Sentinelspire - Mark Sehestedt [65]
"Lewan, I commend your manners, but I sense a lack of sincerity in them."
Lewan said nothing. He tried to hold her gaze but found that he could not, so he glanced away and pretended a sudden profound interest in the nearest bookshelf.
"I ask you, Lewan," she said, "have I shown you anything but kindness since you came to my home?"
"As I remember it," said Lewan, still studiously watching the bookcase, "you sent a band of killers to capture my master. He was killed trying to escape, and I was poisoned and brought here."
Silence. Soon it became uncomfortable, and Lewan decided to risk looking at Talieth. She stood in the same pose as before, but her eyes had gone cold.
"I loved Kheil more than my own life," she said, her voice low and carefully controlled. "Whether you believe me or not… damn it all, I honestly don't care. I care not if he took a different name and fled my father. Gods know I've considered it many times over the years."
She turned her back on him and bowed her head. A small part of him-the part that remembered his master's lessons of treating women, especially nobles, with deference, if not genuine respect-felt a pang of guilt. But only a small pang. Although the memory of watching his master disappear beneath that shambling manlike mound of earth was dull and unfocused in his mind's eye, he could still see it, like a fading dream, and he held on to that last fleeting image. He would not apologize.
Talieth turned to him. "We must make things clear between us, you and I," she said. "Clear, my lady?"
Her jaw clenched for a moment. "Yes, clear," she said. "We are a proud people here at Sentinelspire, and whether you know or respect our code of conduct and honor, I assure you we do have one. This fortress is the pride and envy of the East and West-among those few fortunate enough to have seen it and lived. But we are not like the societies of the pampered sultans or simpering kings. Every person here must contribute something. We have no layabouts. Your task is to unlock the secrets of this relic." She held Erael'len up in her fist and shook it at him. "As long as you agree, as long as you contribute-and I do expect results-you will be our most honored guest in the fortress. You will be clothed in the finest clothes, fed the finest foods, bathed and oiled, you will sleep in a soft bed with the company of Ulaan or as many women as you choose. But you will help us."
"Or what?" said Lewan, and he was proud that his voice didn't tremble, for his heart was beating double-time under Talieth's imperious gaze. He expected her to say, Or you'll find out what we do in that charnel room up the hall, or Sauk will let that tiger hunt you in the grounds, or I'll have you dragged to the top of the tallest tower and thrown off, or any number of threats.
But she said none of those things. Instead she looked at him and said, "Or I'll see that you're given the best traveling clothes we have, as many supplies as you can carry, weapons of your choosing, and I'll have you taken out the gates and down the mountain. You can go wherever you like. And in a few days' time, or a tenday, or perhaps even a month if the gods smile upon us, when Sentinelspire explodes and shatters the land for a hundred miles, when a cloud of dust and ash and fire covers half the known world, choking babes in their sleep, killing wild beasts and livestock, and strangling sunlight from this season's crops-and very likely next season's as well-if you're far enough away to escape that… well, then, I guess you can live the rest of your life knowing that you could have helped prevent it. Once the fires have died, the earth cooled, and the ash blown away, you can even come to the great hole in the ground where once we lived, and you can dance on the place where we died. Where Ulaan died. Is that what you want, Lewan?"
Chapter Twenty-One
25 Tarsakh, the Year of Lightning
Storms (1374DR)
Lewan sat on the edge of the bed to put on the soft doeskin boots. As he did so, he enjoyed the sight of Ulaan, standing before the open balcony doors in the morning