In some way she could not define—in some way she was scared to define—Rolf’s beauty, his youth, had become essential to her belief in her own. Besides, she was sure she was reading too much into it. The smile had been just a smile, the lack of her title in his speech not brought on by neglect, but by that gentle confusion, that sensation of careless floating so common after coupling. That was all. She would have to talk with him, to patch things up and show him she understood.
She glanced down at her body and suddenly felt ugly and weak. How could he care for one such as you? she thought, hating herself, in that moment, more than she had ever hated anyone or anything. Look at you. A withered old hag, a husk. The wretched remnants of a priceless vase, scattered carelessly and destroyed. Only, it had not been she who had destroyed that beauty. No, it had been the gods themselves, and Amedan specifically. She had served him faithfully for years, had sacrificed much of her youth to do his bidding, to fight his wars against the creatures of the night. And how had he rewarded her? With wrinkles, with breasts that sagged and drooped no matter what ointment she applied, with legs that had begun to show the first signs of those creeping veins which seemed to always appear in the very old or the very overweight and never mind that she exercised regularly.
Many—Olliman, himself, no doubt—would have claimed she had abandoned, had betrayed Amedan and the Light, but they would be wrong. She had not betrayed them—they had betrayed, had abandoned her. While she had been fighting wars, making use of her military genius to defeat the god’s enemies, her body had been slowly but surely succumbing to the ravages of time, and while she stood, at Amedan’s behest, as a shield protecting the realms of men, the god had used none of his power to shield her from the march of years. But she would have her beauty back, have herself back, and Amedan, for his careless neglect, would be made to suffer, would be forced to watch the world which he had created, the people he held so dear, go through terrible travail.
Tesharna.
She was so deeply lost in her own thoughts that, at first, she almost didn’t hear the voice, might have taken it for her own, or for nothing but the slight rustle of the wind through a window not fully closed. But it was none of those things. In an instant, all worries about Rolf faded from Tesharna’s mind as, too, did the concerns over beauty’s transience. At least, most of them.
“Yes, Mistress?” This spoken aloud as she was the only one in the room and had no worry of being overheard.
Come to me.
“Of course, Mistress. Only, if you will allow me but a moment to clothe myself, I wi—”
Now.
The word struck her like a hammer blow, and Tesharna cried out, staggering and just managing to catch herself on the small nightstand beside her bed. “O-of course, Mistress,” she gasped.
She made her way to her wardrobe, all too aware, as she walked, of the movements of her body. Once, walking would have only accentuated her beauty, a slight sway to the hips, a tightening of a clingy summer dress against her form, and she would have reveled in the thought. Reveled, too, in the inevitable eyes such things drew and the attention she had once been foolish enough to think would always be hers. Now, though, she was aware of her body in different ways.
The gentle sway that had done the most to show off her curves had turned into a modest shamble. She had bounced and rocked when she had walked as a young woman, but in all the right places. Now though, she felt it in flab on her legs no matter what she did, in the underside of her arms which had begun to droop, like balloons from some Fairday celebration with all of the air let out of them.
She forced her thoughts away as best she could and opened the wardrobe, sliding the clothes away so she could see the mirror hidden behind them. She then removed the black cloth draped over it, doing her best to hide her reluctance, for conversations with the goddess were never pleasant.
As always, the mirror’s surface was completely unreflective, showing only darkness. Then, storm clouds began to gather and bursts of what appeared to be lightning went off in the mirror as tiny sparks, but though the lightning itself was tiny, the distant roar of the resultant thunder sounded real enough.
Ah, Tesharna, the goddess said, speaking directly into her mind, and Tesharna winced at the power in her words. So beautiful, aren’t you? So…perfect.
Tesharna could hear the mocking in the goddess’s tone but chose to ignore it. “How may I serve you, Goddess?”
So eager aren’t you, Tesharna? So very eager to prove yourself, to receive your reward.
