by Marc Turner
Mazana spoke again. “You serve me now,” she said to the giant.
The executioner’s gaze swung back to her, his bestial countenance giving no hint as to his thoughts. His blade was still raised in the position it had been when Mazana commanded him to hold. The muscles of his arm did not even twitch under its weight. With the giant’s speed it would take only a heartbeat for him to cut Mazana in half, and Senar gathered his Will in readiness to block an attack.
Then in one smooth motion the executioner returned his sword to the scabbard on his back. He settled into his familiar relaxed stance, his gaze fixing on nothing.
Senar released his breath, but did not sheathe his own blade. An allegiance that had changed so swiftly could easily shift again. If anyone should know, it was the Guardian. And yet, with Imerle shackled it would surely be suicide for the giant to challenge Senar and Mazana together. This was victory, then. A strange victory, perhaps, that left an enemy as implacable as the emira alive, but something told Senar it wasn’t mercy that had stayed Mazana’s hand. Most likely the Storm Lady had plans for Imerle—plans that involved a public execution and a spike on a wall.
He looked across at Mazana to find her studying him in turn. He knew better than to expect her to thank him for coming to help, but still he’d hoped to see something in her eyes. Some recognition of his presence, at least. There was nothing.
To his left were the two strangers he’d seen fighting with the Watchman against the stone-skin. The woman lay on the floor, apparently unconscious or dead, her shirt torn and bloody round a wound to her chest. Her male companion was kneeling beside her, pressing on her injury. His right hand was burned and blistered, his sleeve on that side stuck to his arm. Behind them the belligerent Watchman was pretending an interest in the mosaic floor as he sidled toward the rear of the chamber. The stone-skin was dead, and another body, burned beyond recognition, lay beyond what remained of one of the thrones.
“Pernay,” Mazana said, following Senar’s gaze. “It seems Imerle’s fondness for the gallant chief minister did not extend to shielding him from my magic.”
“Considering the sorceries you unleashed, I’m surprised more weren’t caught in the cross fire.”
Mazana did not reply.
“I saw you talking to Imerle and Jambar earlier,” he said. “What was that about?” He paused, then nodded at the body of the stone-skin. “It has something to do with him, doesn’t it?”
“You know him?”
“I know his people.”
“I’ve never seen his like before.”
Nor had Senar, but he’d read enough about the stone-skins in ancient texts to know who the man was. An Augeran. Erin Elal’s ancient nemesis. It was a name that had all but passed into legend. Centuries ago the stone-skins had driven Senar’s ancestors from their homeland across the Southern Wastes following a war that had lasted five years. There had been hundreds of Guardians then, but the stone-skins had rolled over them like a wave. Strong, ruthless, devastating. Out of a population of millions only tens of thousands of Erin Elalese had survived to take ship and sail into exile.
Senar was about to tell Mazana as much when she called out, “Septia Kempis Parr, stay with us awhile, if you please.”
The Watchman scowled at her from the rear of the room. Senar thought he would throw himself into the waves. He must have recognized the pointlessness of trying to escape a water-mage through the sea, though, for he came slinking forward, kicking the ground like a petulant child summoned to heel.
Senar looked again at his shoulder—as if he might have imagined the scales the first time. Where the executioner’s blade had landed, the plates were marked by an indentation that was even now fading. His shoulder ached when he rolled it. Maybe he owed his life to the scales, but he was still struggling to see them as a good thing. A crackle of sorcery drew his attention back to the emira. A movement of her hands set her magical shackles hissing. The sorcery must have caused her pain for the lines about her eyes tightened.
“Why is she still alive?” Senar asked Mazana.
The red glow had receded from the Storm Lady’s eyes, and with it had gone some of the remoteness in her look. “Because from what Jambar tells me, this stone-skin is not the last we’re going to see of his kind. Perhaps Imerle will have her uses.”
The emira’s lip curled.
Then a throwing star sprouted in her forehead, just above her right eye. She crumpled to the floor.
