by K. Eason
“Tal’Shik’s godsworn wear a fucking dragon. I think we made the wrong alliance.” Dek had to look away now, before she did hit him. Sought Belaery’s eyes. “Adept. I want this tunnel sealed. Can you do that?”
“Not alone.”
“Then get who you need and come down here. Bring an escort. The streets are not safe.”
Belaery bowed over her interlaced fists. “First Legate. The adepts are yours to command. And.” She half-reached for Dek’s sleeve. Stopped at the glare she got back. “I am sorry about K’Hess Rurik. I—liked him.”
Dekklis turned away before she strangled her best ally. She should have let Snow fight her war here in Illharek, let her murder her way through the godsworn in the Tiers. That might’ve kept Rurik alive. Damn sure she hadn’t avoided a civil war, playing subtle. And she’d lost Rurik in that game. But they hadn’t punched their troops through the Suburba. Hadn’t incited a riot. The Suburba still held that rough peace, Snow’s rough peace.
It was the Tiers she had to settle. Now.
There were still a few survivors from the other side. A brawny Alvir with a purple egg on his forehead, bleary-faced. A couple more, barely past adolescence, looking battered and frightened.
Kill them all here and now: she could do that. Law said she could. Or she could ask questions. She had a great many of those.
“Get them up,” she told Neela. “If they don’t want to walk, or can’t, you drag them.”
Neela frowned. Opened her mouth, looked at Dekklis, and said only, “Yes, First Legate.”
“Ville.” She felt the old soldier’s attention like spears on her back. “Choose some of the Sixth to carry the First Tribune’s body. We need to take him home.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
An ill-tempered wind scudded out of the mountains. Rattled the shutters, sent slivers of autumn chill through the slats. Storm coming later, normal for this time of year in Cardik. But a west wind this early and blowing this hard meant a storm by midday, and that meant Snow couldn’t linger. The plan needed darkness, but it needed Kellehn and his people back inside Cardik’s walls first.
Snow pushed herself onto an elbow. Her trousers were there, halfway across the room. Her boots were—there, one and two. Her shirt, at least, was within reach. If she stretched. She stuck an arm out and hooked the sleeve with her fingertip.
Veiko stirred against her back. Rolled and wrapped an arm around her. His hand, carelessly draped over her hip, remembered where it was. Twitched and tightened and slid up her ribs.
She shivered. “Stop that, yeah? Or don’t. Depends if you want to get out of here before midday.”
A moment’s hesitation. A sigh. Then Veiko rolled onto his back and took his hand with him. Laced it with the other one across his chest on top of the blankets and looked at her sidelong. “I do not. But.”
“But. Yeah. I know.” She sat up and pulled the shirt over her head. Felt him watching. Turned and caught him at it and damn near took the shirt back off.
Took a breath instead. Two. Found somewhere else to look. “Firedog’s out, yeah?”
“I will get it.”
“Stay where you are. Conjuring’s faster than fire steel.” She grabbed a fistful of straw from the pallet. Snatched her trousers on the way across the floor, stepped into them one-handed while she stuffed straw through the firedog’s grate. “You’re serious about hunting up this dragon spirit in the ghost roads?”
“Yes. If I am to face a dragon in the flesh, then I must know how to kill it.”
“Soft bits, sharp metal.”
“It is likely more complicated.”
“Bet it isn’t.” She pulled fire out of cold air. Sat back on her heels and fed the last of her winter kindling to the flames. “A dragon-spirit’s going to tell you its weak spots?”
“If I defeat it and bargain well, yes.” He was sitting up now, the blanket puddled across his lap. Not the first time she’d seen the man naked. But this time, he wasn’t dying or bleeding. This time, she knew more about what was under those blankets than she had.
Work to do, Snow. Come on.
She hauled her gaze back to his face. “Fine. You hunt your dragon-spirit. Let me handle Kellehn. Save a little time, if we divide up the work. Don’t give me that look. I’m not without weapons.”
“I do not doubt your weapons. But you will be well out of the walls when you meet him.”
