Mo ignored the flames moving toward him. He thrust his sword through Basta's body as if he had never done anything else in his life, as if from now on his trade was killing. Basta died with an expression of surprise still on his face. He fell into the fire, and Dustfinger stumbled back to Farid, who was still held in Meggie's arms.
What had he expected – that the boy would come back to life just because his killer was dead? No, the black eyes were still empty, empty as a deserted house. There was none of the joy in them now that had always been so difficult to banish. And Dustfinger kneeled there on the trodden earth, while Resa comforted her weeping daughter, and men were fighting, killing, and being killed around them, and he no longer had any idea what he was doing here, what was going on, why he had ever come beneath these trees, the same trees that he had seen in his dream.
In the worst of all dreams.
And now it had come true.
72. AN EXCHANGE
The blue of my eyes was extinguished tonight
The red gold of my heart
Georg Trakl, "By Night," Poems
They almost all escaped. The fire saved them, the fury of the bear, the Black Prince's men – and Mo, who practiced killing that gray morning as if he meant to become a master of the craft. Basta was left dead under the trees, along with Slasher and so many of their men that the ground was covered with their corpses as if with dead leaves. Two of the strolling players had been killed, too – and Farid.
Farid.
Dustfinger himself was pale as death when he carried him back to the mine. Meggie walked beside him all the long, dark way. She held Farid's hand, as if that could help, feeling as sore inside herself as if it would never get better.
She was the only one whom Dustfinger did not send away when he had laid Farid down on his cloak in the most remote of the galleries. No one dared approach him as he bent over the dead boy and wiped the soot from his brow. Roxane did try to talk to him, but when she saw the expression on his face she left him alone. He allowed only Meggie to sit beside Farid, as if he had seen his own pain in her eyes. So they both sat with him in the depths of Mount Adder, as if they had come to the end of all stories. Without a single word still left to say.
Perhaps night had fallen outside by the time Meggie heard Dustfinger's voice. It came to her as if from far away, through the fog of pain that enveloped her as if she would never find her way out.
"You'd like him back, too, wouldn't you?"
It was difficult for her to turn her eyes away from Farid's face. "He'll never come back," she whispered, and looked at Dustfinger. She didn't have the strength to speak any louder. All her strength was gone, as if Farid had taken it away with him. He had taken everything away with him.
"There's a story." Dustfinger looked at his hands, as if what he was talking about was written there. "A story about the White Women."
"What kind of story?" Meggie didn't want to hear any more stories ever again. This one had broken her heart for all time. Nonetheless, there was something in Dustfinger's voice…
He bent over Farid and wiped some soot from his cold forehead. "Roxane knows it," he said. "She'll tell it to you. Just go to her and… and tell her I've had to go away. Tell her I'm going to find out if the story is true." He spoke with a strange kind of hesitation, as if it were infinitely difficult to find the right words. "And remind her of my promise – that I'll always find a way back to her, wherever I am. Will you tell her that?"
What was he talking about? "Find out?" Meggie's voice was husky with tears. "Find out what exactly?"
"Oh, people say this and that about the White Women. Much of it's just superstition, but there's sure to be some truth in it somewhere. Stories are always like that, aren't they? No doubt Fenoglio could tell me more, but to be honest I don't want to ask him. I'd rather ask them in person."
Dustfinger straightened up. He stood there looking around him, as if he had forgotten where he really was.
The White Women. "They'll be coming soon, won't they?" Meggie asked him anxiously. "Coming for Farid."
But Dustfinger shook his head, and for the first time since Farid's death he smiled, that strangely sad smile that Meggie had never seen on any face but his, and that she had never entirely understood. "No, why should they? They're sure of him already. They come only if you're still clinging to life, if they have to lure you to them with a look or a whispered word. Everything else is superstition. They come while you're still breathing, but very close to death. They come when your heart is beating more and more faintly, when they can smell fear, or blood, as in your father's case. If you die as quickly as Farid you go to them entirely of your own accord."
Meggie caressed Farid's fingers. They were colder than the stone where she was sitting. "Then I don't understand," she whispered. "If they aren't coming at all, how will you ask them anything?"
"I shall summon them," replied Dustfinger. "But you had better not be here when I do it, so will you go to Roxane and tell her what I have said to you?"
She was going to ask more questions, but he put a finger on his lips. "Please, Meggie!" he said. He didn't often call her by her name. "Tell Roxane what I have told you – and say… say I'm sorry. Now, off you go."
Meggie sensed that he was afraid, but she did not ask him what of, because her heart was asking other questions. How could it be true that Farid was dead, and how would it feel to have him dead in her heart forever? She caressed his still face one last time before she got to her feet. When she looked back once more at the entrance to the gallery, Dustfinger was looking down at Farid. And, for the first time since she had known him, his face showed all that he usually hid: affection, love – and pain.
Meggie knew where to look for Roxane, but she lost her way twice in the dark galleries before she finally found her. Roxane was tending the injured women, while the Barn Owl was looking after the men. Many of them had been hurt, and although the fire had saved their lives it had burned many of them badly. Mo was nowhere to be seen, and nor was the Prince; they were probably on guard at the entrance to the mine, but Resa was with Roxane. She was just bandaging an arm that had suffered burns, and Roxane was treating a cut on an old woman's forehead with the same ointment she had once used on Dustfinger's wounds. Its springlike fragrance did not suit this place.
When Meggie came out of the dark passage, Roxane raised her head. Perhaps she had been hoping it was Dustfinger's footsteps that she had heard. Meggie leaned back against the cold wall of the gallery. This is all a dream, she thought, a terrible, terrible dream. She felt dizzy with weeping.
"What's that story?" she asked Roxane. "A story about the White Women… Dustfinger says you're to tell me. And he says he has to go away because he wants to find out if it's true."
"Go away?" Roxane put down the ointment. "What are you talking about?"
Meggie wiped her eyes, but there were no tears left in them. She supposed she had used them all up. Where did so many tears come from? "He says he's going to summon them," she murmured. "And he says you're to remember his promise. That he'll always come back, he'll find a way wherever he is…" The words still made no sense to her when she repeated them. But they obviously meant something to Roxane.