by Jon Sprunk
Calm's breath burned in his throat. Rage filled his thoughts, at Ral, at himself, at the gods if they existed. The Brotherhood had Josey. A thought flashed through his head. If they were riding with wounded, he might still be able to catch them.
He started toward his steed, but stopped after a few paces. The horse shuddered like it had an ague. Strings of milk white foam drooled from its mouth. The damned thing was blown. Useless. It wouldn't run again tonight, if ever.
Caim gave the animal what mercy remained in him. He stripped off its bridle and saddle, and dropped them on the ground. A wasted effort. It would probably drop over dead before morning. He had failed them. Josey, Kas, Mathias, his parents-they were all gone now. He was alone. Grief sliced up his insides like a river of broken glass. He wanted to scream to the heavens, but the cry lodged in his throat. He had nothing left. Then, a whisper-light touch settled on his shoulder.
"I'm so sorry, Caim."
The words tickled his ear as Kit alighted beside him. Her inner radi ance surrounded him like the light of a thousand fireflies. He wanted her comfort, wanted it more keenly than he had ever wanted anything in his life since the day his father died, but he couldn't accept it. The rage had rendered all his tender feelings down to a lump of useless, hardened tissue.
"Where have you been?" He made no effort to temper his tone. "Out in some meadow, picking flowers and dancing with starlings?"
She floated around to face him. Tears trickled down her face like falling stars. "I was here, Caim."
"Yet you did nothing."
"I couldn't!" she cried. "I saw them kill Kas and drag the girl away, but there wasn't anything I could do."
"You could have come to find me. I could have stopped it."
"Would you have listened?"
"Of course I would-"
"No." She retreated a few steps from him. "You stopped listening to me a long time ago, and it only got worse when you met that girl."
"Her name was Josey."
"If you want to know where they took her-"
"Say her name!" he screamed.
Kit wiped at her face with the back of her hands. "Josey, okay? Her name is Josey, but she's not dead."
"I saw the dress, Kit."
"Listen, you idiot!" A deep crimson blush stained her cheeks as she propped her tiny fists on her hips. "She's still alive. They took her and rode off like a pack of demons. They left the dress so you would get all hellfire mad and go riding after them without a thought in that wooden head of yours."
He strode through her as if she weren't there, walked up to the door of the cabin, and stood on the threshold. The emptiness within yawned before him like a great mouth.
"I never wanted this for you." She came up beside him. "Neither did your mother."
"Don't, Kit."
Her ethereal fingers brushed his face. "I was happy in my world, Caim, but I had to come when I heard your mother's call. She understood it would be hard for you in this place, born of two peoples, belonging to neither. And I knew the first time I saw you that I would love you forever. That's the curse of my people. We never forget and we never die. We love forever, even after the ones we love die and pass into the great dark."
"Kit…" Troubled feelings rumbled in the depths of his soul. They chipped away at his resolve and made him feel weak and pathetic.
"Don't you think I mourned for your loss, Caim? Don't you think I cried myself sick after what happened to your parents? But you were a stone. You never cried."
"What good would it have done them?" But tears, hot and bitter, sprang to his eyes now as her words dredged up his past.
Kit rested her head on his arm. "We don't cry for them, Caim. We cry for ourselves. Kas understood that."
"And now he's dead, too."
"He died doing what he knew was right."
Caim thought of the bloody spear. Kas had died a hero. Would the same be said of him when his time came? The gloom inside the cabin beckoned to him.
"It's funny," he said. "For years after they were gone, I thought losing my parents had made me a stronger person. Tougher. Now I wonder if I didn't lose the best part of myself that night. The man with the black blades. He's like me, isn't he? A monster."
An electric tingle ran along his jaw as she touched his chin. "You are not a monster."
"There's darkness inside me, Kit. I've always known it was there, just below the surface, and you've seen what happens when I lose control."
She turned away.
"He sent that shadow-snake after me, didn't he? Now he's working with Ral, and Josey is gone. So who the fuck is he, Kit?"
