Sun Sword - The Riven Shield Part 45

"Maybe. Maybe it's no longer ours. Maybe we only live long enough to make history, not to remember it."

He laughed. "Why did you seek to save me from the City?"

The moon was bright. "I don't know. Why did you interfere with the other demon?"

"Ah. I do know," he replied. "But I do not think that this is the time to discuss it. Nor the place. Come, Elena." He began to walk.

"Where?"

"Where?"

"Where are you going?"

"We," he replied, "are going to pay a visit."

A visit? She closed her eyes. "Lord Telakar?"

"Yes?"

"Why did you bring me here?"

He was silent. After a moment, he said, "By that, do you mean to ask what I intend to do with you?"

"To me."

"For the moment, nothing. You are mortal, you are of these lands. Over the rise of that ridge, there is a city. It is not large; it is not-in any way I once understood the word-a city of note. It is flat, its buildings of stone and dead wood; people huddle behind its walls as if they think to find safety there."

He shook his head. "But there is no safety in such a poverty of power. Can you feel it, from here?"

"Feel what?"

"The city."

"No."

"No. Nor can I. It did not draw my attention in the way the old Cities once did. But it is there, and if I am not mistaken, it is the city in which the man who claims to rule now resides."

"You mean Callesta?"

He shrugged. "We will travel there."

"On foot?"

"Unless you wish to travel in another fas.h.i.+on, yes."

"How did we get here?"

"There is a reason, Elena Tamaraan, that you remember nothing of that pa.s.sage."

"How-how long has it been?"

He shrugged again. "Days. Weeks, perhaps."

There was no road beneath her feet; she had no way to judge the distance.

She said, "If we're in Averda, we can find my people."

"They are in this Terrean?"

She nodded. "Most of them."

"And you wish to take me to them?"

Silence, then.

He laughed. "Come."

He walked for hours.

Hours, as the pa.s.sage of the moon s.h.i.+fted, and s.h.i.+fted again, changing the face of the sky.

She was used to walking. Although she was Margret's cousin, the daughter of the Matriarch's sister, she disliked the closed walls of the wagons, and where possible, she avoided them. Especially in Averda.

But her legs were shaky; her feet, stiff. His pace was even; he did not deign to notice the geography of Averda as it pa.s.sed beneath his feet. Did not seem to be inconvenienced in any way by the fall of the ground, or its rise.

She stumbled.

Felt his frown.

"We will not arrive in the city before dawn if you walk at this pace."

Struggled to keep up.

He stopped. "You are so frail," he said at last. "In the time when the Cities of Man held the heartlands, you would have perished."

She was hungry, tired. Hot. He approached her, and she stopped herself from flinching.

"Come," he said again, and before she could speak, he lifted her in the cradle of his arms. As if she were a child.

"I can walk."

"Yes. But I cannot wait."

"Then leave me here."

He smiled. "Elena, you are safe."

She laughed. She could not keep the hysteria out of the sound, and she hated herself for it. "How can I be safe, with you? Don't you know what you are?"

"Oh, yes, I know." He crested the ridge and stopped for a moment.

She could see the lights of the city of Callesta in the distance.

"Do you know what you are?"

"Elena," she whispered. "Elena of the Arkosa Voyani."

"That is barely a name," he replied.

She said nothing.

Felt his chest beneath her cheek as if it were the cool low winds that swept down from the mountains.

"Is my cousin safe?"

"Your cousin? Ah, the Matriarch. Yes. Inasmuch as she resides within Tor Arkosa, she is safe. Only upon the Isle of the G.o.d-born would she be safer. I do not understand how the City came to rise; I would never have been trusted with such information." His smile deepened. "Nor, it seems, would you, and you are of that City."

"My other cousin?"

"Who?"

"Nicu."

He frowned. Closed his eyes. Eyes closed, he looked almost human. "I do not know," he said quietly. "Why do you ask?"

"I want to know."

"Is he not the man who stood at the side of Lord Ishavriel? Is he not the man who intended to deliver Arkosa into the hands of her ancient enemies?"

She said nothing.

He laughed. "Were you another person, Elena Tamaraan-or were I-I would do you the grace of pretending to believe that you asked out of a desire for either justice or vengeance."

Lies came easily to her lips, but they did not pa.s.s them. "He's family," she said at last.

"And that is so important?"

"It's all we have, on the Voyanne."

"It is all you had. But if I am not mistaken, Elena of Arkosa, it cannot be all that remains if you are to claim what was stewarded for you by the wild earth."

She was quiet for a long time.

"Telakar?"

"Yes?"

"What is a demon?" Her voice was hushed.

"A name, not unlike the name Elena."

"What do you call yourself?"

"Among the kinlords, we are rarely required to call ourselves anything. What are you told about demons?"

"They serve the Lord of Night."

"Ah."

"We don't."

"No, you don't."

She was so tired. "Why did you challenge Lord Ishavriel? Aren't you on the same side?"

He laughed. "You are quaint, a child. Not one of the kinlords serves any master but himself and his own interests."

"But the Lord of Night-"

"And we are all interested in our own survival."

"Does he know you're here?"

Silence. Then, "You are a very clever child." But he did not answer the question.

She woke again at the gates of Callesta.

Had anyone told her that she would have slept, she would have cursed them for a liar. But she did not remember the pa.s.sage from the ridge to the walls. Could not remember the exact moment when she had given up on wakefulness, retreating into the luxury of a sleep that depended upon another person's arms, another's motion.

But she remembered the last thing she'd heard: his description of the trees in the far, far North, in a land that she had rarely heard of and never visited.

"Elena."

She struggled; he set her down.

"I have need of you here. There are guards at the gates, and for the moment, I am content not to kill them. They will not allow me to pa.s.s without questioning, and I am not so well versed in the etiquette of these lands that that questioning would go smoothly."

I am content not to kill them.

"I . . ."

"Elena."

It was night. The Lady's face was clear and bright. Elena met her silver gaze beneath a sky that went on forever. "Have the skies changed?" she asked him softly.

"Perhaps. It has been an hour. Two."

"Since . . . the last time you walked these lands."