Yuchai finally woke—really woke up, and not simply moved from a fevered dream into a dreaming fever. His dreams had been full of pain and terrible ghosts: Vampire Heads, Cat Women, Snow Demons, and Blood Stones. They had taken turns tormenting him—and even the bravest warrior could be forgiven his fear of facing such an appalling array of supernatural torturers. Once or twice he shook free of them, and opened dry and burning eyes to see familiar faces full of dismay and concern about him. It was then that he would realize, dimly, that his pain was due not to the claws of the Cat Women, or even the Blood Stones sucking his soul out of his head—it was from all the hurts he had taken when his poor horse shied into that pit.
But always he had dropped back into his fever dreams, and each time he did it was to fall into the hands of his torturers a little weaker than the last time. A little less able to break free.
Then a dream of great strangeness: it had felt like those times of almost-awakening, except that there had been only one familiar face—Shenshu's. And two strangers: a man with the pale face of a spirit, and a giant. Then a bitter-tasting drink, and finally peace, and sleep with no dreams.
He opened his eyes carefully, to find he was in his cousin Jegrai's tent. Sunlight that filtered through the walls made white felt glow warmly, but the air was cool, and smelled of grass and fresh water. And the camp-sounds were peaceful, as they had not been for more than a year.
This could not be their previous campsite, which had smelled only of horses and dust, always. And he could hear the cheerful gurgle of a spring or brook nearby, and that was not the sound of the great river they had crossed, either.
He hurt—but it wasn't like before. His head hurt, but he could think again, and the pain was localized and not nearly as bad as it had been.
He didn't want to move, much, especially not his head; but he could see what he really wanted to see without moving. His cousin, the great Khene of the Vredai, dozed beside Yuchai's bed, propped up by his saddle, and within touching distance.
Jegrai had taken charge of him. The thought startled a little croak out of his throat.
Jegrai came awake immediately, as any warrior would—but he smiled when he saw Yuchai's amazed eyes on him, a smile with no hint that the Khene considered his injured cousin to be any kind of burden on him.
Yuchai nearly wept with relief, and was immediately ashamed of such a maidenly reaction.
"There are too many in your father's tent for you to be undisturbed, and only me in mine—so I carried you off here, where you might heal in peace. So, young warrior, have you seen enough of battle to suffice you?" Jegrai said teasingly as he stretched limbs that must have been cramped, from the way he winced.
"I have seen nothing of battle, Khene," Yuchai whispered. "All I saw was a storm—"
"Wind Lords willing, that is all you will ever see, cousin," Jegrai replied, his face darkening. "Yuchai, little cousin, will you now content yourself with your father's path? I know you have it in you to be a Singer, and a great one."
"How can I think of the path of the Singer when half of the warriors who once followed our banner are dead, Khene?" Yuchai croaked. "Vredai needs fighters, not tellers of tales and keepers of lore!"
Jegrai shook his head. "We have said this before, you and I. I know all your arguments, as you know mine. Wind Lords willing, there will be no more of fighting for some time. But—all that is new in your case is that at the moment you can neither sing nor fight—though the chagun healer says that you will heal well enough to fight again, and Shenshu agrees with him." Jegrai picked up a bowl from the little flat table beside the fire-pot in the center of the tent, and stared moodily at its contents. "I could almost wish you crippled, little cousin. You have too fine a mind to waste . . . ah, enough. Drink this. This time it will not put you to sleep."
"This time?" Yuchai said, wonderingly. "Chagun healer?"
He remembered something more of that last dream. The man with his thin, pale face and gentle hands who brought both agony and soothing. The brown giant who filled the tent, nearly. He thought them visions.
"Whenever you woke I have been giving you of this to make you sleep again," Jegrai said. "It is from the healer-with-the-knife. But he said to leave off part of it, else it would make you crave for it."
"Cousin," Yuchai said wonderingly, "Where—hai-kala, in the name of the Wind Lords, where are we gotten to? This is not our last camp—I hear water—and the strangers you spoke of—"
"We have," Jegrai told him with a smothered twinkle in his eyes, "come to an unusual place, by the grace of the Wind Lords. Almost it could be the lands of blessed spirits. We have been granted water-pledge by wizards who hold lightning in their hands. One of them came himself from their home in the clouds to heal you with his own hands."
