An Ill-Fated Sky

by Darrell Drake

  Soon the small valley opened to an intersection of hills, which housed a central terrace lined with steps and laden with the uneven shadows of corpses. The terrace, functional as it was, would not have been worth mentioning if not for the pyre that engulfed its main building—curling around pillars and licking at eaves. The shadows all stretched as if their souls were writhing in the heat of its light, saddled even in death by an eternal madness.

  “. . .”

  Strange. Tirdad could have sworn he heard a laboured quiet within the roar of flames. He turned his horse about, it obliging with awkward steps that avoided stumbling over the scores of bodies. Empty. The cavalry was no doubt doing a circuit of the city, so it could have been—

  “. . .”

  Shkarag was directly in front of him. He’d missed her for two reasons: the steps leading up to the terrace had her level with and hidden by his charger’s neck. Also, she sat amidst the corpses as if she belonged there. With the way her silhouette moved, she must’ve been kneading her splinters. The thought of it made his skin crawl.

  “Here you are,” he said.

  “Here,” she agreed, casting about. “I think.”

  “Where were you?”

  She canted at that. “You just . . . like some—”

  “Here?” he cut in.

  “Maybe.”

  “What happen—” Tirdad caught himself. He really wasn’t in the right frame of mind for enduring her vagaries. “Why didn’t you open the gate then? You said you were off to do as much.”

  “Sluice gate trapped me something fierce,” she muttered. “Know I deserve it, but don’t like drowning over and over and over and over again, especially not in a sluice gate.”

  “Oh.” Tirdad looked away, uneasy despite the fact that he couldn’t see more than the impression of her figure.

  “Then I felled the general.” She held up what must have been a head. “A trophy,” she explained, patently pleased with herself. “Šo-wretched crown-basting King of Kings doesn’t deserve a trophy. So I beat him to the, flogged him in the, beat him to the execution. Didn’t put up much of a fight, but that’s just as the crow flies.”

  “When was this?” asked Tirdad.

  “Before . . .” She trailed off, and in her moment of deliberation dropped the head so that she could return to kneading. “After making an omelette. Maybe. Oh. Your breakfast is . . . around.”

  “And after that?”

  “Waited for you.”

  “All day?”

  “. . .”

  Tirdad pinched the bridge of his nose, and tried to smother his anger. She’d caused this. And now she just kneaded as if she were oblivious. “Shkarag?” Try as he might to dampen it, his tone had taken an edge.

  “. . .”

  “The least you could—”

  “I know.”

  Tirdad screwed up his face. That was unexpected. “You know?”

  “Never intended to open the gate. You were, you were, would’ve drawn a lot to find me. If I open the gate, a div opened the gate, and no one cares because I’m just some, just some waterlogged, can’t be a hero. If you do it, you’re loyal. Crown-baster forgives you, so you’re happy. Display of power also makes them think twice about crossing you like some, like some dozy river that needs fording, and it used to be this dozy river, and you know, like in the capital, the course swerves over time, drowns the metropolis, so now it’s a, it’s a dozy river with crocodiles.” She lowered her voice to mutter. “And I really want to leave.”

  Tirdad shifted uncomfortably. He didn’t like the implications of what she’d said. Not in the slightest. “You manipulated me.”

  “. . .”

  “Why would you do that?”

  “Maybe,” she belatedly replied. Then to his more immediate question, “We take care of one another.”

  Rage pounded against the back of his ribs, eager to burst from its cage. He hadn’t reached the point of shouting, but he was damn near to it, and angry enough that he spoke without thinking. “Don’t you fucking play innocent with me, Shkarag. Look around you. You think this is taking care of me? Putting all these deaths on my hands when you could’ve just opened the fucking gates? If you’re as clever as this lets on, why in the seven fucking climes would you think it’d make me happy? How often have you manipulated me in some attempt at . . . whatever you aimed to get out of this, but sure as fuck not in trying to make me happy.”

