The Brightest Shadow, page 70
Smiles alone didn't bother him and he managed to find a smile to return. Yet though he was no expert on women, Slaten felt that some of them had a higher level of interest. Why him? He knew that women outnumbered men due to casualties, especially when it came to warriors, but he would have thought that taking care of Teren would deflect their attention.
Though Teren pulled him forward, she didn't really know where to go. Slaten managed to guide her from behind so she wandered toward the large table where Hanfel sat with several pitchers. Based on the smell, he didn't think they were alcohol.
"Teren wanted something special to drink," he explained to Hanfel. "Do you still have juice?"
"Plenty of it." Hanfel bent down and smiled at Teren. "What would you like?"
"Ooh, let me try some of each!" Teren carefully climbed up onto the bench opposite him and accepted the small cup he handed her somberly. When Hanfel poured the first drink, she sipped it seriously as if considering an important decision.
Meanwhile, Slaten noticed that Hanfel's drink was orange and caught the other man's eye. "You don't drink?"
"I do, but not to celebrate." Hanfel filled Teren's glass with a dark red juice next, though he continued replying to Slaten. "I will drink alcohol if others insist, but for me, it has always been a way to forget. Today we celebrate our victory, so I would rather enjoy every moment of it."
Slaten wasn't sure how to respond to that, so he remained silent. Meanwhile, Teren seemed to be fully enraptured by the choice of four different juices. The Chorhan Expanse certainly had more variety than the Oken territories on the western edge. He watched her, wondering if she could grow up happily here and simply never go back to Oleph-Amm.
"You're so good with Teren."
The soft female voice came from the side, surprising him. Slaten had known there was someone there and judged they were no threat, but he hadn't expected them to talk to him. He turned to look and discovered one of Elima's apprentices, who he vaguely remembered from his time in the infirmary. A few years older than him, with unruly red-blond hair. She gave him a warm smile.
"But it's getting late, isn't it? After she goes to sleep, will you be free?"
Since he didn't want to cause offense, Slaten kept a neutral expression on his face. "I'm sorry, but my injury is still troubling me."
"Oh? Something you want me to take a look at?" She leaned forward, putting a hand on his chest. Slaten felt trapped there as surely as if she had used some sein technique to bind him in place. He had thought his refusal was as plain as day - had she not seen it, or simply ignored it?
"I'm sorry, but right now... my mind is still wrapped up in the battle."
She saw he was uncomfortable and pulled her hand back, though she still smiled. "Yes, that sounds like you. Wouldn't you rather forget about it, instead of dwelling on it?"
He wasn't sure what else to say and just opened his mouth stupidly. Fortunately, at that moment Teren turned back to him holding two cups. "Slaten! I want these!"
"Okay, that's fine." Since she handed the cups to him, he took them and followed her as she marched back to their place. Slaten gave the healer an apologetic shrug but she just shook her head, a strange expression on her face. Far from heartbroken, so apparently she had just considered him an acceptable choice.
On his way back, Slaten tried to pin down exactly why he hadn't even considered accepting her offer. It had absolutely nothing to do with how much Oken society would disapprove. His mind was just too troubled at the moment to think about anything else. Especially not with someone he barely knew, whose name he couldn't remember. Other men had made it obvious not everyone worked that way, but he simply found himself too preoccupied.
Once back, Teren eagerly spoke to him in Okeni while drinking her juice. The drinks left her excited and she spent a while dancing gleefully with the others. Several instruments were added to Balunel's harp and many began to dance. Slaten stayed by the wall.
Eventually Teren wore herself out, coming back to slump against him. He picked her up in his arms and carried her toward the women's quarters. But just when he thought she might be asleep, she spoke in a soft voice.
"Slaten... if you kill enough of the bad men, can we go home?"
He stared down at her, lying slack with her eyes almost entirely closed. "I don't know, Teren. Do you want to go back?"
