The woman paused, then reached up and pulled off her hood without a word. Bron stared, stunned. The face was familiar, one he’d seen before. It was older now, worn by more than just years. There was fathomless sorrow in her eyes, and her hair was silver-white now. But still, there was no mistaking who she was.
“I don’t…” he began, then trailed off and tried again. “I don’t believe it.”
“You don’t have to,” said Wentha MarSevrin, pulling on his unbroken arm. “Just come on.”
Bron somehow found a way to haul himself along beside the Weeping Lady, limping and lurching and falling more than once as they fled the village and took to the wilds. Gray, leafless trees loomed around them like bony hands. There was no road, not even a game-trail he could make out, but Wentha made her way through the gloom with quiet certainty, stopping now and then to look behind, in case someone followed them. No one did.
The eastern sky had brightened to the dull gray of lead by the time they stopped at last, at the remains of some large, stone building. Its walls were crumbled stubs, its roof long gone, but there was a staircase leading down into a cellar. Wentha led the way down, out of the rain. When she reached the bottom, she lit a candle, illuminating her face. Bron slumped to the earthen ground, groaning.
“Don’t get comfortable,” she said, ripping a strip of cloth from the hem of her cloak. She found a piece of broken wood, and used it to splint his broken wrist. “Tarlo and the others aren’t going to let you get away easily. They know this place, and they’ll be looking here before long. We’ll be moving again in a couple of hours.”
Bron nodded: he’d expected that much. But that wasn’t foremost on his mind. He looked at the woman in disbelief. “How in the Abyss-”
“How did I survive?” she asked, and smiled. “I was in Karthay when the burning mountain hit. The city was destroyed, but those of us who fled quickly lived through it. I got out, and after a year or so I found passage back to land. It’s just an island now, Karthay-the same with Lattakay, and a few other places.
“I’ve been living back there, in Flotsam, ever since. They don’t know me there. Not like they know the Hammer, anyway.” She eyed him grimly. “They were going to press you to death, in case you’re wondering. Pile stones on you until they crushed you.”
Bron shuddered at that savagery. A shudder ran through him.
“Now,” Wentha said, “suppose you tell me about this.”
Reaching beneath her cloak, she pulled out Ebonbane. The candlelight glistened on its blade, reflecting the chips of porcelain on its hilt Bron stared at it.
“This was my brother’s blade,” she went on. “How did you come by it? Who gave it to you?”
Bron blinked. No, of course she wouldn’t know. Hardly anyone alive knew the final fate of the Twice-Born. He shut his eyes, moaning … then opened them again when he felt the cold steel of Ebonbane’s edge against his skin. Lady Wentha stood over him, her eyes like stormclouds.
“Tell me,” she said.
And he did.
Her face was covered with tears by the time he finished. They were both silent for several minutes, afraid to speak. Finally, she drew a hand across her eyes, and took a deep breath. “So you left him there. In Xak Tsaroth.”
Bron nodded. “For all the good it did. I saw the city disappear. He couldn’t have survived.” She was silent for a long time again. “No” she murmured, “but maybe he wasn’t meant to. He needed to be out on that lake, with the Disks, when the mountain hit. He had a purpose in mind.”
“But what?” Bron demanded. “Why would he do such a thing?”
Lady Wentha shook her head. “I don’t know. I doubt we ever will. But be sure of this, Sir Bron … my brother died working the god’s will.”
“Did he?” Bron shot back, his voice bitter. “And what stories will people tell of Cathan Twice-Born? What songs will they sing?”
“None,” she answered. “But the forgotten hero is a hero still.”
Bron shook his head. “I envy your faith.”
“It is all I have left.”
They were silent for a time. Rainwater dripped into the cellar.
“Now you’ve seen the Blood Sea,” she said at length. “Where will you go next?”
“I don’t know,” he answered. “Far from here. What about you?”
Wentha pursed her lips, glancing up the stairs. “I’ve heard Taol survived the Cataclysm. Do you know if it’s true?”
Bron nodded. “Parts of it. Though the land is much changed, from the tales men tell.”
“What land isn’t, these days?” she asked. “I will go there, then. Changed or not, I would like to see the land of my birth again.”
“You’re lucky to be able to ” Bron said. “I was born in Edessa.”
His home. Gone, lost beneath the red waves.
“I will go with you,” he offered. “If you will let me.”
Wentha MarSevrin looked at him gravely for a long moment. Then she smiled, tears in her eyes-but she shook her head at the same time. “No,” she said. “I travel alone. So must you.”
He should have begged her to reconsider, he told himself in the hard times to come, when he yearned for a companion on the road. But he only returned her smile, and watched as she extended Ebonbane, hilt-first, toward him.
“I don’t know how to use it, anyway,” she said.
He took the sword from her hand. “Thank you,
“
She bent down, pressed her lips against his forehead. Then, rising, she drew her hood back over her head, turned to the steps, and raced up them, two at a time.
He never saw her again.
