The False Martyr (91 page)

Rynn relaxed, shame
washing over him.

Eia jumped in. “He is
still learning to read the emotions around him. I am sorry, Naidi.
He is your student, but I understand the situation and can explain
it so that the Chancellor understands.” The black hood nodded, and
Eia continued, “You are very calm, so Rynn cannot read you, but
there is a great deal of emotion radiating from the city around us.
Rynn is in touch with that emotion, and one of the things that he
is learning is to separate the emotion around him from that in the
background. When you surprised him, he momentarily lost track of
that separation and assigned the emotions outside to you. The fact
that he recovered so quickly shows how much he has progressed in
his training.”

“
I see,” Ipid mumbled,
though he was concerned more than reassured.
If the boy is having so much trouble dealing with this, how
will he manage the workers tomorrow that want more than anything to
kill him?
“I am sorry if I startled you,
Rynn. Are you certain that you will be able to handle the work
around the bridges?”

Naidi answered before Rynn
had a chance. “I will be with him. . . . It will be a challenge . .
. but I am certain that . . . he will learn and grow . . . through
this experience.”

It was not the answer that
Ipid wanted to hear, but he could only sigh as Naidi led Rynn
slowly from the room, using the boy now to support his shambling
walk.

Watching them go, Ipid
wondered how all this would play out, wondered what game Belab was
playing. Certainly there were a hundred of his followers that he
could have sent, so why Rynn? Why now? Why here?

“
What is the matter with
you?” interrupted him. It was the question he had been dreading the
entire day. He had put it off thus far with the weekly lessons,
meetings, and reports, but Eia had him cornered now. And just like
a cornered animal, he looked for any possible place to run or hide,
for any possible excuse: people he must meet, places he must go,
things he must do.

“
You will talk to me,” Eia
demanded, ending any hope that he had of escape. “You’ve been
avoiding me all day. You’ve barely said a word to me or
acknowledged I was here. Then a man who is very nearly a saint in
our order comes here to help you and you openly doubt his abilities
in front of me. Are you trying to push me away?”

Barely hearing her words,
Ipid kept his eyes away, not wanting to see her and be reminded of
what had happened the night before. Despite her words then and
after, he remained convinced that he had hurt her, that he was the
lowest kind of monster, that she must hate and fear him. Or in many
ways worse, that she had been honest, that she really did want that
monster, that she would bring that darkness out again, that it
would feel so good that he would not be able to put it
back.

“
I asked what’s wrong with
you,” Eia repeated. She placed a hand on his cheek and turned his
face until he was looking into her dark eyes.

Ipid retracted. He
stumbled back from her as the images of her writhing on the desk,
of his hand on her throat, of her gurgled cries leapt to his
mind.

Eia laughed. “Is this
about last night? About what we did?” She laughed again then took
his chin in her hand and brought his eyes back to her. “My dear, I
want you to look at me when I tell you this. I said, what
we
did last night. I was
there. I did nothing to resist you. I even told you that it was
what I had wanted, that I had enjoyed it. Why are you acting like
this now?”

Ipid tried to pull his
eyes away, but Eia would not let him go. Seeking a refuge, they
went to the silk scarf she had tied around her neck. Though hidden
from casual observation, he could see the purple marks the same
size and shape as his fingers that it hid. “It was wrong,” he said
finally. “I don’t care . . . I don’t care what you said. I . . . I
had no right to treat you that way. No woman should ever be treated
that way. I was angry. I was drunk, but that is no excuse. I do not
know where that came from, but it . . . it was wrong, and you
should never have to put up with that.”
By
the Order, Kira would have killed me if I’d done that to her, no
matter how drunk or angry I was. She would have gutted me like a
pig, and I’d have deserved it.

“
Oh, dear, sweat boy,” Eia
laughed. “It is very gallant of you. I am sure the women here would
swoon, but I am not one of your women. I do not need you to protect
me, and you have seen too much to think otherwise. Do you not think
I could have stopped you if I wanted to?” She laughed again and
wrapped her arms around him, burying her face in his chest. “Trust
me, my love, last night was perfect. Far from being wrong, it was
exactly what I wanted. I wanted your anger, your passion, your
aggression. It is what has always been missing. I was thrilled to
have it. It made me feel alive like I haven’t in years upon years.
And far from not wanting to put up with it, I long to feel it
again.”

“
So I didn’t hurt
you?”

Eia laughed. She came away
from him slightly, looked up at him, and adjusted her stance
meaningfully. “Oh, it certainly hurt, but sometimes the greatest
pleasure is found in pain.”

“
So when you were
screaming, when you were crying . . . ?” The lump in his throat
kept Ipid from saying more.

“
It was both.” Eia put her
hands on his arms and stared into his eyes. “Pain at first but then
pleasure, waves upon waves of it. And don’t pretend that you didn’t
feel it was well. I heard you. I saw you. I felt you. I know that
you experienced something unlike anything you have ever
known”

Ipid could only gulp at
the memory of that release when it had finally happened. In
honesty, that was part of his problem. How could anything so
terrible feel so good? “I . . . .”

“
Stop,” Eia demanded. She
stepped away and went to lean on the desk. “I do not need to
console you. You do not need to feel guilty for experiencing
pleasure like you have never known or for giving me some share of
it. You are a grown man. Your emotions, your passion are gifts from
Hilaal. You should never apologize for them. You should apologize
for all the times you have kept them from me. They are part of you,
and I want everything you can give me.”

“
Is this how you . . . I
mean with your other lovers?”

