“Il Mer.” The Imperator General bowed, and his dragon’s helm caught fire in the sunlight. “We are very sorry for your family’s loss.”
“Are you really?” The boy’s eyes were dark and terrible. “I think you do not comprehend my family’s loss. You leave our dead out here on indecent display, as if they were nothing.” He gave an odd little shudder, and the hairs on Hafsa Azeina’s arms stood on end. Something about this son of salt was not quite right.
You two-leggeds are so slow, Khurra’an chuckled in the back of her mind. And you smell like roast pork.
Her stomach rumbled. You stay out of this.
As you wish. He laughed again and was gone.
“Baram, Naamak, shield our folk from the eyes of these… people.” The young man shut his own eyes, and visibly took hold of his emotions before opening them again and looking straight at her. “Dreamshifter. I find it passing strange that you arrive just as the flames are dying. Tell me, what business might the Queen Consort of Atualon have at the Grinning Mymyc? Are you come to drink with some old friends?” He kicked at the charred and twisted foot of a patreon.
Akari Sun Dragon spread his wings above the horizon, bathing them in inappropriate blessing.
“What do you say, il Mer?” Davidian demanded. “You do not think this was an accident?”
“Only as accidental as the deaths of the ne Atu, so many years ago.”
She said nothing.
“Soutan! Aiyyeh!” One of the Salarians called out. “This one is not ours. She is… ah… she is Atualonian.”
Khurra’an nudged Hafsa Azeina from behind and came to stand very close beside her.
How can he tell? His eyes mocked her with their secrets. You all smell like roast pork.
I told you to stay away. Leave the bodies alone.
Tell your grandmother to hunt mice. I ate a whole tarbok. These are hardly worth my time. But he licked his chops anyway, long pink tongue curling around the gold band on his tusk. Atualonian and Mer alike edged away from him.
Davidian stepped closer, and bent down to examine the body. “He is right. This woman was Atualonian, and known to me. I had forgotten she had rooms here in Bayyid Eidtein.”
“Who was she?”
“An old wet-nurse for the ne Atu. She was a pensioner and chose to live away from the city, though some of the children used to visit her, before, ah…”
“Before they all died.” Soutan Mer shuddered again, and Hafsa Azeina felt her intikallah shiver in response. “We will take care of her, Imperator, since you seem to have such trouble taking care of your own.” The men began to drape the sad, charred bodies in lengths of white linen.
“Of course—as you wish. Of course.” The Imperator General bowed his head, flinching as the salt merchants exclaimed softly over the smallest corpse, too obviously a child, her long ringlets singed and matted with blood and mud and soot. Someone, perhaps her mother, had dressed that child in a pretty yellow tunic with flowers all about the hem, had brushed those long curls and fed her and kissed her soft round face, never imagining that it would be her last dress, her last morning, her last everything.
No more than Hafsa Azeina might have imagined how her own day might end.
“What is this?” The Imperator General stooped like a hawk. When he stood, Hafsa Azeina saw in his hands two halves of a broken, bloodied mask. “What is this? It looks like…”
Matteira screamed.
“Halfmask,” Imperator General Davidian said, his face gone grim. “But what is this symbol, here between the eyes?”
“I know that sign.” Soutan Mer’s eyes had gone strange, the pupils dilated so that hardly any whites showed around the edges. He sketched a symbol in the air—a circle bisected by a jagged line. “The Eye of Eth. Used by Arachnists…” He looked straight at Hafsa Azeina, and she could hear the faint notes of the Hunt. “Arachnists, and sorcerers. Your people call it the dreaming eye, do they not… Dream Eater?”
Behind her, Hafsa Azeina could hear the hushh-shushhh of shamsi being drawn from their sheaths as the Ja’Akari made ready to die.
They have my back, she thought. They have always had my back. Another realization come too late.
Matteira reached out toward the shattered mask with both hands, wailing as if her soul had been sundered.
“I ask you thrice, Dream Eater—why have you come here?” Soutan Mer drew himself up. Akari Sun Dragon peered over the youth’s shoulder at her, and it seemed that the boy wore a crown of golden antlers, and that the white-robed soldiers behind him glowed like vengeful spirits.
