Sisters of Sword and Song

by Rebecca Ross

  Any moment now, she thought, Evadne and Damon would be arriving at the Destry.

  She thought of Thales’s words, spoken to her in confidence, just before Evadne and Damon had departed yesterday.

  Ensure your sister is armed before she leaves with the commander’s son.

  Halcyon had asked why, but Thales had not answered.

  And so all she could do was wonder and worry about her sister.

  “There,” Iason said, eager. “There is Damon’s signal.”

  Halcyon squinted and saw the nightingale. It was a speck in the haze, but it became clearer as it flew closer to them. It would glide to the commander before circling back to the city, reassuring him that Damon had set Selene’s distraction in motion.

  “Let us go,” Narcissa said.

  The three of them jogged out of Mithra’s sight, down the hill to where the legion waited. The horses had been left behind miles ago, due to the fact that Laneus had the Golden Belt, which he would no doubt wear into battle. Because he could command animals, Straton and the captains would approach on foot among the hoplites. But that was not to say that other animals might not be summoned to fight them.

  The thought made Halcyon’s stomach clench. She felt the tension, the excitement in the air, thick enough to divide with a blade as the hoplites prepared themselves for battle. Narcissa’s squad was ready. Halcyon and Iason merged back with their brothers and sisters, and Narcissa waited among them, watching for Straton to give the motion to progress.

  The commander stood before his legion, gazing at them—a moment that seemed to stretch long and endless. And then he slid his helm upon his head, the black-and-white horsehair catching the breeze, and a shout rose from his warriors that made the earth tremble and the sun hide behind a wisp of clouds.

  Straton led them over the hill into the field that stretched to Mithra.

  The hoplites walked in unison, arranged in tight formation eight warriors deep, their long spears held upright, their shields hooked on their left arm. Halcyon was at the front of the phalanx, with the strongest warriors. The younger, weaker warriors were in the middle, and this was where Thales had been positioned after he had insisted he fight alongside them.

  The front line also experienced the heaviest casualties. But Halcyon knew why she had been appointed here.

  Narcissa’s squad had been given one important order: to pressure Macarius to draw the Devouring Sword from its scabbard.

  It had first seemed daft to the other hoplites in Narcissa’s phalanx. For Macarius to wield the relic meant all of his enemy’s weapons—the legion’s—would vanish in their hands. They would be magically disarmed, but the common convicts would still boast their iron. The hoplites would have to fight with their strength, their weight.

  But if Macarius drew the sword, then all the convict mages beneath his command would also lose their power. Whatever enchantments they wrought in battle would be broken.

  It was a dangerous, brilliant move.

  “I want you on the front line,” Straton had told her that morning. “You are to take the Devouring Sword from Macarius.”

  And Halcyon had bowed to the command, honored. Once the relic was in her possession, her opposition—the quarry convicts—would also lose their weapons.

  But most of all, Straton was wordlessly giving Halcyon the chance to kill Macarius.

  And her breaths skipped like stones tossed over water. Her blood was pounding, fast and thin and bright as gold heated over fire, and her heart was expanding, filling her chest. She marched and felt as if she could rise from the earth at any moment on sightless wings.

  Macarius heard their approach.

  Soon, Halcyon could see the convicts pouring out of the quarry gates, forming their own shallow line before Mithra. Straton raised his arm, and the legion came to a halt. A mile stretched between them and the convicts. But Halcyon could see Macarius at the center of them, outfitted in leather armor, the Devouring Sword sheathed at his back, the ruby in its pommel glittering in the sun. And there was Laneus with the Golden Belt at his waist and a sword in his hand. And Cassian, the prisoner who had spat in her food, with his cronies gathered about him, wielding iron picks.

  The mages were interspersed among the quarry men. They carried no weapons, but Halcyon knew their unbridled magic had the potential to be devastating.

  Straton began to walk the distance alone, to meet Macarius in the middle. The two talked, the commander’s final attempt for peace. Halcyon knew it was futile. Macarius would not settle for anything, and the commander strode back to the hoplites while Macarius hurried to the protection of his line.

