A month after they left the court in mourning, the great courtyard at home was filled with feasting and music. Nirithu's sister Bghali was dancing with her betrothed, Gomusir son of Hibhin, foremost of the warriors of the Gmou Hisol.
They were well-matched in looks. She was slim and he was solid; her heavy braid whipped out behind her like a rope and his curls were caught in a loose tail at the nape of his neck; a milky opal hung on a gold chain on her forehead and his eyes were deepened with the black wings of ravens. They didn't touch. It wouldn't have been proper before the wedding, and it wasn't that kind of dance. A woman Nirithu didn't know was singing. She was one of the upwards of thirty cousins Gomusir had brought with him when he came to finalize the betrothal, as well as his mother, brothers, sisters-in-law, and uncles, not to mention the wandering beggars and musicians who always knew where a celebration was happening. The song was a traditional one, about a foolish parrot who tried to court a cobra, and she changed the parrot to a raven in Gomusir's honor. When he reached for Bghali, she whirled away, their feet moving in perfect concert. Members of both families surrounded them, laughing and stamping their feet. Bghali's eyes were wide, and when she pressed her lips together, they trembled.
Nirithu didn't stop to see the end of the dance. His arms were full of a basket of food, a little of everything he'd managed to grab from the platters in the feast hall. Risokh, back in their rooms, was still waiting for his dinner. He was mostly used to Nirithu by now, and to their new quarters at home, but since the strangers had arrived four days ago he hadn't left their bedroom. He'd eaten little and not slept at all, and in consequence, neither had Nirithu. Nirithu had been using sorcery to keep himself awake; he didn't know how Risokh did it.
Making his way through the crowd, too bleary-eyed to look properly, Nirithu almost ran into his brother Miren. Miren put out a hand to steady him, grinning, flushed with the dancing and probably a pipe or two of hashish. Nirithu managed a smile of his own and ducked his head, using the music as an excuse not to talk. Once he saw that Nirithu was properly back on his feet, Miren slipped his arm around the waist of his young armor-bearer again. In his other arm, he held his son, asleep on his shoulder.
Between Nirithu and his rooms there was another cluster of people to get through. These were watching Nirithu's brother Mephimor and his wife Nulrin arm-wrestling, which they'd been doing at every family celebration and every new moon when Mephimor was at home since Nirithu was very small. They kept the contest interesting and the balance of wins and losses shifted over the years, but generally Mephimor won twice for every victory of Nulrin's. Mephimor was no weakling, nor was it in his nature to purposely lose, but Nulrin had the kind of arms that came from kneading dough and lifting children daily, and also from regular practice with the ballista when the men were at war and it was up to the women to defend the compound. Their three daughters hung on their knees and leaned against their backs, cheering for Nulrin when she offered them sweets and honeycomb, then switching their support to Mephimor when he promised them silver bangles.
Nirithu's uncle Jophli, his eyes never leaving the wrestlers, offered Nirithu a pipe as he pushed past.
"I shouldn't," said Nirithu.
"Stick around," Jophli urged. "Biyubh is going to sing next. He says it's something new."
A new song of Biyubh's would be worth hearing. But Nirithu only kept going until he was out of the great courtyard, away from the light of torches and the smell of smoke, and the music was only a distant hum. The clear air cleared his head a little. He made it to the rooms he shared with Risokh, set the basket down on the small wooden table, where Risokh didn't acknowledge it, and then went out into their courtyard while Risokh, hopefully, ate.
Nirithu was so tired he didn't dare sit down, but he settled his shoulders against the wall and ended up dozing off standing up. When he woke, he was muzzily convinced that he was with the warriors on the march, and that Miren was going to give him latrine duty because he'd overslept again. He was almost disappointed when he remembered the truth.
He didn't know how much time had passed, but Risokh was probably done with whatever eating he was going to do. "My lord?" he called at the door, and when there was no answer, cautiously opened it to find Risokh sprawled across the table, his hair trailing into a bowl of rice. Nirithu got his shoulders under Risokh's arm—and Risokh must have been fast asleep, because he didn't flinch or stiffen at all—and half-lifted, half-dragged him over to his bed. He was heavy, and Nirithu was exhausted, and with only half an intention, Nirithu drew on his source. Then Risokh was no longer a burden, but a warm, almost pleasant weight on Nirithu's back, and the last spark of life departed from his source, leaving it nothing but a dead mango pit against his chest. He could have wept.