"That sounds like a tale to me, cousin," Yuchai said skeptically, sipping at the bitter brew of herbs Jegrai had handed him. As son of the Clan Singer he had a sure instinct for bald truth, the gilding of truth, and the warping of it.
Jegrai chuckled. "It is a tale. A tale a good many of the Vredai believe, but still only a tale. The 'wizards' are only men and women, I think; and though they have much wisdom, still, they can learn much of us. And if they are to be believed, this is their wish, to learn. The lightning I have seen, with my own eyes. Aya, it is powerful and fearful, but if men made it, other men can learn the use of it. The place in the clouds is a tall stone building up on the mountain pass on the western side of the valley."
Yuchai managed a feeble grin. "That sounds like less of a tale, though it is wonder enough."
"There is more wonder. One of the wizards did come to heal you, for no other reason than that another asked it of him, and both are good men. He gave us these herbs that kept you in a healing sleep and took your pain, and as I said, he also told us that after three days you would begin to crave them and that we should use them more sparingly. The Shaman thinks you are brave enough to do without except when you must sleep of nights, and I agree."
If Jegrai thought him brave enough to bear pain, then he would bear it until it tore him to ribbons before he complained. "I can bear it, cousin."
"I—I think I would like to ask another thing of you," Jegrai said after a moment of heavy silence, all the laughter gone from his face. "No—do not agree without thinking, and hear me out. We are under a three-day truce with the wizards. I go to speak with them before long, this very day, in the matter of—perhaps—an alliance. I think that there will be an exchange of hostages. Shenshu would go; she is wild to learn of this healing-with-knives. With her, Losha, equally wild to see new herbs and their uses, and to see the craftwork of these wizards. Shaman Demonsbane is to be the third. Shaman Northwind will be sometimes here, sometimes there if they permit; I think perhaps he and the woman-Khene of the wizards are two of the same mind. But I think that there should be a fourth to go." He paused. "Someone whose life they well know I value."
Yuchai blinked, and licked his lips. "M-me?"
"How better to hold my loyalty than to hold one who cannot escape them should I determine to betray them? And how better to prove my intentions than to offer that same person?"
Yuchai shivered. To be left alone, among wizards, trapped by a wounded body in a great hulking stone prison . . .
How better to serve his adored cousin, his Khene?
"Hear me, Yuchai—there may be something more here than being a hostage. The others speak of going to learn, so why not you also? You say you would be a warrior for the Vredai—would you wield your mind for me instead of a sword? Would you learn to cast lightning instead of shooting a bow?"
That possibility had not occurred to him.
"But I will not force you," Jegrai continued. "Though you would serve me and Vredai there as no one else could. You—little cousin, you are the only one of Vredai other than the healers and the -Shamans—and your father, whom I do not trust, as you know—with the quickness of mind to learn these things for me. You know Trade-tongue. You are the only one at all who would do this out of love for me and for the learning. You are the only one except perhaps Shenshu and Northwind who would see things clearly, and with no baggage of omens and portents attached."
"I would?" Yuchai said, bewildered. "Why do you say these things?"
"Because, little cousin, you ask too many uncomfortable questions," Jegrai replied, grinning. "You accept too many inconvenient answers, provided they be truthful. You are, in short, too much like me. I have another reason for wanting you in the hands of the wizards, and it is an entirely selfish one. I want you entirely whole again, little cousin, as strong and limber as before, and with both Shenshu and the healer-with-knives within the fortress walls, if such a thing can be, it will be."
Yuchai did not really need to think upon the matter long. Jegrai wanted this: well, Jegrai would have it.
Although—when he thought a moment longer, the notion of all the new things to see, to learn—that alone would likely have been as much a temptation as Jegrai's need.
"I will go gladly, cousin," he said softly.
The Khene sighed. "You may come to regret your decision before the day is over," he replied, "and your father will want my head upon a stake before his tent. But I thank you, Yuchai. You buy me more than you know."
It had been Felaras's decision to make the nomads come to her choice of ground, so they met in a pavilion set up by the side of the road within sight of the Fortress. The Order had used this pavilion at harvest festivals in the Vale; it held fifty people and tables for all of them, and was more than large enough for the two delegations and the single bargaining table.
