Chapter 38. Seeking an End

re you awake?”

Ebony laid her hand upon his shoulder and shook him gently.  Pendaran did not stir but lay there with his eyes closed feigning sleep.  One of her cats was curled against the small of his back as he faced the gently fluttering wall of the tent.

“Pen, you need to at least have some water.  Come on now.”

He was sweating beneath the blankets, but he no longer cared.  At some point he had risen and visited the latrine and would need to do so again soon, but beyond that he had no desire to speak with anyone or take sustenance.  His life had always been an exercise in futility, one moment of pain after another.  All he wanted was peace and quiet.

“I know you’re awake,” Ebony said, anger lowering the pitch of her voice, “If you think we’re going to let you sit there and starve yourself to death, you have another thing coming.”

“Go away,” he whispered, “Just leave me alone.”

“You have a family, Pendaran.  You have to think about them.”

The truth was, nearly everyone he had ever loved was dead, and if they were not dead, then they had faced death because of him.  He saw it as clear as day.  It would be better for all concerned if he simply ceased to exist.

“Leave me.”

After all, what did he have left to live for?  Teleri had not even come to sit beside him over the last two days, and she forbade Mabane from visiting.  That morning he had heard Morisedd telling her how much he despised the weak-willed weasel she had married.  Would he never stop hating Pendaran?  And did he have no clue how thin the walls of the tent were?  Perhaps he had hoped his words would be overheard.

He should end it now while he still had the strength left to carry it out.  Grenth might very well punish him for having the temerity to choose his own time, but at least he would be done.  At least he would never again suffer at the hands of Threnody.  Oh gods, he could not go through with that again.  Better the blade than that.

Did Ebony know or suspect the nature of his thoughts?

“I’ll drink if you go away,” he replied to her persistent nudge.

“Very well,” she sighed, “but I will be back in a minute.”

Pendaran waited until she was gone before sitting up stiffly and sipping the tepid water.  It tasted sweet in his parched mouth and his body willed him to empty it.  Stupid animal flesh.  He hated it.  Always betraying him.  Always leading him astray.  Rising to his feet, he fumbled with Ebony’s shoulder bag and found her ritual blade.  Small and sharp, it fit easily in his palm as he sank back into his bed and hid it under the blankets.  As promised, she returned with reinforcements.

“Hello Pen,” said Lemony, her voice unable to conceal her pain, “Ebony told me you were in a bad way.”

“I’m tired, I want to sleep,” he said.  Sleep forever.

He felt the little monk against his back as she sat beside him, her small hand cool against his cheek as she stroked aside his hair and gazed down at his face.

“There was a time when I was so sad I hoped my heart would just hurry up and break and let me go beyond the mists.  You ever feel that way?”

“Many times,” he replied, swallowing against an unwelcome pang of grief.

“Someone very dear to me helped me find a reason to go on,” she paused for a moment to stroke his hair, “Someone very wise who saw my pain helped me to remember my Nandao as I had loved him, not as I had seen him ruined and alone on the most terrible night of my life.”

Pendaran closed his eyes against an unwelcome surge of emotion.

“I know you hurt right now, Pen, but pain eventually fades and goes away.  You give it time, alright?  Don’t decide anything right now, just rest and let us take care of you.  Can you do that much?”

She was so earnest that he felt compelled to answer her.

“I can’t promise anything, Lem.”

“Is it alright if I lie down next to you?”

“No, please leave me alone,” he choked.  Don’t make me change my mind.  It’s like being betrayed over and over again.

“I’m scared for you, Pen.  Don’t do anything foolish.  Some things can’t be undone. Lyssa wanted me to help you.  She must have a plan.”

“She uses me for her amusement.  I hate her.  I hate the gods.  GO AWAY!”

Something snapped in him and he was on his knees, his teeth bared like a maddened dog.  Lemony was pale, her eyes round as she gazed back at him in abject horror and bewilderment.  And then she began to weep.

“I loved Zhou, too,” she sobbed, “A lot of people did.  You stupid selfish man.  Isn’t it bad enough that he is dead without you going insane as well?”

“Get out!” he shouted at her, the anger driving away his unwelcome grief.

“Pendaran!” Ebony said harshly, “That will be enough.  You will not speak to anyone like that in my presence.”

Somehow the elderly woman gave him pause, her thin figure a menace as she towered over him.  His anger turned into a cold knot of dread in his belly and he lay down once more, turning his back to them.

“I’m sorry, Sister,” Ebony said softly, “I’ll walk you back to your tent.”

He lay there alone for a time, his fingers gripping the dagger under the blankets.  No, not here, he might be discovered and restored to life by one of the monks.  Lurching stiffly to his feet, he pushed out into the open beyond the tent and nodded to the man Ebony had no doubt posted nearby to keep an eye on him.  He strode toward the far end of the yard near the doorway that led down to the dock.  Outside the wall was the latrine pit and no one took any notice of him going in that direction.  He moved around the rough shelter of young logs that screened the pit and entered the boulders and ferns that lay on the other side.  The forest rose up to meet him, dense and shadowy as he wove between thick trunks and grasping brush, his footfalls muffled by the thick duff as he moved down toward the shore.  He remembered the long dead forests of Rin and the vineyards, the smell of hay freshly cut and curing in the sun.  He wanted to go home and lie in the cool shade of the oak tree that he and his brother had climbed in the halcyon days when war and suffering were inconceivable.

