by Spurrier, Jo
At the camp they were whisked through the ring of sentries and into Mira’s tent, but not before Sierra saw three sleds pulled up nearby, each man-sized load covered with an oil-cloth wrap.
Mira was waiting for them along with a man Sierra hadn’t seen at the cache, a tall fellow with the typical black hair of a Ricalani, although his features showed some influence of southern blood. Rhia was also there and she immediately went to Isidro, helping him across the tent to settle into a chair. Still in her outer fur, the warmth of the tent made Sierra sweat but as Isidro collapsed into the chair he continued to shiver. Even as exhausted as he was, the awful, gnawing pain in his arm wouldn’t let him be still.
The crossbowmen had followed them in and the anxiety of having them at her back was making it difficult to keep her power under control. She could feel it clawing at her skin, searching for any point of weakness in its cage. The men watching her were nervous. If she did spark they might well shoot at her out of reflex. If she had to use her power to stop the bolt it could trigger a chain of events that would end in disaster for everyone here.
‘Issey,’ Sierra pleaded, hunkering down beside him. ‘You have to let me help you. We’re safe here. Rasten won’t dare come after me in a camp full of people.’
He swung his head her way and when he spoke his voice was a hoarse whisper. ‘It’s not Rasten I’m worried about now.’ They were shielded from Mira’s view by Rhia’s hovering form but Sierra saw his eyes flick in her direction.
Sierra leaned closer and lowered her voice. ‘I’m reaching the limit of what I can hold. I’ve got more than enough to deal with any other surprises that come my way. Issey, please, I can’t bear this any longer!’
With a sigh he bowed his head and offered her his good hand. Sierra swiftly stripped off his mitten and glove and then bared her own hand to make the link. The numbness that swept through his arm was a relief for them both and Isidro finally slumped back in the chair and fell so still that Rhia quickly leaned forward to check his breathing. ‘What happened to him?’ she demanded.
‘Rasten stomped on his arm. I heard something go crack. I hoped it was just the splints.’
Rhia gave her a hard look. ‘Most likely it was. There’s nothing left in his arm big enough to break.’ She laid her hand against his pallid cheek. ‘He should be lying down. Help me.’
Isidro caught her wrist. ‘Not yet. There are things we need to talk about. Mira …’
Mira had drawn herself up to deliver a blistering address but the sight of him had stolen her voice. When he said her name, though, she composed herself and came over to him. ‘Hush, Issey, you should rest. What on earth possessed you to go off like that?’
‘Trying to keep you from making a mistake,’ he rasped. ‘Too late. Rasten killed your hunters. He knows you sent them after Sierra.’
Mira gasped and clapped a hand over her mouth as the colour drained from her face. Behind her, the man Sierra didn’t know swore beneath his breath.
‘You’ve brought a whole new world of trouble down on yourself and your clan, Mira,’ Isidro went on. ‘If you’ve got any sense you’ll call a truce with Sierra until you can set it right.’
In the stunned silence that followed his words Cam went to the table behind the stove, poured bowls of hot tea from the kettle simmering over the coals and handed them around. Sierra caught his eye and nodded her thanks, wrapping her cold hands around the bowl to savour the warmth.
‘A truce?’ Mira spluttered. ‘That’s out of the question! She broke her word never to return. She murdered my men!’
‘Murdered? They were trying to kill me!’ Sierra snapped. ‘And believe me, I wouldn’t be here if I had anywhere else to go. But your men settled that when they destroyed my gear!’
Mira gaped at her for a moment. ‘What do you mean, they destroyed your gear?’
‘One of the men doused her sled in oil and set it alight,’ Cam said. ‘She’s got nothing now but the clothes she stands up in.’
That wasn’t entirely true. They’d stopped by her abandoned sled and Sierra had picked up Kell’s book and the enchantments she had been wearing when she made her escape, all of which had been protected from the flames by the power they held. They were hidden under her coat.
For the first time since their arrival, Mira’s anger faltered and she turned to swap a glance with her companion.
‘That wretched Pillepor always had a fondness for oil and tinder,’ he muttered. ‘The war-leader warned me about him when he left for the muster.’
