It was all a bluff, though, and Baern probably knew. She had no choice but to wait for Lavery’s arrival, whether it be in seven days or twenty. The future of Avestas depended on him, and she wouldn’t go down in history as the woman who had abandoned the final hope, the last glimpse of light before eternal darkness.
What an epitaph that would be: Here lies Elaya, enabler of destruction. No one will likely read this because humanity has expired, thanks in no small part to the woman beneath this stone.
No, thank you. That sounded positively shitty.
She pushed the thought of extinction out of her mind. It wasn’t a joyous one, and worse, it didn’t seem nearly as far-fetched as she would have liked. Baern had information that dragons were returning, but nothing comprehensive. He didn’t know when, where, how many—otherwise known as the important details.
Even if this army of the dead did exist—something Elaya refused to believe until she saw it with her own eyes—would it be enough? Apparently it had been in the past, but that was with all of Avestas united, not fractured as it was now.
She shivered and imagined happier times. Then, a while later, after walking the length of the camp, she returned to the inn. Her mercenaries slept on chairs and tables and the floor. Tig and a couple others had snagged the few cots upstairs. They each offered their bed to her, but she declined. Sleep wouldn’t come easy to her right now; she had maps to study, Silderine weaknesses to review, assault points to reconsider.
She had a plan to perfect.
Lavery was cold, famished, and lonely. So the point of Laythe’s finger and deadpanned announcement, “Tactin’s Fist,” jolted him with excitement and hope.
“Wow,” he said, looking beyond the cratered proper of Tactin’s Fist, “that is a lot of tents. I’ve never seen that many tents.”
Laythe idled the horse. “I have. In war.” He sniffed the air. “Stay here.” He clambered off the saddle and added, “Scoot up. If anyone comes for you, kick your heels into his belly and aim him toward me. Do you understand?”
Lavery desperately hoped it wouldn’t come to that, but he nodded that he understood.
Laythe rapped a nail on the phylactery. “Above all, keep that safe.” He started off toward the crater, a shadowy figure loping into the darkness.
Tepidly, Lavery reached for the reins. He lifted them, examined them. This wasn’t his first time on the saddle alone; he’d ridden plenty around the Valios proper and even out to the Graw Woods once. But he’d never feared for his life during those times; he knew people acted differently when death rounded the corner and chased them down.
His head snapped this way and that; shadows seemed to dance outside his field of vision, but when he looked… nothing.
“It’s okay, boy,” he told the horse, who seemed not in the least frightened. He stroked its mane. “You don’t have to be scared.”
After what seemed like far too long for such a short walk, a silhouetted Laythe crested the hill. With hands cupped around his mouth, he hollered, “Bring him in.”
Lavery patted the horse’s neck. “See? I told you it’d be okay.” He kicked the steed into a slow walk, soon reaching the lanky Wraith Walker, who jumped on and guided the horse the remainder of the way.
He tied him to a horizontal post attached to what had once been a triangular chapel. The triangular form remained, but behind the doors lay hay, hoes, pails, horseshoes, wire brushes—essentially an a la carte of horse-keeping materials and tools for travelers passing through.
Lavery followed closely behind Laythe, arms wrapped around the phylactery so tightly that a would-be thief would need a crowbar to pry them off. Or a sword. Yes, a sword would probably work very well.
Into the well-lit inn they went. The stench of stale ale and old wine almost floored Lavery. He’d recalled this was what the Valiosian tavern often smelled like, but after being with nature for nearly two months, such scents felt overwhelming.
“There he is,” said a familiar voice, throaty and strained. “Boy of the hour. If you’re holding what I think you are, then you’re the man of the hour.”
“Baern!” Lavery darted between tables, kneeing chairs out of the way. “You’re actually here. And… Elaya? Tig, Adom, Kaun. I don’t understand; are you helping us?”
Baern gestured for Lavery to hand over the phylactery. He did so eagerly, glad to be rid of the thing.
“Helping?” Elaya said, drinking from a horn. “You could say that. You need to get into Silderine, and we happen to be taking Silderine.”
