7: Enemies and Shadows (12 page)

Chapter Seventy-Six

John knew that it was still snowing. If he opened his eyes, he would see huge drifts of snow, crusted with brittle frost. Tiny icicles hung from the stone above him and clung to the fur of the tahldi crouched only a foot away. And yet the ground beneath John felt warm. He pushed himself back and the earth gave. Shocks of pain throbbed through his body. John ignored them. He concentrated on the soil beneath him. The sense of it washed through him, overflowing any awareness of his own injured flesh.

Below the snow lay a black and cinnamon mulch of fallen leaves, river grasses, and reeds. A rich swathe of carbon and nitrogen seeped from the decay. Lace-like threads of fungi spread through the ground, linking the deep roots of distant pines and wrapping like cocoons around the tiny gold grains of dormant seeds.

John drifted further. He felt the leaf lined burrows of weasels where dozens of the animals lay sleeping through the worst of the winter. Deeper in the ground, the clay and peat turned to stony lignite. The carbon remains of what had once been living matter shed cellulose and protein, returning to pure dark mineral. John’s senses slipped over glassy flecks of mica and rolled through the white velvet masses of kaolinite. Strung through the stone and soil, dendritic aggregates of gold and silver sprouted like mosses over granite.

 John found the rich veins of nickel and iron. The minerals wove through each other in intricate crystalline lattices. They spread over John with the architectural perfection of vast dark cathedrals.

Deeper still, the heat of molten lava radiated up with the warmth of a living body. The decay of isotopes throbbed through John like a steady pulse. The heat and strength of the world seemed to flow through him.

 Distantly, he was aware of lakes and rushing rivers. The sharp cliffs of the continent dropped into a deep, vast ocean. Islands rose in chains like immense mountain ranges.

He wanted to explore further, but an odd sensation tugged at him. It turned his attention west, across dark forests and steep hills. Far away in a vast field of snow, shadowed by a tiny stone bridge, he could see his own body.

He was nearly as white as the surrounding snow. His hair looked garish yellow against the pallor of his skin. Only his lips seemed to retain any color and they were a pale blue. His arms spilled out from his body like the limbs of a corpse.

Ravishan knelt over him. His hands pressed desperately at the white flesh of John’s throat, groping for any sign of a pulse. Tears began to pour down Ravishan’s face.

“Please, Jahn, don’t,” Ravishan whispered. “Jahn, please.” His voice broke and he drew his hands back over his face. An anguished howl tore up from him.

I’m not dead, John wanted to say, but he didn’t seem to be able to make his body move.

“Oh god,” Ravishan moaned into his hands. “Parfir, please hear me. Please. Save him. Please. I beg you, Parfir.”

Ravishan wrapped his arms around John’s chest and pulled him into his lap. It disturbed John to see the way his own limbs hung limply in the snow. His head lolled back.

“No,” Ravishan whispered. He lowered his face against John’s chest and wept.

Fear crept through John. He couldn’t be dead, could he? The Rifter couldn’t be so easily killed. The poison Hann’yu had sent had worn off, hadn’t it?

Slowly Ravishan lowered John’s body back down to the ground. Ravishan’s face was red from crying. His breath came in a shudder.

“No,” Ravishan whispered. He clenched his eyes closed and tears slipped down his cheeks. “I won’t live without you. I won’t.”

Ravishan drew his black curse blade. He lifted the blade to his own chest. Very carefully he placed the tip of the blade over his heart. Horror shot through John. Ravishan’s hand clenched around the hilt of the blade.

Suddenly heat and desperation engulfed John’s senses. John reached up and jerked the curse blade back from Ravishan’s chest.

“Don’t!” The word came out as a breathless groan. John’s lungs gasped for air. He coughed and forced himself upright.

Ravishan stared at him for a moment. Then he threw his arms around John and embraced him fiercely. John hugged him in return. Ravishan’s hands dug into John’s back.

 “I thought you had died.” Ravishan sobbed against John’s neck. “I thought I had lost you.”

“No,” John whispered. “I was just…drifting. I heard you and I came back to my senses.”

“You weren’t breathing,” Ravishan said. His arms tensed around John again. “When I came back, you were cold as ice and you weren’t breathing.”

