~
Imprisoned in the bachelor hut, Maktaz fumed. It had all fallen apart—again. He’d be disgraced, likely even expelled from his Clan and the tribe for breaking faith in the Ordeal. If Vatar should manage to return from his Ordeal, then he would win—total victory. Vatar had slipped through his fingers too often. At every turn Maktaz had failed to make him pay for Torkaz’s death. It was unbearable.
His eyes narrowed in thought. Maybe there was still a way he could strike at Vatar. One—no two—targets that might still be within his reach. Maktaz smiled. He might be defeated, but he could make Vatar’s victory a hollow one. He could take from Vatar the same thing Vatar had taken from him. His son.
First he would need allies. Well, the Wolf Clan had never failed him in that, yet. The other residents of the bachelor hut were fertile territory. He’d need to make them believe that the fate of the Dardani depended on them, that immediate action was crucial. They had to be ready to kill for him.
Chapter 51: Thekila
Vatar woke late in the day and blinked at the tall blonde woman sitting beside him. “Am I home?” he croaked. She certainly looked like a Dardani. She even dressed like one, except for the short hair and the cut of her tunic. He’d never seen a tunic that laced that far down.
The woman smiled at him. “As I don’t know where your home is, I can’t answer that. But I very much doubt it.”
Vatar licked dry lips. “Who . . . ?”
“My name is Quetza. I’m one of those who found you. How’s the pain? The Healer left more of the sleeping draught for you.”
He had far too many questions to go back to sleep now, but the pain in his hand and ankle impeded his concentration. “No. My pouch?”
Quetza shrugged. “With your clothes, I assume. What’s left of them. Just a moment.”
Quetza went out briefly and returned with Vatar’s belt pouch, opening it for him. “What did you want?”
“There’s a jar.”
Quetza looked inside. “Well, there’s a bit of luck. It’s not smashed. Though how it’s not is beyond me.”
She took the jar out and opened it for him. Vatar took a small amount of the salve on his fingers. This salve that Mother had given him for his Ordeal was strongly laced with pauver juice. His left hand was splinted, but not bound tightly. He rubbed the salve gently around the splint. Then he lay back with a sigh of relief.
Quetza watched with interest. She raised one eyebrow. “What is that?”
“Pauver juice,” Vatar answered, “It numbs the pain.”
Quetza chuckled. “So I see. I think our Healers may want to talk to you about that when you’re stronger. Is there any place else you need this?”
Vatar stretched and winced. “My ankle.”
Quetza took a dab of the salve and gently applied it to Vatar’s broken ankle. “Anywhere else?”
Vatar sighed and stretched again, this time without the wince. “Thank you. No. The rest I can deal with. It doesn’t do to overuse it.”
Quetza resealed the jar and set it on a table beside his bed and sat back down. “Are you a Healer where you come from?”
Vatar shook his head slightly. “No. I’m a smith. But my mother is a healer.” He looked up as someone came to the door and his mouth dropped open.
Thekila stood in the doorway. “He’s awake!”
“You are real!” Vatar said at almost the same instant. “I thought I’d dreamed it.” He felt his heart beat a little faster just at the sight of her. There was no doubt this was the same woman he had dreamed of since his manhood test. The face and hair were unmistakable—and the eyes. Even the freckles. And yet, she was also very different from what he had expected.
If he’d ever believed that she was real, he would have pictured that face on a body more like Avaza’s—or even Quetza’s—the size of a normal Dardani woman. Thekila was surprisingly small, almost tiny by Dardani standards. If he was standing, her head would only come to the middle of his chest. If they stood close together, her head would tuck under his chin with room to spare. That image made him feel unexpectedly warm.
Vatar couldn’t take his eyes from hers. Those beautiful green eyes he had looked into so often in his mind. Now that he saw her, they were full of fire and intelligence and laughter. He hadn’t felt this compelled by anything since he first started working with iron and steel.
Thekila smiled. “Yes, I’m real. And so are you.” She placed a hand on his forehead, just as his mother had done countless times. “Don’t you want the sleeping draught?”
