The evening air smelled damp and earthy from the afternoon rain. After a while Karon lagged behind, and I glanced over my shoulder to see him standing in the middle of the path staring upward, watching the first star emerge from the deep blue of the clearing sky. He was forever dawdling when we walked out, stopping to examine the subtle shading of a primrose, or peer underneath a water lily to see the silver trout hiding there, or gaze for moments at a time at a raindrop poised at the edge of a leaf. I had never known anyone so entranced with nature, with people, with beauty—or so observant of them.
I had no heart for gardens or beauty. A message had arrived just before dinner. Tomas would be at Windham the next morning to escort me to the royal palace in Montevial. My time had run out. The knowledge that I might never return to Martin’s house except as Evard’s wife dissolved my resolution like frost in sunlight.
“You are extraordinarily quiet,” Karon said after a while. “Am I too distracted?”
“No. I wish I could do as you seem to do, take in all this to hazard against an uncertain future.”
“Ah.” We walked on.
The silence was too heavy. “Will you travel again soon?” I asked.
“Perhaps. I’ve stayed here much longer than I intended. I should go.”
“And where will you go? Whom will you study next?”
As always, his smile illuminated his face as if his inner being had taken fire. “I’ve heard of a land of flame-haired women—” He never finished the jest.
Tanager burst into the garden from the library doors. “Karon, Seri, come! It’s Martin. The blasted fool has tried to kill himself.”
We ran through the gardens, up the steps, and through the doors that led into Martin’s study. He was slumped in his chair by the fire, scarcely breathing, his lips a sickly blue, his eyes glazed, spittle stringing from the corner of his slack mouth. A glass of wine had fallen from his hand, and Julia knelt beside his chair, staring in horror at a silver vial in her hand. “Oh, my darling, you said this was only for the worst of times, and we weren’t there yet. Not yet. How could you?”
Karon took the vial. “What is it?”
“I don’t know the name,” said Julia, pressing one hand to her mouth and wrapping the other about her stomach. “Martin brought it from Valleor years ago. He said it was made by jonglers, a ‘diplomatic gift” he couldn’t refuse. They told him it was painless, and that it was always good to have a way out of the worst of times. He joked about it. Never, ever, did I think…“
Karon did not hesitate. “Tanager, bring me a knife. Sharp and clean. Just do it! Don’t ask questions.” He gave Tennice a plain white linen handkerchief. “Rip it into three strips and tie them together end to end. Tight.” Martin was limp as Karon lifted him to the floor; his eyes had rolled back in his head, and his tongue was swollen and discolored, threatening to choke off what little breath remained in him.
Hurriedly Karon removed his coat, loosened the left sleeve of his shirt at the wrist, and then knelt on the rug beside Martin. When Tanager returned, Karon took the knife, then glanced up at us hovering close about him. After an ever-so-slight nod of his head, he closed his eyes, opened his arms wide, and spoke with quiet intensity. “Life, hold! Stay your hand. Halt your foot ere it takes another step along the Way. Grace your son once more with your voice that whispers in the deeps, with your spirit that sings in the wind, with the fire that blazes in your gifts of joy and sorrow. Fill my soul with light, and let the darkness make no stand in this place.”
He gripped Martin’s hand and with a flash of the knife made a deep and bloody gash in Martin’s arm. Before any one of us could cry out or pull him away, he pushed up his left sleeve and did the same to himself. He had done it before. His arm was covered with scars. Hundreds of them.
“What in the name of all gods—?”
Karon ignored Tanager’s outburst, holding out the knotted handkerchief. “Bind us together. Hurry, if you love him.” His command was tight and hard. Cradling Martin’s head with his right hand to ease his choking, he positioned his wound over Martin’s and had Tanager tie their bleeding arms together as tightly as possible. Tanager’s hands were trembling. “Now, all of you stay back.” Eyes fixed on Martin’s face, Karon whispered, “J’den encour,” in a language I did not know.
I sank onto a stool by the fire, stunned and speechless. This must be another of Martin’s pageants. Surely in a moment he would pop up and say, “Good joke!” and Karon would show us how the knife was a trick and the blood was not real and nothing out of the ordinary was occurring here. But instead, Karon remained kneeling at Martin’s side, the two of them bound together in this strange brotherhood. Karon’s eyes were closed again, his head bowed, and for an hour he did not move. Nor did any of us, shocked and terrified as we were. I could feel a charge in the air like a veil of lightning, shimmering about us, ready to strike our hearts still at any moment.
The clocks in the Windham tower chimed a second hour. Just as I thought my chest must burst or my head split, Martin sighed and began to breathe easier, faint pink replacing the morbid blue of his lips. Karon was ashen, sweat pouring down his face. He swayed a bit, and Tanager moved to catch Martin before Karon could drop his head to the floor. But without moving or opening his eyes, Karon said hoarsely, “No! You must not. Only when I tell you.” Tanager paled and backed away, clasping his hands tight as if they’d been scorched.
Another quarter of an hour and Martin’s eyelids fluttered; his cheeks grew rosy.
“Cut the binding now.” Karon’s voice was no more than a whisper.
Gingerly, Tennice picked up the knife Karon had dropped and slit the strip of linen. Martin’s arm exhibited no drop of blood, no mark; on Karon’s arm was only a new pale scar among all the rest. Karon gently laid Martin on the rug and backed away, but remained on his knees, arms folded, shoulders hunched, looking pale and fragile, almost transparent. He did not raise his head.
Martin sat up slowly, rubbing his temples and blinking as he looked about the room. “What’s going on here? Why so solemn? Stars and planets, Karon, you look like death.”
Karon, eyes still averted, said softly, “I think there are those not far from here who’ll tell you that is exactly what I look like.”
Martin glanced from Karon to the rest of us, and only after an awkward moment did his puzzled gaze settle on the spilled glass of wine, the silver vial, and Karon grimly fastening his left sleeve as if he could hide what was there. “Oh, my friend, what have you done”—his voice was filled with shock and distress, but no surprise—“and what have I, in my unbounded self-pity, done to you?”
“If Evard is to be king, then he must have someone worthy to keep an eye on him, to be ready when his subjects take his full measure,”—Karon glanced at Martin, his smile as pale as the rest of him—“and we’d miss your entertainments so.”
“And did you tell these others what you were about?”
Karon laughed ruefully and blotted his neck with the remains of his handkerchief. “I thought it best to surprise them with it. More in keeping with the Windham tradition of puzzles and mysteries. I thought that if I were to reveal my little secret, I’d best get some good out of it and make sure you were here to defend me.” His color was returning.
“And what did you think we would do?” asked Julia, abruptly sitting herself on the carpet between the two men and grasping one hand from each, forcing Karon to look at her. “Such faith you have in your friends!”
Tennice stood behind Karon and laid a long, thin hand on his shoulder. “Have you listened to nothing we’ve said these past two years? We know what kind of man you are, and nothing you’ve revealed this night makes any change in it.” Then Tanager sagged onto the couch cushions, saying sorcery must not be all it was made out to be, as it looked more like work than the devilish fun he’d been led to believe.