The answer to that came later. In the meanwhile, they had a question of their own, to wit: how in God’s name had I survived?
I finally broke from my daze enough to look around. The sisters had not followed me in my uphill charge; that was hardly surprising. But what on earth could I possibly say to explain my presence here, if I could not point to a Draconean as the answer?
They must have conducted a rapid argument amongst themselves, while I was lost to the world in my own reunion. When I looked up, Ruzt was concealed among the rocks not far away, watching me with a steady eye. I met her gaze, and something passed between us. We were not sisters, to read one another’s minds through long familiarity; but we had built a rapport over the winter months, in which we learned to communicate by means both verbal and otherwise, and I knew what she was saying now.
With my heart beating so strongly I could taste my pulse upon my tongue, I nodded my agreement.
She stepped out from behind the rocks, standing tall in the sun. “There,” I said, my voice pleasingly steady. “There is the Draconean who saved my life.”
*
The side of a mountain above the snow line is not the best place to conduct an extended conversation. At some point during what followed, we agreed to retire to a more comfortable spot—still on the western side of the col.
Suhail and Thu had known for months that such organisms existed: humanoid bodies with draconic heads. And Suhail, of course, had both his archaeological knowledge and his familiarity with my draconic expertise to draw on in forming conclusions based on that fact; moreover, he had the entirety of a long Mrtyahaiman winter in which to contemplate the possibilities. But as I myself had discovered, it is one thing to find a frozen specimen, and quite another to meet the living cousin face to face. (Or rather three of them, as Kahhe and Zam had, with palpable reluctance, joined Ruzt in view.)
I could scarcely tear my gaze away from my husband. Winter had left its marks upon him, as it had upon me. For many years his family had pressured him to become a prayer-leader; the colloquial phrase for this is “to grow one’s beard,” as Amaneen prayer-leaders do not shave their faces. I assumed Suhail was no more inclined to the religious life now than he had been, but he had at least grown his beard: a useful addition to the face in a Mrtyahaiman winter, though one I hoped he did not intend to keep. This, I eventually realized, was a source of some hilarity to Zam, who had found my own hair astonishing enough; she had not realized that the males of my species could grow it upon their chins as well.
But there was little hilarity in those initial moments, as we were all too busy reeling from our various shocks. Suhail’s own gaze kept alternating between me and the Draconeans, pulled this way and that by his dumbfounded relief on the one hand, and his astonished curiosity on the other. When I explained the situation to my caretakers, his expression took on the abstracted cast I knew so well; it was the look he bore when the greater part of his mind was devoted to efforts linguistic. “You were right,” I said to him, breaking off my explanation. “Their language is related to Lashon and Akhian. No doubt you’ll be more fluent than I am in a week.”
The complex tangle of languages caused no little difficulty. My Draconean companions were accustomed to hearing me mutter to myself in Akhian, but Scirling was wholly unfamiliar to them, and it made them nervous: to them it had the sound of a code, used so they could not hope to guess at what I was saying. But it was the only language Thu and I had in common; and he and Suhail still resorted to Yelangese on occasion, which they had used a great deal during their own winter sojourn. Together with Draconean, there were four languages tumbling around in our conversation, and matters often ground to halt while a concept was carried through the necessary chain of translations.
My first task was to explain to the sisters who these two men were. This went with relative ease, for they recalled my story of how I came to be in the Sanctuary—and I think that Ruzt and Kahhe at least were very glad to see my fears laid to rest, though Zam may not have cared overmuch. After that, however, I was peppered with questions from both sides: Why had Suhail and Thu come back? How many Draconeans were there? Were other humans coming over the col? Where had I lived all winter? Could the men be trusted not to speak of what they had found? Could they be permitted to see a Draconean city?
“Enough!” I exclaimed at last. I honestly cannot recall which language the word emerged in, but the meaning was clear to everyone. I pressed my hands to my aching head and tried to marshal my thoughts into order. Then I turned to the Draconeans and said, “You are safe for now; there are only two of them, though we should discuss what will happen next. But will you let me explain matters to them first? I think they are much more confused than you.”
Permission thus obtained, I began to direct the traffic of the conversation in a fashion that even I will admit was imperious and high-handed. It was the only way to retain my sanity, for individuals on both sides kept breaking in with new questions. By the time I had satisfied everyone’s initial curiosity to an acceptable degree, it was almost midday, and my throat was so dry I felt I could have swallowed all the snow on Gyaptse.
Silence fell after I stopped talking. Suhail finally released my hand—he had not parted contact with me since we were reunited, save when the practicalities of moving to a more sheltered spot required it—and climbed to his feet. Kahhe was the nearest of the sisters; he approached her with his hands extended. “May I?” he said, doing her the courtesy of addressing her even though she could not understand the words.
I translated his query, expanding upon his meaning, and Kahhe nodded. Suhail walked a circuit around her, studying her with open fascination. As he came again to his starting point, he began a process familiar to me from my earliest days in their house: pointing to objects and suggesting words for them, based on his attempts to reconstruct the Draconean language. When I tried to answer him, he waved me off with a fond smile. “You have talked yourself hoarse already,” he said. “And I cannot pass up the chance to learn from them.”
He would learn from them regardless—assuming that we could form a plan for what should happen next. No one had yet broached that subject. I accepted a skin of water from Ruzt and went to sit next to Thu, who had been watching with quiet intensity for most of this time, turning a pebble over and over in his fingers.
“Thank you for coming to look for me,” I said. “Even though you thought I was dead.”