“I don’t know what you saw, Renna,” he responded wearily, “but we who come from the islands cannot tolerate the power of the Shard. It would consume us.” He shrugged. “I have always had my doubts about prophecies.”
Renna’s eyes lost their fire and slid away from the old man as she slumped back into herself. Seeing the bony woman give up on an argument felt like an offense against nature. Kest drew himself up to jump into the breach, but Nira stopped him.
“This is the only reason I’m here, isn’t it?” she asked Gamarron, eyes brimming with hurt. “I’m just a set of hands to hold your little toy.”
He looked ashamed, but he did not soften. “Yes.”
“I’m from the Mainland,” offered Guyrin brightly. From his expression, he seemed to have missed the context of the conversation.
Nira thrust a finger at him. “He’s from the Mainland. He can carry the Shard! Who better to handle the Chaos than somebody that already does?”
“Wait a second,” Guyrin interrupted. “The Shard? You want me to carry a chaos Shard?” He laughed, sounding a little wild. “No. That is not a good idea.”
“Why not, you little shit?” Nira looked like she might hit him.
“Discord,” answered the short man in the brown dress, unoffended. “Using Chaos rips and reshapes reality, and the toll builds up in your flesh over time. I’ve got so much I’ll probably die soon. Me touching another source of Chaos would amplify the effect, like building a fire in a gas spore colony. I could kill everybody. I probably shouldn’t even get too close to it.” Nira stared at him, angry and at a loss. “Sorry.”
She ground her teeth. “What if I say no? I can walk my gullible little self on back to Far East, then what?”
Gamarron kept his calm, but Kest could see that dangerous urgency just below the surface. “I will not allow it.”
Nira laughed bitterly. “Turns out dear old grandpa is a heartless bastard. I should have guessed.”
Gamarron met her angry gaze with a face of stone. “I would do anything – lie to anyone, break any law, sacrifice anyone – to face the threat of Bakal. You say you have seen his face. Am I wrong to act so? Is there any task more crucial you could perform? I would carry the Shard myself if I could. But I can’t, so I will use you. Hate me if you wish… but you will do what I say. I will be as unpleasant as I must.”
Nira clenched her jaw. “Good to know where we stand. Nice chat.” She turned away, paused, and turned back. “Will it hurt me, touching this thing?”
The old monk sighed. “I don’t know.”
“If you use it,” Guyrin said quietly, “it will hurt.”
She nodded woodenly. Looking at Gamarron, she said, “You should have told me from the first.”
He looked neither repentant nor defiant. “I judged otherwise.”
“And that’s as close to a ‘sorry’ as I’m going to get, isn’t it?”
“What is necessary is never to be regretted.”
She was silent for a long time. Then she said, “I’ll hold your precious little toy for you. When we’re done with that demon, I’m going to bash your face in with it.”
He finally looked her in the eye. “If we are both alive and he is not, I will let you.”
Nira turned around and stalked off into the forest, tearing savagely at the leaves and twigs as she went. Kest wanted to follow her, but he doubted that looking at his ruined face would help her mood. “We move at nightfall,” Gamarron called after her. She lifted her hand in a rude gesture without looking back, which the black-robed savage apparently took for assent.
Renna pushed herself up from where she had slouched against a tree. She looked awful. “I’ve had cysts that were more enjoyable than you lot.” With that, she retreated into the trees, stalking off as if she were intent on murder. Strangely, her ill humor relieved Kest. After all, a predator only left off biting when it was gravely wounded. She’ll be all right. Guyrin found a comfortable hummock near a tree and sprawled himself on it, leaving only Kest and Gamarron looking at each other.
“Something on your mind, Kest?” the old man said.
Kest couldn’t help himself; he spat in the dirt. “You’re a bad chief.” He had a thousand other things he wanted to say to the man, but that encompassed them all.
“Yes,” the savage agreed. “Though perhaps not for the reasons you think. The day will come when you lead, Kest, and you will have to be able to look past your tender feelings and make hard decisions. Maybe at that point you’ll look back and judge me a little less harshly.”
“You’ve been acting strange. It’s getting worse.”
Gamarron stood, not looking at him. “I know.”
There was no good answer to that, so Kest let him go. Dinner was cold frog legs and brackish water. Everyone ate separately, thinking their own angry thoughts. Kest wondered what to do with the zephyrs. They wouldn’t do well in the swamps. It would be best to unhobble the beasts and let them hunt. Either he’d return and track them down… or he wouldn’t.
From the corner of his eye he saw Renna approach Guyrin. “Trade me clothes,” she commanded.
The little fellow squinted at her. “I’m sorry?”
“You heard me, you little weasel. You look like an idiot wearing that dress. Give it to me, and I’ll trade you.”
Baffled, Guyrin looked to his clothes. The dress was indeed ridiculous – too long for his short stature, and frilled with dirty lace at the bodice and wrist. “Ah...” he equivocated, looking now at the Hand’s garb that she wore. “I’m not sure I’d make a very good Hand of Gaia.”
“As it turns out, neither do I,” she said. “Come on, my clothes will cover you just fine.”
It was true. The leaf tunic that left the oak-tree old woman bare at the midriff
