The smile fell from Sabolu’s face as fast as a ripe coconut. “What would I know about any of that? I look like a witch?”
Not really, Nahoa thought. But she said, “I just hear that you know people. The sort who might be able to find me a geas.”
Sabolu hugged her elbows and looked around the deserted stables. “I might. But those things are dangerous, lady. You don’t have enough trouble with that old hag? She knows about geas, too.”
Nahoa was glad she hadn’t brought Ahi. Sabolu’s fear was infecting her—she checked the stables again and nearly jumped when a mouse scurried into a corner. “Not Makaho,” Nahoa said. “Someone else.”
She felt as though her heartbeat was loud enough to echo off the walls by the time Sabolu spoke again. “I can’t. . .I don’t work with geas no more. Why don’t you ask the black angel? Word is she knows all about them.”
Nahoa swallowed. Careful, now. “Where is the black angel, though?”
Sabolu seemed relieved, as though this were more comfortable territory. “With the rebels. I ain’t seen her there, but that’s where her papa said she went.”
Sabolu clammed up after that, as though her relief had let her say too much, but Nahoa didn’t mind. She was eager to leave anyway. Sabolu had done something wrong with a geas, and she didn’t want to think that this eager girl had done anything to her daughter. But who else could it have been? Sabolu had warned her about Makaho, warned her about the geas, but then she’d also implied that she’d been in rebel territory. What business could even a precocious girl like Sabolu have west of Sea Street? Everything seemed to be leading her back to either Makaho or the rebels, but she couldn’t believe that any of them would want to hurt Ahi. So perhaps that left a mysterious third party.
She sighed and took a long walk in the gardens before going back to her apartments.
She heard Ahi’s squeals and giggles long before she slid open the door. She expected to see Malie, but there was someone else in the room. He was lying on the floor holding Ahi high above his head. One would think the child had never been so happy in her life.
“Oh what, sweet one? Should I put you down? Or should I tickle you. . .here!”
Ahi squealed again, and Nahoa felt something warm spreading from her stomach to her tender breasts, to her neck and cheeks and ears until she was overflowing with it.
“She loves you,” Nahoa said, surprising herself.
Pano gently put Ahi down and let her play with one of his large, rough fingers. “I think this little one loves life.”
Nahoa didn’t argue. She didn’t want to lose that sense of profound happiness she felt when she looked at the two of them. Malie was seated by the door, reading a book, but Nahoa could tell she wasn’t paying it much attention.
“Is it safe?” Nahoa asked her. She didn’t remember seeing anyone in the hallway on her way here.
“As safe as it may be. I hope that one knows enough to be careful.”
Pano grimaced. “Malie seems to think it is impossible for a gardener to also be endowed with good sense.”
Malie snapped her book shut. “Not when that gardener is fool enough to think he can win a war against the Mo’i himself.”
“It doesn’t matter what I think we can win. Eliki thinks we’ll lose, and soon, without access to a harbor. And she might be right.”
“If you’re going to lose either way, then surely you’re better off not killing so many in a pointless war first!”
Pano considered this carefully, but Nahoa felt as though her words had hurt him. “Do you think,” he said finally, “that Bloody One-hand will let us off so easily if we surrender?”
Malie blanched and looked down. Nahoa rushed over to hold Ahi and remembered, though she wished she didn’t, what the two guardians had said about her husband in their meeting the other day.
“If you’re going to fight a war,” Nahoa said, her voice a little thick but otherwise steady. “You might want these.”
She undid the top buttons of her shirt and handed the plans, now slightly damp, to Pano. His gaze was blank and distant as he took them. He seemed exhausted. The preparations for this new battle had to be taking their toll on him. He looked at the plans for so long that Ahi fell asleep. His expression was one of wonder, tempered by bitter resignation. She realized with a flash that she had just guaranteed the war that he didn’t want to fight.
“How did you find these, Nahoa?” It was the first time he had addressed her as an equal, by her name. It gave her enough courage to tell him what she had done.
