A man in gray stood beside the Lady Idane. The two of them turned away.
There was only the clearing, the heat, Noya bringing her sword once more toward Tegan’s guard in this last match, this final time, this last time for losing.
I outreach her, Tegan thought. I always did. She is fast, but there is a pattern that she follows. If I move here, turn her on her own path, then, then-
A calm came upon her, the world slowed down for her to use, for the lady had turned away and there was only Tegan, centered in a still place born of despair and loss where nothing mattered except the blade’s edge, the pattern of its reaching.
See, how slow this is, the back of Noya’s knee exposed, the dark sureness welling up within me, a touch there. So! So slowly, I turn as she trips, my sword a part of my arm, weightless, a hawk stooping from this far and distant sky where I’m alone-
Noya lay on her back, the point of Tegan’s sword at her throat.
Well. Well, Tegan thought.
Noya rolled away, laughing at the expression on Tegan’s face.
Tegan was only human, no emperor’s child. She held no magic except a demonsoul stone, and no enchanted sword. She could never win against a demon. She kept her back to the outside world, trying to create a barrier of mortal flesh between Ninidh and freedom. Her grip on the sword began to loosen. She fought to hold it, useless though it seemed to be.
Ninidh, laughing, held a king’s ransom of opals in her hands. What weakness in that, that a mortal could use?
Tegan reached for a calm place that she had once found, a still place born of despair where nothing mattered except the blade’s edge, the pattern of its reaching-
Tegan struck at the demon’s hands. Her sword could not cut demonflesh, but it struck the gems. Raw opals scattered across the cave.
The invisible substance that was Ninidh shrieked in outrage. The demon sank toward the floor. Her insubstantial fingers plucked at the tossed gems. The stones drew themselves into little heaps as Ninidh tried to pick them up again. Tegan let herself feel the smallest bit of hope.
“Well fought,” old Caedrun said. “Well fought.”
Noya, on her feet again and still smiling, handed over the water jug.
It was so good, so wet, Tegan’s thirst had been like a fire in her throat. She drank, and drank again, and handed the jug to Noya. Far to the west, thunderheads were growing, black at their bases and moving quickly.
“Tegan! Come here, please.” The Lady Idane called. “Caedrun, see to the packing, if you would, and Noya. We will be leaving sooner than I expected.”
Tegan rushed to keep up with her, the lady speeding along a path through the crackling leaves, this once careless of their noise. The man in gray-had he been real? Tegan felt eyes on her, appraising eyes, but when she looked, she saw bare branches, bright evergreens waiting for snow. No man anywhere.
The lady carried a wrapped bundle on her back. It contained, Tegan knew, the Sword.
They reached the sourcespring. The stream that welled from it led down toward the pass, the road back into the lowlands.
Beside it, crouched, an impossible beast lapped at the water with its long tongue, its bronze wings furled tightly on the length of its huge back. The beast backed away from the spring and growled. The lady shoved at it with her shoulder and scratched a spot behind its ears.
“This is Tegan,” she told the beast. “Take her scent. Tegan, come closer.”
Reek of giant cat, hot breath, the beast reached out its long neck and sniffed at Tegan’s hand. Its rough tongue flicked lightly along the skin of her wrist, taking a delicate taste.
“Stand still,” the lady cautioned.
Tegan stood still. It had never occurred to her to move. She was almost too awed to be frightened.
The Lady Idane mounted the griffin and settled the weight of the Sword over her shoulders.
“This is not to be your life. You will leave us now.”
The protests that rose in Tegan’s throat died at the look on Idane’s face.
“Here.” Idane tossed a small sack tied with a familiar green ribbon. Tegan caught it. It was heavy.
“You won’t understand, not for a long, long time. Nothing I can say will-Oh, bother! Go quickly. We are hunted.”
The Lady Idane touched her heels to the beast’s side. The griffin stretched its wings and rose toward the western pass, toward the gathering storm.
Rejected, cast aside, named unworthy. Tegan had hated the Lady Idane with deep hatred, and tried to mask it in disdain. Who did she think she was, this uncaring woman, but a surrogate mother to a bunch of foolish women who lived in tents? They were fools, fools who saw themselves as knights-errant for the weak. Feh. Their schemes and manipulations seemed to do so little in the world.
Tegan despised them. They were petty, and cruel, to cast her aside.
I’ll show you! Tegan thought. She clenched her fist at the sky and choked back tears. I’ll show you!
Wealth and power, and satins, and kingdoms to do her bidding, that was what Tegan had decided would be hers, in that moment when the griffin vanished forever. How were they gained in this world? How did a woman gain them? Not by eating beans and wearing rough linen in a mountain camp.
She went to the Red Temple at Wellfleet. She listened to the random bragging of her clients. She kept the coins that were her due, and avoided the gaming tables. She spent some of them on lessons in swordplay, telling herself it was only to keep her body hard and tight, for she sought clients who liked hard, tight bodies, and found them.
The deceptions that the world called beauty, she learned those, too, cosmetic arts, gestures, the uses of a low and murmuring voice. Even among the wrecked souls of the Red Temple, there were skills to be gained.
If the women of Small Aldwyn, her mother, her sister, knew how she had gained her wealth in those visits she made them, they pretended not to know. Then Lyse’s husband vanished, Lyse’s child with him. Lyse’s grief had led Tegan in a search for knowledge of the lands around Idris-and she found Osyr, a fitting tool to use against Idris.
Osyr now used, now dead.
As she would be, soon, and for naught.
In the mine, Ninidh’s presence seemed stronger, as if each stone she gathered from the floor added to her substance. Laughter filled the cave and echoed back from the tunnels.
Did you think to hold me? the demon asked. Oh, foolish mortal.
Tegan struck again at the gems, scattering them to the far corners of the cave.
The demon’s breath washed across Tegan, a wave of ice, of terror. Cold sweat drenched Tegan’s face.
Ninidh would be loosed to do as she would, and her theft of whatever gems she wanted would only make the ones yet to be found more valuable. Another duke would hold power in Idris, in Osyr, and the mine would be restocked with little ones. Ninidh would like that, an ever renewed source of innocent souls to chew up and spit out.
The demon’s malice leached away the last of Tegan’s strength. She fell to her knees, weakness bringing her down as if she were made of melting wax. Darkness rose from within her, darkness that filled the cave and left her helpless, paralyzed. Her sword slipped from her hand. Her breath sighed out and she knew that her muscles would not move to draw in another.
Was this how dying felt? Where were the bright memories, the peace that the priests of Ardneh promised? Where?
The cave filled with a space where falling stars streaked across the night, a space of utter silence in which Ninidh’s shriek of immortal terror tore at the hills themselves.
Ninidh shrank away from a sword wielded by a goddess in silver armor that reflected the red of Tegan’s dress, or it was a chiton she wore, gauzy draperies spun of unearthly silk.
Ninidh retreated, her substance torn by the invisible path of the terrible blade. Tegan got to her knees, released from the demon’s attention by the onslaught of the Sword of Stealth.