Chapter Forty-Five
For a moment, no one moved. Padrajisse closed her eyes.
Then S’ythreni stamped her boot on Jaffet’s hand: an even smaller stiletto popped out of his fingers. It had two fine metal tubes running out of the hilt on to the blade: crafted specifically to deliver poison. She held it under the boatman’s chin. “You womb-souring animal! You have one chance to tell me what was in here.”
He glanced at Padrajisse. “See for yourself.”
The sacrista’s face was twitching. Then one side of her mouth sagged, and she bucked backward. She tried hard to remain silent, but a shuddering groan erupted from her, an animal sound which seemed to come up from the bottom of her belly. Umkhira staggered over and, along with Druadaen, held the spasming sacrista as still as possible.
S’ythreni pushed the knife tighter against the nephew’s throat. “Tell me where you keep the antidote.”
Jaffet’s only reply was a laugh.
“There is none,” Elweyr explained in a gravedigger’s voice.
“Then how did she save you from—?” She fell silent when she saw the look on her friend’s face.
“S’ythreni, oa menessë: she is a sacrista. How do you think she did it?”
The brutal irony—that she who had rescued two of them from the certain death of hyprine was now powerless to save herself from its ravages—seemed to pull all color out of the aeosti’s face. Dagger quivering dangerously in her hand, she stuck her face into Jaffet’s and shrieked, “You imbecile! She was saving you!”
The boatman sounded increasingly weak. “Why? So my mentor’s family can track me down and kill me over the course of days? No, I am no coward. I will die quickly.”
S’ythreni blinked, then nodded. “Here,” she said, “let me help you.” Faster than Druadaen’s eye could see, her right hand swept in, shortsword held in an overhand grip. She rammed it down into his heart.
“S’ythreni, he was—!”
But she rose in one motion and strode away, one hand held up to stop any further words from Druadaen or anyone else.
Padrajisse writhed. Her eyes flew open; they were staring in different directions. She tried to control her motions, shuddered as if an animal inside was trying to get out. But the sacrista lost that final struggle for dignity: her body wrenched so hard that bones cracked. Then she howled and soiled herself.
* * *
The end came shortly after: one abrupt but sustained spasm of boardlike rigidity and then complete collapse, as limp as a bag of old rags.
Druadaen and Umkhira exchanged glances. He wondered at finding nothing odd in seeing only pain and deep mourning in her ur zhog eyes. They nodded to each other, eased Padrajisse’s corpse to the ground, and then he passed a hand over her face to ensure that she would not go into Thyeru’s Creedland while staring at the world she had already left.
Rising, they found Ahearn standing over the broad warrior he had bested, holding the slightly curved broadsword appraisingly. One glimpse confirmed Druadaen’s suspicion: the weapon and the man’s armor bore a brass badge stamped with the outline of a dragon in flight. “So, Kar Krathauans.”
Ahearn nodded. “Hardly a surprise. But odd to find them on this side of the river.”
“Odder still that they knew where to find us,” Elweyr observed as he joined them.
Druadaen nodded, glanced back at Jaffet’s corpse. “It’s easy to see how they knew to ambush us here. But why they did? There’s a troubling mystery.”
Ahearn used his toe to poke the terribly pale soldier, who had used his baldric to cut off the flow of blood to his wrist. “Here now, you. My friend finds your actions mysterious. A thorough answer might change my opinion about putting a proper binding on that little scratch I gave you.”
The Kar Krathauan looked up balefully, then leaned over and very deliberately spat on Ahearn’s boot.
“Ah, I was afraid you might say that,” the swordsman sighed sadly. “You might want to reconsider your answer, seeing as how it’s unwise to disappoint us. Apropos of which—” Ahearn’s spittle-covered boot flashed up and caught the man full in the face. The cause of the resulting crunch was evident as he fell back; his nose was not merely broken but flattened.
“Now, see,” Ahearn mused philosophically, as he held out a hand to restrain Druadaen, “my friend here—the one whose delicate sensibilities are troubled by your mysterious actions—wants me to give up trying to convince you that cooperation would be best for all concerned.” He paused. “But I am a rather hardheaded man, and I’m as impatient as I’m stubborn.” He crouched down. “So, mate, what’ll it be? Cooperation or more persuasion?”
Druadaen pulled the swordsman back, discovered that despite his terrifyingly jocose demeanor, his muscles were taut to the point of quivering. “Ahearn, he’s a Kar Krathauan. He’s not going to share anything. He’s sworn to that on his honor and that of his family.”
“Is that a fact, now?” Ahearn mused, his muscles relaxing.
“Listen to the Dunarran,” the Kar Krathauan said through a split lip. “He knows whereof he speaks.”
