“Oh, you look so much in control of the situation!” Olikea snarled. She glared at Epiny and kept the obsidian blade at the ready as she backed away. “Someday, Jhernian woman. Someday it will be just you and me.” Then she turned angrily on Likari. “Why are you still standing there? He told us to go wait by the stream. And that is what we must do.”
“He told her to go away, and she and the boy are leaving,” I hastily interpreted before Epiny could look at me. I wanted her to keep her wary gaze on Olikea. “But she threatened that someday she’d get back at you.”
“That’s fine,” Epiny said almost absently. There was strain in her voice. She kept her gaze fixed on Olikea and Likari, watching them until they were out of sight. Crouching over me, pressing the knife to my throat, was uncomfortable for her. Her pregnant belly got in her way. I could see that it was hard for her to remain still, the hatchet blade pressed lightly to my throat, and all her weight on her bent knees.
“And now what?” Lisana asked in a low voice. “What will you do now? Do you think this is over? That Soldier’s Boy will let you just walk away after you have threatened the forest?”
Epiny blew the hair away from her eyes and then looked up at Lisana. “And do you think it’s a good idea to ask me that question while I’m in this position? The simplest way for me to resolve it would be to cut his throat and go my way. By the time they realize he’s not coming, I’ll be long gone.”
“Do you think the forest would allow you to escape that easily?” Lisana countered.
Epiny sighed. “No. I don’t think the forest or the magic will allow any of us to escape. It wants the impossible. It wants to reverse the flow of the years; it wants to go back to when Gernians came here only to trade for furs and then to leave. It won’t happen. It can’t happen. And as long as the magic demands that, there will never be a resolution. Not for any of us.”
I looked from Epiny’s bowed head to the sweat drops rolling slowly down my own face and then up at Lisana. Epiny was right. As the thought came to me, I felt as if my existence wavered. The magic was weakening. Lisana was weary and there was little magic left in my own body for me to draw on.
“Epiny! I’m fading. I’m sorry. I did what I thought was wise, but it helped no one. Not even me. Farewell. I loved all of you the best that I could. Get away if you can. Get all of you away.”
Suddenly I was in my body, looking up at Epiny. I think she saw me in Soldier’s Boy’s eyes, because she said softly, “You stopped him from killing me. Remember that you could do that. Believe you’ll eventually find that strength again, that you’ll master him again. Until then, I’m sorry, Nevare. I’m sure you’d do the same thing in my place. And you know, you really deserve this.”
She lifted the hatchet from my throat, but before I could stir, she reversed her grip on it. The blunt end of it hit me squarely between the eyes, and I knew nothing more.
CHAPTER EIGHT
QUICK-WALK
When I became aware again, Epiny was gone. I didn’t immediately realize that. With Soldier’s Boy, I felt woozy and disoriented and unable to focus my eyes. My gut heaved with nausea. Being struck on the head hard enough to cause unconsciousness is never a joke, and my body had endured two such assaults in rapid succession. I could barely breathe past the thickness in my mouth, and I could not stir my limbs. I felt Soldier’s Boy’s frustration as he used yet more of his rapidly dwindling magic to speed the body’s healing. Even so, we lay motionless and queasy for a good hour before he felt well enough to sit up.
That was when he discovered that Epiny had taken a few precautions before she left. The leather strap of her bag was tied securely in my mouth as a gag, and strips torn from the draggled hem of her dress were knotted about my wrists and ankles. Soldier’s Boy rolled onto his side and began working against his bonds. Tree Woman spoke to me as he did so.
“Your cousin is more resourceful than I thought. Truly, she would have made a better servant to the magic.”
Little as I wanted to serve the magic, the comparison still stung. “Maybe if my self hadn’t been divided, I would have been a better tool for the magic. Or a better soldier.”
“That’s likely,” she admitted easily. Soldier’s Boy didn’t hear her. He wasn’t looking at her tree stump, so I couldn’t see her. But I could imagine her gentle, rueful smile. I hated what she had done to me. I hated how the magic had twisted my life away from my boyish dreams of a glorious career of a cavalla officer, of a gentle well-bred wife and a home of my own. I’d forfeited it all when I’d battled Lisana and lost. She had been the engineer of my downfall. Yet I still felt tenderness toward Lisana, my Tree Woman. It was no longer based entirely on Soldier’s Boy’s love for her. I sensed in her a kindred spirit, someone who had come unwilling to the magic’s service but, like me, saw a need for it.