Daughter of Blood

by Helen Lowe

  Rayn pointed, and Kalan started that way, pacing quietly between rows of shelves but angling toward the furtive sounds. He listened for a careless footfall or yesterday’s betraying scuff of a bin lid, but whoever had crept in was also adept at stealth. When he paused to look down another long aisle, he saw the rear door standing ajar and considered closing it, except that might panic his quarry. A few paces more brought him in sight of the grain bins, which stood several rows deep along the warehouse wall. A chain hung down from the gantry above them, part of a mezzanine loft that in turn joined a narrow walkway running along two sides of the warehouse.

  Plenty of pathways for a pilferer, Kalan thought, his gaze traveling casually across the dimly lit space. And plenty of places to hide among the stored goods. He could see the privy door built into one corner and separated from the grain barrels by stacks of sail canvas. Continuing in that direction, he picked out a variation in the dust between the last two rows of barrels—the suggestion that a mark might have been brushed away. A glance along the barrels revealed that one lid was very slightly raised, as though it had been partially lifted clear then hastily replaced.

  So where are you? Kalan thought. Are you crouched between the barrels, or do you have a better bolthole? He pretended to be distracted by a pallet of axe-handles, picking one up while in reality studying the surrounding area. A half turn, as he tested the handle for heft, showed him a pile of abandoned creels and crates behind the sail canvas. The loose stack offered crawlways for anyone small enough, as well as potential hiding spaces. Replacing the axe handle, he crossed to the pile and examined a creel instead. If someone was hiding there, however, even Kalan’s acute sight could not make them out.

  Thoughtfully, he set the creel down again, aware that Rayn and Che’Ryl-g-Raham had fallen quiet. Even so, the exhalation as he turned away was so soft that few others would have caught it. Kalan was sure it came from within the pile of crates, yet still could not see anything out of place. Frowning, he considered the possibility that he was dealing with an aptitude similar to his own: someone who was adept at taking on the appearance of his or her surroundings, while turning a hunter’s eyes and mind away. The ability was one most Derai would only expect to find among their own ranks, but Kalan’s time beyond the Wall had taught him otherwise. All the same, a gift that matched his shielding power, or Jehane Mor’s, would still be rare.

  But if he was dealing with another shielder, then the power use itself would also be concealed. Hiding in plain sight, Kalan thought: it does fit—yet how to flush the quarry out?

  Turning back to the crates, he sank onto his heels, which brought him eye level with the gaps between them. He was no seeker, like Malian and Tarathan, but suspected that separating illusion from reality would be like standing between the waking world and the Gate of Dreams, able to see one and both at the same time. So rather than using power, he concentrated on looking both at, and through, the tangle of wickerwork and planks.

  At first the loose pile appeared the same, but eventually Kalan began to see how the shadows clung more densely to one cluster of creels. Narrowing his focus, he gradually pulled what initially looked like disparate elements into a coherent physical form: first the outline of hands wrapped around knees, then a head hunched down onto shoulders. Finally, a face emerged from the pattern of substance and shadow, darkness and light, and two wide, frightened eyes stared back into his.

  “Ah,” said Kalan. “Found you.”

  He thought his quarry might flee at once, but the boy remained frozen in place. “We met yesterday, on the wharf,” Kalan said, keeping his manner easy. “You’re Faro, aren’t you?”

  The boy continued to stare, but gave no sign of having heard him. “I’ve met some friends of yours,” Kalan went on, still casual. “Leti and Stefa at the Anchor inn: they’re worried about you.” Best, he decided, not to mention Myron. “If you were to make your way there, I could buy you a meal and ask the inn-wife to find you a real job.” He paused, but the boy’s set face remained blank. “Or I could leave some money for you, since I’ll be leaving Grayharbor soon.”

  He tried to think of a good place to leave it, where the boy would not have to deal with those who meant him well—the inn-wife, or Andron, or even Rayn—unless he chose to. Somewhere out of the way, Kalan thought. “There’s a temple before you reach the Anchor,” he said. “It’s the small old one, down a side lane off the crossroads. The god niches on either side of the door are empty, so I’ll put the money in one of them. Say at noon tomorrow, if you haven’t come to the inn.”

