The Way of Things: Upper Kingdom Boxed Set: Books 1, 2 and 3 in the Tails of the Upper Kingdom

by Dickson, H. Leighton

  “Vast,” she corrected. “And wide. He says much room for people and many yaks. He calls it the Plateau of Tevd. The Cradle of the Moon.”

  “Plateau of Tved,” he repeated, rolling the words on his tongue as if they might find a home somewhere.

  “Tevd,” said the dog. It sounded natural, earthy. “Holy Place. Cold.”

  Kirin studied him, the Imperial words sounding as odd on a canine tongue as canine words did on his.

  “We call it Shibeth,” said Sherah.

  “Shibeth?” he frowned. “This is Shibeth?”

  “Of course.”

  He couldn’t believe they were in Shibeth. He had never been to Shibeth. It was taboo, forbidden, lost to them. It was an Ancient province, indeed a holy one. The Ancestors had divided the three Kingdoms from Shibeth according to history, given its capital, Lha’Lhasa, to the cats. Many dynasties of war with the dogs and treaties with the Chi’Chen had cost them most of Shibeth including Lha’Lhasa. It was still a matter of bitter political debate but cats are, after all, a political people.

  “No war Chanyu,” said Naranbataar.

  “Chanyu?”

  “It is their word for their people,” said Sherah. “People of the Wolf.”

  “Tell him this is not a mission of war, sidala. But we will fight if we must.”

  “He knows this,” she said. “But still.”

  The dog—Kirin found it hard to think of him by his name—began to speak to the Alchemist and by the tone of his voice, he was angry.

  “What is he saying?”

  “He is worried for his sister,” she said. “He fears she is being led down dangerous roads by Shar Ma’uul.”

  “Nevye,” Kirin growled. That was one sentiment he shared with the dog. Perhaps the dog would throw the jaguar over a cliff, sparing Kirin the trouble. Perhaps he would shoot him with an arrow. He chased the thought from his mind.

  “Asalan kill Shar Ma’uul?”

  “Asalan?”

  The Alchemist smiled, her golden eyes gleaming.

  “Lion.”

  Kirin grunted now.

  “Asalan kill Shar Ma’uul.” The dog grinned wickedly. “Naranbataar bayartai.”

  Somehow, Kirin didn’t need a translation for that.

  Together, the three of them turned back onto the road to Tevd.

  ***

  “So you not see this?” she asked and he shook his head.

  “No,” he said. “No, I don’t see many things.”

  “You are not Oracle.”

  He looked up at her. She was so very young.

  “I am nothing,” he said. “I was a soldier, but now, I am really nothing at all. Or maybe…”

  He shrugged, looked down at the ground. It was stone, earth and some snow. “Maybe I’m a little bit of everything. I don’t know.”

  “I think that is best way.”

  He smiled to himself. Her accent was adorable.

  “Tell me story of Shar,” she said and she knelt beside him in the learning pose, open and trusting like a child. “Come please. Tell me.”

  “It’s not very interesting.”

  “I am judge, Shar.”

  They were alone, sitting high above the bridge with only mountains and pines, a horse and an owl for company. Hunts in Silence sat on an outcropping of rock, watching them with huge yellow eyes.

  “Stand up,” he said. “Back against that rock.”

  Eagerly, she did and he grabbed a stone, drew a very tight half-circle around her feet in the snow.

  “Don’t move now,” he said, looking up at her. “You are standing on a ledge over a very steep drop and if you move, you will fall. Do you understand?”

  She clapped her hands and laughed and he realized that she was very beautiful. He swallowed and took her hand, pulling her back to the ground. “Now you may sit, but don’t move from this ledge. Your legs may dangle over but don’t move your body. Do you understand still?”

  She nodded, lowered her body to the ground. She was lithe and graceful. A dancer.

  He sat back on his haunches.

  “I used to be a soldier,” he said. “From the beginning of my life, I was a soldier. I ran the fastest in my entire village. I shot the farthest arrows. I could throw a dagger through the heart of a bushbuk from across a clearing. I was the very best soldier in all of Keralah. That’s a very big province in Hindaya and because I was the best, I was promoted very quickly to the Governor’s personal guard.”

