Fortune's Toll (The Legion of the Wind, Book Two)

by Corey Pemberton

  “No!”

  Yasar swung Brenn's ax right into the rock body. He'd left the other weapons at the end of the bridge, preferring to use the one with which the Vogaths were most familiar. Again and again he swung. His face lit up in a shower of sparks, the ax head deflected, he refusing to be deterred.

  There was supposed to be flesh somewhere beneath those rocky scales. Argus hoped the legends were true.

  “Why doesn't it turn around?” Nasira said.

  Her words were a cold shiv to his groin. “Because it doesn't have to.”

  Argus had forgotten that piece of lore. The noth's wings were oriented one way, but that didn't mean its maw followed. Its mouth could move! Crawl along the underside of it and devour whatever it chose.

  “Shit!”

  “That's a brave lad,” said Brenn. “He's getting somewhere with that ax.”

  Argus didn't answer. He took off running instead, running straight for the noth in a reckless crouch. It groaned and thrashed. Maybe Yasar would do some harm before he ruined Brenn's ax.

  The Legion yelled behind him. Their voices disappeared into the noth's groan. The sounds of boulders rubbing together—it swallowed them all. Argus hopped over some missing planks, landed with one boot in a hole, jerked it out and kept moving.

  Its wings were just ahead. For now they were motionless. But would they stay that way, once he put his body weight onto them?

  Argus jumped.

  Those wings quivered. He scrambled across them and tried not to stumble over their ridges. He reached for a rope but found nothing but empty air. So he grabbed the mangy fur, using it to pull himself along. The closer he got to the middle, the stronger those wings fluttered.

  Argus gripped the fur tighter. He couldn't let up. The moment a hand slipped would be the moment the noth flicked him over the edge. He kept going into the heart of the groaning, where he heard Yasar scream.

  “No!”

  Argus's words couldn't stop it, but he saw it all atop the noth's wings. Yasar lying on his back in agony, still swinging Brenn's ax. Black blood covered the Vogath, but it did nothing to slow his blows. He kept swinging—even after his legs disappeared into that gaping maw.

  Reaver sang. She damn near burst his eardrums with her thirst. But she lay on the other side of it all, across the bridge. Seething, Argus thrust his fingers into the crevices between those rock scales and did the next best thing.

  He gave the noth sight.

  It was a simple spell—one he'd practiced many times in Davos. But the terrible thrashing made it difficult to focus. Argus looked around, chanting, surveying the moon and the peaks and the stars.

  He saw it all, remembered it all. And then he showed it to the noth.

  It bucked him right off its back, onto a single hanging rope. Argus grabbed it, legs flailing, desperate not to look down. He held on as the noth's wings unfolded and started beating again. Groaning, it took it a few tries to clear the bridge, and when it did, it was flying sideways.

  Argus watched the beast careen through the night sky, shuddering. Just before it disappeared into the shadow of a distant peak, he glimpsed Yasar still dangling from its mouth, swinging Brenn's battle ax.

  He pulled himself back onto the bridge and collapsed. Some time later came a thud that echoed throughout the range. Rocks slid loose and skittered down mountainsides. When it was all over, there was only the wooden creaking of his friends' approach.

  “Are you all right?” Nasira said, breathless.

  He nodded. “Watch out… for… missing planks.”

  “What in the blazes did you do to it?” said Brenn.

  “I made it see what I saw. Without eyes it's sensitive to light. I'm just glad the stars and moon were enough. Too slow, though. Not before it got Yasar.”

  Nasira said she was sorry. Brenn said he was brave. Their words rang hollow, like a metal bucket scraping an empty well.

  “Let's just get across.” Argus tried to stand, and collapsed onto the planks. Brenn picked him up and swung him over his shoulder. “Remember the… missing planks.”

  They picked their way across, careful not to slip on the black blood. Argus almost fell asleep many times; every time he was on the cusp the image of Yasar hanging from the noth's open maw woke him.

