Part 21 (2/2)

She turned and looked into his eyes. For a long, long time she was silent, as his words echoed softly in her brain. ”Yes,” she said at last. Her voice was a mere whisper. ”You're right.”

”You're not alone, you know. In every war there are women left behind ... and men, of course, and children, friends and lovers and relatives who care ... sometimes you can lose yourself in work, and sometimes you can't. It's never easy, honey.” He touched the side of her face lightly, lovingly; his finger smeared a tear across her cheek. ”I think maybe for you a change would be best. Go somewhere peaceful, cut out the stress. That way you won't have to put on a show all the time, pretend that nothing's wrong.”

She stared at him for a long time, then whispered-almost soundlessly-”Yes.” She nodded slowly, very slowly. ”A change. Somewhere fresh.”

She leaned forward and kissed him gently on the cheek, trembling as she did so, loving him as much in that moment as she ever had her father. What would he say if she told him what his few words had inspired? How would he react if she told him right now what she was thinking?

She didn't dare. He'd talk her out of it, surely.

”Thank you,” she whispered softly. ”I'll do that.”

As she gathered up her things, she wondered if she would ever see him or his shop again.

The apartment was just as Andrys had left it, and she stood in the doorway for a minute just drinking it in, remembering their short time together. In his weeks in Jaggonath he had trained housekeeping to come when he called, and at no other time. Now, with the apartment permanently silenced, the scattered gla.s.ses and rumpled bedding stood as a monument to the man who had lived here, and the few days she had shared with him.

Her lover.

How strange that word seemed. How odd to apply it in this case, where their time together seemed like a brief bout of pa.s.sion between one tragedy and the next. They had not even made love in the traditional sense, although he'd known enough close variations to make the time pa.s.s pleasurably enough. Now, though, she ached for that shortcoming, and wished she had held him inside her once, just once, in that embrace which was so intimate that echoes of it lasted forever in one's flesh. But he'd been terrified of making her pregnant, and though the intensity of that fear was incomprehensible to her-like so much else about him-she had indulged him, stifling all the arguments that she might otherwise have raised about the efficacy of birth control, the predictability of her fertility cycle, the availability of abortion should all other things fail ... those were things you said to other men, not him. His soul was too tender, too bruised, too vulnerable. If intercourse would increase his anxiety, then it would have to be avoided. There'd be time enough for it later, when his soul had a chance to heal.

If that time ever came.

She walked to the bed and sat down upon it, breathing in deeply; their scents were mixed together on the sheets, along with the sweat of love and the sharp tang of fear. Here he had trembled as she held him, shaking like a child lost in a storm as b.l.o.o.d.y memories enveloped him, images so horrible that he couldn't even talk to her about them, could only whimper as they flooded his brain, overwhelming his fledgling defenses. He'd tried to pull away from her when it happened, to run away from her so that she wouldn't see him fall apart; she hadn't let him go. That was a bond even more intimate than their pa.s.sion, now, that she had seen his fit of weakness and accepted him. She sensed that night, with poignant clarity, that no other woman had done that.

Closing her eyes now, breathing in the scent of his presence, she could almost see him as he rode northward, every beat of his horse's hooves carrying him closer and closer to what he feared the most. How powerfully he must hate the Hunter, to commit himself to such a venture! They had never discussed his ancestor at length, partly because of her own mixed feelings about him. Now he was alone, headed toward a confrontation that only one of them would survive. If even one.

Time to choose, Nari.

The Hunter wouldn't hurt her, she knew that. His Forest was no threat to her. She didn't know enough about Andrys' demonic ally to predict what he would do, but the G.o.ddess Saris had promised to protect her in that arena. So she wouldn't need an army to protect her if she went north. h.e.l.ls, she wouldn't even need weapons-although of course she would bring them, just in case-and she could make better time riding alone than the Church troops would be able to, with their wagons of supplies and their overladen horses slowing them down. If she played it right and made good enough time, she could follow them in secret, to be there when he needed her. . . . Or maybe even enter their camp openly and demand her proper place in it. And if their G.o.d didn't like it, to h.e.l.ls with him. Let him protest the move in person if he cared so d.a.m.ned much, and explain to all concerned why the suffering of one man was so important to him that his precious war could not be waged without it.

Oh, Andri. She shut her eyes and trembled, but not from fear this time. It was exhilaration coursing through her veins now, the sure high of certainty. This was right. This was what she was meant to do. And soon-within days, if all went well-she would be where she belonged, joining the man she loved in battle. Waging war not only for his Church, but for his very soul. She shut her eyes and trembled, but not from fear this time. It was exhilaration coursing through her veins now, the sure high of certainty. This was right. This was what she was meant to do. And soon-within days, if all went well-she would be where she belonged, joining the man she loved in battle. Waging war not only for his Church, but for his very soul.