  “Impressive,” she said and her tail moved from side to side in the snow. He thought it odd. His tail would lash when angry or irritated, hers when happy. They were so very different.

  “Since I was the best soldier but still a very young soldier, they made me the personal guard over Tilka Ragnar-Poole, the Governor’s only son.”

  “Oh, very good!”

  “No, very bad. Tilka was very bad. He was a horrible boy. Brought much dishonour on his house to his father’s shame. But still, it was an important position and I did it very well.”

  “I know you did.”

  “When I was in my sixteenth summer, the Governor chose to make a tour of all the cities and landmarks of Keralah, and I was chosen to go along. To protect Tilka, naturally. To make sure he stayed out of trouble.”

  “Naturally.”

  Now he adjusted position so that he was sitting cross-legged on the ground.

  “There is this amazing place in Keralah called Edukkalah in the Nambukuthri Mountains. It takes an entire day to climb up, up, up but once up, there is a cave, and you squeeze inside and then go down, down, down into the very heart of the earth. It’s called the Mouth of God. It is a very holy place, but cats are, after all, a very holy people.”

  “Dogs not holy,” she said.

  “Well, some cats are not very holy either. The Governor and his party were having a tour of the cavern when my dear little Tilka slips through a crack in the wall and is gone! I follow him but before I can catch him, he is outside on the very top of the rock! It is so very high up and you can see the entire province from up there!”

  “Like your Wall.”

  He tried to smile. “Yes, like our Wall. But strange. Round. The rock is so smooth that it’s almost a dome. Two sides are sheer and smooth, and the others are very craggy. Of course, Tilka is balanced on the very smooth side. So, I move carefully to where he is. I can tell he doesn’t want me there and he screams very loudly. He tells me to go away, that I never let him have any fun, that he wishes I were dead and that he will kill me when he gets the chance. And then he falls.”

  “Falls?” She sat forward.

  “Yes. He is wearing silk slippers and they have no grip. He slides down the dome toward the cliff face. There are roots and scraggly bushes and I can see him trying to grab them but he is an awkward boy and dresses inappropriately and he keeps on sliding. I run after him, throw myself on the rock just as he is about to go over the edge and I catch him but barely. We both go over but I have a hold of a dry root that is somehow growing out of the rock and we swing there for a moment and I am very grateful to the god from whose mouth we are hanging, until the root begins to pull out of the rock and we begin to fall. And we do fall, but not terribly far, because I am strong and there is a ledge.”

  She gasped, looked down. “This big?”

  “Just that big. No bigger. I bounce off it first on the way down but then my hand catches hold and we swing a little bit more—”

  “You have bad boy still?”

  Her expression was so eager. He had forgotten what it was like to be in the company of a woman, even one so strange. He looked down again.

  “Yes. So one hand on the bad boy, one hand on the ledge. I manage to pull myself and then him up to sitting but it is so narrow there is room for only one and he must sit on my lap. He hates this and he is kicking and scratching and hitting me to try to push me off and I am forced to use a soldier hold on him to make him stop.”

  “I would let him go,” she said quietly. />
  “Believe me, that thought crossed my mind. But I was a soldier and he was my charge and I couldn’t. Not honourably. I would die before I let him die.”

  She nodded.

  “I called and called but there was no one to hear. Everyone was deep inside the Mouth of God. We were very high up and the sun was hot – it gets very hot in Keralah so I knew we couldn’t stay on that ledge for long. So I made him hold on to my back and I began to climb.”

  “Climb up smooth round rock?”

  “Exactly. It was difficult and we slid back many times. He was holding on with his claws and I could feel the blood running inside my uniform making everything sticky but I needed to keep going. The roots and bushes were not very helpful. I would grab them and they would hold for a moment then let loose and we would slide back yet again. It was sunset when I heard them calling. We were almost at the top and Tilka started to scream.”

  He paused, stared at the ground. Silence blinked one eye.

  “He began to climb up my back using his claws. He had kicked off his slippers and was using his feet and my uniform was almost gone from his tearing, but he is screaming and climbing and I was desperately trying to get to the top and suddenly we are there! I get one hand and then the other and he scrambles up and over my head onto the round top of Edukkalah…”

  He took a deep breath.