Instead, he settled Risokh on the bed and brushed a few stray grains of rice from his hair. Nirithu was awake now, he might as well bring Risokh's dishes and uneaten food back to the kitchen.
There were two pairs of slippers, one small, one large, outside the kitchen door, and he heard voices as he toed his own slippers off before coming in, growing louder as he passed the ovens and drying racks for spices.
"I still don't understand what I said wrong." That was Biyubh, sounding as contrite as he could make himself.
"Everything you said was right. And you think it's funny." What was Bghali doing in the kitchen during her own betrothal celebrations? Sulking, by the sound of it. "Although," Bghali went on, looking up from the plates she was scraping with a sneer when Nirithu walked into the scullery, "can you see Nirithu bashing anybody's brains out on the floor? Really?"
"Well, maybe not," Biyubh admitted, looking Nirithu up and down. "But I'm sure he could manage a plague of lice, couldn't you, Nirithu?"
Nirithu didn't know what they were arguing about, but that particular topic wasn't funny to him recently. "You know I can't affect living things with sorcery."
Bghali grabbed the basket from his hands. "You can't do anything except complain about how put-upon you are and how nobody has any consideration for you," she said, savagely scraping the leftovers into the slop bucket. "And you," pointing a spoon in Biyubh's face, "can't do anything except admire yourself and make up stupid poems. You call yourselves men?" She dropped the dishes and spoon into the wash-basin with an impressively accurate clatter of pottery; Nirithu certainly would have broken something if he'd tried that. "You're the two most useless babies I ever saw off their mother's tit!" She whirled, braid snapping and skirts flaring behind her, and stormed out.
"What did you say?" said Nirithu.
Biyubh shrugged unhappily. "I made up a song for her. I thought it would cheer her up, since she'd got betrothal jitters. Maybe I shouldn't have sung it in front of everybody first... that was not jitters. Does she have an objection to Gomusir, do you think?"
"If she has, she should have made it before he brought the bride-gifts."
"She hadn't met him then," Biyubh pointed out. "Maybe it's something she just found out about."
"Still," said Nirithu. "Can you imagine the fit the Gmou Hisol would pitch if we backed out now? Baba's position has taken enough damage as it is."
"That's just politics. I'm talking about Bghali." Biyubh frowned. "I wish I'd never made up that song. I can't stop people from singing it now."
The annoying thing about Biyubh, Nirithu decided as he made his way back to his rooms to try to get some sleep, was the way he could combine compassion and incredible arrogance in a single breath. But he changed his mind the next morning, when he heard one of the Hisoluun singing a song on his way to dawn prayers:
Why does pretty Aunty Bghali
Look so sad and melancholy?
Sing a song to make her jolly
Ta-rum ta-ra-rum ta-ra-rum
Daughter, say what makes you grieve
Mother dear, I hate to leave
Carried off as if by thieves
Ta-rum ta-ra-rum ta-ra-rum
Dry your tears; you're nobly sold
Your husband's brought you wealth untold
You'll leave with honor and with gold
Ta-rum ta-ra-rum ta-ra-rum
Why do you weep the whole day long?
My husband looks so fierce and strong
And what if he should do me wrong?
Ta-rum ta-ra-rum ta-ra-rum
Your nephew and your brothers four
Will bash his brains out on the floor
And he won't do it anymore
Ta-rum ta-ra-rum ta-ra-rum
Why beat your breast and wail aloud?
His mother is so fine and proud
I fear I'll be completely cowed
Ta-rum ta-ra-rum ta-ra-rum
Daughter, do not be afraid
If she should treat you like a maid
I'll hang her by her lovely braid
Ta-rum ta-ra-rum ta-ra-rum
Why are you still all wrapped in gloom?
I fear to carry in my womb
A child that may be my doom
Ta-rum ta-ra-rum ta-ra-rum
God deals no hurt without alloy
You will have pain, but also joy
And live to love your baby boy
Ta-rum ta-ra-rum ta-ra-rum
Nirithu had to suppress an urge to start humming himself. The really annoying thing about Biyubh was how often his arrogance was justified.
Nirithu came back from prayers to find Risokh awake, sitting up in bed, and unraveling a bed sheet. His knees were drawn up, and he had a little frown of concentration between his eyebrows as he pulled the long white thread from one side of the sheet to the other. A thick spool of thread wound around two of his fingers, and the ends of the sheet hung in draggled fringes onto the floor. At Nirithu's step, he looked up with a sunny smile directed about a handspan to the left of Nirithu's face. "Nirithu," he said.
