I'd been avoiding thinking about Bastilla.
When I was fifteen, the daughter of one of Penrod's grooms had been the love of my life. She had been twenty, gentle and cheerful. When I was sixteen, she broke my heart by marrying a merchant in Tyrfannig. I understood her reasons and knew they were good ones. I even liked her husband, though that had taken me a good long time. After her, I'd slept with a few who had taught me that the act without love was dreary indeed.
I felt nothing more for Bastilla than I did for…Axiel. Less perhaps. Given that, I should have refused her outright rather than leaving the possibility open for some later time. I hadn't had the chance for private conversation until now, but the ride was too good an opportunity.
"If you'll excuse me, ladies," I said, "I'll desert the field of battle, for no man wins a war with a lady's tongue."
Ciarra stuck her lady's tongue out at me.
The trail we were riding through the overgrown forest was wide enough for a wagon, so Pansy and I had little trouble working back to the rear ranks where Bastilla rode with Oreg.
I turned to ride beside them. "Go talk to Ciarra, Oreg. See if Haverness's daughter is any happier with you than she is with me."
"She finds you objectionable?" Bastilla sounded amused.
"I believe it is my eyelashes."
Oreg batted his eyes at me. "Mine are prettier than yours are, Ward. She's bound to like them."
When he'd ridden off, I slowed until we brought up the rear. I switched to Avinhellish, which I spoke with a terrible accent but well enough for my purpose, which was to ensure that no one overheard what I had to say to Bastilla.
"I believe I owe you an explanation, Bastilla."
Her marvelous eyes sparkled in the dappled light, and she smiled. "An explanation for what, Ward?"
"For my refusal of your offer the night before we came to Callis."
Her smile fled as if it had never been. "How so?"
"If we had not been on duty that night, I would have taken you up on your offer. And it would have been wrong."
"Ah." Her gelding bowed his head against her white-fingered grip on the reins. "I am too old for you? Perhaps Tisala suits you better?"
I shook my head. "Not too old." I couldn't let her think this had anything to do with Tisala. "For you, sex is a game—one you play very well. But I cannot view it that way."
"You sound like a virgin bride." Her voice was brittle with hurt.
I shook my head. "My first lover taught me that love only works between equals." And she had been right. She had led and I followed, unable and unwilling to break out of my idiot act, even where I loved. "You and I are not equal in this; you can sleep with Axiel and Penrod without causing them to fret. Anyone who can do that is far more skilled than I am. My second lover taught me that coupling without love is worse than nothing—at least for me."
"And you don't love me."
"Do you love me?" I wouldn't have asked it if I hadn't known the answer.
Her chin went up, and she didn't say anything.
"I should have said this that night. There is no love between us, lady. Respect and lust, yes, at least on my part. But not love."
"You will regret this," she said with a careful smile to hide the hurt in her eyes.
"Lady, my body already does," I said ruefully. "But it is the right thing. I will not play games."
She did not reply. After a few moments, I decided it might be best to give her some time to herself. As I rode past Penrod and Axiel, I jerked my head, and both of them fell back to ride behind Bastilla.
The priest looked at us blandly. "We are here to protect these things. They are dedicated to Meron, and we must keep them in her temple."
The temple in question was a little timber building, half the size of the peasant huts of the town. The priest, Oreg, Bastilla, Axiel, and I were the only ones inside, as there simply wasn't room for anyone else. Tisala had tried to talk to the priest for a few minutes before throwing her arms up and stalking off to get the rest of the little village into packing up and leaving. I hoped she was getting further than I.
"Except for the armband, they're not much," reported Oreg from the altar where he and Bastilla were getting a better look at the items in question. "What magic they had upon them has faded. The armband was powerful once, but there's no shape to the magic anymore."
The priest was visibly displeased with Oreg's assessment.
"They are not worth your life; even the goddess knows that," Axiel said. I'd left the negotiations to Axiel, once Tisala left, since he looked the least like a Northman and spoke Oranstonian.
"I know that, my son." The priest set aside his irritation to smile gently at the dwarf king's son. "But my word is worth my life. If I die in her service, I shall be with her forever."
"You're aiding the enemy," said Oreg unexpectedly. "These don't seem to be powerful, but if the Vorsag gain enough of them, and if they have the right sort of knowledge, they can use this to destroy even the memory of Oranstone and the Great Healer, Meron. If you take them to a fortified place, they will still be hers." But the priest would lose his power outside this village, and he knew it.
"You imply Meron cannot protect her temple," chided the priest.
Oreg moved to my side. "There are rules the gods must follow, or they invite destruction. If she steps in to protect this temple, the Vorsagian gods can act on their behalf, too."
"Perhaps the Vorsag serve Meron, too. Perhaps she has decreed that they shall have the sacred objects." The priest was enjoying this.
Stala said that to persuade someone, you had to know who they were and what they wanted. What made a priest of Meron? They were a peasant group, loosely knit with little higher organization. As Oreg continued to argue, I thought about what we must look like to the priest. Shavigmen, or at least not Oranstonian. But he'd been no more ready to listen to Tisala.
The followers of Meron were men of the land, farmers and herdsmen. Peasants. If a peasant had spoken to a nobleman's messengers the way that this priest was, my father would have him whipped until he couldn't stand up. But a priest was different.
I looked at the priest's calloused hands; he helped in the fields. Perhaps he had his own herds.
"Eh," I broke in, interrupting Oreg rudely. "They're mages, what do they know about the way of the Healer? Good with a fancy argument, they are." I'd heard enough peasant Oranstonian to know I'd gotten the accent close to right. "Nobles who sit in stone halls don't understand the goddess. I worked the land myself, before I took up the sword, and didn't I feel her hand guide my plow?" I thought my father's head herdsman might be a man of the priest's ilk, and his mannerisms weren't difficult to adopt. "Doesn't mean I don't think you ought to take whatever the goddess holds sacred and save it for her." I nodded at the armband that held its place of honor on the altar. "Hate to see that on the arm of one of those heathens who burned Silverfells and stole the dragon stone."
For the first time, the priest looked shaken in his convictions.
"If you take them with you to Callis," I said, "as soon as Kariarn turns his attention elsewhere, you can return them to their place." I heard something odd outside.
He took a deep breath. "I suppose…temporarily…"
It was the faint clash of steel on steel I'd heard. I left the priest dithering to Oreg and took a quick step to the temple door and peered out. It required no more than a glance.
"To arms!" I bellowed, as if I wasn't the last person to see. "Raiders!"
They had doubtless meant to sneak up on the village. But had met with a few of Tisala's men who'd been on the outskirts of town. I tore out of the temple and was on Pansy's back before I'd finished speaking.
The first few men hadn't slowed the mass of Vorsag down much, but by the time I arrived at the fighting, they'd run into the larger block of our troops and their forward progress had slowed to a crawl.