Kinesee stumbled forward with what she guessed was a stupid smile. “Hello.”
The Edan spoke, her voice smooth with pure tones. “Greetings, child.”
An Edan spoke to me! She strode close, then blushed when she realized she’d interrupted. A map lay spread across the table, a massive forest on the eastern side and half a hundred squiggles in blue ink running west. Ivin, Polus, Meliu, and Rikis leaned beside the Edan.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
Ivin smiled at her. “It’s fine, Kinesee. You can represent Emudar in this discussion.”
Her eyes went wide and her muscles seized until she realized the levity in his words. “I… I just wanted to talk with Meliu.”
The priestess straightened and glanced to Ivin. “I can spare a wick. Shall we walk?”
They stepped into a wind gusting from the north. Maro followed close behind and Meliu stopped. “I think this is private girl talk.”
Maro took two steps back, and Kinesee said, “That’s as far as you’ll get him.”
Meliu smiled and leaned close. “Do you still have your special coin?”
Kinesee tugged her pearl necklace free and showed her the copper piece Meliu’d given here.
Meliu took slow strides with her hands behind her back. “Good! What is it you wanted?”
“Do you know the word, Nesfereum?”
“First, why do you ask?”
Put to it, she didn’t know if she wanted to say. But if the Choerkin trusted her, Solineus trusted her, and so should she. “Sedut asked why the Nesfereum wanted me dead. No one knows what it means.” They walked in silence too long; the priestess knew something. “What is it? Who are they?”
“You’re certain you heard right?”
“Not a doubt, I swear.”
“It is an old word, two words. Nesfer means lion, reum means… falsehood. So, the lion’s lie.” Meliu turned in front of her and kneeled, voice soft. “When I say those words to you, what do you think they mean?”
Kinesee’s skin prickled, the priestess’ intensity bringing a sweat. “I don’t know. The lion, Sol… I don’t know!”
Meliu’s hands took her shoulders, and she nodded, relaxing her tone. “Her exact words?”
“Umm, why does the Nesfereum want you dead?”
Meliu stood and spun to stroll north, and Kinesee fell in behind, staring at the rhythm of the priestess’ feet. Her beautiful boots. “It is a thing or a people. If we take the Nesfereum as a literal lie, then it could be a prophecy which wants you dead. If Sedut thinks a prophecy mentions you—”
“It felt like she asked about a person.” They crested a rise and stopped behind a hundred people stopped and staring north.
“That would raise… Hells!”
Kinesee raised her eyes from Meliu’s heels: A wall of smoke billowed on the northern horizon.
The cool wind from the north, refreshing after smoky tents, turned to a terror, and Iro’s words struck Meliu in the face: He promised the winds would change. Now they brought fire.
“Maro! Get Kinesee to the river!”
The big man grabbed the girl and lumbered downhill fast as he could with Kinesee shrieking in his grip.
The fire raising so much smoke raged a horizon or more away, but carried by a wind that whipped her hair, there was no telling how many wicks away it was. She glanced to the ground: packed grass and dirt, but the Silone had been gathering grass for days to pound the seeds into meal. Hunger might save uncounted lives with the wide swaths of ground cleared all around.
She turned and bolted along the ridge, straight for the Choerkin tents but her eyes flashed north as she ran. Shadows on the dirt road, and she slid to a stop muttering a prayer to see. A family or two, with carts, children, and animals. As she watched, the donkey pulling a small wagon reared; the man in the lead lost his grip and tumbled as the animal bolted past, the wagon bucking, and in flickers a wheel separated to roll on its own down the hill. Wagon and animal went down as the axle dug dirt, and the rickety contraption broke to pieces. The beast flopped and kicked.
Further up the road a child lay in the grass and dirt, a baby swaddled in her arms. “Forges.” Her feet turned to run north but what the hells’ good was she?
Several men stood with horses nearby, but they wouldn’t be able to see the family without prayers. She rushed to their sides. “There’s a family out there! In the road.” They looked but stood dumbfounded. She screamed and grabbed the reins from a man, stared at the withers of the giant mare then her owner. “Be a gentleman and give me a hand?” The bastard was so stymied by it all he cupped his hands for a step into the seat.
