Lines creased her brow. 'What are you talking about?'
'The match earlier today. You were losing. You got angry. You quit on me, Del. You threw down your sword and walked away.'
Astonishment was manifest. 'I have never walked away from a match in my life!'
'Earlier today,' I insisted. How could she have forgotten?
Del recoiled. Pale brows knit together. I saw surprise and worry. 'But we didn't. . .' She changed direction. 'Was that your dream?'
'It wasn't a dream, bascha.'
She shook her head slowly, as if trying to work out a multitude of thoughts. 'There was no match earlier.' Almost absently, she added, 'Something's wrong. Something inside you.'
I found it preposterous. 'Del—'
She overrode me. 'We haven't sparred since that first time, Tiger. Five days ago. That's the only time we've sparred. Five days ago. Two days after you got here.'
I gritted my teeth, verging on frustration. 'Earlier today,' I repeated. 'We had an argument in the circle, as we sparred. You quit on me.'
Del sat back, putting distance between us. Astonishment had faded. Now she stared. Examined me. Evaluated. Comprehension crept into her eyes. 'Tiger … we need to leave this place. We need to go.'
'Oziri says—'
'I don't care what Oziri says!' She lowered her voice with a glance at the open doorflap. 'We have to leave. Tomorrow, first thing.'
'You're not ready to leave, bascha. You need to rest.'
'You need to get away from here,' she countered. 'And I've rested enough. Trust me.'
Oziri had said that. Trust me. 'There are still things I have to do,' I explained. 'Things I need to learn. Oziri says—'
Del pronounced an expletive concerning Oziri that nearly made my ears roll up. With crisp efficiency she began to gather up her belongings. 'We're going. Tomorrow.'
'I'm not done learning what I need to know. I realize it's difficult for you to understand, but there are things about me that are—different. Things—'
'Yes! Different! Wrong. That's my whole point.' Del stopped packing. She moved close, sat on her heels, reached up to trap my head in her hands. The heels cradled my temples. 'Listen to me, Tiger. To me, not to the things Oziri has put in your head. Or to what you believe happened.' Her eyes caught my own and held them. 'You're right: I don't understand this dream-walking. But what I do know is that it's changing you. You spend most of each day inside your own head. You don't hear anything I say. You answer no questions. You don't even acknowledge I'm present. It's as though your body's here, but your mind is somewhere else. And what you've just told me, this conviction we sparred earlier today—you're confusing reality with what's in your mind. With the dreams. You have to stop.'
'I have to learn how to control it, bascha.'
Del leaned forward. Our foreheads met. Her skin was smooth, cool. 'Let it go,' she murmured. 'Let it go, Tiger. It's Vashni magic.'
'It's just another tool—'
'Magic,' she repeated, 'and you know how you hate magic.'
'If I don't learn to control it, it will control me.'
She released my head, ran one supple, callused hand through my hair, almost as if I were a muddled child in need of soothing. 'It's controlling you now, Tiger. Every time you go inside yourself.'
'It's just stillness,' I told her. 'It's like ioSkandic discipline. What happened to me atop the spire, in the Stone Forest …' I shrugged. 'Well, you know.'
Del's hands fell away. 'I don't know what happened to you atop the spire,' she said. 'You've never told me.'
My brows lifted. 'You were there with me.'
'No.'
'Del, you were. I saw you. I dreamed you, and you came.' And put the jivatma scar back into my abdomen, after Sahdri had lifted it.
The color ran out of her face. 'No, Tiger. I was never in Meteiera. I never saw the Stone Forest. I stayed in Skandi until Prima Rhannet's ship sailed.' Something flinched in her eyes. 'We all thought you were dead.'
'You were there, Del. I remember it clearly.' So very clearly. I was naked. Alone. Bereft of everything I'd known of myself, whelped again atop the rock. Until she came. 'You were there.'
Del shook her head.
'You're forgetting things,' I told her, beginning to worry. 'What happened in Meteiera a few weeks ago, and the sparring match earlier today. Maybe if you talked with Oziri—'
'No.' Her tone was certainty followed by puzzlement. 'Tiger, we left Skandi months ago. Not weeks. And we sparred five days ago. Not since. Certainly not this morning.'
I opened my mouth to refute the claim, but she sealed it closed with cool fingers.
'Listen to me.' Her eyes searched mine. 'Trust me.'
I had trusted this woman with my life more times than I could count. I was troubled that she could be so terribly confused, but I nodded. I owed her that much.
'I need to go,' she said. 'I need to leave. Will you come with me:
'Why do you need to leave? You're safe here. You're the Oracle's sister. They'd never harm you.'
'I need to leave,' she repeated. 'I promised Neesha we'd meet him.'
It took me a moment to remember the kid. Then I frowned. 'You don't owe him anything.'
Her voice hardened. 'I owe him my life, Tiger. And so do you.'
'Maybe so, but—'
'It's time for me to leave,' she said. 'Will you come with me?'
'Del—'
'Please, Tiger. I need you.'
The desire to refuse, to insist she stay with me, was strong. I felt its tug, its power. Leaned into it a moment, tempted. I owed a debt to the Vashni for tending her, and Oziri had much to teach me. But I owed a greater debt to the kid for keeping her alive so she could be tended.
She'd said she needed me. That was very unlike Del. Something serious was wrong with her.
With her. Not with me.
I nodded. 'All right, bascha. We'll go.'
Del averted her head abruptly and returned to packing. But not before I saw profound relief and the sheen of tears in her eyes.
TWENTY-TWO
THE STUD, for some reason, didn't want me near him. I found it decidedly odd; he can be full of himself and recalcitrant, but not generally difficult to catch and bridle. When I finally did manage both, I noted the rolling eye and pinned ears. He quivered from tension, from something akin to fear, until Del came out to saddle the gelding. Then he quieted.
'He knows, too,' she said.
I tossed blankets up on the stud's back. 'Knows what?'
'That things are not right.'
I had no time for oblique comments and obscure conversations. I had agreed to go, but I regretted it. 'Things are what they are.'
'For now,' she murmured, and turned her full attention to the gelding.
