An'desha flushed, feeling obscurely ashamed of his outburst.
"It is only when we have passed the bonds of this world that They may act—or when events have passed into realms where nothing men can do will mend them. Your events have come nowhere near that point." Tre'valen finally smiled at him warmly, and An'desha flushed again, feeling as if he had been taken gently to task for something that should have been obvious.
"There are many courses that you may yet take," Dawnfire suggested. "Think of all the friends that you and Karal have, those who will not be swayed by a hateful man's willful blindness. I can tell you that the Healer already spreads her tale of a poor young man tried past endurance, and there are as many sympathetic ears as unsympathetic. You might think on what ears you may find."
Well, that was true enough, and while Karal was recovering, Jarim would not have a target for his abuses.
Unless he takes me for a target—and then, I think, it is likely since he will not only have to contend with me, but with Firesong, and Firesong is a past master at making fools look as foolish as they truly are. The thought made him smile a little.
Still—it would not be easy for him to move among the people of the Valdemaran Court, defending Karal's honor and honesty. He still often felt gawky and out of place except during a crisis, when he was too busy to think or feel self-conscious.
But I am Shin'a'in. Jarim cannot deny my heritage. And I, beyond anyone here, can vouch for Karal. Did I not see him with his master, and the way the two acted with one another? Did he not bring me through my own darkness? Did he not place his life in jeopardy to protect not only his land, but those of all the Alliance? I can speak to all of this, these things that others seem to have conveniently forgotten.
"You have all the resources that you need to solve this trial without our intervention, little brother," Dawnfire said as he thought through all of this. "You need only to reason out where to look, where to reach, what to grasp, and how."
Tre'valen laughed. "And know who to ask, and guess what will result, and know how to cope with the results, and after that, the universe is easy to live with, hey?"
To his own surprise, An'desha laughed along with the Avatar, his earlier shame forgotten. He realized at that moment that he felt much more comfortable with the Avatars now than he ever had dreamed he would.
"We are your friends, An'desha," Dawnfire said, as if she was following his thoughts.
He nodded, feeling the same warmth he knew in Karal's company. They were his friends, as well as his guides and teachers—and could it be that the distance between them, that gulf between student and mentor, was narrowing more with every moment?
"Soon enough," Tre'valen said enigmatically.
Well, that might be. What was certain was that things were by no means desperate, though Karal had reached his own limit. Karal's own reticence and determination not to reveal his difficulties had actually worked against him. Most of his friends had probably not been aware of his plight; now they knew, and now was the time to organize them to do something about it.
The gryphons! They like Karal—and it would take a braver man than Jarim to cross them! I need to talk to them, let them know what's been going on—
"Now you are beginning to see your options," Tre'valen encouraged. "And now, I think, you should go where you can do something about them."
"But return again, little brother," Dawnfire added, as he prepared to return to his body and the world he knew. "The Moonpaths are always open to your walking."
He gathered himself; flung himself down, and then in.
And only then, as he opened his eyes in the quiet of the garden, did he pause to think about the significance of that last remark.
The Moonpaths are always open to your walking. The Moonpaths—all Shin'a'in could walk them on the nights of the full moon, but for Dawnfire to say that they were always open to his walking meant that he now possessed a status, a power reserved for Sword-Sworn, Goddess-Sworn—
—and shaman.
An'desha looked in on Karal the next morning after Firesong had gone, to find him barely awake, drugged and sleepy and not really able to think well. He spoke in monosyllables, yawning between each phrase. That made him tractable, which so far as An'desha was concerned, was all to the good.
"Can't get up," Karal complained, and yawned. "Too tired."
"Then stay there; I'll get your breakfast," An'desha told his friend and left before Karal could object. He made certain that Karal ate—soft, mild foods that the Healer had prescribed—then saw to it that he drank all the potions the Healer had left. He left Karal alone with a book to make his own meal, and by the time he returned, Karal was asleep again, the book fallen from his hands onto his chest. An'desha smiled down at him and walked softly out.
Good. He should stay that way until this afternoon, and that leaves me free to prowl.
Rather than don his more colorful Shin'a'in garb, he ransacked his wardrobe to find a plain brown tunic and black trews, which he thought would blend nicely into the background. There wasn't a great deal he could do about his hair, but he thought that if he tied it back and kept to the sidelines, he should be, if not ignored, certainly less conspicuous.
He took an unaccustomed place at Morning Court, staying carefully on the edges of the crowd, near the curtains. He said nothing, but kept his ears open.
Karal was the major topic of the conversations he overheard; he had positioned himself as near to the Guild Masters as possible, mostly to see what people who could reasonably be thought to be uncommitted would say.
He strained his ears, eavesdropping shamelessly, the moment he heard Karal's name. "... the Karsite is not in his room," said the Master of the Goldsmith's Guild grimly. "The servants say he was not there last night. I fear that the Shin'a'in's accusations are too true."
"Your news is late and incomplete," replied a woman in the tabard of the Weaver's Guild crisply. "The Karsite is not in his room because he collapsed last night. The Healers have seen to him, and they say that he is ill with strain and grief." She looked at the Master Goldsmith in a way that made An'desha think there was a long history of rivalry between them.
"And this means that Envoy Jarim's accusations must then be false?" the Master Goldsmith retorted, with a broad gesture that nearly knocked the cap off of a young page next to him. "I think not! If I were an Imperial spy, I do not doubt I would be under great strain, and as for grief, we have only the Healer's word for that."
"And you doubt the Queen's Own, who says the same?" the woman snapped, crossing her arms over her thin chest. "One might well ask where your loyalties lie, if you choose not to believe what Herald Talia says!"