A group of children playing by the riverside gave me better directions, and I soon found myself within the vicinity of the eatery. You could tell which one from the stench—a combination of putrid bitterness that came from the slaughterhouse, and the distinct aroma of roasted goat. I walked around the fence, catching sight of a carcass strung up between two banana plants. A butcher was ripping out its intestines as deftly as if he was peeling fruit.
Someone whistled; the butcher disappeared into the back door, leaving his grass-cutter blade on a rock. I didn’t even wait. I slipped my hand through the fence, claiming the blade for my own; the wooden hilt was still covered in goat’s blood. It was half the size of my arm.
I circled the eatery, past the tavern, until I found the set of stairs leading up to the lodging. I let my arm hang loosely, a faint attempt at hiding the knife between the building and my body, and slowly made the climb. There were silhouettes behind the curtains. I recognized one of the voices. Lushai. I didn’t know the others. At least one guard, and perhaps one of his deputies.
I pressed my back against the wall, right outside the window, and breathed slowly. Their conversation drifted between the day’s events until the deputy started talking about Yuebek’s arrival in the castle.
“And how sure are you that she’ll come?” he asked, appearing right by the window.
“The Zarojo assured me,” Lushai replied. It was definitely him; I had spent too much of my childhood listening to the man brown-nose his way through my father’s meetings. “He’ll drop a bait she can’t refuse, he said.”
I smirked. Can’t refuse. Of course. Lo Bahn didn’t look like it, but he had gotten smarter, at least when it came to his dealings with me. Too bad for whatever new deal he had going that I had learned my lessons, too. I knew he had been oddly specific about where he saw Khine for a reason. But the joke was on him; all he did was give me a way out. I could take care of the rest.
“Won’t Prince Yuebek be angry?” the deputy continued.
“Of course,” Lushai chortled. “He needs to learn his place. Having the queen in our custody will shift the tides in our favour, and I can imagine she’d much rather be in the company of her countrymen.”
“My lord, I’m not sure I agree with you.”
“You don’t know the queen half as well as I do. I’ve watched her grow up. Head harder than a brick, harder than her father’s, the only person she ever listened to. You couldn’t force that child to do anything. You can lay out all reason for her, tell her exactly why it’s important, and she’ll do the complete opposite just to spite you. If Yuebek wants to marry her, he’s going to have to do it on our terms. At this moment in time, Queen Talyien is prime currency, and—”
He paused, and the room fell silent. Long enough that I felt unease stir in the pit of my stomach. The shutters flipped open and I caught sight of the deputy peering down at me.
I sliced him across the neck with the blade.
He uttered a low shriek. I took off just as Lushai and the other guard came barging after me. They were in full armour, and lumbered down the steps at half the speed. I went straight for the safety of the narrow streets. A drainpipe gurgled with water from that morning’s rains, and I paused to wash the blood off my hands and my face. From around the corner, I saw the guard’s silhouette. The idiots had split up to search for me.
“You…!” he thundered as he approached. “Who sent you?”
I paused. If he didn’t recognize me, then…
He took another step, sword drawn. A mere guardsman. I struck him, missed his neck, ended up hitting him under his armpit. The grass-cutter was dull, which didn’t stop me from ripping a hunk of his flesh. Dull blades hurt just as much as sharp ones, if not more—you just had to strike a little harder. Reeling in pain, he bore down on me ungracefully, sword in hand, giving me no room to escape. I stepped back as he slipped on a puddle and tripped over the gutter. His jaw struck the hard ground. He groaned and tried to twist himself back up, but he ended up only flopping like a fish on dry ground—the fall must have dislocated his neck. I tightened my grasp around the wooden hilt, making sure of my target, and put him out of his misery quickly with one clean strike across his throat. Blood spurted out like a lemon squeezed too hard, and he slid partly down with the water, leaving red trails in the current.