They lined up on either side of it, her group, then the nomads. She'd wondered about chairs, the table, but the nomads seemed reasonably acquainted with such furnishings. The nomad chief Jegrai—even handsomer now that he was clean and rested—had brought with him only seven other folk (and Eriel had babbled about auspicious numbers), so she had ordered the same. The four of the delegation, and Zorsha, Kasha, and Boitan.
Kasha, because Felaras was going to be luck-wishing this colloquy with all her strength, and she wanted someone ready to deflect any ill-wishes. It was a pity Kasha wasn't as expert at this as Felaras was; she could deflect, but she didn't yet have the level of fine control needed to send an ill-wish right back in the teeth of the sender. But this time, deflection should be enough.
Boitan was here, because one of those with Jegrai was the injured boy, in a horse-litter. The boy was half-asleep over on a cot that had been brought at some haste from the Fortress, and set up at the side of the pavilion. Before long he should be completely asleep, as he'd been well dosed with poppy-gum. That was on Boitan's orders, after one look at his strained, white face. And, without prompting, Boitan had silently put himself at the boy's side rather than make an unmatched number at the table.
That was a likely ally she'd overlooked. Vider was hers, but inflexible and very cautious—he'd take to new ways only if others tried them first. But Boitan—quiet, unsmiling, but always ready to try something new and different—this was the one to learn whatever the nomad healers could teach, and giving him that opportunity might well make him hers. A lot like Duran, from what Felaras could judge of that near-legend. Boitan is definitely one to cultivate, a word of thanks and putting him in charge of dealing with the nomad healers will go a long way in that direction.
There had been relief in all the nomads' faces when they'd seen Boitan was one of those in the Order's party, and more relief when he'd taken charge of the boy as if it were a given.
That boy—Felaras fancied she knew what was coming; it made very sound sense in many ways for the boy to become a hostage. It was no secret to anyone how much the nomad leader valued his young cousin. There was this—he would certainly get the best care of both worlds up here.
And there was the other aspect—he certainly wouldn't be able to escape if Jegrai turned his coat, so that made sense too. It virtually assured her of Jegrai's sworn word.
Lords of light and darkness—that says a lot of nasty things about the folk these nomads have been dealing with of late. If I were a betting woman, I would bet that the last leader he talked truce with would have demanded the boy. Not exactly used to dealing with anyone reasonable; wonder if they'd know a potential friend now if they saw him? But if the boy is anything like his cousin . . . hm. Felaras took her seat on her side of the bargaining table, keeping one part of her mind on the boy, the other on analyzing the Khene's expressions. A sharp mind generally hungers after learning. I wonder if we could gain ourselves an in-camp advocate with the Khene's ear just by teaching him as if he was one of ours. It's certainly worth a try.
She'd have preferred having the boy awake, so as to get the interactions between him and the Khene, but . . . no. The boy had endured the pain of the journey up the side of the mountain, but he did not have to continue to endure pain while his elders made noise at each other. She would have ordered that poppy-drink herself if Boitan hadn't anticipated her.
Let him sleep, Felaras thought. It's not as though knowing what's in his head is going to make any real difference at this stage. We'll be turning his world inside out soon enough.
So while the boy drowsed, oblivious, on one side of the pavilion, his elders drank wine and made diplomatic sounds at each other.
Jegrai was amazingly good at it for a "barbarian." Better than most of the folk in the Order.
Felaras was good at it, but she wished she wasn't. Polite noise, pretty compliments, all the rest of that diplomatic rot; Felaras mouthed it and loathed it even as she mouthed it. She was prepared to continue it indefinitely.
And then a glance at Khene Jegrai when his face was momentarily unguarded made her decide that enough was enough. That combination of tension and boredom was nearly identical to the emotions she was keeping hidden.
"All right," she said abruptly, putting her half-empty goblet down on the table. "You've danced your dance, I've danced mine. You want peace with us, we're willing. What are you prepared to give us for it?"
Jegrai's eyes widened a little. "That would depend on what you demanded," he said, his syntax having much improved after a three-day period spent in chattering with Teo. "I may tell you what we are prepared to offer. Hostages—and hostages willing to tell you of the lands we have traveled through, of our ways, of our fashion of healing and other crafts."
She nodded; this was exactly as she'd expected. "How many?"
"Four. The Second Shaman of Vredai, Demonsbane—"
A young man with very old eyes (sitting at the left hand of the weirdly bedecked ancient Felaras knew was the first Shaman, Northwind), nodded at her, and smiled faintly.