Ahearn turned to the bloodied soldier. “See, my friend here is a nice fellow, isn’t he? But I’m not. So start talking.”
The man raised his chin defiantly. “Go to the last hell.”
“Oh, I’m sure I will—and I’ll see you there.” Ahearn swept the man’s own sword across his neck with a sudden sureness that surprised not only Druadaen but Elweyr.
When Druadaen finally found his voice again, he shouted, “By the gods…why?”
“Why?” Ahearn laughed as if it were the stupidest question he’d ever heard. “Because you’d have argued against it like a hand-wringing consecrant of Asheen the Pacifist.”
“Yes, because both mercy and justice demands no less when the lives of another come to rest in our hands alone. But we also needed information.”
“And it was you who pointed out that he wasn’t going to give it to us. And yeh, information is valuable, but not if it costs us our lives.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean you couldn’t afford to let this one leave the field alive. You’ve got the right of him, and you saw him bear it out. Kar Krathauans may be flesh and blood, but they have souls of stone and wills of iron. They’ll report to their captains or die trying. So it was either kill him now—as he’d wish—or later, after you came to realize that even if you did allow S’ythreni to play mumblety-peg about his bollocks with her dagger, he’d still not say a word. And we’d be that much closer to dawn and discovery.”
Druadaen struggled to find a rebuttal, a reason that Ahearn was wrong—had to be wrong—but given the circumstances, he couldn’t find one.
He discovered the swordsman’s hand on his shoulder. “You’re a good leader. Mostly. But you need to leave your blasted Legion behind. Not the training, exactly, but the purpose.”
“What do you mean?”
Elweyr nodded. “He means they’re trained to fight wars. That just as they trained you to fight, they trained you to obey rules. And those rules don’t apply out here. Because this isn’t war; this is just killing.”
Druadaen felt a chill run through him. It wasn’t in reaction to the cool night air, or even the grim picture Elweyr and Ahearn were painting; it was because they were right and he’d resisted seeing it plainly for this long. Until now, when he could no longer avoid seeing the unvarnished truth of what they had to do in order to survive.
Ahearn patted him once on the shoulder and leaned toward the dead man. “Now that that’s settled, I think I’ll just claim my part of their goods right now.” He reached down toward the corpse’s pale neck.
“What are you doing?” Elweyr asked suspiciously.
“Getting what I won at the risk of my life, I’ll have you know! He’s not the type to wear jewelry, I reck, so that bauble about his neck is a graced amulet, for sure!”
Elweyr’s voice became almost clinical. “Are you sure it’s manced?
Ahearn pulled the heavy chain from the body’s neck. “Eh-hah, aren’t you? If there’s not a bit a mancery in it, then what else was keeping you from slowing him down?”
“You mean in addition to the hyprine sprinting along my veins? Oh, not much I suppose.” His tone was no longer sardonic when he ordered, “Give it here.” Seeing Ahearn’s reluctance, he rolled his eyes. “Damn you, I don’t want it for myself. But I do want to see if it’s safe for you to keep.”
Ahearn frowned but dropped it into his friend’s palm.
They waited as Elweyr turned it over slowly, eyes half-lidded.
“Well,” asked Ahearn testily, “is it graced?”
“I’m not sure yet.”
“Well, hurry up, blast you!”
After another few moments, Elweyr held it away from him, studying it before he nodded. “Now I’m sure.” He turned and hurled it into the river.
Ahearn looked like a child whose new toy had been flattened by a passing wagon. “So it wasn’t manced?” he almost wailed.
“Oh, no; it was.”
Misery rapidly became rage. “It was? Then why in flaming—?”
“Because,” Elweyr interrupted in a tone of rebuke, “some enchantments come with a cost. And theirs almost always do,” he emphasized, jerking his head toward the corpse. “Besides, some artifacts alert their creator if they change hands without consent of the one upon whom it was bestowed, or those who received it from a rightful owner.”
Ahearn actually kicked the ground with his boot. “Well, we still could have sold it for—”
Elweyr shook his head. “There are some kinds that can be tracked even if they’re not worn. Besides, if you plan to sell it for something other than a piece of jewelry, then you plan on selling it to someone who knows what it is.”
Druadaen nodded. “And that is also someone who knows that they’ll see Kar Krathaun gold in their palm if they just point their finger after us.”
Ahearn glanced from one to the other, then stomped away—and almost tripped over Jaffet’s body. He snarled as he stumbled, which clearly irritated the wound in his buttock. Then he began to grin. “I always said that mouthy bastard was a pain in the—”
“No,” Elweyr said shaking his head in an attempt to ward off the dismal pun. “Just…no.”
