The Lone Warrior

by Denise Rossetti

  Now she perched on the driver’s seat next to the taciturn cook as he guided the chow van down the rutted trail. The plate-size hoofs of the shaggy vanbeasts churned up choking clouds of dust, strongly flavored with herbivore flatulence on a grand scale. Faugh.

  Dinari called something from out in front, the command repeated down the line. Cook tugged the reins, swearing under his breath, and the van swung around to take its place in the circle.

  Camp. Thank the Sister. Without waiting for permission, Mehcredi jumped down, stumbling on unexpectedly stiff legs.

  “Where ye goin’, boy?” Cook glowered down at her from under bushy brows. “There’s supper still t’ get.”

  Mehcredi scowled, stuffing her hands in her pockets. “Name’s Meck,” she muttered. “Gotta check Wajar don’t need me.”

  When Cook grunted his reluctant assent, she fled in the direction of the horse string. It wasn’t until she met the swordmaster’s flat gaze that she realized how badly she’d needed to see him. The breath whistled out of her on a long sigh and her shoulders relaxed.

  “I left you with Cook.” Walker removed the saddle and the bay tossed its head. Without thinking, Mehcredi laid a soothing palm on the animal’s twitching neck. “What are you doing here? And watch him, the bastard bites.”

  “He’s all right.” She bestowed an absent pat. “I like horses. How much longer to Trimegrace?”

  “Two days, maybe three. You stick with Cook when I’m not around. Make yourself useful.”

  It was frightening how much she longed to creep into his arms and rest her head on his shoulder. Gods, the skin hunger was insidious, like a feverish illness. He’d taken pity on her, given her a glimpse of heaven, of human contact and caring, and now she craved it like a crazyspice addict.

  The kissing, whispered a sly voice in her head. It was good, but you want more. Look at the pit of his throat, all brown and smooth. You can see the pulse beating there. He might like it if you nuzzle in, you never know. Do you think his nipples are as sensitive as yours? What if you set your mouth to the hard muscle of his belly, would he shudder, get hard? And his ass, gods so tight and high and fine. What if—

  In desperation, she blurted, “Where are we sleeping?”

  Walker paused, grooming brush in hand. “Out there.” He indicated the dark shapes of the hills with a tilt of his head. “I’ll have sentry duty anyway.”

  Another guard trotted in and swung down with a narrow sidelong glance. “Fill this.” Walker shoved a bucket into her midriff. “Water’s in the barrel over there. Then get back to Cook. Report to me after supper. Got it?”

  “Yeah.” With genuine ill-grace, Mehcredi did as she was told.

  The dog caught up with her halfway back to the chow van, his step so sprightly it was immediately apparent he hadn’t traveled on his own four feet. Mehcredi bent for a quick pat. “And he said I was a lazy little shit. Huh!”

  The dog said nothing at all, but when they reached the chow van, he settled well out of range of Cook’s big boots, nose on his paws, eyes bright.

  Under Cook’s monosyllabic direction, Mehcredi chopped, stirred and stoked the fires. Then she slopped ladlefuls of highly spiced stew onto rough trenchers made of hard-baked bread for a seemingly endless procession of hard-eyed dirty men. Several directed jocular comments at her, so she dropped her head and mumbled until the ones farther down in the line complained and they shuffled on.

  Hard fingers grasped her wrist and she looked up, startled. “By the Three,” said a wiry guard in his forties, “what sweet morsel do we have here?” His thin smile revealed crooked teeth, the canines glinting gold in the flare of the torches.

  Mehcredi lifted a truculent lip. “Keep yer fuckin’ hands to yerself.” A jerk of the ladle and boiling stew splashed over the man’s knuckles.

  He snatched his hand back. “Fuck! Why you little—”

  Abad stood at his elbow. “Letafa, don’t,” he said urgently. “The boy’s—”

  “With me.” Walker loomed out of the darkness. Not a muscle in his face moved.

  Letafa tilted his chin. “Who the fuck are you?”

  “Wajar.”

  Letafa’s gaze dropped to Walker’s sword. Then it returned more slowly to his face. He rose on the balls of his feet, and all at once, tension crackled in the air.

  Unperturbed, Walker smiled, the effect chilling. “Meck can take care of himself,” he said calmly. “Look.”

