a killer, he succumbed far more swiftly than a strong man like yourself and now he is terrorising the lands around Lania, torturing, killing and maiming. With the war keeping our troops from the area, there is little that can be done to stop him.”
“Why tell me?”
The priest said nothing for a moment, averting his eyes from Druss’s direct gaze. “I have watched you,” he said at last. “Not just in the present, but through the past, from your birth through your childhood, to your marriage to Rowena and your quest to find her. You are a rare man, Druss. You have iron control over those areas of your soul which have a capacity for evil. And you have a dread of becoming like Bardan. Well, Cajivak is Bardan reborn. Who else can stop him?”
“I don’t have time to waste, priest. My wife is somewhere in these lands.”
The priest reddened and hung his head. His voice was a whisper, and there was shame in the words. “Recover the axe and I will tell you where she is,” he said.
Druss leaned back and stared long and hard at the slender man before him. “This is unworthy of you,” he observed.
The priest looked up. “I know.” He spread his hands. “I have no other… payment… to offer.”
“I could take hold of your scrawny neck and wring the truth from you,” Druss pointed out.
“But you will not. I know you, Druss.”
The warrior stood. “I’ll find the axe,” he promised. “Where shall we meet?”
“You find the axe - and I’ll find you,” the priest told him.
Alone in the dark, Druss remembered with bitterness the confidence he had felt. Find Cajivak, recover the axe, then find Rowena. So simple!
What a fool you are, he thought. His face itched and he scratched at the skin of his cheek, his grimy finger breaking a scab upon his cheek. A rat ran across his leg and Druss lunged for it, but missed. Struggling to his knees, he felt his head touch the cold stone of the ceiling.
Torchlight flickered as the guard moved down the corridor. Druss scrambled to the grille, the light burning his eyes. The jailer, whose face Druss could not see, bent and thrust a clay cup into the door-stone cavity. There was no bread. Druss lifted the cup and drained the water. “Still alive, I see,” said the jailer, his voice deep and cold. “I think the Lord Cajivak has forgotten about you. By the gods, that makes you a lucky man - you’ll be able to live down here with the rats for the rest of your life.” Druss said nothing and the voice went on, “The last man who lived in that cell was there for five years. When we dragged him out his hair was white and all his teeth were rotten. He was blind, and bent like a crippled old man. You’ll be the same.”
Druss focused on the light, watching the shadows on the dark wall. The jailer stood, and the light receded. Druss sank back.
No bread…
You’ll be able to live down here with the rats for the rest of your life. Despair struck him like a hammer blow.
Pahtai felt the pain recede as she floated clear of her plague-racked body. I am dying, she thought, but there was no fear, no surging panic, merely a peaceful sense of harmony as she rose into the air.
It was night, and the lanterns were lit. Hovering just below the ceiling, she gazed down on Michanek as he sat beside the frail woman in the bed, holding to her hand, stroking the fever-dry skin and whispering words of love. That is me, thought Pahtai, staring down at the woman.
“I love you, I love you,” whispered Michanek. “Please don’t die!”
He looked so tired, and Pahtai wanted to reach out to him. He was all the security and love she had ever known, and she recalled the first morning when she had woken in his home in Resha. She remembered the bright sunshine and the smell of jasmine from the gardens, and she knew that the bearded man sitting beside her should have been known to her. But when she reached into her mind she could find no trace of him. It was so embarrassing. “How are you feeling?” he had asked, the voice familiar but doing nothing to unlock her memory. She tried to think of where she might have met him. That was when the second shock struck, with infinitely more power than the first.
She had no memory! Nothing! Her face must have reacted to the shock, for he leaned in close and took her hand. “Do not concern yourself, Pahtai. You have been ill, very ill. But you are getting better now. I know that you do not remember me, but as time passes you will.” He turned his head and called to another man, tiny, slender and dark-skinned. “Look, here is Pudri,” said Michanek. “He has been worried about you.”
She had sat up then, and seen the tears in the little man’s eyes. “Are you my father?” she asked.
He shook his head. “I am your servant and your friend, Pahtai.”
“And you, sir,” she said, turning her gaze on Michanek. “Are you my… brother?”
He had smiled. “If that is what you wish, that is what I will be. But no, I am not your brother. Nor am I your master. You are a free woman, Pahtai.” Taking her hand, he kissed the palm, his beard soft as fur against her skin.
“You are my husband, then?”
“No, I am merely a man who loves you. Take my hand and tell me what you feel.”
She did so. “It is a good hand, strong. And it is warm.”
“You see nothing? No… visions?”
“No. Should I?”
He shook his head. “Of course not. It is only… that you were hallucinating when the fever was high. It just shows how much better you are.” He kissed her hand again.
Just as he was doing now. “I love you,” she thought, suddenly sad that she was about to die. She rose through
