Chains of Gold Read Free Page A

is happening?”
    Little enough, I thought, gasping again with the pain of my thawing feet. Little enough sense. They had not heard me; my noise was lost in the sound of wind outside. Arlen smiled and sat on a barley bin, and Lonn sat beside him, looking commonplace next to his splendor.
    â€œEven so, I must ask you yet once more to think,” said Lonn in that warm, steady way of his, and Arlen glanced at him in annoyance.
    â€œDon’t badger me, my good friend, please. Not this last night that is given us to share.”
    â€œI must! Arlen, I cannot bear it. They will tie you up to that bloody tree, tie you with willow thongs and beat you until you faint—”
    â€œI know,” said Arlen.
    â€œâ€”and then they will put out your eyes.”
    Those incredible eyes. I shuddered and closed my own. I had not known it was to be so cruel.
    â€œI know,” Arlen said sharply. “Lonn, stop it.”
    â€œI cannot,” said Lonn. “Then they will castrate you. And after the death blow you will be flayed—”
    â€œSay no more, I tell you!” Arlen made a small, furious sound in his throat and sprang up, turning his back on Lonn, and patted several horses at random. I watched, seeing the anguish on his face, furious at Lonn in my turn.
    â€œAnd then they will sever your joints,” said Lonn, very softly, “and gut you, and hack you apart, catching your blood in a silver basin, and they will sprinkle us—” He choked, unable to go on. Pitiful pain in his voice—it was impossible any longer to be angry at him.
    â€œWhy?” Arlen spoke without turning around. “Why are you doing this to me? They have told us these things since we were striplings.”
    â€œThey have told us so that we would not hear, not really know, not understand—how horrible—”
    Silence.
    â€œArlen, go, flee,” Lonn said softly at last. “Live.”
    Arlen turned back toward him, his face hard and fair, like a carving. “I would rather be dead than dishonored,” he said. “A coward—”
    â€œThere is no dishonor in putting an end to madness.”
    â€œThe sacred rites of the goddess, madness?” For a moment Arlen’s green eyes blazed, but then he merely looked weary. “Lonn, I have no desire to quarrel with you. Please.”
    â€œAll right,” said Lonn stubbornly, meaning that it was not right at all. “If honor is of such concern to you, then think of the girl, her honor. She will be bound to know no man but you, one hour’s wedlove in all her life and then celibacy. Suppose she has promised herself to a sweetheart? She is not here of her own will, any more than we are. Likely she will be foresworn.”
    I could have laughed or cried. Me, a sweetheart, in sterile Stanehold, with father standing guard? Arlen must have thought something of the same sort, for he laughed out loud, mocking laughter yet not unmelodious.
    â€œA daughter of that precious Rahv? She’ll be black as a crow and hard as flint, not likely to care for any lover or honor either. Save your concern, Lonn.”
    â€œBut I think she is not of corvine sort, Arl,” Lonn remarked with meaning in his glance.
    â€œYou’ve seen her? How in the many kingdoms did you manage—”
    â€œI blundered in.”
    Arlen sat down again, sighing and shaking his fiery head, and Lonn spoke on.
    â€œShe is a gentle thing; I swear it from just my glimpse of her. No crow, Arl, for all that her hair shines black as the Naga. She seemed more like—like a dusky flower, a fragile blossom.”
    I snorted. Perhaps they heard me and thought I was a horse.
    â€œNot that she lacked spirit,” Lonn added hastily, as if I had reproached him. “She looked ready to bolt. You have seen the panicky glance of a tethered yearling …? But no flinty shell, Arlen. This—this horror, how is she to withstand it? What is to become of