Vanity's Brood - Lisa Smedman [32]
"Well?" she asked.
He closed his eyes and shuddered. Zelia still controlled his destiny, as certainly as if she'd seeded him. She liked watching him squirm.
"I'll do it," he whispered, "for Karrell and our children."
CHAPTER 4
Arvin winced as the fleshmender turned his hand over, studying his lacerated fingers. "Strange wound," she said.
Arvin merely nodded. "Can you heal it?"
The cleric was a young, blonde-haired woman who might have been pretty save for the deep lines in her forehead, the price to be paid for taking on the suffering of others. She returned his nod.
"The Crying God feels your pain, my son," she intoned.
Dressed in ash-gray tunic, trousers, and matching gray skullcap, she had Ilmater's symbol-a pair of bound hands-pinned over her heart. her heart.
Arvin remembered that symbol well from his childhood. The severed hands-he always thought of them that way-and the other symbols cf martyrdom had decorated the orphanage. Ilmater's martyred clerics were painted in vivid glory, spotted with plague sores, being torn apart by wolves, or covered in open, weeping wounds. All had their faces turned toward Shurrock, a savage domain of broken hills, torrential rains, howling winds, and wild beasts. Ilmater's dwelling place-the domain where his faithful would reap their reward of eternal suffering.
Arvin could have gone to a guild healer, but that would have meant answering unwanted questions. The guild frowned upon members taking on "outside work." But in the Chapel of Healing that catered to the humans of Hlondeth, the only demand made was a coin or two-whatever the petitioner could afford-in the wooden donation box.
Darkmorning had almost ended, and outside the chapel, the streets were quiet. Only Arvin sought healing. Come sunrise, however, the chapel's stone benches would be filled with petitioners.
The cleric murmured a prayer-one that Arvin could recite from memory, even though healing prayers had been used infrequently at the orphanage; the clerics believed that suffering built character in children. The wounds on his fingers slowly closed. She touched his mouth and ears, and the sting of each wound faded. When she was finished, she held his left hand in hers and touched his abbreviated little finger.
"This," she said, lifting his hand slightly, "is too old a wound for me to heal. It requires a Pain- bearer's touch."
"That's all right," Arvin said. He had no desire to meet any of the senior clerics. The only reason he'd come to the chapel was that it was run by the order's most junior clerics-men and women who weren't old enough to dredge up unpleasant memories. "I'm used to it," he told her
He didn't bother to explain what the guild would do to him if they found he'd removed their mark. One day, perhaps, when he was finally clear of Hlondeth, he might seek out a cleric who could regenerate his finger, but…
She released his hand. "You have the face of someone who has seen much suffering. Ilmater bless you and help you to bear your load."
Arvin stood. He was grateful for Ilmater's healing, but that was as far as it went. The last thing he needed was another god meddling in his life.
As he dropped coins in the donation box, a disheveled woman rushed through the door, an infant lying limp in her arms.
"She's been bitten!" the woman shrieked. "There was a snake! A snake in her swaddling basket! She started to cry-it woke me-and I saw she had its tail in her fist. It bit her. Please, oh please, can you save her?"
The cleric turned her attention to the baby, touching its tiny hand and intoning a spell. Arvin watched a moment-the mother was panting from her run, and it was probably already too late for the poison to be neutralized-then he slipped out the door. He really didn't want to see the outcome. As he walked away from the chapel, ho heard the cleric murmur condolences and the mother break into loud sobs. At least, he thought grimly, the woman had known the joy of holding her child in her arms, if only for a short time.
He wondered if Karrell would live