5.Death of Chaos
XXI
GAIRLOCH AND I trudged back through Kyphros, another five days in all before Kyphrien spread out from where we rode through the hillside olive groves. Five days of dampness, chilied goat at outliers' barracks, and five more nights reading The Basis of Order. I was sick of all three.
And five more days of looking at the cedar length that held the face that my mind was too dull to find and my arm too sore to carve more than fitfully.
In the end, Gairloch and I still had to plod through Kyphrien itself. Should I stop at the barracks and try to find Krystal? I wanted to see her.
So I stopped, left Gairloch with the ostler, who said nothing, and marched up to her door.
Herreld wasn't exactly helpful.
“She didn't say where she was going, ser.”
I looked at him.
He backed away. “She really didn't, ser.”
Next I went down to the barracks, where the smell of oil and metal and leather was almost a military incense, to find Yelena.
“Yelena's off duty, ser. She said she was going to the marketplace.”
Tamra? Well, she wasn't there, either.
“The red... the apprentice? She's gone, not that many'd mind, ser.”
Tamra was still making friends, I could tell.
So, much later, I rode into my own yard where the big lantern had been lit, and still flickered with the wind that gusted through the fittings that held the glass around the wick.
Krystal came out, almost running, and half hugged me, half carried me off Gairloch. I'd forgotten how strong she was.
“You're back.”
“Careful of the arm. It's still tender.”
So she kissed me instead. The kiss alone was almost worth it.
“... didn't miss each other much... not at all...”
I ignored Haithen's wry comments to Perron, who had pretty much replaced Yelena as head of Krystal's personal guard.
Finally, we let go, and I carted in my gear. Haithen offered to stable Gairloch, and I let her. Gairloch seemed agreeable.
“You could use some food,” my consort observed.
“I could use cleaning up.”
Krystal wrinkled her nose with a grin. “I suppose so.”
“Dinner'll wait a while. It's waited enough already,” added Rissa. “I cook for numbers I do not know. I cook and do not know when people will be here to eat...”
Krystal and I grinned at each other, but she came with me to the washroom, where I stripped off my close-to-filthy clothes.
As I washed, she studied my arm. “How did that happen?”
“Some innkeeper's bully boy, looking for a guest to rob. I didn't dodge quickly enough.”
“What about your staff?”
“I wasn't carrying it. People get unhappy when you carry a five-cubit length of wood. They think it's dangerous. Of course, carrying a blade is respectable.”
Krystal snorted. “Maybe you ought to carry a truncheon.”
“That's not a bad idea.” I hadn't thought about it, but the idea did make some sense. “There are maybe tenscore troops around the spring, and they've got rockets.”
“Rockets? Like Recluce used on Fairhaven in the old days?”
“Not quite. Berfir's got steel casings, I think, or thin iron.” I began to shave away the stubble I hated even worse than shaving itself.
“You're going to shave before dinner?”
“You want me to afterward?”
“You are impossible.”
“Only sometimes.” I switched the razor to the other cheek and jaw. “That wizard-Gerlis-is stronger than Antonin was.”
“Let's talk about that later.” Her fingers brushed the faded yellow and green of my wound. “How long ago did this happen?”
“In Sunta. So, let's see-not quite an eight-day ago.”
“It looks older.” She frowned.
“Order-mastery has some advantages.”
“Don't let it blind you. Some wounds you won't be able to heal.”
She had a point, and I finished shaving and washing as quickly as I could. But my stomach still growled as I pulled on a clean shirt.
“Some things haven't changed.” Krystal shook her head.
“A lot of things haven't changed.”
We walked past the door to the back porch I hadn't sat on since summer and into the kitchen. No sooner had we stepped inside than Rissa was setting things on wooden holders all around where I sat.
“Serve it before it gets colder,” suggested the cook.
Perron and Haithen grinned.
Everything was steaming, enough that I almost burned my left hand, but I didn't argue. I served one of Rissa's favorites, a chicken thing with dumplings, green noodles, mint leaves, and a pepper sauce nearly as hot as burkha.
“How was your trip?” asked Haithen.
I looked at Krystal, then smiled. “After I tell the commander, I'll let you know.”
Perron shook his head.
“The olive grower-Hensil, he said his name was- stopped by last eight-day,” announced Rissa into the silence. “He started to complain, but I told him-just as you had told me-that you were on business for the autarch. And he said that was fine, but the autarch didn't make good chairs, and you ought to stick to chairs and not the business of ruling.”
I swallowed a mouthful of too-hot chicken dumpling before I spoke. “What did you say?”
Rissa shrugged. “I told him that he was right, and that we all would be happier if we did what we did and not what others wanted us to do.”
“Of course,” pointed out Haithen, her mouth full, “he probably wants the master - crafter to do his chairs.”
I kept eating. There was no way I was going to win that sort of argument.
After dinner, Rissa shooed us out, and we didn't protest, not for an instant.
Krystal closed the bedroom door. “Business or pleasure?” She smiled.
“Business first. Then we can get to the important part.”
Except we both knew that the business part never went away, no matter how hard we tried.
So I told her everything, even the bits about the two girls and my feeling bad about the stable girl.
She shook her head. “You would think that, but you also have to think about why you were there.”
She was right. Getting caught or calling attention to the fact that I was a wizard of sorts wouldn't have helped anyone, and I still didn't see how I could have done anything to Jassid except kill him, one way or another.
“You're worried about Gerlis?” She sat on the edge of the bed, so close I could sense her with every sense I had, without even trying.
“Yes.”
“Can you do anything about it tonight?”
“No.” I had to admit that.
So... that night we mostly just held each other. Not totally-but the holding was the important part, and I remembered that was how it had begun back on Recluce, even before I knew I loved Krystal, when, facing dangergeld, she had asked me to hold her, and I had.