Sardas poured him a glass. “Sometimes my friends’ departures have made me think of leaving, too.”
They clinked glasses and Sardas swallowed the contents of his in one gulp. Thiyo took a more cautious sip. He didn’t want to talk about friends departing. Instead, he said, “Back to Laalvur.”
“I suppose.”
“I’d like to see it,” Thiyo said. A dangerous admission. Sardas might have guessed Alizhan and Ev were returning there, and if so, he’d wonder why Thiyo hadn’t gone with them. People in Estva didn’t ask questions, but they still seemed to know lots of answers.
“You might yet,” Sardas said. “You’re young.”
Thiyo didn’t feel young. It was hard to feel anything other than angry and tired and lost. I don’t know what you should do, but it shouldn’t be this, he’d told Alizhan and Ev. He swallowed down some of what Sardas had poured. A whiskey of some kind. If Thiyo were more sophisticated and less pissed off, he might appreciate its flavor. Right now, he appreciated its fire. What else could burn up the hard, sharp, scraping thing in his chest?
“You never left, though,” Thiyo said. Maybe he’d never leave either. Maybe he’d die without seeing the sun again.
“I might yet,” Sardas said as if he were giving himself advice. He smiled. “I’ve been thinking of going back. Waiting for the right moment, I suppose. I’d like to see the Temple of Doubt. Having met Ayat, I want to know if they’re all like her.”
Thiyo laughed. The tightness he’d been carrying in his body began to ease. “Can you imagine?”
“Truly, I can’t.” Sardas kept smiling as he shook his head to himself. Then he placed a hand—lined, but not weathered—on Thiyo’s. “I know we haven’t known each other very long, but I like you, Thiyo. I always enjoy talking to you.”
Their two hands sat there on the table and Thiyo didn’t know what to make of it. In Hoi, people touched each other all the time, far more than on the mainland. It was friendship and familiarity. In Nalitzva, touching had always carried a sensual suggestion with it, so Thiyo had come to interpret all touch that way. But this didn’t feel sexual.
“You make me wish I’d taken on an initiate,” Sardas continued. “I’d like to have had a student like you. But I think we’re too late for that, and you already know more than I ever could have taught you.”
Was Sardas being… fatherly? Thiyo’s own father had never behaved like this, so it was hard to tell. But it was a kindness at a time when Thiyo desperately wanted it, so he smiled and nodded, too. And when he moved his hand away to pick up his drink, he found himself regretting the loss of contact. Could he put his hand back? No, that was too much. He took a drink instead. His glass was empty.
Sardas poured him another. Then he got up from the table and went searching through the room. “I found that book I was telling you about,” he said. He pulled down a small, tan volume from a shelf and handed it to Thiyo, who put his glass—already empty—down on the table to examine it.
He opened the left flap as if it were a mainland book, and was confronted with the final pages of a text in Hoi script. He blinked. Until a little over a year ago when he’d left Hoi with Ilyr, the council of elders had forbidden the export of books, even seemingly harmless ones like this. He flipped it over and started from the beginning. It was a short treatise on medicinal and recreational uses of wai. Where had Sardas acquired such a thing?
And why did it seem so familiar? Thiyo had never handled this book before.
“That’s been here for years,” Sardas said, gesturing at the book. “I don’t even really know what language it’s in. But a wild guess led me to believe you might.”
Thiyo’d already had too much to drink, if this little book was bothering him so much. Should he translate it for Sardas? The council had been bitterly divided on whether Thiyo should be allowed to leave Hoi, and if so, what he should be allowed to share. Thiyo’s own mother had led the isolationists.