"—the First Healer of Vredai, Shenshu—"
Felaras had liked this one immediately, and not the least because of Boitan's descriptions of cleverness and competence. Shenshu twinkled as her name was spoken; there was no fear in her of what she was going to.
"—Losha, who studies plants and all their uses, not just of healing, and who teaches some of the other crafts, including that of weaponry—"
Another intriguingly handsome man, not so young as Jegrai and not quite so handsome, but in the same mold.
"—and—"
"And?" she prompted.
Jegrai simply looked over at the sleeping boy. "—Yuchai. I would have you to know that he is my heir until I breed those of my own body."
"Is it your wish, Khene, that this be more than an exchange of hostages?" Felaras asked carefully. "I am empowered to allow you the indefinite use of the place where you are now camped, and provisions, if you would help us to guard the Vale from wild beasts and . . . the like. But we could also offer you more than this. Would you have an exchange of something far more precious than hostages? Of knowledge? If we engage to teach those you leave with us and to learn from them, will you pledge likewise?"
Again Jegrai's eyes widened in surprise. "That—you freely offer this?"
"Freely offered," Felaras nodded. "There is nothing more important in our eyes."
He drew in a long breath. "We will so pledge."
"Then here is my envoy," she said, stressing the fact that she had not used the word hostage. "Four in exchange for four. Teo you already know. This is Halun, one of our finest artificer-scholars. Mai, wise in many things, including the arts of warfare. And Eriel, who searches for the ways by which we may understand the world. As much as you show to them, so they will teach you." She smiled at the young Khene, who was showing signs of the odd little light in his eyes that the best of the novices got when they discovered that they were going to be learning, and not just playing servant to their mentors. "I would take it well, Khene Jegrai, were you to keep Teo at your hand, yourself. There is much you could share with one another."
Jegrai and Teo exchanged a look bordering on the conspiratorial, and Teo began to grin.
"Master of the Order," Jegrai said formally, under far better control than Teo, "it is well. My people came prepared to stay."
"And mine to leave," she told him. "Let there be truce between our peoples, then."
"As long as the grass shall grow," he said, making it sound like a vow. "And, Wind Lords permitting, let this be the opening to something more than truce."
"Hladyr grant," she said fervently, and stood up from the bargaining table. She nodded briefly at Kasha and Zorsha, who made their unhurried way to the side of the pavilion, and picked up the boy Yuchai, cot and all, without waking him. She nodded again to Boitan, who gathered up the other three the way a kridee gathered her chicks, and with as little fuss.
"Do not fear, Khene Jegrai," she said, reacting to his look of worry. "We shall care for him as one born of us. Kasha, for the duration, the boy's a novice; equal shares with you and Zorsha until he proves out where his interests lie."
"Yes, Master Felaras," Kasha murmured, after casting her a single startled glance.
They headed for the pavilion entrance, following Boitan and the rest of the "hostages." She prepared to go after, but Jegrai cleared his throat urgently.
"Master Felaras, there is a favor. . . ."
"Ask."
"Shaman Northwind would come and go here—if that is permitted."
Felaras thought about that; it was obvious to a child that the old man could carry messages back and forth. Then again, they were asking openly. This wasn't exactly clandestine.
She looked out of the corner of her eye at the bizarre old man—who caught her eye, grinned, and winked.
By the gods, I like this old goat! she thought with amusement. Why the hell not?
"Why not?" she said aloud. "Surely your envoys will wish to send words to their families from time to time. He is welcome in our home—if—" she said with sudden wild inspiration "—I will be welcome from time to time in yours."
The young Khene was plainly not expecting that response. She watched him grope for an answer, and the Shaman forestalled him by answering her smoothly.
"How not?" he said in passable Trade-tongue. "One wizard should always find a welcome in the home of another. It is plain to me that you and I have much we should speak of together; now, if we may." He gave her a long look, and continued, with emphasis, "Is it not always so when folk share . . . knowledge?"
She felt just a hint of a tickle at the back of her neck, the pleasant little sensation that meant someone was luck-wishing (not ill-wishing) her, and looked at the Shaman with wild surmise. By the gods, he's not mouthing platitudes, and he's not making boasts! He's a real wizard—and he's got me pegged as having the power too! He must have felt the luck-wishing I was doing, and—
She glanced at Kasha, disappearing with the boy.
