Shadows moved in her mind. Some were darker—some moved away from her, and others menaced her. She saw again an elven face, pale against a dark hood. She felt a burning pain at her throat, and tried to raise her hand, struggling. The shadows seemed to harden, thickening into reality. Sounds came, faintly at first, then louder. Shrill cries, mocking laughter, the clatter of weapons. Bitter fluid stung her throat, the stench of it wrinkled her nose. The faces came clearer out of the darkness: orcs, their fangs bared, their taloned hands holding swords, knives, whips. Other fighters, whose kind she did not know, in armor of leather and plate. The light was green, a sickly shade that turned spilled blood black.

Gradually she was able to remember the bargain the iynisin had made: she had had to fight, fight for their amusement against opponents of their choosing, fight with whatever weapons they gave her, for the chance to live a little longer. As it had happened, so in the memory Ardhiel's treatment roused: she could not remember how long these fights had gone on, or the intervals between them. But she could remember, as if reliving them, the pain of her wounds, the hunger and thirst and exhaustion, the fear that she would never see daylight again, the grim and bitter anger she had summoned against that fear. When Ardhiel took his hands away from her brow, she was aware. And the memories she had lost lay in a cold heap in her mind. She hated the thought of them, of stirring through them, but she had no choice. That, too, she resented: she had had no choice with the iynisin, and no choice here.

Chapter Twenty-seven

Chapter Twenty-seven

For of course Amberion insisted on knowing what, if anything, she remembered. She replied as quickly as possible, surprised at her own distaste, with an outline of the iynisin bargain and her fighting. She remembered even the black armor, and her reluctance to wear it.

"And you called on Gird before each encounter?" asked High Marshal Fallis, who had come up to listen.

"I tried. I couldn't—couldn't say it out loud." Paks hoped he would say nothing more about it.

"But you tried—you intended to?" Amberion's eyes held hers.

"Yes—sir." Paks looked away with an effort. "I tried. At least, all the times I remember—"

"That should be enough—" But his tone lacked conviction, and he looked across her to Ardhiel.

"I don't understand. What's the matter?" Even Paks could not be sure whether irritation or fear edged her voice.

Fallis sighed. "Paksenarrion, you had no way to tell—but if you handled cursed weapons, and in a cursed cause—"

"And that black armor was definitely cursed—"

"But I killed orcs—some iynisin—and they're all evil—"

"Yes. I know. That's why we think it may work out." Amberion shook his head, nonetheless. "I wish you hadn't touched those things—"