Bratu rolled his head from side to side, eyes fixed on Ganelon's face. Whether he recognized the younger man or not, he seemed calmer. With a broad gesture at their surroundings, he opened his mouth to speak. All that came out was a pitiful moan of rounded vowels divided by blubbered Bs and Ws. His tongue was gone.
Ganelon turned away in disgust. Bratu's own people must have done that to him. It was probably part of some banishment ritual. This way, he couldn't speak of their secrets.
"I'm so sorry," he whispered. But when he turned back, Bratu had already started off again.
Ganelon stood there for a time, uncertain what to do. There was nothing he could do to help the Vistana. Truth be told, he wasn't even doing a very good job of helping himself. If he was going to make it to the Iron Hills and find Helain, he was going to have to keep to his own path and let Bratu wander off on his own.
As the first drops of rain began to fall, Ganelon decided that the log and the pine needles were going to be the best shelter he could hope for tonight. He wedged himself against the wood and heaped needles over his legs and stomach. It would have been warmer to cover himself all the way to his neck, but that would only serve as an open invitation for the roaches and weevils to venture up to his face. They needed no extra help finding his ears and nose.
He fell asleep with a nightmare already half-formed in his brain: Blood-red beetles pressed into his mouth. Razored pinchers clacking in anticipation, they scurried to the root of his tongue and set to work.
The next morning, Ganelon awoke feeling more rested than he had any right to expect. The rain hadn't been as bad as the clouds had threatened, and the insects had only bothered him a little, despite his nightmare. He lay there for a time, eyes closed, willing away the last vestiges of the night's unquiet dreams. Finally, he stretched his arms and cracked open one eye at the morning light. The bright glare made him hiss and clamp his eyes closed again. What was going on? The sun couldn't possibly be that bright through the canopy of branches overhead.
"Don't think of reaching for that stick, sleepy head," admonished a decidedly female voice. "It's already gone. Besides, it wouldn't have done you any good anyway. Not against this."
Ganelon felt the slightest of stings on the tip of his nose. He opened his eyes again and saw the cause: a dagger, its thin blade shining with reflected sunlight. The dagger shifted slightly and the reflected light flared, blinding Ganelon again. "Get up," the woman said. "Slowly," Ganelon propped himself on his elbows and, from this half-reclining position, was able to assess the situation. It could have been better.
After meeting Bratu the previous evening, Ganelon was only moderately surprised to discover Inza Kulchevich on the other end of that alarmingly sharp dagger. The striking, dark-haired Vistana had swapped her flowing skirt for leather leggings, and had tied her hair back with a scarlet ribbon. She also sported a heavy cloak, Ganelon noted enviously.
"All right," the girl continued imperiously, "your nap is over, giorgio. I've got some questions for you." As he looked up into the girl's green eyes, all Ganelon could think of was Bratu's wordless groans. Monsters, he thought, you and all your kind. He cast a disdainful eye over the half-dozen other Vistani arrayed behind Inza and said, "I don't have the answers you want."
Inza flicked the dagger toward Ganelon's left leg. The blade touched the brace so lightly that he didn't feel its impact. It scarred the metal nonetheless.
"Think of the damage such a weapon would do to your face," Inza said.
"Or tongue," Ganelon offered. The defeat in the man's voice made Inza smile. It was not a pleasant thing to see. "Then you do have some answers for me." She motioned to one of the other gypsies. "Bring him something to eat, and some clean water. Oh, and a cloak, too." She nodded to Ganelon. "Don't think I didn't recognize the envy in your eyes, giorgio. There isn't a Vistana alive who doesn't know what it's like to be cold when all around her are warm."
Inza waited until Ganelon had splashed some water on his face, wrapped himself in the brightly dyed woolen cloak, and sat down to a plate of bread and cheese before she spoke again. "It was Malocchio Aderre's men who cut out Bratu's tongue," she said, "though we were ready to do so, too. He was passing secrets to the Invidians."
"Why would the Invidians want his tongue cut if he was working with them?" Ganelon asked between mouthfuls of bread.
"He'd been found out. They were afraid he would reveal the names of their other agents in Sithicus," Inza replied casually. "So, tell me, how long did you travel together?"
"We didn't," Ganelon said. "We crossed paths in this very clearing. He went on, I stayed here."
Inza scowled. "I heard the men at Veidrava describe you as kind and compassionate, but they must be liars. You let an injured man wander off into the night without so much as offering to share your fire."
Ganelon overturned the now-empty wooden plate. "You said you were going to cut out his tongue if the Invidians hadn't beaten you to it. What do you care about him?"
"There is punishment and there is torture," Inza said. She impaled a millipede on the end of her dagger and watched it squirm. To be lost from the tribe is torture for poor Bratu. We would have kept him safe with us, even after justice was meted out."
Ganelon missed the grim looks exchanged by the other Vistani, who knew that Inza had proposed a far different fate for Bratu. Instead, the young man had his eyes fixed on the matted pine needles that had been his blanket. "It should be obvious that I had no fire to share with Bratu," he said. "I offered him help, but he couldn't hear me. Did the Invidians cut his ears off, too?"
"He harmed himself," Inza replied distractedly. "You haven't told me your cause for being here, giorgio. Maybe you're a spy, too." She gestured at the leg brace. "They only make those in Invidia. Your price for betraying your homeland, perhaps?"
"I'm looking for Helain," Ganelon said. "I should be going if I'm ever going to catch her."
Inza gave the man a knowing smirk. "Ah, the sick girl from the store. She finally heard him, eh? It was only a matter of time."
"Heard who?"
His look of puzzlement was too genuine for Inza to think him a liar. "The Whispering Beast," she said. "Just like Bratu, she answers the Beast's call."
Ganelon stood and brushed off the borrowed cloak. "Nonsense," he snapped. "The Beast only speaks to those who lie and cheat. Helain is nothing like that."
The coarse laughter of the Vistani men fanned Ganelon's anger. He turned on them. "What would any of you filthy wretches know of honesty?"
Inza wrapped a hand around Ganelon's wrist and eased him back to a seat beside her. "If we are all liars, giorgio, then you should pay all the more attention to what we say. Liars have to know the truth well enough to avoid it." She lifted the cloak back to his shoulders. "No one is saying that your Helain is like Bratu, you know. It might just be guilt that drove her to him. Sometimes that's enough."
"Guilt about what?"
She shrugged. "It only matters that you find her before she gets to the Beast. Once she's in his hands-" The Vistana mocked a shudder. "Horrible. And there will be no way to find her. His lair is hidden."
The words of the Bloody Cobbler came back to Ganelon then: "The place where she is heading is the first thing in the hills touched by the morning sun." That place, he realized with a terrible certainty, was the lair of the Whispering Beast.