With a shake of her head, Mira dismissed the matter. ‘The laws are clear. A sorcerer who practises his power must be put to death and as a representative of my clan I’m bound to uphold them.’ To Sierra, she said, ‘It’s nothing personal.’
‘Nothing personal?’ Sierra said incredulously. She clenched her fists, trying to keep control, but realised at once that it was a mistake. Her power leapt in response to her anger and it burst from her skin in a blaze of blue light, crackling like fire in dry grass and showering blue sparks onto the trampled spruce at her feet.
Startled, Mira jumped back while the man cursed and shoved her behind him as he drew the knife from his belt. Shouting, the two guards stepped forward with crossbows raised, while Cam pushed himself between them and Sierra. He grabbed her by the arm hard enough to make her realise just how much tension he was concealing. ‘Stop it!’ he shouted. ‘For the love of life, get yourself under control!’
‘I’m trying!’ she snarled back. ‘But by the Black Sun, you’re not helping!’
Muttering, he let her go, but kept himself between her and the crossbows. With a wrench of effort Sierra pulled the power back beneath her skin, but it refused to stay there. With every beat of her heart fat blue sparks swelled out of her skin to writhe and course over her body. Sierra tried to calm and focus her mind the way Rasten had taught her, but it wasn’t easy and she was getting tired of the way everyone stared at her.
In the shocked silence that followed, Isidro spoke again. ‘Mira, Ardamon. Just think for a moment. Dremman might be able to buy himself and the clan out of a charge of treason, but when word of this reaches the king he won’t accept any deal that doesn’t include your head on a platter. Do you understand?’
Mira turned away, covering her face with her hands.
‘Don’t talk to my cousin like that, Balorica,’ Ardamon snarled. ‘Remember you’re a guest of our clan —’
‘Ardamon, no.’ Mira laid a hand on his arm. ‘He’s right, as usual,’ she said with a hint of irritation. ‘But a truce? Impossible. It would violate the laws the Gods themselves set down —’
‘Horseshit,’ Isidro said. ‘The Gods made Sierra the way she is — why would they condemn her for doing the very thing they created her for?’ He scrubbed a hand through his tangled hair. ‘But that’s not important now. Mira, there’s no way we can prevent word of this from reaching Kell and the king. You and Ardamon and your whole clan are screwed unless we can do something to change the state of play.’
‘And do what, precisely?’ Ardamon drawled.
‘You have to kill Rasten,’ Isidro said. ‘You’ll never get another opportunity like this. Rasten is wounded and on the run and here —’ he gestured to Sierra ‘— is the one person in Ricalan, other than Kell, capable of bringing him down.’
The tent fell silent and Sierra shivered, wrapping her arms around herself. ‘Issey,’ she said. ‘I can’t … he would have had me tonight —’
‘But you won’t be meeting him alone,’ he said. ‘You can do this, Sirri.’
‘You think killing Kell’s right-hand man will make things better?’ Ardamon said. ‘It would be a declaration of war!’
‘But it’s a war the king doesn’t have the men to fight,’ Isidro said. ‘Kell is the only thing holding the Akharian army and their mages back from the Mesentreian settlements. He can’t turn his attention away from that or the kingdom is lost. With Rasten gone the king will have no choice but to forge a new treat
y with your clan. He’ll need the Wolf Clan’s support so desperately he’ll agree to anything you demand. Surely you can see that you and Sierra have more to gain as allies than as enemies? Removing Rasten will change everything …’ As he spoke, Isidro’s face slowly turned grey but now he broke off abruptly and slumped forward in his seat.
Rhia lunged in to catch his shoulders. ‘Help me!’ she demanded. ‘He needs rest. You must not tax his strength further!’
Together, Cam and Rhia laid him on the ground. Rhia shoved bundled blankets under his feet while Sierra brushed damp hair back from his forehead. ‘What’s wrong with him?’ Cam demanded.
‘I don’t know! He’s not in pain …’ That wasn’t entirely true, but it wasn’t the sort of pain she could help. There was a dull, leaden ache in every fibre of his body. His breathing was fast and laboured but there was no one cause, nothing that she could identify and relieve to spare him.