For a moment, he thought she wouldn't answer. Then, "He serves the Lords of the Shadow."
Caim swallowed past the knot in his throat. The taste of tears lingered in the back of his mouth. A thousand questions jostled in his throat, but only one was important.
"How do I kill him?"
"He is flesh and blood, just like you. Cut him and he will bleed."
"I tried that." The admission was torn from his throat in an angry growl. "I tried, Kit. He has powers I don't understand, magic I can't match."
Her slender finger touched the space over his heart. "The blood calls to its own, Caim. You are your mother's son. You already possess everything you need."
He laughed, a cruel sound even to his own ears. "Then I'm damned and so is Josey."
"They took her alive, so she must have some value to them. They won't kill her out of hand. There's still time to help her."
"Now you want to help her? You couldn't stand the sight of her before."
Kit folded her arms across her slender chest. "I'm glad you have a mud-woman in your life. I know I can't love you the way I've always dreamed, the way I wanted to."
"Kit, I-"
She smiled and shook away another bout of tears. "But I'll always be here for you, as your friend."
"You're my best friend, Kit. You always have been. That won't ever change."
She punched at his arm. "It better not!" Then, in a more somber tone, "We'll find her, Caim."
He watched the light play upon the shards of broken glass on the cabin floor.
"I already know where she is," he said. "Ral told me himself once. He said we were the most feared men in the empire, that we should be lording it up in the palace."
"You mean the palace palace? Like the big muckety-muck's digs?"
Caim walked into the cabin. A storm lantern hung from a hook on the wall. He took it down and lit the wick from the hearth embers. Light filled the cabin as the lantern sprang to life. He hurled it into the back room. Flames shot to the ceiling as he strode out the door. The growing fire threw harsh shadows across the grass and against the trunks of the surrounding trees as he went around to the back of the cabin. Thoughts of Josey swirled around in his head. He would go after her, and the gods help anyone or anything that got in his way.
Across the yard, the boulder hunched in the earth like the egg of a giant bird. While Kit floated over him, he squatted down beside it. He fit his hands underneath the stone and heaved. The boulder was sunk deep in its loamy home, but he would not be denied. He pulled for the memories of his father and mother, for Kas who'd become the father he wanted and needed even if he hadn't realized it until too late, for Josey who needed him now. He pulled until his tendons strained and his legs shook. The wound in his side ached, but he didn't let up until, inch by inch, the stone came free of its bed. With a groan he heaved it away.
Pale worms wriggled in the damp earth where the stone had lain. Kit crouched beside him as he pulled a moldy leather sack from the soil. He cracked it open to pull out the items inside, and set them on the ground with reverence. The first was a square of sturdy broadcloth. It unfolded into a dirty gray tabard. A great sablewood tree was stitched onto the breast in black thread, the sign of his father's house. The second item was wrapped in oilcloth. Caim pulled away the covering to reveal a portrait in a plain wooden frame. Calm's father was tall and imposing
in the picture. His mother looked tiny beside her husband, like a dark-leafed sapling growing in the shade of a mighty rowan. Her hair was long and lustrous black, her eyes mysterious pools of obsidian.
While Kit mooned over the picture, Caim took out the third item. The sword's leather scabbard was in bad repair. He wiped away years of grit from the whorls carved into the pommel. This had been his father's blade. Though the hilt was cool to the touch, holding it produced a burning heat in the pit of his stomach. He had pulled this weapon from his father's corpse. Now, he would use it to sever the chains of death that had bound up his life for so long, or he would die. In either case, the matter would finally be resolved.
Caim set the sword aside and pushed the other items back into the hollow. Getting behind the boulder, he heaved it back into place.
Kit watched him with an intent expression. "You can't keep running from your past. It's part of who you are."
He snatched up the sword. "I'm not denying it. I'm finally accepting my true inheritance and everything that goes along with it."
He started back toward the trail. "You coming?"
