I paused, then sighed. “I wish I knew. Are you willing to go through with it anyway?”
She smiled. “Of course. It would be rude not to,” proving that even Issolas are capable of self-directed irony. This, while maybe not an important discovery, was, somehow, a pleasing one.
“Let’s do it, then.”
She nodded. I held out my hand, and she took it; her hand was dry and cool.
I began.
You don’t need to hear about it again, do you? I knew better than to let my fear interfere with what I had to do. Loiosh was his usual steady self, and, to make a long story short, I turned out to be sufficiently rested not to destroy myself.
The big difference between doing it on someone else and doing it on myself was that the coldness from my wrists became more and more insistent, and there was an awareness somewhere deep inside me that I could be seriously hurting myself. I had to trust Loiosh.
I was used to trusting Loiosh; over the years, I’ve gotten pretty good at it.
I concentrated, and pulled at imaginary skeins of fabric until it rolled over me, covered me, and I felt like I was going to drown in it; the chill on my wrists beginning to feel like heat, and insisting more and more on my attention; but I still had a bit left in me when the whole thing was shattered—quite literally—and I was pulled back to a hazy sort of half consciousness, vaguely pleased that my wrists were now free, noting that Teldra’s were as well, and hoping that I wouldn’t have to do anything strenuous like moving for at least a year or so.
She said something, but I didn’t quite catch it. I tried to ask her to repeat it, but that, too, was beyond me.
In case you’ve missed it, I was more than a little exhausted. I closed my eyes, leaned against the wall, and concentrated on keeping my breathing even and shallow.
“I imagine,” I said after a while, “they ought to be showing any second.”
“The Jenoine?” asked Teldra. “Or our friends?”
“Both, I should imagine. At the same time, presumably, it’s how it ought to work out.”
“You’re just saying that, Boss, because you know if you say it it won’t happen that way.”
“I’m an Easterner, chum. I can be superstitious if I want to.”
I rested, and recovered, and felt hungry. I found some more dried gammon in my pouch and offered some to Teldra, who gratefully accepted; then I watched her attempt to eat it daintily. She succeeded. I’d have been more astonished if I could have spared the energy for astonishment.
“Well,” I said, “the longer it takes them—any of them – to show up, the better for us.”
She nodded, and continued being dainty with dried gammon.
I wondered why she didn’t make me feel rude and uncouth, but I suppose that was part of her talent. Or magic. You can always say it’s magic if you don’t understand it; and, who knows, you might be right.
While we stayed there—free of the chains but unable to move (in my case, unable to move for a number of reasons)—my imagination took flight. I wondered what Morrolan and Aliera were doing. They must be with Sethra, talking things over, making plans. Had they made contact with Verra? Was she going to take an active role in this? How about the Necromancer?
I pictured the lot of them, sitting in the library at Castle Black, or in one of the sitting rooms at Dzur Mountain, or in Verra’s Hall; planning, scheming, debating.
Or maybe they’d all just gone and decided to take a nap, figuring, hey, what’s one Issola and one Easterner? Maybe they’ll just leave us here.
Or maybe they were eating, the bastards.
Meanwhile, in this structure, or near it, perhaps the Jenoine were coming up with their own schemes, or chuckling about how well this one had worked (did Jenoine chuckle? I couldn’t imagine it). Perhaps they, too, had forgotten us. Perhaps, in the grand scheme of things, we didn’t matter. Verra had as much as told me that I mattered because she was going to make me matter. I had mixed feelings about this.
Eventually, various needs brought me to my feet; I carried one of the chamber pots into a corner of the place and relieved I myself, feeling like a drunk who’s just staggered out of Coriaton’s Public House. Then I made it back, drank some water, and waited.
Time dragged, and my imagination soared, and I considered my Fate. Teldra remained silent, perhaps aware of my thoughts and not wishing to disturb them, or perhaps she was busy with her own thoughts. Even Loiosh remained still.
But considered who I was, and whether, when all was said and done, I would make a difference in the world. I had rarely had such thoughts—lately I hadn’t had time for them, and before that they had never occurred to me.
But had Fate included me in its plans?
Did I even believe in Fate?
“Teldra, do you believe in Fate?”
My words shattered the stillness, like a sorcerous explosion, but she hardly blinked.
She said, “In a sense.”
“Yes?”
“I believe in paths and choices. I don’t believe in an inescapable fate, but I believe we are each given several possible directions, and sometimes we choose one without being aware of having made the choice.”
I nodded. “I think I understand.”
“But at other times, we know. Sometimes you realize you cannot stand still, and to move forward, or move back, or move to the side will set you on a new path.”
“Does it matter to you if you make a difference in the world?”
“I do make a difference, Lord Taltos.”
“Vlad.”
“Very well. Vlad. I make a difference whether I wish to or not. I hope to make a good difference, if only in a small way.”
“I wonder,” I said. “I wonder whether a small way is enough for me. And I wonder if a big way is too much.”
“Hmmm. What brought this up, if I may ask, Vlad?”
“I don’t know. Too much time on my hands, boredom, and remembering my conversation with Verra.”
“What about your conversation with Verra?”
“What she said about me being a tool.”
“Oh,” said Lady Teldra. “There is another thing about the Goddess.”
“Yes?”
“Sometimes, when she speaks to us, we do not hear the same thing.”
“I don’t understand.”
“It has been said that she speaks in words we can each understand, and that we will each understand her in our own way.”
“Isn’t that true of everyone?”
“Perhaps. But I didn’t hear anything about you being a tool; I heard ... well, it doesn’t matter what I heard.”
“Hmmmm,” I said wisely, and didn’t press the matter, though I wanted to badly. “I think,” I said, “that I may be approaching one of those decision points you were talking about.”
“Maybe,” she said. “But I suspect, my lord, that you made your decision some time ago, and are just now beginning to understand its significance.”
I let that one float around for a bit, then felt myself snarling “All right, there’s only so much of this I can take. I need to be doing something.”
“You’re feeling better, then?”
I considered, then said, “Yes, in fact, I am.”
“Well then,” said Teldra, “I am ready. But I don’t know what we ought to be doing.”
“It’s not like I have a plan or anything,” I said. “But it seems to me that, if we aren’t going to just wait for our friends or our enemies, we should see if we can get out of this room.”
“But then, will they be able to find us? Our friends, I mean.”
“I hope so.” I shrugged. “One would think that they could reach us psychically, if they were close enough.”
I stood up, moving slowly and carefully, and walked across the room to where my rapier lay, all unnoticed and neglected. I checked it—it was fine. I returned it to my sheath. Then I walked over to the Morganti dagger. I thought for a while, made a decision, then hesitated because I didn’t want to, then made myself pick it up and put it into its sheath.