Revelation (67 page)

Lightning shattered the gloom, so close I could smell it, and the belch of thunder followed so soon after, the storm must be just on top of me. Perhaps it was the storm that weighed so heavy on my back. Raindrops rolled down my face. I was parched, but could lure few of them onto my tongue. Periodically someone would jam a thick, warm finger onto my neck, then tiptoe away, whispering “stubborn devil.”

Stubborn . . . if I could have made it go faster, I would have done so. I was pleased when I began to shiver, for it meant I’d lost enough blood to make a difference. When my vision began to blur and my breath to labor, I tried to make my peace with life. I had done my best. But what had come of all the pain and grief and blood? That was the worst part of the whole business—to die believing I had accomplished nothing.

Soon I could no longer focus my attention, and all my unwanted memories were set loose to play havoc in my head: childhood, training, demon battles, slavery . . . So many faces accusing me of treachery and blindness and insufficiency: Aleksander and Blaise, my son and Kyor and Drych, all the dead demons, all those, human and demon, who were going to be dead in the next hours and years. . . . And throughout everything was Ysanne, the threads of our lives binding everything else together. From the moment of our first meeting, I had never passed a day without loving her. On the day of my freedom and homecoming, I had believed that no man had ever been so blessed as to see the living substance of his dreaming. And she . . . she had said she was ready to give up the throne for me . . . but my anger had driven me away. What wretched fool had ever destroyed himself so perfectly?

All this was terrible enough . . . but as the cold rain fell and the blood leaked out, hard memory abandoned me to wilder visions . . .

 

 

Oh, but he would. And soon.
Please, whatever god there is to hear me, let it be soon.

 

 

Only a moment’s jarring wakening, as if I were falling. Mud was splashing in my eye, but I could not close it.
Soon. Soon.

 

 

Soon. Soon.
The thunder was very far away. The ground beneath my cheek had lost its gritty texture. As in the pits of the Gastai, I could not feel the edges of my physical being. I sank deeper . . .

 

 

No!
A last, weak burst of impotent rage pulled me out of my visions. Rain had pooled beside my face, and the water did not move with my breath.
Vyxagallanxchi!
Was it truth, what I had dreamed? Had he done what he intended and died in the accomplishment? It was not fair that I was never to know.
So leave it fool. Everyone is mad or dead . . . or going to be so very shortly. Enough is enough.
I reached for oblivion, and it was just at my fingertips . . . but I could not yet escape . . .

 

 

“Let me through. I’m commanded to see if he’s dead.” The clear voice was scarcely audible against the steady downpour.

“No one is to touch him but myself, madam. The gods will have him soon. There’s a lake of blood on the other side of him.”

“Do you know who I am, guardsman? I bear the Queen’s mandate. We want to be sure.” Of course. The watchdog would want to know when her watch was over. Fiona.

“My apologies, Kafydda. Be quick and hold your protections carefully. The demon will be free soon.”

Someone breathing close by. A slender cold finger on my neck and the soft press of a hand on my back. A hunting bird’s cry. A fluttering of wings.

The vultures are here
, I thought.
A bony, bloodless meal for both bird and woman. Too bad.

I wasn’t shivering anymore, and as the puddle of water lapped against my staring eye, the world was drowned in murk.

 

“Damnation. Did she have to gut you?”

One would have thought the speaker herself was doing exactly that, for she stuck something extremely sharp right into the place where I hurt the most. I was surprised to hear a man screaming and even more so to discover it was me. I was surprised to hear anything. I thought I was dead. I wanted to be dead. The tugging, stinging aftermath of the stabbing pain seemed benign compared to the first sticking. Or the next. Or the next. Only the novelty of it all kept me from passing out.

“I’m sorry. All right. I’m sorry.” The mumbling apology came somewhere from behind me.

I was still on my face. My arms and legs were still bound, though with rags instead of ropes, and it was still raining, just not directly on me. My head lay on something soft and dry, though every other part of me was soggy.

“I’ve got to get it closed up, or you’re going to lose what little blood’s left inside you. The cursed closina won’t let your blood clot, and I don’t have any of the right things. If we’d had more time, we could have taken you to someone who knew what she was doing. Damned stupid woman, why didn’t you learn these things when you had the chance?”

From the course of the conversation, I realized that the speaker was actually addressing herself, even if some of the words happened to be aimed at me. And since the speaker was Fiona, I knew she had no intention of me hearing her. Just as well. The only responses I could come up with were the pitiful wavering scream and a few abject groans. By the time she finished with her sewing exercise—I finally figured out what it was she was doing—I was quivering wreckage.

To my continuing surprise, as soon as she had wrapped a dry bandage about my middle, she unbound my hands and feet—not that I was going anywhere. I stayed spread out like a starfish in a tide pool, because I had no strength to move. Through my churning head drifted the vague presumption that Ysanne had decided to pretend she was a Gastai—kill me, heal me, then have the pleasure of killing me again.

“Now to get something in your stomach.”

When Fiona pulled my arms and legs together and attempted to roll me onto my back, I was lost again. My death dreams—my visions of failure and destiny and horror—continued to plague me with far more vivid reality than the young Aife and her mysterious activities. But still I did not die.

 

Sometime much later I seemed to be in the rain again. Drowning. But it was only Fiona trying to pour water down my throat at the same time as I was trying to fight off the vision of my infamy. “I will not!” I shouted—my voice harsh and weak—choking and gasping as I inhaled the water. “I will not. It is not me.” Even when my one usable eye came open, all I could see was darkness . . . the end of the world resting in my hand.

“Here, be still. You’re going to tear yourself apart.” Firm hands held me down until I could wake up, catch a breath, and fall limp against whatever lumpy pillow supported me half sitting. I was covered by a cloak that stretched only between my neck and my knees, which meant it was likely Fiona’s. Just beside my feet was a tiny fire—a sorcerer’s fire, for it put out a great deal more heat than its size would lead one to expect. While she proceeded to pour more water down my parched throat, I got a blurred glimpse of our surroundings—a grove of thin trees, some rocks behind our backs, tall grass trampled by no more than three or four sets of boots, an immensity of silence, and infinite damp darkness. We were nowhere near the Ezzarian camp. I could make no sense of it.

“Did the Queen command you to try drowning next?” I said. “Just be done with it. And quickly, please.” I rolled to the side, drew up my knees against the tearing pain in my side, and dug the heel of my hand into my eye, vainly trying to erase my seeing. No matter how I denied its legitimacy, no matter the platitudes about prophecy and possibility . . . had not the vision of my first dream come true? I had become my enemy. I had led a demon legion into my world, bringing death and ruin. No rains could ever cleanse the blood from my hands.

A hand lay on my shoulder. “You need water.”

“I need to be dead. Why am I not dead?”

“It isn’t time for you to die yet.”

“Is there someone else I need to kill first? Some other war to start or make worse? Some other stupid mistake I need to make? My wife has judged me abomination. She is always right. She warned me.”

“You’re very sure of your guilt.”

“Tell me of someone I did not fail.”

“First you must drink and eat a bit. Then I’ll tell you.” I didn’t argue with her. I assumed that dying prisoners being guarded by the future Queen of Ezzaria had few options. Fiona proceeded to fill a cup from a small pot that was steaming beside her fire. “Here. Try this and see if it settles.” I reached for the cup, but my hand was so unsteady, Fiona bypassed it and took the cup straight to my mouth. Broth . . . rabbit or gorse-hen . . . strong and hot. The very smell of it gave me a hint of how monstrously hungry I was . . . and how sick. I pushed away the cup and vomited up most of the water. My side felt like Ysanne’s knife was still within.