by A. S. Etaski
All will be different from how it was when I lived here.
My Elder would be curious to know how much I cared, no doubt. She’d watch how much attention I paid to this. Perhaps the drama here was best left to another Red Sister. One who did not feel what I felt that moment, threatening my new focus.
“Will you be staying at our House for a time, Red Sister? Do we wait for anyone to set the pyre?”
I listened to her voice, eyes resting on the sleeping male. The Matron was good. I couldn’t tell if she had a preference. Hiding my own reluctance like the little squeak upon the stairs, I shook my head.
“No, Matron Thalluen. I will be leaving now. You may set the pyre for the Second Daughter at your convenience.”
Gaelan was waiting when I returned to the Cloister. Had she been carrying a pole-net in one hand, I’d have thought she watched for me like a flashing bug, ready to stalk and catch if I tried to avoid her.
*Come,* she signed. *D’Shea wants a report.*
I tapped her shoulder. *The Elder’s quarters are the other way.*
Both her expression and tone of hand were sarcastic. *Is it? I’d forgotten, novice.*
That moment I felt like anything but a novice, resentful that she did not even ask where I’d been or if she knew of my accomplishment, and my irritation showed.
*Annoyed with our Elder again?* I signed back as a barb. *Still won’t say why?*
*Fuck your ear,* she replied and sped up to where I’d have to speak aloud at her back to say anything else.
I knew the tension in my closest Sister rose quickly when our Elder provoked her—often on purpose, and about things I knew little about, because they didn’t argue in front of me. Gaelan couldn’t always let it go, even once D’Shea was no longer present.
Definitely the case here.
Smirking, I hustled out of the Cloister after her. Our hoods up, Gaelan and I weaved along sunken paths carved out at the bottom of magically-masked crevices. Our elevation and the illusions obscured our comings and goings from chance observers. There were roads and fields within sight of the Cloister, off in the distance and below us. So many Wards, traps, and secret passages lay between them and us, however, that we were rarely worried about moving too many of Red Sisters or mounts too fast and drawing their attention.
To caravans, slaves, and commuting Davrin, our hill looked like an unusable swath of igneous rock they’d seen well off-road for centuries. It was not worth building upon or adjacent, though they would have been hard-pressed to explain why without being able to say they were too late. The Sisterhood had already constructed something underneath.
Between our Cloister, one side of Sivaraus and the massive Palace-Sanctuary complex on the other stood the Wizard’s Tower and four of the wealthier Houses and their plantations. It was quite a distance to move between, but we used hidden transport rings and magical entries into the spyways of the Valsharess’s complex. They were worth whatever price was paid in resources and skill it took a sorceress to build.
This moment my Sister and I didn’t take a ring which brought us closer to either Wizard’s Tower or the Palace but farther away from them. We jumped past the sentry perimeter and landed on the edge of the wilderness where darkness was near complete, and we stood in a bubble of silence but for the throb of the Deepearth. Suddenly, I was nervous.
*Why does our Elder want my report way out here?*
Gaelan noticed I covered the hilt of a dagger at my belt and eyed her. She grinned as my response lifted her ill humor. It didn’t help.
*Hand off the weapon, Sirana,* she signed. *Don’t get paranoid.*
*Easier signed than performed,* I remarked. *It’s not stupid to keep one’s guard up.*
*True. But don’t get paranoid.*
I made a face. Clearly, there was a difference I was missing.
As we kept climbing upward, I tried not to let my mind wander to Jaunda’s recent journey to the Surface. It was harder than I thought.
She was gone for spans and spans. How much of that was climbing like this? How would she know she was any closer to the blinding light and open space? Why wouldn’t she just hit one dead end after another?
I shook my head, imagined D’Shea’s voice in my head.
Report. Focus.
I was climbing to report on House Thalluen, far out from both the city center and the Cloister. Although, regardless of what Gaelan said, that “paranoid” part of my mind left it open that perhaps this wasn’t the case.