As if in answer to her thought, he followed the glance, then winked again, slowly.
—by the gods, he felt Kasha's deflection shield, tool This is going to be a very interesting conversation.
"It isn't so as often as I'd like, Shaman Northwind," she replied courteously, gathering her scattered and ambulatory wits again. "Pray, come with me. If you will excuse us, Khene, I think Shaman Northwind and I indeed have a very great deal to discuss."
"Where should we put our new novice?" Zorsha asked Kasha's back with a half-grin as he balanced his end of the cot over a rough place in the road. A rough place that was a legacy of those little efforts of Felaras's at impressing the nomads. "I've never had a novice before—only a puppy. I don't suppose we'll have to housebreak him, will we?"
Sunlight on the top of Kasha's head gave her hair reddish highlights that looked very nice against the dark brown of her tunic. "I think we'd better put him somewhere he's not likely to be frightened when he wakes up. Some place as open as possible. With a window." Her voice had gone flat the way it always did when she was thinking. "Hm. You know, there's the Master's Folly."
"There is, and probably the best bet if what you want is 'open,'" Zorsha agreed. "I just hope he doesn't get just as frightened when he sees how high up he is. He's just lucky it's spring, though, or we'd have to shovel a path from his bed to the door every morning."
"Oh, it isn't that bad. I stayed there when the Master had pneumonia. I'll grant you it's cold and drafty in winter, but I've been in worse inns. And it should keep him from feeling like he's buried under a pile of stone."
"I'll give you that. It also puts him right next door to Felaras, which is no bad thing. . . ."
Kasha gave him a sharp look over her shoulder. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"
"If you're thinking that there are some folk who, for all their learning, would take a certain enjoyment in tormenting an injured and helpless barbarian boy—"
"That's what I'm thinking, all right." The expression on her face as she turned away again was of someone who had tasted something sour. "Easy on, threshold—and dragon—ahead."
As they neared the white stone wall and the dark, arched hole of the outer gate, Zorsha craned his head around a little and could see Boitan waiting for them.
"Stop a bit, children." Boitan's voice was unusually gentle; when they paused, he put his wrist against the boy's forehead, then pried up one of the boy's eyelids and smiled at what he read there. Zorsha nearly dropped his end of the cot; Boitan never smiled!
"No fever, no sign of permanent brain injury, and healing faster than any of you ever had the grace to do," the physician said with satisfaction. "The boy's a credit to his physicians. Where are you putting him? Novices usually go in the room next to their mentor, and you can hardly split him in two."
Zorsha actually had a solution to that—involving sharing a room, and presumably, a bed—but one look at Kasha's face convinced him that it would not be politic to voice that solution.
"Well, Kasha thought he might be frightened if he was too closed in, so we thought maybe we'd put him in the Master's Folly," he said instead.
Boitan considered this for a moment, then nodded. "If we did that, then Shenshu could take the room next to that; it's empty since I don't know when. That would put him between Felaras and his own healer. I'll meet you there, all right? The herbalist has the boy's things with him, so we'll bring them. It seems the Master has given me the duty of getting the adults settled in, and I thought since I don't currently have a novice I could pack that herbalist and the Shaman together in my novice's room."
Zorsha raised an eyebrow at that, and the look Boitan gave him said that the physician had also considered the possible unfriendly actions of his fellows, and had decided to deal with them before they happened.
"Fine," he replied, as the expectant silence on Boitan's part seemed to indicate that the physician was waiting for his approval. "I doubt Felaras will disagree with you. Now if you don't mind, this boy is not getting any lighter, nor the staircase shorter."
Boitan stepped gracefully out of the way, and Zorsha could see that the other three nomads had been—not concealed, not exactly, but certainly arranged so as not to be terribly visible—behind him.
There were plenty of curious gawkers on the way to the room they'd chosen for the boy. A few even looked sympathetic, and those few included Kitri and Ardun.
Which should make anybody think twice about trying anything, Zorsha thought.
Kitri even walked with them down the corridor once they told her where they were taking him. "Poor little lad. Gods, at an age where our youngsters are just thinking about their final choice of mentor, this child was out fighting wars. It doesn't bear thinking about."
