The False Martyr (29 page)

Dasen took a deep breath
and scraped away the last of the beans. Turning to the pot, he
found a big wooden spoon and tried to peer through the column of
steam rising from it. He could tell without even seeing that they
were burnt to the bottom with almost no liquid remaining to cover
them. Cursing, he stirred and cast another look of frustration at
Teth. The entire thing was a disaster, and she had not moved a
muscle to stop it from happening. It was selfish. That was all he
could think. She was so wrapped up in herself that she couldn’t
even do this tiny thing. So caught up in herself, in whatever had
happened, that she couldn’t even talk to him, couldn’t even let him
touch her. It was wrong. It was selfish and stupid. He was her
husband. She had a duty to. . . .

He opened his mouth to
voice his thoughts. Then he looked at her, curled and miserable,
and his indignation leaked away. He took a deep breath and released
it slowly. “There’s some soup here. It’s kind of burnt, but you
already knew that I can’t cook.” He waited for Teth to join in the
deprecation with a barb of her own. A moan, followed by a single
snuffled sob came from the bed, the exact opposite of what he had
hoped to achieve.

“
Listen, Teth. I’m sorry,
okay? I shouldn’t have yelled. It was my fault. I shouldn’t have
been gone so long. I just . . . .” He thought better of his next
words. “Nothing. It was my fault, but I think you should eat. I
think it will help you feel better.”

Her back was to him,
curled round with her legs tucked to her chest, head resting on top
of her knees, arms holding her legs like they might escape and
wander away, whole body trembling with each shaking, mournful
breath. “Teth,” he whispered barely audible over the ripple of
water against the wood at their sides. “What is wrong? What did
they do to you?” He took a deep breath. “I love you, Teth. I want
to help, but I don’t know what to do. Please . . . .”

A sob – a single, loud
gush – interrupted him. “Stop!” she moaned without moving. She
cried again, breath rising to pants that bordered on
hyperventilation. “Just stop!”

Dasen could only stare at
her in shock, numb with the avalanche of horrors that played in his
mind.
By the Order, what could they have
possibly done to bring her to this?

“
Leave me,” she called
through her knees. “There’s nothing you can do. Just . . . just
please, leave me alone.”

Dasen stared at her. He
could not believe what he was hearing. He could still remember how
she had greeted him in that tower, how she had tackled him and
kissed him until he was suffocating. He couldn’t understand what
could have happened or why she could not share it with him. After
everything they had been through, after everything they had done.
And all of it together, side-by-side, hand-in-hand. It was him and
her against the world. He had started to believe that as long as he
had Teth, there was no obstacle that they could not overcome. Now,
she wanted him gone?

He swallowed the lump
growing in his throat, grabbed a bowl from the shelf above and
spooned the beans into it. “There are beans here if you want
something to eat.” He turned to the stairs. “I’ll be on the deck if
you need me.” He knew that his tone was sharp, but he couldn’t help
it. All he wanted to do was help, and she told him to leave. Well,
that was exactly what he would do.

But the sounds that
followed him from the hold were not those of relief. Though he had
given her exactly what she wanted, Teth’s cries rose. She moaned
and cried as if in real pain, as if she were dying. They were the
last sounds Dasen heard as he emerged onto the deck and carried his
bowl of beans to the back of the boat.

#

An hour later, the boat
was free and floating down the river with the current. Getting it
loose had been easier (and more painful) than Dasen had expected.
After eating as much of the dreadful beans as he could manage, he
had spent more time inspecting the sandbar and the current.
Finally, he had hoisted the long pole, taken it to the back of the
boat, and pushed. It had taken only a few pushes, straining for all
he was worth, to pivot the back of the boat into the current. Once
the river took hold, it jerked the boat around, sending him
crashing back onto the deck with the pole cracking him square
between the eyes.

When he recovered enough
to dispel the stars that were spinning around his head, they were
free from the sandbar and floating backward down the river.
Luckily, the river kept a leisurely pace, and there were no other
obstacles to snag them or break the rudder before Dasen managed to
plant the pole again and use it to swing the boat back around. This
time, as he tried to bring the heavy pole out of the water, it
slipped through his hands and nearly remained in the middle of the
river behind them. Only at the last second was he able to wrap both
arms around it and, falling back to the deck, wrest it from the
mud.

That was enough of the
pole for him, so he laid it along the side of the deck and took up
the pilots place at the rudder under the canopy at the back. He
watched the river float by, trying to avoid the sandbars and grassy
islands that marked their progress. Steering proved to be
relatively easy as long as he knew where he wanted to go. Good
river pilots knew the water beneath them better than they knew the
curves of their wives. They would know exactly where the sandbars
were, how they might have changed, and how to detect new ones.
Dasen had no thoughts that he had such abilities, so he focused on
keeping them in the main channel and avoiding the obvious hazards.
The height of the swollen river made that easy, and he was soon
watching the grass to either side, following the path of an eagle
that circled lazily over their heads, and looking for other boats,
invaders, or creatures.

Despite all those
distractions, his mind went constantly back to Teth. He could not
help but replay her words, could not help but see the face she had
made, could not help seeing how she had retracted when he touched
her. Then he thought also about how they had been before Thoren,
how they had slept holding each other, kissed, held hands, talked,
and joked. He wanted that Teth, needed her desperately, but that
was not the person in the hold.

Something terrible had
happened at the Weavers’ compound. And he only wanted to help,
wanted to bring back the girl he loved. But she could only push him
away as she never had before. After everything they had been
through . . . . His thoughts ran around and around, frustration
growing to anger, falling into sorrow, and igniting again into
frustration. The river flowed by, the sun passed overhead, and he
found no answers, no solutions, no peace.