“Eliki will be pleased,” he said, when she finished. “You might have just saved our lives.”
But many would die, she understood. She’d never seen a war—no one alive on the islands had—but she remembered that much from the stories.
“Why did you come here, Pano?” she asked, and then wished she hadn’t because he suddenly seemed so worn down and sad.
“I thought that you might speak to your husband again. Ask him to do the right thing.”
What right thing? Nahoa thought frantically. Kill himself? Had the two guardians told the rebels of their solution? But Pano was continuing, “Tell his troops to stand down. Promise to stop the secret detentions. Give those imprisoned a fair trial. Work with us to help the victims.”
Nahoa’s expression must have been wild, because Pano took her by her shoulders and made her meet his eyes. “It’s okay if you’re too afraid. He’s unpredictable.”
Of course he is, Nahoa thought. Two of the spirit guardians told him he’d be better off dead! But she knew that Kohaku had been unstable long before that. “I’ll speak to him,” she said. “He won’t listen to me, but I’ll try.”
He rolled up the plans and slipped them in the band of his trousers. “If you need to reach me, ask the young one in your stables. She can get into our camp with a message.”
Nahoa was momentarily speechless. “She’s working for you?”
Pano laughed. “Among others, I imagine. The child has a head for business.”
After he left, Malie gave her a speaking look and went off to find their dinner. Nahoa stroked Ahi’s head and wondered at the anatomy of betrayal. It wasn’t Pano. She wouldn’t believe it. She’d believe Kohaku before Pano. And so that left Makaho, who had so much to lose by the death of this child that Nahoa thought she must either be insane, or playing a game that none of them could guess at.
There would be war. Lana would have guessed this from the quiet, determined industriousness that had engulfed the rebel camp in just the one day since Pano had returned from visiting Nahoa. But she heard more than she’d ever wanted from Eliki and Pano about the battle plans and strategy for pushing rebel territory north to the old piers. Kai helped them. He said that if there was going to be a battle, it should be done cleanly. Lana wasn’t so sure. She thought that they should try harder to negotiate with Kohaku, no matter how fruitless it seemed. Surely anything was better than further destabilizing the spirit bindings?
But sometimes Lana thought that Eliki didn’t believe in any spirits at all. To her, the only harm was political. The only solution was violence. Or, at least, violence was the primary option. Lana kept to the room Eliki had given her, for the whole of the first district had dedicated itself to making as many of the coveted bows and arrows as they could. Thanks to Nahoa’s ingenuity. Lana wondered what it must have taken for her to break with her husband like that, to give his mortal enemies his most deadly secret. Kohaku had become notoriously cruel—she wondered how much of that cruelty Nahoa had witnessed firsthand.
The main hall of the rebel camp was now filled with ten or so soldiers, sanding down boughs of wood and fitting sharp triangles of alloyed copper onto notched hafts. Eliki and Pano spent a great deal of time huddled close to the fire, poring over maps and reports from their soldiers and spies, which came in at odd intervals. Late one evening, when Pano was out on one of his long errands, Lana even spotted Sabolu receiving whispered instructions from Eliki. Sabolu’s
eyes widened when she saw Lana observing her and she nearly fell on her face as she stumbled out the door.
Lana frowned and squatted by the fire. Her hands always felt frozen these days, so she held them up as close to the licking flames as she dared. “I hope you’re not putting that one into danger,” Lana said quietly to Eliki.
The rebel leader’s cool, pink-eyed stare was unnerving. She managed to convey contempt without so much as a flicker in her expression. “And what makes you think I can choose that for her?”
“She’s young. Too young to understand what might happen if she gets caught.”
Eliki tilted her head and blew a derisive puff of air, as though she couldn’t be bothered to laugh. “Oh, you’re suddenly so concerned for her welfare? You paid the child to spy for you, too. She knows Makaho better than either of us. I think she understands precisely what she’s risking.”
Lana thought of the startled fear in Sabolu’s eyes and wondered if Eliki might not be right. But still. . . “You’re about to start a war,” she said.
