Betrayal

by Lara Morgan

  She straightened as quickly as she could, worried he might just pick her up, and held out her right hand. ‘Fine then, if you won’t accept no for an answer.’

  But instead of taking her hand he put his arm about her waist, drawing her close.

  ‘Fooled you,’ he said softly, and if she’d had the energy to protest she might have pulled away, but she was suddenly glad of his help as he practically carried her to the cart. She tried to pretend to herself that she felt nothing when she caught the faint scent of spice about him or felt the solid warmth of his body pressed against her side, or when he handed her up into the cart and his hand stayed in hers longer than necessary. She tried to ignore all these things and when he asked her again if he could see her at the temple she said no, and no again, but he smiled a half smile as the cart pulled away and she felt him watching her until it turned out of his sight into the street.

  Chapter 3

  Tallis concentrated on the Seducer facing him.

  His name was Farris and he was built as though hewn from rock, an ugly scar puckering the side of his face. He had already bested two men and Tallis did not want to be the third.

  The afternoon was sticky and warm and the morning’s rain had turned the arena’s ground to mud. Tallis stepped carefully, his thighs tensed as he and the Seducer slowly circled each other, blunted training swords at the ready. He was finding commanding men a very different thing from commanding serpents. A man’s mind did not sing to him. Again and again he had failed to control his opponents and he wore the bruises to prove it.

  Concentrating hard he focused on Farris and willed him to lower his weapon. The Seducer resisted. He’d raised a barrier against him in his mind and Tallis could not seem to cross it. He pressed, feeling the veins in his neck bulging with the effort, but Farris only grinned. A white-hot pain flashed behind his eyes. Submit! The command seared Tallis’s mind and he dropped to his knees, gasping for breath. The Seducer came in hard, the blunt edge of his sword catching Tallis across the chest. He fell back into the mud, his ribs aching.

  The Seducer dropped him a mocking bow. ‘I win again, clansman. Perhaps you should have asked your serpent for help.’ Laughing, Farris walked back to the row of benches.

  A series of disparaging remarks focusing on the size of Tallis’s manhood were voiced by the other men as he slowly got to his feet. They were in the smaller of the yards’ training arenas and most of the benches were filled with Seducers and Hunters. Rorc and Cyri stood watching against the rail and Tallis could see from their expressions the frustration he was causing.

  It couldn’t be anywhere near the annoyance he was feeling. He made his way toward the rail, shaking the mud from his clothes. He should be able to beat these men; despite their having trained since boyhood he knew his mind was stronger. Every day he felt his command over the serpents growing, his strength increasing; he should be able to master a man’s mind as well. But something held him back. He had no control over his power and it infuriated him.

  ‘You’re making slow progress,’ Cyri said as he reached them. ‘And few friends.’

  Tallis glanced at Rorc standing silent beside the Faithful’s Consul. ‘They see me as an outsider,’ he said.

  ‘Trust must be earned and ignorance is only a barrier if you let it become one,’ Cyri replied. ‘Worry less about them, and more about what you need to learn.’

  ‘I’m learning as fast as I’m able.’ Tallis swiped at some mud on his shirt.

  Cyri reminded him of Karnit sometimes — another old man trying to control him. If he thought he would succeed, he was wrong.

  Cyri looked amused. ‘Control is subjective,’ he said.

  ‘Stay out of my head.’ Tallis eyed the older man and strengthened the wards he was learning to weave around his mind.

  The Consul smiled. ‘Now you are learning.’ He turned toward the trees. ‘I’ll need a full report later,’ he said to Rorc.

  ‘Of course, Consul,’ Rorc replied, but he was looking at Tallis. ‘He will do better — he knows our lives depend on it.’ Tallis met his look but didn’t reply.

  Rorc turned to a young boy waiting behind him. ‘Collect some training swords and distribute them. Sparring practice!’ He raised his voice so the other men could hear and walked away to the middle of the arena.

  Tallis fought down his irritation and wiped the sweat from his hand so his sword wouldn’t slip. He knew Rorc was right; he had to succeed. To fail was to allow Azoth a better chance at winning.

