The city of Adalian became increasingly desperate for relief. Funeral pyres of the dead burned every day and, with too little water left to keep all the city-dwellers alive, many of them began escaping into the war-torn countryside. Tansen's attack on Gulstan had failed, and his victory against Ferolen had been short-lived, since Kariman soon thereafter assumed control of the dead waterlord's territory. If Tansen couldn't find a way to break the Society's power in the south soon, Adalian was doomed.
"If only Kiloran hadn't managed to regain Gulstan's friendship," Tansen said pensively one day as Zarien bandaged another minor battle wound for him. "If only he'd found it necessary to kill Gulstan the way he killed Dulien."
"I don't understand how Kiloran found out Dulien was betraying him," Zarien said as he expertly dressed the wound. "No one knew about Dulien besides you, Baran, and—"
"I told Kiloran."
"You what?"
Tansen made a dismissive gesture. "I mean, I made sure Kiloran found out. He doesn't know the information came from me, of course."
Zarien froze. "Why did you do that?"
"So Kiloran would kill him for us, of course." When the boy remained motionless, Tansen prodded, "Finish the job, would you? I have work to do."
"But Dulien... sought your friendship. And you agreed."
Tansen replied, "Dulien sought the best way to keep everything he had, and to get whatever else he could with no risk to himself—or so he thought."
Staring in dark wonder, Zarien said, "You betrayed him?"
Tansen looked at him in surprise. "He was a waterlord, Zarien."
"But don't you... Doesn't..."
"They all have to die," Tansen said. "Or be driven out of Sileria. We can't leave part of the Society alive and functioning after the war, son. Nothing would change. Within a few years, things would be just as bad as if we had fought no war at all. And thousands of lives would have been lost for no reason."
Moving slowly, his face dark with thought, Zarien returned to bandaging the wound. "Will you betray Baran, too?"
"No."
"Because he has served your cause?"
"Because betraying him would endanger Mirabar."
"And if it wouldn't?" the boy prodded.
"Baran may be demented, but he's much smarter than the rest of them. As smart as Kiloran, I think, but hot-headed and sometimes reckless." Tansen shook his head. "Anyhow, I doubt Baran would ever put himself in a position where he needed to trust me, as Dulien did. He's certainly too smart for that."
There was a long, deafening silence between them. Realizing he had shattered some of the Zarien's ideals—particularly the ones the boy cherished about him—he said, "What are you thinking?"
"Nothing," Zarien replied.
"If there's some—"
"I'm done." The boy finished dressing the wound, then turned away, vanishing into the general bustle of the encampment.
Tansen repressed a sigh and decided to let the subject rest for now. He had too many other things to accomplish today.
Kiloran's grip on his own territories was so secure that nothing had so far succeeded in disturbing it; and Tansen knew he could only vanquish the old waterlord by first eliminating Kiloran's additional support—the rest of the Society.
The ultimate fate of Zilar and the Shaljir river was still uncertain. Kiloran and Meriten both understood how destructive it would be to the Society if the Firebringer's loyalists achieved all-out victory there, so they still fought bitterly for it. In the east, Verlon and a few of the lesser waterlords still defended their territories more ruthlessly than the Valdani themselves had during the rebellion.
This deep into the dry season, there was no relief for the water-starved nation. The long rains were still some time away... if they came. If this was one of the occasional years in which the rains were late, sparse, or simply never arrived, then Tansen knew Sileria could not hold out against what the waterlords were doing to the land and its people.
He needed victory. Sileria needed it. Tansen knew this, and the knowledge had led him to attack Gulstan... which he now saw, with bitter regret and self-condemnation, had been a mistake. What did Kiloran always say? Mistakes were so easily made.
Too easily. Much too easily.
Tansen knew he couldn't afford any more.
He had been thinking like a shallah when he led the Firebringer's loyalists into battle against Gulstan, one of the Society's most powerful and ruthless waterlords—and certainly the fattest. Tansen's plan to sow dissension between Gulstan and Kiloran had failed, and he had fallen back on the simple Silerian solution of all-out violence.
