The Mad God's Muse (The Eye of the Lion Saga Book 2) (23 page)

“I accept your apology.
Peace, then?”

Maranath nodded. “Peace.”

“Peace”, Ariano
agreed.

Davron raised his hands in a
magnanimous gesture. “Then what would you ask of me, friends?”

“We need fighters,”
Maranath said. “A lot of them.”

An odd request, for powerful
sorcerers.
“For
what purpose?”

“We intend to capture
Aiul,” Maranath told him. “But we have learned there may
be a large group of Elgar cultists with him.”

“You have my attention.
How many?”

“If Ariano's tracking of
them is correct, our best guess is a hundred perhaps two.”

Davron nodded slowly, thinking.
“Poorly equipped and trained, no doubt, but in numbers, still
dangerous. I can provide two hundred men on short notice. More will
take time.”

Ariano shook her head. “Time
is something we lack. We'll take the two hundred and hope it's
enough. If not....” She shrugged.

Davron nodded again, fully
understanding her point. “War is risk. I will place my men
under Caelwen's command. Don't let your egos cloud your minds into
thinking you're military tacticians.”

Ariano was clearly displeased.
“What sort of fools do you take us for?”

Maranath chuckled softly. “He
takes us for Meites, dear. We're rather well known for making
impulsive decisions, hmm?” He turned to Davron. “We've
some other business to tend before we head out. We'll meet you back
here in, say, two hours?”

“Done.”

Narelki had not been in
Prandil’s private quarters for many years, and it troubled her
to be here now, for more reasons than she cared to contemplate.
Chiefly, it was that she was here to deceive him, but it was more
than that. It brought back too many old memories, pieces of the past
that both of them had cast aside.

Prandil raised his glass of
wine in toast, and said, “To old friends and fond memories.
It’s been too long.”

“It may be longer,
still,” she murmured. “It should have been you calling
out to me. But clearly other things occupy your mind.”

“Be reasonable,” he
purred, stroking her with his words. “I could write you a
poem,” he offered, grinning.

“That might get you into
my bed,” she said softly, allowing herself a ghost of a smile.
“But it will hardly make all well between us. It seems you’ve
lost your taste for me.”

“Oh, no,” Prandil
assured her with a hungry look. “Not at all.”

“It’s been years.”

“A taste for one thing
doesn’t preclude delighting in others as well. One can only
eat so much at a time.” He raised a hand to her cheek and
stroked it softly. “Besides, I do believe it was your turn.”

He was good. He always had
been. Refusing to take the blame for their split, even as he
carefully avoided pushing it back on her. Even now, he was a match
for her better judgment. She had to forcefully remind herself of
just what sort of person she was dealing with, what was at stake. It
was all too easy to allow him to gull her into acquiescence.

She gave no answer, simply
looked past him, studying their reflection in his full-length
mirror. His charm was obvious, even in a simple reflection. The
confidence in his eyes, the way he stood as if he were the central
character in the history of the world, it was enough to make her
swoon like a virgin. But then, they all had that bearing, even
Maranath. To be a Meite was to view the world as one’s
plaything, to see oneself as a god. Time bore down on their flesh,
but their souls seemed immune to its passing. The light in their
eyes never seemed to dull with wisdom and pain. If anything, it grew
ever more intense as they sensed their final grains slipping through
the neck of the hourglass.

And yet it was a fragile state.
For someone standing atop the world, a fall from grace could prove
disastrous. Seeing herself beside him, her own years weighing upon
her shoulders like stones, her eyes dim and troubled by truths that
he and his kind denied, she hated him, even as her heart sang with
giddy, childish passion. It was unfair that the universe would
reward fools like the Meites, and deny those who saw things as they
truly were.
Damn you! Damn you all!

“I’m not a
commoner,” she said with a scowl. “I’ve hardly
been celibate, you know. It has nothing to do with other women. Just
that you prioritized me out of your life.”

Prandil considered this a
moment, then nodded. “It is a fair complaint. What shall we do
to change that?”

Narelki smiled at him. “Let’s
start with something simple. I know a place that would make for a
fine picnic.”

Prandil’s face lit up at
the notion. “And what shall I bring?”

