Kushiel's Chosen

wake? An ill-luck name, I had told myself, with all the self-deceiving guile of a child. It was not so. I had set myself willfully on this course from the day Melisande Shahrizai's parcel arrived; I had taken her gambit, knowing it for a fool's move. Wiser heads had sought to dissuade me, from Thelesis de Mornay and Ysandre de la Courcel to Quintilius Rousse; yes, and Joscelin 'too.
    And I would have none of it, heeding none of them, dragging Joscelin and my poor, dear chevaliers to their doom. Nicola, Nicola L'Envers y Aragon, had tried to show me my arrogant mistrust for the folly that it was, and I had been too proud to hear her, so pleased with my own cleverness, so certain that I was master of my game.
    So clever had I been on Dobrek, concealing the truth of my situation from Kazan, concealing its weaknesses; oh, clever indeed, Phèdre! So clever that it led him to give me all unwitting to my enemies. What was the cost of death for that rescue, that I might live? One ship? Both of them? How many men had died aboard the Serenissiman vessel? And now Kazan lay screaming out his wits in torment at the back of a cave, thanks to my cleverness.
    I fixed onto that thought and held it, forcing myself to take another step in his direction, and another, dimly aware in some part of my mind that there was somewhat unnatural in this flood of guilt that paralyzed me.
    But it was true, it was all true.
    And Kazan was the least of it. Oh, yes, I had gone reckless and heedless into danger, and I had taken my best beloved with me. Remy and Fortun, slain in cold blood, for the foolish sin of loyalty to one such as me. Ti-Philippe, who might be alive or dead, and Joscelin; ah, Elua, Joscelin! How many times over had I wronged him, how many cruelties had I subjected him to, straining the loyalties of his last remaining vow until either it broke or he did.
    Worst of all, I'd taken pleasure in it. I'd driven him to lash out in cruel words, and I had taken an anguissette's terrible pleasure in the pain it provoked; the pain of a wounded heart, deeper and more exquisite than any torment of the flesh.
    And if I thought I'd known pain then, it was naught to this.
    I saw my flaws and follies revealed in all their hideous vanity, and the awful cost in mortal lives and pain that had resulted. I knew my soul laid bare and scourged on a rack built of my own deeds. Names and faces, too many to count, for it was not only in this venture, but nigh everything I'd done since I had no title to my name but that of Delaunay's anguissette. His man-at-arms Guy, foully murdered, a murder that might have been prevented had I not kept silent about Alcuin's plans. Alcuin, Alcuin and my lord Delaunay... I choked on the memory, remembering them in a welter of gore, and how I had concealed my slip of the tongue that revealed the depth of Melisande's knowledge; it might have saved them, had I not been too cowardly to speak, it might have given Delaunay the key to evade a deep-laid plot.
    It went on, unending, and I struggled against the tide of it while Kazan's cries rang in my ears. I understood, now, why he screamed. In a sea of anguish, I made my way to the back of the cavern, until I heard his raw breathing and fell to my knees, feeling blindly.
    He was there, lying on the cavern floor, his skin cool to the touch, but alive. "Kazan," I whispered, shaking his shoulder. "Kazan, it is not worth the price of madness. Kazan, come with me!"
    He moved, one hand groping, feeling along my arm to take my hand and grip it hard, and then the pain Of remembered guilt struck again and his grip bore down on mine, until I could feel the bones in my hand grinding, and I was remembering, remembering ...
    ... how I had led Joscelin to murder the thane Trygve, strangling him to win our freedom, letting Joscelin take that darkness on his soul; how I had stabbed Harald the Beardless, killing him with my own hands, and others, so many others! I had done it, I had done it all. I whispered a hoarse, futile plea for forgiveness, remembering. All the dead of the Dalriada, whom I beguiled into war; Eamonn mac Connor, his bright hair against the blood-soaked battlefield. Hyacinthe, ah, Elua, Hyacinthe! Not dead, but a worse fate; I wept in the darkness. Magister Acco, whom I drove to take his own life, and poor Tito of La Dolorosa, whose kindness I had cultivated to my own ends.
    It was my fault, all mine.
    I have known pain-Elua knows, I have known pain. It is my gift and my art to