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Brendell could not believe it. Not even when he had been following Katerina and the others through the countryside near Diciara for the entire morning. I'm free. I'm finally free. The thought echoed in his mind. I'm finally free, thank the Light. I'm free.
The young woman - Elza - gave him a quick, tight smile and fell into step beside him. "How're you doing?"
"Great." It was the honest truth; he could keep walking for miles if he had to, even with the pace that Katerina was setting. He could not quite think of her as Berekovi yet. No one in any part of Dicia, even the city they had just left, had not heard some story of the dashing and heroic Child of the Light. But somehow he had expected Berekovi to be more, well, male. Admittedly, this woman looked as if she could take on anything that came her way, but it was still a bit strange.
Then again, so was his 'cousin'. She was a channeler locked up by the Manifest, very strong if she could attack Leese, even for a moment, yet she was clearly not even remotely connected to the Sisterhood. For a moment Brendell considered the possibility that he had fallen in with one of the renegade female channelers, but that did not make any sense, either. Elza did not seem to know how to use idar.
"Do you know where we're going?" he asked after a moment's silence.
Elza glowered at grizzled Per Connley. "He won't tell me, the great bloody lummox. Somewhere safe, he says. There's nowhere safe right now. Even if I don't get caught, my little brother will. Fool boy could never take care of himself." She smiled again, this time rather bitterly. "He's about your age, Brendell. Just so you know. Do you think maybe you've...?" Her voice trailed off hopefully.
"I don't think I know him," Brendell said.
She sighed. "I didn't say you did. I just thought for a minute - " She cut herself off abruptly. "Never mind what I thought. I'm losing my mind."
Brendell did not point out that with her ability to channel, exactly that would happen at some point. He kept his attention on the rest of what she had said. "Elza? Do you know anything about the Paladin?"
"The Paladin?" Elza gave him an appraising look. "Just what everyone else does. He'll gather the pieces of the world and stick them together, he'll break those who stand with him and strengthen the ones standing against him, he'll live so that others may die, and then somehow he'll put the seventh Seal in place and everything will be fine as you please. Why do you ask?"
Brendell stared at the road ahead, suddenly wondering what to say. But he had to tell someone or else he would go crazy. He did not have any real family; he supposed his 'cousin' was the closest he was going to get. "I've seen the Paladin. In my dreams."
"You what?" Elza stared at him. "Brendell bloody Cane, what are you - "
"It's true. I swear on my life it is. I've been trying to warn the Paladin about things. I see them in dreams." He shrugged uncomfortably. "I don't mean to. It's just like I enter dreams and they're real, and there's people in them who frighten me. But I have to warn the Paladin."
"You've seen the Paladin." Elza shook her head. "All right. Let's pretend you aren't a few apples short of a basket. What's he look like, then?"
"That's just it." Brendell made himself hurry on before his courage failed him. "The Paladin's a girl. And I think I'm supposed to help her."
Elza gave him the most penetrating look he had ever seen for a long, long time. He could see her as a Sister. As the head of the Sisters. She had that kind of look. "You're supposed to help the Paladin," she said flatly. "Is that why you're coming with me, cousin?"
Brendell shrugged. "I don't know," he said honestly. "I just know that this girl's the Paladin and that she's in trouble."
"Boy, I'm thinking anyone who meets you gets in trouble."
"Maybe."
Elza gave him what could only be described as an evil eye. "Anything else you want to share?"
She's going to march me back to the Manifest right now. Brendell sighed and spit the rest of it out. "Sometimes I see other people in my dreams. A very tall girl and a little boy. I think they're friends of the Paladin. And the boy..." He worked the words around until they sounded mostly sane. "He belongs there. The girl doesn't. And there's this other girl."
"You dream about girls a lot?"
"They're not dreams like that. They're real dreams." Brendell glared Elza into silence and pressed on. "This other girl is connected to the Paladin, too. I feel like I should know her, too. She scares me, but she's not dangerous. It's like I'm remembering someone else's feelings."
Elza frowned at him. "Maybe we're both mad," she said finally. "When I asked you about my brother Jonaton, I was sure that you knew him. I don't know why." She glowered at the fields around them as if she could make the world give up its secrets. "Do you believe in the Great Lace, Brendell?"