“Yourself. I’ll
handle the rest.”

“Generous. I presume
you’ll be expecting something in return, eh?” He raised
an eyebrow and gave her a seductive glance.

Narelki played to him. “Talk
is crude.”

“Indeed it is.” He
leaned in closer, but Narelki pulled back.

“There is one thing that
concerns me. Ariano.”

Prandil stepped back, a look of
annoyance on his face. “Why bring
her
up? That quite ruins my mood.”

“She frightens me,
Prandil. She’s made threats.”

Prandil shook his head
dismissively. “She makes lots of threats.”

Narelki was having none of it.
“Sadrina Veril? Maralena Prosin?”

Prandil gave her a sour but
agreeing look. “Sadrina, yes, and can you really blame her?
Maralena, I have no idea. I suspected you, to be honest.”

Narelki waved the idea aside as
a nuisance. “She’s out of control.”

Prandil raised an eyebrow. “I
should expect better of you. She is stronger, so she chooses.”

“Perhaps I still hold out
some hope that reason might some day enter into Meite philosophy.”

Prandil chuckled, not yet
understanding how deadly serious she was. “I am shocked,
absolutely
shocked
,
to hear such heresy from you.”

“I’m a failure,
remember?” she snapped. It was stupid. She was losing her
temper, and that was dangerous. But the old bitterness demanded
release. “We lesser creatures are to be indulged, yes?”

Prandil’s smile faded to
an expression of great sorrow. He stepped forward and embraced her.
There was no lust in his touch, simply compassion. “We did not
cast you out. You are the victim of your own self doubt.”

She was losing her resolve, but
for the moment, she didn’t care. Here was Prandil, and he was
strong, and she was so very, very weak. She buried her face against
his chest and sobbed.

He held her for a while, until
she was able to master herself once again. Her timing was good. She
was just getting herself presentable again when two figures
descended from the sky and lit on Prandil’s veranda.

Ariano spied them at once, and
entered without bothering with the pleasantry of being invited.
Maranath followed, looking a bit embarrassed.

Ariano nodded to Prandil. “We
need to talk.” She cast a glare of loathing at Narelki. “Leave
us, weakling. This is not for your ears.”

Prandil’s face darkened
with anger. “This is
my
home! You have no right to dismiss my guests!”

Ariano regarded him with a cool
stare, her green eyes flaring with challenge. “I have all the
right I shall ever need.”

Maranath, embarrassed now, laid
a hand on Ariano’s shoulder. “Power is no excuse for
incivility. Haven't we just had to swallow that bitter lesson? We
are guests in Prandil’s home.”

Prandil snorted. “Uninvited
guests, I might add.”

Ariano shrugged. “Fair
enough. If, in my passion, I occasionally step on people’s
toes, so be it. I apologize to you, Prandil. But not to her.”

Prandil shook his head in
disgust. “And you continue to insult me by lashing out at my
guests.”

Narelki put a finger to his
lips. “I’ll go. We’ll work the details out later.”

Prandil shouted at the top of
his lungs, “You will not treat me as a child in my own home,
you wretched crone!”

Ariano raged back, “If
you were an adult, you would be more concerned about Elgar than your
petty pride!”

Maranath didn’t like the
way things were going. Grousing and minor insult were fairly
constant amongst Meites, but this was getting truly hostile.
“Enough! Ariano, it is time for you to explain yourself.”

Ariano looked hurt at the
rebuke, but nodded. “Not in front of Prandil.”

Prandil was incensed. “Mei!
What is wrong with you? Can you do nothing without taking a stab at
me?”

“It’s your own
arrogance that makes you think you’re important enough to be
the issue, here!”

“I think it’s all a
fraud. First it was ‘not for Narelki’s ears’. Now
it’s not for mine?”

Ariano hunched her shoulders.
“Two different things, pup!”

“So you say, but you’ve
been deceiving me all along.”

Ariano was at volcanic levels
at this point, her voice rising to a shriek. “I
can’t
tell you, fool! I swore it! I can’t tell
anyone
.”

“Anyone except Maranath,
eh?”

