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middle-aged woman gone dumpy and grey.
The weather had been problematic all the way up from the shadowgate. We had
had to skirt rain storms and thunder-heads again and again. That had cost us
more than a day.
Now, only twenty miles out, there was no evading the weather. Except by going
up way high, where it was icy cold and almost impossible to breathe, then
zigging back and forth between seething mountains of cloud while being tossed
and taunted by turbulence. Shukrat and Arkana were dead set against getting
caught aloft in a thunderstorm. Arkana told me, "Think what might happen if
you got hit by lightning."
I did not think long. There was no one I wanted to see badly enough to have my
post blow up between my legs. I headed for the ground. We holed up in a Gunni
farming village where the locals treated us with the same cautious respect
they would have shown a trio of nagas, the evil serpent people Gunni myth has
living deep underground but surfacing to plague humanity on numerous
occasions, always a couple, three villages away.
We did not steal any of their babies or maidens, nor their sacred cattle, nor
even their sheep. I found it interesting that they were sufficiently flexible
religiously to raise sheep for sale to folks like the Vehdna, who were going
to gobble them right down.
The lightning quit stomping around soon after midnight. We left our hosts with
coin enough to have them blessing our names. Which we never mentioned.
There was no lightning now but there was a steady, light rain. The Voroshk
apparel helped, but only some. I was cold and miserable and my pet crow, now
riding right in front of me in order to get under a fold of my cloak, was so
far gone in the miseries that it no longer bothered to complain.
The Company barracks seemed both unnaturally quiet and abnormally alert. Armed
sentries appeared everywhere. "Looks like Suvrin's worried about an attack."
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"Something must have happened."
I hovered. "You girls sense anything?"
"Something definitely isn't right," Arkana said. "I don't know what."
"We'd better find out." Gone less than two weeks and everything had gone to
hell?
Survin explained. I controlled myself and did not run off to see Lady before I
got the whole story. Suvrin told me, "General Singh has Tobo in a cell that's
isolated so the Unknown Shadows can't reach him for instructions. Singh won't
let anyone visit Tobo. We do know the kid is hurt, though."
"Obviously. Or he wouldn't put up with this. He tried something stupid?"
"Oh, yes. And I don't have the horses to get him out of it."
"Now you do. If you want to bother. What about Lady?"
"We don't know what happened. Nobody was there. And I've had no reports
recently. Last I heard, she was conscious but sullen and unresponsive. And the
girl is worse. Your effort was successful?"
"Pretty much. Which probably explains Lady and Booboo." I did not expand. "It
feels creepy around here."
"Gets more that way every night. Tobo's friends aren't happy. And they get
unhappier by the hour. But Aridatha isn't intimidated."
"We'll see if we can't change that. After I see my wife." Or the person who
used to be my wife.
I took Arkana with me. Just in case. "Don't say anything. Just stay in the
background and cover me," I told her.
There was a guard outside my quarters but he was not there to keep anyone in.
Probably not to keep anyone out, either. He was an early-warning marker for
Suvrin. He and I exchanged nods. He broke Arkana's heart by failing to notice
that she was an attractive young woman. I guess that was supposed to be
obvious despite the Voroshk outfit.
Lady sat at a small table. She stared into nothingness. At some time she had
been playing a solitaire-type card game but had lost interest long ago. The
lamp beside her was almost drained of oil. Black smoke boiled off it because
its wick needed trimming.
Wherever she was looking, it was plain she saw nothing but despair.
She had lost all interest in maintaining her appearance.
I laid my good hand on her right shoulder. "Darling. I'm back."
She did not respond right away. Once she did recognize my voice she pulled
away. "You did it," she said, more thinking out loud than actually speaking to
me. "You did something to Kina." Only in the "you" was there any human
emotion.
I glanced back at Arkana, to see if she was paying attention. This would be a
critical moment. "I killed her. Just the way we contracted to do." If there
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was any fragment of the Goddess in her now, that ought to provoke a reaction.
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