Kushiel's Justice (55 page)

It wouldn’t come to it, of course. I had a considerable income and estates of my own, despite the fact that I neglected them. I’d never cared about wealth or status. I’d gladly cede it all if it meant getting out of Vralia.

Because all I really wanted in the world was to go home and make love to my girl.

F
IFTY-SIX

B
Y THE TIME
I
FOUND
M
IROSLAS
, it was well and truly winter in Vralia. Even in Terre d’Ange, the frost must have been thick on the ground. Summer had passed and autumn had come and gone since I began my quest.

If it hadn’t been for the war, I daresay my luck would have been worse. I bypassed the first village I enountered, but I couldn’t afford to bypass the second. I’d been two days and the better part of three nights on the road, with naught to eat but a quarter-loaf of bread. If I chanced waiting for another, farther village and it proved more than a day’s ride, I’d starve. As it was, hunger made a knot in my belly, and I was starting to feel dizzy. I’d pushed myself and my stolen mount, trying to stay well ahead of any pursuit.

Luck was still with me.

Unlike in Terre d’Ange, gossip in Vralia didn’t spread swiftly from town to town. The distances were too vast, and the commonfolk had little cause to travel during the cold months. No one in the small farming village I entered had heard news of a D’Angeline spy in Tarkov. The village was a quarter empty, for many of the young men had gone to enlist in Micah ben Ximon’s army. The people I did encounter were curious and kind, especially the women. There was no inn, but a generous widow put me up for the night. She fed me and let my horse shelter in her cow byre. When I left the next day, she gave me three loaves of bread, a wheel of cheese, and a fur hat and mittens that had belonged to her husband.

I paid her with Tadeuz Vral’s coins, feeling guilty. I might not be a spy, but of a surety, I was deceiving everyone I encountered. It was a feeling that stayed with me during my journey. I tried to avoid inhabited places, but when the snow began to fall in earnest, I had little choice. And too, there was the small matter of getting lost, which happened several times when I took a wrong turn and cost myself days. If I had pursuers, all I could hope was that it confused them.

Miroslas wasn’t easy to reach. It lay several days’ ride past the nearest village. If I’d been on foot, I might have given up. There had been heavy snowfall, and the path—it wasn’t even a proper road—was nearly invisible. If it hadn’t been for the peaks of the Narodin Mountains visible toward the east, I would have gotten lost. I spent half my time making camp; trampling snow before I could built a fire, breaking off pine branches to build a makeshift pallet, rigging windbreaks for my stolen mount, melting snow in a small iron pot I’d purchased from a family weathy enough to have one to spare.

When I did find Miroslas at last, it seemed almost a mirage. A yeshiva of sorts, Ethan had called it, but it looked more like a castle hidden in the woods; except that there were no walls, no defenses. Only an open courtyard, where an elderly man was sweeping snow.

Somehow, it seemed disrespectful to ride. I dismounted and approached on foot, leading my horse. The man paused, leaning on his broom and watching. “Shalom, father,” I said in Habiru. “I’m seeking—”

“So the avenging angel has arrived,” he interrupted me.

I said nothing.

“It is the wise man who knows the value of silence,” he observed. “It is our policy to welcome all travellers. Yeshua’s mercy knows no bounds.” He pointed. “You may stable your horse there, poor beast. When you have finished, come find me. I am Avraham ben David, the Rebbe of Miroslas.”

I inclined my head. “Imriel nó Montrève de la Courcel.”

“I know who you are,” he said.

I led my horse to the stables. There were no other horses there, only goats. A young Vralian man was there, milking one of them. He gaped at me, but said nothing, only pointed to an empty stall. I found the hayrack and a bucket. The Vralian pointed to a tub of water, already beginning to ice over. I lugged an armload of hay into the stall and filled the bucket with water for my grateful mount, then unsaddled him and rubbed him down with a handful of straw, trying to think what in the world I would say to the Rebbe.

It was a quiet place, Miroslas. A place where men go to think and be quiet, Ethan had said. It was true. As I learned later, many of the men there had taken an oath to dwell in silence, contemplating the glories of Yeshua. When I entered through the unguarded main door, the sound of my boot-heels on the flagstones seemed very loud. A fellow of middle years, clad in plain black robes, approached me with a wondering look.