Ariano’s lowered her
volume, her voice a multi-harmonic growl that communicated well just
how far Prandil had pushed her. “
Including
Maranath. It’s just that his being able to best me will at
least be an excuse. You know, pup? Waste not, bend a knee to
superiors? You don’t meet that bar!”

Prandil, too, grew quiet and
stern. “You’re very smug in your superiority. Shall we
put it to the test?”

Maranath stamped his foot, and
the ground shook with a minor tremor, strong enough to rattle the
glass in the windows. “That is enough, Prandil! Unless you
would put me to the same test! How do you think you will fare, eh?”
He turned to Ariano. “And from you, too. Since when do you do
as you’re told?”

Ariano snorted, her nostrils
flaring. “Since the one who told me can crush me like a bug!”

Prandil’s eyes grew wide
in shock and disbelief as he first mouthed the name, then spoke it.
“Tasinal? He lives?”

Ariano nodded, looking much
aggrieved. “He certainly still did when Lothrian and I made
our little raid on Torium.”

Prandil raised his hands to the
sides of his head for a moment, as if he were physically restraining
it from exploding. “You did
what
?”
He waved his hands in the air. “How many secrets do you have,
you wicked witch?” Ariano, for once, was not inclined to meet
his gaze. He turned to Maranath and asked, “Did you know about
this?”

Maranath nodded, his expression
sour. “But not about any encounter with Tasinal.”

Ariano’s chagrin was
short lived. “It’s not as if he came to honor me! He
just felt the threat would be more clear if he delivered it in
person.”

Prandil’s anger seemed
quenched by the thought. He began to laugh softly, almost in
sympathy for her. “That must have been quite awkward.”

Ariano scowled at him, then
looked at the floor. “Lothrian didn’t survive the mess
we made, and Tasinal cleaned it up. Did you really think Tasinalt
had Lothrian put to death?” She shook her head in regret, her
eyes haunted with the memories. “As if he had the power.”

Prandil waved aside the notion
with a look of disdain. “Of course not. It was obviously a
cover up, but I had no idea of what.” The bitterness began to
creep back into his voice as he groused, “I was clearly not
valued enough to be trusted with the truth.”

Maranath chuckled at this. “A
couple of your elders had already demonstrated they couldn’t
be trusted.”

Ariano pursed her lips,
obviously not pleased to be on display. “Exactly. I’m
not the one who made the decision to keep you or anyone else in the
dark. I’m the one who
provoked
it. No need to hate me for it.”

Prandil frowned, but he seemed
to at least understand the situation. Liking it was another matter
entirely. “Go on, then. I’ll just stay here and play
mushroom.”

Ariano, still smarting from her
own confession, was in no mood to be graceful. “No,” she
sneered, “You’ll be diddling the weakling, no doubt.”

Prandil’s eyes blazed
with reignited fury. “Better than diddling you, you wretched
crone! Assuming your crotch hasn’t closed up from lack of
use!” He realized just after saying it that he had delivered a
fairly grave insult to Maranath as well. His face went bright red as
he turned to the elder sorcerer. “I apologize for that. But
she started it.”

Maranath shook his head and
chuckled. “As irritable as she is, I should think everything
must be functioning just fine.”

Ariano, trembling with fury,
seemed unable to find any words. She glared at one, then the other,
then looked up at the ceiling. Prandil groaned as the boards above
his head bent and buckled outward, then exploded in a hail of
flinders and debris, leaving a gaping hole. Ariano shot up and out
of it.

Maranath looked at Prandil and
shrugged. “I always thought you had a way with women. Couldn't
tell from that display, though.”

“You should put yours on
a leash!”

Maranath gave him a scowl of
disapproval. “She’s very upset by all of this. Something
happened all those years back, something she never spoke of, but it
haunts her. She is convinced this all ties together, but she won’t
explain why.” He looked up at the hole Ariano had left and
sighed. “Your prodding just makes it worse.”

Prandil nodded. “I
suppose. Then what do you recommend?”

“Besides shutting up? Not
much.”

“Then why did you even
come here?”

Maranath chuckled at this.
“Just to tell you we’re off again. The two of you have a
way of complicating very simple things.”

