Bloodsongs (21 page)

She started to protest. “But Kel . . .”

He raised a stern finger. “You said he wouldn't come until tomorrow night.”

She thought about it and remembered the hard ground that had been her bed last night. She still ached from that and from her long ride. She said no more but picked up her sword and followed Lycho.

Once through that dark doorway, they passed down a long corridor. The candles mounted on the walls were unlit, but enough light spilled from some of the smaller side rooms to let her see. There was a narrow kitchen, and next to that a chamber empty of anything but kneeling cushions. An inner prayer room, she decided. She passed another room whose center was occupied by a large wooden tub; several white garments hung on lines and dripped on the grooved floor.

Beyond that were the sleeping rooms. Lycho opened a door and motioned for her to enter. A single lamp filled the small room with a warm amber glow. Her gaze fell at once on the bed. It was not plush by any standard, yet she could see that the mattress was soft. A beautifully dyed linen cloth lay folded at the foot. Lycho spread it over the mattress and tucked it under the edges.

“This is your room,” she said with sudden realization.

He nodded and winked. “Between us, it's the most comfortable in the temple.” He opened a chest beside the bed and took out a large pillow. It was dyed with a different but equally beautiful pattern. He placed it on the bed and fluffed it. “I'll use one of the other rooms. There's little sickness in Dakariar this time of year, and we've no other guests.”

“I can't take your room,” she protested.

“You're not taking it,” he said with a grin. “I'm giving it. Would you like more light?”

She wanted nothing but to crawl into that bed and grab some sleep. She leaned her blade against the wall close enough to reach if she needed it. Then she sat down on a stool and removed her boots.

Lycho watched her. “I'm going to bring you a pitcher of drink,” he said. “Your fatigue is plain to see. The water of the gods will chase it away.”

“Will it chase away my confusion?” she said softly, surprising herself. She looked at the man standing across the room. He was younger than she was; his face was still unlined and his hair untouched by gray. Yet he had been generous, and there was something about him she trusted. It seemed a long time since she had trusted anyone.

“You are troubled in your mind,” Lycho said gently.

She leaned back against the wall and let go a sigh. “I don't know what's happening,” she confessed, finding it easy to talk to the priest. “I don't know what my son is plotting. I don't know if his will is his own, or if a sorcerer has entranced him.” She looked at her hands and began to massage the stiffness from her fingers. “I hate him with all my heart for what he did to his brother,” she said distantly, “and yet, I love him, too. How can that be?”

Lycho said nothing, but he listened, and she found she could not stop talking.

“I want to kill him for the things he's done, but I don't know if I can.” She sat forward, rested her elbows on her knees and her chin in her palms. She closed her eyes, and faces swam in her memory—Kimon and Kirigi and Kel—each wearing the expressions she remembered best.

Her heart felt like a lifeless stone in her chest.

“I don't know what's happening,” she repeated. “I don't know what I'm doing.”

Lycho kneeled down before her. He tilted his head and smiled when she met his gaze. “Follow your spirit, woman.” His voice was a comforting whisper, and he placed a hand on the side of her knee. “It will tell you what to do when the time comes.”

“You didn't see Soushane,” she insisted. “I gathered the bodies. . . .”

“When the time comes,” he said again, “you'll know what to do. You're Kel's mother. No son can forget the one who gave him life.” He stood slowly, squeezed her hand, lifted her to her feet, and pointed to the bed. “Now rest. I'll bring you the water.”

“I'm not really thirsty,” she said as she started to unfasten her tunic.

“Drink anyway. It won't end your confusion, but when it eases your aches and pains, you may see things more clearly.”

He left her alone; she listened to his footsteps recede down the corridor. He'd been kind, she reminded herself, so she resolved to drink his water and not offend him. Every town and village had its local superstitions. But priests without a god? She scratched her head at that.

