Naamah's Kiss - Jacqueline Carey [255]
They bowed in reply, too overcome for words.
With that we took our leave. I glanced back only once to find Bao watching me. He raised one hand in a last farewell, and I lifted mine in answer.
It hurt to leave him.
And the princess was right, she would have travelled more swiftly without me. Although she didn't give voice to her impatience, I could sense it. I forced away my weariness, channeling the last of the dragon's dwindling energy into my tired, aching limbs, trying to set the fastest pace I could. Bao and Dai would shout if there were pursuers approaching. Until then, we had agreed I needn't summon the twilight, hoarding my strength for the climb itself.
The thin air grew thinner. I breathed the Breath of Wind's Sigh, drawing the cold, thin air into the space behind my eyes, imagining myself a creature of the airy mountain heights.
Like me, the dragon offered.
"Yes." I frowned in thought. "Do you know why I must come on this journey, treasured friend? You told me something once. You told me to remember the wise-woman when the time comes. Is that it?"
No. He said nothing more.
I sighed. "Dragons and sages."
"It's no use getting impatient with him," Snow Tiger murmured. "I suspect if the dragon were to say too much, it would upset the balance of nature."
Yes, the dragon agreed. There are rules. But… there is another thing you must remember soon.
An image flashed through his thoughts, a glimpse as quick and slippery as a salmon's leap, vanishing as quickly in the depths. All I caught was the fleeting impression of a lashing tail and a distant roar.
As if in echo, the Divine Thunder began to boom on the distant battlefield once more. Snow Tiger pressed the heels of her hands against her blindfolded eyes.
"At least it means your father's army is not defeated," I said softly.
"True." She shuddered. "It also means they were not able to retreat. Ah, gods! This battle should not have been fought on open ground. They should have been behind thick walls. And I am the one who chose the battlefield."
"No," I said firmly. "Black Sleeve and Lord Jiang chose the battlefield. When every wall was pounded to rubble and there was nowhere left to hide, it would have come to this in the end. It would never have been otherwise."
"Perhaps." The princess turned her face toward White Jade Mountain. "Let us make haste."
After that, we spoke no more, saving our breath for the climb.
It was not so steep as the climb up the cliffs to the monastery, but it was infinitely longer. Hours passed, and the snow-covered peak seemed to grow no nearer. If Bao and Dai had failed to hold the pass, if there was pursuit coming on the trail behind us, we would have no way of knowing.
Upward and upward, we climbed.
I grew faint and dizzy with exhaustion, gasping for breath. But when Snow Tiger asked quietly once more if she might go ahead without me, my diadh-anam flared in alarm, and I shook my head in silent refusal.
She took the lead, feeling her way blind over the rough semblance of a path more swiftly than I could with eyes to see. She clambered effortlessly up steep inclines, reaching a hand back to haul me ungently after her. I accepted her aid gratefully.
Far, far below us and to the north, the Divine Thunder coughed and boomed. And with every thundering crack that split the sky, I knew there was a cost in carnage, more corpses littering the battlefield, torn and rent beyond recognition.
I prayed.
I prayed to the Maghuin Dhonn Herself, I prayed to Naamah and Blessed Elua and Anael the Good Steward, and the thousandfold gods of Ch'in, the older ones whose names I did not know, and Sakyamuni the Enlightened One, and Guanyin, She Who Hears Our Prayers.
In the oldest, oldest prayer of my people, I prayed to stone and sea and sky, and all that they encompassed.
Moirin.
I was startled at the touch of the dragon's voice in my thoughts, half imagining I'd been addressed by a god. I