Soldier Scarred

by D. K. Holmberg

  “Endric!”

  Endric shrugged. “Should I not? If we leave without some way of helping her, she’s going to die on the journey. I’m all for the idea that divine intervention might save her,” he started, though even that wasn’t true. He wasn’t convinced that it was divine intervention that would be Senda’s salvation so much as it was the possibility that teralin-infused water might be able to help. “But that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t prepare for the possibility that she will need something more than that,” he said.

  Pendin sighed. “For what you intend, we need to find the back stair. I think if we do that, then it’s going to be easier for us to move without them noticing us.”

  “And where would that be?”

  “You would have come down it to reach me.”

  Pendin slipped in front of Endric, and his gaze lingered on Senda for a long moment before he shook his head and tore his eyes away. He hurried forward to the end of the hall and peeked around the corner before darting forward. When Endric didn’t follow fast enough, Pendin glanced back at him and waved to him, urging him onward.

  Endric shifted Senda in his arms, trying to get a better grip. She was still heavy, but the bloating made it difficult to keep her tightly secured. Already his mind began working through the likely challenges that they would face because of that. How would he secure her to the horse? How would he keep her from not slipping? How would he keep her alive for the several days’ ride to the teralin-infused pool?

  None of that mattered until they managed to get free from here. Only then would it matter. Only then could he begin to think about how he might help her.

  “Where now?” Endric asked, slipping past Pendin and looking along the hall. This hallway was narrower, and the lanterns were more staggered than they had been along the other hallway. It seemed as if it were less traveled than the other, and the air had a dank, almost heavy quality to it. Endric tried not to think about what that might mean, just as he tried not to think about the stench coming off Senda.

  “We need to take the stairs up this hall,” Pendin said, motioning toward the stairs.

  Endric saw nothing but a darkened archway. When he poked his head up, he was greeted with nothing but blackness. “This is where you would have us take her? It looks like it goes nowhere.”

  “It only looks that way because no one ever takes it.”

  “How is it that you know this way?”

  “Because I have spent too much time wandering, looking for ways around here. I haven’t found anything other than passageways that meander through the canicharl. As interesting as they are—and some of them are quite interesting,” he said, glancing at Endric with a knowing look, “that knowledge has been mostly useless to me.”

  “Maybe not so useless.”

  “I don’t know. Even if there is anything useful about what I learned, I’m not so sure that it will do much for us.”

  Pendin started up the stairs, leaving Endric to follow. He looked down at Senda. There was a sheen of moisture along her face, and he didn’t know whether it was sweat or whether the swelling was pushing out of her skin, leaving her looking perpetually damp. Her hair was greasy and in need of washing. Despite that, all he wanted was for her to open her eyes, and he would hold her close. Even if she didn’t open her eyes, he thought that he might hold her close.

  At the top of the stair, he found Pendin standing, blocking his way.

  “What is it?” he whispered.

  Pendin rounded on him, a finger brought up to his mouth, silencing him. “Quiet.”

  He motioned along the hallway, and Endric saw a gray-robed figure heading away from them. There was a slight stoop to the spine, suggesting that it might be the older Teacher that Endric had met before, though it could have been any one of the Teachers who occupied the canicharl. He knew so little about them.

  When the Teacher had disappeared from view, Pendin breathed out.

  “We don’t need to be that concerned about them,” Endric said.

  “Don’t we? The Teachers might have more to say than you realize if they discover that you’re attempting to break out one of their patients.”

  “But I’m the one who brought her here in the first place.”

  Pendin shrugged. “That doesn’t matter. Not to them. What matters is that you would go against their judgment. Remember, these are people who are descended from the same people as the Magi. For many of them, it’s a direct line of descendants. That makes them feel somewhat superior.”

  “Sort of like the Magi.”

  “Something like that,” Pendin said.

  “But Senda is descended from Teachers, too.”

  “Which is why they would be even more inclined to be upset at any attempt to take her without their blessing.”

  “They wouldn’t have any way of stopping us.”

  “Wouldn’t they?” Pendin looked at him, arching a brow. “You don’t have a lot of experience with Teachers, but there are dozens of them here. Would you intend to fight your way out?”

  “No, but—”

  Pendin shook his head. “Then you would have to talk your way out. I think you have some experience with how unlikely it is that you would be able to do that.”

  Endric snorted. Unlikely was not strong enough. His experience with Teachers had shown him that it would be almost impossible to talk his way out of doing something they disagreed with.

  “So we just have to sneak our way out?”

  “If we can. That’s what I’m trying to help you with.”

  “And when they report you to your mother?”

  Pendin shrugged. “I’ve been here long enough that I don’t even know if they remain in contact with her. It’s possible that they do, but I just don’t know. Either way, I think it’s time that I end my residency in the canicharl.”

  “Are you ready to return to the Denraen?” Endric asked.

  “Are you?”

