by Kevin Hearne
And she threw herself into it with unusual vigor and maybe a good measure of her own frustration. I recalled that she had been ready to beat someone at the time I needed a beating, and it appeared that whatever had vexed her then hadn’t quite worked itself out of her system. When we called it quits, both of us gasping for breath and sweating, I suggested a trade.
“Trade what?”
“Reasons,” I said. “I’ll tell you why I came looking for a fight a couple of days ago if you tell me what’s bothering you now.”
She narrowed her eyes at me. “Okay, but you go first.”
I shrugged. “It’s easy enough. I was missing my wife and was enraged because I was reminded that we still have no idea who killed her. I wanted to feel any pain but that sort of impotent fury.”
“Impotent fury. Yes. That’s what I’m feeling, too. But look—this is between us.”
“Of course.” The Mynstad peered around to see if anyone was within earshot, then drew closer and lowered her voice.
“You’ve met Gerstad Nara du Fesset?”
“Yes, we met a few days ago.”
“She’s away right now, doing something for the pelenaut.”
“Right, I think she mentioned she’d be on assignment for a while.”
“Well, it’s not widely known, but she’s my lifebond.”
“Oh!” Some comments and behaviors from others made a bit more sense now. “I didn’t realize you were bound with anyone. But that’s great. I wish you both happiness.”
“Thank you. But that is what’s on my mind. I worry about her more each day. She could be dead already and I wouldn’t know it.”
“No, surely—she’s a rapid.”
“It’s a dangerous mission.”
“I’m sorry. I know that worry can wear on you. Should she be back yet?”
“I don’t even know that much about it.”
“Which makes it worse, yes.”
I did secure permission from the Mynstad later to write this down so that I wasn’t breaking any confidence, but I offered a sympathetic ear and thanked her again for her sympathetic fists.
“It’s more difficult to make new friends as you grow older,” I ventured, and then my conversational ship ran aground and I flailed about, not knowing what to say next that wouldn’t sound ridiculously sentimental. She saw the panic in my eyes and had mercy, smiling at me.
“I understand completely, Dervan,” she said. “I’m glad we met as well.”
“Right,” I managed, giving her a tight nod. “See you soon.”
Fintan surprised me by wishing to return to Hollit and Orden’s restaurant again. “I’m paying this time,” he said, “and I’m going to face this fear that’s been hiding inside me.”
It was busy during the lunch rush again, so busy that they couldn’t keep up with demand and some people walked out. They appeared to be short-staffed, and Orden confirmed it when he came to visit our table after the madness.
“Sorry about that,” he said. “Two of our staff didn’t show up for work today, and we received a note that they’ve decided to move to Festwyf.”
“Festwyf?” Fintan and I said in unison.
“Aye, the pelenaut’s reopened it for resettlement as of this morning. Surprised you hadn’t heard already. Should relieve some of the pressure on Survivor Field and in the city proper, I imagine.”
I immediately thought of Elynea. Would she be moving back? Or would she want to remain here?
“Does that mean you need a new server or two, Orden?” I asked. “Because I know someone looking for work if so.”
He eyed me. “Well, who is it?”
“Widow of Festwyf with two kids, currently living with me. She’s almost thirty, I think.”
“Is she going to move back?”
“I don’t know. I’ll ask her.”
“If she wants a job, send her here, midmorning, with a note from you. If she doesn’t show, I’ll have to hire someone else.”
“Understood.”
When Orden left, I peered at Fintan. He didn’t exhibit any shakes this time, but perhaps that was because he was clutching the edge of the table. He was sweating again, though.
“If it helps,” I said, “I used to have similar reactions anytime someone said the word gravemaw.” Fintan looked up at me, a querulous scowl on his face, and I realized I hadn’t shared that story with him, only with Mynstad du Möcher. I waved it away. “Traumatic experience from my mariner days. Gave me my limp, nightmares, and a bad reaction for years. But the nightmares faded with time, and it’s just the limp I have to live with now.”