Aiul rode slump shouldered and
head down, as if he had died in the saddle, swaying as the great,
black horse beneath him walked ever eastward. He wore his robe’s
hood over his face in a vain attempt to hide the steady flow of
tears, but he felt certain that Logrus saw, and was secretly
laughing at him.

They had been traveling for
three days, through snow covered plains and sparse woodlands, a wall
of silence between them. Logrus, Aiul knew, had little to say, and
Aiul, for his part, had no desire to share his thoughts with a stoic
killer. Yet silence left him with little to do but think, to
remember horrors and pains that the action of late had pushed from
his mind. He was falling into a black spiral of depression from
which there seemed no escape.

The gaping, putrefying wound in
his soul, born of Lara being torn from him as she was, was always
present, a constant sword through his gut. His hate for Kariana, for
all of Nihlos, was not merely an emotion, but a way of life. And yet
he had weathered these torments for months. They had not dulled, but
at least the outlines of their scars were mapped. Men have the
capacity to adjust their expectations of life, to adapt to a known
horror, and Aiul had done just that, becoming, at last, what was
necessary to survive. The old Aiul, the doctor, the husband, the
lover, had slipped away in the prison, died screaming, welcoming
with open arms the cold embrace of oblivion. The new Aiul, who lived
for revenge and had no need for anything else, was what was left.
Enough time had passed that he had become familiar with his new
self.

His actions of late were
another matter. Aiul closed his eyes, remembering slashing Banger’s
throat with casual contempt. But it was the sheer euphoria that had
come over him during his killing spree amongst the cultists, the
complete satisfaction he had felt in the act, that stung him most.
He had lived so long as a healer, and now, without really
understanding why, he was a murderer with a growing list of victims.
That they deserved it was little comfort. He did not mourn them. He
mourned himself.

Logrus rode beside him astride
a twin of Aiul’s mount, seemingly unaware that he even had a
traveling companion until he shattered the illusion by speaking.
“Why do you weep?” he asked, his words jarring to Aiul
after so much silence.

Aiul glared at him briefly,
then returned to staring at nothing. “You say not a word to me
for days,” he growled. “My shame amuses you, when
nothing else penetrates.”

“No,” Logrus
answered, without a hint of guilt. “I am curious. It seems
strange to me.”

“Mei!” Aiul spat.
“You treat me like baggage, and now you would hear my secrets,
as if I were a friend?”

Logrus shrugged, confusion on
his face.

“Are you really such a
fool?” Aiul wondered. “You expect me to believe you see
nothing uncivil in responding to every attempt at conversation with
grunts and gestures?”

“I had nothing to say,”
Logrus told him.

“No doubt,” Aiul
said. He huddled deeper into his robe, longing for warmth, envying
Logrus’s casual indifference to the weather. “Better to
be thought a fool then speak and prove it.”

Something akin to rage crossed
Logrus’s features and passed in an instant. He turned his gaze
back to the road and took a deep breath. “You know nothing of
me.”

“Nor could I,” Aiul
shot back.

Logrus rode on in silence,
retreating back into his self-imposed isolation. As the hours
passed, however, Aiul noticed with grim satisfaction that Logrus’s
normal air of arrogant indifference seemed more like Aiul’s
own brooding.

Just before dark, Logrus
stopped to make camp, selecting a small copse of needled trees where
the snow was thin on the ground. They tied their horses, and Logrus
busied himself with preparations for the night. Aiul resolved to
give him no aid until it was asked for. His spiteful game did not go
unnoticed, but Logrus refused to play, eventually setting up the
entire camp alone.

Aiul took a seat by the fire
and rummaged through his pack for something to eat, studiously
ignoring Logrus. It was, in the end, something that kept his mind
from wandering to darker places.

Logrus took a seat on the
ground across from Aiul, his face shimmering in the rising heat of
the flames, angry. It took him several minutes to speak, and when he
did, it was with some difficulty. “I could kill you in an
instant, with whatever I could lay my hands on,” he said.
“Should I despise you for your weakness?”

“It’s hardly the
same,” Aiul groused. “Combat is a skill that is years in
the learning. I have only the most basic training.”

“It is just the same with
me and talking,” said Logrus.