  Endric sighed. Was he? He had been away for long enough that he no longer felt as if he truly belonged to the Denraen. When he had returned from his time with the Antrilii, he had tried to re-assimilate, but that had been difficult enough that he hadn’t felt as if he were a part of them, not as he had been. Attempting to lead had only brought him difficulty. And then he had disappeared, thinking that he knew enough to run off on his own, needing to find answers to what had happened to Tresten. That had been important, but the Denraen didn’t necessarily know that. How could they?

  “Eventually.”

  “Why eventually?”

  “There are things that need to be done before I can return. As much as I might want to return”—and Endric had become increasingly uncertain that he did—”I don’t know that I can.”

  “The Denraen will always welcome you back. You’re the son of Dendril. You’re the heir to the general.”

  “I’m holding the heir to the general.”

  Pendin glanced down at her. His gaze lingered on her face. “Senda would never have wanted that. She saw herself as holding the position for a while, but I don’t think that she ever wanted to lead the Denraen.”

  “She wouldn’t have accepted the title of Raen if she weren’t willing to serve.”

  “Perhaps if it were necessary, but for her to lead would require that she challenge and defeat your father. I don’t think Senda ever thought that she would be able to do that.”

  Endric shifted her in his arms. Where his forearms had pressed against hers, there were depressions in the skin, markers of the swelling that remained. “Come on. We need to get out of here before the Teachers find us.”

  Pendin looked at Endric for a few moments before he nodded. He hurried along the hall, leading them in the same direction as the Teacher. That surprised Endric.

  “You’re sure it’s this way?”

  “I’m sure. If we go the other way, it’s not going to bring us to the head healer and anything that you might want to keep her alive on our journey.”

  Endric gritted his
teeth. This way made it more likely that they would encounter other Teachers, but it also made it more likely that Senda would survive the journey. It was something he was willing to risk.

  But did he need to risk Senda?

  “Do you think you can tell me what I might need to bring with us?” Endric asked Pendin, who glanced down at Senda.

  “I don’t have any idea what they have been using on her,” he said. “The head healer has been involved in the attempts to help her, but all of the Teachers have taken turns trying to study and see if there’s some way that they can bring her back.”

  “Then you carry Senda out of the stable, prepare two horses, and get her secured to one of them.”

  “I know the way out of here,” Pendin said.

  “Then you can provide me directions. We don’t need to risk her if there’s a way that we can get her out.”

  “And I don’t know the way to this divine intervention if you’re captured.”

  Endric breathed out a frustrated sigh. It seemed that regardless of what he might intend, he would be stuck. “Then I guess we’re all going together, or were not going anywhere.”

  Pendin nodded and led them down the hall. He turned another side hall and hurried along it. When they reached another intersection, Pendin paused, looking both directions along the hallway before leading them onward again. They continued that way, weaving along the hallways, occasionally taking a stair, until Pendin stopped in front of a door.

  “This one?” Endric asked.

  “This would be the head healer. I don’t know if it’s his quarters, but if anyone would know some way of keeping her alive as we make our way to this place, it would be him.”

  Endric leaned his head against the door, listening for a moment. He heard nothing that would tell him that anyone was inside. He grabbed the handle, twisting it and throwing the door open.

  “I don’t need any service right now,” a deep voice said from the back of the room.

  “I’m not here for any service,” Endric said.

  He hurried forward into the room. When Pendin entered, Endric kicked the door closed and motioned for Pendin to stand in front of it.

  The healer jerked to his feet. He had a round belly, requiring an enormous robe draped around him. “What is this?” he snapped. His eyes went to Senda and widened. “What are you doing with her?”

  “I intend to find her help.”

  “I’m helping her.”

  “If you were helping her, she would be doing more than breathing,” Endric said. “What I need to know is what you’ve been doing to keep her alive.”

  The head healer looked from Endric and finally seem to notice Pendin standing there. “You. You’re helping him with this? When your mother—”

  “My mother won’t get here before I get Senda to some help.”

  “All I need to know is what you’ve been giving to her.”

  The head healer glared at Endric. “Why? From what I understand you’re the person who brought her to Aria, as if she would have some way of healing her.”

  “I brought her where I needed to keep her alive. Much like what I plan to do now. Now. What have you been giving to her?”

  The head healer looked around the room before looking past Endric and staring at the door.

  Endric was tempted to set Senda down and lunge toward the other man, but decided against it. Instead, he stalked toward him and brought Senda close, forcing the healer to smell the decomposition of her body. Endric had tried getting accustomed to it, but the stench was almost unbearable.

  The head healer jerked his face away, as if unwilling to stand the stench. “Let me ask you one more time,” Endric said. “What have you been giving her?”

  “Nothing.”

  Endric glared at him. “Nothing? You’ve done something that has kept her alive. The other Teachers all seem to agree that you must have given her something. Otherwise she would have died long before I could have returned.”

  The head healer looked past Endric again, his gaze going to the door. Was there some sort of signal that he’d overlooked? Was the healer somehow summoning someone else? He couldn’t take too much time, not if he wanted to get Senda out of the canicharl.

