by Victor Poole
"The boy has been cursed," the pointing priest said. The other priests, who had let out gasps and yelps of alarm when they had seen the black pits in Coren's face, gathered together into a knot, their bodies pressed close in a group. Ajalia thought that they looked a little like a group of frightened sheep.
"He wears the oldest curse," another priest shouted, pointing at the words that scrawled in large black scars beneath Coren's eyes. The group of priests let out another collective gasp, and thrust their bodies more closely into a clump. Those priests who stood on the outer edge of the group looked nervously at Coren, and at Ajalia, as though they were afraid of being smitten by either of them. Coren followed their looks, and he curled his upper lip in anger.
"She can't hurt you," Coren told the priests loudly. "She can't do any proper magic at all." The black pits in Coren's face twisted grotesquely when he spoke. Ajalia wondered if the black depressions would ever soften or heal, or if Coren would look like this for the rest of his days. She did not envy the boy, who wore the traces of his alliance with his mother openly now.
Ajalia thought of Delmar again, and she liked him even more than she had before. Delmar, she told herself, must have been subjected to much of his mother's dark magic when he had been small, but he had found some way to fight her off, and to maintain the purity of his own soul. Ajalia looked at the hideousness of Coren, and she told herself that Delmar was strong inside.
"Where have you gotten this child?" the priest in front, who seemed, now that Ajalia looked at him, to be in charge, demanded. She saw that none of the priests recognized Coren at all. Coren seemed to realize this as well, because his face contorted with rage.
"I'm Coren!" the little boy shouted at them, his hands curled into fists at his sides. "It's me! You have to obey me! You have to help me now!" The priests looked at Coren, and Coren glared at the priests. "She hurt me!" Coren blazed at them, pointing furiously at Ajalia. "She hit me in the face, and then she pulled on my hair!" Coren glared at the priests, who looked, all as one, back at him. "I'm the son of the Thief Lord!" Coren shouted.
"That Thief Lord is dead," the lead priest told Coren. "What have you to do with this child?" he asked Ajalia sharply.
THE MEETING WITH THE PRIEST
"What have you come here for?" Ajalia asked the priests. Some of the priests in the group murmured together, and nudged at the priest in the front, who seemed to speak for all of them.
"First," the priest said, "I must know why you have this monster with you." The head priest's eyes moved distastefully to Coren, and then went back towards Ajalia.
"What do you want?" Ajalia asked. The priest's face turned hard in the moonlight.
"You are a foreign woman," the priest said imperiously. Ajalia turned away when he first opened his mouth. She took Coren by the shoulder, and walked him back into the shadows of the hall. She heard a flurry of hurried words behind her. The priests, she thought, were arguing with each other. "Wait!" the head priest shouted urgently. Ajalia heard his footsteps coming behind her. "I spoke out of turn," the priest said hurriedly. "I was in the wrong. Please come and speak to us."
Ajalia hid a smile; she thought that when she had first come out, the priests had all been looking speculatively at the shining steps and floor of the dragon temple, and thinking of invading boldly. She thought of Sharo, and she pictured to herself the way the priests had expected this meeting to go. They had hoped, she thought, that she would be blushing and shy, overwhelmed at their coming to her house to speak to her. Ajalia turned to look at the priest who had followed her.
"What do you want?" she asked again. She could just see the priest's face in the shadows; she thought she saw him open his mouth, ready to ask her to come back into the light where he could see her better, but then he changed his mind.
"We have come to explain," the preist said, "and to ask for your help."
Ajalia looked back at the group of huddled priests. They were staring anxiously into the shadows, trying to hear what she said.
"It looks more as though you came to stare, and to make demands," Ajalia said mildly. The priest's face was in darkness, but Ajalia thought she could hear consternation coming from him. "If you wanted what you said," she remarked, "you could have come in the daylight, and you could have come alone."
The priest turned away, and moved quickly to the other priests. Ajalia watched as the priests formed a slovenly huddle, and spoke to each other in whispers.
"Come on," Ajalia told Coren, and she pushed the boy towards a room that lay to one side, midway down the hall.