  Farris grinned as he passed him. ‘You and me again, clansman,’ he said, and smacked the blade of his sword across his palm. Tallis could feel the beating he was about to take already and wished Salmut had hot springs to soak what were going to be more aching muscles.

  ‘Attack!’ Rorc shouted and, bracing himself, Tallis parried a massive thrust as the Seducer came at him.

  They trained with swords and the mind for the rest of the day and Tallis managed to hold his own against a few, but still could not attack. It was as if a barrier was holding his power back. The other men had not shown him any quarter, pressing him hard under Rorc’s command, and by the time the sun started to drop, he was aching, bruised and angry as he found himself yet again on his knees, his sword in the mud. Cursing, he got to his feet and went back to the benches as two Hunters took to the ground and engaged in a blur of training knives, kicking and turning.

  ‘Oi, clansman!’ Farris called out to him from the benches above. ‘How about one more try, just for fun. Unless you’ve got some hair braiding to do.’

  A few of the others laughed as Tallis turned to look up at him. Farris had been jibing him all day about his longer hair and braids.

  ‘Come on.’ Farris stood up and grabbed at his crotch, laughing. ‘Come and get your punishment.’

  ‘Enough, Farris.’ A younger Seducer spoke up from the seat behind Tallis. ‘The day’s over. It’s time for food, not fists.’

  ‘I’m just making friends,’ Farris said. ‘Isn’t that right, clansman? Or shouldn’t I call you that? Way I heard it you were cast out of your clan. Surprised me. I thought those sand eaters would take anyone.’

  A tic started in Tallis’s jaw. A few tense chuckles came from the other men, but most sat silent, waiting to see what he would do.

  ‘Ignore him,’ the younger Seducer said. ‘It’s just Farris being Farris. Day’s over as far as I can see.’

  But the words had cut too deep. Tallis got to his feet and made his way back out into the arena to the rumbling cheers of the men. He ignored them and forced the pain from his aching muscles, too furious to speak. He might not be Clan anymore but an insult against it could not be left.

  ‘That’s it, good dog.’ Farris jumped down and followed him out. ‘Come and take your hiding like a good boy.’ He walked toward Tallis, swinging his sword, cutting at the air. ‘Just one more time.’ He grinned and something snapped inside Tallis. A faint metallic taste of blood ghosted across his tongue and his vision wavered as the world furled away and darkness rose inside. Without thought, he ran at Farris. He could sense the man’s blood running hot through his veins, coursing through fat and sinew. He registered Farris’s sudden falter but nothing could stop the burst of anger that exploded from his mind as he lunged at him, aiming his fist hard at the man’s jaw, the darkness in his mind flowing out with it, uncontrolled. Knuckle connected with jaw and the Seducer hit the mud and lay still. For a moment there was silence.

  Tallis stood over him, vibrating with energy, his breathing harsh and loud. The barrier he’d felt all day was gone and he was dizzy with the world spinning in his blood, his breath the breath of the land. Power roared through his skull. Arak-ferish. Faintly he heard Marathin’s whisper. In the back of his mind he felt Shaan’s awareness snap to him, sensing what he’d done.

  He looked up and the men who had been approaching stopped and stepped back, and Tallis knew his eyes were probably so dark now they appeared almost black.

  Only Rorc kept walking
till he reached them, then bent to check the prone man’s pulse.

  ‘He’s still alive,’ he said, then rose so fast Tallis barely saw the fist coming before it connected with his jaw. He went down, wet earth smacking the back of his head. Pain throbbed along his face and neck and he saw cloud-scudded sky as the world came back into focus again. He looked up into the fierce eyes of the commander.

  ‘Take Farris to the healers,’ Rorc said to the other men. ‘We’re finished for today. Go back to your barracks.’

  When they had gone Rorc said, ‘On your feet.’ He stepped back and Tallis rolled to his side and pushed himself up. ‘Tell me that was an accident,’ Rorc said in a low voice. ‘Tell me you only lost control and didn’t mean to almost kill my armsman?’

  Tallis didn’t know what to tell him. He could still feel the residue of the power on his skin, like drift ash from a fire.

  ‘I don’t think so.’ His throat was constricted and he had to force the words past his teeth.

