'Elspeth's knife?' the man repeated, scowling ferociously. 'Demons take it, I knew that thing was going to come back to haunt us!'
Karal started to shiver, when he happened to look down to see just what painting he had snatched up as an impromptu shield.
Ulrich's warm, amused eyes gazed up at him; he froze for a moment, then burst into tears.
Sixteen
:Are you sure that you're ready for this?: Altra asked anxiously. :This is going to be very dangerous for you.:
Karal shrugged, and shook his head.
'Actually, I'm quite sure that I'm not at all ready for a confrontation like this,' he admitted to the Firecat. 'But we just don't have a choice. An'desha needs help; besides being afraid of allowing his emotions free play, he's locking down his anger because he is certain that if he lets it go, he'll use his powers to hurt whoever he's angry at. The problem with doing that is that it just makes things harder for him the next time he's angry.' Karal rubbed the side of his nose thoughtfully. 'He has to discover that 'control' doesn't always mean 'containment.' He's got to see that the simplest solution isn't always the right one.'
The Firecat washed a paw thoughtfully. :I saw how he was when they told him how near you'd come to being killed—both times,: he said. :Terrible anger—then nothing. He just turned it all inside himself.:
'Terrible anger is dangerous when you are—or were—an Adept who specialized in destruction,' Karal said grimly. 'Someone has to prove to him that he can lose his temper and his self-control, vent his emotions, and not hurt anyone in the process. Then he'll feel safe enough to go after those very emotional memories of Adept Ma'ar and learn all the destructive magic that Ma'ar knew. Firesong thinks the Ma'ar memories are important; I know that they have to be the key to this situation. I can't tell you why I'm so certain, I only know that I am.'
Hurry, hurry, hurry. That sense of terrible urgency made him as tight as a strung crossbow. The sense that time was running out on them was stronger than ever.
:But are you the best person to do that?: Altra asked, with complete logic. :Shouldn't it be someone who's also a mage, who can defend against his attack if he should lash out? He can turn you into a cinder, and you haven't got any kind of protection.: The Firecat looked up at him with large, bottomless blue eyes, full of candor and concern. :I'm not completely certain even I could protect you against his full power, in a killing rage.:
Karal sighed. 'That's why it has to be me. It has to be someone so completely vulnerable that An'desha knows that person is defenseless. It has to be someone who knows An'desha well enough to make him rage with anger in a very short time. Firesong won't do, Firesong could hold his own against any attack An'desha could launch, and what would that prove? And it has to be done, because if it isn't, I think he'll be incinerated. Talia and Firesong both agree with me. If he keeps turning his anger inward, one day his power will turn inward as well, and it will consume him.'
:And besides,: Altra added, :he's your friend.:
'That's right,' Karal agreed. 'He's my friend. Friends help friends. We're both strangers in this Valdemar place. Sometimes friends are all we have.'
He didn't have to mention all the nights this past week that An'desha had held him while he wept out his grief for Ulrich; Altra knew all about that, since he'd been there. He didn't say a word about the thousand little kindnesses that An'desha had shown him since—and the way he had gently deflected Firesong's resulting jealousy. None of that really mattered anyway. What did matter was that An'desha needed help, and it was help that Karal could give him.
In the larger picture, if he didn't help An'desha, they might never have their 'breakwaters' to use against the disruption-waves. The latest one had caught at least one large animal that Karal knew of, turning it into a monstrous killer that had savaged an entire herd of cattle before twenty men shot it full of arrows. Word had trickled back that the Tayledras Vales were suffering damage to their special shielding. According to Master Levy, the engineers and mathematicians had constructed a pattern of increasing power to these waves. Natoli had explained it to him, and he had felt the jaws of time closing on them. Something had to be done, and done quickly.
It had taken Karal the better part of the afternoon to work up the courage to face this particular trial. It had been relatively easy to steel his nerve to face a possible enemy, but to have to face a friend who just might kill him—that took a different kind of courage altogether.
Now, though, he was as prepared as he was ever likely to be. An'desha was hiding down in the tent in the garden, already shaken by a preparatory confrontation with Firesong, carefully planned and choreographed by Karal and the Healing Adept beforehand. The effects of the last disruption-wave were over, which meant there would be no interference from that quarter. Now, if ever, was the perfect moment.
