“Cunning? I knew more tricks when I was five years old than he'll ever know.” She looked at him seriously. “Do you really think I'm too old to fight him?”
“Perhaps.”
“Then I’ll let you rest your weariness tonight, but tomorrow I’ll spar with you. Old indeed!”
“Oh, never mind my weariness, I’ll spar with you now!” he made a lunge at her, meaning to catch her about the waist and pull her close to him. But she twisted and rolled out of his grasp.
“Not with that stink about you!”
“Is it really so bad? I've grown used to it.”
The bathroom held a pool of steaming water that was sunk into the floor. Around it the floor and walls were covered in mosaics of human figures, mostly female, bathing. In typical Relanese style there were garlands of leaves and flowers carefully covering their nakedness. The pool was small, just enough room for the two of them, that meant there was less water to heat.
Adhara stepped out of her robe and slipped into the pool. Drawing her knees up to her chin to make room for him. Menish watched with approval at her muscular body. Adhara had lines on her face now, and grey in her hair, but she still moved as gracefully as a swan.
With a sudden twinge of guilt he remembered Thalissa.
“What's wrong?”
“Nothing.” Their voices echoed eerily in this room. Menish pulled off his breeches and stepped into the pool.
“Ow, it's hot!”
“Better hot than cold.”
Menish lowered himself in, feeling the soothing heat as it crept into his leg. He spent some time rubbing the sandy soap they used into his skin and then sat back against one wall of the pool. He tried to relax, but thoughts of Gashan filled his mind now. Plans and strategies crowded into his head. A dike across the battlefield, archers, shields covered with water-soaked skins. Adhara ran her fingers over his knotted brow.
“You're thinking of Gashan. Not tonight, my love. Tomorrow there'll be care enough for the King, tonight let there be love enough for us.”
Later, when they lay on the great, carved bed wrapped in fur blankets, Menish stared at the ceiling and listened to Adhara’s breathing as she slept. He had thought he was tired but she had roused him just as she always did. It was not through want of passion that she had borne no children. He sucked in his breath between his teeth suddenly as he recalled again that he was not childless even though she was. He had to admit that the Keeper had been correct about Azkun’s saying he was Gilish, even though his prophecy had been misleading. What he had said about Vorish could not be misinterpreted.
Adhara’s breathing changed and she stirred.
“Are you awake, my nightingale?” he asked.
“Yes. I'm thinking about Gashan.”
He closed his arms about her.
“Not until tomorrow.”
“How can you be so sure when they'll attack?”
“Azkun told me.”
“Yes, I know. You said he could see what they were thinking. But how do you know that's true? I don't trust him.”
He could have told how Azkun had found Thalissa for him at Lianar, but he did not.
“Oh, we can trust him. I saw him when we were watching the Gashans. It's hard to describe, but they get into his blood. He was very frightened.”
“That woman, Tenari, he brought with him, she's an odd one. While he was away she just sat in the woman’s hall and stared at the wall. She wouldn't eat or speak, nothing. Neathy kept an eye on her and she said that sometimes, in the evenings, she'd weep a little, but nothing else. I think today was the first time she left the hall. Neathy must have made her understand you were coming back.
“Anyway, what happens now?”
“I'll send word to Vorish for the forces he promised. When he comes we can work out some strategy.”
She sat up suddenly.
“Strategy? What can you do? I've heard you too many times to have hope in strategy. It was you who told me how the Gashans will fight even when they are wounded mortally, how if their front ranks fall with arrow wounds their comrades surge from behind them like the sea, how they launch balls of fire.”
“Yes, but we beat them last time.”
“So you did, but with a trick they'll watch for. We'll sell our lives as dearly as we can in this war, and we'll die fighting side by side. I suppose it's a better end than watching each other fade into dotage.” Her voice grew bleak in the darkness. “But it's not long enough, my love.”
He pulled her close to him again.
“Don't grieve. We've not lost the war yet. You forget that last time an inexperienced youth went into battle and beat them. This time the youth has forty years experience behind him. And I have Althak and Vorish to aid me.”
“They have the Eye.”
“Well, we have Azkun. He's proof against fire. They'll not expect that.”
“Azkun again! What use will he be? He'll squeal and run as soon as he sees a Gashan. You expect him to raise a finger against them?”
“He killed the first Gashan he saw.” Menish told her of the incident of the Gashan who had been tied to the stake.
“I don't see you slaughtering Gashans by convincing them to tie each other up so that Azkun can slit their throats.”
“But we can use him somehow. He hates them and we can build on that. At every thal we stopped at on the way home he urged everyone to call on his dragons to fight the Gashans. He can hardly refuse to help us himself, though the dragons are nonsense. Althak is good with him. Sometimes I feel he doesn't quite trust me, but he trusts Althak.”
“Poor Althak. He looked haggard when he came in. Is that from the insect bite?”
“Yes. He very nearly died.”
“That would have been a great loss. With Grath and Hrangil lost we'll need him more than ever.”
“I told you he saved my life again at that pirate fight? He always seems to be where he's most needed. He never tires. Well, almost never. We wouldn't have been able to make our way around Lake Kel if Althak hadn't kept our spirits up. I almost despaired when he was bitten. But Althak never despairs.”
“So you think Althak will get Azkun to fight these Gashans and beat them again?”
“Perhaps. We'll fight, but I'll not risk all our folk in this war.”
“But if we lose against Gashan…”
“Then I'd rather we lived to fight again. I saw those stable hands when we came in. They're so young. I've seen so many like that on the way here, young and fresh faced. They think it will be a huge spring games or a great cattle raid. I don't want to lead them to their deaths.”
“If they die in battle and are pure of heart then Kiveli will take them to heaven.”
“If Kiveli really wanted to aid us she could help us win.”
“Then perhaps she will.”
Menish could not keep the cynicism from his voice.
“In which case she could tell me to stop worrying about the battle.”
“You joke. You shouldn't joke about these things.”
“Do I joke? Perhaps not. But if Kiveli promised her help it would have to be more than just to win the battle.”
“What more could you want?”
“I don't want our people slaughtered like they were last time. I'd ask that none of them die.”
“In a battle? You ask much.”
“She's a goddess. Why not? The question is: can your Kiveli promise this? Aton certainly can't. He failed us last time.”
The next day Menish called a court in his hall. A number of thals had converged at Meyathal to hear news from Menish and the local townspeople were also present.
There were no petty disputes to judge, no one wanted to hear anything but Menish’s tale of Gashan first hand. It took some time, for there were many questions and interruptions. One man had heard a rumour that Azkun had hurled fire at the Gashans and this had to be denied. He had difficulty convincing them that Azkun’s perception of the Gashans’ plans was reliable, and he found himself telling them much of their previous journey as well.