Барб Хенди - First and Last Sorcerer

Watching Wayfarer and Osha leave, Leesil almost wished he could go with them. A bit of air might be welcome. However, those two had something to work out, and the sooner the better. Besides, he did want to remain with Magiere.

After washing up and changing clothes, followed by Magiere combing his damp hair, for a short while his world had almost begun to make sense again. Only moments later that feeling vanished as reality took hold.

Brot’an was here, as was Chane. They were all stuck in this place, and when they left, they’d have to hunt an undead like no other they’d ever dealt with. Leesil didn’t even see how they could kill something that had no flesh of its own. And all because some fallen Suman sage had more secrets than he’d shared.

Leesil glanced again at the blanketed form beyond Shade in the room’s dim back corner.

What was going to happen when that blood-soaked undead rose again at nightfall? Magiere was in no condition to deal with Chane, at least not alone. Brot’an might help if something started. And if Magiere wanted to finish it, Leesil would ...

—No—

He twisted his head to look at Chap.

—Leave Chane alone— ... —For now—

Leesil couldn’t argue without alerting the others to what Chap had said. Turning away, he crouched down before Magiere, who was still sitting in a chair facing the open area around the table. She was a little thin but still beyond lovely, and he was grateful to have her back. They simply always seemed to have another battle to fight that couldn’t be avoided.

“So, it seems we have another undead to hunt down,” he said. “I hope that domin was serious about having a plan.”

Wynn came closer and dropped her bundle of blankets into an empty chair. “Well, whatever his plan is,” she put in, “it will have to take place at night, as we’ll need Chane.”

Leesil rose up, unable to hold back. “No, we won’t.”

“Oh ... Leesil!” she shot back. “Who fought off guards at the front gates and again in the streets when we were about to be caught? I wouldn’t have that orb in the bedchamber if not for him ... and Shade would have died if he hadn’t rescued her. Even Osha is able to work with him.” Half turning away, she added over her shoulder, “So spare me your self-righteous indignation. Whatever the past, you—we—will need his help when the time comes.”

After snatching up the blankets, she stormed off toward the bedchamber, passing through the sheet that still hung in the doorway.

Leesil glanced at Chap, then looked to Magiere. She was staring at nothing, though her hands were clenched on the side of the chair’s seat. Magiere hated Chane as much as anyone, maybe more for her inner nature. She’d once even taken his head, but he’d somehow come back.

Leesil expected her to be as angry as himself, but she was quiet, as was Chap.

Didn’t either of them see what was happening here? They couldn’t accept help from an undead who had murdered countless people.

Leesil started after Wynn.

“Leave her be,” Magiere growled at him.

“Not this time.”

Nearing the bedroom, he heard steps behind him and looked back. It was only Chap following, so he kept on. When they passed through the sheet curtain and stepped into the bedchamber, Wynn sat on the floor stroking Shade’s neck—which was a surprise.

Leesil hadn’t even seen Chap’s daughter leave the outer room’s back corner—and her vigil there. It was still unbelievable that a majay-hì guarded an undead, but at the sight of Wynn petting the dog, some of Leesil’s anger faded.

“If what Ghassan says about this specter is true,” Wynn said quietly, “we need everyone we have.”

Leesil didn’t know what to say to that. How could she justify using one murdering undead to hunt down another?

“I dislike any of us being used as bait,” said a deep, quiet voice.

Chap snarled, and Leesil spun to find Brot’an’s hulking form inside the doorway.

The aging shadow-gripper too often showed unsettling concern for Magiere’s safety. So where was that when he’d abandoned everyone on the docks? Either way, it couldn’t be true concern, not from him. Even Chap hadn’t uncovered Brot’an’s true motives, even now that Most Aged Father’s loyalists had been removed.

“I don’t like it either,” Leesil replied. “But the domin says we don’t have a choice.”

Brot’an blinked slowly. “Magiere is not the only possible bait. Perhaps not even the most effective.”

Wynn rose to her feet. “What do you mean?”

“This Khalidah wants to take Magiere alive,” Brot’an continued, “or he would have killed her already. So long as she lives, that goal remains attainable. If the domin’s sect imprisoned this specter long ago, and all are dead but him, would the specter not want to finish what it started with the domin as a potential obstacle?”

In the following moment of silence, Leesil felt a chill; Brot’an had a way of making the coldest reasoning sound ... reasonable.

“I’ve been wondering what you thought of all this,” Wynn said, studying the master assassin with a frown. “For the most part, you’ve been awfully quiet.”

“I have been listening.”

—Listen to him— ... —Something is ... missing ... in the domin’s plan—

As usual, Chap was annoyingly right, but Leesil disliked siding with Brot’an.

Wynn let out a tired sigh. “Ghassan is no coward. I can vouch for that. So ... why use Magiere when he’d be the better bait himself?”

There was little Leesil wouldn’t do where Magiere was concerned. He looked up at Brot’an.

“Perhaps we should find a creative way to ask him?”

Osha followed Leanâlhâm—Wayfarer—out the back door into the rear alley. He watched as she leaned against the wall, folded her arms together, and looked away from him.

They were alone and out of sight with their hoods pulled forward and low. There was little chance of anyone noticing them, but that was no longer his main concern.

She had neither spoken to him nor looked at him since leaving the sanctuary, and the weight of his choice back in Calm Seatt was crushing him. Worse, he was painfully aware of not having given enough thought to how that would affect her—had affected her.

Upstairs, when she had come out of the bedchamber with her long hair still damp and lying over one shoulder of her red tunic, he had been startled, as if seeing a stranger. What could he say to wipe away the damage he had inflicted upon her?

Along with her dead grandfather and uncle—the kind healer Gleannéohkân’thva, and the great and honorable anmaglâhk Sgäilsheilleache—she had once treated him as family.

“Lean—” Osha began, choking on that name. “Wayfarer ... forgive me.”

Still, she did not look at him, so he stepped out in the alley to face her.

“I beg you for ... I am so sorry ... so very sorry that I remained behind without telling you first.”

Her large green eyes instantly fixed on him, as if an apology was the last thing she had expected. Did she think so little of him now?

With a pained expression, she dropped her chin, and though her small mouth opened slightly, she did not speak.

“What can I do?” he asked.

One tear ran halfway down her cheek and drowned him in more guilt.

“Do?” she whispered. “I lost my only family. I was driven out by our own ancestors’ spirits and then forced to leave all I knew by Brot’ân’duivé. I would have withered and died ... if not for you caring for me.” She choked once. “And you left me with the greimasg’äh ... without a word.”

Osha could barely breathe, as if he again stood in the fiery cavern of the Chein’âs, where his own weapons had been burned off his wrists. That pain, which had almost killed him, seemed as nothing here and now.