“Yes,” she answered, steadying him now as he began to tremble violently. She took his sword before it dropped from his hand. “My tresh,” she said, her eyes full of wonder, “it is within you. Your blood sings.”
Numbly, Reza nodded his head. The thundering in his body had abated to a basso thrum. He fell down to his knees, his system reeling. “I have a soul,” he whispered, his eyes lost in hers. “I have a soul.”
Esah-Zhurah kissed him long and hard, then held him tightly as her own soul rejoiced at what they now knew, at the melody that had suddenly burst forth from her lover. Every soul ever born of Her blood that had not fallen from Her grace had its own voice, but Reza’s was different from all of the others in a way that she could not define, but that she accepted as Her blessing in their final hour.
But joy was not the only emotion to be found in the falling rain.
With Esah-Zhurah’s supporting arm around his waist, Reza made his way to the formless heap of flesh that was all that was left of his beloved friend.
“Goliath,” he breathed as he knelt next to the stricken animal. Taking off his gauntlets, he ran his hands over the fur of the old beast.
“I am sorry, Reza,” Esah-Zhurah said softly. “He was a noble creature. I grieve with you for his loss.”
Goliath had been much more than a simple beast of burden or a pet. He had been his friend. Reza had often spent long hours talking to him when he was lonely, in the days when even Esah-Zhurah treated him as an animal, in the days when he had no one. No one except Goliath, who had always been there, who would listen to his troubles without complaint, contentedly munching on the plants Reza gave him as a treat. The quiet tears Reza shed for his fallen friend mingled with the rain, watering the earth with his sorrow.
“We must go soon, Reza,” Esah-Zhurah said gently.
Reza nodded. “Good-bye, old friend,” he whispered.
“There is something we must do first,” she told him. Getting to his feet, instinctively replacing his gauntlets, he followed her to where the genoth’s head lay stretched upon the rain- and blood-soaked ground. “I hope we are not too late.”
“Too late for what?” Reza asked.
Esah-Zhurah did not answer him directly. Instead, she took out the knife that had brought them together, the blade once held by the Empress, and pried at a strange-looking scale above the genoth’s blown-out eye. After digging it out of the dead animal’s flesh, she held it out to the rain, letting the falling drops cleanse it before handing it to Reza.
“It is an eyestone,” she explained. “You cannot see it now, but it should be brightly colored when held up to the light, like a mineral stone. Only this species is known to have them, one over each eye. They are terribly rare, for the beast must be only freshly killed for the colors to remain visible. It does not show while alive, nor after the animal has been dead more than a few moments.” She was already moving to the other side to remove the remaining stone. “Long ago, they used to be valued greatly among our people as signs of courage. They are still terribly valuable in such a sense, but the Empress forbade the ritual killing of these beasts long ago, that they may continue to live in honor of the old ways.”
“You mean,” Reza said, “that the wastelands are filled with them?”
“Yes, according to Her laws. The wastelands are given to the creatures that dwell there. For us, it is a place forbidden. But this one,” she gestured at the dead genoth, “trespassed upon our domain, and so is rightly ours to claim.” She put the stones in a pouch and then held her face up to the rain for a moment, luxuriating in the cool water. It would quickly become a nuisance on the long trek home on foot.
“Come,” she said. “It is time to return home.”
Fourteen
E’ira-Kurana was the first to spot them. “There!” she cried, pointing toward the two ragged figures trudging toward the kazha.
Tesh-Dar stepped forward, her eyes narrowed into tight slits against the glare of the sun. The human’s Bloodsong had grown in strength as the night had worn on, clearly audible to the senses of her spirit. Only with the greatest of difficulty did she restrain herself from signaling for the two to come to her on the run.
Tesh-Dar’s fists were clenched tight in anticipation, the muscles standing out on her arms like bands of steel as the two young warriors passed through the ancient stone gateway. As they made their way through the throng that had gathered to meet them, Tesh-Dar felt at once proud and afraid. Proud that she had taken a weak human who had had nothing to give but his life, and made him into a warrior respectable in all ways save his blood. And afraid that the origin of the song in his heart was not entirely of human origin, and what must happen if this was so.
As the two came near, dropping to their knees to salute her, she knew the truth. All of it. She could smell the human’s scent on Esah-Zhurah, and she knew instantly that she had disobeyed Tesh-Dar’s orders and touched the human in a way that she found entirely repugnant. And her mind did not have to probe far into the young warrior’s soul to discover the rest of it; she did not have to ask Esah-Zhurah to know that there were matching wounds on their hands from the ceremony Esah-Zhurah had performed. For a moment, the priestess was overcome with the temptation to kill them both outright, but she reluctantly stayed her hand. Other things were already afoot, and to kill the two now would not make the situation any brighter.
“Greetings, priestess,” Esah-Zhurah ventured.
Tesh-Dar’s eyes were hard and her mouth was set in a grim line that reminded Esah-Zhurah of the faces carved in the entryways to many of the buildings in the City. The great priestess was not at all pleased.
“What am I to do, child?” she asked, her voice barely audible above the light breeze. But it was not a solicitation for advice. “Have you cast aside your commitment to the Way, to the Empress?” Her eyes were stony, accusatory. One of her duties was to dispatch justice in the name of the Empress, and it was not one she accepted lightly. Esah-Zhurah was to be given every chance to defend herself, but the evidence against her was already overwhelming. Esah-Zhurah opened her mouth to speak, but Tesh-Dar cut her off with a sharp gesture. “Silence,” she hissed, pondering how she would handle the matter. “I would see you in my chambers, now.” Both of them got to their feet and turned to go, but Tesh-Dar put a massive hand roughly on Reza’s chest. “Not you, human.”
Reza bowed his head. “Yes, priestess,” he whispered, trembling inside. It appeared that his fate would not be so clean-cut after all, and he was terribly afraid that Esah-Zhurah had sacrificed her own future, as well.
In Tesh-Dar’s quarters, Esah-Zhurah kneeled and told the priestess everything. She would not, could not lie.
Before her, Tesh-Dar paced in a seething rage. “I do not understand, child,” she was saying, speaking more to herself than the fearful young woman. “You used a sacred ritual of another order – of
“Reza carries the eyestones in the pouch I gave him,” Esah-Zhurah whispered, any fear she had for incurring Tesh-Dar’s wrath drowned in the shame she felt at the priestess’s sense that she had been betrayed. But there was no shame in Esah-Zhurah for loving Reza, for doing what she had done. It had all felt… right to her, and had she to do it all again, she would change nothing.
“Have you anything else to add,” Tesh-Dar said stonily, “before I pass judgment upon you?”
“Yes, my priestess.”
“Speak, then.”
