Bastion

by Mercedes Lackey

  That’s what I thought. But it still don’t seem possible. He thought he should feel triumphant, but instead he only felt horrible. This wouldn’t have happened if it hadn’t been for him. They wouldn’t even be here if it weren’t for him. . . .

  He was pretty darn sure of at least one thing. This wasn’t Bey’s doing. Bey hadn’t been up there with the others. Bey probably didn’t even realize the other Sleepgivers were there; he’d gotten the feeling that Bey hadn’t left the caves in the entire time that he’d been here, so he wouldn’t necessarily know when his countrymen turned up. Or even that they had turned up.

  Well, he knows now.

  Maliciously, Mags wished that another storm would come and turn them all into frozen lumps, but if the last one hadn’t, they’d probably survive another. There must be some sort of shelter up there, he thought. Maybe other caves, ones that don’t connect with the ones down here. That last storm might have done them an actual favor, scouring most of the snow from the heights so they could move around. Damn them!

  How long had they been following him? Probably since his return to Haven. He thought that if they’d been following earlier, Bey would certainly have noticed and would probably have joined with them.

  Or maybe not; Bey seemed to want to handle this himself. He did have a lot of contempt for the second-rankers. Some of them, at least.

  His thoughts circled around and around, restlessly, and he knew what he was trying to avoid. The obvious. He had to give himself up. There was no other answer. He couldn’t allow his friends to be cut down, and he couldn’t allow innocent villagers to be murdered. And this time there would be no reprieve—

  Would Dallen come with him?

  :I’ll follow you to the ends of the earth,: came the exhausted reply. :Do what you must, Chosen. You will still be a Herald of Valdemar no matter where you go or what else you are. If you must turn yourself over to them, tell them at once that you are Bey’s prisoner and that he said not to meddle with you. So long as we can keep those spirits out of your head, you will remain yourself, and this will be somewhat on your own terms.:

  Somewhat, Dallen said. And Dallen was right, he could never do this completely on his own terms, even at the best interpretation. All Bey had to do was make a veiled threat about what the Sleepgivers would do to people he cared about, back in Haven, and Mags would give in and do whatever he asked. Really, all he had to do was threaten anyone in Valdemar, and Mags would yield. Mags liked Bey and trusted what he said, and he believed that, on his own terms and in his own way, he was honest. But Bey was also a ruthless killer and saw no reason why threatened death could not be used as a lever to move Mags.

  He looked over at Amily and dreaded telling her. She couldn’t come with him; that was impossible. Bey wouldn’t allow it, and neither would her father. Or if Bey allowed it, it would only be so he had another hold over Mags. Sure, they would be together, but they would be miserable, what with him knowing Bey just had to hint he’d hurt her to get his way, and her knowing that she was the reason he’d be doing things that weren’t right. She sipped tea and smiled tremulously at him. Did she guess?

  “I’m gonna check on Jakyr,” he said, lurching to his feet. He trudged toward Lita’s sleeping nook; Amily seemed to understand he needed to be alone and remained where she was.

  Or maybe she realized what he had to do, and she was wrestling with the implications, too. Maybe he had made her sad that he hadn’t asked her to come with him, and she hadn’t yet figured out she would be the weapon against Mags in Bey’s hands. Or maybe she had realized that, and that was making her sad. In any case, what could he say to her? He seemed to be fumbling everything at the moment.

  Lita had left a lantern burning on the hook she had made above the bed area. Jakyr was awake and staring at the ceiling of the nook when Mags peeked around the canvas curtain. Before Mags could say anything, he spoke. “This was why I fought with Lita and drove her away from me, you know,” he said quietly, as if he and Mags were resuming some conversation that Mags had somehow forgotten. “This was why I decided that I didn’t have the right to have any close ties with anyone.”

  “What was?” Mags asked, sitting heavily on the rock lip of the bedding area.

