They led the horses to the water first, letting them drink a long time, then tied them to the trees, placing grain bags around their necks. Then, Elasand left, saying he’d return with kindling for a fire.
Ranhé again went some distance away to take care of her bodily functions, then returned part of the way and was washing her face in the stream. When she opened her eyes, water dripping down her lashes, Elasirr stood before her, watching her coldly, with unblinking narrowed eyes. In the gathering mists, he was like a being of the forest, while the last pale rays of the sun illuminated his back.
Crouching at the bank before the running water she stared back up at him, at his silhouette, with her expression matching cold for cold, then said, “What do you want?”
“Don’t be afraid,” he replied quietly. “I don’t want you. Did anyone tell you that you’re quite an ugly thing? Neither proper man nor woman?”
Water dripped from her face as she stared at him, allowing his words to cut into her. And then she rose, wiping her face against her sleeve, while moist tendrils of her hair that had escaped her braid stuck to her forehead and cheeks.
Standing, she still had to look up to meet his face, because of his considerable height—just like Elasand, and yet so unlike.
She was looking at his silhouette face now, and there wasn’t a trace of expression there. “Actually,” she said, “I’ve been told I’m ugly by my father, so you are not the first. He was the one who first called me a boy, because I was tall and my wrists were large. Because I was stronger and smarter than the boys of the house. And because when I was sixteen, hair grew on my cheeks and chin, like a beard.”
And then, because for some reason the expression of his face that was silhouette seemed to grow even more stonelike, she drew near to him with her face, and said, “Look at me, and see how really ugly I am. Look at my cheeks, now. . . . I didn’t really let you see my face back then, when we were in the Red Quarter, because I thought you were a true erotene, and I was too ashamed. But now, I don’t give a damn. You’re dirt, because you toyed with me back then. And if you thought I was so ugly, and yet still wanted to touch me, then you’re perverse and sick. Well? What do you say to that?”
His breathing had stilled so much that she could hear above it the silence of the forest. He said nothing, and she did not know why. And then suddenly he began to laugh.
It was the most terrible sound she had heard in her life.
It filled her with final deadly ice, a death wish. He stood, laughing openly, and his eyes were expressionless, winter-cold, terrifying. “Yes, I can see the hair on your face now, Ranhé,” he said then, smirking, his lips inches away from hers. “And yes, it makes you obscenely ugly and repulsive as sin. . . .”
And then, he suddenly had nothing else to say. She stared into his eyes, her face a mask of utter control, her own eyes dilated. Abruptly, he turned away, and then simply left her side, and headed back to their camp, walking in silent strides.
Ranhé remained standing at the stream bank. As the sun exuded its last glow upon the forest, she stood frozen, her breathing stilled, while the wind gathered around her, drying her face. And then, drawing in a deep draught of the wind, she put down all feeling within her, and headed back also.
At the place where they had stopped the horses, Elasand had built a fire. Just in time, the bright cheerful gray flames arose, for the sun had sunk, and after an instant of twilight, there was only a black sky of night.
He had put a small pot of water to boil, and threw inside some dried tea leaves, so that they could have a warm drink for the night. Vaeste and Elasirr both sat before the fire upon a large blanket that they had removed from one of the saddlebags. When she came upon them, Elasirr did not look up, but continued stirring the fire, while Elasand smiled, saying, “Come, Ranhé, sit here where it’s warm. And if you’re still chilled, then grab your own sleeping blanket. We have enough for everyone.”
“Thank you, my lord,” she replied in a barely audible voice, and went to get the blanket. Only now did she realize that her hands were shaking.
When she returned, Elasand was staring at her closely. “Are you all right?” he said, for he had noticed the deadness in her features.
“Tired, my lord. I will have the tea now, and then take the first watch.”
“No. I will take the first watch,” said Elasirr suddenly.
She glanced up to see flames reflected in his eyes, like demon-sparks. For one instant only he looked at her intently, seriously; then he calmly turned away and filled his mug with the ready tea.