Vatar waved his uninjured right hand. “Later.”
“But the pain . . .” Thekila said.
“He has a magic salve for that,” Quetza said.
Vatar shook his head without ever taking his eyes from Thekila’s. “Not magic. Pauver juice.”
Quetza laughed and stood up. “Well, I know when I’m not needed.”
Thekila broke off the long eye contact with Vatar. “Quetza!”
Quetza laughed again and gestured to the seat she’d just vacated. “Talk. I’m sure Vatar is full of questions. Almost as full as you.” And with a wink at Thekila, she left.
Thekila sat down in Quetza’s place. “Where would you like to start? With your questions, I mean.”
Vatar blinked. Even lying on his back, his head was swimming. It wasn’t from his injuries, though. He was overwhelmed by the presence of Thekila. He’d only ever seen her face before—and only briefly. He’d never imagined the touch of her hand or the smell of her hair, which reached him across the small distance between them. He could barely make his mind focus on anything else. He sighed. It wasn’t a very inspired question, but maybe it was best to start with the basics. “Where am I?”
“You’re in the Valley, at the Academy. We brought you here after you were attacked. Do you remember that?”
Vatar closed his eyes at the memory. “Yes, but not how I got here.”
Thekila shrugged. “That’s not surprising, since you were unconscious. My friends and I arrived just as you fell. We were able to . . . convince . . . your attackers to stop. After the Healer had seen to you, we brought you here.”
Vatar’s eyebrows rose toward his hairline. “That simple?”
One side of Thekila’s lips quirked up. “Well, it was a little more complicated than that. But, after all, we were their teachers. It’d be a sad comment if we didn’t know a trick or two they didn’t. And Quetza can be quite convincing all on her own.”
Vatar shrank away from her a little. “You taught them?” And am I in even more danger now? And . . . does she have magic like theirs?
Thekila held out a hand. “Yes, but please don’t hold that against us. Believe me, we are as horrified by their behavior as you must be. Possibly more. They broke half of the Tenets using their Powers in that way.”
Powers. Magic. Vatar drew in a deep breath. “Then you’re Fasallon?”
A crease appeared between her eyes. “No. Valson.”
He’d never heard it pronounced that way. Vatar shook his head. “I don’t understand. But you have Talent?”
“Powers? Yes. Same as you.”
Vatar raised his hand as if warding off the idea. “I don’t have any magical Talent.”
Thekila cocked her head to one side and studied him. “Oh? Then how did you bespeak me so many times? Even if you couldn’t hold on to the contact for a whole sentence. And, I think they heard your call for help on the far side of the Valley. You may not have had training to develop them, but you do have Powers.”
Vatar shook his head, but decided to let that go for now. He’d argued it round and round often enough with Father. He didn’t feel up to arguing about it now. His head hurt and there was a ringing in his ears. And he didn’t want to argue with her at all. Too many things were spinning through his head right now, anyway. Time for a different question. “Why were Loran and the others in the Forest, if they’re from here?”
Thekila sighed. “It’s tradition. When the student
s complete their schoolwork, they are allowed to go out into the Forest alone or in small groups for the summer. It shows that we trust them to be responsible. And it gives them a chance to burn off a little excess energy after their examinations. Clearly, those five were not ready to be trusted. And I’m sorry about that.”
Summer. Well, that would explain why the Dardani had never seen any hint of them. The Dardani only ever approached the edge of the Forest during the winter. In the ordinary course, his people and hers would never have met at all. Did the Modgud have any idea that the Valson sometimes shared the Forest with them? “Not your fault.” Vatar stifled a yawn. Hard as he tried to fight it off, he was beginning to feel a little fuzzy. He wasn’t ready to be parted from Thekila, yet, but he knew he couldn’t stay awake much longer.
“Does that answer most of your questions?” Thekila asked.
Vatar chuckled. “No.”
She smiled. “Well, I think it’s enough for now. The Healer specifically ordered rest. Do you want to try to sleep without the draught?”
“Yes.” He grabbed her hand. “Will you be here when I wake up?”