He nodded slowly. "Yes. I mean, I know it's heresy, but – "
"But I'm a heretic anyway," Elza finished. She gave him another piercing look. "The Creator makes the Great Lace, using threads of the Light and the Darkness. He weaves people's lives in pictures and designs. He makes the patterns of the Ages over and over until the Great Loom breaks and the world ends. And some threads are used over and over again, because they're the right strength and the right color, because they offset the Light or the Darkness when one threatens to overwhelm the other."
Brendell had heard all that. He did not like the thought, but he had heard it and it made some sort of sense. "Do those threads remember things that happened when they were used before?"
"I think so. Sometimes." Elza sighed. "Maybe you and my brother knew each other in another life. It would be like Jonaton to get himself mixed up with channelers." She laughed softly as if this was a great joke.
"Do you miss your brother?" Brendell asked softly.
Elza nodded slowly. "More than words can say. But I don't want to see him ever again, because then he'll be safe from what I am and what I can do. He's the only one in our family who can't channel. I want him to have a normal life."
"I don't think that's going to happen. Not if he's like you."
She sighed. "No. I don't think so, either."
***
Wat stared at the boy - this Lord Ihvan Helios - and wondered if he should stab him right then and there. If his sister was a demon, then was he a demon, too? Wat knew that Ihvan had chopped up the trees like so much firewood, even if he did not know how he knew. Such power was unthinkable.
He glanced at Mai and sighed inwardly. With her, such power was not only thinkable, but fairly ordinary. Wat wished he knew what to do with her. His first memory of her was when they were both toddlers. She was being teased by Wat's older brother, so Wat had come up and pummeled the bigger boy on the leg. He protected her. It was more than his job; it was his duty and a sign of his close friendship with her. Wat was - had been - closer to Mai than either Tem or Jaia until Quentin had come.
Now Mai needed the other vereni. She did not need him at all. He needed her, though, because he was still too weak in the One Power to do anything constructive.
But he could still try to protect her. Even if it meant killing a demon's brother.
"Wat, don't!" He did not even realize he had his hand on his belt knife until Mai grabbed his arm. Darris stepped up beside her like a soldier flanking his general. Or a husband flanking his wife.
Mai thinks Darris is annoying and obnoxious. It's bloody obvious. Wat did not even believe his own thoughts. With an effort he made himself release the knife. "I wasn't going to do anything, Mai. I swear I wasn't."
"I know." It came just a bit too slowly, a touch too hesitant. "I know, Wat. I'm sorry." She closed her eyes and shivered for a moment, her lips moving as if she was talking to someone else. Wat shuddered; it was not the same as the Madness, but the taint on idar was still there, insidious and always fatal. He expected Darris to recoil, but instead the Red Hand just rested a concerned hand on her shoulder.
She pulled away from me. Wat could not stop the treacherous thought. Everyone was acting strangely, not just Mai. It did not make him feel any better. "Mai? Mai, what are we going to do about Lord Helios here?"
"Clop him upside his flaming head and hand him to the Order," Mel growled. Ihvan actually shrank back from him. That was not surprising; Mel's face, with its sharp nose and wide-set eyes and strangely pointed chin, could have frightened anyone. Especially on a day like this, when he was in a bad mood.
Tamla shook her head. "Not yet." Her beautiful smile was somehow more threatening than anything Mel could have managed. The woman could truly terrify when she wanted to. "Lord Ihvan of Trahelion, correct? Which sister? Lady Gwaindlyn? I didn't know she could channel."
Ihvan swallowed and managed to speak. "She can't. Anyway, Gwaindlyn would never do anything as vile as work for the Dark One." Tamla's eyes flashed as if the very mention of the being in Shagul infuriated her. The boy seemed to take it for a threat and continued hurriedly. "It's Layla, Light preserve me. I didn't know she could channel." Suddenly rage seemed to burn away his fear. "The Trahelion lands are in the hands of a demon. Do you know what could happen?"
"I can make a guess." Tamla sat back on her heels, frowning as she spoke. "Trahelion is the only province in Dicia that isn't under the thumb of the High Seat. If it falls under control of a demon, they might give it to the Manifest just to create unrest."
