Angus Wells - The God Wars 03 (33 page)

           
"But you?" He raised his
head, chin tilted to indicate the clearing. "When that magic struck, how
did you survive? Ochen said the destruction of the uwagi should destroy the
living. Yet—thanks be to Dera!—you live."

           
She nodded, her eyes clouding, and
murmured, "Ochen said their destruction should slay the living."

           
"I do not understand," he
said.

           
"No." Fear grew in her
eyes and she bit a moment at her lower lip. "There is much to be
explained."

           
Again she shuddered, and he held her
tight, not understanding. "Do we find the others?" he suggested,
thinking that the best reassurance.

           
For a moment she hesitated, holding
him, not wanting to face what now must be told, what could no longer be hidden.
Then she said, very softly, forlornly, "Aye. Do we find them and speak of
all this."

           
CALANDRYLL'S bruised leg pained him,
aching dully as they made their way back toward the road, so that he leaned
against Cennaire, letting her help him over obstacles, avoid the hindrance of
thickets and brambles, content enough to feel her arm around his waist, his
about her shoulders. The forest was very dark now, the night aging toward dawn,
and he found it difficult to discern the path, while Cennaire seemed not to
hesitate, as if her eyes found the obfuscation no problem.

           
He wondered at that, and then at all
he had witnessed: her strength, the way she had faced and overcome the uwagi,
that she was not destroyed with the were-breasts, and had stood immune to
Rhythamun's magic.

           
But
neither was I, he thought, so perhaps whatever gramaryes protected me protected
her.

           
Perhaps,
he thought, she is chosen by the Younger Gods, and they protect her.

           
And yet, had Ochen not said that the
magicks that might destroy the uwagi must also destroy the living? That had been
the trap Rhythamun set, so why—
how
—had
Cennaire lived through that assault?

           
Her arm was warm where it rested
about his waist. He smelled her hair, the scent of her skin,- could feel the
softness of her as he held her,- had tasted the vitality of her lips. And yet .
. . How had she slain the uwagi? How had she found him? How had she survived?

           
He did not understand, and when he
turned his face to look at her, to voice the questions, he saw hers set grim,
determined, as if she moved toward confrontation, not away from a victory. She
seemed ... he was not sure . . . wary, fatalistic, and he left the words
unsaid, the doubts unsettled, skirling troublesome about his mind. She had
saved his life, preserved the quest—surely that spoke for itself, that she had
risked her own life for his sake. There could surely be no doubt of her
integrity. He pushed such thoughts aside, remembering the softness of her lips,
her embrace, and without thinking nuzzled her glossy hair.

           
Cennaire started at the touch,
glancing up, her eyes troubled. Her mouth curved in a brief smile and then she
looked away, concentrating on the path. She was afraid—of what must now become
revealed, and of how he might react, how his comrades would react. Perhaps
Ochen—who had so far kept her secret—could sway them, could persuade them
against . . . She was uncertain what they might do. Look to slay her? Banish
her from their company? Demand the wazir bind her with his magicks? For an
instant she contemplated deserting Calandryll, leaving him to make his own way
back to the road. Then dismissed the notion: he could barely walk unaided and
might lie lost within the forest, or Rhythamun might return in some guise to
slay him. That thought she could not bear, so she stifled her fear and pressed
on. She would bring him to the road's edge at the least, and then . . . Then
she would decide. She could leave him there, safe, and follow after. Save then
she must trek to Pamur-teng and likely onward to Anwar-teng, and all her gear
lay in her saddlebags. Doubtless, did she simply disappear, the mirror Anomius
had given her should be discovered, and with it her secret. Then, if she were
gone, the questers must surely deem her enemy, and turn against her; and did
that come to pass, she could entertain little hope of success, either of
satisfying the strictures of her master, or of regaining her heart.

           
It was an enigma, a mandala,
twisting about itself so that each possibility, every consideration, returned
to the starting point: that whichever course she chose, she must stand revealed
as reve- nant.

           
There seemed, in it all, only the
one sure fact— that she must return Calandryll to safety and reach whatever
decision she must make after she knew him secure.

           
As chance had it, or fate, or
whatever design wove their destinies, the decision was taken from her.

           
THE
night descended into the absolute absence of light that precedes dawn. The
forest was utterly still. Then the sky was filled with grey opalescence, birds
began to chorus, announcing the ascension of the sun, and the blank etiolation
was transformed. The heavens paled, grey replaced with soft pink, brightening
to silvery gold, hints of azure. Cennaire heard the searchers long before
Calandryll, and thought again of leaving him. Dismissed the thought as she felt
his weight against her, and went on, toward the sounds. She felt suddenly very
weary, leeched of judgment, indecisive, even careless of her fate. What came
would come: she would see Calandryll safe, and that would be enough.

           
Suddenly, bright as the radiance
that filled the sky, she experienced a kind of freedom. She thought no longer
of herself, but only of him. She smiled and asked, "Do you hear? We come
to the road. To safety."

           
Calandryll frowned, head cocked,
listening, then nodded and grinned: "Aye, I hear them now."

           
Then figures came through the trees,
Bracht and Katya, Ochen, Chazali, kotu-zen. Cennaire called, "Here,"
and she was surrounded, passing her limping burden to the Kern and the
kiriwashen, the wazir and the warrior woman either side of her, questions
clammering until she shook her head and trod wearily toward the road.