“They will learn our secrets and destroy us with them,” she’d said, her eyes on Thiyo. Her party members murmured agreement behind her, and a few others in the room looked sick with uncertainty. Thiyo had raised his chin and stared back at his mother. Ultimately, his lofty speech on opening up to the world—for love and freedom and knowledge—had narrowly defeated what he’d thought were her outmoded views on preserving their way of life. The council members had agreed to let him leave with Ilyr, under the condition that he exercise thoughtful judgment about what it was safe to share with outsiders. His mother, staunch to the end, had been silent as the council announced their decision. In all his years of disappointing her, she’d never looked so furious and betrayed. Luckily, the vote allowed him to put an ocean between them. Thiyo had won.
The memory of his victory in the council felt hollow and sad. What did Thiyo know of good judgment?
He shut the book and changed the subject. “So the Temple of Doubt didn’t exist when you left Laalvur?” He stopped. He shouldn’t have said that, but for a moment, he couldn’t remember why. “Oh. Questions. Not supposed to ask.”
“It’s fine, Thiyo. We don’t have to treat each other with distant politeness. Neither of us is Estvan by birth, anyway. And in answer, no, the Doubters were just a collection of grumbling priests of the Balance back then. They’d only just begun to murmur about calling themselves something else. It seemed wiser, as a young initiate, not to associate with them.”
“Wiser not to associate,” Thiyo repeated. He could have used a little of that wisdom. He was always associating with the wrong people. People who left. He took a drink.
“One of my few smart choices at that age,” Sardas said. “I made more than my share of mistakes.”
“Me too.”
“Mostly women,” Sardas admitted. “One in particular.”
“You loved her,” Thiyo said. He tried to intone it just right so it wouldn’t be a question, even though it was. It was difficult. Was he drunk already? He’d only had two drinks, hadn’t he? Sardas was pouring him another, and he couldn’t remember what number it was, but he was lifting the glass to take a drink. What did it matter? He wasn’t going anywhere.
“I would have done anything for her,” Sardas said. “But she didn’t love me.”
“Stupid,” Thiyo said fiercely. Sardas was still handsome, and he would have been glorious in his youth. And he was brilliant. And he cared about Thiyo after knowing him for only a few weeks, so he must have cared deeply for this woman. “I would have loved you back.”
Sardas raised his brows. Thiyo shouldn’t have said that.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”
“Oh, don’t apologize. I’m flattered. And I appreciate your candor. I’ve never… had those inclinations, myself, but I understand them to be just as worthy as feelings between men and women,” Sardas said. “But don’t blame her. It wasn’t her fault. We met in a tragic moment. A terrible wave had just hit the city. I’d only just joined the Temple, and suddenly I was presented with the enormously challenging, but vital work of offering comfort to grief-stricken survivors. That’s how we met. I was young and clueless and not very good at my job, but with her… everything felt easy. And she was so beautiful. I can hardly describe… but I suppose it wouldn’t mean anything to you, if you don’t like women.”
“Why does everyone always assume that I don’t?” Thiyo muttered. “Have you seen women?”
Sardas laughed. “I didn’t want to assume, but—point taken.”
The liquor was making him say things he shouldn’t. He looked down at the table. “Sorry. Please continue.”
“So yes, we had a connection. But she’d lost someone and taken it hard. I don’t think she’s ever really loved anyone since. She couldn’t help not loving me, just as I couldn’t help loving her.”
All the good people in the world suffered far too much. That deserved another drink. And he might as well take advantage of the moment to ask a few more improper questions. There was something intriguing about this s
tory—a beautiful young Laalvuri woman surviving a disaster and losing everything—or something familiar. His thoughts swam. He needed to know more. “What happened?”
Sardas shrugged. “Nothing. She didn’t love me and I couldn’t make her. I came here.”
“You never saw her again.”
“We write to each other sometimes,” Sardas said. “I enjoy our correspondence very much. It’s so rare to meet someone with a mind like hers. She’s remained a dear friend.”
Sardas was still in love with someone who’d never love him back. He’d spent half his life in this icy, sunless hole, waiting for letters from her, knowing she wasn’t waiting for his. “That’s sad,” Thiyo said, and his tongue stuck to the words. When he shook his head for emphasis, the room spun. It had been a long time since he’d felt so intoxicated.
