As Iron Falls (The Wings of War Book 4)

by Bryce O'Connor

  “My Uncle Jarden used to tell me that,” he said aloud, though he didn’t look down from the sky. “And other things, too. You remind me of him, in a way.”

  Syrah made a choking, laughing sound.

  “I hope not in too many ways,” she said teasingly, and Raz made out the sound of her boots as she approached. “My complexion doesn’t favor a tan.”

  “Or dreaded hair,” Raz chuckled, finally looking down at her as she came to stand by his side. “Or a clan-chain.”

  Syrah winced, one hand reaching up to rub her ear like it suddenly hurt.

  “No,” she agreed quickly. “No, I don’t think so…”

  Raz laughed again. “I mean,” he continued, glancing one last time at the heavens, “that Jarden would have liked you. They all would have liked you, I think.”

  There was a silence, the two of them standing side by side in the dark. After a little while, Syrah stepped closer and wrapped one arm around his waist, holding him tight. She didn’t say a word, but her touch drove away the dull ache of grief that had just started to well up in Raz’s chest. Letting go of Ahna with one hand, he wrapped his own arm about her shoulders, and together they waited like that in silence, faces turned toward the sky, watching the Moon and Her Stars drift their way across the night.

  That was how Odene found them a few minutes later, stepping out from the noisy bustle of the Red Shield’s common room and looking both ways down the road before hurrying across to the alley. They broke apart as he reached them, but the kuja didn’t so much as blink.

  “We have the rooms,” he said quietly. “Akelo paid for three nights. The owner has a few thugs hired, and says the locals know better than to steal from her. I should be able to hitch Gale and Nymara up outside the tavern without any trouble.”

  “Good,” Syrah said, sounding a little relieved. “I don’t know how much use we’ll have for them in the city, but you can’t be too careful.”

  Raz nodded in agreement. “Did Akelo find a street-facing room?” he asked the Percian.

  In response, Odene turned and pointed upward. Following his finger, it didn’t take more than a moment for Raz to make out Cyper leaning out of one of the third-story windows, looking up and down the street to make sure all was clear. Apparently seeing nothing concerning, the West Isler waved them up hurriedly.

  “Syrah, leave your staff here,” Raz told the Priestess quickly, leaning Ahna against the wall to his left as he eyed the façade of the tavern, studying the walls and windows and ledges. “I’ll come back for them after.”

  “After what?” Syrah asked in confusion, frowning up at Cyper. “What is he doing, waving at us like—?”

  And then it dawned on her, and she groaned.

  “Can’t exactly go through the front door, can we?” Raz asked her with a wink, bending down to loop an arm around her waist.

  CHAPTER 43

  “There are always those who would see you fail. No matter how many friends you think you have, no matter how many allies you believe you can count on. When you sit upon this throne, you do not have the luxury of showing anger, of showing fear. You may not indulge in the display of fondness or appreciation. Such things can be taken as weaknesses, as opportunity for exploitation, or as opportunity to strike…”

  —Koran Esente, Tash of Karesh Syl, to his First Hand, Ekene

  CRASH!

  “HOW?” Naizer Ima bellowed in half-panic, ignoring the shattered remnants of the porcelain vase he had just smashed into the ground at his feet. “HOW? WHAT HAPPENED?”

  “Naizer, calm down,” Yseri Suro told the man sternly. “You are a Hand of the Tash, not a child. Control yourself!”

  “CONTROL MYSELF?” the Second Hand demanded, like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “CONTROL MYSELF? HOW CAN I BE EXPECTED TO CONTROL MYSELF WHEN WE’VE LOST TEN MEN, AND THE CITY HAS BEEN BREACHED?”

  “We lost two,” Azzeki Koro corrected evenly, though he looked to be having a hard time not smirking at the Second’s tantrum. “The eight others were merely incapacitated.”

  “‘Merely incapacitated,’” Naizer repeated in a mocking tone, glaring at the Third Hand. “How does that change the fact that—for the first time in over three hundred years—enemies of Karesh Syl have managed to get inside our walls?”

  “It does not,” Koro said with a smug nod. “Which is why it pains me to point out that all this might have been avoided had my advice been heeded sooner.”

  At that, Ekene felt his temper flare, and he narrowed his dark eyes at his Third.

  “Mind your tone,” he said dangerously. “Our response was not lacking. Thirty of my own slaves, thirty of our fastest horses, and a hundred and fifty soldiers set upon the east roads. I find it hard to believe any man, legend or not, could have escaped the attention of the patrols.”

  “I have my doubts he dodged them at all, great Tash,” the Third Hand said with a gracious incline of his head. “I have reason to believe he cut right through them.”

  That sent a shiver across the room. Even Ekene, who prided himself on his calm demeanor, felt the thrum of a troubling knot form in his stomach.

