The Dragon of Jin-Sayeng

by K. S. Villoso

  “You were instilling them with the memory of my blood.”

  My guess caught him off guard. He nodded, as if glad he didn’t have to explain. “I was down in the stairwell when I heard the door open. I had forgotten to lock it. That shouldn’t have been a problem—nobody but your father goes up there, and the runes had already been adjusted for him. But it was Liosa. I believe they were having an argument.”

  An argument. An argument—like some old, married couple. But everyone always said my father had stolen Liosa from her mother and kept her locked up, the greatest blasphemy he had ever committed.

  “She was carrying you,” Parrtha continued, his eyes growing wet. He rubbed at it. “She saw the stairwell and became curious. Stepped over the threshold…”

  “And the runes reacted.”

  “Precisely.”

  “She didn’t die.”

  “I heard her and threw a spell to try to counteract the runes as soon as it all happened. I… I panicked. It was too strong, the wrong kind. The arrows shattered before they reached her, but she lay crumpled on the ground, a wreck, by the time I got to her. She had dropped you and you were crying and the only thing she could say was…”

  “Talyien,” Liosa called from the other end of the temple. The weight of the name hung as heavy as the silence that followed.

  My face was wet. I closed my eyes, allowing the rest of the tears to fall.

  In my mind, I turned the gem again to find that the shadows weren’t where I once thought they would be. The sunlight had chased them away, but I didn’t know if that was a good thing.

  Yesterday, I accepted the knowledge of who my father was and what I had to be as a result. A shelter in the darkness—I was only Yeshin’s daughter, however much that doomed me. There was no Liosa’s daughter, never had been.

  Parrtha told me the rest of the story, and it was difficult not to see it unfold in my head with every word. I saw my father come thundering into the room and imagined how his face contorted in horror at the sight of his blood-drenched wife shrieking at the top of her lungs. A man who had seen his sons die—it was a wonder he could still think straight afterwards. He must’ve assumed the worst. Perhaps he imagined the fates had finally arrived to punish him for his transgressions.

  He spotted me on the ground. When he attempted to get close, Liosa attacked Yeshin like a wild animal; Parrtha himself had to hold her down so that my father could reach me. Parrtha said he had never in his life seen a man so devastated. Every wall, every armour that my father had built up came crashing down, and the terrible Warlord Yeshin, Yeshin the Butcher, seemed to disappear in an instant. He picked up my still form and carried me to the corner, where he rocked me back and forth in his arms, sobbing like a little child.

  But I was unhurt. When Liosa had dropped me during Parrtha’s spell, I landed on the curtains, the part that trailed along the floor near the corner of the room, and somehow that cradled my head from the impact. The blood was Liosa’s. My father’s warmth must’ve woken me, because I started crying at the top of my lungs. Yeshin screamed, then, his voice thundering through the hall as he ordered the guards to take Liosa away. They said she howled in her chambers all night long, tearing the sheets and curtains with her bare hands and eating her own filth. The servants wept for days.

  Yeshin nearly had Parrtha beheaded for his error, but because he had inadvertently saved me—the arrows would’ve pierced both me and my mother otherwise—he allowed him to try to find a cure. As a mage-builder, Parrtha had no knowledge of the healing parts, but he eventually found a Jinsein herbalist who also claimed to be a witch within the right company. She gave Liosa a sleeping draught, which allowed her to examine the young woman closely. By then Liosa was so thin you could count the bones on her spine.

  She was asleep for several more days after. The herbs, or the spell, or a combination of all those things must’ve done something to her, because when she finally woke, her mind was blank. She uttered nothing but simple words, a child once more. More than that, though—the sight of her own infant sent her into a foamy-mouthed frenzy. Yeshin had her sent to Burbatan with Parrtha as an escort. On the road, the caravan was intercepted by Peneira’s bandits, who dragged Liosa up to the temple instead, hoping the priests and priestesses might figure out a cure. Enraged, Yeshin decided to leave her to her fate, though he ordered Parrtha to stay in the temple to keep an eye on her. In the meantime, he claimed his wife died during childbirth, closing that chapter of his life forever.

