In Legend Born (80 page)

"Calidar..." He inhaled, wishing he could smell her familiar scent, wishing he could touch her warm flesh one last time. "
Kadriah
."

"Now is the time..."

He heard Armian's words, and he knew his destiny. Sorrow, rather than pride, filled his heart. Acceptance, rather than fear, flooded his veins. He would go to Darshon. He would give himself to the goddess. He would offer himself to She who would never, as his dreams had made clear, share him with the memory of Calidar.

Lost in his thoughts as Calidar faded from his vision for the last time, he was startled into awareness by Mirabar's cry of dismay. He saw her thrust her hand into the heart of the fire, then withdraw it with a sharp gasp, nursing burned flesh as Calidar's scarf went up in flames.

"Josarian!" Mirabar looked up at him, tears of regret filling her flame-hot eyes. "The scarf! I'm sorry. I tried... I'm so sorry..."

He wanted to grieve, but he knew he could not mourn his wife any longer. It would not be tolerated; Dar was a jealous goddess. He knelt and cradled Mirabar in his arms.

"Shhh... It's all right," he murmured. "Don't fret, Mira. It's all right. I won't need it again."

"You're going to Darshon, aren't you?" Her voice was weak and despairing.

"Yes."

"Then I'm coming with you," she said firmly.

He smiled. "I know."

Mirabar was supposed to leave here with Kiloran, but she'd never go now. Josarian would send Cheylan in her place, he decided. Nothing would keep Mirabar away from Darshon now, and Josarian knew he might need her there.

He rose to his feet and summoned one of his men. "Send a runner to Dalishar. Tell Jalan I'm ready. I'll meet him at Darshon."

His failure to re-capture the
torena
meant that Koroll would have to inform the Imperial Council that she had escaped. Several days of combing the countryside and slaughtering peasants had produced no results whatsoever. Koroll even began to suspect that people might actually be telling the truth; the rescue party might not have brought Elelar back to rebel-held territory after all. He had to stop the search sooner than he wanted to, too, since he couldn't risk going much closer to the region around Dalishar with only two hundred men. Even assuming that informants were exaggerating, Koroll knew that there were thousands of armed Silerians living in rebel territory now, and hundreds more were joining them every day: refugees from sacked villages, more
shallah
clans pledging their blood to Josarian's cause, escaped convicts, more assassins, bandits and smugglers, ambitious fools and naive idealists... It made Koroll shudder to think of social life within rebel circles. He derived some small satisfaction in picturing
Torena
Elelar stranded amidst such company.

However, the satisfaction was very small, indeed, when he considered how to phrase his dispatch to the Imperial Council. There were only so many ways to explain that the prison in Shaljir had been ransacked by rebels who had liberated his most valuable prisoner—and none of the ways made Koroll look good. He decided not even to mention Borell's "final orders"
or
the trial Elelar wouldn't have lived to see. Koroll's previous plans on that score were irrelevant now that the
torena
was gone; her death would have been so much easier to explain away than her escape.

On the road back to Shaljir, Koroll's company came across a small rebel group returning from a raid. Vastly outnumbered, the rebels tried to flee rather than fight. More than half of them got away, but Koroll's men were able to run down a few. Galloping up to where four Outlookers had seized a big, well-fed, surprisingly well-dressed rebel, Koroll stopped his men from killing the man. He'd had trouble impressing upon the new recruits that they needed to keep some rebels alive for interrogation. Silerian rebels were not usually talkers, not even under torture, but one must try, after all, even if success was rare.

This attempt was failing. Even when the Outlookers tied this rebel like a trussed chicken and began beating him, he struggled, spat, cursed them, and disappointed any hopes that he might talk in exchange for his life—or for a quick death.

However, Koroll at least discovered why this man was such a healthy, well-dressed specimen: He was an assassin. One Outlooker, favoring a hand which seemed to have been burned, showed Koroll the wavy-edged dagger the man had carried. It now lay on the ground nearby. The Outlookers had disarmed the rebel but found they could not touch his dagger, which burned with a bitter cold worse than fire.

A
shir!
And a captive assassin. Unlike the new recruits he commanded, Koroll knew what this meant. He had taken the trouble to learn about Silerians and their ways. He knew how powerful a
shir
was, and he knew what a man had to do to get one. This assassin might not give Koroll any information, but he would give him something almost as valuable.

Without another word, without warning, Koroll unsheathed his sword and slit the assassin's throat. Silent with surprise, his men watched him turn and pick up the
shir
.

It came into his hand almost as if answering his summons, and it felt more sure and powerful in his grip than any sword ever had. It was a lovely thing, easily as beautiful as the only other
shir
he'd ever seen, the one owned by Tansen. The wavy, water-made blade shimmered almost like the diamonds of Alizar; it practically seemed to ripple and move of its own volition, as if still connected to the currents of the spring or river which gave it birth. Even the hilt was very fine, made of petrified Kintish wood with silver and jade inlays. It was as exquisite as it was deadly. Koroll wondered who had made it. The waterlord who had fashioned this thing would fear it, too. To make his loyal servants powerful, effective, and feared, he had imbued this weapon with enough power to threaten him, too. Whoever he was, no matter how mighty, he was vulnerable to this thing.

Kiloran himself? Ah, perhaps that's too much to hope for.