  “There was an ambush,” Jakyr said, still staring at the ceiling. “Karsites, of course, it always seems to be Karsites and those damned demons of theirs. A nighttime ambush, and I was the only one to get out. Some people in the Guard we both knew, another Herald, my former mentor, and his new Trainee—all dead, and me mauled and left for dead. That was when I knew. Lita and I were—well, everyone thought it was going to happen, we were going to settle down together. But I knew then, a Herald’s life isn’t his own. That I was going to end up the same as my mentor one day. And meanwhile, everyone knew that Lita was going to be a great Bard, an important Bard, that if she stayed at Haven for just a little while longer, she’d be made an instructor and resident performer at the Palace. Except she wouldn’t do that if she spent all her time worrying whether I was going to be the cause for the Death Bell every time I went out. So she’d try to follow me, and that might get her killed, and it certainly would cost her the chance at greatness. I couldn’t do that to Lita. I couldn’t let her waste her life, and all that talent.”

  He sighed heavily. And Mags thought of Amily. What would she do if he gave himself up? Cry for a long while, surely—but eventually she would get over him, she’d find something wonderful to do with her life, or someone else, or both. She was a Herald’s daughter, and if anyone knew the risks, she did. She’d know better than anyone not to look back, but forward.

  “So?” Mags asked.

  “So she wouldn’t listen. Kept trying to tell me ways we could make it all work. That’s when I fought with her. Said unforgivable things. Deliberately set out to make her hate me.” He closed his eyes. “I guess it didn’t work as well as I thought.”

  Mags thought that Jakyr was asleep, but a few moments later the Herald sighed. “Don’t fight with Amily; obviously I proved that doesn’t work. She’s her father’s daughter. She knows what you have to do as well as you do, and she’s probably laying it all out in her own head right this minute. She might want to be alone to cry about it; leave her alone. The sooner you can make a clean break with her, the better. Go in the morning before she wakes up. Goodbyes won’t do anything but make both of you sick and sorry.”

  That seemed to take all of the little energy that the Herald had. Jakyr closed his eyes, looking utterly spent. A moment later, and Jakyr was asleep. Mags shuffled back out to the firepit, but Amily was already gone.

  So were Lita, Lena, and Bear.

  He felt too heavy with sorrow to sleep—and Jakyr was right; if he went to Amily now, they’d both cry, and try to make love, and it would ruin all the good times they’d had together; and in the end, nothing would be accomplished except to make more misery. He resolved to stay out by the firepit, wait out this last night alone, and go out in the dawn and give himself up. At least this time he knew he wouldn’t have his self crushed and swallowed up, or distorted beyond recognition, by the evil spirits in those talismans. Bey could protect him from that much.

  And Dallen would follow him; he wouldn’t be all alone in a strange land. When Bey tried to get him to do things, Dallen would help him find ways to give Bey what he wanted without compromising himself too much. Dallen was right, no matter where he was, he would still be a Herald of Valdemar. Nothing that the Sleepgivers could do would take that away from him. Bey wouldn’t force him to do anything he really didn’t want to do; Bey needed his Gift too much, and he probably knew enough about Mind-magic to know that if you forced someone to do things against their will too often, the Gift often died within them.

  If only it all didn’t hurt so much . . .

  He curled up around the aching in his heart and the opening wound in his soul and wept silently until he ran out of tears.

  • • •

  “Wake up, cousin. That looks like a pai
nful way to sleep.” The soft voice jolted through his dreams.

  Mags came awake all at once, thinking that the voice he had just heard was surely part of the dark dream he had been struggling through. But when he glanced up through gummy eyes, a handsome set of gleaming white teeth smiled down at him out of the shadow-shape looming over him.

  There was no mistaking those teeth.

  An irrelevant thought intruded through all his unhappiness. Why does he have to be handsomer than me?

  “Bey!” he exclaimed, trying to scramble to his feet and nearly falling down because his left hand and leg had gone numb.

  “Ehu! Not so fast, cousin!” the Sleepgiver laughed softly, catching him before he fell and steadying him. “There, sit yourself back down again. We have a great deal to discuss.”

  The cavern was almost completely dark; the fire had burned down to low flames over coals. Bey tossed a couple of logs on the coals; the bark caught and flared, giving a little more light. Mags could see Dallen and Jermayan, heads up, watching them. No one else seemed to have awakened.

