The Betrayed Read online

  “But we defeated it,” Theo said. The smooth face of the young Andani herdsman beamed as he looked over at Cane. “We didn’t flee this time. We held our ground.” The talking had died down. Everybody was listening to Theo.

  “It was Thimeon,” Bandor proclaimed. Bandor was one of the Andani, but he wore his long red hair in a braid like the Anghare. Indeed he might could have been mistaken for one of the Northlanders if his features had been a little more angular. But his manner was gentler, more like that of his own people. He was in his late twenties and had joined the company with Thimeon. “Thimeon won the battle. Did you see the power we wielded?” The others nodded their agreement. They looked around and spotted Thimeon, where he sat on the ground in front of Elynna. Elynna soon found herself in the middle of the company as they gathered around Thimeon. Noaem and Anchara continued to treat Noab’s wounds, but they fell silent now. All waited for Thimeon to speak. All except Elynna, who wanted them to stop so she could tell them about Cathwain. Yet even she was curious about the strange power he had wielded during the battle—power that seemed to have come from the stone about his neck. Power, which along with the mysterious gifts of Cane and Cathros, had driven the Daegmon away.

  “What is it?” several voices asked. “The power you had. How did you do it? Are you, too, one of the gifted?”

  “No,” Thimeon answered. “I don’t think so. I am not sure.” He rose to his feet and shook his head. “No. It was not me. The power came from the stone on my neck.”

  He slipped it off his head and held it in his palm, where he could both study it and let others see. The necklace was silver and held a gemstone set in an ornament of black metal. Thimeon had found it wrapped around the old book in the hidden treasure at Citadel when they had escaped from the dungeons. It seemed to have grown in size and weight, though perhaps this was only an illusion. It filled the palm of Thimeon’s hand. The stone was a single polished dark-blue gem, translucent and smooth. Somewhere deep within it, a flicker of the mysterious blue light remained. Or could that be just a trick of the sun and the stone? Elynna stared into it and felt lost, as though the stone were bottomless.

  The silver chain, now dangling off Thimeon’s hand, was wide and long, beautiful but also simple and sturdy. But the craftsman or artist had made the pendant itself of some other material than silver: a dark metal or alloy even the Northlanders claimed never to have seen but which Elynna instinctively guessed was more precious. She would have called it black gold, if such a thing existed. It was just big enough to hold the stone in an eight-prong setting.

  Thimeon turned it over in his hand, and Elynna leaned in to look more closely. The others also crowded around to get a glimpse of this new talisman as Thimeon turned it over again and held it stone-side up.

  “What is it? Where did it come from?” they asked.

  “I do not know,” Thimeon replied. “You know as much as I do. You were with me. I found it in the ancient chamber beneath Citadel, wrapped around the book—” He paused. “Around the book I began but never finished.”

  Elynna finally got a close look. Engraved on the back, in fine delicate lines, was a three-pointed crown. She might not have recognized the image at first had she not also seen it on the cover of the book Thimeon spoke of. It was an image of the triune peaks of Illengond.

  Cathros, whose father worked with precious stones, stepped forward and looked more closely, though he made no move to take the stone from Thimeon’s hand. “I have never seen such a perfect cabochon,” he said.

  “Cabochon?” Elynna asked. She was trying to wrap her mind around yet another mystery. “Is that the type of stone?”

  Cathros shook his head. “Cabochon is the type of cut. Smooth. Without any facets. Most northland gems—emeralds and rubies and diamonds and the rare angstars—are cut to show their natural facets and structure, and so light will reflect and bounce within at myriad angles. But some stones, like sapphires, oceanstones, and green and blue and pale moonstones, are cut and polished smooth like this. But I do not know what type of stone this is. Nor do I know what the metal is in which it is set. I have not before seen anything like it. This one is beautiful.”