  One more death. For the graveyard in my mind…

  Finally the world stopped swaying. Brenn put him down on solid ground.

  They weren't alone.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  The Legion lunged for their weapons.

  Argus dove between them. They froze there, face to face with the Vogaths who'd come across the bridge leading to another peak. He counted ten of them by the time the last one stepped onto the summit. All of them carried flint axes and daggers.

  “Ashal pun mabi,” he said.

  The Vogaths came closer with their weapons high. Argus kept talking, trying to calm them down, but the tribesmen didn't stop until he could feel their hot breath. They wanted to know about that terrible sound. They laughed when he told them what had happened, how a noth had crashed and fallen.

  One man edged closer than all the others. Snarling, he laid his dagger on Argus's throat. “Polasi tum Vogathi?”

  Argus told him how he'd learned the Vogath tongue, going into as much detail as he could so they knew he wasn't making it up. He told the man that a boy named Yasar had been instrumental in making sure he knew all the curses and taunts.

  “Is that so?” he said in the common tongue. “Then how come you don't recognize this friend when he's right in front of you?”

  After the dagger fell, Argus raised his eyes. “Mot!”

  The lean-faced man laughed. His hair was longer now, pulled into a ponytail. Although his beard had started to fade, it was still a patchwork that refused to connect above his lip. His eyes were identical. They flickered. A trickster's eyes.

  Mot drew the dagger across his palm and passed it to Argus to do the same. Once he reopened his cut, they shared their blood and finished the Vogath ritual. Embracing the man sent him back to a different time, into a world larger and fuller of possibilities than the one he lived in now.

  “What are you doing here, you bastard?” said Mot, grinning. “See? I remember the curses you taught me too.”

  Argus explained what brought them to the Riven Mountains and introduced his friends. Mot greeted them the Leithish way, clasping forearms. He introduced the Vogaths behind him. Argus didn't know any of their names, though a few faces were familiar.

  “Now can you tell me what really happened?” Mot said, and pointed. “The bridge looks like it will break any second.”

  Argus told them what had happened again, this time with help from his friends. He lowered his eyes when he got to the part about Yasar. As Mot translated into Vogathi, the tribesmen started to murmur.

  “They think you killed Yasar,” said Mot. “You and these flatlanders. Or you're just trying to save his honor. By not telling us that he fell.”

  “He didn't fall,” Argus said. The Vogaths practically came out of the womb as climbers. Insinuating someone was a poor climber was the nastiest insult you could sling.

  “Go down to the foothills come morning,” Brenn said. “There you'll find… whatever you call that creature with that man in its mouth.”

  Mot shook his head and muttered something about old myths. But he couldn't resist the temptation to peer over the edge. The Vogaths leaned over, so far that Argus's toes tingled just watching them, but in the end they found only darkness.

  “We will come back,” Mot said. “After first light.” He told his men to head back across the bridge from where they came, and invited the flatlanders to follow.

  Siggi groaned the whole way, but this bridge was nothing compared to the last. Atop Dola peak, the largest in all of the Riven, hundreds of Vogaths waited. They emerged from tents and caves to see what the excitement was about.

  Mot yelled for them to make way and headed right for the cave reserved for the rinn. �
��My father will be surprised to see you.”

  “Yes,” said Argus. “That's what I'm worried about.”

  * * *

  Hadad stood at the entrance to that cave, waiting for them.

  His beard was white where Mot's was brownish-gray. Aside from that they were almost identical. Fatherhood was meant to be collective among the Vogaths, but from the moment Mot was born no one had questioned Hadad's parentage.

  “Argo,” he said in heavily-accented common tongue. “Why are you here, man of Leith?”

  Argus and Mot told him everything that had happened. A crowd gathered, and by the time their story was over it had swelled to damn near everyone living on Dola peak. Some Vogaths hissed when they spoke of the noth. News of Yasar's fall crumpled one woman, whose tribe backed away and fanned her while she sobbed.

  His mother?

