“Race me,” he shouted. “There and back.”
Like an arrow from a bow, Sandr sped for the far bank, and Cithrin followed him. Her legs ached, and her heart beat like a boulder rolling down a hill, her numb face made itself a mask. Sandr reached the edge of the ice, pushed off from the snow, and sped past her, going back toward her cart. Cithrin turned too, pushing faster, harder. In the middle of the pond, the ice darkened and complained, but then she was over it, almost at Sandr’s back, skating beside him, past him. Almost past him.
Her skate slammed into the snow and the dead, winter-killed reeds. The moon-blued ground rose up and hit her so hard she couldn’t breathe. Sandr lay beside her, his eyes wide, his cheeks as red as if she’d pinched them. The look of surprise and concern on his face was so comic that, when she could, Cithrin started laughing.
Sandr’s laughter twinned with hers, and he threw a handful of snow in the air, the flakes drifting down around them like dandelion fluff. And then he rolled to her, resting his weight against her side. His lips were on hers.
Oh, she thought. And then, half a breath later, she tried kissing him back.
It wasn’t as awkward as she’d expected it to be. His arms shifted around her, his body entirely on hers now, pressing her into the snow that didn’t seem cold at all. His hand fumbled at her jacket, and then the thick wool sweater. His fingers found her skin. She felt herself arching up, pressing herself into the touch almost as if she were watching it be done. She heard her breath grow ragged.
“Cithrin,” Sandr said. “You need to… You need to know…”
“Don’t,” she said.
He stopped, pulling back. His hand retreated from her breasts. Contrition narrowed his face. She felt a flare of impatience.
“Don’t talk, I mean,” she said.
She’d always known about sex in a general way. Cam had talked about it in dour, stern, and warning tones. She’d seen the mummers in the spring carnival dancing through the torchlit streets in masks and nothing more. Perhaps there should have been no mystery. And still, as she undid her belt and pushed down the rough pants, she wondered whether this was what Besel had done with all those other girls. All the ones that weren’t her. Had it been like this for them? She’d heard it hurt the first time. She wondered what that would feel like. Sandr’s bare flanks shone nearly as pale as the snow. Concentration possessed him as he tried to pry off his skates without rising up.
I hope it’s all right that I don’t love him, she thought.
A roar came out of nowhere, deep and violent and sudden. Sandr rose up into the air, his weight gone, his eyes round in surprise. Cithrin grabbed for her waistband. Her first thought was that a monstrous bird had come down from the sky and plucked him away.
Captain Wester threw Sandr out onto the ice, where he landed awkward and skidding. The captain’s sword hissed out of its scabbard, and he moved toward Sandr, cursing in three languages. Cithrin rose to her knees, tugging at her clothing. Sandr stumbled back, his still-erect penis bobbing comically, and slipped.
“I wasn’t forcing her,” Sandr squeaked. “I wasn’t forcing.”
“Do I care?” Wester shouted, pointing with his sword at the wineskin half covered by snow. “You get her stupid drunk to get her knees apart, and you want a good-conduct medal?”
“I’m not drunk,” Cithrin said, realizing that she likely was. Wester ignored her.
“Touch her again, son, and I cut something off you. Best pray it’s a finger.”
Sandr opened his mouth, but only a high whine came out.
“Stop it!” Cithrin shouted. “Leave him alone!”
Wester turned to her, rage in his eyes. Taller than she was, twice as broad, and with naked steel in his hand, he made the small, still part of her mind tell her to be quiet. Wine and embarrassment and anger washed her forward.
“Who are you to tell him what he can and can’t?” she said. “Who are you to tell me?”
“I am the man who’s saving your life. And you will do as I say,” Wester shouted, but she thought there was a new confusion in his eyes. “I won’t have you turning into a whore.”
The word bit. Cithrin balled her fists until her knuckles ached. Blood lit her cheeks and roared in her ears. When she spoke, she shrieked.
“I wasn’t going to charge him!”
Wester looked at her as if seeing her for the first time. The confusion deepened, knitting his brow, and something like amusement plucked at his mouth. And then—inexplicably—anguish.