  But Bey’s words only reminded Mags of what he was going to have to do at dawn. “Not much to discuss,” he said, dully, sitting back down again and rubbing his leg and hand to get the prickles out. “I gotta give myself up. You know that, I know that, and there’s not much anybody can do about it. Well, I’d appreciate it if you’d come with me so you can keep ’em from trying to hang one of those spirit-holders around my neck. But—”

  “Not so fast, my cousin,” Bey interrupted, with a gesture of negation. He sat down next to Mags. “Speak quietly. I would not like to waken your friends until we have a plan, you and I. I said, we have a great deal to discuss. I am certainly not going to let you walk out to those . . . toads. They would not heed me, for I am not the heir yet, and they would most certainly hang one of the Ancestor Stones about your neck, aye, and dose you with the herbs until you purged yourself of everything useful to me!” He scowled. “You will do me no good if your Blessing is destroyed by such handling. So I am here to keep you out of their hands.”

  “Wh—what?” Mags could hardly believe what he was hearing.

  “When I left you, I went outside of the caves for the first time since I arrived here. I was not pleased to see my countrymen on the heights above, and particularly not pleased to see those countrymen. The only thing that pleased me—” the teeth shone again “—was to know how miserable the last storm had made them. So! I crept about their camp, less than a shadow, and I learned much. I watched them send their message and—I am sorry I could not prevent this—I saw them strike down your friend.”

  “But—what do you think I can do?” Mags asked.

  “You and I have shared minds. Therefore, you have knowledge of my training. You are not quite the equal of me, but you are ten times the Sleepgiver of any of those dogs outside.” Bey’s tone was arrogant, but Mags was not about to argue with him, not with hope unlooked-for in his hands. “Your friend, who became nearly a spitted fowl—how fares he?”

  “He’s hurt, but he’ll live,” Mags said. Bey nodded.

  “That is well. He is rash. If he is hurt, we can put him with the others of your friends who are no help to us. The most secure place is that cave wherein you bathe in steam. A good custom that; I adopted it, and I think I shall take it with me. We should put them there and pile wood before it to act as a bulwark. They can fire over that at need.” Bey held up a finger. “Your mate. She is useful. I have seen her shoot.” He held up another. “The doctor-of-herbs. He is also useful. His mate and the old singer, they are not. They shall be with your wounded friend, while you and I dispose of those inconvenient dogs outside, and your mate and the doctor stand ready.”

  Mags gaped at him. After all of the emphasis the Sleepgivers had put on blood relations—he could scarcely believe the words coming out of Bey’s mouth. “But—those are your kinsmen!” he stammered.

  Bey made a little motion with his hands, as if he was brushing away a bug. “Not that close. Cousins of cousins of cousins of cousins, and probably born of slave women. Idiots. And they follow a faction that would keep to the old, bad ways. This is as good a way as any to be rid of them.”

  Mags felt a tiny chill down his back at the casual way that Bey had just dismissed the murder of his own countrymen . . . but he couldn’t let that stop him. Nevertheless, it was . . . telling. Bey was, in his own way, just as ruthless as any other of the Sleepgivers. When something was going to get in his way, he removed it. If he had to remove it permanently, he obviously didn’t let little things like kinship stop him.

  That reminded Mags of the way the young Sleepgivers were first taught; make no friendships, allow no ties of affection. Compete, or fail, and become—what? Probably slaves, or servants no better than slaves, if you were lucky. If you were not, you died as a result of your failure. Bey had never gone through that training, since it was becoming clear to Mags that even as there were three tiers of rank within the Sleepgivers themselves, there were obviously two tiers, at least, of training. But Bey was the product of the culture that had produced that training. No matter how charming and likable he could be, that culture was what had formed him.

  “So, what do we do?” Mags asked, anxiously. “You don’t want me to give myself up, but I can’t let them slaughter helpless people!”

