Crown of Shadows - C. S. Friedman [136]
Hell, he thought. Taking a deep breath, fighting to calm his nerves. You knew it wasn’t going to be easy.
He went below to search for a manual.
Thirty
Gresham came to Narilka’s workbench and sat himself down, straddling a nearby chair. For a moment she just went on buffing as if he weren’t there, but the pressure of his gaze slowed her rhythm, and at last forced her to stop. Slowly, reluctantly, she looked up at him.
“You want to talk about it?” he asked.
It took her a minute to find her voice. “I don’t know what you mean.” The words sounded weak even to her, and Gresham shook his head gently.
“Don‘t, Nari.”
“What?”
“Keep it all pent up inside. It just eats at you worse that way.”
She turned back to her work and started buffing again. But his large hand reached out and took hers, and kept her from moving.
“It was polished long ago,” he said quietly. “See?” He turned the piece over; its surface was gleaming. Gently he took it from her and set it on the worktable. Then he took up her hand again, folding it carefully in his own. “Talk to me, Nari. Let me help.”
With a sound that was half-sigh, half-sob, she turned away from him. “You can’t help. Nobody can help.”
“Let me try.”
She shook her head stiffly. Tears were forming in her eyes.
“You miss him?”
“I’m afraid for him. Oh, Gresham ...” And then the walls broke down and the tears came, hot tears that had been days in the making. “What they’re doing to him ... nobody understands. They don’t even really care, as long as he does what they want. So what if there isn’t a whole man left when they’re finished? What does it matter to them if he goes crazy?” She lowered her head, and wiped her eyes with the back of her free hand. “I’ve been having nightmares,” she whispered. “I think they’re his. Is that possible?”
“If you care that much for him? Yes, of course it is. That’s how the fae works.”
“He’s so afraid, Gresh.”
He snorted. “Any sane man would be, going where he’s going.”
She shook her head. “It isn’t that. Nothing that simple. It’s because—” She stopped then, because the truth was too private a thing. She couldn’t even share it with Gresham.
He fears that this masquerade will really transform him. He’s afraid of losing his soul. He had held her all that last night, barricaded in his apartment as if the enemy were at his door, and she had tasted the substance of his fear as if it were her own. She had felt the terror inherent in his masquerade, his gut fear that once the essence of Gerald Tarrant was invoked into his flesh he would never be free of it. To invite the substance of your enemy to take you over, to dim the flame of your own soul so that his might burn even brighter ... was there any greater terror than that? She had managed not to cry that night, but only because it would have made him more afraid. Now the tears flowed freely.
“He needs me,” she whispered.
He squeezed her hand, said nothing.
“I could help him.”
“You said they had their reasons for not letting you go with them,” he reminded her. “You said you’d try to accept that.”
Reasons. She shut her eyes and trembled as anger seeped into her veins, a rage that was days in the making. “Damn his faith!” she whispered fiercely. “They think they’ll have more control over the fae if I’m not there. Who’s to say if they’re right? Or even if they are, if it’s worth the price he’ll have to pay? What kind of a god is that, who rewards his people for suffering?”
He snorted. “No one I know has ever claimed to understand the One God.”
Oh, Andrys. She reached out with all the power of her soul, wanting so badly to feel his presence, to know that he was still safe. But she lacked the kind of power it would take to establish such a link. Was