“Captain,” a new voice growled, and the Tralgu loomed out of the darkness.
“Not a good time, Yardem,” Wester said.
“Took that from the shouting, sir. There’s soldiers.”
Wester changed between one heartbeat and the next. His face cleared, his body pulled back a degree. Their confrontation evaporated, and Cithrin felt herself unnerved by the sudden shift. It seemed unfair that the captain had abandoned their conflict with things still unsettled.
“Where?” Wester asked.
“Camped over the ridge to the east,” the Tralgu said. “Two dozen. Antean banner, Vanai tents.”
“Well, God smiled,” Wester said. “Any chance their scouts overlooked us?”
“None.”
“Did they see you?”
“No.”
Cithrin’s rage collapsed as the words fought through the wine fumes and trailing remnants of anger. Wester was already pacing the length of her cart. He considered Sandr still wobbling on his skates, the half-buried wineskin, the pond with the white scoring of blade tracks still on the ice.
“Sandr,” he said. “Get Master Kit.”
“Yes, sir,” Sandr said and awkwardly scampered off toward the mill house.
Wester sheathed his sword absentmindedly. His eyes shifted across the landscape, searching for something. Cithrin waited, her heart in her throat. They couldn’t run. Against two dozen, they couldn’t fight. Any goodwill she might have expected from Wester was certainly gone now.
The seconds stretched by endlessly. Wester took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
“We’ll need a broom,” he said.
Geder
The bitterly cold predawn breeze murmured through the walls of Geder’s tent and set the flame on his oil lamp dancing. He leaned closer, then cursed softly and turned up the wick. The flame brightened and then smoked. He backed it down slowly until the smoke disappeared. In the brighter light, the pale ink grew, if not clear, at least legible. He stuck his hands into his armpits for warmth and leaned in closer.
And so it came that in these final days, the three great factions entered into a war of both blood and terrible cunning such that measureless stone ships flew through the skies with great iron thorns that slaughtered dragons as they flew and also deep pods found manners to hide themselves from their enemies until they should be forgotten that they might attack an unprotected enemy and also swords envenomed to slay both master and slave. The mighty silver-scaled Morade, maddest and mightiest of the warring clutch-mates, fashioned a tool more devious than the world had known, and in the high mountains south of Haakapel (which, Geder thought, would be Hallskar now) and east of Sammer (which Geder was almost certain was the fifth-polis name for the Keshet), he forged the Righteous Servant to whom none could lie nor no one could long disbelieve, and its sigil was of cardinal and intercardinal showing the eight directions of the world in which no falsehood could hide, and in this great Morade found his subtlest power.
He rubbed his eyes. The thick, yellowed pages of the book smelled of dust and mold and the odd sweet binder’s glue that no one had used in half a thousand years. When he’d found it in the deep shadows of a rag-and-bone shop in Vanai, it delighted him. As he struggled through his translation, his enthusiasm waned.
The author claimed to have copied and translated a much older scroll, long since lost, that dated back to the first generations after the fall of the Dragon Empire. That was, for the first part, a framing device for sp
eculative essay so trite and overdone that Geder’s heart sank when he read it. In the second part, it meant that everything else in the essay was presented as legitimate history, which he found less interesting. And finally, the author had embraced long sentences and complex grammar in an attempt to make the text feel authentic, and it made every page an endurance test. By the time Geder reached the verbs, he had to turn back and remind himself what they were talking about.
If he’d been back in Vanai, he would have put the work aside. But Sir Alan Klin, Protector of Vanai, had heard of the caravan smuggling out the secret wealth of the city and made its recovery his first priority. This meant sending his favorites along the dragon’s roads to Carse, and every man’s status after that took his search party farther and farther from the likely hunting grounds until Jorey Kalliam was left with the Dry Wastes, Fallon Broot on the sea road to Elassae, and Geder Palliako leading two dozen half-mutinous Timzinae soldiers through the icy mud of the southernmost of the Free Cities.
