The Living Throne (The War of Memory Cycle Book 3)

by H. Anthe Davis

  For Cob, that was the worst part. He knew he could lure animals in to be slain, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. Not from squeamishness—he'd helped butcher goats as a child—but from a sense that it would violate some unspoken law of the world.

  Fortunately, Arik never asked.

  At least it wasn't difficult to find water. Salt-slimes popped up from the sand everywhere he went, ready to contribute some of their substance in exchange for being raked clean. When they stopped to rest or to hide from possible haelhene flybys, they were inevitably treated to a briny spring forming right beneath their feet.

  More and more, their presence unnerved Cob. None of them bubbled up black, but his imagination painted a churning sea beneath the dunes and pits and mudstone flats, a dark wave creeping over the knucklebone hills. He was afraid to close his eyes at night—afraid to sleep, lest his mother's arms enfold him again.

  Lark didn't sleep either. She still carried Rian's body, swaddled tight in the remnants of her wolf-wool robe, and spent each night sitting up with him like a colicky baby.

  But it was day now—their twelfth since setting out from the den in the Garnet Mountains—and things couldn't continue this way. Sand-creep and yellow witchgrass speckled the desert around them, inedible but welcome, and thickened ahead. They were nearly free.

  That raised his hopes, but also his concerns. With Fiora at his side, the words you're pregnant were never far from his lips; he'd have to speak them soon.

  The prospect terrified him. They barely knew each other, but he doubted she'd be happy. From what she'd told him of her life, her goals, she didn't want a family; she wanted her sword and shield and her vendetta against the Empire.

  But he could feel it inside of her, that tiny second life. Too small for a heartbeat, too fragile for a war. It sickened him to think how the Palace might affect it.

  He had to leave her behind.

  She would kill him.

  And she'd be right to. It wasn't as if they were in any more danger than before. He was already gambling with their lives; what was one more in the mix?

  Still, it changed things in a way he hadn't been ready for, and he'd spent his sleepless nights studying the information Geraad had implanted in the arrowhead. It was difficult to make sense of the visions; they weren't always coherent, the conversations tangled and the emotions flat or overwhelming, the images distorted by their arcane perspective. Nevertheless, Cob gathered that Geraad had fallen into Enkhaelen's hands somehow, and that Enkhaelen had taken him to the Palace. It was clear that the necromancer's real body was there.

  Along with others. Vriene and Sogan Damiel. Ammala and her children.

  He had only glimpsed them. The first time, the shock had been enough to kick him from the vision. The second time—sifting cautiously through the divided strands of time and thought and feeling—he had managed to stay long enough to see the pilgrims subsumed and the prisoners left exposed before his nerve failed.

  He knew he had to try again, but he couldn't bear to see them like that, trapped in memory as if in amber. Just like he couldn't look at Lark or Fiora without feeling his heart twist.

  I need to go alone. This is all my fault, and I can't bring them down with me.

  I can't get more of my friends killed.

  “Hoi,” said Fiora at his side, almost making him jump from his skin. He slanted a look at her to find her staring up at him, mouth creased in a frown, stray curls flailing at her temples as the wind whipped them about. She'd lost her eye-guard in the black water, making her gaze direct, if bloodshot. “You've got that brooding look again. Out with it.”

  “'M fine.”

  “No you're not. Cob, we all went through the same thing. You can't pretend that losing three people didn't affect you.”

  “It's not—“ He bit down on the words. In the face of Rian's death, Ilshenrir's surrender and Dasira's disappearance, the rest of his concerns were distant and petty. He should be focused on the survivors, not plotting how to escape them.

  He was just so tired.

  “I've held my tongue this long out of respect,” continued Fiora, casting a significant glance toward Lark, “but we need to talk about what happened. That woman, and the wraiths and the metal folk, and you...”

  “I know. I foxed it all up.”

  “That's not what I mean. We're almost out of the desert, right? We won't have much chance to talk privately after that.”

