One's Own Shadow (The Siúil Book 2)

by Randall P. Fitzgerald

  Inney scoffed. “No sense of the girl’s ability if she won’t go easy for even a moment.”

  “No,” Rianaire replied. “I think this is an important lesson. For us as well as her. The horsefolk will not test us. They will try to kill us.”

  Rianaire called both fighters over and commended Eala for her effort and strength of will. The girl shrugged the words away, lost in her own mind replaying the battles.

  “She knows nothing of how we move.” Gadaí’s first complaint.

  “How could she be expected to? There have been no satyr here for as long as most can remember.”

  “You know the standard triplets at least?”

  Rianaire looked to Eala who shared her blank expression. Gadaí grew impatient.

  “Then of the scouting standard movement cycles? The faun and their couriers? The wordwitches?”

  “Faun?” It was a name Rianaire seemed to remember. An almost mythical race of horsefolk. They had been spoken of in few books and then only as rumor or the tale of drunkards and madmen.

  Gadaí made a plaintive noise and spit at the ground beside them. “You know this little and you fight with so few?”

  “Who would have told us?” Rianaire could hardly accept that they should know tactics of a race who rarely left survivors who had seen a battle proper. She remembered the way the ambush had gone, perhaps it was one of the methods she spoke of.

  “This is a bad way. You must learn. Quickly, at that. A horde is no scout camp. You must understand what you fight.”

  Rianaire could not disagree with that. She sent Eala away to rest, saying they would begin again tomorrow. As Gadaí began to take her leave, Rianaire stopped her.

  “What do you think of the girl?”

  Gadaí did not waste a second. “She is not fit to fight satyr. Not as she is. There is some skill in her, but no experience. She will die.”

  “I was worried you might be so grim. Well, I suppose there’s nothing else for it. You will be her official adviser.”

  “I will what?”

  “You will teach my Binse of War how to fight. How to handle attacks from the horsefolk who would do us harm.”

  Gadaí groaned, or growled, Rianaire could not hope to tell the difference. “A large request.”

  “With a large reward, of course.”

  “Very well. Your word has value. I will accept it.” Gadaí turned and began to walk away toward the gate. “I will sleep.”

  Rianaire sighed and put her hand on Inney’s head, fussing with the half-Drow’s hair. “Back only a few hours and already I’m frustrated. It’s a wonder why I keep coming back at all.”

  “Perhaps you are a masochist.” Inney let out a satisfied huff at her own joke. A side she only showed when the two were alone.

  “I doubt if I could deny it. Between the people seeking my constant attention, you, and Síocháin, my life is little more than abuse and sex.”

  “Then should I remind you of the state you left the temples?”

  Rianaire laughed as she turned to head into the Bastion. “More abuse. Best you stop before I soak through my small clothes.”

  U

  Aile

  Aile left Fásachbaile’s Bastion City before there were any sounds inside the inn. She did not want to be bothered with meals before such a long ride. Her horse followed her again without complaint or sound. She had seen the remnants of food left in the dirt around it, so it had been fed at least. She was half surprised it decided to follow her after being fed by some other’s hand. It did not matter, she supposed. Going without stealing a horse meant the already passive guards had no reason to be vigilant should she return.

  It seemed the horse had taken even more gleefully to being unhindered by the chariot than their first ride made it seem. She had never known a horse so fast. Compared to the half-hearted gallops when it was weighted down, the animal now nearly flew over the easy terrain of the main road away from the Bastion City. She kept expecting her mount to tire as the hours drove past, but it seemed to be sourced with boundless energy and an unwillingness to slow. Surely the horsefolk were breeding from a different stock than the elves but they made such poor use of them. The foothills passed them and Aile turned north as the sun drew toward the far edge of the sky. It would be another pair of hours yet until it went down. She had prepared a bundle for sleeping but she may not need it. The faun owed her money and so much more for his part in the little charade and she meant to collect on the debt without much delay.

