The Hidden Icon

by Jillian Kuhlmann

  This from Imke. I dropped my head back against Antares’ shoulder so I could see her, fix her with a stare that was remembering still what I had done and could do. She was silenced and everyone else, too, and though I sensed in others the same question. No one dared demand that I answer.

  “I can walk, Antares,” I said, grounding myself in the moment. I could worry for all that had happened when we returned to the city, could make my apologies, or try to. Antares lowered me to my feet, though I sensed that he knew my words were much weaker than my legs. Even as I moved them I thought of the sirens, my wet sandals slogging through the sand with none of the grace of their webbed toes.

  We were not so far from Cascar, the lights rising as we rounded out of the cove where they had found me. The sounds of the city were quick to crash as loud as waves, and as we drew nearer still I noted the bodies crowded together, the angry humming of talk. Dark though it was, I felt Cascari eyes on me, sensed their thoughts churning as dangerously as the maelstrom I had conjured on the sea.

  “This is my fault,” Antares said softly, loud enough only so that I could hear him. He had let me walk, but hadn’t left my side. “After Re’Kether, I should have known that you would not be completely in control of yourself. I should have heeded Gannet.”

  His words shocked me, but not as much as Morainn, breaking from a clutch of soldiers ahead of us and rushing forward. Triss trailed behind her, bedraggled hair but one marker of the wounds she had suffered on my account. Her eyes smoldered, but it was her mistress to whom I attended, for she took my hand in hers, demanding that I meet her eyes. Our steps slowed and the ring of soldiers tightened, and not because of the mob that waited before us.

  “Han’dra Eiren, my father will be pleased that even the sea cannot claim his prize.” Her first was full of command, of the bravado these people would expect. Under pretense of making sure that I was unharmed, she leaned forward, whispering. “I thought we had lost you.”

  It wasn’t the tool, the weapon, that she had feared lost, but me. A grin wormed across my lips, surprising us both. Imke watched the exchange, her dark eyes calculating. But I didn’t care. I could smile still, it seemed, for all the Cascari feared and hated me more for it. Even as I raised my head, as I warred with the part of me that wished to show them just how much they had to hate, the crowd surged, parting only to allow a single figure through.

  “You cannot bring her back here.” It was the captain. He had survived and for this I was grateful, for all it was clear he’d hoped for me a different fate. Did he know me? Did he suspect? He addressed Antares, purposefully avoiding Morainn’s gaze. Without looking at her, I could hear in Morainn’s words why the captain might fear to meet her eyes.

  “The Cascari are renowed for their generosity, and their sense,” she hissed. “Han’dra Eiren is my guest.”

  The captain didn’t speak. In his mind I saw the ship splintered on the waves, knew that he believed me possessed by some terrible power, even if he could not name it. I didn’t need to be a god for him to fear me. Any man or woman who could do the things that I had done was worthy of nothing less.

  “Dresha Morainn, you are always welcome here, but it is too dangerous for her,” he said at last, and I saw only his hands, shaking in pockets. What he meant was that I would not be safe, and neither would anyone be safe from me. His next words made me want to crawl back into the waves. “Whatever she is, it is not of this world.”

  “She is a monster!” This from one among the crowd, and they began hollering all. What hurt more was the answering echo of feeling I felt in some of those who had returned with me from the beach. Morainn’s thoughts, which would have been kindest, were eclipsed by the fervor of feeling from the Cascari. Torches were raised, but not to see better, and several stones were thrown. Morainn and I were immediately fenced on all sides by the spears of the guard.

  “The horses, Dresha Morainn,” Antares boomed over his shoulder, spear raised in both hands defensively. “They have torched the barge. We must ride now, through the Rogue’s Ear.”

  Morainn’s expression was all I needed to know that whatever the Rogue’s Ear was, it wasn’t a path Antares chose lightly. But even as he spoke I saw the bright flare at the city’s eastern gate that could only be the barge, and with it any hope of another road. Like a drop of fat on the hearth it leapt and died, a spectacle I would under different circumstances have admired. If all we lost were goods it would be a lucky thing. The gorge of panic rose in my throat at those who were noticeably absent, namely, Gannet.

