Angus Wells - The God Wars 03 (38 page)

           
Ochen had suggested the power within
him invested him with a sight capable of penetrating to the soul, to the truths
within: abruptly, he chose to trust the wazir's observance, to put it to the
test.

           
"I'd speak with Cennaire,"
he said, rising, beckoning her to her feet. "Alone."

           
She looked up then, startled,
hesitating as Bracht frowned, Katya's brows shaped a question, Ochen smiled in
seeming approval. Calandryll nodded, encouraging, and she rose, instinctively,
nervously, smoothing her tunic. He took her arm, courtly, and she allowed him
to lead her away from the fire, toward the trees, docile.

           
The moon was risen now, a slender
crescent again, wan against a hyacinthine sky pricked through with silver
stars. The wind sung cold among the trees, its melody echoed by the lament of
wolves, the soft hooting of hunting owls. He walked away from the fires, past
the picketed horses, the guards Chazali had set, aware of all their eyes on his
back, aware of their expectations and their fears, their doubts. He continued on,
his hand formal on Cennaire's elbow, back down the road until they were beyond
earshot.

           
Then, a few short steps distant from
the road, where tall pines swayed, rustling in the wind as if they gossiped,
circling a narrow patch of coarse grass, he let go Cennaire's arm and turned to
face her.

           
For a moment he stood silent,
voicing a prayer to Dera that the goddess guide him to the truth. Then, aloud,
he said, "Lady, we needs must talk."

           
"Of what?" Cennaire
brushed back hair streaked silvery with stars' light, her eyes luminous on his
face, her voice subdued. "What may I say that I've not already?"

           
It was as difficult to fight the
urge to take her in his arms as it was to forget all she had done, who had made
her what she was. He set a hand about his swordhilt, saw her eyes register that
movement and shifted his grip, thumbs hooking his belt.

           
"Bracht believes ..." He
paused, contradictory emotions a turmoil in his mind. A deep breath then, a
rush of words, best spoken swift lest his tongue should falter: "Bracht
believes that what I feel . . . that because I love you ... I am blinded. He
believes you a traitor."

           
It was hard to face her as she
smiled, wistfully he thought, and said, "He's made that clear
enough."

           
"And yet Ochen claims you've a
part to play in this quest of ours. I must decide ere this mistrust tears us
apart."

           
Cennaire nodded then, her starlit
features solemn, her eyes grave, and said, "And do you decide, shall
Bracht accept it? He's an unforgiving man, I think."

           
"Aye." Calandryll smiled,
brief and without humor. "There's that, but even so—do you convince me,
then perhaps I may persuade him."

           
"How shall I convince
you?" she asked, turning a moment away, head thrown back, eyes studying
the velvet sky, closing an instant as if in resignation, then open again,
returning to his face. "Shall I tell you that I made a choice when I saw
the uwagi take you? That I thought then only that you might die, and I could
not bear that thought? You say you love me? I tell you, Calandryll den Karynth,
that I love you. No!" She gestured him silent as he was about to speak.
"Hear me now; now that we may speak alone, without interference or
interruption—I'd have you know what I am, exactly. After, when you know it all,
judge me."

           
Her voice was edged hard as Bracht's
face, steeled to decision: Calandryll ducked his head, accepting. He suspected,
looking into her intense eyes, that he should not welcome this confession, that
he should learn of things he might better prefer remained unsaid. It seemed the
wind grew colder, the susurration of the trees more ominous.
Dera be with me now,
he thought.
Be with me and guide me.

           
Cennaire, for all the chill breath
of the night wind meant nothing to her, shivered, folding her arms across her
breast. She locked her gaze, unblinking, on his face, determined now that he
should learn it all. Did he turn from her after, then so be it: for now she
felt a need the truth be told in its entirety, that there no longer be secrets
between them. She did not properly understand her motives, only knew that along
the way from Kandahar to this forest clearing she had changed, become something
other than the revenant Anomius had sent out, something other than the woman
she had been, and that she must unburden herself to this man.

           
"I was a courtesan," she
said, only determination preventing her voice from faltering, praying even as
she spoke that he might understand—should believe—she was no longer the person
she described. "I was condemned to death for stabbing a lover. He refused
me payment, and when I took his purse he threatened to denounce me—I put a
knife in his belly, and I was condemned to death.

           
"Anomius found me in the
dungeons of Nhur- jabal and ordered me freed. I knew not why, save ..."
She shrugged, the meaning explicit. "He worked his magicks on me and I was
his creature. His gramaryes lent me such powers . . . Oh, I had known hunger
before, but invested with his magicks food was pleasure, only,- nothing more. I
was strong; I need not sleep. I can see, hear . . . Burash, but you know that.
How else did I find you, when the uwagi took you? It was intoxicating. And he
owned my heart—save I did his bidding, he would destroy me! He sent me out like
a hunting dog, to find you, and Bracht. He knew nothing then of Katya. That he
learned after I went to Vishat'yL"

           
She hesitated, lips pursed. An owl
hooted, but otherwise the forest was grown still. Even the wind, it seemed,
waited on her confession, the tall trees leaning closer, anticipatory.

           
"I learned of Katya, and where
you went, from Menelian. That knowledge he gave me because he was confident of
destroying me. He looked to slay me with his cantrips, but magic works better
against the living, not against . . . what I am. I slew him." This in a
dull, dead tone. "And then I spoke the cantrip Anomius had taught me and
was back in Nhur-jabal ..."