"But they're going to help me!" Coren said loudly, looking back in anger at the huddle of priests.
"If you are lucky, they will not try to kill you," Ajalia said, and she pushed the boy into the room, which had no door. Most of the rooms that lay off of the main hall of the dragon temple had only open doorways. Denai's little room had a door, which was part of why Ajalia thought it must have been a closet. The other rooms in the hall were in the shape of graceful squares, and had well-proportioned windows that opened to the outside. Ajalia put Coren into one of these rooms, and went to a lamp that lay on a table near the window. Keeping one eye on Delmar's brother, Ajalia lit the lamp, and carried it towards the open door.
"What are you doing?" Coren demanded, watching her through narrowed eyes. The light of the lamp threw up hideous shadows on his marred face, and made the holes in his tunic seem like gaping eyes.
"You look awful," Ajalia told Coren. Coren's mouth twisted into a sneer. "That really doesn't help," Ajalia told him, watching the deep black scabs contort with the motion of Coren's face.
"You don't know anything," Coren said. "You aren't even a witch," he added, as though sure that what he said would crush Ajalia's spirit forever.
"No, I'm not," Ajalia agreed. She laid the lamp down on the floor just outside the door, and then went into the room, and sat down.
"What are you doing?" Coren demanded. "Why aren't you out looking for Wall?"
"I don't need to look for Wall," Ajalia said. "Wall will come looking for me.
"No he won't," Coren said instantly. "Why will he come looking for you?" he asked, his voice guarded. Ajalia shrugged.
"I'm not sure," she admitted, "but I think he will."
"Why?" Coren asked aggressively. "I think you're just saying things to make yourself sound interesting."
"Sit down," Ajalia told Coren. Coren glared at her, and then went to a chair, and slumped into it with a motion like falling rocks. Ajalia was sitting in a chair from which she could see both the door and Coren, and where she could stand if she needed to, to block Coren's access to the door, or the window. She settled herself into her chair, and leaned her head back against the cushioned rim. She had been careful, when she had purchased furniture for the dragon temple, to choose items that she could rest in. She had been in Slavithe long enough by that point to realize that she was not likely to spend a majority of her nights in her own bed. Ajalia sighed, and closed her eyes. She listened to Coren. She could tell he was staring at her.
"What are you doing?" Coren demanded. "Are you sleeping?" he asked.
"Yes," Ajalia said, without opening her eyes. She heard Coren sit forward. "If you run, I will beat you," she said, settling herself more deeply into her chair. She heard Coren freeze. She could hear his breath coming slowly in and out of his lungs.
"I don't believe you," Coren said doubtfully. Ajalia swung up out of her chair, and was on top of Coren before he could stand. She had a hand on either side of his chair, and he shrank down into the seat, looking up at her with rims of white around his eyes.
"Try me," Ajalia said grimly. Coren's mouth quivered a little.
"That's okay," he said in a small voice. Ajalia took a deep breath. She closed her eyes, and told herself to calm down. I'm calm, she told herself, and straightened up. "I knew you wouldn't hit me again," Coren said, a little snidely. "You're ashamed, with the priests here."
Ajalia put her hand on Coren
's shoulder, and pulled him up out of the chair. The boy pulled against her, and she kicked him him hard.
"Ow!" Coren protested angrily. Ajalia pulled the boy up, and pushed him hard, so that he stumbled against the floor, and hit against the wall of the room. She went back to her chair, and sat down. "That was not nice!" Coren said. He sounded dumbfounded more than afraid.
"I am tired," Ajalia explained. "I don't enjoy beating anyone." She had closed her eyes again, but she thought that Coren was staring at her.
"You're stupid," Coren told her. Ajalia settled her shoulders into the soft back of the chair, and she heard the boy stand up cautiously, and return to his seat. "And you're mean," he added, as if it was an afterthought that he had had. They sat in silence for a few minutes. "Why did you put that lamp out there?" Coren demanded. Ajalia said nothing. She focused her attention on relaxing her body. She thought that if she sat still for a few minutes, it would be almost as good as a full night's sleep. She wondered where Delmar was, and if hunting the witches was going well for him.
