Deepwood: Karavans # 2 (38 page)

The karavan-master shook his head. “I just can’t imagine Brodhi volunteering to enter Alisanos.”

“Neither can I,” Davyn admitted. “But she saw it in my hand, that Brodhi is in the company of my two youngest.” And that, too, he amended in his head:
In the company of two of my youngest
… Now that the new child was born, Megritte and Torvic were no longer the babies of the family. “She swore it.”

Jorda chewed absently at the tuft of beard jutting out just below the center of his bottom lip. “That may be the only way that Brodhi’s willing to do such a thing; that he has no choice, since Ilona’s seen it in
your hand. Though I believe he will refuse, at least initially. Maybe what happens is that he is also taken.” He grimaced. “I suppose it’s possible Brodhi’s in the deepwood even as we speak, which means both Shoia are trapped.”

That awoke a surge of hope in Davyn’s body. Perhaps he wouldn’t have to hire Brodhi’s service at all; perhaps what the hand-reader saw was the natural result of the Shoia being swallowed as well. He was ashamed to admit he hoped that was so, but he did.

Jorda read his face. “It would save you trouble.”

“Oh, indeed!” Davyn, hands full of reins and leadrope, rubbed an ear against a lifted shoulder to rid himself of an insect buzzing near it. “And it may also mean that he has
already
found Torvic and Megritte.” He sent a quick, hopeful prayer skyward, toward the pale Mother Moon that waited in the heavens for night to fall. Hope tranformed itself to excitement. “O Mother, let them be brought safely out of the deepwood and back to me!”

Jorda joined him in that. “May it be so. But you do realize we will have no way of knowing what may have happened, or what
will
happen, until Brodhi either returns—”

“—or doesn’t.” Davyn nodded. “We can only wait. But I believe it will be an easier task for me now, the waiting.” Hope bubbled up again, strong as a tankard of raw spirits. “And if I am very fortunate, he will find
more than just Torvic and Megritte.” He smiled at Jorda. “The hand-reader only saw a few images. Perhaps if I visit her again, she’ll see others.”

Jorda frowned. Reluctantly, he said, “We can hope so, but I have not seen it happen that way with Ilona.”

Davyn crowed a laugh. “But you’re not a diviner, karavan-master …
should
you see it that way?”

Jorda opened his mouth to answer, thought visibly, then murmured, “We’ll know in time.”

“Less time,” Davyn averred. “Let it be
less
time!”

But in that, the karavan-master didn’t join him. He held doubts, Davyn knew. But now it no longer mattered.
The Shoia courier will bring my family out…

AUDRUN LOST TRACK of time. She had not counted the nights they spent beside the dreya ring, or upon the journey. But she could roughly count the number of times she thought of her children, saw the faces of her children, of her husband, in her mind. Hundreds. Hundreds of times. She never once forgot them. Always, always they claimed her mind, and her prayers.

Few rests were allowed, and none of them was of sufficient length. But Rhuan insisted, and each time he urged her to her feet she answered the request. She grew accustomed to seeing the back of him: broad
shoulders, narrow hips, tied-back rippled hair hanging to his waist. It was longer than her own.

When he turned to mark where she was, Audrun saw his face in place of his back, and the strain in flesh and features. Each time, with nothing said, she pushed herself the harder to catch up, to keep up, to follow his track.

So many days uncounted. So many days lost.

So many children taken.

SITTING ON THE guildmaster’s rug, Brodhi laced up his leggings. “Now that the pleasure appears to be finished, tell me your business.”

Ferize, still naked, still sheathed in her opalescent scale pattern, stretched languorously, arching her back as she lay on the rug. “Some choices are more difficult than others.”

“I do know that. What’s the business about?”

“That.”

“What, that?”

“That some choices are more difficult than others.” She sat up, wriggled close to him, perched herself in his lap, and wrapped her arms around his neck. This time, her hair was silvery-white, eyes quite black. “That
is
the business, Brodhi.”

He detested it when she was coy and cryptic. He set her aside and rose. “I haven’t time for word games, Ferize. I’m expecting Hecari warriors to come for me
at dawn. It’s nearly that now. I have a long ride ahead of me.”

She shook back her wealth of hair and rose as well, somehow in the transition gaining a white silk robe that would have been perfectly modest had the neckline not plunged to her navel. “And it will be longer yet, depending on your choice.”

He faced her with hands on hips. “Ferize—”

“Your road may fork,” she said, “or it may not. Is that so difficult to understand? The words are plain, yes?”

“The words are plain, yes, but—”

“Then what more should I say? What occurs when you arrive at a crossroads?”

He bit back a retort. She was not, after all, being cryptic or coy. “You choose which way to go.”

Ferize smiled. “So you do.”

The door latch rattled. Brodhi swore. Ferize just grinned at him, and when a moment later the Guildmaster opened the door to his map chamber, he stopped short in startlement. “Where did that cat come from?”

Brodhi said smoothly, “She must have gotten in yesterday and hidden herself. I heard her calling, and found her here.” He bent, scooped up the silvery-gray cat, tucked it under one arm. “I’ll send her on her way out of doors.”