“How much time?”
“About twenty years.”
“Great. Well, I’m blessed with perfect recall. My memories won’t fade with time. That’s essential for telling stories and recording history, but every horror and every embarrassment of my life—everything I’d like to forget—is fresh as the day it happened. I’m used to the nightmares now, as much as one can get used to them, but this is new. I’m perfectly safe and I know it, but my body is behaving like I’m back at the Godsteeth.”
I didn’t know what to do or how to help, because his was a special case. There was no comfort I could give him except to say quietly, “You have my sympathies.”
The multitudes on Survivor Field did look somewhat less multitudinous when we looked out from the wall that afternoon, but there were still many thousands out there, and they were still clamoring to hear more of the Raelech bard’s tale.
“I’ve heard that Festwyf is on its way to being a city again,” Fintan called out. “That’s excellent news. How about a traveling song, then, for all those on the road to restoring Brynlön?”
The open road beckons, so I may not linger
The trees in the wind wave to me like fingers
The clouds drift low like welcome banners
And the horizon greets me with good manners
So I’m off, I’m rolling on the open road
And the freedom of it always lightens my load
Don’t know what I’ll find when I get there
But the journey’s better so I don’t care
(Second verse repeated until everyone gets tired of it)
“Let’s find out how Melishev Lohmet reacted to the news I delivered to him,” Fintan said after the break, and took on the seeming of the Nentian viceroy.
This situation is worse than five kherns fucking. The Raelech juggernaut got called back to Rael to deal with some strange giants invading the other side of the continent—not Hathrim but some people they’re calling Bone Giants. Which means we can’t expect any more help from them, not that they gave us any to begin with. And then that scrawny ball sack of a bard arrived to tell me that Ghuyedai is dead and all my army with him, completely destroyed by Gorin Mogen. Except for Junior Tactician Nasreghur, whom I suppose I must now promote to senior, and the dregs of my garrison, I am defenseless should the Hathrim or anyone else decide to take my city. The Raelech stonecutters, at least, have been returned and are already at work finishing what they started.
The Hearthfire’s demands that we simply give him that land in perpetuity are so outrageous that I cannot begin to respond. Let the king do it—that’s beyond my purview anyway. I’ve done all I can at the moment. Maybe when or if the king’s forces arrive here we can take back a measure of the blood Mogen’s spilled. The Fornish say through their perfumed ambassador that they’re working on providing some military aid, but I don’t know when or even if they’ll have a force capable of countering the Hathrim.
The bard ends his completely miserable audience by saying he’ll stay at the Raelech embassy and then tosses out a wish for me to “be well,” which is more alarming than the news of my army’s destruction. People are beginning to notice. To question my health. My sanity! My fitness to rule. Khaghesh has been making noises to the effect that I should rest and he will take care of everything while I heal. Which I never will with the king withholding his hygienist from me. So
I must show them I am well. A trip to the plains with my cheek raptor! An outing under Kalaad’s blue sky! Nothing makes one feel more alive or appear more normal than playing with a face-eating pet!
My forearm is wrapped in khernhide and I have a khernhide helmet with cheek guards as well, the only natural material impervious to raptor claws and far cooler than steel. Four crossbowmen accompany me; they have the same helmets on.
It’s going well. The raptor’s behaving, fetching a khek hare here, a grass weasel there, when a flushed Nentian courier rides out from the city. He turns out to be military; insignia on his shoulder flares identify him as a junior tactician, but he’s not one of mine. I toy with the idea of offering him a commission here since I’m so poorly supplied with officers, but he looks afraid of me. If he fears me, he’d soil himself in battle and shouldn’t be leading men at all. He surprises me, though.
“Viceroy Bhamet Senesh needs your help,” he begins, and it’s a request so out of tune with reality that I laugh at him. And then, to my horror as much as his, I can’t stop. It’s too ridiculous.
“Forgive me, Viceroy, but it’s no joke. He really needs your help.”
