by K. Eason
Please, Belaery didn’t notice just how tenuous a grip Dekklis had on the Sixth, or just how deep the fissure ran between the Sixth and other cohorts. They’d been the Cardik unit. Suspicious of southerners, suspicious of highborn, suspicious of politicians. All of which Dekklis had become, very suddenly, with everyone in the Sixth apparently forgetting she’d been one of them a winter earlier.
And oh, Snow would have something to say to that. Rolling blue eyes, whip-sharp laughter. Snowdenaelikk had no House name. Had fair half-blood hair, and a rapid, raw Suburban accent. Had a bad habit of heresy and assassination and no love of authority.
The hell you expect, Szanys?
A little loyalty, maybe. From troopers she’d known for years, from her so-called allies. From Snow, from whom she’d heard nothing since midsummer. Belaery reported the same silence, with a shrug. She gets like this, First Legate, when she’s angry.
Which Snow was, damn sure. The decree of general amnesty for the early-spring Senate violence—Senators dead, among them Dek’s own mother—hadn’t made anyone happy except the godsworn highborn who mistook that decree for permission to continue their toadshit. But it bought peace. Made it so the First Legate could go on patrol with her troops and see what the Taliri were doing.
Of course, she went on those patrols with soldiers from the Sixth, who were mostly border-born, or who’d lived north long enough they might as well be. Take that for how secure she felt among the city’s legions. Better the Sixth’s distrust than a knife in the back.
Snow would appreciate the irony, if Snow would ever talk to her again.
Dek followed Rurik downslope, scout-careful. Crouched and glided from tree to tree, waited and watched. Guided Belaery around low-hanging limbs, over fallen ones. No stepping on twigs, no slipping. And for her part, Belaery wove and pooled the shadows deep between the trees so that their creeping bodies disappeared into them.
The shadows stopped at the edge of the forest, while the early autumn sun glared yellow and hot on what the Taliri had left in the field.
Rurik had been right, anyway. They weren’t Dvergiri on the poles. They were formerly fair-skinned bodies in piecemeal armor. An Illhari cuirass here, leather greaves there. Long hair bound back in braids. Taliri faces, or maybe renegade Alviri. It wasn’t easy to tell them apart, unless you heard the language. And these corpses—women, most of them—were long past speaking.
The flies had already settled. Hear the buzzing, see the seething black over open mouths and eyes—no. The crows had been here first.
Belaery gagged and coughed.
Dekklis had her own memories of finding K’Hess Kenjak: of her breakfast steaming on the snow, rank stink to match the taste in her mouth, and the icy seep of snow soaking through the knees of her breeches. But she’d seen, foremothers, what?—a score of corpses like Kenjak since that day. Her stomach didn’t even quiver at this new crop.
She nipped a glance at Rurik. He was cutting a wary half-moon around the foremost pole, sword out and level. He squatted and peered at the wood below the body. Poked at it with the tip of the sword and scraped the blood and shit away.
“Nothing. It’s blank.”
Dekklis stepped carefully around Belaery and joined Rurik at the corpse’s feet. He was right. Smooth wood. No glyphs or sigils, none of the gut-curling sense of godmagic.
“Well, hell.”
“They’re not offerings,” Bel said. Her voice sounded thick. “At least, not to Tal’Shik. They’re women, Dekklis.”
“They could be rival godsworn.”
“No.” Bel’s fists clenched and spasmed in her robe. “Kishta’s Annals is clear. Tal’Shik’s godsworn may kill their rivals, but the poles are solely and specifically for sacrifices. Her godsworn already belong to her. One would not offer their”—Gasp. Gag. Belaery forced the words out in a rush—“deaths up as a gift to she who already owns them.” She leaned over and emptied her gut to dry heaves.
One of the troopers grunted and spat. Contempt for civilians, for Taliri, for godsworn superstition.
Rurik eyed Belaery with something like pity. “So, why hang them up here, then? Were we supposed to find them?”
“I don’t know,” Dek started to say. And stopped, as her eye snagged on a patch of shadow hanging between the trees, moving when it shouldn’t, darker than it should be. She moved, blink-fast, drew her sword, as a man stepped out of that solid dark.
