Keph caught his breath at the lie. What?
Bolan hissed in righteous anger. "Moonshadow Hall will crumble!" He stepped away and bowed low, the candlelight shifting with his movements. "We will do honor to Shar tonight."
"I do hot doubt it," said Variance. "Now, go. I have preparations of my own to make."
Bolan bowed again and the light bouncedthen dimmed and faded as the squat man trotted away. Keph almost gasped and called out after him: Leave the candle, Bolan, please!
The words faltered in his throat. Darkness, utter darkness, cloaked Shar's temple.
"You're finally awake."
Variance's voicefar kinder than the last time she had spoken to himemerged from the shadows. Her footsteps approached across the raw stone of the floor, as sure as if she walked through the brilliance of daylight. Keph flinched away. For the first time, he realized that he was stretched out on wood, maybe a broad bench. His arms and legs were untied. He sat up, and the movement brought pain. Fire shot through his ankle and across his face where the priest Aeso had struck him. He gasped and fell back.
"Be still."
A hand touched him. He tried to pull away, but
Variance pressed him down against the wood with shocking strength.
"By the glory of Shar, be healed."
The agony that surged through him was almost worse than his injuries. Keph jerked and spasmed, his head cracking back hard. The false brightness of pain exploded across his visionbut when it cleared, the ache in his ankle was gone and his face felt no more than tender. Variance lifted her hand away.
Keph gulped air and sat up, trembling with relief. He stared blindly into the darkness. She'd healed him. Why?
Variance gave a soft laugh and said, "Do you think that just because you're blind, I am as well? I see confusion on your face, Keph. You have questions. Ask them." He heard liquid pour. Variance put a metal cup into his hand. "Water," she said. "Nothing more."
He didn't move. After a moment, Variance released him and stood up. He heard a rustle of clothing and footsteps as she moved away, then returned. A tindertwig scratched on stone and flared bright as Variance lit a candle.
"Light, Keph," she said, holding the candle out to him.
"You were angry," he rasped. Fear made a hard lump in his stomach.
"Of course I was angry," Variance said calmly. "I was worried. When Bolan told me that the Selunites had captured you, I feared for you. Praise Shar, I was able to reach you before they could start their torture. The werewolves among them"
"Torture?"
The Selunites hadn't been going to torture him. And werewolves? The only werewolf among the Selunites of Moonshadow Hall was Feena, and she had been long gone when he and Julith had been captured.
Julith… He remembered the young priestess staring as Variance…
Keph blinked Variance's voice was inside his head, seductive and haunting, weaving lies among his memories.
The cup fell from his hand to splash water across wood and stone as he thrust himself backward, away from the pale woman. If Quick had been at his side, Keph would have drawn herbut the Selunites still had the blade.
"Stop it!" he gasped at Variance.
She narrowed her eyes. Her voice surged back, harsher than before. "I brought you to safety…"
Keph clenched his teeth and pushed back against the whispers, straining with all the strength of his will.
"No!" he shouted.
The force of the denial was shocking, like a slap in the face. In an instant his head was clear and Variance's eyes were hard in the candlelight. Breathing hard, his heart pounding, Keph tensed and met her gaze.
"Stay out of my head!" he snarled.
Variance pressed her lips together. For a moment, she was silent, then she whispered, "My words come back to haunt me. I did say you had remarkable strength of will, didn't I?" She shrugged. "Very well. Keep your memories."
Keph's breath caught in his throat. He gaped at the priestess.
"You-"
"admit surrender?" Variance's eyebrows rose. "Why shouldn't I?"
Silence dropped. It was all Keph could do to stare. She was giving up? The priestess whose disdain had once made him grovel, the woman who spoke for the Lady of Loss, was admitting defeat? Suddenly, his rage was gone, stolen out from under him so quickly that his head spun in confusion. The fear that had driven him to flee Yhaunn, the sense of purpose he had found in helping Feena… they were gone as well. If Variance was just giving up, what was there to be afraid of? Off balance, he groped desperately for something to help make sense of what was happening.
"This is some kind of trick," he said, taking another step away from her.
Variance gave him a measured look and asked, "How is it a trick?"
He struggled for an answer. "You… you lied to Bolan. You told him the Selunites tried to steal me away. You know that's not what happened."
"You want me to tell Bolan the truth?" She opened her free hand as if releasing some captured insect. "That your faith failed? That you tried to flee? That you fell in with Selunites? That I dragged you back through Shadow by the hair on your head? What purpose would there be in telling Bolan that? He would strike you down on the spot. But so long as he believes the Selunites snatched you away, you're Shar's hero. If I had convinced you of the same thing, no one would have known any different."
"But you didn't convince me."
"No, I didn't," Variance agreed. "I might have, though.. If plans never succeed, why bother making them at all? But I serve the Lady of Loss. One of her harshest lessons is learning to recognize when a plan has failed and there's no hope of taking it any farther." She turned away and began walking across the temple. "It's clear that you've turned away from Shar. Drawing you back isn't worth the effort."
Keph stopped, his feet heavy, his heart in his throat. "You're… you're letting me go?"
"If I wanted to harm you, I could do it easily enough." She glanced back at him and said, "Come with me unless you want to stand in the dark."
It wasn't an answer to his question, but he hesitated, then followed her.
"You and Jarull," he said, "you've been manipulating me."
"More or less," Variance replied. On the far side of the temple, she turned down a curving tunnel. "It's regrettable that you fell in with the Selunites. I'd be curious to know how that happened."
"It was coincidence."
Variance said, "You'll find there's no coincidence where gods take a hand, Keph."
"Maybe… maybe Selune is giving me a chance to redeem myself."
"Or perhaps Shar chose to show me that your faith was weak." She paused and turned to look at him. Her face was placid, but cold. "The Mistress of the Night could have given you many rewards, Keph. I spoke no lie when I said you had the potential to become one of Shar's priests. It would have been best for both of us if your faith had been strongeror if your will had been weaker."
"It's a good thing Shar teaches you loss then, isn't it?" Keph said.
"Shar teaches the anticipation of loss," answered Variance. "Even if I prefer to expect that my plans will succeed, I prepare for the possibility of failure."
She raised the candle. Stone walls shone with slowly trickling water and slick mineral depositsthen ended abruptly in darkness. Just beyond Variance's reach lay a shadow that seemed to consume the candle's feeble glow, resisting its light. Variance held out her hand and spoke a prayer under her breath. Like mist before a wind, the shadow parted.
Keph stared.
Chained like a dog to the stone floor, Jarull jerked back from the sudden light, covering his eyes and howling in agonythen clapping his hands to his ears as if the sound of his own voice were painful. Howls dropped into moans and the big man swung his head back and forth like an animal driven to madness.
With the parting of the shadow, the stench of excrement filled the tunnel as well. The pants that Jarull wore were stained and horribly crusted. His skin was pale, his tall frame gaunt, and his hair, a tangled nest. The fingers that cupped his ears were torn and bloody. When his open mouth swung into the light, Keph could see that his tongue was raw and red as well. The rock walls within reach of the chain had been rubbed clean of mineral deposits. Jarull had been licking the stone for water.