  The hoplites formed their shield wall and began to close the distance at Straton’s command. Halcyon lowered her spear, preparing for impact. She felt the shield of her hoplite brother at her back, pressed tight against her so there would be no space between them. Narcissa shouted, sensing her phalanx was drifting. It was hard to resist pulling to the right, Halcyon thought as she struggled to march straight. Apprehension and fear made them all want to seek shelter in the shield of the hoplite to their right.

  The convicts did not know how to fight in a formation. They were foolish and zealous, the first line of them charging the phalanx, axes and picks and swords raised. Halcyon watched them come, felt the earth tremble, felt her mind calm as it always did before she sparred.

  How many days of her life had she practiced, trained for this?

  How many hours, by sun and by night?

  And yet nothing could prepare her for the first moment of impact.

  There was a clash, a blow of resistance as the two sides finally met. She plunged her spear into the neck of a common convict just before he could swing his pick into her. She watched the blood gurgle from his mouth, his eyes bulge. He fell, and Halcyon withdrew her spear and continued to move forward in a perfect line, the hoplites at her back pressing her forward.

  Hold formation, hold formation, she chanted to herself as the screams and shouts and groans began to spiral in the air around her. As long as the phalanx held, they would be unbeatable. They were like a wall of bronze, surging forward.

  She could see Macarius, nearly dead ahead of her. He stood at the very back of his convicts, observing with a frown. Soon the phalanx would reach him.

  She watched as he lifted his hand and started to sing, and her courage began to unravel.

  Hold formation, hold—

  There was a crackle in the wind. Sparks unfolding, rending the air like thunder.

  And his magic exploded, striking the phalanx several warriors down from Halcyon. It broke their line. Halcyon was hurled to the side, narrowly missed being impaled on Iason’s spear. She hit the ground, her ears ringing.

  The dust billowed—she struggled to rise, to see through the clouds of gold—and then chaos spawned. Hoplites were combating convicts hand to hand, and it was a tumbling mess of shields and screams and blood-splattered iron. And woven among it all were fiery tendrils of magic that sparked explosions and bone-splintering pain, and shadows that rose up with teeth and malice, shredding through armor and muscle.

  The world became nothing more than fire and shadow and dust and iron.

  “Halcyon!” Narcissa was screaming at her.

  Through her daze, Halcyon saw her captain standing a few yards away, as strong and immovable as a pillar, summoning Halcyon to her mission

  Macarius.

  Halcyon found her footing and surged to join Narcissa. The dust was thinning, but there were shadows writhing within it. And they were not magical shadows. They were the shadows of countless birds, swarming in a circle, preparing to attack.

  Halcyon had only a breath to raise her shield before the birds began to plummet and strike her. She hated the sound of their feathered bodies thudding on her shield, on her armor. Some of their talons caught her arms, leaving bright lacerations on her skin. But she pressed onward, slow but steady in Narcissa’s wake. These were songbirds. Sparrows and doves and nightingales. Gentle
creatures.

  Laneus was a fool. He had summoned little songbirds into battle, forcing them against their will.

  And Halcyon would kill him.

  She moved out of the bird windstorm and lowered her shield. And there he was. The vile boy of Dree. Who was cruel and rotten within. He stood only a few paces away, sword held in his hand. He was too preoccupied with trying to direct his birds to see her coming. And then he saw her, a moment too late.

  She watched his eyes go wide, his mouth slackened in fear.

  She speared him in the stomach. Again and again, just above the Golden Belt.

  Laneus screamed and crumpled to the ground. She stood above him and watched him begin to bleed out. The birds were soon released from the summoning and flew back to their roosts, and Thales appeared, as if he had been in Halcyon’s shadow.

  “Take the belt, Thales,” Halcyon ordered him.

  “Yes.” Thales dropped to his knees, hurrying to unbuckle it.

  Halcyon strode onward, over dead bodies and scorched earth and trampled grass. She saw the red-and-white plume of Narcissa’s helm as she continued to cut, stab, down convict after convict. But Macarius was lost from Halcyon’s view. And she sought him, hungry for his blood.

