But what about when we have the book and come back? Of course Seregil would barter Sebrahn for him; Alec even felt the pricking of guilt. He’d had to choose between the two of them once before; he’d chosen Seregil. He believed he would again, but hoped to hell he didn’t have to.
They reached the edge of the forest early the following morning. Rolling foothills fell away to a plain, and Alec could just make out the thin blue line of ocean on the horizon.
“We’ll reach Beggar’s Bridge by tomorrow,” Seregil told them.
“It’s a Tírfaie town?” asked Rieser.
“That’s right.”
“Then my people will go back to the waterfall and make camp there.”
“We’ll be needing our weapons back,” said Seregil.
Nowen and Rieser exchanged a look, and the captain nodded.
Their weapons were returned. Alec smoothed a hand along his bow’s smooth limbs, checking for damage. It was sound, as were the arrows, thank the Light.
Alec stole a glance in Seregil’s direction, looking for any sign that they were going to fight their way out of this or make a break for it. He’d stayed close to Hâzadriën and figured out half a dozen ways to get Sebrahn away from him when the time came.
Instead, Seregil turned in the saddle and offered Rieser his hand.
“Will you keep our bargain now, Bôkthersa?” asked Rieser, ignoring it.
“We will if you will,” Seregil replied.
“The tayan’gil will be kept safe, and my people will be here when we return. I swear it by Aura, and so do they.”
Seregil turned to Alec. “Well?”
It was tempting to refuse. He even thought of letting Seregil and Micum go without him, but he couldn’t bring himself to do that, either.
“Alec?” Seregil gave him an apologetic look.
There didn’t seem to be any way out. Dread settled in the pit of Alec’s stomach. “But if they aren’t here, if Sebrahn is gone, then I’ll kill you, Rieser í Stellen, and I’ll track down the others, too. I swear that by Aura.”
Rieser smiled, almost as if he approved. “I know you would, Alec í Amasa.”
“You should take off your sen’gai here,” Seregil advised. “Aurënen ships often put in at Beggar’s Bridge. Your pattern isn’t one anyone will have seen before. And if you’re caught with it in Plenimar, there’s bound to be trouble.”
The man unwound the long length of blue-and-white cloth and handed it to the woman named Nowen, who carefully tucked it away in her saddlebag.
Seregil gave Alec a look that said clear as words, There’s no help for it, talí. We’ll take this one step at a time.
But there was still the matter of what Sebrahn would do now.
“At least let me say good-bye.” Alec dismounted and went to Hâzadriën’s horse. Sebrahn came willingly into his arms. Alec hugged him close for a moment, his heart like a stone in his chest, then he set the rhekaro on his feet and knelt in front of him.
“I’m leaving, Sebrahn.” His throat went tight and he had to clear it before he could go on. “Seregil and Micum and I, we’re going away for a little while.”
Please, throw a fit. Sing this away!
But Sebrahn just looked up at him with those wide silver eyes. “Leeeeaving.”
“Yes, leaving. You’re staying. Staying? With Hâzadriën.”
Sebrahn looked at him for a moment, then turned and held his arms up to the tall rhekaro.
“It’s time to go,” Seregil said quietly. “Come on.”
Alec’s heart ached as he lifted Sebrahn back up into Hâzadriën’s arms. “Take good care of him.”
The tall rhekaro said nothing, and his expression did not change as he shifted Sebrahn in his lap.
Going back to Windrunner, Alec swung up into the saddle and looped Patch’s lead rein over his pommel. Looking back over his shoulder, Alec saw Hâzadriën and the other ’faie ride off without a backward glance.
Sebrahn did nothing.
And Alec’s heart broke a little more.
Rieser braced for an attack as soon as they were out of sight of the other Ebrados, but his traveling companions appeared to be ready to keep their word, at least for now. If they slipped away from him, he would hunt them down. If they murdered him, Turmay would know and there would be nothing to stop his riders from heading home with the small tayan’gil. Either way, he would have accomplished his mission.