Laythe was removing the few foodstuffs that remained in the sacks. He stopped. “Is that a jest?”
“Did it sound like one?”
He straightened, tongue firm against his cheek, irritated. “You cannot take Silderine.”
“Well, we—”
“End of discussion. You cannot do it. Take your aspirations elsewhere.” He crouched and began again, setting aside dirty potatoes and carrots.
Elaya drained her horn of wine. As she took the handle of a flagon and refilled it, she smiled. “You saw the army yourself. That’s my army. I’m taking Silderine, that I promise you.”
Baern lifted an eye at Elaya, then resumed rotating the phylactery. He looked bewildered. “There should be a key…”
Lavery touched his pocket. “Oh. Yes, there is. Sorry.” He handed it over, then started as a potato met its executioner: the floor. Laythe had slammed the tuber to the ground in apparent frustration.
“I don’t care if you have an army of dragons,” he said, hands moving erratically as he fumed. Lavery had never seen him display so much emotion, on either side of the spectrum. “I do not question your ability to usurp the rulers of Silderine. Simply, you are not allowed.”
Elaya chugged, then threw aside the horn. She stood and met Laythe, an arm’s length of space between them. “You’re going to stop me?”
Laythe’s chest inflated, then deflated harshly. He looked to Baern. “Would you chime in, Keeper?”
Baern had opened the phylactery. Both his face and hands were inside. He pulled out a prismatic crown that looked as if it’d been made by melting an assortment of colorful gems—amethysts, rubies, emeralds, lapis lazuli, bloodstones, topazes, moonstones—and pouring them into a mold.
It reflected brilliant flashes of light from the flickering torches throughout the inn. Upon closer inspection, Lavery noticed it wasn’t reflecting much of anything; it seemed to be creating its own light, pouring out within the crown itself and then shooting off as crisp rays that zigged and zagged into his eyes and across them.
“Keeper,” Laythe reiterated.
Baern laid the crown in his lap and produced another item from the phylactery: an empty vial. At least it appeared empty. Given a quick shake, clear liquid sloshed inside, splashing against the cork. “Er, what’s the problem now?”
“Sil-der-ine,” Laythe hissed, teeth gnashed. “She cannot—”
Baern set down the phylactery. He put the crown in Lavery’s lap, then the vial, which he held on to momentarily, telling Lavery, “Don’t touch that one.” He put an arm around Laythe and whispered something, prompting the two to walk side by side outside.
“Fancy-shmancy crown,” Adom said. He squeezed the back of Lavery’s neck. “How you been, pal?”
“I’ve been better,” Lavery admitted.
“Us too. Well, maybe not Paya.” Paya was sitting a table over, face in a bowl of bread chunks, fingers sitting on a plate of oil and herbs. “Can one of you heartless bastards make sure she’s still breathing?”
Tig scooted over on his chair from three tables over, screeching all the way. He put his mouth right next to Paya’s ear. “PAYA!” he screamed.
She flew up, then backward, crashing into a set of chairs behind her. The entire inn erupted with uncontrollable laughter. Even Lavery found himself chuckling. It’d been a long time since he’d done that.
“Goddamnit,” Paya spat. “Fuck you, Tig. Why are you even here? Go find a clan of ogres; you’ll fit in re
al nicely.”
Again, a ruckus of laughter. Everyone quieted when Baern and Laythe walked back in. Laythe seemed displeased. Angry. He sat far from Elaya, then after a moment of brooding pointed at her and said, “You remember this: whatever happens there, it’s on your hands.”
Elaya sat, locked her hands behind her head and pointed her chin at Baern. “What’s his problem?”
“Indoctrination is powerful,” Baern said. “And you can’t kill an idea.”
“Bluntly,” Elaya said. “Tell it to me bluntly; don’t feed me riddles. I’m too drunk to decipher them.”
“Your crusade against the Daughters—”
“It’s against the Twin Sisters.”
A granted nod of Baern’s head. “It may embolden their cause.”
Elaya shrugged. “Not if they’re all dead.”
