"The fortress was built around the wells," he explained to her as they entered a dim cavernous space, lit by sky holes. "Their water has not run dry in five thousand years."
The chamber was damp and smelled of bats and their droppings. Odd pieces of glazed tile still clung to upper portions of the wall, and the sky holes were glazed with thick lenses of rock crystal. Wisps of mist rising from the wells scudded across the natural rock floor. The wells were laid out in a honeycomb pattern, with only thin strips of rock between them. Some steamed more than others, and their colors varied from milky blue and green, to rusty yellow and pink, to crystal clear sapphire and inky black.
"No two share the same temperature or taste," Lan said, pulling two horn cups from the pack around his waist. "It is custom to sample twelve of the thirteen."
He had thought ahead, she realized, for the cups were normally in one of his saddlebags. Realizing he was making an effort to be amiable, she took one of the cups from his hand. "You go first."
He crossed to one of the wells at the back of the chamber, easily balancing on the narrow stcffip gangways. "This Sull will try the water that looks the worst."
Ash laughed, surprised by his humor. Following his path along the lips of the wells, she went to join him. Crouching, Lan scooped up a cup of gray water and drank. She watched him swallow and then did the same. The water smelled of sulfur and bubbled in her mouth. It was lukewarm.
"You must choose the next one," he told her.
She picked the largest well. Steam peeled off the surface, and its water was hot and clear and salty. Lan chose one of the rust-colored wells next and Ash was impressed by its coldness. They moved between the wells in silence, crouching, sniffing, tasting. Lan kept count, and when they had sampled eleven of the thirteen wells he said, "It is custom to bathe in the twelfth well."
She looked at him carefully. His sharply angled face was still. Mist had coated his skin in a fine film.
"We have been lucky in our choices. The two wells that remain are both warm." He shrugged off his buckskin cloak. "Make a choice."
Ash followed tMmotion of his hand. One of the wells was clear and Mack and barely steamed. The other lay at the center of the honeycomb and was milky green with a circle of cloud above it. "That one, she said. "As long as it is not too hot."
Lan undressed and left his clothes and gear in a neat pile on the rock floor. Naked, he stepped into the pool. His body was lean and muscular, covered by a fine down of golden hair that darkened around his pubis. Ash looked at him and found she had no desire. Outside the sun was setting and the sky holes let in rings of amber light. The mist and dimness were making her drowsy and she yawned as she pulled off her clothes. Once she'd removed her boots she earned her clothes to Lan's pile and dumped them on top. The boots knocked against his bom anowcase, making the arrows slide out. A few of them came out all the way, revealing their steel heads with the holes drilled through them. The heads were socketed into the wooden shafts and bound with wire. One of the three was bound with something else.
'"Come," Lain called. "This Sull does not wish to boil alone."
Ash turned quickly and went to join him, Tiptoeing around the wells, she thought about the arrow. It did not seem such a bad thing. With a high squeal she jumped into the pool.
Water splashed up, soaking Lan and sloshing into the other pools. It was shockingly hot and Ash's skin reddened immediately. Dipping her head under, she wetted her hair and face. Lan was leaning against the bowl of the well, his arms stretched wide. The lead clasps that bound his braids had reacted to something in the water and turned silver black. Ash floated away from him, coming to rest on the opposite side of the bowl. A ledge cut below the surface provided a place to rest and Ash sat and luxuriated in the steaming water.
«Drink,» Lan said after a while.
Of course, this was the twelfth well and she hadn't sampled its water yet. Leaning forward she opened her mouth and let it fill with sweet-tasting liquid. Lan watched as she swallowed.
Ash closed her eye. "It's getting dark,"she said. "We may have to wait for the moon to rise to get back."
"It is the dark of moon tonight."
The Far Rider's voice rippled toward her across the delicious warmth of the weter. She tilted her head and let her arms and legs float to the surface. Heat enveloped her, wrapping around her belly and thighs, and cupping her neck. She drafted free, slowly turn-ing in the water. Sleep came as gentle relaxing of thought and
At first the nightmares did not come. She floated in darkness, insu-lated. Something sissed softly. Laughter tinkled then faded away. Mistressss.
The word roused her and she swung away from it. Far in the distance water lapped against rock.
A massive and unknowable presence turned in the darkness, watchful, cunning, waiting. It had bided in the shadows for hundreds of years, and its time was drawing close.
Wake.
Ash inhaled deeply, opened her eyes. All was dark and still Memories slid into place and she realized she was in water. The sun had set and the sky holes let in no light. "Lan?" she called, not expecting an answer. Kicking, she propelled herself to the edge of the bowl. The stone felt cool against her palm. Cool and good. She waited a moment, gathering her strength, and then pulled herself out of the pool.
Water streamed down her body. Her legs felt like wet sticks, barely able to take her weight. Tentatively, she took a step across the stone in the direction of the entrance, seeking a flat surface with the pad of her toe. She knew the direction of the stairs, but she and Lan had been bathing in one of the middle wells and that meant that other wells stood between her and a way out. Crouching, she felt her way along the rim. The pressure on her knees made them shake in spasms, and she doubted if she could hold her weight this way for long. The hot water had robbed her strength.
Slowly, she edged between the pools. Mist purled under her chin. Water bubbled. The blackness was absolute, but she found she wasn't afraid of it. She just wanted to be gone from the wells. An enchantment had been practiced here. Twelve of the thirteen wells: Lan had tricked her with a spell to make her sleep.
Finally her toes and fingers detected a broad shelf of rock. Collapsing onto her butt she just sat for a while to think She decided she had been very stupid. After seeing what was wrapped around the tang of Lan's arrowhead she should not have entered the water. She should have been afraid, not flattered.
The thick lock of hair she had given to the Far Rider had been divided in two, and half of it had been bound to the arrow. And she thought she knew what had happened to the other half.
It had made a creature of the Blind explode. There had been no heart-kill. Lan's second and third arrows had penetrated shoulder flesh. She had made the mistake of assuming that his first shot, the one she had not seen, had hit the creature's heart. She had been dead wrong. Lan Fallstar was no Raif Sevrance.
He had been experimenting that night in the woods, testing to see if the girl he had stumbled upon on the south bank of the Flow could really be what he suspected: the Reach. He had never been interested in her safe passage to the Heart Fires. The only thing he cared about was whether or not she was useful. And he had wanted to keep her isolated until he knew for sure.
Now what?
Ash rose to standing. Her body was cooling and she felt some of her physical strength returning. She would not think about their love-making, the betrayal of her flesh. I initiated it, she reminded herself sharply. The fault was mine.
Casting around in the darkness, she attempted to locate her clothes and weapons. Nothing was there. Not even her boots or dress. This had been carefully planned, she realized. Right down to the dark of moon. He might have been planning it from that very first night, when he had paid a terrible toll in burned flesh. Ark Veinsplitter and Mal Naysayer had never put red-hot knives to their arms—and they'd had many costly tolls to pay.