In their weeks on the farmer’s tracks and game trails, they’d found three caravans. Small affairs hardly more than three carts each, and all of them tracking winter goods between local cities and towns. In between, days of mud and nights of nagging cold wore on Geder. And as poor a companion as his essay on the powers of dragons to unmake lies might be, it outshone the soldiers. At the end of the day, he curled into his bed, sleeping while the others drank and sang and cursed the snow. In the mornings, he rose with the cook, reading and translating and pretending that he was anywhere besides here.
A discreet scratch came at the door, and his squire stepped in along with the Timzinae who acted as his second. The squire carried a tray with a shaped-bone bowl of stewed oats with raisins and an earthenware bottle of hot, dark, oily water that pretended to be coffee. The Timzinae made a formal salute. Geder closed the book as the squire laid his food out before him.
“What are the scouts saying?” Geder asked.
“The carts haven’t moved,” his second said. “They aren’t more than two hours’ march.”
“Well, no hurry then,” Geder said with more cheer than he felt. “Tell the men we’ll break camp after we eat and have this done with by midday.”
“And after?”
“South and west,” Geder said around a mouthful of oats. “That’s where the road goes.”
The second nodded and saluted again, turned on his heel, and left. Geder had the feeling that there was contempt in the movement, but he might only have been seeing what he expected to see. As he ate, the seams of his tent began to grow more distinct. Voices rose, men calling to each other, horses complaining, the chopping sound of planks coming down from the cooking platform. Outside, the sky moved from darkness to grey to a blue-and-white daybreak more light than warmth. By the time the weak sun had taken the worst chill from the air, Geder was mounted, and his men ready to march. According to the scouts, the newly sighted caravan was at least a decent size.
Still, Geder didn’t have any real hope for more than another disappointing search and sullen locals until he saw the Tralgu.
It was sitting on the outermost cart, its ears pricked forward with an interest that didn’t show in the rest of its face. Wester’s second was supposed to be a Tralgu. Geder swept his eyes over the carts huddled around the old mill, counting under his breath. Information was always sketchy, memory unreliable, and carts in a rough group could be hard to count, but it was near enough to what they’d been searching for that Geder’s heart began to beat a little faster.
A Timzinae in a thick wool robe walked down the road toward them. Geder motioned, and his six archers fanned out on the road behind him. The Tralgu sat forward and flicked an ear.
“You’re master of this ’van?” Geder asked.
“I am,” the Timzinae said. “Who the fuck are you?”
“I am Lord Geder Palliako of Rivenhalm and representative of King Simeon and Imperial Antea,” Geder said. “Where are you coming from?”
“Maccia. Going back there too. Bellin’s snowed over.”
Geder stared down at the black eyes. The nictatating membranes slid closed and open again, blinking without blinking. Geder wasn’t sure if it was a lie. It was possible, of course, that there was more than one ’van in the Free Cities with a Tralgu guard. This might still be a false alarm.
“You’ve stopped here?”
“Axle came loose on one of the carts. Only just got it strapped back in place. What’s this all about?”
“Who’s your guard captain?” Geder asked.
The ’van master, turned, spat, and pointed to a man leaning against one of the carts. A Firstblood with a blank, friendly face and an air of restrained violence. Wheat-colored hair touched by grey. Broad across the shoulder. It might have been Marcus Wester. It might have been a thousand other men.
“What’s his name?”
“Tag,” the ’van master said.
One of the soldiers in the road behind him spoke, his voice too low for Geder to make out the words. Another replied. He felt a blush crawling up his neck. Either the man was lying to him or he wasn’t, and every moment that Geder hesitated, he felt more like a fool.
“Get your guards out onto the road,” he said. “Put the carters with their carts.”
“And why would I do that?”
Someone chuckled. Geder’s embarrassment turned to rage.
“Because if you don’t, I’ll have you killed,” he shouted. “And because you had the temerity to question me, I’ll have every weapon and piece of armor in a pile on the road ten paces from your guardsmen. And if I find so much as a work knife overlooked, I’ll leave your corpse for the crows.”
The nictatating membrane slid open and closed. The caravan master turned around and trudged back toward the carts. Geder motioned his second closer.