  She wondered idly as she rode if he had been warned in any way. There would be less fun in that. A quiet job, quick and unsatisfying. The plans she had built up in her mind would not be played out as she hoped and with so little else to look forward to she doubted her heart could bear such a loss. She sighed sarcastically to no one and laughed lightly, looking up to the sky, imagining what fun she could have.

  Her pace had slowed with the rougher terrain that came with riding among the open desert. It was not an unpleasant ride, especially when compared to how she had traveled for so much of the previous weeks. She was nearing the camp, at least, and with more than a few hours to spare before the sun would come up. For a moment she wondered if the camp would be where she left it. It seemed curious as an existence. Some anomaly that had no centaur and had tasked itself with gathering up a very influential satyr. Surely the centaur would not smile upon that sort of thing. It was doubtful the faun could rejoin his friends, or even if his orders were meant to be valid. Salaar may have had ideas of his own about changing the face of the hippocamp forces and the papers may well have been for pulling forces into place. It riled her that she could not know. When there was less to be done, she would need to gather a little satyr or a faun of her own and learn as her former employer had.

  The camp came into view after another hour or so, she had stopped bothering to keep track of the passing of minutes as they mattered little. Her horse seemed to understand where it was bound and had headed there without any coaxing or direction. She wondered what it might do when she dismounted so close to where it was often allowed to wander. It was an animal, even if it seemed a clever one, it was like to return to its ways and wander off. There was little she could do about it, and with any luck she would at least be able to find a suitable mount at the satyr’s odd stable area. There were only a pair of fires burning in the camp that Aile could see from the angle she approached. Strange, she ought to have seen at least a half dozen from the numbers she’d left in the camp before when the old goat was delivered.

  She unmounted her horse and it looked at her until she began to move. As she started to walk into the outer rim of the camp, the horse moved to follow. She sighed. This would not do. It would be a shame to dirty a blade but the horse could not be allowed to follow her into the camp. She had not seen one in her entire time there before and it would draw attention even if they were a normal sight in the camps.

  “You. Sit. Wait here.”

  She pointed to the ground and the horse looked to the spot and then back up. It took a step to her and chuffed.

  “Stay.” She said the words more firmly this time, pointing again to the ground. “Sit. Wait.”

  Her hand started toward a blade when the horse took a few steps back, exhaling and shaking its head. It moved to the place she had pointed and stood. She turned back to the camp and took a step. There was no sound behind her. She shook her head, not sure if she should be annoyed at having to coax an animal to leave her be or happy that it seemed her ride away from the camp was secured.

  Slinking into the camp was easily done and curiously quiet. She made for the largest tent near the camp’s edge and climbed the side of it, wary at the lack of noise. All the goats breathed like death when they slept and it was certainly late enough for that. She came to the top of the tent and looked over the camp. There were scattered tents missing, as many as half from the looks
of it. The ones that stood had no fires left around them. She dropped from the tent and moved cautiously through the camp. There was little reason to trust the lack of noise meant safety. Salaar’s tent had sat at the middle of something of a clearing before and now sat at the center of a larger one. Two satyr stood at the door, chittering mindlessly to one another and laughing from time to time. The noise was more than enough to allow Aile to work her way to the back side of the tent and then up it. The benefit of creatures so large was that her size and weight were well below what would have caused any problem for the structures they kept themselves in.

  She stayed at the back of the tent for a time, listening and then moving and listening. She heard some shuffling and a familiar grumbling from inside. Salaar was here, it seemed. He had not kept a guard before and his distaste for satyr made that no real surprise. There must be a reason for the ones that sat in front of his tent now. They would need to be dealt with or else even if the conversation was quiet— it would not be— they would come to see what caused it. Aile moved herself to the front edge of the tent and quietly looked down at the satyr below. Two women, one of them busty beyond anything she thought the satyr capable of. Most of them were wiry and flat-chested. Perhaps she was some kind of breeding stock and here out of desperation. They each held pikes. Pikes would be useless at such a range but they would not have the chance to use them.

