After what had happened in the Temple, whatever insane will had been keeping Arenadd together disappeared. He woke a few times, briefly, but into a world full of such agony that his mind refused to bear it and no matter how hard he tried to stay awake, he slid back into a half-conscious state where there was no thought, no sight or hearing, and only the vaguest sensation of pain. His mind, set free from the bonds of his ruined body, lost itself in dark dreams and memories, and he drifted away-unable to sense night or day or the passing of time.
Somewhere in the remnants of what had been his thoughts, he knew that he was dying.
He was too far gone to be afraid any more.
The dreams were his world now. He saw Skade; sometimes human, sometimes griffin, but always with a smile in her eyes that was just for him. She flitted here and there through the shadows, holding out a hand-inviting him to join her. Skandar was there, too, screeching defiance at the great light of the relentless sun. And others, too. People he thought he’d forgotten long ago. His old warriors, dead during the war. Arddryn was with them, scowling to herself. Sometimes, she looked like Saeddryn.
And there was a white griffin. She said nothing and never looked at him. Arenadd saw her flying, always away from him, looking for something she had lost.
An egg hatched, and Laela came out of it, but she didn’t have a smile for him now. She wore a black robe, and her brow was furrowed. She looked much older than he remembered.
Only the Night God was missing. Arenadd wandered alone through a night without moon or stars, searching for her-calling her name. But she never came, and no voice answered his cries. He needed her now, but he knew she wouldn’t come. She knew he had betrayed her.
The dreams went on for a long time, but eventually the day came when they grew confused. He began to wake up from them more often, and every time he woke, the pain was a little less. And the more he woke, the more he began to realise that the dreams weren’t real, that he had another place to belong to, a real place. When he realised that, the part of him that wanted to wake grew stronger, and he fought to hold on to it. He remembered what had happened, and knew other, far worse things must be happening even now while he was helpless. Anxiety worked at him, and only helped him to wake up once again.
His eyes opened at last, and he could see. Paralysed, he peered at the ceiling above him. It was wooden. There was light, so it must be day. . but no, he thought. . too dim. Coming from somewhere. Lantern, his inner voice said after a fierce struggle. Lamp.
Night, then. He sighed very faintly. Blessed night.
After that, he closed his eyes and slept again.
But he woke again several more times-always at night, and each time he felt stronger and stayed awake longer.
Little by little, he pieced together that he was in a ship’s cabin-the same cabin he’d lived in on the journey to Amoran.
His mind was painfully sluggish now, but it didn’t take him long to realise that he must be on his way home.
His first feeling was relief. No more blazing sun. No more strange, dark-skinned sun worshippers. No more Gryphus, glaring down from the sky with hatred.
But relief was quickly followed by guilt and despair. The slaves. He hadn’t freed them. He hadn’t completed the alliance negotiations with the Emperor.
His entire journey and all the suffering it had brought had been for nothing.
Arenadd closed his eyes again, nursing his pain, and slept.
Two days later he woke again. The moment he opened his eyes, he felt new strength in his mind and body. He was recovering.
He breathed deeply and turned his head for the first time since his accident.
Laela was there, sitting beside his bed. She wore a light gown, and her expression was guarded.
Arenadd felt his lips twist into a weak smile. “Laela,” he rasped.
Laela nodded curtly. “So yeh’ve come back to us at last, Sire.”
“Going. . home?” Arenadd managed.
“It’s the best thing for yeh, Sire,” said Laela.
He slumped onto his pillows. “But the slaves. . the agreement. . I never. .”
“I took care of it, Sire,” said Laela.
Arenadd stared stupidly at her. “What?”
“I said I took care of it,” said Laela. She examined her fingernails. “I sealed the deal with the Emperor. The alliance is signed. There are a hundred slaves comin’ home with us, an’ the Emperor promised the rest would be ready once we’d sent payment.”
“Payment?” said Arenadd. “What. . payment?”
“Goods, mostly,” said Laela. “Wool, silver, furs. . that sort of thing. I bought most of the ones we’ve got with us now with the treasure from that pirate ship. The Emperor gave me the rest as a present.”
Arenadd lay there, quite unable to grasp the magnitude of what she was saying. “But how. .?”