Eia laughed again. “How
long have you been wanting to ask that? The problem is your silly
counselors and their obsession with this Order that they have made
up in their minds. They tell you everything you should do,
everything you should feel. But you are not a dog or a rabbit or a
fly that should mount its mate and deliver its seed as quickly and
efficiently as possible. You were gifted by Hilaal with emotion,
with freewill, with the ability to feel and choose. Each person is
different. Each lover brings something different, and I accept them
as they are. I ask only that they do not hold themselves back from
me. With some it is slow and gentle and constrained such that when
we reach our climax it is like the storm in the desert, more
violent and complete for all the time it has waited. Some others
wear their emotions like clothes. And those emotions are expended
as quickly and violently as the ripping away of those clothes.
Others still, have no idea how to feel, have never known real
emotion, and can do little more than what you did prior to last
night.

“
That is where I feared we
were to go and it upset me because I know that you are a man of
deep emotion no matter how constrained they may be. You have felt
pain, have known heartache and anger. I understand that you must
bottle those during the day, but until you could tap them, our sex
had no hope of being anything more than the same tired exercise as
an animal releasing its seed. That is why last night was a
revelation. It was the first time you let me see the real person,
let me experience what is inside you, let me feel who you truly
are. Your emotions run so deep, have been constrained for so long
that they are like nothing I have ever known. I think that if we
ever tap them fully, I will never be satisfied by another lover as
long as I live. I may be forced to join you in fact.” She laughed
at her joke.

“
But . . . .”
The real person? What is truly inside?
Who you truly are?
Ipid
could not fathom the horror of that being who he truly was. The
thought so overwhelmed him that he barely heard a word she said
after. Certainly, the joke didn’t stand a chance.

Eia approached and put her
hand over his mouth. “Shhh. I don’t want to hear the preaching of
your counselors. It is for us to decide, not them. For us, using
the freewill that Hilaal has given us. You can hold back all you
want when you are out here, but when you are inside me, I want to
feel your emotions. I want you to flood me with them. I want you to
overwhelm me. You cannot hurt me, but I promise if it is too much,
I will tell you.”

To his horror, Ipid felt
his anticipation rise at her words and proximity. Could what she
said be true? Could that really be what she wanted? Could he
possibly do it again? He desperately wanted the answer to be no. No
matter what Eia said, that monster from last night was not who he
was, not who he ever wanted to be. At the same time, he had to
admit that the release that ended it had been something that he had
never even imagined was possible. If Eia felt the same way, was it
really wrong? If it was what she wanted, why should he deny her . .
. and himself?

“
Not now,” she said and
backed away. “I need to recover. Even I can only take so much. When
the time is right, it will happen. For now, we can be as we were. I
still long to be with you, still want to sleep beside you.
Everything else is the same. So can you stop with the dramatics and
kiss me?”

He did. He kissed her for
a long time like teens hidden in the trees before they were joined,
but nothing more than that. At least for now.

Chapter 49

The
40
^th
Day of Summer

The sun was barely peeking
over the horizon when Valati Lareno shook Dasen awake. He woke
slowly, stiffly and looked at the robed man standing above him. For
a moment, the valati’s brown robe was black, his misshapen face
wrinkled with age, his dull brown eyes black with malice. Dasen
shot from the bed, clasped the valati’s thin wrists, and fought to
tear them away. He felt his mind clear and search for the unholy
energy from the battle. He found nothing. Even the man he held in
his crazed clutches showed no fear or surprise, seemed to dispel
rather than create the energy that Dasen sought.

“
Dasen,” the valati said
with calm certainty, “it’s me, Valati Lareno. You are at the inn.
You are safe.”

The words cut through
Dasen’s fear, brought him to the present, and allowed him to see
the valati for what he was. Carefully, he released his grip and
brought a hand to rub his sweat-matted hair. “I’m sorry. You
surprised me. I must have been in the middle of a
dream.”

“
Not a good one, I
suspect.”

“
I don’t remember.” Dasen
shook his head and looked around the room. Teth’s place on the far
side of the bed was empty, the single sheet thrown back, her
clothes gone from the hook where she hung them each night. The room
was still more shadow than light. The sun was barely up, and she
was already gone – or had she ever returned?

“
Did you mean what you
said last night?” Valati Lareno asked.

“
Of course,” Dasen
groaned. Even through the returning haze of sleep, the images of
the camp were fresh and horrifying. He shivered and looked up at
the valati again. “That camp is inhuman. I’ll do anything I can to
help those people.”

“
Good, then we have a lot
of work to do. Get up and shave. I brought a tray of breakfast.
Mrs. Tappers is waiting to do your face and wig. It will be another
long day, but I think the Order has, at least, blessed us with a
cooler one.”

Dasen looked to the open
window and saw the rain dripping from the sash onto the lower sill.
A cool breeze blew into the room. He sighed and shook his head. “I
don’t think my disguise will hold up to rain. The wig will never
stay on.”

“
The rain will stop before
we leave the inn,” the valati said with certainty. He stood and
walked toward the door. “I will have Mrs. Tappers join you in five
minutes. Drink the dram I left on the desk, eat everything, and
drink that entire pitcher of water. Remember, you are on a hunger
strike, so no food while people are watching. You’ll fast until you
get back here tonight, just like yesterday. And it’s going to be a
long day.”

“
Where is Teth?” Dasen
managed to ask before the valati was out the door. “I’m worried
about her. She seems . . . I don’t know.” Last night, when he’d
returned from the camp, while he was eating the clandestine meal
that Mrs. Tappers brought, she had been in near hysterics over what
had happened. Eventually, she stormed from the room and had not
returned before he was asleep.

The valati paused with his
hand on the latch. “She is doing what she must,” he said without
turning. “The battle left her wounded in ways you cannot see and
cannot heal. It is up to her to apply the medicine and bind the
wound. You need to give her time. Constantly looking under the
bandage only makes it worse.”