“I am Nuala, high priestess of this temple.”
Perhaps he should have been awed, honored that so lofty a personage should show such interest in him, but just then he had more questions than manners.
“How did you get me out of there?”
“Through His Glory,” she said. A smile tugged at her lips. “And by way of tunnels built beneath the city some centuries ago. Tunnels of which the Sheraighs had been ignorant.”
“Had been?”
She lifted a shoulder. “You’re gone. They’ll have found the doorway by now. And the first short span that leads from there.”
The muscles in his chest clenched. “Won’t that lead them here?”
“No. There are iron doors throughout what is essentially a labyrinth. Each door opens with a different key. It would take them turns and turns to trace our path.” Her brow creased. “Which is not to say that you’ll be safe here for long.”
Sofya reached for him again.
“I can take her,” he said.
“No, you can’t. Not yet. Our healer was quite insistent in this regard. You’re to do nothing for another day or two. Not even feed yourself. The men who held you were all too thorough with their torture.”
Something in her tone chilled him.
“Tell me,” he said. “Please.”
She winced, canted her head. “The bones should mend with a bit more of the healer’s magick. He’s quite hopeful about them. One knee was shattered almost beyond his capacity to heal it, but in time even that should be all right. And the burns have responded well. But the gashes.” She shook her head. “They were so deep, and the lye so damaging… I’m sorry, but he says the scarring will never go away.”
Tobias closed his eyes, relieved. It could have been far worse. He raised a bandaged hand to his face, felt his cheek with numb, swollen fingers. A jagged ridge ran from his left ear to his jawline. On the other side, another started at his ear and dropped to his collarbone.
“Yes, those two. There’s also one on your brow. And, of course–”
“All over my body.”
She nodded. “Yes.”
He shifted his gaze from her eyes to Sofya’s face. She grinned, gave a small shriek of delight.
Tears again, more than he could contain. What were a few scars balanced against her life?
He wanted to ask about Elinor and Jivv, but feared doing so might endanger their lives in some way. Then again, Sofya was here, and so was his carry sack.
“There was a couple. Older. They sheltered us.”
“Elinor and Jivv Timmin.”
Shame heated his face. He had never learned their family name.
“Yes,” he said. “Elinor and Jivv. Are they all right?”
“They are, with none in the castle any the wiser. If it wasn’t for them, for Elinor in particular, and also for the guards you met the night you were taken, you’d still be in that dungeon.”
Tobias shuddered, which brought a dull throbbing to all of his joints.
Concern creased Nuala’s forehead. “I should leave you to rest. Or I can send someone to feed you. Are you hungry?”
At the question, he realized that he was famished.
“Yes, please.”
“Very well.”
She stood, drawing a complaint from Sofya. After a moment’s hesitation, she held the babe to Tobias, allowing him to kiss Sofya’s brow. The princess grinned at him, and traced a chubby hand along the scar on his cheek.
“She doesn’t seem to mind,” he said.
Nuala smiled. “No, she doesn’t.”
Once they were gone, Tobias closed his eyes, wearied by the simple task of carrying on a conversation. As sleep came over him, however, so did visions of the dungeon. Blood. Fire. The sound of his own screams. He forced his eyes open, his breathing coming in gasps, sweat tickling his brow.
He was still trying to slow his heartbeat when a knock on his door made him start.
“Enter,” he managed.
A young man let himself into the room, a priest Tobias gathered from the simple white robe he wore. He bore a platter of food: bread, cheese, dried barrowfruit. Tobias’s appetite had faded with his memories of the dungeon, but he allowed the man to help him sit up. The priest fed him, which might have been uncomfortable had he not also spoken ceaselessly about trifles – the weather, the sanctuary garden, his childhood in the Daerjen hinterlands. Tobias listened, chewed, swallowed. His hunger returned with the taste of food.