The assault left the grass-cutter so dull it was useless. I dropped it and picked up the soldier’s sword. Without stopping to examine my kill, I raced down the alley and into another, separated by another narrow channel of storm water. Slurries of green slime floated above the surface, smelling faintly of urine.
Lushai was waiting for me on the bridge.
“You irritating, troublesome wretch,” he snarled.
I smiled. “I should say the same thing about you, Warlord Lushai.”
“I’m not your enemy, Talyien.”
“You all say that. Forgive me if I find it hard to believe now.” I paused. “Not queen? You can’t even pretend very well, can you?”
He took a step. “I told your father he should’ve disciplined you more. Instead, he chose to spoil you.”
“Spoil,” I repeated in disbelief.
“He gave you the fucking world instead of letting you learn what it’s truly like to live in it,” Lushai snorted. “Look at you. Running through the streets like you must’ve been doing the rest of the year, like some common harlot. Dragonlord Rayyel had a sensible plan, and what did you do?”
“You’re not even pretending to work with my father anymore, are you?”
“Warlord Yeshin isn’t my liege.”
“And yet when he was alive you licked his boots better than his own dogs. I see how it is. You’re only an ally when it suits you. You don’t want the Oren-yaro banding together against you, and yet it would have worked out very well for you if I had been assassinated out there, wouldn’t it?”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Lushai huffed.
“Come on, Lushai. Haven’t you always wanted what my father got? Oren-yaro benefitted from the resolution of your war, but you? Bara didn’t get much more than a couple of fiefdoms added to the region. You wanted your daughter to be queen. Your grandson, heir to the Dragonthrone.” I stopped in front of him.
“You do recall that marrying Prince Rayyel is not enough requirement to secure the throne,” he said. “Otherwise, I would’ve suggested your father marry Ryia Ikessar and save us all the trouble.”
“A suggestion that would’ve gotten you killed.”
“Perhaps.” He nodded towards me. “Rest assured, I’m not going to try to take anything from you. All I need is leverage over your new prince, and we can embrace this new tomorrow with open arms. Imagine the possibilities. Trade with the Zarojo Empire once more, and beyond! Riches and powers beyond our wildest dreams. We’d be true royalty, Talyien, not just landowners squabbling over ruins and rice fields.”
“You’d let the nation burn because of your ambitions.”
“No,” he said. “You’d let the nation burn because you can’t see beyond what you want. Clearly, you’re here now because you couldn’t imagine yourself married to that man. But I suppose your own happiness, your own feelings, take precedence, eh? What did I tell you? Spoiled!”
I attacked; he met my charge like an angry boar. The man didn’t look like it, but he had survived the War of the Wolves for a reason. He tore the sword from my hand as easily as if it had been made of wood, grabbed me by the collar, and flung me to the ground like a rag doll. My left rib cage slammed against the pavement. Stars exploded in my vision.
“A spoiled fucking brat,” Lushai continued, thundering after me. “My own children wouldn’t dare act the way you do. If Chiha was queen, I’m sure we wouldn’t be in this mess. Wouldn’t have the Zarojo breathing down our necks like dragons, for sure! Because she would’ve been smart—she would’ve followed every command and never once forgotten her place. You, on the other hand? I couldn’t believe what your father let you get away with when
you were a child. Talking back to him, building up your own ideas before you understood the way things are… I should teach you a lesson first!” He reached me just as I got up and struck me with the back of his hand.
I grabbed his wrist, staring at him with blazing eyes. Lushai tore it away and spat to the side.
“You’re coming back with me to Toriue,” he said.
“If you want to present a carcass to Yuebek, then be my guest.”
“You bring shame to your father’s name with every breath you take. Very well, then. I can’t bring a carcass back, but your unconscious body…” He lifted his hand again.
It never reached me. Blood suddenly spurted from his mouth, and he turned just as someone stepped away from him, bloody knife in hand. Lushai slumped to the ground, the blood seeping from his belly and around his shirt. His eyes lost light before he could manage another word.
