The Winner's Kiss (The Winner's Trilogy, #3)(104)

The sky deepened. Its oranges and reds were resinous. Arin’s pulse leaped with anger.

But this time Roshar’s voice came low. “I need you.”

“What?” The air whooshed out of him.

“The emperor might be in Sythiah. He might not. What we know for certain is that an entire Valorian army whose forces vastly outnumber ours will be traveling up that road with a general who will prob ably continue to fight regardless of what happens at Sythiah. Are we to bet every thing on Kestrel’s game? I say, we deal with the Valorians. I say, no retreat.”

“You don’t need me to fight a battle.”

Roshar tipped his head to one side, his shoulders shrugging, and opened his hands as if scattering seeds. The gesture—a Herrani one, used to indicate doubt—made Arin angrier. “You don’t,” Arin insisted. “You’d be fine without me. You’re good at war.”

Roshar met his gaze. The green paint around the prince’s eyes was fresh, his expression sober. “You’re better.”

He didn’t like to tell her what Roshar had asked. But he did, focused on adjusting the small lamp they’d set on the canvas tarp that covered the dirt floor of his tent. The lamp didn’t burn well. Its oil was bad. It smoked. As he talked, he tinkered with the burner, the chimney. Then Arin stopped, realizing that he was close to destroying the thing between his hands.

Kestrel sat up in the bedroll, unbound hair spilling over her bare shoulders. It was the color of candlelight. She said, “Roshar’s right.”

Arin struggled with his unease, didn’t know what to say, dreaded blurting out the wrong thing. Finally he settled on blunt truth. “You’re taking a big risk. I don’t want you to have to do it alone.”

She sat in profile to him. Her hair had slid to curtain most of her face, but she shoved it back, meeting his gaze with her own firm one. “It will work.”

He thought of the Bite and Sting tiles carefully stowed in a velvet bag. He scrubbed the heel of his hand against his scarred cheek, saw Kestrel’s quiet regard, how her expression changed the way a story does: subtle, with shifts of detail. Revealing. It calmed him a little to see her intelligence, vivid and clear.

“I believe you,” he said. “I’ll stay with the army. But it’s strange to me that Roshar changed his mind. He was ready to retreat to the city.”

“Seeing Risha changed him.”

“Even so. It’s hard to know what he really wants.” Arin explained how Roshar could lay claim to Herran, and in the eyes of his people he’d only be taking what was legally his.

Kestrel said nothing at first. Then: “It’s not like you to question someone’s friendship.”

With a nauseated jolt, Arin thought of Cheat, who’d been his first friend after the invasion. “Maybe I should.”

“Maybe it would make you less yourself, if you did.”

“And you? Do you trust Roshar?”

She considered it. “Yes.”

Arin let out a resigned sigh. “I do, too . . . even if I shouldn’t.”

“Let the morning keep what belongs to the morning,” Kestrel said, but as if she wasn’t paying attention to what she said. Then she blinked. Her jaw tightened. She blew out the lamp.

He drew her to him. “What is it?” he murmured. Her heart beat against his palm.

“It just means that you shouldn’t borrow tomorrow’s problems. Deal with today’s.”

“But why does it upset you?”

“It was something my father would say.” She grew smaller in Arin’s arms. “I can’t face him.”

“You won’t have to,” he promised. This, he could do. Arin sensed his god listening. He felt the god’s assent fall on him, light and warm, like ash.

Give him to me, said death.

As Kestrel neared sleep, it occurred to Arin that the emotion that spread through him—delicate, and unable to be named at first, because so unfamiliar—was peace.

He held the feeling close before it could be lost.





Chapter 39

The rain began the next morning and showed no signs of letting up. Mud sucked at Arin’s boots as he helped Kestrel ready her horse. The rain intensified, dropping down like little stones.

Arin squinted up at it. “Terrible day to ride.” He hated to see her go.

She wiped water from her face, glancing over at Risha, whose head was tipped back under the rain, eyes closed. “Not for every one,” Kestrel said, “and the rain will make it less likely a Valorian scout will notice that a small band is riding from camp.”

True. The middle distance was a gray fog. Arin raked dripping hair off his brow. He tried to be all right. His nerves sparked the way a blade does against the grinder.

Kestrel touched his cheek. “The rain is good for us.”

“Come here.”

She tasted like the rain: cool and fresh and sweet. Her mouth warmed as he kissed her. He felt the way her clothes stuck to her skin. He forgot himself.

She murmured, “I have something for you.”

“You needn’t give me anything.”

“It’s not a gift. It’s for you to keep safe until I return.” She placed a speckled yellow feather on his palm.

The rain fell in a veil behind her.