Mistake.
It was time to think like a shatai. It was time to remember the training and education drilled into him by his kaj. The teachings of great Kintish swordmasters and philosophers had been distilled, over the centuries, into pure, poetic, simple lessons taught to the finest warrior caste in the three corners of the world, that they might always be the best, wherever they went, whatever challenges they faced.
It was time—past time—to be the best, as he had been taught to be.
Tansen's kaj had always said he was too quick to choose violence, too ready to fight. That trait, Kaja said, was the Silerian in him, the bloodthirsty shallah.
"A shatai should always win a fight," Tansen murmured, remembering what Kaja had tried to make him understand even after putting two deadly swords into his hands, "but to win without fighting is the pinnacle of skill."
To this wisdom, Tansen now mentally added the gift which had rarely failed him over the years: Make them see what you want them to see.
He needed a plan.
And he thought he had one.
If it didn't work...
Focus on the task at hand.
But if it didn't work...
I am prepared to die today. Are you?
Zarien would be orphaned again.
Tansen sighed heavily, filled with a tremendous guilt he had never before known upon risking his own life. A terrible, devouring fear crept through his blood when he thought of Zarien alone in the world, without him.
He wondered now if Armian, who had seemed so powerful, so reckless and invincible, had felt this way, too.
He wondered now, with a sudden shaft of piercing sorrow, if Armian had loved him even as Tansen murdered him.
"I can't get near Tansen, so I can't get access to the boy," Searlon reported to Kiloran as they met in Kiloran's underwater palace at Lake Kandahar. "So I'm working on a plan."
"To separate him from the boy?" Kiloran asked.
"I've come to believe that, under current circumstances, he will not leave the boy somewhere—at least, not long enough for me to locate him. Tansen is, based on what I can learn, very protective of Zarien and much attached to him."
Kiloran's blood felt cold with memory. "Is he indeed?" It wouldn't matter. Not in the end. Not with Tansen.
"However," Searlon continued, "if I can distract Tansen with an unexpected problem, perhaps I'll have a better chance of getting close to the boy."
"No matter what," Kiloran began, "the boy is very valuable and—"
"Must not be harmed. I understand, siran." Searlon added, "Baran still shows no interest in Zarien. He has made no effort to communicate with the boy, let alone to get him away from Tansen."
Kiloran murmured, "So Baran really doesn't know."
"As far as I can ascertain, siran, no one else—not even Zarien himself—knows what you, I, and a few of the surviving Lascari know about him."
"Even so, secrets are like children," Kiloran said. "No one can guard them day and night forever, and no one can predict what they will become."
"I'll find the boy," Searlon promised.
"Tell me about your plan."
"Ah!" Searlon smiled. "It comes as part of a bundle of good news I bring today, and it's a plan which should also solve certain problems in the east."
"Verlon?" The old waterlord, although still part of the Society, was quite
clear by now about his uncompromising enmity for Kiloran.
Searlon shook his head. "The Lironi and their allies."
"The Lironi?" Kiloran considered this with interest. Despite his problems with Verlon, destroying the Firebringer's loyalists everywhere was indeed still his primary concern. "So your plan will leave Verlon unchallenged in the east?"
Searlon shook his head. "Not quite, siran. I have discovered that Verlon has a burden we didn't even know about, one which I wouldn't wish on anyone." When Kiloran gave him a quizzical look, Searlon grinned, the scar on his cheek flowing into a dimple. "Verlon," he said, "has an ambitious heir."
Kiloran laughed and realized how much he had missed Searlon.
"The news gets even better, siran."
"Oh?"
The assassin helped himself to a modest quantity of Kintish fire brandy as he continued, "I've finally found someone who's willing to betray Mirabar. Someone ready to offer us friendship."
