Light of Eidon (Legends of the Guardian-King, Book 1) (38 page)

He frowned, dismayed by the renewal of aggrieved self-loathing, and
pushed the thought away. Would he rather be dead? Lose Shettai? Break her
heart?

Of course not. Of course not …

“You’re up early, my love.” As if his thoughts had drawn her, Shettai
slipped up beside him and slid an arm underneath his unfastened tunic. She
lifted her lips for him to kiss and he did so, slowly, tenderly, savoring the taste
and touch and smell of her.

Dust and ashes! How can I even think of giving this up?

When they drew apart she stayed in his arms, looking up into his eyes,
searching for the answer he still hadn’t given her and clearly hesitant to ask.
He wanted to reassure her, to tell her he had indeed decided-that he would
never leave her, never hurt her like that … but the other side of him kept
his tongue frozen and his mouth closed.

After a while he saw the despair move across her face. “You’re going to
refuse,” she said quietly.

It was as if she’d stabbed him through the heart. “N&” His voice came
out a ragged croak. “I’m not! I’m going to take it! I am? It would be insane to
do anything-“

She laid her fingers on his lips, stopping the flow of words. Then she
smiled, that old, ironic smile. “I can see it, even if you can’t. And I can’t say
I’m even surprised, though I had hoped …” She trailed off. Her eyes moved
across his face, as if she sought to burn his features into her mind. She
touched his lips, the rings in his ear, the thick, shoulder-length hair come
loose of its knot hours ago. Finally she sighed. “I wish for once you could fight
without the costume,” she said. “There are those who do not believe you are
Kiriathan.”

“It won’t matter, because I’m not going to fight,” he declared firmly,
resolve hardening once more within him. “I’m going to take his offer.”

He saw the hope flare in her eyes, then fade as she smiled sadly. “I think,” she said, “if you were the kind of man who could take such an offer, I would
never have fallen in love with you in the first place.”

His resolve crumbled, shattered by the impact of her words and the sudden, devastating certainty that they were true. It was the most agonizing, gutwrenching realization he’d ever made, and for a moment he thought he might
become physically ill.

He saw the tears welling in her eyes and kissed her again, fiercely this
time, wishing he didn’t have to die, wishing he could take Beltha’adi’s offer
without losing his soul, wishing she hadn’t loved him after all, and a hundred
other things that weren’t going to happen.

Abdeel and Dumah arrived a little while later, banging open the door and
clumping into the room, jeering and laughing until they saw her in his arms.
They stopped, surprise widening their eyes, followed by a flicker of jealousy
and, yes, a light of new respect.

That only made it worse, however. As they escorted him back to the
underbelly of the Val’Orda, they jabbered incessantly, tossing out ribald questions and vulgar suggestions that, had he done anything but ignore them,
would have roused him to a fury.

Trap sat in the front room of the suite of chambers he and Abramm
shared in the lowest level, eating black bread, figs, and cheese. He looked up
as Abramm entered, cocked a brow at the sight of him, but said nothing. He
looked haggard, as if he had gotten no more sleep than Abramm last night.

As the handlers left them, Abramm dropped onto the bench across from
him and stared at the portion of dark, crusty loaf on the plate. The last thing
he wanted was food.

He felt Trap’s eyes upon him and knew if he sat here much longer the
man would speak to him. Wanting conversation even less than he wanted
food, he stood and took one of the wooden practice swords down from the
wall. Wordlessly he started through the basic cycle of forms, the need to concentrate on technique and sequence effectively keeping more troubling
thoughts at bay. When it came to an end, he started the next form, then the
next, and the next. Finally, though, he was forced to stop for breath. Leaning
the sword against the wall, he stripped off the heavy tunic.

“So it’s true, then,” Trap said behind him. “He did make you an offer.”

Abramm froze, crushing the tunic in his fists.

“Brogai status, they say,” Trap went on. “Wealth, honor, everything you
could want.”

