The sweet scent of night jasmine floated over Kiram as he followed the winding path through the grounds. The air felt thick, like it might rain soon. Deep shadows filled the overhanging branches of fruit trees but thin rays of light still shone through the wrought iron bars of the gate. Kiram pulled it open.
"Kiram, damn it, slow down!" Javier's voice was closer than Kiram expected and far more strained. Despite himself, Kiram turned back.
Javier stood a few feet away, leaning heavily against the thin trunk of a plum tree. His breathing came in slow deep gasps. A sheen of sweat covered his face.
"You left your coat." Javier gripped the stained blue jacket in his right hand.
"I can't believe you." Kiram returned to Javier. "You can barely walk."
"I could manage a hell of a crawl, though." Javier closed his eyes and bowed his head back against the smooth trunk of the tree. "Will you just put up with me, Kiram? I need your help."
"You're an ass," Kiram said, but he couldn't summon any real anger. Javier already had his sympathy. It embarrassed Kiram to be so easily won back. "Fine, but I'm just repaying you for what you did yesterday."
He ducked under Javier's right arm, taking half of his weight. Javier leaned against him. The scent of blood overpowered the jasmine in the air. He wrapped his arm around Javier's waist and helped him out through the gate.
"I'm taking you to the infirmary," Kiram said flatly.
"Please don't," Javier whispered, and there was nothing seductive or laughing in his tone. He sounded so desolate that it reminded Kiram of Fedeles. "I don't think I could endure Scholar Donamillo tinkering with me like I'm one of his mechanisms. Not today." He bowed his head against Kiram's neck.
"You need a physician."
"I don't, I swear. I've done this a thousand times. I just need time. The white hell will heal me." Javier straightened a little as if to prove that he was already recovering. Kiram could feel the strain trembling through Javier's muscles.
"Fine, we'll go to our room. But if you haven't recovered your strength by the time the warden calls last roll I'm going to summon Scholar Donamillo up to see you."
Through the twilight Kiram picked out the distant shapes of several students lounging in front of the dormitory. Farther across the grounds he thought he could see the shadows of riders returning to the stables. He thought he recognized Elezar among them.
At the sight of the riders, Javier changed course, so that he was facing into the deep shadows of the school orchards. "We can circle around to the back of the dormitory. There's a pulley lift near the scullery. We can use it to get up to the tower rooms without climbing the stairs."
"Why don't I just go get Elezar?" Kiram suggested.
"No." Javier shook his head. "I don't want the other students to see me like this. Not even Elezar."
Kiram studied the footpath that skirted the perimeter of the orchard and then disappeared behind the dormitory. Remnants of an old wall jutted up in places and Kiram supposed Javier could rest against one of them if he needed to.
Kiram took as much of Javier's weight as he could and they walked slowly. Kiram heard calls echoing through the trees and Javier told him it was a red owl calling for its mate.
As they moved on, Kiram felt heat returning to Javier's body. By the time they had reached the cider shed, Javier was standing straight and moving easily. He kept his arm wrapped around Kiram, and Kiram held his waist, feeling the muscles of his hips flex and relax beneath his fingers.
"So what kind of bow do you use?" Javier's tone was unconcerned and Kiram thought that the question had probably been chosen simply for the sake of conversation. It still surprised Kiram slightly, if only because it seemed like days since he had told Javier that he practiced archery.
"My favorite is a short compound bow that my uncle Rafie brought back from the Yuan kingdom."
"Yuan?" Javier's brows lifted. "That's a long way to travel for a bow."
"His partner is a Bahiim." As always Kiram felt a twinge of embarrassment at the disclosure that his uncle's partner was a religious zealot who talked to trees, but then he realized that Javier probably didn't know much, if anything, about the Bahiim. "They traveled a lot when they were both younger. Now they've settled down in Anacleto."
They passed between the shadows of overhanging tree branches and shafts of dull gold sunlight. When the warm light fell across him, Javier's white skin looked as if it had been gilded.
"What kind of business does he do? Your uncle, I mean?"
"He's a physician."
"So, he and his business partner traveled to Yuan just to practice medicine?" Javier raised a black brow; his expression was slightly teasing. "You're sure they weren't smuggling Sueno root?"
"I'm sure." Kiram smiled at the thought of his fastidious uncle Rafie keeping company with smugglers and addicts. He'd be scrubbing them down in hot baths in a matter of minutes. "My grandmother would probably have been happier if Uncle Rafie had chosen to follow a smuggler to Yuan. At least the rest of the family wouldn't have thought she raised a religious fanatic."
"So they went as missionaries?" "Not exactly. They were invited by a merchant's family to lift a curse from the household." Kiram sighed, knowing that he would have to explain. "His partner, Alizadeh, is a Bahiim, a priest of the old church. The Bahiim battle curses and put ghosts to rest and I don't know…talk to trees and things like that. My parents think Alizadeh's a lunatic, but he's always been kind to me and he's quite charming."
Javier stared at Kiram as if he couldn't quite put all of Kiram's words together in any way that made sense.
"So, this man, Alizadeh, your uncle's."
"Partner," Kiram provided. It was the word Haldiim always used when speaking in the company of Cadeleonians. It sounded businesslike and Cadeleonians easily accepted two men uniting their houses if it was for the sake of profit.
"His partner," Javier repeated, "is a kind of exorcist?"
Kiram shrugged. "Something like that."
"A Bahiim." Javier seemed to consider this for a few moments, then he asked, "So when he went to Yuan, did he lift the curse?" Javier's casual level of interest seemed to have risen.
"There was none," Kiram replied. "A store of grain had gone foul and mistakenly been used to make a medical poultice. My uncle figured it out, destroyed the poultice, treated the victims, and that was that."
They reached the iron gate enclosing the low beds of the kitchen garden. Javier placed his bloodstained left hand against the lock. Kiram heard a slight crackling noise then the solid clunk of a bolt sliding back.
"You don't believe in curses, do you?" Javier shrugged out of Kiram's grasp and pushed the gate open. Kiram felt strangely aware of where Javier's body had pressed against his own and the absence felt wrong.
"I believe in the possibility of curses," Kiram allowed. "But it seems like there are usually better explanations for why things go wrong."
"Fouled grain or just plain bad luck?"
Kiram nodded cautiously. Something in Javier's tone put him on edge. It was the seriousness of it, Kiram realized.
Javier closed the garden gate behind them and laid his hand up against the lock again. This time Kiram saw white sparks skip from his fingers to the metal.
"It's not as though I don't believe in powers," Kiram said quickly. The last few weeks living with Javier had led him to believe in shajdi powers more than he ever had before. But meeting Javier hadn't stopped Kiram from applying reason. "When it comes to things like curses and deviltry, people make accusations too easily. They use curses to justify their prejudices."
"Are you thinking of King Nazario?" Javier glanced over his shoulder at Kiram. "That was a long time ago."
"It was, but things haven't changed so much. Even now if a Cadeleonian is well connected he can accuse any Haldiim of cursing his fields and have the Haldiim stripped of his property and imprisoned."