Page 23 of The Sorcerer's Alpha
“And the Sarnoy?”
“Too distant for me to say much of use. I’ll search again when we make camp tomorrow.”
Marut frowned. “There’s no way for you to send us back to Banuri? Or even to the badlands? I’d take the Skopoy over traveling across the Khentii in midwinter.”
Sycamore rubbed at his eyes. “I don’t know. I’m sure there’s some way. But—as I said, I don’t know what I did, which means I don’t know how to repeat it.” He looked at Marut. “You told me you didn’t intend to die. Well, neither do I, and I’m certainly not willing to die of something as ridiculous as being excessively cold. We’ll return to Banuri in one way or another.”
Aditya needed him. And the kingdom. Dying wasn’t an option.
“All right,” Marut said. He went back to his rummaging. “We should probably,” he said without looking at Sycamore, “share—it’s cold enough that the bedding isn’t—you’ll be cold. If we don’t—”
“In the interests of survival,” Sycamore said, to put the poor man out of his misery. “I understand.”
“Yes,” Marut said. “So.” He turned from his saddlebags without ever removing anything. “We should sleep.”
“All right,” Sycamore said. Marut still wouldn’t look him in the eye, and he couldn’t resist poking a little. “Am I to take it that you cuddled me every night while I was healing?”
Marut’s head jerked up, eyes wide. “What? Cuddle—? I—my lord—”
“Oh, stop,” Sycamore said, immediately remorseful. Marut wasn’t a courtier or a fellow sorcerer to exchange verbal parries with. “I’m sorry. I’m only teasing you. You’re right that it’s the sensible thing to do.”
Marut looked away again, mouth pulled into a tight line. “I swear to you that I was—respectful—”
“Marut. Please.” Sycamore pushed back his blankets, fighting a shiver as cold air flooded his nest. “I know you were. Come lie down where it’s warm.”
Marut did, stiffly, still without making eye contact, and lay stiffly beside Sycamore like a log. Sycamore tried to get comfortable without accidentally elbowing Marut in the kidneys or making contact with him in any other way, which was impossible. He finally turned onto his side and pretended he didn’t notice Marut’s arm along the length of his back.
He considered and rejected making some comment about how this would be more effective without clothes on. Marut would surely run screaming into the darkness and freeze to death on the steppe.
He closed his eyes. He had been suitably warm before, but now, with Marut’s body heat warming the air beneath the blankets, he was as cozy as he ever was in his bed in Banuri, tucked beneath a down comforter with a fire crackling in the hearth.
Marut lay without moving. Not merely a log: a dead log.
“Stop thinking,” Sycamore said. “Go to sleep.”
“Good night, Sycamore,” Marut said quietly into the darkness.
* * *
GettingSycamore onto Rhododendron’s back was a humiliating ordeal that involved Marut more or less shoving him into the saddle, but the important part was that he made it. Once in his seat, he could hold the reins well enough, and Rhododendron was content as always to follow Jackrabbit. They rode west, Marut leading with his compass and Sycamore close behind.
The hills where Sycamore had detected the reindeer were a long morning’s ride across flat, treeless land. Sycamore could imagine that this country was beautiful in the warmer months, an endless rolling sea of grass. Even now there was something about the stark vastness of the landscape, the enormous sky overhead like a pale blue canopy, strewn with clouds, that captured his imagination. Temur had told him many stories of the steppe, but Sycamore was glad to have the chance to see it for himself.
He would have rather seen it in summer, though.
The hills appeared on the horizon as a brown haze and rapidly grew larger and more distinct. They were small hills by Sycamore’s Chedoy sensibilities, and scattered only sparsely with trees, but as they presented the hope of food, he was entirely pleased with them. He had never before been hungry beyond the simple everyday hunger of readiness for the next meal; the hunger of many days in a row without adequate food was an obsession. He could think of little else. They wouldn’t starve immediately if they couldn’t find food today, but he felt desperation nipping at his heels nonetheless.
Marut drew Jackrabbit to a halt as they neared the base of the hills. “I would imagine the deer have moved since yesterday. Are you able to find where they are, or is it faster for us to ride around and look?”
The answer depended on how readily the earth would speak to Sycamore. “It may be more trouble than it’s worth to get me off the horse and back on again.”
Marut nodded. “We’ll go searching, then. Are you warm?”
“Oh—warm enough,” Sycamore said, surprised by the question. Two blankets plus his cloak meant he was only moderately chilled. Even his coat flapping open at his shoulder where Marut had cut through it was more a nuisance than a source of cold.
Marut nodded again and turned Jackrabbit to climb up into the hills.
They rode along the ridge, Marut peering here and there and Sycamore focusing on staying in his saddle and keeping his blankets from sagging open anywhere and letting in the cold air. Evergreen trees dotted the northern slopes, clustering in the clefts where Sycamore presumed water ran after a rainfall. He saw nothing moving aside from the clouds drifting across the sky. The wind, blowing from the south, whispered a song of snow.