  Thimeon nodded. “I don’t know why I kept it. I hadn’t meant to. I was just looking to set it down somewhere while I read that book. Even when I found myself slipping it over my head, I meant to take it off and put it back. It was as if somebody else decided it should go with me. I didn’t even remember I had it until the battle.” As an afterthought he added, “I should have kept the book as well. Perhaps it would explain—”

  Elynna squeezed her eyes shut. Thimeon’s words brought an unexpected rush of complex emotion. It was as if he was describing her whole journey since the day she had left Citadel. What had she ever really decided? She had not chosen to lead the company. The others had simply started following her because of her gifts. Nor, did it seem, that she had decided any of their many steps since she had become their leader against her will. Their imprisonment. The means of their escape. It all seemed just to happen. Indeed, her very gift itself she had never chosen. Never would have chosen.

  And yet . . . and yet she had decided she would use it. Hadn’t she? But had she done any good with it?

  Cane’s sudden laugh brought her attention back. “What do books matter now?” the Northlander asked. “We have found the power we need. We no longer have reason to fear the Daegmon.”

  “I don’t know,” Thimeon said, shaking his head again. “Even ignoring the problem of finding our enemy, I’m not convinced we have the power to overcome it.” A few started to protest, but Thimeon raised his hand to forestall them. “Don’t mistake me. We’ve done well this day. We were not defeated. We drove the Daegmon away, perhaps even inflicted wounds. For the first time in any encounter, we suffered no losses. For that I rejoice greatly. But it was a small battle only, not the war. I do not think we are yet in sight of the end.”

  No, Elynna thought. We are not. Thimeon was right. Her companions did not even know about Cathwain and her cry for help.

  “How can you doubt our victory?” Cane asked. His voice was sharp with tension.

  Thimeon closed his eyes. “You asked that question once before, not too many weeks ago,” he said in a voice so quiet Elynna leaned forward to hear. He opened his eyes and looked at Cane. “I do not doubt—” He stopped and shook his head. “I will speak the truth with you. I believe our enemy may have been only testing us, searching out our strength. It did not come here to engage in a real battle. I do not think we hurt it in any way. Didn’t you hear it laugh at us as it departed?”

  A vivid image of the recent battle flashed across Elynna’s memory. The Daegmon had been speaking—but not to her. To Thimeon. “Do not think that I cannot recognize you,” it had said. And Elynna had understood. Indeed, she had heard its thoughts more clearly than ever. She hadn’t merely sensed anger and hatred but had heard actual speech. Her own sudden ability had been such a surprise, she had not given thought to the fact that Thimeon had also heard and understood. Was he also one of the gifted? Did she no longer have to bear her burden alone?

  It was almost too much to hope for. Perhaps it was not Thimeon but the power of the stone he held? Or perhaps the Daegmon had spoken aloud in the language of men so that all of them could hear it?

  At this last thought, she turned to look at Cane. His eyes had narrowed as though in suspicion. “What do you mean that it was laughing?”

  Elynna turned from him toward the others of her companions who now surrounded them. The mood of celebration—the hugging, the words of congratulations, the joyous cheers—had come to an end.

  All were silent now, looking at Thimeon. His eyes were fixed on Cane. “You did not hear the Daegmon speaking?”

  “I did not hear it speak; nor did I hear it laugh. What does the laugh of such a creature sound like?”

  Thimeon did not answer. Elynna realized that
he was pondering the same question she was. Had the enemy spoken out loud, or had he gained some power to understand its thoughts? “Did anyone else hear our enemy speak?” Thimeon asked.

  So intent was Elynna on the answer to Thimeon’s question that for a moment it did not occur to her to tell them all what she had herself had heard. But the blank stares of the other companions only made the answer to her question more obvious by the moment. Some stared at Thimeon as though he were mad.

  His young cousin Theo was the only one who spoke, and only after several moments of uncomfortable silence. “I heard only the roar,” he acknowledged. “But nothing more. Are you saying that sound was speech? That the Daegmon has a language?”

  Thimeon shook his head. “No. Not so much in the roar. More in—” Again he paused, as if not sure how to finish.

