Foxfire

HIS ANKLES WERE CHAINED to some kind of stake. When his bare toes touched wood, Keirith realized they had removed his shoes. It seemed such an unnecessary precaution that he laughed. Barefoot or shod, where was he going to run? The chain was shorter than his forearm. His ankles were bound together. He was blindfolded and gagged, drugged and guarded.

His head no longer hurt when he turned it, and the pain in his shoulder had subsided to a dull ache. The Zherosi healer still forced the dream-brew on him several times a day, but he had longer periods of clarity upon waking.

He used that time to lie on his furs, pretending to sleep, while calling on his senses to help him discover anything that might be useful. There were always two guards with him; he could detect the differences in their breathing. Occasionally, he heard the tramp of marching feet, voices shouting orders, the bellow of a bullock. The stink of woodsmoke pervaded the camp, but he failed to catch the briny scent of the sea. He must be in one of the fortresses along the river.

He wasn’t sure whether to be relieved or alarmed that the deep-voiced man did not return. But one morning—two days after arriving? Three?—he heard someone enter the hut and caught a whiff of that familiar spicy scent.

The guards shifted on the rushes. Fists thumped against leather. There was a whispered discussion. Then a guard protested, “But the Vanel gave no orders—”

He abruptly fell silent. Keirith heard more whispering and the crackle of rushes as someone approached.

“My name is Jarel,” a voice said in the tribal tongue. “I am the grandson of the Holly-Chief from the neighboring village. He sent me to make sure you are being treated well.”

He nodded, desperately trying to gather his thoughts. The voice held just a trace of an accent, a guttural swallowing of the consonants. Where had he heard it before?

Urkiat. He’d had a similar accent. Dear gods, had the Zherosi taken him that far south? Surely, he couldn’t have been on the ship that long.

Something brushed his fingertips—the smooth texture of a deer’s bladder. A hand patted his shoulder. Gentle fingers fumbled with the gag.

Water splashed his chest and belly. Someone shoved him. A heated conversation ensued, with Jarel protesting that he was only offering the prisoner some water, and the guards insisting that he keep his distance. Jarel’s grasp of the Zherosi tongue was flawless. His village must have been cooperating with them for years. Which meant he was as likely to be a spy as a friend.

His speech was strangely formal. But perhaps he was nervous, too. Keirith could smell his sweat—and that spicy scent. Why did he smell like the deep-voiced man? Unless he was a Zheroso, pretending to be a friend to lure him into damning revelations.

Jarel expressed concern about the rope burns on his wrists and ankles. He seemed shocked to learn he had been given only porridge to eat and promised to do his best to alleviate his discomfort—as if he were an honored guest instead of a prisoner.

Another commotion at the doorway prevented him from saying more. An unfamiliar voice bellowed, “Zhe’s coils, what are you doing in here?”

There was a flurry of movement. Whispering voices growing fainter as the footsteps retreated. A sigh from one of the guards. A mutter from the other. The crackle of rushes as one approached. The overwhelming stink of fear-sweat as the man yanked the gag over his mouth.

Keirith waited, tense and alert. When he heard someone enter, he wondered if Jarel had gotten his way. Then he recognized the musty scent of herbs and knew the healer had come to drug him again.

When he woke and heard Jarel’s voice outside the hut, relief swamped him. He had feared that the Bellower would keep him away, but clearly Jarel was important enough to overrule him. Whether he was a Zherosi officer or the chief’s grandson, Keirith was certain he was young; when he was nervous, his voice broke like a boy on the cusp of manhood.

He caught the aroma of roast mutton as soon as Jarel entered the hut. His hands shook so badly, he feared he would drop the wooden plate. He tore into the meat and licked the juice from his fingers; it took an effort of will to keep from licking the plate as well.

At first, they talked of unimportant things, like the prospects for the harvest. Then Jarel asked a tentative question about his childhood. Soon they were sharing stories about hunting, Jarel confiding that he preferred playing his flute, Keirith admitting he puked the first time he made a kill. What was the harm in telling him that? But he had to be careful. He was still muzzy-headed from the drug and it would be too easy to let damaging information slip.