Senar seized his sword hilt, but the thrower of the star—the woman he’d assumed was unconscious or dead—was already collapsing into the arms of her companion with the burned arm. Senar saw a look of satisfaction flicker through her pain. Then her breath died in her throat, and she fell still. Properly dead this time. As dead as Imerle herself, for the emira’s eyes were staring sightlessly up at the ceiling. A trickle of blood ran down her left temple.
With her passing, the magic holding back the walls and ceiling of the throne room faded. The barriers wavered until a gesture from Mazana stilled them. The Storm Lady’s last words came back to Senar. Perhaps Imerle will have her uses. He gave a wry smile.
Mazana must have guessed his thoughts for she sighed and said, “And then again, perhaps not.”
* * *
Karmel pushed on her brother’s chest once more, and Caval spasmed and hacked up water. The priestess helped him to sit up, then slumped onto the bench beside him, her legs suddenly shaky, her mind rocked in every direction. A fresh bout of coughing seized Caval. He wrapped his arms about himself. When the convulsions subsided he looked round, evidently confused as to how he came to be in the courtyard when his final memory was of fighting Mili and Tali on the terrace. His gaze met Karmel’s, and she saw consternation in his eyes.
Then his mask came down.
They sat in silence. It was clear Caval wasn’t going to break it, yet what was Karmel supposed to say? A hundred thoughts flitted through her mind, but she dismissed them all. Then she noticed movement above and to her right. She held a finger to her lips. Caval nodded his understanding before stilling his movements and releasing his power to make himself invisible. Karmel followed suit.
And not a moment too soon. On the terrace appeared one of the twins, her robe smeared with blood. She was joined by her sister—Mili, the priestess heard the other woman call her. Their gazes swept the courtyard before fixing on the body of the weaponsmaster. Karmel could see their confusion: three Chameleons had been washed into the courtyard by that wave, so why was only Foss’s corpse floating in the water? Doubtless the twins had heard Caval coughing, but would they assume he and Karmel had moved on? The priestess could only hope so, for while Tali was injured—and while there was no sign yet of their black-haired male companion—there was little doubt in Karmel’s mind as to which side would emerge victorious in a fight.
With an unheard comment to her twin, Tali began hobbling away along the terrace. Mili paused before setting off in pursuit. Catching up to Tali, Mili threw her sister’s left arm about her shoulders to support her.
A dozen stuttering steps took them out of Karmel’s sight.
Karmel sensed Caval looking at her, yet she remained staring up at the terrace. The twins’ apparent retreat might just be a ruse, but more important, she wasn’t ready to meet her brother’s gaze. Now that the initial relief of his survival had passed, her doubts were resurfacing. No, not doubts, she realized. She had stopped deluding herself about Caval’s betrayal when she was on the terrace. What she didn’t know was why. She hesitated. Part of her wanted to quiz Caval now, but another part wanted to put the questions from her mind and pretend the past few days had never happened. The hurt went too deep for that, though. She could no more let it go than she could have left her brother to die.
Caval’s breaths came in wheezes. His face was drawn. At last he said, “When I climbed to the terrace earlier, you were thinking about that time when we took the boat, weren’t you?”
Karmel nodded.
The b
arest hint of a smile touched his lips. “I tried so hard to forget that day, yet always when the memory faded you found some excuse to bring it up again.”
The priestess stared at him. “I thought it would lift your spirits.”
“Ah, because you remembered only the freedom and the adventure. For me, it was the day I realized there would be no escaping Father.”
Her expression tightened. “Why were you so stubborn, Caval? Why did you have to fight him for so long?”
“I never stopped fighting him, even when I took my vows as he wanted. I just fought him in a different way.”
Karmel looked at him blankly.
“You think my sudden devotion to the Chameleon was because I’d seen the light? You think I wanted to be high priest?” He shook his head. “I only wanted it because that meant he couldn’t have it.”