That keeps me going for another minute, and he has sense enough to keep silent until I can speak.
“Well, Tactician,” I finally manage. “If it’s not a joke—you’re sure about that?”
“Very sure.”
“It’s quite a coincidence, then. I could use his help, too, but somehow my messages have failed to produce any either from him or from his cousin in Batana Mar Din. Has he even received them?”
“I have no knowledge of any other messages, Viceroy. I only have this one to deliver.” He waggles a sealed envelope in his hand.
“Of course you don’t know anything. Fine. Deliver your message.” He steps forward, stretches out his arm, and extends the envelope to me at the greatest distance possible. Definitely afraid. Though maybe he’s afraid of the raptor on my arm. I have one of the crossbowmen break the seal and give me the letter folded inside, which is covered in Bhamet Senesh’s hasty scribble.
My dear Melishev,
An extraordinary situation here forces me to ask for your aid. Please send any troops you can spare upriver from Batana Mar Din as soon as possible, preferably with my tactician.
I sense a rebellion in the making and fear that the Sixth Kenning may be real. Only three of the thirty or so beggars who left the city as Seekers have returned, and they claim to be blessed with the Sixth Kenning, too. They call themselves Beast Callers, and I’m told through intermediaries that they want to form a clave. I haven’t been able to locate them in the city, but the rumors of their abilities are awed and even worshipful. The possibility exists that they could be telling the truth since the guards at the Hunter Gate were killed in strange attacks: one suffered a kholeshar bite, and the other’s face was covered in bee stings.
I need more men to find these kids and get them under control. My cousin has sent a few troops upriver, but it’s not enough. I pledge to return them as soon as the situation is secure.
Yours in respect and service to the Crown,
Viceroy Bhamet Senesh
Kalaad save me, not this again. “Do you know what the viceroy asked me, Tactician?”
“I do.”
“Tell me, then, what do you know of these kids who claim to have found the Sixth Kenning?”
“Nothing for certain …”
“Share with me the rumors you’ve heard.”
The tactician nods and gulps. “They say one controls bees and wasps, one controls snakes and flesh eels, and one controls horses.”
“Controls horses? Perhaps that might help answer what happened to your lost cavalry.”
“It’s a possibility, yes.”
“Did you know the men guarding the Hunter Gate?”
“Yes. They were under my command, Viceroy.”
“Ah, so you saw their bodies.”
“I did.”
“And could their deaths have been accidental? A freak chance of animal aggression from the plains?”
“No, Viceroy. The bees might have been a freak attack, but if so, why go after only one man and why only sting his face? A natural swarm would have stung hands as well, any exposed skin. And the other guard who got the kholeshar bite—that was on his face, too.”
“A snakebite to the face?”
“Yes. One would hardly bend down to kiss a kholeshar, so that suggests the kholeshar struck from his height. Which would make sense if the snake was coiled on the shoulder or arms of this individual as rumors claim.”
Extraordinary. Bhamet might have genuine cause to worry. A bunch of kids with power was even more terrifying than adults with power. And for us to finally find our national birthright would necessarily cause tremendous upheaval. “So you believe it’s true—these kids have found the Sixth Kenning after all this time?”
“I cannot be certain, but it fits the facts that we have, Viceroy.”
“And they’re willing to use these powers to kill guards and possibly the missing cavalry.”
“Yes. Though there are rumors about that as well.”
“Oh? Do tell.”
“The story that’s circulating—and that must have come from the kids—is that the cavalry accidentally killed a boy and were going to kill all the Seekers to cover it up, so the hunter boy, the one who found the kenning, acted in self-defense.”
“So they’re actually claiming credit for the lost cavalry instead of pretending they never ran into them, and claiming the cavalry provoked a lethal response?”
“Correct.”
“Very interesting. Do you think they might be telling the truth?”
The tactician shrugged. “We will only ever have their side of the story.”