“I told her about you. She said she’d like to meet you.” Sardas tapped the book that was lying closed on the table. “She’s the one who sent me this, you know. She was hoping you could read it.”
Everyone always wanted Thiyo to read some book. This one wasn’t even in some special, unbreakable code. It was just a bunch of normal words. And it wasn’t unique. Thiyo had seen it before. He remembered looking for it once, for some reason—pulling all the books off a shelf, flipping each one open until he landed on this one. Then he’d crawled out the window.
Thiyo laughed to himself. A window. Why had he done that?
“Thiyo?”
“I’m drunk,” Thiyo explained. He wasn’t going to read any books. And Sardas’s friend was all the way across the ocean in Laalvur, where Thiyo wasn’t going. “And I’m here and they’re—she’s there. And I’m drunk.” It was the best way he could think of to express the problem.
Sardas laughed. “I can see that. That is what we came here to do, isn’t it? To take your mind off your friends who left for Laalvur. Alizhan and… what was her name? Ev?”
“I need to lie down.”
“Yes, I think you’re a bit too tall for me to carry you,” Sardas said, amused. “Let’s walk.”
Sardas put the liquor on a shelf and helped him up. With Sardas supporting him, they walked out the door. Sardas was being so nice to him. Thiyo thanked him profusely, in between explaining that he didn’t get drunk very often since the time that Barold Hyersk had tried to rape him, and that normally he carried a knife, but he hadn’t lately, not since he’d had to use it, which had disturbed him viscerally and emotionally and he hoped never to do again, and for a while he’d thought that even if life was dangerous, maybe he could rely on Ev, or even Alizhan, to watch out for him, but he couldn’t now because they’d left him—how could they, why didn’t they listen—but it was what he ought to have expected from the beginning, because everyone left, because he wasn’t worth staying with…
Sardas hugged him around the shoulders, which jolted the whole world and made Thiyo want to throw up, but was kind of nice anyway.
“I’ll be embarrassed about this when I’m sober,” Thiyo slurred, because even though everyone thought he was shameless, it wasn’t quite true.
“With any luck, you won’t remember,” Sardas said. Their progress toward Thiyo’s bed was slow and dizzying, but they did eventually arrive. Sardas had to guide him toward the cot, which kept moving and was never where he thought it was. When Thiyo finally got settled, Sardas pulled a small vial from the pocket of his grey robes. “You’re likely to be miserable when you wake, but this might help. Drink it.”
Thiyo did as he was told and then let his head fall to the pillow. Sardas gave his shoulder a paternal squeeze. But before Thiyo could let go of his consciousness entirely, there was one more thing. Something Sardas had said a while ago was still bothering him. “They’re not my friends. I’ll never see them again.”
“Oh,” Sardas said. “I wouldn’t be so sure of that.”
Thiyo passed out.
29
An Unmarked Letter
4TH TRIAD OF SIMOSHA, YEAR 764 of the Balance
My dear Iriyat,
M arrived in Estva in extremely dramatic fashion, accompanied by a man with a broken leg. If she intended a diversion, it didn’t work. I noticed her, and so did your ragtag band of adventurers. But Estva’s strict exile laws worked in her favor, and she dispensed with two of them without lifting a finger. Only your girl, her friend, and the islander remained, and M persuaded the first two to go with her. The islander evinced some stubbornness—M had previously mistreated him, which may work to our advantage, and misjudged his value.
Speaking of poor judgment, I want to apologize for all these years of willful ignorance on my part. You were right about magic. It’s absolutely a worthy object of study. I’ve finally begun to take Estvan folklore seriously and have made some exciting discoveries about the effects of the local plants. I will bring you a sample, along with the islander.
That means I’ll be sailing on M’s ship to Laalvur. I’m an old man now, and nostalgia does overtake me on occasion. It’s been so long. I would like to see Laalvur—beautiful, brilliant, blond Laalvur—once more.