Chapter 18

The
22
^nd
Day of Summer

Ipid’s head was falling to
the desk when the cool hand caught it in a caress that rose up his
cheek and through his hair. He shot up. The pot of ink before him
toppled. His pen flew. Ink pooled on his papers and crept down the
angle of the table toward his lap. He did nothing to stop it. His
attention was focused on the space to his side. There was nothing
there, but someone had touched him. He had not dreamed that. He was
sure of it, but his eyes said otherwise. Finally, his other senses
caught up. In the silence of the night he heard a rustling, a
muffled giggle, a shifting. He still felt the cold along his cheek
where the hand had touched him. And most telling of all, he smelled
lavender rising ever so slightly over wool and hair and musk. He
knew that smell immediately.

He reached out a hand.
“Eia?” he asked. His hand found a slim hip covered by course wool.
His other found its opposite, and Eia materialized with a giggle
from the thin air.

She held her hand over her
mouth to restrain her laughter. Her dark eyes sparkled in the light
of the lamp, white skin
glowing.
The hood of her robe was thrown back, showing the
cascade of luminescent hair flowing down her back, seeming to
generate its own light in the dim room. “You found me,” she said, a
laugh lighting her face so that Ipid could not help but
smirk.

“
What are you doing here?”
he finally asked, fighting to find the indignation he knew he
should have.

“
You might want to clean
up that ink,” she said, pointing to the desk. “It’s dripping on
your pants.”

Ipid looked back at the
table, saw the black puddle covering his notes, soaking through all
the sheets piled there before him, and running in a think line down
the desk to slowly drip onto his, thankfully, black pants. He
jumped then searched frantically for something he could use to
contain the puddle. Eia supplied a rag with another laugh. He put
it to immediate use. He stained his hands black trying to save
them, but his notes were ruined. He held the pages up. The ink had
permeated them, reaching down through five sheets, leaving only his
very first scribbles.

He threw the pages back
onto the table and scowled. “I’ve been working on those all night.”
He launched himself from his seat and circled away from
Eia.

“
I know. I’ve been
watching.” Eia laughed. “It was quite a process. I now see why you
required so much time at your desk when you should have been in
your bed.”

“
How long have you been
standing there?” Ipid could not decide how he felt about having Eia
there. His mind fought itself, flashing between images of her held
in his arms and images of her splattered with blood screaming
invectives.

“
Long enough,” she bent
toward the desk and looked at the papers. “None of it was a loss,
you know.”

“
What do you mean? I spent
all night on that. I was just starting to get my head around it.
And what were you doing spying on me? Did Arin send you? Or . . .
or Belab?”

“
Those two?” Eia laughed
again. “If either of them knew I was here, they would ensure I
never saw you again. Belab likes for me to be near you, to keep you
safe, but if he knew the extent of our relationship, I am sure he
would find another of our order perform that duty. No, I came
because I wanted to see you. I wanted to be with you, to help
you.”

“
Then why were you
invisible?” Ipid backed away from her, wariness winning out over
desire.

“
Because I like to watch
you work. You are so focused, so intense. If only I could get you
to focus on me like that . . . .” She tilted her head, eyes
suggesting.

Ipid took a step away from
her, feeling hunted. “I . . . Eia . . . I don’t think we should. I
mean, after what happened yesterday. I don’t . . . I mean, I don’t
think we are. . . .”

“
What are you babbling
about? You mean the things I said in your house?” She laughed then
turned serious. “I told you, I needed your emotions at an absolute
pique to be able to transport you here. I am sorry I hurt your
feelings, but that was the entire point. Haven’t we been over this
enough times for you to know that I didn’t mean any of it? It was
necessary. Again, judge the ends rather than the means.”

Ipid was not convinced. He
knew what he had heard, what he had seen. He kept his distance.
“What about those men you killed? There was no show in
that.”

Eia lowered her head. She
took a deep breath and brought her hands to her face then up
through her hair until her fingers were trapped. Finally, her eyes
rose, looking suddenly old and tired. “I . . . you are right. That
was not a show. That was terrible. I . . . I did things that I will
have to live with for the rest of my life. They were my decisions,
and I accept them, but they were horrifying decisions, and I will
always regret them. That said, those were terrible men.” She
paused, face turning hard, eyes holding his. “I thought they had
killed you. They saw me coming and tried to ambush me just inside
the door. If I had not sensed them, they might have succeeded. And
then what do you think they would have done to me. The same thing
they did to the woman we saw? And if they had done those things? If
they had raped me? Beaten me? Left me for dead or slit my throat?
What punishment would you assign them?”

Ipid shuddered at the
images of Eia being beaten, stripped, raped, killed, screaming in
fear, begging, crying. “I would have killed them,” he heard himself
say.

Eia nodded. “For me, it is
in many ways worse. I could feel their emotions, their hatred,
their darkness, their anticipation, their desire to hurt me. I
could feel the depths of their depravity. I could almost feel the
things they intended to do. It was almost as if they had already
done them. And then to think that they had killed you. . . . Well,
you know what happened. It was wrong. I admit that, but I cannot
change it now. I cannot take it back. I can only live with my
decisions and use it to guide my choices in the future. Do you
understand?”

Ipid did. Suddenly, it all
made sense. He had seen those men, had heard their threats, had
witnessed what they were capable of doing. He could imagine how
Eia, how any woman would have reacted to finding them, to knowing
their intent. And if that woman could defend herself as Eia could?
He suddenly felt sorry for her.

“
I never meant to hurt
you,” she said, voice small and sad. “I knew that I had to pique
your emotions, but I see now that I was too far into my own, that
those men had turned me into a monster, and I turned that monster
on you. It was necessary, but it went too far. Can you forgive
me?”