The Thousand Names Part 34

"Is it . . . are they living things, then?"

"Not as you and I are alive, perhaps, but yes, in their own way."

"If they have tempers, do they think?"

Feor shook her head. "Think, no. They have desires. Not quite as a human has desires, but more in the manner a tree desires water and will push a taproot through flagstones to get it. It is a part of their basic nature." She sighed. "Or so we believe. Mother says that we used to understand them better. Much has been lost to time."

Winter's eyes continued to follow Bobby. She leaned back against the step behind her. "I still can hardly believe I'm having this conversation."

"Why?"

Winter glanced at Feor, wondering if that had been a joke, but the girl's face was entirely serious. She took a couple of moments to compose her reply.

"If I told anyone in Vordan what you did that day," she said eventually, "they wouldn't believe a word of it." Actually, she privately thought they would believe it, if she told them it had happened to a friend of a friend of hers in Khandar. People seemed to be willing to swallow any story provided it was thirdhand and a long way off. "They-we, I suppose I should say-don't believe in . . . sorcery, or demons, or whatever you want to call it."

"A naath is not a demon," Feor said patiently.

"Regardless." Winter felt a little defensive. "I didn't think most Khandarai believed in naathem, either."

"They might not expect to see one," Feor said, "but that is not the same as believing they do not exist. After all, it is the same with the G.o.ds." She frowned. "But I do not understand. I thought your holy book spoke of these things. Your Black Priests dedicate their lives to rooting them out. How, then, can you not believe in them?"

Winter thought about starting with the fact that the Priests of the Black had been out of business for a good hundred years now, but decided to start with something more basic. "Do you know the story of Karis the Savior?"

"No. Your Captain Vahkerson gave me a copy of the Wisdoms, but my Vordanai is not yet up to the task." Feor had taken to learning Vordanai with the same quiet determination with which she approached everything, and the sight of her face screwed up in earnest concentration always made Winter grin.

"The story goes," Winter began, adopting the language of half-remembered sermons from her childhood and parsing it inexpertly into Khandarai, "that there was once a time when men were so evil, so p.r.o.ne to consorting with demons and practicing sorcery, that the Lord Almighty decided to destroy them. He sent a great monster, the Beast of Judgment, to scourge mankind from the world. As the destruction began, G.o.d heard many prayers to halt it, but the hearts of all of those who begged for mercy were tainted, and He turned a deaf ear. When He heard Karis' prayer, though, He found his heart was pure, and the Lord agreed to give mankind a chance. Karis walked up to the Beast without fear and banished it with a word. He said that the Lord had spared humanity, but only temporarily, unless men could be persuaded to change their ways. The people who listened to him went on to found the Elysian Church, and as you say, they dedicated themselves to hunting down demons and sorcerers."

Feor, somewhat to Winter's surprise, seemed genuinely interested. "But you said they don't believe in those things."

"Karis lived more than a thousand years ago. This is the Year of His Grace twelve hundred and eight, so it's been that long since G.o.d agreed to spare mankind." A thought occurred to her. "Maybe the Black Priests got the job done and wiped out all the demons. In any case, by a couple of hundred years ago they were more in the business of putting heretics on trial and interfering in politics. A bit like your Redeemers, really."

"Not so awful, I hope," Feor murmured.

"I wouldn't know. The King of Vordan got fed up with it and threw them out. Ever since, there's been the Sworn Church, ruled from Elysium, and the Free Churches, which don't have to swear fealty to anyone. Vordan is a Free Church country. Maybe they take all the sorcery in the Wisdoms seriously up in Murnsk or Borel, but in Vordan . . ." She shook her head. "Our priest explained to me that it was all a metaphor. The demons stood for the evil that men do to one another, and what the Wisdoms really meant was that we should all be nice to each other." Winter glanced sidelong at Feor. "I thought there was something fishy about that at the time."

"What are *Borel' and *Murnsk'?"

"Other kingdoms," Winter said, aware of her acutely limited knowledge. "Well, Murnsk is an empire, I think. There's the Six Cities League, too, and . . ."

She trailed off. Feor was staring out at the drilling troops, but her eyes were sparkling with unshed tears.

"I will need to learn these things, I suppose," the girl said dully, "if I am to live there."

"Live there?" Winter said, confused. "I thought you wanted to find your Mother here in Ashe-Katarion."

"She would not have me," Feor said, very quietly. "Not now. I have bound my naath to a raschem. This is heresy."

"You think she'd exile you?"

"I hope she will. She may wish to kill me instead."