* * *
After searching for the velene and fearing it lost—or that it had abandoned him—Druadaen was startled to discover it perched upon the bloody chest of the first haideq he had defeated. Along with the others, he was even more surprised to find the fellow still alive; a near-miracle, given his wound. Druadaen nodded to himself; Padrajisse’s assertions about the velene’s curative, or at least sustaining, powers had not been exaggerations, apparently.
But when he extended his arm, the velene stared without moving; it had no intention of returning to his wrist just yet.
Umkhira, who was walking with the aid of an oar, nodded. “It means to keep him alive. At least, for now.”
Ahearn nodded. “She’s right. Seems yer silvery pet made sure there’s someone left to answer your questions.”
The haideq was not cooperative at first, but it seemed that the velene was doing more than controlling bleeding internally and externally; it was also reducing the pain much as it had reduced Raun’s seasickness. After several agonizing attempts at refusing to cooperate, the haideq shared what he knew. Which proved to be relatively little.
“We weren’t trailing you as you mean,” he said, his thick Caottaluran accent mixed with something else: T’Oridrean, maybe. “We just received information.”
“How?”
“Through our zhedrayam.”
“‘Master,’” Druadaen translated for the others.
“Not exactly,” Elweyr corrected. “Not if his zhedrayam was Sanslovan.” A surprised sideways glance from the haideq confirmed that had been the case. “In that mantic order, there is a strict hierarchy which coordinates members of many skills and aptitudes. Sanslovan haideqs are sworn to defend the life of their mentor—a mantic—unto the loss of their own. At least until they have completed their probationary period in the order and become hazhadam: independents or ‘self-masters.’”
Druadaen nodded, tried not to appear as impatient as he felt. “Valuable knowledge, but again, haideq: From whom did your zhedrayam receive word of our whereabouts?”
The haideq started to shrug, remembered the pain waiting just beyond the limits of his immobility, shook his head instead. “I don’t know. Only my master knew that.”
Druadaen tried a different tack. “Do you recall when he received word? Or where?”
The increasingly pale man nodded faintly. “On our way here.”
“What?” exclaimed Ahearn, rubbing the inexpert bandage that had been applied to his posterior. “That’s madness! They sent you after us before you knew where we were going?”
“We were sent even before we knew who we were to ambush.”
“Is he deranged from blood loss?” Ahearn asked of the others.
Elweyr shook his head. “No, I think not. And I think I am beginning to understand how this was arranged. Tell me, did your zhedrayam tell you of the plans in the evening or in the morning?”
“The morning.”
Elweyr nodded. “So he received messages during the night. When he was asleep.”
“That is their way, usually. He dreamspoke with whichever senior Sanslovan wished this done.” The haideq considered, frowning bitterly. “But it seems their dreams are not always so clear.”
“Why do you say that?”
The bodyguard’s eyes cut briefly toward S’ythreni. “The aeosti. We were told there was one among you, but when we observed you from the bank, we saw none. Even my zhedrayam thought there had been a mistake, a misunderstanding, although he said that it should not be possible. We looked carefully but her head was always covered, and she does not—well, does not look like an Iavan.”
“What do you mean?” Druadaen asked, holding up a hand to keep S’ythreni from breaking in.
“In my travels with my zhedrayam, I have seen parties of Iavans from Alriadex and sometimes from Mirroskye itself. They are never equipped as men. All their clothes and gear is…is different. Strange.”
“What brought you to Kar Krathau?”
“We had no reason to come here, except to find you. We were in Vallishar. At court. To help the Grand Potentate.” He laughed sharply; blood spattered out on his lips and chin.
“You found your work for him amusing?”
“No. But it was laughable that the Grand Verdigris never realized that working for him was a way to work for ourselves. We lined our pockets with spoils whenever he called upon my master to settle matters in which he himself could not afford to be implicated. And all the while, we worked as intelligencers for Rakuur.”
“Rakuur?” wondered Umkhira.
“Sovereign Overlord of Caottalura,” murmured Elweyr, who turned toward the dying armsman. “Did the Grand Potentate approve your mission here, or was it unknown to him?”
But the haideq’s only answer was a long, final sigh.
The velene rose slowly and lifted its head, silver eyes regarding Druadaen, who extended his hand toward it. It ran up his arm, flowed around his wrist, and was suddenly a featureless bracelet again. “Well, it seems that when we have finished our business in the Thelkrag Kar, we shall not be returning through Vallishar.”
S’ythreni glanced at him. “Because we can’t be sure what kind of reception we would get from its Grand Potentate?” She shrugged. “I am simply happy we need not pass through that sewer again.”
“It’s a long way around to the next country on the littoral,” Elweyr pointed out.
Druadaen glanced at the riding boots of the two haideqs. “Well, at least we won’t have to walk. Let’s follow their tracks.”