  They were in his personal quarters this morning, a series of some dozen chambers consisting of his own rooms, those of his numerous wives and courtesans, a privy, and his private library. White-and-gold silks hung over the wide arched windows in the south wall of the space, drifting lazily in the breeze of the new day. Blue and red tiles—matching the numerous vases, one of which Naizer had elected to smash in his fit—decorated the ceiling, floors, and the spiraled pillars that adjoined the two. The sprawling expanse of Ekene’s covered bed took up much of the wall behind him, but the Tash had elected to sit in the center of the room on a cushion in a plain oak chair one of his slaves had procured for him.

  He didn’t for a moment miss the hard, cold stone of his throne in the courtroom far below.

  Ekene and his three Hands were alone in the chambers. His wives and lovers had all scurried off at his command, followed quickly by the servants and soldiers, leaving the four of them to their business. The news of the assault on the east gate hadn’t reached him more than twenty minutes after its discovery with the changing of the guard a few hours after midnight, and by the time the Hands had been summoned—Koro appearing in his rooms as he always did, as though by magic—the ten soldiers had been found dead and unconscious. Ekene hadn't spoken to any of them personally, of course, but Yseri had departed at once to do just that, returning with disturbing news just before the Sun’s rise.

  “We’re sure it’s him?” Naizer demanded for the fifth time, the squeak in his voice betraying him all too well. “We’re absolutely sure?”

  This time, even Azzeki Koro rolled his eyes, though it was the First who answered.

  “We’re sure, Naizer,” Yseri said testily, reaching up to rub a temple with the thumb of one hand, like the questions were giving him a headache. “If you insist, I’m sure Koro won’t have a problem summoning up our Southern friends again, just to confirm?”

  The Second scowled at that, but didn’t respond. Indeed, he’d kept much the same silence when the Mahsadën assassin, Na’zeem, had appeared at Koro’s command, much like the Third himself did. The Southerner had been quick to confirm what Koro had already told them: based on the descriptions of the men Yseri had interrogated, at least four of the eight who’d survived had been felled by Northern magic. The woman, Syrah Brahnt, was in the city.

  Which meant the Dragon couldn’t be far behind…

  “What are our options?” Ekene asked, cutting across the tension of the moment. “If it is safe to assume that Arro has breached our walls, where do we go from here?”

  Though he asked the question to the room, it was Koro his eyes fell on.

  The Third obliged at once. “All the usual protocols for such a situation should be followed,” he said thoughtfully. “Additional patrols in the streets, and searches of anywhere the beast might have holed himself up in. Karesh Syl is unlike a
ny city I believe he has ever known. He won’t find the shelter here he is accustomed to, and what friends he has he will likely have brought with him. He does not know the terrain of the fight he is picking. Let us use that to our advantage.”

  “Agreed,” Yseri said at once, nodding approvingly at the man. “Even if we do not find him outright, we will very likely disrupt his plans, if he has any.”

  “Exactly,” Koro concurred. “Keep him on edge. Keep him on his toes. Arro is not a man to be underestimated, great Tash. He’s proven that twice to you, now, and many times over to me, which is all the more reason to keep him from becoming established.”

  “Involve the slaves, as well,” Yseri pressed. “We know Arro has a weakness for their kind. We can use them as a distraction, or as bait.”

  “Yes…” Koro said, sounding almost impressed as he raised a brow at the man. “Distress their community. Less food. Harsher punishments. Random beatings. It’s easy enough to pass off as a response to the events at the east gates. We don’t want them getting it in their heads that we are weak right now.”

  Ekene listened to all of this, nodding in slow agreement. When they were done, though, his eyes didn’t leave the Third Hand.

  “And you?” he asked evenly. “Where will you be in all of this? I was under the impression it was the fervent desire of our Southern guests to bring the Monster’s head back to their new šef?”

  “It is,” Koro answered, “but until such time as we have a sense of where Arro might be, their strength poses little value in such a routing. With your permission, we will stay by your side, night and day. Should the beast be found, we will reassess. Until then, though, I would feel better having you under the eye of the only men the Monster might not see coming from a mile off.”

  “AAGH!”

  There was a second crash of breaking porcelain, and another vase smashed into a hundred pieces across the tiled floor.

  “Naizer!” Ekene thundered, tiring of the man’s childish behavior. “ENOUGH! If you see fit to lay your hands on anything else in these chambers, I’ll have you thrown in chains and let it be known to the entire city who you are! I’m sure the other slaves will appreciate your presence in their midst!”

  The threat did its job. The Second blanched, hurriedly bowing in apology. “Your pardon, great Tash,” he said weakly. “I am merely… uh… distressed that it has so rapidly come to this.”

  “As are we all,” Yseri said impatiently. “And yet you are the only one I see smashing the Tash’s possessions like a spoiled infant!”

  Naizer nodded shakily. “With your permission, Your Greatness, I will excuse myself. Clearly I am not in an even state of mind, and I have much work to do if we are to pay our soldiers for the time they will be spending scouring the city streets soon.”