“I live to serve you, Mistress.”
You live to serve only yourself, Tesharna, now as always. You wish to appease not me but your vanity. But then, all beauty fades, does it not, Tesharna?
“If you say so, Goddess.” Except mine. You promised.
Very well. Now, Bishop Orren has reached out to me through the rituals and has informed me he has succeeded where you failed and captured my husband’s Chosen and those others with him.
“Bishop Orren, Mistress?” Tesharna asked. At first, she couldn’t place the name, then she remembered. A disgraced follower of Shira, one who, along with others, all now dead, had allowed Alesh to escape Shira’s wrath when he was but a child.
Disgraced no longer, Tesharna, Shira said, reading her thoughts easily. And you would do wise to remember it. Bishop Orren has succeeded in doing what you could not; he has brought my enemies low and offered their lives up to me. You will send men and collect the one called Alesh. The others, including those chosen by my foolish son and daughter, are to be killed.
“Of course, Mistress. In your name, I will kill them.”
No, Tesharna. In my name, Orren will do so—he is already seeing to it. What you will do is send men to Peralest and take this Alesh in hand.
“It will be done as you ask.”
It had better be, Tesharna, for your sake. You have had my husband’s Chosen in your power once and allowed him to escape. You will not do so again. Do you understand?
The last words exploded into her mind, and Tesharna gasped, falling to her knees, her hands going to her ears. “Yes, Goddess,” she gasped, “I understand.” But Shira was already gone. Shaking from surprise and pain, Tesharna took her hands away from her ears to see that they were stained with blood. Not much, but enough to leave no doubt as to what the goddess might do, should Tesharna displease her.
She glanced at the bell on her wall. One which, when rang, would summon one of her servants to see to her needs. She started toward it, knowing she must act in haste, then hesitated, remembering her nakedness. Another wave of self-loathing rolled through her. It would not do to allow one of the serving women to see her in such a state—she was quite sure they whispered about her already, rumors and gossip brought on by jealousy, but there was no need to give them more opportunity.
She hurried back to her closet and withdrew a dress, slipping it on before ringing the bell. She waited impatiently, pacing back and forth, and in a few minutes, there was a knock on the door. “Enter.”
A matronly woman, old and wrinkled and obviously overweight, pushed the door open, bowing her head low. “You needed assistance, Bright One?”
Tesharna frowned at the slovenly woman, but despite her appearance, Arabella was Tesharna’s personal assistant and had proven her worth time and again. “So I do, Arabella.”
The woman beamed, as if it was the world’s greatest compliment that Tesharna should remember the name of one so lowly as her. “I am here to serve, Chosen, if it pleases you.”
“I will tell you what does not please me, Arabella,” Tesharna said, gesturing at the shattered remnants of the vase lying in the floor, “is that, having returned to my quarters, I came here to find that someone—no doubt a foolish servant—knocked over a priceless artifact in their oafishness, and did not even bother to so much as clean it up.”
“B-but, Chosen,” the woman said, “you asked no one be in to clean—” She cut off at Tesharna’s forbidding frown and bowed her head in
stead, accepting the rebuke. “Forgive me, Chosen Tesharna. I will look into the matter personally.”
“Yes, and you will clean it personally as well,” Tesharna said. “But first, I have another task for you. I wish for you to scribe me a letter.” She gestured to the nightstand. “You will find parchment and ink within the drawer.”
“Of course, Chosen.” The woman hurried to the nightstand, apparently unconcerned with the way her own body moved disgustingly as she did. A moment later, she retrieved the pen and parchment and turned back. “I’m ready, Bright One.”
“Very well,” Tesharna said. “Now, write that it has come to my attention that those who we have sought for so long have been found in Peralest and that—”
“Forgive me, Chosen,” the woman said, wincing as if expecting to be struck for interrupting, “but who might the letter be addressed to?”