When Jarel learned that Keirith had been a fisherman before joining the rebellion, he exclaimed, “But I, too, am a fisherman! Trout, salmon. Trout, most of all. They are clever.”

Those were the words of someone who fished for pleasure rather than to put food in the mouths of his family. Yet another indication the boy was a Zheroso.

“Salmon are fierce, though,” Keirith replied. “And strong. Swimming upriver from the sea. You have to admire that.”

“I guess everyone’s nervous,” Keirith said. “The Zherosi and your folk. Waiting for my father. That’s why I’m here, isn’t it? The Zherosi want to exchange me for him.”

After a brief pause, Jarel said, “They do. I am sorry. I did not want to upset you by talking about it. Or your father.”

Even with that encouragement, Jarel merely asked, “Was it hard? Having such a great man as your father?”

“You’re young,” Keirith said, then wondered if he had revealed too much. “I can tell by your voice. It gets easier when you’re older. When I was a boy, I had my share of arguments with my father, but now we’re—”

We’re part of each other. We know each other’s thoughts, each other’s feelings. He’ll be coming soon. Hoping to rescue me. If he can’t, he’ll offer his life for mine. That’s the kind of man he is. And I parted from him with the coldest of farewells, because I was too hurt and too angry to forgive him for keeping Mam’s secret.

He knew what he had to do. And he knew he had little time. If the Zherosi had brought him to Little Falls, it would take Fa only three or four days to reach it from the Gathering site.

He lay motionless on the furs, waiting for the effects of the dream-brew to ebb, for his mind to grow clear, for his quarry to return. And when he did, Keirith had a smile in place to greet him.

“Nay, you’re kind. The only person who’s been kind to me here.” A shaky breath. A determined squaring of the shoulders. A soft, reluctant confession: “I’ve always felt so alone. Never more so than now.”

Their conversation was halting, but each time an awkward silence fell, Keirith shifted to another topic, offering stories about his youth that encouraged Jarel to respond in kind. They talked about their first clumsy attempts to fish, laughing at each other’s tales of tangled lines and lost lures. They shared the dreams they had as boys. Keirith even spoke of his time in Pilozhat, careful to praise the beauty of the sea, the majesty of the palace, the kindness of the Pajhit.

When the healer came and tried to give him the dream-brew, Jarel sent him away with an authority that dispelled Keirith’s lingering doubts about whether he was a Zheroso.

Without the brew to hinder him, he felt renewed strength in his limbs, renewed clarity in his thoughts. He laughed at the boy’s jokes. Sympathized over the death of his mother. Praised him for defying the Zherosi healer. And as the words flowed effortlessly from his mouth, his stomach roiled with the sickening knowledge that he had to cast out this gentle, lonely spirit.

If the Zherosi captured Fa, they would either keep him a prisoner forever or kill him. He had to suppress the reluctant sympathy he felt for this boy and use his body to escape.

He pulled energy from the earth beneath him, from the breeze drifting in through the open doorway. He let his awareness drift beyond his little prison to the river that flowed past the fortress and the sun that beat down upon it. He called on Natha to guide him, the Maker to protect him, and the powers of earth and air, water and fire to fill him.

Fear for his father sparked the power. Visions of his slain tree-brothers fueled it. Memories of his kidnapping and rape, his captivity and murder . . . he called on all of them to feed the smoldering fire.

Driven by the fierce tattoo of his heart, the power surged up from his belly and down through his limbs, leaving his toes and fingertips tingling. It thundered through flesh and bone and blood, drowning out the boy’s soft words. It seared his mind and his spirit, white-hot and inexorable. It sang inside him, as sweet as the dream-brew, but a hundred times more potent.

He was the lightning strike that consumed a forest, the torrent that swept away everything in its path, the battle cry that called down death and destruction on his enemies. Let them bind his hands and feet. Let them blindfold his eyes and stop up his mouth. When the power raged through him, he was invincible.