Veriasse helped Gallen to his feet. Gallen’s arm and ribs ached. Veriasse said heavily, “I would like to ask you an important favor. When I gave you my mantle, I did so with ulterior motives. Gallen, I have seen tapes of the Lord Escort’s battles. His name is Xim, and among the Lord Escorts, he is the most capable warrior in many generations. I do not think I have a great chance to survive this fight. If I die, I want you to be my successor. Would you become the next Lord Escort?”
“Me?” Gallen asked, suddenly aware that Veriasse had made a complete turnabout. “But I’m no one. Certainly you have better warriors than me.”
“We created the guardians to fight for us,” Veriasse said, “and so we have not needed human warriors. You wear my mantle, and in time, given a few years, it will teach you. You could become as great a warrior as any I might hope to find.”
Gallen considered the request. He was tempted to say yes. If Everynne died, another like her would be created, and her need would be just as great. Yet if he promised to do as Veriasse asked, he would be bound to labor for many years with perhaps nothing but an ignominious death as a reward. He recalled his oath, that when his heart was hot to aid another, he would always do so.
“As you wish,” Gallen said.
Chapter 13
As night fell, Maggie and Orick sat talking to Grandmother. The old woman let the children build a bonfire with branches from the nearby woods, and Grandmother asked Maggie many questions about her home in Clere.
Maggie told Grandmother of her work in the inn, how she cleaned and scrubbed and cooked all day. She told how her mother died of sickness after giving birth, and of her father and brothers, who had all drowned when their small fishing boat capsized. It seemed to Maggie that Tihrglas was a cold and bitter place, where she had felt cramped, forced into a corner, and as she talked, Maggie realized that she did not want to go back. To live here on Cyannesse, even to live on Fale as a free woman, would be better.
Yet when she finished telling Grandmother about Tihrglas, the old woman smiled and nodded sagely. “We are like you, in that we keep no android servants. This lets us serve one another and take pride in our work. A simple life is best,” she said, as if she were agreeing that, yes, life on Tihrglas must be peaceful.
Maggie wanted to growl and scream in the old woman’s face, but Orick chimed in with, “Och, well said! I’ll drink to that!” and he lifted a goblet of wine in his great paws and poured it down his throat.
The wind was blowing through the trees, and it sounded like the wind that blew through Tihrglas on a summer’s night, warm and comforting with the taste of the sea in it. It was the same kind of wind that had lulled Maggie to sleep as a child, and she felt a pang of longing, not for that damned Tihrglas, but for her childhood, for the blissful ignorance she felt before she’d heard of the dronon, and Maggie realized that if she had never heard of the dronon, even if she’d never left home, she would probably have grown old and been content. “Yes,” Maggie agreed at last, “a simple life is best.”
Veriasse had gone out to look for Gallen and Everynne quite awhile ago, and Maggie was growing worried. Veriasse had said that there were factions who would fight Everynne. Maggie wondered if such factions existed here on Cyannesse, among these seemingly peaceful people.
“I think I’ll go look for Gallen,” Maggie said, and she went uphill, past the singers who sat around a small fire.
By now the stars were out. A red moon was rising and the ocean had slid in under the city. With the wind, Maggie felt pleasantly cool, and she strained her senses as she entered the woods. She found dozens of trails and had no idea which to take, but soon she found one that led to the railing looking out over the ocean. There were benches by the railing, and a path that followed the rail around the city. Maggie imagined that if she just followed the path, she would find Gallen and the others sitting on some bench, talking quietly.
She grabbed the iron rail and used it as a guide, walking through the forest. At the third intersection to another path, she still had not found Gallen and Veriasse, but just as she was ready to pass, she looked down in the cinnabar moonlight, saw Everynne lying in the grass, dead. Her robe was draped over the body, as if to hide it.
Maggie gave a startled cry, rushed to Everynne’s side and pulled off the robe. Everynne was naked. She opened her eyes, looked up.
“What?” Everynne said, sitting up. She looked around in a sleepy daze. “Where’s Gallen?”
Maggie could think of nothing to say. Her heart was hammering and her head spun. “You slept with him, didn’t you?”
Everynne crawled through the grass, picked up her underclothing and put it on, watched Maggie without saying anything. She began to put on her robe.
“You took him, just because you could!” Maggie said.
“On many worlds,” Everynne said, “men and women sleep together whenever they want. It means nothing.”
“Yeah,” Maggie said. “Well, where I come from, it means something, and you knew that!”
“I didn’t want to hurt you,” Everynne said.
Hurt me? Maggie wondered. You’ve crushed me. Maggie found her heart pounding. She didn’t know who to be maddest at, Gallen or Everynne, but she knew they were both to blame. “Maybe you didn’t want to hurt me,” Maggie said. “But you knew that this would hurt me, and you did it anyway. You bought your pleasure by giving me pain. Think about that when you’re the Servant of All.”
Maggie turned and stormed away.
Maggie did not sleep well that night. She returned to the fire, stayed up late listening to the music of this world while waiting for Gallen, but he didn’t return. Veriasse ambled from the woods later. Maggie asked if he had found Gallen. He nodded soberly, saying only, “Gallen and Everynne are talking. They wish to be alone.”
When the music ended and the crowds dispersed, Grandmother conducted Maggie to a large but modestly furnished room, where Maggie bathed in warm water and lay on a soft bed to sleep, with Orick sprawled at her feet.
The longer Gallen and Everynne stayed away together, the more despair tugged at Maggie. She knew she had no claim on Gallen, they weren’t promised to one another, yet she could not help but feel stricken to the core. Two years earlier, when Maggie’s father and brothers had all drowned, a horrible sense of loss had overwhelmed her. But somehow it was less than what she suffered now. To watch family die caused more grief than Maggie had ever believed she would suffer again.
But when Gallen slept with Everynne, Maggie didn’t just grieve from the loss but agonized with the numbing realization that no matter what she did, she could never match up to Everynne. Maggie could love Gallen, serve him, offer everything she was and ever hoped to become, but she wasn’t good enough.
Part of her wanted to be angry at Everynne, to hate the woman for stealing Gallen. But the more she thought about it, the less Maggie found that possible. She had been jealous of Everynne from the first. Everynne was beautiful and kind, and in her own way she bore an air of profound loss and loneliness. It was hard for Maggie to resent someone who was in such pain.
A part of Maggie wanted to be angry with Gallen, but she kept reminding herself that he had never promised her anything. In the end, his loving Everynne seemed inevitable.
In the morning, Maggie stayed in bed late, hoping to get some sleep. Orick left for breakfast quietly, then returned.
“Grandmother and Everynne want to see you,” Orick said. “They have gifts. Everynne and Veriasse are planning to leave. They want to say goodbye.”