The Shield of Weeping Ghosts - James P. Davis [78]
"You risk too much, protecting him," he said. "He's using you."
Duras pulled away and led Bastun to an archer's loft at the back of the room. Thaena stood beside the bottom step as the vremyonni climbed the steep stairway. He winced at the ache in his legs. As Thaena and Duras followed, the whispering below them became quiet arguments and accusations. He wondered if he had done the right thing, if he had come to help them against the durthans imminent betrayal or to die alongside them-possibly by their blades.
Stumbling over a loose stone, he fell to his hands, and pain lanced through his wounded shoulder. Stifling a groan he crawled to the wall and sat down. Thaena ascended the last few steps, his staff held in the crook of her arm. Duras stood at the top step, blocking access to the loft as Thaena paced. With a sigh, she knelt down, leaning on his staff, and regarded him with anger and pity in her eyes.
"Explain yourself, Bastun," she said.
"What would you like me to say, Thaena?" He asked, his voice strained and scratchy.
"Tell me that they're wrong about you," she replied. "Tell me that you haven't betrayed us to spite the wychlaren or your homeland, that you aren't seeking some hidden power or secret of this place for your own gain. Tell me that everything that is happening here is just coincidence… and not design."
"Do I really need to say any of that?" he answered, looking between her and Duras.
"Damn you, Bastun! This isn't a game! Men have died in your absence, and many of those that remain believe you to be involved. Do you understand that? Can you?"
He didn't answer, his gaze drifting to the floor as he reminded himself that he knew to what he was returning. He cursed himself as the reality of what he faced came to rest on his shoulders. Looking up and seeing his two old friends waiting for him to say something, to settle their doubts, he could not help but wonder if they might have given up on him. "What do you think?" he asked.
Thaena shook her head and gestured over her shoulder where the voices of the fang could still be heard arguing in the room below.
"You know, Bastun, contrary to what you may think about the iron-fisted rule of the wychlaren," she said, just loud enough for him to hear, "what I think may not matter for much longer."
"It matters to me."
Thaena stood and turned away, pacing again. He regretted his words as soon as he'd said them and noted that she had not yet returned his staff. She couldn't know what the item meant to him, but in the spirit it was given, in Keffrass s last moments, it was tangible evidence of trust and forgiveness. Though the staff held some small power he might call upon when needed, neither of them suspected the old blade at his belt represented a destruction beyond their imagination.
"Well," Thaena said at length, "in any case, it won't save your life. That is, if you still care for your own life."
"Of course I care," he replied and shuddered as he recalled the nighthaunt's maw descending toward him.
"Then why did you leave? Why when everything we've experienced here speaks of betrayal?"
"I did what I had to do." Though he wanted to tell them everything, he could not be sure of their trust in him. If they still doubted or took seriously the rumors and accusations of those such as Syrolf, then the Breath would be taken from him. No matter what his warnings, they would know that he had kept it secret and pulled it from its hiding place. He would have played into Anilya's hands perfectly. Despite the trust he wished to earn, he knew he had to lie. "I left to find my own way, my own exile. And… I got lost."
Thaena knelt again, searching his eyes. Duras had remained quiet throughout, tall and still at the loft's ladder. Both of them awaited something more, more than just simplicity and the understanding of old friends. Together, ethran and guardian, they represented a reality he was loathe to face, though once he had lived it and had survived for some time-he was no longer one of them. They did not need him. They did not trust him.
But they wanted