"Yes... this was nice... but I remember having fun at home... except I can't remember so well anymore..."
"Because of the battle..." Slaten hesitated for a long time, trying to decide what to say. What would be a lie, what would be understood by a child, what he actually believed. "We're closer to going home, Teren. I hope it will be soon."
She didn't answer and he realized that her breathing had become deep and steady. When he reached the women's quarters, he tried to hand Teren off to the middle-aged woman by the door, but they ushered him inside and let him set Teren down in bed. She looked peaceful and untroubled, lying there with her hair scattered over the pillow.
Slaten sighed and returned to the main chamber. As soon as he reached it, he wished that he had gone to sleep himself.
Since he had last truly looked at the celebration, everyone had become much drunker. Several groups were singing off-key, their songs increasingly drunken. He spotted Veron and Graenin in an alcove, groping at one another. They weren't the only ones, though most couples seemed to want to find privacy elsewhere. That would have shocked him once, but now he didn't care. He was just tired.
Instead of entering the celebration, Slaten walked back into the tunnels and followed the incline of the floor upward. The tunnels there felt cooler and they were certainly quieter, which calmed his mind. He idly headed toward the upper exit, though he knew that he'd be turned away. At least, that had always happened in the past. Now that he was a veteran of the Battle of Gerant, they might allow him through and he could breathe some fresh air.
To his surprise he found the corridor completely abandoned, except for one drunken man who stared blearily at him. Slaten walked up the final steep slope and left the tunnel. He emerged at the top of an outcropping with no way down but a good view of the land.
The stars shone brightly overhead, but the world below lay cloaked in shadow. Slaten closed his eyes and took a deep breath, enjoying the cold breeze flowing around him.
"Not joining the celebration?"
Slaten's hand shot down to his sword before he recognized Celivia's voice. He turned to her in surprise, not having sensed her at all. She was leaning back against the stones behind the tunnel exit, staring out over the dark landscape. Her sein was completely still and in the shadows she might as well not have been there.
He had no answer to her question, if it was a question. After a time, Slaten just replied without answering. "I didn't see you there."
"This celebration isn't really for me." Celivia pushed off the stones and came to stand beside him. "East Corah is not my home. Nor is it yours."
"That's true."
"They've left the entrances mostly unguarded. Even given the precautions we took while returning here, that seems horribly reckless."
"I think for many, this is their first real victory. In the past, it has been unclear raids, but this is something they can point to and say they're taking back their homeland. For many of the soldiers in training, this was their first real battle. I can understand why they're so happy."
Celivia finally turned to him with a strange smile. Her hair fell partially over her face, extremely pale in the starlight. "You can be open-minded in such strange ways, Slaten."
"I... don't see another option."
"Is there anyone you truly hate?"
He blinked, turning that question over in his mind. After a time, Slaten realized that he would be silent for too long and spoke his thoughts aloud. "I'm not sure. I can feel anger when I think about some of the Oken elders. Melal is more frustrating. Thinking about past Heroes... no, that's horror. I'm not sure that it matters, in the end. You don't need to hate someone to kill them."
Her knife-like smile flashed white in the starlight, but she said nothing.
"You do feel hatred, though." Not a question, just a statement. He wasn't sure if that was too forward or if his intent would come across. Celivia was silent for a long time before she answered softly.
"Yes. There are a great many people who I truly hate." She turned then, looking at him for only a moment before she walked past him into the tunnel. "But I don't hate you, Slaten."
Her fingertips brushed his shoulder as she passed, so lightly that he almost could have imagined it. Slaten stared after her, wondering what she meant by that. It might have been an invitation, yet she had seemed so distant... she hadn't come out here to be alone, she had clearly needed to think. And now he did too.
Staring up at the stars scattered across the dark sky, Slaten failed to come up with anything. Eventually he went back into the tunnels, avoided the celebration, and fell into bed.
