by DAVID B. COE
"Where will you go from here?" he asked.
"With your leave, A'Laq," Besh said, "we'd continue west, farther into Fal'Borna lands. We know the name of the merchant who has the woman's baskets. We want to find him and keep him from doing more damage."
The a'laq regarded them both. "You have my permission to cross the clan lands. And you have my thanks as well. Your people…" He grimaced, shaking his head.
"The Mettai are hated by Qirsi and Eandi Besh said. "It's no great secret."
F'Ghara smiled. "Perhaps not. But it does seem undeserved. You've made a friend today, not only for yourselves, but for all the Mettai." He reached behind his neck and untied the necklace bearing the small white stone. "Take this," he said, handing it to Besh. "It's a token of my gratitude for killing that woman, and if you encounter other Fal'Borna it will serve as proof that I've named you both friends of my people."
"Thank you, A'Laq," Besh said, closing his hand over the necklace. F'Ghara placed one powerful hand on Besh's shoulder and the other on Sirj's. "Go in peace."
A few moments later, they steered Lici's cart out of the sept and started westward toward the Thraedes. Lici's few personal belongings were still in the cart-her clothes, several small blades that she might have used for making her baskets, some rope, and a small skin she'd used for water. Besh piled these things in a corner of the cart, and tried to ignore them as he rode beside Sirj in front. But he was aware of them constantly; he felt as though she were still there, watching them, silently accusing him. At last he told Sirj to stop.
"Why? Are you all right?"
"Just stop. Please."
Sirj tugged on the reins until the horse halted. Besh climbed down off the cart, grabbed her things, and threw them on the ground. Then he pulled his knife free, cut himself, and conjured a fire that quickly engulfed the pile he'd made. He watched it burn for a few moments before climbing back onto the cart.
"You can go now," he said.
"What about the horse and the cart?"
He looked sharply at Sirj, but the younger man was grinning. Besh smiled reluctantly.
"I suppose I can live with those," he said.
"Are you sure?" Sirj asked him, growing serious. "I'm certain the Fal'Borna would take them, particularly the horse."
"No, it's all right. And I don't feel much like walking to the Horn."
Sirj nodded and flicked the reins. "Good," he said, as the nag started forward again. "I don't either."
They traveled west for several days, covering more distance by far than they ever had with Lici. Besh still dreamed of the woman, though with each night that passed, the visions grew less disturbing, until Lici was little more than a distant, silent presence in dreams of other people and places. But she was always there, on the fringe of Besh's consciousness, and he wondered if she'd ever leave him.
During the waking hours he and Sirj talked but little, not because of any lingering discomfort between them, but simply because there seemed to be little to say. Sirj had some idea of what had happened between Besh and Lici that last terrible day, and it wouldn't take much imagination to piece together those details that hadn't been so apparent. Still, had Besh been in the younger man's position he would have been curious to know more, and he was grateful to Sirj for sparing him all the obvious questions.
Yet, he asked himself the same questions again and again. Could he have defeated Lici without killing her? Would he have wanted to? Had Lici, in some small way, been hoping that he would kill her? Was that why she had done and said all those things at the end? Even if she had been hoping to die, Besh knew better than to think that absolved him in some way. If anything, it made him wonder if he had been so transparent in wanting her dead that she'd seen fit to use him to achieve this dark end.
By their fourth morning out from F'Ghara's sept, Besh had grown weary of thinking about the old witch day and night. As they rode through yet another desolate stretch of plain, caught between the monotony of the grasses and another grey sky, it occurred to him that whatever else he might have accomplished by killing the woman, he certainly hadn't rid himself of her. For some reason, this thought struck him as funny and he chuckled.
"What are you laughing at?" Sirj asked him.
Besh shook his head. "It was nothing."
Sirj just shrugged.
"I've been thinking about Lici," Besh admitted, flexing his wounded hand, which still felt stiff and a bit sore. "Dreaming about her as well. And it just came to me that she's troubling me nearly as much now as she did when she was alive."
