But her gaze had slid past him, to the jug of wine on the table. She strode over, poured full a goblet and drank it down in three quick swallows. ‘Are you too drunk to fuck me, Hunn Raal?’
Said the woman who just slapped me. ‘Probably.’
‘Men are so pathetic.’
‘I have other things on my mind.’
She refilled her goblet and then faced him. ‘Will Urusander take me?’
‘As what?’
Instead of the anger he expected from his careless retort, she laughed. ‘Now that would ruin your plans, wouldn’t it, Hunn Raal? Don’t you think I have had my fill of old soldiers? They are nothing but dumb need and you have no idea how tiring that is. No, Mother Dark is welcome to him.’
His nod was sharp. ‘So we’re clear on that. Good.’
‘A god now stirs the mud of Dorssan Ryl,’ she said, eyes narrowing, watching for his reaction over the rim of the goblet as she drank. ‘It was dead but is dead no longer. What ancient laws have been broken this day?’
‘Was this too a gift of the Azathanai woman? Then let us be plain. These were not gifts. A city flooded? Ice in the Citadel? They amount to an assault upon Kurald Galain.’
She shrugged. ‘Semantics.’
‘Hardly. You are speaking to an old soldier, remember? Dumb we may be but us soldiers know the answer to such things.’
‘Will you declare war upon the Azathanai?’ She snorted, somewhat drunkenly. ‘Not even Urusander is that foolish. Besides, the woman vanished — as if she opened a door in the very air itself, and then simply stepped through. The power of that made Mother Dark recoil.’
‘Then we are indeed threatened, High Priestess.’
She waved a dismissive hand, turning to refill the goblet. ‘We can do nothing about it. The Deniers will crawl out of the woods now, eager to lay sacrifice upon the banks of the river. Eager to walk the shore.’
‘And Mother Dark permits this?’
‘She is weak, Hunn Raal — why do you think she hides in darkness? Why do you think she draws close the three most feared warriors among the highborn and proclaims them her children? And why’ — she faced him — ‘did she take Lord Draconus to her bed? Sons may be all very well, but a man such as Draconus is another matter entirely. You understand nothing, Hunn Raal. You and your ridiculous plans.’
He saw the challenge in her eyes, glittering behind the alcohol, and felt something stir in him. She is like me. She is the same as me, exactly the same. ‘You will take this to Urusander, High Priestess,’ he said. ‘You will tell him of the threat now facing Kurald Galain. You will explain to him her weakness, her vulnerability. But more than this, you will show him what must be done. The purity of your skin is now a symbol — the light within you is a power. Above all, High Priestess, tell him this: in darkness there is ignorance. In light there is justice.’ He moved closer to her. ‘Remember those words. This is what you must do.’
She leaned against the table behind her, a smirk playing on her full lips. ‘I am to be a beacon, then? Still a High Priestess, but now in the name of light?’
‘It is within you.’
She glanced away, still smiling. ‘ Liossan. And who, then, are our enemies?’
‘All who seek to hurt Mother Dark — we will fight in her name and who could challenge this?’
‘And Draconus?’
‘He but uses her. Another way of hurting.’ He leaned over to grasp the jug of wine, and in the movement their faces came close, almost touching for a moment before he drew back. But he had smelled the sweet wine on her breath. ‘The old religion is a direct threat. The Deniers. The brothers and sisters of the Monasteries.’
‘There are more of them than you might imagine, Hunn Raal.’
‘All to the better,’ he said.
‘Sheccanto and Skelenal could even make claim to the throne.’
‘I wish they would. That would settle the sides quickly enough.’
She reached out and stroked his cheek, where she had slapped only a short time before. ‘We will plunge Kurald Galain into civil war, Hunn Raal. You and I, and all that we now do.’
But he shook his head. ‘We prevent one, High Priestess. Even better, once we have purged the realm, the end to all conflict is then offered to Mother Dark. By taking the hand of Lord Urusander. She will see that she needs such a man at her side. Strength to answer her weakness, resolve to stand firm against her whims. Light and Dark, in balance.’
‘I want Emral dead.’