  Shkarag got to her feet. With a hiss, she flung the head at his chest, which it struck square before tumbling to join the rest of the bodies. “You think—you—that I—you think—” She raked her claws over her head, hissing as she did, and sucking in great gulps of air like the teeth of a saw biting at lumber. “Ashtadukht never cared!” Shkarag shouted, shoulders heaving where the firelight glanced off her cuirass, a sharp hiss bristling in its depths. “Always about her! Not you or me or anyone! Too busy with the dead! Never did anything for us! We weren’t friends, we were tools! And you just, you take your šo-damned blade and you stroke it! You’re tender with it, but you . . .” As abruptly as it flared, her temper faded. “I care, and I . . . try. And you just think . . . like some . . .”

  She bent over to retrieve her spear. “Didn’t think about this part,” she confessed. “Just that you’d, you’d do it, and they’d call you a hero.” She ground the butt of her spear against a step, wringing the shaft between her fists as she did. “So I thought that’s just as the crow flies. Didn’t think about the—” Her head jerked toward the farthest hilltop. “What’d happen when you drew a lot. Because I knock things out of place like some, like some sentinel watching from the ramparts. And there’s an orchard out there as orchards are wont to be, congregating and carrying-on, and you see them every day, those trees all lined up šo-orderly, and you’re thinking, you’re thinking to yourself that their keeper is really putting in work transplanting them every morning. Must be the soil, you say. Rich soil with all the nutrients and things. But once they’re at the foot of the wall and you’re peering down, and there’s a gnarled eye peering back, you discover you’d missed the, the pomegranates for the trees and the trees for the pomegranates and the pomegranates for the trees and the tree for the pomegranates and the pomegranates for the trees and the trees for the pomegranates—”

  She droned on, and her breathing quickened to a runaway pace, hands flexing and unflexing such that her spear clattered down the steps. “—for the trees and the trees for the pomegranates and the pomegranates for the trees and the trees for the pomegranates and the pomegranates for the trees and the trees for the pomegranates and the pomegranates for the trees and the pomegranate trees for the trees trees the pomegranates for the the the the the the th—”

  —ترسو”

  She collapsed, going the way of her spear down the steps.

  “Fuck,” spat Tirdad, dismounting too late to prevent her from hitting the landing head over heels. He knelt beside her, first confirming that she was breathing, then scanning the darkness for any signs of the telltale spoiled yogurt glow. Nothing as of yet.

  Tirdad blew out a defeated sigh saddled by regret. His harsh words had been unwarranted. She could not have known how horrifically his lot would resolve any more than he could have. Shkarag had just assumed he’d succeed. She had admitted to manipulating him, but how was that any different than using what you know of a person in doing them a boon? It wasn’t, he decided.

  He lifted her, cursing his lower back as he did, and eased her over the back of his charger. What she’d said about Ashtadukht was true to an extent. He knew as much; he’d known from the outset of their journey. She had trouble forming new connections because she could not get over the one she’d lost. However, that didn’t mean she didn’t care. Tirdad firmly believed Ashtadukht cared. She’d shown as much over the years. But it was oftentimes overpowered by her grief. She was not to blame for that. The star-reckoners were.

  Tirdad placed a kiss on Shkarag’s head. She’d hyperventilated herself unco
nscious for the second time now. He worried about her more and more. While that cyclone ravaged landscape that followed her shift in personality had grown familiar in their time together, there was still much to learn. And the more he learned, the more afraid it made him.

  With a grunt, he retrieved the severed head, not really knowing what she expected him to do with it. Probably wanted to flaunt it in front of the King of Kings, pacing back and forth atop her steed, head literally held high, triumphant like one of her statues.

  “. . .” She’d returned.

  He greeted her by applying a tender touch to her scalp. She stayed draped over the horse, only moving to reach up and return the favour.

  “Sorry,” she said.

  “Yeah. Me, too.” He lifted the trophy. “Sorry for losing my head.”

  Gaze fluttering about the pyre, Shkarag emitted one of her rare laughs—subdued, fleeting, and all but normal were it not for the subtle hiss it provoked. It faded to a slight, crooked smile.