  “Then, he found a large rock, picked it up in his hands and began to strike my fingers. One by one, Tilka struck my fingers until they were all broken and I could not hold any longer and I fell.”

  She was silent.

  “I fell for a very long time. It seemed like years. I was falling and falling and falling and as I fell, I saw owls and dragons and Empires and you.”

  He looked up now and smiled. It was not a pleasant smile and he quickly looked away. “And then I hit the ground. The physicians say I broke every bone in my body. I don’t know. I don’t remember. But I was not a very good soldier after that.”

  They sat like that for a long while before she leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek. He thought that there were tears in her eyes, but he couldn’t be sure. She rose, pulled him to his feet and led him to the horse.

  ***

  The feasting came to an abrupt end as Eye of the Needle and the Eye of the Storm lumbered into the village, dragging the carcass of Tsakhiagiin Yisu behind them. Their footfall was the sound of thunder and without exception, all who saw them stopped to stare. Soon, a path was opened through the Khargan’s Ten Thousand to the heart of Jia’Khan where the feast fire was raging.

  With a savage twist, the Eye of the Storm ripped one arm from the body of the dead villager the same way Long-Swift might tear the wing off a roasted quail. The rest he tossed into flames alongside yak, goat and boar, and the pelt sizzled with smoke. Holding the arm by the long bone, he dipped the hand into the flames until the flesh burned away and the tendons and fingers began to curl. One finger remained outstretched and the Storm stood for a long moment as if thinking, turned his body once, twice, three times before settling on his haunches like a mountain. He began to draw in the earth with the arm like a stick.

  The Needle had been hidden under a tattered cloak and now, his hairless skull could be seen peering out beneath the hood. Long-Swift could see the wires, threads and pins that held the scrawny creature in its pocket of flesh and he shuddered. Of all the Oracles the Bear had tortured and killed, none had been as unnatural as these.

  The Needle began to whisper into the Storm’s ear.

  “Tsgaan,” they hissed in their syncopated voices, one like a crow, the other like thunder. “Give us tsgaan ari…”

  The Bear reached out as the Ten Thousand pressed in, grabbed a horn from the closest soldier. He passed it to the Storm, who turned it and emptied the contents into his gaping mouth. Wotchka spilled over his lips and down his jowls and the Needle crawled over his shoulder to lap at the overflow. When finished, the Needle snatched the horn and disappeared under the fold of skin. The Storm continued to draw with the fingerstick, seemingly unmindful of the creature in his back and Long-Swift wondered how life could have conspired to create something as dark and disturbing as these.

  Soon, the Needle reappeared, holding eyes in his bony fingers. Five eyeballs still attached to tendons, and one by one he dropped them onto the ground. The Storm began moving the orbs with the fingerstick, one north, one south, one west and two east.

  “The Magic,” rumbled the Eyes. “Five souls serve the Khanmaker with power.”

  “The Khanmaker?” asked the Bear.

  “Kuren Ulaan Baator. Khanmaker, Khan Un-maker. Lion Lord of the Army of Blood.”

  There was a murmur in the ranks and Long-Swift snarled at them all. They could not fear lions. Not now.

  “We can break the Magic,” the Eyes hissed and groaned. “We break the Magic and we break the Blood. One by one, we break them all.”

  And with the tip of the finger of the stick of bone, the Storm pushed at one of the eyes. He poked it until it swelled and burst, spilling jelly onto the rocks. He lifted it with the fingerstick and dropped it into the fire. The soldiers murmured anew and this time, the Irh-Khan did not stop them.

  He approached the Khargan, leaned into his ear.

  “Lord,” he said quietly, not wishing the men to hear. “There is a saying.”

  The Bear arched a brow.

  “Choniin amnaas garaad, bariin amand orokh,” he said. “From the fangs of a wolf into the jaws of a tiger.”

  “And your meaning?”

  “This is Necromancy, Lord. Dark magic. It is dangerous to use dark magic to fight a war.”

