Steelflower

by Lilith Saintcrow

  An Emperor? Maybe. But without my help.

  Shammerdhine Taryana hissed an imprecation through her teeth, and my eyes met hers for a long moment. She ended by dropping her gaze to her pommel, but she did not look abashed in the least. My gaze was not something to be trifled with, especially now with the taih’adai burning inside me, teaching me the uses of Power. When I finished the taih’adai would I be able to fight with Power and steel both?

  I hoped so.

  “Farewell, Rikyat.” My hoarse, colorless voice. “May your gods watch over you.”

  “Kaia, I…” The ghost of the man he once was struggled in the fiery lakes of his eyes, and drowned. “You know my plans. Do not make yourself my enemy.”

  My lips twitched, and I stared at him. He was pale, and his fevered eyes were burning. A spark, carried into those dark depths. His gods would have no mercy for him. “How could I do so, Rikyat? You are gods-touched. I am not bound for Shaituh. Do not send another message—and do not send another Blue Hand.”

  His face changed. He knew, now. “You are far from your companions.” He shifted in his saddle. “Surrounded by my army.”

  I glanced at Darik. He wore his faintest iron-clad grimace of a smile, his eyes fixed on Rikyat. If Rik even so much as twitched for a weapon, D’ri would kill him. This I knew.

  Oh, Rik. What changed you into this? “Do not dishonor your ancestors.”

  His eyes glittered, glittered. “Kaia. Reconsider.”

  I shook my head, my sweat-stiff braids swinging. “No, Rikrik. Farewell.” I pulled on the gray’s reins, and he turned gladly.

  “You will reconsider. You must. You will fight beside me, Kahaai.” But his voice broke on the last syllable. “Kahaai!”

  Darik’s bay fell into step beside me. Kaia? Will he strike you from behind? The line of communication between us turned taut and hot, the skin between my shoulderblades prickling with anticipation.

  No, I answered. At least, I hope not.

  The sounds of a trampled battlefield fell away from us, into Darik’s silence, the determined silence of a s’tarei. I rode, my back cold with gooseflesh. There were crossbows, and other bows.

  But it was not an arrow Rikyat hurled at me. “Kahaai!” he cried, across the distance. “Kaia!”

  I had answered his cries once before.

  I closed my eyes, continued on. Darik kneed the bay up to my side, to guide my horse.

  “You are my luck! You cannot leave me! The gods told me! My luck will turn against me! Kaia!”

  I did not pause.

  “Kaia!”

  “No,” I said, only to myself, but I did not hear Rikyat cry my name again.

  Chapter 44

  Bloodgild

  The camp lay half-deserted, and the sound of Rikyat’s cries did not ride to me on the wind. He had apparently decided to let me go—he would be busy enough mopping up the battlefield.

  No. It had been less than a battle.

  I had not thought he would slaughter a whole battalion. I had not thought he would use me, when I would have given him my strength willingly. I would have cheerfully planned to assassinate the God-Emperor himself, if Rik had not sought to use me without my knowledge. And he had put me on the front lines of slaughter—why? Why?

  I had no easy answer, and I did not wish for one. What would have happened had not Darik pursued a failing Seeker from the borders of G’maihallan?

  I had no easy answer for that either.

  We reached the tent, and Redfist appeared, huge as a ship appearing out of fog. I had not thought I would be so gladdened by a huge, smelly, ginger-furred barbarian, but weary joy lighted under my heart.

  “Fetch my saddlebags,” I said, my voice throat-cut by yelling. “Hurry. We are taking our leave.”

  The Skaialan appeared equally relieved and curious, but he wasted no time with questions. “On the packhorse already, lass. Come.”

  Janaire ducked out of the tent, pushing her braids behind her ear. “You look terrible,” she said in G’mai, her wide black eyes meeting mine. “You—oh. Oh.”

  Atyarik slid past her, holding a light summer cloak he wrapped around her shoulders. “We are leaving? Come, J’ni.”

  “He may follow you.” Darik patted the bay’s neck. “K’li?”

  “There are other tasks to keep him occupied.” I touched my braids, still tied back and coated with dust. “Let us go. I do not wish to stay here.”

  “In that you have my agreement, princess,” Atyarik said. “The minstrel and the boy are with the horses.”

  Janaire followed him, her cheeks still pale and the fume of foreknowledge following her skirts like fine dust. She glanced back often at me, her unbound braids slipping forward over her shoulders. I urged the horse after her, Darik behind me. I clutched at the reins with nerveless fingers, my throat rasping. Redfist was already gone.

  Kaia Steelflower, the Iron Flower, sellsword, assassin, thief. Now where do I wander? Antai, perhaps. I do not know. I took a deep breath. “Six rooms and seven waterclosets,” I murmured. “A bedroom on the bottom floor. Linens hung in the Sun. Chai bushes out back.”

  Rest, Kaia. Darik’s voice, calm and restful.

  That won a tired laugh from my dry throat. “I cannot rest. I am responsible for you all.”

  “Let us decide for a day, Kaia. You have fought a battle.” Darik urged his horse forward. The bay whickered as we reached the pickets.

  Janaire was already in the saddle, Diyan’s young, frightened face eased. Gavrin petted his brown nag and mounted with more luck than skill. He did not look well, pale and sweating.

  “So have you,” I pointed out.

  Redfist led the packhorse, with Diyan perched in the saddle. Atyarik mounted his own slender black horse and made a low clicking sound of greeting. The minstrel, his face ashen, ran a hand back through his light hair, making it stand up like a bird’s nest.