When they had sat like this for several minutes, a cautious knock came at the wall just beside the door, and Coren spoke again.
"You aren't scary at all, either," Coren told Ajalia, and for the first time, she thought she heard the sound of a real boy coming from somehwere inside Coren. Ajalia sighed, and opened her eyes.
"Come in," she said, "and bring the lamp."
The head priest who had spoken to Ajalia before put his face cautiously into the room. Ajalia heard him pick up the light, and carry it into the room.
"It goes on that table," Coren said nastily to the priest.
"If you speak," Ajalia told Coren, "you will be sent away."
"Sent away where?" Coren shot at her. She looked at him with steady eyes, and the boy blanched. He looked ready to say something else, but he bit down on the inside of his lips.
"What do you want?" Ajalia asked the priest.
"We came to see about Sharo," the priest said cautiously.
"What is your name?" Ajalia asked.
"My name is Thell," the priest said. Thell sat down cautiously. He was watching Ajalia carefully, as though he thought she might burst into tears, or shout at him suddenly.
"I've sent Sharo to do some sewing," Ajalia said. The priest regarded her for a long moment.
"Sharo belongs to the priesthood," Thell said.
"Sharo tells me she is a free woman," Ajalia said.
"This is not so," Thell told her. "She is bound to us for seven years."
"She tells me that she is free to marry," Ajalia said. She turned a cold eye on the priest, who quailed a little under her gaze.
"Of course she is not free," Thell said. "To marry," he added slowly.
"Oh," Ajalia said. "What do you want her for?" Thell's eyebrows darkened.
"I do not think it is any of your business what I do with my own servants," Thell said.
"Sharo was a servant to Tree," Ajalia said. "As an act of kindness to the girl, I have given her temporary work." Thell watched Ajalia; she saw his lips working a little.
"She belongs to me," Thell said.
"Then Sharo is a spy," Ajalia said. Thell's face went purple.
"No," Thell said at once. "That is not so." Coren was watching this exchange avidly; Ajalia saw the boy's blackened and hideously-disfigured face fixed first on Thell's expresson, and then on hers. Coren caught Ajalia looking at him, and he scowled, and looked down. "Why do you keep such a child?" Thell demanded, as though he had caught Ajalia in some great indiscretion.
"I will tell the Thief Lord," Ajalia said slowly, "that the priests have seen fit to spy on the government, and to bribe guards at the eastern gate."
Thell's face, which had flushed purple, now drained to a shocked white.
"No," Thell gasped. He cleared his throat. "No," he said more strongly. "No, that is not what we were doing."
"It was," Ajalia said. "I have already told Delmar about your plan to entrap him in marriage to a servant woman."
Ajalia heard a snort of laughter from the place where Coren sat; she ignored the sound, and kept her eyes fixed steadily on the priest, who looked as though his face was going to turn inside out with embarrasment and disconcerted emotion.
"No," the priest said. Ajalia looked at the priest, and waited. The silence grew and stretched like a taut thread. "How did you find out about Sharo?" the priest asked finally, his tone a little shaky. Ajalia said nothing. Thell's mouth creased with displeasure at the corners; he looked quite cranky. Ajalia settled back into her chair, and closed her eyes. The sight of her relaxed face and posture seemed to act on the priest like an irritating sound. He twisted gently where he sat, and glanced with annoyance at Coren.
"She left me tied up in a room for hours and hours," Coren told the priest with a sickly smile. Thell went pale again, and glanced at Ajalia, whose eyes were closed. Coren seemed to be enjoying this exchange enormously. Ajalia remembred that she had warned the boy not to speak, but, she thought, as long as he continued to behave in a helpful manner, she would let him stay. Ajalia heard the slight rub of the priest's brown cloak against his chair, as he shifted again.
"Is she sleeping?" the priest whispered finally to Coren. Ajalia cracked an eye at Coren; the boy's lips turned in a cruel smile, and he laughed.
"No," Coren told Thell. "She likes to hurt people. I told you she hurt me."