  “There is also a saying, Long-Swift. ‘Be fire, with fire.’”

  “This is no way to win a war.”

  “I use any way to win a war, Long-Swift. Perhaps that is why I am Khan and you are not.”

  And he turned back to the feast fire and the Oracle of Jia’Khan.

  Long-Swift tightened his jaw. His plan to distract the Khargan had failed and worse, he had the sinking feeling that he would be the one falling into the jaws of the tiger.

  ***

  “You see them, Shar?”

  “Yes, I see them.”

  “They will try kill you.”

  “Just because I’m a cat?”

  “Especially because.”

  Yahn Nevye released a breath, steadied his breathing, fixed his eyes on the end of the bridge. Remnants of the Legion were waiting in ambush, along with the rest of the village of Lon’Gaar. Their heartbeats were loud, their thoughts all but deafening, but with Setse’s arms wrapped around his waist, he feared nothing. In fact with her, he felt strong, something he hadn’t felt in a very long time.

  The horse had carried them both easily, for the Oracle weighed less than a chiwa. They had first felt the Legion as they navigated the winding road down to the bridge and Silence had confirmed it as he swept over the rocks. It was a new thing for him to be seeing through the eyes of a bird and he understood why it was so important for the Seers of Sha’Hadin. Now, as they approached the wide expanse of the bridge and he counted their numbers—nineteen Legion soldiers and more than forty villagers—it occurred to him that they might need a plan.

  He turned his head in the saddle. “Do you think we can make a Shield? You and I?”

  “We try. If not, we fight.”

  “I don’t fight. I can’t. Not any more.”

  “You fight last night. You beat bad cat.”

  “That was the Seer, the one with the eyes like a dog. He was moving my hands and my feet.” He shook his head. “It wasn’t me.”

  “No, not Sakal. Shar.”

  “Sakal?”

  She grinned, touched her chin. “Sakal.”

  He laughed softly. He felt so light in her company, as if the word ‘despair’ had never existed in his lifetime.

  “Make horse run,” she said. “Dogs fear horses.”

  “Yes, that’s a good plan. A Shield and a running horse.” He looked
at the far end of the bridge, blew out a long deep cleansing breath. “Blue Wolf, Yellow Cat.”

  She smiled, leaned her head on his back and closed her eyes, turning her mind to the formation of the Shield.

  “Blue Wolf, Yellow Cat,” he repeated. “Blue Wolf, Yellow Cat.”

  He drove his heels into the horse’s side and they leapt onto the bridge.

  They were halfway across when they heard the whistling. The wind on the bridge was strong and rushing in his face, making his eyes sting. The horse increased its speed and the hard stone rattled with the sound of hoofs. He could see the arrows like a swarm of bees closing in and he clenched his eyes tightly, not wanting to know whether or not the Shield would hold. He could feel the power from her tiny body, joined it with his own, pushing the air out in front of them, making it grow hard like steel. He heard the crackling as the wave of arrows shattered against it, felt the Shield advance and the arrows ricochet in all directions, felt the Legion fear and turn and run.

  Sudden, unexpected and cold like a dagger, a thought pierced the sight, echoing through his mind. He felt Setse scream even before he heard it, felt her head snap back and her arms fall away and he knew that she was falling, falling backwards and he twisted in the saddle, managing to snag her reindeer cloak as she collapsed from the back of the horse. The movement cost him his balance and he went with her, hitting the stone hard and tumbling, rolling and skidding toward the rail-less edge of the bridge. He lost his grip on her for a heartbeat, watched in horror as her body slid to the edge before slowly, ever so slowly, tipping over the side.

  He lunged, catching the cloak and almost pulling his arm from its socket. He prayed she didn’t snap her neck but he held even as her weight dragged him to the very edge of the bridge.

  His claws ached and he flattened his body, peering over the side and knowing it was a mistake. The wind howled as she swung by the cloak high above the gorge. Mountains rose up on either side, steep and fierce, a last reminder of their Good Mother. Far far below, a valley of rocks, snow and shale, almost black in the shadows of the cliffs. Small scrub cedars, twisted pines, brokenness and pain and death. He knew these things well.