like. Snarling and rearing back. I felt hate along with its hunger then, and fear. Somehow, by impossible chance, I had actually made it afraid.”
Sherin opened her eyes, blinking tears that she quickly wiped away. “Then it was gone, the forest, the tiger all vanished in a heartbeat and I was back in the Sepulchre. Luralyn told me only a few seconds had passed. I—” She looked at her hands again. “I could feel it, the change in me. It was like a bright, burning flame, and I knew what I could do, what I had to do.”
“Did you bleed?” he asked, noting again the pallor of her skin.
“Some,” she replied with a note of irritation. “Enough to leave me in this irksome state. Don’t worry, the body will recover from loss of blood in time.”
“Your gift is dangerous. Not just in the price it exacts, but in the passions it stirs in others. You must be cautious in how you use it . . .”
“Thank you, my lord.” A measure of the familiar animus returned as she shot him a warning glare. “But this gift is mine, and I will decide how best to employ it.”
He quelled the compulsion to argue, but not without difficulty. Her compassion worried him. How could one such as her resist using this gift, regardless of what hazards it entailed?
“I offer only guidance,” he said, tone as gentle as he could make it. “For most of my life I bore a gift. I would not have you make my mistakes. Many and grievous as they were.”
She looked away, pulling the blanket more tightly around her shoulders. “I need to sleep.”
Vaelin watched her settle onto her side, back turned to him, then rose and moved to Derka. He removed the bridle to allow the stallion to partake of the grass but left his saddle in place, suspecting they might need to ride on quickly. He felt only a faint fatigue after so many hours’ hard riding so stood guard whilst the others slept. He knew this invigorated state must be an effect of Sherin’s healing, making him wonder how long it would last. All the aches that had begun to beset him over the course of the past couple of years were gone now and, had he a mirror, he fancied he might see fewer lines around his eyes.
“Youth is not appreciated by the young,” he told Derka, scratching his nose as he munched a mouthful of grass. The stallion gave an indifferent nicker and lowered his head to the ground.
* * *
◆ ◆ ◆
They rode on come nightfall, Luralyn maintaining an unerringly westward course. “I assume you have some destination in mind?” he asked her as they cantered across the darkened plain.
“The Steppe turns to marsh on the southern shore of Materhein Lake,” she said. “Beyond the lake lies the foothills of the coastal mountains.”
“You intend to navigate a marsh?”
“There is a passage, known only to a select few of the Cova Skeld. Once clear of the marsh we’ll head south to Keshin-Kho. Hopefully, the high country will slow any pursuit. My people are masters of the Steppe, but not the hills.”
“This path through the marsh, your brother will surely know of it.”
“He will.” She slowed her horse to a trot and Vaelin followed suit. She waited until the others had ridden out of earshot before speaking again. “I have a notion of how to forestall further pursuit,” she said, speaking in the clipped tones of one imparting knowledge with great reluctance. “My family . . . these people we travel with, will resist it. When the time comes I shall need you to lead them on.”
“Meaning you will not be coming with us.”
“My brother doesn’t want you. It suits him to have his great enemy out of reach, a goal for his worshipful army. But not me. Me he will never let go.”
* * *
◆ ◆ ◆
The marsh proved to be some of the worst ground Vaelin had ever seen. Flies swarmed in dark clouds above pools of stagnant, algae-covered water amid islets of tall rushes, all wreathed in a perennial mist. Even the supposedly safe path Luralyn led them along was a waterlogged sponge of moss and peat that forced them to dismount lest the horses become mired. Twice they were obliged to pull one of Luralyn’s companions from the water after a wayward step sent them stumbling into one of the pools.