'You must release the cloak to make a new Guardian. That is the gods' will.'
Anji bore the daybreak without flinching. 'I will, once our enemies are vanquished. As long as our enemies walk, they may corrupt any cloak newly come into power.'
'How can we confine a Guardian's holy cloak?'
'In a chest wrapped with chains. Hidden away where it cannot be easily found.' He turned away, speaking as he went. 'Best we move quickly, Commander. We'll lose the element of surprise soon enough.'
Joss spun, grabbing for Anji's arm. As Joss's hand darted out,
Anji threw up an arm and slapped his hand away hard, then caught himself, took a step back, and deliberately relaxed. Toughid came running, pulled up to a walk, halted at a distance, a hand on his sword's hilt.
'My apologies,' said Anji. 'The hour is early. You startled me.'
Joss shook off the ache in his hand and stepped in close. Anji did not react as Joss grasped the captain's forearm. He was taller than Anji, although the captain was sturdier. They'd both seen a lot of death, Joss supposed; they'd both trained in a hard school. Yet for the first time Joss wondered what would happen if they were forced to a fight.
A fight over what? Anji's beautiful wife? The hells!
'There is just one thing,' Joss said, easing off the grip and stepping back to show he wasn't meaning to threaten. 'Lord Radas, the cloak of Night, Blood, Leaf — and this other one you-' The word stuck in his throat, and after all he could not say killed. He swallowed. 'Those alone are targets. The woman who wears the cloak of Death is not our enemy.'
'Those who warned us cannot be our enemies, can they?' Anji's steady gaze never left Joss's face.
'No.'
'Not unless they become corrupted by the sorcery that offers them so much power,' added Anji.
Marit's own words — I don't desire oblivion. Therefore I am already corrupt — haunted Joss, not Anji's reddened face. Anji had done what must be done: Lord Radas and his allies must be stopped; there was no other way than the way the other Guardians had freely offered them, however impious it was. But what if the corruption, like a cholera spreading through a town, had already worked its shadow into those who did not yet know they were sick? What if corruption was inevitable?
When they arrived late that day to Horn Hall, weary, foul-smelling, and coaxing exhausted eagles to perches for a rest and a haunch of meat, a reeve out of Argent Hall was waiting with a message from Olossi. He did not even wait for them to come inside but bounded forward to offer the message to Anji.
Anji unrolled the scrap of paper to reveal a script Joss did not recognize. His eyes scanned the words swiftly. The flare of emotion was as edged as that of a sharp-set eagle so angry it cannot reason.
His expression smoothed to implacability as he studied the words again. His lips tightened. He glanced toward Toughid, who watched him with a gaze that took in every least reaction, measured and prepared to act at Anji's command. Secondarily, he glanced at Tohon, who was standing with Kesta at the ledge's grand wall, pointing toward the Lend at something Joss couldn't see. Anji glanced again over the message. He lifted a hand, signaling to Toughid, who ambled over while scooping his flint out of the pouch. He snapped sparks, coaxed-^ flare with a bit of dried moss, then applied the flame to the message. The paper caught, and Anji released it, fire consuming as it spun down. The white scraps Anji ground into the stone with the heel of his boot.
He turned to Joss, the bundle hanging at his back swaying with his movement. 'I must return to Olossi at once. Ready your reeves. Keep the lines of communication open with our allies. Prepare a storeroom here with padding for oil of naya. We'll send the first vessels up via flights from Naya and Argent Halls. The army will march out of Olossi as soon as I reach there to give the command.'
30
With Atani braced on her hip, Mai watched Priya hoist a scant bundle of possessions across her narrow back.
The woman smiled gently. 'I will come every day, Mistress, in time to say the dawn prayers with you,' she said in the steady voice Mai had come to depend on. 'It's just O'eki and I would like a little cottage of our own.'
A hundred words wished to flood from Mai's tongue, but she held them back. Atani frowned thoughtfully at her, catching her mood.
Don't leave me.
You are the one I depend on.
What if you decide never to return?
She had to smile as Priya took her leave, departing through the garden gate, which Chief Tuvi closed and barred and latched behind her. He exchanged a few words with the guard on duty. In the fading light, he ambled over to Mai. He touched a finger to Atani's soft, dark cheek, offering with both hands to take him, but the baby turned his face into Mai's taloos and gripped his mother more tightly.
'He's afraid you'll take him away, too,' muttered Mai.
Tuvi rubbed at the corner of an eye. He scuffed a boot on the gravel walkway. He took in a deep breath of the garden, still blooming because it was watered: the sweet haze of purple-thorn, now fading as the last flowers withered; the slightly bitter taste of tallowberry in its neatly trimmed ranks.
'You can hire a night nurse,' he said. 'Or purchase one.'
'No one I can trust,' said Mai. 'I will bring Miravia back from Astafero.'
He whistled softly, a falling note.
Was he blushing? 'Do you like her, Chief?'
He sighed.
'Neh, never mind. I would never have said anything if all that hadn't happened, and that awful Keshad hadn't blurted out all those things, like he has only to wish something and it must be true. I don't like him!' She wiped her running nose with the back of her hand, and sniffed. Because Priya had gone.
'It's just down the street,' said Tuvi. 'A room in a block with a small courtyard. A hundred steps will bring her here.'
'She's free to do as she wishes.' It's just she hadn't thought Priya would desert her. For half of Mai's life, Priya had been a constant presence, the one comfort she could rely on.
'Mistress?' Sheyshi padded out into the garden, carrying a lamp. 'Are you coming in? Did that wicked woman desert you?'
'She did not desert me, Sheyshi. You aren't to say so. Priya and O'eki have every right to set up their own household. I'm just fortunate they have agreed to continue in my employ, for I am sure I don't know — what I would do — without them-' The words choked her. Atani reared back to stare at her, looking perplexed.
'But Mistress-'
'Sheyshi,' said Tuvi, his tone like a slap, 'go inside now. We'll want to eat as soon as we come in.'
Sheyshi fled, taking the lamp with her. If only Sheyshi had been the one to go, instead of Priya!
'Oh, Tuvi-lo.' She let the tears flow, and after a while the tears were all shed and she pressed Atani's precious body against her as he patted at her wet cheeks with his chubby little hands and tasted the moisture that coated his tiny fingers. 'I'm ready to go in. You won't leave me, will you?'
'Hu! A question not to be asked. Come, Mistress. Dinner awaits.'
'I'm not hungry!'
'Of course you are.'
How awful she was even to think of poor Sheyshi in that unpleasant way, because Sheyshi had nowhere to go and no one to go with. It wasn't her fault she so lacked charm and warmth that not one of the Qin soldiers — those who hadn't yet chosen wives from among local women — had expressed the least desire to consider Sheyshi, young as she was, for a wife.
'It's done,' she murmured, 'and done for the best.'
'If you say so, Mistress.'
