Gate of Ivrel

And then while he knelt feeding the fire to life he heard Erij’s tread behind him, and felt the gentle touch of Erij’s long fingers gather back his hair, which hung loose about his shoulders. It was long enough to gather in the hand, not yet long enough to resume the braid that marked a warrior. Erij tugged at it gently, as a man might a child’s.

He lifted his head perforce. He did not try to turn, but braced himself for the cruel wrench he was sure would come. It did not.

“I would have thought,” said Erij, “that the honors bestowed on you at your leaving would have counseled you against coming back.”

Erij let go his hair. Vanye seized the chance to turn and rise. Erij was taller than he: he could not help looking up at his elder brother, close as he stood to him. His back was to the hearth. The heat was unpleasant. Erij did not back a pace to let him away from it.

And then he saw that Erij had no right hand: the member that he kept thrust within the breast of his tunic was a stump. He stared, horrified, and Erij held it up the better for him to see.

“Your doing,” said Erij. “Like much else.”

He did not offer his sorrow for it; he could not say at the moment that he felt it, or anything else save shock. Erij had been the vain one, the skilled one, his hands clever with the sword, with the harp, with the bow.

The pain of the fire in his legs was intense. He pushed free of Erij. The wine cup spilled on the floor and rolled a trail of red droplets darkly across the thirsty dust.

“You come in strange company,” said Erij. “Is she real?”

“Yes,” said Vanye.

Erij considered that. He was Myya and coldly practical; Myya doubted much and believed little: they were not notoriously religious. It was doubtful which side in him would win, god-fearing Nhi or cynical Myya. “I have had a look at some of the things she carried,” he said. “And that would seem to support it. But she bleeds like any mortal.”

“There are enemies on her trail and mine,” he said hoarsely, “that will be no boon to Morija. Let us be on our way as soon as she can ride, and we will be no trouble to you and neither will they. Hjemur will be far too busy with the both of us to trouble with Morija. If you try to hold her here, it may well be otherwise.”

“And if she dies here?”

He stared at Erij, gauging him, and began to reckon with the two years and what they had wrought: the boy was dead, and the man would kill, cold-bloodedly. Erij had been a creature of tempers, of vanities, of sometime kindness—different than Handrys. Erij’s features now seemed those of a man who never smiled. A new scar marred one cheek. There had come to be lines about the eyes.

“Let her pass,” said Vanye. “They will want her and all that ever was hers; you cannot deal with Hjemur. There is no dealing with them at all, and you know it.”

“Is that where she is going?” he asked.

“The less Morija has to do with her the better. She has bloodfeud with them, and she is more danger to them than to you. I am telling you the truth.”

Erij thought upon that a moment, leaned upon the fireplace and thrust the maimed limb within his tunic once more. His dark eyes rested upon Vanye, hard and calculating. “The last I heard of you was through Myya Gervaine, the matter of a killing and a horse-theft in Erd.”

“It took the better part of two years to pass the land of your cousins of Myya,” Vance acknowledged. “I lived off them; and took the horse in trade for mine.”

Erij’s lips tightened in grim mirth at the insolence. “Before you acquired a service, I take it?”

“Before that, yes.”

“And how was it that you acquired that service?”

Vanye shrugged. He was cold. He returned to the fire, folding his arms against the chill. “Carelessness,” he said. “I sheltered where I ought not—too intent on the woman to remember that she had lord-right. It was fair Claiming.”

“Do you sleep with her?”

He looked up at his brother in shock. “ Ilin with liyo, and the like of her? No, I do not. Did not.”

“She is beautiful. She is also qujal. I do not like having her under roof. She claims no hearth-right here, and I do not intend she should obtain it.”

“She does not wish it,” said Vanye. “Only send us on our way.”

“What is the term of your service to her? What does she claim of you?”

“I do not think I am at liberty to say that. But it has nothing to do with Morija. We only turned here after we were harried in this direction by Hjemur.”

“And if released, she will go—where?”

“Out of your lands, by the quickest means.” He looked his brother in the face, dropping all arrogance: Erij was due his revenge, had had it in the hospitality he gave them. “I swear it, Erij; and I hold nothing against you for this welcome of yours. If you let us go I will take every care that it brings no trouble on the land—on my life, Erij.”

“What do you ask of me, what help?”

“Only return to us the gear you took from us. Give us provisions, if you would. We are scant of everything. And we will go as soon as she can ride.”