Shadows of Prophecy. Rachel Lee

their swords and sat, waiting. Tom and Sara watched Tess with worried eyes. Ratha and Giri alone remained on guard, ready to protect their company and Jenah.

      Tess stirred, a murmur escaping her. At once Archer stroked her golden tresses. “Be still,” he said. “You are safe.”

      For a fleeting instant a smile fluttered over her lips, then vanished. He had seen her smile so rarely, he realized. But none of them smiled nearly enough these days. The savagery of their time in Lorense, and the horrors of the deaths of thousands of refugees in Derda, had left a deep mark on all of them.

      Tess’s eyes fluttered open and met his, blue meeting gray for an electric instant. Her mouth formed a surprised O; then she abruptly sat up. At once she raised a hand to her head.

      “Who hit me with the hammer?” she asked.

      “’Twas the healing,” Archer reminded her.

      Recalled to what had passed, she looked toward Jenah and appeared as stunned as any of them by what she saw. “Oh!”

      At that moment, Jenah rolled over onto his back with a groan. His eyes opened suddenly, taking in the dawning day, and Giri and Ratha standing guard. “What happened?” he demanded.

      “Sit up and see,” Giri said. “The Lady Tess healed you.”

      Jenah pushed himself up gingerly, as if he did not believe what he was told. But upon discovering he no longer hurt, he leapt to his feet and looked around.

      “Thank you,” he said, bowing to Tess. “And please forgive my words, Lady. My people are not used to such kindnesses from yours.”

      “You were in pain,” Tess said, smiling. “People oft say things they do not mean. Think nothing more of it.”

      But then his gaze returned to his fellows.

      “So this is all that remains of Gewindi-Tel, the proudest of the northern clans.” His voice was already sparking with anger again. “A handful of stalwarts and a traitor.”

      The men who had fought beside Jenah last night stirred not at all. Their faces were as impassive as if they had been carved from the stone the Anari worked with such unparalleled skill. The five who had remained to guard the campsite were not quite as impassive, however. Though they betrayed little except by the flicker of their eyes, it was obvious that they knew suspicion fell upon them.

      “You have nothing to say?” Jenah asked.

      “I wish only that I had died in my brother’s place,” one of the men said. “First came he from my mother’s womb, but only by the moments it took for me slip out after him. I spent my life chasing him. If now I must follow him into death, then so be it.”

      Jenah seemed to weigh the man’s words for a long moment, then nodded. “Be at peace, Jahar Gewindi. Your brother died at my side, valiant to the last. Let not your mother lose two sons on this day. Already too many mothers will bear that burden.”

      Archer watched as Jenah interrogated each of the men, one by one. As long as he had spent in the company of Ratha and Giri, he could not yet read the faces of Anari except in the most obvious of moments. What Jenah sought, and whether he was seeing it, Archer had no idea.

      “It is not safe to remain here,” Tom said, quietly. “Master Jenah, I know you are angry, and that one thought alone burns in your mind. But we are not far removed from the Bozandari who killed your kinsmen last night. There will be time enough to sort this out once we have found a suitable resting place.”

      “And what of a resting place for my brothers?” Jenah asked. “Am I to leave them in the sand, to be picked over by the vultures, their bleached bones to be swallowed up into the vast, empty memory of the desert?”

      “We cannot bear them with us,” Archer said. “And the lad is right. It is too dangerous for us to remain here. The gods will embrace the spirits of your fallen, whatever may befall their bodies.”

      “Anari never leave their dead behind,” Jenah said.

      “There is much that Anari have never done,” Archer said. “But I fear you will need to learn to do most of it before this war is over. Come, let us away, for the safety of those who remain in your Tel, lest all your mothers weep in vain.”

      Tom walked beside Sara, occasionally reaching over to grasp her hand. The sun was nearing its zenith, and even in the middle of winter, faint shimmers of heat rose from the red sands. Their horses walked beside them, pausing from time to time to graze from the occasional bunches of pale green grass or the leaves of the bushes that dotted the landscape.

      “This is a beautiful land,” Tom said. “But a hard land, as well.”

      “Yes,” Sara said. “It is a land to make one’s heart weep—with beauty and with pain.”

      “That feeling I know well,” Tom said, giving her hand another squeeze. “I feel it every time I look at you.”

      “Now, now,” Sara said, suppressing a smile. “Speak not every word that is in your heart, Tom Downey, lest I come to long for the days when you spoke none at all.”

      “I’m sorry,” he said, quickly looking away.

      “No!” Sara replied. “Tom, you really must learn to recognize when I jest. I like your words. So many nights I lay in bed, wishing that you would voice your thoughts, afraid I was mistaken when I read your eyes. Now I have no such doubts, and that lightens the burden of my heart.”

      “Then let me lighten it more,” Tom said. “For in all the world, there is no soul with such sparkle, no other face that I would wake to, no other voice that I would carry into my dreams. Please do not ache for the past, Sara Deepwell. Whatever you have done, you have done for the love of all that is good and right in this world.”

      “I would that your words were enough, Tom. But I bear the stain of my blood, the stain of my heritage, it seems. When I heard tales of the Ilduin in my father’s inn, they were tales of lightness and beauty, hope and joy. Never did I imagine that I would be one of them. And never did I imagine that Ilduin blood would be so dark.”

      He could hear the aching loss in her words, and he knew she was once again seeing the dead and dying forms of her mother and the dark mage Glassidor. If only Lady Tess had not stilled his blade, he would have spared Sara this burden. Instead he had stood mutely by as the final act was played out in soul-chilling screams.

      “You are of love, Sara Deepwell,” he whispered. “That is all I know of such things. But it is enough.”

      Near the front of the small column, Tess rode beside Jenah, whom she had insisted take Archer’s mount. She rode at Archer’s demand, for he was not sure she was yet strong enough to walk. And, she thought, he might well be right. A deep, aching fatigue seemed to press through every muscle and sinew in her body. She longed for sleep but could not bring herself to relax.

      “You should rest, Lady,” Jenah said quietly. “Your body cries for it.”

      “As does yours,” Tess replied. “And yet you also hold yourself awake. So we are both stubborn.”

      Jenah laughed, and for an instant Tess saw once again the infinite beauty of the Anari people. She had seen it in the fleeting moments when Ratha and Giri joked amongst themselves. They were a people who, when the cares of the world could be set aside, seemed to glow with an inner joy that shimmered in the iridescent blues of their black skin. They were, she thought, the most beautiful people she had ever seen.

      “What?” Jenah asked.

      “Oh,” Tess replied, “I was just thinking how lovely your people are to behold. If the finest gold were spun into human form, it would not approach the Anari.”

      “You mock me,” Jenah said, though the warmth in his eyes belied the accusation. “We are but humble desert stonemasons.”

      “And I but a simple blond woman,” she said. “Take good words