Karis looked away, and for a long time neither of them said anything. In her full strength and clarity of mind, Zanja might have been able to interpret this silence, turning its raw material into a thread of her own spinning. But now she could only wait, until Karis took a breath and continued, “That I have a purposeful life now, in spite of smoke, is largely thanks to Norina’s overbearing, cold‑hearted, unscrupulous meddling.”
Zanja said, “You owe me no explanations, Karis.”
“No, I am trying to explain to myself why I would follow her advice in opposition to my own–wisdom.” She paused again, as though astonished to hear herself use such a word. When she continued, it seemed she was arguing with herself. “I know it was wisdom, to save your life. And I would have done it much sooner, if not for Norina’s interference.”
Zanja said bleakly, “But now you will accept her interference once again. And what am I to do with this life, now that you have given it to me? If I am not to serve you, then what am I to do?”
Karis said, “Serve Shaftal, if you must serve.”
“I am just one warrior… .”
“Is it an Ashawala’i habit, to display a false humility? It makes me wonder if you take me for a fool.”
Zanja sat silent, and then, as Karis began to apologize, interrupted her to say, “I am not often admonished for having too little self‑importance. But I might admonish you for the same thing.”
“Oh, I know that I am important,” said Karis bitterly. “Not a day passes that I am allowed to forget it.”
When Norina came into sight, skiing behind the raven that flapped ahead of her like a black rag blowing over the snow, Karis walked part of the way to greet her, and they stood for a long time, leaning in each other’s arms, as though, without the other, neither could stand.
Almost as soon as they ended their embrace, they began to shout at each other. Zanja, able to hear the tone of their voices but not the words, turned again to look at them only when they both fell silent. The sun shone full on Karis’ stark face. Norina, in shadow, seemed grimly resolute. She had taken off the skis, and carried them on her shoulder. Karis bent down and took the satchel Norina had dropped upon the ground. It seemed a gesture of capitulation.
They turned, and started down the snowy hillside. Norina’s head came to Karis’ shoulder, and she took two steps to Karis’s one. She wore a leather doublet over her sweat‑stained wool longshirt; from a distance, it looked like armor. Karis plodded beside her, head down.
“I’m taking Karis away tomorrow.” Norina’s voice was tight with controlled rage. “You’ll stay here for the winter, with me and J’han.”
“That’s very kind of you.” Zanja made no attempt to conceal her irony. She had half‑expected the command, for, much as Norina might hate it, she had no choice except to shelter Zanja. But there was no point in pretending to be happy about such an uninviting prospect as a winter spent in Norina’s company. Little wonder Norina was so ill‑tempered, Zanja realized. Even politeness, which was sometimes the only thing that made human company tolerable, was completely transparent to her.
“She has asked me to help you find a place,” Norina said.
Zanja glanced curiously, not at Norina, but at Karis, who had pressed her lips together as though she didn’t trust what might come out of her mouth. “A place in what?”
“One of the Paladin companies, perhaps.”
“South Hill Company,” Karis said.
Norina took in her breath and released it. “Karis–”
“The commander has a good reputation.”
“Have you put this matter into my hands or haven’t you?”
Karis replied just as sharply. “Are you going to do as I ask, or aren’t you?”
There was no capitulation here, and Zanja was hard put to sort out which of them was giving orders to whom. She did not know enough about the old Lilterwess rankings, but a Truthken, as far as she could understand, outranked everyone, for in contested matters the law must take precedence. But there was no place in that old system for earth or water elementals; their very rarity precluded the creation of an Order to restrain them. No rule or way existed for Karis to follow, no law that gave Norina dominance. Karis could do as she liked.
“You should think,” Norina said, “of what you’re doing.”
“I have. It makes no sense.”
There was no possible reasonable response to senselessness. Karis could not be physically restrained, either. Norina seemed nonplused.
Reluctant to put herself in the middle of a dangerous disagreement that she did not even understand, Zanja spoke cautiously. “ Serrainim, I beg you not to sacrifice your friendship over so unworthy a cause.”
They both looked at her as though they had forgotten her. Then Norina seemed to come to her senses and said quite prettily, “I beg your pardon. Of course you may not wish to join the Paladins or to concern yourself in any way with Shaftali troubles. What is it you want to do?”
“The Sainnites themselves have made this my war. But my first concern is that Karis endanger herself no further on my behalf. Last night, I placed myself under your command, and so I must agree to whatever you say, regardless of what Karis demands. So the two of you have nothing left to argue over.”
Norina said, with scarcely a hesitation. “Perhaps I might reward your acquiescence.”
At this point in a negotiation, Ashawala’i protocol required endless protests of one’s unworthiness. But such insincerity in the presence of a Truthken would have been absurd.
“Karis?” Norina prompted, with somewhat less exasperation.
“I’ll behave myself so long as you take care of her,” Karis said.
“For what your promises are worth–”
“It’s you who have sworn to make my life possible–”
“And how was I to know–”
“You’re the Truthken!”
Norina threw up her hands. “But you are beyond comprehension!”
It was, Zanja realized, a truly astonishing statement for a Truthken to make. Not until Karis collapsed onto the bench beside her and roared with laughter did Zanja realize it had been a joke.
“It wasn’t that funny,” Norina said after a while. She had leaned against the barn wall, and seemed almost despondent. “It was the truth.”
“And whose fault is that?”
Karis took Zanja’s hand again, not to hold it, but to measure it against her own. “You’re being very patient with us,” Karis said to her, “While we fight like–”
“–A couple of sisters,” Norina said dryly.
Karis glanced over her shoulder. “Loan me your dagger, Nori.”
Zanja had noticed the night before that Norina’s knife could serve as a substantial dowry. Now she saw that her fighting blade would have become an heirloom among Zanja’s people, a blade with a genealogy, passed among the generations of the katrimas lovingly and devotedly as any story of heroism and self‑sacrifice. Norina gave the dagger to Karis, and Zanja would not even touch it until Norina impatiently nodded her permission. It was a subtle weapon of austere beauty, with a blade deceptively slender and of startling substance. The metal had been folded upon itself, over and over, leaving a wavering, overlapping pattern inlaid in its shining steel, like ripples on sand. An extraordinarily skilled and patient metalsmith had sweated over, meditated upon, and lived with that blade, day in and day out, until it welded into the smith’s very dreams and became itself a vision.
“You’re cutting yourself,” Karis said.
Zanja had involuntarily closed her hand around the blade, and it had casually parted the fabric of her palm. It could have sliced all the way to bone by weight alone, and she might never have even felt it. It seemed amazing, impossible even, that the blade had no Mearish mastermark. Surely only in Mear did the smithery exist to produce such a blade. But even a Mearish mastersmith might well have been awestruck by such workmanship, unable to reproduce it or even to say exactly how it had been done.