  A flash of light, bone white with heat, shot past Halcyon’s shoulder. Her armor warmed uncomfortably in response, and she heard a hoplite scream in pain behind her. A convict mage was about to shoot another bolt of that lightning, his fair hair matted to his brow, his teeth rotten to the gums as he smiled.

  Halcyon hurled her spear and caught him in the heart. He went down and she recovered her lance, his fingertips steaming from the magic she had interrupted. She progressed with her search for Macarius, her eyes peeling through the chaos. The shine of iron and bronze and the tang of blood and the song of magical choruses mixed like a sickening tonic, churning her stomach.

  She saw the commander fighting in the fray, his helm and his red cloak drawing her attention. He did not see Macarius suddenly emerge nearby, casting off his invisibility. But Halcyon did.

  Coward, she raged as she sprinted, spear raised. She hurled her lance; it arced and gleamed, and Macarius spun to see it hurtling toward him. His eyes widened, like all the men who Halcyon had killed. But then the mage reached behind him, unsheathing the Devouring Sword.

  Halcyon’s spear turned into dust just before it would have pierced his heart.

  And the mages’ enchantments broke instantaneously, rising from the field like smoke.

  Her lost weapon did not stop her. Her hands were empty, but they were angry, and she began to close the distance to Macarius.

  He did not know it was her at first. He was smiling, triumphant about how he had vanished her weapon. How he had vanished all of the legion’s weapons. But Halcyon continued to stalk to him as if the victory were already hers, and Macarius’s smile melted.

  He recognized her. Even in her helm and armor, he knew it was her.

  And he began to stumble away. Frantic, even though he held an enchanted sword and she held nothing but her vengeance.

  But then again, he had always been afraid of her.

  Halcyon smiled at him. Her teeth cut the dust and the light, and Macarius tripped over one of his dead men and fell. He sprawled on his back, and Halcyon leapt on him.

  She struck his face, once, twice. She felt his nose crush beneath her fist. He finally roused himself, remembered he held the sword in his hand. Macarius began to lift it, but Halcyon took hold of his arm before he even knew what had gripped him. She pressed her thumb into the tendons of his wrist, and he whimpered, releasing the sword.

  It clattered to the ground, a full arm’s length away.

  Halcyon reached to take it, to end this, when Macarius uttered a spell. He stole a flash of light from her armor and roused his fiery chimera.

  The monster unfolded in an array of sparks. Halcyon felt them fall on her, burn her skin, hiss on her armor. The chimera did not attack; it was devoted to guarding the Devouring Sword. She could not believe it at first. The relic should have stopped all enchantments. But then she realized that its hilt had to be held for its power to be active.

  She turned to Macarius and struck him, again and again, his blood streaming back into his hair. She heard his chimera let out a keen wail, and she sensed it was about to maul her when someone came between them.

  Straton. He had no weapon to cut the monster down, but he took the brunt of the chimera’s charge. Halcyon heard his cloak rip, the scratch of fiery talons on bronze, the commander’s grunt of pain. She lunged for the sword and took it into her grip.

  The hilt burned through her glove, hot from the chimera’s presence. But the chimera morphed into smoke instantly, joining the wind with a hiss.

  Halcyon held the Devouring Sword, her reflection bright upon its steel. She looked down at Macarius, who was whimpering.

  “Please . . . please don’t kill me.” He held up his quivering hands.

  Halcyon waited, watched his groveling.

  “Have mercy, Halcyon. Mercy.”

  Once, long ago, Halcyon would have granted mercy. But she was no longer that girl.

  And she plunged the Devouring Sword into his throat.

  Once the dust settled and the last of the convicts were defeated, Halcyon sheathed the Devouring Sword. She wanted to give it to the commander, and she found him sitting in the shade of the Mithran wall.

  She knew something was wrong immediately. His cloak was draped over him, his complexion sallow, his eyes glazed when he looked at her.

  Halcyon knelt beside him, drew back his cloak, and saw the wound.

  It was a trio of deep gashes in his thigh. Macarius’s chimera had cut through the hard pleats of the commander’s cuirass, down to the bone of his leg. And this was not a wound of iron or steel. It was weeping a steady trickle of blood, and the edges of it were a mass of melted flesh, mottled purple and red.