“Rebbe Avraham told me to find him,” I said softly in Habiru. He shook his head, uncomprehending. I repeated myself in Rus.

His eyes lit. He touched my arm and beckoned. I thought he would lead me to the Rebbe, but instead, he led me down a long corridor to a dining hall filled with long, empty tables. There I sat while he served me a dish of meat dumplings so good I nearly groaned aloud. If it hadn’t been for all the silence, I would have.

When I had finished, he touched my arm again, motioning for me to leave my pack and follow him. It was a good thing I’d had practice in unspoken communication with Kebek. I followed him down another long corridor. We passed other men in plain robes. All of them looked curiously at me. None of them spoke.

He led me to the temple proper. It held the Yeshuite accoutrements with which I was familiar: the
khai
symbol inlaid in mosaic on the floor, the ever-lit lamp of the Ur Tamid. The ark containing the sacred scrolls; a replica of that original ark described in the Tanakh. I hadn’t read the Tanakh. But I knew where it was, that ark. It was in Saba, on an island called Kapporeth, in the midst of the Lake of Tears. I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, but I knew. I’d been there. It was where Phèdre had found the Name of God.

And there was one thing here that was not there.

A great cross of rough-hewn timbers, lashed together and bolted to the wall. The Rebbe lay prostrate before it, his arms spread wide. My guide touched my arm a final time, nodded, and departed. I waited.

After a long time, Rebbe Avraham rose. He sat on a wooden bench and beckoned to me. I joined him.

“What do you see?” he asked me.

“A cruel way to die,” I said.

“You find it barbaric.” He nodded. “When Tadeuz Vral seized upon it as a symbol, I did, too. And yet, he is right.” He turned a deep gaze on me. “Yeshua ben Yosef
chose
this. To subject himself to every humility mortal flesh might bear, to offer up his suffering, to make atonement for all of mankind. On his own shoulders, he bore this cross to the place of his own death, bloodied by the lash, enduring the jeers and spittle of an ignorant populace filled with fear and hatred. Should we not be humbled by this?”

I thought about Phèdre and Daršanga. “Yes, of course.”

“And yet you are not,” the Rebbe said. “Not enough to accept his sacrifice with gratitude.”

I spread my hands. “My lord . . . I am D’Angeline.”

“D’Angeline,” he mused. “What does that mean? Elua ben Yeshua was born of the blood of the
mashiach
. And yet he rejected his birthright when it was offered to him.”

“Blessed Elua had more than one birthright, Father,” I said. “The one he chose was love.”

“Carnal love,” he said. “Not divine love.”

I shrugged. “We are mortal flesh, my lord. How can we separate the two?”

The Rebbe sighed. “Here in this place, I seek understanding. I seek to understand Yeshua’s will; Adonai’s will. I seek to reconcile the Yeshua-that-was, the gentle philosopher, with the Yeshua-who-comes, the warrior. To reconcile the long history and traditions of my people, the Children of Yisra-el, with this fierce new faith of Tadeuz Vral. But I do not think I will ever understand D’Angelines.”

I smiled wryly. “Nor I Yeshuites.”

He was silent for a long moment. “I know why you have come. And I would ask you to find it in your heart to leave.”

“Do you know what he did?” I asked.

“Yes.” Rebbe Avraham’s face looked old and tired. “Yes, I do. Many of the men who come here seek solace in silence and thought. Berlik did, too. But not all who come vow themselves to silence. Berlik spoke to me. We spoke at great length. I know what he did.”

“Then how can you ask?” I said.

“Because it is my duty,” he said quietly. “Because I have seen the depth of grief in his heart at his own actions. Because Yeshua’s death granted all men the right to repent and atone. Is your Elua, your god of love, so merciless?”

“No.” I gazed at the cross. The blood stirred in my veins, whispered in my ears like the distant rustle of bronze wings. “But I am not here on Elua’s business, Father. I am here on Kushiel’s. And his mercy is just, but it is stern.”

“God’s punisher,” the Rebbe said. “He who loved his charges too well.”

“Yes.”