  With a smile of his own, he secured her spear, and hopped into the saddle. “Are you going to ride like that?” he asked, looking back at her.

  “Maybe.”

  “Can you at least hold the head?”

  “Generally against it.”

  XII

  With Chobin’s blessing, Tirdad and Shkarag headed east from Dara. What transpired on the front would not concern them until Chobin came calling: that was the promise Tirdad had made to the marzban in leaving and to the half-div in asking. With that in mind, and in the pursuit of a break, they followed the swift river that led south to and eventually bifurcated the capital of the empire. Being the capital, and a metropolis besides, Tirdad had decided against bringing his quest there quite yet. The teeming streets would hardly be a break for Shkarag. But the river made for good scenery and promised easy access to civilization.

  It wasn’t long before Tirdad had grown accustomed to its carved riverbank, to the winking waters that, while lacking the scent of brine, lent to a certain nostalgia. He could imagine splashing in the shallows. Memories of two childhoods blurred together, each too carefree to belong in any reality. On the opposite bank there rose a wall of dirt like a miniature escarpment, which made crossing all but impossible. He made a habit of searching its precipice, though he hadn’t the slightest what he hoped to find. Occasionally, passersby would wave from their boat or raft.

  Only nine days had come and gone since they set out, but the road had already proven itself a boon. Shkarag seemed to be in higher spirits, and that in turn uplifted Tirdad. He took pleasure in knowing he’d done her some good. What’s more, the path breathed life into him; it harkened to a past in which they had shared many such journeys.

  He turned his attention from the river to the half-div. She rode her horse backwards, as she often did, and was casually popping berries into her mouth. “What’re those?” he asked, unaccustomed to her snacking on something without a shell.

  She glanced his way, piercing one with her fang as she did. She canted. “. . .”

  “The berries,” he specified.

  “Deadly,” she mouthed against it. Her pupils, drawn to slits in the midday sun, flicked away and back. “I think.”

  He squinted at her, briefly taken aback before recalling her immunity to poisons and toxins. Curious how she’d respond, and looking to toy with her besides, he extended a hand. “Mind sharing?”

  Meaning to oblige, Shkarag leaned forward and reached into her saddlebag, where she stopped elbow deep and threw a cant at his upturned palm. It was her turn to squint. “Deadly,” she insisted.

  Tirdad beckoned. “Come on. I can handle it.”

  Shkarag sat back up, now staring daggers at the berries in her hand. “Seems like a šo-nasty way to go,” she said. “Saw them squirming and writhing like some, like some snake pinned by the tail, all throwing a fit and hissing and there’s venom all over the place. But if you, if you want it done, I’ll . . .” She trailed off, and hefted an axe in her other hand. The look she gave him was utterly resigned, as if nothing in all the cosmos mattered. “I’ll make it snappy.”

  “I was only joking,” he hurriedly clarified. For someone so prone to turns of phrase, she had a knack for taking the wrong things literally. “I’ve no desire to end my life.” He chose not to tell her that he had inherited Ashtadukht’s desire to do as much, and that while only ever fleeting, it would return with those memories that had taken place after Gushnasp passed.

  “Not a thing to guffaw and hold your paunch over,” she said. The resignation sloughed away, leaving something inscrutable. “Not at all amusing when the person you, you—” What had just shifted to impenetrable parted briefly so that fear could surface, wide-eyed and darting, before it, too, was overtaken. She turned that deadpan expression on him and opened her mouth as if to speak. Her stare darted around uncertainly, or what he took as uncertainly, until it came to rest nowhere, falling instead into a faraway state.

  Heaving a sigh, Tirdad brought his horse closer so he could take hold of her waist, mooring her to the saddle for the duration. It wasn’t long before she returned, heralded by her regular silence, and signalling him to give her some space.

  “. . .” She ate another berry.

  “You know,” he started, coming to the realization that he’d yet to express how much he treasured what they had and not wanting it to go unsaid. For a moment, he clammed up, unsure how to convey it without stumbling. Then, once again, her lesson in wine gave him the direction he needed. Don’t overthink it. He spoke as it came to him.

