Valor of the Healer

by Angela Highland

  It was too much. A spasm of coughing racked him, and when it passed, he lay panting and sweating, unable to focus on his quivering fingers. “I was stabbed,” he croaked, peering at them anyway, trying to figure out why they kept changing. Why they were long and lean one moment, delicate and dusky the next.

  “Indeed. You’ve had quite the adventure, sir.”

  That was a new voice, not the doctor’s, and with trepidation only somewhat muted by the torpor of his mind Kestar recognized it. With effort, he focused on the room. No decoration but the star sigil carving that hung three feet above him adorned the walls. A lit candle stood upon a trunk beside the cot where he lay, and beside it were a pitcher of water, his uniform coat and a towel. There were no windows, and no door save for the one six scant feet away, a smooth barrier of oak broken only by a barred slit of a window and the sturdy iron of its lock.

  Sitting before that door was the priest. Enverly looked pale and haggard, his cassock’s lines marred by the awkward angle of the sling that bore his arm—and for the life of him, Kestar couldn’t remember when or how the man had gotten hurt.

  Alarm spiked in him. He had to be alert, he had to think, for fear was growing in the pit of his belly and he had no strength to tamp it down. His body reacted to his tension, each muscle tightening as another wave of deep coughs swept over him. Only when it subsided was he able to speak. “As have you...what happened, Father?”

  Enverly gave him a self-deprecating smile. “I’m not yet too old to be wounded in the service of the gods.” He leaned forward, his hand slipping beneath the collar of his cassock. “And it puts me into the curious position of having something in common with you.”

  “You weren’t going to Cleanse her,” Kestar accused, his head tossing back and forth along the pillow. “Your master hurt her. Don’t want anything in common with you.”

  “Ah, but you don’t have the luxury of ignoring this connection between us. It may be your only salvation.” Enverly drew out his amulet, a silver leaf upon a chain, casting a cold sheen through the candlelight. With an implacable gaze, he added, “Look to your own amulet if you don’t believe mine.”

  Kestar fumbled along his bandaged chest and then higher still until he found his amulet twisted around behind his neck. As he pulled it forward, it shone blue against his hand, brighter than Enverly’s, as if direct contact with his fingertips strengthened its sacred light. “This isn’t possible. I—I’m not an elf...”

  “Your amulet disagrees. Or do you suggest that the Blessed Anreulag’s sight is somehow wrong?”

  Kestar slumped, his fingers clutching the amulet even as his hand dropped onto the pillow beside his head. “It’s never done this before.”

  “That may be all that will keep any other priest of the Four Gods from Cleansing you on the spot.”

  “You haven’t come to do that now?” Kestar scarcely knew what he uttered; fear leached away the sense of his own words. Her again. It was her fear he felt, the echo of a nightmare where a vaguely female form of towering proportions became a hawk that rent her with talons of fire. Her power soaked through him along with her fright, out through his arm and to his fingers, until the amulet reacted to its presence. It terrified him to his core.

  “I haven’t yet decided what to do with you.” Enverly’s voice rolled over Kestar, inescapable, holding him fast. “Tell me why you came back for the girl, and perhaps it will permit me to make up my mind.”

  “I came back.” His eyes squeezed shut and his head dipped toward the amulet clutched in his fist. “I had to ask her...” Without his willing it, his voice shifted inflections as he writhed. “Four years, akreshi...he said my magic was for him alone. I heal on his command...”

  “Eh?” Enverly’s voice changed too, turning startled, but Kestar didn’t look at him.

  He couldn’t, for the akreshi priest served the duke and he was not to look a man in the eye. “Dear gods, I can’t get her out,” he groaned, flinging up his head, and even that small motion drained him. He sagged hard against the pillow, trembling. “She’s in my head! I can’t...”

  Eyes widening, the priest snapped out an order that brought the dark-braided doctor back to sit at Kestar’s side.

  “Drink this,” she bade him. With one hand she pressed down upon his shoulder, and with the other, she lifted an earthenware mug to his lips.

  “Help me. Please. I can’t get her out!”

  “This’ll help, my lord. But you must drink it.”

  The pungent scent of valerian wafted over his face, rising from the mug’s steaming contents, and with a throaty moan Kestar obeyed her.

