Troy calmly touched the tip of his weapon to her tunic. The paint was so dry from their long battle that it barely marked her. As she gathered her thoughts, she realized Troy suddenly seemed only slightly winded. He smoothly sheathed his blade, the corner of his lips curling upward in a familiar, self-satisfied smile.
He had tricked her. He had been far from his limit. He could have stepped up the pace and defeated her at almost any point. All the long months in which her confidence had grown, her plans been laid, her hopes constructed, had been rendered meaningless with one quick gesture.
"Another time," he said. "Maybe your luck will change." He chuckled as he opened the barn doors. The brightness of the day stabbed her eyes.
Her throat was dry from her weeping. Alemar poured water into her mouth. She choked, swallowed some, inhaled a bit, and lost the largest part down her neck. She was tired. She wanted to stop. The pain, however, had lessened. The tendrils had unravelled from the first junction, and were doing the same with the second, leaving the areas cool, green, and untainted.
She was in a sitting position, with Alemar wrapped closely around her. Wherever their skin touched, energy passed back and forth. She trusted him utterly, knew that he would guide her tenderly and well through the rest of it, but she doubted her own ability to continue. She felt like a cripple. But the more he touched her, the more her breathing calmed, the more her muscles relaxed. She drifted back into sleep as he drew her to the next junction.
The clop of her oeikani's hooves was crisp and sharp, like her mood. Ahead the great, green canopy of the forest yielded to blue sky, a sign that she was nearing Garthmorron Hold. Alemar rode at her side, engrossed in his own thoughts of homecoming.
"Look. There's the tree where we talked with father," he said, pointing to a trunk heavy with creeping vines. Keron had visited them only once in their memory, staying only two days. One afternoon he had walked along this road with his twins to have a private moment with them.
She nodded absently, still playing out in her mind what she would do after their arrival, once the homecoming celebration began and she could arrange an encounter with Troy. She imagined the scene:
"Learn anything in your year in the Old Kingdoms, my lady?" he would ask, politely but patronizingly, lifting a goblet of wine to his lips.
"The men of Numaron like their women fat," she would respond, sipping from her own goblet, "and the folk of Sirithrea are astonishingly rude."
"True, true."
"And," she would add casually, "the wizards of Acalon make fine rapiers."
Troy would pause, meet her eyes, remember he had wine in his mouth, and swallow. "That they do. Of the finest Antoth ores. But they don't let go of them easily."
"I know." Her eyes would sparkle. "Nevertheless, I happened to obtain one. Would you like to see it?"
Troy would try to seem nonchalant, mildly interested. Perhaps he would even decline her initial invitation, but eventually she would open the polished hardwood case, revealing her prize. He would hold it reverently up to the light, check its balance, examine the swordmaker's signature on the pommel. "Seth of Tsiris. They say no one has ever broken one of his blades." He would betray a hint of envy, for though he had two Acalon swords, neither had been made by such a famous craftsman. "How did you get it?"
"He made it especially for me, for a price no higher than a common smith would charge. He was impressed by my fencing." And she would smile.
Perhaps she would mention the training she had received from other swordmasters, hinting at the new tricks she had learned, or perhaps she would surprise him. Sooner or later he would want to discover for himself why his pupil, still a mere eighteen years old, had merited such a trophy. Perhaps she would even use her Acalon rapier, for they were both at such a level that they could dispense with the precaution of practice blades.
Then they would see who was the best.
She and Alemar rode through the flowered archway that led to the main hold, and saw an animated gathering of people on the broad stone steps. Their mother, Lerina, and the rest of the party with whom they had toured the capitals of the Calinin Empire had preceded them by half an hour, and by now most of the residents had turned out to welcome the travellers. The twins eased through a crowd of servants and friends, touching hands, smiling, offering greetings. Elenya was surprised to see her mother leave Lord Dran's company and thread her way through the celebrants. Elenya had to lean over in the saddle to hear her somber words.
"Swordmaster Troy caught the ague and died two months ago," Lerina said.
All at once, the grounds and the people around her became shadowy and unreal. So deep was her shock that she did not hear her mother's next words.
"It's so sad. He was so proud of you."
This time, as Alemar focussed the memory, she heard the comment, and finally understood that over the years, Troy had come to respect her. She had been so anxious for overt acceptance that she had missed the small, subtle signs that he had given, indications that a perceptive observer like Lerina had recognized. Elenya had pushed for total acknowledgment, not seeing that Troy's pride would never let himself stand revealed so openly. His death had meant to her that she could never prove herself, never resolve the matter between them, not knowing that it had already been resolved.
She no longer resisted the journey along the filaments. The suffering was tolerable now. She stalled at only two places. The first was when she looked back at her life in Zyraii, and realized how much her unhappiness there had been exacerbated by her own character. Another woman would not have had as great a problem with the sexual inequality of the desert society. The second was when she remembered Milec, and realized that part of the reason she had failed to fall in love with him was that he, in turn, could not measure up to the other men she had known, from Alemar to Troy to Lonal.
The strands unravelled, releasing the pain. Alemar had been right; she had never suspected the ills hidden within. Though she had never concealed the memories from herself, she had forgotten and denied the depth of the emotions associated with them.
She opened her eyes. She could see almost nothing, only the dark backdrop of the ceiling, the dim shape of Alemar asleep beside her, and the murky glow of Motherworld leaking in at the edge of the tent flap. Her throat smarted, dry as dust. Caked perspiration clung to her like a shroud, moist only at her waist, where Alemar's arm was draped. She lifted his limb away and set it gently on the blanket. He did not stir. In fact, he was so lifeless it frightened her, until she made out the steady rise and fall of his chest.
She swayed as she sat up, and decided not to stand. She crawled to the water bags and, ignoring the cups, put the spout to her lips and did not remove it until her stomach felt like it would burst. The dizziness faded. She tore off a tiny hunk of bread, put it in her mouth, and held it, her tongue and cheeks pressed against it, finding more comfort in the possession of the food than in the actual consumption. When she trusted herself not to fall, she crawled outside, closed the flap, and stood up.
The cold breath of night greeted her, stiffening her nipples and raising the hair on her legs. The valley was still with the promise of dawn; she saw no sign of activity across the meadow, in the camp. She considered fetching a shawl, but decided against it. The cold felt good. Her nudity felt good. The world would not harm her this night.
The dew brushed her ankles as she walked. She scooped her hand across the grass and wiped her forehead, delighting in the wet caress. Warm in spite of the air, she was strong, contented, free.