All the same, he couldn’t help noticing how Alec bit his lip and looked away as they went on.
“Sebrahn will be safe. I’ve given you my word.”
Alec spared him a black look and rode to the head of the line.
Seregil admired Rieser as they rode away from his people. The man might not trust them, but he trusted in their honor. It was astonishing, really, and so ill-founded.
“We have a day or two of riding ahead of us,” Seregil told him as they set off down through the foothills toward the coast. “We might as well pass the time pleasantly. Why don’t you tell us about this ‘white road’?”
“Haven’t you guessed?”
“Tayan’gil means ‘white blood.’ The white road leads to them?”
“Yes, and the white road we followed when we left Aurënen. But the tayan’gils themselves are sometimes called ‘white roads.’ It is their blood that heals us, and the same blood that made us exiles.”
“I see. And am I correct in assuming that Hâzadriën was made from your ancestor, Hâzadriël?”
“Yes.”
“That was more than four generations ago. He’s really that old?”
“That’s correct. She is dead, but he still exists. No one knows if they ever die.”
“How do you feed him, if the person he was made from is dead?” asked Alec, breaking his silence at last.
“Any Hâzadriëlfaie can feed a tayan’gil. We all share the same blood. Think what you like of us, but my people will not let Sebrahn go hungry or be harmed.”
“Anyone?” Alec looked positively dismayed at that.
Seregil’s heart went out to him. First the little rhekaro’s disregard for their departure, and now this. Perhaps this will help him accept the truth, and what has to happen when we get back.
Turning to Rieser, he asked, “How did Hâzadriël and her people come to be in that valley?”
“How much do you know of her?”
“Only that she had some sort of vision, gathered up some followers, and headed north.”
“That’s the end of the story, but not the beginning. She was captured by the Plenimarans, and was used by a—What did you call them?”
“Alchemist.”
“Yes, by an alchemist to make Hâzadriën. Somehow she escaped, and brought four other ’faie back with her, and five tayan’gils, including Hâzadriën. They were the only ones to return. What she saw in Plenimar—” Rieser paused and made some sort of sign with his right hand, probably one of reverence, or warding. “It was only then that it was revealed to her that her blood and those of the people she saw treated in the same manner was different, special.”
“Dragon’s blood,” Alec murmured.
Rieser gave him a surprised look. “Yes, we are blessed with the Great Dragon’s favor. It is our gift and our burden.”
“Do they all have the power to heal?” asked Micum.
Rieser acted as if he hadn’t heard him.
“Do they?” asked Seregil.
“Yes. They are a treasure to our people. Some even count them as a gift of Aura, but the white blood was a curse when we lived within the grasp of the Tír. They tortured and enslaved us to make tayan’gils, and bled us to make dark magic.”
“Not my people,” Micum replied.
Rieser smiled darkly. “Oh, yes. Tayan’gils have been found in all the Tír lands over the years, so it isn’t only the Plenimarans who know the secret of their making. That’s why we withdrew so far. There were no Tír near the valley you call Ravensfell when she led her people there. Now that there are,
we have to guard ourselves all the more carefully.”
“I’m from Kerry,” Alec told him. “Most people up there don’t even believe in you anymore. I always thought the ’faie were just some tales the bards told.”
“Your father knew better,” Rieser pointed out. “Did he lie to you, his only child?”
“To protect him,” Seregil cut in. “To keep him from going off to look for his mother’s people, or seek revenge. Alec’s father knew what would happen to him if he got anywhere near you.”
“How did your father meet her in the first place, Alec, if you don’t mind me asking?” said Micum.
“He never told me anything about her, except that she died when I was born. Whenever I asked more questions, he’d go silent. Sometimes he looked sad.” Alec paused, gazing off into the distance as if he could see his past there. “He had no people, so it was just him and me, all those years, always moving around. We never went near the pass.” He turned to Rieser. “It was because he knew about the Ebrados, wasn’t it? You came hunting us.”
