The Destroyer Goddess (7 page)

Yes, he had been kind. And mostly gentle—gentle until those strange, hot, dark moments between a man and a woman when gentleness became an obstacle to what they both blindly sought.

Now, knowing things about him she had never foreseen in her wildest imaginings, she wondered about her husband. Women gossiped enough for Mirabar to be aware that not all men knew how to please a woman. But Baran knew, and he used the knowledge well. It made Mirabar wonder: Who had taught him? Why did he care enough to learn? Had he, of all people, once loved?

Even now, with a frail rapport developing between them, she knew she couldn't ask him. Baran had claimed intimacies with her body which she could still feel lingering in her flesh, and he would do so again—after all, they both wanted a child. But their verbal relationship stopped well short of what they did together as man and woman, and her fear of him by day hadn't particularly decreased despite her acceptance of him by night. 

So Mirabar wondered about him, yes; but she found it hard to believe that Baran—who had slaughtered hundreds in vengeance and greed, who hadn't bestowed a truly tender look on her even in their most intimate moments, who seemed sardonic even in his sleep—had ever
loved
. Because love, Mirabar knew now, was the part of you that surrendered against your will, the part of your heart that bled willingly, the part of your nature that gave just for the sake of giving. And nothing about Baran suggested he was capable of love. 

Mirabar thought of Tansen, up at the Dalishar caves right now, and wished things could have been different. 

Love was the hunger that ate you alive a little every day.

"Damn it, where is Velikar?" Baran said restlessly. "She said she'd be back in the morning."

Love was the fire that even a Guardian couldn't control and which even her tears couldn't extinguish.

"You're determined to bring Velikar to Belitar with us?" Mirabar asked, loathing the idea. "What about Sister Rahilar? She's up at the caves, and I like her. Well," she added more honestly, "I don't
dis
like her. I could ask—"

"Now, now, there's no reason for you to feel threatened by Velikar," Baran chided. "I swore vows of fidelity yesterday, and I will keep them, regardless of the temptation she presents."

Mirabar rolled her eyes. "I'd rather send for Sister Basimar."

"Who's that?" 
      "She was a personal friend of Josarian's. I've known her since..." 

Baran's gaze wandered idly around the room, and Mirabar sighed and gave up, realizing she was wasting her breath. Baran was determined to bring Velikar with them, but he would enjoy teasing Mirabar with the futile hope of leaving the nasty old woman behind. 

Baran took her arm as she turned away, and began, "Are y—"

He stopped when she gasped in pain as his fingers pressed against the cut made by the assassin she had killed during the nighttime battle on Mount Niran.

"Excuse me," he said, watching as she rolled up her sleeve to examine the cut. "I noticed that last night, but I forgot. It looks fresh."

"No," she said. "It's from a
shir
."

"You were attacked?" After she nodded, he said, "I can heal that for you."

She shook her head.

He seemed amused. "You don't trust me?"

"I can wait for it to heal."

"That takes a long time."

"I know." She rolled down her sleeve and said, "And until it stops hurting, it will remind me that I killed him."

He smiled. "You're more vicious than I guessed."

Mirabar didn't remember the incident with satisfaction. She wanted to remember the cost to herself of taking a life. 

Baran persisted, "If you change your mind..."

"I don't want to talk about it." She poured them both some water to drink. "I'm hungry, aren't you?"

"No."

"You should eat." Darfire, she already sounded like a wife. "It'll be a long journey, and it was a busy night."

He snorted with amusement and cast her an impertinent look.

She ignored this and continued, "You don't want to eat now. You barely even nibbled at the wedding feast." She shook her head. "No wonder you've become so thin."

"This from the woman who loves Tansen, who's always been a bit on the skinny side." Baran blinked innocently as she choked in surprise, spewed some water, and started coughing. "I'm sorry. Is it something I said?"

Mirabar stared at him in wary confusion, her heart pounding hard.

He grinned, enjoying her discomfort. "My dear, it was written all over your face when I saw you with him yesterday. All over his, too, actually—which, I confess, surprised me. Tansen always seems to be the ideal upon which the blank-faced
shallah
stare was based."

She cleared her aching throat and just kept staring at him, totally unprepared for this.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" Baran protested. "Am I some possessive, bloodthirsty
shallah
? I should say not! I'm hardly going to start a bloodfeud with the Gamalani—er, even if they still existed—just because one of them is in love with my wife." He leaned closer and murmured, "Not even because she returns his feelings."

"Waterlords kill for much less," Mirabar said tersely. "
You've
killed for less."

"True, but never my allies." He frowned. "Oops! I'm lying. I've killed them, too, haven't I?" Baran shrugged and added, "But only when I was feeling particularly irritable."

Her stomach hurt. "Tansen has never, um... I will never..."

"I know." He smiled charmingly. "I wouldn't have married you if I questioned your commitment to the vows you made while taking a knife to my flesh." He looked down at his palm, where the long cut was red and angry. "Need you have made it
quite
so deep?"

"No wonder you're eager for Velikar's return," Mirabar murmured, realizing that she had perhaps been a bit too enthusiastic about slicing open Baran's hand.

He leaned back again and silently called to the water she had poured for him. It danced out of its cup drop by drop, and swirled towards his mouth. He parted his lips, and the quivering drops came to rest on his tongue. Baran closed his mouth, held her wide-eyed gaze, and smiled. "After all these years, that's still fun. Tell me,
sirana
, is fire magic ever just fun to you, just sheer delight? Or is it always wrapped up in duty, destiny, Dar-worship, and other dreary things?"