           
"How?" Calandryll asked,
hoarse-voiced. "By magic?"

           
"Aye, how else?" Cennaire
nodded. "He taught me that spell that I might return to him the
easier."

           
"Then might you not have gone
back," Calan- dryll said slowly, "even go back now? And take back
your heart?"

           
"Wound round with Anomius's
gramaryes?" Cennaire shook her head, starlight playing over the darkness
of her hair. "Think you he's not set protections? I think that did I
attempt that, I should die. That he should know of my coming and destroy
me."

           
"Aye." Calandryll
remembered the ugly little sorcerer and could only agree. "Go on."

           
"I went to Aldarin," she
continued, "where I learned that Varent den Tarl was dead. I learned that
from a man named Darth, who served den Tarl."

           
"I knew him," Calandryll
said, his voice hollow as he added: "And did you slay him, too?"

           
Cennaire nodded. "He looked to
take his pleasure of me. I'd have let him live, else. But he gave me scant
choice."

           
"Dera!" Calandryll said,
aghast. "You leave few alive behind you, Lady."

           
She ducked her head again. He stared
at her, wondering that he could still love her: that he did, he could not
doubt, even were it insanity.

           
"I learned from Gart and Kythan
what it is you seek," she said as he motioned her to continue. "Those
two I did not slay—you've my word on that. Though likely you'll not take
it."

           
She laughed a hollow laugh and
studied him with eyes that seemed haunted. He was not sure why he believed her,
but he did—she had confessed to other murders. Why not, then, to those? "I
take it," he said.

           
And she smiled: a glimmer of hope,
and said, "From them I learned the rest, which you mostly know. I used the
mirror to speak with Anomius, and he commanded me to find you and join you.

           
The rest you know—I came to the Kess
Imbrun, to the Daggan Vhe, and there I saw Rhythamun for the first time."

           
She broke off, shuddering at the
memory. She seemed then, for all Calandryll knew her undead, a woman imbued
with preternatural powers, one who had slain men in obedience to her creator,
entirely vulnerable. He steeled himself and demanded, "Aye?
Continue."

           
"What I told you of him was
true," she said.
"Is
true.
I felt . . . Burash! It was horrible, what he did. To eat human flesh? To steal
another's form?"

           
"And yet you still obeyed your
master." It was an effort to hold his voice calm, to hide the revulsion he
could not help but feel. "Anomius bade you join us, to take the Arcanum
from us."

           
She looked at him then, her fate in
his eyes, and nodded. "Aye, then." She swallowed air, cold, hope
fading. "I joined you to take the Arcanum from you, for Anomius."

           
"So is Bracht right?" he
demanded, the question chill as the wind. "Do you look to seduce me to
that end? Is that why you saved me from the uwagi? In service of your
master?"

           
"No!" Her voice rose loud,
helpless; hopeless. "Burash, but I cannot ask you to believe me, even
though all I've said is true! I know not what has changed me, but I tell you—I
love you! I cannot bear the thought of your dying. What can I say? I have
traveled with you—with you and Bracht, and Katya—and something in me has
changed in your company. I'd have back my heart and be mistress of my own
destiny again. I'd not see Rhythamun, or Anomius, own the Arcanum. I'd not see
Tharn raised. Calandryll, I've not the right to ask or expect belief from you,
but I tell you this—that I shall do all I may to see your quest succeed.

           
Burash! Does it cost me my heart,
still I'll see you succeed! Believe me or not, that is the truth."

           
The night hung still about them, the
wind died down, wolves and owls, all the predators of the dark hours, fallen
silent. The moon was a curved blade against the sky, the stars cold and
distant, an impassive jury. Calandryll felt the weight of decision—of
indecision—heavy on his shoulders as he studied her face. Her eyes were wide
and shining, though whether in hope or defiance, he could not be sure. He felt
certain she had told him the truth about her life—about what she had been, and
what she had done in service to Anomius. But the rest? Could he believe she had
changed so much? That a creature made by magic, her heart no living organ but
some product of thaumaturgy, might so dramatically shift her allegiance?

           
What if she lied, hiding her real
intentions?

           
What if all she said was truth?

           
He wiped a hand over lips gone dry,
sighing, aware of a pressure building behind his eyes, thoughts racing madly
about his mind. He wanted to believe her. But was that a wanting born of
emotion, of what he felt for her? He coughed a bitter laugh, thinking a moment
of his father, thinking what Bylath might have said, were he present. He could
imagine his father's scorn, his brother's contempt. And yet . . . and yet what
he felt for this woman surpassed all he had felt for Nadama den Ecvin.

           
That, in the midst of all his
confusion, remained a fact hard as stone, as steel; and like a steel blade, it
cut him deep.

           
Did she lie, then he might likely
need to slay her. And would: of that he had no doubt. The notion of the Arcanum
in Anomius's grubby hands was as

           
abominable as the thought of
Rhythamun's success.

           
Dera,
he asked into the silence, do you show me the way of itl Show me the truth, I
beg you.

           
Not
Dera, for this is not her domain but mine.

           
Calandryll gasped as the words
struck his ears. For a moment it seemed the night, the world, spun whirling
around him. He saw Cennaire start back, eyes wider, turning to seek the
speaker, even as he recognized the sound came not from among the trees, was not
shaped by any human throat, but rather echoed inside both their minds. She
looked then afraid as that realization dawned, and he touched her, saying,
"Wait," softly, and she looked at him, and drew closer, as if seeking
his protection as shadow coalesced among the pines, taking solid form.