Elasand was either oblivious to this new tension between them or simply chose to ignore it. “Let him take the first watch, Ranhé,” he said. “If he wakes you up in time for the second watch without killing us in the night, then I just might begin to trust him better.”
Elasirr, his profile to them, flames dancing against the light of his hair, sipped the hot tea. She watched how the strong muscles of his throat worked at each swallow, his half-lidded eyes, with the pale lashes sweeping his cheeks. And she thought of how much she hated him, this cold blond demon who had laughed at her, in that moment when her soul was most bare.
She hated him now, more so than she did when he had almost seduced her with his soft hypnotic touch, in the room with the warm pool and the mauve orb-light. . . .
Unable to think any more about it, she turned away, and received a hot mug of tea from Elasand, who for some reason was obliging her constantly now, as though he were the one serving her, and not the other way around.
They were silent, for the next half hour, while everyone finished eating and sipping the hot tea, and the forest danced around them with its blackness. The small fire continued to burn, like the center of the black universe, and they sat at its edge, huddled in the blankets.
“Your watch,” said Elasand eventually to the blond, and pulling his blanket against him, lay down in their middle, a little away from the fire. Ranhé wrapped herself also, and yet made sure that her sword was within reach of her right hand. She lay down somewhat away, on the other side of Vaeste, as far away from Elasirr as she could.
Lying on her side, she shut her eyes, but could not sleep. Eventually she could hear only the soft crackle of the fire, and Elasand’s light breathing. Staring through the concealing fringe of her lashes she saw the form of Elasirr as he got up and walked a few steps away to stretch, then settled with his back against the trunk of a nearby tree. From where she lay she could see how he threw his head back, and was staring for a long time at the bottomless night sky.
Eventually, the tension left her, a warm grogginess came to steal within, and the fire seemed to crackle comfortably in her blurring field of vision, then only in her mind. Then, at last, came soothing dark. . . .
Ranhé woke up with a start from a gentle touch on her shoulder. It was gray cold dawn, and Elasand was shaking her gently, whispering, “Wake up . . .”
She sat up with a start. “Ah! What about my watch?”
“Sh-h-h. It’s all right,” said Elasand. “Elasirr took your watch, because he told me he could not sleep, and woke me up in time for my own. He is still sleeping now.”
Looking around, she noticed in the gray twilight, the low simmering embers of last night’s fire, and the still form of the blond man, covered with the dark blanket. However, the moment she got up, he stirred, then threw off the blanket and sat up. “Damn, Vaeste . . .” he grumbled hoarsely, holding his forehead. “I barely put my head down, and it’s dawn already.”
“So why the hell did you take my watch?” said Ranhé coldly, straightening her clothes and putting away the blankets.
“Why the hell indeed,” he replied, then got up, shaking out his long pale hair, and walked off to take care of his business behind the bushes.
Ranhé threw one look at his sword that he had left lying on the blanket in the folds of his cloak. Another gesture of trust on his part? Or else, a sign of utter self-confident insolence.
“Hav
e tea before we go,” said Elasand meanwhile, adding the last of the kindling to the low-burning fire.
Ranhé poured herself a mug as she looked at the thoughtful face of the Lord Vaeste, noting his greater pallor, as if he hadn’t slept at all through the night. Seeing her concerned gaze, he looked up, meeting her eyes, and she realized what had come to pass.
“You saw her tonight, didn’t you?” she whispered. “The lady of violet?”
In response, he smiled sadly. “I see her every night now. That is why this journey has taken on an even greater urgency.”
“How much longer until we get there, lord?” she said gently, sipping the hot tea.
He thought for a moment. “At least one day more. We may get there by nightfall.”
“Get where, Elasand-re?” came the cool low voice of Elasirr. He had returned silently, like a shadow, and had been standing behind them listening.
“I think it’s time,” he said, walking out into the light of the low fire, and filling his own mug of tea, “that you tell me everything about this trip of ours.”