Thekila smiled and her eyes danced mischievously. “If I’m not, I’ll make sure whoever is calls me. Is that good enough?”
“Yes.” This time, Vatar failed to suppress the yawn.
~
Vatar woke to someone probing his bruises. He opened his eyes and tried to focus. Ah, it was the Healer. He remembered her.
“He’s awake again.” He turned his head to see Thekila watching from the other side of his bed.
The Healer looked up and nodded. “Quetza tells me that your mother is a Healer. Is that true?”
Vatar winced as she pressed on a particularly tender bruise. “Yes. She studied in Caere when she was young.”
The Healer paused and looked at him, her brow creased. “Caere? I’m not familiar with that academy.”
This place just gets stranger. Who doesn’t know where Caere is? It’s the biggest city in the world. “It’s not an academy. It’s a city.”
The Healer shook her head as she went back to checking each of his wounds. “There’s only one City in the Valley.”
Vatar shook his head and instantly regretted it. “Caere is on the ocean, far to the west.”
“Ah,” the Healer commented, noncommittally. She held up his left hand. “Can you curl the fingers for me?”
Vatar did.
“Does that hurt?” She asked.
Vatar shrugged. “Not much. I’m sure it would, but the pauver juice is still working to numb the pain.”
“Hmm. I’m going to want to talk to you about that. Later. In the meantime, I’m going to give you some exercises to help prevent stiffness. You’ll regain full use of the hand much sooner if you do these exercises every day.”
After showing him the exercises, the Healer left.
Thekila sat down in the chair by his bed. “So, you come from a city by the ocean? Caere?”
Vatar turned his palms up and shrugged. “No. And yes. I live part of the year in Caere, now. But I was raised on the plains, among the Dardani.”
The crease between her eyes got so deep that her eyebrows drew together.
Vatar pushed himself up in the bed with his good hand. “Do you have paper and ink?”
Thekila laughed. “I’m a teacher. And this is a school. Of course we do.”
“Maybe it would help if I drew a map.” Vatar silently blessed the geography lessons he’d had from Cestus. He could draw a passable map of the world he knew thanks to them. And, maybe, with a common reference, they’d be able to start making sense to each other.
Thekila held the paper for him as he drew.
“The edge of the Forest is here. The Gna River is to the south. The Zeda waterhole is about here, near the center of the plains. And the sea coast is to the west. Caere is here, at the back of a deep bay. The Dardani live mainly between Zeda and the edge of the Forest. But we trade with Caere.”
“I see,” she said, studying the map. “Then why have we never met any Dardani in the Forest before now?”
Vatar placed his hand over the part of the map that represented the forest. “We don’t go into the Forest. Just far enough to gather firewood during the winter. Never out of sight of the plains. And only in the winter.”
She looked up at him. “Then what were you doing in the Forest?”
Vatar sighed. “That’s a very long story. I’m not even sure where to begin.”
Thekila smiled again. “All right. We can save that story for later, when you’re stronger. Why don’t you tell me about those marks on your chest?”
Vatar touched his left shoulder. “The claw marks?”
Thekila shook her head. “No. The other marks.”
“Oh, my Clan tattoos. The small one, here.” Vatar touched the spot above his heart. He remembered belatedly that his tattoos had been covered. But he looked down and realized that the mark was visible again. The Healer must have cleaned the stain off along with his blood. He felt stronger just knowing that this symbol of his Clan identity was visible once more. “This is my Clan Mark. It signifies acceptance into my Clan. I am . . . I was . . . I am Lion Clan so my Mark is the print of a lion.”
“And the other one?”
Vatar touched his right shoulder. “This one is my manhood tattoo. I got this one after . . . well, after a test.”
Thekila stared at the larger tattoo. “So every man of your Clan has a tattoo like that?”
“Well, no. Not exactly like mine. The usual tattoo is a charging lion. Like this.” Vatar sketched a version of Danar’s tattoo on the back of his map.
Thekila looked at his sketch. “That’s not the same as yours. Why is yours different?”
Vatar looked down, heat rising in his face. “Mine’s a hero’s tattoo.”
