A Painted Goddess

by Victor Gischler

  She smoked. She paced. She avoided eye contact with everyone around her.

  These people are going to die, and there’s not a damn thing I can do about it.

  Fifteen minutes later, a runner in the duke’s livery found her, red faced and out of breath. Rina wondered how many flights of stairs he’d run up looking for her.

  “Your grace.” The runner paused to suck in deep lungsful of air. “The duke requests you attend him.”

  Rina took a last pull on the chuma stick, blew out a long gray stream that swirled away on the breeze. “Tell him I’m coming.”

  The duke leaned on the table, glaring at the model of his city, toy soldiers lined along the miniature walls. He looked haggard and unhappy. He was surrounded by various generals and military advisors in armor only slightly less garish than his.

  Rina approached, offered a slight nod. “Your grace.”

  The duke sighed. “You’ve been watching?”

  She didn’t need to be told he meant the ships. “Yes.”

  “My advisors say it will take hours for all of them to arrive, and then another day to position themselves. It would seem . . .” He cleared his throat. “It looks like you were right about the number of enemy ships. It still seems impossible.”

  For a long moment, nobody said a word.

  Then the duke drew his sword and smashed the model city, sending figurines flying. Rina flinched at the sudden violence. All of his men took a step back as he smashed the model again and then once more. He tossed his sword on top of the wreckage with a curse.

  The duke took a few moments to master himself, then in a calm voice said, “All those hours of planning. Doesn’t seem fair really.”

  He looked up, saw everyone watching him.

  “Gentlemen, may I have a few moments with Duchess Veraiin?”

  His advisors bowed and hurried away. Rina thought most of them looked relieved to be going.

  “I apologize for the display.”

  “Think nothing of it.” She pulled out a chuma stick. “May I?”

  The duke snapped his fingers, and a servant hurried forward to light it for her.

  “Thank you, your grace.”

  “Please. I’ve asked you to call me Emilio.”

  She puffed, then said, “Have you sent a rider to Baron Kern? Maybe he can send reinforcements.”

  “I’ve already sent a rider telling the baron not to bother,” Emilio said. “He could send all the ships he has, loaded to overflowing with every man, woman, and child big enough to hold a spear, and it wouldn’t matter. Not against what the Perranese are sending. In fact, I’ve warned him to look to his own in case the Perranese break off a portion of their fleet to sail north and harass him.”

  Rina puffed and thought about that. That the duke would consider the welfare of others and not just his own people gave her some comfort about the man.

  Not a lot. A little.

  “As you see, none of my plans amount to a hill of beans now,” Emilio said. “I was wondering . . . that is, I was hoping you might have some suggestion.”

  She rolled the chuma stick from one corner of her mouth to the other. A silly habit she’d started. The way she was going through chuma sticks, she’d be out before the Perranese even attacked. “I’m not sure what you mean. I’m no tactician.”

  “I understand, but, well, I wasn’t looking for military advice so much as I was hoping for something . . . uh . . . magical?” He rubbed the back of his neck, embarrassed. “Forgive me. We’ve all heard the stories of what you can do. It’s hard to separate truth from exaggeration.”

  “I see.” She thought about it. It’s all she had been thinking about since arriving in Sherrik. What could she do, fight the entire Perranese army single-handed?

  She sighed out a long stream of smoke. “I can fight with you. And die with you. But I have no idea how to stop what’s coming.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Tosh paid Miko to take them back to Sherrik. Rina had given Tosh more than enough money to carry out the expedition as he saw fit. He’d tried to be frugal, and thought—hoped—there was enough left to get them home again after this was all over. Miko’s little scow-schooner was really more suited to island-hopping than it was for the open sea, but the weather was calm. They’d had some luck.

  Luck. Don’t make me laugh.

  He’d brought five volunteers with him on this trek, five women who’d trusted him, and he was coming back with one. And they weren’t home yet. Dumo help him if something happened to Kalli too. How could he look the others in the eye when he got home? Why should Tosh be alive and the others dead?

  Luck. He leaned over the gunwale and spit. That’s for luck.

  “You okay?”

  Tosh turned, looked up at Alem. “I just want to get home.”

  “Me too.”

  “I thought you were running away from home.”

  “I was.” Alem sat next to him. “I did.”

  Tosh wasn’t really in the mood for company but didn’t object.

  “It wasn’t a place I was running away from,” Alem said. “I was running away from how I felt, and that’s pretty stupid because there’s no place far enough to run away from that.”

  They sat a while in silence. The sun set.

  “You gave those women something, you know?” Alem said.

  A noncommittal grunt from Tosh.

  “They followed you because they didn’t want to be whores anymore.”

  “They were alive when they whores,” Tosh said.

  “They made a choice. You showed them they had a choice, that they could take a different path. I’m sure Kalli wants her sister back. I’m just as sure she wouldn’t go back to the Wounded Bird.”

  Tosh sighed. No. None of the girls would go back. You can see the pride in the way they walk now, in their eyes, and how they hold their heads up. They’d never give that up. They’d die first.

  None of that made Tosh feel one bit better.

  Miko shouted something from his place at the tiller, the words lost in the wind and the sound of the boat plowing through the waves. Maurizan came forward. She’d put on some clothes: breeches of the lightest material she could find, which she’d cut off at the knees, and a cotton shirt, the top two and bottom two buttons left undone. The heat seemed to hit her harder than everyone else.

  Maybe Tosh would cut off his own breeches at the knees too. It was pretty damn hot, although it helped a little when the sun went down.

  Maurizan pointed ahead of them. “Look.”

  Tosh and Alem squinted ahead into the darkness.