Still, I breathed in and out slowly, quietly, while bringing recent faces to mind—Kaltra’s, just before she died, and my Mother’s, just before I left. I kept the Deepearth scents in my nose, scanned the tunnel walls around us, and listened as we eventually reached a source of running water. My eyes had long since adapted to the ever-present Radiants. Challenging as it might be given the quality of a Red Sister cloak, I could still make out Gaelan’s form separate from the water-carved stone, even after she stood still, waiting with her arms crossed. I took a moment to fill my empty flask with water, test it, and swig a needed drink.
The running water muffled any footsteps there might have been, so Elder D’Shea’s appearance out of one of two tunnels in a fork I’d missed startled me. The Sorceress gave me a look reminding me I was, indeed, still a novice, and gestured for both of us to follow her. We went left at the fork, D’Shea retracing where she’d just been; she brought us to a stone door masked as well as the crevices leading us away from the Cloister.
*Inside,* she motioned.
I found a small but familiar version of the “cache room” where Gaelan had first taken me after dragging me off the D’Verin property and away from their prized male. Like that other, larger spot, this could be used as an interrogation space, as storage for cached weapons and supplies, or just as a place to rest if one was out on assignment in the area. Among a few sturdy, non-upholstered furnishings, there was a bench that could be used as either a low table or a place to sit.
Or a place to lay out tools.
As if she’d heard me, my Elder gestured to me and spoke. “Show me.”
I laid out my equipment in the pitch dark, managing to fill the surface of the bench as I added the warm and squishy pouch last. Then I stepped back and waited.
D’Shea called a small, orange light, just enough that the three of us didn’t flinch, and stepped closer to the items. She scanned all of them, studied a few a bit closer, used a cantrip or two to cause a few of the things I’d used to illuminate in an odd, fluorescent glow. She lifted the empty vial with the antidote to the poison, from which my Mother had drunk without question. She put it down, then lifted the oiled, liquid-proof pouch containing my evidence.
“Obsidian carving blade, long dagger, barbed knuckle-wrap,” she murmured more to herself, weighing the evidence in her palm before she raised it, so she was clear. “Who quaffed the vial I gave you, Red Sister?”
“Matron Thalluen, Elder.”
“Before or after you executed the Second Daughter?”
“After, Elder.”
“Ah.” D’Shea tugged open the pouch and placidly looked inside it. “And you made my statement to her?”
“Yes, Elder.”
“Before or after she drank the contents?”
“Before. Otherwise, she may not have drunk the contents.”
The Sorceress’ intense eyes flicked up to catch my expression, and she smiled. “Your presence and purpose weren’t incentive enough, Sirana?”
I remembered to breathe. “No, Elder.”
“Hm.” My Elder cinched up the evidence and attached it to her own belt, glancing over my tools again, at Gaelan, back to me. “Report. From the beginning.”
I described and confirmed the entry point, offered the basic layout of the bedroom and those who were in it. At D’Shea’s insistence, I recited most of the conversation with my former sister.
“Did you cut her the first time before or after she c
onfessed?”
“After,” I replied truthfully.
“Did she receive any other injuries before then?”
I thought back without flinching. “Bruises. I had to haul her around a bit.”
“What caused her will to break?”
I glanced at the amethyst crystal that my Elder still hadn’t picked up. It held these answers in the laced sound captured by her magic. “Talking about the First Daughter.”
The Elder Sister looked at Gaelan and smiled back at me. “Indeed. And you could without shouting?”
I returned the smile. “For a long time, I couldn’t so much as whisper talking about her. Shouting wasn’t necessary. Repeating it like a chant was, rubbing in how easy it was for me to speak what I’d always thought.”
“Impressive, Sirana. Did you tell her how you killed her?”
Nice try, Elder.
I smirked. “I didn’t kill her, Elder.”
The Sorceress chuckled, changing the subject. “Who was the male in the bed?”
“Sibron. House Guard.”
