She turned, knelt by the water. The morning sun winked through the leaves. It seemed pleasantly warm. She decided to keep a vigil throughout the day.
She stood silently grieving for what seemed like long minutes. With her endowments of metabolism, it was easy to lose track of time, to have it stretch out of all proportion.
The riders in town were mounting their horses when she heard her husband gasp. She climbed up, looked over the wagon. He’d wakened.
Outwardly there was little change in his appearance. Beads of sweat had sprung up on his brow, and the armpits in his tunic were drenched. His eyes still looked yellow and filmed, and his face was pallid. His lips were blistered from fever. He gazed up at the trees, at the sky.
“You’re looking a little better,” Myrrima lied. “Do you feel better?”
“I’ve never felt worse,” he said with a dry throat. She unslung her waterskin, forced a dribble down his throat. He drank weakly, pushed it away. “What are you doing?”
“Trying to save you,” Myrrima said. “You’re lucky you didn’t take sick and die.”
He closed his eyes painfully, shook his head. The tiny gesture spoke volumes. He didn’t want to live.
Myrrima held silent for a moment. She felt as if she were trying to pound through his armor, get at the soft flesh underneath. She let him sit for a moment, and asked in a softer voice, “Why? You knew you were infected, and you merely walked away. Why?”
“You don’t want to know,” Borenson said.
“I do.”
He opened his eyes to slits, studied her dispassionately. “I don’t love you. I...can’t love you.”
Myrrima felt stung by the words. Her heart suddenly pounded, and she fought to control her tone. She knew vaguely what he’d been through. She’d seen the light in his eyes when he spoke of Saffira. She’d seen him call for her in his sleep. She knew that with her endowments of glamour, Saffira would have been irresistible to a man. And Raj Ahten had castrated her husband. “Did you bed her?” Myrrima tried to keep the pain and anger from her voice. “Is that why Raj Ahten took your walnuts?”
“What is it to you?” Borenson demanded.
“I’m your wife.”
“Not—” he began to say. Borenson shook his head. “I never touched her. No man could have touched her. She was too beautiful...”
“You don’t know what love is,” Myrrima said with finality.
For a moment, neither of them spoke. “I knew it would hurt if you found out,” Borenson said.
Myrrima could think of nothing to say for a long moment. “I’m your wife, still,” Myrrima said. She could see his torment but felt incapable of reaching him. Raj Ahten had done so much to hurt him. “Why didn’t he just kill you?”
Borenson groaned, pushed himself up in the straw. “I don’t know. Raj Ahten doesn’t usually make strategic mistakes.”
There was anger in his tone, suppressed rage. Myrrima liked that. If he was angry, at least it gave him something to live for.
Myrrima heard the scuffing of a footstep, looked up.
Gaborn strode down the road, his face clouded with concern. Iome followed at his side, and appeared more shocked at Borenson’s injury than anything else.
Gaborn came straight to the wain. “How are you feeling?”
Borenson responded in a tired voice, “Fine, milord. And you?” The tone of sarcasm was impossible to miss.
Gaborn reached down, touched Borenson’s forehead. “Your fever has broken.”
“I’m glad that’s all that is broken,” Borenson said.
Gaborn said, “I...came to thank you, for all of your efforts. You’ve given much for Mystarria.”
“Only my conscience, the lives of my Dedicates, and my walnuts,” Borenson said. He was still unaware of the spell that the wizard had cast on him, the hope of regeneration. He spoke from his pain. “Is there anything else you’d like, sire?”
“Peace and health for you and your kin,” Gaborn said, “and a land without war, where men have never heard of Raj Ahten or reavers or the Darkling Glory.”
“May you have your wishes,” Borenson said.
Gaborn sighed. “There are forcibles to help speed your recovery, if you want them.”
A look of pain clouded Borenson’s eyes. He looked hurt, broken. “How many can you spare me?”
“How many will you want?”
“Enough to kill Raj Ahten,” Borenson said. “It’s true that he’s still alive?”
Gaborn did not hesitate. “I can’t give you so many.” Now there was pain in Gaborn’s eyes. He wanted to give in to rage, he wanted Borenson to get his vengeance. If any man deserved it, Borenson did. He’d been forced to kill children that Raj Ahten seduced to be his Dedicates. He’d been forced to slay even men that he called friends. Raj Ahten had ripped away his manhood.
Borenson painfully pulled himself up to the side of the wagon, as if to prove his resolve. “I was the best guardsman in your father’s service. If there is any man alive who can take him—”
“I can’t,” Gaborn said. “You can’t. The Earth Spirit forbids it. For the sake of us all—”
“Yet you came here to seek a favor of me,” Borenson said. “I can tell by that look on your face. And you’re offering forcibles....”
“A hundred of them,” Gaborn said. “No more.”
That was a lot of forcibles, more than twice the number of endowments that Borenson had had before.
Iome took Myrrima’s arm, drew her away so that the two men could barter alone.
“What’s happening?” Myrrima asked.
“Gaborn needs your husband to deliver a message to King Zandaros, suing for peace. It’s a great deal to ask on the heels of what has happened.”
“I see,” Myrrima said. She knew that Borenson would carry the message. Eight days ago he had vowed to go to Inkarra to search for the legendary Daylan Hammer, the Sum of All Men, in hopes of learning how to defeat the reavers and Raj Ahten. He’d planned to go in secret, sneaking into the land, for the borders of Inkarra had been closed to the men of Rofehavan for decades.
But Myrrima could immediately see how carrying the message might work to their benefit. If Borenson could persuade Zandaros that it was in his best interest to ally himself with Mystarria, Zandaros might even help them find Daylan Hammer. Even if he couldn’t persuade Zandaros, at least delivering the message would give Borenson a pretext for crossing the border.
“Where will he get the Dedicates?” Myrrima asked as they strolled to the banks of the river.
“There is a facilitator at Carris,” Iome said. “Your husband can take endowments there.”
“The city is in ruins,” Myrrima objected. “Are you sure it would be safe? The mage’s curses are so thick in the air that illnesses are breaking out everywhere!”
“He’ll have to forgo taking stamina for a bit, but Batenne is along the way. Gaborn assures me that your husband can get endowments there.”
Myrrima paused. She’d never seen a map of Mystarria, had no idea where Batenne lay, though the name was familiar. It was a sprawling city in the far south, in the wine country along the borders of the Alcairs. Wealthy lords and ladies often wintered there.
Iome asked, “Will you be going with him?”
“If he’ll have me. I guess...even if he won’t.”
“Of course he’ll want you at his side,” Iome said. She had such childlike confidence that he would.
Myrrima squeezed Iome’s hands, said nothing for a long moment. She asked, “How do you do it? How do you love so easily?”
The question seemed to catch Iome by surprise.
“I see it in your eyes,” Myrrima said. “I saw it when you looked at your servants. I see it when you look at me. There is nothing feigned about it. Yet I am married to a man who says that he does not love me, and I believe him. He will not even try to feign it.”
“I don’t know,” Iome said. “Love isn’t something that you feel. It’s something you give.”
“Doesn’t it tear you apart, to give yourself away like that?”