”Hang in there, my love,” she whispered. ”I'm on my way.”

Thirty-one.

They Couldn't make it to sh.o.r.e before daybreak. Tarrant said that was just as well. At best they would have been rushed through a dangerous landing, with barely enough time left to find suitable shelter before the sun rendered him helpless. At worst their enemy would find a way to mobilize neighboring towns against them before they had a chance to lose themselves in the lands to the north. No, despite the risk of remaining at sea, this was surely the safest course. make it to sh.o.r.e before daybreak. Tarrant said that was just as well. At best they would have been rushed through a dangerous landing, with barely enough time left to find suitable shelter before the sun rendered him helpless. At worst their enemy would find a way to mobilize neighboring towns against them before they had a chance to lose themselves in the lands to the north. No, despite the risk of remaining at sea, this was surely the safest course.

Which was all well and good, Damien thought, but Tarrant wasn't the one who had to sail the vulking boat alone for twelve hours, with enemies to the north and south and a d.a.m.ned ugly weather system taking shape on the horizon. By dawn's cold light, and then by the mixed light of sun and Core, he watched as ominously dark clouds gathered to the west of him, and wrapped his jacket tightly about his chest as winds gusted heavily across the bow. Tarrant had raised a storm, all right; the only question was how long it would take to reach them, and whether Damien could ride out the fringes of the squall long enough to drown them both in the heart of it.

He dared to leave the wheel long enough to feed the horses from their store of special grain, not because he thought they couldn't make it a day without food but because he was afraid that hunger might disrupt the Working that kept them calm. There was water in the galley, too, and he gave them some of that, although the motion of the s.h.i.+p on the waves turned that normally simple exercise into a test of both agility and nerves. He checked their wounds to see that they were clean and that the bleeding had stopped, but he could do no more to help them; the fae he would have used for Healing was hundreds of feet beneath the surface of the water, inaccessible. He stoked up the furnace anew and fed it as much fuel as it would hold, not wanting to think about what would happen if it went out while he was trapped at the helm. By the time he regained his post there was land clearly visible to the north of him, and he steered away from it as best he could. He tried to bear in mind what Tarrant had said about steering into the waves so that they wouldn't capsize the boat, but exactly how that worked when the sea was going one way and you wanted to go the other was something the Hunter had failed to explain. It seemed to take forever to accomplish that minimal maneuver, and when the northern sh.o.r.e finally faded into a curtain of mist in the distance, his every muscle ached from doing battle in a world whose rules he didn't really understand, and whose aspect was growing less friendly by the minute.

By noon a pattering of rain had begun to fall, and the waves that beat against the hull more than once sent a spray of salt.w.a.ter up over the prow. It occurred to Damien that he probably should have tied down the loose items on deck, or at least brought them down into the cabin for protection, and that there was probably some special way the sails were supposed to be tied up in a storm-but when you were one man alone and the sea had turned against you, such distractions were luxuries you couldn't afford. He did dare to leave the wheel once more, long enough to make sure that there was enough fuel burning to keep him in steam for a while, and by the time he came back, the sheer force of wind and current had brought the boat about into the trough of a wave. It took everything he had to keep it from going over, and when he had at last forced it back into position, his hands were shaking and a cold sweat had broken out across his brow. He felt a sudden sympathy for the captains of legend who tied themselves to their wheels when a storm closed in on them. No doubt (he mused) they had the intelligence to supply themselves with rope before the storm really got going; G.o.d knows you couldn't go back for it later.

He tried not to remember that those men had crews, as he struggled to maintain the bearing Tarrant had chosen. He tried not to think about the fact that if those men wound up in the water, all they had to worry about was drowning. If this boat went under with the Hunter inside it, unable to save himself while any hint of daylight remained- Not much danger in that, he thought grimly, as the sky overhead went from pearl gray to ash gray to a steamy charcoal. A film of rain enveloped the horizon, and Damien could only pray that he was still where he belonged, in the middle of the Serpent, and not north or south where the rocky sh.o.r.es lay hidden in the mist. Soon it would be dark enough that even the Hunter could come out ... and Damien wouldn't have complained if he did. he thought grimly, as the sky overhead went from pearl gray to ash gray to a steamy charcoal. A film of rain enveloped the horizon, and Damien could only pray that he was still where he belonged, in the middle of the Serpent, and not north or south where the rocky sh.o.r.es lay hidden in the mist. Soon it would be dark enough that even the Hunter could come out ... and Damien wouldn't have complained if he did.