  All of the power that I’d felt on the sea I couldn’t conjure now, and I wasn’t sure that I would if I could. If it came to defending myself against an attack, I felt far more comfortable taking up a fallen spear than rending flesh as easily as I had the hull of the ship. I knew that Antares wouldn’t let it come to that, nor any of the others for Morainn’s sake, at least. Their shoulders formed a wall around us. The Cascari menaced but most did not come near, their threats those of proximity only and their numbers dwindling the nearer we drew to the flaming barge.

  The horses had all of the grace of their masters, corralled by a number of the guard well beyond the reach of the fire. We crossed the few Cascari who remained to oppose us, their cries silenced on blunt spear blows, bodies crumpled before my eyes like the storm-drenched sails of ship. This, too, was my fault. Guilt dragged my eyes down, heavier than any sleep.

  “Can you ride, Han’dra Eiren?” Antares shouted, and my eyes lifted once more, cutting from the great blaze that was the barge to the circle of horses. Morainn was already astride, and many of the guard, as well. Where was Gannet? With my eyes on the fire again I nodded dumbly, which seemed to satisfy Antares.

  “I’m glad to hear it, though Circa is a steady beast,” Antares returned, lifting me bodily onto one of the horses. I could feel her heart beating through my legs, or maybe it was my own, pounding panic. If he didn’t come, would he be left? Assumed dead or able to care for himself if not? The Cascari had struck indiscrimately, and I didn’t think our hasty departure would leave them feeling any friendlier towards the Ambarians. That I might have caused trouble for my people, or what used to be my people, by what had been done here occurred to me only in the wake of my worry for what might have happened to Gannet, and shame and confusion joined the ranks of everything else I was feeling.

  “Can you hold them?” Morainn’s voice raised above the crash of the barge’s flame-weakened beams, the screams of the Cascari mob as they descended in earnest down the streets toward us. She thought of her brother, as well, and though she asked Antares, I knew she would order him, if necessary. Antares knew this, and his resolve washed over me, cool in contrast to the belching flame.

  “Not for long, Dresha Morainn,” he said, words as brutal as the spear he hefted. “But long enough.”

  Even as Antares leapt from the horse he had only just mounted and many of the guard with him, their faces rising in the smoke, their ranks like columns of ash, a dark figure stumbled from the burning barge. My heart chased a sound of surprise and fear from my throat as the figure steadied, as though he were giving a lesson on maintaining dignity under pressure. He should’ve been dead, for taking such a risk. But he wasn’t.

  And my relief was as profound as my confusion in feeling it.

  Gannet’s expression was not so proud when stained with sweat and soot. His cloak was in ruins though not, curiously, any of his other garments. Neither Morainn nor I could express our relief, she for reasons explicit and me because I didn’t know how to, not to him.

  “What can possibly have been worth going back for?” Morainn shouted, her worry for her brother disguised by her outrage.

  “Something I meant for Han’dra Eiren to have,” he said, his words a puzzle until he pressed a warm volume into my hands, the leather supple from heat. No book was worth a life. I held it like I might a severed hand or the carcass of some beast found dead in the street before shoving it into one of the bags that hung from Cir
ca’s saddle. With this, as with so many increasing things, I would simply have to trust Gannet. My discomfort at such a thought eclipsed my relief that he was alive, and for that I was even more grateful.

  Canvas destroyed and beams sagging, the barge groaned in chorus with the Cascari mob, and Antares mounted again. Now that we were all accounted for, I could see his measure of the crowd, his military training weighing his own numbers against those of the crowd. There would be another battle, another day, to reclaim Cascar. Not today.

  “We haven’t any more horses,” Antares said, voice steady for all his eyes cut with the surety of a blade to the assembling crowd. The captain had joined them, and him I watched. The rightness that he felt was as mad of a fever as the one that had claimed me aboard his vessel. One did not need to be a god to do wrong.