By the time Lycho returned, she was naked between the sheets. He set a pitcher and cup on a small stand and poured for her. With a word of thanks she accepted and drained the cup, then handed it back. “You haven't asked my name,” she said at last.

He tucked the topmost sheet close under her chin. “It wasn't important,” he answered. “You came to do a good deed, to warn us about your son.” He moved her sword within easier reach.

She bit her lip. “No, I just came to find him.”

Lycho bent over the lamp, prepared to extinguish it. But he paused long enough to wink at her again. “But you warned us first. You see? It's just as I told you.” He blew out the lamp and darkness filled the room. “When the time comes, you'll know what must be done.”

She heard him move toward the door, though she could not see him. “It's Samidar,” she whispered quietly, “though most people call me Frost.”

She didn't know if he'd heard.

A lonely kind of fear stole over her as she lay there in the dark, listening for any tiny sound that might break the silence. But, little by little, the softness of the mattress and the cool of the sheets dulled her senses and swept her to the borderland of sleep. She turned onto her side and listened to the distant muffled thudding of her heart. A wetness damped the corners of her eyes, lingered on her lashes.

Her last thought set the tone for her dreams.

She felt so old.

 

 

 

Chapter Ten

 

When Dark Angels sing

The wings of Night enfold

The souls of men,

And melodies of wind

Whistle down in sharp arcs

To wake the land.

Crimson notes blow,

Spreading music in a flow,

And last songs are heard one time

Then never again.

 

Frost woke with only a vague memory of the strange songs that had filled the night's dreaming. Yet some of the lyrics stuck in her head, and she lay on her back for some time trying to decipher their meanings, piecing them together with other bits she remembered as if they were parts of a puzzle.

But if she could not remember the words, it was impossible to forget the singer. His face hovered in her memories, untouchable, beyond her embrace. “Kimon,” she moaned softly, clutching the thin sheet to her breasts. His voice was a haunting echo, distantly heard, fading.

She sat up slowly and swung her feet over the edge of the bed. The sky beyond the room's only window was still dark, nor was there anything to light the lamp. She listened for some sound, anything to indicate if anyone else stirred.

Nothing.

She wrapped the sheet around herself and stood. The floor stones were cool against her bare feet. She padded noiselessly to the door and out into the corridor. A thin beam of amber light stole under a door farther down the hall, but she didn't approach it. Instead, she turned the other way and emerged into the temple's main chamber where the priests had fed her earlier. She passed the table, went outside into the night, and leaned upon the well. A gentle wind blew down the empty streets.

All Dakariar must be asleep
, she thought,
but me
.

“Are you all right?”

She whirled, startled, then relaxed when she recognized Lycho standing in the entrance. She leaned back on the well and thought before giving an answer. Slowly, a wan smile parted her lips. Her aches were gone; the soreness had left her muscles; all the stiff spots from sleeping on the ground had melted away.

“It's the power of the water,” he told her. He came to her side and began to haul the rope. She could hear the water at the well's bottom and smell it as he drew it up. He produced a small cup from a pocket in his robe. “Drink, Samidar,” he said quietly. “It has more work yet to do.”

She looked at him strangely, wondering what he meant. She didn't really believe in his well. She had needed sleep; that was all.

“Your body's pain is soothed,” Lycho continued, “but I can feel the heaviness of your spirit. Drink of the well.” He pushed the cup into her hands and lifted them to her lips. “In time, it will ease all your burdens.”

She hesitated, then tossed the contents down with a quick gulp. She was thirsty, after all. She gave him back the vessel when it was empty. “I haven't got time,” she said. “Kel comes tonight.”

Lycho was silent for a long while. He dipped his cup into the bucket and sipped. “It is a wonderful night,” he said, gazing at the stars that twinkled overhead. “But not long before dawn.”

She looked at him, finding some measure of strength in his tranquillity. His mouth shone with moisture, and his eyes were full of a soft glow. “You are kind,” she told him.