  “He shouldn’t bear this right now, Father, and neither should you,” she scolded. “Must you undo the work I’ve done on both of you?”

  “I’ll leave soon enough, but I require an answer out of our young knight first.”

  “He’s out of his head! What true answer can he give you?”

  Not out of my head. She’s in here with me. But Kestar couldn’t voice the protest, for the tea, as he finished it, blanketed his thoughts anew with numbing fog. He sighed as Doctor Lannedes took the cup away, and didn’t resist as she slipped an arm beneath his shoulders and settled him more comfortably in the cot. Nor could he do more than watch as Enverly rose with cautious movements and stepped over to look down and study him, evaluating.

  “What do you mean when you say ‘she’ is in your head?”

  Hadn’t he said it? Couldn’t they see her blazing? “Faanshi. She shines so brightly.” More fragments of memory floated through his consciousness, like leaves on the surface of a stream. Wetness prickled at his sight. “I don’t want to hurt her.”

  “Father, I must insist that you let Lord Vaarsen rest—and retire to your bed at once.”

  Enverly waved a hand. “One moment. Kestar, my son...”

  He was speaking how a priest ought to speak, now. There was something amiss with that but Kestar couldn’t remember what, not in the lulling embrace of the doctor’s tea. “Yes, Father?”

  “You realize that if Faanshi causes you to perceive her from afar, this can be done only through magic? That she’s tainted you with magic that must be Cleansed?”

  Kestar’s brow crinkled. “She’s not supposed to...”

  “No, my son. But I’ll help you. Remain true to the Voice of the Gods, and She’ll deliver Her loyal servant from his adversity. Ani a bhota Anreulag, arach shae.”

  The familiar ritual words soothed Kestar far more than the tea. “Arach shae,” he whispered, relaxing, his mind drifting deeper into the fog. Only the tiniest disquiet remained that the priest’s face was the last thing in his sight.

  Chapter Thirteen

  They rose early, well before false dawn, for they couldn’t wait for proper morning when the family that worked the Blind Pig would rouse for their daily labors. To Julian’s reluctant satisfaction, the girl proved no hindrance to their flight. She roused quickly when he shook her awake, following him down out of the hayloft and grabbing the small, neat bundle she’d made of her Tantiu clothing as she went—another small bit of foresight of which he had to grudgingly approve.

  Seven hours northward into the hills, with the sun almost at its zenith, they stopped for the first real rest they could afford. Situated in a meadow that sloped away from the cover of the trees, the little shepherd’s shrine wasn’t much of a hiding place. Yet the meadow was blanketed with wildflowers and grasses, long empty of any sign of grazing beasts. The weather-beaten shrine, its wooden roof sagging beneath layers of moss, slumped among walls of crumbled stone. But there was one stretch of ground behind those walls where the horses could relax unseen, and their riders could stretch legs grown stiff from hours in the saddle without fear of the guns of any passing patrols.

  Or so Julian hoped. The disrepair of the place suggested its regular visitors had abandoned it long ago, and as the three fugitives ventured in among its walls, he discovered why. Though it too showed the wear of time and the elements, the statue
by the altar was recognizable—and it was none of the Four Gods of the Adalon Church. That almost heartened him. West of the Brannaligh Hills the Church’s sway wasn’t absolute. Here in this place, under such a guardian’s eye, they might be briefly safe.

  Faanshi eyed the statue as she accepted his aid to climb down from Morrigh’s back, but what thoughts she harbored remained unvoiced. “May I help somehow?”

  “You tell me,” Julian said. Her motions were awkward, but she’d dismounted with less clumsiness than he’d expected. “What do you know of horses?”

  For a moment he thought she might not have heard him. She went still, lifting a hand to Morrigh’s mane as the stallion swiveled his head around to her. “He must be fed.” Her Tantiu accent slipped away from her words. “Rested and watered. You’ve had a long, hard ride, Tenthim lad...”

  Tenthim, not Morrigh; Julian frowned. As she stumbled he seized her elbow and guided her into the shrine, away out of sight. “Sit. Your ride’s been just as long.”

  Mercifully she didn’t argue, but neither did she sit. Instead she lingered before the statue. “Julian? Will we have time to cut my hair?”