“It’s all right,” John said softly. “It’s all right.” He didn’t know what else he could say. He held Ravishan close and tried not to think of how very much he was lying.

“Don’t die.” Ravishan pressed his face against John’s neck. “I wouldn’t be able to stand it if you died. I wouldn’t.”

“I’m not going to die. And neither are you.” John glanced down to where Ravishan’s black curse blade lay in the snow.

“Listen.” John pulled back slightly, so that Ravishan could see his face. “No matter what you think has happened to me, you can’t kill yourself.”

Ravishan stared at him. His face was still streaked from tears. “I have nothing left but you.”

“Don’t say that. You have your entire life and the whole world.” It terrified John to think of how close he had come to losing Ravishan. “Don’t just give up. No matter what happens. Don’t ever just give up.”

“I couldn’t go on without you,” Ravishan said. He bowed his head and his black hair fell over his face. “I’ll never be the Kahlil, now. I’ll never cross through into Nayeshi. Who knows what they will do to Rousma… You’re the only thing in this world that remains for me.”

 John couldn’t immediately find any words of comfort. Ravishan had lost so much in just this one day. His sacrifices had all been for John’s sake.

“I know things are bad right now,” John said. For a few moments he couldn’t go on. He thought of Bill’s death and Laurie’s imprisonment. He remembered Samsango’s cold dead body. He flinched back from his own knowledge.

He focused on Ravishan.

“Things will get better,” John said firmly. “So long as you’re living there’s always a chance that it will get better. You can’t give up.”

Ravishan lifted his face. John stared at him. He seemed suddenly, heartbreakingly beautiful. His dark eyes and full lips astounded John unreasonably. John leaned into Ravishan and kissed him. His lips were soft and warm. The slight scent of smoke clung to his skin.

When John drew back, Ravishan’s eyes were still closed. Ravishan lifted his chin slightly, inviting John to linger in his kiss. Then he opened his eyes. He smiled at John.

It wasn’t one of his brilliant, wide smiles, but right now John found any sign of happiness relieving.

He offered Ravishan a smile back, though he imagined it wasn’t nearly so handsome. His entire body was bruised and streaked with blood, soot, and veru oil. His stomach growled softly from hunger.

“I brought food. And I found the splints and plaster rags you asked for. But…” Ravishan trailed off, staring at John.

“What is it?” John asked.

“Your hands,” Ravishan murmured.

John glanced down at his hands. Immediately he realized what had shocked Ravishan. Black bruises and red scratches colored the skin of John’s hands but the bones beneath looked straight and strong. The extent of their recovery startled even him.

“Your hands were crushed,” Ravishan said.

John slowly clenched his hand into a fist. The movement was fluid and easy. Only a slight ache throbbed through the bruised flesh.

Ravishan lightly touched John’s knuckles and fingers.

Cautiously, John attempted to move his legs. The muscles ached and shuddered. But he could flex his toes and shift his feet. The bones had healed.

“There was no one to bear the wounds,” Ravishan said softly. “This is amazing.”

“I know.” John had felt the warmth and strength of the living world flow through him. It had healed his broken body when he had drifted in that deepest sleep.

“Parfir must love you, Jahn,” Ravishan said quietly.

John smiled at that thought.

“I’m serious,” Ravishan said. “This is a miracle.”

“It is surprising.”

“It’s more than that.” With great tenderness, Ravishan inspected John’s hands further. His expression turned solemn and deeply thoughtful. “Parfir wants you to live.”

John felt a little uneasy at how close Ravishan was to the truth. He should just tell Ravishan, he realized. There didn’t seem to be any point in keeping it a secret any longer, except that they had been through so much already. Still, Ravishan deserved to know.

John hesitated, trying to think of the best way to broach the subject. Ravishan went on with his own thoughts.

“When I came back and found you lying so still and cold,” Ravishan said, “I thought that Parfir had taken you from me as a punishment for what we did together in Nurjima. I wanted to die for what I had done to you.”

“That had nothing to do with it—” John began to say.

“I know,” Ravishan went on. “Parfir wouldn’t have healed you if he had been angry. He wouldn’t have allowed me to reach you before they burned you on the Holy Road. I realize that now.” As he spoke, Ravishan’s voice filled with assurance. He straightened. A new confidence almost radiated from him. “We have his blessing. He is with us.”

“Because he healed me?” John asked.

