Division of the Marked (The Marked Series)

by March McCarron

  “We don’t want to attract attention,” Adearre said, handing the Chaskuan man a small bundle of clothes. Ko-Jin looked down at the corduroy trousers in his hands dubiously.

  Adearre distributed similar outfits to Yarrow and Peer. To Bray, he handed a rough-looking dress, petticoats, and bonnet. She climbed back into the carriage to change, while the men found what privacy they could in the trees.

  Yarrow unbuttoned and removed his robes and pulled on the common clothes. After a short struggle with the suspenders he emerged, ordinary-looking, in an olive coat, black trousers, cream shirt, and brown cap. If it weren’t for the long brown braid running down his back and the mark upon his neck, he might pass as the shop boy he had once been.

  Bray hopped down from the carriage, her bald head more or less concealed in a blue bonnet. The dress, too, was plain and blue. It reminded Yarrow of the dress he had first seen her in as a girl. She came forward and helped him and Ko-Jin tuck the tails of their braids down their coats.

  “We going through the city or around?” Peer asked.

  Bray pulled up the collar of his coat to cover the mark on his neck. “Around, I think. The fewer who know we are here the better.”

  Because the carriage itself would draw eyes, they left it and the horses, tied up and happily grazing, behind the copse. They set out afoot.

  Yarrow pulled his coat closer against the wind and glanced up at the overcast sky, wondering if it would snow. It was cold enough.

  He could not allow his mind to wander, as the walk was arduous and footing in the marshy ground precarious. Within the first hour, he’d trodden unwisely often enough that his socks, shoes, and the hem of his pants were soaked. The strip of land that separated the city from the sea was narrow and sloped, the steel-gray waves churning hungrily below.

  It was a virtually silent walk, as they all hunkered against the ocean spray and wind.

  As afternoon gave way to evening, they finally came fully east of the city and were able to move away from the brutal wetness of the shore. Yarrow could see the ruin clearly many leagues before they were upon it. It sat crouched upon the finger’s tip, its stone walls crumbling, but far more intact than Yarrow would have guessed given the length of its disuse. It sat perched upon a sheer cliff, overlooking the sea like a lighthouse.

  Bray and Adearre headed the party, and as they grew closer to their destination, the route they took became increasingly indirect. They sought refuge behind every hill and tree. Yarrow understood why—there was smoke billowing from several of the remaining chimneys, candlelight in the windows, and fresh tracks in the mud that even his novice eyes could discern.

  Yarrow felt rather ridiculous in his efforts to be clandestine. He crouched and picked his way carefully, as the others did, but he could not help but linger on how utterly unqualified he was to be in such a situation. Arlow’s admonishment rung in his mind.

  They approached the outer wall of the ruin with great caution, the sounds of movement and voices plainly audible. Yarrow kept his head down and out of sight behind the stone barrier and watched as Bray peered up over the edge and into the compound.

  She looked for only half a minute, then sat back down. Her eyes, even shadowed in the cowl of her bonnet, were clearly wide with shock.

  “How many?” Peer whispered.

  “There were easily three dozen in the yard alone,” Bray responded, her face pale. “How is this possible?”

  “What are they doing?” Adearre asked.

  Bray’s hands clutched at the fabric of her dress. “Some the Ada Chae, others the Tearre.”

  “Wait,” Ko-Jin whispered, “are you saying there are three dozen Chisanta? That can’t be!”

  “I am aware that it can’t be,” Bray responded, “but it is. Look for yourselves, but don’t be seen.”

  Yarrow removed his hat and raised himself slowly, so that only his eyes crested the top of the crumbling barrier. The yard between the wall and the first building of the temple teemed with people—not just people, Chisanta. They were split into two parties—clearly Cosanta and Chiona by their exercises, though not their dress and hair. There were no robes, no jerkins, no shorn heads or long braids. They all looked perfectly ordinary, save for the marks on their necks.

  The only difference between these Chisanta and the average group practicing exercises at either the Cape or the Isle was their definite youth. Yarrow scanned their faces—they were boys and girls from all three nations, but none seemed older than twenty and the vast majority were in their mid-teens.