  A poisoned wound.

  Halcyon could not breathe at first, remembering all the poison she had been forced to endure. But then she felt the commander’s gaze on her face, and she looked at him. She knew he was dying.

  She could not imagine a world with him gone.

  “Commander,” she said, and he weakly tried to draw his cloak back over his leg.

  “Leave me, Kingfisher.”

  Leave him? She gaped at him a moment. Angry, she said, “You want to die alone, then?”

  Straton closed his eyes. He chuckled, which made his blood pool faster. “I only want to rest a moment. Ask if they will open the gates for us. I would like to see my wife and daughter.”

  Halcyon ignored him. She pulled off her leather glove, which prompted him to crack open his eyes. When he saw what glittered on her hand, he raised his brows.

  “Ah. It is as I thought.”

  Halcyon did not reply. She slipped the ring onto his forefinger and stared at him, unable to conceal her worry.

  It would take time, she knew. He needed to be in the sun.

  She helped him shift away from the wall’s shadow, and he lay down in the light, which was beginning to thin as the sun set behind the mountains. By now, Narcissa had noticed them. She ran to see why Straton was on the ground, grinning into the sun as if he was drunk. And then she saw his wound, how the blood and mottled colors were slowly easing, and the sunstone on his hand, and she only slid her eyes to Halcyon, grateful.

  “We need to get inside Mithra,” the captain said. “And then find a wagon for the commander. Will you see—”

  “I do not need a wagon.”

  “If they will open the gates?” Narcissa finished.

  Straton was still half smiling, half wincing into the sunlight. Halcyon glanced to his leg, relieved to see the ring was already working its magic, closing his wound.

  “Yes, I will go,” Halcyon said and began to stride over the bloodstained ground, aiming for the southern gate.

  Thales approached like he had been waiting for her. He no longer wore the Golden Belt, a
nd Halcyon was too exhausted to wonder who he had given it to. He fell into stride beside her, anxious.

  “What is it, Thales?”

  “Your sister. I am worried about her, Halcyon.”

  Halcyon lost her temper. “Why? Why do you keep tormenting me about it?”

  Thales rushed his hand over his face. He was trembling. Halcyon did not know if it was the aftershock of battle or if he was truly that concerned about Evadne.

  “I was unable to murder the Basilisk, as you know,” he said. “But I still deserved to be in the common quarry.”

  “Yes, why?”

  “Because I did kill someone. After the failed assassination, I tried to sing an enchantment to end Selene. But she was too powerful, her magic much deeper than mine. My magic ran dry and sundered.”

  “Sundered?” she echoed, glancing to his right hand, the scar where his mage’s ring had once gleamed.

  “Yes,” he stammered, his brow furrowed as if the memory still caused him pain. “Selene drained my magic dry to the bone. It broke my hand, and my magic departed. And in that moment, in my turmoil . . . I ended up killing someone very dear to me.”

  “Thales . . .” Halcyon began to understand his worry. She felt her pulse in her throat. “Who did you kill?”

  He looked down at his right hand. Scarred and out of alignment. A constant reminder of who he had once been, of what he had lost.

  He brought his eyes back to hers, and there was nothing but sorrow, deep and terrible sorrow, within him when he answered.

  “I killed my scribe.”

  XXXIV

  Evadne

  Evadne was not afraid of Selene’s magic. Not even as it gathered overhead, drawing her eyes upward to the glorious ceiling of the Destry. She watched as it ate the sun, the clouds, the blue illusion of the sky. A hungry fog that swirled and obscured and began to billow downward, shrouding the divine pillars. It reached for Damon and Evadne, ready to swallow them whole.

  Evadne’s heart quickened as Damon began to sing his unnamed enchantment.

  He sang the first stanza only, repeating it over and over.

  This was not the slow-burning magic of stars, or the fire he had made in Mount Euthymius. This light was brilliant and piercing; it was the gleam of sun on a sister’s sword, the reflection of light on a brother’s helm. It warmed the air like midday, and ripples of heat flowed outward.