She nodded. “Fine. If Arasgon is to come with—”
Talaras snapped at Arasgon, who replied with obvious anger. Talaras stood his ground but looked ready to start a fight.
“We’ll be fine without you,” Janel told Arasgon. “We’re taking the elephants with us. Besides, someone will need to lead Pocket Biter and Cloud to Atrine when you’re finished. We’ll meet you there, when we know the townsfolk are safe.”
Arasgon didn’t look like he believed her, but he pranced a few steps, blew air out his nose, and turned to join his brother.
Janel picked up a bag from the ground. “Come, then. The same advice Gan gave Tamin applies to us as well. Let us put as much distance as possible between us and this town by nightfall.” She turned to Ninavis. “If you would be so kind as to show us the way.”
“Should have made that bastard Tamin heal my leg before he left,” Ninavis mused. Then she turned to the elephant keeper. “Sana, think one of your girls will let me ride up top?”
A middle-aged woman looked up. “A wee slip like you? Tishar won’t even notice.” She smiled, a forced expression that didn’t hide her tears.
“Let’s get this herd moving,” Count Janel said. “We’ve a lot of ground to cover before it grows dark.”
* * *
The red-orange sun set as they headed toward the tree line, where they planned to stop for the night and make camp. Twilight turned the blue-green skies a burnt vermilion.
Adrenaline carried the townsfolk through the first few hours, but the horrors they had witnessed and the people they had lost began to sink in. The refugees had fallen into silence. A few were in tears. They stared at the camphor and cedar as if the forest were a lake after an eternity crossing a desert.
If they made it to the trees, they would be safe.
Ninavis and her crew were in their element. They directed the elephants, made sure able adults carried children on their shoulders, and patrolled the small convoy’s edges to prevent unexpected surprises from sneaking up on them. They did it all with smiles and jokes, singing songs about their wonderful adventure, kidding the elderly about misspent youths. They made it almost possible to forget the horrors they left behind.
Almost.
During this, Brother Qown noticed Count Janel had wandered off to the far side of the group. She walked by herself, maintaining a steady distance from the others. Dorna, who was helping the children, hadn’t noticed.
But then Dorna’s responsibilities didn’t include seeing to the count’s emotional and physical healing. Qown’s did.
Brother Qown had almost reached the count when she wiped her face.
She was crying. Her tears were silent, wet paths rolling down her red cheeks.
“Count…,” Brother Qown began.
Janel looked away. “Don’t. The others can’t see me like this.”
“No one would blame you for being upset by what happened, Count. It was…” Brother Qown fought for words and failed. “It was horrifying.”
She sniffed again, tossed her head back, swallowing a short laugh. “I’m a stallion. They need to think me strong. When this is over and they’re safe—then they may realize how they’ve misplaced their trust a second time.”
“Count Janel, you’re making no sense,” Brother Qown said. “If not for you—”
“If not for me,” she said, “all those people in Mereina would still be alive.”
“Not true.”8
“Ninavis was right; I should have struck down Tamin when I had the chance. Am I not Janel Danorak? I was the one who insisted on my way. My way led straight to a town full of dead.”
“Tamin’s murder would have stopped nothing! Tamin didn’t unleash the witch-smoke, and you had no reason to think Senera a threat.”
“No,” Janel agreed. “But she did it in response to what happened with Dedreugh. Because I revealed his true nature as Kasmodeus. She did this to cover up the real crimes, and she’s proven how far she’ll go to erase their tracks.” Janel grimaced. “A long way, as it happens.”
Brother Qown bit his lip. He believed the count had misjudged the Doltari witch’s motives. For some reason, Senera had been … satisfied … when Janel triumphed over Kasmodeus, as if the Doltari woman had just finished a task. Nothing in Senera’s attitude suggested she considered what followed a setback.
“You can’t blame yourself,” Brother Qown said. “Besides, you weren’t wrong. You said it yourself. If you had killed Tamin at that point, his men would have shot you. Do you think Dedreugh would have canceled the tournament? Do you think the warden’s ‘voice’ Senera would have done so? No. All of Ninavis’s people would have ended up burned at the stake.”
“Do you think the citizens of Mereina would consider that trade fair?” Janel countered. “All those people dead, in exchange for fewer than a dozen lives?”
“That spell wasn’t your doing. You cannot take responsibility.”
“Taking responsibility is my job. I caused this by revealing Dedreugh’s true nature as a demon.”
“Then you must try to make it right as best you can. I think Relos Var and Senera would be quite amused to see you shouldering the guilt for their crimes.”9
Janel stopped walking.
“Aren’t I right, though?” he pressed.
“I just … I hadn’t…” She shook herself, and her eyes regained their focus. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Anyway, we have other matters to discuss.”
She began walking again. “We do?”
“The manner of our survival.” Brother Qown looked back toward the refugees in case anyone was close enough to eavesdrop.
“That’s not so mysterious. You saved us from the smoke.”
Brother Qown blinked, left open-mouthed for a moment. “I—uh…” He found himself near to blushing. “Yes. Well. I’m going to assume you know nothing about magic.”
She gave him a sideways look that might have set the forest on fire.
“That’s what I thought.” Brother Qown cleared his throat. “Without boring you, let me say this: the symbol I drew saved our lives, but I don’t understand why it worked.”
The count blinked. “I don’t either, but I admit I assumed you would be more knowledgeable.”
“All objects have … energy … in them, which people call tenyé. It’s the vital essence of you, me, that tree over there. There isn’t any difference between a god’s tenyé and a sorcerer’s tenyé except in quantity—”
“Brother Qown, talk like that is why your order is heretical in half the empire.”
He coughed. “The problem with heresies is they are named so because they touch on uncomfortable truths. My point is this: art has no tenyé.”
Janel blinked. “I don’t understand.”
“A superlative drawing only has as much tenyé as the materials used to make it.10 Paper, paint, ink. There is no difference in tenyé between a doodle and a masterpiece. Symbols in a book convey information, but they don’t contain extra tenyé. And magic is only possible with tenyé to fuel it.” Brother Qown gestured behind him, toward Mereina. “What I did back there. What Dorna did. That shouldn’t have worked. I only did it in the first place because I hoped to link the symbol I’d copied from that woman—Senera—to her spell. If it worked, I hoped to insert myself into the same category as those soldiers under its protection. It was a desperate, impossible long shot.”