This puts me in an excellent position to report on M’s designs to you. I’ll do everything in my power to make sure you’re ready. I know you’ve been waiting a long time for this homecoming.
* * *
Yours,
Tsardeya
30
Casual Intimacies
HIS INSIDES SLOSHED. IT STAYED dark even when he tried to open his eyes. There was a wad of cloth stuffed into his mouth and something tied around his wrists. Something rocked him back and forth. Was that the sound of hooves? Thiyo didn’t know where he was.
He ought to be terrified and struggling, but his heart beat sluggishly in his chest. Drugs. He’d been drinking with Sardas. Then he’d gone to bed. Had there been something else in the liquor?
Was Sardas alright?
Or was that the wrong question?
His thoughts were all out of order. How much time had passed? Which direction were they going—and who were they in the first place? Was Thiyo condemned to be drugged and dragged from bed and imprisoned every few months? He couldn’t remember how he’d gotten to prison the first time—Merat—but it must have been something like this. Even more reason for alarm.
Ah. His stomach was alert to the threat—and the movement—even if his pulse and his mind remained slow. Bile rose in his throat.
Thiyo made a sound of protest and horror and then a rag was placed over his face and the world fell away.
They’d left Estva in a matter of hours. Pirkko’s goodbye had been chilly and Thiyo’s had been as icy as death. Pirkko’s mood couldn’t be helped, but it was a stab in the gut, making Thiyo so angry and having no way to fix things. Ev had known, in a distant way, that he’d leave eventually—that one of their conversations would be the last—but she’d never imagined it would hurt so much. And she didn’t want to miss him, vain and irritating as he was, but she did. She’d spent the first few hours of their ride expecting some clever barb about what dismal company Merat’s guards were, how the unrelenting darkness really brought out their best features or their highly refined sense of style or something. But Thiyo was gone. No one had said anything witty at all.
Leaving felt like the wrong decision, even if physically walking out of the gates of Estva had been easier than she’d ever imagined. They’d spent so much time feeling trapped there. If only they’d had more money, they could have left long ago.
Merat had traveled in a finely appointed carriage, so Alizhan and Ev had opted to ride alongside. Merat’s entourage was three men, down from four, since they’d left the man with the broken leg in Estva to recover. Two men drove her carriage and the third rode with Ev and Alizhan. They were frugal with their conversation, speaking short sentences of Nalitzvan-accented Laalvuri when they had directions to give, but they were obviously listening every time Ev and Alizhan said anything to each other. Ev spent long, silent stretches of their journey assessing the men, wondering i
f she could take two at once. Three was out of the question, and she had a feeling they all knew it.
They were headed for the small coastal city of Koritz, where Merat’s ship awaited them. Koritz was governed by Nalitzva, but was small and sleepy enough that it was unlikely to be crawling with guards. Ev and Alizhan would keep out of sight once they arrived, just in case. And if there was trouble, Merat had coolly promised to make it go away—whatever that meant.
It would take two triads to ride there. They broke up their ride in the tiny village of Din Yaritz, where they found lodging at Night’s End Inn, a hopeful and farfetched name, given that the sky of Din Yaritz was still very dark. But the blackness had ebbed into deep blue, and the Night was not so absolute as in Estva. Even though it was no warmer outside and they were both exhausted, Ev had talked Alizhan into taking a walk. It was easier to talk when they were far from Merat and her men.
Din Yaritz was surrounded by a stone wall and they circled the inside of it, ambling past cozy little houses and piles of snow that felt as ancient as the stones. Eventually, Alizhan sat down in an alcove built into the wall, and Ev sat with her, shoulder to shoulder. They’d hardly stopped touching since the kiss. Soon enough, now that Ev had stopped eating nightvine, that would have to change.
“I didn’t want it to end like that with Thiyo,” Alizhan said. The bench in the alcove hadn’t been cleared of snow, and she picked up a handful next to where she was sitting. “I wish he hadn’t been so stubborn.”
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