Another silence passed between us. “If this is love at work, it is no kind I recognize. Berlik is not here.” Rebbe Avraham ben David squared his shoulders. “I sent him away. I could not allow this to happen under my roof.”

“Where?” I asked.

“Do you know,” he said without answering, “he sought to extract a promise from me. That I would tell you, if you came. You and you alone.” His wrinkled lips twisted. “I wouldn’t give it. I didn’t want to know.”

“Where?” I repeated.

His voice rose and cracked. “I gave no promise!”

I said nothing.

“I don’t know,” the Rebbe said at length. “Truly. It is a sin for a man to kill himself, even though he use another man’s hand to do it. Berlik . . . Berlik believed he could see the future. That certain things were foreordained. I will not abet his madness.”

“Berlik
did
see the future,” I said. “Too much of it. I know, I saw it, too. That’s why he killed my wife and our unborn child, my lord. And if he had to do it again, he would, no matter how deeply it grieved him. Again and again.”

“I do not believe that,” he said.

“Then let him convince me,” I said. “Berlik has a right to his wishes. Mayhap this quest is not what I believe it to be.”

Rebbe Avraham lifted his gaze to the cross. His lips moved as he prayed in silence. I waited. Watched his shoulders slump in defeat. “Betimes there are no easy answers, are there?”

“Not always,” I said. “No. We try to be
good
. But the way is seldom clear.”

“Berlik spoke of continuing,” he said heavily. “Of going northeast. Of crossing the mountains. Onward, always onward. I begged him not to risk it, not with winter coming. To wait for spring. Miroslas . . .” He paused. “We have a writ from Tadeuz Vral himself. This land that lies northward under the shadow of the mountains—a great deal of it is set aside for our usage. Leagues and leagues, for silence and contemplation. Berlik needed solitude. I begged him to avail himself of the quiet spaces Miroslas has to offer; in the woods, alone. To hide. I do not know if he heeded me. I know only that he left.”

“How long ago did he leave?” I asked.

“Six weeks ago, perhaps,” the Rebbe said. “Before the heavy snows fell. There has been no word of him since. I cannot say if he stayed or went. I have told you all I know.”

I took a deep breath, feeling a new burden settle into place. “Thank you, Father.”

The Rebbe rose. “Don’t.”

It was the last word he or anyone else spoke to me in Miroslas before I departed. In fact, it was the last word I was to hear spoken by any voice not my own for a long time.

I left Miroslas in the morning. Like the people I’d met elsewhere in Vralia, the silent priests and acolytes had been generous. I was given a chamber with a hard cot on which to sleep, a basin of water for washing. I was fed another meal of plain, hearty fare. My bags were packed with a sack of pottage grain and a heavy parcel of dried, salted meat I couldn’t identify. When I went to the stable to retrieve my mount, I found another sack of coarse grain, large enough to last a long time.

The same young Vralian was there milking the goats. “Why?” I said aloud to him. “If the Rebbe disapproves, why aid me? Wouldn’t it be better to let me wander in the wilderness without succor and let God’s will decide?”

The Vralian didn’t answer; I wasn’t even sure what language I’d spoken in. But he looked at me with grave eyes and offered me a dipperful of warm goat’s milk. I sighed and shook my head. I could guess how the Rebbe would have answered my question.

It is my duty
.

As I had mine, more arduous and distasteful with each day that passed. I led my horse into the courtyard. It was a clear day. The courtyard hadn’t been swept yet, and the sun was bright on the new-fallen snow. Beyond lay a vast tract of woods, dense and pathless. I stooped and touched the ground.

“Blessed Elua, Mighty Kushiel, hear your scion,” I murmured. “I cannot search forever. If it is your will that I find him, let it be swift. And if it is your will that I spare him, I pray you make it known to me.”

There was no answer, but then, there seldom was.

I rose and continued my quest.

F
IFTY-SEVEN

I
DIDN’T COUNT THE DAYS
.

What was the point? I had no fixed destination. I rode back and forth across the cold, snowy land, seeking any sign of Berlik; any sign of human habitation. I measured the passage of time by my dwindling supplies. I gauged my position by keeping sight of a particular peak of the Narodin Mountains, hook-shaped and distinctive. There would come a time when I could simply search no more, and would have to seek civilization or starve.

