Chapter 24
To say that dinner was awkward was like saying that sieges were unpleasant. There was less blood and screaming than a siege and the food was better, but it was still a great deal of grim, entrenched silence behind walls that felt a mile high.
At least Edmund supposed the food was better. He couldn’t taste it. He was eating because he knew that he should be starving, even though food was the last thing he wanted.
Dog Violet had chosen to stay in the stables with her horse.
Edmund got the impression that large groups of strange humans were still a little unsettling for her.
The common room had filled up by the time he had delivered the gnole’s meal and was willing to face the Dervish again.
There was a single long table with benches and only one open seat at the end.
He was not next to the Dervish, thank all the gods, but he was down one and across from him, and even though he tried to keep his eyes firmly on his food, he couldn’t help but hear the other man’s voice.
The Dervish was not eating in silence. He was being charming, quite savagely charming, recounting a heavily censored version of their travels that had the other customers laughing uproariously. When he reached the dragon, though, protests rose from the crowd.
“A dragon?”
“Nonsense!”
“Come on now…”
The Dervish held up his hands. “I know, I know. That’s what I said when I saw it.
I stared down the thing’s gullet and I still don’t half believe it.
It didn’t look real. Even when I was running like hell, part of me kept thinking, This thing can’t possibly exist. It looked like somebody mashed a snake onto a six-legged cow. ”
“It’s true,” another man said, “they do look like that. Saw one once, up north. Unnatural damn beasts.”
“So did you slay the beast, then?” asked someone else, clearly skeptical but willing to be entertained.
“Slay it?” The Dervish threw his head back and laughed.
“Are you mad? No, I was absolutely frozen. Even if I’d remembered I had a knife, what was I going to do, pick its teeth for it?
Fortunately, my gnole friend was in the bushes, watching me about to end my career in whatever passes for a dragon’s belly, and made a ruckus.
The monster turned to see what the sound was and I ran like a rabbit.
” He took a drink of ale and wiped his mouth, smiling that wicked, alluring smile.
“I do not think anyone is going to beat my speed record on that stretch of road anytime soon.”
There was more laughter and the skeptic leaned over to murmur to him. The Dervish bent his head to listen, still with a half smile on his lips, then said something that made the skeptic laugh.
Edmund realized that he’d been watching the Dervish helplessly since halfway through his story and dropped his eyes to his plate. The rabbit pie did not deserve what he had done to it.
I’m jealous. The thought was astonishing. He turned it over like a rare specimen, something to catalogue and put away. What right do I have to be jealous? I have been inflicted on him, a curse he never asked for.
Even if they had met at some other time, in some other place, it could hardly have mattered. A scholar of Edmund’s order had committed an unspeakable atrocity. He closed his eyes, remembering the pattern of lines, the silver dots, the silver …
Eyes.
He did not realize that he had left the inn until he was standing outside in the dark.
The nights were still cold enough that the wind chilled him, but that hardly mattered.
There was no pain that Edmund could feel that would compare to what the Dervish had suffered, unless he somehow became immortal and survived death after death in pursuit of a sadist’s pet theory.
He was no longer surprised at all that the Dervish wanted nothing to do with the priests of the Many-Armed God. He was a trifle astounded that the man hadn’t gone back to the temple and systematically murdered them all.
Edmund knew that it was foolish, but he had always believed, deep down, that most problems with other people could be solved if you could just explain things clearly enough.
If you could lay out all the facts and present them logically, the rest of the world would go, “Oh, I get it now,” and the conflict would melt away.
He knew this wasn’t actually true. He’d known it for years. But on some level, part of him kept trying, which was why it had taken him so long to leave the temple. Even in the face of all evidence, he’d kept thinking that maybe if he just tried this analogy, this time it would work.
This time, though, he didn’t even have that spark of stubborn hope.
What was there to explain? That it wasn’t his fault?
Of course it wasn’t, but what good did that do anyone?
It didn’t change the truth of what the Dervish had endured, it didn’t fix the curse, it didn’t do anything at all, except make the Dervish pretend to absolve him to assuage his own horror. There was nothing he could fix.
Except … maybe there was one thing.