  She looked familiar. A lot of them did. Not familiar enough to remember all the names. To feel like he truly belonged. Argus spotted the young men and women he'd met at the spring. They weren't smiling anymore; they watched with their lips drawn taut.

  Hadad turned to Mot. “You believe this man? This flatlander?”

  “He isn't a flatlander, rinn. Argus lived with us for years. Hunted with us, ate with us. Became a man. Don't pretend like you've forgotten. Or should I have him take off his boot so you can see his ankle?”

  Hadad shook his head. “Hema was a wise rinna. But to take someone from Leith? Her biggest mistake. As soon as he returns he surrounds us with death! And he brings other flatlanders with him.”

  While Mot pleaded with his father, Argus scanned the crowd. Sympathetic faces outnumbered the glares. Even so, would any dare to intercede on his behalf? To defy the rinn?

  “He should die,” Hadad said. “He doesn't belong.”

  A few onlookers murmured their agreement. The summit was filling up, more Vogaths hurrying across bridges from the other peaks they called home. Mot kept arguing until Hadad reminded him it wasn't his father he was addressing; it was his rinn.

  Argus fell to his knees. In Vogathi he said, “Kill me if you must. But let my friends live. I was the one who brought them into the Riven Mountains.” No answer. He pulled off his boot and wagged his foot at the crowd. “You are my people, and always will be. Don't you remember?”

  Murmurs. Mot waved them on until they got louder. Some grew into cheers. Around him swelled the sweetest chant he'd ever heard:

  “Agrab tet vall.”

  Let him live.

  Hadad's eyes were sharp, but not sharp enough to silence the entire tribe. Men and women both lay down and displayed their scarred feet. The wind gusted, and when it let up the chanting dwindled. Hadad was silent.

  Mot offered a compromise. Argus and the flatlanders would leave the Riven at once. They would blindfold Argus's friends so they couldn't see the way through the mountains. He volunteered to take them himself.

  At last his father agreed. He told Argo to rise and beckoned him closer. One of the men beside him handed him a dagger. With hot blood on his forehead, the rinn pulled him close and whispered, “This time you will live. But you mustn't ever return. Remember that.”

  He pulled away.

  Argus offered the crowd a wan smile. He felt hollow. Mot wrapped an arm around him and said, “Best I could do, vo.”

  My brother, Argus thought. Even after all this time he still calls me that.

  “Thank you.” They embraced again while the flatlanders were being fitted with dark cloth blindfolds. He couldn't look at Mot anymore. Tears brimmed in the corners of his eyes, despite his best attempts to stifle them. Seeing Mot and the others, only to be ripped away minutes later, was worse than not seeing him at all.

  Argus followed his brother and the three other Vogaths he'd chosen for escort duty. Each one paired off with one of the Legion, guiding them through the masses. As they made their way toward the western slope, heading for the rope bridge, hands landed on Argus's shoulders. Some people smiled and wished them well.

  Most were silent.

  Gone was the cheer from earlier. Their rinn's decision had deflated them. No foot scar was enough to overrule a rinn.

  This rope bridge was wider, the Vogath equivalent of a major city street. They shuffled along, slowly at first so the blind ones could adjust, while other Vogaths passed them on their way back to warm beds.

  “You look tired,” Mot said, still smiling, always smiling even when the weight of the world flattened him. “The beard doesn't suit you.”

  Argus laughed. “You've spent half your life complaining about not being able to grow a proper one yourself. I think you're just jealous.”

  “The hairs are going gray. You'll never find young beautiful women like that, unless…” He turned to Nasira.

  “I don't like it either,” she said. “And that's just my friendly opinion.”

  Mot shook his head. The Vogaths rejected social graces and polite ways to phrase things. Honest and direct were the only ways they knew—something that had taken Argus many months to understand. He imagined Mot trying to navigate the political intrigue of a place like Azmar, and wondered how many days it would take before the Vogath pulled out his ax to settle it. “Why are you going to Leith?” he said.

  Argus sighed. “It's a long story. There are problems—”

  “I know. We've watched the little Leith men clog the mountain pass.”

