Path of the Sun: A Novel of Dhulyn and Parno (42 page)

She might well have died, Dhulyn thought, and these women with her. If it had not been for Parno, and the unique bond they shared as Partners, they might not have come back from the Vision—Dhulyn because she did not know how and the Espadryni women because they could not let go of their hope. And now there was no consciousness of what had passed, what they had lost, in the behavior of the three women. They knew they were to be punished for what had happened, and their reactions were only varying degrees of fear, resentment, and defiance. It did not even occur to them that they should tell the men what really happened when they Saw.

“I am a Mercenary Brother, and many people have tried to kill me,” Dhulyn began. “I am not offended, nor frightened, by it. And I assure you these women made no such attempt.”

“But in their carelessness—”

It was true, then. The men could not know. Not if they believed the women had no more caring in the Visions than they did in the real world. “They are not careless in the Visions,” she said, raising her voice to half-battlefield tones so that all would hear. “They are whole. In the Visions your women are whole.”

Spring-Flood looked to his fellow chief, Singer of the Grass-Moon. It seemed to Dhulyn that some unspoken communication, some private consultation, took place between them, reminding her that though Spring-Flood was the least shaman of the Tribe, he was still a Mage. Parno leaned forward, his brow furrowed.
Can he hear them
, she wondered. Was his Pod sense somehow alerted?

“That is why they sometimes don’t return,” Dhulyn said, as she watched belief slowly replace the shock of denial on the faces around her. “Because when they are whole, they don’t want to become broken again; sometimes they cannot face it.”

“But why would they not tell us this?” Spring-Flood said.

“Ask them.” Dhulyn turned to where the three Seers still stood, awaiting their judgment. “Winter-Ash, why have you women not told the men that you are whole and safe while in your Visions?”

The young woman looked quickly away and back again, as if she sought for the answer that would please. “What is ‘whole’ and ‘safe’? This is only words. We’re not such fools. What would that gain us? We are always the same, always what the Caids made us.”

Dhulyn turned back to the shaman. “You see? When they are here, they don’t feel the difference. They don’t feel.”

“W
E SHOULD BEpassing under the courtyard now,” Falcos said. They’d come down two sets of narrow stairs, the second little more than steps created by blocks of stone identical to those making up the walls around them, to a passage that was wider but not as tall as those they had already seen. Parno might have had to stoop here, Mar thought, though none of them was tall enough to bother. They passed by an opening to a separate, narrower passage, marked only with the horse head symbol, and kept going.

It had taken them a few minutes of arguing, when they were still standing over the body of the assassin, but they had finally persuaded Falcos that using the throne room, or any other exit within the palace itself, was a bad idea.

“Look,” Alaria had finally said. She’d been pointing to the crest sewn on the man’s blue tunic. The crest that was identical to the one Julen had on her own tunic. “Even if we knew which rooms are safe from assassins, you won’t know which of your own guards can be trusted. We must get you away from the palace entirely. You say the sunburst symbol will lead us out?”

Falcos was shaking his head. “What’s to prevent Epion from having guards there to apprehend us?”

“What’s to prevent him from having guards anywhere?” Mar had said. “That argument applies to any exit.”

“Maybe.” Gun had been rubbing at his upper lip, a sure sign of thought. “Epion must know by now that we are not in the Tarkina’s suite. If these passages are not flooded with guards loyal to him in the next few minutes, we can be sure that either Epion does not know the mechanisms for all the entrances or that he would prefer to keep the passages . . . well, secret. The conditions we’ve seen, the dust for example, support that idea. He’s sent this one man in, not a squad.”

“Then we will have a chance,” Alaria had said. “And a better one, as I’ve said, if we try for this outer exit.”

“If you’re outside, and safe,” Julen had argued. “I can go to House Listra. Once I take this uniform off, no one would be looking for me.”

“And if House Listra cannot be trusted?” Falcos had said. But he spoke more in the spirit of someone who wanted to go on arguing than as someone who really meant what he said.

“The worst that will happen,” Julen had pointed out, as if she was taking Falcos’ question seriously, “is that I will be captured. You will still be free and able to rally your own support. But Listra is the most important House next to the Tarkinate itself. She is chief of the council and has her own allies and connections. She, if anyone, can call for a full investigation and examination of the truth. It is a chance worth taking.”

So they had gone on, still with Falcos in the lead, but now heading for the exit outside the walls of palace and town.

“How far outside of Uraklios will we be?” Mar asked. As far as she could tell, this passage was running straight, and it was the longest they’d been in so far.

“My mother never told me.”

“And you never tried to find out?” Mar wouldn’t have been able to stop herself from trying to explore the secret passages, once she knew they were there.

Falcos glanced back over his shoulder. “Do not think I never looked. You saw for yourself that it took Gundaron to Find the mechanism in my mother’s bedroom. I do not think the triggers are such things as can be found by accident.”

“And a Tarkin-to-be’s time is kept quite full,” Alaria said. “He is watched more carefully than you might think and is hardly ever left alone.”

Interesting, Mar thought. Not what Alaria said but that she felt motivated to say it.
Clear enough whose side
she’s
on
.

Mar had made up her mind that they would likely have quite a walk ahead of them, so it was a pleasant surprise when Falcos stopped at another set of steps, these leading upward. The young Tarkin, holding his upper lip in his teeth, looked up and around them, back the way they had come, and up the stairs.

“Unless I’m completely turned around, I think we’re under the olive grove to the west of the palace,” he said. “Gundaron, where is the Path of the Sun?”

“There.” Gun pointed up, and to the right.

