It was the only hope that remained to him. If Morgaine had done so, Roh was finished, powerless. This was surely the fear in Roh’s mind, that drove him to create chaos of Ohtij-in, that drove him to accept allies that would turn on him when first they could. If Roh came too late, if Morgaine had passed, and the Wells were dead and sealed against him, then those same allies would surely kill him; and then would be another bitter reckoning, at Ohtij-in, for the hostage for a dead enemy.
But if Roh was not too late, if Morgaine was in truth lost, then there were other certainties: himself bidden to Abarais, to serve Roh—masterless ilin, to be Claimed to another service.
There was nothing else, no other choice for him—but to seek Roh’s life; and the end of that, too, he knew.
A door closed elsewhere, echoing in the depths; a scuff on stone sounded outside, steps in the corridor. He thought until the last that they were bound elsewhere: but the bolt of the door crashed back.
He looked back, the blood chilling in his veins as he saw Kithan, with armed men about him.
Kithan walked to the end of the table, steady in his bearing; his delicate features were composed and cold.
“They are leaving,” Kithan said softly.
“I did not,” Vanye protested, “kill your father. It was Hetharu.”
There was no reaction, none. Kithan stood still and stared at him, and outside there was the sound of horses clattering out the gates. Then those gates closed, booming, inner and outer.
Kithan drew a long, shuddering breath, expelled it slowly, as if savoring the air. He had shut his eyes, and opened them again with the same chill calm. “In a little time we shall have buried my father. We do not make overmuch ceremony of our interments. Then I will see to you.”
“I did not kill him.”
“Did you not?” Kithan’s cloud-gray eyes assumed that dreaming languor that formerly possessed them, but now it seemed ironical, a pose. “Hetharu would have more than Ohtij-in to rule. Do you think that Roh of the Chya will give it to him?”
Vanye answered nothing, not knowing where this was tending, and liking it little. Kithan smiled.
“Would this cousin of yours take vengeance for you?” asked Kithan.
“It might be,” Vanye answered, and Kithan still smiled.
“Hetharu was always tedious,” Kithan said.
Vanye drew in a breath, finally reading him. “If you aim at your brother—free me. I am not Roh’s ally.”
“No,” said Kithan softly. “Nor care I. It may be that you are guilty; or perhaps not. And that is nothing to me. I see no future for any of us, and I trust you no more than Hetharu should have trusted your kinsman.”
“Hetharu.” Vanye said, “killed your father.”
Kithan smiled and shrugged, turned his shoulder to him. He made a signal to one of the men with him, toward the door. That man summoned others, who held between them a small and tattered shadow.
Jhirun.
He could not help her. She recognized him as he moved a little into the torchlight. Her shadowed face assumed a look of anguish. But she said nothing, seeing him, nor cried out. Vanye lowered his eyes, apology for all things between them, lifted them again. There was nothing that he could say to ease her plight, and much that he could say to make it worse, making clear his regard for her.
He turned from the sight of her and of them, and walked back to stare out the window.
“Make a fire in the west tower hall,” Kithan bade one of the guards.
And they withdrew, and the door closed.
CHAPTER Ten
The thunder rumbled almost constantly, and in time the torches, whipped by the wind that had free play through the small cell, went out, one by one, leaving dark. Vanye sat by the window, leaning against the stones, letting the cold wind and spattering rain numb his face as his hands long since were numb. The cold eased the pain of bruises; he reckoned that if it also made him fevered, if they delayed long enough, then that was only gain. He blinked the water from his eyes and watched the pattern of lightning on the raindrops that crawled down the stones opposite the narrow window. So far as it was possible, he concentrated entirely on that slow progress, lost in it.