  Aile slid the long blade from her back and pulled a throwing knife to join it. She moved to the right edge and drew a quiet breath. The dagger plunged into the busty one causing a deep shudder even before Aile’s feet met her shoulders. The second had barely turned when the cow-titted creature below buckled, her knees digging into the ground enough to allow Aile a steady shot. She flung the throwing knife and it buried in the satyr’s chest. The one she rode lurched forward and Aile jumped, sliding in the sand as she landed. The other was trying feebly to cough, pawing at the knife. It had sunk deep through her shoddy leathers and sat in her lung. Aile clicked her tongue, dismayed she would not be able to retrieve it without tedious work. She pulled the long dagger from the doughy one and put it through the other’s soft belly. It fell over and she put the blade through its temple, not wanting to be bothered by sounds of shuffling outside while she did her work.

  She heard some movement from behind the flaps of the tent and decided it was best not to give the faun time to become curious. Aile walked into the tent and Salaar’s mouth fell open. He stammered something a few times before yelling a word she did not know. The guards, no doubt.

  “They are dead. And you will shut that tiny hole in your face or things will be worse for you than you know.”

  The tiny goat’s mouth clapped shut and he backed silently into a wall of the tent, jumping in fear as he hit it.

  “W-w-w-whad are you d-dang here?”

  Aile wiped her dagger clean against her thigh, frowning at the sight of her leathers. They were in poor shape after her recent travels. She sheathed her weapon. The faun watched it all with wide eyes.

  “I have come for the pay I am owed.”

  “Oh!” He breathed out hastily, feigning relief but still talking too quickly to form the foreign words cleanly. “Th-thren skalls. Of, of course. I can gib them.”

  Aile took a step forward and he screamed— only for half a second— closing his eyes and looking away.

  “I will arrange the gold myself. With costs to be paid punitively.” Aile could hardly contain her glee. She heard nothing outside, even with the screams. “You did not have guards before. Why now?” She walked past the faun who seemed to calm at her questions. Perhaps he thought she would not bother asking if she meant to kill him.

  “Shahuor,” he spit, “the chaurak, he wasted no time in turning the satyr against me. And so close to the siege. Left the two outside and a half dozen more to keep me in this tent. An insult! They sleep at the far side and send some milkwife and a slow-minded one to watch me. Insults and insults more! These lands will be flooded with centaur soon enough. They are fools to join him now.”

  She could guess easily enough what the siege entailed. The Bastion City. She could not stay there long, then. And the rest sounded no better. It was enough that she could figure their plans. Work would be scarce in an invasion.

  He was still raving as Aile came to the chest he kept the gold in. The box was of poor quality except the leather which bound the wood together. She opened it to see that it was nearly full.

  “Should at least send warriors to be a guard. Proper kind.”

  “Would they be needed? Could you have killed the two outside?”

  He quieted at that. Aile lifted the box from the awkward plinth it sat on and took it back to the large room where the faun’s desk sat.

  “You would steal—”

  She spun and he again clapped his mouth shut. She had grown tired of pretending. Aile threw the chest of gold onto the desk and turned. Salaar screamed out but a slap across his mouth stopped the noise. He looked at her hazily and she slapped him again, drawing blood. She pulled the long blade again and the faun stared at it and whimpered. Piss began to drain from somewhere inside the fat and fur that covered his lower half. Aile held the dagger under it.

  “Good. That will help. I have gotten tired of such quiet work of late, Goddess knows. With the satyr, I could not risk it. But with you…” She grabbed the faun by his wrist and he writhed, trying desperately to get away. “Do you know, the elves have stories about us? That we eat bones.”

  She squeezed hard and the bones snapped. Frail and panicked, he screamed and she slapped him again. She could see his eyes lose their focus. She dragged him limping to the chair at the desk and shoved him toward it. Salaar fell into the chair sloppily and seemed to come back to himself. He flipped over, slowly.