“What good is it if you have to sell your soul to get it?” Abramm asked,
dropping the tunic onto the bench. He picked up the sword again. Fifth,
sixth, seventh, eighth-he ran through the intermediate forms, holding his
mind to each nuance of stance and stroke. But inevitably he was once more
reduced to weak-armed panting and thoughts he wanted to forget. Shettai in
a hundred different images of beauty and softness and sweet, wonderful
scent, realities of memory that far surpassed anything he might have imagined. The price of pleasure, it seemed, was the amplification of pain.

And there was nothing he could do to change it.

“We’ll probably die out there, my lord.”

Abramm stood where he was, staring at the wall, his breath rushing
between his teeth, his back to the other man. Sweat trickled down his chest
and sides. He didn’t know what to say.

After a moment, Trap spoke again. “You’re not ready.”

At that Abramm finally turned, barking a bitter laugh. “Seeing as I’ve
defiled myself in every possible way by now”-he’d broken the last of his holy
vows just last night, in fact-“I’d say you’re right. Unfortunately, there isn’t
time enough to do anything about it.” He feigned a start of surprise, then
widened his eyes as if in sudden understanding. “But wait! I could take hold
of your gray talisman? Let it burn that golden shield into my flesh and
then … why, then I’d be ready, wouldn’t I? Isn’t that what you were going to
say?” He snorted. “Sorry, but it’s just too convenient for me to believe.”

Meridon regarded him steadily. “‘Those who receive the truth and spurn
it shall be without excuse.’”

That was from the Second Word of Revelation. Abramm grimaced. “Very
nice, Captain. But frankly, I don’t care anymore. Even if Eidon is in your
mysterious light, why should I want it? He hasn’t done any more for you than
he has for me. We’re both slaves, marked and unmarked.”

Trap smiled slightly. “But very well treated slaves, you must admit.”

“Oh yes, very well treated. Right up to the point where we’re defeated
and tortured to death. The last thing they’ll hear from you will be your
screams for mercy,’” he quoted from Katahn’s warning last night. He snorted
again. “What good is a god who can’t protect his followers from harm?”

“He can.”

“Then why hasn’t he? Or does he take pleasure in making you suffer?”

“Of course not.”

“You can’t have it both ways, Trap.”

“Suggesting he takes pleasure in our pain is blasphemous. But he has
given us the freedom to choose. Some choose to do sinful, evil things, which
have inevitable and ugly consequences.”

“Consequences that spill over to others who did not so choose,” Abramm
added bitterly.

“But that’s the beauty of it-Eidon can use those evil deeds and consequences for the ultimate benefit of his servants.”

“Benefit?” Abramm’s voice cracked with incredulity. He waved the sword
at the chamber around them. “You’re saying this is for our benefit?”

“Yes?” Trap’s gaze bored into his own, arresting his outrage. When next
he spoke, the Terstan’s voice was quietly compelling. “Do you have any idea
how much you’ve changed, my lord? You are not at all the man you were
when you left Kiriath. You have become a hero here, the champion about
whom innumerable stories and songs are even now being written and spread.”

Of course Abramm knew he was a hero. How could he not with his supporters waving their diamond-topped sticks and screaming their approval at
every match? He wouldn’t be facing the match he faced today if not for their
growing adulation and the dangerous attitudes he had spawned in them
through his continued success at defying Beltha’adi’s claims of destiny and
right to rule.

But suddenly, somehow, perhaps because of the way Trap had said it, he
saw his newfound status through different eyes-the eyes of a frail and
scorned little boy who spent entirely too much time reading adventure stories
and tales of the great champions of Kiriathan history. The greatest goal of his
childhood, besides knowing Eidon, was to emulate those champions, to
become someone honored, admired, sung about. Someone who was emulated by other little boys. It was a dream that had died on the practice floors
of the royal school of fencing a good fourteen years ago. A dream, he now
saw, that had been realized, in spite of its death and through no conscious
choice of his own.

The sword point sank slowly to the stone.

“Can you think of any other way you could have become what you are
today?” Trap pressed. “Could it have happened in Kiriath? Would you have made the kinds of decisions that have led you to this point? Would you have
even had the opportunity?”

Abramm stared at the nicked and polished length of wood before him,
and a chill swept up his spine. No. He would not have.

“How can you say he has not been with you, Abramm?” Trap demanded
softly. “Using you for his glory even though you continue to reject him.”