  “Nothing would be effective with the type of injury that she sustained. We simply maintained her injuries as well as we could. She is a daughter of Teachers. We were helping her pass with peace.”

  “She is more than simply the daughter of Teachers. And you did nothing for her. Everything that was done to help her had been done by Aria.”

  The head healer sneered at Endric, but he ignored him, turning away so that they could leave. When they reached the door, Endric pulled it open slightly and heard the sound of footsteps.

  “If you weren’t able to do anything for her, why do you care what I attempt?”

  The head healer didn’t answer, though Endric didn’t expect him to, not really. He motioned to Pendin and the two of them hurried out of the room and down the hall. The sound of footsteps chased after them, and they hurried along, trying to outrun the Teachers.

  It wasn’t until they were back outside, under the overcast sky, that Endric began to relax. He looked over at Pendin and saw a distraught expression on his friend’s face. “What is it?”

  “I didn’t realize that they weren’t able to do anything for her.”

  “We will get her the help that she needs,” Endric said.

  “And what if you can’t? What if there isn’t anything that you can do that will help her? What if your divine intervention can’t do anything?”

  Endric hoped that wasn’t the case, but what if it was? What if there wasn’t anything that would save her? Was he prepared to lose her?

  “We won’t know until we get her to the pool.”

  “And if the pool is unable to do anything to help her?”

  Endric looked down at Senda, noting the shallow way that she breathed, the steady and occasionally irregular pattern. Would she make it?

  Even if she didn’t, it was better to be doing something than to leave her in the canicharl with the Teachers doing nothing. Had he known that they weren’t going to do anything for her, then he would never have brought her here.

  “Then at least we will have tried. It’s more than they were willing to do.”

  15

  Endric stared at the mountain in the distance. The gradual way the peak rose belied its enormity. There was something about the scale of the mountain that was difficult to fathom unless he was right up near it. When he had been here before, he had struggled to understand just how massive the mountain was. Now that he had been here, he had a greater appreciation of it. He could understand why the people of Salvat viewed it as a place of the gods, even if he didn’t concur.

  “You came all this way yourself?” Pendin asked.

  Endric glanced over at his friend. Pendin seemed to dwarf the smallish mare that he rode. He smiled, knowing that it might irritate his friend but unable to do anything else. How else could he react other than grinning?

  “I came all this way looking for some way to help Senda.” Endric looked down at Senda, who he had secured to the saddle. He had been very careful about tying the ropes around her, wanting to hold onto her carefully so that she didn’t slip. It was a precarious position and if the horse bolted, she might slide off to the side. With her swelling, Endric expected to have significant trauma were she to crash to the ground.

  “Even after how she treated you?” Pendin asked.

  Endric smiled. “I know why she behaved the way she did,” he said. “She was angry. In her mind, I wasn’t serving the Denraen, not the way that she would have. That upset her.”

  “I’m not sure that it upset her so much as it disappointed her,” Pendin said.

  Endric looked down at Senda again. She was still bloated, and he had been hoping that over time, that bloat would begin to fade, but it had not. If anything, it had lingered longer than he had expected. He didn’t think it was any worse—wh
atever concoction Aria had administered seemed to have delayed its progression—but there was a part of him that had hoped she would begin to recover, only she never had. She still breathed. If nothing else, there was that relief. He was thankful for every breath that she took, and thankful that she still lived. He tried not to think about how much longer that might be, focusing only on where they needed to travel, the next push with the horse, and whatever it would take to reach the teralin-infused water.

  “I know,” Endric said softly. Disappointing Senda was possibly the worst thing he could have done. He didn’t want to disappoint her and would do anything if he could fix it, wanting only to have her understand that he had only done what was necessary so that he could better serve the Denraen. Would she ever understand that?

  They rode for a while in silence, and Endric focused on the steady clapping of the horse’s hooves over the stone. Everything around him was barren. It made it difficult to determine his path, but thankfully he had the ever-sloping mountain in the distance to help guide him.

  Every so often, the sun peaked out of the gray sky, finding a hole in the smoke that created a heavy haze over everything. Thunder rumbled, almost a promise of rain, though Endric knew better. There would be no rain, not here. Whatever would come was less about water than about the threat of fire and ash.

  Pendin gripped the reins of his horse tightly, squeezing with every rumble that erupted. He sat with a stiff posture, his back almost uncomfortably tense, as if he could stop the potential threat from the mountain and its eruption.

  “You need to relax. It’s not going to erupt anytime soon,” Endric said after watching Pendin for a while.

  “How do you know?” Pendin stared into the distance, and Endric followed the direction of his gaze, noting the intensity of his stare as he studied the mountain.

  “I don’t know, but I’ve heard that the mountain has rumbled for many years without erupting,” Endric said. “It either will or it won’t. Anything we do won’t impact that, so you might as well grow accustomed to the fact that there is not a whole lot you can do to prevent what might happen.”