Thekila’s eyes glowed. “Now I’m sure there’s a story behind that.”
So Vatar told her the story of the tiger hunt. He wished briefly that he had the fang with him after all, to prove his story, but Thekila didn’t appear to doubt him. The tiger hunt naturally led to the story of Fenar’s birth to explain the presence of Cestus and Boreala and then to the flash flood and Torkaz’s death to explain Maktaz’s enmity.
When he’d finished that story, Thekila said, “I’m confused. You seem to have two different fathers.”
Vatar nodded. “It is confusing sometimes. In a way, I do have two fathers.”
“How is that?”
“Danar is the man who raised me—my mother’s life mate. He stood for me when I got my Clan Mark and my manhood tattoo and that makes him my father in the eyes of the Clan. But Veleus is the man who sired me—before Danar and Mother were together. He is a Fasallon and he lives in Caere. He has Talent . . . Powers, like you.” Vatar put his hand up to hide a yawn.
“I’m sure there’s another story behind that,” Thekila said. “But it’ll have to wait until tomorrow. You need to rest.”
Chapter 52: Bad News
Orleus followed the trail back across the Forest with Seeker’s help. Not Vatar’s path. He knew as much as he could learn from that. The track left by Vatar’s pursuers. The traces told Orleus little beyond number—apparently two men and two women—until they once again neared the far side of the Forest. When he estimated that they’d reached about the same distance from the Forest’s edge as Vatar’s first camp, the trail led them out into a large clearing.
Eureka. The tattered remains of a tent flapped disconsolately on one side of the clearing. In the center, rocks had been piled into a cairn. Judging by its size and shape, it marked a grave. The rest could wait. Orleus strode across the clearing and began pulling rocks from the cairn.
“What are you doing?” Cestus asked in a horrified whisper.
Orleus pulled another rock loose. “Getting a look at the face of the enemy.” He turned to Cestus as he put the stone down. “Don’t worry. We’ll cover him back up.”
Cestus gagged as they uncovered the
body.
Orleus put a hand up to cover his nose. “Be grateful the weather has turned cold. It could be worse.”
“He’s so young!” Cestus said. “There are students his age still at the Temple school.”
Orleus nodded. “Yes. And he’s the one that was wounded in the gut. That’s a nasty way to die. But at least it wasn’t Vatar. I didn’t think it could be—he’d never have made it so far across the Forest. But now we’re sure. All right, let’s cover him back up.”
After they finished, Orleus looked around the clearing for any more information he could glean from the tent, which wasn’t much.
“What now?” Cestus asked.
Orleus turned his face to the sky. “It’s going to be cold again tonight. We know there’s a decent shelter at Vatar’s first camp. We’ll go there for now and make plans in the morning.”
Before they got to the camp, Orleus held up a hand, sniffing the air. “Smoke. Someone’s already there.”
Cestus gripped the haft of his knife. “The same ones who chased Vatar?”
Orleus shook his head. “No way of telling from here.” He paused a moment longer. “Walk as quietly as you can.”
They peered out of the trees at the campsite. Two men stood on the far side, gripping their spears.
Cestus studied them. “I . . . I think it’s okay. I think they’re Modgud.”
“Who?”
Cestus shook his head and stepped out into the camp, hands out and palms showing. “Are you Modgud?”
“We are,” the shorter of the two answered. “Who are you?”
“We’re Vatar’s brothers, from Caere. We came to help him,” Cestus said.
“So did we,” the taller one said.
Cestus nodded. “Arcas said you might.”
“You know Arcas?” the first one asked.
Cestus smiled. “Yes. In fact, I officiated at his wedding.”
The two Modgud relaxed and introduced themselves as Bron and Clev.
“Where is Vatar?” Clev asked.
Orleus sat down on the same log Vatar had used to keep his tally of the days. “We don’t know. We never found him. Seeker and I tracked him across the Forest. I believe he went over the mountains beyond. We can’t follow him until spring. Snow has closed the pass.”
The Shaman's Curse (Dual Magics Book 1) Page 26