”Tell me again how this is less dangerous than being on land,” he muttered, as he fought the wheel into a new and hopefully more promising position. d.a.m.n the man for going below without doing something to control this storm! It was little consolation that without it their enemies in Seth would surely have overtaken them by now. Damien would trade this cold, rainy h.e.l.l for a hand-to-hand conflict any day.

At last, after what seemed like an eternity, the wind began to abate. Numbly, Damien noted that they were still afloat. It seemed nothing short of a miracle, for which he gave thanks as he tried to unclench his hands from the wheel, to force life back into his strained and frozen flesh. There was a pain in his shoulder blades that felt like a spear had gouged into his flesh there, and his feet were soaked and aching from the cold ... but he was alive. That was worth a few deep breaths, surely. He watched foam-topped waves break against the prow with considerably less fury than before, and muttered a quick prayer under his breath. Please, G.o.d, let that be the worst of it. Please, G.o.d, let that be the worst of it.

It was.

At sunset Tarrant rose up from his hiding place within the cargo hold, and came to where Damien stood, s.h.i.+vering and exhausted. Without a word he took hold of the wheel and nodded for the ex-priest to withdraw. It took Damien a minute to get his flesh to respond, so frozen was he in that att.i.tude. At last, stiffly, he started back to where the turbine still churned, meaning to feed it more fuel. ”I've already taken care of it,” Tarrant informed him, as he swung the boat about on a new heading. For a moment Damien could neither move nor respond, then he walked a few steps to where a narrow bench was fixed to the deck and fell down onto it, heavily.

”It would have been nice if you'd done something to calm down that storm,” he muttered.

”I did. As much as any man can, who conjures wind in such a hurry.”

”I meant during the day.” h.e.l.l, what was the point of this? But he couldn't stop the words from coming, not after all those hours. ”It was dark enough-”

”I did did,” the Hunter snapped. ”Forgive me for not coming up on deck to make a show of it. Or did you think that the storm died down just in time out of liking for us?” He glanced toward the sh.o.r.e as if judging their distance from it, then back at the water directly ahead of them. ”Weather-Working is a risky art, Vryce, I told you that before. Under the circ.u.mstances, I did the best I could.” He glanced back at Damien; the look of concern on his face was almost human. ”Get some sleep,” he urged. And then, dryly: ”I'll wake you before the fun starts.”

He started to respond, then didn't. His mouth framed a question, then lost it. With a groan he forced himself to his feet-no easy task, that, not once he had allowed himself the luxury of sitting down-and started back toward the cabin. There should be a comfortable place in there somewhere, if the horses didn't trample him while he looked for it. Definitely worth the search.

That decided, he sank down to the deck beside the bench, lowered his head to the rain-washed wood, and drifted off into a sound and untroubled sleep.

Waves against wood. Wind slapping canvas. For a moment he couldn't place where he was, and then it all came back to him. Along with the pain.

”G.o.d,” he whispered. His neck, the only part of him that hadn't hurt earlier, was cramped from his awkward sleeping posture. He tried to ma.s.sage out the knot that had formed in it while pus.h.i.+ng himself up to a sitting position. ”Where are we?”

Tarrant was still at the wheel. ”Check the furnace,” he said, without turning around. Damien muttered something incoherent and moved to obey.

There was still fuel, but not much. He stayed around for a minute to watch it burn, reveling in the feel of its heat upon his face, and then climbed back up to the captain's perch.

”Everything all right?”

”Yeah,” he affirmed. ”If you don't count that the horses nearly killed me.

The Hunter glanced at him. ”My Working didn't hold?”

”They're scared and they're hungry; you've got a lot to Work against.” Heavily he sat down on the bench once more, gazing out at the water ahead. It seemed to him that there was something dark along the horizon, that might or might not be land. ”You bringing us in?”

”Unless you'd care to spend another day on the water.”

”Please.” He s.h.i.+vered melodramatically. ”Don't even joke about it.”

It seemed to him that Tarrant smiled ever so slightly. Damien studied his slender hands resting on the wheel, so elegant, so confident-so different from his own anxious grip-and asked, ”So when the h.e.l.l did you learn to sail?”

”When I accompanied Gannon and his troops to Westmark.” The Hunter s.h.i.+fted the wheel slightly to the right, toward the land ahead. ”Unlike you, I take every opportunity to expand my store of knowledge.”

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