His tread was firmer as he returned to the sanatorium. He found that Hannah had moved Meren from the darkened cell to their more spacious and comfortable former quarters. Meren sprang up as soon as he entered and seized the sleeve of his tunic. 'I read a full scroll of hieroglyphics that the woman set for me,' he exclaimed, bursting with pride at his latest achievement. Even now he could not bring himself to use Hannah's name or title. 'Tomorrow she will remove the bandage for ever. Then I
will astonish you with how the colour has come to match the other, and how nimbly it moves. By the sweet breath of Isis, I declare I will soon be able to judge the flight of my arrows as accurately as I ever did.' His loquacity was a sure sign of his excitement. 'Then we shall escape this infernal place. I hate it here. There is something foul and detestable about it, and the people in it.'
'But see what they have done for you,' Taita pointed out.
Meren looked slightly abashed. 'I give most of the credit to you, Magus. It was you who brought me here, and saw me through this trial.'
That night, Meren stretched himself out on his mattress and, like a child, dropped into sleep. His snores were boisterous and carefree. Taita had grown so accustomed to them over the decades that to him they were a lullaby.
He closed his eyes, and the dreams that the hellish imp had placed in his mind returned. He tried to force himself back into consciousness, but they were too compelling. He could not break free. He could smell the perfume of warm, feminine flesh, feel silken swells and hollows rubbing against him, hear sweet voices heavy with desire whispering lascivious invitations. He felt wicked fingers touching and stroking, quick tongues licking, soft mouths sucking and hot, secret openings engulfing.
The impossible sensations in his missing parts rose up like a tempest.
They hovered at the brink, then faded away. He wanted them to return, his whole body craved release, but it stayed beyond his reach, racking and tormenting him.
'Let me be!' With a violent effort he tore himself free, and woke to find himself wet with sweat, his breath roaring harshly in his ears.
A shaft of moonlight slanted in through the high window in the opposite wall. He stood up shakily, went to the water jug and drank deeply. As he did so, his eyes fell upon his girdle and pouch where he had laid them as he prepared for sleep. The moonlight was falling directly upon the pouch. It was almost as though some outside influence was directing his attention to it. He picked it up and unfastened the drawstring, reached in and touched something so warm that it seemed to be alive. It moved beneath his fingertips. He jerked away his hand. By now he was fully awake. He held the mouth of the pouch open and turned it so that the moonbeam lit the interior. Something glowed in the bottom. He stared at it and watched the glow take an ethereal shape.
It was the sign of the five-padded cat's paw.
With care Taita reached once more into the pouch and brought out the tiny fragment of red rock that Hannah had removed from Meren's
eye socket. It still felt warm and glowed, but the cat's paw had disappeared.
He clasped it firmly in his hand. Immediately the disturbance of the dreams subsided.'
He went to the oil lamp in the corner of the room and turned up the wick. By its light he studied the tiny fragment of stone. The ruby sparkle of the crystals seemed to be alive. Gradually it dawned on him that the stone contained a tiny part of the essence of Eos. When she had driven the splinter into Meren's eye she must have endowed it with a trace of her magic.
I came so close to throwing it into the lake. Now I know for certain that something was waiting to receive it. He remembered the monstrous swirl he had seen beneath the surface of the water. Whether or not it was crocodile or fish, in reality that thing was another of her manifestations.
It seems that she places great importance on this insignificant fragment. I shall accord it the same respect.
Taita opened the locket lid of the Periapt and placed the little ruby stone in the nest of hair he had taken from Lostris in both her lives.
He felt stronger and more confident. Now I am better armed to go out against the witch.
In the morning his courage and resolve were undiminished.
No sooner had they broken their fast than Hannah arrived to inspect Meren's new eye. The colour of the iris had darkened and almost matched the original. When Meren focused on her finger as it moved from side to side or up and down both eyes tracked in unison.
After she had gone, Meren took up his bow and the embossed leather quiver of arrows, and went with Taita to the open field beside the lake.
Taita set up a target, a painted disc on a short pole, then stood to one side as Meren selected a new string for his bow, then rolled an arrow between his palms to test its symmetry and balance.
'Ready!' he called, and addressed the target. He drew and loosed. Even though the breeze coming across the lake moved it perceptibly in flight, the arrow struck less than a thumb's length from the centre.
'Allow for the wind,' Taita called. He had coached Meren in archery since the younger man had run the Red Road with Nefer Seti. Meren nodded in acknowledgement, then drew and loosed a second arrow. This one struck dead centre.
'Turn your back,' Taita ordered, and Meren obeyed. Taita brought the target twenty paces closer. 'Now turn and loose instantly.'
Moving lightly on his feet for such a big man, Meren obeyed. He had recovered the balance and poise he had lost when his eye was blinded.
The arrow swung slightly with the breeze, but he had allowed for that in his aim. His elevation was perfect. Again the arrow slammed into the bull's eye. They practised for the rest of the morning. Gradually Taita moved the target out to two hundred paces. Even at that range Meren placed three out of four arrows in an area the size of a man's chest.
When they stopped to eat the simple meal that an attendant brought them, Taita said, 'That is enough for one day. Let your arm and your eye rest. There is a matter I must attend to.'