Ravishan nodded.

“When we first met, I felt that Parfir had sent you to me, to comfort me.” Ravishan looked slightly embarrassed. “I know it sounds vain and arrogant, but I truly felt that. From the first time I saw you I felt that you were meant to be with me.”

“The very first time?” John asked. “When I was dressed in weasel skins and hadn’t had a bath for months?”

Ravishan flushed. “That day, Parfir sent me a sign.”

“Oh?” John asked.

“I’ll show you. I’ve kept it hidden here. I didn’t want Dayyid to find it.” Ravishan stood and climbed easily up the bank of the stream and onto the bridge. John heard a stone scraping against the others. A moment later Ravishan dropped back down to the frozen stream. He crouched down beside John with something clutched in his right hand.

“Just before I saw you, Parfir led me to this.” Ravishan opened his hand. John stared at the golden key that lay across Ravishan’s palm. It was the same key that John had used to open the Great Gate and then had lost. All this time it had been in Ravishan’s possession. John thought that if there were a greater god, if Parfir was out there somewhere, he was laughing at John.

Ravishan gazed down at the key reverently.

“This is the holy key, the ush’hala,” Ravishan said. “It is one of the three symbols of the Kahlil.”

“I read about it. It’s made from one of the Rifter’s bones like the yasi’halaun.”

“Like the yasi’halaun, but different. It unlocks a god’s death.” Ravishan closed his hand around the key. “When I found it I had been on the verge of running away from Rathal’pesha. And then I found the holy key just lying in a field of snow. I realized that it had to be a sign from Parfir. He chose me to be his Kahlil. He entrusted me with the life of his holy incarnation. Even though Dayyid hated me, Parfir chose me. And then Parfir sent you to me.”

John simply nodded. He remembered the day they had first met. The trees had been bare and the land blanketed in snow, just as it was today. He had been looking for the key and Ravishan had appeared out of the thin air. Ravishan had been a lanky youth with short roughly shorn hair. John remembered how beaten he had looked, how tired and frustrated.

Bill had been alive then. John closed his eyes for a few moments.

“Everything seemed clear, until today,” Ravishan said. “I was going to become Kahlil and you were going to be with me in Nayeshi. And then…”

“Everything went to hell,” John said.

“Yes,” Ravishan agreed, but his tone held none of the desolation that sank through John’s own words.

“Everything changed,” Ravishan said, “and for a little while I thought that Parfir had abandoned us. But he hasn’t, John. He is still with us. I don’t know what his plan is, but I think that he must have meant this to happen. We have to trust that he has a purpose for us.”

For a brief, bitter instant John wanted to tell Ravishan that Parfir had nothing to do with it. He wanted to scream in frustration and shake the earth.

He didn’t.

Parfir’s blessing meant so much to Ravishan, John realized. It shouldn’t have surprised him. Ravishan had lived most of his life in a monastery. He had been groomed from childhood to serve his god. Being Parfir’s chosen one had been Ravishan’s only source of pride.

John couldn’t take that from him. Not now when Ravishan had lost so much already. Ravishan needed to believe that John’s recovery was Parfir’s blessing and part of a divine plan, not just a result of John’s Rifter nature.

John took in a deep breath, feeling the chill and agitation in the air. The snowfall intensified.

Stop
, John thought.

But the snow continued to pour from the sky. High up in the rolling white clouds, John thought he caught a flash of lightning. Lightning and snow. That certainly wasn’t natural. John knew he was causing this. He had no idea how to stop it.

“Jahn.” Ravishan touched his shoulder.

John returned his attention to Ravishan.

“Here.” Ravishan swung his pack down from his back and pulled a wool blanket out. “The weather looks like it’s going to get worse.”

John took the blanket.

Ravishan unpacked a loaf of taye bread as well as a block of reed-wrapped goat cheese.

“We should eat,” Ravishan said. He sat next to John and shared the blanket. John tore off a hunk of bread and cut a slab of the pungent cheese. Ravishan helped himself as well.

It was good to eat something. The normalcy of it soothed John. He thought of the cheese sandwiches his mother had packed for his lunches. They had been made from vivid orange cheese, mustard, and white bread. This cheese was softer and made John think of the taste of walnuts. The bread was colored red from weasel eggs. It was good, John thought.