  “We are each of us a lone rider, the horizon our end, where we’ll stand before the bridge of judgment, and us with no choice but to push forward.” He paused and had to force himself to go on without thinking too much on what came next. “So on those rare occasions when our path converges with someone whose company we truly enjoy, we should be careful not to lose sight of that. I once made the mistake of being too obsessed with honour, with the sum of my deeds, but I don't care about that horizon anymore, Shkarag. What comes, comes. I just want to share the path with you.”

  Downcast, countenance drawn in a grimace, Shkarag reached up to feel the uneven scar that divided her brow. Her touch roamed the other scars in turn, as if reliving their experiences, and none too happy about it. When she’d traced the last of them, she exhaled. That only seemed to burden her further. Her hand became a claw, which raked down the scales of her scalp, stopping to hover over her ear. Shkarag turned her grimace on him. She canted.

  With only her body language to go by, Tirdad ventured a question, hoping she’d grace him with an actual answer this time around. “Does that make you upset?” he asked.

  Her eyes jerked away. She shook her head.

  He reached out to stroke the disfigured scales above her ear, but hesitated, thinking the better of it. “Something about it bothered you,” he reasoned. “Of that I’m certain.”

  “Maybe,” she agreed, or didn’t. She looked up, once again wearing her guarded expression. “I want . . .” She trailed off, only to pick up again almost immediately, and the remainder came out in a hurry. “Want that too.”

  Tirdad was well aware she was holding something back, but that was Shkarag: cagey, and anything but forthcoming, even in her admissions. What might’ve agitated him in the past only endeared him to her all the more. She was so withdrawn, so ancient, that knowing everything there was to know about her was impossible; in that, he felt privileged for those fleeting moments when she mustered the strength to open up. And that privilege was further shored up by the allure of mystery. The unknown.

  He grinned at that, thinking back to their return from Dara, and to the small mark he’d left on a life that could fill annals. “Oh, the look on his face when the King of Kings spotted you with the general’s head high for all to see, riding through his army like the hero of the whole sturgeon-fucking campaign. He looked ready rupture a testicle!”

  That drew a crooked smile, though it scarcely pressed into her
cheeks and could not have aspired to her eyes, which leered at him as if in suspicion. Shkarag pulled her cloak around her shoulders, her scarf over her head.

  Tirdad frowned, but left her to her refuge. They continued along the river without sharing a word, following farmland demarcated by its bends, oftentimes sharp enough the river nearly doubled back on itself. With dusk nearing, and the autumn chill creeping in, they happened upon a farming city not a quarter the size of Ray. Tirdad figured a warm bed would be a welcome respite, so he veered their horses into its narrow causeways. Flanked by high adobe walls, he ventured deeper, through arched tunnels, beneath a roofscape trimmed in luxurious stucco and the copper of dusk.

  The streets were as calm as he’d expect in a small city at the end of the day: vendors closing shop, children returning home, and here and there someone rushing to finish a chore put off until the last minute. He drew to a stop by a vendor, knowing they had nothing better to do while waiting for customers than to keep their ear to the ground.

  A middle-aged man looked up from the scarves he’d nearly finished stowing, hiding exasperation behind what was clearly a manufactured smile. “Bit late for business, but far be it from me to turn away a customer. What can I do you for?”

  “A scarf,” Tirdad answered. “I meant to ask for directions, but come to think of it, I could use a new one. Something yellow. As bright and bold as you can get.” He fished in his tunic for the pouch of coins the King of Kings had rewarded him with, which had been further padded by Chobin. “And I’d like a place to stay. Know where I can find one, or if your fine city is in need of a star-reckoner?”

  Before Tirdad could finish talking, the man had a scarf spread over his hands. “Silk,” he said. “And would you look at that there motif? Pearl roundels embellished with peacocks and—”

  “Thank you, but I can see it just fine,” Tirdad interrupted. “I’ll take it. As for my other question?”