Bells of the Kingdom (Children of the Desert Book 3) (26 page)

“Affiliation, not birth,” Idisio said. The silence still hung too thick and dangerous, so he added, “And if that doesn’t matter to you, consider another name I’m claiming affiliation with: Deiq of Stass.”

Another hiss; he could feel the circle melting away around him, taking to the shadows. More seagulls cried out, sounding agitated this time.

“Marked,” the leader said curtly, then faded with the rest.

Idisio swallowed hard to settle the nervous bile in the back of his throat, then uncrossed his arms and sprinted to catch up with Deiq and Alyea. He couldn’t help feeling a little bit resentful that Cafad’s name held so little power, while a scant mention of Deiq sent everyone scattering.

As Idisio eased into position behind Alyea, Deiq said,
This area is heavily influenced by F’Heing and Darden Families. Scratha means almost nothing here. I’ve gone out of my way to have my name known in a variety of places and aspects. This side of town connects my name with some—unpleasant episodes.
He glanced at Idisio, and his teeth showed, pale in the murky dusk. It might have been a smile, or something less friendly; Idisio had a feeling the latter was more accurate.

It would have been entertaining,
Deiq said thoughtfully, t
o rip off a hand at the wrist. I haven’t done that in a long time. It is a bit more difficult than it sounds, by the way. It’s easier to pull an arm off at the shoulder than a hand at the wrist. Has to do with relative leverage and bone strength. The hand tends to become pulp long before it’s actually torn off.

Idisio set his gaze straight ahead and tried not to think about anything at all. Most of all, he tried to stifle how nauseated Deiq’s matter-of-fact delivery of such gruesome facts made him feel.

Thank you,
Deiq said, more seriously.
You handled it well. You’re better at keeping your temper, in such instances, than I am.

Idisio felt his spine straighten a bit more with the praise. “Yeah, well,” he muttered. “Some things don’t require violence.”

He could feel Deiq’s attention sharpen.
To a lesser form of life,
he said. Y
es. The ha’reye are quite fond of saying that. It’s a pity they don’t follow their own advice more closely, and more often.

Abruptly, he closed up into a bitter silence, as though he’d said too much; and Idisio was more than happy to let the quiet settle in for a long stay.

Kolan pushed the door shut behind him and took three steps into the silence; and ducked. A thick wooden pole whistled past. He promptly dropped full-length on the floor, face down, arms splayed out to either side.

“No harm,” he said, voice muffled by the floorboards, into the resounding lack of sound that followed. “No harm,
s’a.
No harm.”

One end of the pole thumped lightly against the floor; he guessed she was leaning on it, studying him, thinking the situation over.

“I’m only seeking shelter,” he said, turning his head to allow the words to come out clear, but kept his eyes shut. “Nothing more,
s’a.”

“You’d seek shelter in a witch’s house?” she demanded. Her voice was a light alto, and wobbled slightly.

“You’re not a witch,
s’a,”
he said. “And neither is the owner of this home.”

The end of the pole landed firmly in the middle of his back, right on the spine. He winced but made no protest.

“How do you know
I’m
not the owner?” she demanded. “How do you know I’m not a witch?”

“There are no such things as witches,” he said. “There are mechanical traps laid out at the gate, not spells; the place is shut down as though the owner went away. Are you here by invitation,
s’a?”

The pole pressed a little harder, then lifted away. “Yes,” she said. “I am. But
you
aren’t. Back out into the rain with you, thief. Find your shelter elsewhere.”

He stayed still, splayed out on the floor. “I’m not a thief,” he said.

“You avoided the gate traps and came through a locked door,” she said. “That speaks of thievery to me. On your knees and crawl back out the door. I’m not taking any chances on you.”

“I’m wet through, tired, and hungry,” he said. “Have some grace,
s’a.
I’ll sleep here by the door if you’ll allow me; it’s better shelter than I’ll find elsewhere tonight. I give you my word, under the grace of the Four, I won’t move a step without your permission.”