~ ~ ~
Tani felt like she had a hangover when she woke up. That feeling was somewhat complicated by the fact that she hadn't drunk a drop of alcohol the night before and hadn't ever experienced a hangover. Part of her insisted that it must be true, so she lay in bed and stared at the cave ceiling.
It didn't help that everyone had been praising Melal and she'd spent the entire night struggling against the haze in her mind. She'd been successful, and of course Slaten and Celivia weren't taken in, but she felt as though she had lost others. Walernel had met her with wild praises, but she had managed to get him to have a normal conversation instead of adoring her. Though their conversation hadn't revealed anything interesting about him at all, at least it was something.
Then Melal had arrived, and all of that had been undone. Walernel had spent the rest of the night fawning over Melal like so many others. That left her vaguely disgusted, but the fact that there were so many women eyeing him left her repulsed on a deeper level. If they just admired the hero of the battle, that was one thing. But if he drew them as the Hero...
Scowling, Tani rolled over onto her side and stared at the cave wall. She was definitely awake now, there was no hope of getting any more rest. Yet she didn't want to rise and face the day with so much bitterness in her heart.
Maybe she would have felt different if she'd spent the night with someone, like so many others did. But Narenel had been unconscious, healing from his injuries, and even if he had been awake, she doubted his moral code would bend. Which she tried to respect, even if it was frustrating.
Her burns had been shallow, but they still ached a bit after the healing. Tani wanted to check with a healer about them and hadn't been able to find one last night. She hadn't seen Laeri at all, after a few early drinks, and hoped the young woman hadn't been badgered into going with anyone. Actually, Laeri had been acting strange for some time. Perhaps she hid some deeper troubles underneath her innocent smile.
"Tani! I think w-" She turned over to look toward the door and discovered Narenel poking his head through the curtain. He flushed and he raised a hand in front of his eyes before pulling back. "I'm sorry, I assumed you were awake and dressed..."
She glanced down at herself: she'd gone to sleep in her pants and tunic, so he could see... some of her stomach? Tani restrained her snort to spare his feelings and rearranged her clothes before pulling on her vest. While she was putting on her shoes Narenel came back through the door. Surprisingly urgent for him, considering it wasn't proper for him to barge into the women's quarters.
"I was saying, I think something is wrong. I tried to tell Graenin and Hanfel last night, but they didn't take me seriously. And, honestly, I wasn't thinking straight and didn't do a good job making myself clear. But when I woke up... well, I hope you'll listen."
"Of course I will." Tani strapped on all her knives, the tension eroding her remaining sleepiness. "What's wrong?"
They stepped out into the corridor and he began to speak, low and quickly. "During the battle, a group of Deathspawn escaped the city. Something about it seemed wrong to me at the time, so I followed them. That was how I got injured, actually."
"It isn't strange for them to flee a losing battle. What seemed wrong about it?"
"They seemed to be moving too purposefully. I know, it might just have been an organized retreat. That's what Destrela said. But I've been thinking about it more." Narenel tugged at the straps on his armor uncomfortably. "On another subject... do you think they didn't put enough effort into following us? Usually, we've had to be so careful about killing any scouts trying to find the hideout. Given the size of our forces, this would have been a good time to try."
"Maybe, but they'd already taken a beating. Plus, they have to know all their previous spies have failed, so maybe they thought it wasn't worth it."
"That's exactly what I was thinking." As it started to come together for Tani, she began to grow uneasy. Narenel leaned forward, eyebrows knitting together in concern. "What if they gave up on tracking us? What if, instead, they planted someone in the resistance? I've been looking around since I woke, and security is incredibly lax. It would be easy for someone to leave the base and go report its location."
Tani stabilized herself on a tunnel wall, trying to come up with counter-explanations. It was easy to invent some and pretend this was just a wild theory, yet it struck something in her.
"You mean the Deathspawn might have a human agent?" she asked. "It's obviously not impossible, but..."