“I’m the Master of Wisdom,” said Laela. “Second-most senior out of all the Northerners who were in Amoran. With you out of it, Oeka an’ me took charge. I did what I thought was best.”
“The marriage,” Arenadd said eventually. “I didn’t. .”
“Sorted,” said Laela. “I did that, too.”
Arenadd struggled to raise his head, and gave up. “How?”
“The Emperor’s got a son,” said Laela. “I married him. It was a very nice wedding.”
“You. . married the Emperor’s son?”
“Yeah,” said Laela. “He ain’t comin’ North with us. It was more like a formality. The Princess gets t’stay home. But Vander’s with us. Him an’ Ymazu. They’re gonna leave us when we get to Maijan. So that’s it, then,” she finished, as if it were nothing very important. “I’ve sorted it all out, an’ we can go home. Job done.”
Arenadd lay still, breathing rapidly. “You see now,” he whispered. “You really are. . like me.” He coughed. “The better side of me.”
Laela didn’t smile. “I wanted t’ask yeh somethin’. I’ve been waitin’ weeks t’ask it, an’ I ain’t waitin’ any longer.”
Arenadd tried to sit up. Instantly, pain crackled through his chest, and he fell back.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” said Laela. “Yer chest’s got a hole as long as my finger right through the middle. I gotta say, though, yer lookin’ pretty good for a man who had this taken out of him.” She took something from a table beside her and held it up.
It was a piece of sword blade, as wide as Arenadd’s hand.
“Them Amorani healers are damn good,” said Laela. “They couldn’t figure out why the wound wouldn’t stop bleedin’, so they went in there an’ had a look, an’ sure enough they found this lodged right inside yer rib cage. Looked like it’d been in there a while.” Her eyes narrowed. “Ever since the day Erian an’ his sister Flell died, I’d guess.”
Arenadd stared at the piece of metal. His expression did not change.
“Funny coincidence,” Laela went on. “But it’s that day I wanted t’ask yeh about.” She paused, taking a deep breath. “Flell’s child. The one yeh didn’t kill.”
Arenadd looked away. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“I don’t care whether yeh want to or not, because you’re gonna talk about it now,” Laela said coldly. “The child. Yeh said it was still alive somewhere. What’d yeh do with it?”
“Sent it away,” Arenadd muttered.
“How? Who with?”
Arenadd closed his eyes. “There was some man there. . a Southerner. . had a griffin. He burst in after I. . after Flell was dead. Saw me by the cradle. I don’t know who he was. He pleaded with me not to kill the child. And I. . I don’t know why. . I listened to him. I didn’t know him, but. . he stopped me. I gave him the child. Told him to take it away, far away, and never come back. I never saw him again.”
Laela felt sick. “The man,” she said. “Yeh don’t know his name?”
“No.”
“What did he look like?”
Arenadd’s eyes opened. “Big man. About your age. Had a beard.” He sighed and the eyes slid closed again. “Funny; I remember him so well. . remember his voice, anyway. It was strange. He acted like he knew me. I remember how he called to me, and it felt like his voice. . woke me up, somehow. ‘Don’t do it,’ he said.”
At that, Laela lurched forward in her seat. She nearly vomited. Breathe, she told herself furiously. Breathe!
She breathed deeply, and a strange giddiness came over her. “So yeh still think if yeh ever found the child, yeh’d kill it?”
The eyes opened once again. They were as black and cold as the gemstone around Laela’s neck. “Yes.”
There was no humour in Laela’s smile. “I saw somethin’, yeh know,” she said. “In the Sun Temple that day. An’ it was the same thing I saw once before, in a dream. The first time, I didn’t believe it was real. The second time, I didn’t believe it, either. But when I talked to Oeka about what happened, I started havin’ second thoughts. Turns out while I had that vision, there was somethin’ else goin’ on-somethin’ no-one else could explain. The priest who was there said the same thing. I’m a simple woman, Sire. I’ve always been that way. I ain’t no fancy thinker; I see it, I hear it, I touch it: It’s real. But after what happened, even somethin’ so fantastic, I don’t want to believe it is startin’ t’feel a lot like somethin’ real. Know what that is?”
Arenadd was watching her with a confused expression. “What are you talking about, Laela?”
“It’s Gryphus,” she said simply.