"It's, uh..." She frowned, trying to remember. Had it ever been "fun," even once? She didn't think so.

Baran glanced at the cup, indicating what he had just done, and said, "That was the first thing I learned to do upon apprenticing to water magic. Not the first thing I was
supposed
to learn," he added cheerfully, "but I was whimsical and lacked focus."

"Whimsical? You surprise me," she said dryly.

"I was, I fear, quite a trial to my teacher. He..." Baran sighed as he considered his past. "Ah, yes, he was perhaps the most focused individual I have ever met. Well, until
I
learned to focus, that is."

He was baiting her, of course. Mirabar knew it, but she was nonetheless curious enough to ask, "Who was he?"

Baran's eyes danced, and he clearly delighted in the shock he was about to deliver. "Kiloran."

Her breath came out in a rush, and she sat down abruptly. "Of course!"

He looked interested. "Why do you say that?"

She nodded, thinking hard. "The old proverb is true, isn't it, Baran?"

"Most of them are true, but which one—"

"The more intimate the friendship, the deadlier the enemy," she quoted.

"Oooh! Very good." He grinned, evidently pleased.

"No wonder the two of you hate each other so much. Whatever happened between you, whatever you did to each other..." Mirabar nodded again. "No one hates a stranger or an acquaintance nearly as much as he hates someone who was once a friend." She arched her brows. "You
were
friends?"

Baran considered this. "I don't think Kiloran has friends. He was, shall we say... more like a rich uncle to me." Guessing her next question, he added, "No, we're not related. He took an interest in my talent and tried to guide me." He paused and added, "For a while, that is. Mostly, of course—as you already know—he has spent the past fifteen years trying to kill me."

"So what happened between the two of you?"

"Well, I don't want to alarm you..." he replied coyly.

"Baran," she said in exasperation.

"If I tell you this, it's because I want you to understand, before we leave Sanctuary, just how serious I am about protecting you."

"So you don't intend to kill me as soon as you can?" 

He touched her cheek. "I think I proved last night how serious I also am about getting a child with you."

Mirabar wondered how he knew what she knew, why a waterlord had been the one to echo her visions:
A child of water. A child of fire.
But she didn't want to be distracted from what he intended to tell her now, so she said, "What happened between you and Kiloran?"

"Come now,
sirana
," he said. "Surely you must have guessed by now that only one thing could make two men hate each other as much as Kiloran and I do?"

She was puzzled. "No, I don't..." 

Then it came to her. Mirabar shook her head, sure she must be wrong—but she already saw it in his face. It seemed extraordinary that the years-long battle between these two giants had all begun over... "A woman?" she asked.

Baran nodded and raised a hand to absently stroke the silver-and-jade necklace he always wore. His face was more serious than she had ever seen it when he replied, "He killed my wife."

Chapter Three

Silence is also speech.

                                          —Silerian Proverb

Tansen let Sister Velikar precede him—by quite some distance—on the path to her Sanctuary. Part of him wanted to race ahead and make sure Mirabar hadn't been harmed in the earthquake. Mostly, though, he dreaded the possibility of finding her in Baran's arms—Dar have mercy, it was obscene! So he hung back with Najdan, who seemed equally reluctant to venture into a potentially embarrassing situation. Pyron and the rest of Mirabar's escort were trailing behind them. 

Zarien had stayed up at the caves this morning. Tansen was fighting an impulse to turn around and run back to join him there.

"I have spoken with Baran several times since he proposed marriage to the
sirana
," Najdan said suddenly, speaking for the first time all morning. "I believe his intentions are... serious."

"So do I," Tansen replied.  "I just don't believe they're what he
says
they are."

Najdan looked at him. "You really think he's going to kill her?"

Tansen sighed. "
She
certainly doesn't seem to think so."

"If he tries—"

"I know, I know, you'll die to protect her." Tansen shrugged. "That's less comforting than it used to be."

"She believes—" 
      "I know. She told me."

There seemed to be little else to say. They hadn't stopped her from marrying Baran, and they couldn't stop her from going to Belitar. All they could do was pray that her instincts were right... But since neither of them was on speaking terms with Dar, they weren't even praying.

Walking more slowly than they had ever before walked in their lives, they eventually came upon Vinn, Baran's even-tempered assassin, who had been the waterlord's sole companion for his journey here.

"The earthquake?" Tansen said.

"They're fine," Vinn said.

Tansen and Najdan kept walking.

"I don't like him," said Najdan.

"Of course not," said Tansen.

They approached a bend and, knowing that Velikar's Sanctuary would be visible beyond it, they slowed down even more.

"Congratulations on taking a son," Najdan said.

"Thank you," Tansen said.

"Too bad about his family."

"Yes."

"But even if they were alive, being sea-bound, they would have shunned him—for having been on land."

"Probably," said Tansen.

"It's good that he has you now."

"We have each other."

"Yes," said Najdan.

They stopped. Looked at each other. Looked doubtfully ahead. Decided to go on.

The Sanctuary was a bit of a shambles in the wake of the earthquake, but still standing. After a moment, Mirabar pushed aside the
jashar
covering the door and stepped out alone into the sunlight. Tansen's heart started thudding hard.

She saw him and Najdan, and she said, "I cannot abide that woman!"

"Is she—"

"I suggested Sister Rahilar! I suggested Sister Basimar! But
no,
" she said. "No,
he
has to have Sister Velikar with him. Only that sour-tongued, bad-tempered, nasty old woman will do for my half-mad husband. And I—
I
am cursed to live in the moldy ruins of Belitar with an insane waterlord and a Sister with the manners of a wounded mountain cat!"