Someone swore behind her. Swords rattled out of their sheaths. Belaery stopped coughing as abruptly as if someone had cut her throat.
Hell. The woods could be full of men like this one. Armed with stolen weapons, patchworked armor. His sword was still in its sheath. But oh, his bloody hands, held carefully away from his weapon. Oh, his stained breeches and tunic. Murder could get messy, when you stuffed a sharpened pole through living, wiggling flesh.
The man had the broad, slanted Taliri cheekbones, the warm golden skin. But the tip-tilted eyes were chips of summer sky, cold as all the north. Like Veiko’s eyes and not—because Veiko’s eyes were clear as witchfire, and this man’s stare was solid, opaque stone.
“Adept, ask him who he is. What he wants. Where,” as she darted a glance past him, examining shadows, “the rest of his friends are.”
Belaery squeezed the words through her teeth. “I can read Taliri. I don’t speak it.”
Foremothers, Dek wished for Snow. For Veiko. For his motherless dog, who might be of more use than this city-bred conjuror.
“There is no need,” said the Talir. His accent was liquid, lilting, all the stresses stacked in the wrong places. He bowed from the neck, very slightly. “First Legate. I am pleased to see you here.”
Dekklis raised her eyebrows. “You know who I am.”
A second bow. “I would be a poor envoy if I did not.”
“Envoy, is it? Butcher, looks like.”
He bowed a third time, palms pressed flat against his chest. “The gates to the city are open, First Legate. I could simply walk in, if I wished to observe Illharek. I offer myself to you. I greet you.”
Then maybe she should consider, as her next act as Senator, proposing that Illharek seal its gates. This man could have walked Illharek’s streets unremarked. Could have, Dekklis thought, walked past her on the Arch and she’d never have noticed him.
“An envoy.” She nodded. Folded her arms. “From the Taliri.”
“I am Kellehn a’Rhostiddir.” A pause, while he waited for—what, some sort of acknowledgement? Recognition? His expression soured, as Dekklis stared at him, into a grimace. “Taliri. Yes. From.” He pointed north and west. “Up there.”
Fallen Cardik lay that direction. But there were no Taliri settlements in the mountains. So, he must mean the high plains, on the other side of the peaks. Glacier and flat land, beyond the Illhari Republic’s border.
“That’s skraeling country.” Rurik pushed his sword back into its sheath. Muttered sideways, just under the leather-creak: “Hell of a walk south, yeah?”
“Yes,” the Talir said. You could strike flint on the stare. “A long walk.”
The Taliri had been a riding people, once, before the Purge and a conjured plague. Now the only horses left were paint and stone. That plague had been the Academy’s triumph. Stopped the war, when the allied Alviri and Taliri cavalry found itself on foot, suddenly, and far from supply lines. Hadn’t stopped the Taliri raids, but it had slowed them down.
And still. That was a long walk, and damn sure this man hadn’t come alone. She wondered how many Taliri hid in the barred forest shadows. Whether they had bows and spears.
“And these, then?” Dekklis waved at the bodies. “What are they?”
“I hoped we would get your attention.”
“They’re a message?” Rurik scowled. “You couldn’t petition at the Senate?”
The Talir regarded him, unblinking. “They are your enemies, yes? We show you that they are ours, as well. We offer you alliance, First Legate. The Rhostiddir, and the Tesh, an
d the Skaanidd. And we bring you a message. The dragon has devoured the north.”
CHAPTER THREE
Snow twitched her hood a little higher and smeared the darkness from within its folds across her features. Hitched the sack over her shoulder up, so that its contents bumped and rolled across her back. She had the seax on her hip, easy reach, but she wouldn’t draw steel here on the Arch. Wouldn’t need to.
Briel.
Svartjagr flew feral over Illharek. No one even looked up when Briel dropped out of the cavern on arrowed wings, banked and skimmed over the bridge. Reach an arm up, you might brush fingertips on her tail. Look up, and you might see the silver tracery of scars on her wings.
Snowdenaelikk did neither. Saw what Briel did, through Briel’s eyes: dizzy spin that settled into a blur of dark Dvergiri heads, the occasional pale Alviri. A tangle of anonymity, robes and tunics and soft city boots. Nothing Briel was trained to notice: no armor, no metal bigger than a belt-knife. No bows or javelins. No conjurors.
