“Yes, actually,” said Caliban, coming around the side of Brenner’s horse.
Slate found that she still had the strength to snicker.
“Aww,” said Brenner, putting his arms around the knight’s neck. “I didn’t know you cared.”
“I really don’t.”
The assassin’s knees also buckled when he hit the ground. The knight also held him upright. Slate wondered if he’d worn the same expression of stoic martyrdom when she’d been clinging to him.
Oh, probably.
He herded them both into the inn, like a sheepdog with a pair of bitter, bow-legged sheep.Twelve hours in the saddle and he’s not even limping. Thatbastard.
Brenner, fortunately, looked as if he might be permanently damaged. Slate approved of that. If she was miserable, someone else ought to be, too. She felt as if she had been…no, the onlymetaphors that came to mind were mostly sexual and too disgusting to contemplate.Still.
They passed through the common room. Slate didn’t really see it. The sheepdog was still herding.
He stopped at last at the foot of the stairs, and gestured to his sheep. “Go up to your rooms, you two. I’ll have them send up trays.”
Slate looked up the stairs. There were quite a lot of them.
I could ask him to carry me. No, that’d be humiliating, and then he’d have to carry Brenner, too.
Actually, that’d almost be worth it. I wonder if he’d do it.
Behind her, the assassin turned away from the stairs and locked his fingers on the edges of the knight’s tabard. Caliban stared down at him, lip curled in something between pity and disgust.
“Send…beer…” Brenner rasped.
The knight pried his fingers loose. “I’ll see what I can do.”
They ascended the stairs like a pair of mountaineers tackling a cliff face.
“My legs will never close again,” she muttered.
“That would be music to my ears if I wasn’t dying,” said Brenner, a step below her.
“Do you think we’ll make it to Anuket City?”
“I don’t think I’ll make it to myroom.”
Eventually, of course, they did make it. They got halfway down the hallway, realized they didn’t know which rooms were theirs, and sagged together against the wall. Slate’s ankles, heretofore numb, started to make their presence known. She didn’t dare sit down, or she’d never stand up again.
“I think I hate him,” said Brenner, leaning against the wall next to her.
No need to ask who he was talking about. “I’m gettin’ there,” said Slate.
“I could kill him. He’s got to sleep sometime.”
“Then who’d get us off the horses tomorrow?”
“Good point.”
Someone came up the hall. It was Learned Edmund, carrying a pack. He stared at them both down his nose.
“Are you twodrunk?”
“Not yet,” said Brenner, “but soon enough.”
