The Blood Knight - J. Gregory Keyes [189]
“That’s silly,” she said. “You’re not what I would call ugly. A little inept, perhaps…”
“Oh,” Stephen said. “Sorry about that.”
“But perfectly trainable,” she finished. “A tafleis anscrifteis.”
Now his ears were burning.
“Anyway,” he went on, “I suppose I had vaguely hoped I might somehow move on to one of the less…stringent orders. And as things are, there’s not much chance of me taking the Decmanian vows now. Or even of living much longer, really. We should have gotten up earlier.”
“This pass is too dangerous without daylight,” she replied. “We started as soon as made sense. As for the other, I’m sure you feel you could die happy right now. But I promise you, there’s still plenty to live for.”
“I don’t doubt that,” Stephen replied. “But Hespero is still back there, and then there’s the woorm. Of course, we haven’t seen it lately. Maybe it’s given up the chase.”
“I doubt that,” Zemlé said.
“Why?”
“I told you—because the prophecy says it’s the waurm will drive you to the Alq,” she replied.
“But what if I’m not the one spoken of in the prophecy? Aren’t we making a rather large assumption?”
“It followed you to d’Ef, and from d’Ef at least as far as the Then River. Why would you begin to doubt now that it’s following you?”
“But why would it follow me?”
“Because you’re the one who will find the Alq,” she said, her voice hinting at exasperation.
“That’s a ‘catel turistat suus caudam’ argument,” he objected.
“Yes,” she agreed. “It goes round and round. Doesn’t mean it’s not true.”
“Well, is it supposed to kill m—Kauron’s heir?”
“I’ve already told you what I know,” she said.
Stephen remembered the monster’s glance as it found him from half a league away and shivered.
“Is it that bad?” she asked.
“I hope you don’t ever have to find out, no matter what the prophecy says,” Stephen replied.
“I’m kind of curious, actually. But set all that aside; you did have a look on your face. If it wasn’t guilt, then what was it?”
“Oh. That.”
Her eyes narrowed. “What do you mean, ‘that’? Don’t you dare tell me you don’t want to talk about it.”
“I—” He sighed. “I was wondering what would happen if we simply forgot this whole prophecy business and just went off into the mountains someplace. Maybe Hespero and the woorm would kill each other and everyone would forget the Alq.”
Her brows leapt up. “Go off together? You and me? You mean, like husband and wife?”
“Ah, well, I suppose I did mean that, yes.”
“That’s all well and good, but I hardly know you, Stephen.”
“But we—”
“Yes, didn’t we? And I enjoyed it. I like you, but what have either of us to offer the other? I’ve no dowry. Do you think your family would take to me under those conditions?”
Stephen didn’t have to think about that for long.
“No,” he admitted.
“And without your family, what do you have to offer me? Love?”
“Maybe,” he said cautiously.
“Maybe. That’s exactly right. Maybe.
“You wouldn’t be the first to confuse sex with love, Stephen. It’s a silly confusion, too. Anyway, a day ago you were desperately in love with someone else. Can a few well-placed kisses change that so easily? If so, how can I trust in any constancy from you?”
“Now you’re making fun of me,” Stephen said.
“Yes, I am, and no, I’m not. Because if I didn’t laugh at you, I might get angry, and neither of us needs that right now. If you want to run off into the mountains, you’ll have to do it alone. I’ll go on to the Witchhorn and try to find the Alq myself. Because even if the praifec and the waurm do destroy each other, there are others looking, and someone will find it eventually.”
“How do you know all this?” Stephen asked.
“The Book of Return—”
“But you’ve never seen the book,” Stephen snapped, cutting her off. “Everything you know is based on a thousand-year-old rumor