“Someone should go warn people about Death and the othergods returning soon. Contact the other acolytes and the loyalist nobles. Tell the queen that we need some kind of accord with the Stoneborn or we’ll all starve or burn.”
He laughed again, but this time there was no mirth in it. He pulled off the last piece of the gold-chased armor and kicked it into the corner.
“And let me guess who you have in mind for this assignment. No. You’re not going. I can’t believe you’re even going to ask me.”
“You don’t have to go to Wesha, and neither do I. You can break my vows. The same way you broke the priests’ vows,” I said.
“I could, except that I don’t want to. I imagine it was a daily challenge, keeping you alive during your last war, and you wouldn’t last the week if I let you go now. Your body’ll decorate a gibbet right next to your little friend, and the next time I see you, you’ll be pointing a glowing spear in my face.”
I felt as though I were standing in a deep hole, looking up at a surface that was so far away that it would be easier to dig through the center of the Earth to escape. I couldn’t stay here and watch Taran become something I didn’t recognize in a war he didn’t want to fight, and my soul shuddered at the idea of how many people would die because I’d helped turn them against the gods when the Stoneborn returned to demand their due.
“Then come with me.” I put my hands on Taran’s arms, bared by his sleeveless tunic. His skin was as smooth as marble but warm like brass in sunlight. “We’ll both go. We’ll do it together again.”
He looked at my hands and didn’t move. “And what kind of welcome do you think we’d receive upon our return, after abandoning the Summerlands?”
I swallowed hard. “We could stay.”
“So you can age for a few decades, then die of some pointless mortal ailment?”
“I’ve always been mortal. It’s not frightening to me,” I reminded him.
“Well, it’s frightening to me!” Taran said, stripping off his tunic and turning toward the baths.
I glared at his stupidly muscled back.
“I’m only twenty-two. I’ve got a little time before gray hair and wrinkles set in.”
Taran spun around and yanked me against his body. He was bright and close, warm and compelling.
“I am trying to give youall of it,” he said, eyes earnest. “All the time I have, all the power I have. I’d share it all with you.”
I knew he meant it—and maybe he had always meant to give me this. An endless summer where he could protect me from harm or want, cherish and coddle me. He’d suffered to gain that power, but his power wasn’t what had led him to confront Death alone, wasn’t what made him patient with Hiwa or gentle with me or the hundreds of other things that had made me love him. I didn’t need his power, I just needed him to believe in me again.
“Some things are more important than us being safe. You used to know that,” I said, begging now.
From his face, he simply didn’t believe me, even though I couldn’t lie to him. He disentangled himself from my arms and stalked to the baths.
“I’ll tell them tomorrow I won’t lead their army,” he said, swinging the door open. “Maybe Wesha will bestir herself when she can smell the smoke from her tower.” He slammed the door behind him, hard enough to shake the wall.
My eyes were gritty with repressed tears, but I was willing to give him a moment. When I heard the water run to fill a bath, I tried the door, found it locked, and banged on it with an ineffective fist.
“You know you can’t keep me out of it forever,” I shouted through the wood.
“I’m willing to try,” he called.
I began to sing the lock open, but Taran announced that he was already naked, and I was left to fume outside the door.
“Taran?”
He didn’t answer.
There was only one exit from that room, so if I was more stubborn than him, we could still finish this argument. I sat down on the floor, but long after Taran’s toes must have shriveled to raisins, I heard nothing from within. Maybe immortal toes were unaffected by a long soak; in retrospect, I really should have noticed he never got so much as a mosquito bite, let alone a pimple or a hangnail. He could probably sit in the bath until I turned to dust.
My bare foot started to ache from contact with the cold floor, so I crossed my legs and rested my head against the door. I missed him so much. I wanted him back so badly.
“You know, Hiwa wasn’t even the youngest acolyte fighting with us,” I said after a minute. Even if he didn’t respond, I knew he could hear me. He couldn’t stop me telling him who he was. “That was Acco ab Diopater. I bet he was the first child you ever met. He’d only just started his training when the rebellion began, but he couldn’t go home because both his parents had died in Ereban. Acco barely spoke at first, but when you showed up, he took to you. You let him sleep in your tent even though he still wet the bed.” I wiped my eyes, remembering Taran dipping a shrieking Acco into a pond by his armpits in an attempt to wash him off.
There was no sound from the other side of the door, but I continued with my eyes shut.