"Think about how many people returned to the base without blindfolds for the first time. If they had an agent who left the base regularly, the secret would already be out. But if they managed to send someone among the workers here instead of the warriors...
"And that led me to another thought: we know Aryabaus is going to bring an army to secure Gerant and scout the area. The whole plan involved staying hidden until it passed. But what if that's just a ruse to move the army in range? Then once their contact gives the location..."
"They could march on us quickly. It could work, in theory." Tani bit her lower lip as she thought over it. "So, what do you think we should do?"
"I don't know." Narenel ran a hand through his hair and then checked the straps on his armor yet again. "We should secure the entrances, for one. When I tried to talk to Hanfel about it, he didn't really believe me, but he said that they had an extra watch outside in case we had been tracked. He was certain that nobody left last night. But this morning..."
"Anyone could leave and tell Aryabaus. Alright, how many exits are there?"
"Three, though I don't know the details of one. The primary entrance low in the hills, the hilltop vantage point, and the emergency passage. Destrela has never told me the location of the last one, but I understand it opens into the hills north of the caverns."
"Then there might still be time. It's still early morning, right?"
"Yes, very early."
Tani bit her lip again, thinking through the matter quickly. "We'll need to split up. You should go to the hilltop, see if you can spot anyone running, in case they already left."
"Good, I can do that. I should even be able to run them down if the timing is too close, but I hope they haven't escaped yet." Narenel stopped fiddling with his armor unnecessarily and squared his shoulders, focus returning to his eyes. "Destrela and the other top fighters should know the exact location of the emergency passage. Find whoever you can, then you can split up and cover the remaining two exits."
"Right. Be careful, Narenel."
With those quick words, they split in opposite directions. Tani knew that they might have this entirely wrong, or they might be much too late or much too early. She still felt a sense of urgency that she hadn't experienced since the battle had ended. Was this what had been bothering her since then? Tani didn't judge her instincts to be so accurate, but now they screamed at her that there was something to this.
Should she try to find someone else first, or head to the main entrance? Deciding that any action was better than nothing, Tani headed straight downward, hoping she would run into someone along the way.
To her surprise, she almost immediately stumbled upon Veron and Slaten. Though Slaten looked the same as always, as if he had been awake for hours, Veron was padding around barefoot with her hair askew. They stared at each other in surprise before Tani recovered.
"Where are you two going?"
"Finding Destrela." Veron shoved some hair out of her face and cursed under her breath. "That bitch stole my money."
"What money?"
"The money we stole that you're not supposed to know about." Veron began glaring around the room as if she'd find Destrela lurking in a corner. Meanwhile, Slaten moved closer to Tani to speak.
"Regardless of what was stolen, I think something isn't right. I tried to speak to Destrela this morning about how lax our security has become and she brushed me off, as if she had bigger concerns."
"...stealing all my fucking money..." Veron added amid mumbled curses.
Hearing that Slaten was concerned as well made Tani simultaneously relieved and more worried. She moved in front of both of them, making sure she had Veron's attention. "Look, there may not be time to explain, but Narenel has a theory that we might be at risk, and I think he might be right. What if Aryabaus found a human agent and planted them in the resistance? Wouldn't this be the perfect opportunity for the agent to leave and report the location?"
As soon as they heard the idea, Slaten closed his eyes and Veron cursed. No disbelief, which was again a cold comfort. Veron turned around to go back the way they came. "If I have to chase her down, I need some fucking shoes. She's still injured, I should be able to kill the cunt."
"But we're not sure if it's her. I think it's most important to make sure the entrances are guarded. Veron, do you know about the emergency passage?"
"The northern one? Yeah, they told me all about it. Actually, Slaten, I showed you the thing a while back, do you remember?" He nodded, so Veron moved away, toying with the hilt of her sword. Tani wanted to call her back, but the woman clearly had her own agenda. Instead Tani looked to Slaten.
