Fires of Azeroth

He did so. The bows relaxed; the arrhendim's vigilance did not. He bowed his head against his hands and waited, with fever throbbing in his brain and desperation seething in him.

The arrhendim led Roh back finally, and settled him under the watchful eye of the archers. Vanye looked at Roh, but Roh met his eyes but once, and his look said nothing at all.

"Come," Sharrn said, and Vanye rose up and went with them, into the dark, down where the trees overhung and the brook splashed among the stones.

Merir waited, sitting on a fallen log, a pale figure in the moonlight, wrapped in his cloak. The arrhendim stopped him at a few paces' distance, and he stood, offering no respect: respect had been betrayed. Merir offered him to sit on the ground, but he would not.

"Ah," said Merir. "So you feel misused. And yet have you been misused, khemeis, reckoning all things into the account? Are we not here, pursuing a course you asked of us-and in spite of the fact that you have not yet been honest with us?"

"You are not my sworn lord," Vanye said, his heart sinking in him, for he was sure now that Roh had done his worst. "I never lied to you. But some things I would not say, no. The Shiua," he added bitterly, "used akil, and force. Doubtless you would too. I thought you different."

"Then why did you not deal with us differently?"

"What did Roh say to you?"

"Ah, you fear that."

"Roh does not lie… at least not in most things. But half of him is not Roh; and half of him would cut my throat and I know it. I have told you how that is. I have told you. I do not think anything he would have told you would have been friendly to me or to my lady."

"It is so, khemeis, that your lady bears a thing of power?"

Had it been daylight, Merir must have seen the color wash from his face; he felt it go, and fear gathered cold and small in his belly. He said nothing.

"But it is so," said Merir. "She could have told me. She would not. She left me and sought her own way. She was anxious to reach Nehmin. But she has not done so… I know that much."

Vanye's heart beat rapidly. Some men claimed Sight; it was so in Shiuan… but something there was in Merir's hardness which minded him less of those dreamers than of Morgaine herself.

"Where is she?" he demanded of Merir. "And do you threaten? Would you?"

He sprang to seize the old qhal to hostage before the arrhendim could intervene; and all at once he felt that thickness of sense that a Gate could cause. He caught at the qhal-lord, and as he did so his senses swam; he yet held to the robes, determined with all that was in him. Merir cried out; the dizziness increased; for a moment there was darkness, utter and cold.

Then earth. He lay on dew-slick leaves, and Merir with him. The arrhendim seized him-he hardly felt the grip-and drew him back. Weakly Merir stirred.

"No," Merir said. "No. Do not harm him." Steel slid back into sheath then, and Sharrn moved to help Merir, lifted him gently, set him on the log; but Vanye rested still on his knees, lacking any feeling in hands or feet. The void still gaped within his mind, dazing him, as it surely must Merir.

Gate-force. An area about the qhal-lord- charged with the terror of the Gates. I know, Merir had claimed; and know he must, for the Gates were still alive, and Morgaine had not stilled their power.

"So," Merir breathed at last, "you are brave… to have fought that; braver surely than to sink to violence against one so old as I."

Vanye bowed his head, tossed the hair from his eyes and met the old lord's angry stare. "Honor I left long and far from here, my lord. I only wish I could have held you."

"You know such forces. You have passed the Fires at least twice, and I could not frighten you." Merir drew from his robes a tiny case and carefully opened it. Again that shimmering grew about his hand and his person, although what rested inside was a very tiny jewel, swirling with opal colors. Vanye flinched from it, for he knew the danger.

"Yes," said Merir, "Your lady is not the only one who holds power in this land. I am one. And I knew that such a thing was loose in Shathan… and I sought to know what it was. It was a long search. The power remained hidden. You fit well into Mirrind, invisibly well, to your credit. I was dismayed to know that you were among us. I sent for you, and heard you out… and knew even then that there was such a thing unaccounted for in Shathan. I loosed you, hoping that you would go against your enemies; I did believe you, you see. Yet she would seek Nehmin… against all my advice. And Nehmin has defenders more powerful than I. Some of them she passed, and that amazes me; but she never passed the others. Perhaps she is dead. I might not know that. Lellin should have returned to me, and he has not. I think Lellin trusted you somewhat, else he would have returned quickly… but I do not even know for certain that he lived much past Carrhend. I have only your word. Nehmin stands. Perhaps the Shiua you speak of have prevented her… or others might. You cast yourself back into our hands as if we were your own kindred-in some trust, I do think; and yet you admit with your silence what it was she wished in coming here… to destroy what defends this land. And she is the bearer of the power I have sensed; I know that now, beyond doubt. I asked Chya Roh why she would destroy Nehmin. He said that such destruction was her function and that he himself did not understand; I asked him why then he sought to go to her, and he said that after all he has done, there is no one else who will have him. You say he rarely lies. Are these lies?"