“You were fifteen. Another few months, and you would have reached majority. You could have walked away.”
“And left you behind?”
“Then you could have let him think he’d won! You could have made things easier for yourself!”
“As you did?”
Karmel’s eyes narrowed. “You think I should have stood up for you? I was a girl—”
“There was nothing you could have done,” Caval cut in. “In any case, whatever you did, he’d have found a way to blame me for it.”
There was truth in that, Karmel knew. Caval alone had borne the weight of their father’s expectation, while Karmel herself had felt anonymous. Even rejected. Was that why she’d always felt driven to compete with her brother? Why she’d resented his elevation to high priest even as she celebrated it?
Caval’s gaze swung to the opposite side of the courtyard. The flow of water from one of the windows had stopped where the body of a Storm Guard blocked it. Caval stared at the corpse, then said, “Do you know how many times I prayed to the Chameleon for the beatings to end? The god never responded, of course … Until one day I stopped begging for his help and asked what I could do for him. Have you never wondered why he supported me in my bid to become high priest? Because for all Father’s devotion, he wasn’t ambitious enough. The Chameleon isn’t interested in prayers. He wants power. Power I promised to give him.”
Karmel’s voice was flat. “So you allied with Imerle.”
“The Chameleon told me about Imerle’s plans for Dragon Day long before she did. He thought she would be vulnerable with her forces committed. He thought if the Chameleons ruled Olaire, the faith would spread like wildfire across the Sabian League.”
A starbeak alighted on the weaponsmaster’s corpse and began pecking at his eyes. Karmel looked away. The moment was upon her. “Why did you pick me?” she made herself say. “To go to Dian.”
“Because you’re good,” Caval said. Then, “And because you alone would trust me enough not to ask questions about the true purpose of the mission.”
“You sent me to die. To die!”
Her brother opened his mouth to speak, then shut it again. He bowed his head.
And with that simple gesture, finally admitted his betrayal. Karmel’s vision blurred. At least this time he hadn’t denied it. She’d expected him to try to turn her uncertainties upon themselves. To deflect and refute and confound. The fact that he hadn’t came as a relief. The truth she could deal with—perhaps. It was the lies she hated, and she’d started to fear Caval was incapable of telling the truth.
But he still hadn’t given her the whole truth, she sensed.
Their hands were close on the bench, and when Caval lifted his, Karmel snatched hers back, thinking he meant to take it. Instead he began massaging his injured shoulder. If he noticed her snub, he gave no sign. “Do you remember the time we confronted Father after I became high priest? What he did when I taunted him?”
“He smiled.”
“He smiled,” Caval agreed. “I wanted to see his anger. To see he knew he was beaten. But he wasn’t. Perhaps I was doing what he wanted. Perhaps he’d been hoping all along that I would depose him.” His hand paused on his shoulder. “Or perhaps he knew the scars he’d left me would never fade. And that for so long as they remained, I would never be free of his influence.”
“If you hated him so much, why didn’t you send him on the damned mission?”
“Because he’s dead.”
For a while Karmel could not speak. Dead? No, that wasn’t possible. He’d left Olaire for Benaldi two weeks ago. Since becoming high priest, Caval had found excuses to send their father as far away as possible, as often as possible. “His commission to Benaldi—”
“A ruse to keep people from wondering at his disappearance. In time I would have broken the news that his ship had been taken by pirates or gone down in a storm.”
“You killed him?” Karmel whispered.
“Yes.”
It felt like a pit had opened up in her stomach. Not because of her father’s passing—he’d been dead to her from the moment she was old enough to escape his clutches. No, what sorrow she did feel was at Caval’s part in his death. For all that her brother had been through, she would never have believed he could so such a thing. And yet he had tried to have her killed too, hadn’t he?
