The tahren plucks the bottle from Josef's hands. "Maybe you should sit down. Your heart is racing, and you smell stressed. This way." Inran leads Josef back to the table and pulls out one of the chairs. Josef is too tired to be scared anymore, too tired to mistrust the simple act of kindness. He collapses into the chair. "I'll bring you some food and something to drink," says the tahren. "Would you like that, boy?"
"I'm not a boy."
"Of course, you aren't," Inran says. He pats Josef on the arm and waddles away, his claws clicking on the stone floor with every step. Josef places the lantern on the table and stares into the flame, watching dance a futile little jig on the wick.
"Oh," Inran's voice floats out of the darkness. "I'm sure his mastership mentioned before he sent you on ahead. Don't touch the cages."
Josef remembers cages from another time, full of animals and monsters, cowering in fear, clawing to get out. He also remembers his friend, Barrow, trapped in such a cage. What if he's done it again? What if there are more children here, locked in cages? Experimented on. Tortured.
There's a sound like paper ripping and a new portal opens. For just a moment, Josef sees Eska, held suspended in an invisible grip. He wants to go to her, to hold her, to be held by her. He wants it more than anything, that reunion. They've been apart too long. They were never meant to be apart. Loran Orran steps through, and the portal snaps shut behind him. She's gone. Taken from him once again. Half a world separating them. Frustration and exhaustion war within him and Josef sobs.
Loran Orran flaps his robes, depositing dust and sand on the floor, and glances towards Josef. "I hope you're not as ungrateful as your friend, Yenhelm."
"Is she alright?" He asks, begs. He needs to know she's alive, can't fathom a world without Eska in it.
Loran Orran waves away the question. "Inran? Inran, why aren't the torches lit?"
The tahren mumbles words, so quiet they were nothing but a whisper.
"Well that's all fine for you. Some of us can't navigate in the dark." Loran moves off into the darkness, grumbling something Josef can't hear. A thump and a curse later, and a torch on one of the far walls sputters to life, orange flames eagerly licking at the wall. Loran Orran rubs furiously at his left knee through his robes. Behind the prince, set out along the wall, are dozens of cages, metal bars shining in the torch light. Some are empty, but not all. They are not for animals and beasts. These cages hold people! Terran, pahht, tahren. Prisoners, ragged and malnourished. The dead eyes of those who have accepted their fate and have no fight left in them.
Josef lurches upright and backwards, pushing away from the table, his chair tips and clatters to the stone floor. "I've seen this before," he says, his voice weak and rasping.
Loran Orran turns to Josef, his eyes bright in the torchlight. "You remember? You and Helsene both, odd that the memory block has degraded on you. Perhaps the others, too, are beginning to remember. Interesting."
"What did you do to us?" Josef asks. But he already knows. Deep down, he already knows.
"What does it matter? The past is past. That's actually the first rule of Chronomancy. The past is always behind us, the present moves ever forward at a varying pace, and the future is always looming, always changing."
Josef staggers back, his legs entangling in the chair. The world tips and he hits the floor in a painful sprawl. "You put magic in us. Are you doing the same to them?" He points toward the cages.
Loran Orran stops by the table and plucks the lantern, holding it forward. He looks like a kind old man in the gloom, his wrinkled face a picture of sympathy. It's all lies. "It really doesn't matter what I did to you, Yenhelm. What matters now, is what we are going to do together."
"What?"
A gnarled hand reaches out, hanging in the air in front of Josef. An offer of help, of partnership maybe. An offer veiled in secrets. "You are the chosen one, Yenhelm. I made certain of it. I made you the chosen one, and together, we're going to bring the Rand back. All of them."
Chapter 7
I slept for a full day. Actually, it was more like a day and a half. After pulling Horralain from his nightmare, my exhaustion finally caught up with me. We moved away from the amphitheatre, though I do not remember doing so. Back down the path leading up to it and out into the city of Do'shan once more. Hardt found us a building, one that wasn't occupied by the feral pahht, and we claimed it for our own. Apparently the ferals fled at the mere sight of me, even stumbling and barely conscious. They feared me as feverishly as they worshipped Aerolis. I suppose that was something I had earned. They were not the last people I taught to fear me.
As soon as we were inside, I collapsed against a crumbling wall and knew no more. Hardt draped half a dozen cloaks over me as I shivered my way into sleep, and I'm told Horralain stood guard for hours until a similar exhaustion took him. The big Terrelan thug became a second shadow after that day. He devoted his life to protecting mine, perhaps as payment for a debt he felt he owed, or perhaps just to show gratitude. Maybe it was because he needed someone else to make the decisions for him, and I had stepped into that role and proved more than capable. It's a shame his dream problems were so much easier to resolve than my real ones.
When finally I woke, I was ravenous. I have been hungry a great many times in my life. Down in the Pit we never had enough to eat, and all Sourcerers develop a hunger that is beyond the need for food, but after days of sleep, the hunger was something else. We had a decent store of salted meat, taken from the packs and pouches of dead soldiers, but it would last only a few days at most. I wondered if our small flyer was still nearby. There was a town below Do'shan, we had passed it on the way, and there would be food aplenty down there.
Our group was subdued. Not just in attitude, but there was something else as well. A cloud of ill feeling hanging over us all. Horralain followed me about like a lovesick fool, dogging my heels. Hardt watched the city outside, standing guard near an empty door frame. Ishtar paced, refusing to admit she would be better served by resting her ankle. And Tamura sat nursing an old kettle he found, boiling the water within and occasionally adding things to the mix. Worse than all of them, though, was Imiko. The little thief sat in a corner of our building, staring at nothing. Not even her little ringlet could cheer her solemn mood. She barely even noticed my approach. I kicked her foot to get her attention, and Imiko startled, fear bleeding from her eyes. It shamed me that I caused that fear. With a sigh, I lowered myself down next to her.
"Does he have to loom so close?" Imiko asked sullenly, nodding at Horralain. The big man was standing over us both.
"Go away." At my order, Horralain took two steps backward and waited there. "Apparently looming is what he does now."
Imiko snorted and went back to her thorough contemplation of the floor.
"You couldn't have stopped him." I guessed at her feelings. During the Iron Legion's assault, the little thief hadn't fought like everyone else. She hadn't even tried, just collapsed and screamed at him to stop hurting her friends. It was more than I managed. "Even Hardt and Horralain couldn't get close, you had no chance. I guess, sometimes a passionate plea is worth more than a knife in the back."