She fell in beside him, but said nothing. He was glad for the silence. He had planning to do. The trees swayed over their heads as they followed the rutted path back to Othir. The tang of wet copper stung the back of his throat. A storm was coming. Good. Let the heavens pour out their tears. I'll give them a slaughter worthy of their misery.
Over the plain, flickers of lightning danced through the shroud of purple-black clouds and echoed with the growls of thunder.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
osey's hands, clenched in the folds of her skirt, trembled as she stood before the painting. A regal man astride a fierce charger gazed down at her. His wavy black hair was cut at shoulder length in the masculine style of the previous generation. Thick brows met over a prominent, aquiline nose. And the eyes-she knew them with intimate familiarity. They were her own.
Is this really my father?
A brass plaque below the portrait read: Leonel II of the House Corrinada Emperor of Nimea
She whispered the name, adding her own. Josephine Corrinada. The jumble of thoughts warmed her body like a hot bath. Then she thought of Earl Frenig's kindly face and the languor evaporated in a cool shiver. So many secrets, so many lies, all to preserve her identity. How am I supposed to feel? She didn't know, and that was the scary part. And on top of that, what had happened to her at the cabin…
She bit back tears as a wave of images crashed over her. The rough grasp of strange hands. Markus's face in the dim firelight, sweat dripping from his nose as he took her. Josey folded her hands over her stomach. She wanted to curl up into a ball and die.
No.
She pulled her hands away and stood up straight. With a sniff, she drew back the tears. To hell with them all. She wouldn't succumb to the terror. Father hadn't yielded when they took his post away. He was an old man, far past his prime, but he'd continued to fight unto his last breath, and so would she.
Angry voices interrupted her thoughts. Josey turned toward the center of the chamber. The Grand Hall of the Luccian Palace, named after the famous architect and composer Luccio Fernari, who had spent the last years of his remarkable life involved in its construction, was a masterpiece of traditional Mitric architecture. Once, vibrant frescos depicting significant events and persons of the empire's history had covered the domed ceiling, but they had been replaced by scenes of inferior quality showcasing the Church's rise to power. She recognized them from her catechism: the Hanging and Decapitation of Phebus, Conquest of the Nimites, and, finally, Revolution Day. Each picture was bordered in ornate molding of curling vines and leaves chased with gold. Enormous, hand-woven tapestries hung on the walls, separated by brass lanterns with frosted glass panes that bathed the chamber in stark, ghostly light.
On the floor, a dais of marble steps dominated the eastern wall. A semicircle of massive thrones, fashioned of deep-stained redwood and upholstered in purple silk, crowded the highest tier. The seats of the prelate and Elector Council, they represented the highest powers in both the spiritual and temporal worlds. On the wall above the dais, a giant sunburst was emblazoned in a mosaic of tiny white-and-gold tiles. Once, that august symbol of the Church's authority would have instilled a sense of awe within her. Now, knowing what she did about the Council and their murderous deeds, she felt only a touch of melancholy, as if for a treasured thing lost beyond recovery.
Thirteen wooden boxes rested on the bottom step of the dais. She had no idea what they were meant for, but it could be for nothing good. She harbored no illusions about why she was here. The Sacred Brotherhood had taken control of the palace, apparently under the command of the man who stood at the foot of the dais, and she was his captive as surely as if she wasted away in some dark dungeon cell. She shook her head at the uncomfortable image. There would be rats and lice, all manner of crawling things…
Caim will come for me.
That hope huddled close to her heart, and yet reminders of her dire predicament were all around. She had cried as they dragged her, naked as a babe, from Kas's cabin and tied her over a saddle. Then, she began to hate. Jarred and battered, she fantasized about Caim killing the men who had abused her, cutting them into pieces for the carrion birds to devour. Hatred sustained her on the long ride back to Othir. By the time they reached the city she was a teary, sodden mess, bruised from thigh to collarbone. More soldiers met them at the gates and provided an escort to Celestial Hill. She had been appalled to see the state of her beloved city. People rioted in the streets, destroying property, burning and looting. Bodies lay in the gutters, both commoners and soldiers alike. She wished she could put a stop to it somehow, but trussed over her steed like a sack of parsnips, all she could do was watch the carnage.