Eliki frowned; on her normally smooth and controlled features, it had the force of a snarl. “This has always been a war, black angel. Do not mistake that.”
“And if you lose it?”
“Then I imagine the spirits whose disposition so concerns you will make all of our lives so miserable that Sabolu will have far greater problems.”
Lana sighed, outmaneuvered but still uneasy. “Isn’t there some third way? Something other than all this?” She gestured to the room, where one rebel soldier was testing the fit of an arrow into a newly made bow. It made her back ache just to look at it.
“Like what? Going to Bloody One-hand and hoping he won’t massacre us all for believing we should have better governance?”
“Don’t put it so—”
“Intelligently?”
“Like one of your damn pamphlets! Not everything stands or falls on principles. There are people—not just your rebel soldiers, but regular struggling people—who will die when you fight your way north.”
“We’re issuing a call for all in the area to leave or join us here.”
“And you think everyone will? What about the old, the sick, the injured? Imagine them stuck in their half-burned homes, wondering if it will be the rebels’ or Kohaku’s arrows that kill them?”
Eliki’s mouth thinned. Suddenly, her eyes seemed not so much pink as red, reflecting the fire. “We do what we must. There are no perfect solutions.”
“You’re playing with people’s lives, as though they don’t matter.” “We’re saving them. Or have you forgotten why those people are sick and injured? Why their homes are half burned? Why there is no one in this city who hasn’t lost someone they love to a painful, fiery death?” Lana’s throat felt very dry. “So you’ll become as bad as him to stop him?” she asked, though almost immediately she wished she hadn’t.
Eliki leaned back in her chair; fire extinguished, suddenly exhausted. “If you’re as naive as all that, then I don’t know why you’re here. Go back to your father. Help him tend the injured in One-hand’s hospitals. Congratulate yourself on your benevolent good works. But leave us be, for we have work to do.”
So Lana stood and left her, angry and wounded and inexplicably ashamed.
It was difficult to entice the head nun out of her temple, but Kohaku had done so that afternoon, much to Makaho’s thinly veiled displeasure. The ash clouds filtered the sun into perpetual twilight, turning the winter air chill enough that even Makaho had deigned to drape her pendulous breasts in a swath of austere black barkcloth secured with a rope. Even so, her hands were red and chapped with cold. Kohaku ordered a tea service brought for them before she could object. The fire temple might be one of the most luxurious dwellings in Essel, but the head nun lived as simply as an outer island officiant. Kohaku had never seen any evidence that Makaho harbored the slightest religious conviction, and yet he had to admit that she held herself detached, as though all of these mundane politics in which she so forcefully engaged were only an ugly means to a higher purpose. She accumulated power and wealth like an urchin does a stench, and yet she seemed to use none of it for personal gain. She flaunted her ascetism and used it to her advantage. Kohaku sipped his tea and watched as Makaho leaned closer to the fire. What hair she had left was wiry, gray, and closecropped. Her eyes were a small, hard brown and her skin was dark for an Esselan and liberally marked with old burns.
“Am I particularly beautiful today, Mo’i?” she asked, her thin lips twisting into habitual scorn.
Kohaku looked down quickly at his tea and grimaced. “Much the same as always,” he said.
Makaho laughed. “Ah, neatly done. But I assume you did not call me here to admire my looks.”
Kohaku stood abruptly, agitated as he had been for the last several days. “Of course not,” he said, and was surprised to hear what sounded like a snarl.
“You could have come to the temple,” Makaho said, unfazed. “It raises fewer questions.”
He stared at her for a moment and then began to pace. “Your temple has leaks,” he said, and was pleased that the effort to keep his voice steady had largely succeeded.
This didn’t surprise her. “It’s a large facility. As is the Mo’i’s house. Nothing of importance has escaped.”
