“What betrayal?” said MacAllister when Iskendar stopped. “How the Twelve knew what? Iskendar, tell me. ...”
The old crow, ignoring the Senai’s pleading, gave his death shudder and lay still. The second corpse would be Nyura. The two bitter old fools had rarely been more than two steps apart.
The Senai loosened the blackened claw from his cloak and laid it and its fellow gently across Iskendar’s breast. He began to speak, so softly I could scarcely hear him. “Across the ages walks the race of One, the Single, the Children of the Whole, never alone, but joined since the dawning. ...” The words of the Elhim death hymn. He probably knew the death hymns of every race. The words should be sung, of course, and on the second discourse he tried. “Across the valley of time walks the race of One. ...” Ten, fifteen tones of unmatched purity, such beauty in his voice that I could almost glimpse the welcoming vale for myself. But he faltered. His voice cracked and the music fell sour in the hot, stinking air. Bowing his head, he cupped his terrible hands at his shoulders in apology. “I’m sorry ... so sorry.”
I stood silently, waiting for him, trying to think what I was to tell him. He would want to know of Narim’s plotting. Perhaps at last he would be a proper man and figure out the truth of the world. How you could trust no one. How kindness and care were but the pretty face on scarred ugliness.
But when he got to his feet and noticed me standing by the wall, he had only one question. “What was he talking about ... Death Bringer?” From the look of him you’d have thought he had torched the old Elhim himself and was asking me to mete out his punishment.
“He was a mad old man,” I said. “He was dying. You can’t endure a dragon’s fire and speak anything of sense.”
My words hung weakly in the air. MacAllister stared at me unblinking until I had to turn away.
“Come on,” I said, starting down the passage toward the lake. “ Let’s find a place to spend the night. I’ll tell you more of Iskendar and his plots and his hatred of Narim, and you can tell me what you think you learned from the kai.” He followed without argument. How could anyone be so naive?
We had counted no more than fifteen bodies in the ruin. No way to tell how many more Elhim had been completely consumed in the attack, but the tracks on the lakeshore told us that many—most of them, perhaps—had escaped. Narim had escaped, I had no doubt.
We made camp in a sheltered cove a quarter of the way around the lake, where there was a broad stretch of sand. MacAllister fell onto the sand without speaking and was asleep before I could get my pack off my back. I made a fire, cooked barley soup, and sat leaning against the rocks, wondering what in the name of Vanir the fire-tamer I was doing.
Glaring sunlight scorched my eyes, forcing me awake. My back ached. I was still sitting up, and flies were gorging themselves on my untouched soup that had spilled into the sand. MacAllister was kneeling by the lake bathing his face and head. I considered pretending I was still asleep—perhaps for an entire day or until the Senai tired of waiting and took his inconvenient questions away. I had no reason to stay with a madman who believed he spoke to beasts.
As I watched him through the slits of my eyes, he removed his shirt and dipped it in the lake, then squeezed it out and spread it on a rock in the sun. In all the weeks of our sharing my hut, even on the night we left him hanging for the wolves, I had never gotten a good look at his back. When I saw my clansmen’s work, it was as well I had eaten none of my soup the night before. MacAllister came away from the lake, dried his face and hair with the hem of his cloak, and stretched out on the sand on his stomach.
Only after an hour, when he had put his shirt back on and poked up the fire, did I let my eyes come open. I felt dirty. Shamed. But to a man or woman of the Ridemark, a life debt is a chain that binds beyond reason, beyond decency. I had no choices.
“I’ve seen more tracks up a gully on the other side of the lake,” he said when he saw me stirring. “I think most of the Elhim got away. They must have heeded your warning beacon. Now, tell me. ...” His face was expectant. His questions had not been washed away with the previous day’s filth. Best to attack, lest I end up in a position with no escape.
“Iskendar and Nyura and their circle had not left Cor Talaith in a hundred fifty years and swore they never would. It’s their own fault they got caught here.”
“I don’t understand what Iskendar was trying to tell me. He spoke of plots ... of destroying everyone. What is Narim hiding?”
“Narim has been trying to protect you from Iskendar and the others. That’s why he had to be so brutal, so secretive, why he had to stand back while you fell into despair. All those weeks he stayed away from you for guilt at not telling you of his hopes. If you didn’t believe you were dead, then Iskendar wouldn’t either. But for some reason, the old crows decided you were still a threat. Something Nyura told you one morning out by the bridge. Narim didn’t know exactly what was said. ...”
At last I had told MacAllister something he didn’t know. “About Donal,” he said. “Nyura told me that my cousin Donal was a prisoner of the Gondari.”
“Well, whatever you said on that day made them believe you were not ... incapable ... as they wanted you to be. They were afraid of you. They had to be sure you wouldn’t try to help, and when they came to believe you would ...”
“... they decided to kill me. I understood that already.”
“Exactly. So Narim sent you to stay with me.”
“So what was Iskendar talking about? What Narim found ... his plan ... betrayal ...”
I picked at a hard lump of bread I’d pulled from my pack, and it crumbled in my hand. “Narim allowed you to go into Cor Neuill even though he knew there was a risk you would be recognized. He had to see what happened when you were near the dragons. And then he brought you to Cor Talaith to save your life. There’s plenty of guilt to go around, and Iskendar wanted to make sure you felt it. It was my fault that Desmond suspected the Elhim. It was your fault that his suspicions were confirmed. As soon as Desmond knew you were here, Cor Talaith was doomed.”
“I shouldn’t have come.”
“Narim knew you would never agree to stay here if you suspected what might happen. That’s why he hid it from you. That was his secret. So in a way Iskendar was right. Narim betrayed you by letting you go into such danger. By lying to you. He betrayed the Elhim by allowing you to come here when he knew the likely consequences.”
“Death Bringer ... Why did he say that I would destroy us all?”
“What do you think would happen if the dragons were taken away—freed? Wars of vengeance. Invasion—barbarians pouring over the mountains. Iskendar believed a human wouldn’t think of the consequences. But mainly Iskendar hated Narim. He held Narim responsible for this attack, and even as he died he wanted revenge. There’s no surer way to defeat Narim’s purpose than to make you mistrust him.”
“How can I trust him?” He ran his fingers through his dark hair. “Lies, secrets, deception ... you’ve not given me much to work with.”
That was certainly true. I wasn’t good at this word twisting. “You can either believe the one who tried to kill you or believe the ones who saved your life. Narim wishes you no ill. He and Davyn and Tarwyl and the others have risked everything to protect you. I’ll swear it on whatever you choose. By my honor as a daughter of the Ridemark, I’ll swear it.”
I did not look away as the Senai stared at me, weighing my truth. Everything I’d said was truth. Just not all of the truth. But I was no Udema shopkeeper who could not meet the tax collector’s eyes as I fingered my skimmed-off tally in my pocket. I didn’t know whether he believed me or just decided there was no purpose in asking me any more, for he gathered up his meager provisions and jerked his head toward the track that led up the ridge beyond the lake of fire. I stuffed my food bag back into my pack and took out after him.