  “Not the same one,” Darik murmured. Not the same battle at all, adai’mi.

  “Was it truly a slaughter?” Gavrin, bits of his mussed hair sticking to his damp forehead. “They were bringing in the wounded—there was no news—”

  So he had seen the cost of battle for the first time. I hoped the sight had sobered him out of wishing to make a drinking song of it.

  “Hush.” Janaire silenced him. When had she decided to speak so?

  I put my head down, stared at the pommel of the saddle. My eyes filled with hot salt heaviness. My entire body burned with exhaustion; the horse needed a good combing and rubdown. I would not have minded one myself, as long as it was accompanied by a pot of mead and a hot bath.

  Silence fell over me, the twilight of a silence I knew all too well.

  “You did well,” Darik said quietly. How could I still hear him? How could he stay so close to me? “You fought with honor, and repaid a life.”

  I shook my head. My braids, tangled and finally loosened, dropped forward across my forehead, swung down to touch my wrists. Ammerdahl Rikyat was dead, the thing living in his skin just an echo. I could have killed myself—and my s’tarei—in a battle that had no honor, against almost-unarmed opponents. I had been blindly determined to pay my debt to a dead man.

  “You fought with honor,” Darik repeated. His tone was formal, a prince recognizing his adai.

  “You fought with honor,” Atyarik echoed. I looked up to catch sight of him riding slightly behind Janaire, his back iron-straight. I could not see his face, but there was no sarcasm in his voice. For once.

  I forced myself to think. They were still my responsibility. “The gold. Who has the gold?”

  “I do, lass.” Redfist’s tone was carefully neutral.

  “Leave it here.” I urged the gray forward. “Pour it out and let Rikyat have his bloody coin.”

  “No.” Atyarik sounded determined, but I still could not see his face. “Tis good gold. It will feed us through the winter, while Janaire trains you.”

  “Tis bloodgild. I do not want it.”

  �
��Then you are not required to spend it,” Atyarik said. “You earned it nonetheless, princess. Keep the gold.”

  I closed my eyes, swaying in the saddle. “I do not want it.”

  “Then it makes no difference if we keep it, Atyarik and I. You will shatter yourself, Kaialitaa, if you fling yourself against a mountain.” Twas a G’mai proverb, and for once, the sound of Janaire speaking the tongue of the Blessed People did not hurt me. For the first time, I found it comforting.

  I wrapped my fingers in the reins. “You are all mad. Mad.”

  “Of course,” Janaire agreed. “Why else would we travel with you? Darik, help her, she speaks nonsense.” Her tone was forced and light, seeking to find some merriment where none existed. My back prickled with sweat, dirt, and danger. Would Rikyat send archers, swordsmen, to drag me back to his army? Or would he send an assassin to punish me for leaving his grasp?

  A life for a life. I shuddered. The grip of battlefever eased. I simply felt worn, and suddenly old. The gray walked instead of trotting, his head drooping slightly. Wind brushed through chedgrass as we passed through sentry lines without a challenge. Everyone was at the battlefield except the healers and a few camp followers—and the wounded, returning from the slaughter.

  We crested the rise, and I turned in the saddle to look back at Rikyat’s camp. It shimmered in the gathering heat of day. Dust and smoke from the battle rose in the distance from the Towan Hills. More dust than there should have been. I heard a faint sound, carried on the wind—clashing, steel against steel.

  More battle? But they had all been dead. Dead or near to it. Twas none of my concern now, anyway.

  I drew in a long breath, and when I turned away from the camp I saw Darik had pulled the bay to a stop and watched me, black eyes thoughtful in a Dragaemir face. The scar across his throat drew my eyes again. Would I ever have the courage to ask him how he had received it?

  Later. He tilted his head to the side. The wind played with his black hair, and I felt something in my chest ease for the first time in many years. It eased all at once, suddenly, and so completely I was half afraid I would fall from the saddle. I will tell you later. For now, though… “For now,” he said aloud in commontongue, and I found they were all looking to me, even Atyarik, whose face was expressionless. “Where shall we go, Kaia’li?”

  I set the riddle to my weary mind, which returned—thankfully—an answer. “Back to Vulfentown. From there we can decide where to winter.” I pointed down the road. “That way.”

  Darik nodded. “As you like.” The bay started in that direction. Redfist made an affirmative sound, very much like a grunt, and Diyan gave a sigh of relief.

  Vulfentown, then. We could catch ship for Antai unless some other destination presented itself, and I could puzzle out a way to explain what I had just done. If Rikyat succeeded in his bid for the throne, I had possibly just earned his enmity. If he did not, what price would be exacted from those who had fought with him, even briefly? The God-Emperor had a long reach, even if I was only a sellsword thief of little account.

  Where would I be safe—and not just myself, but the other members of my little troupe? Antai, Pesh, some of the other cities…who knew? I could not return to Shaituh now. I knew too much of Rikyat’s plans, and he planned to attack the city as well.

  I heard his despairing cry again. My luck will turn against me!

  Gods grant it was true.

  Where could I go now? How on earth could I keep them all safe?

  Twas a riddle I would solve tomorrow, for I was far too tired to think, and we had a long weary journey ahead.

  To Be Continued

  About the Author

  Lilith Saintcrow lives in Vancouver, Washington, with her husband, two children, three cats, and assorted other strays.

  To learn more about Lili, please visit www.lilithsaintcrow.com.