Elasand watched him evenly, with his tired clear eyes.
A long pause.
“Very well,” said the Lord Vaeste. “We go another day’s ride, deeper into this forest.”
“Oh? And who is it that we meet there? Agents from our neighbors farther west, the City of Niadehm? Or is it even farther still?” Elasirr’s face took on a sarcastic look. “As you can see, Elasand-re, I know even more than you suspect. I know all your secret dealings in the name of the Regent.”
Elasand sighed. “You have me watched always, I know that also. But this time you’re really off track. It’s not Niadehm that we go to court.”
“Then who?”
“No one in fact. No one human. We go to the old Shrine of Light.”
Elasirr paused with the mug halfway to his lips. “What?” He straightened, and stood staring at the man with the raven hair. “What foolery is this, Elasand-re? You’re joking with me, aren’t you?”
“This is why I didn’t want you to come with me in the first place. I knew you wouldn’t understand,” said Vaeste.
“Understand what?” The blond neared him then, crossing the little space between them, and then dashed the contents of his mug into the fire. He stood before the Lord Vaeste, boots planted firmly, his usually lidded eyes wide open and sparkling with intensity.
“What the hell are you telling me, Elas?” he said, like a serpent. “You are telling me that we are going to an old shrine to pray? To pray, Elas? That I’ve come here with you all this way just to see you make a pilgrimage to an old nonexistent god?”
“You did not have to come,” repeated Elasand with unblinking eyes.
The blond man threw the mug down, and it cluttered against some stones on the ground. “Like hell!” he exclaimed, his face inflamed with emotion. “And it no longer matters what she hears! In fact, let her know all!” He threw a glance at Ranhé before returning his gaze to Vaeste. “You know as well as I that I always have to come with you, in this enterprise and in all others!”
Ranhé heard the strange words, feeling suddenly out of place in an intimate scene that made no sense and she was not a part of.
And then Elasand said another incomprehensible thing: “Then support me in this one thing also. It’s your duty.”
The blond looked at him, stricken.
“You can turn back now,” continued Elasand then. “And I will not think any less of you. Nor would he have thought any less of you.”
“So. . . . It comes down to this: it is always my duty to follow you, is it not?” whispered the Guildmaster of Bilhaar, with an alien expression in his eyes that somehow frightened Ranhé more than anything else he’d yet said or done. And then he exclaimed, “My duty has been clear, ever since Rendvahl Vaeste died by my hand. The old lord of a damned House, who always loved his oldest son best!”
With those words, he stomped out the fire, then grabbed the rest of his gear, threw it in back of his mount’s saddle, and turned to pick up his sword. Ranhé watched his movements with a slow dawning of comprehension, while next to her, Elasand Vaeste stood impassive.
“Let’s ride then, and let all be damned!” exclaimed Elasirr, and instantly he was in the saddle, his stallion rearing up on its hind legs, sensing a new urgency in his master. Without looking back at them, Elasirr started out alone on the path.
At the same time, dawn came to pour over the rim of the horizon obscured by the lattice of jet and silver trees. Elasand and Ranhé quickly gathered the rest of the things and mounted the horses.
As she rode along his side, Elasand mentioned, almost casually, “He is my half-brother, Ranhé. Tell no one this thing.”
“I see,” she uttered very softly, feeling a numbing cold.
“He and I share one father, Lord Rendvahl,” continued Elasand. “My mother was the legitimate wife, of noble Family blood. While Elasirr—only a few moons after I had been born, he was born of a high-class courtesan, in the House of Erotene. For that reason, Father could never acknowledge him, nor could he ever grant him the name Vaeste.”
“And is that why he killed his own father?” said Ranhé, in a voice like ice.
Elasand said nothing.
“It is a sad man that has no family name,” said Ranhé. “Is it true that he killed your father? Answer me, my lord! Is that how he came to be thus, at the head of the most terrible Guild of death? And is that why he hates you so, his own brother?”