Only a Dekklis-shaped woman and a bulky male companion, standing on the Arch in plain northern clothes.
Briel marked Dekklis as pack and known in that way svartjagr did—a glow you felt rather than saw. A dissolution of boundaries, so that Snow had a doubled moment of seeing what Dekklis did, when Dek looked up and marked Briel’s passage and the scars on Briel’s wings. Then she turned and looked right at Snow, through shadow and cloak. Raised her right hand, muted greeting, that might as well have been a shout to any watcher.
Hell. Put her in a forest, Dek could creep from one end to the other and no one would see her. Put her in commoner’s clothes on the Arch and she forgot all her scout’s tricks.
Snowdenaelikk shook her hood back and let the shadows drip away. Shoulders back, chin up, hair bound up in a conjuror’s topknot. Let people shiver and startle. Let them part and eddy in her wake and watch where she went. And if the First Legate didn’t like that—which, if her scowl was any indication, she did not—then let the First Legate learn to slouch like a commoner. Let her learn to leave her dog at home. Laughing God, look at Rurik, looming at her shoulder. Expect the man to start growling, yeah.
Dekklis had you’re late all over her face. But all she said was, “Snowdenaelikk. Got your message.”
“Yeah. Thanks for coming.”
“Had to. I was curious. Rumor says there’s a new boss in the Suburba, running the cartels. A half-blood who wears a conjuror’s topknot and rings in her ears. Sounds familiar.”
“Yeah. I’ve been busy.”
“You know what else they say? This new boss, she runs with a pair of northerners, one Dvergir and one skraeling. They also say she serves the Laughing God.”
“You knew that already.”
“Did I? Last I knew, the God killed you. I reckoned that might complicate your relationship.”
“That was the old God, and he’s dead. This is a new one. He’s different.”
“Different. Of course.” Dek’s face washed blank. Settled cold. “So, where is Istel? I assume he’s your Dvergir northerner.”
“You can assume that.” Snow looked over her shoulder at conspicuous nothing. “He’s with my partner, which is to say, not here.”
“Maybe you know why he’s avoiding me. Maybe you’ll tell me.”
“You stripped his commission, Dek. He’s not legion anymore.”
“That was never meant to be permanent. He knows that!”
“Maybe he doesn’t know what to think. How do common men fit, in this new Illharek? Way I understand it, we’ve got a lot of new seats with women in them who don’t support the Reforms. Might be Istel’s wise to worry.”
Rurik sucked a deep breath. Held it. Let it go. “My brother is no commoner. And I don’t see him with you, either.”
Snow hitched her brows high. Turned and looked straight at Rurik, the way northerners did.
“There’s reason for that, First Tribune. K’Hess Soren comes back to the Tiers, he’s dead. He knows who the godsworn in the Senate are, yeah? And they will reckon he’s told other people by now. Which he has.”
Rurik grimaced. “You mean he’s told other godsworn. Like you.”
Cold spot in her chest, spreading from throat to belly. “Exactly so. Like me. The ones who didn’t murder half the Senate this spring. The ones who didn’t get amnesty.”
Dekklis grimaced. “So you heard about that.”
“Of course I did. All of Illharek heard. I also heard it was you who suggested it. Senator Szanys. First Legate, commander of the legions. First Sellsword, you ask me.”
“Show respect, half-blood.” Only that, only ice-cold polite, but Snow felt the heat coming off him. Saw the flicker as his hand dropped to his hilt. That was promise, not threat.
Snow curled the palm of her right hand around air and filled it with witchfire. No smile, now. Cold blank, a stare Veiko would approve. “You want blood on these stones, K’Hess, it’ll be yours.”
Dekklis hissed. Came off the wall where she’d propped herself and put a shoulder between them. Let Rurik have her back and squared to Snow.
“This isn’t the time for a civil war.”
“Right. Well.” Snow swung the sack off her shoulder. Held it out. “Not here to listen to your toadshit. I brought you something, Szanys. From the Suburba.”
Dekklis raised both eyebrows. “What is it?”
“A gift.”
Rurik reached for it, and Snow pulled it back. “No. Not for you. For her.”
