Celia Friedman - When True Night Falls

It took him a minute to realize what he meant, to accept that the rakh standing before him was exactly that, and not a sorcerer in disguise. The Prince was . . . dead? Then they had succeeded, he thought dully. The mastermind behind the atrocities of this region had been vanquished, and his works could now be undone. It seemed unreal, like something in a dream; he had trouble accepting it.

“Where’s Jenseny?” he pleaded. “Is she all right?”

The rakh said nothing. For a minute he just looked at Damien, and then he shook his head slowly. “She took him with her,” he told Damien. “Sacrificed herself so that he might die. All in the name of your god, priest. She bought into your myth and it saved her.”

He reached into his cloak and removed something from an inner pocket; Damien heard the jangle of keys. “Under the circumstances I think it best that you leave here.” He seemed to fumble with the key ring, as though lacking the coordination to manipulate it. “As soon as possible.” The key slid into place and turned; the door swung slowly open. He looked at Damien. “Can you walk?”

He nodded and tried to get up, but pain shot through his back. Breathing heavily, he gritted his teeth and tried again. This time he got as far as a kneeling position. From there it was only one lurching twist and a gut-wrenching extension to a standing position. He reached out for the nearest bar and used it to steady himself; the lamplight was swimming in his vision. The rakh offered no aid and voiced no concern, but he waited patiently until Damien had released the bar and then said, “Come with me.”

The Prince is dead, he thought. Waiting for the joy to come. But there was no room for it in his soul, not with so much grief already filling him. Later, he promised himself. Later.

Ten stairs. A hundred. Each one was a separate trial, an individual agony. More than once he had to stop and lean against the wall, fighting to catch his breath. The rakh said nothing, offered nothing, waited. At last, when they were close enough to the top that his Worked sight revealed enough earth-fae, he muttered, “A minute. Please.” When the rakh stopped and turned to him he gathered up the precious power and patterned it into a Healing, a blessed Healing that poured through his broken flesh, cooling the fire of his pain. With desperate care he rewove broken blood vessels, mended shattered cells, prompted his body to clean out the pool of waste fluids that had accumulated in his wounded flesh. At last, satisfied that he had done the best he could possibly do, he let the Working fade and leaned against the cold stone wall, breathing heavily. Thank God the pain was fading quickly; that didn’t always happen right after a Healing.

“All right,” he muttered. Pushing himself away from the wall at last, forcing himself to move again. For the first time since they had started their climb, he felt as if he might really make it. For the first time, it sank in that they had won.

No. He had won. Hesseth was dead, and Jenseny also, and as for Tarrant . . . how many hours had it been since the Prince had consigned him to the dawn? He wanted to ask, but he couldn’t find the breath. At the top, he promised himself. He’d ask when they reached the top.

The stairwell was beginning to lighten, reflecting light from the palace above. The rakh drew up his hood to shield his face, and wrapped the cloak tightly around his body. His people are sensitive to sunlight, Damien remembered. Was he injured when the Prince conjured light to attack Tarrant? Was the Prince willing to accept that pain in order to guarantee his victory?

It could have been him in that situation, he realized. Hell, it almost was. What was that like, to have another mind controlling your arms, your legs, your eyes and hands, perhaps your very thoughts? It was too horrible to consider. Thank God Jenseny had died before the Prince had subjected her to that.

Two turns. Three. The light was brilliant now, and Katassah put up a hand to shade his eyes. Damien noted that the fur of his arm was matted and stained. With blood, it looked like. Whose? The rakh staggered then, and it was clear he was having trouble. Was he hurt also? If so-

“I can help you,” Damien offered. “There’s enough fae here for a Healing if you need one.” He reached out toward the rakh, intending it as a gesture of support, but the rakh snarled and backed off. Sharp white teeth were bared; the matted, stained fur of his mane bristled with aggressive vigor. Damien stepped back as far as he could, to where his back was against the inner wall; it didn’t seem far enough. This was an animal display far beyond Hesseth’s civilized snarlings, and he sensed that if he moved too fast or said the wrong thing those long, thin claws would slash his face to threads before he could draw another breath. Frozen, tense, he waited. At last the rakh seemed to shudder, and his claws resheathed. His lips closed over his sharp teeth, hiding them from sight. When he spoke, his voice was hoarse, and he clearly had to struggle to discipline it into human words.

“I’m . . . sorry.” The words were clearly hard for him; how often did he have to apologize? “Human contact—”

“Hey.” Damien managed to force a smile to his face. It was stiff and awkward but he thought it communicated what it was meant to. “I understand.”

Together they ascended into the light. After so many hours in darkness the brilliance of the palace was blinding; both he and the rakh paused at the topmost step, shading their eyes, struggling to adapt to it. “He didn’t care,” the rakh muttered. “ He could see using the fae, and that was enough. He didn’t care if the light damaged my eyes.”

“Sweet guy,” Damien muttered. “Sorry I didn’t get to know him better.” And then he dared, “Speaking of light . . .”

The rakh understood. “Your friend?”

Friend. What a bizarre word that was. What an alien, almost incomprehensible concept. Could one call the Hunter a friend? Would one ever want to?

“Yeah,” he muttered. “Tarrant. Is he alive?”

The rakh hesitated. “I think so. I went to him first when it happened, because time was such a factor.” He shook his head. “I couldn’t do anything. Maybe you can.”

“How much time is left?”

He glanced toward one of the walls, but if there was some kind of clock there Damien couldn’t see it. “Not much,” he muttered. “I’ll take you there. You can see for yourself.”

There were more stairs, crystal stairs that glowed with all the brilliance of the sun. It was clear that the light hurt Katassah’s eyes, and more than once he stumbled. Was the whole damn palace Worked?

Two men came into sight. They looked startled to see Katassah there, but were far more surprised by Damien’s presence. After a moment of confusion and hesitation they both bowed low to the rakh and then hurried away in pursuit of other business. Katassah stood still just long enough to accept their obeisance, then resumed the long climb by Damien’s side.

“They don’t know, do they?”

The rakh shook his head. “No one knows. No one will know, until I tell them. Or until they guess.”

He would have asked him more about the Prince’s death, but at that moment the stairs grew steep and uncomfortably narrow, and he decided that his attention was better spent on his footing. They climbed perhaps twenty feet that way, to a narrow tunnel which opened onto darkness-

And the night sky unfolded before them, in all its predawn glory. Overhead the heavens were as black as ink, with a spray of stars scattered across the east like drops of fire. Beneath that was a band of pale blue rising along the horizon, and it was bright enough already that the stars directly over it were nearly invisible. Damien had watched the sun rise often enough on this trip to know how little time they had left.