He grew weary before he had eaten his fill, and the priest left him. Alone once more, Tobias lay back down. Sleep pulled at him, and in that netherworld between wakefulness and slumber came again images of his prison, the weight of iron on his wrists and ankles, the burning agony of lye scalding his wounds.
He fought to remain awake, but he was so very tired. His dreams, when they came, were torment. He tried to rouse himself, but couldn’t. Sleep held him fast, like manacles. Orzili was there, hurting him again, dousing him with water that seared his skin wherever it touched. He had someone with him. A boy. The lad Tobias killed in the lanes. Blood still pumped from the wound in his chest, but he held a sword in one hand and a torch in the other. And he leered at Tobias as he burned and carved his flesh.
Tobias finally woke to a room crowded with people. Nuala was present, with two priests, a pair of guards, and a grizzled man who had to be the healer. The faint white glow of magick haloed his head and clung to his slender hands, which rested on Tobias’s knees.
“You’re flailing,” he said, an accusation. “You must lie still.”
Nuala eyed the man. “I believe he would if he could, healer.”
The healer scowled but nodded. “I’d like to give you a sleeping draught. You won’t be of much use to anyone for a few days, but you’ll sleep, and you’ll heal.”
“Sleeping isn’t the problem,” Tobias said, his throat raw again. He must have been screaming. That was why all these people had come. A part of him was embarrassed; another didn’t care. “The problem is my dreams.” My memories.
The healer answered with a curt nod, and a look that conveyed unexpected sympathy. “I understand. The draught should help with those as well.” He raised his eyebrows, questioning.
“Yes, all right.”
The man released Tobias’s knees, the glow around his hands and head melting away. “Good. I’ll be back shortly.”
“The rest of you can go,” Nuala said, adding to the guards, “I think we’re quite safe.”
The guards and priests left, and Nuala closed the door before sitting beside Tobias on his bed.
“I’m sorry to disturb your temple,” he said. “Is it very late?”
“Not very, no. You were dreaming of the dungeon?”
He turned away, nodded. He couldn’t bring himself to mention the boy.
“There’s no healing those scars. At least not quickly. It will take time.”
“I have no time. The princess and I have to get away from here.”
He hoped she would dispute this. She didn’t.
“We can keep you safe for a while, but not indefinitely. The temples enjoy some autonomy from the royal houses, but we’re still subject to the laws of the land. And because the people of Sheraigh worship Kheraya, they’re likely to give us less consideration. If they demand to search the grounds… when they do – I can’t deny them entry.”
“I understand.”
They lapsed into a silence that lasted until the healer returned with his elixir.
“Drink it all,” the man said.
He gave the cup to the high priestess, who held it to Tobias’s lips. The smell reminded Tobias of rotting vegetables and sour milk. He cringed and turned his head away.
“All of it,” the healer said again.
“For the girl,” Nuala added. “You can’t save her if you don’t heal.”
He knew she was right, but drinking the stuff seemed only moderately easier than surviving Orzili’s abuse.
It tast
ed as foul as it smelled. Twice he gagged as he tried to choke it down. But it worked as promised. Within a spirecount or two of downing the last of it, Tobias drifted into a deep slumber.
This time he woke to an empty room. A single candle burned on the table beside him, the flame dully reflecting off the rounded edge of a metal cup. No light showed around the shuttered window. Night.
A sound reached him, faint but as familiar as the whisper of his own breathing. Somewhere nearby, Sofya was crying.
Without a thought, he threw off the blankets covering him and swung himself off the bed. Only with his first lurching step did he remember his wounds. He froze, took stock. His knees, shoulders, elbows – every part of him, really – felt stiff. There was no real pain, though. He took a step toward the door. Maybe a twinge in his right knee, and in his shoulder on the same side. That was all. The healer had done well.
He opened the door to his room and staggered out into the corridor. Sofya’s cries were more distinct here. Tobias followed them to a door on the other side of the hallway. Pushing the door open, he found a chamber much like his own, also lit by a candle.
Sofya lay in a cradle, tears on her face, her swaddling smelling.