Sirj didn't laugh, nor did he say anything, at least at first. Besh could see, though, that he was considering what Besh had told him.
"You saved my life the other day," the younger man finally said. "And not just in the obvious way.
"What do you mean?"
Sirj didn't look at him, but Besh could see the muscles in the man's jaw bunching. "When I was riding to the sept to speak with the Fal'Borna, I wished that you'd gone instead of me. I assumed I'd make a mess of talking to them." He laughed. "Actually, I did make a mess of it."
"It seemed to me that you did just fine," Besh said. Even as he said the words though, he realized that he'd heard little about Sirj's encounter with the white-hairs.
"No, I didn't." He described for Besh his conversation with the warriors and his offer to submit to the a'laq's mind-bending magic. "They learned about Lici. They were ready to kill all three of us."
"I doubt I would have done any better."
"Yes, you would have," Sirj said. Then he shook his head. "That's not important, though. But I think that if you'd left me with Lici, I'd be dead now, and she'd have escaped."
Besh frowned. "I don't think-"
"Please." Sirj's smile was pained. "I know myself pretty well. I'm not being modest, or paying you idle compliments. I have my strengths, but using magic as you did isn't one of them." He glanced at Besh, looking almost shy. "Elica told me that you vowed to keep me safe, and I just wanted to say that you've done that and more." He shrugged again. "Anyway, I don't know what you're thinking about Lici, or what thoughts are troubling your sleep, but I wanted you to know that."
"Thank you," Besh said.
They rode in silence for a short while, the cart bouncing along through the grass, the wheels squeaking occasionally.
"Have you ever killed anyone?" Besh finally asked.
Sirj shook his head.
"I never had, either. I know I made the blood oath to Pyav, and I threatened Lici, but I never really thought I would. That's why I'm having these dreams, I think. I'd never killed a person, and I'm not entirely sure that I had to kill Lici."
"You think you had a choice?" Sirj asked, sounding incredulous.
"There might have been-"
"No," the younger man said. "Don't even say it. I saw you, Besh. You were bleeding all over. Your hand.." He shook his head, swallowing. "I don't know how you managed to fight her in that condition, but you were lucky to survive at all. If you hadn't killed her when you did, you would have died."
Besh shook his head slowly. "We could have learned more from her. She told me that there was no way to defeat her plague, but I have to believe there is, and that we might have learned something from her, given the time. Just as we finally learned about that merchant who bought her baskets."
"You're assuming that what she told us was true," Sirj said. "We don't even know that anymore."
Besh had never even considered this, and the idea of it hit him like a fist. "If she lied to us…" Abruptly he found himself blinking back tears. "That would mean we had nothing, that it was all for nothing."
"We stopped her," Sirj said. "Or, rather, you did. That's hardly nothing."
Besh started to argue the point, but at that moment, Sirj suddenly stood up from his seat in the cart, balancing precariously as the wagon continued to rock and shudder.
"Do you see that?" the younger man asked, pointing to the southwest.
Besh scanned the horizon
, and half stood himself before being thrown back onto his seat by the motion of the cart. "I don't see anything," he said. But he knew better than to think this meant much. Sirj's eyes were keener by far than his own. "What is it?"
"Riders, I think."
Hope blossomed in his heart. "A merchant?"
Sirj shook his head, looking grim. "No cart. Just riders. White-hairs, I think."
"The Fal'Borna."
"They'd have to be, out here," Sirj said.
"The a'laq named us a friend of the Fal'Borna."
Sirj was already turning the cart northward, as if hoping to avoid the strangers. "Yes, he did. But I'd just as soon not put too much faith in the hospitality of the Fal'Borna."
Besh could hardly argue.
Sirj pushed Lici's old horse harder than Besh would have, always steering to the north, his eyes constantly flicking in the direction of the riders. "Are they coming this way?" Besh asked after a time.