  Letafa whirled around. Mehcredi met his eye, trying to copy the menace of Walker’s smile, the blade in her fist shining with a baleful glitter.

  Someone gave a crack of laughter. “Hey, Letafa,” a voice called out of the darkness. “Looks like ye’re outmatched. Leastways, ’til the next cathouse.” Abad guffawed and slapped his knee while Letafa glared.

  “Come on.” Walker waited only for her to dish up two meals, then hustled her off beyond the glare of the torches. “Over here.” He led the way toward a stand of scrubby vegetation a hundred yards from the camp. Their packs were already there, shoved into a hollow under an arching root.

  The swordmaster squatted comfortably on his heels, devouring stew in a series of rapid efficient bites. “Where’s that damn dog?” he said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

  “Scrounging, I guess. He’ll turn up when there’s no one left to beg from.”

  “Keep him with you.” Walker rose, a dark shape against the stars. “I got the early shift but I won’t be far. Sound carries out here at night. Yell, and I’ll hear you.” He faded into the darkness without a sound. His voice drifted back to her. “Back the hour before midnight.” A rustle, and then nothing save the night breeze playing in the branches and the rumble of masculine voices in the distance.

  The sickle of the Sister drifted across the face of the stars, the red disk of the Brother in hot pursuit. The temperature had dropped. Shivering, Mehcredi fished the hated robes out of her pack and wrapped herself up until she was no more than a black bundle in the black night. Setting her back to a tree trunk, she tilted her head back and stared, feeling very small.

  Was that smear of light a starship, streaking off to another world, one among an infinity? She squinted. Perhaps it was a falling star, and she should make a wish. Sleepily, she canvassed the options, but apart from getting out of Trinitaria in one piece, all her wishes had but a single name. She sighed. Once, just once, to lie in his arms and hear his cool deep voice murmur extravagant praises—who cared if he lied? Her eyes stung.

  When a cold nose touched her hand, she yelped, and got an apologetic lick in response. Lifting her arm, she allowed the solid little body to snuggle close. “Keep your bitemes to yourself, you disgusting little scrounger,” she said severely, sinking her fingers into the coarse fur.

  When she scratched, the dog groaned with pleasure. “You always come back to me. Why is that, hmm?”

  During the first bewildering weeks at the House of Swords, exasperated beyond measure, she’d asked Florien. She didn’t want a dog, she didn’t need a dog. Godsdammit, the stupid mutt had led the swordmaster straight to her!

  “He loves ye,” the boy had said, his voice husky and uncertain with the first intimations of adolescence. “Wit’ everythin’ he’s got.”

  Mehcredi had scrubbed even harder at the big pot in the sink. “But why?”

  “Ye saved him frum somethin’ awful, dincha?”

  Her mouth had fallen open. “The Necromancer was going to—Never mind.” She shuddered. “How do you know?”

  Florien shrugged, ducking his head so she couldn’t see his eyes. “Some dogs is real bright. He knows. An’ ye feed him. That counts for lots.”

  Now a thought occurred to her. “What’s your name?” she asked her furry companion. With a canine sigh of contentment, the dog laid his head on her hip bone. “Scrounger?” His ears pricked and she saw the white of an eye.

  Mehcredi grinned, ridiculously pleased. “Suits you.”

  Walker passed through the night, his steps sound
less, no more than a moving patch of darkness among the double-edged shadows cast by the Sibling Moons. The true desert, the rocky arid home of the Shar, was still miles away, but if he breathed deeply, the distinctive salty odor of mannaplant filled his nose. The gift of his Ancestors. How could he have forgotten it?

  He paused, listening, every sense alert. A couple of fires still burned inside the circle of vans, a few more dotted the perimeter. Three or four dark silhouettes tilted a bottle, threw the dice. From far away, the desolate howl of a direwolf echoed across the landscape. A vanbeast lowed, harness clinked.

  Walker frowned. They were only a day out of Belizare. Why were scavengers like direwolves venturing so close?

  With a predator’s care, he approached the grove where he’d left Mehcredi. Out of habit, he ensured he was upwind. Nonetheless, he was greeted by a low, threatening growl. A stifled exclamation, and a shadow detached itself from the base of a tree to reveal his assassin, eyes wide, blade at the ready.