Kiloran accepted the brandy which Searlon offered him, too, and said, "In truth, it's probably worth almost any price at this point, but I feel obliged to ask, nonetheless: What will this friendship cost us?"
"Nothing we can't afford, siran," Searlon assured him. "And our investment in it should reap many profits."
Emperor Jarell sent warnings to the temporary government in Shaljir: The killing of Silerian-born Valdani must cease, or there would be reprisals from the mainland.
The imperial warnings inspired horrified alarm among the leaders of the Alliance, who sent appeasing replies back to the mainland. However, no one knew how to protect the Valdani, in particular, while an inferno of murderous violence and centuries-old enmity was consuming Sileria in all its explosive fury. There was no longer any such thing as order—let alone safety—anywhere in the mountains, and the lowlands were awash with fighting, refugees, pilgrims, ambushes, deadly water magic, and raging wildfires. While Adalian grew weaker and more desperate under Kariman's onslaught, the food shortages in Shaljir led to riots and violent factionalism even though the Idalar River—now very low and sluggish—still flowed into the city.
Everyone knew that Baran had sided with Tansen by marrying Mirabar—but what if that madman changed his mind? Or what if Kiloran killed him and gained full control of the Idalar? What would happen if Tansen died? If the Lironi lost their war in the east? If more earthquakes destroyed Shaljir beyond repair? If Mirabar's visions were false and never came to pass? Or if Kiloran killed her prophesied Yahrdan the way he had killed the Firebringer?
Others insisted that now was the time to be strong. Baran and Mirabar working together could keep the capital city from falling under Kiloran's influence. The Society, despite months of trying, had yet to regain control of the Shaljir River or the town of Zilar. Now was the time to support the Firebringer's dream of freedom for Sileria, not turn away from it in spineless terror of what might happen.
Now was the time for fire or water to gain ascendancy forever in Sileria, and there could be no turning back.
A child of fire...
It was a dark place full of light, a bright place shadowed by darkness. A vast cavern, heavy yet airy, immense yet encroaching.
A child of water...
Fire and water were all around her. The churning lava of the volcano dripped into water which flowed through strange tunnels lit by unfamiliar glowing shapes. Angry hissing filled the air wherever fire and water met, and steam rose to obscure Mirabar's vision.
A child of sorrow...
Tonight the past and the future came together in the present. The tragedy of wasted lives, the waste of squandered talents, the enmity that ran stronger in their blood than love, the love which they had twisted into something so destructive that the future could only survive if they perished...
Fire and water, water and fire...
The bloodlust of a people which they must learn to stop quenching. The vengeance that could no longer be their whole way of life. The passion for betrayal which they must stop indulging...
Mirabar noticed little glowing shapes moving now, in this strange sunless place of lava and crystal, this domain of mingled fire and water. Some slithered leglessly, and others seemed to have a thousand legs. Mirabar shuddered, praying that, despite the power of this vision, she was still, in reality, safely at Belitar.
She saw the Beckoner now, distant, evasive, and she asked him, "What is this place?"
Protect what you most long to destroy.
"Where is this place?"
Are you ready?
"To protect her?"
She didn't need to ask if she was right; she knew Elelar was somehow the answer. She knew by her own revulsion, her repugnance, her screaming reluctance to relinquish her craving for vengeance, for Elelar's blood. She wanted Elelar to suffer the way Baran wanted Kiloran to suffer... And daily exposure to her husband's hate-driven madness was why she knew she must surrender her bloodlust and protect Elelar. Mirabar must not squander her gifts in hatred as Baran had. She must not sacrifice Sileria and its well-being to personal vengeance as her husband had.
She had to be more than Baran was, better than he was. Dar had sent her into that madman's arms so that she would know and accept her duty: for the good of Sileria, the good of the powerful child she would bear Baran, and the good of her own soul.
"I am ready," she vowed.
And she knew she spoke the truth.
"Sirana?"
Mirabar frowned, startled by the intrusion of Najdan's voice.