I should have died in the Searing.  They were the lucky ones.

“I’m coming home,” he said softly, drawing the blade across his wrists.  He recoiled in pain and sighed as he dropped to his knees, his vision swimming with tears and giddiness.  One last moment of suffering and then it would be over.  He smiled upon the beauty surrounding him, the sweet music of birds calling to one another amidst the fertile shadows.  Geetha emerged from a clump of ferns, her green eyes gazing upon him with something resembling sad curiosity.  She howled loudly and padded closer.

“Idiot!” shouted a voice somewhere behind him.  He glanced up the slope and saw Morisedd tearing through the leaf litter toward him, “Gods, you wretched scum.  Have you no decency?”

Pendaran was too cold and numb to answer.  He did not particularly care what the ranger thought in any event.  It was too late.  By the time Morisedd ran back to get help, he would be dead.  His consciousness was already beginning to fade.  Then, to his dismay, he felt the splash of cool water upon him as the ranger uttered a fervent prayer to Melandru.  The cuts upon his wrists closed and his body surged back to life.

“No,” Pendaran moaned as Morisedd jerked the blade from his hand.

“How dare you besmirch this holy place,” he snarled at Pendaran, “Perhaps I should have let you go and allow the gods to damn you.  Stand up.”

“Leave me alone.”

To his horror, Morisedd grasped a fistful of hair and hauled him up by it.

“There is something I’ve been wanting to do for a very long time,” Morisedd growled.  Before Pendaran could struggle free, the ranger’s fist struck him full upon the jaw.  Blinding flashes of color filled his vision and he reeled as Morisedd released him.  His breath burst from his mouth as he curled around a vicious hook to his breast.  He dropped to his knees, winded and senseless.

“I heard you knew how to fight now but I think that training was wasted on a pathetic coward.  Come on, pretty boy, show me what you learned from Master Bei.  How sad it would be if the man died leaving a failure as his legacy.”

“I hate you,” Pendaran rasped, still gasping for breath, “I always have.  You’re a bitter nasty piece of work.  Moron ranger trash.”

Morisedd laughed harshly.

“You’ve never been worthy of Teleri.  You want to know the truth?  The first time she saw you she watched you go into captivity and did nothing to stop it.  That was the only good decision she ever made in your regard.”

Pendaran staggered to his feet.  Very well, if it was a fight he wanted, he would have his wish.  He uttered a hex and saw the ranger’s eyes widen in alarm as a flare of magenta energies gathered around his head.  Morisedd hesitated, trying to determine the nature of the curse.  He reached for his bottle of troll unguent and Pendaran silently chuckled to himself as the foolish ranger began the slow incantation only to be brought up short as Pendaran released the energies of his signet.  Snarling with rage, Morisedd drew back his fist.  Pendaran ducked and laughed harshly as the ranger cried out and stumbled around blindly. While Morisedd was thus incapacitated, Pendaran seized back the dagger and ran.

“Don’t you dare!” the ranger called after him, “I’ll hunt you down and kill you myself before I let you try that stunt again.”

Pendaran did not reply.  He only had a few seconds before the blindness wore off and he veered toward a knot of boulders, determined to hide there.  He heard the hiss of an arrow and cried involuntarily as it bit into the flesh of his calf and tendons.  The impact of the arrow sent him scudding head over heels down the slope, his body cutting a rut in the thick litter until he crashed with a sickening crunch of bone against the boulders.  Morisedd strode grimly toward him, a second arrow nocked to the string.

“I got my second wish granted,” he said humorlessly.  Pendaran dared not move.  As it was, the collision with the boulder had jarred every bone in his body and the pain was immense.  The ranger placed the arrow back in his quiver and set his bow aside.  Now he unpinned his flowing green cloak and approached Pendaran with it.

“Ass,” Pendaran hissed, “You’ve broken my collar.”

“A little more to the right and I might have broken your neck.  But then again, you might have appreciated that.”

“What are you doing?” Pendaran demanded as Morisedd once more seized the dagger away and made him sit up.  He was now wrapping his cloak tightly around Pendaran’s arms and upper body. He cinched it in place with his belt.

“I’m done playing games with you.  Now shut up and come peacefully.”

“You call that a game?”  Pendaran shouted at him.

“If it wasn’t I’d have killed you twice already.”

He opened his mouth to utter a second hex only to be stunned silent by a harsh blow to his jaw.  Morisedd grimly drew a kerchief from his belt pouch and looped it into Pendaran’s mouth, knotting it harshly against his nape.

“Now we’re done,” Morisedd pronounced, slinging Pendaran over his shoulder with a grunt, “You may never thank me for this, but Teleri will and that is the only reason I saved your miserable hide.  Remember that.”