At the sight of him, she stopped squalling, smiled, and began to chatter, as if catching up an old friend on the day’s tidings.
“I’m glad to see you, too.”
He lifted her out of the cradle, wincing at the soreness in his shoulder. A pile of clean swaddling lay on the floor beside a table. He retrieved a cloth and changed her as Elinor had taught him.
“What are you–”
Tobias turned. Nuala stood in the doorway, a second candle in her hand.
“You’re up,” she said, the alarm on her smooth features giving way to surprise and pleasure.
“I heard her crying, and it didn’t hurt too much to walk here.”
“The healer will be pleased.”
“How long have I been sleeping?” he asked, turning back to Sofya, and finishing with her swaddling.
Nuala joined him by the table. “You do that well.”
“No, I really don’t,” he said, thinking of Elinor’s deft touch.
“You do it as well as I would. More, you do it well enough to convince a stranger that you’re her father.” She faced him. “You drank that sleeping draught yesterday morning. You’ve been asleep for a day and a half.”
Tobias blew out a breath. Too long.
“I suppose that’s why I’m so hungry,” he said, trying to smile.
“I can have food brought to you.”
He lifted Sofya into his arms. She balled her fist into the shirt he wore – a shirt he didn’t recognize – and put her other thumb in her mouth. For her at least, it seemed no time had passed.
“No, thank you. I’ve been in that room, and that bed, for long enough. I’d like to walk, and then eat.”
She considered him, then nodded. “All right. Come along.”
Tobias followed her out of the room, through the narrow corridor to a stone stairway, and down a single flight to an arched doorway. Opening it, Nuala led him out into the night. Clouds covered the sky, and a fine mist fell, but the air was warm for Sipar’s Settling.
Torches burned throughout the grounds of the sanctuary, lighting the space as if it were day. The single stone path leading from the building in which he had slept soon split into several walkways that wound off in different directions.
The priestess led Tobias along one such path toward the enormous temple at the center of the domain. Sofya stared with bright wide eyes at every building, every torch, every bare tree in the dormant gardens. Occasionally she pointed and chattered.
Upon reaching the temple, Nuala climbed the broad marble stairway. Tobias halted at the base of the steps to admire the structure before him. Twin wooden doors at the top of the stairs had been polished to a glassy shine that reflected the nearest torches like mirrors. The wood itself had been inlaid so that when closed the doors formed an image of Sipar standing with his arms raised and his head lowered, silhouetted against a half-risen sun.
“It’s even more impressive inside,” the priestess said.
Tobias climbed the stairs. Above the door, figures had been carved into the stone façade. Farmers pushing plows, hunters drawing back bowstrings, warriors locked in battle, lovers tangled in passion, craftsmen and tradeswomen engaged in every sort of commerce. It had to have taken someone years to carve this one thin arc of stone. On top of that, columns reached upward, supporting elaborate archways, which supported more pillars and more arches. It seemed to go on forever, stretching ever higher into the night sky, ending in one of those astounding steeples.
Back in Windhome, it had been all too easy to take for granted the magnificence of the Travelers’ palace. Tobias had made every effort to appreciate the ancient grace and power of its towers and crenellations. But he had never seen anything to rival this place.
Nuala pulled open one of the great doors and gestured for Tobias to enter. He stepped forward but paused on the threshold.
“Where I come from,” he said, “the Two are worshipped together. There aren’t Temples of Sipar or Temples of Kheraya. All the sanctuaries are devoted to them both.”
“I understand. You’re welcome here.”
He entered the structure.
In the antechamber, he set Sofya on the shining stone floor and removed his leather shoes, as he had been taught since the earliest days of his childhood. Then he scooped the girl into his arms once more and entered the nave.