  She sliced at his arm where she had broken the bones and the faun let out a shriek that stung her ears. She quivered at the sound. She stood and walked around the desk. Salaar only held up the end of his arm that was left and looked at it.

  “Bitch! Bitch, bitch! You! You! Bitch!”

  It must’ve been the only word he’d learned. There was a plate on his desk, pewter, perhaps. Roughly made and still covered with bits of food. A convenient thing. Aile flipped it and placed her hand to it as she walked back around the table. He had continued spitting the word at her. The plate had turned a dim orange under her hand. She grabbed the stump and pulled, bringing the faun out of his chair. He barely registered his protest before the bloody stump sizzled against the plate. The screams were piercing and constant. When she was satisfied, she let him fall, and he did. He sat staring at the stump breathing half-screams each time he exhaled. Salaar gathered himself after a moment.

  “Anything. The khala, take it. All the chast. Please.” His words were gone again.

  “Is it your life you want, little goat?” She squatted in front of him and smiled a most crooked smile. “Why? What do you have that I could need?”

  He thought, still breathing ragged. “You… you…” He wavered, staring at the stump. “The gold must be enough. It must be.”

  Aile stood and looked at the chest. “No. No, you see… you wanted the chest…” She squatted again, having brought the pewter plate from the desk. “And my life. The balance must be made equal.”

  She pressed the pewter against Salaar’s naked stomach and he squealed, hyperventilating. The screams began to fade and he fainted. Aile threw the plate aside and sighed. She dragged the pitiful little thing into the chair and casually cut out his tongue. He did not stir.

  “Dead? No, I think not yet.”

  She slapped his hand against the arm of the chair and hacked at it with the dagger. He jerked awake and screamed again. She hacked a second time and a third, catching wood with the last. She slid the pooled blood and the hand onto the ground.

  Aile walked to the pewter plate where it lay on the ground. She placed her hand on it an
d heated it to a bright red.

  “You have a choice. And being the creature you are, I think I know how you will choose. You can bleed out in that chair and die. Or you can close the wounds on my Fire. You see, the horsefolk do not know me nearly as well as they ought. Cursebringer?” She scoffed and moved to leave, taking the chest as she moved. “A pleasant dream.”

  She came out of the tent and looked to see nothing stirring. The work had been satisfying in the end. Behind her, as she left, she heard the searing of flesh and muffled, awkward screams.

  Part Twelve

  z

  Z

  Socair

  It was more than she could take, trying to work with the horse beneath her knees. Socair had never been good with the animals, cursing them for useless more times than she could remember but never so often as her ride south now. In her mind, at least, it felt as though she had spent as much time wrestling the worthless thing to its place on the road as she had simply riding.

  Práta had fared better but they often slowed for Nath who had little experience on horseback. She was hesitant in the saddle and the horse matched her beneath. Still, Socair could not bring herself to complain at the girl. She showed sorrow in her face each time she drew attention and the look of it never failed to have Socair pause and abandon her frustration. The situation was bad through no fault of any of the three that rode together. This was a thing built intentionally or so Socair’s instinct told her. She tried as best she could to throw off the idea, but near every minute she’d lived had been in service of trusting what her mind told her before it could be clouded with emotion. There was little else to do, as much as it bothered her, and so Socair was left in the mire of trying to make sense of something she could not hope to understand. There was not enough known to piece together anything of value. Her mind searched for hints anywhere she could think for the whole of her time in the Bastion. Deifir seemed to like her, at least as best as Socair could guess. She often spoke with her privately and frankly about the state of things, even to the chagrin of the others in the Binse. They would never bring such words to Deifir or Socair directly though. Had some other force been involved? Some change while she had gone seeking aide? If an answer was to be found, the horse beneath her would surely jerk or wander before she could find it. It was an excuse she allowed herself, knowing that if any answer to her worries was coming, it was at the crossroads. And even still, she would not want them until the fighting was done.