The Shattered Circle

4. The Road Home

It took me two days to decide what to do with Shira. I had called her a prisoner, but something about the idea of locking her in some hole to be ransomed back or forgotten grated on me. Besides, eventually Varys would find out and take her, whatever my wishes. I had thwarted him so far, but that was not guaranteed forever. If this little light was to understand her new world, part of that awakening would include learning to harness her own strength.

Vex's thin eyebrow arched skeptically when I told her my intention. "You mean to make an assassin for yourself, my lady? Sidon and Lera will use any training and knowledge you give her against you."

I shrugged. "Should I leave her lying around helplessly as bait?"

"I was thinking as a meal."

"She's skin and bones, Vex." I cinched the saddle down another notch on the horse I'd taken from Sidon's favorite commander. Tavuus was a fine warhorse, with a temperament much more suited to me than the soft idiot he'd been previously saddled with.

"She looks more tender than stringy," the wight said in a low voice, glancing back at Shira.

The young woman seemed slightly better than she had been, dressed in one of my spare shirts and fitted leather pants, with a thick doublet of blood-red wool to keep away some of the chill. Her appearance was almost strange to me, rosy-cheeked from the cold in a way undead never were. Her eyes still watched Vex and I fearfully, circled by shadows from the cruelties of Varys that haunted her in her sleep. She was slightly built and smaller than me, with more girlish curves. I had long ago lost that softness and my northern blood meant I stood a full head above her. My youth was spent eating meat and chasing storms in the barbarian north, while she had grown on a farmer's diet with not much in the way of spare food.

I turned to face Vex and her eager hunger. "No. That's my final answer."

"Very well," Vex conceded, clearly disappointed. "Shall I fetch some rope?"

"She rides with me," I said pointedly. "A leash will not be required."

Vex pursed thin lips. "A prisoner, my lady?" Clearly her opinion was that I should be dragging the young woman behind my horse, if only to avoid getting peasant on my person. Her minor noble roots had a habit of showing. To her, I was royalty above all others except the King in Black himself.

"She'd slow us down and I would rather be back at the Sanctum sooner than later. She cannot move as tirelessly as the undead or as fast as a horse."

My faithful wight sighed. "As you wish, my lady."

I turned and whistled sharply, catching Shira's attention. "Over here, priestess." The last word fell off my lips with a bitterness I made no effort to disguise.

The truth was that I felt conflicted every time I looked at her. She was a servant of the same gods who sent chosen one after chosen one to end me...but she was also young and painfully naive, perhaps more so than the boy I had cut down. Could I not afford her the same softness I felt towards him? Surely she was a pawn of the Light too. She had been duped by them, manipulated into aiding and abetting leaders like Lord Sidon and his liege, Princess Lera.

Maybe that was why I thought of her protection even as I knew my efforts would strip away that coveted innocence already damaged by Varys. Was that cruel of me, to make her see the world as I knew it was?

Probably, but cruelty was in my blood and bone.

Shira approached, muscles tight like wire. I could see her ready to flee, though she still glanced around nervously at Vex and towards Varys's section of the camp, now pulled up and ready to move. We had stayed in one place for just long enough for Vex's seconds to carry out my order: the road to the border was lined with heads. Some of the enemy army had survived, withdrawing out of the Eternal Kingdom with hungry undead gnashing at their heels. The survivors would have scars and nightmares for the rest of their days.