Up the Processional they rode, each clop of the horse's hooves on the hard cobblestones driving the saddle horn deeper into her ribs, until they reached the palace. There she was taken down from her humiliating position and hustled through a number of gates to a small chamber where an old silent woman in a black shawl washed her with stubborn disregard for her comfort and shoved her into new clothes.
Josey looked down at the garment she had been forced to wear. Layers of white silk brocade trailed on the floor. Rows of tiny seed pearls were sewn to the low-cut bodice and down the puffy sleeves that encased her arms, but left the shoulders bare. She felt scandalous in the gown. It reminded her of a wedding dress for a virgin bride, something she would never be. That part of her had been stripped away. Just thinking about it made her feel sick.
The only other people in the hall were Markus and Ral, who was also an assassin, according to Caim. A dangerous man, supposedly, but he hardly looked the part. He wore a fine suit of black with starched white cuffs and collar. A slender blade with a silver guard hung at his side. Josey couldn't imagine Caim wearing such an extravagant weapon. Then, she spotted the assortment of blades hidden about the man's person, tucked into the tops of his boots and under his sleeves, and reconsidered her opinion of him. Maybe he wasn't such a dandy.
"I don't care." Ral's words rang across the hall. "Drive them away. Kill them, if need be. Just get them away from the gates."
Markus saluted and stalked out of the hall. When Ral looked over, Josey met his gaze without backing down.
"A vast improvement." He treated her to a slick smile as his gaze wandered up and down. "Now you look the part of a princess."
"I'd throw this dress in your face if I had anything else to wear."
"Tsk, tsk. No need for hostility, Josephine. We need each other."
"I don't need anything from you. You're the one who killed my father. Don't try to deny it. I know everything now."
"Everything? Do you know that without the Council to control the people, the city is tearing itself apart?" He stepped closer, until the scent of his oiled hair clogged her nose. "Do you know that you're completely alone, a young girl in a perilous place surrounded by perilous peop
le?"
"Caim will-"
He cut her off with a laugh. "Caim is dead in some gutter, or soon will be. Look around you, Princess. I hold the palace, and with it, the city. Perhaps someday the entire country will bow to me. Forget Caim and whatever romantic notions have been bouncing around inside that little skull of yours. Think of the big picture. An alliance with me would benefit us both. You would enjoy my protection, and I would gain a measure of legitimacy."
Josey could have been slapped across the face for all the shock she felt.
"You mean marriage. Us? You're insane. I would never-"
"It's not so far-fetched, my dear." Ral sauntered toward the dais. "Worse unions have been forged for the sake of politics. Our marriage will cement my hold on the throne. You will be an empress with all the wealth and splendor a woman could ever want."
Josey resisted the impulse to lift a hand to her temple, where the beginnings of a frightful headache throbbed. Her bodice was too tight, making every breath more difficult to inhale.
"You might hold the palace for now," she said. "But the Church won't sit idle. Once the riots are quelled, they'll put you…"
Her words died away as Ral opened the wooden boxes on the dais, one by one lowering the front sides to reveal their gruesome contents. Thirteen pairs of glassy eyes stared at her in various states of shock. She recognized their pale features. From their wooden prisons, the heads of the prelate and the Elector Council confronted her.
"As you can see, the Church is no longer a concern. With the Brotherhood firmly under my command, thanks to the largess of my benefactor, none remain in the city who can challenge me." He laid a hand on the box holding the prelate's head. "Call it a wedding gift from your betrothed. After all, these are the men who killed your real father."
Josey shook her head. Tears wet her lashes and gathered in the corners of her eyes. She wouldn't give in to this fiend, wouldn't allow him to twist her thoughts. She drew herself up straight. "The people of Othir will never stand for it."