Thell made a face at the boy that seemed to express the priest's wholehearted accordance with any persons's desire to hurt Coren, and then he looked back at Ajalia.
"This is not working out the way I expected," Thell said finally to Ajalia.
"Tell me what you expected," Ajalia said at once, without opening her eyes. Thell smiled in spite of himself, and glanced at the boy. Coren was no longer meeting the priest's eyes; the boy seemed to have lost himself in thought, and was staring at the floor. His lips moved slowly from side to side, and the blackened cavities in his cheeks stretched when his skin moved.
"I thought you would feel honored," the priest said stiffly. "I expected to explain about Sharo. And I came with an invitation,"
Ajalia took a deep breath. The priest, she told herself, was going to ask her to be the sky angel for them, instead of Sharo; she was sure of this. She let out the air she had taken in, and thought of the closed-off temple, and the darkened rooms that the priests had lit secretly with candles. She thought of the silver door that Minna said would make anyone sick who passed through it with a witch's taint in them, and she remembered the way Sharo had looked, when she had called herself the sky angel.
"No," Ajalia said.
"No, what?" Thell asked, sounding surprised. "You haven't heard any of it yet."
"I do not feel honored," Ajalia said, and she sat more deeply into her chair, and settled her hands over her waist. Her eyes were still closed. "I feel irritated," Ajalia said. "Sharo told me about herself, and I respectfully decline your invitation." Ajalia opened her eyes, and looked over at the priest. "If I am the sky angel," she told Thell, "I do not need your blessing, or your teachings. I will tell Delmar what you have done to spy on Tree, and I will see about rooting out your cloaks from among the guards at the eastern gate."
Thell opened his mouth to deny this, but Ajalia stopped him with a look.
"I know about the guards you are paying," she said, "and I know you leave your cloaks at the eastern gate, to be lent to all manner of people who should not enter the city openly. There will be a stop put to this corruption. If you cooperate fully," she added, closing her eyes again, "you might be permitted to stay in the temples."
Ajalia heard a slight sputtering noise; she had guessed, or connected the facts that she knew, to reach the conclusions she had shared with Thell. The old priest made another spluttering noise, like the grinding of gravel beneath heavy wheels, and then Ajalia heard Thell stand up, and stride quickly out of the room.
Ajalia sighed, and relaxed into her chair. Perhaps now, she thought, she would have a little quie
t.
"You shouldn't have said any of that to Thell," Coren said knowingly. Ajalia did not reply. "You should have stayed friends," the boy added. He waited, but Ajalia made no sign that she had heard. "I know you aren't sleeping," Coren said accusingly. Ajalia lifted her eyebrows silently; she imagined the boy grinning when he saw this. "My father said we had to stay friends with the priests," Coren said. "He said you have to stay close to your enemies, and get to know them, before they can start a fight with you."
"Your father saw me as an enemy," Ajalia said, her eyes shut against the gentle gleam of the lamp. "I won. Do you think his way, or my way, is the wiser course?"
Coren shut up his lips at this.
"You didn't kill my father," Coren said finally.
"No," Ajalia agreed.
"Delmar killed him," Coren said. Ajalia raised her head a little in acknowledgement of this fact. "He cut his neck open with a knife," Coren added. "I heard about it."
"With my knife," Ajalia said. Coren looked at her peaceful face, and at the way her eyelashes fell against her cheeks. Ajalia thought that she could hear the boy thinking about her.
"Can I see it?" Coren asked. Without opening her eyes, Ajalia leaned forward, and drew the knife out from the harness that held the blade snug against her back. She held the knife up in the lamplight. She heard Coren stand, and come closer. She knew that Coren wanted to hold the knife himself. "How did you put magic into it?" Coren asked. Ajalia had forgotten that Coren could see the lights, as she could, and as Daniel could. She did not answer the boy. "Can you do magic?" Coren asked. Ajalia thought that this was a stupid question, as Coren had seen her work the lights from the sky and within the earth in the smalll room upstairs. Coren seemed determined to think that she couldn't do magic, because he pressed on. "I haven't seen you do any real magic," he insisted. "You've only done childish tricks with the light."