  He stepped out of the dark. “It’s me.” Hunkering down, he stroked the dog’s head. “Good work.” To Mehcredi, he said, “Did you sleep?”

  A shoulder hunched. “Dozed.”

  “Cold?”

  “A little.”

  Well, shit, why hadn’t he thought of it? She wouldn’t have a clue how to make a fire. He should have done it before he left her.

  Her teeth gleamed in a swift smile as she rubbed her hip. “The ground’s hard.”

  “That it is.” But when he pulled her to her feet, she came easily enough. Ah, youth. “Wait while I get us settled.”

  There were a few stray bunches of feathergrass dotted about. They’d do.

  Deliberately, he grounded himself, reaching out with his shamanic senses. Yes, there! The feathergrasses were hardy and persistent, eking out a precarious existence in the leached soil. Walker fed them ch’qui until they burgeoned, the stems multiplying so rapidly they hissed and slithered as they grew, tangling into a thick, springy mat, longer and wider than any bedroll.

  At his elbow, the assassin squeaked with surprise.

  When he finally paused for breath, she said in a hushed voice, “Did you do that with, uh, Magick?”

  His blood singing, Walker reached above his head and grabbed a branch. “Yes, and here’s more.” His tingling body the conduit, he wove the ch’qui through the branches, bending, thickening and interlacing them into a serviceable bower. By the time it was finished, only a few stray moonbeams made their way through to gild the tips of the feathergrass stems with silver.

  No more than a few days away from his garden, but gods, how he’d missed this! Like the nea-kata, the surging life force of his world centered him, giving him back the equilibrium he needed to function on a day-to-day basis. Some days, it was all that kept him hanging on.

  Nerves still thrumming with power, his balls drawn up tight with it, he gathered the kindling for a small fire and dug out his tinderbox.

  As the first flames spread and the air in the confined space warmed, Mehcredi removed her robes and spread them over the feathergrass mattress. Sinking down, she shot him a cautious glance from under her lashes, then held her hands out to the fire. “Thanks.”

  Comfortably cross-legged, Walker allowed himself to reflect on the day, sorting and discarding impressions, memories, images. As was his custom, he was dispassionate, setting aside what was messy and weak—regret, self-pity, fear and guilt. All his old friends, sealed away where they couldn’t grin and chatter like the picked-clean skulls of those he’d loved.

  Sometimes it worked. Other times, it didn’t.

  It was a relief to concentrate on Mehcredi’s elegant profile as she gazed into the heart of the tiny fire. Her eyelids drooped, but she sat stiffly, jerking upright every time she dozed.

  “Tired?” he murmured.

  She huffed out a funny little sound midway between a yawn and a laugh. “Gods, yes.”

  Praise where it was due. “You did well today. Kept your head with Letafa.”

  Her lips trembled, and for a horrifying moment, he thought she might cry. But First Father be thanked, she regained control, ducking her head. He heard a long quivering breath, then another.

  “Sorry about . . . what happened in the van.”

  “So you should be.” He fed the fire another handful of twigs. “We won’t speak of it again. Go to sleep.”

  “What about you?”

  “I have some thinking to do.” He should fade away into the darkness and run through a couple of high-level nea-katas to settle his mind and reacquaint himself with his duty, his vengeance. He fingered one of the braids at his temple, feeling somehow . . . jangled. Why couldn’t he hate her? It would be so much simpler. This entire debacle sprang from her attempt to poison Erik Thorensen. Welderyn’d’haraleen’t’Lenquisquilirian hadn’t had the slightest doubt about his destiny since the first diabloman gurgled and died, spitted on his blade. He’d been certain no distraction could deflect him from his purpose, but now?

  Damn her, how had she got him so tangled in her stupid, wide-eyed hero worship? Why was he so fucking soft with her? He snorted to himself in derision. Hard was more like it. But his Ancestors and his people had shaped him, made him a warrior all the way to the marrow of his bones. He couldn’t help but respect courage—and what extraordinary courage she possessed, bloody-minded enough to persist with joy and wonder in the face of years of neglect and misery. He at least had been greatly loved, and had loved in return. Despite the horror and death that rode over the hill with Ghuis Gremani Giral and his demon army, he’d been lucky. He’d had a place.

