CHAPTER 7
There was the scrape of a step on stone, something hovering over him. Vanye in sudden panic turned onto his back, flinging his arm and the covers aside, seeking to rise.
Then a man in black and silver stepped back from him and Vanye stopped, one bare foot on the floor. The fire had almost died. Daylight poured wanly through the narrow slit of a window, accompanied by a cold draft.
It was Erij—older, harder of face, the black hair twisted into the different braid that was for hall-lord. The eyes were the same—insolent and mocking.
Vanye thrust himself to his feet, seeing at once that they were alone in the room and that the door was shut. There would be men outside. He had no illusions of safety. He put up a brave face against Erij and ignored him for the moment, going about the necessary business of getting his boots on. Then he went over to the leavings of last night’s wine and had a sip of the wretched stuff, returning to the fireside to drink it, for the chill crept quickly into his bones. All this Erij let him do without troubling him.
And then while he knelt feeding the fire to life he heard Erij’s tread behind him, and felt the gentle touch of Erij’s long fingers gather back his hair, which hung loose about his shoulders. It was long enough to gather in the hand, not yet long enough to resume the braid that marked a warrior. Erij tugged at it gently, as a man might a child’s.
He lifted his head perforce. He did not try to turn, but braced himself for the cruel wrench he was sure would come. It did not.
“I would have thought,” said Erij, “that the honors bestowed on you at your leaving would have counseled you against coming back.”
Erij let go his hair. Vanye seized the chance to turn and rise. Erij was taller than he: he could not help looking up at his elder brother, close as he stood to him. His back was to the hearth. The heat was unpleasant, Erij did not back a pace to let him away from it.
And then he saw that Erij had no right hand: the member that he kept thrust within the breast of his tunic was a stump. He stared, horrified, and Erij held it up the better for him to see. • .
“Your doing,” said Erij. “Like much else.”
He did not offer his sorrow for it; he could not say at the moment that he felt it, or anything else save shock. Erij had been the vain one, the skilled one, his hands clever with the sword, with the harp, with the bow.
The pain of the fire in his legs was intense. He pushed free of Erij. The wine cup spilled on the floor and rolled a trail of red droplets darkly across the thirsty dust.
“You come in strange company,” said Erij. “Is she real?”
“Yes,” said Vanye.
Erij considered that. He was Myya and coldly practical; Myya doubted much and believed little: they were not notoriously religious. It was doubtful which side in him would win, god-fearing Nhi or cynical Myya. “I have had a look at some of the things she carried,” he said. “And that would seem to support it. But she bleeds like any mortal.”
“There are enemies on her trail and mine,” he said hoarsely, “that will be no boon to Morija. Let us be on our way as soon as she can ride, and we will be no trouble to you and neither will they. Hjemur will be far too busy with the both of us to trouble with Morija. If you try to hold her here, it may well be otherwise.”
“And if she dies here?”
He stared at Erij, gauging him, and began to reckon with the two years and what they had wrought: the boy was dead, and the man would kill, cold-bloodedly. Erij had been a creature of tempers, of vanities, of sometime kindness—different than Kandrys. Erij’s features now seemed those of a man who never smiled. A new scar marred one cheek. There had come to be lines about the eyes.