  Yarrow lowered himself back behind the wall and shared amazed looks with the others. He could feel all of their shock reverberating in the back of his own mind.

  “It can’t be…” Peer said, his brow furrowed in thought.

  Bray brought her fist to her forehead. “How did we not see it before?” she growled softly to herself. Yarrow felt a pulse of self-reproach from her.

  Adearre slid the rest of the way down the wall and onto his bottom. “All this time, we believed someone was killing Chisanta children. But they were abducting them…”

  “The bodies…” Peer whispered. “It doesn’t—”

  Bray shook her head. “Remember the body of the boy who had a hand but shouldn’t have?”

  “And the girl in Gallan—the first fire,” Yarrow said, the horrible picture beginning to come together in his head, “they never found her body.”

  “So…” Ko-Jin said, “they’ve been killing the families of the kids and leaving another body to erase suspicion?”

  “Yes,” Bray said. “Where they get those poor souls, I do not know.”

  “But why?”

  “It’s an army,” Yarrow said.

  The others looked at him quizzically.

  He ran his fingers over his forehead, concentrating. “I can feel them. They’re… uniform, determined, militant.”

  This pronouncement met with stunned silence.

  Yarrow plucked the number from his memory. “And there will be one hundred and fifty of them.”

  Ko-Jin let out a long breath.

  “What’re we going to do?” Peer asked. They all looked at Bray—and Yarrow was glad, in that moment, to not be the leader of this party. What could they do?

  “We need more information,” Bray said, “we’ll need to spend some time observing.”

  “We should send a telegram to Dolla,” Peer said.

  Bray bit her lip. “No. They must be relying on the city for supplies, which means they’re likely to have connections down there. We can’t let them know we’re here. With any luck, they think we’re on our way to Che Mire.”

  Beyond the wall feet shuffled and, for a horrible moment, Yarrow feared they’d been discovered.

  Then a clear voice rang out—it was deep and musical, but the accent had a kind of roughness to it, like Bray’s.

  “My brothers and sisters,” it said. Yarrow sensed the bated breath of the crowd, heard the drumming of loyalty in so many minds. “Which of you is willing to offer something of yourselves for our great cause?”

  The gathering resounded with eagerness in Yarrow’s mind. He did not have to see to know there were many hands in the air.

  The man must have chosen from his volunteers, because another shuffling of feet sounded. Yarrow felt the glow of pride from the boy who stepped forward, and the unrestrained jealousy of those who had not been selected. Yarrow understood—there was something compelling about the man’s voice. It seemed to sing. Even at a distance, and not being the one addressed, Yarrow felt a kind of pleasure, like a warmth that spread through his chest and out to the tips of his fingers and toes. But the man’s emotions were jarringly in opposition with the charm of his voice. He was cold and hard as a hail storm. The discord unnerved Yarrow.

  He needed to see this man’s face. Perhaps his ability was playing a trick on him? It seemed impossible that such a voice could come from such a person.

  Yarrow scanned the stony wall against which he leaned. Not far
to his left, he spied a gap where a stone had fallen loose from its mortar. As silently as he could, he moved to that place and peered through the opening. Long grass grew up over the hole, leaving Yarrow with a partial view, but also shielding him from sight.

  There were perhaps a hundred boys and girls in the courtyard now. They had formed a large arc around a central space where a man and a boy stood. The man was Dalish; he had dark hair, neither braided nor shorn, but in the medium length fashionable amongst civilian men. He had small dark eyes and a sharp spear of a nose. Yarrow thought, all together, he had a rather charming face.

  A girl emerged from a nearby doorway, cradling in her two hands a strange sphere. Its surface gleamed, perfectly smooth and glassy, but its insides churned like an angry fog. Its color was changeable, many shades of blue weaving in and around each other. It glowed, casting a soft azure light that illuminated the girl’s face and the front of her dress. Yarrow watched as she came forward to the center of the clearing and placed the sphere upon a stony pedestal with the delicacy a mother treats her child. She scurried away then, as if eager to distance herself from the thing.

