Dawn by Tim Lebbon Page B

her eyebrows but did not respond.
    She thinks it’s her, Trey thought. She thinks she’s the leader of this pathetic little gang.
    Trey went back to Kosar, and all the way he knew what the answer would be. The big man barely glanced up. Even as Trey stated their aim and said they would be moving soon, Kosar only looked at the horizon and nodded. “I’ll not be going with you.”
    “Where will you go?”
    “Some corner of Noreela where I can be forgotten.”
    Trey wanted to say more. He so wished he could think of something stirring and affecting that would make Kosar rethink his decision and join their continuing journey south—something about trust and loyalty, and pursuing any scrap of hope that might still exist. But he followed Kosar’s gaze and saw the landscape swathed in unnatural twilight, and he knew that it would not take long for the plants and animals to die.
    “I don’t think such a corner exists,” he said. Then he turned away from the thief and walked back to Alishia and Hope.

    WHEN KOSAR STOOD and looked back, the others were mere shadows. He could see Trey standing within the fake protection of the dead machine’s ribs, and on the ground at his feet Hope and Alishia seemed to be huddled together. There was an implication of ownership in Hope’s pose that he did not like. She had been the same with Rafe. We’ll have to watch her, A’Meer had whispered to him one night, and yet in that final, useless fight, Hope had been as strong as any of them.
    He guessed that she missed Rafe more than anyone as well. With him had gone her lifetime of dreams and desires. It was no surprise that she was willing to hang on to any fragment of hope that remained, however false.
    Is Alishia really something special? Kosar wondered, and he realized that, yes, she probably was. She was certainly no longer a normal girl, if she ever had been. But he no longer cared. A’Meer was dead, and day was night. Useless, he thought. He turned away from Trey, Hope and Alishia and looked east.
    He wanted to be on his way. Hope put him on edge, Alishia disturbed him and Trey was somewhere he was never meant to be. The fledger had used the last of his fledge a couple of days before, and already he was showing signs of withdrawal. It was difficult to tell in this weak light, but his skin seemed to be growing a paler yellow, the whites of his eyes clouding with burst blood vessels.
    Kosar craved his own company once again, and the idea of wandering Noreela seemed the only thing to do. He would explore, as he had done so long ago. He would find the corner of Noreela that Trey said would not exist, and perhaps he could live out his life there, hidden away from the glare of the Mages’ influence.
    And if they burn the land? A’Meer asked in his mind. Send out armies, kill everything, spread disease?
    Kosar shook his head. She had always been so practical. “Leave me alone,” he said. “I’ll mourn you well enough, but don’t start talking back at me, A’Meer.”
    It’s you doing the talking, just using my voice.
    “And is that the voice of reason?”
    Maybe.
    He shook his head again and touched the sword at his side. “Fuck.”
    A large bird passed overhead—a moor hawk, perhaps—and Kosar watched it drift away in the night. It had flown northeast. With no real idea of where he wanted to go, he decided to follow.

    A’MEER’S VOICE REMAINED silent as Kosar took his first steps away. He expected guilt to crush him, regret to pick at his limbs and turn him around, but his steps felt fine, his legs surprisingly strong. Perhaps the last few days had welcomed him back into the life of a traveler once again.
    He waited for the shout that would bring him to a halt, but none came. He did not look back. If he turned and saw Trey watching him leave he would have to return, try to explain once again why this was all so hopeless now that Rafe had gone and dusk had fallen. Kosar was a good man, and even though he was finding the