"Then let Persius stop them."
"Persius has never been very good at stopping the Amalites, Jabone. Only your madra was ever able to really stop them. She will stop them now, again."
"And put you and my mother and my friends in danger to do so, and we are safe here."
"Today, today we are safe." Arvon's voice was harsh. When he turned around in the pool and looked up at Jabone it was obvious that he was out of patience with him. "That will not last if they are allowed to grow in numbers. You think you have seen the worst of them but you have not. I have, I have seen them so numerous that no one army could have stopped them. You don't realize how lucky you are to be able to fight. Look at me son, really look at me."
He did and saw for the first time the age on his fadra's face. His shock must have shown because Arvon smiled and said, "That's right. I'm an old man. I'm half human and apparently I age like them and not like the Katabull, just my rotten luck. I'm older than the rest of your parents and I didn't hesitate to go to the territories when we thought you were in danger. I ran right into that battle my sword blazing a trail through the Amalites for you my son. I left Dustan here as I have done in the past not knowing whether it would be the last time I saw him or not and ran off with Tarius to do battle. Nothing could have kept me here while I thought you were in danger. I fought well and now I can hardly walk. If the battle had lasted more than a couple of hours I wouldn't have made it to the end. Your madra had to have me put on a wagon to get me out of the field and she's been mostly half carrying me for the boat ride and since we've been here."
"I'm sorry Fadra I didn't know . . . "
"I didn't tell you to gain your pity. You haven't noticed because you've had bigger things to worry about than your old fadra. I want to go back to the territories and fight the Amalites even though it would mean once again leaving Dustan for what could be months depending on the siege.
"I know exactly how you feel, because when Braxton . . . " He stopped, took a breath and went on. "When Braxton brought me back from the field, me sick with fever, with my leg nearly rotted off and my life hanging in the balance with only your madre's will to save me, I never wanted to go back into battle ever again. She told me I'd get my fight back and I did. And now . . . I can't go with her any more. I can't fight any more. That battle was my last one. If I try to go back and fight again I will die or worse yet cause someone else's death because my speed and my strength are no more." He seemed near tears. "So I won't go back to the territories with Tarius and I won't fight and I feel rather like a horse that's been put out to pasture. Something worthless kept around for sake of affection."
"There is nothing worthless about you Fadra."
He laughed, patted Jabone's leg, then turned away from him. "Part of me says that I still have much to give. But the part of me that has always been a fighter says that the only thing worse than an old sword slinger that can't fight is a young one that won't."
Tarius was once again talking to the girl. "Daily baths and treatments have done you well, and when his mother took your stitches out yesterday and Jabone could see your skin wasn't going to fall apart because you had healed, well I think he finally feels like you are going to wake up . . . What's that you say? Oh, aye, he does worry too much . . . Oh, no no, not like me. I never worry. That would be his other mother. He did explain that, didn't he?" She sighed. "Oh girl, please don't wake up an imbecile. I promised I'd kill you if you did, and I think he'd happily care for you if you drooled and cussed walls for the remainder of both of your lives . . . And your father, how would I explain to him that I had taken one of his children to the Kartik and then killed her? Though seriously why he should worry when he has so many I don't know."
"But I'm his favorite."
"Well that would just figure then wouldn't it?" Tarius stopped talking and stared into the girl's face. Kasiria's eyes were still closed.
Have I just been pretending to talk to her for so many days now that I'm hearing things or did she really speak?
"Girl, did you say something?" There was no response. Tarius looked quickly around and then got right in the girl's face and screamed, "Bats!" There was no sign of movement, not so much as a flickering eyelash. Tarius took a deep breath and let it out then mumbled. "Girl's going to be a blithering imbecile, old tired war lord going to be a blithering imbecile."
"If you're going to make an assault on a cave you're going to have to send a unit in to scout it out first," the girl said, and this time Tarius had seen her lips move.
"Jabone!" she yelled out. "Jabone get in here now!"