  The dark-haired man clasped the boy beside him on the shoulder in a fatherly way. “What you give, you give for the good of all. We salute you.”

  With a closed fist, he pounded three times on his chest. The hundred teenagers mimicked him, the dull thumping of fist to breast echoing ominously in the air.

  Yarrow watched the boy stride forward. He was Adourran and perhaps sixteen years old. He had the wiry, long-limbed look of a recent growth spurt. His dark face was set in determined lines as he stepped resolutely closer to the sphere. As he approached, a visible shiver ran through him. Yarrow heard the tingling of his discomfort—the sphere must have some kind of unpleasant effect at close proximity.

  But the boy did not falter. He stepped right up to the orb, placed his long-fingered hands on either side of it, and looked into its depths. The sphere glowed brighter and brighter still—some of those near it went so far as to shield their eyes from the glare.

  Yarrow studied the boy’s face closely, but he needn’t have. His emotions were raw, pained, desperately sad. They crawled at the back of Yarrow’s mind, making him ill with a grief that was not his own. Tears streaked the boy’s face and Yarrow felt wetness in his own eyes. He brushed the tears away impatiently with the rough fabric of his coat.

  The teen stepped away, the tears still pouring unabated down his smooth cheeks, and nodded to the girl who had brought the sphere. She scurried forward and took the thing back through the crumbling doorway.

  What happened next was so utterly unexpected that Yarrow nearly shouted out in surprise. Several of the larger boys and girls marched forward and, as a group, began to kick, hit, and generally beat the poor Adourran boy. He did not fight back, he was too wretched and resigned. The sound of the blows against the boy’s flesh resonated sickeningly across the otherwise silent watchers on. The boy collapsed to the ground, bleeding and broken.

  Then the dark haired man approached. He knelt down beside the teen and spoke so soothingly and sweetly that even Yarrow, completely aware of the coldness that radiated from the man, felt buoyed.

  “You will be rewarded, my brave brother,” the dark haired man said, and he helped the boy up to his feet. Yarrow was shocked that the lad could even stay upright after the beating he’d received.

  The crowd began to beat their chests again—a sign of support. It reverberated like a drum, lending the bleeding boy courage.

  Yarrow continued to stare, awed, as the lad closed his eyes and formed the opening move of the Ada Chae, Warm Hands Over Fire. His movements were less graceful for his injuries, but they were still distinct. Brush the Dragonfly yielded to Taking Flight. A hard lump lodged itself in Yarrow’s throat. This boy, so ill-treated before his own eyes, was not just Chisanta—he was Cosanta. He was Yarrow’s brother, who should be safe and unharmed at the Cape.

  The boy was stepping into Crouching Butterfly as it happened. His thin limbs inflated like a balloon given air. His frame no longer appeared wiry, but thick with muscle. His youth dissolved, leaving him, in appearance, a full-grown man—wide-chested, thick-muscled, and intimidatingly strong. He closed out the Ada Chae and the crowd cheered for him. Yarrow watched him closely as he opened his eyes and examined his new body. He was pleased with it, and proud of what he had done, but the sadness he had felt upon looking into the sphere had not gone away—it remained still, a scar that would last far longer than any physical wound he had suffered.

  Yarrow jumped at a tug on his sleeve and recalled himself to the situation. Bray gestured for him to follow and, quietly as possible, they crept away from the wall, down the sharp rocky slope that led to a churning, craggy shore.

  “Who was that?” Ko-Jin asked, the wind so strong it pulled at his braid.

  “Quade Asher,” Bray said, much to everyone’s surprise. Her emotions whirled, dark and wild as the ocean itself.

  “Who?” Peer looked as nonplussed as Yarrow felt. “I don’t remember seeing him at the Isle.”

  “No, you wouldn’t,” Bray said. “He was only there once in our time—for Ambrone Chassel’s funeral. I spoke to him briefly that day.”

  Adearre looked impressed. “You recognized a man you only met once, and remembered his name?”

  “You recall how much I studied Chassel’s writings and—”

  “How you were completely obsessed with solving his murder? Yes, we remember,” Peer cut in.