She hadn’t ridden bareback in a decade, but she gave the animal her heels and held on for her life. She clenched her legs and arms in desperation until she gained the rhythm of the animal’s pounding gait. Leaning into the mare’s mane she could see the family without prayer now, then heard hooves to her right, then left.
A man and woman she’d never seen before joined her in the race, but those lucky bastards had saddles.
The donkey limped and ran down the road dragging remnants of wagon, but the three of them thundered past without a second look. The fire crowned the northern hill, flames licking thirty feet high, as she wheeled her horse and leaped to the ground beside two children. She waved the other riders by.
The girl was no more than five, eyes wide with terror, shrieking shrill. “It’s all right, Kedee! It’s all right.” Over and over, but the baby wailed, more terrified by sister’s screams than the oncoming flames it knew nothing about.
The horse yanked Meliu’s arm, but she kept her grip. But one slip and the mare’s hooves would throw clods all the way back to the river. “Child! Bring the baby to me! Child!”
The girl leaped to her feet and ran to Meliu, screams and sobs, if there were words she couldn’t pick them out. The horse circled them with wild eyes. “I’m gonna put you on this horse.” She lifted the both of them with a strength she never knew before. “Clutch her mane and hold your brother tight!”
She leaped and clambered but her soul sank as she slid from the horse’s ribs. No way in the hells she’d make it atop this big animal. The wagon. She turned and trotted down the road backwards, watching to see how well child held on.
She spun as they reached the remains of the wagon and she balanced on a piece of its bed. She reached for the horse’s mane about to jump… The lady and her horse thundered by with riders on back, and her horse spun circles to follow, pulling her down to the ground. Meliu growled as she planted both feet and pulled on the reins, regaining a semblance of control.
Meliu stared the animal in its panicking eyes. “The faster you let me up there, the faster we all get the hells out here!” She climbed atop the wagon’s bed, set foot atop a ridge of wood propped high by the surviving wheel and axle, and launched, draping over the mare’s back.
The horse bolted but not before she righted herself the best she could, and clung to the mane behind the children, feet dangling. She could feel her grip slipping, it was a matter of when she lost her grip and how hard she hit the ground. A hand grabbed her shoulder and pulled her forward, her thighs gripping the mare’s flank, and she pulled herself upright.
A man and woman straddled behind the rider of the third horse. She didn’t see who was on the back of the woman’s horse as she passed, but she knew there was no way they’d gotten everyone. They crested the next rise and people caught them, taking the reins of the spinning and puffing mare, lifting her and the children down.
The man and woman from the other horse rushed to them, sweeping the girl into their arms. Such joy until the mother asked, “Silveen, where’s Kedee?” The child’s arm raised and pointed to where grassfire swept over the broken wagon, bearing down on the wounded donkey, and Meliu’s heart sank from her chest.
Ivin tapped the map sprawled on the table. “The first major river is the Ilmen, south of this, the Blooded Plain no longer borders the Hidreng?”
Limereu nodded, a finger sweeping north-south down the map. “Here the Tek Reshu rule, and the Mother Wood fades into the Nenaree, ruled by Trelelunin. The Treaty holds here as well. The Blooded Plain narrows, best to keep to closer to the forest, but not so close your people trespass into the woods.”
“There are scores of rivers down the Blooded Plain, plenty of space to spread out and fish.”
Rikis said, “If these other Teks don’t take Iro’s advice to destroy us.”
“It’s the best chance we got. Winter home won’t sustain us lo—”
“Fire!”
Everyone’s head turned but Ivin was the first to the tent’s flap, throwing it open. He stood face to face with Solineus and the man muttered, “Prairie fire… the sons of bitches.”
Ivin peered over his shoulder. “I don’t see…” A darkness rose on the horizon.