  Still Elynna did not speak. The implications were still too immediate. She was no longer alone. No longer the only one to bear the burden of leading them. Or the guilt if she failed. Whether it was the stone in Thimeon’s hand that gave him the power or something else, it did not even matter.

  “What do you think you heard?” Cane finally asked.

  Thimeon turned to face Cane. He sounded angry. “There is little doubt what I heard. The Daegmon spoke to me.”

  If it was anger in his voice, it was anger Elynna understood. How often had she had to answer the same sorts of questions herself and face the same skepticism? She felt a sudden sympathy for Thimeon as he stood staring at Cane, waiting for a challenge to his claim.

  Finally Thimeon lowered his voice again. “Perhaps it did not speak to me with words, but it spoke. And no, I do not know how I understood. Until a moment ago, I assumed we all heard it. Now I see this is not the case, and that I am alone in this.” He turned toward Noaem. “How is it you understand the animals? Is it in their speech? Or do you somehow understand their thoughts?”

  Noaem, one of the Ceadani from village of Gale Ceathu, was not fluent in the trade tongue. But however much of the conversation he had or had not followed, he did not require his brother Noab to translate this. “I hear no words in their growls or barks. Only thoughts in my mind.”

  Cane’s brother Cathros spoke next. His voice was less sharp than Cane’s, but his gaze probed just as deeply. “We do not doubt your honesty. Let us accept that you heard something—that it was not a delusion brought on by the battle, though such things have been known to plague even great warriors in the past. You still have not told us what the creature said.”

  Elynna closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She knew what Thimeon would say, for she had heard the voice herself. She wished for his sake that he did not have to answer. But she had been around him long enough to know he would. He would answer just as she had answered so many times in those same shoes. Yet for all the sympathy she now felt, her sense of relief was even greater. For once, somebody else had to explain an awareness of their enemy. Somebody else had to put into words what she herself had never been able to articulate. Their enemy’s hatred. The despair of knowing the power they were up against. But he was a real leader. Perhaps he was up for the task in a way she had never been.

  When she opened her eyes, she was surprised to see Thimeon smile. “I have not, have I?” he said. “Then let me tell you.”

  2

  VOICES

  Thimeon took a deep breath. Every member of the company was silent now. Every gaze was fixed on him as he told them what their enemy had said. “The Daegmon was not pleased. ‘You have come back,’ it said. It’s hard to explain.” He paused, and again Elynna could sympathize with his struggle. It was ironic that Thimeon had that task now. Thimeon, whose love she had repeatedly rejected. And at times, because she had rejected his love, she had also rejected his help. And yet had never been free of her need for that help even as she had feared it.

  Or perhaps it was not his help she feared but his hope. A hope that could so easily disappoint. A hope that even now seemed so fragile. In the voice of their enemy Thimeon was now tasting the fear and uncertainty that had gripped Elynna from the moment she had first felt its terrible presence? Would he also taste the guilt and responsibility Elynna felt at the destruction of her home and the breaking of her family? The pain and suffering she’d endured because her gift had not been strong enough?

  Thimeon’s voice grew quieter as he continued. “It spoke to me as though it knew me. But I don’t think it recognized me from our previous battles. This was something deeper. I think it recognized my power. Or, rather, the power of this talisman—this stone. It spoke as though it knew me from long ago. That was my impression, anyway. At the time, though, I was so surprised to hear a voice that I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t even realize the voice was only in my own head. The Daegmon went on to say it tasted my power and I could not hide. I was confused and afraid. But I sensed that my enemy also was afraid. Or perhaps not afraid but just uncertain. It hesitated as though waiting for something from me. I don’t know how such a thought would have come to me, but it dawned on me that I held some small advantage in that. If I hid my own confusion, then perhaps I might gain some information from our enemy. If it was talking to me, I might ask questions of it. If nothing else, I could stall the battle to let my companions get into place.”

  “I remember you talking,” Theo interjected. “But I didn’t know who you were talking with, and my attention was focused on the enemy. This all came at the start while we were running over to join you. In the heat of the battle, I forgot all about that.”

