by Matt Wallace
The door swings open, but Bam doesn’t come striding through. Instead a filthy little man in ragged clothes, his wrists bound behind his back, is flung into her chamber. A gag has also been shoved into his mouth. He crumples into a pile of tatters at her feet.
A hooded figure enters in the captive’s wake. Despite the fact that her head is completely covered, Evie immediately recognizes her enemy-turned-ally-turned-lover.
Several other hooded, black-clad figures enter behind her, joined by Bam and his comically large mallet.
Sirach removes her hood, revealing that perpetually satisfied smile she so often wears.
Evie breathes a small sigh of relief. “I was wondering if you were going to return in time for the siege.”
“We were delayed, but I assure you it was worth the wait.”
Evie grins. “You always are.”
Though she did not admit it to Mother Manai, Evie had begun to worry. Sirach and a company of her night fighters had been sent out the night before the siege to gather any last-minute intelligence or information that might be useful to them before they stormed the city.
Sirach bows her head. “The General flatters me, but that’s not exactly what I meant.”
“Of course,” Evie says. “I imagine this person has something to do with that.”
“Unless you arrested him for refusing to bathe,” Mother Manai offers.
“Don’t let the grime deceive you,” Sirach warns.
She bends down and grips the man roughly, one hand snagging his hair while the other takes hold of his right shoulder. Sirach dips him forward and forces his chin into his chest.
There is a tattoo inked on the exposed flesh of the back of his neck.
It is an ant, the symbol of Crache.
“A Skrain scout?” Evie asks.
“There were three of them,” Sirach confirms. “The other two were clumsy and fell on my sword.”
The remaining scout begins growling a protest around his gag.
“Can the Skrain be that close already?” Mother Manai asks, alarmed.
“I don’t know,” Sirach says. “But he clearly does.”
“He hasn’t told you?” Mother presses.
“Not yet.”
“Perhaps watching you kill his friends made him belligerent?” Evie says.
“They were clumsy! I explained that!”
Evie frowns heavily at her, and then crouches low to meet the level of the bound scout’s eyes, her leather armor creaking softly. She reaches out and yanks the gag from his mouth. “What is your name?”
The man spits on the floor.
Sirach thrusts her palm against his right ear. It clearly hurts. A lot.
Evie sighs. “You understand everyone in this room besides me will very happily torture you until you tell them what they want to know?”
The man nods.
“Do you imagine you’ll be able to resist?”
He has no answer to that.
“I didn’t think so. Then why bother? Pride? Duty? Fellowship?”
“Something like that,” the scout manages, hoarsely.
“My friend, regardless of what happens in the immediate future, no one will ever know what you did here. No one will compose a song about how you bravely resisted interrogation for several long minutes before the excruciating pain broke you. Neither will they curse your name for betraying your Skrain brothers and sisters and Crache. Your name will not be committed to history. You have free reign to act without the judgment of time.”
The scout stares at her, the resolve in his eyes faltering, but he again maintains his silence.
“If you answer my questions, we will bathe you, feed you, clothe you, and shelter you comfortably. Securely, but comfortably. If you do not answer my questions, Sirach is going to horribly maim you until you do, after which I will probably kill you simply to end your misery. I will feel very guilty about all of it, and if I survive the first day of this siege, I will still be so plagued by your death that I’ll find no rest, even in sleep. However, I would submit none of that changes or improves your position, or how you’ll feel about the outcome.”
The scout looks up at the rest of them surrounding his prostrated form. After that he stares at the floor for quite a while. Blood from the night before still stains the stone there.
“They will arrive by nightfall tomorrow,” he mutters.
Evie nods. She feels somewhat relieved.
“How many?”
“Six companies of Skrain, mobilized from the Ninth and Eighth Cities. They have a large complement of Savages. I don’t know how many, exactly.”
“What else?” Sirach demands.
The scout inhales deeply before answering. “Word around the camp is a much larger force is readying in the east. But they want to stop you from gaining any more ground, or reaching city gates.”
Evie doesn’t try to hide her surprise. “They’re willing to sacrifice a thousand soldiers just to slow us down?”
“Of course they are,” Sirach says. “Once we attack a city, this all becomes real, and ten times harder to hide from your people. If it ends here at the border, they can keep pretending none of this has happened.”
Evie knows the truth of her words.
“Bam, see that he is cleaned up and fed,” she instructs her trusted guard, “then lock him in the barracks cells. Don’t let anyone hurt him.”
The hulking stoic nods obediently, his hand swallowing one of the scout’s biceps and dragging him to his feet.
“You can’t win,” the scout assures Evie, desperation in his voice. “None of this will matter in the end.”
“It matters a great deal to us,” she replies before Bam hauls him away.
Evie looks to Sirach. “How likely is it the siege will end and we will have fortified our position by tomorrow night?”
“How likely is it I’ll swallow the moon and piss moonbeams?” Mother Manai asks in return.
Sirach points at the older woman. “What she said. Sieges can last weeks, months, or even years.”
Evie looks to them both. “What are our options?”
