The Warrior's Assault

by Kristen Banet

  Mat met them on the trail back to Alchan’s home.

  “We’re moving out,” he explained.

  She took his hand, the three of them walking back to Alchan’s home connected. She studied the caravan they’d made. Their remaining horses were carrying supplies or pulling carts, except one. A black gelding waited with a saddle. Alchan was going to ride, which none of them questioned—soldiers walked, kings rode.

  She fell into place with the Company. Kian was right behind them with Senri’s other husbands. Behind them, there were just over four dozen males. They were in charge of the supplies and pack horses, though someone from the Company would perform nightly checks.

  Alchan and Luykas walked out of the cliffside home, armored and ready for war. She’d seen them in their Company armor before, the brown so dark it was practically black, but this wasn’t their Company armor. Alchan wore black with white accents and a white dragon crest on his chest. Luykas was opposite, wearing a majority white with black accents and a black dragon on his chest.

  This had to be what they wore during the War. She couldn’t find another explanation.

  Alchan mounted his horse and turned to them. Luykas stood to the side of the Company, his arms behind his back.

  “Forward!” he ordered. The Company started walking. They didn’t bother with a march, though the males behind them attempted it for the first few steps.

  It would take weeks to reach the northern port city of Blackstone on foot. They didn’t have another choice.

  Mave steeled her resolve. Their feet would bleed. Their legs would give out. None of these things were new to her.

  And at the end of it, she was going to fix this. She was going to free those who would have never been captured if not for her.

  22

  Trevan

  “Training was shit today. You think that was the last rain of the season?” Emerian asked as he sat down at their table.

  Trevan shook his head. “Probably one more. There’s always one or two more even after the season is declared over.”

  “Hey! Speak Common, you fucking pricks!” an Andinna yelled across the chow hall. Emerian huffed, shaking his head. Trevan hadn’t even realized they were speaking Elvasi. He naturally replied in whatever language the person used when they spoke to him.

  Whatever Emerian replied with wasn’t in a language he knew, though. He fired back at the gladiator in Andena. Trevan reached out and hit him.

  “They’ll beat you for that,” Trevan snarled. “Andena is banned in the Empire.”

  “The guards like me more than you,” he retorted.

  Isn’t that the truth? Trevan didn’t bother feeling bitter about it. Emerian was nicer to the Elvasi than he was the Andinna. He antagonized the other gladiators, killed them without question on the sands. It was like he had no regard for his enslaved relatives. The Elvasi, however, he sucked up to. He did everything exactly as the guards wanted, helping them around the pits without needing to be ordered. Trevan shook his head.

  “They’ll kill you for all of it eventually,” Trevan warned again. He always warned this mutt that his alliances would get him killed. Emerian never listened.

  “It helps I can speak all three languages fluently. Sometimes, the guards ask me in Elvasi to tell them what some try to whisper in Andena.” Emerian grinned wildly.

  “Oh yeah, they’re going to kill you one day.” Trevan picked up his bowl, standing. He didn’t want to be in the room when the Andinna decided to jump the mutt. He took in Emerian, thinking he would be targeted just for his bloodlines, but Emerian didn’t help his own case. He actively hated the Andinna back.

  He was nearly back to his room when Emerian caught up to him.

  “Why did you leave me?”

  “Because I didn’t want to be around when they went for the kill,” Trevan answered simply as if it was an easy solution. “You know, I did well on my own. I don’t need you pissing them off right next to me, trying to get us both killed.”

  “By getting along with the guards, I’m only helping us stay safe!” Emerian growled at him.

  “I don’t need you to ally with the guards. They’ll keep me alive until I give the Empress what she wants.” He snorted, shaking his head. “You don’t know fucking anything.”

  “I know enough, and it’s not like you’re very forthcoming.”

  “Neither are you,” he reminded the mutt. For the last few months, they had yet to really get to know each other. They knew each other’s personalities, but not their histories. He didn’t know where this mutt came from, and the mutt didn’t know nearly anything about him.