“Do that.” The Guildmaster made a gesture of dismissal and rounded his table. “Hecari are in the courtyard waiting for you. They are not, as a rule, patient.”

“Then I’ll collect my belongings and take my leave.” Brodhi walked out of the chamber, but paused as the Guildmaster said something more.

“Be careful, Brodhi. You’ve two enemies, now, on this ride: Hecari, and Alisanos.”

Brodhi smiled thinly. “Pleasure before business.”

T
HE TEA, THANK the Mother, was effective. Ilona breathed a sigh of extreme relief, gently patting a hand against her formerly upset belly, and sat up in bed, legs dangling over the side. Jorda had come not long after Bethid’s departure and fitted a replacement canopy over the roof-ribs, lacing the oilcloth through holes and tying rope around various davits. Once again she had privacy, with heavy wooden walls providing shelter at either end, and the oilcloth pulled down low on the sides, weighted with lengths of wood to keep the wind from lifting it. Well, normal wind, she reflected; the storm had found easy purchase. Ilona felt at ease again now that she had a choice of raw daylight or privacy and shelter beneath the oilcloth. The Mother Rib still lacked the string of protective charms normally attached to it, but they would be replaced in time. In the meantime, she could send prayers to the Mother of Moons as well as to Sibetha, god of hand-readers, for her survival.

The closed door rattled. Ilona looked up, feeling the wagon shift beneath someone’s weight on the steps. She expected to hear a knock, or a voice calling her name, but neither occured. Just as she was rising to go to the door, it was pulled open. A man upon the bottom step filled the doorway.

Her knees faltered. She sat down very hard upon the edge of her cot.

He was as she remembered. Tall, broad, mature, incandescent with something inside that overwhelmed all. Coppery hair, arranged in complex braid patterns, glinted with glass and gold. His clothing, as she remembered all too well, was supple, scaled, russet hide, with a wide, gold-bossed belt riding his hips. His eyes were Rhuan’s; his face was not, despite similarities. And as he smiled, she saw there were no dimples.

What shot through her mind were any number of opening comments, none of them particularly effective at underscoring her intelligence. Ilona shut her mouth and stared at him. Just that. It was not wise, she realized instinctively, to let him know she was confused and concerned. Best to show strength, or nothing at all. He was a man who would use any hesitation or momentary lapse as a weapon. She was neither a fool nor a coward, but there was no question she felt the power at his call. As a diviner, she was open to such things, more sensitive to power. He made her senses tingle, but it wasn’t desire. It was the simple awareness of threat, and of danger.

His smile grew into a grin. Indeed, no dimples.
“Alive and in the flesh. Though I doubt you recall our last meeting.”

She arched both brows, trying not to let him know she was guessing based on information from Bethid. “You must mean the one we shared at the verge of Alisanos, not far from the river.”

He had not expected that. She saw a brief, slight downward twitch in his eyebrows, but he recovered easily. “Good. This speaks well of you. Few humans—possibly no humans—might remember that.”

He was male. Not human, but male. She knew males. “Well, I suspect you are often remembered—and you may take that in whatever vein you wish.”

“A compliment, certainly.” He climbed the next two steps and ducked down to get through the low door.

Ilona looked again at the braids, the ornamentation of the complex arrangement hanging down his spine. Rhuan had told her it was a Shoia tradition. But the question begged to be asked. “You’re not Shoia, are you?”

He paused, and grinned at her. “Indeed not.”

She kept her expression and voice casual. “Then Rhuan also is not Shoia? Or Brodhi?”

“Occasionally,” he answered. “It serves very well as explanation for resurrection. The name is a euphemism—there are no Shoia anymore. We assume the name of an extinct race as means to make ourselves comprehensible to humans when we’re in the human world.”

She recalled Rhuan apparently forgetting the number
of “deaths” he had experienced. “Then you don’t die at all?”

“We can be
killed
in your world, yes, any number of times—but it’s never permanent. We learned it was simpler to give ourselves six deaths in any one place before moving on.”

She took the gamble. “And in your world?”

He lowered himself to sit on the trunk opposite her cot. Their knees touched. Ilona moved hers aside to escape the contact. “My world is somewhat more perilous.”

It was obvious to her now. “Alisanos.”

“Alisanos. Yes.”

“Are you a demon?”

Teeth flashed in a grin. “I suppose it depends on your perspective. But no. We are not demons.”

He looked so much like Rhuan that she had to ask it. “You’re kin, are you not? To Rhuan?”

“To Rhuan, yes, and to Brodhi. Brodhi is to me what humans would call a nephew. Rhuan is my get.” He paused, seeing the flicker in her eyes, and amended it: “Son.”

He had said “is.” Not “was.” Hope surged. “Then he’s still alive?”

“For now.”

“In Alisanos.”

He smiled. “For now.”

The rush of relief was immediate and tremendous, but seasoned still with fear. Not for herself; for this man’s son. His
get
. “What is it you want of me?”