Adversaries Together (27 page)

“
Why did you come?” Fery
asked more to herself than to anyone, but Kira took it
up.

“
Yes, why did you come for
me?”

Roth stared across the table but not at
anyone, he played with a piece of bazlama tearing pieces of it off
absentmindedly.

“
That question would seem
to dovetail with my own concerns.” Wynne assented.

Roth nodded, “Yeah, I suppose I can’t just
say out of the goodness of my heart.”

“
I think we all feel that a
more nuanced explanation is necessary.” Wynne said lightheartedly
and Roth chuckled.

“
Alright, here’s what I
know.” Roth looked at them all, his tone assertive, “I convinced a
dear friend to take what I thought was you and your paladin to
Bandra.” He pointed at Kira, “I saw you being shuffled on to the
wrong ship and when I went to go investigate…”

“
They bashed his head in
and threw him in the brig with me.” Kira finished his though
turning to Wynne and Fery.

“
Exactly.”

“
So…revenge?” Fery
asked.

Roth shook his head, “That captain…I do owe
him a good deal of hurt but no.” He gestured for Fery to pass him a
dish of kofta, “I need to make sure my friend is alive. I owe her.
But before I can do that…”

“
You needed to rescue
Kira,” Fery said plainly handing him the plate, “for what?
Leverage? Insurance?” She seemed to Kira to be especially
suspicious of him. Roth sniffed the plate of kofta, raised an
eyebrow, cut one open to examine it further, then made a face and
set the plate aside without taking any.

He looked at Fery, “Because I know Kira needs
to know what happened to Goshen.” Roth popped a bit of bread into
his mouth and continued as he chewed, “She and I, there are people
we care about being endangered through no fault of their own.”

“
Do you think Goshen is
still alive?” Kira asked.

“
Jena wouldn’t have let him
be killed,” Roth nodded at Kira, “I think they both are, but I
can’t say for certain. I am certain they need help and I’m
responsible.”

“
Bandra is on the other
side of the sea.” Fery whispered.

“
It’s not so far.” Wynne
assured her.

Roth snickered, “Cute how you make it sound
like you’re going to let us go.”

Kira made a face, “What do you mean?” and
turned to a frowning Wynne, “What does he mean?”

“
You know what I mean.”
Roth pointed a finger at Wynne.

“
I think Roth is suggesting
it’s time we explained why we had you brought to us.”

“
Suggesting,” Roth laughed,
“Suggesting.” He shook his head and poked at the food on his plate,
“It took me weeks to get here and in that time you haven’t bothered
to explain yourself? What have you been doing? Cozying up to her?”
He turned to Kira, “Have they been weaseling their way into your
confidence? Trying to convince you all this was a big mistake, they
never intended to harm you?”

“
They’ve been nothing but
kind…”

“
Because they hired
smugglers to be the bad guys. Have they hid behind that?” Roth
raged, he flipped the plate in front of him over and Fery jumped,
“No one hires mercenaries thinking they’re not going to do harm.”
Roth stood, pointed at Wynne, and in a bitter growl said, “You knew
the kind of tactics they’d use, you knew but you didn’t care. You
just wanted this woman hijacked. Brought to you to have under your
thumb.” Roth threw his fork down onto the plate with a piercing
clang, “I’m done explaining myself. It’s your turn now.”

He turned away from the table and closed his
eyes. Just then, a couple of guardsmen came into the room and were
about to restrain Roth when Wynne stood, “There is no problem here,
you needn’t stay.” The guards looked at Wynne, hesitated, “We are
safe. Please step outside.” Wynne’s voice was calm but assertive
and the guards departed.

Wynne came around the table to where Roth was
standing; he didn’t touch him but reached out his hand gesturing
for him to sit. Roth’s eyes narrowed, but he slowly sat back down.
Wynne turned to Kira, “We brought you here.”

Fery broke in, “The Alders did. We didn’t
know.” She pointed to herself and Wynne. “We weren’t here…”

Wynne raised his hand toward Fery, nodding.
He Sat next to Kira and let out a long sigh, “We Alders hired the
smugglers to bring you—just you—to us. But we didn’t want you
harmed yet we willfully ignored the fact that they would probably
have to harm any guardians accompanying you.”