“It’s all right, Rurik. If Snow wanted to kill me, we wouldn’t be talking.” Dekklis hitched a half-smile. Held out her hand. “What have you—” She frowned. And then, with a slow-dawning horror, worked the strings loose and looked inside. Her eyes rounded white.
“Foremothers defend—you brought me a woman’s head.”
“I brought you Yrse. Heard of her? Butcher, officially. Unofficially godsworn, although I guess that’s legal now, if the god is Tal’Shik.”
Dekklis looked into the bag again. Shook her head and cinched it shut. “I’ve heard of this Yrse.”
“Have you, now? From whom? Senators? Senators’ sisters? Which of the highborn pardoned godsworn sitting in that Senate with you mentioned Yrse by name? Because that’s who I want first.”
“Snow.” Dekklis looked at her the way highborn always looked at commoners. Stern. Fucking condescending. “Shut it down, yeah? We have the same enemy.”
Snow looked from Dekklis to Rurik. Speared her gaze up, at the Senate buildings. The egg-smooth walls of the curia, the angular thrust of the courthouse. They sat at the top of the First Tier, higher even than any one House. Illharek’s ruling body perched over the city like a toadeating dragon.
“Glad you said that, Szanys. Then you won’t be upset when I tell you what’s in that bag is a promise. We’ve cleared the Suburba of Tal’Shik’s godsworn. Now we mean to clear out the rot in the Tiers.”
Laughing God, drop a feather into that silence and you’d hear it land. Snow held eyelock with Dekklis for several stretched heartbeats, while Rurik bounced a stare off both of them and said nothing. The look on his face wasn’t outrage. It was indecision.
“No,” said Dekklis, finally. Quietly. She raised the bag. “You can’t do this. Not up here. I won’t allow it.”
“I wasn’t asking permission.”
Headshake. “Listen to me, Snow. Listen. I’ve let you do what you want down in the Suburba. I know about the fires and the murders. But you bring this into the Tiers, I’ll have to stop you. And I’ll have the Academy’s help. I’ve talked to Belaery.” Dekklis had the grace to wince. “She said the adepts will support me in keeping order.”
“She said that. Motherless Belaery.”
“This is no time for a holy war.”
“A holy war? I’m talking Purge, Szanys. Last time I checked, that was law.”
“Oh, you care about law now? That’s new. Because this”—and Dekklis shook the bag—“is not law. It’s simple revenge. You said t
his new God was different, but this is an old habit between the Laughing God and Tal’Shik. I’ve read the histories, Snowdenaelikk, just like you told me I should. I’m not going to let you kill all Tal’Shik’s godsworn just so the God’s people can take their places.”
“That isn’t—” what we want, Snow nearly said, and stopped. She hadn’t asked the God what he wanted. Had assumed—what, that he’d complete his own Purge, kill what passed for power in Illharek, and then go back into the shadows? The old God had wanted to control Illharek, yeah, but the new God was Tsabrak and Tsabrak had never wanted that.
When he was alive. But he’s not just Tsabrak anymore, is he? He’s the old God, too.
So maybe the Laughing God did want holy war. Maybe he’d counted on Dekklis allowing it, based on that not-quite-friendship. Maybe, being the God, he didn’t care overmuch if Dekklis did object—because he would reckon Snow loyal first to him, and to a highborn sometimes-ally, distant second.
The godmark on her palm ached. Snow closed her fist around it. Closed her eyes. Counted five and opened them again.
“So what, then? You let Tal’Shik have the Tiers? Let her have the Senate? See if that keeps the peace? You want Illharek to go back to that?”
“No. Hell. But I told you: this isn’t the time for a civil war. Will you listen to me? We have Taliri out there. Above.”
“I know that. My idea to come here and warn Illharek they were coming, wasn’t it? You didn’t want to. You wanted to stay and die in Cardik. You afraid of the Taliri godsworn, is that it? You reckon Illharek needs godsworn to counter whatever they have? Makes fine sense, until the war’s over. Then what? You planning to ask the godsworn in the Senate to please renounce Tal’Shik?”
Rurik interrupted then. Raised a hand and got both women’s eyes on him, that fast. “The First Legate’s right.”
