The Emperor's Wolves (Wolves of Elantra #1) - Michelle Sagara Page 0,95

to choose?”

“What to think about? No, not really. Sometimes we get visitors. I mean, not like you guys—you’re fun. Mostly the visitors aren’t. They’re kind of mean, or they’re frightened, and they want answers Right Now. Answers that make sense to them, I mean.”

“Do they make sense to you?” It was Jerrin, whose stomach had finally shut up, who asked.

“Not really? I mean, I knew I shouldn’t eat any solid food for two days, but I didn’t know why—not until I heard the door.” Her grin was infectious. “Sometimes some of us forget to eat. If we’re having oracles, all we see, or hear, are the oracles themselves, not the people. We don’t notice food, and we often don’t eat it unless someone spoons it into our mouth.”

“So...he thought you were...busy?”

She shrugged. “Who knows? I don’t. I mean, it would be great if I were like you guys—then we’d all understand each other.” She hesitated. “That is the way it works, right?”

They all agreed that it was.

Random wasn’t afraid of them. She wasn’t afraid of her own secrets, if she had any she felt needed guarding. She wasn’t afraid of the demands they would, or could, make. She also wasn’t really afraid of breaking the rules; Severn wondered if there were any, beyond the rule that kept her safely in the house.

“Why aren’t you allowed to leave?” Jerrin asked.

“People have really weird ideas about how Oracles work,” Random replied. She no longer had to grab Jerrin by the hand, but had done so anyway. “They think that they can just ask us questions about the future, and we’ll answer clearly in a way they can understand.

“They think that if they know the future, they can do things that people who don’t can’t. Or plan things. Or kill people.” She shrugged at the last one. “I don’t understand why we can’t explain it to everyone—but Master Sabrai thinks no one would believe us anyway.” Her expression grew shadowed. “Sometimes people really don’t like it when they hear the future. They don’t like the future, and instead of figuring out how to avoid it, they blame us—they say we’re cursing them.”

The Tha’alani didn’t need to look at each other to share what would, in humans, require a glance.

“So it’s not really safe, because people are like that. And we don’t know which people will be like that. It’s exhausting to always be afraid of people.” She turned toward them. “But I guess you kind of know what it’s like.”

“What do you mean?” Tessa asked.

“Well, you can read minds, right? You can know what we’re thinking. You can know everything about us. We can’t have secrets. We can’t lie.”

“We can’t just do that without touching you, though.”

Random nodded.

“And you don’t care?”

“Well, ummm, not really, no. Should I?”

Oracles, Severn realized, were strange. Random seemed to be open and truthful; he couldn’t confirm that the way he could with the three Tha’alani children, because he wasn’t privy to her thoughts. Without Ybelline, he wouldn’t have had access to the Tha’alani children, either. But he thought Random meant what she said, and regardless, he was carried along with the Tha’alani children until they had climbed a wide flight of stairs and had entered a hall that was full of light.

The light itself didn’t appear to emanate from windows—there was simply too much of it—but shone on paintings that adorned the side of the hall that had no doors to break it. At the end of that hall was a painting that was taller than any of the children present, and wider as well. It was above the ground by a good three feet, but that didn’t matter.

Severn stood staring at a painting that was almost preternaturally alive. The Dragon’s eyes were red; the scales that covered every inch the painting had captured were a dark shade of blue, with hints of purple sheen.

“The Emperor,” Random grinned. “Isn’t he amazing?”

That wasn’t the word any of the Tha’alani used. In fact, they were surprised enough they didn’t resort to words at all; their communication was a tide of different emotions, which had no need of words.

“Do you have one where you can see his wings?”

“Not him, but I think there’s another Dragon. It’s not in the hall, though.”

“Why?”

“The paint’s not dry yet?” She shrugged. “I’m not sure. It’s not like this one, though.”

“Well, not if you can see wings. Mostly you see eyes and teeth in this one.”

“Yeah. It’s not even life-size, you know?” Random’s shrug deepened. “But