Lavery felt uncomfortable, as if in the presence of a friend who had finally showed her true personality—one that was apathetic to violence and murder. She is a mercenary, he reminded himself.
Baern watched Lavery fumble with the crown. He held it far from his eyes, inspecting it with caution. “Go on. Place it atop your head.”
A wrinkle of consternation marked the bridge of his nose. “Right now?”
“Sure. Let’s see how it looks on you.”
Lavery picked the crown up with both hands, waited for several moments, then lifted it onto his head. “I feel silly.”
“You don’t wear a crown like that,” Baern said. He pushed it down, securing the band around his skull. “There. Now it won’t fall off and skitter away when you look up at the heavens.”
Lavery frowned. “Do I need to wear it? Can’t I—I don’t know, carry it?”
“Kings do not carry their crowns. They wear them.”
“I’m not a king.”
“Of the dead, you are.”
That didn’t make Lavery feel better. In fact, it made him feel a whole lot worse.
“We leave in the morning,” Baern said. “We’ll arrive at Silderine in two days, ideally at nightfall. And then we bring that wall down.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
“You told them I was a general.” There was a question in there, maybe, but mostly it was a statement of disbelief.
“It sounded better than telling them you’re my bodyguard,” Oriana explained.
“I s’pose,” Rol said. “But I’m no general. I can’t tell you the first thing about mass warfare and all those nitpicky strategies they employ. I’m a sellsword, not a commander.”
Oriana motioned at Perfumer Fartook several paces ahead. “Get a rose from him, if he offers.”
Rol looked at her as if she were mad. “What am I, the general of flowers?”
“It’s for me. They smell divine. But he’s already given me one… I think it’d be rude if I asked for another.”
“I don’t care for this place.” He kept his arms tucked tight to his body as people passed by, and was constantly scratching at his neck, fumbling with his fingers. “It’s too proper.”
“How is a simple dress like that, or a tunic like that, or a skirt, or a headdress—none of that is very proper. No gems, no silvery threads, no fifteen layers of fluff that the ladies of nobility enjoy wearing—or are forced to wear—in Haeglin.”
They passed the perfumer. He smiled knowingly at Oriana, but made no move toward Rol. She smiled back, then turned and frowned. “I really wanted another one. I guess I could pay for it.”
A woman in a silk dress cut off at the knees lingered, heading in the same direction. Her chestnut hair was smooth and curly, and her skin bright and soft.
Rol regarded himself with disdain. “I look like a buffoon. Dressed in oiled leather and chain and these old-as-my-dead-grandma boots. D’ya have any idea how many years I’ve worn these things?”
Oriana stifled a laugh; he was being absolutely ridiculous right now, but also sincere in his worries. “They add character. I like them.”
“Six years. Six. That’s”—he flung his hand up—“what, six plus… and then add another… that’s five decades in boot years.”
“Oh? There’s a formula for determining the true age of your boots?”
“Ori…”
She stopped, affectionately grabbed hold of his arm and brought him in close. “Rol, you look fine. Great, even. Wonderful. I never took you as someone who cared how he appeared to others.”
“Bah,” he grumbled. “That’s not it. I just feel wrong being here. Forget it, I’m bloody tired, that’s the problem.”
She smiled and snuggled up close to him, hand advancing up his arm, inside the sleeve of his mail. “I like it, actually.”
“My bitching? You enjoy that?”
“Your fears,” she said. “I like when you tell me them. I know all about your boldness and courage and virility, but to see the other side of you… it’s quite nice.”
“It’s not a fear, it’s—”
She lurched onto the tips of her toes and put her lips to his. “Shh. Don’t ruin it,” she said, winking. With the soles of her feet on the sandy cobbles again, she went toward the citadel. “I have a plan. I just need you to go along with it, act, er—”
“Generalish?” Rol suggested.
“Yes, generalish.” She grinned. He lifted his chin, set his jaw. Narrowed his eyes. “What are you doing?”
“Acting generalish. Do I look the part?”
“Well. No, not really. Just nod along and chime in with obvious interjections but, um—in an authoritative manner.”
