The Beauty of Darkness - Mary E. Pearson Page 0,194

reaching out to Lia, praying for her safety and strength, praying her voice would be heard by the Vendans.

Natiya, who was only a child herself, spoke to the children with words that were familiar to them, and it seemed at times that was all that quieted them and got us through the night. The next day the children still trembled with fright, struck out, recoiled at our touch. It was hard to gain their trust. I understood too well that trust couldn’t be forced or gained overnight, but I also knew it could come with patience, slowly, day by day, and I was ready to give them that time, however long it took.

When I went into the valley and saw the dead, and then helped care for the hundreds who were injured, I thought about the devastation described in the Holy Text and the handful of the Remnant who had survived. We had almost been them. I kissed two fingers, one for the lost and one for those to come, and prayed the winnowing was over.

We could spare no more lives to the heavens.

“I’m done with this one,” the surgeon said. She wiped the blood from her hands, and I followed the sentries as they carried Kaden to the far end of the tent.

KADEN

I reached down, feeling for my leg.

“Don’t worry. It’s still there.”

Pauline wiped my forehead with a damp cloth.

My head still swam with the elixir the surgeon had given me. The tent was full of the injured. There were a dozen more tents like this one. I’d had to live with the wood in my leg for three days. There were too many wounded for the few surgeons here to take care of at once. I’d almost taken Orrin up on his offer to cut it out for me. Tavish lay on a bedroll opposite mine, his arm and neck swathed in bandages. Half of his long ropes of hair were gone. He lifted his good arm as a welcome, but even that small effort left him grimacing with pain.

Rafe sat on a crate in the opposite corner while Berdi brushed a healing balm on his hands. Someone else dressed a gash on his shoulder, then put his arm in a sling. I could hear Gwyneth through the tent walls, giving orders to Griz for more pails of water, and Orrin tearing fabric for bandages. The aftermath was as loud as the battle but with a different kind of noise.

“The Watch Captain?” I asked.

Pauline shook her head. “No sign,” she answered.

The coward had slithered away, and he and a half dozen of the Council were unaccounted for. It could be they were among the mass of dead bodies—not all were recognizable anymore.

“If they’re alive, they’ve crawled into deep dark holes,” Pauline added. “We’ll never see them again.”

I nodded and hoped she was right.

RAFE

“How are your hands?”

“Berdi just changed the dresssings,” I answered. “I should be able to ride in a few days.”

“Good.”

“And how is your shoulder?” I asked.

“Sore—but more than worth it. You may pull it out of joint anytime you wish.”

I had barely reached Lia before she went over the bluff with the Komizar and Calantha. My hands had still been wet with raw burned flesh, but I caught her wrist and pulled her back up. Even with our injuries, she and I were among the lucky ones. I’d told Kaden about Andrés, but his body had never been found, perhaps trampled beyond recognition by a brezalot.

Dalbreck’s toll was high. By General Draeger’s count, we had lost four thousand soldiers. Without Lia’s plea and her promise to the Vendans, there would have been no end to it. There was no doubt in Draeger’s mind now that the Komizar would have wiped Morrighan, and then us, from the face of the earth.

Dalbretch, Vendan, and Morrighese forces worked together during the aftermath, and Lia spoke to the Vendans daily, helping them prepare for their journey back home.

“We should be ready to leave in a few days too,” she said. “The last of the bodies have been burned. There were too many to bury them all.”

“Jeb?”

She nodded and walked away.

LIA

It had been almost two weeks. The last of the dead were buried or burned—including the Komizar. It was strange, looking at his lifeless body, the fingers that had clutched my throat, the mouth that had always held threat, the man who had looked out on an army city and imagined the gods under his thumb. Everything about him now was