  The small body stirred. “’Tisn’t a temple.” His voice was small, too, and hoarse, although that could be the aftermath of smoke. “It’s a tomb. A god’s tomb, some of Seruth’s priests say, from the time before time.”

  “Is it now?” But Kalan was recalling a moonless mountainside in Emer and the ancient darkness that had crept out to waylay Malian in her guise as Carick the scholar. “The niches are outside, though, and I’ll be leaving the money when the sun is high.” He made a move to stand.

  “I like horses.” A tremble shook the hoarse voice as Kalan resettled onto his heels. “And I’m fast to run messages. I could work for you.”

  Kalan shook his head, but the hoarse voice spoke quickly before he could reply.

  “You wouldn’t have to pay me or anything.” The boy was shaking now, enough to stir the creels. “I’ll work for just my keep, if you’ll take me away with you.”

  Pity twisted in Kalan’s gut, but he kept his tone reasonable. “Faro, the place I’m going is the Derai Wall and that’s no place for you.” Or anyone who’s not Derai, he added silently, remembering Rowan Birchmoon. “Come to the Anchor or take the money I’ll leave for you. You have friends here and can make a life for yourself again.”

  The head amid the enclosing crates jerked—no—before Faro turned his face aside. Kalan sighed inwardly. “I’m going to stand up now and move away,” he said, addressing the resolutely averted head. “You go when you’re ready. But I’ve accepted Rayn’s hospitality, which means I’ll have to tell him about your pilfering, so best you don’t come back.”

  If Rayn is wise, he thought, he’ll keep that rear door bolted from now on. And if you’re wise, he added silently to Faro, you’ll let your friends at the Anchor help you. But the feeling in his gut, where the twist of pity had dispelled the warmth of Rayn’s liquor, told him that Faro was unlikely to be wise. He shook his head again, about to withdraw as promised—and only heard Che’Ryl-g-Raham’s soft tread a moment before she unshuttered the lantern off Rayn’s desk.

  She crept up on me, Kalan thought, astonished, as the navigator set the lantern down on a grain bin and turned toward him. Her silhouette, a shadow warrior with cabled hair twisted around her head like serpents, and a long, curve-tipped sword at her hip, loomed across roof and wall—and Faro screamed, erupting from his hideaway. Kalan caught one glimpse of his terrified face before the boy darted over the top of the sail stack and swung the gantry’s hanging chain at Che’Ryl-g-Raham. She and Kalan both jumped back, and Faro fled through the door, slamming it shut behind him.

  “I thought I heard voices.” Che’Ryl-g-Raham’s surprise was reflected in the lantern’s glass panes. “Was that your pastry thief from yesterday?”

  Kalan nodded. He was wondering why the navigator had terrified the boy so much now when she had not done so the previous day, even before she let him go free. Che’Ryl-g-Raham glanced from him to the door. “You’re not going after him?”

  “No, he’s frightened enough as it is. Poor little rat,” Kalan added.

  Curiosity replaced the navigator’s surprise. “You know, I think our weatherworker may be right about you.” Her tone was reflective. “You’re not like any other Blood warrior I’ve met.”

  “You’ve met a lot, I take it?’ Kalan replied coolly, although his heart had begun to hammer.

  Che’Ryl-g-Raham’s smile glinted. “Enough to decide that you’re a puzzle.” The smile deepen
ed as he kept his expression impassive, and she spoke softly, leaning forward so that her lips almost—but not quite—brushed his ear. “Don’t let it trouble you, Blood warrior. I like puzzles.”

  9

  Sepulchre

  Attendance at the Anchor’s dinner was sparse and Kalan had a table to himself, one that commanded a view of both the common room door and a window onto the yard outside. Afterward he lingered over his beer, but although he waited until the inn gates were closed for the night, Faro did not come. The tapster had shot more than one speculative look his way as the evening lengthened, his manner shifting to heavy sympathy as he closed up. “Girl let you down, did she? It’s probably nothing personal. Even if she liked you, most families are wary of northerners.”