‘He is not well and he has pushed himself too hard for too long,’ Rhia said crisply as she loosened his sash, opened his coat and gently lifted his bound arm from the sling tied across his chest. ‘He will not admit how weak he is.’ Isidro’s fingertips, just visible through the bandages and splints, were an unhealthy dusky shade. Rhia held her hand out to Cam. ‘Give me a knife. Quickly. I must cut bandages off.’
Cam gave her his knife and she began cutting through the bandages. Without looking up, she said, ‘He needs lots of rest. Somewhere warm and comfortable where he will not be disturbed.’ When the bandages were cut away, Sierra quickly looked away from the ruin of his arm. It was swollen, turgid and black with spreading bruises.
Isidro shifted his head and his eyelids fluttered open. He turned towards it and Sierra quickly reached out to stop him. ‘Don’t look,’ she said.
Somehow he managed a smile, a meagre quirk of the lips, but a smile all the same. ‘It’s alright,’ he said. ‘I’ve seen it before.’ He lay back and licked his dry lips. ‘Is there any water …?’
Mira poured some from the kettle, cooled it with clean snow, and Sierra helped him lift his head enough to drink.
‘We could stay here for a few days,’ Mira began, but Rhia interrupted with a shake of her head.
‘A tent is not good enough. Too cold, too much noise and disturbance. He needs to rest in a house, or perhaps a temple.’
‘Drysprings Temple has a good healer,’ Mira said, turning to Ardamon. ‘It’s only an hour’s ride to the south.’
‘A little more than that at an invalid’s pace,’ Ardamon said. ‘But it’s an easy journey.’
‘It’s not that bad,’ Isidro said. ‘I just need to sleep. I’ll be well enough in the morning.’
‘Hush,’ Rhia said. ‘He will manage that, but he must be carried in a litter. The bumping of a sled is not good. And there must be no more arguing or discussion,’ she said, glaring at her patient.
‘Well?’ Isidro said, looking past Rhia to meet Mira’s gaze.
Mira tossed her head with a rattle of beaded braids. ‘Very well then, a truce — but only until tomorrow, to give us time to think it over and discuss the matter.’ She fixed her gaze on Sierra. ‘Do you think you can keep your word this time?’
‘I can if you can,’ Sierra said through clenched teeth.
Sierra rode close to Isidro’s litter on the journey to the temple, in case some jolt disturbed him, but Rhia had prepared him well for the journey and the need for her help never arose. She had pulled his arm as straight as the swollen flesh would allow and splinted it again and had laid him on the litter well wrapped with furs and packed all around with hot rocks to ward off the cold. Isidro would have hated the very idea of being consigned to a litter but as near as Sierra could tell he slept the whole way.
Cam rode nearby and, although Sierra felt full to overflowing with fears and worries of what lay ahead of them, she didn’t want to discuss it with him where they might be overheard. So she held her tongue and let her concerns bubble and ferment inside her.
Since she had escaped from Kell’s camp she had never been able to form a plan that reached more than a few days ahead. She couldn’t remember a time when she hadn’t had a cold knot of fear lodged in her belly or a sound sleep that hadn’t been brought on by sheer exhaustion. Her only respite had been the time she spent with Isidro between the furs, lost in the shared sensation, but even that was only a brief release.
All the time she had been a captive, she had believed things would be different if she could escape. She had to believe it — that hope was all she had to sustain her. Now she was free — as free as she would ever be — but nothing had changed. She still lived from day to day with no control over the future and with allies whose lives were as precarious as hers. Out here her power counted for nothing. It didn’t matter how powerful a sorcerer she was, she couldn’t survive if the people of Ricalan closed ranks against her. Rejection by the common folk had doomed far more powerful sorcerers than her in the past — Vasant and all his followers had known they were finished when the common folk had begun to refuse them shelter and aid. What hope did she have, untrained and friendless?
And now Rasten had marked her trail and tested her strength. He would heal and once he did he would be better prepared for her the next time they met. When that time came she knew she could expect no mercy.