He recoiled. “What? No, that’s not-”
“-Possible?” said Laela. “Hah. You seem t’believe the Night God’s spoken to yeh. I’ve heard yeh callin’ her name plenty of times since yeh’ve been unconscious. An’ now I’ve seen Gryphus, twice, an’ he’s told me things I couldn’t possibly have known.” She looked at him, her blue eyes steady. “An’ one of them things is that I’m the child.”
Arenadd stared, winced, and laughed. “No. That’s not possible.”
“My foster dad’s name was Bran,” Laela said steadily. “Branton Redguard. He was a big man with a beard. He told me my mother was murdered. He said he caught the murderer standin’ over my cradle, an’ rescued me from him. An’ now, thanks to Gryphus, I know that murderer was you.”
“No,” Arenadd said again. “Flell’s child wasn’t. .”
“Flell’s child had bright blue eyes,” said Laela. “Like her mother. Like her uncle. Like her grandfather, Lord Rannagon. Flell’s child came from the line of Baragher the Blessed. I couldn’t understand it,” she added, “when Gryphus came to me. He said I was blessed, called me his chosen one. He said I was the only one of my line left, the only one. . with the power to stop you.” She looked up, terrible in the firelight. “The only one who could punish the Dark Lord for his crimes.”
Arenadd listened. All of a sudden, he looked quite calm. “And what did you tell him, Laela?”
“I said no,” said Laela. “I said I didn’t believe him. I said it was none of my business what you’d done. I said I didn’t know how t’fight yeh, an’ I didn’t want to do it anyway. Because you were my friend.”
“Am I?” said Arenadd, very softly.
Laela fixed him with a stare. “Are yeh?”
Silence-deep, foreboding silence.
“Yeh came into the Temple t’look for me,” said Laela. “Into the place where Gryphus was the strongest. Even though yeh had to have known what it would do to yeh. Just t’help me. But tell me, Arenadd-are yeh my friend? Now yeh know who I am, do yeh want t’kill me? Would yeh?”
“No,” said Arenadd. He reached out to her, his hand trembling. “No,” he said again. “I would never hurt you. Never. Not even if the Night God herself told me to.”
“But yeh killed my mother,” said Laela. “An’ my uncle, an’ my grandparents. My entire family, gone. All of them murdered, by you. An’ I know yeh loved every moment of it. I know yeh did. Don’t lie about that, Arenadd. Not now. Not t’me.”
“Yes,” Arenadd whispered. “I did.”
“It’s nighttime now,” Laela said in conversational tones. “No-one’s about. Some sailors on watch, but they’ll leave if I tell ’em to. If I tied yeh up an’ put some weights in yeh pockets, yeh’d go right t’the bottom of the sea. An’ no matter if it killed yeh or not, no-one’d have any chance of findin’ yeh. I’d consider that enough punishment for my mother’s sake.”
“And are you going to do that, Laela?”
“No,” said Laela. “I ain’t. No matter about my family; I’m part of the North now an’ the North needs yeh. The South needs yeh, too. If yeh weren’t there t’stop it, yer cousin’d invade the South in a heartbeat. So I’m takin’ yeh back there in one piece, an’ when we get there, I’m gonna go on workin’ for yeh. ’Cause if that’s what it takes t’keep my mother’s people safe, then I’ll do it no matter what.”
Arenadd smiled. “I always knew you were a special person, Laela. Now you know it, too.”
“Don’t think I’ve forgiven yeh, Arenadd,” Laela said sharply. “I ain’t ever gonna forgive yeh. I’m gonna stay your follower, an’ I’ll do my duties, but we ain’t friends no more, an’ next time yeh feel like pourin’ yer heart out, talk to Skandar or the wall or somethin’. Because I ain’t doin’ it for yeh ever again.” She stood up and bowed stiffly. “Get some rest now. I’m gonna go tell everyone yer feelin’ better.”
Then she left, leaving Arenadd feeling more alone than he could ever have imagined.
Even so, he looked at the door that had closed behind her, and his eyes still had some of their old sly glitter. His plan was working. She had become every bit as ruthless and manipulative as she would have to be. She had learnt far more from him than she could have realised, and one day it would be vital to her.
“You’ve come into your own now, Laela,” he murmured. “I knew you would. You’re the Dark Lady through and through.”