Part 20 (2/2)
Fearin still hadn't looked at me directly and I was fairly sure I knew why, but that wasn't the point needing to be made first.
”You've never mentioned the name of the city that's supposed to be our ultimate aim,” I commented, watching Fearin carefully. ”Since we're almost there, no one should mind if you share that information now.”
”The city we'll be taking for our Guardian is called Stophen-Zur,” Fearin said after a very brief hesitation.
”It's the city that was stolen from him, and - ”
”No,” I interrupted, having antic.i.p.ated getting that particular answer. ”That can't be the city he lost to an enemy. I visited that city before I went on to Faerza and fell slave, and there was a large, well-attended temple to him that was thriving. But the main point is that his wasn't the only temple doing well, so the whole city couldn't have been his.”
Exclamations of surprise and shock sounded from the others, and Fearin finally looked at me with a frown.
”You have to be mistaken,” Fearin said, disturbance in his dark blue eyes. ”You heard our Guardian for yourself, so there's nothing to argue about. You and Garam and his men will leave here today at - ”
”No, I won't,” I said again, this time bringing anger and worry to the expression in his eyes. ”There was an excuse to reduce Faerza because of the slaves they kept and the way they treated people, but Stophen-Zur has a law against slavery and they even help out people down on their luck. The city doesn't deserve to be destroyed because of a whim, so I flatly won't do it.”
”Even if the reason for the attack is a whim, you seem to forget whose whim it has to be,” Fearin pointed out at once, which silenced the others again. ”Since you don't want to make the mistake of offending the one in whose cause we move, you'll just - ”
”You don't seem to understand,” I interrupted again, carefully making sure not to think about what I said.
”I've had enough of this farce so I won't waste any more time on it. If that city is attacked, I won't be part of the effort.”
Lokkel was open-mouthed with shock, Talasin had covered his eyes with both hands, Garam was trying to order me to keep quiet and do as I was told, and Fearin seemed to be trying to find what to say.
Ijarin, who sat to my right, voiced a sigh, and then his hand was on my arm.
”Kiri, this isn't something you can afford to be stubborn about,” he said, his voice filled with weariness.
”The first time you ignored the wishes of a G.o.d you paid for the act with your freedom. Do you reallywant to find out the hard way what you'll lose this time?”
”Listen to him, Kiri,” Ranander urged from my left, his hand on my other arm. ”I know you won't have any trouble doing what our Guardian expects of you, so I don't understand why you're hesitating. Maybe if we all told you how wonderful we think you are you'd feel better about - ”
”Are all of you deaf?” I asked, ignoring the words of agreement coming from the others. ”I'm not being stubborn and I'm not hesitating, I'm flatly and absolutely refusing. This trained bear has done her last dance no matter how many times the music is played again, and that decision is final. If you think that taking Stophen-Zur is so important, go ahead and do it without me.”
”We should be able to do just that,” Garam said to Fearin, speaking into the strained silence. ”Once I get a look at the city I can devise a strategy that will do the job even without the girl's help. They don't know we're here, so there's no reason to hold back a quick, decisive thrust.”
”You've absolutely right,” Fearin said, clearly pulling himself out of the strange mood that had held him.
”Our army won't have trouble taking the city, and then - ”
”No, we can't!” Ranander protested, cutting off Fearin's words without hesitation. ”We have to have Kiri doing her part, otherwise our Guardian will be furious!”
”How sure are you about that, Ranander?” Talasin asked without the hope that Fearin had started to show in his expression. ”Is that just your opinion, or do you know it?”
”I'll bet he knows it,” I said before Ranander could respond. ”Would anyone like to bet gold against the point?”
”Why are you acting so strangely this morning?” Fearin demanded before anyone could take my bet.
”What's gotten into you?”
”Why don't you tell us first what's gotten into you,” I countered immediately. ”You've been distracted since we first got here, not even pestering me the way you usually do. If you're not in the mood to share with us, maybe I can guess the answer.”
I'd added that last because Fearin's jaw had tightened with an expression that usually meant he was about to snarl something about intrusion.
”If you think you can guess, why don't you just go ahead and try,” Fearin returned, his tone eloquent with the knowledge that I'd be wasting my time. ”If you can't guess, don't bother asking the same question again because you still won't be getting an answer.”
”Then my guess had better be good,” I responded, smiling into his anger. ”What I think put you into so distracted a mood is the visit you had before we got here. You were told not to keep trying to speak to me, and probably also not to tell me about the visit. You were ordered to leave me completely alone, and you've been trying to figure out why the G.o.d would say something like that.”