"Good morning, my lord," Nirithu sighed. The sheet was already ruined; there was nothing to be done about it. And Risokh seemed happy and quiet for the first time in days, which was worth a sheet, perhaps. If it lasted. "Did you sleep well?"
Risokh bent his head to the sheet again, pulled the thread to one side, wound it around his fingers, pulled it to the other. Polite conversation may as well have been birdsong to him. Nirithu wasn't sure why he kept trying to make it. He crouched on the floor and began to fold the bedclothes that Risokh had thrown there.
"Your source went last night," Risokh remarked to the sheet.
Nirithu stopped, startled. Risokh had been asleep, he would have sworn. And even if he hadn't been, there would have been no way for him to have known, to have felt the bond between source and sorcerer as it failed and died—was there?
The mango pit was tumbled by the foot of Nirithu's mattress, where it had fallen this morning as Nirithu dressed for dawn prayers. He would never have left it if it were alive, but dead it had simply... slipped his mind. There was nothing mystical about Risokh's noticing that, if he had. It was only improbable that he would have been paying so much attention to his surroundings and drawing conclusions based on them.
"Yes," said Nirithu. "Are you hungry, my lord? You didn't eat last night."
Risokh didn't answer. Nirithu piled the bedclothes on the bed and picked up the mango seed, meaning to dispose of it, but he saw Risokh following it with his eyes, and set it on the table by the window. A source was bound to its sorcerer's soul, and died when it was used up, or when that soul moved on from its body. By all reason, Risokh ought to be as dead as the mango pit. Nirithu could not quite chuck it over the wall with Risokh watching.
There was a bustle of activity around the kitchen this morning. Servant girls trudged back and forth, hauling water, Nirithu's young nieces giggled as they pounded spices, and Nulrin knelt in the sun of the kitchen courtyard, folding the fancy fruit pastries she was famous for.
"Good morning, Nirithu!" she called cheerfully. "We've missed you at the feasts, but I should have known you'd come out for my pastries. Are you going to grab an armful of them and run off for the hills with Biyubh and Bghali, like you used to when you were little?"
"You know, I just might," Nirithu said slowly. Without Biyubh and Bghali, of course, but the idea was tempting. It wasn't as though he would be missed, after all. "Is Ammi around?"
"Inside," said Nulrin. "You'd think she could stay out of the kitchen for a few days, with her only daughter a bride, but she won't believe anything could be done right if she weren't supervising." This, with fond exasperation. Nirithu's mother had never inspired a proper sense of terror in her daughters-in-law. The only matriarch of the Gmou Bim for longer than Nirithu had been alive was his grandmother, and his mother and sisters-in-law stood united under a common tyrant, which suited his mother better, after all. He found her sitting on a low stool, frowning critically at a plate arranged with fruit and flowers, moving a bright red flower from one place to another, to no effect Nirithu could appreciate.
"Could I have some journey food for myself and my lord, Ammi?" said Nirithu. "We're going out to see Hokhiun."
"Now?" His mother eyed him with a look remarkably similar to the one she had been directing at the platter, as if she could work wonders with just a little judicious rearrangement. "Why?"
"My source went," said Nirithu.
Nirithu's mother didn't say good riddance the way his father might have, but the thought was as loud as words. She peeled a leaf, and then another, from the stem of a yellow flower, and replaced it with a nod of satisfaction.
"And it might do my lord some good as well," Nirithu went on. "To get away from the crowds, I mean. He doesn't like them."
"He has no reason to love Hokhiun," said Nirithu's mother.
"Why?" said Nirthu, surprised. Hokhiun's temper ran to the dry and sarcastic, but he had never, to Nirithu's knowledge, harmed anyone. Even his sorcery was a decidedly peaceful sort, to the occasional annoyance of Nirithu's father.
His question, like most questions about Risokh, went not just unanswered but unacknowledged.
"He has no reason to love any of us," said Nirithu finally. "At least Hokhiun will still be the same as he remembers. If he remembers."
Nirithu's mother contemplated her fruit platter a bit longer. Bghali, who was kneeling over a pot of frying dumplings, gave Nirithu a glance over her shoulder, but apparently wasn't speaking to him since last night.