“The Four,” she said bitterly. The pole prodded him in the side. “A thief taking an oath on the Four. How appropriate.”

The depth of her anger told him not to admit he was a priest; that would make matters much worse. “I’m sorry for your pain,
s’a,”
he said. “I can’t change the world. But I’m not a thief, and I mean no harm.”

“What are you then, if not a thief?” she demanded.

“A simple traveler,” he said. “I hail from Arason, originally. I’m trying to get home. I went through Kybeach, but the watchman there rousted me out before I could ask for a room. This road seemed as good as any other.”

“He
would,”
she muttered. “Nasty old bastard.”

“You’re from Kybeach, then,
s’a?”

“I didn’t say so!” Her voice sounded panicked now. The pole caught him on the hip this time. “No, you’re nothing but trouble. You won’t find shelter here. Out you go!”

He sighed and labored to his knees, taking his first look at her. Tall and slender, with long blond hair bound tightly back into a severe tail, she was dressed in shabby servant-clothing of grey and dun. Her feet were bare, and her hands showed no rings; he put her age at somewhere above thirty and under fifty.

Her grey eyes held a familiar shadow, the mark of old and poorly healed pain. She watched him without fear, holding the heavy wooden pole ready. He set his hands on his thighs and tilted his head to look up at her.

“Out,” she said, but made no move to open the door.

“Throwing me out won’t change what I know,” he said. “You’re hiding from someone in Kybeach. A husband, I’m guessing, who beat you until you ran. Yes?”

She stared at him, the color draining from her face.

“Did he
send
you?” she said in a near-whisper.

“No. I told you, I was rousted out before I could so much as get a room. And I won’t go shouting back to Kybeach about you. I’m not holding that as a threat over you,
s’a.
Don’t think that.” He rubbed a hand over his face, trying to think. His mind felt vague and clouded with exhaustion all of a sudden. The room lurched around him. His palms scraped against the floor, his forehead touching the boards; he stayed still, breathing hard, and tried to catch his balance.

Dizziness threw him back into vivid memories of pain and darkness: Ellemoa’s voice hissing and whispering as he hung upside down, flame tracing delicate patterns over his skin as her hands moved, and the abrupt flip upright as he was about to lose consciousness....

He moaned and shuddered, curling tightly into himself, knowing that wouldn’t save him. They wouldn’t let him go into the dark, not yet, he hadn’t screamed nearly enough for that—but there were no voices, no flames; his hands rested on wood, not stone. And the darkness, to Kolan’s intense relief, flowed across him without impediment.

He woke to warm dry air, soft cushions beneath him, a thick blanket over him, and the smell of rosemary and apples. Out of long habit, he lay still, eyes shut, while he sorted out where he was and what was going to happen next.

Someone was moving around; a woman. Memory seeped back: he’d fainted. She’d apparently taken mercy on him and dragged him in here—by herself? She must be stronger than he’d thought. Then again, he’d heard the priests remark that he weighed remarkably little for his size.

She made little noise as she padded around the room. He could hear her only because he was listening carefully. After a few moments, her soft tread faded as though she’d gone into another room.

He turned his head to examine the room. Nearby, a cook-stove radiated warmth and good aromas. A pie—probably apple—sat on a wide stone shelf beside the stove, cooling. Other shelves, further from the stove, held small glass jars of what looked to be jams, chutneys, and pickles.

He propped himself up on his elbows, wincing at the accumulated aches that announced themselves with movement. The kitchen turned out to be a long room, with two wide benches set near the cook-stove, one of which he was occupying. Three tall, glazed earthenware vases stood empty and somehow forlorn along one side of the room.

His clothes hung on a drying-rack beside the stove.
All
of his clothes.

“So you’re awake,” the woman said, coming back in through a curtained entrance at the far end of the room. “Good. Are you clear-headed enough to answer some questions?”