He smiled. “You are lost,” he answered, touching her bare shoulder lightly. “At least, you think you are. But you'll find yourself.”

She turned away and her gaze wandered up and down the street, then up to the night sky. The moon was already down, it seemed. The breeze kissed her cheek. “I don't know, Lycho. There's so much I'm afraid of, so much I don't know.” She took a few steps out into the lane and said wistfully, “Can you understand? I'm standing in shadows and staring at stars.”

He folded his arms and sat back on the well's edge. “If you can see the stars at all, then they'll fill you with light.”

Such guileless words, she thought. How could she help but grin? She realized suddenly just how little Lycho knew of the world. He had said he was not from Dakariar. From the next town, then, she guessed, or the next city over the hill, or maybe the next farm. She couldn't laugh at him, though. His innocence touched her.

“We both should have been poets,” she said, “with our sweet words and clever phrases.”

Lycho shook his head. “What do you mean?”

“Never mind.” She went back to the well and sat beside him.

The night was silent, a world of grays and blacks, of shadows and deeper shadows. Yet the air was cool and refreshing. She was glad she had awakened so early. The water's smell so close was almost a perfume, and Lycho beside her smelled as clean and sweet. She studied him out of the corner of her eye. Their arms brushed, and she made a quiet decision.

“Would you make love to me?”

Lycho looked down at her slowly, and she could not read his expression. His hand covered hers, a soft caress. “I don't love you,” he said honestly, “though in time I think I could.”

Love didn't always matter. It was his warmth she needed. Her arms had been empty for too long, and for too long there had been no one to hold her. More than anything she wanted to touch him and to be touched, to forget everything but what they could share together for a short time.

But he kept his silence.

“I'll say please, Lycho,” she offered. “I'm not above that.”

There was the slightest tremor in his touch when he rose. He clung to her hand. “I'm the one who should say please,” he answered. His fingers interlocked with hers. His flesh was warm as fire.

She took a deep breath, then led him back into the temple and to her room. She needed no light to find the bed and wanted none. She unwound the sheet from her body and draped it over the bottom of the bed, then watched as Lycho lifted the hem of his robe, pulled it over his head, and let it fall to the floor. He wore another garment of linen around his loins. He unwound that and dropped it by the robe.

She thought of Kimon, mildly surprised to find she could do so without any sense of guilt. This was no act of betrayal. She needed arms to hold her, and Kimon's arms were dust and death. Her love for her husband was not weakened, nor was her grief diminished.

But Lycho had arms of flesh and blood, and her flesh and blood cried out for his touch. It would not have been different for Kimon had he lived and she died. It wouldn't have been different for any man or woman.

“Samidar . . .”

She shook her head, touched a finger to her lips. No words were necessary. He came to her then, and she slid her arms around him. He did the same. She laid her head on his chest to hear the pounding of his heart, and a welcome contentment settled upon her. She hugged him close.

They did not need love to make love. The sun found them curled in each other's embrace, peacefully sleeping.

 

Later, when they had breakfasted, they walked through Dakariar. Pericant and Oric went with them. The town was subdued, the streets filled with a ghostly silence.

“They're afraid,” Pericant said ominously. “They hide behind their shutters.”

“Many left in the night,” Oric informed them. “Nearly half the town was gone by midnight.”

None of the shops were open. Not a single wagon rolled down the roads. To all appearances Dakariar was dead. An anvil lay abandoned in the gutter, and farther down the way a trunk with a broken lid spilled its contents in the dust. Those who had fled had wasted no time.

Frost went to the nearest door and pounded. No answer. She pounded again and called out. Nothing stirred or answered from within. She tried her weight against the door, then, and wasn't too surprised to find it barred on the inside.

She turned back to Lycho and frowned. “I guess the smart ones ran away. We're left with the mice.”

He gave her a tolerant smile. “We're left with the women and the children and the old ones.” Then his smile vanished, and he shrugged. “Maybe a few mice.”