Kira knew this; she hadn’t heard it aloud
before, and she hadn’t let herself dwell on the fact. She wasn’t
shocked; she was just tired, so tired of all this and she just
wanted to be home. She could feel her face reddening and eyes
welling up with tears. She felt her nose begin to run and she began
to heave a bit, at once covering her face with her hands. Anger,
fear, and guilt were coursing through her veins, but in her mind,
she just felt ashamed, an overwhelming sense of shame. She felt
someone touch her shoulders and recognized it as Fery. There was a
moment of relief, but it didn’t last.

Roth was silent, clearly stewing. It seemed
as though he was about to lash out. When Wynne looked to him, he
found a pair of eyes burning into him. He didn’t flinch but met
Roth’s gaze with his own fixed, calm demeanor. Fery had given Kira
a cloth and it appeared as though Kira was herself again.

Wynne turned away from Roth to Kira slowly,
unblinking and continued “We need you, Kira, so we can save our
city and prevent The Cathedral from taking our lands for their own.
You’re more important than you know.” He reached out and took ahold
of her hand, “You been used since you arrived in Sulecin. Some here
mean to use you.” Wynne tilted his head toward Roth, “Some here
only want to protect you. Fery and I are asking you to help us—just
her and I. If you decide not to, then we’ll see you home.”

Kira’s face was puffy and her eyes raw. She
took everyone in, then nodded, “Tell me more.”

Essia,
18
^th
of Mabon

They moved at a leisurely pace, Roth at the
front, then Fery, Kira, and Wynne bringing up the rear. The road
was hardly more than a cow path that cut a thin line along the
hills, but it gave an excellent view of the city. Wynne was sure
they could travel this route without threat from the city mobs or
the rovers scouring through the dying fields. For Kira, it was just
one more new vista. The hills outside of Rikonen were low,
occasionally some deeply wooded coulees would appear, and soon
flattened out to pure farmland. But what had once been wide,
fruitful fields of rapeseed and soja with some smatterings of
goosefoot here and there were now a sick ochre color with
finger-like drifts of grey dirt choking them out. When the siege
had begun, it was these fields that were expected to sustain the
city until an agreement could be reached. It looked as though they
could have, but they were quite dead now. There may have been
pastureland but the cattle, sheep, and goats were gone—slaughtered
to feed the city or driven out of Rikonenese reach to Heveonen.

Kira was losing herself in the fields,
mulling over what Fery had told her of the city’s devolution, of
surviving in burnt out and abandoned buildings, and scurrying
through the alleys to escape gangs and cannibal rovers until the
civics found her. It was only because of her, of Fery’s insistence
that her father be found either dead or alive, that Wynne had been
found and brought into the refuge. Wynne reminded Kira a little of
Goshen, his conviction and steadiness, but he was still a mystery.
It was clear that Wynne had his own agenda, but it was equally
clear that he was entirely devoted to the city’s redemption. The
other Alders had wanted to expel Roth, turn him over to The
Blockade to curry some kind of favor, and probably also to mend
fences with that revolting pirate. Wynne had stood ardently against
the notion and had called out many of the Alders for allowing
themselves to be broken by the siege. Listening to Wynne chastise
his fellow citizens was bizarre. He never accused any of them, but
had a queer way of stating facts that seemed to provoke shame and
guilt. Yet he never exempted himself, he acted and spoke as though
he himself had committed all the mistakes. The Alders tried to
defend themselves, they argued but not a one seemed to show anger
at him; they all seemed to absorb deliberately the castigation.
Kira had been used to seeing her guardian preach and exhort, and
though those he spoke to were deferent, they weren’t like this. The
esteem that Wynne held with these Alders was something she had
never seen.