Her tone held no more sympathy than it had before, for all that she’d brought him close to the fire and undressed him. Kolan pondered for a moment, then pushed the blanket aside and sat up, swinging his legs over the side of the bench to put his bare feet flat on the floor.

She regarded him without any reaction at all, so he said, with matching bluntness, “What do you want to know?”

“Who are you?”

“Kolan. From Arason.”

Her gaze moved to the scars webbed across his body, and her mouth tightened. “I can see you were hurt,” she said. “Is anyone after you?”

“No.”

“Why are you here? Why did you come all the way out to this place, instead of following the proper road east to Arason? The truth, this time.”

He hesitated a moment, then said, with care, “I had hoped to find—an old friend here. But I was wrong.”

“Who’s this old friend?” The woman pointed at his chest. “The one who did
that
to you?”

He put a hand to the ropy scar that ran from his left shoulder across his chest to his lower right hip, tracing it absently. “Not this one,” he said. “But some of the others. Yes.”

“So you’re looking to kill her?”

“No,” Kolan said, and smiled at her evident surprise. “No, there’s no point to that. I’m hoping she’s alive, but that’s probably foolish.”

“What’s this old friend’s name?” the woman demanded, still emanating prickly suspicion.

He checked intuition to be sure it was safe, then answered honestly. “Ellemoa.”

Some of the tension left the woman’s slender frame. “Ellemoa,” she repeated. “And you truly don’t know whose house this is?”

“Just that it belongs to a supposed witch,” he said.

“So your Ellemoa is a witch, then?”

“She’s been called that,” he admitted. “But she’s no more a witch than ... than I am.” He looked down at his hands and frowned a little. “She’s not a witch,” he added, not looking up.

“Why don’t you want to kill her?” The question held a barbed anger. “After those scars—why don’t you want to kill her? Never mind. Not my concern. Don’t answer that.” She shook her head and hurried past him to check on the stove.

A cloud of damp, rosemary-laden air rushed out as she opened the oven and withdrew a large clay casserole pan. Setting it on top of the cook-stove, she put the heavy potholders aside, closed the oven door, then glanced over her shoulder at Kolan. “Are you hungry?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

He stood, went to the drying-rack, and checked his clothes: warm and dry. He dressed without haste, then sat back down on the bench he’d woken upon and watched her fill bowls with a vegetable-noodle mixture of some sort.

“Arason noodles,” she said as she handed him a bowl. “Ought to be a nice taste of—”

He sat still, his eyes abruptly flooding with tears.

“—Kolan?”

He sucked in a shuddering breath, rubbing a sleeve across his eyes, and offered her a wan smile. “Sorry,” he said. “It’s been a while since I’ve—been home. Eaten food from home. I miss it.”

She sat beside him, her own bowl cradled carelessly in one hand, and tried for a little smile herself. “Sometimes I miss home as well, horrible as I know Kybeach must seem to an outsider,” she said. “I had to leave my daughter behind. She thinks I ran off with a southerner, or that I’m dead, or some such. But if I’d taken her, my husband never would have stopped hunting, and he would have killed me when he caught us. She meant far more to him than I ever did. This was the only safe place I could think of, close enough to watch—”

She stopped and looked down at her bowl, prodding her spoon through it, then shrugged and began eating.

He followed suit, content with the silence and her slowly thawing temper.

“It’s none of your concern,” she said at last. “No more than your woman is of mine.”

He looked at her sidelong, considering; then said, “What’s
your
name?”

“Rodira,” she said. Then, a little defiantly: “Rodira Lashnar.”

“Rodira,” Kolan repeated slowly. “Lashnar.” He lowered his bowl to his lap and frowned down at it. “I think I met your husband when I passed through Kybeach.”

She started up, her face shaded with fresh alarm, and retreated three long steps before he had a chance to say anything else.

“He sent you!” she said, a bit shrilly. “I knew it!”

Kolan shook his head and stayed seated. “No,” he said. “He was very drunk. He came along while the night watchman was trying to herd me out of town.”