  “Go,” Ekene snapped at once. Then he looked around at the other two. “All of you. Leave me. Handle this business. I want updates every hour. Moreover, I want that beast’s head on a stick, and the bitch sorceress’ along with it.”

  At once, all three of his Hands bowed, bidding him the formal farewells before taking their leave, Yseri and Naizer through the door of the chambers, Koro through the nearest window. For a long time after they were gone, Ekene sat alone, staring at the shards of the shattered jars, the morning’s events pressing down on him. Steadily, despite every effort to control it, the Tash’s heart began to thud in his chest, faster and faster until his hands began to shake. The knot in his stomach tightened, twisting about itself as his breathing grew uneven and shaky.

  Then, all at once, Ekene shoved himself up from his chair, snatched a third vase from where it sat on a pedestal beside him, and hurled it across the room with a shrieking, furious scream as it smashed against the far wall.

  CHAPTER 44

  “It… It was like nothing I’ve ever seen. Nothing I’ve ever imagined… By the time I got to my window, most of them were already dead. I… I didn’t even have time to understand what was going on before he killed the others, too… Sun have mercy on us all…”

  —witness statement, taken by soldiers of Karesh Syl

  Raz knew no later than the following morning that he had done well picking the Red Shield Lodge. The small rooms were cramped—four men in a space meant for one or two would naturally cause some discomfort—and the fact that he and Syrah were utterly confined to their quarters while Akelo and Cyper were able to at least descend to the common room didn’t help much. On the other hand, though, the Sun had risen with the expected chaos of soldiers thundering up and down the road outside, shouting orders and demanding that any with information regarding the events at the east gate come forward, and no one had bothered their little group.

  Yet.

  It was only a matter of time. Raz knew that. Syrah had been right in her own way, too, though he still wasn’t ready to admit it just yet. The Red Shield appeared far from the first place the army was looking for the perpetrators of the crimes, but with each hour they got closer and closer to being discovered. They would have to move, likely sooner than later, but Raz was still at a loss as to where they could go next. They had the gold—Akelo had barely used half of what had been left to them of the Moalas’ treasure and the coin and valuables they’d looted from the patrols along the road east—but was it so easy as to simply change establishments? Maybe they could find out what inns and taverns had already been searched, and make for one of them?

  Somehow, Raz doubted it would do the trick. Erom and Aleem had returned from fetching bread and meat from the horses’ saddle pouches with the news that gossip was circulating among the common folk. Though the soldiers Raz had heard outside the window had never said a word of it, apparently rumors were abound that ‘the Dragon’ had come to Karesh Syl.

  If the Tash knew he was within the city walls, Raz thought it likely he needed a better plan than lying low in the dingy parts of town, and he needed it fast.

  As it turned out, though, his and Syrah’s stay at the Red Shield ended up being—for better or for worse—far shorter than any of them expected.

  They made it the length of the day without disruption, which both of them would look back on in amazement later. The Sun rose and fell, Raz, Syrah, Akelo, and Cyper discussing in increasingly desperate terms what they should do next, the others cycling in to voice their opinions. Even Hur made an appearance sometime in the afternoon, thick arms crossed over a massive chest as he scowled at a ludicrous idea suggested by Harnen, one of the Northerners, that they charge the Tash’s palace outright while they still had some element of surprise. By the time night began to fall they had chased their tails in circles more times than they could count, sending out the group in pairs to scout the city in every direction as far as they dared, though no one brought back good news. Not a single half-decent option for their next hideout had been found, and everyone reported there were more soldiers prowling the streets than they liked. Several men returned with stories of the patrols unnecessarily roughing up anyone who looked suspicious, and Zehir and Odene had actually been stopped by one such group of guards.

  Fortunately, the kuja had abandoned their filthy soldiers' uniforms that morning, and their old mismatched gear had been enough to hide the scars that marked their wrists and ankles.

  Far more trouble arrived, though, just after the Sun had set in truth.

  As the darkness of the evening settled over the city, Raz braved opening the room window to peer outside. He told himself it was just to get some fresh air circulating through the space—a score of men who’d had little opportunity to bath in several weeks had passed through the quarters that day, after all—but the truth was that he just needed to see the sky, even for a minute or two. He hated being cooped up. After nearly three months spent between the open air of the sea and the flat vastness of the savannah, the room felt as much a cage to Raz as actual iron bars would have.

  Syrah, Akelo, and Cyper hadn't given up their conversation, but Raz only half-listened to the West Isler insisting they shou
ld consider trying to find an entrance to the sewer system, a network of tunnels beneath the streets that carried water and waste out of the city to Sun-knew-where. It would have been a good plan, except that it was perhaps the fifth time they had rehashed it, with Akelo shooting the hope down with all the same arguments once again. They had no idea where the entrances were, if there existed any. They didn’t know how big the tunnels might be, or where they led to. Syrah even put forth that the city likely had some sort of flooding mechanism, in order to clear out the sewage that had to build up on occasion. If they were caught down there, they were as likely to be drowned in human filth as they were to be felled by spear or sword.