Part 28 (2/2)

”Come forward, boy, and tell us what you know of this.”

Gun found himself responding to the tone of command in the Tarkin's voice, stepping around Mar and coming closer to the table before he realized he'd made up his mind to do it. Mar touched him on the arm as he pa.s.sed, her worried eyes searching his face. He looked away from her. He couldn't tell them everything everything. He couldn't tell them that he, himself-they would never understand. Mar would never understand. He would lose all that was growing between them.

When he was facing the Tarkin, he cleared his throat, and released the breath he was holding. ”I have seen it, my lord Tarkin. It is real.” Gun glanced around, but except for Mar, there was no friendly face. ”I-we've been hiding,” he said. ”Can you tell me, Lord Dal, have the Marked been going to the Dome only since since the . . .” Gun bit his lip and then continued. ”Since the green has come into Lok-iKol's eyes?” the . . .” Gun bit his lip and then continued. ”Since the green has come into Lok-iKol's eyes?”

”I believe the decree changed that morning, just hours before my cousin, or the thing that he has become, sent for me.”

”What can you tell us, Scholar of Valdomar?”

Gun drew in a deep breath and settled his shoulders. He found himself folding his hands in front of him, as if about to recite his lesson. If only this was just another lecture, another examination in his Library. That what he was about to say was only interesting history, and not something that might very well change the lives of everyone in this room, including his own.

”I believe it is this Green Shadow that seeks for and destroys the Marked. That the teachings of the New Believers are nothing more than an excuse, invented to give it freedom to act.”

Gun saw movement out of the corner of his eye and hesitated. The Cloudman was nodding, a satisfied smile on his face.

”Continue,” the Tarkin said.

”I cannot explain how, my lord Tarkin, but I have only recently remembered seeing what Lord Dal describes, the green light, the misshapen shadow, the . . . the feeling of otherness, in Beslyn-Tor, the Jaldean High Priest. It seems I took no notice of it at the time, but afterward, as I say, I remembered remembered seeing it many times.” Gun waited for the murmurs to die away. seeing it many times.” Gun waited for the murmurs to die away.

”I think I saw it in Lok-iKol once, but not in the same way,” Gun continued when no one else spoke. ”At that time, Lok-iKol did not move or speak, but stood slackly, like a rag doll, as if the Green Shadow only looked through his eyes. In any case, it was the priest who wanted Marked brought to him, not Lok-iKol.”

”The Green Shadow,” Parno Lionsmane said under his breath.

Gun meant meant to continue, to tell about himself, to tell everything, but his throat closed. He looked down at his clasped hands, trembling, knuckles white. When he looked up again, he met Dhulyn Wolfshead's eyes. to continue, to tell about himself, to tell everything, but his throat closed. He looked down at his clasped hands, trembling, knuckles white. When he looked up again, he met Dhulyn Wolfshead's eyes. She knows, She knows, he thought. he thought.

”They say Beslyn-Tor has suffered a stroke, and lies feeble and raving in rooms Lok has given him in the Dome,” Dal said, leaning back in his chair with a thoughtful look.

”Always the Jaldeans,” Tek-aKet said. ”Zella warned me they were the real danger, and I didn't listen.”

”They supported Lok-iKol's coup,” Dal pointed out.

”But why? why? Was it this Green Shadow?” Was it this Green Shadow?”

Gun nodded. ”It wants the Marked.”

”The Marked.” Tek-aKet let out a forceful breath. ”I did not give the New Believers what they wanted.”

”And so they gave their support to someone who would.” Parno Lionsmane focused his attention on Gun over his Partner's head. ”But what did that support entail?”

”The people.” It was Dhulyn Wolfshead's raw silk voice that answered. ”How did the traitors get into the Dome so easily? Almost all of the Carnelian Guard, soldiers whose duty it is to protect the Dome, and more than half of your Personal Guard, Lord Tarkin, have been in the streets for the last moon, helping the City Guard keep order, quelling little riots and mob violence. All started by the Jaldeans.”

The Tarkin was shaking his head. ”They wouldn't have done so much on Lok-iKol's bare word that he would enact their laws. Lok-iKol must have been doing something for them already.”

Gundaron swallowed. ”Lok-iKol was collecting Marked for them, my lord.”

”Explain.”

”Not everyone came voluntarily to the shrines to be blessed by the Sleeping G.o.d. Some even left the city, or moved to new quarters, never obeying the edicts about their dress. Lok was seeking these out and holding them for the Jaldeans when he found them.”

”And how was he finding them?”