"I think the Master has some notion of sparing this one that fate, Leader," Kasha said without turning her head. "She assigned both me and Zorsha as the boy's mentors, and she means it. She said to that Clan Chief of theirs that he was to be treated like one of our own, and told Zorsha and me to teach him until his real aptitudes show up."
Kitri looked like a cat who has just been presented with a particularly delicious cheese-rind. Surprised, then smug, then extremely acquisitive.
"Now, now, lady," Zorsha admonished her, laughing. "Felaras gave him to us. If you want any little nomads to drag into education, you'll have to go find your own!"
"Go on with you—" she objected, then smiled sheepishly. "That obvious, was I?"
"Leader, I could have predicted the expression on your face," Kasha giggled. "We know you."
Kitri chose that moment to get ahead of them and open the door to the boys new room. "Well . . . if he shows any signs of aptitude as a pure scholar—"
"We'll let you know," Zorsha promised, and they stepped through the door and gratefully put their burden down.
The room called "the Master's Folly" had once been the large and airy bedchamber reserved for the Master's use. Then some unnamed Master had decided that it wasn't quite airy enough, or else decided that he or she wanted an unobstructed view of the northern mountains. The tales said both, and whoever had been chronicler at the time had tactfully "forgotten" to memorialize this particular piece of bad judgment. Whatever the reason was, the past Master had ordered the north wall of the chamber knocked out and made almost entirely window.
So it was done; the Hands being what they were, metal supports were crafted that took the place of the absent wall, the stone was removed piece by careful piece, and it was accomplished without fanfare or fuss, right down to heavy shutters to be closed against the worst weather. The view was virtually unobstructed, and the Fortress retained its structural integrity at that point.
The Master was pleased through spring, through summer; then came the fall.
The shutters were so heavy and so hard to get in place that when the first autumn rainstorm moved in, the entire contents of the room were soaked before those shutters could be closed.
But that was not the worst.
Winter brought the usual snow and icy cold—and the Master learned that shutters do not take the place of a solid stone wall the night of the first real blizzard.
The Master, so it was said, had to abandon the room that night. And in the morning the snow that had been driven in through the cracks and seams of the shutters had to be shoveled out.
The Master moved out of the room that very day, into the novice's room. And no Master had used it since.
Kasha was already putting the shutters aside, letting in light, a playful little breeze, and the most spectacular view obtainable short of standing on top of the walls or the roof.
"Should we get him into bed, do you think?" Zorsha asked, looking down at the boy and wishing vaguely that he could do something to make him get well faster. Poor little fellow. I think I'm going to like him.
Kasha shook her head. "No, I don't think we should. The bedding hasn't been changed or aired in ages, for one thing. For another, if he wakes up and finds himself in one of our beds, it might confuse or frighten him. That cot will do for now." She pulled back the coverlet on the bed, and wrinkled her nose at the musty odor. "Hladyr knows there's enough room in here for three beds and twenty cots without crowding anything."
The room did seem rather empty, with only the bed and a wardrobe and a couple of chests. They'd set the cot down against the eastern wall, between the two chests. It seemed as good a place as any to leave the boy. Kasha stood at the enormous window, looking out on the mountains.
The boy was still quite thoroughly asleep. And Zorsha was effectively alone with Kasha—as he had not been for months.
His throat tightened. Say something, anything. Now, before the moment gets away. Teo's going out of the Fortress, and now, if ever, is going to be your chance.
"Kasha," he said softly. "I'd like to talk about us. And Teo—"
"Don't say it," she replied tightly, staying exactly as she was. There was controlled anger in her voice, and he knew he'd made a mistake. "He's not going out of reach. He's only down at the base of the mountain. No matter what you think, nothing's changed."
"Except—" He groped for words, desperately. As long as I've put my foot in it, I might as well put it in good. Besides, what do I have to lose? She's already pledged that she'll never break the Trinity. "—things might change. I just want to know . . . if they do change for Teo, could—could they change for us, too?"
"Zorsha, things could change for you, too. Did that ever occur to you?" she asked sharply. "A hundred things could change. The point is that one of the two of you is going to have to make a decision, if you want a change in the relationship between the three of us. It won't be me. I won't change things. And you and Teo are too good friends to pick a fight—especially when you know both the winner and the loser would lose. You won't force me into making a choice between you. You know that, you know that very well."
