Blooded (Lisen of Solsta Book 3)

by D. Hart St. Martin

  “How did they test it?”

  “A few Thristans, disguised as Garlans, entered the novitiate at Rossla Haven, and every time they were given kitchen duty, they put it in the food.” He came back to her, once again, and plopped down in front of her. He took her chin in one hand and began washing her face.

  “It works quickly when inhaled,” he continued, “which is why I assumed that’s how Ondra gave it to you, but swallowing it does work eventually.”

  “Did the drug make me…blind?” Her throat caught at the end of the question, and Korin paused in his ministrations.

  “Yes. The blindness may be caused by the mental activity entailed in reclaiming the power.”

  “Am I going to be blind forever?” To see nothing but darkness to the end of her days, to never again see the faces of her friends, to have to find a way to navigate around the Keep without bumping into things—she sought reassurance.

  “I don’t think so. I believe that once a drugged hermit’s system eliminated the toxin, they regained their sight.” He took her hand in his free hand and resumed stroking her face with the cloth. Then he moved on to her hair.

  “How long?”

  “That I don’t know, but I would bet you’ll be able to see before you reach Avaret.”

  She gasped. He really had come to set her free.

  “How do you know all this?” she asked.

  “The Guard taught me well. I have expertise on all sorts of topics thanks to my time in your service, my Liege.”

  Someone in the cave yelled in Thristan, and Korin let her hand go, pulled the cloth away from her head and responded. A quick exchange followed.

  “What are they doing in there?” she asked once he’d concluded his other conversation.

  “The Thristans are preparing to bury the dead.”

  “But didn’t you tell me that you…I mean, the Thristans…wrap your dead in a shroud and return them to the desert?”

  “We can’t carry them all back with us.”

  She nodded, hearing the finality of another leave-taking in his words. He would not be returning with her to Avaret.

  “There’s one in the cave where they kept me,” she whispered.

  “I’ll tell them. Damn, I can’t seem to do a thing about your hair.”

  “She was very nice to me.” Lisen bowed her head in shame. The push should never have been given to her or to anyone else. It was too powerful.

  Korin touched her chin and tilted her head up. If she could see, it would have made sense for him to do it. As it was, it seemed a silly gesture.

  “You didn’t know anyone was coming. But I do have one question.”

  “What?”

  “How did you plan on getting home?”

  “You see that big black horse over there?” She pointed in the direction where she thought the horses all stood. “The one with the magnificent mane?”

  “Not so magnificent now, but I see him.”

  “We have a connection. I can’t explain it, but I know if I jumped on him right now, he could carry me directly to Avaret.”

  “Where did you get him?” Korin asked.

  Such a casual conversation for two very formal associates, she thought, then replied. “He was a gift from the Miras. Malaki Mira and I are good friends now.”

  “You and Heir Mira?”

  “No. Nothing like that.”

  “And Holder Corday?”

  “We came to an agreement, right before…. Have you heard what happened to him? We were together when this happened, and I saw him fall before they put the hood over my head.”

  “No, I haven’t heard anything. One of the guards I brought with me might know. I’ll ask. Now let’s get you someplace you can rest. I bet you haven’t had much of that in the last several weeks. Gryl can make it hard to sleep.”

  She smiled and shook her head. “No.”

  He had her up in his arms before she’d finished the word, and the next thing she knew he’d carried her past all the busy Thristans to someplace deep inside the maze of caves. He laid her down and put a blanket over her, and he stayed there with her, silent, until she finally fell asleep.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  left unsaid

  Nalin leaned back in his chair, stretched his arms up over his head and yawned. Indirect afternoon light slipped in the north-facing window of the Empir’s office, and the unseasonable heat left him exhausted.

  “Tired?” Bala asked.

  He looked down at the piles of papers on the conference table—transcripts of testimonies, reports from the search, pleas for matters to be put on the agenda for the upcoming Council session—and he shrugged. “Seems to be part of the job.”

  “Malaki thinks we have enough to take Lorain to trial.”

  “I know.” Nalin looked down at the pile he knew contained the evidence collected so far against Lorain and smiled. “Makes putting up with her and her demands so much easier.” He reached down and scratched his half of a leg. It did little good; the itch was nowhere he could reach.

  “When do you want to move?” Bala asked.

  “An arrest shortly before Opening, and then we’ll try her the first day.”

  “My lord.”

  Nalin looked up as Jazel entered the room from her office and came to him. “Yes?”

  “I’m sorry, my lord, but it’s Holder Zanlot again. I’ll tell her you’ve retired for the day if you want me to.”

  “No, no. Send her in. What’s a day without the holder reminding me of my duty to her son?”

  “Do you want me to leave?” Bala asked.

  “No, stay,” he replied with a shake of his head and covered the “Lorain” pile with a petition he hadn’t yet studied.

  Lorain strode in, stirring the air as she passed through it as she always did.

  “As usual,” Nalin said with a flourish, “I’d rise, but….”

  “But you lack a foot,” Lorain supplied. “That one’s getting old, Nalin. Bala, tell him to come up with something new.”