"What kind of a mother murders her children?"

"My life is hers to begin with," Feor said. "If she wishes to take it, that is her right."

"Well, you'll always have a place with us." And, Winter privately resolved, if "Mother" decides Feor needs to die, she'll have to go through me. "What about Bobby?"

"He will be safe, I think. To interfere with a naath, once bound, would itself be heresy."

Winter nodded grimly and looked back at the field. The drills were ending, and Bobby was re-forming the troops to march back to the barracks. Her face was drawn with exhaustion, and Winter wondered if she'd been sleeping.

"We have to tell her," she said. "I don't know how much she remembers, but she knows something happened." She could scarcely miss the fact that a palm-sized patch of her skin had turned to something closer to marble than flesh.

Feor sighed. "You have to tell her." She paused, concentrating, and switched languages. "Me . . . Vordanai . . . not . . . good . . . sufficient."

"You still need to be there," Winter said. "She may have questions I can't answer."

"Are you going to tell her that you know her secret?"

"I think I have to," Winter said. "Graff knows as well, so we can't keep Bobby in the dark that the truth has gotten out. I think we can trust Graff to keep his mouth shut, but . . ."

"And what about yours?"

Now it was Winter's turn to fall silent. That was the real question, and she didn't have a good answer. She was still having a hard time coming to grips with the fact that Feor knew, and had known for some time. No matter how many times the Khandarai girl had insisted it was some supernatural naathem sense that had told her, Winter couldn't help but feel like there was some flaw in her disguise. What if they all know, and they're just laughing at me behind my back? That was ridiculous, of course-Davis, for one, would never settle for quiet mockery when there was a chance to push someone in the mud and kick them while they were down.

"You don't trust Bobby?" Feor asked.

"No, not that," Winter said. "G.o.d, if there's anyone I can trust, it'd be her. And you, of course. It's just . . ."

"Just?"

"It's been two years." Winter drew her knees to her chest. "I feel like I'd nearly convinced myself."

Chapter Seventeen.

MARCUS.

Marcus pushed open the door and found that he was the last to arrive. Val, Mor, and Fitz were all seated in flimsy wicker-and-wood chairs around a lacquered monolith of a table that even the Redeemers had found too heavy to move. Mor was putting a deck of cards through an elaborate shuffle.

"Finally," he said, as Marcus entered. "We were about to start without you."

"Speak for yourself," Val muttered. "If it was just me against you and Fitz, I might as well hand over my purse and be done with it."

"So I'm the other sucker, is that it?" Marcus said.

"Every table needs at least a couple," Mor said.

Fitz coughed. "You saw Adrecht?"

The mood darkened. Marcus nodded, and there was a quiet moment as he pulled out one of the chairs and sat gingerly, lest it collapse.

"And?" Val said gruffly. "How is he?"

"Better," Marcus said shortly. "He's still not awake, but the cutter told me his fever is down and there's no sign of festering at the . . . site."

"I knew he was too irritating to die," Mor said, a little too cheerfully.

"Liar," Val said. "You were practically dividing up his things already."

Marcus looked down at his hands where they lay on the tabletop. He closed his left hand slowly, then shook his head.

"It's a shame," Fitz said unexpectedly. All three captains looked at him, surprised.

"Course it is," said Val.

"That's war," Mor said. "Or at least, it is if you're fool enough to get within sticking range of someone with a bayonet. Getting shot I can understand, but-"

"He saved my life," Marcus said quietly.

That brought another moment of awkward silence, which Marcus felt duty-bound to break. He slapped his palms on the table with a dull thud and put on a grin he didn't feel. "Right!" he said. "Deal the cards already."

Mor started expertly spinning cards across the scarred surface of the ancient table. Marcus was an indifferent cardplayer at the best of times, and this was shaping up to be one of his worse nights. Coins slid back and forth across the table, occasionally catching in a deep rut and bouncing salmon-like into the air. The first of these bounced off the top of Val's head, to general laughter.

In the pause while Fitz collected and shuffled the cards after the first round was over, Val said, "Marcus, you're the colonel's right-hand man these days, aren't you?"

Marcus shrugged uncomfortably. "I'm not sure he has one of those."

"You're the best we've got," Val persisted. "So have you got any idea where we go now?"

"I'm not sure what you mean."

"Oh, come on," Mor said. "Everyone's been talking about it. Are we going to just dig in here, or go after the Divine Hand and his gang of malcontents?"