For several moments Sirj didn't answer. Finally, though, he exhaled through his teeth and whispered, "Damn." He glanced at Besh. "I didn't turn soon enough. I'm sorry."
"It was going to happen eventually."
"We can't outrun them," Sirj said, sounding desperate.
"We don't have to. We've done nothing wrong."
The younger man took a long breath. "Right," he said.
Still he drove the nag on, until Besh finally laid a hand gently on his arm. "You'll kill the beast," he said. "Let her rest."
"But the Fal'Borna-"
"We're not trusting in the… what was it you said? The hospitality of the Fal'Borna? But we can have some faith in ourselves, I think." Besh raised his eyebrows. "We've earned that, haven't we?"
Sirj smiled, though he looked nervous. "Yes, I suppose we have."
Reluctantly, he slowed the cart until they halted. Besh could now see the riders approaching, though he couldn't make out what they looked like. There appeared to be four of them, and as they drew nearer he saw that the two in front were definitely Qirsi. But the other two…
"What would two Eandi be doing out here, riding with white-hairs?" Sirj asked, speaking as much to himself as to Besh.
"Do they look like marauders?" Besh asked, suddenly fearful. "I may have just killed us by telling you to stop."
Sirj said nothing, but he pulled free his knife. Besh did the same. With all that had happened in the past few turns, and especially in the last several days, Besh didn't need anyone to tell him how potent Mettai magic could be. If these were marauders, thinking they had stumbled upon some easy prey in the form of Eandi merchants, they were in for a surprise.
Sirj went so far as to jump down from the cart, grab a handful of earth and cut the back of his hand. Besh, after just a moment's hesitation, did the same.
To his great surprise, though, the riders halted a short distance from them, the Eandi still remaining behind the two white-hairs.
"Drop your knives!" one of the Qirsi called to them. He was a young man, powerfully built with golden skin like that of the Fal'Borna. "And drop the dirt you're holding, too!"
"And leave ourselves defenseless against your magic?" Besh answered. "You must think we're fools!"
The white nag reared suddenly, kicking out violently and straining against her harness.
"That was language of beasts, Mettai," the young Qirsi said. "I also have shaping and fire. You're already defenseless against our magic. Now drop the dirt and blade!"
"If we're defenseless already, then it shouldn't matter to you that we hold on to them."
The Fal'Borna glared at him for several moments. Besh could see frustration written on his face. His companion said something to him that Besh couldn't hear, but the younger man didn't appear to pay any attention.
"I can shatter your blades, you know!" he said. "But at this distance, I might shatter your hands instead. Or your arms. Or maybe even your necks."
"Yes, well perhaps you'd like to see what Mettai magic can do!" Sirj shouted back at him.
Again the other Qirsi said something, and this time the Fal'Borna looked at him, though he didn't respond otherwise.
"They have seen what it can do," Besh whispered, knowing as he spoke the words that it was true. "They know about Lici."
"How can you tell?" Sirj asked.
Before Besh could answer, he felt a strange sensation in his hand. He knew instantly that it was magic-white-hair magic-and he actually cried out, thinking that they were under attack.
A moment later, though, another realization came to him. This wasn't shaping magic, or fire, or any of the other Qirsi magics that he'd learned to fear over the course of his life. This was healing. One of the white-hairs was healing the cut he'd made in the back of his hand.
"What is it?" Sirj asked him, his eyes wide with alarm.
Besh shook his head. "It's… it's all right. I'm all right."
The other white-hair said something to his mount and rode forward a short distance, his pale eyes fixed on Besh. He appeared older than the Fal'Borna. He clearly belonged to another clan. His skin was ghostly white. But unlike so many of the white-hairs Besh had met over the years, this man didn't look sickly or frail. He was as powerfully built as any Fal'Borna, and a good deal taller. He also had a kind face. He smiled now as he stopped in front of Besh.
"You did that," Besh said.