  He sighed and looked forward. Without a map, it was difficult to say, but his bare feet told him that the land ahead was marginally fertile, and the further hills increasingly so. It would take less than a day to reach their moss-clad flanks, and then they would be in civilized territory for the first time in weeks.

  But what would they do? Dasira, who was supposed to lead the way, was lost in the Grey. They had travel papers thanks to Lark's work in Turo, but with all the soldiers and mages that had been after them, he doubted they could stay incognito for long. And while they could skirt the towns and go straight for the swamp, they desperately needed supplies.

  He didn't know if they had the money for it, or even enough for a town's entrance fee.

  “You've gone quiet again.”

  “I'm thinkin'. Pikes.”

  “Think out loud.”

  It took him a moment to stop grinding his teeth. He cared for her—he really did. Maybe not with an all-consuming passion; maybe not even enough to be called love. But he wanted her safe and happy and close. It was just difficult to hold onto those feelings when she kept badgering him. “I feel stupid when I think out loud.”

  “You do it with the Guardian all the time.”

  “Yeah. Exactly.”

  She blew out a breath. “Come on, Cob. You're too private. This isn't just about you.”

  “I know that!”

  “Then tell me what's going on. The black water...”

  “I didn't summon it. It jus' crept up. It's—“ He couldn't tell her about his mother, calling to him from the Dark. To speak of it would make it real, and he didn't think he could bear that. “It's not under my control anymore, if it ever was. I'm sorry.”

  She gave him a frustrated look. “Why apologize if it's not your fault? Anyway...at least it dealt with the metal people. They weren't Muriae, were they? I thought so at first, but then they started using magic, and Muriae don't do that. Brancir doesn't allow it.”

  “Yeah. That's why they fought with Enkhaelen in the first place, because he was combinin' metal with magic. Which means those couldn't be...” He trailed off, blinking. “Those couldn't be the ones who kidnapped his daughter. But that was clearly her.”

  “Mariss?” Fiora reached up to touch the hilt of the silver sword, once again strapped across her back. “She wanted this. Said it was her birthright. So yeah, it must have been her. But then how did she get there? Shouldn't she be in Muria?”

  “I figured she'd been killed. That's what Enkhaelen's in-law was planning to do in his nightmare, but...” Cob shook his head, scowling. “It was weird enough already, so maybe it wasn't true. Just a fear, y'know?”

  “But if she wasn't kidnapped, then why did he attack all our temples back then?”

  “Maybe she was, but he was wrong about who did it. Pikes, this is a lotta speculation. All we know is she's alive, she's dangerous, and I think she wants to kill him.”

  Fiora stared up at him. “Her father?”

  “He killed her mother.”

  “But you said it was an accident.”

  “I said— Look, all I know is what I saw in his nightmare. I don't think we can trust it to be the truth. He could've lied, the Nightmare Lord could've twisted things, or maybe he doesn't even know, because he was out of his pikin' mind by the end of it.”

  “Or he wasn't, and he just wants you to think he was.”

  “Right. So...” Cob scrubbed a hand across his face. “So she was there at Hlacaasteia, and she tried to get the sword and take the Guardian from me so she could fight him. Maybe. And he w
as there, because I saw the wings, so he might know now—or maybe he's always known. Or maybe he doesn't. I don't know!”

  Fiora mulled it over, then said, “There's a lot going on in your head.”

  “You asked.”

  “Well, I don't think we can figure it out unless we go back and talk to her, which we can't. So my question is, who's controlling the fake silvers?”

  “The haelhene, obviously.”

  “No, because they came and found me in the Grey after I called to my goddesses.”

  Cob eyed her. “You jus' said Brancir doesn't allow magic.”

  “She doesn't!” Clearly frustrated, Fiora looked away toward the hills. “A long time ago, before humans existed, there was a war between the metals who supported the use of magic and those who opposed it. The mage-metals tried to contact a great entity to use its power against their foes—something like the Outsider. But it backfired on them, and they were annihilated along with half of the Metal Primordial. The remaining half became Brancir.”