The world stilled and settled.
Ehuani, she thought, no more lies.
No! Khurra’an roared. Stupid human!
“I have come to seek the release of Bashaba, and reinstate her as Sa Atu.”
“Treason!” The Imperator holding Mattu’s mask bared his teeth in disgust.
Khurra’an snarled in the back of her mind. Get out!
The Huntress sounded her horn as the trap snapped shut.
“Ware, Dreamshifter!” one of the Ja’Akari shouted.
“Mutaani,” she breathed, and a smile kissed her mouth. Death has found me at last. The problems of the world were no longer hers to solve. Still smiling, she drew her shamsi and wheeled her mare as the Ja’Akari formed a loose circle with their horses, haunches in, swords shining bright and eager beneath the sun. The air shivered and rang with the war-cry of the vash’ai as Khurra’an drew back onto his haunches, hackles up, growling low in his throat.
Hafsa Azeina turned to catch Saskia’s eye. “Go!” she yelled. “Ride to Atualon, tell Ka Atu! Then you guard my daughter!”
“No! Dreamshifter…”
“Go!” she shouted. “Ja’Akari! Go!”
Saskia’s face was a terror, but she sheathed her sword and gave her sleek mare the heel. The asil mare, daughter of the desert, fleetest of horses, gathered in her fine, bold heart and flew.
The streets were lined with white-robed Salarians, mounted men with catch-poles and halberds and spears, and beyond them a handful of men with heavy crossbows.
Saskia cut through them like a new sword through silk and then they were gone. Three of the men peeled away to give chase, but they stood no chance of catching the Ja’Akari on her swift red mare.
The remaining Ja’Akari drew their circle closed, but they were a handful against many, hemmed in on all sides. Hafsa Azeina sighed her regret into the wind, that it should end like this despite all she had done.
A poor sacrifice to your ambition, my love. My blood will buy you scant pleasure.
“Show me yours, cowards!” Fiery Talilla spat into the sand and jerked the thongs of her vest so that it hung open in a show of contempt. “Or have you nothing to show?” The Ja’Akari laughed, strong white teeth flashing in faces so smooth and untroubled that Hafsa Azeina wanted to weep.
“I will show you mine before you die, cunt!” one of the white-robed men called in reply. The others were silent. Grim-faced, they showed little eagerness for this task.
“It is a good day to die,” Talilla laughed. “Pity we have to die in such ugly company.”
Hafsa Azeina watched with a bitter taste in her mouth as the Imperators pulled back.
“Kill them,” a white-robed officer called, drawing his own short sword. “Kill their horses, too.”
“Aieee!” Lavanya Ja’Akari screamed. “Coward son of a maggot-riddled pig’s ass, show me yours!”
Salarians closed in from both sides.
There was a commotion in the back, the snarl of a cat and a man’s scream cut short and the shriek of a dying horse, and then a blur of dappled gold shot past her and into the closing ranks. Khurra’an sprang upon their enemies, a fury of claw and tusk stoking terror and chaos in their midst. His mind was a fog of musk and bloodlust, and closed to her.
One of their attacker’s horses reared, screaming, throwing its own rider to die beneath thrashing hooves as the vash’ai rent its hide bloody. It would no
t be enough. Even as she watched, one of the men raised an iron-banded club and brought it down with a sickening crunch upon Khurra’an’s head, and Hafsa Azeina threw her head back and shrieked in grief and in fury as he slipped from her mind.
She felt as much as heard the krak-chunk of a crossbow releasing its bolt and her head jerked back sharply as if someone had grabbed a fistful of her hair and yanked. The bolt passed before her face, and the doe-eyed Talilla from Uthrak fell from her horse as gracefully as she had once danced.
Lavanya raised her shamsi and charged the soldiers with a roar that would have made Khurra’an proud. She and her rangy dun mare were cut down before they had gone four strides, the mischief and beauty of youth churned to mud and blood beneath the feet of their enemies. Hafsa Azeina trained her eyes on the man who had called for their deaths, and wished she might meet him once more in Shehannam.