  “Hello, Lorain,” Bala said, appearing to concentrate on the document in front of her rather than turning to greet Lorain properly.

  “Nalin, may I sit?” And without waiting for an answer, Lorain did exactly that—sat down on the chair next to the one on which Nalin’s leg rested.

  “Of course, Lorain,” he said after the fact. “Feel free.”

  “Nalin, we’re just a few weeks before Council convenes, and I really think some decisions need to be made. And the truth is that you can’t be the Empir’s Will without an Empir. So—”

  “Stop. Enough. You’ve approached me nearly once a day since this whole…this whole situation began and done so with as many different tactics. I listen, and yet you’ve brought me nothing original in weeks. Perhaps it’s time we allowed new ears to listen to your concerns and suggestions and let them decide, eh?” He raised an eyebrow to punctuate his question which was actually more a statement of intent.

  “Well,” Lorain said, stretching out the time while she came up with an answer. “Whose ears in particular are you talking about?”

  “The privy council’s, of course. You know they’ve been here for awhile.”

  “Well, yes, I knew.”

  “I’m surprised you didn’t demand this yourself.”

  “I thought about it,” though her eyes said she hadn’t, “but they’re all your appointees. Do you really think they’d rule against you?”

  “My appointees, yes. Rule against me? Perhaps, perhaps not if your argument is convincing. And don’t forget, Melanda Cabell is a member of the council.”

  “And, Bala, tell me,” Lorain said, turning to Bala across the table, “would you rule against the man you love? Oh, don’t look so shocked. You took pleasure in standing between him and myself when he was sick. The love just oozed from your eyes.”

  Nalin knew Bala would tell the truth. Go on, he thought.

  “Lorain, you have a singular aura about you that tends to drive people away.
You push until you get what you want, and if you don’t get it, you’ll steal it. Yes, I love Nalin. I love him because no matter how sick he got after he broke his leg, he never failed to follow his principles. Would I rule against him? Weighing your history against his, I think not.”

  “Let me make this an official invitation.” Nalin reentered the conversation. “Most everyone on the privy council is busy for the next few days. How about we meet five days from now?”

  “Five days?” Lorain appeared to consider it for a moment. “All right. I’ll prepare a presentation.”

  “Perfect. Five days it is, then. I’ll let everyone know.” Nalin returned to one of his stacks on the table, pretending to study it, hoping Lorain would take this as a dismissal. But in his peripheral vision, Nalin could see the wheels in her mind turning. He couldn’t tell where they were going, but she wasn’t leaving. “Lorain, I need to get back to work now, if you don’t mind.”

  “Of course, Nalin.” And she stood up, turned from the table and headed out the door to the hall. The door had barely closed when Bala began to giggle.

  “I’m sorry, Nal. I can’t help it. I think you left her speechless.”

  “I always get close to that but never quite achieve it. But maybe, just maybe this time, I’ll be able to silence her for good.”

  Bala leaned in towards him. “What?”

  “Do you really think I’d invite her to make her arguments to the privy council? They know what her arguments are, and they agree with me.”

  “So that….”

  “…was just a ruse.” He smiled, feeling the warmth of actions and their consequences swelling up within him, and leaned back in his chair, his hands behind his head.

  “You’re bringing her in for questioning.” Bala popped up, rushed him and gave him a hug. “And the council?”

  “Will be informed to prepare to finalize their decision regarding charging the holder of Bedel with treason.”

  After a full night’s sleep, Lisen had awakened to the sound of Korin’s breathing. She’d reached out, brushed his knee and confirmed that he sat beside her in the cave. Numb to her core, she’d sat up, tried to run her fingers through her hair and realized that the remaining blood had dried, forming thick, short dreadlocks. Not exactly a fashion statement in Garla, she thought.

  They’d said almost nothing to each other this morning, she and Korin—nothing of any consequence, that is—and the first thing he’d done after she’d sat up was hand her over to Sergeant Kopol for a thorough rinsing in the river. So, under the sergeant’s guidance, she made her way to the river’s bank, and after they’d both stripped naked, they stepped into the water, the guard helping Lisen navigate.

  “This is a good place, my Liege,” the sergeant said. “Why don’t you kneel down so I can wash you.”

  Lisen felt foolish. She didn’t need help to bathe; she was blind, not incapacitated. But then, she thought about the river and its flow rushing around her and how one misstep might allow the river to reach out and grab her. And so she knelt, the water up to her shoulders. It was cold, but she didn’t mind. To get clean again after weeks covered in sweat and grime and a day overwhelmed with blood was a welcome blessing.

  As the sergeant scrubbed her body, Lisen allowed her numbness to dissolve away as well. Like skin enduring deep cleansing, her soul screamed in the anguish of nerves exposed and raw. Ondra’s band of rebels had swooped her up, shut down her mind and brought her here to endure the most agonizing weeks of her life. She hadn’t thought about it at the time; she couldn’t have. It was too immediate and filled with fear in a mind that could barely manage to get from one minute to the next, much less analyze her situation. But now, with her eyesight gone, the inner eye took over, and the shivering of feelings recollected began to consume her.

  “My Liege, is it too much?” the sergeant asked.