Isidro woke when the bearers set the litter down. Rhia appeared over him and pressed him back down onto the sling. ‘No, Issey, lie still. It will not be long and they will take you inside.’
‘Where are we?’ he said, still trying to sit up, but despite her small size, Rhia was strong and he was forced to admit defeat.
‘At the Drysprings Temple,’ Rhia said, looking around with a frown. ‘Lady Mira sent word ahead for the priests to expect us. I don’t know what is causing the delay.’
‘By the Black Sun, let me up. I’m not so far gone I can’t walk a few paces to get inside.’ He freed his left arm from the furs and levered himself into a sitting position. The effort set his skull pounding.
‘Do not do this to yourself … Limitations come upon us all and fighting them does more harm than good.’
Isidro shook his head. ‘Don’t treat me like a halfwit.’
‘I do not!’
‘Yes, you do!’
‘No! I only tell you what I learned when I was a slave. There comes a time when we cannot fight any longer, when we bow our heads to fate and do what we must to survive.’
The world was swaying around him as though he was on a boat and the world around him was a stormy sea. ‘So there does — but I’m walking inside.’
She sighed and offered him her hands. ‘As you wish, then.’
Chilled after the inactivity of the saddle, Sierra stamped her feet on the packed snow and tucked her mittened hands under her arms as one of Mira’s men took the reins of her horse and led the beast away. The entire complex of shrine, halls and outbuildings was surrounded by a high stone wall broached by a gate at each of the cardinal points, although the wooden doors that had once existed to close them off were long gone. Behind the drifts of snow and a rime of ice the walls seemed oddly flat and regular, just like the caverns Kell had carved out of the rock beneath Lathayan. Even without closer scrutiny Sierra would have been willing to wager the walls had been mage-built.
A fitful lamp flickered beside the entrance to the Priests’ Hall. So weary she could barely think straight, Sierra had been about to create a globe of light before she remembered where she was. She hadn’t set foot inside a temple in years, not since the last time a priest had realised just what was odd about the young Herder girl who seemed so nervous. Many folk with latent powers were admitted to the priesthood and Sierra wondered how far inside she would get before someone recognised what she was. And how would her reluctant hosts respond then? When she saw Isidro struggling to rise from his litter she went over to help him, smiling to herself with a kind of humourless mirth. She would find out soon enough.
When she came to Isidro’s side Rhia
gave her a noncommittal nod of greeting. Over the past week, Sierra had noticed that the physician’s hostility towards her depended on how much pain Isidro was in. The more he needed her, the more Rhia tolerated her presence.
Isidro swung his head towards her, but it took a few moments for his eyes to focus on her face. ‘Sirri …’
‘Hush, Issey. Let’s get inside.’
The steps leading up to the doorway gave them some trouble. Cam met them at the door and quickly backed up to hold the heavy draught curtain out of the way. On the wall opposite the entrance a mural of the Bright Sun gazed serenely down at them, bedecked with garlands of flowers and finished with gold leaf that glittered in the lamplight.
‘The priests have a chamber ready for him,’ Cam said. ‘This way.’
Another curtained doorway admitted them to the common room, the gathering place at the centre of the Priests’ Hall. Three sides of the large room were divided into chambers by partitions of wicker and carved wood. The remaining wall incorporated the furnaces that warmed the hall, a complex network of chimneys and chambers that trapped the heat in the stone and radiated it back to warm the air.
The chambers against the walls were raised above the floor-level of the common room by a platform that housed another set of furnaces, heating the floor from beneath. Off in one corner was a stairway that led to the second level, where the lower-ranking priests and temple dependants had their quarters.
At this hour the common room was empty except for a handful of priests wrapped in yellow robes, who gathered around Mira as she spoke to a stooped old woman with white hair and the red robes of the High Priestess. Most of the chambers were dark, but the one Cam led them to had lamps lit within, the glow filtering through the blankets hung across the latticed partitions. As they approached it a priest wearing a yellow robe trimmed with a wide green band detached himself from the others and gestured them into the chamber. ‘In here, if you please. I’ve added a brazier, so it should be quite warm by now.’