Not her blade he meant, but her conjuring. He was remembering the first day they’d met, yeah, when she’d conjured to throw the legion off her trail in deep forest. She’d been lucky then that the backlash had confined itself to rearranging the local terrain. Lucky she hadn’t ended up sticky remains in the middle of a crater. Lucky Veiko had come along when he did, but not too soon; backlash wasn’t picky who it killed.
There’d been a lot of luck that day, and a lot of luck since. They just needed a little more to deal with Kellehn, and then Tal’Shik.
And before that, more basic needs. Snow grimaced. There were things a woman could miss about Illharek, and the biggest was Illhari plumbing. She got the kettle back out of her pack. Leaned on the table and shoved her feet into the boots, one and the other. “I’m going to get more water, yeah? Won’t take long.”
“Take Logi with you.”
“Planning on that. Didn’t reckon he’d use the chamber pot.”
Veiko snorted. “I mean, when you go to find Kellehn. He may be of some use.”
“Oh. Then Logi speaks good Taliri. Has a way with negotiation.”
Veiko peered up at her through a curtain of what had been braids. Looked more like rope now, splitting around brow and nose. “He is a hunter, and Kellehn may not wish to be found.”
That was toadshit. They knew the Taliri were still out there; Briel’s pre-dawn scouting flights had confirmed it. And Kellehn was the sort to watch the gates. He’d see her come out.
She looked down at the kettle in her hands. Easier than eyelock with Veiko, yeah. Too much of him looking back at her. Naked that had nothing to do with clothes. Her chest hurt, like there wasn’t enough room for heart and lungs and the spreading ache.
“Well. I’ll take good care of Logi, then.”
“Yes,” grave and unsmiling. “Return him unhurt.”
Which was how she ended up crossing Cardik’s ruined fields, walking with Logi as escort. Crows gathered like a feathered crop, hopping and picking through the bones and ruins. Laughing God knew what was left for them. Nothing except bits of metal that winked in the sunlight. Little metal seeds scattered by a careless hand. Bright in the dirt. Bright among the stones on the S’Ranna’s bed. One pretty thing, then, that the day showed Snowdenaelikk so far.
Otherwise, the brightness was no great gift. Shadows banished to the edges and undersides of everything, all the river fog burned away. Left a woman exposed to every idiot with a bow, to every working eye in the treeline, as she walked up the middle of the motherless Illhari road.
Briel would’ve been just as obvious, had she been there. A single svartjagr, only the blind would miss her. But she had practice staying out of bowshot. And she could count the Taliri for some value of count. One-two-three-many, which was nothing Snow didn’t know already.
Instead of Briel, she had Logi, who counted nothing. Who was happy for the sun and warmth and unworried about arrows. He pranced ahead, made little dashes at the weeds pushing up at the edge of the road. Snapped at the tips and came trotting back, long strings of green dangling from his jaws.
“Idiot,” Snow told him.
Truth was, having Logi along was a comfort. Like having a part of Veiko. Truth was, she’d gotten used to having a partner at her back, and she’d slipped out of that habit in Illharek. Told herself it was simpler, working alone. And now, hell.
Half a year in the man’s company—in the man’s fucking head, thank Briel—for her to reckon just how much he mattered. Hadn’t figured it out during the long winter, when Still Waters had been alive. Not when there might have been
a chance to get used to this—whatever it was. Whatever it was that made it feel like she’d left half her own self behind, with him.
Toadshit from tavern ballads, that’s what it was.
What need will you have for a partner when this is all finished?
Truth was, the God’s right hand didn’t need a partner.
Maybe that needs to change, yeah?
“Tsabrak.”
Veiko had warned her she risked confusing both herself and the God by naming him. But it was too late for that.
“Tsabrak. You there?”
Snow.
Imagine her name whispered against her ear. Imagine a faint hint of jenja woven through with a man’s particular scent. Feel her guts twist, throat to belly, remembering that scent on her skin. On her tongue. Old memories bubbling up.
I’m here.
“Of course you are. Needed you yesterday, yeah? When that avatar came at us.”
You managed. You had your partner and your conjuring. Those are very effective wards. Gentle laughter, like powdered glass. Tell me. What did you two talk about all night behind them?