"Vohi," Nirithu's mother called to a servant girl, "this will do." She handed the girl the platter and added, "And get Nirithu a day's journey's worth of provisions, for himself and the Commander."
His journey thus blessed by his mother, as well as fortified by a stack of flatbread, two skins of water, and large folded napkins full of dried fruit and fried chickpeas, Nirithu headed for the stables. Some of the Hisoluun, not of Gomusir's immediate family, who hadn't found sleeping space in the buildings of the Gmou Bim compound, had set up tents nearby. There was a knot of young men idling there, and Nirithu thought he saw a cockfighting ring drawn in the dirt and hastily scuffed out. The cocks themselves were nowhere in evidence. He ought to tell his father, he supposed, though most likely he already knew and was turning a blind eye. In most fights, no birds were killed, let alone eaten, but many of the older people still considered it a bird-eater's pastime, and Nirithu himself couldn't stomach watching it.
One of the men broke off from the group. Maybe he didn't realize that Nirithu had already seen the traces of the ring, and meant to head him off before he did—but maybe that was unfair. Long oiled hair, worn loose now in peacetime, broad shoulders, a familiar easy grin. Nirithu and Reghir had both served under Nirithu's brother Miren in the supply train, and Reghir had previously served under Miren in a more intimate capacity, having been his armor-bearer for several seasons. Nirithu was a fourth son and used to hand-me-downs: clothes, weapons, books, why not men? And Reghir was handsome and more generous than he had to be to a junior.
"You've been avoiding me," he accused. "Unkind, when you're half the reason I came to witness cousin Gomusir's betrothal."
That, Nirithu didn't believe, but as a piece of flattery he didn't mind it. "I haven't, truly. I've just been busy."
Reghir frowned, but whatever his thoughts may have been about Nirithu's new duties, the change in his father's status, and the continued wisdom of allying their families, he had no say in the matter. He was a son of a minor branch of the Gmou Hisol, and a younger son at that. "Don't you pity me at all, sleeping cold in my lonely tent, far from home?" he said instead. "Come see me some night."
"Maybe I will," said Nirithu. If Risokh would sleep, if Nirithu himself were not so exhausted that even eating felt like an onerous but necessary chore. If he didn't have a new source by then to occupy his attention, maybe. Nirithu missed—he wasn't honestly sure whether he missed Reghir, but he missed the days when a quick tumble among the grain sacks had seemed like a pleasant way to spend an evening, and not just another damned thing. "But right now I'm bound off."
"Tease," said Reghir, not unfriendly. "I'll be waiting."
Nirithu continued on to the stables, chose mounts for himself and Risokh, and suppressed the slight guilty pang he felt when he remembered their trip back from the palace and Risokh's wordless misery then. He'd been loaded onto a horse every morning and stopped at an unfamiliar place every night, driven forward without seeming to understand the purpose of it. That had been necessary, this was just Nirithu's whim—but Risokh needed to get away from home as badly as Nirithu did, and seeing Hokhiun might do him some good, might help him remember his life before his years of captivity.
That was what Nirithu told himself when he broke the news of his plan to Risokh. Risokh didn't argue—or, what would have been more likely, fled, hid, or just gone inert and unresponsive—but meekly let himself be dressed and mounted, and followed Nirithu out of the Gmou Bim compound and onto the road through the farmland beyond. Nirithu chose to see that as a good sign.
Along towards noon, when Nirithu brought the horses to a stop at a stand of trees and a fountain by the side of the road, he wasn't sure anymore. Risokh hadn't spoken since their conversation that morning, and though Nirithu had chosen the gentlest mare in the stables for him, she had been twitchy all day, shying at fallen twigs and dried-up puddles. Fortunately Risokh remembered how to ride, even if he couldn't remember learning, but it was clear the mare was picking up on his mood, and there was a certain tightness around his eyes, and in his hands on the reins, that promised trouble. You had to push him, Nirithu's thought chided, and an opposing one, petulantly: why shouldn't I do what I like for once?
Because you will be the one who has to handle him when he breaks down, logic pointed out. The trouble was that the voice of logic in Nirithu's thoughts sounded like Hokhiun, and thinking of Hokhiun made him stubborn. Maybe it had been a mistake to come, but they were nearly there. They might as well go on as back.