Tesharna frowned, glancing at the shards of the vase still lying in the floor. “Why Arabella,” she said, “to the Broken, of course.”
Chapter Seventeen
Marta came awake slowly. Her head throbbed painfully, and she winced as she opened her eyes. Sonya was unconscious beside her and, at first, she had the wild idea that the girl was dead, but saw a moment later that her small chest was rising and falling nearly imperceptibly.
Suddenly, she was jolted by something, and she groaned as the pain in her head grew worse. Grunting, she sat up and saw she was inside a carriage. She and Sonya sat on one side while two men in the gray robes of priests sat on the other. Their expressions were blank, impassive, and they said nothing.
“What do you want with us?” she said, trying her best to sound angry but unable to ignore the whimper in her voice. Neither of the men answered, didn’t so much as move or glance in her direction. “Hey,” she demanded, or at least tried to demand. What came out sounded far too much like a plea for her liking. “What are you doing with us?”
Still no answer, and she felt a spark of hope. She was invisible again, as she had been for most of her life. The men had seen her in the inn only because they came on her while she was sleeping, and she hadn’t been able to tell herself the lie that she was invisible, to make them believe it—normally, an easy enough thing to do.
Now though, she seemed to have gained her invisibility once more. She glanced at Sonya, still unconscious, then made a decision. She would go and find help, would find that old grumpy bastard Larin. He would know what to do. She reached for the door of the carriage, knowing she would have to be quick, for though the men might not notice her, they would certainly notice when the door opened on its own.
Her hand was only halfway there when one of them reached out and slapped her across the face, almost casually. Marta cried out in surprise, recoiling. The taste of blood filled her mouth, and she stared at the man, shocked. “You don’t…you can’t…” She trailed off, unsure of how to finish. The man didn’t bother responding, only stared at her with a blank, almost dead expression. Oh, he saw her alright. For the moment, the how or why of it didn’t matter—only that he did.
That’s okay, she told herself, pretending at far more confidence than she felt and doing a fairly convincing job. After all, she had spent her life pretending, what some people called “lying.” As if the truth were so important, so great. And maybe their truth was great. Marta was only twelve years old and considered young in Entarna, but in some places she would have been considered a woman grown. And young or not, she knew one thing—people who had time to sit back and judge others probably hadn’t spent their day evading roaming gangs of thieves and worse. And in the poor district, for a young girl, there was always worse. She suspected few of them had been dropped off at the doorstep of orphanages where they remained, mistreated, until they realized orphanages were nearly always worse than the streets from which they were meant to protect their wards, and snuck out one dark, rainy night.
Let those same people with their perfect houses, their perfect families and their perfect lives spend the night huddled in an alleyway, using the piles of trash that regularly accumulated in the far-less maintained poor quarter byways as both blanket and camouflage, and Marta thought maybe they’d learn that the truth could be a weapon as well as a shield, could hurt as well as help. It was better, then, to lie, better to believe that the moldy, hardened chunk of bread you ate was a Fairday turkey than to pause and look at it. Better to convince yourself that the painful bites the rats got in before you woke from a restless sleep to knock them away again were only the playful nips of a puppy, eager for your affection and your love, one that, maybe, your loving parents had bought you for your birthday. Not that Marta could remember her birthday—none at the orphanage had ever bothered to tell her, even if they had known it—and that wasn’t the point, anyway.
The point was that the truth might be a shield, but sometimes it was a flimsy one. Lies, she’d found, could be whatever kind of shield you needed them to be. If you told yourself you were dry and warm and safe long enough, then you might even start to believe it, might not feel, quite so much, the chilling rain or the hard stares of men who lurked in the shadows, waiting for an opportunity to take what little you had.
Lying offered an escape when there was none. So what if you had to make-believe the gentle hand patting you on the head, so what if you had to imagine the woman’s voice, warm with love and caring, telling you she loved you? Marta thought there were worse things than that, thought, too, that the truth was a worse thing. Brutal and sharp and unbending like the blades the men in the shadows sometimes carried, sometimes used on children too slow or too foolish to evade them.
