They wandered back out to the barracks yard, where Tobin spied the wooden swords he and Tharin had used earlier in the day. "I think you"re supposed to practice with me. Want to try now?"
With some common ground established at last, they saluted each other and started in. But Ki didn"t fight in careful drills like Tharin did. He swung hard and moved in aggressively, as if they were really fighting. Tobin fought back as best he could until Ki caught him a sharp blow across the hand. Tobin yelped and stuck his fingers in his mouth without thinking to call "hold."
Ki lunged in and poked him in the belly. "I call a kill!"
Tobin grunted and grabbed at his middle with his wounded hand, trying not to let on how embarra.s.sed he was. "You"re much better than I am."
Ki grinned and clapped him on the shoulder. "Well, I had all them brothers and sisters to teach me, and Father, too. You should see me after a practice with them! Bruises all over. My sister Cytra split my lip wide open last year. I bawled like a cut shoat when my stepmother sewed it up. Look, you can still see the scar over on the left side."
Tobin leaned close and squinted at the small white line that crossed Ki"s upper lip.
"That"s a nice one, too." Ki touched his thumb to the scar on Tobin"s chin. "It looks just like Illior"s moon. Bet that makes it lucky. How"d you get it?"
Tobin jerked back. "I-I fell."
He wished that Ki was right about the scar being lucky, but he was certain it wasn"t. Just thinking about it made him feel bad.
"Well, don"t fret yourself," said Ki. "You"re just not used to my way of righting. I"ll learn-ah, teach you, if you like. I"ll go slow, too. Promise." He touched his sword to his brow and gave Tobin a bucktoothed grin. "Shall we go again, my prince?"
The bad feeling quickly pa.s.sed as he and Ki began again. This boy was different than anyone he"d ever met, except maybe Tharin. Even though he was older and obviously knew more of the world than Tobin, there was nothing behind his eyes or smile that didn"t match what he said. Tobin felt all strange inside when Ki grinned at him, but it was a good feeling, like the way he"d felt in his dream where Brother was alive.
Ki kept his word, too. He went more slowly this time, and tried to explain what he was doing and how Tobin could defend himself. In this way, Tobin saw that he was using the same thrusts and guards that Tharin had taught him.
They started slow, stepping through the positions, but soon Tobin found himself having to work to keep his guard up. Their wooden blades clacked together like a heron"s beak, and their shadows jumped and darted like moths in the moonlight.
Ki was the more aggressive fighter, but he didn"t have the control that Tharin had instilled in Tobin.
Ducking a wild swing, Tobin lunged forward and struck Ki across the ribs. The older boy dropped his sword and collapsed in an ungainly heap at his feet.
"I"m slain, Your Highness!" he gasped, pretending to hold his guts in. "Send my ashes home to my father!"
Tobin had never seen anything like this, either. It was so absurd that he laughed, hesitantly at first out of surprise, then louder because it felt so good when Ki joined in.
"d.a.m.n your ashes!" Tobin giggled, feeling giddy and wicked.
This started Ki laughing again and their voices echoed together off the courtyard walls. Ki made faces, s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up his eyes and hanging his tongue out of the side of his mouth. Tobin laughed so hard his sides hurt and his eyes watered.
"By the Four, what a racket!"
Tobin turned to find Nari and Tharin watching them from the gateway.
"You haven"t hurt him, have you, Tobin?" Nari demanded.
Tharin chuckled. "What do you say, Ki? Will you live?" Ki scrambled to his feet and bowed, "Yes, Sir Tharin."
"Come along, you two," Nari said, shooing them toward the door. "Ki"s had a long ride and you"ve been feeling ill, Tobin. It"s time you were both off to bed."
Tobin stifled the sudden urge to shout, "d.a.m.n your bed!" settling instead for an exchanged smirk with Ki. As they headed back into the house, he heard Tharin chuckle again and whisper to Nari, "You have been exiled too long, girl, if you don"t recognize play when you see it!"
JLt wasn"t until they reached Tobin"s door that he realized Ki was to share both his chamber and his bed. Ki"s small traveling bundle lay on the disused chest where Tobin had the doll hidden, and an unfamiliar bow and quiver leaned in the corner next to his own.
"But, he can"t!" Tobin whispered, tugging Nari back out into the corridor. What would Brother do?
And what if Ki found the doll or saw him with it?
"Now, now. You"re too old for a nurse," Nari murmured. "A boy your age should have been sharing a room with a companion long since." She rubbed at her eyes, and Tobin saw she was trying not to cry. "I should have told you, I know, pet, but I didn"t think he"d get here so soon and- Well, this is the way it must be." She was using her firm voice now, the one that warned there was no use in arguing. "I"ll sleep down in the hall now, with the others. Just call down if you need me, like you always do when you"re in bed before me."
Ki must have heard them. When Tobin and Nari came back in, he was standing in the middle of the room looking uncertain again. Nari bustled over to the bed and went to put his bundle away in the chest.