Nirithu dismounted and drew some water into the trough for the horses before finding the lunch his mother had had packed in the saddlebags. The smell of flatbread only a few hours old, and dates made sticky by travel on a hot day, went a way towards settling his nerves, and seemed to do the same for Risokh. At least, he sat crosslegged on the ground like a normal person, and not in the odd defensive hunch he sometimes adopted, and he looked at—well, near—Nirithu when he left half of the provisions on a napkin and withdrew behind a tree to eat his own lunch.
Nirithu uncapped his waterskin, spilled enough on the ground that it stood in a small puddle, and said, "Come drink with me." A few winged insects buzzed curiously around, but none alighted, which was a good omen, surely. Angels on a day like this wouldn't be bringing anything but trouble. Nirithu drank, alone. The water was cool, the bread was warm and chewy, and the dates were sweet. It was as pleasant a time as Nirithu could remember spending recently, and it was some minutes before he realized that he wasn't hearing anything from the direction of the fountain. Not that Risokh was in general a noisy man, but—Nirithu hastily swallowed what was left of his lunch and called, "My lord?" There was no answer, and when he looked around the tree, the napkin with Risokh's share of the food was still there, and so were the horses, but he himself was nowhere to be seen.
Nirithu's heart sank, and he cursed himself silently for a fool. He and the horses had trampled over any tracks Risokh might have left. If he had a pebble for a source, he could have asked the road where Risokh had gone; if he still had his mango pit, maybe the weeds growing on the road's verge had witnessed something. But Nirithu had only himself. He left the horses to look after themselves—he would suffer if he lost them, or let them come to harm, but not nearly as much as if the same happened to Risokh—and headed downhill. It was only a random guess, but it was as good as any, and he could cover more ground this way, at any rate.
The first sign that Nirithu was on the right track came at the bottom of a sharp, rocky drop-off, where a cloud of flies had been drawn to a puddle of fresh blood. The blood continued, a steady track winding along the bottom of the defile, and Nirithu wondered whether to call out. He had learned, over the past month and a half, that Risokh hated it when you came upon him without warning, but Nirithu didn't want him to run again. So he picked his way among the rocks as quickly and quietly as he could, and he heard a thump, and another one, just beyond a boulder—
"My lord." Nirithu heard his own voice, high and quavery, as if from the end of a long tunnel. There was blood all down the side of Risokh's face, completely coating his left eye, and on his hands as well, and he rocked forward on his knees and his head hit the boulder with another sick, wet thump. "Stop it," Nirithu begged. "Stop it, don't, please don't."
It was exactly the wrong tone to take, as surely as if Risokh were a panicked horse. Calm, Nirithu had to be calm, but one of Risokh's hands closed on a sharp, jagged rock, and he couldn't wait to see what Risokh meant to do with it. Nirithu lunged, grabbed Risokh's blood-slick wrist, and Risokh pushed him away with enough force to send him skidding down the slope in a tumble of rocks and gravel. Riding wasn't the only thing bred deep into Risokh's bones too deep for the past fifteen years to entirely erase; every son of the Gmou Bim learned to fight as soon as he could walk. But Nirithu was in better practice, and if Risokh had the strength of desperation, so did Nirithu. After a breathless, terrifying minute, Nirithu found himself on Risokh's back, bearing him to the ground—at least he couldn't draw his head very far back, though Nirithu wasn't sure how to stop him from beating it on the rocks in any case—but then Risokh went limp and nearly still, except for the trembling.
"My lord," said Nirithu, calm and gentle as he could, "do you understand me?"
There was no answer. Nirithu could feel Risokh's breath fluttering raggedly against his belly and Risokh's legs between his own, tense and shaking. It felt... very wrong. But Nirithu didn't know what else to do. Finally, Risokh nodded, quick and shallow, once.
"If I let you up, can you be still? No more," Nirithu swallowed, but kept his voice steady, "head bashing, or any of that?"
Another pause, another nod. "Thank you," Nirithu breathed, sliding off of Risokh's back. He stayed in a crouch, wary, waiting for Risokh's next move, but when it came after a throat-tightening wait, it was only to roll over into a sitting position, tuck his knees up and his face into them. Nirithu knew the moment when he was sure Risokh wasn't going to try to injure himself further, because he started to tremble himself as his exhaustion fell on him all at once.
Risokh glanced up, then away, bird-quick. "You're hurt," he said.
It occurred to Nirithu only then to imagine how he must look, wild-eyed, his clothing torn and dirt-stained. His palms were scraped raw from his slide down the slope, and his ribs on the right side felt tender, which he hadn't noticed before. He shook his head. "My bruises will look after themselves, but you—let me take a look at your face."
