Paladin of Souls - Lois McMaster Bujold [189]
Also tethered thus was the one horsewoman, or rather, a woman who rode pillion Roknari-style behind a servant, sitting sideways on a padded chair atop the horse’s haunches with her feet demurely disposed on a little shelf. The sorceress wore courtly, trailing garments, and a broad-brimmed hat tied below her chin with dark green ribbons. She was a much younger woman than Joen, though neither maidenly nor beautiful. She stared intently at Ista.
Ista stepped out after Illvin, keeping her eyes upon his face and not the dark drop below, which was deliberately lined at the bottom with sharp rocks and glinting broken glass. Cattilara’s sandals slipped on her sweating feet. Illvin reached to clasp her hand, a hard grip, and pulled her to stand upon the dusty ground beyond. Instantly, the board was jerked back, scraping through the postern door, which was then clapped shut.
The woman rode closer. Even as Ista looked up to return her glower, the demon light within her faded, until Ista only saw skin and clothing. The mere expression of a face, not the colors of a soul. Ista’s breath caught, and she looked again at Sordso. Now he appeared no more than a golden-haired young man upon a prancing black horse. Not one of the sorcerers flung up their hands, wincing at the glare of Ista’s god light, nor did the demons cringe within them—she could not see the demons within them.
My inner sight is stolen. I am blinded.
Something else was missing. The pressure of the god upon her back, which had borne her forward floating as if in a dream since that bloodstained dawn upon the north tower, was gone as well. Behind her, only an empty silence loomed. Infinitely empty, since so infinitely filled just moments before. She tried frantically to think when she had last felt the god’s hands upon her shoulders. She was certain He had been with her in the forecourt, when she had spoken with dy Cabon. She thought He had been with her when she’d stepped onto the board across the cleft.
He was not with me when I stepped off.
Her useless outer eyes blurred with terror and loss. She could barely breathe, as though her chest was bound tight with heavy cords. What have I done wrong?
~Who is this?~ asked Prince Sordso, pointing at Illvin.
The bronze-skinned sorcerer pushed his horse up next to the prince’s and stared down in surprise at Illvin, who looked back coolly. ~I believe it is Ser Illvin dy Arbanos himself, Your Highness—Lord Arhys’s bastard brother, the bane of our borders.~
Sordso’s blond eyebrows went up. ~The new commander of Porifors! What does he here? Ask him where is the other woman.~ He gestured at his translator.
The officer rode nearer to Illvin. “You, dy Arbanos! The agreement was for the dowager royina and the daughter of the march of Oby,” he said in Ibran. “Where is Lady Cattilara dy Lutez?”
Illvin favored him with a slight, ironic bow. His eyes were icy black. “Gone to join her husband. When, watching last night from the tower, she felt him die, she flung herself from the parapet and gave her grief to the stones below. She lies now waiting to be buried, when you withdraw as you agreed and we can again reach our graveyards. I come in her place, and to serve Royina Ista as warder and attendant. Since, having seen your armies and their dubious discipline once before, the royina did not desire to bring her handmaidens among you.”
The translator’s brows drew down, and not only at the oblique trailing insult. He repeated the news to Sordso and the others. The sorceress nudged her rider to bring her closer. ~Is this true?~ she demanded.
~Look yourselves for what you really seek, then,~ said Illvin, with a bow in her direction. ~I should think Prince Sordso could recognize the remnants of his own sister Umerue from this distance, if she were still . . . well, alive is not quite the right term, now, is it? If she were still residing within Lady Cattilara behind those walls.~
The translator jerked in his saddle, though whether in surprise at Illvin’s message or at the tongue in which