She pushed on recklessly. 'The Guardians are not pure gods-touched vessels given the form of humans. They're just people, like you and me, given a second life. Those who die seeking justice for others may be awakened by a cloak to become Guardians. The other cloaks' aren't lilu or gods-cursed demons, they're just people who have succumbed to the worst in themselves, and who have twisted the power the gods granted them to serve their own corrupt ends.'
'Why would the gods give cloaks to humankind if they could be so easily corrupted and used in the service of such monstrous goals?'
'Surely the question isn't whether it was wrong to begin with, but what is to be done about it now.'
He shifted impatiently, his gaze still averted. 'But it has to matter! We have to figure out why this gift from the gods was corrupted, and stop it from happening again. What has happened in the land to poison it? Maybe these troubles are only a reflection of our own selves. The marshal of Bronze Hall says we've betrayed the gods by forgetting the old ways, the traditional forms.'
She considered the assizes she had so recently presided over, and a hollow weariness sank into her heart. 'Maybe. But we can't cling to the old ways just because they're the old ways. Maybe that's the puzzle we're meant to solve, the mystery whose heart we must seek. Maybe this is a challenge, to discover how to walk forward from where we are now. Joss!' Yet she looked away, because it hurt to look at what she had lost. 'You know as well as I do that if we don't stop this army, they'll infest the entire land and we'll all pass under the Shadow Gate.'
T know.' He stared fixedly at the ground.
'Take Badinen to Clan Hall so he can tell his story, and get training. Then before you return to your duties in Argent Hall, you've got to convince the commander at Clan Hall that the reeves must unite in finding new ways to fight.'
The smile that pulled at his mouth was wry and mocking in a way the young Joss she'd loved had never been, because he had always been straightforward and passionate and outward-moving. That had been a great part of his charm.
'That's easily done,' he said as he looked up.
His eyes caught her: the reckless, bold, and sometimes furiously brooding young man had been tempered, beaten, burned, and yet emerged with the deepest part of him intact. The part she had fallen into love with, even if she had called it only desire. The part that was willing to rebel in the face of injustice even if meant standing alone. The part that was bold and crazy enough to try anything, however unexpected or difficult.
'You are Commander of Clan Hall!' she cried, gaping at him.
He closed the gap between them and grasped her wrist. Gods help her, she fell into him in the remembered way that had once come so easily, the way her arms embraced his torso and her hands crept up his muscular back; the way he held her close with one arm just below her shoulders and the other bracing her hips against his. His kiss was the same, at first tender and tentative and then abruptly passionate and searching.
In those first moments, her eyes squeezed shut, it was merely a glorious kiss. Aui! How she had missed this!
Then it hit.
The contact so intimate, so intense, released on her a flood. She was devoured again and again in the guise of different women — so cursed many! — and one young woman so blazingly and immediately vivid that his desire for Zubaidit was a knife in Mark's own longing heart; all his grief and anger poured over her, stupid petty disputes like stings, raging arguments, devouring thirst that no amount of rice wine could slave; yet also she was slaked by the calming friendships he treasured among the other reeves whose affection for him was balm, and yet this comradely affection more than anything made her ache for what she could never again share-
She broke away, blindly groping for a path out of her gods-rotted loneliness. 'Don't touch me!' Grief felled her; she sank to her knees.
He knelt beside her but did not touch. 'Ah the hells, Mark. I wasn't sure — Aui! — but now- No one else can kiss like that.'
Laughter choked her sobs, or maybe laughter and tears were the same thing. 'You sure as hells tried enough women to find out.'
'Marit-'
'Neh, you have nothing to apologize for. Sheh! You thought I was dead. And even if I weren't, I hope I would never be the kind of person who was jealous of the Merciless One. Let it go, Joss.'
After all these years, he could not." 'Do you still love me, Mark?'
She wiped her face. 'I love the memory of the love we shared then. How can I know if I love you now? I'm not so naive, nor should you be. I'm a Guardian. I have my duty, and you have yours. Please tell me you understand.' She did not look at him. She did not want to know if he was lying or telling the truth.
He rose and paced away, his back to the fire. 'What must I do?'
She rested on her hands until she was no longer shaking. Then she rose and wiped her face a final time, organized her thoughts as she would when, as a reeve, she was reporting to her marshal. This is what I have seen. First, Herelia is poisoned. That is where they've built their stronghold. Wedrewe is a stranglehold gripping the throats of every person who lives within the cloak of their power. Wherever they extend their control, they choke until those they rule are grateful merely to be living. Second, I have come to see that in the days long ago the reeves were organized differently than they are now. They ranged more widely, and spread their perches into more outposts. They weren't all gathered into a few halls.'
'Then why do the tales speak of six reeve halls?'
'The tales speak of "the fifteen towns" of the Hundred, but that does not mean there are only fifteen towns today. A reeve hall might have meant something different in the tales. We say it is an actual place, but maybe it used to mean — oh — an allegiance, or a breeding line of eagles.'
'Family groupings,' he said, musing. 'It's true, I'm trying to implement new patrol protocols, even methods of fighting in concert with our allies. But not all the reeve halls will join me. I've got to be cautious in how I approach them.'
'Don't wait too long to act. A newly trained cohort has already marched from Herelia to join the main army. Another will march
within the month, and a third in three months. Fifteen cohorts they have in number.'
'Fifteen?'
'They will train more, whether with willing recruits or unwilling ones. These are the people who hang prisoners from poles. Surely you've seen-'
'I know what we face! We have Olo'osson's support. There's an outlander captain named Anji who is training an army, and he's very good. But how can we defeat an army that boasts fifteen cohorts of fighting men and is commanded by Guardians, none of whom we can stand against?'
'What if I told you there was a way to separate a Guardian from the cloak, to release that cloak to find a new vessel? Maybe a cleaner spirit, one who has not crossed the Shadow Gate.'
He became still, as if holding his breath; it seemed the wind itself ceased. 'Are you saying I could kill you?'
'Yes. If you could take me by surprise, render me senseless so you could separate the cloak from my body. Or if I let you because I was desperate enough to welcome oblivion.'
'Are you that desperate, Marit?'
She could hear how badly he wanted her to answer no. He wanted her to be alive for his own sake as much as for hers. Yet she must consider dispassionately. She must delve into her own heart, her own spirit. Aui! How strongly that heart beat; how powerfully that spirit flamed!
'No. I'm not that desperate. I don't want oblivion.' Her voice trembled with the the ferocity of her desire, unexamined until now. 'I want to be alive. Even in such times, in these days, in this situation, I want to walk and breathe-' She shut her eyes, wondering if he would take the moment to draw his sword and run her through. 'Great Lady. Therefore I am already corrupt.'