'If I had,' Heboric continued after a moment, 'I would be able to stay at your side, to offer what protection I could — though wondering why I bothered, granted. Yet I would.'
'What are you babbling about?'
'I am fevered. The D'ivers has poisoned me, lass. And it wars with the other strangers in my soul — I do not know if I shall survive this, Felisin.'
She barely heard him. Her attention had been pulled away by a scuffing sound. Someone was approaching, haltingly, a stagger and a scrape of pebbles. Felisin pushed herself to her feet to face the sound.
Heboric fell silent, his head cocked.
The figure that emerged from the ochre mist sank talons into her sanity. She heard a whimper from her own throat.
Baudin was burned, gnawed, parts completely eaten away. He had been charred down to the bone in places, and the heat had swelled the gases in his belly, bloating him until he looked with child, the skin and flesh cracked open. There was nothing left of his features except ragged holes where his eyes, nose and mouth should have been. Yet Felisin knew it was him.
He staggered another step closer, then slowly sank down to the ground.
'What is it?' Heboric demanded in a hiss. 'This time I am truly blind — who has come?'
'No-one,' Felisin said after a long moment. She walked slowly to the thing that had once been Baudin. She sank down into the warm sand, reached out and lifted his head, cradled it on her thighs.
He was aware of her, reaching up an encrusted, fused hand to hover a moment near her elbow before falling back. He spoke, each word like rope on rock. 'I thought… the fire … immune.'
'You were wrong,' she whispered, an image of armour within her suddenly cracking, fissures spreading. And beneath it, behind it, something was building.
'My vow.'
'Your vow.'
'Your sister …'
'Tavore.'
'She-'
'Don't. No, Baudin. Say nothing of her.'
He drew a ragged breath. 'You …'
Felisin waited, hoping the life would flee this husk, flee it now, before-
'You … were … not what I expected …'
Armour can hide anything until the moment it falls away. Even a child. Especially a child.
There was nothing to distinguish sky from earth. Gold stillness had embraced the world. Stones pattered down the trail as Fiddler pulled himself onto the crest, the clatter appallingly loud to his ears.
He wiped sweaty dust from his brow. Hood's
Mappo emerged from the haze ahead. The huge Trell's exhaustion made his walk more of a shamble than usual. His eyes were red-rimmed, the lines that bracketed his prominent canines were deeply etched into his weathered skin. 'The trail winds ever onward,' he said, crouching beside the sapper. 'I believe she's with her father now — they walk together. Fiddler..' He hesitated.
'Aye. The Whirlwind goddess …'
'There is … expectancy … in the air.'
Fiddler grunted at the understatement.
'Well,' Mappo sighed after a moment, 'let us join the others.'
Icarium had found a flat stretch of rock surrounded by large boulders. Crokus sat with his back against stone, watching the Jhag laying out foodstuffs in the centre. The expression the young Daru swung to the sapper when he arrived belonged to a much older man. 'She's not turning back,' Crokus said.
Fiddler said nothing, unslinging his crossbow and setting it down.
Icarium cleared his throat. 'Come and eat, lad,' he said. 'The realms are overlapping, and all is possible … including the unexpected. Distress over what has not yet happened avails you nothing. In the meantime, the body demands sustenance, and it will do none of us good if you've no reserves of energy when comes the time to act.'
'It's already too late,' Crokus muttered, but he clambered to his feet nonetheless.
'There is too much mystery in this path to be certain of anything,' Icarium replied. 'Twice we have travelled warrens — their aspects I cannot say. They felt ancient and fragmented, woven into the very rock of Raraku. At one point I smelled the sea…'
'As did I,' Mappo said, shrugging his broad shoulders.
'More and more,' Crokus said, 'her journey takes a tack where such things as rebirth become more probable. I am right in that, aren't I?'
'Perhaps,' Icarium conceded. 'Yet, this pensive air hints at uncertainty as well, Crokus. Be mindful of that.'
'Apsalar is not seeking to flee us,' Mappo said. 'She is lead' ing us. What significance should we place in that? With her godly gifts she could easily mask her trail — that shadow-wrought residue that, to Icarium and to myself, is as plain and undisguised as an Imperial road.'
'There might be something else besides,' Fiddler muttered. Faces swung his way. He drew a deep breath, let it out slowly. 'The lass knows our intent, Crokus — what Kalam and I had planned and what is still — as far as I know — being followed. She could well have taken the notion that by assuming the guise of Sha'ik, she can… indirectly… support our efforts. In a manner wholly her own rather than that of the god who once possessed her.'
Mappo smiled wryly. 'There is much you've held from myself and Icarium, soldier.'
'An Imperial matter,' the sapper said, not meeting the Trell's eyes.
'Yet one that sees advantage in this land's rebellion.'
'Only in the short run, Mappo.'
'In becoming Sha'ik reborn, Apsalar will not simply be engaging in a change of costume, Fiddler. The cause of the goddess will take hold of Apsalar's mind, her soul. Such visions and visitations will
'She may not realize that particular possibility, I'm afraid.'
'She's not a fool,' Crokus snapped.
'I'm not saying she is,' Fiddler replied. 'Like it or not, Apsalar possesses something of a god's arrogance — I was witness to the full force of that back on Genabackis, and I can see that its stain still resides within her. Consider her present decision to leave Iskaral's temple, alone, in pursuit of her father.'
'In other words,' Mappo said, 'you think she might believe she can withstand the influence of the goddess, even as she assumes the role of prophetess and warleader.'
Crokus scowled. 'My mind's tumbling from one thing to the next. What if the patron god of assassins has reclaimed her? What will it mean if the rebellion is suddenly led by Cotillion — and, by extension, Ammanas? The dead Emperor returns to wreak vengeance.'
There was silence. Fiddler had been gnawing on that possibility like an obsessed hound since it had occurred to him days earlier. The notion of a murdered Emperor turned Ascendant suddenly reaching out from the shadows to reclaim the Imperial throne was anything but a pleasant prospect. It was one thing seeking to assassinate Laseen — that was, in the end, a mortal affair. Gods ruling a mortal Empire, on the other hand, would draw other Ascendants, and in such a contest entire civilizations would be destroyed.
They finished their meal without another word spoken.
The dust filling the air refused to settle; it simply hung motionless, hot and lifeless. Icarium repacked the supplies. Fiddler strode over to Crokus.
'No value in fretting, lad. She's found her father, after all these years — there's something to be said for that, don't you think?'
The Daru's smile was wry. 'Oh, I've thought on that, Fid. And yes, I am happy for her, yet mistrustful. What should have been a wondrous reunion has been compromised. By Iskaral Pust. By Shadow's manipulation. It's soured everything-'