A tremor went through him. He shook his head and swallowed the bile in his throat. "Lord, he believes it."

"I put to you the same questions, then. What do you believe?"

"I-do not know. All these things Roh claims to know for truth… I do not; and I have served her. I told her once that I did not want to know; she gave me that-and now I ca

"That is truth," Merir judged. "At least– you believe that it is so."

"I have never lied to you. Nor has she." He strove to gain his feet; the arrhendim put their hands on him to prevent him, but Merir gestured to them to let him be. He stood, yet sick and dizzied, looking down on the frail lord. "It was Morgaine who tried to keep the Shiua out of your land. Blame me, blame Roh that they came here; she foresaw this and tried to prevent it. And this I know, lord, that there is evil in the power that you use, and that it will take you sooner or later, as it took the Shiua… this thing you hold in your hand. To touch that-hurts; I know that; and she knows best of all… she hates that thing she carries, hates above everything the evil that it does."

Merir's eyes searched over him, his face eerily lit in the opal fires. Then he closed the tiny case, and the light faded, reddening his flesh for a moment before it went. "One who bears what Roh describes would feel it most. It would eat into the very bones. The Fires we wield are gentler; hers consumes. It does not belong here. I would she had never come."

"What she brought is here, lord. If it must be in other hands than hers-if she is lost-then I had rather your hand on it than the Shiua's."

"And yours rather than mine?"

He did not answer.

"It is the sword-is it not? The weapon that she would not yield up. It is the only thing she bore of such size."

He nodded reluctantly.

"I will tell you this, Nhi Vanye, servant of Morgaine… that last night that power was unmasked, and I felt it as I have not felt it since first you came into Shathan. What would it have been, do you think?"

"The sword was drawn," he said, and hope and dread surged up in him-hope that she lived, and agony to think that she might have been in extremity enough to draw it.

"Aye, so do I judge. I shall take you to that place. You stand little chance of reaching it alone, so bear in mind, khemeis, that you still ride under my law. Ride free if you will; attempt Shathan against my will. Or stay and accept it."

"I shall stay," he said.

"Let him walk free," Merir said to the arrhendim, and they did so, although they trailed him back to the fire.

Roh was there, still under the archers' guard; the arrhendim signalled them, and the arrows were replaced in their quivers.

Vanye went to Roh, anger hazing his vision so that Roh was all the center of it. "Get up," he said, and when Roh would not, he seized him and swung. Roh broke the force with his arm and struck back, but he took the blow and drove one through. Roh staggered sidewise to the ground.

The arrhendim intervened with drawn swords; one drew blood, and he reeled back from that warning, sense returning to him. Roh tried to rise to the attack, but the arrhendim stopped that too.

Roh straightened and rose more slowly, wiped the blood from his mouth with a dark look. He spat blood, and wiped his mouth a second time.

"Henceforth," Vanye said in Andurin, "I shall guard my own back. Take care of yours, clan-lord, cousin. I am ilin, and not your man, whatever name you wear. All agreements are ended. I want my enemies in front of me."

Again Roh spat, and rage burned in his eyes. "I told them nothing, cousin. But have it as you will. Our agreement is ended. You would have killed me without asking. Nhi threw you out. Clan-lord I still am, and for my will. Chya casts you out. Be ilin to the end of your days, kinslayer, and thank your own nature for it. I told them nothing they did not already know. Tell him, lord Merir, for his asking: What did I betray? What did I tell you that you did not first tell me?"

"Nothing," said Merir. "He told us nothing. That is truth."

The anger drained out of him, leaving only the wound. He stood there with no argument against Roh's affront, and at last he shook his bead and unclenched his bloody hand. "I bore with everything," he said hoarsely. "Now I strike back… when I am in the wrong. That is always my curse. I take your word, Roh."

"You take nothing of me, Nhi bastard."

His mouth worked. He swallowed down another burst of anger, seeing how this one had served him, and went away to his pallet. He lay down there, too distraught for sleep.