  Rorc’s look was glacial. ‘Get cleaned up and come to my quarters.’ He turned and strode away and Tallis noticed Balkis standing near the rail, looking at him across the arena. He met his gaze and wondered what the other man was thinking. Was he so keen to pursue his sister now he had seen what her brother could do?

  ***

  He washed at the well outside the Dome. He had taken over one of the old serpent crells on the lower floor, now that all but Marathin and Haraka had left the city. Cool and dry, the crell was more like the caves of his home than the barracks. But sometimes, like now, being there made him think too much of what he had lost.

  Why had he fought today for a clan he was no longer even part of? He had almost killed a man. What was he becoming?

  He dried himself on a rough cloth and pulled on a clean shirt, hanging his mud-streaked clothes over the lip of the well. To be reminded now of home was pain he didn’t need. He swung the well’s bucket back over the drop and winched it slowly down again. The well was on the lee side of the Dome to the city and he leaned against the low wall, looking out to the edge of the cliff as the sun dropped into the sea.

  ‘Tallis.’ Shaan’s voice sounded but he didn’t turn. He’d sensed her coming some time before.

  ‘I’m all right,’ he said. ‘It was just a fight during training.’

  ‘It was more than that.’ She leaned next to him on the well’s edge. ‘What happened?’

  ‘What’s happened to you?’ He had noticed as soon as she was close that there was something different in her, something subtly shifted. ‘What has changed since I saw you this morning?’

  ‘My clothes,’ she said. ‘You tell me first what you did.’

  He let out a short breath. ‘I attacked a man, using the power I have over the serpents. It just … came out of me.’

  ‘You were angry.’ She tilted her head to one side, frowning, and he felt his awareness of her flare brighter. ‘You feel stronger,’ she said.

  He nodded. ‘I feel like I broke through something. But I don’t know if I’m strong enough yet to control it.’

  Shaan crossed her arms about herself and stared out at the sea for a moment.

  ‘You sound like you’re starting to like it.’

  ‘No, but I feel like if I don’t leash it, it will control me.’

  A bitter smile crossed her face. ‘Wonderful gifts Azoth passed on to us, aren’t they?’

  ‘Maybe they’ll help us defeat him,’ Tallis said. ‘But what did you come to tell me?’

  She was silent for a while, watching the spreading orange light of sunset suffuse the horizon.

  ‘Shaan?’

  ‘I went to the healing temple today,’ she said, and he felt a leap in his understanding.

  ‘You healed someone.’

  She nodded and lifted her left hand a little way from herself, as if to show him. It was less than steady. ‘I felt his life, Tallis,’ she said. ‘I saw the way his body works in my mind, felt it, knew how to fix it. It was —’ She stopped, shook her head.

  ‘Frightening?’ he said.

  She dropped her hand. ‘I’m not sure. It wasn’t the same as you; he was normal.’

  ‘More human,’ he said.

  She looked at him quickly. ‘Yes.’ Her expression was bleak and he caught the thought that flew through her mind. More human than both of us.

  He put a hand on her shoulder, but neither of them felt much comfort.

  She said aloud, ‘I tried it on myself but I couldn’t do anything. I can’t heal my own aches.’

  He was sad about that, though not surprised; it was, after all, a gift from Azoth, from the Birthstone. ‘But you can heal others,’ he said.

  ‘It seems so.’ But her voice was dull and he thought that if he had heard someone say that before, when he was still Clan, he would have been amazed, almost disbelieving, but now … Was he becoming so much like Azoth that no power could surprise him anymore?

  Shaan shifted. ‘Well, it could be worse,’ she said, trying to smile, but the smile wouldn’t hold.

  ‘You have to be careful,’ Tallis said. ‘There is that dark edge to it. You could do damage.’

  ‘I know. So could you.’

  ‘I already have.’ He thought of Farris, of Haldane, the man he’d once called father, now dead, and Jared, his earth brother, his friend, whom he’d abandoned to Azoth. The ache flared again in his chest. How much more loss was there to come?

  ‘You have to go.’ Shaan nudged him. ‘Rorc is waiting.’

  ‘I know.’ He got to his feet.

