LITMIR.BIZ

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she rose from the ledge and balanced on the stick.

      She stared into the crystal and the shadows beyond the smooth outside plane. Her image was wavery, her blond hair a shade of yellow on the milkiness. She made out the curve of breast and hip.

      But besides herself, she once again saw an imaginary vision of otherwhere. This time a section of a great, circular stone wall, and flickers of colorfully robed figures. Once again the strange sounds the doctors had called tinnitus plagued her. Chimes. A gong. The chanting of many voices in words she couldn’t seem to grasp. Gregorian chants, maybe.

      Bong!

      The sound came next to her ear, louder and more vibrant than ever. She pivoted, lost her balance and fell. Ah, shit, she was going to hit her head on the damn crystal.

      But she fell through it, into a blank whiteness so pervasive she couldn’t tell if her eyes were open. She choked on a scream. All the emotions that had calmed as she sat on the ledge jammed into her. Fear. Despair. Most of all, a great longing for someone to love. Someone to love her back. A partner.

      It lasted instants. It lasted an eternity. Then bright colors whirled in her sight—patterns, stained glass! She glimpsed pillars around the curved walls of a circular room, and rafters with huge crystal ends.

      Pain shot up her hip, stealing breath. Calli didn’t believe this. Her throat closed with fear. She must have hit her head on the rock and was dreaming. She rubbed her head, but didn’t feel any bumps. Dazed, she examined her surroundings. A big round stone room with an altar and colored goblets. A gong. A circle of people.

      Calli sucked in air. It didn’t smell anything like a hill in Colorado. It smelled like incense in a church. She gulped and shivering seized her.

      A small woman with white hair and a young face, green eyes and a long scar along her cheek caught Calli’s attention. The lady wore a long velvet robe with silver threaded designs. “Hi, I’m Alexa Fitzwalter. Welcome to Lladrana,” she said.

      This couldn’t be happening! But she wouldn’t take it lying down. When Calli awkwardly sat up, pain lancing low in her torso, the singing stopped.

      Alexa stepped forward into the center of the star, compassion in her eyes. “It’s a rough trip.” She held out her hands.

      Calli stared at her, touched her fingers. They felt solid and warm! Another moment passed and Calli realized that Alexa wouldn’t push. The dream woman was courteous. Alexa would let Calli make her own choices. A hard knot in her chest loosened, she was in charge of the dream. She put her hands in Alexa’s and was drawn to her feet with surprising ease and strength.

      Alexa kept an arm around Calli as if to steady her and Calli was grateful for the physical and emotional support. Her gaze swept the circle of people, pausing at the men and women who were dressed more roughly than those in velvet robes.

      When Alexa looked up at Calli, her expression was haunted. “We need you really, really bad.” Alexa licked her lips. “Do you know anything about horses?”

      Clang! An alarm shrilled. Everyone in the room tensed.

      Alexa cocked her head, her hands fisting. “We have no volarans,” her voice broke. “We can’t fly to battle.”

      Stranger and stranger. Calli shot glances around the room, wanted to run, didn’t think she could hobble fast enough to escape…what?

      “How good are you with horses?” Alexa demanded again, squeezing her arm.

      Calli knew she flushed but shot up her chin. “Excellent. I’m an excellent horse trainer and one of the top barrel racers—”

      People ran to the great door, flung it open, sending in bright summer-morning sunlight. A whir of wings rushed into the room.

      Cheers rose outside. A young man shouted something.

      “They came back,” Alexa whispered. Tears ran down her face. “The volarans have returned.” She looked up at Calli, sniffed. “I knew it was right to continue with the Summoning.”

      Hooves hit the stone courtyard. The next moment people were spreading out in the room, making way for…for a winged horse.

      Calli blinked. Blinked again. The pegasus didn’t vanish. In fact, more swept into the room. Ten. With dozens outside. Chestnuts, roans, piebalds, even a palomino or two. She caught her breath in sheer wonder and thought the top of her head would explode with this huge wave of horse-thoughts and horse-love radiating from them, inundating her.

      A gray clopped up, stretched his wings, forcing people aside.

      Her mind spun. Her mouth dropped open.

      The stallion’s large dark gaze fixed on her. We love you. You are the Volaran Exotique. She heard the words in her head.

      Then chimes clashed and she felt the sound storm through her, plucking at muscle and bone and nerve. She cried out, arching away from Alexa, escaping the woman’s grip. Reached for the winged horse, missed. Calli landed on the floor again on her butt and shrieked with the pain radiating through her pelvis.

      Only agony existed. Everything else around her dimmed—she couldn’t see. Again and again the chimes rippled, but they sounded muffled as she grimly fought through the pain and hung on to the edge of consciousness.

      Then someone struck the gong. Once. Twice.

      She only heard a part of the third beat. Sweet darkness descended.

      2

      “She’s hurt!” Alexa Fitzwalter, once of Denver, now a Swordmarshall of Lladrana, whirled to face the Marshalls and Chevaliers.

      Few were paying attention to her or the new Exotique. They were herding the newly arrived volarans out the door, the gray stallion grumbling, then taking off. People ran with unseemly haste to find their own winged companions.

      The defection of the flying horses ten days ago had devastated the Chevaliers and Marshalls. A black pall of despair had filled the Castle. Calls to battle had been blessedly few—only three—but fighting without the flying horses was nearly impossible. Lladrana would be lost to the invading monsters without volarans. Dread had circled the Castle like a vulture.

      They’d been desperate when they’d worked the ritual, praying the one they Summoned would somehow lure the volarans back.

      A medica strode forward and crouched by the woman on the floor. Alexa turned back to watch the examination. She didn’t even know the woman’s name yet, but Alexa feared for her. She and the Marshalls had Summoned this woman from Colorado, away from Earth to this world, so Alexa was responsible for her until she made her own place on Lladrana. Biting her lip, Alexa shifted from foot to foot, grateful when her husband, Bastien, joined her.

      He cocked his head, as if he listened to the mind-Song of a volaran—or many. His nostrils flared, then he grinned. He grabbed Alexa and spun her around and around, then placed her gently on her feet. Holding hands, they looked down where the medica sat next to the new Exotique, smoothing blond strands of hair away from a pale forehead.

      “The volarans came back,” Bastien said. “For their Exotique.”

      Alexa leaned against him in relief.

      The medica said, “The Lady’s pelvis has recently been broken in three places.”

      Alexa winced.

      Glancing up at them, the medica said, “I suggest we all join together to do a healing spell.”

      Alexa said, “I’ll call Marian, the Exotique Circlet Sorceress. She can help, too.” The community of Sorcerers had had Marian Summoned from Boulder, Colorado, just a few weeks ago.

      “Good idea.” The medica hummed a slow lilting spellsong that settled the woman deeper into a healthful sleep.

      Marrec watched as Lady Hallard closed the door of the healing room behind her, muting the continuous lilting of a healing Song.

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