Tahn (41 page)

She started to reach for his hand, but there was yelling suddenly from the north wall, guards ordering back some unwelcome stranger.

And then came a wail, a shout, of utter desperation.

“Vari!”

Tahn looked toward the sky with a gasp of recognition. “Lady,” he said, “go and wake the boy. Tell him to hurry.”

“Vari!” the stranger screamed again.

“And don’t worry,” he told her. “Tell him it’s Marcus.” He hurried toward the wall with his limping gait, and she turned and ran inside.

“He’s drunk!” one of the guards complained in disgust.

Tahn brushed the comment aside.

“Marcus?”

A boy’s face emerged from the shadows of the trees for just a moment and then drew back, tainted with fear.

“What do you want with him, sir?” a guard asked. “He wouldn’t be chased off. Is he dangerous?”

But Tahn ignored the guard. “Marcus,” he said calmly, “I have sent for Vari. He told you truly that you need not fear. Come ahead and let me talk to you.”

“It’s the Dorn, isn’t it?” the boy was saying with shaky voice.

“Yes. You know I’m Vari’s friend. And yours if you want one. But I can’t help you if I can’t see you.”

“I had a hold of him,” one guard said. “But he slipped my grasp, and Josef said it was better to run him off, a drunken kid unarmed.”

Unarmed? That was strange, Tahn knew. “Marcus, has something happened to you?”

“Don’t hurt me, sir. Please just let me see Vari. Please!”

“I told you he’s coming. He’ll be quick enough. Just relax. I’ll not hurt you. Are you all right?”

“I’m hurting bad.”

“The tincture?” Tahn was walking slowly and silently into the trees toward the voice.

“I had another sip or two. But they took it.”

Tahn stepped from around a tree, and Marcus screamed.

Tahn took his arm. “Sit down before you fall,” he said. “You’re safe. You have my word.”

Marcus sunk to the ground. He was shaking badly. “I can’t do this! Vari said he’d help, but I can’t take it!” Marcus’s clothes were torn, his belt was gone. He had a painfully obvious black eye among a collection of other bruises.

“Marcus, who did this to you?”

The boy didn’t answer. He was suffering a violent tremor and cried out again.

From somewhere behind them came the sound of running footsteps. “Tahn?”

“Over here.”

Vari was at his side in a moment. “Thank God, Marcus! Hold on.”

“Vari! Vari, I need a measure! Please!”

“You know I can’t. You’re going to be glad I won’t.”

“Oh God!” the young man shrieked. “Somebody kill me! Dorn—”

“Take a deep breath, Marcus,” Tahn told him. “Breathe slowly. Try to relax. If you can sleep, it’ll go faster.”

“I can’t sleep!”

“Probably not,” Tahn conceded. “Unless God would give it to you.” He was suddenly aware of another presence. He looked up and saw Jarel standing in the trees, watching.

“Marcus, God will help you,” Vari was saying. “He did it for me and for the Dorn.”

“He—he wouldn’t help me! Not after—”

“It doesn’t matter what we’ve done,” Tahn told him. “He wants to forgive. He
will
help, if you will have it.”

Marcus sat up, breathing in hard gasps. “I’m going to die!

Vari, don’t leave me out here to die!” He was shivering.

“Can we get him to the house?” Vari asked with concern.

Tahn looked up at Jarel and shook his head. It was too much to ask to bring another of the mercenaries under the Trilett roof. Especially one unconverted and beyond his senses right now. “We’ll go to the church.” He turned to one of the other men. “Can you go and beg Father Anolle’s permission? If he agrees, then bring us a wagon.”

The young guard looked up at Jarel in question. “Sir?”

“Do as he says,” Jarel told him.

The young man hurried into town, and Jarel stepped closer. “He’s one of whatever you were.”

“Right now he’s hurt,” Vari answered impatiently. “And I gave him my word I’d help.”

“I’ll not stand in the way.”

Marcus gave a sudden cry, his eyes wide with terror. Tahn took hold of his shaking arms. “Breathe,” he said. “Think about your breathing. Close your eyes, Marcus. Ask God’s help.”

“Vari!” Marcus screamed again.

“No, brother.” Vari shook his head. “You’ve got to listen to Tahn. Call on Jesus. He’s your only help.”

Marcus reached out for Vari and fell against his shoulder. Vari cradled his head as he lay against him and began to gently rock. “Jesus,” Vari said again. “He already paid for this. He already took care of it. Just say his name, Marcus. Believe it.”

“Jesus.” It was Tahn’s voice, soft and distant. “Lord Jesus.”

Jarel looked long at the Dorn and then down at Marcus. God had lifted a killer out of the darkness. Now here lay another soul in need. Suddenly it didn’t matter so much what role this boy might have played in what had happened. He was a lost child, and Jarel wanted him to respond, to whisper the blessed Name and know peace. He wanted to witness such a transformation before his own eyes and be a part of it. He knelt down next to Vari and began softly singing his mother’s favorite hymn.

