Jaran

'And yet-' She turned her head to look at him. 'Yet you rode through their lands and into-into this? Why?''

The dim illumination made his complexion ashen and bloodless except for the shaded hollows of his eyes. 'It's a kind of madness,' he said, as softly as the merest brush of wind.

'No,' she said, equally quietly, because she felt impelled to reassure him. But she knew that to be the kind of man he was, doing what he meant to do, he had indeed to be infected with a kind of madness, a fire that would burn inward and outward until, in the end, he would be consumed and his people transformed on the anvil of change. 'No, it's a kind of honor.'

He turned his head slowly and met her eyes. 'Do you think so?'

'Yes.'

'Death should not be unwelcome to the honorable man.'

Tess felt her insides tighten. She found it difficult to speak. ' 'You once told me you had no intention of dying in battle.'' He gazed at her, the two of them oblivious for that instant to all that surrounded them. Not me, she thought, I'm not going to get burnt in that fire. And then shook her head, disgusted at her own train of thought.

He shook himself as well and smiled, straightening his back. 'Did I mention dying?' he asked, his tone light.

Tess attempted a laugh.

'I sent Josef up the back trail,' he continued conversationally, 'to discover if it can indeed take us out. The pilgrims can look at the site tonight. In the morning, if the trail is good, we'll ride out that way, though I'll have to leave four archers behind to cover our retreat.''

'Who will you leave?'

'Mikhal, Tadheus, Konstans-'

'I'm better than Konstans.'

'' You're not included

'Who's the fourth?'

'l am.'

'Of course,' she said softly. 'Where did you learn to shoot so well?'

'In Jeds. I know how to shoot to kill a man. May the gods forgive me.'

'Why don't jaran men use bows and arrows in battle?'

'Arrows in battle. That's a grim thought.' Below, at the neck of the gorge, there was a slight movement. Stillness, a flash of light hair. Bakhtiian began to speak again. 'The plains are as wide as you can see, and there is space to run. There is nothing to defend, except your kin and your honor, and honor rests in facing your opponent in a land where you could just as well flee.'

'In this land, between these walls, you'll be dead before you can reach the man you're trying to kill.'

'Do you wonder at our enmity?'

'No. I don't wonder.'

'Look. The pilgrims have gone down. Just as I suggested to them. A surprise, don't you agree?'

She looked down to the right, where a light moved among the ruins on the far side, against the slide, dipping up and down. They were looking for something.

'Good God.' She felt blood drain from her face. What if the symbols on the wall were Chapalii, worn away by time-but they could not have been here that long-worn away by some inexplicable confrontation, then. She had seen, she had touched, their transmitter with her own hands. She had found a fragment of a metallurgy too sophisticated for Rhuian development. What if the transmitter wasn't a single anomaly set up in the last five years to prepare for this expedition? A whole cluster, perhaps dating from the first years after the League's discovery of the planet, or from immediately after Charles's ennobling and his receipt of the system. Set up to monitor him. And if he was disseminating the odd volume of Newton and Aristotle, what else might he be surreptitiously doing that violated his own interdiction order? What if the Chapalii had set up monitoring positions to incriminate him? It made sense.

She needed proof.

'I have to go,' she said, staring down at the light. She took one step away.

'No.' He stopped her with his voice alone. 'Don't go. Please.'

She turned back slowly, her throat tight, flushing along her neck and cheeks. She could just make out his face in the moonlight as he watched her, and she trembled, sure that he was afraid that this might be his last night on earth. What would she do if he asked her to spend it with him? God knows, he's attractive enough, she thought; men like him always are.

'If you don't disturb them now,' he continued, 'then there will be no trouble about leaving before dawn tomorrow. But if you interrupt them, what will I do to convince them to go?'

She recovered her normal breathing, sure that it was fear that made her overreact in this way, cursing herself inwardly for forgetting everything she knew about jaran men. About this man in particular. 'Surely when you tell them about this army, they'll agree to run,' she said, knowing that the Chapalii could easily defend themselves against a hundred men, that they would, without hesitation. Missile weapons. She did not know whether to laugh or cry, thinking of it. And which would hurt Charles more-that she not investigate here now, or that she let the confrontation come and force the Chapalii to reveal what kind of magic, what kind of utterly superior weaponry, they possessed?

Bakhtiian stared beyond her at the disembodied, flame-less light moving below them. 'It has been said before that the khepellis control great powers. Magical powers. I have no use for magic.' He broke off. 'Not any more. Can't you wait until the shrine of Morava? We'll be there for a hand of days. Enough time for spying, I should think.' But it was said without heat or accusation.

Enough time for spying. In a way, it was almost as if he knew what she was thinking, as if he were offering her a way out, an excuse to follow his lead and exercise restraint now for the promise of a later chance. And she found that against his asking, she could not refuse. 'If we get that far,' she said, though she knew the very words sealed the agreement, that she would not disturb the Chapalii, not at this time and in this place.

'Be assured,' said Bakhtiian coolly, 'that I do not intend to die here.' He turned away from her to return to the fires, as if, she thought with sudden bitterness, now that he has what he wants, the conversation no longer interests him.

Yuri woke her. It was quiet, damp, cold, and still dark. She lay still for a moment, hearing the soft sound of whispers, and horses, and of leather creaking and rustling against cloth.

'Get up, Tess,' Yuri said in a low but urgent voice. 'We have to get the horses saddled.'

'Are we leaving now? There's barely enough light to see by.'

'When Josef gets back.'

'Yuri, what if that trail is a dead end?'

'It can't be. It just can't be. Come on, you're one of the last.'

'The khepelli?'

'They're ready. I don't even think they slept. Niko has them.' He pointed, and Tess could faintly make out a group of men saddling horses, all gray and dim. Then he grabbed her hand and pulled her roughly to her feet. 'Tess! Don't you understand? A khaja army is down there, waiting to kill us.'

'Are they already attacking?' The last dregs of sleep vanished, obliterated by adrenaline.

'No.' He looked back, but all was silence and darkness below. 'Not until daybreak. They hate us, but they also fear us. It's bad enough having to come up that path one by one, without it being dark as well. Ilya has fifteen men along the lower wall with him. The rest of us will go when Josef returns, then the fifteen from below-'

'And last the four archers?'

'Yes. Last.' A horse whinnied softly. 'I'm a better archer than Konstans. But he says I'm to go with you and Niko.'

Tess thought, he's doing that for me. She said, 'If only you had bows for everyone. If only you could all shoot well.'

'It isn't honorable,' Yuri began, but he hesitated. 'They are only khaja, after all.' He put out a hand and Tess took it and laid it on her cheek. It was cold. 'I don't know what we'll do if we lose Bakhtiian.'

'Neither do I,' she replied. They saddled their horses in silence and herded the rest to the base of the trail.