Shadows Return - Lynn Flewelling [111]
There was no question that it was focused on him now, though. As he stole to the outer door to listen, it followed right behind on bare silent feet.
There were guards somewhere outside. He could hear them talking. No use going out the front door, then.
It would have been helpful if the place had a window into the smaller garden, but no such luck. The skylights were no more help, either; there were bars across them now. When had that happened? Perhaps it was a night barrier, set in place when the alchemist finished for the day? The rhekaro followed him like a lost pup as Alec hastily searched further, looking for any other way out.
In the process he found a cupboard containing a few of Yhakobin’s stained work robes. They were a bit large, but had sleeves and were not slave garb. There was a pair of worn shoes, too.
He paused, keeping one ear attuned to the door, and took stock. So far he had access to clothing, knives, tea, a dye he didn’t know how to use, and a lock pick that worked.
And no idea where Seregil was.
He paused by the athanor, watching the contents boil sluggishly. It still looked like mud to him.
“What is he up to, I wonder?” he murmured.
Cold fingers closed around Alec’s wrist. Surprised, he looked down to find the rhekaro staring up at the retort as well, and it had a hand pressed to its chest, just as he had when he’d tried to make it understand his name.
“What? You have a name?”
As expected, there was no answer except that it lowered its hand.
“You want a name?”
That little hand went back to its chest, over its heart—assuming it had one.
“Can you tell me what you mean, or is that just something you saw me do?” he wondered. “But I should call you something, I guess. I’ve never named anyone before, except a horse.” He studied the little creature for a moment, then said, “How about Sebrahn?” It was the Aurënfaie word for moonlight. He touched the rhekaro on the chest. “Sebrahn. That’s you. What do you think?”
The rhekaro looked at him a moment, then slowly pointed at the retort and then at itself, and held up a finger, showing him the white line of a scar.
Alec held its hand a little closer to the waning glow of the fire. A scar? And it had healed without the help of his blood, too. He looked at the roiling mass, then back at the creature. “He put something of you in there, didn’t he? He made you from me, and now he’s trying to make something from you.”
Sebrahn went to the knife drawer, selected a small, sharp blade, and brought it to Alec, then held out its hand.
Alec put it back and closed the drawer. “No. I won’t do that to you.”
Just then he heard a louder voice outside: Yhakobin, speaking with the sentries.
Alec looked frantically at all the open cupboards and drawers. He’d let himself get distracted by the rhekaro, forgetting that the alchemist worked all hours!
Cursing silently, he flew around the room, trying to put everything back to rights. It was only when he stumbled over Sebrahn that he realized that the rhekaro was still following him. The voices were getting closer now. Ahmol was with his master.
Alec took the rhekaro by its thin shoulders and whispered, “Tend the fire!” then bolted for the stairs. A final glance found the creature squatting by the athanor again with its basket of chips, but it was looking at him.
Alec just managed to get the stairway door pulled shut when he heard the workroom door open. It hadn’t been locked!
Damning himself for all kinds of fool, he crept back to his room and locked himself in with shaking hands. It took several tries, and he had just gotten the pick hidden in the mattress when he heard steps on the stairs outside his room. He braced for the worst, but they continued on downstairs to the cellar.
Alec quickly moved the pick, since Khenir already knew that hiding place. Reaching under the bed, he wedged the brass pin between the mattress