Bite her lip, she could do that. Taste blood and swallow it. “We didn’t talk. We fucked.”
A lie. There had been talk, too, that the God could not know. So tell him this half-truth and hide the rest behind it.
Ah. I see. Laughter, brittle and angry and not one jot amused. Quite an athlete, isn’t he?
“He is.”
And young.
“That, too.”
She made a fist of her left hand, the one Tsabrak had broken before he delivered her to Ehkla. He had been angry then, jealous of Veiko, before there was any reason. When Tsabrak had been just man and not the God. And now he was both, and still jealous, and more dangerous.
No. I’m not—sss. I’m not jealous. I wish you joy, yeah? Truly. And I’m sorry for your hand, Snow. I’ve said as much. Lots of things that I regret, then and now.
“You, the God? Or you, Tsabrak?”
Yes.
The old God had never apologized. Tsabrak hadn’t either. So ask where the God-Tsabrak had learned it and why he bothered now. Istel, most likely. Istel was the kind one. And if Istel was leaking into the God, then that leak went both ways. Dekklis might turn around one day and find Tsabrak grinning at her. Snow’s lips flexed. Funny, yeah, right up until Dekklis figured it out. She might get back to Illharek and walk straight into Dek’s revenge.
You may, at that.
“What’s that mean?”
Means the secret isn’t anymore. Godsworn came at Dek. I had to intervene.
“Fuck and damn. She okay?”
She is. A pause. The avatar will move soon. She’ll want to hit Illharek when it’s most distracted. You know she’ll smash the legions flat. And when she does, the Illhari godsworn will step up and save the city. Or they’ll try.
“You still think she’ll let Illharek fall?”
I do.
A breath. A beat. “You asked what Veiko and I talked about last night. This: we have some ideas, yeah? Noidghe toadshit, and conjuror toadshit. How to beat Tal’Shik. How to divide her. Kill the dragon, but also kill the spirit. Or—hurt her. I don’t know if we can kill her. But if we can, it will cost you.”
The God’s voice was swordclash and breaking steel. Our bargain’s already made. You are my godsworn, Snowdenaelikk. My right hand.
“I am. But you know better than to try and wear my skin. Conjurors are dangerous to spirits. That’s why you agreed to my privacy, yeah? Because I could fuck you up. And you think maybe I can fuck her up, too. That’s why you need me. That’s why you’ve always needed me, you and Tsabrak. That’s why you kept me and used me all those years.”
You were hardly unwilling.
“Maybe not. But I have a partner now. We were never that, you and me. Veiko’s a better bargain. So, let me tell you my terms. After we settle this avatar and save Illharek—you release all my oaths. Find yourself a new right hand.”
No.
“I can turn around right now, go back and have Veiko walk us on the ghost roads to Illharek. We’ll tell Dek what we know. The Taliri will keep raiding, keep sending refugees into Illharek, and Illharek will sink into civil war. Then we can let the legions meet the dragon. See how that goes. If you’re right about Tal’Shik, Illharek will survive. They’ll reverse the Purge. And just think, Tal’Shik’s godsworn back in power. All the Reforms undone. That will earn you some new converts, yeah? Angry men. Men like Tsabrak.”
The old God remembered those days. The old God had his own thousand-thousand faceless, nameless souls to remind him. All those stories, all that hate and pain and suffering. But nothing personal. No memories that were his alone. Tsabrak had a history. Tsabrak had said, more than once, he wished his life on no one. Veiko was right, that this God didn’t laugh as much; but he was wrong, too. This God was still Tsabrak in some large measure. Tsabrak’s desire, Tsabrak’s needs, Tsabrak’s hatred, a particular shape and flavor that Snow knew, having spent so many years with the man.
She felt it now. Fire so hot, it didn’t need air, fire that left only ash in its wake.
You bargained for Istel’s life. Shall I take it back when I let you go?
“You won’t. You like wearing him. You need to wear him, to stay close to Dekklis. She’s your best ally, once I’m gone.”
Silence then, for a long time, until she thought he might’ve left her again. Until she had to stop, or risk bowshot from the forest.
Then, chill and razors: Deal. And then, Look to the trees, Snowdenaelikk.