  “You want forthcoming? I told you I freed the Champion, right? She was the Empress’ personal property. So were the other two Andinna I helped free because I made a deal with the Ivory Shadow Mercenary Company to make it all happen. All three of them made it out of the capital. All of them made it to Olost. I was dropped down here to die until the Empress realized I might know something. I regularly get tortured, and I’m sent out on the sands to fight for my life, but they will never let me die until they think I’ve given them some way to catch those Andinna again.

  “There’s only one group down here who really wants me dead—the Andinna. The ones you keep pissing off. They have the real power down here. Haven’t you figured that out yet? Being invisible to all of them is safer than getting their attention. You’re going to get yourself killed, and I can’t figure out why. Not even the Champion picked fights, and she could win them. She kept her head down unless they attacked her. She protected herself, not antagonized everyone. What you’re doing isn’t protecting yourself, it’s fucking suicide. Like me even hanging out with you. You’re going to get me killed.”

  “Why did you do it?” Emerian asked, derision and disgust edging into his tone. “What did they ever do for you? What could have possibly made that a good idea?”

  Trevan sat down slowly as they reached their room. It barely fit them, but it was enough. They had stolen shit mattresses off other cots and covered the floor. It was the best anyone could have in their hellhole.

  “I saw her on the sands once. Over six hundred years ago, I saw her fight in the Colosseum,” Trevan started, remembering that day. It had been hot like most summer days, and even hotter, thanks to the sands of the Colosseum. It was always hotter in the arena. “She was impressive. I wanted to know her. I was a fan, I think, but I also saw…something else. She never bowed to the Empress. Did you know that? A slave who remained defiant and powerful, and there was nothing that could stop her.

  “My first day down here, I don’t remember what was going through my head, but I remember what I saw. The other Andinna hated her. The Elvasi hated her. The lenasti ignored her, but only because she didn’t need them, and they knew she wouldn’t lose. I remember hearing how they all wanted a…piece of her.” He looked up at the mutt, hoping he caught the meaning. “And they tried. In time, many tried, and they all died for it. She was alone. Completely and utterly alone. She survived, not because she had anyone to rely on, but because she refused to die.

  “We Elvasi believe women should be protected from the horrors, kept clean and safe, yet I saw her stagger back from events she was forced to attend—broken, bloody, and violated. Even after the horrors she lived with down here, nothing could protect her from my people. My people, who claim we’re so much better than them. The Andinna have a right to be angry. We destroyed them and took their lives away from them. My people have no excuse.”

  “I refuse to believe the Elvasi are worse than the Andinna,” Emerian whispered. “And nothing done to the Champion, a single slave, is ever going to change my mind. I’m sorry.”

  “Really? Which of your parents is Elvasi? Doesn’t matter in the end. You have horns and wings. You have the tail; therefore, you’re a slave, no matter how pointed your ears are.” Trevan gave him a bitter smile. “Don’t think the Elvasi will like you because you have a piece of them. They’ll end up hating you more for ruining the pe
rfection of our people in their eyes.”

  “My father was Elvasi, and you don’t know anything. I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for the Andinna,” Emerian growled. “You don’t know shit.”

  “Explain it to me then.” Trevan leaned back on the wall.

  “My parents were married before the War and lived on a vineyard in the north half of the Empire, close to Anden, so she could visit her family,” he began. “Happily in love. When the War started, my mother wasn’t considered safe in the Empire, so the Andinna dragged her back to Anden and left my father, thinking they couldn’t trust him. When the War ended, she was captured, and he found her again. He paid for her to go home with him again because he loved her and wanted to keep her safe until they could leave together. He bought as many Andinna as he could afford to give them the best lives he could until he could get them to freedom. They had me within the first decade.” He shook his head.

