Angus Wells - The God Wars 03 (37 page)

           
That, for all his reaction ashamed
him, was too much: he snatched his hand away, as if from a flame.

           
Cennaire wiped blood from her lips,
her expression apologetic. "It's clean," she said hesitantly, and
smiled sadly, "and I'll not contaminate you."

           
"I did not think ..." His
voice faltered, he shook his head, helpless. "Forgive me."

           
"How should I forgive
you?" she murmured. "Should it not be I who ask that?"

           
"I do not know." He sighed
and shook his head again, meeting her gaze. Dera, but those were eyes to drown
in! "I am not sure what I know any longer."

           
Only
that I love you.

           
He took refuge in formality,
retreating behind the punctilios learned in his father's court. Carefully,
rigidly, he said, "Lady, I take you at your word. I owe you my life, and
you've my thanks for that, but until we reach Pamur-teng and consult the gijan
there ... I trust you understand."

           
Cennaire's gaze fell away as she
answered, "Aye. It were foolish of me to expect else."

           
Save
how can you not know? Burash, but I have never felt like this before. Can you
not feel thatt

           
She rose, pausing as she heard his
voice, soft: "Cennaire? I pray it be as you say."

           
She found his eyes on her face,
hopeful, frightened, and answered solemnly: "As do I, Calandryll."

           
He nodded, and for all his
expression was forlorn, she felt hope rise, like a kindled fire.

           
THE
morning was advanced as they rode out, the sun topping the surrounding forest
to shine bright from a sky all cloud-streamered blue, the breeze
that gusted from the north hinting at the
year's aging. It skirled the smoke rising from the funeral pyres, drawing out
the black in long pennants of mourning that drifted away over the trees like
waning hope.

           
Calandryll rode deep in thought, and
it seemed the omnipresent sense of dread he had felt before grew stronger, as
if the drumming of the hooves became a threnody, the freshened breeze assumed a
charnel taint, whispering of loss, of defeat and futility. He looked up, and it
seemed the sky was livid with threat of storm, the clouds lamenting, the blue
fouled with blood. The trees beside the road stood ominous, looming dark; bird
song died, lost under the rattle of the breeze,- the air became filled with the
stench of dung and death. He groaned, his soul weighed down, and into his
bedeviled mind came, subtle as a serpent, the thought that Tharn must surely
win resurrection, that Rhythamun must doubtless ride too far ahead to halt, and
cross into the Mad God's limbo, to use the Arcanum to raise his master.

           
He felt himself sinking into
despair, megrims tugging at him, loosening soul from the confines of his body.

           
Does
love do this! he wondered. Does what I feel for Cennaire bring me so lowi

           
Almost, as the wind rustled an
affirmative, he answered himself
yes
and gave up, let go to the awful despondency,- almost, he felt his pneuma drawn
out again, trawled by the despondent breeze. But somewhere deep a flame yet
burned, hopeful, and he shook his head and told himself
no, not until she be proven false. Until then she's the right to my
trust.
He remembered the cantrips of protection Ochen had taught him then,
and mouthed them, and felt the shield of honest magic rise around him, denying
the horrid suction of despair. He recognized then, as the sky became again blue
and clear and the breeze clean, that he was assaulted on the occult plane, that
Rhythamun, or Tharn, once more sought to suck out his pneuma, to lure him into
the realm of the aethyr and trap him there. He smiled as the pressure eased and
was gone, feeling freed, and suddenly triumphant: a small victory won.

           
He loved Cennaire. Aye, he loved
her! That he could not deny. But that love he would not allow to endanger the
quest.
Paramount
was the securing of the Arcanum, its
delivery to Vanu that the holy men might destroy the book. Did Cennaire have a
hand to play in that, then good; if not . . . He pushed the thought aside,
praying that in Pamur-teng she be proven true and all doubts resolved. Bracht
would learn to trust her, and they— all of them—go on to thwart Rhythamun's
fell design. Until that was done he would set his feelings aside, that they not
endanger the higher purpose.

           
Aye! He laughed, throwing back his
head, drinking in the now-clean air, wrapping himself round with the defensive
gramarye, challenging Rhythamun, challenging the Mad God himself, to defy that
purpose.

           
It seemed that the wind snarled a
moment then, disappointed, but when he cocked his head, listening, it was once
more only a rustling among the pines. The birds sang again, squirrels
chattered, and from the undergrowth ahead a wild sow burst, followed by three
plump yearling hogs as she scampered, snorting irritably, across the road.

           
The warriors to either side turned
toward him and he smiled at them, confident in his newfound resolution.

           
IT
was easier found than held as they journeyed on, for when they halted, at noonday
and at dusk, he was forced into company with his comrades and Cennaire, and the
divisions imposed by knowledge of her revenancy came to the fore.

           
It was easy enough to promise
himself that he would set aside his feelings, defer judgments and decisions
until they reached Pamur-teng; far harder to attain that objectivity as
twilight shaded the road and he saw Cennaire dismount and hesitate, clearly
unsure of her reception. Bracht ignored her with a painful ostentation, busying
himself with the stallion and then gathering wood for their fire. Katya, while
less obviously hostile, remained aloof, and the kotu-zen, alerted to her
condition, withdrew to their own groupings. Calandryll found himself facing a
quandary: should he risk Bracht's displeasure by inviting the woman to join
them? Or should he go to her, which would doubtless anger the Kern the more? He
paused, torn between loyalty and pity.

           
And smiled thanks for Ochen's
diplomatic intervention.

           
The wazir sprang down from his horse
with an agility that belied his years, smoothed out his opulent robe, ran
fingers through his mustache, and bowed in a courtly manner to Cennaire as she
stood indecisive.