Call me, a voice sang in her ear. Even now I can save you. Call me, Annubasta. I would walk again among Men, and your enemies will tremble at your feet as I drink their souls.
I think not.
Die then, Belzaleel laughed, it is all the same to me. Perhaps I will seek out your daughter, once your bones are gone to dust. I hear she is a lovely thing…
Hafsa Azeina shut the Liar’s voice from her mind. “To me!” She cried. “Ja’Akari, to me! Mutaani!” Her sword flashed bloodgold in the light of the dying sun as she charged, and the hoofbeats—so like the pounding of a living heart—were soon lost in the clash and clamor of a short, brutal battle. Hafsa Azeina clove the officer’s head from his shoulders—No more dreams for you, she thought— and brought the hilt of her sword down on a gleaming helmet that crunched and crushed beneath her blow.
A hand grabbed for her leg and she severed that as well, and was blinded by a hot spray of blood in her face. She saw a tall girl dragged from her horse, screaming and cursing the men for cowards even as their swords fell upon her and rose again, stabbing and hacking long after her screams had fallen silent.
Her little mare, her lovely Keila, silver and soft as moonlight, lurched beneath her and they came crashing down in a tangle of flesh and weapons. Hafsa Azeina rolled away, closing her ears and her heart to the sounds of her horse shrieking in agony. She hit her head on something, hard enough that the shadows pulled in close from the corners of her vision.
Keila was still screaming. Oh, sweet horse.
She had lost her sword, and her right arm hung limp and useless at her side. She tried to raise her left hand to wipe the gore from her eyes, but a sudden pain blossomed in her palm, hot and bright as if she had reached out to pluck a coal from the fire. She looked down, confused, and saw that a crossbow bolt had pierced her hand and pinned it to her breast. Blood pumped from the wound in a crimson tide and mixed with the gentle rain.
“Oh,” she said, and fell to her knees.
They were waiting for her in the shadows.
FORTY - TWO
The Gate of the Iron Fist was flanked by two giant warriors. The golden giant was helmeted and armed in the ancient style, and held one hand upraised as if in blessing, although the stern set of his stone mouth did not bode well for the red warrior who knelt bareheaded on the far side of Supplicants’ Square, broken sword before him and jeweled tears sparkling on his face.
Jian could hardly begin to imagine the lives that had been spent to carve these giants from the living rock and bring them down the Kaapua from the mountains, bound with the souls of a thousand willing soldiers and set here for all time, a testament to the emperor’s implacable might. The walls of the city gleamed silver in the early light, and the square before them was split in two by a road of cobbled bloodstone ringed all about with skulls.
A riff of birdsong tickled down from the mountains and across the Kaapua to dance upon the jewel-blue moat, and the air was thick with the scents of jasmine and sweet puali’i. Jian looked upon the Forbidden City, the heart of Khanbul. He felt himself moved to fear, and to something approaching love.
“Stay clear of the water,” Xienpei warned. “We lost three Daechen to the zhilla last year, and the emperor was not pleased.” The flag bearers changed course to set foot upon the wide red road, and the bloodstone rang a martial welcome beneath their booted feet.
Jian followed at the head of his squad, aware and wary of the position. Perri marched at his shield, and Naruteo beyond him, carrying Jian’s bundle as well as his own. After the day by the river when Jian had defeated him so soundly, the boy’s yendaeshi had abandoned him to Xienpei, and he had become little more than a servant. Naruteo walked alone, and ate alone, and though the two of them had not spoken since that day something in his eyes made Jian grateful that access to weapons was strictly controlled.
The other boys whispered that Naruteo was being punished for losing a fight before his yendaeshi, but Jian wondered. It felt to him as if they were pieces in some elaborate game, and the players were still pondering their opening moves.
“Where are the soldiers?” Jian asked as they crossed the broad square. “I thought this was the Wall of Swords?”
“Look,” Perri breathed beside him. “Look.”
