Doppelganger (43 page)

Uh-huh. And it's going to be that easy, I'm sure.

"What do you have planned?" Mirage asked her bluntly.

" 'You' meaning 'you and your friends,' I assume." She hardly waited for Mirage's nod. "We're not certain. We'd like to go on as we have, and save more doppelgangers, but it's much more dangerous than it used to be."

Not surprising
. Mirage glanced over to Miryo and raised an eyebrow.

"Our best bet is to hole up, I think," her double said. "To get off the road and really work this through. We'd have to find a place we're not likely to be tracked down. Does Silverfire have anything like that we could use?"

"Yes, but I don't think that's a good idea." Mirage sat down and twiddled her mask between her fingers. "Hunter security is good, but it can be broken, especially by magic. And they'll be expecting something like that." She realized that she had wrapped her entire head covering around her left fist. She pulled it off and folded it neatly. "Our best bet would be somewhere else, somewhere remote."

"The mountains?"

"Maybe. I'd favor the ones here in Abern. I know a few folk who live there; they might be able to set us up." The itinerary from Tari's study was in her saddlebags, so hopefully no one would be able to make the connection to her earlier jobs. Mirage wondered briefly if she should demand protection from Ashin as one of the three boons she and Eclipse were now due.
No, no sense in it; they want us alive anyway. Save the boons for later. And hope there will
be
a later
.

"Hiding is a good idea," Ashin said, nodding. "We can get in touch with you through the paper you have."

"And if we think up anything that requires your help, we'll contact you."

The Hand Key nodded again. "May the Goddess be with you. I'm sure she'll give you an answer."

"Does Ashin frighten you as much as she does me?"

Miryo had to laugh, despite the tension weighing on her. "Yes. She's so single-minded it's unbelievable. There's the problem, which she knows; there's the solution, which she's looking for, and there's the Goddess, who will make it all okay."

"When you put it that way, she doesn't sound all that different from us. But somehow… I don't know. I think it's the way she's willing to gamble so many lives, including her own daughter's, on this."

"Yes." Miryo fingered the tail of her braid, twisting it around her finger. "Maybe that's the only way to do it, though. There really
is
a problem. The clergy have been saying so forever, and we've been ignoring them. I think that 'unbalanced' thing
must
have something to do with this. Which is encouraging, in a way; it means that we
are
right, at least in thinking that the current situation is wrong."

"Whether any of our hypothetical solutions are right is another story."

"I guess we'll find out." She glanced up sharply as a rumble of thunder reached her ears.

Mirage also looked up and made a sour face. They were in a large, open field probably intended for grazing, though at the moment no livestock were in it. There was no shelter to be had, other than the low stone wall at then-side. Miryo, considering the incoming weather, wished they had gone ahead and pushed to reach the next town, but Mirage had advised keeping as low a profile as possible.

Eclipse approached their campsite as a second roll of thunder began. He had been some distance away, bathing in the stream; he ran a hand through his wet hair and gave the sky an irritated look. "I might have saved myself the walk, and just waited for the rain to wash me off."

"Two baths won't kill you," Mirage said.

Ill weather might make them all sick, though. Miryo glanced at the wall. "Could we rig up cloaks over this? That might give us at least a little bit of shelter." If there was a more exposed place to camp within a hundred miles, she'd be surprised.

"We can try," Mirage said. And, as Miryo had hoped, the Hunters were able to set something up. They weighted one edge of their cloaks onto the wall with loose stones, and set their saddles on the inside of the other edge, forming a sloping roof. It would hold for at least a while, provided the winds didn't become too strong.

"I refuse to do this again," Miryo said when they were finished. "Dye my hair; Void it, cut off my nose and I won't complain. I just want to sleep in a building."

"It won't be bad after tonight," Mirage said. "Soon we'll be in trees again, and then we'll be able to set up something much better. Besides, the bad weather probably won't last long. Summers have been dry, lately."

