Mari saw her and climbed down from the rubble. His right eye was swollen shut and there was a cut across that brow. He embraced Sasha hard, like a father.
“You did it, huh?” he exclaimed, considerably less distraught than his wife. “You beat those bastards! You and Kessligh…just look at this, you make us heroes!” He waved a sooty hand at the pyres.
“You did it,” Sasha told him solemnly. “You are heroes, by your own making. They'll tell tales in Lenayin of the Dockside's defence.”
Mari beamed and clapped her on the arm. He'd fought armed with nothing more than the hook pole he used to haul in crab nets, to hear Valenti tell it, insisting that he used it better than any Nasi-Keth used a blade. The better weapons, he'd left to his sons. Deaths along the Dockside stood at between two and three hundred, though it would probably be days yet until the final tally was known. The Velo family had not lost anyone, though there was a dead cousin and an uncle wounded, in the balance.
“So where is it?” Mari asked in a low voice, with a wary glance at the surrounding commotion. “Some folk, they see our place burned down, they think it's lost. I tell them it's not lost, but I don't know where it is, and they don't believe me.”
“It's safe,” Sasha assured him. “Kessligh knows where it is. He's not telling anyone.”
“And…Kessligh is well?”
“Kessligh is very well,” Sasha said firmly. “One other person knows. Tell that to anyone who asks.”
Sasha continued her way across the dock, answering questions, giving comfort to some and advice to others. Men and women hailed her heartily and several stall owners insisted she accept hot food in passing.
She put on a riding glove to stop the handful of fried octopus from scalding her, and chewed as she walked. Amidst the tragedy, she could see hope. Family helped family, and complete strangers exchanged food and water, and comforted the grieving. Dockside had always been close, by Petrodor standards, but this calamity had forced them closer. These people had been the lowest of the low, before the arrival of the desperate Riverside masses, at least. The Nasi-Keth had raised them and brought them together, and now events had strengthened those bonds. Further north, where the big ships docked at North Pier, she could see the bustle of the trade had resumed, although perhaps not at its previous intensity. Much of Dockside worked at North Pier, another reason the patachis had been reluctant to support the archbishop's bloody gamble. This morning, the Docksiders went back to work and repaid the debt they owed the patachis for holding the northern flank, however selfishly motivated.
There were no pyres burning near North Pier Temple, and were it not for the lingering smell of smoke, it would have seemed that all here was normal. Only the foreigners were absent, sailors not game to leave their boats or their upslope inns, and venture down to Dockside so near to the calamity.
Inside the temple, Sasha found the pews replaced by bedding for perhaps a hundred wounded. Women walked amongst them, carrying trays of food or water. Nasi-Keth healers knelt to administer medicines, and rewrap bandages, while a few priests and caratsa comforted others. The air smelled of sweet and pungent herbs, and various pots were stirred above makeshift fireplaces.
Sasha made her way carefully between the wounded…the most serious, she noted, had been lain to the right, directly beneath the painted ceiling and its scaffolding. The scene there was grim indeed, and the air smelled more of blood than herbs. To the left, seated against the base of the wall, she found Kessligh gazing up at the painted ceiling. A heavily bandaged man Sasha did not recognise sat by his side, his head lolling.
Sasha knelt at Kessligh's side and clasped his hand. “How do you feel?” she asked. She felt a little nauseous just being here, truth be known. She hated to see him in this place. She knew how he disliked crowds and cities, even more than she.
“Don't look at me like that,” Kessligh reprimanded her, mildly. “I'm fine. The leg is not infected.”
“Look…I could move you. Father Horas has given me an upstairs chamber, there's room enough for-”
“No,” said Kessligh. “My friend Peteri here was just telling me about the painting…before he went to sleep.” Indicating the man at his side. “I haven't had time to really look at it before. And the healers here use different techniques than I've seen; I learn by watching them work.”
He looked quite serene, Sasha thought. He'd always had an ageless face, hard and sharp. Sasha wondered how he could be so calm. Probably he would never be the same swordsman he had been again. Yet he sat with his bandaged leg outstretched, his head against the stone at his back, and gazed up at the scaffolding and the half-completed figures of gods, angels and their followers.
Tears welled in her eyes, though she could not say precisely why. Kessligh looked at her. And frowned, predictably. “What?” With exasperation in his tone. He'd never been able to accept emotion as a rational response to anything. Certainly he'd never made allowances for her gender. Previously, she might have found it infuriating. Now, she smiled through the tears.
“You're such a grouch,” she told him. Kessligh frowned some more, not understanding. “I love you,” she said simply, and kissed him on the cheek. And got up to leave, knowing better than to think Kessligh would appreciate any extended display of softness.
“Hey, get me some fried chicken legs or something,” Kessligh called after her. “That stall owner by the mouth of Ashetel Lane does great chicken. I'm sick of seafood.”