* * *
Kasiria opened her eyes and at first could see nothing but bright light. Then she blinked and then she blinked again, and then she rubbed her eyes because she was pretty sure she couldn't be seeing what she thought she was seeing because the person standing over her with the scar that ran down the length of her face, a small one on her chin and one that ran across her throat could only be . . .
"Are you Tarius the Black?"
"Ya ha!" the woman screamed out, and then she shouted again. "Jabone!" Her voice was abnormally deep for a woman, probably because of her throat injury.
"Are you?" Kasiria asked again.
"Am I what . . . Oh yes, yes I am Tarius the Black." She laughed out loud then. "I am so glad you aren't an imbecile."
"Madra what is wrong?" Jabone asked, panic in his voice as he came sliding into the room.
The woman smiled at her son and then pointed to Kasiria. "Nothing is wrong, Jabone, your woman is awake and she's not an imbecile."
Jestia came into the room and walked up to look down on Kasiria. She seemed to be looking into her eyes. "How do you know she's not an imbecile?" she asked.
"Because, as she woke she was talking battle strategy," Tarius said.
"How very romantic," Jestia said, rolling her eyes. She looked at Kasiria and smiled. "Nice to see you again. I'll go get Jazel."
Jabone dropped to his knees beside the bed and took her hand. "Kasiria can you hear me?" he yelled.
"People in the Kartik can hear you my love." She laughed and then felt a pain in her right side, not bad but there. Jabone just started kissing her forehead over and over again.
"I'll give you my son was screaming, girl, but of course people in the Kartik could hear him because you are in the Kartik," Tarius the Black said.
Kasiria wondered now as she looked at the woman that she had known immediately that she was Tarius the Black. Except for the scars and that she looked so much like her son she didn't look at all as she had expected her to look, and then she knew why she had known her. "I recognized your voice," she said.
"Madra has been telling you stories," Jabone said, having stopped kissing her to just look at her.
"Jabone, what are we doing in the Kartik? What happened?"
A Jethrikian woman walked in followed by Jestia and Ufalla and Jestia said, "She doesn't remember what happened. Well doesn't that just figure? I nearly killed myself saving her life and she doesn't remember."
"I failed you Kasiria, I failed you," Jabone said, crying on her shoulder, as on her other side Ufalla was hugging her
"He couldn't catch an arrow," Jestia explained with a shrug. "His mother could and he couldn't and he's just been whining and crying like he is now in a most unpleasant way for days. He's been half crazy for all this time and you wake up mumbling battle strategy." She turned to face Ufalla and said, "Remember this, if you should ever be in a comma for weeks and you wake up and are saying anything but how much you love me, I'm going to smack you right back into a coma."
Ufalla smiled and whispered in Kasiria's ear. "At least then I could get a little rest." Then she released Kasiria.
Kasiria smiled and then frowned as she finally remembered the battle, the arrow, Jabone's face looking as if it had been shattered, and then nothing but dreams, vivid dreams, wonderful dreams.
There were way too many of the enemy. What had Hellibolt said? Help was on the way. She had thought he meant her father had sent men but she quickly realized what must have happened. "The Marching Night came to save us." Had someone told her that? Had she heard it? How long had she been asleep and . . .
She touched her chest where the arrow had gone in and through the cloth of the gown she was wearing she could feel a scar, a scar that felt healed.
Jabone was still crying and when she realized why he was still crying she felt horrible. "Oh Jabone." She patted his back. "It wasn't your fault."
"It sort of was," Jestia said, and she and Tarius and the older woman all glared at Jestia. She just shrugged, completely unaffected by their disapproval and said, "Well it was. When a witch tells you not to do something you should listen."
The Jethrikian woman had shoved Ufalla out of the way and now seemed to be doing what Jestia had done which was looking in her eyes as if she could see something odd if she looked hard enough. "Are you Jena?" Kasiria asked.
The woman stood up. She and Tarius looked at each other and then they started to laugh. They embraced each other and laughed even harder until the other woman pushed Tarius away and said, "Well it isn't that funny, Tarius."
"That's not my mother," Jabone said, wiping his nose on his sleeve. "That's the witch Jazel."
Kasiria touched the scar again, and thought how odd it was.