  “If all the mage-metals died, then how—“

  “Well, obviously they didn't. I don't know anything about them, I just know that Brancir hates magic so much that she joined the Trifold specifically to get help against Daenivar's followers, back when they were infecting Kerrindryr and Muria with nightmare magic.”

  “What? When did that happen?”

  Her look of bafflement matched his. “You don't know? But you're Kerrindrixi...”

  He reddened. “I lived in a cave, all right? I didn't go t' school. There was one in the village, but m'mother wouldn't allow it.”

  “What? Why?”

  “She said it was dangerous t' go up and down the cliffs too much. Plus there were the goats t' look after, and...” He sighed. “I don't know.”

  “So your parents never taught you your own history?”

  “M'father was never around, and mother didn't talk much.”

  “But... All right,” said Fiora in a tiptoe voice that set Cob's nerves on edge. He hated thinking about the past, and that pitying look on her face was too much. “Anyway, it was during the war that led to the Portal and the Seals. Daenivar of Nightmares and his brother Rhehevrok were the instigators; they'd been the patrons of Lisalhan for a long time, and we think they wanted to bring the rest of the north under their sway. So Daenivar's cultists started spreading this...nightmare-plague in the neighboring empires. It made people paranoid and aggressive, and really took root among the soldiers in Altaera. They started doing horrible things, massacring civilians and burning towns and starting riots—even in their own territory. That was how Breana was martyred: she tried to stand up to her infected captain and was executed.

  “It got so bad that Altaera began to fall apart. All its barons were at each other's throats, and the northern ones started raiding Kerrindryr and spreading the infection. Brigydde wanted to stomp it out, so she raised Breana and reached out to Brancir—who'd turned her down before. This time, they joined forces and contained the nightmares.

  “Except then the Sealing happened, which obliterated Lisalhan and nearly ruined everyone else. Sister Merrow thinks the goddesses lost containment of the nightmare plague, and that's why Jernizan has been a crazy place ever since.”

  Cob snorted. “Sounds about right.”

  “But anyway, Brancir would never work with a magic-user, and neither would Breana. So how could the fake silvers find me in the Grey?”

  “Maybe the sword? It only resists Enkhaelen's magic.”

  Fiora bit her lip. “If so, then they can track us—but they haven't.”

  “That we know of.”

  “I don't think they're subtle. But how would they have known about it? The skinchangers wouldn't tell them, and Ilshenrir said the wraiths hate Daenivar so it couldn't've been him...”

  “This is gettin' way over my head.”

  “I'm sorry,” she said, and to his surprise she sounded strained—almost agitated. “It's my fault we ended up there. They pulled me out, and everyone followed, and it all just fell apart.”

  “You didn't know.”

  “I should have! I learned enough at the temple to have recognized something was wrong! But I didn't, and even when I had a bad feeling about it, I told myself that it was fine. I got—“ She glanced to where Lark plodded in parallel to them, head bowed, arms curled tight around the unresponsive bundle. Lowering her voice, she hissed, “I got him killed and Ilshenrir caught. I'm so, so sorry.”

  “We both made mistakes.”

  “But I—“

  Halting, Cob clasped Fiora by the shoulder and forced her to turn toward him. Leaning down to be on level with her, he found her eyes misty and mouth set in distress. “We did what we could,” he said softly. “Once the fight started, we had no control over what was happenin'.”

  “It didn't have to start.”

  “Fiora, they were on our asses before we went into the Grey. The only way we could've avoided that fight is if we'd gone through the spirit realm, and that's pikin' dangerous too.”

  She grimaced and tried to shrug free of him. He let her. “I still need to know why they came for me. If I did something wrong—”

  “There's no way it was you. Maybe Ilshenrir was mistaken about Daenivar and he told our enemies how to find you. He'd been watchin' over the sword for who knows how long. Plenty of time to put some magic on it.”

  Fiora gave him a doubtful look, but nodded. “Maybe. He and Rhehevrok and the Blood Goddess have always sought to undermine us. Trick us, kill us, steal us from the Trifold. He even— He talked to me outside the manor.” She shuddered. “If I've brought his attention down on us, I'm sorry.”

