"I know." Javier patted Lunaluz's neck soothingly. "But obviously none of this is mine or yours to decide."
Javier's calm resignation annoyed Kiram but he kept his peace while the two of them rode further. Two more crows passed overhead. Kiram watched them, thinking of the night he'd run for his life from the shadow curse. He couldn't imagine how anyone could in good conscience allow something like the shadow curse to continue to torture and hunt.
"What do they think they're going to do when the shadow curse comes for them personally?" Kiram asked.
"I don't know." Javier simply shook his head. "Alizadeh just wrote to warn me to stay away and keep a low profile for a week or so. He'll send word when it's right to come forward."
Javier reined Lunaluz to a halt as they reached a clearing full of spring flowers and outlined by tall oaks. Kiram heard the distant melody of a prayer being sung and realized that they were very near the Grunito family's chapel. Javier swung down from his saddle and freed his stallion to sample the young shoots of grass.
"This is where I usually come to practice the lessons Alizadeh has taught me." Javier indicated one tall, old oak. "What do you think?"
"It's beautiful," Kiram replied. Swaths of wildflowers bloomed between the trees and bright gold butterflies flitted through the air. But Kiram's mind wasn't really on the view. "Does Alizadeh think he can convince the other Bahiim to support him?"
"I don't know," Javier answered mildly.
Kiram frowned at the idea of the Bahiim rejecting Alizadeh's arguments. He wished there was something he could do. "Can they be so deluded that they think the White Tree will ignite on its own the next time the shadow curse returns?"
Javier simply gave him a tired smile. "I've pretty much told you everything Alizadeh wrote to me. Would you like me to make some answers up? Or I could attempt to interview a squirrel or something, if you'd like."
Kiram sighed. He supposed it was pointless to rail against the Bahiim to Javier. He swung down from Verano's back and allowed the gelding to graze alongside Lunaluz. "We're on our own again, aren't we?"
"For now it would seem so." Javier strolled between the trees and Kiram walked beside him. "I don't suppose Scholar Donamillo has written back to you?"
"No, but in his last letter Scholar Blasio mentioned that Scholar Donamillo has been quite ill." Kiram didn't like to think of how bad the sickness must be for the scholar not to respond to his letter.
"It's not likely to have been his treatments, then…" Javier commented.
"What do you mean?"
Javier sighed as if defeated. "Supposedly Fedeles has fully recovered his senses."
"Elezar mentioned something about that. It's wonderful, isn't it?" Kiram started to smile but Javier's grim expression warned him that the news was not cause for jubilation.
"It should be" Javier said carefully. "But it seems that he's accused me of being responsible for his madness both to Lord Quemanor and before the royal bishop, Prince Nugalo."
"Fedeles wouldn't." Kiram began but realized that he couldn't really know what Fedeles would do. He would never have imagined Fedeles tearing apart his steam engine either and yet he had. Although that had been the shadow curse, not Fedeles.
And suddenly a terrible thought occurred to him. What if Scholar Donamillo had been too ill to treat Fedeles? What if the curse's hold over him had grown? "When did this happen?"
"There were rumors for a while," Javier replied. "But three weeks ago Prince Sevanyo was in attendance for Lord Queman- or's complaint before the royal bishop. Fedeles gave a personal testimony."
"Fedeles spoke?" All Kiram could imagine was Fedeles singing out the names of beloved horses.
"He was quite eloquent, apparently. The bishop was horrified enough by his descriptions of the black magic I practiced against him to dispatch a troop of his men to bring me to stand trial" Javier scowled. "Luckily, only Prince Sevanyo knew I hadn't returned to Rauma. He sent me a warning."
"And all of this began a month ago?"
"So it would seem."
A month ago would have been at the start of Scholar Donamillo's illness. Kiram felt suddenly foolish for all the time he'd wasted in the last few weeks. If only he'd known he might have done something.
A nervous fear prickled through him. The bishop's men could be well on their way by now. If they were swift they would reach Anacleto any day. "You should have said something sooner."
"It wouldn't have changed anything if I had. I didn't know anything for certain until I received Prince Sevanyo's letter." Javier shrugged. "Anyway I thought Elezar was already causing enough of a panic. He demanded that Morisio and Atreau swear loyalty to me, you know."
"I know" Kiram replied. "I promised to stand with you as well."
"Did you?" Javier's calm expression wavered and for an instant Kiram thought he saw fear in his face. Then Javier stepped into the shadows of a towering oak tree. He leaned back against the gnarled trunk. "I won't let it come to that."
"It might not be your choice."
Javier gave him a hard look. His fingers gripped the rough bark of the tree. Kiram knew he didn't want to talk about this but they were too far in to stop now. Kiram couldn't be like Javier and simply wait to see what fate awaited him; he needed to have a plan. "So what are you going to do?"
"I don't know what I'm going to do. But the one thing I'm certain of is that Fedeles wouldn't betray me of his own will. Something has happened to him."
"It has to be Father Habalan's doing," Kiram decided. "He's using the shadow curse to control Fedeles just like he used it to make Fedeles destroy my steam-"
"Someone is using the shadow curse." Javier cut Kiram off. "But I don't think it's Habalan. Now more than ever."
"It has to be him."
"Habalan knows next to nothing anything about the Bahiim ways…certainly not enough to create and control a shadow curse," Javier said. "The more I've studied under Alizadeh, the more certain I've become that the man on the hill isn't Habalan."
Kiram wanted to dispute Javier's argument but he had little evidence beyond his own deep dislike of the holy father. "He was in possession of Bahiim writings and confessions."
"Even if he did have them he wouldn't be able to read them." Javier glanced away and when he spoke again his voice sounded raw. "At this point it doesn't matter who's behind the curse. It's Fedeles who's riding with the bishop's men to arrest me. He's the one I would have to kill to win a trial by combat."
Kiram didn't need to be told that combat would be the only way that Javier could win his trial. The royal bishop certainly wouldn't accept Alizadeh's expert testimony.
Kiram tried to imagine Fedeles in any state but that of blissful mania. All that came to mind were those brief instances when he'd seemed tortured and the sad morning after he'd tried to kill himself.
"Fedeles wouldn't want to betray you," Kiram said at last. "And if the shadow curse has finally taken over his mind, death might be a mercy-"
"I won't kill him!" Javier glared at Kiram, the muscles of his jaw flexing with restrained anger. Kiram met Javier's hard gaze, though the fury in his expression frightened him.
"Refusing to think about it won't make it go away," Kiram said firmly. "You have to face this."
"No!" Javier slammed his fist into the tree and hissed in pain as his knuckles scraped open.
"Would you let him kill you, then?" Kiram demanded. Just the thought of that hurt Kiram far more deeply than any blow Musni had struck against him the previous night.
Javier met his gaze for only a moment, then lifted his head and stared up into the bare branches above him. "He's the only family I have."
"I know. And I understand how hard it is to lose your family, I do. But getting yourself killed won't save Fedeles. It won't free him."