Koroll ran the blade along his thumb and discovered that the legends were true. Although the
shir
was sharp enough to cut through cloth as if it were thin air, it could not harm him. It could not drink his blood now that he possessed it.

He slipped it inside his tunic. It would live from now on against the soft flesh of his belly, where no Valdan would ever dream of keeping an unsheathed blade. Perhaps he would kill more rebels with it. Someday, he hoped, he would even use it on the waterlord who had made it.

Elelar was exhausted by the time they finally reached the mountains. They had traveled from the coast on foot, something she wasn't used to. Nor was she used to hauling her pampered body over rough ground, negotiating uneven trails narrower than her hips, or climbing straight up the side of rocky mountain faces to "save time." She would like to complain sometimes, just to relieve her ire, but it would only cause more trouble between her two companions, and she didn't need that.

Men.

Besides, she knew that Faradar was just as tired, and the maid said nothing. A
torena
should show no less fortitude.

Well aware of the danger they were in, knowing how desperately the Outlookers would be searching for her, Elelar allowed Tansen to push her to the very edge of her endurance—and sometimes beyond. She knew he didn't do it lightly or without careful consideration, and she often caught him studying her, as well as Faradar, trying to assess her strength and determine how much farther she could go. Tansen insisted on brief but regular rest stops, even in the mornings when the two women felt fresh; it would make them last longer, he said, and help build their endurance. He pushed Elelar hard, though, so hard she was furious at him more than once. She understood why he did it, but she needed somewhere to direct her feelings of fear and exhaustion. He understood; and sometimes he even purposely inspired her anger to fuel her strength.

He's playing me like a harp.

Having exercised similar skills on various men, Elelar recognized the tactics. Since she knew Tansen was doing it to ensure her survival, she permitted it.

Zimran, on the other hand, offered her all the courtesy and solicitude of a
toren
courting a virgin. He found shady places and smooth boulders for her and Faradar during their brief rests. He offered them water at regular intervals. He gave Elelar a hand over rough portions of ground, scavenged wild harvest fruits and fresh honey for her, and scouted ahead to warn her when the going was about to become rough or reassure her when it was about to become easier.

Zimran and Tansen, both
shallaheen
, didn't even seem to breathe a little harder during what Elelar considered a punishing, life-draining uphill trek. Unfortunately, this left them plenty of breath to argue.

Zimran thought Tansen should be more considerate of Elelar; Tansen thought Zimran should stop coddling her. Zimran thought Tansen's pace would kill the
torena
; Tansen thought Zimran's dawdling would get her killed. Zimran thought a particular place was a good spot to stop for the night; Tansen thought they should press on. And so on. At times, Elelar felt like a juicy bone being fought over by two hungry dogs.

Zimran was a handsome man and quite charming when he chose to be. Elelar found it pleasant to return his simple gestures of flirtation with easy smiles and uncomplicated appreciation. After her recent experiences in Shaljir, she enjoyed such gentle and undemanding consideration.

Tansen was, as always, more challenging company. Elelar was actually rather fond of Tansen, perhaps because of their long history together, or perhaps because he had grown into an extraordinary—if difficult—man.

She just wished, she thought wearily, that he and Zimran would stop bickering so much.

Suddenly exposed by the Valdani and condemned after all these years, this was the first time in Elelar's memory that subterfuge, misdirection, and false promises weren't part of her daily life. There was little that Tansen didn't know about her, and neither of them liked to allude to the events of which Zimran and Faradar knew nothing. So, for the first time in her adult life, she wasn't living in a nest of tangled lies.

She had expected to die in Shaljir, or to be taken to Valda where she'd stand trial—and probably die anyhow. Now finding herself unexpectedly free in a way she had never foreseen—for who would have thought even Tansen would do something so daring and mad as break into Shaljir's prison?—she found herself thinking only day-to-day, sometimes only moment-to-moment, for the first time in her life. After all these years, suddenly she had no hidden agenda, no secret purpose, and no false friendships or pretended enmities. Now she was just a rebel escaping through the mountains, hoping to survive, and attempting nothing more complex than reaching safety.

Elelar had never felt so free. It surprised her that she could walk all day without thinking about much besides putting one foot in front of the other and trying not to break her neck by falling down a steep slope or slipping off a sheer drop. She was amazed by how quickly and deeply she fell asleep at night in the cool mountain air—she who had always been prone to lying awake long into the night, planning and scheming, and waking often from a shallow sleep. For once, she didn't feel compelled to make two plans for every possibility and three counter-plans for every contingency. Now she simply lived the moments as they came, light-headed with her own freedom.

No Borell. No Shiraj. No Ronall. For the time being, no Alliance. No orders or duties.

It was a revelation to her to see the unconcealed desire in Zimran's gaze and realize that only one factor influenced her response: whether or not she
wanted
him as a lover.

Elelar had taken only one man, the very first man, out of desire. All the others—and there had been so many—had been for duty. The bitter heartbreak of that first man's betrayal was only a memory now, lost in the elaborate maze of her secretive life; but choosing or rejecting every lover for a purpose, to serve a concealed goal, had become second nature to her in the succeeding years. She had forgotten what simple desire was like, and she hadn't ever expected to accept or a reject another lover based solely on what she wanted as a woman.