Page 128 of A Trade of Blood

“What is it?” asked Tauri. “What do you laugh at?”

“Meris Chamhali Ayonias!” I cried.

“What? What is that?”

“Don’t you remember? She said that was what it was called, your Touched Site. The cup of heaven, the place of the angelic, eternal servants! Yet how angelic did they look to you?”

I kept laughing, unable to beat back the madness of it all. Tauri stared at me, his eyes wide with horror. Then he grabbed me by my collar and shook me until my senses returned. Together we continued out of the crumbling city, and back into the shivering seam of the wood.

—

When we exitedinto the rolling plains of Lacanthim, both of us nearly burst into tears of relief. I ripped off my helm and cast it away, then sank to the earth, and fought the desire to take off my boots and cast them away, too. I wished to keep no part of me that had come close to those dark waters.

Tauri knelt in the high grass, panting. Then he looked at me. “That was real, wasn’t it?”

“It was real,” I said hoarsely. “And I will never forget it, as much as I wish I might.”

He was silent for a long, long while. “I…I told you once that the web must fester in waters full of corpses to learn how to conquer the mind. But…but I never…”

“It was slavery,” I spat.

He sank into the grass, eyes wide, lips trembling.

“A crime worse than slavery,” I said. “For at least slaves have the escape of death. Those folk were not even granted that.”

“Din…” murmured Tauri.

“The Daljen were the masters of orchards. The tribe of Khanum who grew all the provisions and nourishment for the ancient Empire. Yet who harvested these crops? Who tilled the land, labored to pull sustenance from the soil?” I fought back another bout of mad laughter. “Perhaps it’s to be expected. We see the field cats and the cattle as our inferiors. Should we be surprised to find that the Daljen once felt the same of common folk like you and me?”

There was a long silence as we sat in the grass together, grappling with the abominations we had witnessed. Then, suddenly, Tauri cried out and leapt upon me, forcing me to the ground and shaking me by the collar. “And they were immune to it!” he bellowed at me. “Weren’t they?”

“Wh-what?” I said.

“The Khanum, and the Daljen!” he screamed. “They couldn’t be commanded, couldn’t be conditioned! Not by theirowncreation!” He pulled me close, his eyes bright with rage and terror. “How long have you known what she is? Ordoyou know?”

I did not answer.

“She wasn’t bewitched by the tune of the pipe,” he hissed. “Not because of wax in her ears or any such silliness. It is because she isbeyondit. Isn’t she?” He shoved me back down and stepped back, breathing hard, face flushed.

“Tauri…”

“Say nothing!” he cried. “Don’t speak! Don’t…” He looked away. “And do not follow me! I…I wish I had never met you, Kol! Damn it all and damn your eyes!”

I watched as Tauri strode away into the grass to the carriage in the distance. I watched as it started off, churning up a great cloud of dust. Then it shrank to nothing, and he was gone.

Chapter 35

It took me a greatwhile to walk the long distance to the shrine of Master Gaddar. My body ached from such a long day of journeying—as well as from the magnitude of all I’d witnessed, and Tauri’s castigation.

I found her sitting alone before the towering, unearthly statue of Gaddar. She had always seemed a small woman to me, but she seemed especially tiny now, dwarfed and bent under the blind gaze of that figure.

“You are back, Din,” she said softly as I approached.

“Y-yes, ma’am,” I said shakily.

“And you are alone.”

“Yes.”