  “They all knew this,” I said. “The servants. Everyone in the castle. And they all kept it from me.”

  “To protect you,” Parrtha replied.

  “Protect me?” I hissed. “I was to be queen, not some helpless milkmaid!”

  “If the Ikessars had known—”

  “He didn’t even really want me to marry Rayyel. You knew that, too, didn’t you? Let me guess. Prince Yuebek supplied you to him.”

  Parrtha shook his head. “I don’t know anything about that. I don’t know the man.”

  “Then maybe you know the purpose of my father’s study. Why the spells, Parrtha? Why did you have to make them in the first place?”

  He dropped to a bow by my feet, his head on the ground. “Forgive me. I cannot say. Forgive me.”

  “You’re afraid of Warlord Yeshin,” I said. “Why?”

  “Forgive me.”

  “The man is dead. I’m queen. I order you to tell me, on pain of death. Tell me!”

  He didn’t even flinch. “Forgive me,” he repeated, banging his forehead against the ground, as if he was begging for it to open up and swallow him whole.

  I took a deep breath. “What’s there to forgive?” I finally whispered. “We’re still all his puppets somehow.” My gaze turned to where Liosa sat, mesmerized by the sunlight. If I didn’t know anything about her, I would’ve only seen a woman—not that old yet, and still so beautiful for her age. She noticed my attention.

  “Leaving?” she asked brightly.

  “Yes,” I managed, choking down the rest of my tears.

  “Come back,” she replied.

  I couldn’t think of an answer. I knew it wasn’t her fault, but I could’ve lived without ever having met her. I wanted to push away this new knowledge and forget it ever existed.

  I stepped outside with every intention of leaving it all behind me. But it seemed as if I wasn’t allowed even a moment’s rest. Deng and Peneira had caught up with us at last. They stood by the fence with their men, swords drawn. From the look on their faces, it was clear they had been listening to Parrtha’s story the whole time.

  Peneira broke into laughter. “And now you know everything.”

  “We need to put the past behind us,” Parrtha said.

  “How do you expect me to agree to that after everything her father did?” Peneira hissed. She took a step towards me, her finger shaking as she prodded my chest. “Your father was a sick, depraved old man who snatched a girl from her mother’s side. She could’ve had her pick of the young men in every city—royal princes could’ve been fighting over her if I had the time to present her properly in court. Instead, Yeshin ruined her. He ruined my daughter’s life!”

  I swung my father’s sword just as the words dribbled out of her mouth, pressing the blade on her neck hard enough to produce a trickle of blood on the wrinkled skin.

  “Kill me if you want, Yeshin’s daughter,” Peneira said, her eyes blazing. “It’s nothing to me.”

  “You’re not worth it.”

  “You don’t think so?” she asked. She turned her head. The commotion had attracted Liosa to the yard. There was a concerned look on her face, anxious, even though there was no possible way she could’ve understood what was going on. “My daughter is, though,” Peneira added in a low voice. “Deng!”

  Deng moved quickly. I braced myself, but instead of going for me or my companions, he went straight for Parrtha. He twisted the mage’s arm, forcing him to his knees. With another swift motion, he sheathed
his sword and pulled out a dagger.

  The rest of their men drew closer.

  “What do you really want?” I asked, staring into Peneira’s face.

  I had never seen so much anger in someone’s eyes before. “I want my baby back,” she snarled.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  THE ECHOES OF BURBATAN

  I learned when my son was born right in the midst of that blood-drenched battleground that it was possible to feel like you could rip the whole world apart with your bare hands, if only to save your child. I recognized the timbre in Peneira’s voice and knew there was no fighting it. Nothing in the world could quench the fire of a mother’s anger.

