In the farmsteads and villages, Midlanders tossed in their sleep, plagued by nightmares. The color of their dreams changed. Where they had seen a horse as white as foam, they saw three; smoke and pitch and blood.
Where they had seen a venerable figure—a Man, or something like one—with a gem as clear as water on his breast, they saw a shadowy face, averted, and a rough stone clenched in a child’s fist, the crunch of bone and a splash of blood.
Over and over, it rose and fell.
Onward, they rode.
Lilias was seasick.
She leaned over the railing of the dwarf ship Yrinna’s Bounty and spewed her guts into the surging waves. When the contents of her belly had been purged to emptiness, her guts continued to churn. There was no surcease upon these lurching decks, this infernal swell. The waves rose and fell, rose and fell, a constant reminder that the world she knew had vanished. Lilias retched and brought up bile until her very flesh burned with dry, bitter heat. It was no wonder she failed to hear the approach of the Ellyl behind her.
“Pray, steady yourself, Sorceress.” A cool hand soothed her brow, and there was comfort and sweet ease in the touch. “’Tis but Meronin’s waves that do disturb those accustomed to the solid ground of Uru-Alat.”
“Get away!” Lilias, straightening, shoved him. “Leave me alone.”
“Forgive me.” The Ellyl took a graceful step backward, raising his slender hands; Peldras, one of Malthus’ Companions. The one with the damnable shadow of sorrow and compassion in his gaze. “I meant only to bring comfort.”
Lilias laughed, a sound as harsh as the calling of gulls. Her mouth was parched and foul. She pushed strands of dark hair, sticky with bile, out of her face. “Oh, comfort, is it? Can you undo what is done, Ellyl? Can you restore Calandor to life?”
“You know that such a thing cannot be.” The Ellyl did not flinch, and the sorrow in his gaze only deepened. “Lady Sorceress, I regret the deaths at Beshtanag. Even, yes, perhaps even that of the Eldest. It grieves me to have come too late. Believe me, if I could have prevented them, I assure you, I would have. I did seek to do so.”
“So.” Lilias shrugged and glanced across the deck toward where Aracus Altorus bent his head, listening to the Dwarf captain, who was the picture of ease upon the pitching decks, with his short stature and his root-gnarled legs astraddle. She was unsure how or why Yrinna’s Children had stood ready at Port Eurus to ferry Haomane’s Allies over the waters. “You failed.”
“Yes.” Peldras bowed his head, fair, gleaming hair falling to curtain his somber brow. “Lady Sorceress,” he said softly, “I do not think your heart is as black as it has been painted. I would speak to you of one I met, Carfax of Staccia, an agent of the Sunderer’s will who by Arahila’s mercy became a Companion in truth at the end—”
“No.” Gritting her teeth and swallowing hard, Lilias pushed past him. “I don’t want to hear it, Ellyl. I don’t want your cursed pity. Do you understand?”
He took another step backward; avoiding her foul breath, no doubt. Once, even one of the Rivenlost would have stood awed in her presence. Now, there was nothing to her but bile and decay. This foulness, this mortality, it rotted her from the inside out. The stench of it bothered her own nostrils. “Forgive me, Sorceress,” he breathed, still reaching out toward her with one pale, perfect hand. “I did not mean to offend, but only to offer comfort, for even the least of us are deserving. Arahila’s mercy—”
“—is not something I seek,” Lilias finished brusquely. “And what did Arahila the Fair know of dragons?”
It was something, to see one of the Ellylon at a loss for words. She took the image with her as she stumbled toward the cabin in which she had been allotted space. Haomane’s Children, scions of the Lord-of-Thought. Oh, it gave them such pleasure to imagine themselves wiser than all other races, than all of the Lesser Shapers.
The air was hot and close inside the narrow cabin, but at least it blocked out the sunlight that refracted blindingly from the waves, making spots dance in her vision. Here it was mercifully dark. Lilias curled into a Dwarf-size bunk, wrapping herself around her sick, aching belly into a tight bundle of misery.
For a few blessed moments, she was left in solitude.
The door cracked open, slanting sunlight seeping red through her closed lids.
“Sorceress.” It was a woman’s voice, speaking the common tongue with an awkward Arduan inflection. The cool rim of an earthenware cup touched her lips, moistening them with water. “Blaise says you must drink.”
“Get away.” Without opening her eyes, Lilias slapped at the ministering hand; and found her own hand stopped, wrist caught in a strong, sinewy grip. She opened her eyes to meet the Archer’s distasteful gaze. “Let go!”
“I would like to,” the woman Fianna said with slow deliberation, “but I have sworn a vow of loyalty, and it is the will of the King of the West that you are to be kept alive. It is also the will of our Dwarfish hosts that no Man shall accompany one of our gender in closed quarters. So … drink.”
She tilted the cup.
Water, cool and flat, trickled into Lilias’ mouth. She wanted to refuse it, wanted to flail at the life-sustaining invasion. The Archer’s hard gaze and the calloused grip on her wrist warned her against it. And so, with resentful gulps, she drank. The cool water eased the parched tissues of her mouth and throat, rumbling in her belly. Still, it stayed where it was put.
“Good.” Fianna sat back on her heels. “Good.”
“You should wish me dead,” Lilias rasped. “Aracus is a fool.”
“You know his reasons. As for me, I do.” The Archer’s voice was flat, and there was no burdensome compassion in her mien, only hatred and steady distrust. “Would you say elsewise of me?”
“No.” Lilias drew herself up until her back touched the wall of the cabin. “Oh, no. I would not.”
“Then we understand one another.” She refilled the cup. “Drink.”
Lilias took it, careful to avoid contact with the Archer’s fingers. Those were the hands that had nocked the Arrow of Fire, those the fingers that had drawn back the string of Oronin’s Bow. She did not want to feel their touch against her skin ever again. “Indeed, we do.” She sipped at the water, studying Fianna’s face. “Tell me, does Blaise Caveros know you are enamored of him?”
A slow flush of color rose to the Archer’s cheeks; halfanger, half-humiliation. “You’re not fit to speak his name!” she spat, rising swift to her feet.
Lilias shrugged and took another sip. “Shall I tell him?”
For a moment, she thought the other woman would strike her. Fianna stood, stooped in the tiny cabin, her hands clenching and unclenching at her sides. At length, the habit of discipline won out, and she merely shook her head. “I pity you,” she said in a low voice. “I shouldn’t, but I do. You’ve forgotten what it means to be a mortal woman.” She regarded Lilias. “If, indeed, you ever even knew. And it’s a pity because it’s all that’s left to you, and all that ever will be.”
“Not quite.” Lilias gave a bitter smile. “I have my memories.”
“I wish you the joy of them!”
The door slammed on the Archer’s retort. Lilias sighed, feeling her tense body uncoil. If nothing else, at least the confrontation had distracted her from her misery. It felt as though she might survive the sea journey after all. Aracus’ will, was it? Well, let him have his way, then. It was nothing less than the Son of Altorus demanded. “I wish you the joy of it,” Lilias whispered.