Eliizar leaned on his sword and looked down upon his vanquished King and foe. “I always used to tell you not to waste time talking in battle,” he muttered. There came a thunder of wings from above, and Finch and Petrel landed beside him, the backsweep of their wings raising a whirl of glittering sand that drifted down to cover the Khisu’s body.
“Thank Yinze that’s over,” said the irrepressible Finch. “Now can we go home?”
Petrel glared at him, and touched a hand to his forehead, in homage to Eliizar. “All is well, O Master of the Forest Lands. The battle for our new land has been won.”
Eliizar looked down at the mortal remains of Xiang the Tyrant. “Yes.” He smiled grimly. “Now it truly has.”
22
The River Runs
Since Benziorn had cut off Vannor’s hand, the days had passed for the merchant in an inescapable labyrinth of agony and anguish. The worst of it was that he could feel the hand as though it still existed, even though he could see the bound and ugly stump that lay on top of the covers. If he closed his eyes, or looked away, he could feel his fingers clenching and unclenching. And for something that wasn’t there, it hurt like perdition, despite the concoctions Benziorn gave him, that were meant to dull the pain.
Though he knew full well that the physical injury would heal, given time, Vannor’s mind was shattered by the loss. Gone were his days as leader of the rebels. What use could he be to anyone now, crippled and maimed as he was? How could he continue to fight against the Magefolk when he couldn’t even use a sword?
Why me? was the litany that kept repeating itself over and over again in his mind. Why did this have to happen to me? Why couldn’t it have happened to a cutthroat or one of those thieving human dregs from the waterfront—or to those evil Mages themselves?
Vannor could bear to see no one—not even his beloved Zanna, though she insisted on coming anyway. The hurt in her eyes when he railed against her pierced his heart, yet he couldn’t help it. He didn’t want anyone, and especially his beloved daughter, to see him like this. He could no longer see a future for himself—only darkness. His only surcease was sleep now, but sleep was slow in coming despite the soporifics that Benziorn gave him. If Vannor were honest with himself, what he really wanted was to die—but the core of stubbornness that was so much a part of his nature would not permit him to seek death.
So here he lay, on another day much like the rest; drowning in the depths of self-pity: lying awake with the agony of his hand and the greater agony of his thoughts, and wondering if there would ever be a way out of this torment. For a long time now, the merchant had been dimly aware of the soft murmur of talk in the kitchen below his room, but suddenly, as the voices were raised in furious argument, they intruded on his notice and he began to make out what they were saying.
“Leave the city?” Zanna shouted. “You can’t possibly be serious! My dad is in no fit state to make such a journey!”
Benziorn sighed patiently. “I’m his physician, lass—do you think I don’t know that? Moving him now is not what I would choose, but we’re no longer safe here. Do you want your father to be captured again by the Magefolk?”
“Damn you!” Zanna snapped. “You’re not being fair. I can have no possible answer to that—and well you know it. Look,” she begged. “It’s scarcely three weeks since you performed the amputation. He still needs rest, and time… How the blazes do you expect him to clamber around in the sewers with only one hand?”
“Why, the little lass is right,” came Hebba’s querulous tones. “The poor master, bless him, is still sick abed! How can you think of sending him down them dirty, stinking drains?”
Vannor half smiled to himself—the first time he had smiled in days. Clearly, the others had told the cook she must come with them for the sake of her own safety—and there was no way in the world that the timid, nervous woman would take kindly to a journey through the sewers.
“We’ll help him,” Yanis volunteered. “Don’t worry, Hebba—he’ll manage. We all will. Why, even though my own arm is only just healing—”
“So how can you help someone else, you idiot?” cried Zanna in exasperation. “You’ve barely recovered from that fever!”
“It’ll be all right, Zanna—you’ll see.” It was Tarnal’s voice. Vannor could imagine the serious, solicitous young man putting a comforting hand on his daughter’s arm. “I will help him,” the smuggler said softly. “We both will. If we meet with any difficulties on the way, you and I can help Vannor, and Benziorn will assist Yanis. But Benziorn is right. We can’t risk remaining in Nexis any longer. You and your father are fugitives, and with every day that passes, Miathan’s net is tightening. Already the soldiers are searching houses on any excuse, and we know that there’s a reward out on your head. Hebba’s neighbors must have realized by now that she’s no longer living alone here. How long do you think it will be before the gossip begins to spread and folk start putting two and two together?”
“But what about infection?” Zanna pleaded. “In the sewers—”
“Zanna, let’s not pretend any longer.” Benziorn’s voice was soft with concern. “Admit it—it’s not Vannor’s body you’re worried about, it’s his mind. Though we’ll help him in every way we can, to a certain extent he’ll have to cooperate, and at the moment he’s so lost in his self-pity—”
His words were broken off by the sharp impact of flesh on flesh. “How dare you say that about my dad!” Zanna yelled. “Why, he’s the bravest man I know! No one else could have undertaken that journey through the catacombs and sewers the way he did, wounded as he was, and made it through! He’ll be fine—you’ll see—he just needs time…”
The words trailed off, swallowed in a sob. A door slammed sharply, and there was a thunder of feet on the stairs, and then Vannor heard the sound of brokenhearted weeping in the adjacent room. Suddenly, the merchant was deeply ashamed. Why, in all this time, he had been thinking about himself, and had never considered how deeply he must have been worrying Zanna! Poor lass—her mother already dead, and her dad worse than useless to her…
Then, like a thunderbolt, it struck him. He was not useless, after all! Someone still needed him, still depended on him to be brave and strong—and still believed, with utter faith, that he could do just that. “Get up, you bloody selfish old fool,” Vannor muttered wrathfully to himself. “This is no time to be lying in bed feeling sorry for yourself and whining about the harshness of the world. Your daughter needs you…”
But despite his brave notions and newfound determination, getting out of bed was far more difficult to accomplish than the merchant could ever have imagined. The grueling underground journey to escape the Mages was as nothing compared to the problem of simply hauling himself upright on legs that had turned, it seemed, to two limp strings, while the room spun dizzily around him. Inwardly, Vannor railed against his weakness—and found that the anger helped, not only to impel him toward his goal, but to scour away so many of the all-consuming doubts and fears that had so unmanned him in these last few dreadful days.
Vannor clung with his one hand to the post at the foot of the bed and cursed vilely, wondering how he was ever going to manage to let go without falling over. How the bloody blazes could he make it all the way to the next room? He managed to shuffle as far as he could reach while still holding on to the bed—and suddenly the door did not seem so very far away. Taking a deep breath, he let go and lurched across the room, only his staggering momentum keeping him from falling flat on his face. He reached the door only just in time and leaned against the blessed, solid wood, hanging on to the handle like a drowning man and breathing heavily as sweat trickled down his forehead.