  “He was going to help all of them to freedom, but the Andinna are vicious, and you’re right, they were angry. They killed him for being their ‘master.’ They killed my mother, a female Andinna, one of their own fucking people, for being his ‘whore.’ They would have killed me…” He fell against a wall and slid down. “But the local guard unit showed up and found me hiding. They didn’t know I wasn’t a captured Andinna. They didn’t know the Elvasi merchant who ran the house was my father.” Emerian laughed bitterly.

  “My mother’s people not only ruined my life but their own chance at freedom. The Andinna are stupid brutes. They always have been and always will be. Even when someone wanted to free them, they were violent. They murdered a man trying to save them. Why should I want to be in a community with monsters?” he sneered. “And before you say I have it wrong, I’m at least half-Andinna. I know the urges. I know the need to fight and spill blood. I know sometimes violence for the sake of violence is all they want, just to make themselves feel better. How could the Elvasi ever be worse than that?”

  Trevan absorbed every word, his heart aching.

  “Maybe, in the end, both sides are wrong,” he whispered. Mave had been vicious, but he always saw it as her way of protecting herself. The other Andinna in the pits…If they banded together, they could live better lives, but instead, they fought against each other, angry. They killed more of each other than the sands ever claimed. The Elvasi enslaved and tortured them, claiming they were always that way. He didn’t know anymore, but he did have an understanding of Emerian’s anger—that he could understand.

  “Sure. We’ll go with that,” Emerian spat, shaking his head again.

  They both curled into balls. It was time for them to get some shut-eye.

  It was much later when the mutt spoke again. Trevan didn’t even know why either of them was still awake.

  “You should rat them out and get out of here. You don’t deserve this. You were just following your uninformed heart.” Emerian sighed. “You belong up there in the white city, living a good life with a beautiful woman. You aren’t one of the monsters down here.”

  “I won’t betray my honor,” he whispered back. “It’s all I have left.”

  “Fuck your honor,” Emerian mumbled, rolling over. When Trevan looked over to him, the mutt’s back was to him. “Who cares about honor in our world?”

  He did. If he stopped caring, he had nothing left, then what would matter in the world? He could and would continue to suffer, even though Emerian’s story was only another hammer against his resolve. Who would want to save people who killed a loving couple and tried to kill a child?

  Mave wasn’t like that. She wasn’t. She was better. I know she was.

  She had to be—he refused to think he’d given up everything for nothing.

  “You’re an idiot,” Emerian accused, sitting up again. “A fucking idiot, you know that? I would give fucking everything to be up there or out of here. I would give everything to stop being associated with the fucking thugs and brutes down here. I would cut off my fucking wings, horns, and tail to make that happen.”

  “You could fly, and yet you choose to walk,” Trevan whispered. “Who’s the idiot now?”

  “Who’s flying? Not me. Not any of them.”

  “Have you ever flown? I’ve heard them talking about it. Sounds like an amazing experience.”

  “I used to. Farms let a lot of Andinna fly, but if we go too high or too far, we’re brought down. I never tested it. I just flew the loads where they wanted them to go. It’s nothing special.” Emerian shrugged.

  “Sure. We’ll see how you feel about flying when you’ve done without for a decade,” Trevan retorted. “I’ve seen Andinna go mad from wanting to reach the air. I’ve seen them risk getting shot out of the sky to get their bonds off and fly out of the training area. Many of them sneak off their bonds down here at night and stretch their wings when we aren’t watching. I never got them in trouble for it.”

  “That’s right. You were a guard down here for a long time. So, you know all the tricks,” the mutt said softly. “We could work with that.”

  “We already are. We move once a week, so the Andinna don’t accidentally pick up from the guards where we are. I know their stations. I know the back exits of this place and try to stay away from them on shift changes when there are guards wandering around with nothing to do. There’s not much else in terms of tricks or secrets that will help us.”

  “Well…have you really met the Empress? What’s she like?”