  “What? Why?”

  “If it won’t hinder us, I’d like to make a sacrifice to Djashtet in thanks, and I’ve nothing else to give Her. Also, there’s too much of it and it doesn’t fit under the cap. I can’t make a korfi scarf with what I have, but if I’m to wear a boy’s clothing, I shouldn’t have a maiden’s hair.”

  He couldn’t argue with that, not when he’d encouraged this meek little mouse to have more ideas that could save her life, and this one was as sound as the last. Still, it halted him. So did the look of her. As if to compensate for her sari’s loss, she’d tugged the leather cap low over her head. Her hair still hung unbound down her shoulders and back, though. The rough garb Rab had stolen fit her loosely; it made her seem like a lad wearing his older brother’s clothes, save for that hair.

  Then Faanshi looked up, and he lost himself in staring at her unveiled face. Hunger and strain pinched her features, turning sun-golden skin a sallower hue and etching shadows along her cheekbones, which only heightened the delicate shape of them. And if he somehow failed to catch the stamp of elven blood in her visage, a man had only to glimpse her eyes to see a light no human eyes would bear.

  With an effort, he shook himself back to alertness. “You’re right,” he said gruffly. “It’ll have to go.”

  Faanshi nodded, but her gaze went back to the stone figure beside them. “Is it a god that guards this place?”

  “It’s Degne.” Julian’s frown deepened. There was a suspicious vacancy in the girl’s expression, light or no light, and in the wandering of her attention. How tired was she? Did she suffer from magical backlash even now? “A god from the old religions of this land, before Nirrivy became part of Adalonia.”

  “He watches over sheep,” Rab called over from the far side of his horse as he crouched to loosen Tornach’s girth.

  “But there are no sheep here,” Faanshi said. She scowled, the sharpest expression Julian had seen so far on her face, and he allowed himself a faint grin. Her irritation at his partner’s supercilious tone made him almost like her.

  “He was a guardian, a protector. Shrines like this were built in his honor, and used by shepherds for shelter.”

  Each corner of Faanshi’s mouth curled upward, easing the scowl away. “Then he’s a good god. Will we stay here for a time?”

  A smile. Tykhe. Never mind the weary fragility that roused protective instincts he didn’t want to acknowledge, or the hints that stronger emotions than timidity lurked beneath her surface. Now that she was smiling, he couldn’t quite look at her anymore. “For a short time. Pray if you wish. But keep it brief.”

  “May I make my sacrifice here? Will Degne take offense?”

  “Does he look like a god who’d take offense?” Julian nodded toward the statue. It depicted Degne as a beardless youth with a garland of leaves and flowers crowning his riotous curls. He held a crook against his shoulder with one hand, and stretched out the other in welcome. Though his features had suffered the most wear, the warm expression gracing them was still clear.

  “He seems kindly,” Faanshi said.

  “You don’t appear convinced.”

  “The akreshi duke looks kindly too.” Her smile skewed, and something went taut somewhere in Julian’s chest, but before he could reply she set down her bundle of clothing and looked up at him with uncertain eyes. “If I braid my hair and hold it out, will you be able to cut it with your knife?”

  He found his voice. “Go ahead.”

  Faanshi nodded. Her hands flitted like birds up to her head, steadying her cap and then sinking her fingers into the dark locks beneath it, splitting them into three plaits and weaving them together. The deft motions, at odds with her shyness, commanded Julian’s gaze. These were the same hands that had mended his damaged flesh. That had hurled blinding radiance to save the life of a Hawk.

  It seemed odd somehow that they should be so small.

  “Will this do?” With her head tilted away, one of her hands holding out the rope of her hair, Faanshi peeked back up at him. Beneath her hat’s brim her exposed neck looked as frail as her hands, an easy target for a knife. The line of her jaw seemed fragile enough to crush in a single strong grip. Her ears looked...wrong.

  Mismatched and mangled, they were half the size they should have been. Thin ridges of scars were all that remained of the tops of each one, leaving no sign of their original shape—not that he had to guess, for they’d doubtless once been pointed. He shouldn’t have been appalled or even surprised; she wasn’t the first elf-blooded slave ever to suffer mutilation.