  Kalan stared. “It wasn’t that,” he said stiffly, but could tell the man was unconvinced, especially when his color heightened, remembering Che’Ryl-g-Raham’s murmur against his ear. Her eyes had been alight with amusement and something more as she stepped back, but she left immediately afterward, striding out into the rain as though she did not notice it—which she probably didn’t, being used to walking a deck in all weathers.

  Ignoring the tapster’s knowing look, Kalan returned to his room, where sleep eluded him. Admittedly he had slept most of the day, but part of his wakefulness was chagrin, because between intervening on Faro’s behalf, fighting fires, and catching a Sea House navigator’s attention, he was not doing well at staying in the background. And why, he asked himself, am I so concerned about this Faro anyway? What’s makes one Grayharbor foundling different from a world full of starving and abandoned children? I can’t look out for them all.

  He thumped his pillow, trying to get more comfortable, and supposed that unlike all the other foundlings, this one had crossed his path. But if he wouldn’t take a trained knight like Jarna with him to the Wall, he certainly couldn’t take a Grayharbor street brat. Still, if Faro did come to the inn tomorrow, he would speak to Andron on the boy’s behalf. The smith might be willing to get Faro some sort of apprenticeship in the watch’s compound, especially if he really had been fond of the boy’s mother.

  Despite forming this resolution, it was near dawn before Kalan fell into a light uneasy sleep—and swift as a dam breaking, the white mists of the Gate of Dreams flooded into his mind. The hounds he had been hearing more frequently since leaving Emer were silent, but a woman spoke in Derai, her intonation exasperated. “I’ll be glad when we’re done with this nursemaiding detail.”

  A man replied, sounding weary despite his good-humored tone. “We all will, Innor. But riding escort allows us to scout out this country like the Captain wants, especially up around Dread Pass, so . . .” Kalan never heard what the so was, because a gap opened in the mist and he found himself standing on a plain that reminded him of the Gray Lands, although sheer mountain walls rose on either side and he was gazing toward a massif that had to be part of the Wall of Night. He thought he could make out what looked like a narrow pass between the heights, with dark clouds boiling above it.

  “Dread Pass,” he whispered. Foreboding prickled across his skin, but the brume rolled in and the plain gave way to a forest of vast, silhouetted trunks. A voice sang through the blank world, a low vibration of blood and danger, and he knew without needing to look that the black-pearl ring on his hand would be glowing. He waited, half reluctant, half with a rising sense of anticipation, for the Gate of Dreams to reveal the Great Spear that he had first encountered six years before . . . “Soon,” the voice sang, exultant and fierce: “soon.” But the spear did not materialize and gradually both the song and the glow from the ring faded. Although there was no breath of wind, the fog began to blow apart, the forest dissipating into the gentle slap of water, a creak of rigging, and the smell of salt and tar. A shadow loomed through the whiteness as a gull mewed nearby, perhaps disturbed by the coming dawn.

  The shadow darkened, acquiring form through the dream, much as Kalan had distinguished Faro from his surroundings the previous evening. The wooden planks beneath his feet became the Grayharbor dock, while the black swan’s neck rising above his head was the prow of the Che’Ryl-g-Raham. Beyond the mist, the gull called again, greeting the day. Kalan could see the bird’s wings in his mind, turning against the first light, even as a wave lifted the ship’s crest high—and the eye painted on the side of the black prow opened, gazing down at him.

  The dream fled, or Kalan did, back to the dawn’s pale light filling his room at the Anchor. Che’Ryl-g-Raham’s voice followed him, an echo out of the ship chandler’s the night before, the same note of laughter infusing her tone: “Don’t let it trouble you, Blood warrior. I like puzzles.”

  I’m not sure I do, Kalan thought, waking up. He found he could not shake the memory of the eye on the ship’s prow opening to look at him, or of the navigator’s words, however long he lingered over breakfast. The spear song with its promise of “Soon” also unsettled him, and eventually the common room discussions of soil conditions and crops drove him to the stable. He groomed the horses, keeping a watchful eye on the yard through the open double doors, before polishing their tack to a high gloss. When he was done with his own gear, he began on the inn’s harness, sitting on an upturned tub just inside the stable door while Leti and Stefa came and went, exchanging glances as they worked around him.