Ivin’s heart stayed steady, his thoughts racing, as he charged outside. “The river! Buckets! Douse the tents.” But people scattered in chaos. He turned to the Choerkin warriors around him. “Women and children to the river! Every man with a bucket gets water, every man with a scythe clears grass!”
Solineus said, “Fires going to move fast in this wind… sparks might not reach the southern shore, the camp’s made something of a firebreak.”
Ivin faced south and walked, grabbing Solineus by his collar. “The flames might not make it south, but the Tek will realize that.”
“Shittin’ bastards.”
They ran to the corral, and Solineus shouted. “Ilpen! Get your team and every animal you can to the river!” Ivin grabbed two geldings, and they threw reins and saddles on fast as they could. There wasn’t time to stop and throw on more armor, but both men bore arms every waking flicker of the day.
They rode south and within a couple wicks splashed through the Delhen River. Solineus shouted, “Which way?”
Ivin glanced east and west. If the Hidreng were starting fires, it’d make sense to start them forest-side and move back home. Ivin leaned over his horse’s mane and reined east toward the Eleris. Winter Home had disappeared over the horizon behind them when they spotted the first smoke.
Ivin drew the Ar-Bdein’s blade and waved Solineus west. His horse peeled off to the right and Ivin bore down on the bastard spreading pitch in the grass. The man turned, dropping his bucket and torch, but too late to draw a weapon. His head flew wide-eyed from his body and Ivin wheeled, leaping from the saddle to snuff the torch. Dry grass ignited, but the flames hadn’t yet caught the pitch ablaze. He stripped the man’s grass-brown cloak from his headless shoulders and beat the flames out.
He stomped and kicked dirt on the last embers before swinging into the saddle, charging west. A thousand strides later he passed the parts of two men dressed in identical cloaks; an arm, chest, and head in one spot, the legs and second arm in another. One man, he realized, only split in two in the way Latchu hewed flesh.
Ahead he spotted the flowing tail of Solineus’ horse circling three men. He thundered ahead, shoulder low over his gelding’s neck. One bastard noticed him, arm directed straight at Ivin, and an arrow whirred past his head. Ivin swung with the momentum of his charge and steel collided with the man’s chest, throwing the bastard to the ground and hammering Ivin’s shoulder, but he whipped with the momentum and brought the blade back around to take another in the head. It wasn’t the cleanest blow, but the Tek fell like a boulder hit him.
He left the final man to Solineus, kicking back to a full gallop west. Several thousand strides ahead smoke billowed and fire raged; no way he could put it out, but he could make sure the bastards didn’t start another. Two cloaked heads in tall grass, difficult to spot, but once seen impossible to lose.
Both men turned, loosing quarrels from their crossbows. One sailed high, but the other… his horse bellowed in pain and Ivin felt the animals stride clipped. But the gelding wasn’t going down. One man dove from the horse’s path, the other pulled an axe from his waist, but it fell to the dirt with his arm.
Ivin yanked hard on the reins and wheeled, felt the horse’s shoulder lean imbalanced, and he jumped from the saddle. He hit hard at a full run and in two awkward strides met the second Tek’s scimitar with the flat of his sword, dragging the man’s arm down before shoving an elbow through his chest. A quick toe to his heel dropped him to the ground, and he plunged his blade through his chest.
He strode to the one armed man and lopped his head before checking on his horse. The bolt stuck from the animal’s chest, blood pumping from around the shaft as the animal puffed hard.
Solineus slowed. “You all right?”
Ivin rubbed his horse’s neck. “Good. Get the hells out of here.”
Solineus heeled and he was off at a dead sprint. No way Ivin and his wounded mount would keep pace. He checked the wound; pulling the bolt could be worse than leaving it in. He took the horse’s reins and led him north.
Fires raged to the south by the time Ivin reached the Delhen River, but there was a whole lot less smoke than there would’ve been. The northern fire had swept down to Winter Home, and with the help of wind, sent tents and supplies up in smoke, but if caught on open prairie the toll would’ve been worse. They lost a handful of lives, least that they knew about, as folks battled flames.
By the time Ivin arrived on foot, he caught snippets of tales but the fires were smoldering into nothing.
