I sat down on the ground next to Donn’s dead body and I cried. The raw emotions of betrayal by Garit and Donn broke my already fragile heart. Two of my friends had never really been my friends. They were my enemies.
And my one enemy, Syrani, turned out to be a friend.
The soft nudging against my shoulder brought me out of my sorrowful reverie. Faraway forcefully bumped me and I almost fell forward. He kept on with his onslaught until I was on my feet again and moving away from Donn. A few seconds later, two of our guards had come to carry his body away.
I walked back into the camp and searched for Garit. He was wrapped in brown burlap and already tied up with twine. But I had to know. What if he carried some clue about the Septori—something we’d missed? I had lost my knife last night in the battle, so I borrowed Hemi’s to saw away at the twine.
It took every ounce of my strength to not look into his face as I searched inside his pockets, boots, and socks. Looking for instructions, plans, a name. I found nothing. I started to pull up his shirt and Hemi put a warning hand on my shoulder.
“What are you doing, li’l Thalia? You should let the dead rest.”
“I need to know if he bears the mark. The brand of the Septori. It looks like this.” I picked up a stick and quickly drew a circle in the ground with two slashes through it. “I need to know if he was telling the truth.”
“Searching the body of a dead man is not for our clan leader’s daughter. I’ll do it.” Hemi leaned forward and very carefully began to search Garit’s body for a brand.
It was a rash idea, but I needed to know how long Garit had been betraying me. He couldn’t have hidden the brand on his back, otherwise his soldier friends would have seen it. Hemi searched carefully, shielding Garit from me. I could tell when Hemi found the brand because he let out a long sigh. He re-wrapped the body and came to stand beside me.
“Where was it?” I asked.
“Upper thigh,” he answered and turned to walk away.
“Was it an old mark or new?” I called out loudly after him.
“Li’l Wolf, you don’t need to know. He’s your enemy.”
I spun on Hemi and raised my voice. “Old or new?”
Hemi looked at me, his voice filled with sadness. “It’s newer, a few months old, I’d say.”
My hands trembled and I grounded myself with hate—with fury toward Garit and Donn. Both men had gotten under my defenses so easily, with a joke, with a gift, with friendship. Donn’s mark had been old, Garit’s betrayal recent. Both deaths had been hard, but I couldn’t let them be my weakness.
“Call everyone that is left to gather. We will check everyone for the brand. Now!”
Hemi gave me a long look before he nodded his head to obey. Minutes later everyone had been gathered. Hemi helped check the men, while Syrani and I checked the females. We had hung up makeshift clotheslines with blankets over them to keep some privacy. After the two little girls were checked, Syrani stepped into the changing area and started to unbutton her dress.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“I may not trust you. But I want to give you no reason not to trust me.” She pulled her long hair up over her shoulders and subjected herself to the same humiliation that we had put the others through. I could see her swallow in nervousness, but she was clean. No mark upon her.
Not to be outdone by Syrani’s bravery, I let her check me. Satisfied, we started to get dressed.
“You match now.” Syrani’s back was to me as she ran her fingers through her hair and began to braid her long blonde hair. I had no idea to what she was referring. “You know, your eyes. They’re not so freaky now. They’re actually quite pretty.”
I hadn’t known that my other eye had changed. Inwardly I groaned, but I was able to be nice. “Thanks, I guess.”
“Do you know why they do that?” she asked causally. Her hands deftly wound the braid into a bun on top of her hair, and with only a few hairpins she was able to keep it secure. The style, though simple, made her look less like a spoiled girl and more like a meek young woman.
“No, it started happening when I lost control of my power.”
“What’s the chance of it happening to me? I think I would look nice with silver eyes. It takes some getting used to, but they are quite fetching.” She turned to look at me, her head cocked sideways as she studied me.
“Pretty slim,” I sighed.
“Oh well. I would hate to be too beautiful.”
I snorted in reply. Syrani didn’t notice. Loud voices greeted us as we headed back to the group.
“What’s going on?” I yelled over the din.
One of the soldiers had a male kitchen servant on his knees, a sword pointed at his neck. “Narn. He’s burned the mark off.”
“I did no such thing. I burned my arm this morning when I was moving the hot coals from one fire to make another…away from them,” Narn wouldn’t look in the direction of the few dead bodies of the Septori or of our own, laid out very close to the central cooking fire.
“Yeah right. You dropped the coal on your upper arm?” the soldier said sarcastically. The soldier pulled up Narn’s sleeve to reveal a large red circle burn. It was still swollen, an angry red blister had appeared, and the edges had burned black. The smell was rank and the sight of the yellow pus made me sick, but I tried to look closely for any sign of a previous mark. It was just too hard to tell.
I wasn’t like Adept Lorna and I couldn’t read him.
“Kill him,” Karni spoke softly.
I was surprised at her young voice and the certainty with which she demanded death. Syrani looked to me with a question in her eyes. Neither of us knew what to do.
“Please, please don’t kill me! I’m innocent, I swear,” Narn cried out and fell forward to the ground, burying his face in his hands. “I didn’t do nothing wrong. I’m not a killer. I’m not like one of the others.”
“Tell me what you know of last night,” I demanded angrily.
It took Narn a few tries before he was able to calm himself to answer. “Nothing out of the normal. We made dinner, like normal. Same stuff we make at the Citadel. Nothing new, soup, bread.”
“Did you notice anything strange?” Syrani prodded.
Narn started to cry again. “N-n-nothing. Except that Donn wanted to bring out a case of cider. He was very adamant that everyone get a cup. He said he was trying out a new recipe.”
I thought back to last night. And how everyone had happily been indulging in the cider. Hemi had brought me a cup and ended up drinking my portion. So that was why I hadn’t drunk any. I looked to Syrani and flat out asked her, “Why didn’t you drink the cider?”
A blush ran up her face and she refused to look at me. “I’m allergic to cinnamon. So I never ever drink any cider. I break out in an ugly rash.
I remembered when she tripped me at the Citadel when I was carrying a pitcher of cider. The drink went everywhere, but not a single drop spilled on Syrani. I guess, if something as simple as cinnamon could mar her beauty, she would be extremely aware of it.
“Well, I suppose that leaves us no choice.” I looked over at Narn’s pitiful form. Snot and tears ran down his nose. “Leave him with a few days of rations and no horse. He can find shelter in that time, but he can’t do us any harm if we leave him.”