“Fortify our position here and wait,” Sirach offers, sounding less than enthusiastic about that course of action. “We can’t begin the siege and leave ourselves exposed to an attack. If we deal with the incoming Skrain first, we have the same problem. They’ve sealed the Tenth City because they know we’re coming. If we ride past them to fight, they could muster enough soldiers and Aegins within the city to hit us from behind.”
“We could split our forces,” Mother Manai suggests. “Begin the siege while a smaller force meets the Skrain.”
“We don’t have the numbers for that,” Sirach insists.
“That hasn’t stopped us yet,” Mother fires back at her. “If we wait here, then we have to deal with the Skrain they’ve sent after us and whatever reinforcements the Tenth City has to offer. Not to mention this larger force they’re gathering to completely wipe us out.”
“There is one more choice,” Evie interjects.
The two women fall silent.
“We retreat. Abandon the border and return to the wastelands.”
“If we retreat, it is as good as disbanding,” Sirach warns her. “Half the force we’ve gathered would flee. They’re joining you to take Crache back, not follow you into the wastes.”
“And even if they didn’t,” Mother Manai adds, “we won’t have the food or water to keep all of these folks upright. We’ve already run through the stores in this keep. We need to take the city to feed this new army of yours.”
“Beyond the wastes, then?” Evie asks Sirach.
Sirach shakes her head, her eyes darkening. “There is little left beyond the wastes but the sea, and what is left is barely keeping the Sicclunans alive. We’ve been surviving on scraps for years. Our time was already running out. That hasn’t stopped your former masters from wanting to kill us all over that last patch of fertile land, of course.”
Evie turns from
them and paces across the room, digging her fists into her leather-clad hips. Her chest beneath the breastplate feels hot, and she can’t seem to draw enough air into her lungs. Her mind feels as though it is boiling in acid. She tries to keep her struggling breath quiet, hoping desperately they don’t see the panic attempting to seize her.
There is a cracked and dusty mirror standing in the corner. In the midst of fighting off the shakes threatening to overtake her every muscle, Evie catches sight of herself decked out for battle, her sparrow-emblazoned armor and weaponry, her ridiculous cape. All of it has been fashioned for her by the Sicclunans.
Once Evie believed, as all Crachians do, that Siccluna was a great rival nation threatening the Crache way of life. Now she knows the truth, that they are a collection of nomads whose entire existence is based around channeling their every meager resource toward defending themselves against Crache’s genocidal conquest. Every ounce of steel is precious to them, as is each strip of leather.
Yet they believe in her enough to task their smiths with creating resplendent arms and armor to match the name that those who choose to follow Evie have bestowed on her.
She turns to face her closest allies once more.
“We take the city,” she proclaims. “All or nothing.”
Evie knows they all feel the weight of those words, but to her surprise they seem to readily accept them.
“I suppose there never really was a choice or options,” Mother Manai laments, though she musters a smile for Evie.
“If nothing else,” Sirach says, “it’ll be nice to fuck up one of their cities for a change.”
Evie nods, and the silence that follows is as good as a dismissal. There is nothing left to discuss.
Mother Manai and the Sicclunans turn to leave her.
“Sirach?”
The others filter out of the room, while Sirach remains behind, waiting.
“Did you have to kill those other scouts?” Evie asks when they’re alone.
“No,” she replies simply. “I chose to. Just as they chose to serve the armies that annihilated my people, stole their kingdom, and purged their history from living memory.”
“I served the Skrain as a Savage. I don’t want to become them.”
The way Sirach looks at her in that moment is not unlike a mother beholding their child’s naivety. “I learned long ago that you have to be willing to become a monster to defeat monsters.”
“Fine,” Evie replies. “But do you have to enjoy it?”
“Can we possibly have this conversation after the war?”
“I hope so.”
Sirach forces her pursing lips to form that knowing smile. “I enjoy these verbal sparring sessions of ours, you know. Not as much as our non-verbal sparring sessions, of course.”
Evie wishes it weren’t so difficult for her to remain angry with the woman. Sirach’s actions still disturb her, but Evie also knows there is an inherent contradiction in her, a Crachian, lecturing Sirach on the morality of warfare.
Evie collapses onto the foot of the bed, leaning forward, forearms braced against her knees.
“Do you have any idea what’s beyond the sea?” she asks Sirach. “To the west?”
“We’ve sent ships. We sent them to search for a new home for us all, away from the Crachian machine, though I’m sure it would find us eventually once it’s done eating this land and realizes it will never be enough.”
Evie waits.
“None of them ever returned,” Sirach confirms. “Either the ships we sent found nothing, or what they found they decided to keep for themselves.”
“Or something found them,” Evie posits.
“Yes. Or something found them.”
Evie looks up at her. Sirach is perhaps the fiercest warrior she’s ever met. Evie may very well be the better fighter, but she can never hope to match the ferocity imbued by a lifetime of resisting extinction with every breath. She also cannot fathom carrying the weight of that struggle every single moment of every single day.
“Maybe we can find out for ourselves one day,” Evie suggests.
“Maybe,” Sirach says, though it is clear she can’t bring herself to commit to the possibility. “In the meantime, shall we go wage a war?”