  “Problems I created. Last I heard, they threw my sister Kyra in a dungeon.”

  Mot patted Reaver's scabbard. “You know what you must do then, Argo.”

  “That's what I'm afraid of.”

  “Everything that breathes feels fear. But there is no room for it while you're climbing a mountain. You've told me your green country is flat compared to ours, though you can always pretend.”

  Argus smiled. “Thank you, Mot.”

  Nasira asked if the Vogaths were worried about the Leithish soldiers.

  Mot laughed. “Those men are not soldiers. Who rules down below matters not. Kingdoms rise and fall. And here we remain, above it all. My people are of the mountains. How can rocks have rulers besides the sky and winds, the turning of the seasons?”

  Unless they try to come up here, Argus thought. Then they'll fight until the bitter end.

  He didn't see it happening, though with the way his nephew had been acting it was impossible to say. Was a reunited Leith and Valcrest all he wanted? Or sheer conquest?

  “Move faster,” Mot said. “My men are falling asleep, and there are many bridges yet to cross.”

  * * *

  Every minute of that journey was agony.

  Sometimes it snowed, others it rained, and all the while a sinking weariness seized Argus's legs. But at last the night passed. With no more bridges left to cross, the Vogaths removed the blindfolds for the flatlanders' final descent. The Legion squinted into the blinding snow.

  Mot led them down the final stretch. He had more energy than all the other Vogaths combined. They followed him until the ground started to level. Then he stopped and pointed into Leith's rolling green hills.

  “There is your country, vo. And here is where we leave you.”

  Argus opened his mouth, couldn't find the words. So he just hugged the man who had been his brother, for years before, and then for a single night. He embraced the others too, and left them with fresh blood on their foreheads.

  In turn, they gave him the Vogathi blessing.

  “May the mountains protect you and cradle you in their arms,” Argus repeated. His eyes fell away. The soggy country that awaited did little to lift his spirits. “May our paths cross again soon.”

  Mot offered a rare frown. “Not until Hadad passes under the mountains, I expect. Don't let that stop you from trying again, though. I'll make sure he doesn't have you killed.”

  Argus laughed, and turned away when the tears threatened. “What else are vos for?”

  “Sometimes we try to kill each other, sometimes we protect.”

  “Farewell
, Mot. Thank you. For everything.”

  They embraced again and the Vogath reminded him to remember his scar. With that, he and his men scurried up the hill like the goats that inhabited their mountains. The Legion shuffled westward. Argus felt numb. When he turned back Mot and his men were tiny brown specks surrounded by snow. Next time he looked they were gone completely.

  Nothing there, he thought. Nothing but another hole I'll carry with me.

  For a while they walked in silence. The only sounds were the squelching their boots made in the wet earth.

  “What now?” Siggi said.

  Argus fixed his eyes straight ahead. “Now we go to Leith. Knock some sense into Silas and free my sister.”

  He looked down.

  His fingers were wrapped around Reaver's hilt.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Farmland and rolling hills.

  Everything blooming, trees glistening with morning dew. Leith's countryside was exactly as Argus remembered it. They passed through cozy villages that hadn't changed at all.

  They were cautious at first, on account of the soldiers and Argus's exile. But when they reached the fourth village without seeing a single person, they came down from the hills onto the paved road.

  “Where is everyone?” said Brenn. “One has to wonder where they're getting all those soldiers when all I've seen is an army of cows.”

  Argus scanned the village for signs of life. They crossed a tiny bridge over a stream and heard a watermill creaking. The wood and stone houses were as orderly as one would expect in Leith, stacks of firewood left neatly against the walls. One stack even had an ax in it.

  “I'll take that,” said Brenn.

  “It's like everyone just up and left,” Nasira said.

  Argus closed his eyes, and chanted the words to hear what the others couldn't. Hushed conversations behind closed doors and windows. A panting dog. A baby gurgling, with its mother desperately trying to keep it quiet.