Ginn Hale - Lord of the White Hell book Two

The crow circled them and called out two piercing cries before it swept far beyond Kiram's sight. Kiram glanced to Javier and saw concern dim his sensual radiance. "There's been trouble at the Circle of Red Oaks apparently."

"Did that crow just tell you that?" Kiram asked in a whisper. Javier laughed and gazed at him with amused affection.

"It can happen." Kiram defended. "Alizadeh spoke to me once through a flock of crows."

"Oh, I have no doubt that Alizadeh can speak through many forms when he needs to, but yesterday a note seemed sufficient." Javier's smile faded as he went on, "The Bahiim are fighting him. Many of them want to extinguish the White Tree again."

"What?" Kiram stared at Javier in disbelief. "But once it was ignited they were obligated to return to their duties."

"That was Alizadeh's belief, but it seems he failed to consider that many of the Bahiim might feel that their duty is to lock the shajdis away a second time." A cynical amusement sounded in Javier's voice. "It's so much easier to relinquish power rather than accept responsibility, you know."

"But the shadow curse nearly took over the circle. Don't they realize that?"

"You'd think so, since most of them were there," Javier replied.

"They can't just ignore that!"

"Maybe they can," Javier replied. "It's amazing what some people will choose to do."

"But that's idiotic"' The idea of the Bahiim turning their backs on the majesty of the White Tree and on the threat of the shadow curse infuriated him and not just because they were abandoning Javier's hope for help.

"The curse won't go away just because they wish it would!" Both horses flicked their ears at Kiram's harsh tone.

"I know." Javier patted Lunaluz's neck soothingly. "But obviously none of this is mine or yours to decide."

Javier's calm resignation annoyed Kiram but he kept his peace while the two of them rode further. Two more crows passed overhead. Kiram watched them, thinking of the night he'd run for his life from the shadow curse. He couldn't imagine how anyone could in good conscience allow something like the shadow curse to continue to torture and hunt.

"What do they think they're going to do when the shadow curse comes for them personally?" Kiram asked.

"I don't know." Javier simply shook his head. "Alizadeh just wrote to warn me to stay away and keep a low profile for a week or so. He'll send word when it's right to come forward."

Javier reined Lunaluz to a halt as they reached a clearing full of spring flowers and outlined by tall oaks. Kiram heard the distant melody of a prayer being sung and realized that they were very near the Grunito family's chapel. Javier swung down from his saddle and freed his stallion to sample the young shoots of grass.

"This is where I usually come to practice the lessons Alizadeh has taught me." Javier indicated one tall, old oak. "What do you think?"

"It's beautiful," Kiram replied. Swaths of wildflowers bloomed between the trees and bright gold butterflies flitted through the air. But Kiram's mind wasn't really on the view. "Does Alizadeh think he can convince the other Bahiim to support him?"

"I don't know," Javier answered mildly.

Kiram frowned at the idea of the Bahiim rejecting Alizadeh's arguments. He wished there was something he could do. "Can they be so deluded that they think the White Tree will ignite on its own the next time the shadow curse returns?"

Javier simply gave him a tired smile. "I've pretty much told you everything Alizadeh wrote to me. Would you like me to make some answers up? Or I could attempt to interview a squirrel or something, if you'd like."

Kiram sighed. He supposed it was pointless to rail against the Bahiim to Javier. He swung down from Verano's back and allowed the gelding to graze alongside Lunaluz. "We're on our own again, aren't we?"

"For now it would seem so." Javier strolled between the trees and Kiram walked beside him. "I don't suppose Scholar Donamillo has written back to you?"

"No, but in his last letter Scholar Blasio mentioned that Scholar Donamillo has been quite ill." Kiram didn't like to think of how bad the sickness must be for the scholar not to respond to his letter.

"It's not likely to have been his treatments, then…" Javier commented.

"What do you mean?"

Javier sighed as if defeated. "Supposedly Fedeles has fully recovered his senses."

"Elezar mentioned something about that. It's wonderful, isn't it?" Kiram started to smile but Javier's grim expression warned him that the news was not cause for jubilation.

"It should be" Javier said carefully. "But it seems that he's accused me of being responsible for his madness both to Lord Quemanor and before the royal bishop, Prince Nugalo."

"Fedeles wouldn't." Kiram began but realized that he couldn't really know what Fedeles would do. He would never have imagined Fedeles tearing apart his steam engine either and yet he had. Although that had been the shadow curse, not Fedeles.

And suddenly a terrible thought occurred to him. What if Scholar Donamillo had been too ill to treat Fedeles? What if the curse's hold over him had grown? "When did this happen?"

"There were rumors for a while," Javier replied. "But three weeks ago Prince Sevanyo was in attendance for Lord Queman- or's complaint before the royal bishop. Fedeles gave a personal testimony."

"Fedeles spoke?" All Kiram could imagine was Fedeles singing out the names of beloved horses.

"He was quite eloquent, apparently. The bishop was horrified enough by his descriptions of the black magic I practiced against him to dispatch a troop of his men to bring me to stand trial" Javier scowled. "Luckily, only Prince Sevanyo knew I hadn't returned to Rauma. He sent me a warning."

"And all of this began a month ago?"

"So it would seem."

A month ago would have been at the start of Scholar Donamillo's illness. Kiram felt suddenly foolish for all the time he'd wasted in the last few weeks. If only he'd known he might have done something.

A nervous fear prickled through him. The bishop's men could be well on their way by now. If they were swift they would reach Anacleto any day. "You should have said something sooner."

"It wouldn't have changed anything if I had. I didn't know anything for certain until I received Prince Sevanyo's letter." Javier shrugged. "Anyway I thought Elezar was already causing enough of a panic. He demanded that Morisio and Atreau swear loyalty to me, you know."

"I know" Kiram replied. "I promised to stand with you as well."

"Did you?" Javier's calm expression wavered and for an instant Kiram thought he saw fear in his face. Then Javier stepped into the shadows of a towering oak tree. He leaned back against the gnarled trunk. "I won't let it come to that."

"It might not be your choice."

Javier gave him a hard look. His fingers gripped the rough bark of the tree. Kiram knew he didn't want to talk about this but they were too far in to stop now. Kiram couldn't be like Javier and simply wait to see what fate awaited him; he needed to have a plan. "So what are you going to do?"

"I don't know what I'm going to do. But the one thing I'm certain of is that Fedeles wouldn't betray me of his own will. Something has happened to him."

"It has to be Father Habalan's doing," Kiram decided. "He's using the shadow curse to control Fedeles just like he used it to make Fedeles destroy my steam-"

"Someone is using the shadow curse." Javier cut Kiram off. "But I don't think it's Habalan. Now more than ever."

"It has to be him."

"Habalan knows next to nothing anything about the Bahiim ways…certainly not enough to create and control a shadow curse," Javier said. "The more I've studied under Alizadeh, the more certain I've become that the man on the hill isn't Habalan."