“Could he have heard any of this?”
“No, Elder.”
“You’re sure?”
“He barely breathed and didn’t move at all the whole time. I think Kaltra overdosed him. I wasn’t certain he’d live after I left, though the Matron intended to try her hand at healing.”
D’Shea perked up. “Back up, novice. You imply Matron Thalluen came to the room herself?”
“She did, Elder.”
“Alone?”
“Yes, Elder.”
“No House Guard attending her.”
“No, Elder.”
“This wasn’t odd to you?”
“No, Elder. The Matron often walked where she pleased on her own plantation. She seemed to fear nothing but Jilrina.”
D’Shea’s gaze sharpened, the dark red seeming lighter in the orange light. “And? Continue.”
“I stated my business there, and the Sisterhood’s sentence. Offered the Matron the vial, which she drank. She saw Sibron and seemed…concerned. I offered to carry him out of the room since Kaltra’s corpse was still there. Waiting to be burned.” I couldn’t help smiling a little again at this. “She accepted, and I took him to the healer’s quarters.”
“Which you knew would be empty,” she added. “Is that all?”
I nearly said yes, but I hadn’t yet learned to lie while staring my Elder in the eyes. Not with any confidence. She could see it.
“A little cait I didn’t recognize followed us on the stairs. When I challenged this, the Matron tried to send her away, but she defied her. Begged the Matron not to go with me.”
“Oh?” D’Shea stepped around to my other side. “Thoughts why?”
“Either she recognized the uniform or saw our likeness,” I answered, “and saw me as a threat like Kaltra. The Matron bribed her with a promise to visit her next if she obeyed. Which she did. Only when I asked did the Matron tell me the cait was an orphan of a House Guard who would serve both her and the new heir after she’s born.”
“Why was this significant to ask?” the Sorceress asked.
A test. How much did I care about this?
“Not many Matrons I knew would be willing to tend the nerves of children in a nursery,” I said. “Particularly orphans of House Guards.”
“Does this behavior not suit your former Matron?”
“On the contrary,” I said. “She knew Sibron’s name. She wanted him out of Kaltra’s room. She has often done things like this. She could be…closer to the lowborn than the First Daughter. Not aloof, or distasteful of them. I think that is how the Matron outlived Jilrina’s schemes. The House Guard especially are difficult to turn against Rohenvi of House Thalluen, as she did not flinch at their dirt.”
D’Shea smiled slightly. “And now? With the healer’s betrayal a crucial part of Kaltra’s scheme to prevent an heir and quicken her inheritance.”
“Kaltra found a weakness in him and exploited it,” I said. “I don’t know what it was.”
“That’s true, she did.” My Elder hadn’t blinked since I began my report unless it coincided with one of mine. “Anything else?”
“The Matron asked if I had another purpose or if she should expect more Red Sisters. I informed her neither was the case, that she could arrange the pyre. I took my leave.”
Elder D’Shea nodded, stepping away to study my equipment again. She lifted the amethyst crystal at last and pocketed it without activating the sound-capture spell.
“You asked no questions of your own?”
Her tone was lightweight. Mildly curious, unconcerned. I took the hint; I’d better not do the same.
“I asked who the orphan was,” I admitted. “She looked old enough to have been born when I was sent to Court, but I didn’t know her.”
“And?”
“Matron Thalluen gave me a name. Natia, child of a House Guard.” I thought back. “That was all.”
“Was the House Guard the mother or the sire?”
“I didn’t ask.”
“No?”
“No, Elder.”
“Did you ask anything else?”
I lifted my chin. “No, Elder.”
Her eyebrow quirked. “Did you want to?”
“Yes, Elder.”
“Tell me,” she commanded. “What other questions?”
I wet my mouth a little. “I wanted to ask who was the sire of the unborn heir.”
“You can go to our records for that.”
“Yes, Elder. Why it wasn’t important enough to ask Matron Thalluen.”
