by Ellyn, Court
He breathed and hoped for a thick coating of ice on the wood, but achieved only a damp, smoky end to his fire. A dull throb started low at his nape and reached talons along his jaw and up his skull.
“Not too difficult, eh?” Zellel asked as Kieryn rubbed at the pain. “You need to rest?”
He longed to give that plaited beard a hard tug and see Zellel’s smirk vanish. “Rest? No,” he said and tried to stand up. His legs felt as unsteady as if he’d climbed a mountain, and he collapsed with a whoof.
“Really? Then stop wallowing and pay attention.” Zellel lifted a finger, and a tongue of sinuous blue flame snaked in the air over the earthen barrier. “This is focusing heat energy in its purest form. You bring the energy together, then your will—rather than the pyre—acts as the fuel.” He dropped his hand, and the blue flame disappeared on a gust of wind. “Make yourself comfortable, boy.”
Kieryn crossed his legs, rested his hands on his knees, and focused on the buzzing. How could a flame burn without fuel? He wanted to light the wood again, but Zellel might buffet him upside the head. He sat for half an hour, feeling the energies course along his arms, their vast potential bound only by his lack of skill, before he decided they understood what he wanted of them. All the while, Zellel said not a word, but waited as silent as a fading thought. At last, Kieryn’s right hand lifted as if it had a mind of its own, and the energy funneled out his palm. A whitish-blue flame, no taller than Saffron, manifested above the pyre.
“Good,” Zellel muttered. “Now, hold onto it until I tell you to release it.”
The blue flame wavered as Kieryn reacted to the request with a measure of foreboding.
By the time the sun began its downward descent, Kieryn understood what Zellel meant by ‘stamina.’ Every muscle in his body quivered, sweat ran into his eyes and soaked through his linen shirt, his head felt near to bursting, and his uplifted hand was raw to every passing breeze. The energies passing through it, he realized, were tangible things.
Despite his discomfort, the blue flame continued to burn. The shadows of the hills grew long and filled the hollow with early dusk. Kieryn gave up waiting for Zellel’s permission to release the flame, and putting aside the distractions of pain and his master’s watchful eye, he focused on the flame alone. It cast an otherworldly glow across the hollow, blanched the yellow grass of warmth and substance. Kieryn began to feel as if he floated in a silent half-world, a place where the blue flame was the only light to be found.
Far away in the darkness, he heard someone call his name. Again and again the voice called. Finally it occurred to him that he ought to answer. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t turn from the flame. He was that flame, and he was beautiful and fierce, waiting for release so he could consume the world.
Kieryn! A hand clenched his shoulder, and like a blade cutting a cord, the touch severed his bond with the flame. For a moment he came to himself; the flame over the pyre was gone; traces of pink faded from a smear of dusky clouds; a star appeared over the hollow; Zellel peered at him with a look of fear in his eyes. Then the old man, and the horizon with him, tilted and vanished in the dark.
~~~~
Kieryn woke the next morning in the same hollow among the yellow grass. His body felt as if it had been beaten with a fat club and his skull cracked like an egg. Not one of Kelyn’s hangovers could have been this bad. With immense effort, he pushed himself upright and found Zellel sitting patiently beside him, watching the sun rise. Saffron perched on one shoulder and Yarrow on the other. Zellel’s guardian appeared to be male, though the gender of fairies was often ambiguous. In bright yellow tunic and silver-green leggings, he wore his yellow hair short and spiky. He and Saffron took wing when Kieryn sat up and flitted around his head in nauseating circles.
“You did well,” they sang.
“Well, you call it?” Zellel snapped, scattering the fairies. “He scared the lifelight out of me. You, too, if you’ll admit it.”
“Never for a moment,” Saffron argued, wagging her head snobbishly.
Zellel tugged Kieryn to his feet. “Let’s get you home, boy. And while we’re walking, think about what I tell you—you’ve got to save some will for yourself. Give it all to the flame, and the flame will devour you. Goddess above, I thought you’d give in. I was wrong about you, boy, very wrong.”