  Bray sighed and sat down on a rock. The wind pulled at her dress and whipped the ribbons of her bonnet around her face.

  “Ambrone Chassel dedicated his life to finding legendary lost objects of the Chisanta.”

  “What, like the Scimitar of Amarra?” Ko-Jin asked.

  Bray nodded. “Exactly. But his biggest obsession was the Sphere of the Chisanta. And Quade was the historian and archeologist who worked with him.”

  Yarrow sank down on a rock too—the understanding of what he had just seen hit him like a blow. “Great Spirits…”

  “Okay,” Peer said, annoyed. “How ’bout explaining the whole thing for those of us who’ve not pieced it together?”

  “The Sphere of the Chisanta,” Yarrow said, “is a prominent player in many old Chisanta legends. It was said that any Chisanta who looked into it would come to a full and complete understanding of a sacrifice they wanted to make. Nowadays, there are almost no Chisanta who have anything beyond the first gift. For two reasons; because in times of peace there is no need for anything more, and because the sacrifices are difficult to make—especially the first.”

  “Procreation…” Ko-Jin said thoughtfully.

  “Exactly. You can’t give it up unless you have an appreciation of what it is you are losing—and how can a childless person truly know? It is said that in times of great need Chisanta are often bestowed with the understanding, but the sphere rendered this unnecessary. You could simply look into it and see your potential children, feel the love you would have for them, and then you would be able to give them up and receive your next gift.”

  “So the sphere actually exists and this Quade Asher is using it to…what?” Peer asked.

  “To build an army,” Bray said, “and to give each soldier more abilities than any other Chisanta possesses.”

  Yarrow clenched a fist. “And they beat and do Spirits-know what else to these boys and girls to force the gifts to be physical.”

  “It’s sickening,” Ko-Jin said.

  “How is he getting them to do it?” Peer asked.

  “Did you not feel it?” Adearre said. “His voice—it made me warm and comfortable. I almost wanted to beat my chest along with the rest of them. He must have a gift for—”

  “Charm,” Bray said. “Yes, I felt it too.”

  They remained silent for a long moment, listening to the haunting caws of the gulls and the crash of the waves on the rocks.

  “The thing I still don’t understand,” Bray sai
d at length, “is how they were able to find these children in the first place. How were they able to identify Chisanta on Da Un Marcu Eve, before their marking could be known to anyone outside their own families?”

  Yarrow racked his brains, but he had no answer for this.

  “So what do we do now?” Ko-Jin asked.

  “We observe,” Bray said. “The more we know, the better prepared we will be. But I think our priority should be to get the Sphere away from them. It is the source of their advantage.”

  Bray crept along the gray stone wall, so intent on keeping silent and unseen that she paid no mind to the swirling snowflakes in the wind. Her soft-booted feet found quiet passage along the rocky shelf that separated her from the sea roiling many perilous leagues below.

  Bray stopped, crouched with her back pressed flat against the wall, beside a window. Her fists balled at the sound of his voice—Quade Asher, whose accent kissed so familiarly against her ear. In spite of herself, that voice pooled within her chest, comforting and evocative. She focused, steeled herself against the sensation. She would not be charmed by a mass murderer.

  After she heard him step out of the room, she peeked over the ledge of the window. He had installed his office in one of the more intact portions of the ruin. The room boasted several bookshelves, each crammed with gilded historical volumes. The walls were ornamented with maps and ancient artifacts. A maroon rug warmed the stony floor and a fire crackled in the hearth, giving the room an overall aura of a comfortable study.

  Bray phased through the wall and felt a wave of warmth envelope her like sinking into a tub of hot water. Quade’s voice still sounded in the hall, so she passed through a closet and became tangible only long enough to open the door a crack. Then she waited for Quade to return.

  She heard his heavy footsteps as he reentered the room and saw the shadow his legs cast across the rug. He sat down at his desk and shuffled through a stack of paper. Bray examined him through the narrow gap, memorizing every line and slope of his handsome face. A quiet rage began to burn in her stomach. This man had killed hundreds of people—families. He had taken scared children, her own brothers and sisters, and turned them into something perverse and distorted.