I turned to the newcomer and recognized Sayu, Agos’s wife.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
THE BARAJI EXCHANGE
May the gods forgive me,” Sayu managed to breathe after what felt like forever. “He was going to hurt you.”
“What are you doing here?”
She glanced at the body and walked around it as she came up to me. “That’s Warlord Lushai, isn’t it? I just killed a warlord. Gods…”
“My question first.”
She looked up, startled. I’ve found that you need to be straightforward sometimes when someone is in shock, and Sayu clearly had never killed anyone before. I placed my fingers on her wrist and took the knife from her hand. She surrendered it willingly.
“It was Kisig,” she managed as I led her away from the body, towards a corner where she didn’t have to look at it. “My son. You remember him? You saved him during the… during your trial. He told me so. We heard you were missing and… he begged me to come here and help you. Begged me. I don’t know what came over me. They would have killed him if not for you. So I agreed.”
I took her from the alley and out in the open street, where the canal opened up into the river. The spray of sunlight seemed to energize her. “I left the boys in Oren-yaro a few days ago,” she said. “There was an uproar in Toriue when I arrived. The Ikessar priestess found me wandering near the castle gates and accepted my services. She asked me to come out here today, keep my eyes peeled. She told me to keep an eye out for him.”
Sayu pointed at Lushai. She still looked distraught. I placed my hands on her shoulders. She turned her head to the side, though she wouldn’t meet my eyes. “Where is she?” I asked.
“Just further down the river,” she breathed. “Behind the brewery. Prince Rayyel is there, too, and Lady Chiha. They’ve been meeting there while looking for you.”
I pulled away and followed her as she started down the path by the river. We walked in silence as we crossed a boardwalk that hugged the side of a large rock face, fringed with red and green moss.
“I’m sorry for what I did during my husband’s funeral,” Sayu said, at length. “I overstepped my bounds. You could’ve had me killed for that. You didn’t. You saved my son instead.”
I glanced away. “I should be the one apologizing.”
Sayu made a sound in the back of her throat, and we were silent again for a little while. I wondered if she was trying to stop herself from pushing me into the river.
“What they say about you and my husband,” she managed. “It’s true, isn’t it?” She turned around. Now she was looking into my eyes, and I saw the tears in hers. She was forcing them not to fall.
“It’s true,” I replied.
“All of it?”
“Enough of it.”
I heard her take a deep breath.
“I did always know about you,” she managed. “I knew what you were to him. When I first met him, he spoke of nothing else. But you were so far away, this distant queen of stories, and we… we were real. I thought I could make him forget. That I could give him a good life, good enough to wash away his past. But we can’t have everything. Did you at least love him? No—don’t answer that. I’d rather hold on to the belief that I loved him best.”
“Sayu…”
“You are sorry. I saw it in your eyes the day of the funeral. You risked yourself to say goodbye. And you protected my son and remember my name even when I can’t even say yours without wanting to bite my tongue. Let’s… leave it there. To say more would be… disrespectful.”
“The court’s not here,” I said. “Say what you need to.”
“Maybe you’re testing me. Maybe you’ll take my head after I’m done. For what it’s worth, I can see why he… what he saw in…” She swallowed and wiped the last few tears from her eyes.
“He had a home with you,” I said. “The kind he never had in Oren-yaro. He was loyal and dependable and brave, and he paid the price for it. I’m sorry, Sayu. He deserved more than this, and so do you. I know it cannot bring him back, but I will be indebted to him all my life. So believe me when I say this: Your services here are not required. Take your sons and go home.”
“I don’t know what to feel about what you just said,” she replied.
“Whatever it is,” I said, “you’re allowed.”
We fell silent again. The sun felt hot on my face. The way it looked so peaceful, hovering over the horizon, you wouldn’t think we were at the cusp of war.
“You’re right about one thing, anyway,” she whispered. “Nothing will ever bring him back.” Beside us, gulls shrieked over the dark shadow of River Agos, reminding me that I had not grown numb to the pain—I had simply learned to live with it.