Back in his rooms, Kieryn indulged in a hot bath scented with oil of sandalwood. He was about to crawl into bed and stay there till the silk sheets wore sores onto his hide, but excited voices in the corridor put an end to his plan. He hurried into his clothes and poked his head out the door, but the maids had moved on, and the corridor was empty. The palace had become eerily quiet. He hurried downstairs and found Sadév outside the Duke’s Hall, barking urgent orders at his under-stewards.
“What’s going on?” Kieryn asked.
“The Lady Rhosamen, m’ lord, arrives in the harbor. Rumor is, she hasn’t come alone. The household have run to the Beacon Tower to see for themselves. Couldn’t stop them, I’m afraid. Most irresponsible—”
Kieryn ran not to the Beacon Tower but to the stables. He grabbed the horse in the first stall, Rhoslyn’s golden filly, but took no time to saddle her. Gripping her flanks with his heels, he raced from the palace grounds. He clanged the ferry’s bell mercilessly until Rygg herded his oarsmen onto the flatboat. In their haste to answer the summons, they nearly collided with a river barge bound for Vonmora.
“What’s the trouble, m’ lord?” Rygg asked.
Coaxing the pony aboard, Kieryn answered, “Rhoslyn is returned, and she’s brought the pirates with her.”
“Damn me,” Rygg said, “she did it.”
By the time Kieryn reached the docks, a splendid gilded galleon and a smaller vessel had furled their sails some two hundreds yards from the pier. The smaller vessel flew a black banner marked with a red X. No, they were crossed swords, cutlasses.
A fleet of skiffs rowed out to meet them. The oarsmen secured the ships’ hawsers and lesser ropes and began towing them toward the docks.
Kieryn paced along the quay, desperate to catch some sign of Rhoslyn among the officers and crew hurrying about the Lady Rhosamen’s deck. The pier became increasingly crowded as men and women flocked to see a pirate ship up close. Captain Drael arrived with a hundred of his garrison and ordered the people to clear a path, much good it did him, then directed his men in setting up a dozen ballistae.
Kieryn shoved through the crowd. “Captain, what do you think you’re doing?”
“M’ lord,’ Drael greeted tersely. “I’ll ask you to stand out of the way.”
“But Rhoslyn—”
“I have my orders.”
“From whom?”
“From His Grace. Those ships look peaceful enough, aye. But the pirates may have assumed command of both vessels and, under pretense, hope to enter port without our being the wiser.”
“But it was His Grace who sent Rhoslyn out there!”
“Aye, I’m well aware of it,” Drael retorted, not liking his orders either. “But His Grace is also wise enough to prepare for the worst.”
Surely even two crews of sea-thieves would find it too dangerous to attack and plunder a city the size of Windhaven. That is, unless they had their insurance. Kieryn stood aside as Drael’s men calibrated the ballistae, aiming them toward the deep-water pier where the ships meant to dock. If Rhoslyn came to harm, however, the ballistae wouldn’t be needed. Kieryn felt the blue flame well inside him. How easy, after Zellel’s instruction, for him to set the sails ablaze, the rigging, the masts, the thieves, everything.
The skiffs tugged the ships to the piers, and the oarsmen bound the hawsers to bollards as sturdy as andyr trees. Admiral Beryr appeared aboard the flagship, and Kieryn looked for Rhoslyn at his side. But it was at the rail of the brig that she appeared.
Drael voiced Kieryn’s thoughts, “Goddess, they’ve got her. Men, light the garrots.” Torches lowered upon twelve huge spearheads wrapped in greased twine.
> “Wait!” Kieryn cried.
Rhoslyn raised a hand. “Drael,” she called, “disarm! Captain Rehaan of the Aurion is here as my guest and our ally.”
The docks erupted with confounded chatter. Drael’s men doused the torches and lifted the garrots from their slots. Despite Drael’s word of caution, Kieryn hurried along the pier and waited for Rhoslyn at the foot of the gangplank. She looked pale and wind-tossed, but happy. Kieryn started to bow and welcome her home, but she would have nothing of formality. She flung her arms around his neck, despite a city’s worth of onlookers, and said, “Where have you been?”
Kieryn couldn’t help but laugh.
A tall disdainful-looking man in a red coat followed Rhoslyn down the gangplank. The pirate-king measured Kieryn head to foot. Kieryn made a point to do the same and asked Rhoslyn, “You were not in danger, then?”