"Sirana?"
She whirled to face him as her vision melted away.
His shir shuddered wildly, and he took a sudden step backward, bouncing away from her as if he had walked into a solid wall. His expression hardened as he realized what he had just wandered into—the midst of one of her visions—and he studied her with narrowed, assessing eyes.
Breathing hard and shivering a little from the sudden transition, Mirabar assured him faintly, "It's over now."
He watched her warily for a moment, then nodded. "We have a visitor."
"Right now?" She was in no mood for a visitor.
"It's Cheylan," Najdan said without enthusiasm.
"Cheylan," she repeated with relief.
Najdan gave her a disapproving look. "The sentries have spotted him approaching the lake."
"We need him," she said. "I need his help." She smiled and assured Najdan, "He was meant to come here now."
He inclined his head and said, with a noticeable lack of conviction, "If you say so, sirana."
"Where's Baran?" she asked.
"Occupied. He says Kiloran has enlisted help in trying to gain full control of the Idalar River. He can feel it."
"Help?" she repeated. "Is it Dyshon?"
"Almost certainly. I can't think of anyone else Kiloran would trust enough to admit into his struggle for the Idalar."
"Do you think Baran can withstand this?" she asked anxiously, well aware of how fast he was losing strength.
"Attend to Cheylan," Najdan advised. "You and I can discuss this later."
She nodded, knowing he was right. "Row me across the lake, Najdan. I have many things to tell Cheylan."
"Oh?"
"Yes," she said. "We're..." She placed a hand over her belly, resisting the nausea which she felt threatening as she mentally committed to her appalling destiny. "We're going to become allies again with Torena Elelar."
Najdan looked startled, then a strangely resigned expression settled into his hard features. "I believe your husband will find that very... amusing, sirana."
"Yes," Mirabar agreed sourly. "I believe you're right."
Chapter Eleven
I can take care of my enemies,
but Dar shield me from my friends.
—Josarian
"What is that?" Cheylan asked, studying the rather revolting bundle which Mirabar carried in her arms as she approached him. It was long, slender, and wrapped in a moldy old blanket.
"It's something Baran gave me. Something
which has been hidden in Belitar for a very long time."
"How thoughtful of him," Cheylan said dryly. He lifted his gaze to where Najdan stood glowering at him. "Hello."
Najdan didn't even blink or nod.
Mirabar seemed untroubled by the assassin's bad manners, and she said to Cheylan, "Let's walk a little."
"All right," Cheylan agreed. "May I carry that for you?"
She hesitated for a moment, then nodded. She let him take the disgusting bundle from her, and he wondered at the expression in her glowing eyes as she stared at it in silence.
"It's solid," Cheylan remarked.
"And heavier than it looks," she murmured.
"Yes. What is it?"
She raised her gaze to his. "It's time for me to find out."
"Oh?"
She took a shaky breath. "I'm glad you're here. I'm, well, a little frightened."
Cheylan supposed that a mysterious gift from the madman she had married might reasonably cause that reaction, so he nodded. He turned and, letting her set the pace, started walking.
The ensorcelled chill of Belitar permeated the air all around the gloomy, enchanted lake. Even now, as the rest of Sileria sweltered under the killing skies of the dry season, Belitar was cool... and as damp as ever. If the assassins' shir weren't made of water, Cheylan suspected they'd be rusting.
"Have you been well?" he asked.
She smiled. "Not really."
He saw her place a hand over her belly, and he guessed immediately. "So it's happened, then. You're expecting his child."
"Yes."
The shock he had felt upon learning of her marriage, like the rage he had felt upon hearing from her own lips the reasons she had done it, had driven him to extraordinary measures. He tried to believe it had always been meant to be this way, because the alternative was unthinkable; but at this particular moment, having faith in Dar and in his destiny was a challenge. Cheylan felt a surge of dark envy and mild revulsion as he contemplated the still-flat belly hidden by Mirabar's modest clothing.
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