The Song of Homana by Jennifer Roberson Read Free Book Online Page B

is built out of fact, not fancy. Tell me how it was a king could destroy the race that had served him and his House so well.”
    “Finn would do better to tell it.” If he would.
    Finn, sitting on his pelts with Storr against one thigh, shrugged. The earring glinted in the firelight. In the shadows he seemed more alien than ever, part of the nighttime itself. “What is there to say? Shaine declared
qu’mahlin
on us for no good reason…and we died.” He paused. “Most of us.”
    “
You
live,” Lachlan commented.
    Finn’s smile was not precisely a smile, more a movement of his lips, as if he would bare his teeth. “The gods saw another way for me. My
tahlmorra
was to serve the prophecy in later years, not die as a helpless child.” His hand went out to bury itself in Storr’s thick hair.
    Lachlan hesitated, cradling his harp case. “May I have the beginning?” he asked at last, with careful intonation.
    Finn laughed. There was no humor in it. “What is the beginning, harper? I cannot say, and yet I was a part ofit.” He looked at me a moment, fixedly, as if the memories had swallowed him.
    I
swallowed, remembering too. “The fault lay in a man’s overweening pride.” I did not know how else to begin. “My uncle, Shaine the Mujhar—who wanted a son and had none—tried to wed his daughter to Ellic of Solinde, Bellam’s son, in hopes of ending the war. But that daughter sought another man: Cheysuli, Shaine’s own liege man, turning her back on the alliance and the betrothal. She fled her father, fled Homana-Mujhar, and with her went the warrior.”
    “My
jehan
,” Finn said before I could continue. “Father, you would say. Hale. He took Lindir from her
tahlmorra
and fashioned another for them both. For us all; it has resulted in disaster.” He stared into the fire. “It took a king in the throat of his pride, strangling him, until he could not bear it. And when his
cheysula
died of a wasting disease, and his second bore no living children, he determined the Cheysuli had cursed his House.” His head moved slightly, as if to indicate regret. “And he declared
qu’mahlin
on us all.”
    Lachlan frowned intently. “A woman, then. The catalyst of it all.”
    “Lindir,” I agreed. “My cousin. Enough like Shaine, in woman’s form, to be a proper son. Except she was a daughter, and used her pride to win her escape.”
    “What did she say to the result?”
    I shook my head. “No one knows. She came back to her father eight years later when she was heavy with Hale’s child, because he was dead and she had no other place to go. Shaine took her back because he needed a male heir; when the child was born a girl he banished her to the woods so the beasts could have their shapechanger halfling. But Alix lived because Shaine’s arms-master—and the Queen of Homana herself—begged the Mujhar to give her to man instead of beast.” I shifted on my pelts. “Lindir died bearing Alix. What she thought of the
qu’mahlin
I could not say, but it slew her warrior and nearly destroyed his race.”
    Lachlan considered it all. And then he looked at Finn.“How is it, then, you serve Carillon? Shaine the Mujhar was his uncle.”
    Finn put out his hand and made the familiar gesture. “Because of this.
Tahlmorra
. I have no choice.” He smiled a little. “You may call it fate, or destiny, or whatever Ellasian word you have for such things…we believe each child is born with a
tahlmorra
that must be heeded when the gods make it known. The prophecy of the Firstborn says one day a man of all blood shall unite, in peace, four warring realms and two magic races. Carillon is a part of that prophecy.” He shook his head, solemn in the firelight. “Had I a choice, I would put off such binding service, but I am Cheysuli, and such things are not done.”
    “Enemies become friends.” Lachlan nodded slowly, staring fixedly into the fire as if he already heard the music. “It would make a fine lay. A story to break