  My attention was drawn away from the captain by Gannet’s abrupt weight, one leg thrown over either side of Circa’s sturdy frame at Antares’ words. Though the saddle had been fashioned for the well-muscled legs and gear of one of the guard, Gannet and I were not so slight together that it was not a tight fit. Uncomfortable for the horse, certainly, and for me.

  “What has happened here will not be forgotten!” Morainn shouted, even as Antares turned the rump of his horse upon the mob and others followed suit. The chill in her voice was like something freed from underground, deep and secret. “You will be sorry.”

  There was no one to speak for the Cascari, or they elected not to speak. I was not sure of the depths of Morainn’s threat, but I felt her anger and the edge of humiliation at being driven from the city in this way. I was glad only not to bear any of the weight of her outrage: anymore and I believed I would be crushed as though in a landslide, not of stones but the burdens of my own heart and everyone else’s, besides.

  With the shifting of Circa’s strong muscles beneath us, Gannet was pressed flush against my back, and without the reins or the horn of the saddle to steady him he was left to loop his arms around my waist. I had seen men and women ride in this fashion but their positions had always been reversed. I found I liked better having control of Circa, but not being unable to see what little of Gannet’s expression the mask might’ve exposed. We were moving swiftly but not recklessly away from Cascar, for it was full dark now and there was nothing but scant moonlight to guide us. Antares meant to lead us to some safe distance – if there was such a thing as safety, with Theba in their midst – and break for camp. There were packs on all of the horses that I could see, and I vainly hoped that they would supply the comforts of shelter, hot food, and fire.

  “We thought you had drowned, Han’dra Eiren,” Gannet said over my shoulder, his voice mild, quiet. His mind was closed up tight against any feeling, and I did the same, or tried to.

  “And I thought you dead, stabbed or burned up or worse.”

  “A lucky thing, that we were both wrong.”

  Though we rode among many, smoke and memory a hazy scent on our clothes and the manes of the horses, our conversation felt intimate. His sturdy warmth at my back, the delicate links his fingers made above my waist, these were no comforts following our escape from Cascar. My heart was pounding still. “Why did you go back for the book?”

  Silence and darkness in his moment’s consideration, and I considered, too, how much I should tell him, how much I could. If he had questions for me I wasn’t sure that he would voice them, but my wonder was as great a blaze as we had left behind. The wildness of our departure was nothing compared to what had happened to me beneath the waves, who had delivered me from a watery death. I wanted to tell him, but I hesitated. Without sense, really, for how could a man who claimed to be the incarnation of a nameless god profess that such a thing as sirens couldn’t be real?

  “The book belongs to you. Or will belong to you. It used to be mine,” he said mysteriously, tone resisting further clarification. I hadn’t wanted to read it before, but now I wished there were light enough to flood all of its pages at once.

  “Dresha Morainn would never have forgiven me if you had perished,” I said, quieter than I needed to, given how close we were and how distant the others.

  “Morainn has bigger problems than me,” Gannet returned darkly. Circa’s pace was uneven, hitching Gannet’s hands tighter against me. “The ship you destroyed, among them. Did you know it was called The Stout Lady? Let us hope that captain’s next vessel is stouter than the last. Perhaps he should name it after you.”

  My breath caught at his words, surprise and amusement both coloring my face. I turned, looking at what I could see of his face behind me. Gannet wanted to make me smile; I knew it even if nothing in the turn of his lips betrayed it. In these rare moments I could imagine the man Gannet might have been if he had been granted the privilege I had been given: the opportunity to grow up in ignorance of who I was, in love and lightheartedness.

  “I’m not sure The Dread Goddess makes a very good name for a ship,” I managed in response, but my breath was lighter. The serpent of foul feeling that had curled in my gut unraveled a little; I smirked. I couldn’t help it. “Should we turn around, and you can suggest it to him?”

  Though it would have been far less awkward for Gannet to try and look at me than it was for me to look at him, he stared straight ahead, hands held a fingers-width above my stomach now.

  “How do you know I haven’t already?”