"All the more reason we're due for a wet one." Hearing the whine in her own voice, Miryo grimaced. "Sorry."

"I can hardly throw stones at you for being in a bad mood. I feel the same way myself."

Eclipse glanced at them both, but said nothing. He had reacted little to their account of their meeting with Ashin. Lately he seemed to have assumed the responsibility of keeping them in one piece until they found their answer or killed themselves trying. Beyond that, he was keeping his mouth shut. Not long ago, such behavior would have intimidated Miryo, but she was becoming accustomed to him. He had begun treating her the way he did Mirage. This made things a little problematic for Miryo, who didn't understand him the way her doppelganger did, but she just followed Mirage's lead: If Eclipse's silence didn't bother her, Miryo wouldn't worry about it, either.

Mirage tapped her on the arm. Suppressing a sigh, Miryo got up and followed her out from under the shelter of the cloaks.

They had agreed to pray together every night, in hope of deriving some kind of inspiration from it. Miryo wasn't sure how productive it would be, but it couldn't hurt. If nothing else, it meant she'd at least go to the Goddess's arms with a good record of piety.

She banished such negative thoughts with a grimace.
Thinking like that won't get you anywhere
.

The first sporadic drops of rain began to fall. Miryo knelt on the ground at Mirage's side, looked at the sky, and began to pray.

I don't think this is doing much good.

Mirage suppressed a sigh. It wouldn't help to let Miryo know her heart was not truly in their prayers. It wasn't that she didn't care; her life was on the line, after all. She just didn't get the feeling that kneeling out here in the mud was getting them anywhere.

Once again she turned her mind to the ins and outs of their problem, in hope of having some sudden revelation that would make everything clear. No such luck. Separation still struck her as their best option, but Ashin hadn't favored it, and Miryo seemed to agree with the Key. They'd spent the ride so far cooking up bizarre schemes for making Mirage a part of the casting process instead.

She still had to shudder at the proposition Eclipse had put forth. He hadn't meant it seriously, but the potential consequences didn't bear thinking about. He had suggested that they try to create the channel for power in Mirage.

I
can just see me spawning another one of me
—
of us
—
whatever. Three people with one soul. As if two aren't enough. And we'd still have an antimagical doppelganger around, which wouldn't solve anything
.

Miryo had tried teaching Mirage to sing a spell, but that had been a miserable failure. Not only could Mirage barely tell one note from another, she found it impossible to remember the proper order of the syllables. The language used for magic was not easy to learn, and small errors had meaning. She'd accidentally said "kosuda" instead of "koshuda," and Miryo had fallen about laughing. According to the witch, she would have been summoning fish instead of a wind.

What else was there? They had already tried being in physical contact, the same night she had Eclipse knock her out. None of it was working.

Mirage realized her breathing had quickened. She forced herself to slow down.
Even if I can't concentrate, I shouldn't distract Miryo
.

She knew that Eclipse thought she had become resigned to dying in the attempt. He was wrong, although Mirage could not have said exactly why. She had said at one point that it was because "die trying" wasn't even an option; she
would
succeed. That wasn't quite it, though. And it wasn't Ashin's blind belief that the Goddess would make it all right.

Maybe it's just that I can't believe I really might die.

Oh, and
this
is a cheerful train of thought
.

She shook the gloomy feeling off with an effort. Even as she did so, the intermittent drops from the sky became a real rain. Mirage sighed inwardly, but said nothing; Miryo was deep in prayer, and she would stay out here as long as her double did.

But Miryo was in fact
not
deep in prayer. She was looking at Mirage.

When she realized this, Mirage blinked. Miryo's eyes slid quickly away, but Mirage had to grin. "Have you been praying?" she asked.

Miryo looked uncomfortable. "I… I just can't concentrate. I'm sorry if I distracted you."

At that, Mirage laughed outright. "And here I am, kneeling in the rain because
I
don't want to interrupt
you
. What a stupid pair we make."