“Which will be ridiculously easy, as I work for the Bastard’s Order. And the white god.”
Kyrato managed a shaky sneer. “Who are you to speak for the white god? Have you met Him?”
“Once, about eleven years ago. Not an experience a man forgets.” He shrugged. “Nor does a demon. You can call me Learned… Anonymous for now, although if we ever meet again in less troubled circumstances I promise I’ll introduce myself properly.”
Kyrato looked as though he didn’t believe a word of this. No—as though not-believing was less frightening than believing. Most curious. Nikys watched in increasing fascination.
“I have not much time,” Penric went on, “but I need to speak to you about the way you are treating your demon. Because it’s both theologically incorrect—and rude and cruel,” someone added aside, “and very poor management, frankly.
“Your demon is a gift of the god and the Temple, you know, an elegant opportunity for mutual growth, not a beast to be dominated, imprisoned, and enslaved. To it, you are model, mentor, and the only parent such an elemental being can have. As the holder of a Temple demon, you have an obligation to pass it on at the end of your life improved, not ruined by your selfishness, inattention, or, as in this case, fear, bad judgment, and panic.” Penric waved a hand. “Although I grant you were led astray.”
Learned Kyrato’s stare of terror was slowly transmuting to a stare of utter disbelief. Oh good, thought Nikys, it’s not just me. Even the Temple-trained found Penric confusing.
“I don’t know if or how you will be able to make things right with your demon,” Penric went on, “although I would certainly suggest repentance, prayer, and meditation for a start. Forgiveness will likely be beyond it until it is not beyond you, and as for absolution, you’ll need to petition a higher authority. But I would suggest, by way of a first apology, and also a good idea for your future association, that you start by gifting it with a nice name.” Penric sat up and smiled cheerfully at the trapped divine. Kyrato responded by heaving again against his stony prison, to no effect. No—heaving away from Penric.
“You are mad,” choked Kyrato.
“My brother says he’s as mad as three boots,” Nikys put in from the side, agreeably, starting to get into the spirit of this. “But he’s also a very learned divine, with a very wise demon. You should attend.”
In a hoarse voice, Kyrato said, “It is ascendant!” Then a rather cross-eyed look. “No… but it is monstrous dense. I thought it must be ascendant.” His voice rose sharp again. “Why isn’t it ascendant?”
“That’s just what I’m trying to explain,” said Penric patiently. “Now, names. Can you think of one you’d like?” He looked hopefully at Kyrato, who was starting to wheeze. Penric frowned and forced him to swallow another drink of water.
Abandoning the divine, Penric turned his expression inward. “Des, do you have any ideas for naming a young fellow demon?” A pause. “That’s absurd.” Another pause. “And that’s obscene.” And another, “No, we’re not naming it after me, either.” He sighed and turned to Nikys. “Madame Khatai? What’s a Cedonian name that you like?”
Nikys, in your mouth, she thought, but offered aloud, “Reseen? Kuna? Sarande?”
“Des,” said Penric, “does Learned Kyrato’s demon have a preference? No?” He frowned again at Kyrato. “Really, how long have you possessed the poor thing that it doesn’t understand the simplest of nomenclatures?”
He appeared to think, although not very long, then sat up. “All right.” Penric signed himself and placed his hand on Kyrato’s brow, following to do so again as the man recoiled. “In the white god’s name I bless you and name you Kuna. A somewhat catch-as-catch-can name-giving ceremony,” he added aside to Nikys, “but you and Des are two adults and can bear witness, so it’s sufficiently sanctified.”
As Kyrato was no longer struggling to escape, or much of anything apart from lying there limply in a state of receding heat stroke and advancing Penric, Nikys retreated uphill while Penric continued sermonizing. Adelis had finished organizing their belongings.
“Does he ever shut up?” Adelis inquired in mild gloom.
“I think he talks more when he’s tired. Makes less sense then, though.” She collected the few undamaged arrows that had fallen in their vicinity, adding them to the quiver.
Penric finished his lecture at last, signed the distraught man, tapped his own lips twice with his thumb, and climbed—well, crawled—back up to them, where he lay on his back and tried to catch his breath. Adelis studied the too-rapid rise and fall of his chest, and shook his head ruefully. “Aye. I see the problem.”
“Shall we each take an arm?” asked Nikys.
“Better, I think, if you take the food, water, bows, and… yes, my sword.”
“And his case?”
“If you choose. I’ll lug the blond fool for you. Consider it your belated Bastard’s Day present, sister.”
“Ah, yes, you missed the last one, didn’t you?”
“Busy with a war at the time, which I’m sure your god would understand. I almost dedicated it to Him.”
Penric argued, but he was outvoted three to one, and at last he was coaxed up onto Adelis’s back. Adelis’s legs bent a little, then straightened. “Heavier than he looks,” he grunted.
“I’m sure I could make it on my own—” Penric began, to which Nikys and Adelis replied in unison, “Shut up, Penric.” Nikys thought Desdemona would have chimed in to the chorus if she could.
In the defile, the shadows were growing purple. This stretch, rough underfoot, was a hard slog by any standard. Nikys and Adelis saved their breaths, although Penric was still talking, going on about something in Wealdean until Adelis threatened to drop him back down the hill. His head drooped to Adelis’s shoulder, and then there were only the deepening twilight sounds of the hills: small insects, a nightingale calling, the crunch of the dirt and gravel below their feet, and then the faintest flutter of a bat. As they came up out of the winding rift, an owl swooped by not ten feet overhead, wings spread in vast silence, and Nikys could see the white glint of Penric’s teeth as he looked up and smiled.
A question occurred to her. Happily, she had just the person to answer it right here. “Desdemona,” she said, “if Penric had been killed”—horrid thought—“and you had been forced to jump, where would you have gone? If the demon always chooses the strongest person in the vicinity, it would have had to be Adelis, right?”
Adelis jerked, then paused to heave his slipping passenger back up and labor on. It was too dark to see his expression, but Nikys imagined it a study in dismay.
“No, child,” said Desdemona. “It would have been you.”
At this, Adelis stopped short. Nikys stopped with him. “Me! Why me?”
“We have been with Penric for eleven years, and are now well imprinted with him. We could have made no other choice.”
Penric breathed out, and Nikys could see the faint sapphire gleam of his widening eyes, but for once he was struck silent. After a moment, they hiked on.
No sounds of pursuit arose behind them.
A prayer of supplication to the Bastard was begging for trouble, in many people’s views, but Nikys thought a prayer of gratitude for His better gifts was not likely to go wrong. She hummed the old hymn of praise under her breath as they reached a flatter trail. “Sing it aloud,” entreated Penric from his perch. “I’ve never heard it in Cedonian.”
She looked up to find no up left; before them, now, the land fell away in velvety darkness. A hundred miles distant it rose again, like a black blanket rucked up upon the horizon, the promise of Orbas.