Something in the Tarkin's tone, in the glint of his eyes, made Gundaron look away, down at the white knuckles of his clasped hands. He licked his lips. ”I found them for him, my lord.”

”How?”

Gun bit his lip, his throat tight as a fist. He risked a glance at Mar. Her face was still as stone, but she said nothing. ”Research.” His whisper sounded uncomfortably loud in the silence of the room. Dhulyn Wolfshead looked at him with narrowed eyes; he s.h.i.+fted his own and was startled to find the same searching look in the eyes of the Racha bird.

”What were the Jaldeans doing with the Marked you helped locate?” Tek-aKet's voice was silkily quiet.

”I don't know. That is-” Gun kept his eyes fixed on his folded hands. ”I didn't take any part after the people were found. Afterward, when I remembered . . . now I know that Beslyn-Tor came to give them what he called the Sleeping G.o.d's blessing. But as for why why . . . I think he-I think . . . I think he-I think it, it, the Green Shadow, is destroying the Marked; it fears them, as if they can harm it somehow.” the Green Shadow, is destroying the Marked; it fears them, as if they can harm it somehow.”

”You never tried to find out?” Gun glanced up at Parno Lionsmane, but immediately dropped his gaze. The Mercenary looked like he'd opened a pie only to find snakes writhing inside.

”I didn't know know.” He couldn't tell them everything, they wouldn't believe him.

”It may be that the Green Shadow took the memories from him,” Dhulyn Wolfshead said.

”And it was for this that you brought my Partner, my soul, to Gotterang?” The growl in the man's voice showed it wasn't just for his coloring that he was called Lionsmane.

”No!” Gun cried out, holding his hands up, pus.h.i.+ng away the worst of it. ”Dhulyn Wolfshead wasn't for the Jaldean. Lok-iKol wanted to keep her for himself.”

”And who else?” Dhulyn Wolfshead glanced over his shoulder and suddenly Gun knew exactly who was standing just behind him. He could almost smell the distinctive sweetness of the soap they'd used in Karlyn-Tan's room.

”And Mar, too, if she proved to be a Finder as he suspected.” He squeezed the words out through the barrier his throat had become.

”As he suspected because you you had told him so-” had told him so-”

”Enough, Parno.” The Wolfshead's voice, though soft, had the force of a cracked whip. All the murmurs in the room died away. ”We are all alive, which is more, apparently, than can be said for Lok-iKol,” she smiled her wolf's smile, ”on whom, as his mother wished, has fallen a terrible curse.” She turned to Gun. ”What of you, Scholar of Valdomar?”

”I'll kill him if you like,” Parno Lionsmane said, and there were a few murmurs in the room that showed others agreed.

”He meant no harm,” Dhulyn Wolfshead said, steel showing in her voice. ”You forget the Scholarly mind, my soul. It isn't real to them unless it's in a book.”

Gundaron looked up at her. There was no horrified disbelief on her face, as there was in Parno's. He felt a crumbling hollow in his mind where there had been a good solid wall. A wall that he'd built by sticking to his books, his notes. By not asking awkward questions and by telling himself that everything was all right. He had a sudden mental image of the little page Okiron once telling him that Lok made him nervous, and of himself telling the boy that everything was all right. He'd told himself over and over, since leaving Tenebro House, that he was doing all he could to make amends and there was no point in dwelling on the past. But he'd still been hiding something behind that wall. Of course he'd been horrified when he'd finally remembered, finally realized, what Lok-iKol and Beslyn-Tor were doing. But that hadn't been why he'd wanted to leave. He'd wanted to leave out of fear for himself, not out of horror at what he'd done to others. Out of fear of the Green Shadow, and what it might still do to him. Out of fear of Pasillon. Not out of resolution and defiance, as Mar had done, but out of fear.

Of course the Outlander woman showed no surprise now; she'd known all along, she'd seen him in Lok-iKol's study, and known what he was.

”We have strayed from our point.” Gun roused himself at the sound of the Tarkin's voice. ”What of the green-eyed Jaldean spirit? What can be done now?”

Gun cleared his throat. No one had offered him anything to drink, and he was afraid to ask. ”Lord Dal is right, this is not Lok-iKol. The Shadow does not want what Lok-iKol wanted. If you wait to gather an army, my lords, there may not be an Imrion to save. From what I have seen, the Shadow doesn't care about the country, only about the Sleeping G.o.d and the Marked.” Gun coughed again.

The Racha bird startled them all by suddenly opening and closing its wings.

”These people came together, my lord,” the Cloudman said. ”Shall we accept what they told us without verification? You can withdraw to the mountains. An army can't fight the Clouds,” he said, reminding them all of the old saying.

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