Sword-Maker(141)

It hurt too much. I made my tone hard. “So, you’re going to let him win after all. After six years. After all those oaths.”

“You don’t underst—”

“I understand very well, Delilah. As you yourself said, I lived on hatred, too. I know its taste, I know its smell—I know how it is in bed. And I know how seductive it is, how completely all-consuming … how satisfying it is in place of a human partner.”

Del’s face was bone-white. “All of the things I have done were done in the name of that hatred. I bore a daughter and gave her up … I apprenticed myself to Staal-Ysta … I killed many men—” she swallowed jerkily. “—I tried to usurp the freedom of a man I care about—and then I nearly killed him.”

It took me a moment. “Well,” I said, “he survived.”

Del’s gaze didn’t waver. “If he had not, I would have allowed myself no time to grieve. I would have set aside the pain and gone on, seeking Ajani … alone, as before: a woman fed on hatred, sleeping with obsession—” The voice cut off abruptly. And as abruptly, came back. “Why are you here, Tiger? Why do you stay with me?”

I wanted to touch her, but didn’t. I wanted to tell her, but couldn’t. I have no skill with words. This particular sword-dance required more than what we both knew. Much more than what we had learned, in the circle with our swords.

When I could, I shrugged. “I kind of thought you were staying with me.”

Del didn’t smile. “You have sworn no oaths. Ajani is not your duty.”

Idly, I kicked at a stone, rolling it aside. And then moved against the wall, next to Del, letting it hold me up. “I think there are times when no oaths have to be sworn. Some things just—happen.”

Del stared at me. Then drew in an unsteady breath. “You make it too hard.”

I stared steadfastly across the alley. “You’re afraid, aren’t you?”

“Of Ajani? No. I’ve hated too much for fear.”

“No. You’re afraid of what comes after.”

Del shut her eyes. “I am afraid,” she said, “that I won’t feel the things I know I should feel.”

“What are those, bascha?”

“Pleasure. Satisfaction. Elation. Relief. Fulfillment.” Her eyes opened; the tone was edged with bitterness. “The things that should come with bedding unencumbered or colored by hatred.”

I frowned down at the ground. “When I was young,” I told her, “I swore to kill a man. And I meant it utterly; there was no room in my soul for anything but hatred, for anything but this oath. Like you, I lived on it. I drank it. I went to bed with it each night, whispering to the stars the oath I swore to keep: that I would kill this man. I was a boy; boys swear things, and never keep them. But I meant it … and that oath helped me survive until the time a sandtiger came into camp and killed some of the children. That oath made me take my crude spear and go out into the Punja by myself to kill that sandtiger. Because I knew that if I succeeded, if I killed the sandtiger, I could ask for a boon, and then I would get the one thing I most wanted.”

“Freedom,” Del murmured.

Slowly I shook my head. “A chance to kill the shukar.”

She stiffened. “That old man?”

“That old man did more to destroy what was left of my life than anyone else in the tribe. And he was what made me survive.”

“But you didn’t kill him.”

“No. I was sick for three days from the poison. Sula spoke for me, saying I was owed my freedom.” I shrugged. “I thought killing the shukar would give me a freedom—of mind, if not of body. It was the only kind I knew.”

“But they sent you away, instead.”

“They gave me physical freedom. No more was I a chula.”

“What are you saying, Tiger?”

“That in the end I won. That what the old man most wanted was me dead, not free … and I cheated him.”

“Tiger—”

I kept my voice quiet. “Sometimes what we want is not what’s best for us. No matter how much we want it.”

Del made no answer. She leaned against the wall, as I did, staring into darkness. And at last spoke. “Do you think I am wrong?”

I smiled wryly. “It doesn’t matter what I think.”

Del looked at me. “It matters,” she said. “I have always cared what you thought.”

“Always?”

“Well, perhaps not at first … not when we first met. You were insufferable then, so cocksure and Southron and male.” Del smiled a little. “I thought what you needed was a kick in the head, to knock some sense into you … or maybe castration, so you wouldn’t think with your manhood instead of with your brain.”