He looked down at his feet. His chest felt tight, his throat choked—
—and yet, there was a little relief there too. Relief that the change wouldn't be coming; not yet, anyway. I want Kasha—but not at the cost of losing Teo. There's changes enough right now. Maybe Teo will fall in love with a little almond-eyed archer-girl down there, and the problem will solve itself. If there's got to be a change, I'd like it to be for the Trinity to turn into a Quartet.
"Sorry," he said to his feet. "I—never mind."
"Besides," she said briskly, turning away from the window. "You are going to have some more pressing problems on your hands when this boy wakes up. I believe you asked about housebreaking?"
If he hadn't heard the anger in her voice a moment before, he'd never have known she'd been close to the point of rage at him. Certainly the expression of wry humor she wore now wouldn't have told him.
"Housebreaking?" he said stupidly. "What on . . . oh." The back of his neck and his ears grew hot—hotter still when her wry expression broadened into one of pure, malicious enjoyment.
"Exactly," she said. "You are dealing with a young man who likely never saw a privy in his life, much less one of ours. And I think he would be most profoundly embarrassed if I tried to show him. This is assuming he's healed up enough to take the walk across the room—if he isn't, you'll have to show him how to use the chamber pot."
She was grinning fiendishly, and he had the distinct feeling that she was enjoying his embarrassment. "I can't say that I envy you—and I hope he speaks Trade-tongue."
"But—" he began, feeling no little panicked, when Boitan and the nomad healer came bustling in like they had been blown in the door by a gust of the boisterous breeze.
"Well! Here—" Boitan began, then looked at the two of them sharply. "Am I interrupting anything?"
And to think I volunteered for this, Halun mused ruefully, surveying his accommodations. He had been allotted the felt tent of a now-deceased unmarried warrior; it was scarcely the size of his laboratory storage closet. And no furniture except a pallet and a couple of low tables with folding legs.
He was very glad he'd yielded to impulse and exchanged his long robes for more utilitarian tunics and breeches. Sitting cross-legged on the tent floor in a robe would have been nearly impossible.
The Khene and Teo had shown him how to raise the sides of the tent a little to allow cool air to flow in, and had shown him the sanitary arrangements. . . .
Or lack of them. Bathing in the brook, and eliminating in slit-trenches. He shuddered. It was one thing to be living like this during the haying holidays when one was a novice, and quite another when one was on the downside of fifty.
It was a good thing he'd brought his own bedding. Granted, what they'd given him seemed clean enough, but still—furs, sheepskins tanned with the wool still on, and undyed wool blankets still oily with lanolin—it all seemed the perfect haven for fleas and other less savory things.
He'd used it all to augment the thin pallet, which was of clean cotton. Furs and sheepskins and all going beneath the pallet. Sleeping on the ground. My bones are going to wonder what my head has done to them.
He wondered if he was being a fool.
Tonight he was to meet with the father of that injured boy. Teo had said that the man's title translated as "Clan Singer" but that what he actually did seemed to be to act as a combination of Archivist and chronicler. Since the man was the only person in the entire Clan to speak Trade-tongue fluently, he was the logical choice as Halun's "guide" in this place.
No, I'm not being a fool. There's too much to learn here. I couldn't trust anyone else in the Hand to get it right except Zorsha, and he will go only where Felaras wants him to go. The writing's in the scroll therefor all to read. She's made up her mind—it's very likely that Teo will not be her successor. Somehow I doubt that'll break his heart. But that's why he's down here with the Khene, instead of up there at the Fortress, learning to be Master.
Halun already had a hundred questions; the construction of the nomad's bows, for instance. He could understand the patchwork construction. These folk came from a nearly treeless plain, after all. But when he'd had one of the bows in his hands, he'd been amazed at the flawless mating of materials, and even more surprised at the strength of the tiny bow. Some of the materials had not been wood; there were bone plates, but some of the rest of the laminates hadn't been immediately identifiable. He wanted to know what they were, how they were put together to obtain that incredible strength and toughness.
Then there had been some body armor he'd seen, like boiled-leather scale, but made of horn or similar substance. It looked tough, yet lightweight; an immense improvement over both the Yazkirn boiled-leather and the Ancas metal plate-mail.
In fact, the uses these people put leather to, and wood, replacing pottery—which would be broken the first time they packed up and moved, he reflected—was amazing. He'd seen leather made absolutely waterproof, virtually flame-proof, soft as fabric and as hard and tough as horn. And always the question of how they had done this nagged at him.
