"Marvor," Cadnan said after a second. "He is to come and aid them. He tells me this. We join him and come back with him, away from here, to where he stays now. Then none of us are punished." He paused. "It will be a great punishment."
"I know," Dara said. "Yet one does not go alone."
Her voice was so low that Cadnan could barely hear it, but the words were like sharp stones, stabbing fear into his body. For the first time, he saw clearly exactly what she was driving at. And after a long pause, she spoke again.
"Where one goes, two may go. Where Marvor goes, two may follow, one to lead the other."
"One goes alone," Cadnan said, feeling himself tremble and trying to control it. "You must go."
It seemed a long time before she spoke again, and Cadnan held himself tightly, until his muscles began to ache.
"We go together," she said at last "Two go where one has gone. Only so do I leave at all."
It was an ultimatum, and Cadnan understood what was behind it. But an attraction between Dara and himself ... he said: "There is the rule of the tree," but it was like casting water on steel.
"If we leave here," Dara said, "why think of a smaller rule?"
Cadnan tried to find words, but there were no words. She had won, and he knew it. He could not let Dara stay behind to draw a great punishment, possibly even to die, to be no more Dara. And there was no way of forcing her to go and escape that fate—no way except to go with her.