There was no hesitation before Risokh's answer now. His voice was harsh, the closest to angry Nirithu had ever heard it. "Don't."
Nirithu was at a loss. He didn't think he could use force on Risokh again; he felt as weak as a baby. Risokh wasn't looking at him, but Nirithu sat straighter anyway, and folded his hands formally in his lap. Calm. "I apologize, my lord. I have been selfish and stupid. Hokhiun is my teacher in sorcery, and he's tried, as well, to teach me how a man should act. He will have scathing things to say when he hears what I've done today. But my duty is to you, and if I've failed it once, that doesn't absolve me—you're injured. I have some small skill as a physician. Will you let me treat you?"
Risokh's face was turned away. All Nirithu could see of it was a wash of drying blood. He was surprised to find how many gradations of unhappiness he had learned to read anyway in the line of Risokh's shoulders and the twist of his hands. "I—I'm sorry to be a trouble to you," said Risokh.
Maybe politeness was bred into Risokh's bones as well. How else could he have delivered such a courteous, circuitous, and firm no? Nirithu unlooped the waterskin from his belt—it had taken less damage than either himself or Risokh, and he hadn't been quite fool enough to go wandering off the road without it. He laid it at Risokh's feet and said, "Will you wash your face and hands, at least?"
Risokh didn't move or speak. Nirithu stood slowly, afraid he was being worse than a fool, by being the same fool twice—but he said, "I will be just beyond the bend." And he turned and walked away, set his jaw and didn't look back.
The sun was directly overhead. It seemed hours that Nirithu stood there with his back against the large boulder, but he knew it wasn't; the shadows didn't lengthen. He idly turned pebbles over with his foot, found his eye caught by a spiral on the surface of one of them. When he bent to examine it, he found the curled shape of a leaf stamped into the rock, traced it with his finger, felt the hidden life curled deep inside. A rock like this held several kinds of power. Nirithu had never worked with one before, but Hokhiun would—no. Nirithu tucked the pebble into his shirt, got back to his feet, and Risokh came around the side of the boulder and handed the nearly-empty waterskin to him.
Even after washing, a dozen scores bled feebly on Risokh's hands and arms. Those, he let Nirithu bandage up—his riding coat was a loss anyway. He kept his face turned away, but from the glimpses Nirithu caught of it, it wasn't as bad as he'd feared. The skin around his eye was starting to swell already, and in a day or two it would be truly impressive, but the cut on his temple was only the shallow sort that bleeds ferociously. It wouldn't need stitches, though Nirithu would have liked to treat it with spirits and plaster. There was a blossoming bruise on Risokh's forehead, but Nirithu didn't think he was concussed. He didn't seem any more confused than usual. Less, maybe.
"Let's go home, my lord," Nirithu sighed. Risokh nodded.
They found their horses grazing peacefully where Nirithu had left them. Risokh lingered before mounting, trailing his hands along his mare's neck as if he were seeking comfort there that he couldn't find in his own kind. "Am I really... well to look at, Nirithu?"
"Very," said Nirithu, too surprised to do anything but answer honestly. Vanity was the last thing he would have expected of Risokh, but if so why—"Didn't you know?"
"So many of the things he told me have turned out to be lies. Why not that?" It was almost a plea.
"Who?" Impossible to follow Risokh's train of thought at the best of times, but... who told you that you were beautiful, as if it were a thing to be afraid of? Formulate your question properly, Hokhiun often said, and you'll find you know the answer.
"My brother," said Risokh.
Nirithu found he was twisting his fingers too tightly in his own horse's mane; it snorted and stepped back, and Nirithu had to move quickly to avoid being trod on. The late king of Gudikel, the son of Horchimi by birth and Prijlidi by adoption, who had turned his back on his faith and his people to pursue forbidden power, whose name had been erased from God's book of memory, and would never again be spoken among the Piloruun—he had certainly been Risokh's brother. But to hear Risokh name him so, at such a time, was obscene.
And yet, Risokh had forgotten for a moment to hide his face from Nirithu, and it was clear and guileless, and, despite what he had done to it, very well to look at. This time it was Nirithu who had to turn away, and there was no more conversation as they rode for home.