  Anger rose up in him nonetheless. He kept it out of his motions as he drew one of his fighting blades, but he couldn’t keep it from coloring his voice. “Move your hand farther down the braid, away from your head. There. Hold it as tight as you can, and don’t move.”

  She didn’t flinch as he rested his weapon’s edge against her hair to test the angle of his cut, nor as he sliced through the ebon strands in one swift stroke. Only as he whirled away did Faanshi falter. “Julian? Did I—”

  He stalked out into the meadow, unwilling to look at her for another instant, not until he could rein in his anger and the unwelcome sympathy beneath it. He wouldn’t vent the one on her, and he couldn’t indulge in the other. There was no room for sympathy in what was nothing more than the repayment of a debt.

  “Get Rab’s tinderbox,” he snapped without looking back, jamming his knife into its sheath as he went. “Burn the braid. Say whatever prayers you want, but burn every last hair to ash. Leave no trace of our presence here.”

  He didn’t wait for her reply or to see if Rab had overheard his orders. Rab had moved at any rate, walking Tornach around the shrine’s perimeter to cool him down. Julian went to give Morrigh that same care, but at his horse’s side he paused, his hand straying to his right forearm. It was pulsing again, deep in the muscles, with strong flashes of heat that didn’t subside even as he rubbed the flesh beneath his sleeve.

  Just as strong and no easier to banish, the sympathy lingered in his thoughts. Julian scowled as he stripped all but the most vital items from Morrigh’s saddle, murmuring soothing nonsense to the creature. Morrigh had carried him and Faanshi both well enough, but his tail was lashing and he nipped at Julian’s fingers as he reached for his reins.

  “Hah, I’m with you, mate,” he muttered, sourly pleased that Morrigh’s mood matched his, yet unwilling to tolerate dissension from his horse as well as his partner. “But none of that.”

  Morrigh grudgingly acquiesced to his master’s soothing, and after a few moments followed him readily enough to the far end of the walls. There Julian found Tornach grazing—and Rab, keeping himself close to his mount, his hands to his blades.

  “Devout little chit, isn’t she?” Rab nodded back toward the shrine as the faint scent of smoke wafted to them on the wind. His voice held a t
inge of brittle cheer, only a step away from his usual sarcasm. “And I thought our own countrymen overly fascinated with prayer.”

  “As long as she doesn’t give us away,” Julian said, giving Morrigh his head and letting him graze along with Tornach, “she can turn cartwheels while she prays as far as I’m concerned.”

  “So you’re indifferent to our little dove’s eventual fate, then,” Rab said, his expression deliberately casual.

  “Once we get her to the elves, what happens to her next is no business of mine.”

  “I’m glad to hear you say ‘business,’ Rook. I’d begun to wonder if you’d lost sight of what our business is.”

  Julian’s mouth curled up on one end in his thinnest smile. “Then you’ll be even more pleased to hear that I intend to get all due compensation out of our forest-dwelling friends for bringing them the girl.”

  Rab lit up for the first time in days, his youthful features taking on a gleam of mercenary interest. “Say, what they should have paid us for a completed contract?”

  “Indeed. A mage of her power should be worth at least as much as the life of her master.” Julian’s arm throbbed as he spoke. So did a spot deep within his skull, behind his black patch and the false eye it concealed. He ignored them both. “If the elves want the girl, they can bloody well pay for her.”

  * * *

  Faanshi didn’t speak again for many hours, and Julian told himself it was for the best. Though distress flared in her face when he bade her ride with Rab for a while, for Morrigh needed a rest from carrying double, she offered no complaint. With rote motions, she ate, drank and rested when he gave her the word. Julian knew the strain of keeping up with companions in better physical condition, traveling across unfamiliar and difficult terrain, when he saw it. Neither her blank, stoic face nor her periodic furtive frowns down at her new boots surprised him.

  The shifts in her stance both on and off the horses, however, did.

  At first he thought he was imagining it. There was every reason for her to sit awkwardly in the saddle, especially while riding with Rab. But there was no reason he could name for how, when he ordered her to switch back to riding with him on Morrigh, she dismounted with effortless grace and far less stiffness than a girl untutored in the ways of the horse should have shown.