On Fire's Wings - Christie Golden [49]
She would go, as he had asked.
Kevla returned to the kitchen, and put another piece of fruit on Yeshi’s tray. It was far too much for the khashima to eat; she barely tasted anything Kevla brought her, but Kevla needed an excuse. While she was there, she looked around. Everyone was busy doing something. She picked up a few crumbs from the floor and tossed them and the small piece of parchment into the fire. She watched it twist and curl up on itself, and then it was ash.
It was only midmorning. She had many hours to wait. Finally, Yeshi decided it was time to take a nap. The girls scattered, each anxious to seize time alone, and Kevla headed straight for the kitchen.
Sahlik was there, overseeing dinner preparations. Several loaves of bread were stacked high on platters. Roast meats turned on spits, supervised by dull-eyed five-scores. Other five-scores chopped vegetables for the huge pots of stew that bubbled on the fires.
Sahlik saw her and gave her a wineskin. “Take this,” she said quietly. “If anyone notices you coming or going, say you are bringing wine to the young master.”
Kevla couldn’t help herself. The head servant of the House of Four Waters was actually encouraging the khashimu to meet secretly with a lowly servant.
“Sahlik,” she whispered, “why are you—”
“I have my reasons,” the old woman said curtly. “Go.”
Kevla hurried toward the small building, opened the door, took the torch and descended the cool stone steps, both aching for and dreading this illicit encounter.
He was there. He was dressed in the men’s rhia, which clung to his still-damp body. He sat on the pool’s edge, his legs in the water. Droplets on his dark skin and hair glistened in the torchlight. He turned to see who had arrived and their eyes met.
“Did anyone see you?” She shook her head. “Good. Come, Kevla. Sit beside me.”
Nervously, she did as she was told, dangling her own legs into the cool water. She waited for him to speak.
“I have seen…so much,” he said at last. He didn’t look at her. He stared down into the water, as if speaking to his own wavering reflection. “Kevla…I have killed a man. It was only a few moments into the raid. He charged at me, a dagger in each hand, screaming something—I can’t remember what—and before I realized what I was doing the deed was done. I had drawn my sword and cut deeply into his neck.”
Her heart ached for him, even as her mind filled with images of gore and death. He was born to this, she told herself. And yet, she wished he had not had to experience it.
“It didn’t cut his head off, not quite. But the blood—by the Great Dragon, it was everywhere, on me, on my sa’abah, on the sand—so much blood. And he was just the first. I cannot tell you how many ran at me, how often I swung my sword, how many I struck. My hand ached, my arm grew tired, and still I swung. It was so fast to be so…so thorough. It took much longer to round up the scattered women and children, tie them up like sandcattle—”
He paused, swallowed hard. “Then when it was over, some of them men dipped their fingers in the blood and marked their faces. They laughed. They danced. I went behind a stone and was sick.”
He looked at her then, his eyes haunted, expecting ridicule. Kevla bit her lip and her eyes filled with tears.
Suddenly, violently, he tugged off his rhia, exposing his thin boy’s chest. An ugly scar snaked from his left nipple to his navel. Kevla gasped.
“My lord—are you—”
He smiled bitterly. “I’ll be all right. It was a shallow, clean wound and Maluuk is a skilled healer. He said I should be proud of it. Proud.” He almost spat the word. “Father made me sit through the celebrations. But when I went to sleep that night all I could see was the face of the man I had killed…his head spoke to me, called me murderer….”
He