Nothing? He wondered bleakly. Yet how long before he saw this headline in those damned rebel pamphlets: Bloody One-hand can save the city—his self-sacrifice will put Nui’ahi to rest. Kaleakai, the water guardian, was still walking free and helping the rebels. It had been five days since the two guardians had confronted him in the temple. If the public heard what they had said, Kohaku wondered if any army would be large enough to protect him then.
“Every day he stays free you’re in greater danger,” Emea said, appearing beside Makaho.
Kohaku ignored her. If he was insane, he couldn’t afford to let anyone know it, especially not a ruthless player like the head nun.
“You know what you have to do,” said his sister.
He glared at her, realized what he had done, and quickly shifted his gaze to Makaho. “I know what we must do,” he said.
She inclined her head. “And what is that, Mo’i?”
“Lay a trap for him.”
She tilted her head in polite confusion. “Who?”
Too late, Kohaku realized that he had been continuing his conversation with Emea. “The water guardian. Kaleakai,” he said.
“I didn’t realize he had become an ongoing concern. I take it your meeting didn’t go well?”
Kohaku resisted the urge to scream. “He’s a threat to the stability of my government. There’s no other way. Something with a geas, but a trap, otherwise no one will be strong enough to overpower him. Do you know a witch we can trust enough for this?”
Makaho put down her tea. “Are you suggesting we kill the water guardian through treachery, Kohaku?”
Her tone was remarkably flat. She could have been asking him if he preferred amant or palm wine for all of her apparent interest in the answer. One could be lulled by her pretense of disinterest, but he had learned caution.
“No, I’m suggesting we capture him through treachery. He knows too much. I hear he’s helping the rebels—”
“He’s the black angel’s lover, and she’s helping the rebels.”
That bit him more than it should have. “So then he’s a danger,” Makaho tilted her head slightly, a gesture that might have been appealing on a younger, beautiful woman but on her looked merely sinister. “So they both are. You’ve already tried to kill her once.”
She’d heard about that? But better not to show his surprise. “He’s more important. If we capture him, we’ll have leverage over the rebels. Especially if he’s with Lana.”
“I see,” she said, and he realized that she must have guessed some of it. But it didn’t matter—she knew better than most how Kohaku’s secrets drove him. He just needed to prevent her from knowing the details.
“I have
some familiarity with geas,” she said. “Nothing that could harm him in a direct confrontation, but a clever trap I think I could manage.”
This surprised him. “I’ve never seen you lay a geas before.”
She shrugged. “I prefer to leave the fire spirit to its business. There are still those, you know, who don’t feel the spirit bindings were an entirely wise decision.”
Kohaku could only stare. Makaho, the head of the largest monument to the spirits in all of Essel, had sympathies with the napulo fringe movement?
“Like the barbarians who live on the wind island?”
Makaho smiled with bloodless lips. “Like them. Like a few other, more civilized people. The spirits were bound by people, Kohaku. They can be unbound.”
“With such marvelous results,” he said, gesturing west without thinking.
“And to think, the napulo disciples have made you a hero.”
The irony resonated a second later and he flushed. Of course. Who else would a representative of the fire spirit, a sympathizer with the anti – spirit-binding napulo, align herself with than the one who had helped weaken that very spirit’s bonds?
“See, brother? You did a good thing. The times are changing.”
Kohaku turned on his heel so he could avoid Emea’s blue flame eyes. Everything had gone wrong since the fire spirit’s temple, hadn’t it? And no matter how he tried to smother the flames, ever more kept leaping up around him.
“So you’ll help me with this?” he said, still turned away from her.
“When have I refused you, Mo’i?”
Indeed. Such was the nature of her hold over him, the nature of his utter dependence. “I heard my daughter was ill,” he said. Around Makaho he didn’t bother to mask the pain that entered his voice whenever he mentioned Nahoa or Lei’ahi. She knew so much that any subterfuge would be vanity.
“Yes,” she said. There was a strange note in her voice—almost tentative—that made him turn around. She wouldn’t meet his eyes. “It was very bad. I don’t know what you heard.”
The Burning City (Spirit Binders) Page 23
