A few scattered images returned to me. "I—all I remember after is something about a charm Caderan had cast. He had warned me about it, said over and over how deadly it was, so I'd make sure he survived. I've no idea why we didn't all die—either Caderan was lying or they found the charm and destroyed it somehow."
I turned away from Berys's face. "I seemed to remember Lanen's voice speaking to me in that darkness, but that's not possible." I shivered. "I imagined all kinds of things in my dreams."
"After that I knew only Maikel, now and then, speaking words I did not understand, feeding me something that tasted like nothing I'd had ever known, the ripest pear, the sweetest apricot—oh Hells' teeth!" I swore then, for I had only that moment realised. "Damn it! He gave me Ian fruit, didn't he?"
"If he hadn't you'd have died, you wouldn't eat anything else. Be at peace, Marik, there were still plenty for each of us, and your Steward has sold yours for an obscene amount of silver. I have eaten some and sold some of mine."
I stared at him. I had never dreamed he would be so wastefuclass="underline" but then, he never did know the value of things. "If I didn't know better—I swear, Berys, you look younger." I peered at him in the dim light.
"That does not matter now." He frowned, rubbed his chin, and began to pace the room. "I believe your story, Marik, but on the face of it, it is impossible. What they did to you would only work if you had the gift of Farspeech in the first place"—he frowned at me—"which apparently you do, but how did they know that? Unless..." He started muttering. I heard only phrases—"but why should they—only if..." Suddenly he looked up and stared at me across the room, and his face blossomed into a smile that would terrify strong men.
"Lords of all the Hells," he said in an awed, delighted voice. "They have sown the seeds of their own destruction. The balance will call for it." He stared at me, his eyes boring into mine from ten feet away. "Marik, had you ever had any idea that you might have Farspeech?"
"Of course not. I have only ever heard of it in children's tales," I replied. "Would that it had stayed there."
"Oh, no, Marik my friend, no, no, we have been given a great gift. The power of Farspeech has never been truly understood." His face changed, slowly, and he came to look remarkably like one of the demons I had seen him conjure. "You were forced into this power, but at some level they must have known you possessed it. That means that at least one of them has it, and if you are hearing more than one voice—"
"It seems like hundreds of whispers, sometimes," I said.
"Then it is likely they all have it." He laughed suddenly, a plain laugh, full of delight. "Ah, Marik, we have them now!" He grinned and walked slowly towards me. "For if you can hear, if they have forced you to hear, even one of them, then we have them." He leaned over me, his too-brilliant eyes not a handspan from mine, his breathing short and quick. "Can you speak as well?"
"Back off, Berys," I snarled. "Why in all the Hells do you care?"
"Do this for me, Marik. For us. Try to speak to them."
"And how should I do that?"
"Can you hear any voices now?"
"Berys, I don't want to—"
"I don't care what you want! Listen! Can you hear any voices?"
His voice demanded obedience, though I swore I'd get him back for this. "There is one soft one, a long way away. I can't tell what it's saying at all."
"Listen closer. Can you make out the words?"
I closed my eyes. "No, nothing. I can tell someone is speaking, that's all."
"Try to say something."
"How?" I demanded.
"I have no idea. Just try it."
I tried thinking at the voice, but I felt and heard nothing. "It's useless, Berys. Nothing. Nothing at all."
"Perhaps you can only hear, then." He moved back with a sigh. "Still, it is a great deal better than nothing."
"Whatever you say. My head hurts like fury, you bastard. Fix it."
He laughed, loud and long, as the pain went away and I grew sleepy once again. "Are you content now?" I asked.
"Content, Marik? Yes, I am content. You are saner than you have been since you left Kolmar, and this gift mat has been forced upon you will be the undoing of every dragon ever spawned. Think of it, Marik, dream of it. The hurt they have done you will prove their death. Sleep with that in mind, and dream of power untold." I was too weary to care. I lay down and slept like the dead.
We woke to a sunny morning. The rain had moved off at last, thank the Lady, and it was a little warmer than it had been. If I used my imagination I could almost smell a hint of spring in the air, but that didn't make me feel any better.
In truth I was really beginning to worry. There were far too many things happening to me that I could not explain. It was not simply the voices, though they were bad enough. For the last week I had had a constant headache, and for the last few days my lower back had been aching as well. I was just over my blood time for this moon, and that had been so light and short as almost not to have happened at all, but all the symptoms had stayed with me, the aches and the bloating. I rose that morning sick to my stomach and sore all over, with a burning desire to find a healer as quickly as possible.
However dreadful I was feeling, though, Rella was as bad. When we woke mat morning in the cramped way station, she cried out and cursed when she tried to stand. I knew better by then than to offer to help, but I did it anyway and was snarled at for my pains. She hobbled out the door and we all sat talking quietly, pretending that we couldn't hear her gasp of pain as she pulled herself upright. When we heard her stomp off towards the horses we all went out to help, carrying the saddles and tack. We managed to give the poor creatures a bit of a brush before we saddled them, though they were all in a shocking state. Looking around, I realised that the four of us weren't a lot better.
Rella was first packed and mounted, despite her pain, and we all hurried to join her. To break our fast we ate as we rode, cheese with hard edges and a few last crumbs of travellers cakes—made with oats and wouldn't go stale, but sweet Lady they were dry—and followed Rella's promise of Kaibar. I often had to ride with my eyes closed to keep out the light, for it made my head hurt worse.
We smelled sweet water long before we saw anything, and heard the rush and tumble of the river through the bare branches as we rounded a last stand of trees. The Kai was before us, and there to the west still some miles away across the plain we saw the tall white buildings and the red rooftops of Kaibar. We were at the gates just after noon. Jamie, Varien and I were all for stopping at the first inn we saw, but Rella dragged us deeper into the city and nearer the river, to an inn called the Three Kings.
Kaibar is a large city that sits on the banks of the great River Kai, just where the smaller River Arlen joins it from the north. The Arlen is the boundary between Ilsa, where I was born, and the North Kingdom that we had been travelling through for two moons. If you stand on the pier at Kaibar facing west, your feet are in the North Kingdom, before you across the Arlen lies the southern border of Ilsa and across the Kai to your left is the northern boundary of the South Kingdom—hence the three kingdoms and the name of the tavern. I didn't think of the kings very often, for though I knew old King Tershet of Ilsa sent his tax men to the farm and the village once a year, they never demanded anything that couldn't be paid easily by all, and we never heard tidings of the other three. There had been peace between the four Kingdoms for many years, and even though the barons, the great landholders, were always squabbling amongst themselves it didn't make much difference to the rest of us.
When we finally stopped at the inn, Rella went in and was out again in a very few minutes, looking happier than I had seen her in weeks. "We're to take our horses to the stables while he makes up the beds in our rooms, I've got us the use of the scullery all morning to wash our garb, and I've claimed the first bath, so there!"