“Only of boredom and seasickness,” she replied. “Come, Captain, Father will want to see you.”
Following Rhoslyn along the pier, the pirate-king held Kieryn’s eye squarely, and Kieryn heard the man’s voice sharp and clear inside his head: She was safe in my care, too, avedra. Be glad you held your temper.
~~~~
30
The prow of the ship was painted with a lion’s teeth and a golden eye on each side of the bowsprit, so that it looked like a savage beast swimming toward shore. The port town of Gildancove was on high alert; bells clanged; hundreds of people gathered on the pier to see the strange ship sail into the cove. The pilots didn’t seem to plan on docking at the pier, however. The ship steered slowly past the dock to a stretch of naked gray beach.
Shadryk ordered his minister and the White Mantles to keep pace with it, so they would be there when the ship made landfall. The first wave of his mercenaries had arrived from Zhian, and none too soon. Summer had passed its peak, and only a couple of days ago, scouts reported that the Aralorris had advanced toward Ulmarr. It was time to turn the tables.
The lion-faced ship drew right up to the beach. Men raced into the rigging to furl the sails, and a dozen more leapt from the rails, ropes in hand, and like oxen, pulled the ship onto shore. The prow ground deep into the sand. The men with the ropes then scrambled to lower a wide gangplank.
Sitting his white stallion, Shadryk marveled at the frantic efficiency of these men. Slaves, he decided. They wore only white breechclouts; their skin was the red-brown of the earth, their hair plaited in long black braids. They looked soft somehow, their muscles less defined than might be expected from slaves who towed ships. Shadryk leaned closer to La’od and asked, “Eunuchs?”
The Minister dabbed sweat from his brow with a silk kerchief. The sea air was always so humid. “I’m not certain, sire.”
“How can you not know? What else do you not know about these people? I will not be thought a fool when I speak with them. Is Osaya still queen? We are receiving one of her younger sons, yes?” He ought to have asked sooner, but he expected his ministers to take care of these details for him. He should’ve known better than to trust La’od with the task.
“Yes, sire,” the minister said. “Saj’nal is her fourth son. And as of his last letter his brothers had yet to raise a coup against their mother.”
“He’s coming,” Shadryk said, seeing the slaves run up the gangplank to retrieve a palanquin richly gilded and draped in crimson silk. “Don’t disappoint me, La’od.”
The Minister rode forward to greet Fiera’s allies.
The palanquin started down the gangplank at a steep angle. From inside came a shriek, “Ai! You sons of scorpions. Stop, stop, you’re making me sick. I will walk on my own precious feet.”
The eunuchs hurried the rest of the way down the gangplank and across the small stretch of water, and set the palanquin in the sand. “Sons of twice-used whores! Raise it up, raise it up! I will not crawl out like a beast on all fours.”
The slaves raised up the palanquin again, and from the crimson drapes emerged a young man dressed as brightly as some exotic bird. Wrapped around his head was wrapped a length of red silk studded with glittering bangles. Two large gold rings swung from his earlobes, and his eyes were painted with kohl, which made them both fierce and alluring. In his bejeweled hand he wielded a short whip like a riding quirt. He slashed at the slaves holding the poles on his side of the palanquin. Thwack, thwack! “Miserable whoresons.” He swayed and held out a hand. One of the slaves who had only now endured the sting of the lash raised an arm for the prince to steady himself in the shifting sand.
La’od dismounted and bowed deeply, hands to his heart. “I welcome you, mighty prince, to Fiera, in the name of King Shadryk the—”
Saj’nal’s hand darted up before La’od’s face as if the greeting offended him. Fortunately, this wasn’t the case. Eyes clenched against the daylight and the sound of voices, the prince said, “The sea. Oh, the sea, she is evil! My head. My belly. Who are you, little man?”
La’od bowed a second time and introduced himself.
“A minister? I speak with a minister? Where is your king?”
La’od’s hand swept up the beach. The prince buffeted La’od aside and managed a steady step across the sand. He bowed with a flourish and told Shadryk, “My men and I are yours to command, great White Falcon.”
