Page 105 of Guiding Reason
“The leader was bound like your speedling is bound to you, and it made him stronger. There was also cruelty in that binding, and the leader’s friend saw it.
“The leader’s friend kept regrets in his heart only he himself knew, but he helped the bound soother—the Guardian pet—bringing him to a Darkling healer just like Avan and Anandas. The healer, after the bound soother consented, broke the bond and set the young human free. Or so they all thought.
“The leader came looking for his formerly bound soother, and he left carnage in his wake, slaughtering humans who disagreed with him and Darklings alike. He was enraged, and his rage could not be stopped. When he found the soother, he took him.
“Avan says that in the tale as it is told in his family, the healer who set the formerly bound soother free, saw the young human as he was taken back, saw him hold a knife to his own heart and lack the courage to push it in. That healer, he survived, and he carried the guilt of not being able to help the young human a second time and set him free at last. When the human leader took his soother back, joy drained from that soother’s eyes, and he turned to a husk in the human leader’s hands, powerless to that man’s power.
“The leader’s friend tried to appease the leader for a while. It was around the time the walls were built. The leader would not let himself be calmed, and as the story goes, the leader cut pieces off the soother he kept caged, and none of those pieces ever dimmed his rage. The soother, it’s said, would not ask to be forgiven. He bore his pain in silence because silence was the only weapon he had left.
“The friend eventually left the walls and joined those Darklings he called friends. Love grew from that, and he fathered a child of royal blood with Vasha, who was just as a winter king for seven seasons. Vasha gifted his human lover theprivilege of naming their first child. They named him Avan, and Avan too ruled as a winter king. Like his father, he was just.”
Rose rolled his eyes. “Avan says the other Avan also spoke two languages and spoke them well, so that is yet another reason why he is learning.”
Col was gripping the mug in his hands so hard that his knuckles stood out white. His mind was reeling.
“That’s just a story,” he said.
Rose shrugged. “They take lineage stories very seriously, especially with winter kings in their heritage. And it’s not as if it’s important. That is hundreds of years in the past. Although, imagine, Guardian pet, if there were no walls keeping you trapped and you could get your own people to help you instead of coming back here.”
Col nodded absently. He put his mug down on the floor in front of him, focused on his breathing, glad that he’d meditated so much with Vin and could get calm easily enough now that he really needed it.
They’re not talking about Wilan. This isn’t real. It’s just a story the Hounds tell themselves, and I have to forget about it.
He told himself over and over, snapped out of the confusion inside his head but barely when Rose once more asked to be told everything that had happened since that day on the river.
So Col told Rose, if only to distract himself.
35
HYRAN
Hyran brought the Darkling healer to Lowvalley, the town in which he’d forged unexpected friendships over time. He stopped outside the Old House, and whether it was imagined or real, he thought he could smell the blood on the air, even from outside.
“So very fast,” the Darkling said when Hyran let him off. He wasn’t the least bit fazed by the run. “Useful.” He patted Hyran’s shoulder before hurrying inside without having to be told. Hyran followed.
Taros was bandaging a leg wound but looked up. “You left Col there?”
Hyran nodded. His heart was squeezing with something that wasn’t quite pain. Rather it was longing, but physical, the soothing touch just a brief run away.
Anandas clapped his hands. “We must sort. Speedling, come here.”
Hyran did and was handed the healer’s bag after he put his bow and arrows away to the side.
“We don’t know you,” Sinex said. His clothes and hands were stained, red and brown.
Anandas looked him over. “I am Anandas, son of winter kings, and a healer.” He pulled a small satchel from his bag, opened it, and took out something white that looked like a piece of candy. “Eat this. Put it under your tongue, let it dissolve. Tell me when it has.”
Sinex nodded, glad to be given clear instructions. He took the candy and put it in his mouth. Anandas gave one to Li as well, the mechanic’s daughter too, then went about sorting his patients and administering his Darkling medicine. Before too long, Hyran put the healer’s bag on a table and carried out corpses.
It was when he had a girl in her twenties in his arms, cooling with death, that he realized he’d been wrong to miss Col.It’s better that he isn’t here. I don’t want him to see this. No one in their right mind would want their Conduit to see this.
The work was bleak, and everyone was glad to have Anandas tell them what to do, at least that’s what it felt like to Hyran. Sinex was sent to wash his hands before bringing everyone water to drink and spoon feeding it to those who were healing, those who were dying. Taros handed Anandas things from his bag and wrapped burns and cuts.
They didn’t rest for a long time.
The sky had turned the color of the dead.
“There’s a dead boy in the fields,” Hyran said.
