Naamah's Curse - Jacqueline Carey [175]
Amrita gave me an inquiring glance.
“Oh, aye,” I whispered. “They are coming; or at least Bao is coming, and I doubt he is coming alone.”
“How long?” she asked me.
In my mind, I measured the dwindling distance between Bao’s diadh-anam and mine against the distance that had separated us before this journey. “Not long,” I said. “Less than two hours, I think.”
The sun crept across the sky; and we waited. The shadow cast by Sleeping Calf Rock shifted, obscuring the path toward the further mountains and Kurugiri.
It didn’t matter.
Bao was coming. I could feel it, step by step. The nearer he got, the easier it was to gauge. My diadh-anam sang inside me, while his did not sing at all. Still, I felt it. When I knew he was almost upon us, I flung out my arm and pointed. “Now!”
One man on horseback rounded the curve beneath the outcropping, emerging from the shadows. He paused, surveying the plateau, then turned back and beckoned. Others followed, riding into sunlight.
Even at a distance, I spotted Bao among them. I knew him by the way he sat his mount, by the lean, tight-knit grace of his figure, by the faint shimmer of darkness that hung around him ever since his rebirth. It was stronger in the twilight, but even in daylight, I could see it. I wished I could see his face. The men spread out, forming a line, and advanced at a measured pace.
“One, two, three…” Hasan Dar squinted, counting. “Huh. Twelve, I make it. One more than allowed by our terms.” He gestured to his second in command. “Pradeep, go!”
The guardsman Pradeep clapped heels to his mount, sprinting across the meadow. On the far side, the Falconer’s party halted to confer. In short order, one of their men rode forward to fulfill the exchange.
It wasn’t Bao. I wished it had been; I wished we could have grabbed him and fled, summoning the archers to ward our retreat. But no, it was some southern Bhodistani fellow with thick brows, a hard mouth, and a sword-belt with two empty scabbards. He scanned our company with a shrewd gaze, then gave a sharp nod, wheeled, and retreated, passing our returning guardsman Pradeep on the way.
“So?” Hasan Dar raised his brows.
“They have honored the terms, commander,” Pradeep said breathlessly, leaning on his pommel. “No visible weapons. And their twelfth person… it is not an extra guard. It is Jagrati the Spider Queen herself.”
A chill crawled over my skin. That had not been part of our plan; but Pradeep was right, it was not a violation of the terms, either. It had simply not occurred to any of us that the Spider Queen would leave the safehold of Kurugiri.
Hasan Dar gave the Rani an inquiring look. She frowned, then nodded in assent. Her commander raised one arm, beckoning the Falconer’s company forward.
Once again, they began to advance.
Slowly, slowly, the distance between us narrowed; and I felt my awareness narrowing, too. I tried to fight it, and couldn’t. I was at the mercy of my diadh-anam, and nothing else in the world existed for it save its missing half. My vision dwindled to a tunnel, and at the end of the tunnel was Bao.
Closer and closer he rode, until I could make out his face. His gaze was fixed on me as surely as mine was on him… and there was nothing, nothing at all glad or joyful in it. Instead, his expression was fixed with a mix of fury and anguish, his dark eyes glittering with something that looked very much like hatred.
It struck me like a blow, hard enough that I wrenched my gaze away, breathing slowly and shivering. My vision expanded again; now it was my heart that contracted painfully, thudding in my chest.
The company reached us and drew rein a few paces away. There were ten men including Bao, each looking more deadly than the next. Mountain-folk, southern Bhodistani… others I didn’t know, Akkadian, mayhap. There was even a fellow with reddish hair and grey eyes.
Tarik Khaga, the Falconer of Kurugiri, had deep-set eyes and a strong prow of a nose, black hair streaked