Still, no amount of lying would get her and Sonya out of the carriage, no amount of imagining would make the two robed men with their hard, dead stares go away. Marta had seen other children, in other times, taken by men with just such stares, men who had made some irrevocable separation in their minds, making Marta—and those like her—not people, not anymore. Only things to be used and discarded as it suited them. She had relied on her wits—and her lies—to get her out of such situations before, far before the old god in the ragged clothes picked her, but now they failed her.
Now, she could not see past the truth, could not see around it, for it was too there, too real to be ignored. “What are you going to do with us?” she asked again. The men did not answer only watched her, a dim twinkle of what she thought might have been eagerness in their eyes. She sat back in the carriage bench, feeling small and terrified and cold. She did not ask the question again. She was afraid that, if she did, they just might answer it.
Chapter Eighteen
Orren leaned back, collapsing in his chair and letting his bishop’s medallion slip from where he’d been clutching it to fall heavily on his desk. He stared at it, panting, and then at his hand which had gone a deathly white—except for the design of the medallion which stood out red and angry in what appeared to be almost a brand on the inside of his palm. A torch and a hand holding it high, one of the symbols of Amedan, the God of Fire and Light and father of all the gods save Shira herself to whom he had been wed before the world began.
Had they known the truth, some might have thought it strange that Orren’s link to Shira, to communicating with the Goddess of the Wilds, was the symbol of the husband she so loathed, but Orren understood well enough. The goddess was powerful and wise, but she was not kind and, when it came to her husband, she possessed a cruelty unrivaled even by the world’s most savage beasts. She enjoyed perverting the things her husband held dear to her own uses, just as she had with men, making use of their baser desires, feeding them, until the worst of them became the nightlings with which she intended to destroy her husband’s creations.
Orren did not know why Shira hated her husband and his creations so much, and he did not spend much time considering it. Such matters were far above him. But he knew well why she’d chosen this particular medallion to be his focus, that which he might use to contact and commune with his goddess directly. It was the first
item of any real value Orren had ever owned, for after his escape from the light merchant—Alesh’s father—and his wife, Orren had been both rewarded and punished.
Rewarded for helping to rid the world of the two parents, two of the Light’s greatest agents against the Dark as well as leaving the boy, Alesh, future Chosen of Amedan, as an orphan. Punished, of course, for fleeing and leaving his brothers, including his leader of the time, to die at the hands of the light merchant and his wife. An unjust punishment. After all, it had been Bishop Deckard’s fault, not Orren’s, that they had failed to kill the others as he had been so intent on gloating before doing the job. The only reason the parents had died at all was because Orren had destroyed their light shed. If he had stayed, he would have died and to no purpose, for how could a dead man serve his goddess’s desires?
He had made his case once returning to those higher in Shira’s favor, explaining each of these things, but the fools—something he would never think to call them aloud—would not listen. Tesharna herself had not listened. They had all insisted he be punished for fleeing, labeling him a coward and banishing him to this backwater city in the middle of nowhere, so far from civilization to live out his days in exile. Their reward, such as it was, had been the medallion, marking him bishop, and for all the hate that Orren had held for them—still held for them—he did not hate the medallion. For it was a symbol of his worth, a symbol he had contributed to the goddess’s cause and, in so doing, been given charge over other men as Bishop Deckard had once so carelessly commanded him.
Given charge of what, exactly? he thought bitterly. A backwater city no one cares about? A familiar resentment rose in him. He alone had survived to tell of the parents fleeing into the dark; in fact, he was the sole reason they had in the first place. It was not his fault the nightlings had failed to kill the boy, not his fault the others had allowed Alesh, a frightened child, to make his way to Ilrika, and it was certainly not his fault the boy had been taken in by Chosen Olliman himself, raised and protected.
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