  Thimeon nodded. “Yes. At the beginning before it attacked. It thought I had some power, but then it realized it had made a mistake—that I was not who it thought, or that I did not have any power.”

  “But you do have power,” said Tienna, the lithe Plainswoman. The beautiful huntress. Elynna’s closest friend—and perhaps the only member of the company whom the others respected as much or more than Thimeon. Until that moment, Tienna had remained silent. Now she spoke, and her face held a look of wonder as she stared at him. “There can be no mistake.”

  Thimeon shook his head. “I tell you again—this is not like your gift of healing, Tienna. Nor like the gifts of power that Cane or Cathros wield. Your power comes from within you somehow. It is with you all the time. You feel health and illness as palpable things. When you heal another, it is something of yourself that you give. And something of the other you take into yourself. I experienced that the day you healed your own leg. The power I felt in battle was not mine.” He held up the pendant for all to see. The stone no longer glowed. Whatever energy had pulsed through it during battle was gone. Yet it still seemed to gather up the morning light in the grove and return it as something new, like the calm waters of a very deep pool under a midday sun. “My powers came from this stone. If I had not had this in battle, I would have had no power.”

  The others stared silently. After a moment, Cane, who stood just a step away from Thimeon, reached over and took hold of the pendant. For a moment Elynna feared he meant to pull it away, but he only lifted it a few inches and examined it, leaving the chain still in Thimeon’s grip. “It was not just you who felt power,” Cane acknowledged. “I could feel my own power increase in the presence of this talisman. With just a thought, my blade flamed bright and hot. I struck our enemy with greater potency than I have ever felt.”

  “Could it be our imprisonment has worked out for our good?”

  Everybody turned and looked for the voice. It was the quiet dark-skinned Beth who had spoken. Though she had been in the company from the earliest days, Elynna had only recently gotten to know anything about her. She was from a wheat-gathering tribe of the Plains—a tribe that did not plant or sow but trusted in nature to provide. Or in the All-Maker, as some of them said. They harvested the mysterious wild grains appearing each year in a different place. It was a life Elynna could not fathom. Nor was it easy to think of the ordeal of her own capture and imprisonment
in Citadel—her near execution—as having brought about any good. And yet . . .

  “It would appear so,” Cathros replied, and Elynna could no longer disagree.

  Cane gave a loud laugh. “The Daegmon fled from us. We now have the power we were looking for to overcome it. We have not only gained another of the gifted,” he said, nodding toward Noaem, “we have also gained a new weapon that increases all of our powers. The Daegmon cannot stand against us now.”

  “You speak as if there was only one enemy,” Thimeon said.

  Everybody except Elynna turned to Thimeon. Their expressions were of surprise and dismay. But Elynna had not only heard what their foe had spoken to Thimeon, she heard the words of Cathwain. The implications of Thimeon’s words were no longer a surprise to her.

  “Then there are more than one?” Noab asked. Noab was Noaem’s brother— another of the Ceadani, and also another of the gifted. He could sense truth and falseness in the words of others just as Tienna could sense health and sickness.

  “I don’t know of any other explanation for what we now know and have heard,” Thimeon answered. “When the Daegmon spoke, it kept referring to ‘us.’ And when it departed, it was not so much in defeat but rather as if to go get aid. We believe already that the king’s advisor, Koranth, is somehow kin to the Daegmon. Then too, there were the hints in the ancient book. I could scourge myself thrice over for having left it there. I had just begun to read it when the prince reappeared.”

  “The prince?” Lluach asked in surprise. Elynna remembered that Lluach had not been in prison and had not yet heard the full story of their escape. He did not know about the help Prince Dhan had given them. It was only a few days ago, but it seemed like forever since they had escaped the dungeons of Citadel and fled northwestward up the bluffs and into the Plains. The escape may have proven impossible had it not been for the aid of the prince, who acted against the will of his own father.