  ‘Don’t worry about me. I survived the streets and Azoth trying to kill me, I can survive this.’ She smiled but it didn’t ease his worry.

  ‘I’ll see you tomorrow,’ he said, and made his way down the path from the Dome toward Rorc’s lodge.

  He arrived as the last flush of colour was fading from the sky to be replaced by stars. The commander’s quarters was a small cottage built among the trees at the cliff’s edge of the yards, surrounded by a thick belt of shrubs. Tallis knocked on the door and pushed it open at the faint call to enter.

  ‘In here,’ Rorc said.

  Tallis followed the sound of his voice through a doorway at the end of the corridor and found him standing behind a desk, rolling up a stack of scrolls. Behind him two open windows let in the salt tang of the sea and set Rorc’s face in shadow as the sun disappeared into the expanse of dark water.

  ‘Sit.’ Rorc indicated a plain wooden chair facing the desk. He tied a string around the scrolls and lit the lamps that hung suspended on hooks from the walls. Warm yellow light filled the small chamber. A rich red mat took up most of the floor space and a set of shelves was built into the stone wall. It was full of scrolls and Tallis noticed a lizard carved from bone.

  ‘You recognise the vache,’ Rorc said.

  Tallis nodded. The small reptile lived all over the Clan Lands. The rendition of it was very good, the frill around the neck curving like a crown around its head. He was surprised to see it in the Commander’s house.

  Rorc picked it up, running a finger down the tail. ‘Took me a week.’ He put it down and then turned back with a look on his face Tallis couldn’t quite understand.

  ‘Farris is still unconscious; the healers say he may not wake for several days,’ he said.

  ‘But he is alive?’

  ‘Yes. Cyri had to examine him, though. He had to coax his mind back from madness.’

  Tallis stared at the floor. ‘That was not my intent.’

  Rorc walked slowly back to his desk and leaned against it, watching him closely. ‘I heard how he insulted the Clans, but you’ve done yourself no favours by attacking him.’

  ‘I know,’ Tallis said, ‘but he would not shut his mouth. What would you have done in my place?’

  ‘I would not have struck out at a man who may be guarding my back in the future,’ the Commander said quietly.

  ‘You don’t understand.’

  ‘I understand better than you think.’ Ror
c’s eyes glittered with a restrained anger. ‘You lost control.’

  ‘I didn’t have control to begin with,’ Tallis said. ‘I … breached a barrier. Earlier in the day I hadn’t been able to do that, but the anger —’

  ‘Brought it out?’ Rorc said. ‘And what about now, is that barrier back?’

  Tallis shook his head. ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘So you should be able to control it?’

  ‘I don’t know; perhaps.’

  ‘If you can control the serpents, you can control this.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘It seems logical.’

  Logic had nothing to do with him. He got up from the chair and began to pace back and forth across the rug.

  ‘Why are you here, Tallis?’ Rorc said. ‘You train with the Faithful, you fly on the serpents, but you show no real commitment to either.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Tallis stopped pacing. ‘I’m trying my hardest.’

  ‘It’s not enough.’

  How could it not be enough? ‘You don’t understand. I’m not a wetlander, I don’t fit in here.’

  ‘You have to. Your clan will never take you back. You have no choice.’

  ‘How do you know so much about Clan?’

  Rorc smiled but there was no humour in his eyes. ‘You need to decide why you’re here, Tallis. I have no place for a man who can’t make up his mind. You’ll only endanger us all when Azoth comes. Or perhaps that is your wish?’

  His words were as cold as his gaze and Tallis felt the darkness in him stirring as his anger rose. ‘I’m here because I choose to be,’ he said. ‘I know I can’t go back to my clan and I know what I am.’

  ‘And what is that?’ Rorc said. ‘Tell me why you can’t go back to your clan, Tallis. Tell me the reason they have marked you Outcast.’

  Tallis’s breath stopped in his throat.

  ‘I will not judge you,’ Rorc said. ‘I know something of the Clans, the way things can go. Not all who are sent away have done what they may be accused of. And we must trust each other. War comes soon, and if you cannot trust your brother in arms …’ He looked askance at him and Tallis swallowed.