He let out a long ooookay whistle. “I’ll try not to embarrass us. How’s that?”
“Works for me.”
Quen was no longer posted at the citadel doors. Oriana wondered if he’d taken her advice and resigned. She and Rol requested Sir Dorull. He arrived in short order and escorted them to the second floor, last door on the right.
Oriana thought this was a strange location for a Council meeting. Her father had always reserved the grandiosity of the throne room for such gatherings. What she didn’t know was that each floor of the citadel had a specific theme. The first floor, for example, consisted of the kitchen, scullery, buttery, and larder. The second floor was reserved for official business of the crown. On each floor, the most important—or prestigious—room lay at the end of the hall.
At the end of the second floor lay the War Room headed by the queen, General Hastings, Spymaster Brom Craune, and Master-at-Arms Lord Grendig. Officially, they were called the Council of War. Unofficially, the queen referred to them as the Council of Bore. The Council met once weekly to discuss matters of espionage, geopolitical events and happenings, the ambiance and temperament of minor houses that swore fealty to Torbinen, military needs, and—if necessary—war planning.
Generally, these meetings rehashed the same information as the week prior with a smattering of new developments. Today was different. It felt different, if you were a regular attendee. Gone were the flagons of wine, the relaxed posture of General Hastings, the seemingly permanent smile of Lord Grendig, and the tardiness of the spymaster.
Oriana took a seat across from General Hastings, a barrel-chested, jaw-carved-from-a-mountain sort of man. Rol sat next to her. He peered into a mug that a servant brought, only to be disappointed to find water inside.
“Dragons are on the agenda,” said the queen, taking her place at the head of the table. Silver bangles jingled from her wrists, and green gems dangled from her ears. “I bet you thought you’d never hear that in your lifetime, General Hastings.”
“Can’t say I did.”
Calmly, with clasped hands, the queen scrutinized each face at the table, ending with Rol. “I’m not sure who you are.”
“Rol. Er, General Rol.”
“I see. Welcome, Rol. Or rather, General Rol.” She stared at him precisely long enough to make him fidget uncomfortably, then switched her attention to Oriana. “I’ve given my general, spymaster, and master-at-arms a synopsis of the unfolding events. I’m sure they
have questions.”
General Hastings leaned forward. “The queen tells me the dragons are categorized into clutches.”
“They are, and each clutch—”
“Practices a different a sorcery.”
“They’re not sorceries,” Oriana said.
“Close enough. Explain them.”
Oriana did so thoroughly but succinctly; she’d learned the latter is always preferable to the former, but if you make each word count, you can fulfill both.
She told them the Crimson Clutch breathed fire, the Bluesoul Clutch ice, and the Wryth Clutch plague; the Evanescence Clutch rived time itself, birthing gateways through which the clutches could flee or, less likely, arrive.
“You said there were five clutches,” Lord Grendig said.
“There are. Those are the ones whose breath should concern you. The Iron Clutch won’t melt you or freeze you, but they will rip you apart limb by limb. They devour rock and metal, augmenting their strength.”
“All I know about dragons,” the spymaster said, “is what I’ve gleaned from books. Their intelligence appears to rival our own.”
“They’re not stupid, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“What I’m asking is, how intelligent are they? If I were heading an army of dragons, I would attack from various points. I would surround the city.”
“With respect, spymaster,” Oriana said, “that’s not intelligence. It’s a strategy, and one that dragons do not take. They persevere through chaos. They’ll storm every kingdom, city and village on Avestas with the full might of their clutches. They overwhelm and sow confusion.”
“And their scales?” asked the master-at-arms. “Can they deflect the blow of a sword? An arrow?”
Oriana sipped her water. She felt like she was at a confirmation table, being interrogated by Council members to determine her expertise on the position awaiting her. “They can, but repeated blows will cause their scales to separate from their flesh or fracture.”
“Our catapults could break through their armor with a single launch, I bet.”
Rol cleared his throat. “It’d be a damn tough thing to do, hitting a flying dragon with a boulder.”
The Dragon Thief (Sorcery and Sin Book 1) Page 34
