The Shadow Isle - Katharine Kerr [194]
“No!” Laz snapped. “You can’t do this to me, Sisi. You just can’t!”
“I can, Laz. Here!” She thrust the bundle at him again, and this time her hands were steady. “Here’s the knife, the red pottery plate, the two books, and this is one blanket from our bed. I’ve kept the length of linen, because you gave that to me as a gift.”
Laz tried to step to one side; Sidro dodged with him and thrust the bundle forward again. Laz began to wonder if he were having a nightmare. She could not mean it, she just couldn’t! He could smell his scent changing, shrinking back into his body, turning into something acrid with the taste of defeat. If only he could get close to her—he thought of a ploy, something temporary that would give him a chance to win.
“I could be your Second Man,” he said. “If you and Pir come with me, I—”
“That would be worse, wouldn’t it? Faharn would gloat, and the other men would sneer. Better to just end things between us cleanly.”
Once again she held out the bundle. Once again he tried to dodge around it—if only he could get her in his grasp, then she’d yield to him as she always had before. He was sure of it, but once again she swung around to face him and shoved that accursed heap of things in between them. Laz decided to change tactics. He raised his hands to display his maimed fingers.
“Sisi, I need you.” He allowed a quaver into his voice. “Please, can’t you see how much I need you?”
She wavered—he could see it in her eyes—then shook her head. “No, Laz,” she said. “You’ve got others who’ll help you.”
“I don’t understand! Why have you changed like this?”
“Don’t you remember when you told me that I didn’t know how to be free? Well, I’ve learned.”
“I didn’t mean free of me!”
She considered him for a moment, then laughed. Laz cursed himself for the slip.
“Oh? So the truth comes out, does it?” She continued to hold out the blanket-wrapped bundle. “Pir and I are happy here. We’re going to stay.”
Laz realized that he could think of not one word more to say, not a truth, not a lie. He stared at her and tried to capture her gaze, but she focused her own on the bridge of his nose. She remembered that little safeguard against ensorcellment, too, and he cursed himself again for ever teaching it to her.
“You’ve got to take it, Laz,” Sidro said. “It’s the law of our kind.”
“I’m an outlaw, remember?”
When she pushed the bundle into his chest, he stepped back sharply. She considered him for a moment, then loosened the knot in the cloth. Laz had a moment of hope that she was about to take it back, but when he stepped forward, she shoved the wretched thing into his chest again. He raised his arms and let it fall between them. When it hit the ground, the unknotted blanket opened and spilled its contents. His two books, his translation of the Pseudo-Iamblichos Scroll, wrapped in its dragon cover, and the chronicles of the war at Highstone Tor, slid out to lie in damp grass. He stooped and grabbed them before they could soak up the moisture, then realized what he’d done. By taking even the smallest part of those offered goods, he’d agreed to the break between them.
She knew it, damn her! he thought. She knew I couldn’t let the books lie. Rage coursed through his body, hotter than blood. Although he stood up fast, Sidro had turned and was already hurrying away.
“Sisi!” he called out, but all he could hear in his own voice was the rage. “I still love you.”
She paused and glanced back, looking over her shoulder.
“As much as you can love anyone,” Sidro called back. “You’ll forget me soon enough.” She turned on her heel and strode away, hurrying back to the Ancients’ camp.
Laz stood staring after her. The sun was setting, the night wind was picking up, but still he stood, watching cooking fires bloom among the Westfolk tents. Pir didn’t even have the decency to come greet me, he thought. But then, why should he?
“He won, the sneaking sly little bastard!”
A woman was leaving the tents and hurrying toward him. For a moment hope flared; then Laz recognized Dallandra.
“Laz!” she called out. “I’d like to hear