He waited as the customers began to leave, singly and in pairs. When he finally heard the scrape of furniture being put up for the night, he fetched his bedroll and slipped back through the door.
He had already rehearsed what he was going to say, and was caught flat-footed when he saw the Dervish and the skeptic from earlier leaning against the counter, standing … close. Very close.
A hot, nauseating feeling began in the pit of his stomach and swept upward. Edmund tore his eyes away and went to the fireplace, unrolling his bedroll.
“Time I was off,” the skeptic said regretfully. “Do let me know if you decide to stay another day. Or two.”
“Absolutely,” the Dervish said.
Edmund waited until the door had opened and shut. He stared into the banked coals of the fire, trying to compose himself.
When at least five minutes had passed and he was sure that his voice wouldn’t break or do anything embarrassing, he said, “The person who requested the sword was Scholar Andraste, on Chime Street, in Archon’s Glory. I believe they are a dedicate of the Forge God.”
The quality of silence behind him changed. If a predator had walked noiselessly into the room, it would have not-sounded a little like that. “Why are you telling me this now?” the Dervish asked, his voice light and utterly opaque.
“I meant to tell you sooner. I just…” Edmund lifted his hands and let them drop.
“There’s been a lot going on. I’m sorry.
” He hoped desperately that the Dervish would believe that he hadn’t been deliberately withholding it.
The truth was, between the dragon and everything else, it had honestly been shoved to the back of his mind.
“I don’t want you to think that you have to travel with me.
Us. Actually, Dog Violet would probably rather go with you. ”
“I see.”
In the fireplace, a chunk of wood broke apart with a snap. Ash had coated the sides, but in between the cracks ran a bright line of flame.
“Would you prefer that I travel separately, then?”
No. Yes. I don’t know. “I don’t think my preferences are what matters.”
“Ah.”
The door opened. The door shut. Edmund lay down on his bedroll, still staring at the fire.
A few minutes later, the door opened again. Edmund listened to the Dervish’s footsteps across the floor. When had he become able to recognize their sound? He heard the other man unroll his bedroll and climb inside, heard the slide of fabric over flesh, and closed his eyes.
Silence, except for the sound of their breathing.
The bright line of fire dulled slowly down to red. The Dervish’s breathing settled into the slow pattern of sleep.
Only then did Edmund roll over, bury his face in the blankets, and weep soundlessly for all the things that might have been and could never be again.
The Dervish, who was a very light sleeper, lay on his back and stared up at the darkened rafters, unable to close his ears to the sound of Edmund’s sorrow.
The Dervish woke up feeling warm and dry and was just thinking that this was an excellent start to the day when the event of the night before crashed over him.
Ancestors. Between us, we made quite a mess of things, didn’t we?
Before he had done more than begin his wallow in misery, a head appeared over him, carrying what looked like a giant wooden club. The Dervish rolled sideways to dodge the blow, tangling himself in the blankets, and spent a panicked moment fighting his way free.
The innkeeper, who was holding one of the low wooden benches that went by the fireplace, waited patiently.
“I’m guessing you’re not a morning person.”
“No,” the Dervish said. “They’re interruptions in a perfectly good night.” He sat up. Edmund was nowhere to be seen, and his bedroll was gone, too.
He can’t have. He wouldn’t leave on his own, surely? The Dervish scrambled to his feet, throwing his few belongings together with the automatic skill of one who had broken camp more times than he could count.
“Breakfast’s in the kitchen. It’s not fancy, but you can help yourself.”
“I shall be there momentarily.” He slung his bedroll over his shoulder and made his way quickly to the stables.
The sight of the draft horse’s head poking over a stall door was a relief, but did not quite still the churning in his gut. Edmund had said that Dog Violet might prefer to travel with him.
He can’t have left without saying goodbye.
After last night, said the little Angharad that lived in his head, he might have thought that you would prefer that. As a matter of fact, why don’t you?
Shut up, he told her, not because the voice was wrong but because he didn’t feel like answering. And then, to his enormous relief, he heard Edmund’s voice farther down the row of stalls and felt a knot in his gut uncramp.
Don’t start. I’m just hungry.