We reached the part of the riverbank that rolled up to the city, to the last patch of buildings right under the shadow of Toriue Castle. Sayu led me through a small gate and stopped outside a rickety-looking door. She knocked twice. I saw Namra from behind the window. Her eyes lit up.
“My queen,” she said, rushing out to meet me. She cupped my face in her hands. Only then did I feel the sting of bruises from Lushai’s attack. “Oh, my queen. We thought the worst. What happened?”
“Yuebek,” I said. And then, realizing she was looking at my injuries, I shrugged. “And Lushai.”
“What did he do?”
I glanced at Sayu, who flushed. “Nothing. Tell me what’s happening here.”
She led me into the dwelling, where Rayyel sat with Inzali and Chiha on mats in the common room, steaming mugs of tea in their hands. “What’s this?” I asked, glancing at everyone. “A secret meeting? And I wasn’t invited?”
You could cut the ensuing silence with a knife. I took a deep breath and turned to Rai, whose eyes were on the floor the whole time. “I’m back,” I continued. “Aren’t you going to greet your wife?”
He got up slowly. I could see a flash of relief on his face, but nothing more. That pride again, ever the downfall of the Jinsein people. The pride that kept us all tight-lipped and stubborn. He would rather sit with his pride than even worry about me. Why was I still surprised? It was why we were here in the first place.
“Stop,” I said. I sighed. “I suppose there’s no point asking for an explanation.”
“You are entitled to it,” Rai whispered.
“There are scandals in both our lives,” Chiha broke in. Her voice was calm. Unlike Rai, she could look at me straight—eyes unflinching, head unbowed. What she had done was not a sin, as far as she was concerned. Perhaps her father had it right. Perhaps if she had been queen, the world wouldn’t have erupted in chaos.
“Chiha—” Rai began.
She smirked. “What? After everything that has happened, will you lie after all? Are you going to deny Anino like you’ve done his whole life?”
“My wife—”
“Is sitting right in front of us and has yet to draw her sword. That ought to tell you something, Rayyel, if nothing else.” She turned back to me. “I will not apologize. You can carry grievance against me all you want, it won’t change the past. We were all children back then, thinking w
e knew it all, reaching for what wasn’t rightfully ours, for all that we think we are entitled to it. Maybe I’m not talking about me. Maybe I’m talking about you.”
Anger flashed on Rai’s face. “Lady Chiha…”
“No, Lord Ikessar,” she said. “You don’t get a say, not this time. I warned you this would happen. Nine years ago I begged you to tell her. Tell the child the world is bigger than her own, Rayyel, that your betrothal was a sham, that people are allowed to feel and love outside of her father’s wretched plans. Tell her growing up under Yeshin’s shadow has sheltered her from the truth. Not all of us are Oren-yaro dogs. But you chose the predictable route. Morals, family, duty—ever the Jinsein way. Now look where we are.”
As soon as she finished speaking, Rai walked out of the room.
I pressed my lips together, realizing I had witnessed a lovers’ spat, nearly a decade overdue. My hunch over the years was correct. He did love her. He loved her and she loved him back, years before I ever came into the picture. Far from the aggrieved party, I was the wedge that drove them apart. “I’m not here to fight.”
She turned to me. “That’s surprising. Seems to me like fighting’s about all you’ve done since you took the throne. And you did it without even knowing who the enemy is—a marvel of marvels. How exhausted are you now, Queen Talyien?”
“Very.”
She didn’t seem surprised by my admission. “That happens. It’s hard to be a bitch without a master—you’re barking at every shadow that walks across the street.”
“You’re an admirable woman, Lady Chiha,” I said. “And if we were in a better place, perhaps I’d want to speak more about… what we intend to do from here on. Knowing your son’s existence is not a reason for me to harm him—far from it.”
“If that’s true, then where is he?” she asked. “Word has it that he was last seen with a man who worked for you.”
I glanced at Namra. “Warlord Lushai… claimed to have found him, did he not?”
The Dragon of Jin-Sayeng Page 20
