Read Reap the Wild Wind for Free Online Page A

honing their Power. Where they sheltered the mindless and the lost.

Aryl tasted their names and finally understood. When Chosen Om’ray died, the loss was always more.

She dimmed her perception and lay flat, curling into a ball, tears soaking the sheet.

She sensed her kind again. She’d regained the world.

And remained alone.

    Chapter 4

     
    “I DON’T REMEMBER.”

“Try again.”

Aryl slumped forward, elbows on her knees, and covered her face with her hands. It felt as if they’d been doing this for tenths. She remained mute, beyond argument. Not that arguing with her mother was likely to work. Taisal di Sarc, Adept and Speaker for Yena, back down first?

The world would end before that happened, Aryl thought bitterly.

“You must.”

She didn’t move.

Aryl.

“No!” She pushed the mindvoice away with all her strength. At the soft, pained breath, she looked up through her fingers. “You can’t make me.”

Taisal laid her long hands on her lap, then adjusted the fall of her robe. Adepts wore the formal garment when journeying to or from the Cloisters, as well as for ceremony. The white fabric was thick with fine embroidery from shoulder to floor, its pleats a sign of rank and power. Not worn to impress her, Aryl knew. Her mother would act as Speaker tonight.

The Tikitik were coming.

“You can’t make me,” she repeated wearily, sitting back. Her own hands were restless, plucking at an imaginary splinter in the wood of the bench. As if any of the well-polished furnishings of the Sarcs would have splinters.

“Then open to me. Let me see what happened.”

“You know what happened. That device exploded. All the webbing ripped or fell apart or—” Her voice shattered. “I should have held on . . . been stronger . . . He shouldn’t have . . .”

A single tear sparkled on her mother’s pale cheek. Taisal turned her face rather than wipe it away. Light touched lines of fire from the chainnet that held her thick black hair; only metal could contain the willful locks of a powerful Chosen. Aryl’s hair, pale brown and fine, obeyed ordinary braided threads. Most of the time. At the thought, she poked an errant strand back in place and waited.

Composed again, Taisal continued her argument, growing stern. “We must learn how Bern saved himself, Aryl. All he remembers is thunder and flame, a moment somewhere dark, confused, then finding himself on the bridge in time to see— to see the others fall past him.” Gentler. Aryl. “You’re the only witness we have. You must try to remember. Anything, everything.”

No, Aryl thought. She would forget it all. Afraid her mother could sense this rebellion, she closed her mental shields even more tightly than ever before. “Why does it matter?” she sighed. “Can’t you be grateful at least one survived?”

“Two,” Taisal corrected, gesturing gratitude with a lift of her hands. She gave her daughter a keen-eyed look. “Enough for now. Council can wait.”

“Council?” Aryl echoed, then was ashamed of the quiver in her voice.

“A new Talent is the concern of Council, Aryl. You know that. Bern’s ability must be understood and dealt with, for the good of us all.”

Power shivered between them, as if a knife had been half drawn to glint in the light. Almost as quickly, the sensation was gone.

Her mother’s lips curved in a tight smile, while Aryl’s eyes widened in dismay. Not at the unspoken threat . . .

Because she wasn’t sure who had made it.

The Adept rose to her feet. “Until tonight. Rest.”

     
    * * *

     
    After her mother left, Aryl scowled at her bed. Rest? She went to the window and pulled aside the curtain. The view through the gauze panel was improbably ordinary. From here, she could see six other homes, like hers wrapped around the main stalk of a rastis or a nekis’ trunk, like hers with white walls open to light and air through ceiling-to-floor panels of thin gauze. The remaining panels were so tightly