Caval’s look was distant. “He knew why I’d come. He didn’t even put up a fight. Every time I saw him I remembered the beatings, the sneers, the years of humiliation. I was the new high priest, yet with him I would always be the boy who had cowered as the cane fell. Since I replaced him I haven’t slept more than a few bells at a time. I relive the beatings each night, and each morning when I wake up my shoulder feels like the bone has been broken again. And now the oscura has lost its bite—”
Karmel started. Oscura? Now that she looked for it, the whites of his eyes were a little dull.
“You didn’t know?” Caval said, his mouth twitching. His smile did not reach his eyes, though. “I thought when Father died there would be some respite from the memories.” The look he turned on Karmel was pointed. “But there wasn’t.”
And suddenly everything became clear to the priestess. “Because those same memories you had when you looked at Father, you had when you looked at me. After Father, I was your link to the past. You thought if I died you could sever it.”
Caval lowered his gaze. “I’m glad Veran failed. Your death wouldn’t have helped. Father’s didn’t—though I only came to realize that after you had gone.”
Karmel felt color rise to her cheeks. “So you would do it all again if you thought it would work?”
“Nothing will work. But that hardly matters now.”
“Why?”
He studied her. “You’re not going to finish this?”
It was a heartbeat before Karmel understood what he meant. He thinks I’m going to kill him. More than that, he wanted her to. The realization came as yet another blow. He really thought her capable of that? How broken must he be that any of this made sense to him? Vengeance had never been on her mind. All she’d wanted was to be wrong in her suspicions. For things between her and Caval to return to the way they’d once been. And that, she knew, could never happen.
Her brother’s gaze shifted to the weaponsmaster’s corpse. A second starbeak had joined the first, and they began squabbling over the choice pickings. When Caval next spoke, his tone was rueful. “The Chameleon chose me over Father because I promised him power. I promised him the League, and look at what I have brought him instead. He will be finished with me.” He glanced at Karmel. “And I cannot tell you what a relief that is.”
Karmel did not respond. For the first time in a long time her brother’s look wasn’t closed to her. Along with the self-loathing, she saw resignation in his eyes. Resignation at the fact she wouldn’t grant him the release he sought? At the fact he would have to live with the knowledge of what he’d done? She searched his face, wondering what he now felt when he looked at her. And what she would feel in the coming days when she looked at him.
The metallic chatter of swordplay started up in the dist
ance, followed by a whistle and a shout, much closer. Karmel scanned the roofline before looking back at Caval. They couldn’t stay here. They’d been lucky to evade Mili and Tali earlier, but who was to say the twins might not come back? Or a squad of Imerle’s soldiers?
“Can you walk?” she asked Caval.
He raised an eyebrow. “Walk where?”
“To the gates. With the corridors flooded, we’ll have to cross the terraces.”
Her brother’s gaze was intense. “And then?”
Karmel shook her head. She had not thought that far ahead. “One step at a time, Caval,” she said.
One step at a time.
* * *
With a heavy tread Kempis climbed the stairs to the roof terrace. Mazana Creed had started draining the palace’s flooded corridors, but the septia wasn’t going to stay down there with the sharks while she finished the job. He emerged blinking into bright sunlight and seated himself on the top step. A strand of fireweed was tangled round his legs. He tugged it free before pulling off his boots and emptying them of water.
To his right a section of seawall had collapsed. All around, the flagstones were cracked and scratched. The dragon must have tried to climb to the terrace here, but there was no sign of the creature now. How had the beast managed to slip through the net of ships at the Dragon Gate? And why had none of those vessels followed the dragon here? Something Mazana had said in the throne room came back to him—something about a disturbance in Dian that she would blame on the stone-skins. Were there more of the strangers running amok in Dian and Natilly? Had they disrupted the Dragon Hunt in some way?
Kempis scanned the palace rooftops. To the south he saw two Chameleons—a man and a woman—shuffling along a terrace in the direction of the main gates. The man looked familiar, but Kempis was too far away to make out his features. On a rooftop a stone’s throw to the left, four Storm Guards stood staring out to sea, while on a terrace midway between Kempis and the soldiers …
His eyes widened.