Only to halt once more, his body swaying, his breath trapped in his chest. The sanctuary appeared endless. Arches and columns lined both sides of the central space, the intervals of stone and open air drawing the eye toward the altar and past it to the apse at the distant end. The apex of every arch had to be at least fifty hands above the marble floor. Yet pairs of white candles burned in golden sconces over each one. The vaulted ceiling, also made of stone, soared impossibly high – Tobias couldn’t guess at the height – but the vaults themselves looked as delicate as vine tendrils.
The ceiling was a mosaic, depicting the God in his naked glory. Once more, he stood with his arms raised, his head lowered, the sun at his back. Rather than being rendered in silhouette, here his face and body were clear to see, his expression as changeable as a summer sky. At first view he looked gentle, kind. As Tobias walked farther into the sanctuary, passing between rows of wooden pews, Sipar’s face shifted, his expression at turns wrathful or bereft, contemplative or exultant.
Two-thirds of the way down the central aisle of the nave, Tobias came to the altar, a massive block of ancient rough stone, crudely carved with more depictions of the God, many of them so worn that he couldn’t tell what they were supposed to show Sipar doing. Atop the altar stood a smaller, far more refined carving of the God in his classic pose – arms raised, head down. Beside this rested a smooth stone bowl and a matching knife with a wicked blade.
“Do I need to shed blood?” Tobias asked.
“I believe you have already,” Nuala said from behind him. “Too much.”
Tobias nodded at this and stepped around the altar, continuing into the apse. The benches here were as ancient as the altar, carved from stone rather than the polished dark wood of the pews. The ceiling was lower, vaulted as well, but with no tiles to cover the raw gray stone. After the openness of the nave, this part of the temple felt far more intimate. It was also more plain, save for the brilliant glass image of the God in the great window. Lit only by the torches outside, the colors had to be far more muted than they were during the day. Yet they stole his breath.
Sofya made not a sound as they walked through the sanctuary, but now she let out a small delighted shriek, her tiny fist raised toward Sipar, as if she sought to take hold of his extended hand.
“She likes what she sees.”
Tobias didn’t answer right away. “Thank you for all you’ve done for us. I’m grateful.”
“I’
d do anything for this child.”
He turned. “Even at the risk of your temple?”
The priestess smiled. “I attended her birth, prayed over her with her mother and father, and just over two turns ago, I initiated her into the temple as a daughter of the God. If it was my temple to risk, yes, I would risk it. But you know it’s not. I serve the God and I serve this city. My responsibilities can’t end with her.”
“We have to leave,” he said, confirming what they both knew. “Soon.”
“Are you well enough?”
“That doesn’t matter.”
She raised an eyebrow. “The healer might beg to differ.”
“If he can promise me that Orzili and his men won’t show up at your gates in the morning demanding to search the grounds, I’ll gladly rest another day.”
“Orzili?”
“The man who tortured me. The man who killed Mearlan and Keeda, and too many others to count.”
Nuala’s mouth twitched. “He can’t, of course. The healer I mean. You’re right about that. Still, you shouldn’t leave tonight.”
“I–”
She held up a hand, silencing him. “Give me a day and I can arrange passage aboard a ship.”
“Aren’t the wharves closed?”
“The temples are accorded certain privileges,” she said with an inscrutable smile, “even in an occupied city, and even when we worship the God and our enemies the Goddess. We have many mouths to feed, and at night, when the docks are quiet, the Sheraigh authorities allow our ships to tie in. Give me a day, and I’ll secure passage for you both aboard a ship leaving these shores.”
It was more by far than he might accomplish on his own, and the best chance he and Sofya would have of getting away from Orzili and the Sheraighs. Nevertheless, he couldn’t help but wonder where they should go. Where would they be safe? Where would he be able to build a life for them?
“Yes, all right. Again, thank you.”
Nuala studied him, her expression cool, but curious. “How did you come to be here? In Hayncalde, I mean.”
“I was summoned to serve in Mearlan’s court,” he said, avoiding her gaze. Fourteen years from now.
“As a Traveler?”
He nodded. “It’s obvious.”
Time's Children Page 31