Falcos nodded. “As I thought. There’s a small shrine to Mother Sun in the center of the grove, and I’d wager we are under it now. Gundaron?”

“Third stone up from the top step, left-hand side.” Falcos started up the steps. “But if I might make a suggestion?”

Halfway up, Falcos stopped and turned back.

“The Mercenaries say that you plan for what can happen, not for what might happen. The possible, not the probable.” Gun jerked his head toward the exit. “Remember what we said. It’s possible Epion knows there’s an exit here and that someone is waiting above.”

Falcos sat down on the steps, rubbing at his forehead with his fingers. “So there is no escape for us this way, after all,” he said finally.

Mar’s heart felt like lead in her chest. This didn’t seem like the kind of answer Gun’s Mark could Find for them.

“Not necessarily.” They all turned to look at Julen. “Epion has guards who are willing to detain you based on the suspicions he has created, but he cannot have many. As you pointed out, he sent in only the one assassin—though he may have had good reason for that. We have here three swords and a formidable bow. Even the Scholars have daggers, and I’d wager that the friends of Mercenary Brothers have learned a trick or two. Luck has been with us so far.”

Falcos stood up again. “Any more suggestions, Scholar?”

Gun’s eyes swiveled sideways until he was looking at Mar. She knew as much about strategy as he. “We’re prepared to fight, and we should also prepare for capture,” she said. “If Gun and I were soldiers, I’d say that Alaria and the Tarkin should go back down the passage, far enough to be outside the circle of light, while the three of us went ahead. As it is, we’re the least use in a fight, so we should be the ones to hang back. If things go well, we rejoin you—”

“And if they don’t go well, you are still free and the most likely to find your way out to help,” Julen finished for her. The guard turned back to Falcos. “I agree, my lord. This is a good plan.”

 

It was hard to sit quietly in the dark, ears straining to pick up any noise that might tell them the fate of their friends. It was easy to imagine noises that weren’t there. If they’d had Mercenary training . . .

“I wish we knew one of the Hunting
Shoras
,” Gun said, almost echoing Mar’s thoughts.

“If we did, we’d be up there with swords in our hands, not back here in the dark,” she said. She got to her feet, unable to stay sitting down, no matter how much more sensible it was to rest. “What’s taking so long?”

Gun stood also and, feeling for her in the dark, put his arm around her. “It always feels longer when you are the one waiting,” he reminded her. “Julen’s cautious; she’ll be making sure Falcos and Alaria are safely hidden before she comes back for us.”

Mar nodded, but her heart wasn’t in it. “I have a bad feeling about this,” she whispered.

Moments later footsteps in the dark seemed, at first, to deny her fears, but then Mar realized that the footsteps came unaccompanied by any light. Gun squeezed her to him and then stepped away. Mar licked her lips and, as silently as she could, drew the dagger she had at her waist, using the space Gun had given her. She felt cautiously for the wall and oriented herself next to it. They might not be soldiers, but they could at least try to defend themselves. She might even remember one or two of the moves Dhulyn Wolfshead had once shown her.

“Scholars?” came the whisper in the dark, and Mar relaxed. Finally, Julen had come for them. “Scholars?”

“Here.” There was no point in moving from where they were; they would only bump into the guard in the dark.

“Have you a light?”

Mar heard scraping, and then had to shut her eyes against the sudden glare of Gun’s candle. What she saw brought her hand to her mouth.

Julen was bleeding from a cut on her sword arm, and her left arm hung limp from her shoulder.

“It’s only dislocated, I think.” Julen bared her teeth in a parody of a smile. They showed bloody. “There was almost a squad waiting.” She spat to one side, grimacing. “So much for all our logic. Falcos managed to shut the opening, and as he does not know the trigger from the outside, they cannot come in after us.”

Gun had handed Mar the candle and was now supporting the guard with his own shoulder under her good one. “Epion knows at least one other entrance,” he reminded them.

“Which is why we’ll have to get out as quick as we can, Scholar.”

“No,” Mar said. “Give these people time to get back and Epion time to call off his other guards. Now that he has Falcos and Alaria, he doesn’t really care about us. He might leave one or two people to watch, but no squads as he had here. That will give us a better chance.” They’d been wrong once already, but surely logic couldn’t
always
be wrong?

“But Mar, Julen’s hurt.”

“The stables,” Julen said, jaws clenched. “I know the place like my tongue knows my teeth. There’re only so many places the entrance can be, and the sensible place to put watchers ...” she shut her eyes as if she were trying to visualize the area she was describing. “We would have good odds, I think. And my father will be there to help us.”

“To help
you
,” Gun said. Julen twisted her head to look at him. “Think about it,” he said. “We’ll get you there and get the door open, but I think there’s a better place for Mar and me to go.” Even as he was talking, he had gestured to Mar to lead the way back to where the side passage led to the stables. Mar picked up Gun’s pack and set off, holding her pace to what Julen could manage.

“You’re to go to House Listra, according to the Tarkin’s instructions; she’ll at least be able to put a stop to any further assassination attempts. But I’m afraid the only people we can absolutely trust to help us have gone where neither you nor the House can find them,” Gun said. “And by the time they get back with the real killer, it may be too late for us.”

Mar nodded without turning around. She saw where Gun was going. “We need the Mercenaries.”

“I agree,” Julen said. “Judgment given by Mercenaries would be acceptable to most if not all of the council. But they have gone through the Path of the Sun, where we cannot follow.”

“Ordinarily, I’d agree, but I think I could Find Dhulyn Wolfshead,” he said. “No matter what was between us, I think I could Find her.”

Mar’s lips spread in a wide smile, and she had to catch herself from walking faster.