Traitor's Moon

weight of the robe. Tangled in the fingers of his left hand was his Akhendi bracelet with the blackened charm. Wadded beneath his right was a bloodstained length of cloth—a sen’gai, though he couldn’t make out the color.
    The weight of the robe was too much for him. Falling forward, he was trapped by its smothering bulk.
    â€œWhat name did my mother give me?” he groaned as the moon was blotted out.
    There was no reply.
    Exhausted, trapped, and aching in every muscle, Alec cradled his head on his arms and wept for a woman nineteen years dead, and for the silent, brooding man who’d stood helplessly and watched his only love die.
    Seregil inhaled deeply as he waited, hoping the smoke of the strong herbs would take the edge off his fear. There were no meditation symbols in this chamber—no Fertile Queen, Cloud Eye, or Moon Bow. Perhaps the rhui’auros stood too close to the Lightbearer to need such things.
    â€œAura Elustri, send me light,” he murmured. Folding his hands loosely in his lap, he closed his eyes and tried to find the inner silence necessary to free his thoughts, but it would not come.
    I’m out of practice
. How often had he entered a temple during all his years in Skala? Less than a dozen times, probably, and always with some ulterior need.
    The even breathing of the dreamers around the room grated on his nerves, mocking his restlessness. It was a relief of sorts when a guide finally came and led him down the winding stairs to the cavern below.
    Oh, yes, he remembered this place, with its rough stone and heat and the flat, metallic odor that tightened the knot of dread already cramping his gut.
    Three passages branched from the main chamber, sloping downinto darkness. Seregil’s guide waved a globe of light into being and set off down the one to their right.
    The same?
Seregil wondered, stumbling along behind him. Impossible to know for certain; he’d been so frightened that night, half dragged, half carried into total darkness.
    It got hotter as they went. Steam curled thickly from seams in the rock. Condensation dripped from above. It was difficult to catch his breath.
    drowning in darkness—
    Small dhima stood at irregular intervals along this tunnel, but Seregil’s guide led him far deeper into the earth before stopping beside one.
    â€œHere,” the man instructed, lifting the leather door flap. “Leave your clothes outside.”
    Stripping off everything but the silver mask, Seregil crawled inside. It was stifling and stank of sweat and wet wool; a small fissure emitted a steady flow of hot vapor. Seregil crawled to a rush mat next to the steam vent. His guide waited until he was seated, then dropped the flap back into place. Blackness closed quickly in around Seregil; the man’s footsteps faded back in the direction they’d come.
    What am I so scared of?
he wondered, fighting down the panic that threatened to unman him.
They finished with me, passed sentence. It’s over. I’m here now by Iia ’sidra dispensation, a representative of the Skalan queen
.
    Why didn’t someone come?
    Sweat drenched his body, stinging the scabbed abrasions on his back and sides. It dripped from the tip of his nose to pool in the contours inside the mask. He hated the feel of it, hated the darkness and the irrational sense that the walls were pressing in on him.
    He’d never feared the dark, not even as a child.
    Except here. Then
.
    And now
.
    He crossed his arms across his bare chest, shaking in spite of the heat. He couldn’t fight off the wolves of memory here. They rushed at him, wearing the faces of all the rhui’auros who’d interrogated him. They’d woven their magic deep into his mind, pulling out thoughts and fears like so many rotten teeth.
    Now, as he huddled trembling and sick, other memories followed, ones he’d buried even deeper: the sharp sting of his father’s hand against his face when he’d tried to say farewell; the way friendshad refused to meet his eye; the sight of the only home he’d ever known or hoped to dwindling to nothing in the distance—
    Still no one came.
    His breath whistled harshly through the mask. The dhima trapped the steam, searing his lungs. Stretching out his arms, he felt for the wooden ribs on either side of him to reassure himself that the sodden walls were not collapsing in on him. His fingers brushed hot wood and rested there. A moment later,