“Of course. Until the day our captain’s horse came back with blood on the saddle. We always assumed that he’d found you, and that your father had killed him.”
“No. I would have known.” Alec paused. “He did leave me with an innkeeper sometimes, when I was little. Maybe he knew that the Ebrados were close by.”
“He was a brave, good man,” said Micum.
Alec swallowed hard. “I never knew. He was just—my father. He didn’t even carry a sword.”
“If he was half the archer you are, he wouldn’t have needed one.”
“A good man wouldn’t have left the mother of his son to die alone,” said Rieser.
“He didn’t!” growled Alec. “I saw what happened, in a vision at Sarikali. He was trying to save her when she died. Your people killed her before he could, but he saved me.”
“He didn’t know what he was doing,” Rieser replied solemnly.
“So that’s what you Ebrados do? Kill innocent people?”
“The ones we kill are not innocent. Men came looking for us and we killed them to protect ourselves. Others caught some of us who unwisely ventured out of the valley, and carried them away to make more tayan’gils. The Ebrados hunted every one of them down, and brought back the Hâzad, if they still lived, and the tayan’gils. We take care of our own.”
“Just how many tayan’gils do you have?” asked Seregil.
“Nineteen. They are gentle, silent creatures like Hâzadriën, and great healers.” He turned to Alec again. “They are treated with the highest respect.”
Alec frowned and looked away.
“But you’re willing to risk Hâzadriën, to bring him along as your healer?” asked Seregil.
“It was Hâzadriël’s will, when she led the Ebrados. And it’s not only that. He can sense others of his kind. He helped Turmay find you, and now you see how he cares for Sebrahn. When the time comes, Sebrahn will come with him willingly.”
“But he’s not harmless like the others,” said Alec, still frowning. “What will you do with him?”
“That is up to our khirnari, but I know he will come to no harm, as long as he causes none.”
“How did alchemists find out about the white blood in the first place?” wondered Seregil. “You don’t look any different than any other ’faie. How did Hâzadriël know, for that matter?”
Rieser shrugged. “Aura guided Hâzadriël to find others with the same special blood. The annals say that she was guided by visions. She did not go north until the Lightbringer revealed the way to her.”
“You weren’t a people then, were you?”
“No. We were scattered among all the clans. Some ’faie have magic. Some have music or the hand for art. We had the white blood of the Dragon.”
“How could no one else in Aurënen ever have known?” Seregil wondered.
“They knew at Sarikali. That is where she went with the first rhekaros, and that is where she was given her first vision that sent her to find the people of the blood.”
“She must have been a very strong woman,” said Micum.
Rieser finally spared him a glance. “She was. We strive to be worthy of her legacy, and that of all our forebears.”
A proud people, thought Seregil. That would make them all the more dangerous.
“We should have gone to Sarikali when we had the chance,” said Alec. “If she could take a rhekaro there, then we could have, too!”
“Other rhekaros can’t kill,” Seregil reminded him.
“We could have found a way.”
Seregil sighed inwardly. He didn’t blame Alec for being angry right now, and probably feeling helpless into the bargain. All Seregil could do was trust that he wouldn’t do anything stupid and impulsive. Alec was too smart for that.
Even so, Seregil was still all too aware of the pain his talímenios was in, and how much he hated their unwanted companion. He had no doubt that if Rieser tried anything, he wouldn’t get more than a bowshot away.
They came in sight of Ero early the following afternoon. The ruins of the citadel were visible for miles, and Alec forgot his simmering worries for a moment at the sight of them.
The remains of towering walls and ruined castles stood stark against the blue sky on a high promontory. As they drew closer, he could make out the broken outline of the wall that had encircled the city from harbor front to the citadel. It hadn’t been as large a place as Rhíminee, but still worthy of a royal capital.
“Someday when we have time, I’ll take you up there,” Seregil told him. “It was called the Palatine, and all the nobles in Ero had palaces and villas there.”
“What happened to this city?” asked Rieser.
“The Plenimarans burned most of it when they raided it in Queen Tamír’s day.”
