“And the ships at Tjis?”
“Have received an order to return, their captains and a few picked men to accept the bounty of the guardian in chariots and zeebas, and to proceed overland to the southeasternmost village on the Istris-Ioli road. Here to await yourself.”
“And thereafter to ride into Istris at my back,” said Kesarh. He grinned.
The ships would be slow. He had had no intention to allow his triumphal re-entry into the city to be marred or delayed. The caviling blond-haired half-blood sops who had jittered on their vessels, scared to fight, then mewling about the rights of slaves—they should run behind him through the streets, his kalinx pack, his dogs, for all Vis-Karmiss to see or to hear of.
“We’ll take the boat across again at first light. Where are the rowers sleeping?”
“On the beach, my lord.”
“You can have this cell. Share it with Number Nine, I’m sure he won’t object.”
The soldier stepped aside as Kesarh strode through the doorway and on up the slope toward the temple. Puzzled, the Number Three wondered if his Prince were going to give thanks to Ashara.
The little metal discs on the trees fluttered, making an eerie irritation of sound that seemed to burn in his veins.
He by-passed the great doors of the temple and continued along the black running wall. Quite simply, during their many conversations, his sister had mentioned where the novitiates were housed. Quite simply too, as his health improved, she had been less and less with him.
Presently an arch broke the wall. He went through into a courtyard. A single torch in a vase of thin pinkish stone trembled above a doormouth. The wind was rising on the sea. It could be a rough crossing tomorrow.
Kesarh knocked on the door. A grill was raised and a dark face showed in the glow of the torch-lamp.
“Who’s there?”
“I am the Prince Kesarh Am Xai. I’m here to bid my sister farewell. Let me in.”
“You may not enter.”
“Either you let me by or I break in the door.”
“This is a sacred place.”
“Then keep it sacred. Don’t risk unholy violence.”
There was a whispering, and the face went from the grill. Kesarh waited. The strength which flowed in him, which would brook no denial, seemed also aware that denial would not, ultimately, be tendered. After a minute, he heard a bar retracted on the inside of the door, which then opened to let him through.
He advanced into the gloomy passage and a weightless hand fell on his wrist. He looked, and saw a Lowland woman was by him, pure Lowland from the look of her, her narrow hand now shielding a candleflame from the snarl of wind at the door.
“You see Val Nardia. She is here. Follow, I’ll guide you to her.”
Something in this astonished him. He nearly laughed. They were naïve, then, or more wily than he had thought them.
Kesarh went after the woman and the flame, both blonde, ghostly on the unlit passages. There seemed a mile of these, serpentinely twisting, sloping up or down, and all lightless. Now and then the candle touched a side-turning, or the recess of a door. He suspected the obscurity was a device to confuse intruders, or profane visitors like himself.
Abruptly the woman halted. They were at another door-recess. She moved about and faced him.
“This is Val Nardia’s chamber. She is in the shrine just beyond. You should not disturb her there. Her meditation will shortly be ended. She’ll return, and find you.”
For a moment, he wondered if that were some trick, but then the Lowland woman said to him: “There are high slots in these walls, open to the sky. In the dusk before dawn you should be able to see quite well. The Princess herself can direct you.”
Kesarh lifted his eyebrows at her impassiveness.
“You imagine I’ll be here all night.”
She merely looked at him. Her face was unreadable. Only the yellow eyes gave any color to it, and the violet jewel depending on her forehead—the Serpent’s Eye, gem of the goddess.
“Well,” he said, “I intend to be off the island by sunrise.”
“Then she will light a lamp for you.”
Kesarh suddenly laughed.
“How much do you want for this? Or is it to be a gift to the temple?”
“My lord,” the Lowland priestess said, “the only gift which is required will be given.”
“A riddle. I said, how much?”
“My lord,” the priestess said. That was all. He glimpsed her leaning toward the candle and heard the snake-hiss as her breath blew it out. In the sheer blackness he did not see her go, nor hear it. No glimmer came from the slots above, if slots there were, this place was turned away from the moon and the Star.
Kesarh fumbled with the door and felt it give. The room beyond was lamplit, and he went into it, slamming the door shut on the black outside. The encounter had angered him. He glanced about, and perceived instantly the other curtained doorway. Ripping the curtain aside he gazed into a fresh lightless passage, which presumably led to the shrine the woman had mentioned. With an oath, he pulled the curtain to again and gave his attention to the empty room.
It was spare and small and, to Kesarh, unbeautiful. At junctures, Val Nardia’s own possessions stood or lay, the chests he had seen piled up at Istris for her departure, a box of Elyrian enamel, the plain mantle she wore here. The bed was low and slender. Lying on the pillow was a dying flower that he had tucked yesterday into her hair. He picked it up. A little of its scent still lingered, but mostly now it was perfumed with Val Nardia, and he crushed it in his hand.
Then he heard the noise of the curtain behind him, and next the long indrawn gasp.
He turned. She was barefoot, and had carried no light through the dark. Now she seemed half-blinded, by the lamps, or by him.
“How did you come here?” she said.
“Your priestesses let me in. I came to say good-bye. I leave tomorrow.”
“But,” she said. Unlike the face of the Lowlander, Val Nardia’s gorgeous face was utterly readable. She had flown here for sanctuary, but the sanctuary had abetted him. She was betrayed.
“There are no windows in this room,” he said. “You can’t see the sky. Or the stars. Not even Zastis.”
She took a step toward him. “You must go. Go now.”
“When you believed I might die, you were full of grief and fear. Now you pack me off, maybe to my death, like a doll you tired of. Is that how you considered me, all those years we were children together? A toy. Useful, comfortable. Made of wood or rags.”
“No,” she said, “that’s how you think of me.” Her honey eyes widened. “Something for your use. Your admiring slave. A game you played. For your use.”
“Let me use you then,” he said. “And you, Val Nardia, use me.”
She opened her mouth, and this time he knew it was to scream. Before she could make a sound, he had closed the gap between them. He grasped her against him. The gauzy robe she wore, the shift under it, made no barrier. He seemed to feel her body and its detail as if both of them were already naked. The hand he had clamped across her mouth he drew away, closing her mouth instead with his own. She struggled, as she had struggled before, but more frenziedly now. Even, she tried to bite him, his lips, his tongue, as they invaded her. But the bites were ineffectual, she could not bring herself to hurt him, even in this. He knew a blazing stab of pity for her, pity which was also love, and could have wept himself as he drew his head away. She was too breathless now to scream. Besides, who would hear her?