Kushiel's Chosen

door. All this and more, every minute of every day I spent in the confines of La Dolorosa; the poor, awful madmen, and ah, Elua! Dumb, kind Tito, who brought me honey, and died protecting me, so nearly taking me with him.
    And the look, the dreadful look on Joscelin's face ...
    Truly, I have an ill-luck name.
    Grief heals, they say in Eisande; unshed tears fester like a canker in the soul. Whether or not it is true, I do not know. I wept until I could weep no more, and then slept as long and as hard as I had that first night in Glaukos' house.
    Thus began the long, slow days of waiting, wherein I learned sympathy for sailors' wives, who spend their days scanning the horizon for sight of a sail, betokening the safe return of their loved ones. Glaukos came each day to the house, and we sat in the cypress shade, eating salted melon while he taught me to speak Illyrian. It had taken him nearly three years to learn it, but he'd had no formal structure of teaching, only such skills as he could glean in conversation with Kazan. I made him teach me as I had learned to study language, establishing basic rules of grammar and working outward.
    Sometimes Lukin would join us, and others of Kazan's men, the young ones, lounging in the cool shade and listening, interjecting to teach me jests and use-words such as made Glaukos blush. I daresay they picked up some few words of Caerdicci along the way ... in truth, mostly they came to look at me. I came to know them that way; Epafras the romantic, who sighed and cast puppy-eyes; shy Oltukh, who swam like a fish and brought me offerings of shells strung on leather thongs; Stajeo and Tormos, who were brothers and endlessly competitive; Volos, whom everyone said could talk to birds; and Ushak, whose ears stuck out like jug handles.
    None of them would have dared lay a hand on me, for whatever the status of hostages on Dobrek, of a surety, I was marked as Kazan's-and that, they respected. For his part, Kazan Atrabiades tolerated it better than I would have reckoned, keeping a wry eye on his lads and setting one of the older, more sober men to chivy them back to work as needed, performing the myriad tasks it seemed a life of piracy entailed. There were sails to be mended and rigging restored. Pitch was rendered into tar, and each ship sealed anew.
    There were trade excursions, too, to outlying islands in the archipelago. Kazan went on one such a few days after Nikanor's ship had sailed, and was gone overnight, returning in good spirits after unloading his booty at a profit. He had left me well enough alone before his journey, heeding his promise to put off his claim while I continued to heal. But I saw upon his return that it had been much on his mind, and his gaze followed me hungrily.
    In the morning, he oversaw the distribution of the grain he had bought in trade. All of it was done in barter on the island, the villagers trading for wine and wool and the like. Afterward, I had my daily lesson with Glaukos, and then, when the worst heat of the day had passed, Kazan approached me.
    "You come with me, you," he said. "There is a thing I would show to you. Do you know to ride a horse, eh? It is said that noble-born are taught in your country, yes?"
    "Noble-born or no, I can ride," I said, rising.
    They'd gotten the horses ready, and young Epafras cast adoring looks at me, holding the head of the quiet mare as I mounted. Kazan swung astride his old gelding with careless ease, and I could see by the way it responded to his touch that he'd ridden it long and well; probably, I guessed, in battle. I'd noted before that it was scarred like a cavalry mount, glancing blows on the chest and flanks.
    "Come," was all he said.
    We rode to the foothills, where the pine forest began and a rutted logging trail cut into the deep green shade, pocked by donkeys' hooves and the deep traces of the logs they dragged to the village. The air was cooler and fragrant, and I breathed deeply of it as we made the ascent. The farther we went, the larger the trees. This was old forest, where the Illyrians say the Leskii abide. They are the green-eyed protectors of the forest, covered in black fur, with cloven hooves; anyone who takes a tree without asking permission of the Leskii first may be doomed to wander the forest until he dies and his flesh nourishes the earth.
    I could nearly believe it myself, once the logging trail ended and we turned onto a narrower route, a worn footpath marked by blazes on the trees. It was