And the God, Tsabrak, left her.
So she already knew, when she looked at the treeline, that she would see a man standing there. Snow didn’t need Briel to tell her it was Kellehn. Walk with a man from Illharek, you got to know his stance and habits. A little hipshot, one hand resting on the weapon that hung off that side. Waiting for her, with what were probably ten of his closest, best archers.
Snow kept her own hands well away from her seax. Slipped into her best Suburban swagger and went to meet him.
* * *
Helgi was waiting beside the glacier. Veiko ran his hands over the dog, a hunter’s habit, to look for hidden injuries. Check each paw, each limb, push his fingers through the thick fur. It was a game with Logi, as much wrestling as any assessment of health. Helgi never minded. Never nipped or wriggled. The better of his dogs, Helgi, in every way. And if the hunter wished sometimes that it had been Logi who died, the noidghe was glad for Helgi in the ghost roads as guide and guardian.
But Helgi was not his teacher. That was Taru’s duty, and if Taru did not greet him with the same enthusiasm as Helgi, then she should at least be visible now, walking along the edge of the glacier, having come from wherever it was she stayed when he was not walking the ghost roads.
Veiko stood. Turned a slow circle. The glacier, the tundra, the distant takin. Himself and Helgi. That was all.
He knelt again. Took Helgi’s face in his hands. Looked into the ice-colored eyes, smoothed and tugged the thick, triangle ears. Helgi was a hunter in death as he had been in life. Say Taru’s name, and Helgi would find her.
The wind hissed across the dry tundra grass. Ruffled Helgi’s fur. Dragged cold fingers through Veiko’s braids and let them drop again. A cold wind, northern, that smelled like swamp and river. Truth was, Veiko did not need Taru for this.
“A wurm,” Veiko said finally. “Find me one.”
Helgi turned his face into the wind. Trotted into it, as he always did. This was a familiar path. Across the glacier, across the tundra, until he came to the black river. Veiko paused on the bank. There were faces in the water, if a man cared to look. Voices, if a man cared to listen. Lessons and knowledge, if a man was willing to pay for them.
Not today. Instead, Veiko studied the river itself, while Helgi cast along the bank and searched for the way across. The river was the boundary a noidghe must cross each time he left his spirit-home and came into the shared
lands of spirit. But the path across changed depending on his destination. The time Veiko had gone after Snowdenaelikk, the far bank had been a blasted wasteland, the bridge a great crumbling stone arch. The last time he had come with Taru, he had not needed a bridge at all. The river had been no wider then than his arm. An easy jump to the forests on the far side.
Today, the river was broad and smooth. The other side was swamp and forest: tall trees, lumps of dry ground. A short walk through them to the mountains beyond. Not like mountains that cradled Veiko’s village, or the ones guarding Cardik’s back. These were rockier, taller, naked stone twisting in the sky. Like Illharek turned inside out, Veiko thought, though carved and twisted by wind and not water.
The wurm would be there.
Helgi found a series of stones upthrust in the river, dry and wide and no farther apart than a man might easily step. A simple crossing, if a man kept his footing.
If a man isn’t a fool, Nyrikki’s son. Which you can be.
He turned, half-expecting to see Taru behind him, knowing better. The words were hers, yes, but no voice had spoken them aloud. An echo, perhaps, or a memory. His own willful imagining, because he wanted her beside him now. Because he worried for what waited on the river’s far bank.
Feh. Focus. Did you learn nothing?
Focus. Yes. He had learned. Veiko turned back to the river. There was Helgi, standing sentinel on a stone halfway across, ears cocked and curious.
Take a deep breath then, and let it out. Step onto the first stone—careful, test it before committing all his weight. It held, but the river rippled around it, sudden froth. Oh, now the current ran fast. Wet slopped up on the edge of the stone. Stained it slick.
Taru would have said be careful. Would have stood behind him and talked him across. And then she would have skipped after him, light-footed and agile and unafraid—having died twice already, once to be noidghe and once at the end of her life.
He took a second step. The rock shifted and settled, sending his heart up the back of his throat. He tried not to look in the river, at the fish-pale faces peering up from the black.