Ivin handed his limping gelding off to a corral-hand with a promise of finding the steed a proper healer before heading to the main tent. The canopy stood soaked and bore char marks where flaming ash blew in to die, but it was sturdy and filled with angry clanblood.
Ivin found himself a chair and kicked his feet up waiting for something interesting. He glanced around the room for faces. Roplin, Tedeu, Polus, Limereu… scores of clanblood, no Solineus nor Rikis. He sat poised a wick longer but bound back to his feet as curiosity ate at him.
He sidled to Tudwan Ravinrin’s shoulder. “Where’re Solineus and Rikis?”
“Once they heard you returned, they rode for New Fost.”
Straight at the teeth, no patience, that was Solineus’ way. Most folks would be dead by now with his habits. “Meliu?”
“Haven’t seen her.”
This struck a pang to his worry, but the woman was more capable of staying alive than most. Still. “I’m going to take a look for her. You let me know if anything interesting happens.”
Tudwan laughed and shook his head. “You go find your latest lady.”
His words jabbed Ivin’s conscience, but he knew the man hadn’t meant to. He appraised the bickering faces gathered beneath the canopy, then raised his arms to yell, “I’ve one thing to say!” Ivin waited for Polus and others to quiet the crowd for him. “I’ve got one thing to say, then I’ll leave you good folks to it.
“So long as we sit on our asses in Winter Home, all we’re doing is waiting to react to their next ploy. We need to act and keep on acting until we’re safe or in the grave.” He leaned into Tudwan’s ear. “Good luck with these northerners.”
Ivin stepped from the tent as it exploded in a chorus of shouts and as the sun touched the western horizon. His mind went to Solineus and Rikis, wondering how far they’d travelled. “Can’t believe those bastards rode north with night falling.” But Kotin taught him not to worry about the storms he couldn’t control; Winter Home was a sprawling camp, where the hells would he find Meliu? On a normal night, a happy night, where would I want you to be? No more than a hundred strides away.
He turned toward his tent, happy to see it still stood, and when he threw open the flap, he heard her voice. “Close that.”
She lay curled on their cot, buried beneath furs except for her face. He sat by her side, hand sliding beneath to rub her shoulder. “Are you well?”
“I tried to save him.”
“Who? I’m sure you did your best.”
“Kedee. A baby.”
Ah, hells. “What happened?”
“I go
t his sister back, but he fell from the horse, the fire… the look in his mother’s eyes. Lay beside me.”
Ivin took off his weapon belt and kicked his boots to the corner before crawling beneath the furs.
“Do you want children?”
Ivin shrunk from the question, imagining no right answer. “I suppose so, never thought on it long.”
“I always imagined being a mother one day, even if in Istinjoln, to love a child.”
Like her parents never loved her. “I pity the boy who’d court your daughter.”
“I’m serious. I always… I never imagined what it’d be like to lose your child. I don’t know if… If I could be…”
‘Tomorrow is another day, everything may look different. Rest.”
“Tomorrow I need to find Sedut.”
“That woman! Why?” The answer was obvious, but still the words blurted out. She’d saved both of them, but the name rankled.
“We’ll need her.”
“I know you’re right.” But he felt as if she left something out. “And?”
She hesitated. “And nothing, if we’re going to survive, we need every Silone, Seven Clans and the Church.”
Harder than the hells to argue the point, so it was a foolish fight to pick. “You can do this thing?”
“I can. If you can promise their safety.”
“I will. I promise.”
He nuzzled into her shoulder, body and soul exhausted, and she pushed back with a sigh. With the sun still in the sky it was going to be a long night, but one they both needed.
The Silone left seven hundred men behind in New Fost, but it was the lone Edan which troubled the Hundred Nations more. Solineus, Lelishen, Rikis, and Pikarn found him standing on an outcropping of stone still staring at the blockade.
Lelishen told Solineus once before that the Edan appreciated straight words, so he didn’t hold back. “You took them Tek heads and stuck them in Iro’s tent.”
Trail of Pyres Page 50