  “I was just told there’s no way to do that,” I replied. “Not unless—”

  “The spell is cast backwards,” Peneira finished for me. “Yes. I know. It was your own accursed father who told me. Everything else must remain the same for the spell to work. The same mage. The same… people. It was a dare. He wanted me to see it was futile. You need the child, too, and you will never touch her. I won’t allow it.”

  I started to pull back. Her gnarled hands wrapped themselves around my wrist. Her wrinkled skin felt like death. “You were there,” she hissed. “And so you have to be here now to see this through. We’ve been trying to capture you for years. The time your son was born was the closest we ever came.”

  “You didn’t want me for politics.”

  She snorted. “Your politics don’t interest me. It never has. No… we wanted you, Talyien Orenar, as the child who broke mine. We need you to undo what was done to my daughter.”

  “You tried to lure me out here. You used my son.” I took a step back. The woman knew what I would do for my own child, too. “If you want my help, you need to bring him to me. No more words about how I just have to wait. You want your daughter back, old woman? I want my son. I want him here now.”

  “Grandmother—” Deng began.

  “Stand down,” Peneira said.

  “If you tell her, she’ll have no reason to help us.”

  “If you don’t,” I broke in, “I’ll have less.” I looked at Deng’s eyes and saw what I feared from the very beginning. “You don’t know where he is, do you? Because if you had him, you would have brought him out by now. You wouldn’t risk my wrath if you could get my compliance an easier way.”

  Deng’s face twisted into a grimace. I had them. But it brought no relief. I watched as the old woman finally let my wrist go. “We don’t have the imp,” Peneira said. “We never did.”

  “The finger—” I started, preparing myself to die fighting if they had somehow harmed my boy. That was as much as I allowed myself to think.

  She pulled something out from her pockets and threw it in the air. It sparkled. I made a grab for it before opening my hands under the moonlight. It was my son’s ring, fashioned after the royal seal of the Ikessars.

  “Your boy is alive, as far as we know,” Peneira said. “We heard there was trouble in Oren-yaro months ago and had sent men to scout it to wait for you. We got something better. Your boy, dragged out of Oka Shto in ropes by intruders. We tried to seize him. My men even managed to make off with him for a few paces, but we couldn’t overpower his captors.”

  “I cut his finger off when I knew there was no way we could escape them,” Deng continued. “All they wanted was the boy and were quite happy to let us go. Grandmother knew you would recognize your own son’s finger. It would be enough, she said, to bring you all the way out here, and she was right.”

  “And now you’ll help us,” Peneira continued. “Or you won’t be alive to save him. Deng isn’t a surgeon.”

  “He fought quite hard,” Deng added, baring his neck. There was a shadow of a scar there, a bite mark. “I left his hand a mess in return.”

  I breathed, trying to keep calm. Later. Kill them later. You can’t fight them now.

  “What you are asking is madness upon itself,” Namra broke in. “If the mage isn’t capable, it could leave those in the vicinity in the same state as Liosa. There is no guarantee anyone walks out of this alive, let alone Queen Talyien.”

  “And he isn’t,” Parrtha added, his voice shaking. “I can’t do it. That was the last time I ever cast that spell. I swore I wouldn’t again.”

  Deng stabbed him in the thigh.

  Parrtha uttered a shriek and crumpled to his knees, blood pouring down his leg.

  “Look at that,” Deng crooned. “You think there’s more where that came from?”

  I lowered my sword. “We need to end this,” I said. “Is that all you want? For me to help you with this ritual? You will be content with that?”

  “I’m not a beast,” the woman said. “And I am not your father. Give me my daughter back, and you can return to find your son.”

  “Beloved Queen, if the spell that did this to your mother was cast in the presence of those runes, then they need to be there again for this,” Namra said. “You will have to return all the way to Oka Shto for this.”

  “There is no need for that,” Peneira said. “Everything we need is in the Orenars’ ancestral home. Isn’t that right, Parrtha? These same spells are there?”

  Parrtha swallowed, blood pooling under his heel. “Yes.”