  Bey smiled a little. “That is not an issue at the moment. It is not a hollow threat, I do assure you, but at the moment, they are as trapped here by your wretched snow”—he used the Valdemaran word, because presumably the Sleepgivers didn’t have a word for snow—“as we are. They cannot go and cull some hapless woodcutter for days yet. I have seen, when I discovered them and went up to spy upon them. The snow is chest-deep around about here, and as high as a house in places. It will be long before they could even attempt to make good on their threat.”

  Mags heaved a sigh of relief. So they had—well, probably several days at least before they had to worry about innocents getting caught up in this.

  “They have been here since just before the first great storm,” Bey continued. “They followed you from the city of the Crown, a little behind me, it seems.” He scowled. “It is irritating to admit, but they are better trackers than I. They easily uncovered all your ruses to throw them off the trail. This vexes me. I had not thought that my tracking skills were inferior to anyone.” Then he shook his head. “Never mind. They thought to take you at a town, using the folk there to force you, but they thought better of that plan when they saw how chaotic your towns are. The people are not of one mind, there are dwellings spread all about, and while it would be the work of a child to simply strike at will and fade away, the taking of a hostage is more difficult work than that. There was no good place or time when they could have taken hostages, and you would certainly have fought and maybe been hurt, and the Shadao specifically forbid you being injured.”

  “Thank the Shadao for me,” Mags said dryly.

  Bey looked at him in astonishment, then barked a laugh. “Ha! Almost a Sleepgiver joke! Are you still so sure you do not wish to come with me?” Before Mags could answer, he waved his hand. “Nay the answer is on your face. So, so, so, they came here. They came up over the hills, where I came in the cleft. They found the high caves where I found the low. They provisioned themselves just in time before the storm struck. They are not, however, nearly so well provisioned as you. They are cold, they are impatient, they begin to hunger, and we may use that to our advantage.”

  Now that was more like it. “You have a plan?” Mags asked, eagerly.

  Bey smiled. “I have many, many plans, and they are all superior, oh my cousin. I am a Sleepgiver. I am of the best of the best of the Sleepgivers. All my plans are superior. We only need to consult and determine which is the most superior.”

  Then he looked around a little. “Meanwhile . . . I hunger. And after your distress, and sleeping all awry, I expect you hunger as well. Where are those delectable morsels of meat-in-crust? I so enjoyed the one
s I stole!”

  16

  Of all of the things that Mags had imagined happening this morning, standing beside his cousin as Lita, Lena, Bear, and Amily came out at the sound of voices and saying, “Everyone, this is my cousin Bey,” had not been one of them. He had imagined sneaking off at first light so no one saw him go. He had thought someone might emerge before he could, and there would be tears, or recriminations, or just silent misery. But this was almost a triumph.

  The looks on their faces as Bey swept a sort of bow that included an elaborate flourish of his right hand was worth any amount of money.

  The explanation took surprisingly little time. As he had suspected, although he and Bey had been using the language of the Sleepgivers all this time, Bey spoke passable Valdemaran, and he switched to it except when he didn’t have a word for something. That wasn’t very often. It was the Sleepgiver tongue that lacked Valdemaran words, usually, not the other way around.

  Bey exerted a formidable charm and managed to win all of them over so fast that Mags would have suspected Mind-magic if he hadn’t known Bey didn’t have any. Even Lita was caught in his charisma. Or so he thought, anyway.

  The Bard was not as enraptured as she seemed. But she also was well aware that their options were limited to Bey’s plans and Mags giving up.

  “I thought you said I was an idiot,” Mags whispered to her, as Bey queried Bear earnestly about various supplies.

  “What choice to we have?” she whispered back. “We’ve got no guarantee that even if you do turn yourself over to these Sleepgivers, they won’t turn around and slaughter us anyway! They’ve already killed Jak, as far as they know. They won’t hesitate to do the rest of us, considering they plan on wiping your mind clean of you anyway.”

  Mags nodded soberly. That was a very real possibility, and one that he and Bey had discussed, albeit briefly. Now that he knew that these Sleepgivers didn’t give a toss about what Bey told them . . . once they had him in their clutches, they had no incentive to be merciful and plenty of incentive to make sure there was no one to sound an alarm until it was too late and they were back across the border.