They were about a mile from home when Nirithu saw a pile of stones. It was a small thing, exactly six stones high, the sort of trail-sign one might find out in the hills where the paths were hard to find, not usually by the side of a well-traveled road. A flash of yellow caught his eye, and he pulled up his horse, dismounted, and backtracked until he could look at the pile more carefully. There, tucked between the topmost stones, was a mallow flower, pointing off the road to the left.
In the days when Nirithu, Bghali and Biyubh used to shirk their work and go wandering in the hills, it was a trick Biyubh had taught them to find their meeting places. Look in the direction the flower pointed for anything that might hide a group of idling children from view. A small cave or a large boulder or—there. That copse of trees. Calling for Risokh to join him, they made their way to it, leading the horses.
It wasn't Biyubh he found there, or Bghali, but his mother. He nearly failed to recognize her, in red veils she might not have worn since her own wedding day, so seldom did she leave home.
"Ammi?" he said. Risokh stayed further back, though the early-evening shadows weren't enough to hide him.
She pushed the veils back from her face impatiently. "Biyubh told me that you would find me here, though he wouldn't say how. What have you done to yourself?"
"I didn't listen to my mother," said Nirithu.
"Clever." Nirithu's mother gave a delicate snort to show she wasn't mollified, but the corners of her mouth turned up. "All my children are clever, and where has it gotten them? You should never know the same sorrow; I will look out for a stupid wife for you. How is the Commander?"
"Worse, I'm afraid," said Nirithu. "Don't tell Baba, please?"
"Do you think I'm out here for an evening stroll?" said his mother. "Your uncle Jophli wants to test out some new fireworks tonight. If you wait until after dark to come back, no one will notice. And I've asked Biyubh to take over guard duty at the gate."
She turned and went back down the road, and Nirithu and Risokh settled in to wait. Nirithu withdrew a way into the field they had stopped by; when he came back, the sun had set, and Risokh had finally eaten his lunch. Uncle Jophli's fireworks were a smear of red in the sky when Biyubh met them at the gate, and they returned to their rooms without incident. Risokh had apparently been exhausted enough by the day's events that he fell asleep almost at once. Nirithu was tired as well, but he couldn't sleep; sitting in the dark, listening to Risokh's even breathing, Nirithu made up his mind.
Once Risokh slept, he wouldn't wake during the first watch of the night, and Nirithu wouldn't be gone for long. But there were things about today he would rather forget, and they would be forgotten sooner in company.
Reghir was waiting, just as he'd said. His hands were strong, his mouth was hot, and it was impossible to think about anything else with his body pressing Nirithu's into the flimsy straw bedroll, which was exactly what Nirithu wanted. He held onto Reghir and let his eyes fall closed, and for a short blessed time his mind was clear and brighter than fireworks.
Afterwards, they lay tangled together, Reghir tracing spirals down Nirithu's belly. "Sweet boy," he murmured. The nice thing about Reghir's flattery was that for a minute Nirithu could believe it, that he was something other than short and a little pudgy, with flyaway hair that never grew much past his shoulders and a scrubby mustache hardly worth the name—in other words, completely unremarkable. But then Reghir went on, in the same sleepy, fond tone, "You should stay here tonight, scandalize both of our families."
Nirithu sat up and scrubbed at his face with the heels of his hands. Scandal was an exaggeration surely, though he would cause his family some mild embarrassment if he were seen coming to dawn prayers from the direction of the tents rather than his own rooms. But he could embarrass his family any day of the month without making any special effort. "I sleep with my lord."
"In case he wakes up crying at night?" Reghir sat too, not about to give Nirithu the advantage of height if there was going to be an argument. "You're not an armor-bearer, you're a nursemaid."
Risokh did sometimes wake up crying, usually closer to dawn. Nirithu thought he'd rather deal with that right now than with Reghir. He shrugged into his shirt, tucked the rock with the leaf impression back into place. "I've been enjoying your company. Don't spoil it, eh?"
"I didn't mean any offense," said Reghir. "It's not your fault if your father—"
Thoroughly exasperated, Nirithu interrupted him before he said something Nirithu would feel bound to acknowledge. "Are you trying to pick a fight with me? I imagine you could win one, but where would the honor be in that for either of us?"
"Don't get in a pet. Any insult I've offered you, or your lord, or your father, was very wrong, and I apologize." Reghir put a hand on the back of Nirithu's head, pressed a kiss to his lips. "There, wasn't that pretty?"