”How in the name of chaos could you possibly know that?” Fearin demanded while almost everyone else made sounds of shocked surprise. ”I know you weren't anywhere near my tent during the visit, so how did you find out?”
”I didn't find out, I figured it out,” I answered sourly. ”You were pressing too hard and in a way that might bring out the truth, so you had to be stopped. In a way I was almost expecting something like this.”
”How could you be expecting something the rest of us didn't even know about?” Ijarin demanded, looking almost as disturbed as Fearin. ”And what do you mean, the High Master was pressing too hard?
What truth was involved and what did he have to be stopped from doing?”
”Fearin had to stop trying to prove he was innocent of the accusation leveled against him,” I explained, finding very little enjoyment in the close attention everyone was paying me. ”He was supposed to turn away from me in disgust when I gave him such a hard time, not keep trying to deny his guilt. It was finally necessary to actually warn him off, but that warning off won't do the good it was supposed to. I'm still not going to be available.”
”Look, I have no idea what you're talking about, and I doubt that you understand any better,” Fearin said, more than a little weariness in his voice. ”There's only one question to be answered right now, and here it is: Do you really want our Guardian to find out what you've been saying? Since the answer has to be no - ”
”But Diin-tha already knows what I said,” I interrupted to point out. ”He's been in the middle of all thisright from the beginning - hasn't he, Ranander?”
I'd turned to look at the man on my left, almost everyone else adding silent stares of shock, but Ranander only looked confused.
”Are you asking me to know if our Guardian has been somewhere around, Kiri?” he tried, his air of innocence as real as ever. ”I thought you understood that my ability doesn't work where strong Power or a G.o.d is concerned. And what you said doesn't make any sense anyway. A G.o.d has better things to do than hang around with a bunch of mortals and ... watch... Why are you looking at me like that?”
”I was just remembering what you said when we first met,” I told him, still examining the man closely.
”You said you tried to be friends with everyone, but some people were less than kind to you. That was supposed to make me feel sorry for you, especially when Garam got personal and nasty almost every time he saw you. But you knew Garam would act like that because of his nature and you were even counting on it.”
”Counting on it for what?” Ranander put, still projecting heavy confusion. ”Kiri, I don't understand - ”
”You were expecting my feelings about Garam to get you into my bed just to spite the man,” I said, letting the impatience I felt color my tone. ”I was supposed to believe that you were the only one Garam treated like that, and not realize that he behaved the same toward all people he considered non-fighters. You'd already told me how well the camp women liked you, so you expected everything to go according to your plan. After all, as ugly as I looked I would be rejected by all the rest of the men around me and that would leave you as the only one I could turn to. But I wasn't rejected by the other men around me, not even when they found out what I was.”
”Does anyone understand what she's talking about?” he asked of the others in our circle, the plea almost pitiful. ”All I did was offer friends.h.i.+p and acceptance - ”
”Yes, all you did was offer two of the things you knew I'd come to believe I'd never get from anyone,” I said, bringing his attention back to me when no one else answered his question. ”You never noticed that Fearin was ready to offer those things right from the beginning, and then Garam reversed his position completely after the attack. To make matters even worse, your specially chosen leader of this army snuck around while I was supposed to be brooding about how alone I was and Earned his way into my bed first. That must have come as something of a shock after the way Fearin ignored women on a regular basis. You must have considered him even less compet.i.tion than anyone else.”
”Kiri, are you feeling all right?” Ranander asked in a plaintive, worried way, his tone gentle. ”You seem to be imagining all kinds of plots that I'm responsible for, but it isn't true. If you stop and think for a moment or two -”
”I've already done the necessary thinking, and I've even consulted my memory,” I returned. ”You made sure to mention that 'some people' were less than kind to you, but you never responded in any way to Garam's baiting. If you were what you claim to be you would have been bothered in some way by what was said; you wouldn't have simply dismissed it all as completely unimportant. And then there's that little tidbit you told me about Fearin.”
”You don't mean that he's the one who caused all that ruckus!” Fearin put in with a growl. ”What did you say to her, Ranander, and why would you do something like that? I've never been anything but courteous to you - ”
”Really, Fearin, I'd never say anything bad about you,” Ranander protested, just the right amount of nervousness and innocence added. ”I don't know what's wrong with Kiri, but she seems to be confused about a lot of things.”
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