The Divine Hand's escape had become common knowledge over the past couple of days. As the initial shock of the Vordanai arrival had worn off, the citizens of Ashe-Katarion had come to see how few of the foreigners there really were, and the continued resistance of the Redeemer leader and the Steel Ghost had caused some dangerous rumblings. Jaffa's Justices were spread thin, and Marcus didn't dare send his men out in groups smaller than a dozen.

"The colonel will have to hunt him down," Val said. "Until we bring that b.a.s.t.a.r.d's head back and put it on a spike, they aren't going to believe we're here to stay."

"How many of them even know what he looks like?" Mor retorted. "I don't think spiked heads are going to solve anything."

"Strategically," Fitz said, "going after him would be very dangerous. Until now we've been keeping ourselves fed from local resources, but if we have to leave the valley that will mean a proper supply train, which has to be based here in Ashe-Katarion. And that base would hardly be secure."

"What, then?" said Val. "Sit here in the Palace and wait for the mob to get angry enough to storm it?"

"Yes," Fitz said. "Rebellion has always been a fear of the Khandarai princes, and the inner city is quite defensible. Four battalions can hold it against almost any conceivable force of irregulars."

"It didn't do the prince much good the first time," Marcus put in.

Fitz ducked his head respectfully. "The prince didn't have four battalions the first time. Once General Khtoba threw in with the rebels, the inner city was already compromised."

"There's another b.a.s.t.a.r.d I'd like to see on a spike," Val muttered. "Ungrateful son of a b.i.t.c.h."

"If he's still alive," Mor said. "We know he was at Turalin, and the Auxiliaries lost a lot of men there."

"He's alive," Marcus said. He'd known Khtoba, slightly, in the old days. "He's not a man who'd hang around when things went sour."

"Witness him going over to the Redeemers in the first place," Val said. "Like I said-heads, spikes. End of problem."

"a.s.suming you can lay your hands on the heads," Mor said.

They were interrupted briefly when Fitz began to deal. Mor peeked at his hand, grunted, and dug in his pocket for a few more coins. Val sighed.

I wonder what they would say if I told them it wasn't the Divine Hand the colonel was worried about. Whatever the Thousand Names were, Ja.n.u.s wanted them very badly. He says he just wants to keep them away from Orlanko, but the look on his face . . . Marcus s.h.i.+vered at the memory. Ja.n.u.s had been on the point of carving up a helpless old woman to get the information he wanted, and his plan to send her to the prince's torture chambers had been thwarted only by the fact that the torturers had all run away or been burned by the Redeemers. The two priestesses were currently languis.h.i.+ng in cells under the Palace.

Marcus played even more poorly in the second round than he had in the first. He'd been dealt a decent hand, for once, but his attention kept wandering. By the time Val collected the cards and shuffled for the third round, Marcus had decided his heart wasn't in the game. He was just preparing his excuse when there was a knock at the door. Fitz, as the lowest-ranking member of the quartet, got up to open it, revealing Jen Alhundt. Marcus stiffened.

"They told me I could find you here," she said. "Gentlemen, I wonder if I might borrow the senior captain for a few minutes."

"h.e.l.l," Val swore, looking at Fitz and Mor, then sighed. "I suppose so."

"I'm sorry to take you away from your game," Jen said, when the door had closed behind them.

Marcus waved a hand. "The way things were going, you probably saved me a month's wages."

They walked a while in silence, Marcus awkward, Jen apparently serene. He hadn't spoken to her since that night on the Tsel crossing, which seemed like a thousand years ago. That night, fear and the knowledge of impending battle had closed the distance between them, but here in the Palace it had opened back up into a bottomless pit that threatened to swallow any attempt at small talk.

Jen broke the impa.s.se. "The colonel seems to be a bit . . . distant recently."

Marcus sighed theatrically. "If you ask me what he's planning to do next, I swear I'm going to scream."

"Oh?"

"I just got out of my last interrogation," Marcus said, jerking his head toward the drawing room. "Why everyone seems to think the colonel confides his secret plans to me I don't understand."

"You do spend a great deal of time with him," Jen said.

"Yes, but you know what he's like."

"Not really. I've read his file, but we've hardly spoken."

Marcus paused, reflecting. He'd spent so much time in Ja.n.u.s' company it hadn't occurred to him that the rest of the regiment hadn't had similar opportunities, but thinking back he couldn't recall the colonel speaking to Val, Mor, or any of the others outside of a terse order or the acknowledgment of a report. His longest conversations had probably been with the Preacher, with whom he shared an interest in artillery, and Give-Em-h.e.l.l, who more and more practically wors.h.i.+pped at Ja.n.u.s' feet.