Darris looked at her in askance. "How would one province create unrest?"
"The Trahelion province separates the Tashar empire from Dicia. If it stops being neutral, those countries would be at each other's throats before you could say Jac-o-mist." The songmistress shook her head. "Worse, that would give the Children of the Light the distraction they need to move against the High Seat. It would completely destabilize this entire region."
Ihvan nodded. "That's right. I have to warn Gwaindlyn somehow. My sister and the – the other demons took the White Tower captive. They've probably killed the Amyrlin by now." He gave Mai a desperate look. "Please stop shielding me. I can't do anything without the Power."
Mai shook her head. "No. Not until you tell us what you did."
"I don't know." The boy tugged at his black coat as if straightening it would make the world better. "I'm good at figuring weaves out. I'm strong in the Power," he added, not humbly, but not really boastfully either. It was just a statement of fact. Ihvan seemed to be one big statement in Wat's opinion. "I read about things and I try to imagine how they were done. I didn't really mean to make the gateway, though. I was there when the demons attacked and it just sort of happened."
Mai shook her head from side to side, her eyes turning inward. If Wat had not known any better, he would have said that she was glaring at someone inside of her own head. She's not hearing voices, is she? Oh, Light! He took a step toward his friend, ready to catch her if she fell, but two others had already gotten there first. Darris and Ihvan each supported her with an arm. Wat's heart sank. She wouldn't take any help from me. I know it. But she trusts that Red Hand and a lord she just met! The injustice of it all made him want to hit something. Not Mai, of course. He wanted to smash the other boys' heads together. Preferably hard enough to see them crack.
"It's not easy, is it?"
Wat had not even realized that Mel was standing beside him until he spoke. "What's not easy?"
"Seeing that you can't hold on to her." He patted Wat on the shoulder. "We all lose something," he said quietly. "And sometimes we find someone else. The Creator does what he wills and we can only do what we must."
"I know." Wat watched Mai come back to herself and brush off Ihvan and Darris. Maybe that meant she would let him stay close to her.
He knew it was not true. But he kept telling himself that it was, because protecting Mai was all that he had.
***
The princess of the Tashar Empire reined in her steed, letting the powerful stallion dance as she waited for the scout to catch up. The girl near her own twenty-three years and as good a shot as any could hope to have on their side. She gave arrows wings. "Two villages across the border. No guards, either. The Dicians are getting cocky."
"When are Dicians anything but?" The princess brushed dark hair back under her helm. She had been told more than once that she had been born to hold a sword – that perhaps she had been handed one in the nursery. The princess herself considered this nonsense. She knew that she was among the best warriors in the world; she had bested Guardians in her time and had killed a Myr on two occasions. If there was something that needed to be fought, she could fight it and almost certainly win.
Her face darkened. Almost certainly. She had lost once, when it had mattered the most. A Soulgone had taken the lives of her parents and sent her and her brother into hiding. He was the one creature she had not been able to kill, because she had not seen him until it was too late.
That was the past, though. "Tell the troops we ride tonight. We kill no one, but we take what riches and food we can find. There are those that need feeding, Rill."
Rill nodded. "Of course." She nodded her head respectfully and wheeled her gelding around, disappearing over a rise in the land.
The princess of the Tashar sighed and double-checked her knives and spear. One could not be too careful when one raided, even when going into two apparently unarmed village -
A flash of white caught her eye. She twisted around quickly, knife at ready, but there was no sign of whatever it had been. An overactive imagination possibly.
With a tired sigh, she slipped her knife back into its sheath and started back to the camp. There was no rest for anyone in this world. Especially not for the Captain of the Red Hand.
***
Sarai sirr Loch slipped out from behind her chosen hiding place as soon as the Red Hand was gone. She cursed a few times - words she could get her hide tanned for saying back in her family's lodge. And hung for here. Living so close to the Trocs Land meant that the Venderken knew the dangers of the Dark One better than anyone else, but it also meant that they had their own unique language that she had been told sounded more than a little like a Troc's.
Her eyes narrowed. The Red Hand was going to raid Dician villages? She would see about that.
Brushing her white-blond wisps back behind her ears, she started toward the distant towns.
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