The Towers of the Sunset - L. E. Modesitt [204]
Ryedel looks toward the window, then down at the stone floor.
Hartor shakes his head slowly. In the west, the clouds are breaking and the sunlight is cold, but the drought has passed. In time, he releases the amulet, but he does not turn from the window.
CXL
CRESLIN STRUGGLES INTO awareness, though not out of darkness. He opens his eyes, but he cannot see. Blackness enfolds him like the air he breathes; while not physically restricting him, it never leaves him.
A dry, soundless croak that is an attempt at Megaera’s name emerges from his lips. He tries again. “. . . Megaera . . .”
A strong set of arms helps him into a half-sitting position, where he remains, propped up with pillows. “Drink this.” A cup touches his lips, and a warm scent of broth drifts into his nostrils.
“Megaera?”
“Just drink this. You need to recover as quickly as possible.”
Creslin swallows mechanically, knowing now from the still-throbbing wounds that are not his, and from the headache that is two in one, that she is the illest one. He swallows again, wondering what he can do.
“No!” Lydya commands.
He spills broth over his chest as he jumps at the steel in her voice. “Maybe later, when you’re stronger, but it might kill you both now,” she says.
“But . . .” he stutters “. . . if she . . .”
“Creslin,” insists Lydya, “right now she’s holding her own. If it gets desperate, I’ll tell you. But the best thing you can do for the moment is to heal yourself and stop being a drain on her. She’s been tied to you longer, and the flows still aren’t quite equal.” She pauses. His chest is blotted, and his chin. “You’re strong enough to hold this and feed yourself.”
He lifts his hands and finds the cup in them. “How did you know that was what I was thinking?”
“It didn’t take much guessing. Not when you ripped apart a good chunk of the sky and nearly killed yourself in distorting the order-chaos balance to try to save her. Now when, unconscious, all you did was moan and apologize to her. Not when your first conscious word was her name.”
“So stupid . . . again.”
“No. This time it was my fault. I was worried about Klerris, and you wanted to help me. You weren’t thinking. You don’t think when those you care about are threatened. None of us do. I didn’t either. Now drink some more. I promise you that if I need your help, I’ll tell you.”
“Promise?”
“I promise.”
After finishing the broth, he lies back, but sleep does not find him, not immediately, not even in the darkness that could be full day. He can hear the distant surf beat upon the sand. That, and the small feelings he cannot place, tell him that he lies in his own room, but on a bed rather than on the pallet that he had used, and that the bed is not small.
He tries to lift his hand to feel the headboard behind him, but his arms tremble. The slightest effort to sense the room spins the darkness around him in waves. At least that is what it seems, although the blackness does not lift.
The dull, aching pains that are not his penetrate his arms, his leg, so much that his shoulder wound seems little more than a sting. He closes his eyes, but that fails to ease the burning in them.
Somehow he drifts back into sleep. When he wakes again, a cup is immediately pressed to his lips. “Drink this.”
“Uhhh . . .wait.”
He moistens his lips, then complies. The aching in his arms seems less painful . . . or is he more used to it? “Megaera?”
“She seems better,” Klerris says.
“But not much?”
“Not as much as I’d like. Drink some more of this.”
Creslin again complies. After he downs the cup of warm liquid, he clears his throat.
“You’ll need more in a little while. You’re weak and dehydrated.”
“Dehydrated?”
“Not enough liquids. The body is mostly water, you may recall.”
“Why can’t I see?”
“I don’t know. I can only guess. It’s never happened before, and I’m really not prepared to speculate.”
“Guess,” commands Creslin.
“If you wish, your grace.”
“Skip the titles.”
“Then stop acting like