The Towers of the Sunset - L. E. Modesitt [86]
“At least you’re starting to think.”
“Thought doesn’t do much good, lady, when you have no choices.”
This time she frowns.
“Megaera.” He looks up at the guards, who have edged their mounts even farther from the two. “I’m not welcome on the Roof of the World. I’m not welcome anyplace where the White Wizards live, and I doubt that I’m welcome in Sarronnyn or Suthya . . . especially not now.”
Her eyes rest on him without seeing him.
Wheee . . . eeah . . . The chestnut breaks the silence. A shadow passes over the hill as one of the puffy clouds covers the sun. He laughs harshly. “There you have it. You have me, and everyone else wishes I would disappear.”
“No one has you. No one ever will.”
“But you have me, lady, like it or not.”
“You misunderstand, Creslin.” Her voice is soft, softer than he had imagined it could be. “You have me—no matter what I do—just as I have you.”
“And you hate it, and you hate me?”
“Yes.”
He gazes at the cloud that has cast the shadow over them. Her mount flicks its tail at a horsefly.
“What a pair!” He looks toward the scattering of black-faced sheep on the far hillside, then toward the mounted guards, who shift their weight in their saddles, glancing from the two under the trees to each other and back again. “Let’s return.”
“Are you tired?”
“Yes,” he admits. “Not that it should make any difference to you.”
“What were you thinking?”
“Nothing useful.” He mounts more carefully than normal, aware again of the lack of strength in his legs. “Just wondering what we can do.”
The guards trail them back to Vergren.
LII
“YOU STILL DON’T understand, do you?” Megaera twists on the hard stone, curling one leather-trousered leg under her. She half-faces the east, where, beyond the three-kay spread of the cleared meadows, the broad walls of the town cast shadows across the buildings.
Creslin looks to his right, at the orange sun about to set behind the western hills, then turns back to Megaera. He tries not to frown, knowing it is futile this close to her. Yet, sensing the raging storm within her, he wonders if any answer is safe. “I don’t think so.”
She lifts her arms, letting the long cotton sleeves slide back to reveal her scarred wrists. “You’ve seen these before. Don’t tell me you haven’t.”
“I won’t.” He could remove the scars, but there is no purpose in doing so until the mental scars that underlie them are gone.
“Iron, cold iron, every day since . . . since I stopped being a little girl. Do you know what it’s like. Do you?”
“No.”
“And then Ryessa, sister dear, and Dylyss exchange that cold iron for hot iron. Your blood for my chains, and my life is linked to yours. Do you know what it is like to sense your abilities and never be able to use them? At least not fully. Not without pain.”
Not be able to use whose abilities? His or hers? “Go on.”
“You don’t really want to hear.”
“Why do you—” He fixes his eyes on her. “I said to go on.”
“No.” She looks away. “I refuse to be humored, even by someone who is basically nice, if dense.”
“Fine,” snorts Creslin. “Then tell me why you showed that troop of wizards’ road guards where I was. That almost killed me.”
“What?”
“You know exactly what I mean. You and your damned white bird circled right overhead until that wizard could see me.”
“Is that how it looks to you?” Megaera’s voice carries a surprised lilt.
“Don’t you know?”
“How would I know?” She lifts her arms again, letting the scars face Creslin. “How would I know? When every trip across the skies burns your skin and soul? When the only sunlight you see in days is through an iron-barred window? It’s only in the last season that I could work without searing myself.”
“You don’t know? You don’t see that damned bird when you reach for me?”
“Of course not, you idiot! Who would tell me? Are you strong enough to hold your hands across a red-hot grate to call your storms? And if you are, are you going to wonder what it looks like?