"It was acceptable." Nirithu squirmed away before Reghir could draw him back to bed. He'd already stayed away longer than he'd meant to—outside, a gong was striking second watch. "Good night, Reghir," he added, and then he backed out and let the tent flap close behind him.
At the gate, Biyubh was just coming off guard duty. Nirithu fell into step with him and they headed back towards their rooms together. "I'm sorry you missed the fireworks for my sake," said Nirithu. "Thank you."
Biyubh grinned. "How could I refuse Grandmother? If my lord asks, I'll have to tell him what I saw, but I don't think he will."
"Of course." At least Nirithu could trust Biyubh not to make idle gossip out of Risokh's injuries, and that would go a way towards mollifying his father, in the event he did find out. "Oh! You can tell him that I saw a cockfighting ring set up by the Hisoluun camp—they'd rubbed it out before I got there, but the signs were clear." There, he'd discharged his duty, avoided having to make the report himself, and possibly given his father something to think about other than his own ill-fated attempt to visit Hokhiun.
"Why are you spending time there?" Biyubh demanded. "You're too good for him."
"Who, Reghir? He's Miren's lieutenant, and Miren is in charge of all the transports from the mountains to the Jenpu River. Whereas I'm a nursemaid. I think you'll find that he's too good for me."
"You're too good for him," Biyubh repeated with a scowl.
Nirithu shrugged. "What else am I going to do?"
Biyubh made an obscene gesture, and Nirithu laughed. That might really answer for Biyubh, whose indifference to men was famous and much lamented in the tents of the Gmou Bim at war season. As for women, Nirithu's father's tolerance for whoring among his men was only grudging, and he wouldn't stand for it in his armor-bearer. Biyubh was well on his way to being a virgin until he married, and seemed reasonably content to be so, but for himself Nirithu couldn't imagine it. It would be like substituting sawdust for bread—it might fill the belly, but it wouldn't feed you.
Tonight he was well-fed, and if Reghir was a horse's ass, what did that matter? Nirithu slept soundly and dreamt of forests where there was now rocky scrub and great beasts moving through the trees, taller than towers and heavier than elephants. He woke with the leaf-rock warm against his belly and lay remembering with it for a minute before he rose for prayers, feeling almost content with himself and the world. He couldn't draw on the rock's power yet, but it was a start.
When he came back from prayers, he found Bghali sitting in the courtyard off his rooms, a slim wooden box in her lap. It was daylight, so her presence in the men's quarters wasn't strictly speaking improper, but it was surprising, since last Nirithu heard she wasn't speaking to him. "Good morning," he said cautiously. "What are you doing here?"
"Invite me in, Nirithu," she said. "I have something for the Commander."
Nirithu considered it. If he thwarted her, she would find out why, and she would make trouble. "Come in," he said. "Though I warn you, my lord isn't having one of his good mornings."
"You're going about it all wrong, if you want the Commander to remember... before." She dragged the small table by the window to the middle of the room and set her box down on it. It was a chess set. Her eyes went slightly wide when she took in Risokh's condition—not just the state of his face and arms, but also the way he lay in bed looking at nothing, without acknowledging her presence. That was all the reaction she showed as she briskly set the pieces in their proper places. "He was never an adult of the Gmou Bim, but he was a child of the Gmou Bim, and I imagine he played chess the same as the rest of us."
"You're probably right," said Nirithu, overcome by a sudden wave of nostalgia. "I haven't found time to play in years."
"You and Biyubh stopped playing once you realized I could beat either of you every time." At that point, Nirithu would gladly have conceded she was right—though that wasn't quite how he remembered it—because Risokh had sat up, rumpled bedclothes falling around him, and reversed the board so that the white pieces faced Bghali. "So if you're offering me a handicap, you needn't, my lord," she said.
"I'm not," said Risokh. "I prefer playing black."
Nirithu had never been able to get Risokh out of bed on mornings like this. But now his face was bright and interested, and he smiled when he captured Bghali's elephant and smiled wider when he saw the trap she had laid with her queen. "Thank you, Bghali," said Nirithu.
She favored him with a smile over her shoulder—a pointier one than Risokh's. "I'm sorry I called you and Biyubh the most useless men. It isn't true. All men are useless."
"Um," said Nirithu. "Have you made the same extraordinary apology to Biyubh?"
Bhgali's lip curled. "I will speak to Biyubh again," she said, "the day that nobody asks me why I look so sad and melancholy, ta-rum ta-ra-rum ta-ra-rum."