The sun rose and fell.

I kept searching.

I ate as little as I dared, but I had to be careful. If I was too weary at the end of the day to make a proper campsite, I ran the risk of freezing. I could hunt if it came to it, but I was short of arrows and hunting wouldn’t feed my mount.

He was a good horse, patient and willing. I doled out grain in handfuls. I could abandon him, I supposed, and continue on foot. I wasn’t sure I had the skills for it. I wasn’t sure I had the
heart
for it. It wasn’t just the cruelty. It felt like I’d been alone for a long, long time. Without the company of one single living creature, I wasn’t sure I could continue.

There was a certain peace to it, though. The Vralian wilderness was rugged and gorgeous. My nameless mount and I plodded through pine forests, breaking a trail through deep snow. We scrambled up rocky inclines, and I caught my breath at the splendor of the vistas revealed at the tops. Pine forest spread like an endless carpet, the temple of Miroslas long ago swallowed by it. The tall, jagged peaks of the Narodin Mountains in the background. Frozen lakes, windswept and serene.

There was a good deal of wildlife in the wilderness. I saw foxes and rabbits, their pelts turned a snowy white for winter. Other animals I couldn’t name, low and quick, with dark, luxurious fur and bright, curious eyes. Twice, a herd of deer like no other deer I’d seen, tall and deep-chested, with splendid antlers.

No Berlik.

Days passed, one after the other. Sunny days, cloudy days. Betimes it snowed too hard to see, and we were forced to hunker down and wait until it passed. I grew skilled at building windbreaks and shelters dug into deep snow to hold my body warmth, and learned to carry my waterskin filled with snowmelt inside my clothing so it wouldn’t freeze during the day. My stolen mount grew shaggy. We slogged through snow and clambered over rock. Uncounted days turned into weeks. I don’t know how many leagues Miroslas’ holdings encompassed, but they were immense. And aside from the wildlife, they were utterly uninhabited.

There was no sign of Berlik anywhere. There was no sign of anything human in this emptiness save me, and there were days when I wasn’t too sure about myself.

The days grew shorter.

The nights grew longer, so long they began to seem endless.

I tried to keep the flame of hope alive in my breast; Elua knows, I did. But the place was simply too vast, the task too hard. The long hours of darkness, the eternal loneliness, took their toll. Bit by bit, the flame guttered.

My supplies were running low the second time we encountered the big deer; low enough that I reckoned I’d have to turn back within a day. The first time, I’d seen the herd at a distance. This time, we came upon them at close range. The herd weren’t scared of us, but only watched us with mild gazes as though wondering what strange manner of deer this was with a second body sprouting from its back. My horse stood patiently as I took off my fur mittens and reached for the hunting bow. I nocked an arrow and drew, aiming at the nearest.

The deer watched me, brown ears pricked.

It was an easy kill. In this cold weather, the meat would freeze, so I wouldn’t have to worry about it spoiling. I wouldn’t even have to dry and smoke it. Now I could keep searching longer. Weeks, mayhap. It was a very big deer. Of course, my horse would starve. But mayhap if I turned it loose, it would find its way back to Miroslas. And I could continue alone, on foot, lugging my packs and pounds and pounds of frozen meat. Tramping through the Vralian wilderness and searching for Berlik, who might well be on the far side of the Narodin Mountains, a hundred leagues from here.

I couldn’t do it.

The flame of hope was extinguished.

I lowered the bow. “Blessed Elua forgive me,” I murmured. “I don’t want a reason to keep going.”

The deer walked calmly away toward the herd, its tufted tail flicking. I took a long, shuddering breath, releasing it in a sound that was half laugh, half sob. Tears stung my eyes, threatening to freeze on my cheeks. I swiped roughly at them with one hand, then stowed my hunting bow and put on my mittens, turning my mount’s head.

“It’s over,” I said.

There is a certain peace that comes with accepting failure, too. It settled into me like a stone. I accepted it. Accepted the knowledge that I
had
failed.

I had given up.

There are people in this world whose wills are capable of exceeding the limits of mortal flesh. I wasn’t one of them. I was lonely and hungry and tired, and so cold that I’d forgotten what it felt like to be truly warm. I had failed, and nothing in my life would ever be quite right again. But I simply didn’t have the will to continue.