"We"ll just stow your things in here. Tobin doesn"t--"
"No!" Tobin cried. "No, you can"t put that in there."
"Tobin, shame on you!"
Ki had his head down now, looking as if he wanted to sink into the floor.
"No, it"s just- I have ink jars in there," he explained hastily. The words came easily, being true. The doll was hidden in the flour sack under a heap of parchments and his drawing tools. "There"s ink and pens and wax and things. They"d soil his clothes. There"s lots of room in the wardrobe, though. Put your things in with mine, Ki. We can share. Like-like brothers!"
He felt his face go hot. Where had those last words come from? But Ki was smiling again and Nari looked pleased.
Nari put Ki"s few belongings into the wardrobe and made them wash their teeth and faces. Tobin stripped down to his shirt and climbed into bed, but Ki seemed hesitant again.
"Go on, lad," Nari urged. "Strip off and get in. I put a warm brick down the end to take the chill off."
"I don"t strip off to sleep," Ki told her.
"That"s all well and good for country folk, but you"re in a n.o.ble house now, so the sooner you learn our ways, the better for you."
Ki mumbled something else as his cheeks flamed.
"What"s the matter, boy?"
"I don"t have a shirt," Ki told her.
"No shirt?" Nari clucked her tongue. "Well now, I"ll go find you one. But see that you skin out of those dusty things before I get back. I don"t want your road dirt in the clean linens."
She lit the night lamp and blew out the others. Then she kissed Tobin soundly on the cheek, and Ki, too, making him blush again.
He waited until the door had closed behind her, then pulled off his tunic and trousers and hurried under the covers to keep warm. As he got in, Tobin saw that Ki"s slender body was almost as brown as his face, except for a band of pale skin around his hips and privates.
"How come you"re only white there?" asked Tobin, whose own body was fair as new b.u.t.ter summer and winter.
Shivering, Ki snuggled in next to him. "We wear clouts, swimming. There"s snapper turtles in the river and you don"t want them biting off your diddler!"
Tobin giggled again, though more at the oddness of having a stranger in Nari"s place than what Ki had said. Nari returned with one of Tharin"s old shirts and Ki struggled into it under the covers. Nari kissed them both again and went out, shutting the door softly behind her.
Both boys lay quiet for a while, watching the play of lamplight on the carved beams overhead. Ki was still shivering.
"Are you cold?" asked Tobin, shifting away from a sharp elbow.
"You"re not?" Ki said through chattering teeth. "Well, I guess you"re used to it."
"Used to what?"
"Sleeping bare, or almost, with just one person for warmth. Like I told you before, my brothers and me sleep all together in our clothes. It"s nice, mostly, especially in winter." He sighed. " "Course, Amin gets the farts, which makes it that much warmer."
Both boys dissolved into laughter again, shaking the bed.
"I"ve never heard anyone talk like you!" Tobin gasped, wiping his eyes on the edge of the sheet.
"Oh, I"m a bad character. Ask anyone. Hey, what"s that?" He pushed back Tobin"s left sleeve to inspect the birthmark. "Did you burn yourself?"
"No, I"ve always had it. Father says it"s a sign I"m wise."
"Oh, yeah? Like this." Ki hauled down the covers and showed Tobin a brown spot on his right hip the size of a man"s thumbprint. "Bad luck mark, a soothsayer told my mam, but I been lucky so far. Look at me, here with you. That"s luck! Now, my sister Ahra"s got one of them red ones like yours on her left t.i.t.
A wizard she showed it to down in Erind claimed it means she"s feisty and sharp-tongued, so I guess he must have known how to read marks better. She"s got a voice can curdle vinegar when she"s riled up."
He pulled the covers up again and sighed. "She treated me good, though, mostly. That"s her old quiver I come with. It"s got cuts on it from Plenimaran swords, and a stain she claims is blood!"
"Really?"
"Yeah. I"ll show you tomorrow."
As they drifted off to sleep at last, Tobin decided that having a companion might not be such a bad thing after all. Caught up in thoughts of sisters and battles, he didn"t notice the dark shape lurking unbidden in the far corner.
Brother woke Tobin sometime later with a cold touch on his chest. When Tobin opened his eyes, the ghost was standing next to the bed, pointing across the room at the chest where the doll was hidden.
Tobin could feel Ki"s warm, bony back pressed against his own, but he also saw him kneeling in front of the chest.
Tobin shivered as he watched the boy open the lid and take out a few things, examining them with curiosity. Tobin knew this was a vision. Brother had shown him things before, like the dying fox, and they were never nice. When Ki found the doll, his expression changed to one Tobin knew all too well.
Then the scene shifted. It was daylight now; lya and Arkoniel were there with Ki, and Father, too.
They put the doll down on the chest and cut it open with long knives, and it bled. Then they took it away, looking back at him with expressions of such sadness and disgust that his face burned.
The vision vanished, but the fear remained. As much as the thought of losing the doll terrified him, the look on everyone"s faces-especially his father"s and Ki"s-filled him with grief and desperation.