  “Let's both stop sayin' that and jus' figure out what to do.”

  “Right. Right.”

  Together they looked to Lark, who had kept walking despite their pause. Arik lingered near her, ears raised, glancing back and forth in concern; now that there was no salt to harm him, he mostly stayed in wolf-form.

  “Lark,” Cob called. She didn't seem to hear.

  Fiora hissed, “We have to deal with that, too. I don't know her well enough...”

  “Y'think I do?”

  “You met her long before I did.”

  “Yeah, but she hates me. All the more now.” Steeling himself, Cob turned and quick-walked after her, Fiora jogging along in his wake.

  From behind, Lark was the least bedraggled of them, her orange mage-robe having repelled the stains and damage that decorated everyone else and her braids still tight and orderly, but her gait was more of a shuffle—automatic, mindless. As they caught up, Cob saw the dead-eyed expression still affixed to her face, the unfocused numbness. He almost feared to breach it.

  “Lark,” he said. “Hoi, Lark.”

  She didn't answer, didn't look. In her arms, the grey-brown bundle could have held anything, for no scrap of skin showed. There was no smell, not yet; between the mineral-thick waters and the cold, Cob figured the goblin had been partially preserved.

  But this couldn't continue.

  “Lark,” he said again, and caught her shoulder.

  She halted.

  “We're gettin' close to town,” he said. “We need to figure some things out, and...lay him to rest. You understand that, right? It's not what any of us want, but we have to be stealthy. And we need you focused on the mission.”

  Her expression hardened, but she didn't look at him; she just ducked her head, arms clasping tighter around the bundle. Not for the first time, he wished Dasira was here; the two had formed a surprising bond. But there was no point in thinking about what couldn't be.

  “Please,” he murmured. “Let's give him a proper send-off while we still can.”

  Lark gave a sharp shake of her head. “I want to return him to Bahlaer,” she said, her voice nearly a croak. “Back to where he belongs. Where we never should've left.”

  “I wish y'could, but that's weeks away.” If we even return from the Palace.

  “Days.”

&nbs
p; “Days?”

  “I'll find a caravan. Leave the shadowless circle. Call the eiyets to take me home.”

  Cob swallowed. It was what he'd wanted for her ever since she rejoined him, but to have it happen like this made him feel ashamed. “Y'said Bah-kai fell.”

  A fire kindled in her eyes. Her fingers curled in the rough fabric, lips skinning back from her teeth. “I'll fix it. Then I'll kill everyone who tried to harm us.”

  “I don't doubt that. But even days—“

  She rounded on him, snarling. “Don't you dare tell me what to do, or how to grieve. You—“ Visibly biting back on her vitriol, she looked away, then continued, “Rian is my concern, not yours. I'll get you into the city and on your way to the piking Palace, and then I'm gone.”

  “Do we have any money?” said Cob cautiously.

  “I lost the trade garnets the wolves gave us. So unless any of you have spare coin...”

  “Only a little,” said Fiora. “Tin and copper.”

  A long breath, then Lark turned toward them more fully, face pinched but eyes clearer—if hooded. “You'll need the entry tax, food, pilgrim robes, caravan funds, probably some more taxes, possibly bribes. I have no way to contact my people, and I don't think spirits use money. Maybe we can walk through the walls and mug some locals.”

  “No,” said Cob.

  “'No',” she mimicked nastily, then shrugged. “Well, I don't know then. I can't spin gold from thin air. We could shave a few slivers from the silver sword—“

  “Absolutely not,” said Fiora.

  “—or you could do some Guardian thing. Call up earth elementals like the ones that gave us the garnets and get more. Or make something we can pawn. Pikes, we probably could have chipped off some mineral salts while we were in Crystal Valley and made good money. We Kheri get most of our alchemical supplies from the Riddish.”

  Cob frowned down at the mudstone path. Even with the tectonic lever, he'd had a hard time sensing the earth elementals in the mountains, and had no idea if there were any here—or how to contact them.