           
Pyres burned there, consuming the
slain, the survivors of the battle moving farther off, upwind, to where more
welcoming fires blazed, giving off the smell of roasting meat and tea. Ochen
caught Cennaire's eye and smiled wanly, she answering in kind, helplessly,
allowing herself to be carried along, seeing Calandryll settled on a spread
blanket, against a saddle, Ochen kneeling to massage his damaged leg, murmuring
softly, his sorcery healing.

           
Katya said, "We feared you
slain," her grey eyes wondering.

           
Bracht looked up from over Ochen's
shoulder and said, "What happened? Where were you?"

           
Calandryll said, "She saved me.
Dera, but had she not come ..." and then halted, staring, puzzled, at the
Kand woman, dawn's early light, the company of comrades, reawakening all the
questions the night and relief at living still had stifled.

           
Ochen said, "Do we take tea,
and s,peak? I think the time has come that certain truths be told."

           
Cennaire glanced round, thinking
that she might, even now, flee. Might burst through the ring of curious
watchers and escape into the woods. She had fought with uwagi, had lived
through occult assault—these mere men could hardly withstand her. Then she met
Ochen's gaze, and saw a question in his narrow eyes, and a measure of hope, and
she shrugged, filled with careless exhaustion, a lassitude that leeched her of
purpose, leaving behind only a numb fatalism, and nodded, seating herself.

           
Calandryll, looking hard into her
eyes, said, "Had Cennaire not come, I should be dead now. Rhythamun set
his snares well, and without her aid, he'd have slain me."

           
His voice was firm, but she saw a
question in his eyes and wondered if he did not dredge that authority from a
sense of loyalty, from the attraction she sensed he held. She was flattered,
smiling her gratitude, albeit wanly, but still felt careless of her fate, in a
manner she did not properly understand grateful that it was now taken out of
her hands.

           
"How so?" asked Bracht.
"Her?"

           
"Aye," Calandryll said.
"I owe Cennaire my life."

           
"Ochen sent his magic to your
aid," Katya said, "augmented by the wazir-narimasu. Do you tell us
what happened?"'

           
Cennaire sat waiting, irresolute,
committed now to revelation, starting when Calandryll reached out to take her
hand, answering his smile with hopeless determination, then turning toward
Ochen, saying, "Aye, tell it."

           
"They seized me," said
Calandryll, "on Rhythamun's instruction, and took me into the forest
..."

           
Cennaire listened as he told the
tale, her eyes on his face, aware of the gasps that escaped the others,
surprised, all save Ochen, who took up the story:

           
"I found the wazir-narimasu as
I hoped I should, and we brought our power into the aethyr, joined and channeled.
Rhythamun's trap was triple set— that the uwagi might slay Calandryll; or he
destroy himself by slaying them; or Rhythamun slay him. All that in the
physical plane; far worse that Rhythamun leech out his animus, entrap his
pneuma in the realms of the aethyr. It was a design of diabolic cunning, and
without Cennaire it should have succeeded. She it was saved Calandryll where I,
and the wazir-narimasu, should have failed. Without her, Calandryll would now
be dead, and his soul ensnared by the warlock, by Tharn. Had she not
intervened, your quest would be doomed to failure. What hope remains, you owe
to her."

           
"How," asked Bracht,
studying the Kand woman with confusion in his blue eyes, "did she survive
that destruction? You say you placed a protection about Calandryll; but she
stood alone when your magic struck."

           
"And how," Katya asked,
softer, the beginnings of suspicion in her voice, "did she find
Calandryll? You told us pursuit was useless. That we might do nothing, save
trust in you and her."

           
"Aye, so I did," Ochen
returned.

           
"And that magic that destroys
the uwagi destroys the living with it," Bracht said. "So how does
Cennaire survive?"

           
"Dera, she saved me!"
Calandryll said, defensive, not liking the direction these questions took.
"Does the how of it matter? The why of it? She saved me—I owe her my life!
Without her I should be slain now, or worse."

           
Cennaire felt his fingers clutch
tighter on her hand, and smiled thanks for his trust. Their eyes met, a hope, a
warning, in his that she chose to ignore as she shook her head and said,
"Ochen knows how I survived." Then she sighed and asked, "So,
wazir, do you tell it, or I?"

           
Ochen fetched the kettle from the
fire, filled cups with tea, and passed them round, his wrinkled face creased
deeper as he pondered. When all, waiting, bewildered and impatient, had
accepted, he said, "First, understand that I have known since you came
into this land what you are, all of you. That is why I league with you—that
Rhythamun shall be defeated, that Tharn be not raised, the Arcanum destroyed. I
saw in each of your souls the measure of your spirit, the hope and the purpose
in you. Those things that cannot be concealed from one who views the aethyr
..."

           
"Riddles," Bracht grunted.
"Speak plain, Ochen."

           
The wazir nodded, hesitating.
Cennaire extracted her hand from Calandryll's grip, no longer able to wait,
wanting only that all be laid open so that she know, for better or for worse,
how they—how he!— might view her when the truth was told.

           
"I am magic's creation,"
she said quietly. "Anomius made me."

           
“Anomius!”
The falchion was suddenly in Bracht's hand, leveled on her heart as the Kern
sprang upright. "You're his creature?"

           
"Bracht!" Calandryll moved
to push the blade aside. "For Dera's sake! For Ahrd's sake! She saved my
life."

           
The Kern shifted balance, away from
Calandryll's grasp, the sword still angled at Cennaire's breast. Katya glanced
briefly at Ochen and motioned Bracht to wait, though Cennaire saw her own right
hand drop to her saber's hilt.