“That’s
ridiculous,” Aiul declared. “You’d have to have
lived you life in isolation!”

“Not my whole life,”
Logrus said. “Just most of it.”

Aiul was stunned. He could
think of nothing to say. After several long moments of yet more
silence, Logrus waved a dismissive hand and rose to leave.

“Because I hate what I
have become,” Aiul said quickly, answering Logrus’s
earlier question. “I wept for what I have lost. Which is
pretty much everything I valued.”

Logrus stared at him a moment,
then sat again, nodding. He dug through his own pack and found some
bread, took a bite of it, and chewed while he considered his
response. “What were you, before?”

Aiul stared at the ground,
unwelcome memories tearing at him, summoned by Logrus’s
question. He had hoped to hold back his demons a bit longer, but now
that they were upon him, perhaps speaking of them would sap their
strength. He fingered the strange amber talisman he wore about his
neck, surprised that it was warm despite the near freezing
temperature. “Just a man,” he sighed. “A man who
healed, not killed.”

Logrus listened intently, but
without any sign of emotion, as Aiul told him of recent history. At
times, Aiul paused for long minutes, sobbing, choking, unable to
shape his words, and Logrus waited in patient silence as Aiul
mastered himself. The story poured from him like water from a
collapsing dam: a slow trickle of pieces of his fragile, naive life;
more forceful outpourings of the ill fated assault, his impressions
of the Southlanders, the fury of the Meites; the thunderous crash of
rage, horror, and despair as his life shattered before his eyes; and
the trickling away of his will to live within Davron's prison.

“This Nihlos is as I have
always heard, a city of evil,” Logrus said. He held one of his
curved blades at eye level, staring at it a moment, letting the
firelight glint from it. “There is no good enemy in your tale,
no one person to strike down and have revenge upon.”

Aiul wiped his sleeve over his
eyes for what seemed the thousandth time. His skin felt raw from the
contact. As fresh tears welled in his eyes, he looked at Logrus,
grim, serious, sincere, and could not help laughing, even through
his tears. He grew somber again before responding. “It is all
Nihlos who will pay. I would kill them all, if I could.”

“Truly?” Logrus
asked, his eyes widening in shock. “Your hate is that great?”

“Greater. I just don't
have the words to describe it.”

“But surely there are
those who are innocent in the city,” Logrus said, aghast.

Aiul stared into the flames of
their campfire, the jagged thing in his mind stabbing viciously at
what few vestiges of his humanity remained. “No,” he
whispered. “They must all die for what they did to my Lara.
Those who acted, and those who allowed them to act. All of them.”

“I cannot condemn your
hate,” Logrus told him. “Righteous hate is good, and
Elgar is pleased by it. But I do not understand it. What you propose
seems….” He paused, searching for words. “Unnecessary.”

“What do I care about
‘necessary’?” Aiul growled. “Nihlos is an
organism. If a man kills with his right hand, do you spare his left
as innocent?” Aiul rose and stalked about the fire, shaking
his fist at the heavens, and shouted, “I would kill the
world
if I had the power!”

“I believe you,”
Logrus told him.

A long silence passed between
them, and then Logrus went into his pack and began searching. “I
have something for you,” he said, producing a large bottle
full of clear, amber liquid. He handed it to Aiul.

“What is it?” Aiul
asked, opening the bottle. He sniffed it, recognizing the potent
smell of alcohol.

“Strong,” Logrus
said with the ghost of a smile.

Aiul nodded and turned up the
bottle, grimacing as he swallowed a mouthful. Logrus had told the
truth. It was potent, indeed. He passed the bottle back to Logrus,
and once again fingered the charm about his neck. “Is this for
healing?” he asked.

Logrus shrugged and took a long
drink from the bottle.

“I thought you must have
given it to me while I was feverish,” Aiul said. “Do you
know where it came from?”

“You had it when I found
you,” Logrus told him as he passed the bottle. “Here,
this will be easier,” he said. A look of mischief crossed his
face as he produced another, identical bottle of liquor.

“Then I should sit back
down,” Aiul chuckled. He tossed another log onto the fire, and
made himself comfortable on the ground before it.