Then he saw it. The wall that surrounded the heart of the Forbidden City, so high that a man could scarce hope to reach the top of it with a well-shot arrow, so broad that on a misty morning you could not see one side from the other, bristled and glittered with the swords of thousands of vanquished enemies. Tens of thousands, perhaps. He could see them as they neared. Daggers and scythe-swords and shamsi from the west, glaudrung and shikkar and needle-thin pigstickers from the east. A massive two-handed greatsword crusted with jewels thrust from the stone beneath a short, rusted dagger.
“Come peasant, come king,” he whispered, “fall to your knees before me and despair.”
Xienpei, resplendent before them in her robes of spidersilk, glanced over her shoulder and smiled. The gems in her teeth dazzled and mocked him.
Naruteo snorted. “Idiots and weaklings. They were fools to think they could stand against the emperor’s armies.”
“We are the emperor’s armies now,” Jian said. “I would not say such things, if I were you.” He did not look at Naruteo, but the other boy subsided with a grunt and Xienpei’s smile widened before she turned away.
“If we are his armies, when do we march?” Naruteo complained. “My belly is full to aching with stories of the Dragon King’s magic and his search for an heir. I say we strike while he is weak, before there is another to take his place. Strike the head from the downed serpent,” he made a chopping motion with his hand, “and take his lands for our own, just as we have taken the East.”
Perri hopped a bit in order to catch up with the others. His shorter legs made marching in step a challenge for him. “We are not the emperor’s armies yet,” he reminded them. “First we must be presented to the seers.”
“I do not doubt that I will pass my Inseeing, do you?” Jian could not see Naruteo’s face, but there was a sneer in his voice. “Perhaps you will fail and become lashai. Perhaps you will go mad. That happens sometimes to the weak, or so I have heard.”
“Arrogance is a fine quality in Daechen.” Xienpei spoke without turning, “But do not presume to know anything. Not even I can guess who the seers may send on, who they fail… or who they will consume.”
“I am no easy meat,” Naruteo growled. “I will march with the emperor’s armies, and our enemies will fall to my sword. You ladies may wash my smallclothes for me, if you wish.”
“I hear that the barbarian prides have lady warriors.” Perri laughed. “And that they slice off their own breasts so that they will not catch on their bowstrings.”
“I hear that you are a lady warrior,” a voice called from the rear of the formation, “and that you sliced off your own dick because it was too small to be of use.”
The banter degenerated from that point, but Jian was not paying attention. Inseeing. He knew that each Daechen would have to stand before the emperor’s seers, and pass some
sort of test, but the nature of that test—and the consequences of failure— were little more than conjecture in the halls of the Yellow Palace. The Yellow Daechen knew nothing, and Xienpei’s malicious smile had warned him not to ask.
As if summoned by the thought, she dropped back to walk beside him, and spoke in a voice pitched for his ears alone.
“Naruteo has learned nothing from your fight,” she told him. “Were every sword upon the Wall in the fist of a soldier as strong as he, still we would not have sufficient might to knock the Dragon King from his accursed throne. The might of Ka Atu is not measured in soldiers, but in the magic of the land beneath his feet, and that magic answers to him alone. Three times an emperor has thrown his might against the fortress Atukos, and three times have our armies been crushed beneath the weight of fell sorcery. We are more powerful now than we have been at any point in our history, and it is not enough. We cannot defeat the Dragon King in battle by waging war in his land, and we cannot draw him forth.”
“Why fight the Dragon King at all?” Jian flinched inwardly at the sound of his own words, but it was a question he had wanted to ask for some time. “Why not leave him where he is, and be content with the lands we hold? If we cannot expect to win…”
“Do not even ask that question in your own head,” she warned him softly, “not unless you wish to lose it. The coin does not get a say in how it is spent, and our lives are no more than coins in the emperor’s purse. Do not hope for more than that, Daechen Jian.” She tapped her sword thoughtfully as they marched on. “The emperor cannot ignore the Dragon King, any more than you could ignore a rotting limb. The taint of Atualon’s sorcery spreads outward like poisoned blood. If the corruption is not sliced from the body, it will eventually reach the heart of the empire. The Sundering will be remembered fondly if ever that day comes to pass.
“And it will come to pass, if we fail to stop it.”
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