It's like going to sleep in the middle of a nightmare and waking up in the middle of a fairy tale with all these characters I've heard about all my life. It doesn't feel quite real. The only thing that does is the scar.
* * *
Jena had been outside in one of the gardens when she heard the commotion. She came at a run and then somewhere in the house as she heard them all talking and could tell it was "good" news she just stopped.
She has woken up and she is fine. This is good, this will make Jabone happy.
She gritted her teeth and shut her eyes closed hard.
My son, our only child, and his child, one in a multitude, and if he hadn't done what he did to us I might have borne my own child. We might have had a house full. Tarius doesn't understand, and I can't tell her the real reason I still hate him so is because the son I carried lies buried in the ground in the Jethrik. And he had more children than he wanted and now this girl is going to take our only child, the child Tarius gave me, and it's like a knife twisting in my gut.
She took a deep breath and reminded herself.
I am not my parents and Jabone is not us and this girl is not Persius and all children grow up and find a mate and then they don't need their parents any more and . . . Jabone hasn't needed us in a long time. But I still need to hold my baby.
She thought maybe she needed to go walk in the garden a little longer before she faced her but then she looked up and Tarius was standing in front of her.
"Are you all right?" she asked, wiping a tear off Jena's cheek.
"I'm fine," Jena said, but her voice was choked.
Tarius kissed her forehead and said, "Do you remember what you said when he wanted to go to the territories and I wasn't going to allow it?"
"I don't want to remember because doubtless you're about to make me eat my words," Jena said with a smile.
"You said it's his time. Jena, it's their time not our time, let the past stay in the past. Go in and see her, and what you'll see is a brilliant girl who is very much in love with our son. Go in and see her while she's awake with expression on her face and you'll see why he loves her so much."
Jena nodded, steeled herself, and started walking for the room with Tarius right behind her. When she looked at the girl, she took a double take.
Tarius bent over and whispered in her ear. "She looks very like you did when I first met you."
* * *
"My brother is fine," Ufalla assured Kasiria. "He and Eric both made it . . . "
"Anyone else?" Kasiria asked.
"No," Jabone said sadly. "Only the six of us."
"Amalite scum," Kasiria cursed under her breath. "Can I sit up?" she asked Jezel.
"You can do anything you feel up to," Jezel said. Then turning to the group said, "Well I've got work to do. I will check on her later."
Jabone helped her to sit up. There was a twinge in her chest but nothing more. She looked at him and saw how haggard and broken he looked. She cupped his face in her hands and looked into his bloodshot eyes. "Oh, Jabone, I just lay here and dreamt and you had all my pain for me." Then she kissed him gently on the lips and let him go.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Jestia asked Ufalla.
"Maybe it means mind your own business. Come on let's leave them alone. I'll make it worth your while." Ufalla winked and took Jestia's arm and Jestia didn't protest, just allowed herself to be led away. "Kasiria we're glad you're well," Ufalla said as they vanished out the door.
"That Jestia is quite a piece of work," Kasiria said.
"Yes she is," Jabone said seriously. Then he looked up towards the door, smiled, and said, "Kasiria, this is my mother."
Kasiria was in awe as she watched Jena walk in on Tarius's arm. "You are the greatest of all Jethrikian women. I have heard so much about you," she said, unable to stop herself gushing.
"And I'm sure all true," Tarius said. "Jena, Kasiria, Kasiria this is my dearest love, Jena."
Jena looked from Kasiria to the medallion that hung around Jabone's neck, and Kasiria knew that they knew and she couldn't hold their eyes.
"Kasiria," Tarius prompted, and she looked at her, "As long as you are bound to our son, you are our child. Isn't that right, Jena?"
Jena took a deep breath, expelled it, then said if a bit grudgingly, "Yes."
"I . . . I have got to go to the privy," Kasiria said, the sudden need driving out everything else.
"Can you walk?" Tarius asked.
Before she had a chance to answer Jabone had jumped to his feet, picked her up, and lifted her out of the bed. "No . . . I don't want you to take me," Kasiria said.