This made Roth such a contrast alongside
Wynne. Neither were ready to trust the other just yet, but it was
also clear that the two wanted to be friends. Roth had pressed
Wynne at every turn in his explanation of why Kira and Goshen had
been abducted. He had weaseled out of Wynne details of his time
lost in the city and how the civics and Alders had plotted in his
absence. Roth seemed mollified, coming to see Wynne as a kind of
clean up man, pressed into service to fix the mistakes of lesser
leaders. Coupled with the history Kira had told him about Fery, how
the two were so entirely dedicated to each other, Wynne had won
Roth’s respect.

Seeing Roth alive had given Kira hope, hope
that Goshen was still alive and that they all could find some way
out of this senseless drama. Nothing was making sense in Kira’s
mind, there were too many times when she was simply dumbfounded.
Why had this happened now? How had she been drawn into this
quagmire? What could she do? In the ship’s hold, all Kira had
wanted was to go home—see her stepfather the Vicegerent again, see
him preach in the family chapel, and to feel the sure warmth and
confidence of the congregations. She was losing that desire the
more time she spent with Fery, not because of anything Fery did.
Kira saw what it was like to be without ritual, her prayers were
feeling more and more like burdens. Empty of effect like rote
gestures. Yet she wasn’t wavering in her faith. She felt the Light
in her still, but it was different now, it burned in a different
shade.

Kira had always known she was Silvincian,
known that her birth parents were from Ardavass, but never who
exactly they had been. She had come to Sulecin and the arms of The
Cathedral as a girl of three years when then Canon Sinclar Somerled
had taken in not only her but also a large number of Silvincian
refugee children from Carlisle’s campaign. Sinclar had made Kira a
part of his family, had made sure she was taught by the most
rigorous alms, and she had thrived. So much so that Kira had not
only gone into the sisterhood but excelled there. The faith was her
whole world. After hearing what Wynne had to say, what he had
discovered in his library and through his covert contacts within
the Seven Spires about her birth parent’s legacy thrusting her into
these machinations, her head spun. When she looked out over the
Rikonense lands, up towards the Siracenes her mind calmed but never
ceased whirling.

A better part of the day trotting over the
foothills and galloping through the flat fields before the
highlands began to rise up before them was spent in silence. None
of the four spoke much to each other; Roth had said nothing the
whole time.

Finally, as dusk approached Roth pulled his
horse up short and waited for the others to come up to him, “Reg
should just be over the next ridge,” he pointed.

“
You made camp in one of
the dead villages?” Wynne asked.

“
Seemed appropriate.”
Roth’s tone was humoring.

“
We just assumed that those
were…I don’t know, too hazardous.”

“
Well, they definitely seem
a windstorm away from collapse, but some of them are a lot heartier
than they look.”

“
I thought there were still
hill folk that lived there.” Fery asked.

“‘
Hill folk,’” Roth said
derisively, “live elsewhere, the dead villages are
too…conspicuous…”

“
Conspicuous?” Kira
asked.

Roth looked at Kira, “The Cathedral has been
hunting highlanders for generations.”

“
That doesn’t make sense.”
Kira winced.

“
When they say ‘hill
folk,’” Roth said curtly nodding at Fery and Wynne, “they mean
Athingani.”

Kira blushed; Fery looked between then both,
“You’re?”

“
Athingani.” Roth said
assertively, “A bit, I just was raised among them.”

“
Since when do they take in
strangers?” Wynne asked.

“
They don’t,” Roth replied
through his teeth.

“
I didn’t realize that…that
the Light did such things.” Kira’s voice broke.

“
They do. They make it a
point to.”

Wynne looked at Kira, “Your
great-grandfather, Arsene Parmentier, was the Patriarch then and
was bullied to issue the first edict against the Athingani.”

“
What was that? 60 years
ago? How can that still be going on?” Fery asked.

“
Arius pushed Parmentier
out after he schemed to have the edicts issued. Many say the
current Patriarch wrote them all and imprisoned Parmentier until he
signed them all.” Wynne added.

“
Edicts by the Cathedral
are never rescinded,” Roth was full of contempt, “The Zealots file
them away and follow them at their whim.”

“
That’s not fair. That’s
not how it works.” Kira was red-faced, a mixture of shame and
anger.