Denial welled up. “You’re wrong? I’m no hero in his eyes. I have killed-“

“Defending yourself against those who would kill you. The Words forbid
murder, not self-defense.”

“But I have hated-I have struck in anger. I have defiled myself in every
possible way. Last night I-” He broke off, not yet willing to verbalize that
confession, even knowing Trap must have guessed what he’d done. “I
have … I have hated him. Cursed him…”

And even so, he has not abandoned you.”

Abramm looked down at him, into his eyes, and felt all at once as if he
were sliding down a bright hole, slipping away, losing control, his mind captured and enspelled by Terstan power…

His forearm tingled, jerking him free of the spell. “I don’t believe that!”
he cried, an irrational anger flooding into him. “It was Gillard’s treachery that
brought me here.” He swept the sword up sharply, blade hissing through the
air. And it’s the power of Beltha’adi’s evil that keeps me here.”

He started into the next form, stepping and slashing with rapid, angry
strokes that only gradually settled back into the smooth precision that normally characterized his practices.

The next time he stopped, Trap was no longer looking at him, was instead
watching his own fingers crumble the dark bread on his plate. His lips were
pressed tightly together, his face closed and hard with frustration. Abramm
noticed again the dark circles around his eyes, the way his freckles stood out
against pale skin, and was struck by a new and alarming thought.

`Are you sick? You look awful.”

For a moment he thought the Terstan meant to ignore him. Finally,
though, the man seemed to shake off his sulk and shrugged. “Nothing a little
sleep wouldn’t cure.”

Abramm lifted a brow. He had never known Meridon to lose a night’s
sleep for worrying. Hadn’t he claimed just yesterday to be completely at ease
with whatever Eidon chose for him today, death or life, either one? Appar ently, alone on his pallet last night, he had not been so at ease after all.

The walls shuddered as one of the lions roared, and they both looked
toward the wall nearest the arena proper. The lion fight was scheduled for
some three hours before the final and most anticipated match, but Abramm
had thought they still had double that amount of time. The creature roared
again, and as the subsequent silence stretched itself out longer and longer,
Abramm relaxed. The beast was just sounding off. Or else it was feeding
time.

Across from him, Trap stood and disappeared into the adjacent sleeping
chamber. Abramm went back to his forms. He needed the entire sequence to
work himself into a fatigue strong enough to allow him to sleep.

When he awoke it was midafternoon and the Sorite slave who shaved and
dressed and painted them had arrived to prepare them for their match. They
went through the routine wordlessly, exactly as they’d done scores of times
before. Indeed, it was hard now to believe this would be the last….

The slave was just leaving when Katahn’s personal secretary burst into the
room and thrust a carved jewel case into Abramm’s hands. “The master wants
you to wear this for the match.”

Before Abramm could even slip free the gold catch, the man was gone,
door thumping shut in his wake.

Puzzled, Abramm lifted the lid, then felt his face slacken as he saw what
lay on the satin inside: a pale, gray, opalescent orb, no bigger than the end
joint of his little finger, set into a gold ring hung from a gold chain. It wasn’t
quite the same as the one he’d had before, the color of this one a little lighter,
the sheen more opalescent, but he knew what it was all the same.

He looked at Trap accusingly. “You think I wouldn’t recognize this?”

Trap frowned at him, the expression exaggerated by his painted-on sadface. “What is it?”

“Don’t play dumb. I know you put him up to this.” He pulled the talisman from the box, dangling it between them. “It’s just like the one you gave
me when we were escaping the Keep.”

“Perhaps, but I didn’t make it.”

“There are no other candidates, Captain.” Abramm realized then that for
some inexplicable reason Trap had reverted to speaking Kiriathan, a language
they had not used in months.

Actually, there is,” the Terstan said, still in Kiriathan. A smile might have been tugging at his lips, but the sad-face made it hard to tell.

“What are you talking about?”

“Our esteemed Master,” Meridon said. “Why do you think I didn’t get
any sleep last night?” It was a smile, breaking across his face and wrinkling
the painted tear on his cheek. “He took the star just before dawn.”

Abramm gaped. “Katahn wears a Terstan shield?”