"Yes. I didn't mean to startle you, but it seemed the best way to get your attention, and to deny you access to your magic, at least for the moment." He had a strange accent, one that Besh had never heard before. "What did he do?" Sirj demanded. "What's going on?"
Besh raised a hand, signaling to Sirj that he should keep quiet for a moment.
"What clan are you from?" he asked the stranger. "I've never heard that accent before, and I thought I'd met Qirsi from every clan in the Southlands."
"I'm not from any clan that you know. I'm from the Forelands. My name is Grinsa jal Arriet."
The Forelands! It certainly explained the accent. And for some reason listening to the man speak and hearing where he was from put Besh's mind at ease. That, and the fact that the stranger had chosen to prove his might by healing him rather than attacking him.
"I'm called Besh," he said. "This is Sirj; he's my daughter's husband." The two men exchanged nods.
"I need to ask you what you're carrying in your cart, Besh. It's important that you answer me honestly. Lives may be at stake."
Besh glanced at Sirj, an eyebrow raised. After a brief hesitation, Sirj nodded.
"We're carrying no baskets," Besh said, facing the Forelander again. "In fact, we're looking for a merchant who might have them."
The Fal'Borna kicked at the flanks of his mount, and in a moment was just beside Grinsa. "You know of the witch who made them?"
Besh took a breath, suddenly ashamed, though he knew he had no reason to be. "She was from our village."
The Forelander's eyes narrowed. "You speak of her as if she's dead."
"She is," Besh said. "I killed her."
The reaction to this from the two Qirsi, indeed, from all four of the strangers, was not at all what Besh had expected. Grinsa winced. The two Eandi, a large, heavy man with one good eye, and a slight man with a youthful face, both responded much the same way. The Fal'Borna, on the other hand, merely frowned.
"How long ago?" Grinsa finally asked in a thick voice.
"Just a few days. She attacked me, and she threatened to do to my people what she had done to the Y'Qatt."
"It's not just the Y'Qatt," the Fal'Borna said, glowering at him.
"Forgive me. I know that. But she intended it for the Y'Qatt. It was to be retribution for an old injury they did her."
The younger of the two Eandi steered his mount closer to those of the Qirsi. "You say you're looking for a merchant. Did the woman tell you his name?"
Sirj glanced Besh's way and shook his head.
"I'll answer your questions in good time," Besh said, understanding immediately. "But first I want to know what you i
ntend to do to us." He nodded at his hand. "You've shown me what your magic can do; you know what Mettai magic is capable of. I don't want to fight you, and I'm not sure that we can prevail if you force the matter. But I'm not going to tell you all we know so that you can turn around and kill us." His gaze flicked toward the younger Qirsi. "I know how the Fal'Borna deal with those they consider enemies. I know as well that the last a'laq we encountered named us friends of the Fal'Borna after I killed Lici. But I don't expect you to take my word on that." He pulled from his pocket the necklace F'Ghara had given him and held it up for the Qirsi to see. "He gave us this."
The Fal'Borna glanced at the stone and nodded. "What was the a'laq's name?" he asked.
"F'Ghara."
The man looked at Grinsa. "I know him. He leads a small sept. He has few Weavers, if he has any at all."
"But if he's named them as friends of your people…?" Grinsa asked. "Then we have no choice but to honor his decision."
Grinsa looked at Besh again and opened his hands. "There's your answer."
Still Besh hesitated.
The Forelander smiled. "I haven't been among the Fal'Borna for long, and I don't pretend to understand all their customs. But I can tell you that they take naming someone a friend or enemy quite seriously. If this a'laq has declared his friendship, you're safe on the plain."
Besh considered this for several moments. "Very well." He looked at the Young Eandi. "To answer your question, the merchant's name was Brint HedFarren. At least that's what Lici told me."
The Eandi nodded grimly. "That's the right name. I've met HedFarren.
He doesn't have the baskets anymore. He sold them to other merchants." The elation Besh felt upon learning that Lici hadn't lied to him vanished as quickly as it had come. "Damn. How many other merchants?"