  I must have a face like an overcast day, Kalan realized, finally rousing himself sufficiently to decipher Stefa’s whisper, wondering what could have made him so out of sorts. Che’Ryl-g-Raham, he thought wryly. He had also been hoping that Faro would show up, despite the odds against it. But now it was time to weigh the money he thought Faro needed against how much he could spare, before leaving it at the old temple—or tomb—as promised.

  Kalan counted out the coins in his room, taking account of Faro’s food and shelter as well as the cost of purchasing an apprenticeship—although he doubted what he could spare would stretch that far without the inn-wife or Andron’s goodwill. As much as possible, he chose smaller coins that were unlikely to generate accusations of theft, and was replacing the balance when his hand brushed against the package containing Lord Falk’s dagger. It, too, would fit into the empty god niches, and both the dagger and Audin’s silver buckle would fetch a good price if the right person negotiated with an armorer . . .

  Kalan hesitated, because the parcel’s contents were gifts that meant a great deal to him, as well as being the last ties to a life he had loved. That life was over, though, and none of them—Lord Falk, or Audin, or Ghiselaine—would think their gifts ill-used if they bought Faro a better life. Or even just a life, Kalan reflected, knowing the likely fate of a child living on the street. After further consideration, he decided not to leave the package in the niche with the coins. Instead he would ask Rayn to have the smith, Andron, sell the buckle and dagger on Faro’s behalf and secure him that apprenticeship—once, Kalan thought, exasperated, the little fool realizes he can’t go on living the way he is.

  And then, he told himself, closing the saddlebag, I really will have done all I can for the boy.

  The sun had come out by the time he reached the side lane, although the portico that formed its far end remained in shadow. Coolness reached out, engulfing his approach, and although Kalan was certain Faro would be watching, he also guessed that the boy’s vantage point would be sufficiently far away to prevent him being easily trapped.

  Seen up close, the plaster on the pillars was cracked, with lichen growing over both their surface and the stone slab that served as a door. It was the door that made Kalan decide it really must be a tomb, because he could see no hinge or handle, and it would be unusual to build a temple that did not open. When he looked for an inscription he found nothing, not even the suggestion of a device or dedication eroded by time. Curious, he laid his palm against the stone—and almost jumped back as power flickered across the wards suppressing his magic.

  The power had come from the door or whatever lay beyond it. Kalan kept his hand in pla
ce, but although his pearl ring gleamed against the lichen with the iridescence of a crow’s wing, no glow of power answered the tremor from the door. He waited, letting out his breath as a second frisson of power rippled against his wards and the slab beneath his hand began to grate open. The sound echoed in the narrow lane, and Kalan felt sure people would come running to investigate. But although stone continued to grind against stone, no one came.

  The light from behind him lanced into the dark interior, dust motes speckling its path, and Kalan took the precaution of prying a few looser cobbles from the edge of the lane and piling them against the jamb, to prevent the door closing while he was inside. Then he waited for several minutes, every sense alert for danger, before stepping into the gloom.

  The contrast with the shaft of light made the darkness to either side more impenetrable, but after his vision adjusted, Kalan realized that the interior was little more than a nave, with another empty god niche at its far end. The space was stark, the roof, walls, and pillars constructed from undecorated stone, while the floor was broken only by a steel panel the height of an infantryman’s shield, set into the flagstones. Kalan’s breath misted on the chill air as he walked forward, his boots leaving prints in the surface dust.

  He studied the austere interior again once he reached the panel, but could detect no sign of the power that had ignited when he touched the door. It was possible, he supposed, that a ward had been bound into the slab alone, serving as a magical lock. The metal of the panel was also filmed with dust, but when Kalan crouched to look more closely, he could detect no inscription. If the place really was a sepulchre, then a crypt or coffin, or even a skeleton wrapped in a rotting shroud, could lie beneath the steel. But he felt no inclination to disturb the dead, and was no grave robber either, greedy for treasures interred to give the deceased comfort in whatever afterlife those who made the tomb believed in. In any case, the join between panel and stone was seamless and he could see no easy way to lift it clear.