“Almighty God of majesty high, walked on this earth, and came to die. Bore on his back the weight of our sin. Beaten and bruised, the Savior of men. Such love as this, I cannot tell! He gave me hope, released me from hell! Holy Redeemer loveth my soul! By his stripes healed! In his blood made whole!”

There was a hush over them all.

“Jesus,” Marcus whispered. “Jesus.” He sunk into Vari’s lap, and the shaking stilled. By the time the wagon arrived, he was asleep.

“Bring him to the guardhouse,” Jarel told them. “He’ll be much closer for you to watch over.”

The next day, Netta had all of the children in new clothes and gathered them on the east porch for a reading lesson.

“Don’t we look like haughty beasts?” Stuva remarked. “If I saw me riding by in Tamask, I might throw rocks at myself!”

“One can dress as a gentleman and keep humility, child,” Netta admonished. “I’ll not have a haughty spirit from any of you. I’ll be the first to inform you of the error if ever I see it.”

“Yes, my lady,” Stuva answered.

Netta smiled and shook her head. “I told you about that already. All of you still calling me Lady! Or Miss, for goodness sakes!”

“Isn’t it proper?” little Temas asked, finally looking feminine in a ruffled dress.

“Of course it is. But I have a name, and I like to hear it sometimes.”

“It seems rather strange to call you Netta,” Tam told her. “Makes you like one of us.”

“That is the point, isn’t it?” she asked.

Tam wrinkled his brow and looked down at his new shoes. “I think that when you were in the cave puttin’ on Vari’s clothes, you were still a lady. And I suppose that we’re still the same bunch we ever was.”

Bennamin had stepped out behind Netta. “You are very right, young man,” he said. “Men consider the outward things, but God sees to the heart. What is inside us defines us. And you were all worthy gentlemen—” he bowed to Temas, “and a lady, when you were hungry, or homeless, or locked within a tyrant’s gates. We are all God’s children.”

Doogan was fidgeting in his seat. “But what if we can’t be like we should? Scares me I might make you wish you hadn’t took me in.”

Benn smiled. “I have just that problem. I pray God that I may measure up to what you deserve. And it will take his help, no doubt.”

Most of the children sat there stunned. It was hard to imagine the powerful man saying such a thing.

“We will all pray for one another,” Netta told them. “God’s love molds us together already.”

She looked out over the yard, following her father’s eyes. Tahn was walking toward them, his limp nearly gone.

“How is our guest?” Benn called out.

“He is hungry.” Tahn smiled. “A pleasant surprise born in God’s grace.”

“And yourself? I don’t recall if you ate a bite yesterday.”

“I will today. With your permission, I’ll ask Hildy for a tray for us, and Vari as well.”

“Of course.” Benn laid a hand on Tahn’s shoulder as he stepped to the porch. “Has he told you what happened to him?”

Tahn looked at the children but decided to proceed. “Six of Samis’s men have banded together near Merinth under Donas, one of the eldest. They wanted Marcus to join with them. When he would not, they beat and robbed him.”

“They are very dangerous, then?”

“Not like they were under Samis. They let him live. And they have not the numbers nor the organization they had before, my lord. They will be bandits, no doubt, but no more threat to you than to any other man of means.”

“How many were there, organized before?”

“Nearly forty.”

“And does he say they are all scattered now?”

“We expect so, sir. It seems only one man had a heart to remain with the master when they saw him weakened.”

“Let us pray for them, shall we?” Benn abruptly asked.

But Tahn felt a sudden churning in his stomach. Pray for who? The scattered soldiers? Or Samis? He reached his hand to the porch rail to steady himself.

Netta stepped forward. “Are you all right, sir?”

He held up his hand before she could touch him. “Yes.” He looked at her and then at Benn. “Forgive me. It is not an easy thought, to pray for my master. It is a good idea, though.”

“It seems it would help you,” Benn told him gently. “You are in God’s hand, but Samis still bears a hold. He is not your master, son. Christ is.”

“I know it,” Tahn answered almost angrily. “I know what I’ve been given. I know what I’ve left behind.” He was suddenly uncomfortable that the children should see him so unsettled. He nodded quickly to Benn and to Netta. “Please excuse me.” He turned from them to the yard again and walked away.

“I’ll bring a tray shortly,” Benn called after him. “Thank you for the report.”

Netta was dismayed for him. “Father—”

“Leave him be, for now,” he told her. “He’s all right. I have the same struggle toward the man who took so much from us. We will grow past it together, perhaps, Tahn and I. It is not always easy to forgive.”

30

W
hen afternoon came and the children were either playing nimbles or climbing like monkeys in the trees, Netta sat alone on one of the porches, with the psalms once again in her hand. But she couldn’t concentrate on the reading with Tahn Dorn on her mind. She thought of what his presence had been like for her at first and how completely her feelings had changed—from terror to deepening admiration. She knew she was getting more sensitive to his struggle and more attached to his humble smile. When he said he was leaving, it had rocked her horribly and forced her to confront her own emotions toward him.