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say? Do you tell me you know what will come to all of us? Do you say we are
only game pieces the gods move as suits their will?"
Liren, he said softly, we were the first. The gods made lir before they made
men. We know many things.
She wrenched her hands from her abdomen. "Then will you not tell me? Will you
not say what road lies before me?"
/ cannot, liren. The prophecy unveils itself in the fullness of time. The lir
cannot precipitate it.
"Cai!"
No, he said calmly.
"It is not fair!" she cried. "If he should die, you will tell me it is his
tahlmorra and I should not grieve. Yet if he lives, and returns to me to see
his child when it is born, you will say that is
193
meant also! Cai, you speak to me in tangled words and snaried threads- I
cannot say I like this tapestry you weave!"
The hawk was silent a long moment. It is not my tapestry, he said at last, but
that of the gods. They have said what will come.
It is up to the shar tahls to show you what has gone before, and what may
follow.
"It is not fair," she repeated.
No. he agreed, nor ever shall be.
Alix stared blindly into the darkness and cursed her soul for its unquiet
depths. After a moment she went to the wall Duncan had perched her on and
climbed up to seat herself on it gingerly.
Repeating the action did no good. Duncan was not there, and she felt only the
emptiness of her heart.
"Cai," she said at last, hearing the whisper of an echo in the shattered
dwelling, "I am not meant to wait so patiently, or so silently.*'
You are never silent, Uren.
She did not smile. "I will not remain here."
He wished it.
"I wish to be with him."
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Silence crept into the ruin. Then Cai shifted on the beam and sent a brief
shower of debris raining down on her.
Uren, he has said what he wants from you.
"I will work myself into a frenzy," she said calmly, "and that will do the
child no good at all."
Yet if you go, you risk both of you.
She closed her eyes. "Duncan does what he must, and expects me not to question
it. But I do, Cai. I must. There is something
different in myself. I cannot sit calmly by and wait for him to return to me .
. . if he can."
Uren . . .
Alix opened her eyes, decision made. "1 must do what 1 must, bird. Perhaps it
is my own tahlmorra."
The great hawk lifted and flew from the timber to the broken wall before her.
She saw his dark eyes glinting in the moonlight.
Uren, it is not for me to gainsay you. I have said what I can.
,Alix smiled. "Cai, you are truly a blessing of the old gods."
The hawk fixed her with a bright eye. So is the child you carry.
She slid off the shattered wall and straightened her creased leathers. "Cai, I
will carry this child to full term. It is a part of my own tahlmorra."
He sounded oddly amused. You have only just come to us, Uren, yet you speak as
a learned one who has the magic of the shar tahls.
194
i Alix walked from the dwelling into the cobbled street and stared down
the empty alley. "Perhaps I have a measure of that
; magic, Cai. Now, do you come?"
The great hawk mantled and took to the air. / come, Uren.
Alix moved softly, mimicking Duncan's stealth. She was very aware of the knife
in her boot, wishing she had better but knowing she would be incapable of
using it against another
anyway. She was no warrior.
Cai winged overhead silently, saying nothing to her as she walked carefully
through the empty streets and alleyways. The night sky was clear save for
stars, but she felt a heaviness in her bones as if the buildings of the
Mujhar's city leaned in on her.
And she smelted the stench of death, unable to escape its cloying touch.
Occasionally she passed a tumbled wall still smoldering, still caressed by odd
purple fire. She swallowed heavily as she re-
r called Tynstar and his odd method of departing her presence. A
shiver of foreboding coursed through her body as she stepped carefully through
the broken fragments of a dwelling, and her right hand dropped instinctively
to shield her unborn child.
Alix froze suddenly as a shadow streaked across the street before her, hissing
malevolently. Instinctively she pressed her-
self against the nearest wall, hoping the bricks might provide protection.
Then she saw it was only a cat, fur raised and ears flattened as it fled the
night terrors. For a moment she held herself against the wall, eyes closed-
tightly as she tried to still her lurching heart. Cai, drifting over her, sent
a burst of his own confidence.
Alix pushed away and moved on, releasing a breath that rasped through her dry
throat. After a moment she paused, bending, and took me knife from her boot.
The feel of it in her hand gave her a measure of renewed confidence, and she
walked on softly.
You can go back, Cai said. You can wait for my lir, as he
\ wished.
No, she said silently.
Uren . . .
No.
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Alix felt better for her determination, recalling the urge that had originally
driven her into the streets- For all she was fright-
ened of what might befall her, she was more frightened of what might happen to
Duncan. She would far prefer being with him, in danger, than without him in
comparative safety.
A stone rattled on the cobbles before her. Alix slipped into a recessed
doorway, knife drawn up to her chest in readiness.
195
Another stone skittered across the uneven street and came to rest near her
foot. She followed its path with her eyes until she saw the figure move
silently through the street.
It was a man, 'she thought, for the cloaked form was tall and moved with me
subtle grace of a warrior. She had seen its like in
warriors of the clan, marveling at the body's ability to take on the aspect of
animal suppleness while maintaining human form.
For a moment she thought the man Cheysuli, then recalled none had gone cloaked
on this mission into Mujhara. Alix drew in a breath and waited.
He moved past her, half-hidden in the shadowy folds of his cloak. For a moment
he paused, very near her, and she feared discovery. A hand rose and pushed the [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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