  “No.” Lisen couldn’t stop her teeth from chattering. “It’s all right. Keep going.”

  “I don’t want to make you sick.”

  “It’s not the cold. Just keep doing what you’re doing.”

  “Nearly done now,” the woman with the friendly, young-sounding voice said. “If you’ll trust me, I’d like to lay you back into the water. To rinse your hair, you know?”

  Lisen felt the sergeant stand up beside her, then lean over to place one arm at Lisen’s back and the other hand on Lisen’s upper belly. “Here. Take my hand with one of yours, and hold your nose with the other. Then just lean back, and I’ll lower you in. I’ll hold on to you the whole way. We’ll give the water a few seconds to loosen the caked stuff from your hair and then I’ll pull you up again.”

  Lisen nodded, her mind remembering something she couldn’t quite grab on to. She brought her fingers up to her nose, pinched it tight, took a deep breath and allowed Kopol to ease her back into the water.

  The river flowed through her hair like fingers, untangling and opening it up. She could feel the dried blood dissolving and dispersing, spreading through the water and succumbing to the sheer volume of the river. Her thoughts, as she held her breath, flowed around her like the river, touching her yet not a part of her.

  Homespun robes. Homespun robes and loin cloths. Images assaulted her, and she couldn’t place them. Not at first. But as the sergeant rescued her from the water’s flood, bringing her upright again to her knees and then urging her to stand, the picture clarified. In the darkness that surrounded her, she knew and accepted the knowing as a personal truth.

  Remission of sins. Not in total, but at least in part. Washed clean. This sergeant of the Guard had given her a gift. Kopol had cleansed her spirit of the worst.

  Lisen breathed deeply of the clean air, then brought an arm up to her nose. Her skin was cool and smelled refreshed.

  I know what it is. I know…what it is. It’s baptism. I have been washed clean.

  In the flickering torchlight, Korin sat beside Lisen, and, as he watched her sleep, he reached out with one finger and tenderly pushed a lock of hair out of her face. How could a person who’d done what she’d done just a few days ago sleep soundly? She did moan in her sleep. Perhaps her slumber’s soundness was an illusion, and her dreams pursued her.

  His heart ached. He knew the urge of the Bonding drew him to her, but he would have loved her anyway. He had from the beginning, but a captain in the guard couldn’t admit that to anyone, especially to himself. He’d come intending to tell her the truth, the truth about a child conceived in the Farii and transferred to his pouch in the very place where she slept now, but he’d changed his mind. He’d watched her paralyze Ondra with the push and then kill her, and he’d seen the product of her power—the blood and the bodies. He couldn’t expose Rinli to that, not to that ability to challenge and succeed knowing you could never lose.

  Yesterday, he’d caught a quick look at her as Sergeant Kopol took her to the river and cleaned off the blood and grime he hadn’t gotten off the day before with a wet cloth alone. This morning, once she awoke after two nights of proper rest, he would take his leave of her without saying a word about the child they shared. He would head back to Thristas, to parenthood, while she would return to Avaret, alone, accompanied by the guards he’d brought with him.

  How could he let her go again? He’d never really held her, but here she lay, an opportunity he was about to allow to slip from his grasp once more. Did she love him? She’d never said, but he’d only said it twice—once at a time when she might have seen it as the ravings of a poisoned man and the other after she’d slipped into hibernation and couldn’t hear it. He couldn’t fault her for her silence.

  He looked up at the roof of the cave, fighting tears. Silence had ruled them from the day they met. They had spoken with looks and nothing more. It had begun with the meeting of their eyes after the mudslide that first day and had continued every time she glared at him as he critiqued her progress mastering the sword and the knife.

  He remembered her smile when he’d returned to her at Rossla. And the fire i
n her eyes as the venom had its way with him in the Farii. His first sight of her face the next morning had revived him as he returned to the top of the mesa from wherever it was the poison had taken him. And he could never forget her fear of dying when she’d started to slip into transfer hibernation here in this very place.

  Her grateful smile when she realized he’d come for her in the dungeon in Avaret. Her look of determination when she refused to tell him what she planned to do with her brother. All of these looks told their story, and now, even looks were denied to them, thanks to Ondra and the gryl and Lisen’s fight to overcome it that had resulted in her blindness. Their farewell would be dark indeed.

  “Korin?” she uttered with urgency as her eyes opened once again to the black captivity of the drug still strong in her body.

  “I’m here, my Liege.” He took her hand, and she sat up, catching her breath from a horror he couldn’t fathom.

  “But you won’t be much longer, will you.”

  “Aye, my Liege. It’s time for us both to go home.” He would have sworn she stared at him with those all-black eyes if he hadn’t known it wasn’t possible.

  “I’m sorry,” she said after a pause.

  “For what?” He touched her back lightly with one hand.

  “I wish I could have done it another way.”

  “You had to escape.”

  “This?” She shook her head. “No, this was bad, but I don’t regret it. My brother. I’m talking about my brother.”

  “Ah.” He found it hard to breathe.

  “I did what I had to do, and I’ve accepted that. But I do regret what it did to you, what it did to us.”