A striking spark of humor entered the Sorceress’ eyes. “What of questions only Matron Rohenvi could have answered? Had you asked before you left.”
Fuck.
“Why she was concerned for Sibron,” I said. “Familiar enough to know his name, to check his pulse and be willing to tend him all eve. Why Kaltra had him in her bed in the first place.”
“Those are good questions. Particularly if Sibron is still alive.”
“He may not wake up, Elder.”
“You didn’t stay to confirm this, novice, so I shall have to send another. If we’re lucky, we can still get a sample of that tampered wine you left on the bed stand. I’m curious what was used, and it would tell me the likelihood of survival better than mere unconsciousness. Fortunately, one female is still alive to ask. If she doesn’t know, perhaps one of the House Guard does.”
My heart sped up despite my efforts to control it. Damn it. So, did my Sorceress Elder want me to be curious about my former House or not?
“Anything else?” she prodded, her strength of will like a solid rod poking the middle of my forehead.
I glanced down and clenched one fist in my red gloves. They felt very new. “I fulfilled my mission as stated, but I did not…feel balanced to remain and conduct a thorough interrogation for you.”
Elder D’Shea nodded, seeming satisfied. “You did not fail in your mission, Sirana. I acknowledge that. Any other discoveries would have been nice, but I’ve learned to tailor expectation within the Sisterhood, even if they have been with us for a century.”
Relaxing at this point would have been a mistake. I remained in position, at attention as the Sorceress stepped closer. She tilted her head to meet eyes.
“This excuse of performing the mission only as stated will not always work with me, however,” she said. “I expect more from you. Every mission has an opportunity, and you have the ability to spot it. Your trials demonstrated this without any doubt on my side. Your poise dealing with Kerse again at the Worship Ball, and your thoughts afterward, prove this to me. You will not ignore your instincts in the future, Sirana, no matter if you ‘feel’ unbalanced.”
I swallowed without blinking. “I apologize, my Elder. I will do better.”
The Sorceress smiled fully. When she was genuinely pleased, it was surprisingly beautiful. “A Red Sister
held to a higher standard climbs the ladder faster. I foresee you will appreciate this truth more than others.”
I saw the quickest flick of her eyes to Gaelan, and I knew my Sister would take it as another barb. If her mood had improved at all from when I’d first returned to the Cloister, it was no doubt souring again. I could not yet look at her myself, however. I only heard her weight shift, felt her tension behind me. For a split-instant, I imagined Gaelan drawing a dagger and aiming it at my back.
Don’t get paranoid, she said.
That was an impossible task in Sivaraus.
I saw the Queen’s Eyes again in Reverie, not long after I had executed Kaltra. Darkness within darkness, there hovered an impression of a semi-transparent face floating in the air above an open expanse. Uncountable pricks of light spread above me in a ceiling of impossible height.
The Surface, I realized.
There was no burning ball overhead. I stood at that point of the cycle when the Sun wasn’t overhead, when Davrin could explore more comfortably. Had I dreamt of this before Jaunda had ever left and returned to tell tales?
My feet were wide apart on the shifting sediment, and I wore no clothes. Someone caressed my cunt from behind, and I believed I recognized my Lead.
I was just thinking of you.
Just like that. You know how I like it.
I got down on all fours, willing to give a pleasurable ride, and felt my body penetrated with no hesitation. I groaned, bracing for more force. My chest froze when he spoke.
“Kwernish toug, Davrin?”
I stared at the ground; it gave as my fingers gripped it.
~Why are you doing this? Your Goddess magic is stronger than me. Release me, whore.~
“No.” I shuddered, remembering how disgustingly good that thick, short prick had felt. In my mouth, my ass. Now it moved inside my slit again, stretching it open.
“Get off me, Kain. Goddess, make him go away!”
A Goddess answered, perhaps. The male hunched over my back grew larger, although he never released my hips. The shape of him changed, still deep inside me, and I heard a rumble, then a hiss as he drooled on my bare back.