“One more question, and
then I will tell you my tale,” Logrus said.

Aiul nodded, waiting. Logrus
seemed to be having trouble phrasing his question, opening his mouth
to speak, then stopping several times, before he finally spoke.
“What is it like to love a woman?” he asked, his eyes
brimming with curiosity.

Aiul cocked his head in
confusion. He stammered briefly, trying to avoid insulting Logrus.
The man had just begun to speak openly. It would be a shame to send
him back into silence with an ill-considered comment. He seemed too
old to be a virgin. His people were considerably shorter lived than
humans, something on the order of two or three times. Aiul did a
quick conversion in his head.

“I would guess you are
around thirty five,” he said. “Am I mistaken? Perhaps
you are younger?” Even that seemed hopelessly late. In Nihlos,
sex was something of a pastime among those mature enough to practice
it, but too young to conceive. Aiul himself had spent most of the
years from thirty to sixty in rank, inconsequential debauchery,
before he had taken up his study of medicine. Kariana had been a
constant source of amusement during that period. He felt slightly
ill at the thought and forced it out of his mind.

“Thirty three,”
Logrus answered. “Why?”

Aiul squirmed, unable to find
his usual clinical detachment about matters medicinal. “Well,
it’s just that it seems, ah, well, unusual for a man to arrive
at such an age and know nothing of women.”

“You misunderstand me,”
Logrus told him. “I have known women, in the way you speak.
But I have never loved them.”

Aiul’s eyebrows rose in
surprise, and his lips twitched in wry amusement, not quite
believing Logrus's claim. “Not even in mad youth?”

Logrus shrugged. “My
youth was spent doing other things. Necessary things. It is much
like talking.”

“I see,” said Aiul,
trying to imagine what sort of scarred upbringing Logrus must have
had. He thought for a moment, trying to find words to describe
something that seemed hopelessly impossible to convey except from
experience. “It is a kind of madness,” he said. “A
yearning, a joy, a poison, all at once, at least at first.”
Logrus stared at him with uncomprehending eyes. He decided to try a
different tack. “Has there ever been anything in your life
that you felt you could not live without?”

Logrus’s eyes brightened.
This, clearly, he understood. “Oh, indeed,” he said with
a nod. “I could not live if I did not do what was necessary.
There would be no point to me.”

Aiul paused, uncertain if he
wanted to link love with whatever dark passion drove Logrus. As near
as Aiul could tell, 'doing what was necessary' was a euphemism that
Logrus used to justify an urge for mayhem. Still, if such were his
only passion, it was the only connection possible. “That is
what loving a woman is like,” Aiul said. “It is not
desire, or excitement, though those are part of it. It is when you
find someone and realize that you cannot walk away, any more than
you could walk away from yourself.”

“Like I feel for Elgar?”

“Something like that, I
think.”

Logrus stared at Aiul in
unabashed horror. “And that is what it was like for you?”
he gasped.

Aiul nodded slowly, pained at
the thought.

“Then I understand your
hate, now,” Logrus said, with an empathy that Aiul would have
guessed impossible in his companion.

Aiul sipped sparingly from his
bottle, already feeling the effects of the liquor. He gestured at
Logrus. “Now, your tale,” he said.

Logrus nodded, a look of
sadness on his face. He took a several deep breaths, then heaved a
great sigh, and began. “I never knew my father. He left, or he
died. My mother told me both, at different times. It doesn’t
matter.

“We were poor. My mother
entertained men for money, so we could eat. One of them was a
soldier. He came often.” Logrus paused, looking wistful as he
relived old memories. He pulled his blade again, and began cleaning
his fingernails with it. “I think maybe he loved my mother.
Maybe he loved me, too. He taught me things. How to hunt. How to
kill.”

“What sort of beasts did
you hunt?” Aiul asked.

“Deer, mostly. Sometimes
wolves, or bear. And once a man.”

“A man?” Aiul
gasped. “How old were you?”

“Seven.”

“Mei!”

“That is unusual?”
Logrus asked.

“Indeed,” Aiul
assured him.

Logrus nodded, absorbing the
information. “Perhaps he was like me,” Logrus theorized.
“He knew little but his own trade, I think.”