“Send men around the sides. If anyone tries to sneak away, bring them back alive if you can. Dead if you have to. We’re searching this place down to the pegs and nails.”
“The mill house too?” the second asked.
“Everything,” Geder said.
The Timzinae nodded and moved back, calling to his men. Geder watched the carts, anger and embarrasment giving way to anxiety. The captain and the caravan master exchanged a few words, and the captain looked up. He frowned at Geder, shrugged, and turned away. If there was going to be resistance, it would come now and it would come hard. Geder shifted in his saddle, the still-healing wound in his leg aching in anticipation. Movement came from the mill house, from every cart. How many soldiers would they have? If the full wealth of the Medean bank was sitting in those carts, every carter would be a swordsman or an archer. Geder’s scalp began to crawl. If they had bowmen hidden in those carts, he’d be sprouting arrows. Fear shifted in his belly like he’d eaten bad fish. Trying to seem casual, he turned his horse and trotted to the rear of their formation.
To judge by the expressions of the soldiers, he hadn’t fooled anybody.
The first of the guards lumbered out from the carts, half a dozen swords in her arms like firewood. She dropped them on the ground where Geder had ordered. Then a thin boy hardly old enough to be a soldier with two unstrung bows and a backload of quivers. Slowly, the unpromising parade went on, the sad pile of arms and armor growing until ten guards and a wild-haired cunning man marched out to the road in wool and cotton, counted ten paces from the heap, and stood in the clear, hugging themselves against the cold.
“Move in,” Geder said.
The soldiers walked forward, blades drawn. The carters stood by their carts and smiled or frowned or looked around in confusion. Geder rode a slow turn around the little encampment. The sound of the search seemed to follow him—voices fierce and querulous, wood clacking, metal clanging against metal. He watched as his men pulled ingots of pig iron out of a cart and dropped them to the ground. One man scratched at the metal to be sure it was only what it seemed, then spat and turned back to the search.
Midday came and went. A chill
wind picked up, setting the snow to skitter and swirl around their ankles. The soldiers unloaded each cart, looked under them, examined the horse and mules, and began going through the mill house. Geder got off his horse at the edge of the mill pond and looked at the bare carts, the frigid carters, the ineffectual sun in the watery sky. One of the carters—a sickly-looking girl with pale hair and skin—crouched by bolts of fallen wool and pretended not to watch Geder. He knew what she saw. A puffed-up nobleman bullying her and her friends. He wanted to go to her, to explain that it wasn’t like that. That he wasn’t like that.
Instead, he turned away. The shifting dust of snow moved over the ice like ripples on water. Geder walked along the edge, trying not to feel the girl’s gaze on him. Some idiot had been skating. White marks showed where blades had cut across the thin ice. Lucky they didn’t break through. He’d read an essay once outlining the time it took each of the thirteen races to die in icy water. Well, twelve, really. The Drowned weren’t…
Geder stopped almost before he knew what stopped him. On the edge of the pond, a long, low drift of snow swept out onto the ice. The white blade marks vanished into it, and then out of it again as if the skater had passed directly through the little drift. Or it hadn’t been there until after the skater had passed. Geder walked closer. The snow itself looked odd. It didn’t have the ice-crust he expected, and it was smooth as broom-swept sand. Geder looked up. The guards were on the far side of the caravan. His own soldiers grouped at the mouth of the mill house. He walked around the curious snow.
Deep scores and marks marred the surface of the ice. Poking out just at ankle height, something black and square. He squatted, brushing the snow away. A box, half drowned in recently cut ice and then covered over. And others beside it, all of them crusted over with thin ice and hidden by the carefully arranged snowdrift. He looked up. The girl carter was standing now, craning her neck to see him, her hands knotted at her belly. Geder took out his knife and forced the latch. Topaz, jade, emerald, pearl, gold and silver filigree as delicate as frost. Geder pulled back like the gems had stung him, and then, as he understood what he was seeing, felt a sunrise in his chest, relief and pleasure rushing through him, unknotting his muscles and bringing a grin to his face.
Leviathan Wakes: Book One of The Expanse Page 68