Their smiths, however, were not up to even the standards of the Ancas, much less the things the Order could do. Their swords and knives were mostly bronze, with a few that were obviously family heirlooms of inferior steel.
Halun supposed with a sigh that he would be expected to teach them that.
At least Felaras isn't fool enough to give them the secrets of explosives, he thought soberly, trying to find a way to sit comfortably on the floor of the tent. Hladyr bless—I can just see it now—the slaughter these people would wreak if they had mortars and mines. Even walled cities wouldn't be safe. These barbarians would send the world floating into oblivion in its own blood, and the blame would be all ours.
He opened his writing chest and took out his notes on the language, hoping to be a little more fluent by evening. There were some concepts that simply didn't translate well into Trade-tongue. But his mind kept circling in on Felaras, this near-alliance of hers, and his own ambitions.
Zorsha wasn't haring off on a tangent at the Convocation, he thought after a bit. That was not a bad idea; allying with these barbarians, then declaring the Vale an independent entity. Knowing we had cavalry to enforce our sovereignty, not even Yazkirn or Ancas would dispute it. Gods above and below—no more taxes sent off to those crowned fools! Hm . . . we've gotten the nomads tied in closely enough with us so that we could use them—we could control not only the Vale, but the entire region.
He took that line of reasoning one step further. If we were to educate whoever is Khene just enough so that he depended on what we could manufacture for him and came to rely on us for our advice, but realized that without us the things he had come to depend on would no longer be appearing—we could be the real power behind the throne. Whoever was Master could dictate and the Khene would obey.
He sighed, and finally stretched himself full length on the pallet. Felaras would never agree to that; never. A fool, a fool, we have a fool for our Master. The first chance we've ever seen to come back into civilized lands with a power-base of our own, and she'll throw that chance away because she refuses to use people.
He ground his teeth together in frustration. Damn it all, I should be Master here! I know how to use these barbarian children, and do so in such a way that they would never know they were being used. If only Felaras would have the grace to die, or become ill! Damned woman was always too damned healthy. Not even pneumonia at the height of snow-season killed her! She's maneuvered so that virtually everyone in the Order is going to be supporting her on this alliance, so there's no way I'm going to get her unseated. And with whoever it is protecting her, I can't even ill-wish her.
He'd tried, especially during the truce-talk. Nothing had happened; the ill-wish had just bounced. Where it had gone, Halun had no real idea, although he'd had a suspicion. Dosti, and Dosti's novice Urval, had had a spectacularly bad day. On every loom they tried to string, either the warp threads had tangled, or they'd broken. The cats had gotten into the punched cards for the pattern-looms, and had made a few holes of their own, which meant Urval would have to repunch all those cards again from the archived patterns. When they decided to turn their hands to just plain weaving for the Order, it turned out that the only yarn they had in sufficient quantities to make anything in the way of garment-lengths was dyed in particularly hideous, muddy shades of green, yellow, and dun. Checking the records, they discovered that those stored skeins had been dyed in muted, but pleasant, usable colors—but proximity to the bleaching vats had leeched the color out of the yarn-skeins, turning them ugly. They would all have to be redyed. And just moments before Halun had given up his ill-wishing, Urval had fallen into a (thankfully cool) vat of ochre dye. He now was ochre, brightly ochre, from top to toe. He looked like a bad case of liver disease, and it wouldn't wash off, it would have to wear off.
If only Felaras had some truly virulent enemy . . .
Then the thought occurred that made him sit straight up.
After that business on the walls—she does. I would be willing to bet my life that Zetren is so unbalanced now that he'd be child's play to tip! He never was all that well wrapped to begin with, and he holds a grudge like a badger holds its brock. I can't ill-wish her directly, but I can certainly work on Zetren. . . .
He contemplated the best way to set the mind-spell. I'll have to aim this at Zetren rather than her—but—the worst thing Zetren could do at this point would be to start taking this thing from a grudge to an open vendetta. That would destroy him, because no matter how it came out, he'd be cast out of the Order. Yes. Yes. At the very worst, she'll be distracted and unable to give her whole attention to what's going on down here, which will give me a free hand to work. And at the best—
He found himself smiling.
At the best—the Order will require a new Master. And with neither boy trained or seasoned enough to take it—I become the only logical candidate.
Yes, indeed.