           
"Do you join me, Lady? I should
welcome your company."

           
He offered his arm, escorting her to
a place a little way apart from Bracht and Katya, but yet clearly within their
aegis, the signal clearer when he beckoned Calandryll to fill the gap.

           
"Doubts exist," he said as
the fire kindled, "and it would be foolish to pretend else. But I tell you
this—that we ride together and should at the very least allow a truce."

           
Bracht carved meat and said,
"Those arguments we've heard, wizard. I ride with you, but I need not like
the company."

           
"Horul!" Ochen shook his
head. "I've often thought my own people an unforgiving lot, but it seems
we meet our match in you Kernish folk."

           
Bracht shrugged, spitting the meat
on sharpened twigs, not bothering to articulate a reply.

           
"Mistrust breeds
disaster," Ochen went on. "Did you not feel the touch of Rhythamun's
magic today?"

           
Bracht shook his head. Katya, silent
and thoughtful, passed out hard journey bread, smoked cheese.

           
"Aye." Calandryll nodded.
"It seemed he sought once more to seduce me into the aethyr. But I spoke
those cantrips you've taught me, and the feeling was gone."

           
"It will come again," the
wazir declared. "He waxes ever stronger, and he's a new key to your
unlocking now. You must be ever vigilant against his attacks."

           
Calandryll frowned, his eyes shaping
a question.

           
"What did you think
about," asked Ochen, "when the world grew grey and the wind smelled
of blood?"

           
Calandryll paused a moment, then
said, "Of doubts. I thought of Bracht's mistrust of Cennaire. Of . . .
what I feel for her . . . and what she is . . ." From the corner of his
eye he caught her glance then, hurt, and past her pained face, he saw Bracht's,
angry and scornful. "I feared we should be sundered, fall to quarreling,
be divided, and Rhythamun win the day."

           
"Which he looks for,"
Ochen said, nodding grimly. "Like some poison seeking out the wounds into
which it may flow, he looks to divide us, to prey on doubt and distrust."

           
"I felt nothing," Bracht
said obstinately. "It was a fine morning."

           
"You've not that power
Calandryll owns," Ochen returned. "I felt his attack; Calandryll felt
it. He knows of Cennaire now, and likely guesses she's his enemy; what she
feels, what Calandryll feels. No less, that mistrust comes between us."

           
"How?" Bracht demanded,
suspicious. "How can he know what I feel? What Katya feels? Or any of
us?"

           
Ochen sighed. "Have I not told
you?" he asked. "There are two levels of existence—the one mundane,
the other on the plane of the aethyr. Those with the occult power are able to
cross betwixt the two, and their spirits—their pneuma—are strong on the occult
plane. Calandryll is one such, though he's not yet the precise knowledge of
it—that's a lifetime's study—but still he's strong there, and so Rhythamun is
able to discern him. To learn somewhat of what he feels, and through that
knowledge what those about him feel."

           
"What do you say?" Katya
asked. "That Rhythamun can see us through Calandryll's eyes?"

           
"Not see us," Ochen
answered patiently. "For that he would need send out a spy, what you name
a
quyvhal,
but that he . . . senses .
. . what
Calah-
dryll's pneuma feels, learns of our
dissension and mistrust. He knows now that a bond exists between Calandryll and
Cennaire, and that it drives a wedge between those who oppose him. Between you
three. He looks to drive that difference wider, until none trusts the other and
all fall down into confusion. The which must surely benefit him."

           
"So you say we should trust
you?" Bracht said, and stabbed a thumb toward Cennaire, "and this
revenant ?"

           
"I say that the wider you let
the gap grow," Ochen returned, "the easier you make it for Rhythamun
to attack Calandryll on the occult plane. Do you doubt him—because of his . . .
sympathy ... for Cennaire—then you build a barrier between you. You isolate
him, and thus weaken the shield your comradeship builds, and Rhythamun may find
a way through those chinks."

           
"I thought him protected by
your magicks," the Kern snapped. "Have you not taught him cantrips?
Has he not said already that he used them this day, to defend himself?"

           
"Aye," said Ochen,
"but Rhythamun's strength— Tharn's!—grows more powerful by the day, and
these assaults shall increase. And do you doubt one another, then you make his
task easier."

           
"You ask for trust where that
commodity is hard won," Bracht said. "It seems to me it were far
easier if we were three again and riding alone."

           
"Aye, but you are not,"
said Ochen, "and that's the way the design runs."

           
Calandryll sighed as the argument
turned back on itself, Bracht's obstinacy like a dog intent on pursuing its own
tail. He looked at the Kern's hard- set face,- at Katya's—enigmatic, as if she
pursued the course of her own thoughts—and then at Cennaire.

           
She sat silent, her eyes downcast,
her face partially hidden behind the sleek spill of her raven hair, her
shoulders slumped. She seemed to him resigned, as if accepting whatever
judgment might be delivered on her, as though she forsook hope and cast her
destiny to the winds of fate. She seemed terribly alone, and he felt an impulse
to reach out, take her hand; and at the same time a dreadful revulsion.

           
This, he thought as Bracht and Ochen
flung words like bouncing shuttlecocks at one another, might well continue
throughout the journey to Pamur-teng. Even beyond, should the gijan there fail
to persuade the Kern, and all the while Rhythamun would doubtless prowl the
aethyr, seeking the chance to strike, strengthened by Tharn and doubt. He
thought then of that day's assault, and for all he had defeated the attack,
knew that he would not welcome another,- wondered how long he might resist, did
mistrust continue to grow.