  “Beautiful. Caring when she wants to be. Normally, she’s cruel. She’s manipulative, dangerous, and cunning. She has one thing in common with the Champion, though, something that always gets me. When she walks into the room, she’s the most powerful person in it. She’s the picture of poise and grace.” He shook his head, remembering how she got him to relax and took him by surprise. “She’s a beautiful monster. The first time I was in the same room with her was right after I freed the Champion. My perception of her is colored because I’m a traitor.”

  “Do you think she would ever accept people like me?” he asked softly. “That I might have a place up there?”

  “No,” he answered. “Half-breeds like you are actually banned. The fact that you’re alive astounds me. Many kill your kind in the cradle to keep it from becoming a widespread mix. Since the war, I bet mutts like you are born more often, but I bet you’re one of the few who survived to adulthood.”

  “Oh. That must be why I never meet any others even though I knew Elvasi and Andinna were in bed together all the time. There’s always someone fucking someone.”

  “Yeah. You can want to be one of them all you want. You could give up the wings, the horns, and the tail, and it wouldn’t matter. You still have Andinna eyes. Gemstones in black. They’ll never accept you.” Guilt hit him right away. “I’m sorry, Emerian.”

  “Looks like we’re both learning hard lessons today. I was hoping when I got here, maybe…maybe if I fought hard enough, someone would see me. They would free me, seeing I’m part of them.”

  “That’s a lofty dream.”

  “I’ve carried it with me everywhere I’ve ever been.”

  Trevan frowned. “Would you accept freedom even if it was with Andinna?”

  Emerian groaned. “Probably not, I don’t know. I’ve never considered myself like…them.”

  “I would,” he whispered. “It was my goal. I don’t know why, but I was always drawn to them. I wished I could fly when I was little. Free the Champion and follow them out of the city. Get away from this place.”

  “What happened? Why aren’t you there with them?”

  “The city went on high alert. They needed time, so I stayed behind. I was certain I was going to die but—”

  “Oh, you’re a hero. A noble man who wanted to die for his cause.” The snort of derision made the mutt’s feelings very clear. “Fuck that. I’m your ally down here because I wanted to be around another Elvasi and not all of them, but if it came to me or you? Sorry, but I’ve gotten very good at staying alive.”r />
  “I figured.” He hadn’t thought this was the start of a new friendship. If anything, their wildly different viewpoints on the conflict around them were evidence they might not be allies for much longer. He was certain if either of them had other options, they would explore those, instead of trying to make whatever this was work.

  “Trevan?” someone whispered. He sat up, anxiety clutching his chest. Why did he recognize that voice?

  “Who’s there?” he demanded softly, looking around the dark room.

  “Up here.”

  Trevan tilted his head back to find a grate over his head. With the red moon glowing behind the head, he couldn’t identify who it was.

  “Um…”

  “It’s Dave!” hissed the figure. “I’ve been looking for you down there for months! You know how many of these grates exist in the city? I finally had to have a friend break into the guardhouse to find you on that stupid map.”

  “How did you know about it?” Trevan asked, standing up. Emerian started as well, but he pushed the mutt back down.

  “I used to use it to find Mave if she wasn’t in her room,” the human explained. “Look, there’s no plans or anything, but I promise, I’m not going to leave you down there, okay? We’re going to get you out.”

  “You’re the most wanted human in the Empire,” Trevan growled. “Why are you still in the capital?”

  “I have friends. You know there were more supporters than just you and me. One of them took me in, and they’ve been hiding me. After we heard of you fighting on the sands, freeing you became our top priority.”

  “What?” Hope ran through him. Then he remembered the mutt next to him and looked down at the pale male. Even after weeks in the sun, the mutt was barely tanning. “If you whisper this to anyone, I’ll kill you. Understood?”

  “I’ll keep it quiet. Who is he? Who’s Mave?”

  “Maevana Lorren, Mave…The Champion. Dave was a servant assigned to deal with her, take her places, and bring her back. He helped us free her,” Trevan explained quickly. “Dave, can we free this male too? He’s a mutt—half-Elvasi, half-Andinna.”