Brother was still there beside the bed, touching his chest and Tobin"s, and Tobin knew he"d shown him a true thing. Nari had never bothered with the old chest before. Ki was going to find the doll and everything would be ruined.
He lay very still, his heart beating so loudly in his ears he could hardly hear Ki"s soft breathing behind him. What could he do?
Send him away, hissed Brother.
Tobin thought about what it had felt like to laugh with Ki and shook his head. "No," he replied, barely making a sound with his mouth. He didn"t have to. Brother always heard him. "And don"t you ever try to hurt him again! I have to hide it somewhere else. Somewhere no one will find it."
Brother disappeared. Tobin looked around and found him by the chest, motioning to him.
Tobin slid out of bed and crept across the cold floor, praying Ki wouldn"t wake up. The lid rose by itself as he reached for it. For an instant he imagined Brother slamming it down on him for spite as he reached in, but he didn"t. Tobin eased the flour sack out from under the rustling parchments and tiptoedinto the corridor.
It was very late. No light showed at the staircase leading to the hall. The corridor lamp had gone out, but patches of moonlight gave him enough light to see by.
Brother wasn"t showing himself now. Tobin hugged the doll to his chest, wondering where to go.
Arkoniel was still sleeping in the toy room next door, and would soon occupy the newly repaired rooms upstairs, so that was no good. There was nowhere downstairs that someone wouldn"t look, either.
Perhaps he could get outside again into the forest and find some dry hole nearby? But no, the doors would all be barred and besides, there might be catamounts in the forest at night. Tobin shivered miserably. His bare feet ached -with cold and he had to p.i.s.s.
A creak of hinges came from the far end of the corridor as the door to the third floor swung open, shining like silver in the moonlight. The doorway beyond was a black mouth waiting to swallow him up.
Yes, there was one place, a place no one could go except Brother. And him.
Brother appeared in the open doorway. He looked at Tobin, then turned and disappeared up the dark stairs. Tobin followed, stubbing his bare toes on steps he could not see.
In the upstairs corridor moonlight streamed in through the new rosette windows, casting pools of black and silver lace on the walls.
It took all his courage to approach the tower door; he thought he could feel his mother"s angry spirit standing just on the other side, glaring at him right through the wood. He stopped a few feet away, heart beating so hard it hurt to breathe. He wanted to turn and run away but he couldn"t move, not even when he heard the lock give. The door swung slowly open to reveal- Nothing.
His mother was not standing there. Neither was Brother. It was dark inside, so dark that the lacy moonlight faded to a murky glow just a few inches inside. A current of cold, stale air crawled around his ankles.
Come, Brother whispered from the darkness.
," can"t! Tobin thought, but somehow he was already following that voice. He found the first worn stone step with his toes and put his foot on it. The door closed behind him, shutting out the light. The spell that held Tobin broke. He dropped the doll and scrabbled for the door handle. The metal was so cold it burned his palm. The wooden door panels felt as if they were covered with frost as he beat his hands against them. The door wouldn"t budge.
Upstairs, Brother urged.
Tobin slumped against the door, breathing in panicky sobs. "Flesh my flesh," he managed at last.
"Blood my blood, bone my bone," and there was Brother at the base of the stairs, dressed in a ragged nightshirt and holding out his hand for Tobin to follow. When he didn"t move, Brother squatted down in front of him, peering into his face. For the first time, Tobin saw that Brother had the same little crescent-shaped scar on his chin that Tobin did. Then Brother opened the neck of his shirt, showing Tobin that he had another scar, as well. Tobin could see two thin vertical lines of st.i.tching on Brother"s chest, very close together, perhaps three inches long. It reminded Tobin of the seams on his mother"s dolls, but the st.i.tches were even finer, and the skin was puckered and b.l.o.o.d.y around them.
That must hurt, Tobin thought.
It does, all the time, whispered Brother, and one b.l.o.o.d.y tear fell down his cheek before he disappeared again, taking all illusion of light with him.
Feeling his way blindly, Tobin found the bag and slid his feet across the stone floor until he found the first step again. The darkness made him dizzy, so he crawled up the stairs on his hands and knees, dragging the bag beside him. His bladder was so full it hurt, but he didn"t quite dare let go here in the darkness.
As he climbed higher he realized that he could see a few stars through the arrow slits above. This gave him his bearings and he hurried up the last few steps to find the upper door standing open for him, just as he"d expected. All he had to do now was hide the doll. Then he could find a chamber pot or even an open window and go back to bed.
The room was full of moonlight. Brother had opened the shutters. The few times Tobin had let himselfthink of this room, he remembered a cozy little chamber with tapestries on the walls and dolls on a table.
This was a shambles. His memories of his last visit here were still fragmentary, but the sight of a broken chair leg stirred something dark and hurtful deep in his chest.
His mother had brought him up here because she was scared of the king.
She had jumped out the window because she was so scared.
She"d wanted him to jump, too.