“Aye, mighty Yuan!” Sasha said sarcastically in Lenay. “Whatever you command.” Kessligh watched her go with a wry smile, then turned his eyes back to the ceiling.
In the temple's studio the statues stood silent. Sasha climbed the staircase up the end wall, pushed open the creaking wooden trapdoor and emerged into a dusty hall, daylight falling cold through a series of windows.
She opened a door into a small, paved chamber with two beds. On one lay a saddlebag, containing the few possessions that she had not left at Pazira House-some changes of clothes, her washing oils and other serrin things that a girl did not like to go without. Some thoughtful soul had moved them when they'd taken the Shereldin Star from the Velo House. She had not asked them to, but she could not help but be glad.
Another old, slightly warped door led to the washroom. She knocked, but there was no reply.
“Errollyn?” She pushed the door open. Errollyn sat on a small stool, clad only in pants. His hair was wet, tousled about his neck and brow, and rivulets of water ran down his bare back. He sat with an elbow on one knee, staring at the far wall. He did not look at her, nor speak, nor move.
Sasha pushed the door open more fully and stepped into the washroom. His sword and bow leaned in one corner, and his belt with knives, and the quiver of arrows. Last night, he'd spent much time collecting his arrows from the corpses of his many victims. The fingers of his left hand now rubbed absently at the calluses on his right.
Sasha stepped before him and squatted, hands on his knees. Tears streaked his cheeks. His deep green eyes seemed to shimmer, swimming with moisture.
“Rhillian's leaving,” Errollyn whispered. “They're all leaving. She took Aisha.”
“I heard,” Sasha said solemnly. “Would you rather go with them?”
He stared at her. His eyes were almost frightening. “I can't. My path is here. I cannot betray myself.”
Sasha took his hand awkwardly. And squeezed. “I'm glad. For myself, I mean,” she amended quickly.
“I cannot betray myself, so I must betray my people. She was right about me. She named me a traitor.”
“She said that?” Sasha couldn't believe it, it was not a serrin concept, and never had been. Only…she recalled Rhillian last night atop the Tarae Keep. Recalled the horror in her eyes. Sasha had often wondered just how far a serrin might need to be pushed in order to cease being reasonable. Last night, she'd looked into the eyes of a woman pushed far beyond any limit. “Errollyn…they're saying Palopy was a massacre. I don't know how she and Kiel survived, but it must have been horrific. She doesn't know what she's saying, Errollyn-”
“Doesn't she? I am du'janah. To be born du'janah is to be born a traitor.”
“I don't understand…what does that mean? Not one of you serrin has actually explained to me what a du'janah is.”
Errollyn touched her face gently. He ran a thumb over her cheek. It tingled, and Sasha felt her heart beat faster. His face twisted in a grimace. “I can't explain. There are no words. You'd need to be serrin.”
“Damn it, Errollyn, that's an excuse, nothing more.” Somehow, with her, a racing heart threatened to unleash a temper, no matter what had brought it on. “How can I help if you just keep pushing me away?”
Errollyn hung his head with a sigh, and offered no answer. His hand slipped from hers. His despair was one sad sight too many. The Errollyn she knew was full of mischievous, irreverent intellect. He found everything interesting, but took nothing too seriously. Now, he seemed a sad wreck of a man. Sasha hated morbidity. She had to do something, because this…this was all getting too much.
Her heart thudding madly, she stood, and pushed him upright as she straddled him. Then, she sat in his lap. Errollyn stared at her. A shiver went up her spine. She put her forearms across his shoulders and locked fingers behind his neck. “I've had a hard day,” she told him, awkwardly. As if that explained everything. Dear spirits, she hoped Rhillian had not just been teasing her, or this was going to rank among the most embarrassing moments of her life.
Errollyn took a deep breath. Wiped at his eyes. “This is unmanly, I suppose?” he said, with a crooked smile. And what a smile. Her heart nearly stopped. Errollyn could cry as a Lenay man rarely would and, yes, a part of her thought it most unbecoming of him…and yet he had eyes like a predator and a body not unlike one of the statues downstairs. With a bow in his hand, he was surely more dangerous to his enemies than even she was with a sword.
“It's only unmanly when it becomes a habit,” Sasha replied, a little breathlessly. Errollyn took another deep breath, finished wiping his eyes and tousled his wet hair. Dear spirits, she liked that too. It hung about those impossible green eyes, grey and wild.
“I apologise for being a pale shadow of the many great yuans you've doubtless known.”
“Not many great yuans have bested as many in battle as you have,” she pointed out.
Errollyn made a face. “Aye, but that's archery. A coward's cheat. Even you think so.”
“I do not.”
“Oh yes you do. You've said many times that you hate archers.”
“I didn't mean it.”
“Do you always say things you don't mean with such conviction?”