  If it had seemed a time to laugh I might have. For all of the mad wonders of the world I had experienced of late, Gannet making jokes with me was among the maddest of them. A lock of bright hair, usually swept tidily back from his face, fell pale over the cold brow of his mask. I returned my eyes to the road ahead. I didn’t thank him for the book, nor for his attempt to cheer me. Still, my gratitude was a well that he could dip into at his choosing. I relaxed the walls he had taught me to construct. It was easier to be seen by someone who could understand than to struggle alone. I chose to share this with Gannet not because it meant I didn’t have to say it out loud, but because it meant more not to.

  Chapter 11

  We were hours riding in the dark, and only having Gannet at my back kept me from falling asleep and from there onto the narrow track. Stiff failed to describe the state of my limbs, but I wasn’t the only one whose discomfort was plain. Torches were lit when we were far enough from Cascar to risk it, and I watched as Morainn stretched, Triss offering a steadying hand for all she seemed as like to pass out herself. Imke had ridden elsewhere in our formation with one of the guard, a young man with features muted in the low light, but appeared near Morainn when it seemed we broke, at last, to make camp. She saw me watching the group and her eyes narrowed conspicuously, purposefully, as though she wanted me to see her disapproval. I refused to look away, the flare of anger I felt having nothing at all to do with the fires Theba stirred, and everything to do with me. I was relieved she had survived, if only because I wasn’t eager to add anyone else’s life to the grim tally I was keeping.

  “Triss, help me,” Imke muttered, looking away and loading Triss’ arms and her own with Morainn’s gear, or gear that had been given over for her comfort. What we had wasn’t much. Gannet and I dismounted without looking at each other, as I was sure I had fallen asleep at some point and he had held me, seeing into my dreams of gill-fronded faces and feeling the press of webbed hands on his face as surely as I had felt them on mine. A shore of boiling water and waves of fire had woken me, and I hadn’t been the only one to start suddenly in shock upon Circa’s steady back.

  Though I had felt the ebb and flow of Morainn’s anger on our shamed ride from Cascar, she wasn’t angry now. She was excited at the prospect of traveling by way of the Rogue’s Ear, for all she had seemed at first to fear it. Her temper was the true tempest. How she could forget what had happened, or act as though she had, was a gift I would have traded my own for.

  The Rogue’s Ear, what is it?

  Gannet hadn’t gone far, but still he answered me in kind. First there were images of a narrow riding path, and d
arker impressions of a tunnel with more branches than I had hairs on my head. He withheld a picture of the valley at the tunnel’s end, the wealth of green and running waters that no doubt awaited within. I had the distinct impression he did not want to spoil the pleasure of viewing that first myself, with my own eyes. I drew nearer to him, almost without meaning to, and this time I did speak.

  “Have we rogues to fear, then?” I asked, attempting to make light of what I knew was an extremely tense situation. Gannet didn’t grimace, but he might as well have done.

  “Rogues will be the least of our worries.”

  “Ignore him,” Morainn said, surprising us both in her approach and more with her dark grin. “He’s only saying that because he’s never had his pocket picked.” Gannet would never rebuke her in front of everyone, but I could tell he wanted to and might even have risked a hard look if Triss hadn’t called Morainn’s attention away again. She bid her rest and eat, and crooned something about combing scent into her hair. Normally I would’ve though it a stupid gesture, but we all stank of the flames that had consumed the barge.

  Though the night was a mild one, I knew that colder ones were coming, and wondered at the fires that were springing to life around us. They were meant to protect us against something other than the elements, but reminded me too much of the fires we had fled. I felt now more than I ever had that the Ambarians had as much to fear from me as the Cascari had, that they were fools not to do as the Cascari had done and drive me before them with fire and spear. But they sheltered me, their treasured prisoner, despite the fact that each time I had lost control, my concern for those around me had vanished. Morainn had been on that ship with me, and I wouldn’t have cared if she drowned until it was too late.

  The greater threat for me was that I cared if she drowned at all. Six weeks ago I would have been glad of her death if it meant my freedom. Now, I had the distinct impression she was as much a prisoner as I was, for all the shape of her chains were different.