“Ghan no fool, Yadovír. I know.”
“Ghan Magai.” Yadovír collected whatever little was left of his self-control and forced his shuddering body to stay still. “Will you agree to my proposal? Do we have a deal?”
“Yes, Ghan agree.”
The emphasis on his title was unmistakable and significant, but Yadovír decided to ignore it.
He sighed, and his whole body sagged with relief. He even began to laugh a little, not yet fully aware of what he had done, though that knowledge stood off in the shadows like a silent predator. The Ghan, however, continued to stare at him with hollow eyes. This was not how Yadovír expected them to seal a bargain.
“Should we not drink to our bargain?” Yadovír smiled, but the utter lack of response from any of the Gumiren chilled him. Then he noticed that the Ghan no longer looked at him, but a little behind him. Confused, he turned around.
It was a feathery, shriveled creature that would have been pitiful, if not for the eyes. They were black, but somehow they glowed with fire—not orange-red, but utterly dark. At that moment, Yadovír understood and despaired. With the desperation came a cold kind of acceptance that stopped the hammering of his heart and began to slow the blood flowing through him. So, this was why the Gumiren seemed to know everything in advance, he thought.
“You are the Raven,” said Yadovír, his voice husky and not his own.
“Ah, a clever one.” The voice was a bestial cackle, something between the wheeze of a sick child and the bark of a dog. “Well, you must have something you wish to tell me if you have gone through all this trouble.” The Raven looked with disgust at the corpse of the priest. “But do hurry. You cannot imagine how hungry I am.”
The words nearly stopped Yadovír’s heart cold, but he forced himself to clear his throat. “I can be useful to you, Raven. I know the ins and outs of the city, and I am well studied in Vasyllian lore. I am an indefatigable worker, and…” As his mind blanked, he felt himself reeling from panic.
“You can be useful, yes. I agree. I do not think it will be conceding too much to tell you that I have been disappointed in a line of attack I was sure would work. No matter. You provide me with a different opportunity. I am sure you will be happy to oblige. Yes, my little rat?”
The Raven extended outward in flame and fury. The eyes turned yellow with a pit of black fire; the back expanded into billows of brown smoke like jagged raven wings. A clawed arm whipped out and picked up Yadovír by the scruff—a bird of prey dangling a rat before swallowing it. A foul stench filled his nose, and he began to dry heave.
“I accept your bargain,” said the Raven.
Yadovír fainted into the stench and blood and smoke, pursued into the darkness by the face of Kalún and his surprised eyes.
When Yadovír awoke, he was in his own room back in Vasyllia, shaking in a pool of his own sweat. A rotting stink permeated the room. He tried to find the source of the smell—perhaps a mouse had died in the walls? —then realized that he was the source. The stench came from inside him.
Elder Pahomy chewed his lip; Rogdai shook his head as his eyebrows furrowed deep into his head, threatening to dig into the soft matter underneath. They both avoided looking at her, instead inspecting every possible detail of the map laid out on the table in her private chambers. Sabíana’s impatience loomed over them all like a twisting snake’s head, poised to strike at the first sign of the prey’s lapse in attention.
“Well, my lords? I ask you again? Is it as bad as I think it is?”
Finally, Elder Pahomy answered. “It is worse, my lady. We do not have the force to dislodge this siege, and our stores are already thinning. The imprisonment of the traitors, though necessary, is vastly unpopular among the people with influence in Vasyllia.”
“Not merely that,” said Rogdai, scratching the back of his head, his eyes wide. “The Gumiren have built siege towers of amazing complexity. They could use them at any moment, even in winter, but now they have stopped. There is nothing stirring their camp. Silence. Enough to drive us to madness.”
“Or they simply wait for us to destroy ourselves from within,” said Sabíana and sighed. She had come to rely a great deal on the opinions of only two men. It was a dangerous trust she placed on them. I have no choice, she reminded herself through the pain of her ever-clenched jaw.
“There is one option we have not yet considered,” said Rogdai, though he did not look confident in his own idea. “Escape.”
“Are you mad?” Elder Pahomy looked personally offended at the suggestion.
“Why not? I see two possibilities—one, a spear thrust through the enemies…”
“You would sacrifice most of our fighting force to do that,” growled Elder Pahomy, his jowls quivering with anger, “and it may not even work then. We do not know the full number of this enemy.”
“Or we may cross over the summit and flee over the back of the mountain.”
Sabíana gasped, then felt the blush creep up. There was an ancient, traditional taboo about climbing Mount Vasyllia, though now that she thought of it, she could not call to mind a single good reason for it.
“Why not?” she asked, directing her gaze at Elder Pahomy.
He sighed. “Old superstitions die hard, I suppose.”
She smiled at him. “For my part, I think crossing the summit in winter would be inviting disaster. How many of us would survive? And where would we go? For all we know, even Karila is destroyed.”
“If that is our people’s only chance of survival,” said Rogdai, “why not set out farther east, toward the Steppelands? Or West, to the deserts and beyond.”
“I do not know why,” she said, “but I have a strong feeling that Vasyllia must not be abandoned to this enemy. It is stronger than a mere sense; it is almost a compulsion.”
“I agree with you, Highness,” said Elder Pahomy, and for the first time she heard respect in his voice.
The door slammed open, and in flew a mass of silver robes billowing about a thin figure hidden somewhere in their midst. It fell at the feet of Sabíana. Rogdai lifted it, none too gently. It was Yadovír.
“Oh, my lady,” he finally said. “It’s…unspeakable. Otar Kalún’s body has been found at the gates of Vasyllia. It’s rumored that he was murdered by the Gumiren for trying to strike a deal with them to save his own skin.”
A novice came into the monastery. He knocked on the door, begging for admittance. The abbot came to the door, looked at him, and shut the door in his face. The next day, the novice was still there, begging for admittance. The abbot came to the door, looked at him, and shut the door in his face. On the third day, the same happened. And the fourth. And the fifth. On the tenth, the abbot came to the door, looked at him, and opened the door. The novice entered.
From “The Paterikon of the Great Coenobium”
(The Sayings, Book III, 4:8-11)
Chapter 25
The Warrior of the Word