“So just to make sure I have this right: Viceroy Senesh has lost men twice to these allegedly blessed kids, and they’re asking him to recognize their clave and ignore those deaths.”
“Yes, Viceroy.”
“Fantastic. Gentlemen,” I say to the crossbowmen, “please secure the junior tactician to one of the posts.”
There is some struggle. Some protest. A quick blow to the head with a crossbow stock stuns him and allows my men to get him secured.
“Did you know that cheek raptors can count?” I ask him, and his head wobbles on his neck as he tries to focus.
“What are you talking about? Why are you doing this?”
“Why do children pull the wings off butterflies? Why does my cock hurt all the time? We have no reasons for all the cruelties under Kalaad’s great wide sky. But we do have an answer to the first question I asked you. It’s true! Cheek raptors can count. Watch this; I’ll prove it to you.”
I snap my fingers in front of the raptor and say “Hup!” then hold up my index finger and say, “One! One! Hup!” The raptor leaps off my protected arm and flaps over to the junior tactician, digging its talons into his left cheek and ripping it off, flying back to my arm with a bloody hunk of the tactician’s face as he screams.
“There, you see? His natural instinct would be to take both of your cheeks at the same time, but he only took one! And look, he thinks you’re quite delicious, Tactician. Oh, my, gone already! These plains creatures eat fast. They have to, you know. Well, he was such a good boy, we have to reward him, don’t we? Hup! One! Hup!”
We leave the largely faceless tactician there after removing his military shoulder pins and return to the city. The raptor to his aerie, me to my tower to compose a suitable reply for my colleague in Khul Bashab.
My dear Bhamet,
You great wide gash, we’ve been invaded by Hathrim and we’ll all be breakfast for blackwings if I don’t get some help! Pay attention—I’ve already informed you of this before. If you can’t handle a few rebellious teenagers, then you definitely won’t be able to handle Hearthfire Gorin Mogen when he comes calling. Send all your men to me now in defense of our country. And tell your cousin to do the same.
I do have a suggestion that may solve your problems. Let it be known in your city that you will accept the Beast Callers clave and you won’t have to search for the kids because they’ll gladly pay you a visit to get what they want. Once you have a signed charter—actually, make it a condition of signing it—employ them immediately in service to the Crown and send them to me. I will send them against the Hathrim. Either these kids will emerge victorious and become national heroes—in which case you can publicly “believe” their self-defense stories and forgive the cavalry deaths—or they will die in a fire. You win either way.
Sincere sorrow about the sudden death of your junior tactician. He was attacked by a cheek raptor outside the protection of our walls.
In service to the Crown,
Viceroy Melishev Lohmet
I give the letter to a courier, enclosing the tactician’s shoulder pins, and tell him to make haste to Khul Bashab. And then, just in case those blessed kids could change my luck, I visit Nasreghur at the garrison in person, not trusting Khaghesh to deliver the message.
“Inform every single one of your gate staff. They’re to grant anyone claiming to be a Beast Caller an immediate audience.” One of them under my control would catapult me to the throne for sure.
I was glad that the Nentian expatriates had already been taken care of and the ambassador expelled as well, or else we would have more violent attempts on Fintan’s life to confront. That was the viceroy at his scheming worst, and the crowd muttered among themselves, wishing far worse pain upon him than a burning sensation when he urinated.
“Returning back to this side of the continent, you may recall mention of an expedition to Möllerud that concerned Second Könstad Tallynd du Böll and that Kallindra du Paskre and her family were part of that expedition.”
The bard threw down a black sphere and became the sleepy-eyed teenager with her dark hair pulled back in a queue.
I don’t think I can ever look upon blackwings again with anything but horror. They are creatures of my nightmares now, companions with death the way rain and clouds are best friends. The land is their dinner plate, and they feast upon us when we drop onto it, lifeless and rotting. They swirl and screech over Möllerud still, though it has been weeks since we passed here last and the bodies of our countrymen were freshly slain.