I made camp that night thinking about all the people I had disappointed. About Urist and the men of Clunderry. Drustan, Breidaia, Sibeal, Talorcan . . . all of those who had loved Dorelei. Alais, and ah, Elua! I was ashamed to face Sidonie, knowing that the shadow of Dorelei’s death would always lay between us. I had tried to atone for our guilt and failed. And Phèdre and Joscelin . . . the thought of the compassion and understanding they would extend made me cringe inside.

They’d never given up. Never.

But even the mortification of that thought wasn’t enough to force me to keep going. The prospect was like a blank wall, unscalable and daunting. I could trek through this trackless wilderness for months. If Berlik was hiding here, I could miss him by a matter of yards. Then spring would come, and he would move onward into even vaster territories. And it wasn’t just the sheer difficulty of it. Every step of the journey had chipped away at my will, ever since I arrived in Vralia. Micah ben Ximon, Ethan of Ommsmeer, Rebbe Avraham, my own doubts . . . all of them had led me to question the merits and cost of this quest.

In the end, it wasn’t why I’d chosen to give up.

It just made it easier.

“I’m sorry, love,” I said aloud to Dorelei’s spirit. “You deserved better. You always did deserve better from me. But I did my best.”

She would have understood, I thought.
Truly
understood. Dorelei had never expected the sort of heroism from me that I expected from myself. That the examples of those I loved demanded. All she’d ever wanted from me was honesty and a measure of kindness. And in that, at least, I’d succeeded.

The thought comforted me as I lay down to sleep in my snow wallow, blankets wrapped around my clothing, the farmer’s widow’s fur hat snug on my head. I watched sparks drift upward from my campfire and listened to my horse snuffle and snort behind the windbreak a few yards away. In the morning, I would think about the rest of my life and how I would begin to live it. Tonight, I didn’t.

I fell asleep and slept without dreaming.

I woke to panic.

Not mine; my horse’s. Its hooves stamped dully on the packed snow as it let out a low whicker of alarm. I was on my feet before I realized I was awake, fumbling for my sword-hilt with one mittened hand. The fire was burning low, casting a very small circle of light. Somewhere out there in the darkness, somewhat large was moving. Somewhat large enough to make the snow creak and groan. There was a rank, musky smell.

“No,” I said. “Oh, no.”

A bear roared.

My horse trumpeted with sheer equine terror and bolted, breaking its tether. I shouted a curse and dropped my sword, scrambling for the hunting bow. Flung off my mittens and nocked an arrow, tracking the darkness. A vast shadow moved; fast, faster than I remembered. I shot at it and missed. And then it was moving, fleeing. It could have killed me, but it didn’t. It fled. Branches snapped in its wake. I ran blindly after it, floundering in the snow and crashing through branches, trying to fit another arrow to the string.

Gone.

I stopped, panting. I’d lost him. I’d also lost my hat, and probably my horse. I wasn’t sure I hadn’t lost myself. I closed my eyes and willed myself to breathe slowly.

There were stars overhead, but no moon. In the woods, there wasn’t enough light by which to see. Still, a fleeing bear leaves a considerable path. I turned around and began the long, tedious process of following it backward by feel.

I don’t think I’d chased the bear for more than a few moments, but it seemed like hours before I saw the flickering light of my campfire. With no hat or mittens, I was truly freezing. My horse was gone. I was lucky the fire hadn’t gone out. I donned my abandoned mittens, then built up the fire with stiff, trembling hands and huddled beside it. My lungs ached from the exertion. My scars ached from the cold, from the memory the sight of him evoked.

“Damn you, Berlik,” I said aloud. “Why now?”

It was him. I didn’t harbor any doubts. In the deep winter of Vralia, any ordinary bear would have been slumbering until spring. I don’t know why I’d been so damnably sure his magic was broken. He’d broken the oath he’d sworn on the troth that bound him to his
diadh-anam
. It didn’t seem fair.

Then again, life seldom did. At least not mine.

