The Warslayer(89)

"Live the Legend." Ah, if you only knew . . .

True to her word, Tavara put Glory's arm into a sling to immobilize the shoulder, then bound the arm against her side with more strips of bandage, covering up the Vixen-image.

"Do not, I ask you, Slayer, destroy more of my handiwork," the little healer said scoldingly.

"Do my best," Glory said, her words slurred with exhaustion. "An' if I starve because I can't hold a spoon, it's on your head."

"You will not starve," Tavara said, smiling now. "Come."

She led Glory back to the fountain. Her bed was laid out beside it, and Ivradan was waiting for her, scrubbed up and dressed in fresh clothes. He looked tired, but pleased with himself, and was holding a steaming mug in each hand.

"Felba and Fimlas and Heddvi are here," he said happily. "All well."

It took Glory a moment to place the names.

"The ponies She . . . ?"

"She only sent them away," Ivradan said happily, "and so they sought the nearest place where they knew they would be fed. They came here, arriving before night fell."

No wonder the others had been so stunned at the sight of them, showing up the morning after their horses did. It hadn't been Maidarence at all. It had been them coming back from the dead.

"And it's all right?" Glory said fumblingly, not quite sure of how to ask the right questions.

"No harm can enter here," Ivradan said soothingly. "Come. Sit. I have brought soup for you. You will sleep—we will both sleep, and tomorrow Belegir will tell us what we must do."

She was too tired to pick holes in his logic. She managed to get herself down into a sitting position one-handed—awkward, with the bed so low—and let Ivradan hold the cup for her. It held a thick broth, with a faint undertaste, but tired as she was, Glory hardly cared if Tavara had been spiking it. She was asleep before she finished the mug.

She half-woke a few times, just far enough to remember there was no reason to wake up, and went back to sleep, wallowing in unconsciousness as in the ultimate self-indulgence. Once somebody pulled her hair, but after a while they stopped. She cuddled Gordon tighter and ignored them, her face buried in the toy elephant's mold-scented dusty plush.

Eventually hunger—and more pressing needs—roused her to full consciousness again. She pried open her eyes, and bopped herself in the face with a large bandaged mitt when she tried to rub her face. There was something under her arm.

Gordon.

Sometime while she'd slept, someone had taken Gordon away, and cleaned him, and put him back together again. He'd been restored to his original roundness; the bullet-holes had been carefully patched before they'd brought him back and tucked him in with her again. The color and the fabric didn't match, but it was at least blue, carefully oversewn around the edges to hold it in place against the well-loved plush. She kissed him gently on the forehead, working the tips of her left-hand fingers to the edge of the bandage so she could touch him. Good old Gordon. A real trouper. Not many stuffed elephants could say they'd faced down a demon-queen and survived.

She sat up cautiously, and looked around. Everything was quiet. The others were all asleep. She didn't know how long she'd been out—long enough, obviously, to get herself turned around from all of them. What she needed now was to find the jakes.

Aside from the bum shoulder, and her hands, she wasn't in too bad shape, all things considered, though she wouldn't be in competition condition any time soon. She got to her feet without much difficulty, leaving Gordon on her pillow, and went padding barefoot toward the temple steps. She knew she could find something to make do with up there—better than wandering around down here until she woke somebody, anyway—and besides, she knew she could be alone there. Now that all this was over, she thought she was entitled to a bit of a think.

As she got to her feet, she realized that the Allimir had done more for her while she was sleeping than repair Gordon. Someone had brushed out her hair and rebraided it into two loose braids. Must've been dead to the world and all found, she thought, looking down at them. A nice gesture, even if a little unsettlingly intimate. She wondered which of them had done it.

Sore muscles protested as she went up the broad shallow steps, but it was no more stiffness than a little stretching would cure. She'd give the shoulder a couple of days rest and then see if Tavara had any liniment for it. If these people had horses, they must have horse-liniment, and that would do fine for her, too.

A few minutes later, having debased one more solid gold bucket and another acolyte shift, Glory sat down on one of the benches in the Presence Chamber and took stock of her life.