"No," Chei said with a shake of his head.
"Then take my order. You will go no further with us."
Vanye looked around at her in dismay, at a face implacable in the starlight, a figure that had as well be some warlike statue.
"Liyo—"
"He is a danger," she said in the Kurshin tongue. "There is a gate yonder. Has thee forgotten?"
"There is not enough time!"
"Tell me how long it takes. There were wounded aplenty back there."
"It is Chei! Would a qhal come asking where his brother was? Is that the kind of question a qhal would ask first, who knowswhat the gates are?"
"Barring other chances, there is the matter of bloodfeud. Of revenge."
"Revenge? God in Heaven, has the man come seeking revenge on me? I wish he would—I wish he wouldsay something—"
"In time to come, at some point of crisis—yes. Being what he is, he may well think of revenge, when he wakes from the shock of it. I will not have him with us, at your back—or mine."
"For the love of God, liyo!No! I refuse this. I will not have it."
"We gave him what chance we could. Here is an end of it. He goes, Vanye."
"And where is my voice in this?"
"Thee is always free to choose."
He stared at her in shock, numb. It was the old answer. It was forever true. It was real now, an ultimatum, from which there was, on this plain, near the gates—no return within her trust.
"You will go," she said to Chei.
"Lady—"
"Life I have given you. Use it."
"You have taken my brother's!"
"Aye, and spared yours just now. Do not stay to rest. Take your horse and go. Now."
"Vanye—" Chei said.
"I cannot," he said, forcing the words. "I cannot, Chei."
Chei said nothing for a moment. Then he struggled toward his feet. Vanye put out a hand to help him and he struck it away, fumbling after his horse's reins.
"At least," Vanye said to Morgaine, "let him rest here!"
"No."
Chei did not look at him until he was in the saddle, and then he was all shadow, there between the menhirs.
He rode away without a word, whipping the exhausted horse with blows Vanye felt in his own flesh.
"Liyo,"he said then to Morgaine, without looking at her, "I know your reasons. I know everything you would say. But, Mother of God, could we not have let him rest, could we not have tried him—?"
"Pity," she said, "will be your undoing. I did this. I have spared you the necessity. For your sake—and mine. And I have given him cause to hate me. That is my best gift. Best he lose his zeal for us altogether—before it kills him. Thatis the pity I have for him. And best it come from me rather than you. That is all the mercy I have."
He stared at her in the darkness, somewhere between numbness and outrage. Now it was temper from her. Now she was righteous. "Aye," he said, and sat down abruptly, deciding that numbness was better, for the night, perhaps for a good many days to come.
There was a pain behind his eyes. He rested his head on his arm and tried to make it go away, or the pain in his heart to stop, or the fear in his gut; and none of them had remedy, except that Morgaine knew that pain, Morgaine was still with him, Morgaine was sunk in her own silence and Morgaine was bearing unto herself—she had told the truth—all the cruelty of which he was not capable.
The road stretched on and on in the starlight, unremitting nightmare, and Gault-Qhiverin clung to the course with what followers he had left to him. There was a wetness all down his side, the wound broken open again, though he had bound it, and the roan horse's gait did nothing to lessen the pain of his wounds.
"Go back," his captain said to him. "My lord, let us continue. You go back. We dare not lose you—" Which was true: there were many in Gault's household who were there for reasons which had much to do with court and intrigue and the saving of their lives—lose him they dared not, for fear of who might replace him in Morund.
But they were not mortal wounds, that bled down his side and across his back. He would live to deal with consequences, and he had said things and compromised himself in front of witnesses, in ways that required personal action to redeem him: no, my lord, treason was never my purpose. I only queried them to learn their business: my offers to them were a lie.
Formmeant a great deal in Mante, whatever the Overlord knew of true purposes.
There was most of all, most of all—revenge. And the saving of his reputation: Gault was never without double purposes, even in something so precious to him as his best friend's life. There were ways and ways to accomplish anything; and revenge was always best if it accomplished more than its immediate aims.
This was the common sense that had settled into Gault now the blood was cool and the purpose formed: alliance was not possible and therefore he would be virtuous, serve his own interests in the other way—and survive to deal with his and Pyverrn's enemies.
The pair of them first for himself; and, failing that, for Mante and Skarrin's gentle inquiries. That was the object of his ride.
But there was something before him on the road, a single moving darkness that advanced and gained detail at the combined speed of their horses.
"What is that?" one of his company asked. "Whois that?"—for Tejhos was behind them on the road, where the two members of their own company had gone message-bearing and asking after troops. This could be no answer Mante had sent—from upland, from that direction.
Closer and closer the rider came, on a horse weary and faltering in the night.
"Lord Gault!" the rider cried. "Lord Gault!"
Gault spurred the roan forward of the rest. "Who are you?" he yelled back at the oncoming rider.
And had his answer as the pale-haired rider came straight for him with a howl neither human nor qhal.
"Gault—!"
A sword glittered in the starlight. He whipped his own out and up, and metal rang on metal as the fool tried to leave his saddle and bear him off the horse.
But a knife was in the other hand. It scored his armor and found a chink in his belly, and he yelled in shock as he brought his own sword-hilt round, the only weapon he could bring to bear at too close a range, battering at his enemy who was ripping the knife upward in his belly before his men could close in and pull the man off.
"My lord," his men cried, holding him in their arms, lifting him from the saddle, as he clamped a hand to his gut and stared down at the wild man the rest of them had caught and pinned.
"Do not kill him!" he managed to say, while his gut leaked blood through his fingers and the chill came on him. "Do not kill this one."
The Man screamed and lunged at him, trying before the others could stop him to tear him down by the feet, by the knees; but they held him.
"Do not hurt him," Gault said again, and the man struggled and screamed at him, calling him butcher and coward and what other things Gault's dimming hearing lost track of.
"I am Chei ep Kantory," the man yelled at him. 'Try again, Gault. Do you want a shape to wear? Do you need one? I will give you one—I will give you mine."
"He is mad," someone said.
"What do you want?" Gault asked, fascinated despite the pain that racked him and the cold that came on him. "What price—for this partnership?"