“How long ago?” asked Rieser.
“Five centuries. Later on the rest of it burned again. I think they just gave up on it in the end. Some even say it bears a curse, from the days when Tamír’s kinsmen seized control. Plague was a problem, too, though that was more likely a problem with the swamps or drains than a curse. It must have been a beautiful place in its day, though. You can still find traces of murals inside some of the old villas and palaces, and a bit of statuary. They were a very prosperous people. The original royal crypt is up there, too, or what’s left of it. Queen Tamír had the remains of her kin moved to Rhíminee when she built her new city.”
Alec resisted an urge to snap at Seregil. When he fell into his storytelling ways, he could go on for a long time. Rieser didn’t need to know all this. Deep down, however, he realized that what he really resented was the familiar way Seregil was speaking with the Hâzad, almost as if they were comrades by choice.
Play every role to the hilt, Alec. He knew that this was what Seregil was doing, but with rather more relish than Alec was feeling right now.
“The Skalans must be a powerful people,” said Rieser, shading his eyes as he stared out at the ruins. “I’ve never seen cities as large as they have here.”
“They are a good people, overall,” Seregil told him.
Rieser snorted at that.
They reached the outskirts of the old wall and followed it past scattered farmsteads and pastures to Beggar’s Bridge, which lay just south of the old city. There really was an ancient stone bridge there; a large one, with traces of the ornate carvings that had once decorated it.
“That’s a pretty fancy bit of work, to be called Beggar’s Bridge, don’t you think, Alec?” Micum remarked.
“I suppose so.”
“Seregil?”
“I don’t know. Maybe it was a popular place for people to beg.”
Beggar’s Bridge was small but didn’t seem particularly impoverished. In fact it was no different from any of the little ports Alec had seen. There were a number of small vessels moored close to shore, and several larger ones farther out. Even from here he recognized the Lady. She was sleeker than the high-prowed trading carr
acks, and was the only ship there with battle platforms.
It was getting dark as they entered the town through a simple gate.
“Don’t speak unless you have no choice. Your accent is too thick,” Seregil warned Rieser.
“Who would I speak to here?” the man replied, wrinkling his nose at the stench from the gutters.
The one small square had a shrine to Astellus, the patron deity of sailors, fishermen, and women in labor. The lintel was carved with the traditional wave pattern, and there were dozens of little wax votives shaped like boats and fish scattered in front of it.
The Sea Horse Tavern was a respectable one-story establishment near the waterfront. It had a low thatched roof, and its whitewashed walls were painted with the same wave design in blue.
“Remember, don’t start any conversations,” Seregil murmured as they dismounted in front of the stable. Leaving their horses in the care of the stable hand, they shouldered their packs and went inside.
The front room was crowded, but Seregil quickly spotted Rhal’s cabin boy, Dani, standing by a window overlooking the harbor. As soon as the boy caught sight of them, he pushed through the crowd and began to bow to them. Seregil caught him by the shoulder in time, not wanting to draw attention.
“It’s good to see you again, my l—”
“No names here, Dani,” Seregil ordered, keeping his voice down.
“Well, welcome anyway, sir. And you, sirs!” He nodded to Alec and Micum, then gave Rieser a curious look. The Hâzad turned away with a grunt and glared around at the crowd, clearly uncomfortable being in such close quarters with so many Tírfaie.
“How’s your captain?” Seregil asked the boy.
“He’s fine, sir. He sends his regards. I’ll row you out now, if you like.”
“Is Tarmin still doing the cooking?” asked Micum.
“Aye, sir.”
“Then I say we take our chances here.”
Seregil chuckled at that. “Not a bad idea.”
The house’s jellied eel pie was not a disappointment, and a far cry from what Alec recalled of the bland fare favored by Rhal and his largely Mycenian crew. When they were done, they left the stable boy with enough silver to ensure that their horses would be well cared for until they returned. Giving the horses a few last apples and some affectionate scratching, they set out along the dark street with their packs and saddlebags slung over their shoulders.
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