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.I have to stop this.I don’t care that it’s a true dream, that this is something that has already happened, something unchangeable, something I am only a witness to.I have to make it stop.I have to make him stop.As Malkar’s hand fists in Mildmay’s hair, I lash out, knowing nothing will come of it but unable to stay still, and the dream changes, a different sliver of the past, no less true, as Malkar burns into greasy ashes before my eyes.Burns and burns, and it isn’t Malkar any longer, isn’t the Bastion; Juggernaut’s relentless ticking becomes the crackle and pop of burning timbers, becomes the faint terrible keening of a person being burned alive, and I am one of the dark men who stand and watch and am satisfied with what I see.What Malkar did not tell Mildmay is that I am a monster, too.But Mildmay knew; he knew that long before I sent him into Malkar Gennadion’s trap.I woke with the taste of ashes in my mouth and did not move for a long time, feeling Mildmay’s warmth against my back and thinking about monsters.Thinking about Malkar, and Mildmay.And myself.Finally it was close enough to dawn that I didn’t have to pretend to try to go back to sleep.In fact, I could have claimed, if anyone had asked, that I’d gotten up that early on purpose.I needed to find a priest.One of the Fawn daughters was on duty at the front desk, and she looked at me oddly but answered my question.The Arbalest priest— whom she called the intended— could be found in Our Lady of Floodwaters.She gave me directions, although Arbalest was almost small enough that I didn’t need them.Intended Mallett, a blue- veiled, barefoot old man, was out in front of his church, pulling weeds.He listened carefully to what I had to say and nodded sadly when I was done.“Is the Gann place you found, where Verena Lesley met her end.I know of it.Is considered a bad place—verlain, the mountain people call it— and maybe these ghosts are why.” I would have liked to ask him about Verena Lesley and the Ganns and verlain places, but I didn’t want to leave Mildmay alone— not that he needed my protection.I thought I could trust Intended Mallett to do what was necessary, and that would have to be enough.As it turned out, Mildmay was still asleep when I returned to the Five Dancing Frogs, and he slept on and off for a great deal of the day.I reread Ynge and wished— a tired, stupid itch of desire for something I didn’t even want— for a teaspoon’s worth of phoenix.It would be better than being stuck in this little room with myself.But it would also be worse, and at least I was smart enough to know that.Around sunset, a knock on the door startled Mildmay awake.It was one of the Fawn daughters with an invitation to join the family for dinner.I didn’t want to, and I could see Mildmay didn’t want to, but neither of us— we agreed with a glance— wanted to offend the Fawns by refusing.We followed the Fawn daughter downstairs and into the back of the building, where the family lived.The people of Corambis, as I had observed during my brief foray that morning, were short, square- built, tawny and red, lions and foxes.A group of them like Mrs.Fawn’s daughters, sons- in- law, and grandchildren were bewildering simply for the sameness of them.I hadn’t ever thought about the variations among Mélusiniens— except for my own freakish coloring, which I had been trained to be aware of from a very early age— but I realized now how accustomed I had become to a range of browns, from the velvet near- black of Islanders like Vida Eoline, through red browns and ocher browns, to the light honey brown of Mehitabel Parr.And certainly there were differences in skin color and hair color among even these closely related Corambins, but if I didn’t concentrate carefully, the distinctions blurred into a muddle.I foresaw the potential for getting myself into a great deal of trouble and resolved for this eve ning to say as little as possible.At first, that strategy worked admirably, for we walked into the middle of an argument between several of Mrs.Fawn’s sons- in- law and grandsons.They were discussing, heatedly, what would happen to Caloxa— and it was very definitely Caloxa, not merely southern Corambis— now that the Insurgence had been defeated.The principal combatants, I managed to get fixed in my head.One, Peter Finesilver, was the husband of Mrs.Fawn’s eldest daughter and the father of at least two of the children swarming about the room.He had the self- satisfied air that came from a combination of prosperity and a certain native thickheadedness.The other, who carried one shoulder in an odd hunch, was another son- in- law, Sholto Ketteller; he was obviously, from the moment he opened his mouth, the fire- eater of the family.Finesilver’s position was that with Gerrard dead, it could be as if the Insurgence had never happened.The Corambin governor could come back to Wildar and everything (he said naïvely) would be fine again.Ketteller practically hooted with laughter at this statement, but the interesting thing was that the other men disagreed with it, too.They didn’t want Governor Jaggard back, his time in office having been marked by a significant upswing in both taxes and corruption.James Fawn, Mrs.Fawn’s dead husband’s brother— unlike the other parties— was old enough to remember the Corambin conquest of Caloxa; he merely felt that a new governor should be appointed—“Is not like the margraves will listen to Jaggard now, is it? After the fool the man made of himself.” The others seemed to be in favor of a more moderate version of Ketteller’s fierce separatism.Let the Moot rule, said one of the grandsons, like the Convocation did.And when Ketteller, and oddly enough, Finesilver, protested this idea, he shrugged and said, “Well, then, let the Humes be governors.”“But Prince Charles is only a baby,” one of the younger boys protested.“Can’t do any worse than Jaggard,” James Fawn said and finally provoked a laugh [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]