Kyra frowned. “The Taus are outlaws. I survived because I hid in a tree.”
Astinsai sighed. “I see Shirin Mam told you nothing. Well, perhaps it is better so. Not all things are meant to be known. Not all things are meant to be taken into account. If they were, how would we ever act? How would we take sides?”
“What do you mean?” said Kyra, her pulse quickening.
Astinsai leaned forward and whispered, “Are you sure that you want to know?”
From her breath came the smell of smoke-weed, and something else: the thin, sharp odor of malice.
“Yes,” said Kyra. If the katari mistress had knowledge that would help her make sense of the brutal killing of her family, then she needed to hear it.
“Why?” asked Astinsai. It was not a mere question; it was a command to speak. If Kyra did not give the correct answer, she knew she would not get another word from the old woman. She thought hard before replying.
“Because it is better to confront the truth, no matter how terrible it is,” she said finally. “I am the last of my clan and if I don’t know its history, no one ever will.”
“Well said.” Astinsai leaned back and smiled with hooded eyes. “Remember these pretty words of yours when I have finished telling you what I know. It is not the whole story, and it is not the whole truth. That last is something you will have to find for yourself.” She reached for a pipe attached to a clay bowl and inhaled deeply before blowing a ring of sickly sweet smoke into the air. Kyra held her breath until it dissipated.
“One winter twenty years ago, it was so cold that snow covered the desert and the well water froze,” she said. “In Tezbasti, the village nearest to us, people were reduced to eating snow and straw. Maheshva, the old Maji-khan of Khur, sent a team of men with the strongest camels across the desert to Yartan to barter for food and other supplies. The Akal-shin door was of no use to us; even then, it would not open.” The Old One paused, her eyes glinting like rocks in a pool. “But you have come through the door. What was it like, child?”
Kyra flinched. “It was—not something I care to speak of. Please go on with your story. Did the men reach Yartan safely?”
“They reached safely and returned with enough provisions to last us through the bitter months that followed. All but one. The best of them all was lost to us in Yartan to a blade sharper than any katari. It was a wound he never recovered from. A wound of the heart.”
“He fell in love?”
“Love, lust, deewangee. There are many names we give to this thing, and they are all inadequate.” Astinsai stared at the fire, her eyes turned inward. Was the old woman remembering her own youth?
Kyra had a sudden vision of a slender woman in a marketplace giving sideways glances to a young man seated on a white horse. The young man gazed down at her as she pretended to select the herbs that her aunt, a medicine woman, had sent her to buy. She picked bunches of mint and lemon balm, complaining to the seller about their quality and freshness, but all the while she was thinking of how fine-looking the young man was, how well he sat on his horse, and how smart his clothes were.
Astinsai moved and the image flickered out. Kyra realized with a start that she had looked unbidden into the other’s past.
She cleared her throat. “What happened to them?”
The Old One’s mouth twisted, as if knowing the vision Kyra had accidentally seen. “What can such madness lead to but tragedy? He was brave and handsome, but he was now a renegade who had forsaken his Order. She was good and beautiful, but she was also the eldest daughter of a headwoman, and the heir of her clan.
“They left Yartan, thinking perhaps to make for the small mountain villages farther northwest. For two weeks, they must have known love, sweet and delirious. Despite the hunger, fatigue, and fear, they must have known happiness. For a while, they were free from the anger and envy of those they had left behind.
“But eventually, they were found. They were caught in a pass in the Spirit Mountains, trying to cross into the Skyol Highlands. It was the girl’s clan that found them. It might have gone better if the Order of Khur had reached them first.”
“The headwoman was angry with her daughter?” guessed Kyra.
“There is justifiable anger, and there is blind rage—two entirely different things,” said Astinsai. “The headwoman was fierce and proud. She had sent her sixteen-year-old daughter with a few trusted companions to Yartan to select a mate from the clan of Kushan. She was not merely angry; she was ready to kill the daughter who had caused her to lose face among the clans of Asiana. Faced with this rage, the girl betrayed her lover to save herself. An old story, but we never tire of it, do we? Life is a series of patterns, ugly and scarred. What would you have done in her place, child?”
Kyra flushed. “I would never have run away from my duty in the first place.”
“Is that what you think?” said Astinsai. “Or is it what you have been taught to think by your Order? No, you don’t have to answer me. But ask yourself this: Where do your loyalties lie? I will not make a prophecy for you, but I can see that your way is unclear. Doubt and misgiving will follow you no matter which path you take.”
Kyra felt a chill creep up her spine. “If that is so, all I can do is try my best and pray to Kali to protect my soul.”
“I too pray for you,” said Astinsai. “I pray that you find what you are looking for, and that you do not meet an untimely end, like your—like the young girl of my story did.”
Kyra sensed the barb in her too-sincere words. The story was about to end with a painful twist that her inner eye could almost see.
The Old One gave a deep, theatrical sigh. “There is not much more to add. The girl told her mother that she had been kidnapped by the young Marksman and forced to lie with him. It was easy to believe—especially because her mother wanted to believe it. The headwoman had the Marksman flogged in the main square of Yartan, as was her right by law. The young man protested his innocence with every lash and called in anguish to his paramour to declare the truth of their love.” Her face darkened. “I watched, helpless to intervene. I hoped that pity and shame would move the girl to beg for clemency on his behalf.
“But the girl was silent, her face hidden by a veil. Perhaps she regretted her lie? I do not know. I only know what happened next. The headwoman and her daughter returned to the Valley of Veer, where they dwelled, and the whole sordid tale was never referred to again.”