He looked, perforce. He did not wish to remember the sight, and the faces that had raged wildly beyond the guards’ pikes, the desperate hands that had reached through the grate. “All this is a lie,” he said. “As you are a lie.”
“The sword’s edge,” Roh invited him, “if you believe that beyond doubt.”
He lifted his face toward Roh, wishing to see truth, wishing something that he could hate, finding nothing to attack— only Roh, mirror-image of himself, more alike him than his own brothers.
“Send me from here,” he challenged him who wore the shape of Roh, “if you believe that you can convince me. At least you know that I keep my sworn word. If you have a message for Morgaine herself, then give it to me and I will deliver it faithfully—if I can find her, of which I have doubts.”
“I will not ask you where she is,” Roh said. “I know where she is going; and I know that you would not tell me more than that. But others might ask you. Others might ask you.”
Vanye shivered, remembering the gathering in the hall, the pale lords and ladies who owed nothing to humanity. A fall to the paving below was easier than that. He stepped forward to the very edge, inwardly trying whether he had the courage.
“Vanye,” Roh cried, compelling his attention. “Vanye, she will have little difficulty destroying these folk. They will see her, they will flock to her, trusting, because she is fair to see—and she will kill them. It has happened before. Do you think that there is compassion in her?”
“There has been,” he said, the words hanging half soundless in his throat.
“You know its limits,” said Roh. “You have seen that, too.”
Vanye cursed aloud, flung himself back from the battlements and sought the door, sought warmth, fought to open it against the force of the wind. He tore it open, and Roh held it, came in after him. The torches in the hall fluttered wildly until the door slammed, Roh dropped the latch. They remained on opposite sides of the little corridor, facing one another.
“Say to them that you could not persuade me,” Vanye said. “Perhaps your hosts will forgive you.”
“Listen to me,” said Roh.
Vanye unhooked the sheathed sword and cast it across the corridor; Roh caught it, mid-sheath, and looked at him in perplexity.
“God forgive me,” Vanye said.
“For not committing murder?” Roh said. “That is incongruous.”
He stared at Roh, then tore his eyes from him and began to walk rapidly down the corridor, descending the ramp. There were guards below. He stopped when their weapons levelled toward him.
Roh overtook him and set his hand on his arm. “Do not be rash. Listen to me, cousin. Messengers are going out, have already sped, despite the storm, bearing warnings of her throughout the whole countryside, to every hold and village. She will find no welcome among these folk.”
Vanye jerked free, but Roh caught his arm again. “No,” said Roh. The guards stood waiting, helmed, faceless, weapons ready. “Will you be handled like a peasant for the hanging?” Roh whispered in his ear, “or will you walk peaceably with me?”
Roh’s hand tightened, urged. Vanye suffered the grip upon his arm, and Roh led him through the midst of the guards, walked with him down the windings of the corridors; and they did not stop at the door of the room that confined Jhirun, but went farther, into a branching corridor, that seemed to lead back to the main tower. The guards walked at their backs, two bearing torches.
“Jhirun,” Vanye reminded Roh, as they entered that other corridor.
“I thought that was a matter of no concern to you.”
“She is a chance meeting,” he said. “And no more than that. She set out looking for you, hoping better from you than she had where she was: the measure of that, you may know better than I. You were kind to her, she said.”
“She will be safe,” said Roh. “I also keep my word.”
Vanye frowned, glanced away. Roh said nothing further. They entered a third corridor, that came to an end in a blind wall; and in a narrow place on the right was a deeply recessed doorway. Shadows ran the walls as the guards overtook them, while Roh opened the door.