  “That’s why you attacked,” I said.

  Peneira smiled. “We had to get it ready for you.”

  I pointed at Parrtha. “Bandage his damn wound before we go. And I want a horse that doesn’t doze with every step.” I started to walk past her.

  She laughed.

  “What’s so funny now?” I asked.

  “I don’t see my daughter in you at all. Not the slightest hint. She wielded power deftly, like a river that could carve rocks over time. You, on the other hand—you are Yeshin, through and through. You think power is like a hammer. If people don’t yield, you’ll break their knees.”

  “We all see whatever we want to see, old woman,” I replied, echoing Rayyel’s words. “But if that’s true, then maybe you should tread with caution.”

  “I’ve wasted years doing that,” she retorted. “I’m done with it.” Her eyes gleamed as she stared at me. Only then did I recall she was a wolf herself, as wily an Oren-yaro as the rest of us. The thought filled me with dread.

  I was among my kind.

  Out of everything that had happened that day, it was the sight of them capturing Liosa that broke my heart at last. In the chaos, she didn’t even recognize her own mother, who called for her with the wounded tones of the grieving while she ran from the men with the swords. Once they caught her, they bound her with ropes thicker than my thumb and she sat under the moonlight, staring into the distance while she uttered my name over and over as if it was the only word she knew. My mind had not yet accepted what my lips could say so freely, but I briefly wondered what sort of mother she had been in the days before the accident claimed her mind. She hadn’t been that much younger than I was when I gave birth to my son.

  “Beloved Queen,” Namra whispered to me as we cantered up the road in the darkness. “I don’t mean to sound conceited, but I did very well in my studies and I would never attempt what they want. I’ve got a fair grasp of the healing arts, too.”

  “We needed a ride to Burbatan, anyway.”

  “Burbatan calls to you like your father’s voice from the fog,” she said in a low voice.

  “It’s not like I’m ever really free, Namra—they only give me the illusion of freedom.”

  “I see,” she said, in a tone that told me she disagreed but didn’t want to argue. “What about your mother?”

  “What about her?” I asked. “She can go back to the temple when this is all over.”

  “My queen, you’ll have to forgive me if I don’t believe you. That look in your eyes when the old woman said there was a chance… I didn’t just imagine it.”

  “Maybe you didn’t.” I glanced away.

  She sighed. “Even if this Parrtha fixes what he did wrong, Liosa still has to deal with the reality that she
’s been more or less absent the last twenty-something years. The shock alone might bring her back to the brink of madness. Perspective, my queen. She seems happy with her life, and risking you would be risking the entire nation.”

  “The life of one versus the life of many… yes. Khine and I discussed that in the past.”

  “It seems a simple enough choice, when you consider who you are.”

  “Who I am,” I repeated, thinking of Anya’s words. The doubt hung heavy in my voice.

  She heard it, too. “My queen, when you play cards, sometimes you get the better hand. How you got there does not change what you hold. Guilt should not make you throw it all away, especially not when the stakes are this high.”

  “Khine has told me that, too.”

  She cleared her throat. “When you parted, was it to be the last?”

  “If he’s as smart as he claims to be, he would’ve taken the next ship out of these lands.”

  “You know he would never do that. He would’ve followed you to the end of the world. All you had to do was ask.” She turned her head to the side. “Why didn’t you?”

  I hesitated. “You saw what Agos looked like after they killed him,” I finally said.

  That was not the answer she expected.

  “Lives are not equal,” I agreed, after another period of silence. “Having Khine beside me would make things easier. How often has he schemed us out of one mess or another over these last few months? But this isn’t a game of Hanza. If I understood that from the very beginning, he wouldn’t even be here—he’d be back in his home, trying to piece his life back together. Our lives are not equal simply because there is no single judge. And Khine’s life, to me…” I watched the rising sun as I trailed off. I could say what I really meant in three words, except Yeshin’s daughter didn’t say those words.