Mistress of the Night - Don Bassingthwaite [82]
Feena glanced up at him and replied, "You didn't ask me where I was going either."
She looked back to the hedgerow. The fox was gone. Keph hadn't even noticed it.
"So," he ventured, "where are you going?"
"Arch Wood."
His face creased. "That's northwest of Selgaunt, isn't it? Right on the border with the Dalelands? It's a long way."
"My village is there." "Ah."
They walked a little farther.
"What's your village like?" he asked finally.
"Small," said Feena. "I suppose it's more of a hamlet, but no one there would ever admit to it. There's only a few houses clustered around a mill really, with a blacksmith on the other side of the mill run. My mother's cottage-my cottage," she corrected herself, "is out beyond the smith's."
"It sounds nice," Keph said. "Why are you going back?"
"I've had enough of Yhaunn," Feena said. She managed to keep the bitterness out of her voice. "Moonshadow Hall has lots of priestesses. Arch Wood needs me back." She looked up at Keph and asked, "What about you?"
He shrugged and said, "Ordulin, I guess. Then maybe Selgaunt or Saerloon."
"Wherever the road goes?" asked Feena. Keph nodded. "You did leave Yhaunn in a hurry, didn't you?" When he nodded again she asked, "Am I going to regret helping you?"
He fell silent, his eyes suddenly dark. Feena frowned. "Keph?"
"You might," he said.
He took a deep breath and drew something out of his pouch, then opened his hand to let it dangle from his fingers.
A disk of Shar.
Feena gasped and leaped away, eyes searching the night for signs of an ambush.
"Feena!" Keph shouted. "It's not what you think!"
He kicked his feet free of his stirrups and slithered out of the saddle, still clutching the glowing stone in one hand and Shar's symbol in the other. Feena whirled to face him.
"Stay back!" she growled at him, stepping away. He held his arms wide and said, "Please, listen to me. This isn't a trap." "What is it then?" "I need your help," he pleaded.
Feena stared at him in shock. There were tears running down his cheeks. His outstretched arms were trembling.
"I didn't know you were a Selunite, Feena. I swear I didn't. I wouldn't have helped you if I had-not then, anyway. And you know I didn't expect to see you at the gate tonight. But now…" He choked. "Selune is Shar's enemy, isn't she? You have to help me, Feena. Please. I'm running away!"
She stared. A Sharran running away… Her stomach convulsed. Her chest-still aching from sobs-heaved.
And she laughed. A short, bitter bark. Her mouth twisted.
"Well," she said. "I guess that makes two of us."
Selune was slowly sliding down against the night sky behind them. In the eastern distance, Yhaunn threw up almost as much light as the slivered moon, the combined glare of thousands of lanterns and torches a stain of brightness in the dark. Because the city was sunk down in its quarry, that stain was really all there was to see of it. It was strange, Feena thought-Yhaunn was only really there when you were right down in it.
She and Keph sat together on a hilltop not too far off the road, looking back the way they had come, the glowing stone set between them. Down along the hill's slope, the young man's horse chomped contentedly at summer dry grass. Its pale hide shone ghostlike on the fringes of the magical moonlight.
Feena took a pull at a bottle of surprisingly good wine-Keph really had packed his bags in a rush-and passed it back to him. He drank as well, then stared at the bottle without saying anything.
"There's no rush, Keph," she told him. "Take your fime. We still have half a bottle left."
Keph sighed. "There's not really much else to tell. After the dream, I knew there was only one thing I could do." He sat with one leg stretched out and the other bent, one arm draped around it. He took another gulp of wine, then rested his cheek on his arm. "I was wrong about so much, but Variance, Jarull, Bolan-Shar-none of them were going to let me go easily. If I stayed, what would happen to Adrey? To the rest of my family?" He looked up. "So I ran."
"You can't outrun a goddess, Keph."
"But I can