Elasand sighed. “He is brilliant and volatile, this younger brother of mine. And yet, as a bastard, he had to earn his own name. It’s natural that he harbors a grudge. And grudges can turn into insanity.”
“A grudge!” said Ranhé. “Now, that’s an understatement. . . .”
Elasand kept his eyes on the road. For several moments there was silence.
“He is my brother,” said Elasand then dully. “And he was very young when it happened.”
“How odd,” said Ranhé, “that you do not hate him now. You are extraordinarily magnanimous, my lord. Or else, there is something you are not telling me. Something that exonerates him in your eyes.”
Once again there was a long pause of silence.
“He was raised in the House of Erotene, but after the death of my father the Assassin Guild claimed him early. Back then, it was but a minor enterprise, nothing like today. The Guild had always stood opposed to my own father’s House Vaeste. And Elasirr chose to be thus, a full enemy, because he could not be a full brother. That’s all. And now—now it’s far too late for me to hate.”
Elasand turned his face to her, his eyes earnest. “This revelation, Ranhé, it was not meant to be. I didn’t expect you to learn any of this. Very few know it, and you must never admit any knowledge of it either. Promise me!”
“I promise, lord,” she replied. And after a pause, said, “Then, was this a pretense too, when you were before the Regent, and you didn’t want your brother to accompany us on this trip?”
“Only a half-pretense,” replied Elasand. “I wanted him to come with me, but the Regent must never know of this blood bond between us. For that reason, many of my interactions with Elasirr are two-edged. Ah-h-h. . . . There’s a lot that you don’t know about him, Ranhé. And our mutual hate is also more exaggerated than most think. . . . Although, there are times when the past resurges and stands up with a fury, and then we hate one another afresh, he and I. And someday, I will tell you the whole story. But not now. And one other thing, what I had told you before, still stands—do not trust him, not for a moment.”
“As you wish, my lord,” she again said softly, while her mind was in a turmoil of new things.
They caught up with Elasirr about fifteen minutes later. He rode slowly, and barely acknowledged Elasand with a glance. Ranhé he ignored completely.
The sun was high above the trees, and the forest path had grown more narrow, so that they had to ride single file.
Surprisingly, Elasirr seemed to
have regained his normal lazy high spirits, for he whistled as he hacked at the branches with his long knife. Only occasionally, when Ranhé got a chance to glimpse his face, did she see a new grim expression there, that she recognized to be a kind of despair.
They stopped for a midday meal, and no one spoke much. The deep living forest hummed around them, almost obscuring the slate-gray sky. At one point, Elasand looked up, and then said, “We should be there very soon.”
“As you say, madman,” muttered Elasirr, his profile turned to them as he ate his bread and cheese, “And how soon is it that we see the blessed Rainbow?”
Elasand looked at him and then sighed. “You’ll have to trust me on this—Elas.”
“Oh—I am trusting you beyond all sanity as it is—Elas,” retorted the blond in a like manner, only his voice was sarcastic.
And then, for hours, they said nothing more.
Toward evening, they had ridden in circles, it was beginning to seem to Ranhé. The tiny path had become a barely perceptible track upon the forest floor, and it meandered eternally, so that their heads spun from going around tree trunks and down small ravines, from cutting at the thick pale growth, and the twisting prickly branches striking their faces.
“By all the lords of Rainbow, Elasand-re!” exclaimed Elasirr at one point, “I know we’re damn lost.”
And then, because the growth all around them was so lush and thick, and riding had become impossible, he dismounted, and started to walk forward, leading his tall stallion by the reins. Elasand and Ranhé followed his lead, dismounting, and all walked forward slowly, hacking at the wilderness of growth before them.
Soon, sunset burned, sending monochrome steel shadows of tree trunks low against the earth, like stretched out twins of darkness. In the lead, Elasirr cursed loudly, as for the hundredth time a low growing branch struck his face. It had become very difficult to follow the path, especially for the larger horses.