“It’s pretty, that bottle,” Erdene offered in a soft tone. “And the scent smells so very, very nice.”
“Yes, it does.” I put it away, back in the satchel. “Thank you, my lady. You didn’t have to do this. I am grateful.”
“I didn’t do it for you.”
“I know.” I busied myself repacking everything. “But I am grateful nonetheless. Is there more you can tell me about this menagerie of enemies and allies I face?”
Erdene shook her head. “Nothing useful.”
“I should be going, then.”
“How do you plan to cross the desert?” she asked.
I blinked at her. “Desert?”
“Yes, Moirin.” She gave me an impatient look. “Beneath the shadow of the Abode of the Gods, no rain falls. It is all desert. Do you know the route to the caravanserai?”
“No,” I admitted.
She sighed, scraping a patch of overgrazed earth clear. “I will draw you a map. Fix it in your mind, and do not wander into the desert alone, or you will die before you reach the mountains.”
We knelt and leaned our heads together over the map Erdene sketched in the dirt. She laid out the route clearly, describing and indicating landmarks, and I did my best to fix it in my memory.
“You describe it well,” I said when she had finished.
Erdene straightened and rested her hands on her thighs. “I studied the map with Bao before he left.”
“You aided him?” It surprised me.
“Yes.” She looked away. “I was angry at him, but what my father did was wrong. And I suppose…” She gave a little shrug. “You belong together, you and Bao. No matter how much it hurts to admit it, it is true. For whatever purpose, the gods have joined you. When you came, I saw a fierce passion in him I had never seen before. He loves you, not me.” A wry smile curved her lips. “As you see, I am no thief, to keep what does not truly belong to me. I would rather know Bao was happy with you than miserable with me.” She looked back at me. “I did not know my father had sent you to Vralia, I swear it.”
“I know,” I said.
“Was it terrible there?”
“Yes.” I couldn’t read her expression. “Terrible in its own way. I was lucky to escape alive. If it would please you to know that I suffered, I did.” I glanced at the map. “Although I suspect there is more suffering in store for me.”
“It doesn’t please me.” Bowing her head, Erdene fidgeted with the sash wrapped around her long coat. “Once upon a time I thought it would, but it doesn’t. What you said to me before about not being ashamed of love and desire… Before all this happened, before my father betrayed you… it helped. And it helped to know you had once loved a man who did not love you in return, too. It made me feel less of a fool.”
“I’m glad,” I said. “And I do not think you are a fool at all, my lady.”
Lifting her head, she smiled a crooked smile. “Even though I still love him?”
“Especially so,” I said firmly. Getting to my feet, I extended my hand to her. “It takes courage to love.”
Erdene took my hand and rose. Her gaze was clear and earnest. “I don’t want Bao to die, Moirin. You’ll do your best to find him?”
“I will,” I promised.
Surprising me again, she gave me a hard, fierce hug. I returned the embrace, wrapping my arms around her small, stalwart figure. Short as she was, the top of her head barely came to my chin.
And I understood why she had kept my things as a reminder of Bao. We shared a connection to him. This was as close as I would get to my stubborn peasant-boy for a long, long time.
And I had a long, long way to go.
With a sigh, I released her. “Unless you have more wisdom to impart, I should be going.”
She shook her head. “No, no more.”
I bent and kissed her cheek. “Thank you.”
“May all your gods be with you, Moirin,” Erdene said soberly. “I fear you will need them.”
So did I.
FORTY-EIGHT
For once, my impulsiveness had not led me astray. Without Erdene’s directions, it was very possible I would have wandered into the desert, underestimating its rigors, and found myself trapped there. Wary of the Great Khan’s enmity, I’d become accustomed to avoiding people. I felt safer alone, especially since I had discovered the secret of fixing anchor-stones to conceal my campsite beneath the twilight while I slept.
But when at last I reached the far verges of the southern steppe, my first glimpse of the stony, barren expanse of the empty desert that lay beyond the grasslands convinced me that Erdene was right.
I turned eastward, riding along the edge of the barren desert, following my memory of the map that Bao’s abandoned Tatar bride had sketched in the dirt.
Erdene had guided me well; I had been right to trust her.
So it was that many days after our encounter, I found myself amidst a sprawling caravanserai on the outskirts of the desert, where traders from Ch’in, the Tatar territory, Bhodistan, and even Khebbel-im-Akkad bartered and traded, arranging for passage in a babble of competing tongues.
As used as I’d become to solitude, it intimidated me; and too, there was the lingering fear that someone loyal to the Khan would recognize and betray me. There weren’t many women among the caravans, and my green eyes and half-D’Angeline features marked me. I thought of summoning the twilight to hide me while I took the measure of the place, but it was difficult to navigate through dense crowds unseen. And, too, it would only be delaying the inevitable. So I made camp some distance from the vast city of tents and gers, and entered it warily on horseback.
People, so many people! And there were milling horses, and tall camels with two humps on their backs, an animal I’d only ever seen before in a royal menagerie. Scents from scores of cook fires filled the air, and there was a steady stream of folk watering animals and filling skins and barrels at the river that seeped sluggishly into the barren desert.
I had to own, it was all a bit overwhelming; and now that I’d seen the desert, the task ahead of me seemed more daunting than ever. There was a part of me that yearned to turn tail and flee.
It was possible. I wasn’t far from the Ch’in border. I still had the Imperial seal in my possession. I could travel east to the nearest gate in the Great Wall and present it, and all my difficulties would be over. To be sure, the Divine Emperor was a pragmatic fellow who thought of his country first. Having survived a civil war that could have torn his empire apart, I knew he would not risk sparking a fresh conflict by launching a quest into Tatar territory and beyond to retrieve one errant peasant-boy-but he would see me safely home.
That much at least, he owed me.
All I had to do was abandon Bao.
The Imperial army would grant me an escort to Shuntian. It would be a great pleasure to see Snow Tiger again. She was more than a friend, and she would understand the profound sense of loss I would feel better than anyone else in the world. And I had no doubt that for my services rendered to the Celestial Empire, her father, Emperor Zhu, would commission a greatship to take me home, carrying me thousands and thousands of leagues across the sea.
And, yes, Jehanne was gone; but at least in Terre d’Ange I would be reunited with my lovely, gracious father.
And across the Straits, in Alba, my mother. My private, taciturn, much-beloved mother, who had sent her only child off to an unknown destiny. If I died in the desert or the mountains, she would never know what had become of me.