by G. Deyke
~*~
I drift in and out of blackness a long time, hearing their voices but too fevered to listen, unable to think. At last I wake with a clearer mind. The fever has left me, and I know by the cold that it must be night.
Their voices are quiet now, but heated.
“This is my mission,” Mel is saying. “You must respect my judgment.”
“Certainly,” he agrees. “And I do, when you tell me whither we are going and what we are doing there. But you know less of hurt legs than I. We made poor time yesterday, although you pushed him beyond his limits, and today he could not walk at all – didn't I tell you it would be so? Didn't I warn you?”
“Then you cursed him with your conjury, to make us believe you.”
“I am a conjurer and cannot curse, and if you don't know that you are truly a poor excuse for a noble.”
“What, you can heal but cannot curse?”
He sighs, as though he has lived this conversation too many times. “I have no talent to heal. I know enough to say you are well and truly a fool, but knowledge is not talent – mine is for conjury alone. If it was for healing Arri would be well by now. I have nothing to gain from staying so long in this Desert.”
“Heal him, then, if you truly wish to speed our way.”
“Are you thick, or merely deaf?” Even now his voice is calm – contemptuous, but calm. “I can do no more for that leg. It will not walk tonight. It ought not to walk tomorrow, even slowly. Force it, and your Arri may be crippled for life. Is that your wish, noble?”
“Arri must guide us through the caves,” she says, coldly, and then they are silent. I can hear her walk off a ways and lie down. Her breathing slows and evens, and I know that she sleeps.
I wait a while longer before opening my eyes. The stars are bright above me. I turn my head and find Ty sitting beside me, keeping watch. I am almost surprised; I had hoped that he might have gone without my notice.
“Do not move lest you hurt yourself more,” he warns softly.
My mouth is thick, my tongue dry. “Is there water?”
“Beside you.”
On my right side is a hole in the sand, filled with water. It looks deep, and the water does not sink back into the sand. It is far more than I have ever been able to call.
I cup water into my hand and drink eagerly, tilting my head just enough that I do not choke.
“How?” I ask when my thirst is somewhat slaked.
“I helped you call water.”
“How?”
“I combined our talents. A difficult thing to do, but quite possible as long as both are willing – or if one is too weak to refuse, as you were. Seems it was too much for you, though.”
I remember swooning. I feel the heat rise to my cheeks, and I think, maybe I could have done it if not for the fever. But I say nothing. Instead I look at the pool and say: “It is stronger than my talent alone.”
“My talent is stronger than yours. This little spring will stay here long after we are gone.”
Of course it is stronger. He is a skilled conjurer, and my talent is very weak. I can barely call water at all, on my own. Still, I wish he wouldn't boast so. He is nothing, I remind myself. He is nothing but a hired conjurer.
And I am nothing but kretchin.
I drink a little more. It clears my head a little, but the water in my belly reminds me of my hunger. How long has it been since I ate? It can't have been long – no more than a day or two – but the fever took my strength.
“I did not ask for your help,” I say. I don't like him. I don't want him here.
“You are so prideful,” he says, “especially for one so afraid to overstep his place. You will not take that which is not given to you, yet you refuse that which is. Fool.”
I say nothing. It has been a long time since the kretchin children taunted me, but I am still the same; I said nothing, and I did nothing, and in time they left. They laughed and laughed and kicked at me and then they left and Silwen came and found me and took me home, and I was safe there.
And now I can never see him again, or any of my family. Now there is only Mel.
“Why do you follow her?” he asks at length.
“She is my friend,” I answer, startled out of my thoughts.
“A friend who asks you to walk farther and faster than you are able? A friend more concerned with her own mission than with your pain? A friend who does not leave you here to die – only because she needs your help?”
I wonder whether Ty always tries to push people apart this way, whether he whispers the same untruths to Mel about me. “I will walk tomorrow,” I say.
“She has you well-trained, hasn't she – perhaps you are a dog after all.”
I will not answer to his taunt. I say nothing more. After a while I fall asleep despite my pain and hunger, and this time it is a real sleep, deep and dark and untouched by fever.