Evie nods, slapping her hands against her knees and standing up from the bed. She regards Sirach with a bitter smile. “Coincidentally,” she says, “I don’t have any other plans today.”
BLOODLESS
LEXI ONCE ASKED TARU ABOUT combat. While it’s true that Lexi has witnessed very little fighting in her life, she can’t imagine a fighter more proficient than her Gen’s retainer. She has seen Taru best Savages and Aegins, several of whom were trying to take their life, and from Lexi’s admittedly limited perspective, Taru dispatched every foe decisively and expertly.
Her retainer stated that effective combat operates on two basic principles: knowing the terrain and knowing your opponent. Taru went on to explain that studying one’s opponent revealed weaknesses, while studying the terrain revealed your advantage. Once you’ve delved thoroughly into those two issues, the task becomes combining that information to form a plan of attack or defense.
When it comes to dealing with a superior enemy or larger force, Taru further explained, two elements often make the difference between victory and defeat. The first element is distraction. The second is surprise. According to Taru, the experienced fighter can use misdirection as deftly as a magician, whether it’s in the feint of a single blade, or the arrangement of troops on a battlefield. That misdirection allows one to create tide-turning surprises for their foe. Smaller forces have used these tactics to overcome the odds for centuries, Taru insisted.
Distraction and surprise, Lexi finds herself repeating inwardly as she awakens in the fine, plush bed Burr has given her.
The memory of her retainer’s lecture on combat theory is at the forefront of her mind for a single reason: Lexi has decided to take action. She will no longer wait for her captors to decide how best to fit her among the cogs in their conspiratorial wheel. She will no longer have them decide her fate.
Lexi begins the morning by visiting the gardens, as she often has, taking care to stay away from the monstrously manipulated pods that guard the gaps in the surrounding hedge wall. The lanterns are as lush and vibrant as any fruit-bearing plant in Crache. They have thus far provided her sole source of comfort and serenity in this place. She walks among them, dabbing the morning mist from her forehead with a silken handkerchief provided by her captors, among a slew of other lavish grooming items.
The old man moves silently among the lanterns, his withered face cast in the shadow of his straw hat’s wilted brim. He gently mists the green stems and colorful folds of the lanterns with a water-filled bellows. His cart filled with pungent pig manure is parked beside the row.
“Good morning, Chivis,” she bids the gardener, having learned his name several days ago.
“My lady,” he replies, never wavering in his work or meeting her gaze.
It still grates Lexi, the way in which those dwelling in this secret estate use the antiquated greeting when addressing her. She feels no ill will toward Chivis, however. He is, in his way, as much a hostage of this place as she is.
“They look particularly lovely today,” she comments, stroking her knuckles against the papery fold of a golden yellow lantern.
Chivis doesn’t answer. She imagines he only speaks when he has something of value to say. She also considers that he rarely views what he has to say as valuable.
Lexi turns her attention inward for a moment, thinking of what she has in store for the rest of the day. Her resolve quivers, and she isn’t certain she’ll be able to follow through with her plans.
In the shadow of that doubt, she thinks of Brio. Of Evie. Of Taru. They are all out there fighting to get home while she sleeps in warm, soft beds and eats food grown, harvested, and prepared for her by the Ignoble’s secreted indentured servants.
Lexi owes it to those other
s, and most of all to herself, to join the fight.
She reaches out once more and very carefully, as not to harm it, rolls back one of the lantern’s folds to expose the fruit concealed within the bulb. A dozen plump berries the colors of bruises are bunched together, lush and ripe on their vine.
Lexi glances in Chivis’s direction, but the old man shows no sign of protest, or even notice.
She extends a fingertip and gently tests the skin of the largest berry, finding it waxy and slightly moist.
“Poison, my lady,” he warns her.
Chivis sounds neither concerned nor particularly alarmed by her actions. He is merely conveying to her a fact.
Storm clouds swell in Lexi’s eyes as she stares at the lantern fruit.
“I know,” she says darkly.
She carefully picks the ripened fruit from the pod, tucking a handful of berries inside her wrap.
For perhaps the first time since she encountered him, Chivis stops tending to his garden and looks directly at Lexi.
He says nothing. His expression remains dispassionate, but in his eyes she registers awareness. The old man cannot possibly know her plans, but Chivis clearly recognizes her intentions.
In the end, he returns silently and passively to his unending task of tending the garden.
It is as if the brief moment never passed between them.
Lexi smoothes her hands over the front of her wrap, ensuring the berries she has spirited there won’t bulge too noticeably. Before she turns to exit the rows of lanterns, she leans close to the old man’s mottled ear.
“You deserve to know more of the world than your garden,” she whispers. “There is so much beauty beyond these hedges. I’m sorry you’ve never been allowed to see it. I truly am.”
Chivis’s rough hands halt in their work. Standing so close to him, Lexi sees his lower lip tremble at her words, and the corner of his eye become glassy with the beginnings of tears.
She touches his bony shoulder briefly before leaving him to his garden.
Pausing beside the manure cart, Lexi quickly and deftly uses her handkerchief to gather up a large clump of the foul-smelling pig droppings. She balls her fist around it tightly as she moves on.