  She was shivering again, the little fool. “Here,” he said brusquely, pushing her down with a hand on her shoulder. “Stretch out.” He extended the edge of his robe like a wing, and she crept gratefully into its shelter.

  What he hadn’t intended was for her to curl up with her poor shorn head on his thigh, but being Mehcredi, she did it anyway. When she sighed with contentment, he hesitated for a second and was lost.

  So he continued to sit, cursing himself for a fool, trying like hell to ground and listening to the crackle and pop of the fire.

  He was dozing when she turned her head, blinking up at him. A tired smile curved her lips. “You need to know,” she whispered. “You’re my only chance. I can’t give you up, not yet.” She patted his knee.

  “What?” he said, stupid as a plowboy.

  “I picked the wrong moment.” She covered a yawn with her hand. “You were right.” Another yawn. “Risky. Mmm.” She snuggled closer.

  Walker clenched his jaw so hard, his molars hurt. The fire hissed, as if with scorn. “S-soft,” it crackled in his head. “Soft.”

  And then, oddly enough, his name, over and over. “Walker.” Hiss, pop. “Walker.” A pause. “Sscenda. It’ss Cenda.”

  17

  Walker blinked. Streamers of flame danced, long and curling, like a woman’s fiery tresses. A face formed, flickering in and out of existence, a straight nose, the turn of a long graceful neck.

  ’Cestors’ bones.

  Mehcredi raised her head. “Is that—?” Her voice cracked with disbelief.

  Walker shoved a small branch into the heart of the fire. It caught and flared up. “Cenda?”

  “Yess. Lissten. Message . . . Deiter.” The cadence and power of the voice rose and fell with the flames.

  “What Magick is this?” he said sharply.

  Fiery lips curved with satisfaction, the image firming enough to be completely recognizable. “Sscrying by fire. Be better . . . practiss.”

  The dog gave a single sharp bark and fell silent.

  “Sweet Sister in the sky.” Beside him, Mehcredi made the sign of the Sibling Moons.

  “Takess power. Can’t hold—Lissten . . . great evil in the south . . . the desert. Deiter wants . . . find it.”

  “That would be Nerajyb Nyzarl.” A growl rumbled in his chest. “He’s as good as dead.”

  “No. Forget . . . him.” Sparks shot ou
t of the fire as Cenda shook her head. “Monstrous . . . not human. Huge, killing . . . hundreds.” The fire witch began to dwindle, the flames sinking. “Deiter . . . needs . . . lissten . . .”

  Walker leaned forward. “Cenda? Cenda, come back!”

  Mehcredi fed the greedy flames a handful of bark and the fire shot up on a draft of air as if someone had taken a bellows to it.

  Cenda reappeared, floating in the flames. “Thankss,” she said to an unseen presence behind her. Erik and his air Magick, he’d bet his House of Swords on it.

  “Deiter has a bargain.” She cocked her head, her gaze shifting off to one side, though she looked straight through Mehcredi as if she wasn’t there. Then she nodded in response to some unseen comment or instruction. “Locate . . . evil, find out what . . . is and he will give you . . . the last . . . Sshar.”

  Everything inside Walker contracted to a single point of old pain and fury, hard-edged as a black diamond. “Nonsense. I am the last of the Shar.”

  Cenda shook her fiery head, her hair whipping around her. With a soft roar, the fire flared, illuminating Mehcredi’s expression of open-mouthed fascination, then died down so the shadows swooped back like spread-winged birds.

  “Not sso. There’s a woman.”

  Walker curled his lip. “The old man’s senile. They’re all dead. Fuck, I should know.”

  Gods, the endless searching, watching the veiled figures of respectable women in the souk, the naked faces of the whores, all the time hoping, hoping . . . Forcing himself to attend slave auctions and smile as if he enjoyed it, every dark-haired female on the block making his heart pound and his gorge rise. In the long years before the bitter certainty of Amae’s death grew in his heart like a canker, he could never decide whether he longed to see her up there, on sale to the highest bidder, or whether he dreaded it.

  Cenda glanced at the same spot to her right. A beat later, she said, “He only just found her.”