The Tenth Power by Kate Constable Read Free Book Online Page A

true – not Marna rambling? But what if she dies before she can tell me the secrets? All the knowledge will be lost!’
    Lia shrugged. ‘If everything had gone as it should, the hidden lore would have passed to your mother, and then to you.’ Her expression softened. ‘Calida was not the most gifted chanter among us, but she had a light about her – when we were young, we would have followed her anywhere. Maybe even across theWall, if she’d asked it. She was born to be a leader.’
    ‘So were you!’ said Calwyn impulsively. ‘The novices, all of us looked up to you!’
    Lia made an impatient gesture. ‘What’s done is done. When Calida died, Tamen became the Guardian of theWall. Marna made a mistake there; she knows it.That’s why she has waited for you. You must learn it all, before it’s too late.’
    Close by a hinge creaked. Calwyn shot upright.The light of an approaching lantern showed under the door. Calwyn bolted to the window, pushed it open, and swung herself up and over the sill.When she’d dropped to the snow outside, she reached back cautiously and pushed the window closed. She caught a glimpse of yellow light, and Tamen’s forbidding figure looming over Lia’s bed; she could just hear their conversation.
    ‘Still awake, Lia?’
    ‘You know I find it hard to sleep, Lady Mother.’ Lia’s voice was taut with suppressed dislike.
    ‘You should ask Ursca for a sleeping draught.’
    ‘Yes, Lady Mother. I will do so tomorrow.’
    The circle of light swung around the room as Tamen peered into every cranny. Calwyn ducked beneath the sill, heart pounding. Lia asked, ‘Have you found the girl?’
    ‘Not yet.’ Tamen moved closer to the bed and laid her hand on Lia’s. ‘Why, your hands are so cold, sister. Are your feet cold, too?’
    ‘Lady Mother, you know I cannot feel my feet.’
    ‘Yes, Lia. I know. Just think, if you were to catch the snow-sickness, you wouldn’t know until it was too late.’ Tamen’s voice was very soft, but her words were as menacing as if she held poison to Lia’s lips.
    Calwyn didn’t wait to hear any more. Keeping to the darkest corners, she darted around the House of Elders, behind the bath-house and away. Snowflakes drifted down, filling in the marks that her feet left behind.
    WHEN SHE RETURNED to the loft, she found Gilly, Trout and Mica all seated on hay bales, talking. Famished, Calwyn fell on the food that Gilly had brought. The peppery herbs in the spiced mash helped to disguise the dull, dusty flavour of vegetables that had been stored too long. She wondered why Trout and Mica had stopped eating, and why Trout’s face was so grey. Then she began to listen to Gilly, and her own appetite faded away.
    ‘ – and Rina was another,’ Gilly was saying. ‘She wasn’t even ill. But she’d said things against Tamen. So Tamen poured bitterthorn down her throat and put her into theWall.’
    Calwyn put down her bowl, remembering the catch in Lia’s voice when she mentioned Rina’s name.
    Gilly looked directly at Calwyn. ‘They’ve been waiting for you, you know. Praying to the Goddess, to send you back in time.’
    ‘I don’t – I don’t know what I can do,’ faltered Calwyn.
    She couldn’t help feeling that it was all so unfair. She had travelled back to Antaris, hurt and tired and hoping to be cared for, but instead everyone expected her to take on these enormous problems, problems that she was totally unequipped to solve.
    ‘Don’t fret,’ said Mica, with a squeeze of Gilly’s arm. ‘We’ll help you somehow, won’t we, Cal? P’raps Trout can build a machine, and we’ll bundle that Tamen up like a bale of hay!’
    Gilly giggled. ‘I would like to see that! And the goats, nibbling on her hair.’
    After Gilly had gone, Mica said decidedly, ‘Well, she’s all right, anyhow.’
    Trout smiled. ‘It’s your charm, Mica. You are irresistible, you know.’
    Mica snorted, and threw a twist of straw at his head. ‘Any of that mash left? Reckon