The two hundred soldiers who disembarked couldn’t have been more different from their prince. Brown skin taut over cords of muscle, these were the warriors Shadryk had envisioned. They wore curved single-edged swords on their backs and an odd assortment of animal trophies. One wore a lion’s skull like a helmet, another a necklace of water dragon teeth. Other than these, their only garments were short vests of black quilted fabric, breechclouts made of the hide of some yellow-and-green reptile, and boots that tied up to their knees. On all this naked skin, there wasn’t one hair between them. Only Saj’nal appeared to have kept his eyebrows and lashes. While they gathered into lines on the beach, the prince said, “Two more ships follow, and more later if you need them. These men, they will work well for you. You will see this. They bring me victory over my mother’s uncle when he slandered me, saying I am unfaithful to the Father-Mother. When I sail home, they will bring me victory over my brothers.”
Ah, yes, Shadryk remembered reading that the Zhianese and a few other eastern peoples referred to the goddess as male. “Then I wish you all the … Father’s blessing in that endeavor. But first things first, Highness.”
“Yes, yes, you are right, great king! The dragons.” Saj’nal turned to his ship and clapped his hands. The slaves on board scurried to a lower deck; winches groaned.
This took Shadryk by surprise. What was Saj’nal carrying in the hold of his ship?
“Herrah, herrah!” Saj’nal ordered, and a row of the soldiers hurried up the gangplank. They returned carrying strange devices.
“These are of my own invention,” the prince boasted, gesturing forward one of the soldiers. “Look, look!”
Shadryk was looking. The soldier gripped a large leather bag under his left arm. A hose wrapped around his back and dangled over his right shoulder. With his free hand he lifted the end, showing off a bronze nozzle shaped like a dragon’s head; its mouth was open in a silent roar. Shadryk cast the prince a questioning glance.
“You will see! You will see,” Saj’nal replied, enthusiasm that of a child. He bid him ride closer to the ship, and there Shadryk observed similar devices being hoisted up from the hold. The leather bags and hoses were so large they were mounted on frames with wheels. The wheels boasted iron spikes that would enable them to traverse any terrain. Slaves carefully rolled six of these greater dragons down the gangplank and up the beach.
“This you did not expect, great king, yes?”
“Yes,” Shadryk replied. “What do these dragon do, Highness?”
“What do dragons do? They breathe fire. Of course. You want demonstration? Yes, yes, I see you do.”
Shadryk pointed out a fisherman’s shack a short way along the beach and had the White Mantles re
move the inhabitants.
A team of eunuchs pushed one of the timber frames into range. A soldier stood on a platform and pumped the leather bag like a billows. The hose gurgled as fluid filled it. A second soldier stood on the ground and lifted the dragon-shaped nozzle, aiming the open mouth toward the shack. Beside him stood a slave with a torch. A pungent, yellow-red liquid burst from the dragon’s mouth. The slave touched it with the torch, and the liquid became a stream of fire, roaring and stinking. Flames oozed over the shack’s roof and in moments it crumbled to cinders.
The thrill of excitement welling in Shadryk’s breast was hard to contain. “I’m impressed, Highness,” was all he allowed himself to say.
Saj’nal bowed, pleased. “What mighty palace, great king, would you have us topple?
Shadryk could think of several.
~~~~
Because of the wheeled contraptions and a dozens wagons heavy with barrels of the strange, reeking fuel, the journey back to Brynduvh would take longer than Shadryk anticipated. The welcoming feast would have to be delayed a night. So be it. These dragons were worth the wait.
Prince Saj’nal rode in his palanquin, surrounded by six men of his personal guard. With their gold-enameled scale mail, black cloaks, and curved swords, the guards would’ve been intimidating enough, but the visors of their helms looked like serpents’ faces, and they wore them lowered despite the midsummer heat. Riding high on grunting maned kemyls, they towered over Shadryk on his stallion and glared down at him, cold eyes just a shimmer through the slanted eye slits. They made the White Mantles look as benevolent as nannies. Shadryk would have to remedy that.
“The rest of your men,” he said to the prince, “their armor makes them look this fierce?”
Saj’nal reclined on a pile of pillows. The drapes were drawn aside so he could view the countryside. “Armor?” he cried. “What armor? Any man who fights behind armor is no true warrior.”
“Is that so?” Shadryk said, casting a frown over his shoulder. La’od shrugged and looked like he wanted to crawl under a rock. “Is this the way all Zhianese fight?”