I dozed a bit, waking periodically to stoke the campfire. Mostly I waited for sunrise. I kept the hunting bow across my lap, an arrow at the ready, because it would have been foolish not to. I didn’t really think he’d be back, though. If Berlik had wanted me dead, he would have killed me while I slept. I didn’t know what the hell he wanted.

In the morning, I went to find out.

He’d left a trail a blind man could follow. So had my horse, but I reckoned he was halfway to Miroslas by now. I hoped so. And if I followed him, I would lose Berlik’s trail. I ate a breakfast of pottage. Scoured my kettle with snow, melted snow to refill my waterskin. I packed my bags, slung them over my shoulder, and began trudging after Berlik.

On that journey, I counted.

It took seven days. On the third day, I shot a hare. That was the best day. The first day was hard. I’d gotten spoiled, riding. Oh, there had been times when I’d have to go afoot, leading my horse up some tricky escarpment, but it hadn’t been this endless, grueling trek. And my ears were cold, so cold I feared they’d freeze. I’d hoped to find my fur hat, but some animal had dragged it away during the night. I’d looked for the arrow I’d shot at Berlik, but I couldn’t find that, either. When I made camp that evening, I cut a swath of cloth from one of my blankets and wound it around my head. It was good, because I could use it to muffle my face, too.

The fifth day was the worst.

That was the day it snowed. Not so hard that I couldn’t see, but heavily; steadily. Big, white flakes, falling straight downward, drifting through the air. Adding another layer to the soft blanket of whiteness.

Obscuring Berlik’s trail.

I managed to follow it throughout the day, but the impressions his massive paws had left were growing more shallow. The edges were soft and blurred. I could no longer make out the sharp gouges of his long claws; the claws that had laid open my flesh. That had slain my unborn son. I thought about the day I had met Berlik. I’d asked him what would happen if I challenged him for the mannekin trinket. Berlik had showed me his claws.
You do not wish to do that
. He’d tapped the croonie-stone around my neck and bade me accept his oath. Told me that I might be grateful for it one day.

“You were wrong about that,” I said aloud.

I hated to make camp that evening, but his trail was growing too faint. There was no way I could follow it in darkness, not even by feel. With my dagger, I made a gash in the bark of a pine tree, indicating its direction. I tossed a few hunks of frozen hare into pot with a handful of grain. There hadn’t been a lot of meat on the hare, and I was nearly out of grain. The arrow with which I’d shot the hare had gone clean through it and embedded itself in a tree trunk. When I’d tried to wrestle it loose, the shaft had snapped.

That left me with a hunting bow and two arrows. I’d watched Urist make arrows on the island where we were shipwrecked, carving points and hardening them in the fire. But there had been no end of birdlife there. We’d gathered feathers on the beach for fletching, then plucked better ones from the birds we shot. I didn’t have that luxury here.

I tossed my lone dagger end over end, catching the hilt. Joscelin had taught me to throw, of course, and I was a passing fair shot at twenty paces. Mayhap good enough to bring down a hare. Mayhap not.

By my best guess, I wasn’t more than three or four days’ ride from Miroslas. I’d ridden for a long, long time, but I’d been crisscrossing the land, looking for Berlik. Still, on foot, it was another matter. It might take me weeks. And I might well miss it on my first pass. If I did, it could take days to find it or reach the village beyond.

I should have shot the deer.

Fat snowflakes fell, sizzling where they landed on the embers of my campfire. I sheathed my dagger and stirred the embers with a long stick, then laid a few sturdy branches on the fire. I watched the flames rise, licking at the dry wood. Snow fell, catching in my hair, gathering on my shoulders. Melting on my cheeks like tears. I watched the fire. Showers of sparks, snapping and rising. Golden flames. I thought about Sidonie standing in a shaft of sunlight, her golden hair backlit. Tangled on a pillow. Her eyes, black as a Tatar’s, filled with tears.

Just come home
.

“I’ll try,” I murmured. “Swear to Elua, I’ll try, Sun Princess.”

The silent snow continued falling.

I slept fitfully and woke to a world of pristine whiteness. Somewhere in the night, the snow had ceased. Tall pines stood shrouded in white, the dawn breaking over them. The world seemed hushed and sacred. I could understand why a god would seek to built a kingdom here.