  But it wasn’t completely dark. A tiny dot of orange light in the distance. No. Many tiny dots.

  “Sherrik?” Tosh asked.

  “Almost,” Maurizan said. “Those are ships. The Perranese have arrived. Miko says he can take us a little closer, but he won’t risk trying to run the blockade to take us to Sherrik.”

  “I don’t blame him,” Tosh said.

  “What do we do, then?” Alem asked. “Go back? Or around?”

  “Miko isn’t going to sail us all the way back to Klaar,” Tosh said. “He’s nuts, but he’s not crazy. If not Sherrik, then I don’t know what.”

  “Sherrik,” Maurizan said.

  Tosh cast a questioning glance at her. “Oh?”

  “Miko will take you up the coast away from the Perranese,” Maurizan said. “You can walk to Sherrik from there.”

  “They’ve closed the city,” Tosh said. “You remember what it was like when we left.”

  “I’ll open it for you,” Maurizan said. “I can swim in, find a drain or culvert or something. I’ll tell them you’re coming. Make your way around to the north side of the city. I’ll get you into one of the gates. I promise.”

  Alem frowned. “Now wait a minute. I don’t think you should risk—”

  “I don’t think I asked you,” Maurizan said. “You don’t pick and choose my risks.”

  Alem opened his mouth. Closed it again.


  “Okay, then,” she said. “As soon as Miko gets us a little closer, I’m going.”

  When they were close enough to barely discern the outline of a Perranese ship, Miko declared they were as close as he was willing to risk. Beyond the ship they saw the lights of Sherrik, a city on the edge of war.

  Miko had ordered no lamps be lit. No loud talking. Noise carried in the night. They bobbed in the darkness.

  Maurizan started to unlace her breeches, and Tosh abruptly excused himself.

  Alem didn’t.

  Maurizan handed Alem her breeches and then her shirt. She stood naked, and a sudden gust of cool wind broke her out in gooseflesh.

  “I don’t want you to go,” he said.

  “Miko gave me this lambskin,” Maurizan said. “It’s wax sealed. I can put my things in here, and it should keep the water out.” She wrapped her daggers, clothes, sandals, and a few other belongings into the lambskin and tied them tight with strips of leather.

  “Did you hear me?” Alem asked. “I don’t want you to go.”

  Maurizan tied a leather strap to her wrist, tied the other end to the lambskin bundle. “I’ll be fine unless I catch a current or something. Dumo, I hope there aren’t sharks.”

  “Aren’t you listening to me?” Alem asked. “I said I don’t want you to—”

  Maurizan slapped him across the face. Hard.

  His hand went to his stinging cheek, eyes going wide.

  “Do you think I want to do this, you stupid asshole?” she said. “Don’t you think I’d love to sail back to the Red City with you and stroll the bazaar and forget about all of this? We can’t, okay? All of Helva is in peril, my mother and my people, everyone in Klaar. What I found in the ruined fortress might not mean a thing. Or maybe it does. I don’t know. I don’t know anything except that we have to try. We have to do . . . something. I don’t know what. Okay? I don’t have answers, but we have to try. We have to keep going.”

  She blew out a long sigh, as if all those words flying out of her mouth so fast had sapped her. The two of them looked at each other, no words good enough.

  Abruptly, Alem gathered her on his arms and kissed her. Her arms went around him, and she kissed back.

  They finally broke apart, breathless.

  “I can’t believe I finally got you naked, and now you’re leaving,” he said.

  She started crying first and then laughed, wiping her eyes. “You’re such an . . . ass. You had your chances, you know.”

  “I want another chance,” he said.

  She kissed him once more, then turned and dove into the sea.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Stasha, Giffen, Knarr, Darshia, and the rest looked through the magical doorway in wonder, eyes wide, only partially understanding what they were looking at.

  It was as if they were looking at a scene blurred by water, a painting at the bottom of a clear pool, figures frozen in motion. And yet not completely frozen. As they watched, it seemed that the two men and one woman were moving extremely slowly. They were in some unfamiliar room, walls of black gleaming stone.

  “That’s Baron Hammish, isn’t it?” Darshia said.

  “Yes,” said Stasha Benadicta. “And the woman is the wizard Talbun. I don’t know the boy.”

  “I don’t understand why they’re frozen like that,” Giffen said.

  “They’re not,” Knarr said. “Not quite. They’re moving but very, very slowly.”

  Giffen frowned. “That still doesn’t explain why. I expected a doorway, not a shimmering, blurry window looking at some glacially moving fools.”

  “Who knows how far away they are? Maybe that has something to do with it,” Knarr said. “It’s a magical portal after all. You didn’t really think it was going to swing open like a barn door, did you? You’re the one who chose the setting.”

  “I don’t know where they go,” Giffen admitted. “The old duke had them written down. I knew they were for the doorway. There was no other information.”

  “Enough,” said Stasha Benadicta. “The obvious way to test any door is to walk through it. I believe you have the honor, Lord Giffen.”

  Giffen’s head jerked around to glare at her. “Me?”

  “I believe you made going through the doorway a condition for your aid.”

  “But . . .” Giffen gestured at the shimmering tableau. “What if I get stuck in slow motion like those idiots?”

  “It’s a risk, I suppose.” Stasha’s smile was cold, didn’t touch her eyes. “One I’m more than willing to take.”

  Talbun sat at one of the tables, hunched over the master magician’s spell book. She’d been there for hours. Brasley and Tosh had left to eat a meal and returned to find her sitting in the same place. Brasley tried to open a conversation with her, but the woman waved him away. She didn’t want to be disturbed.

  He poked around the master magician’s workshop. None of the books meant anything to him, and he considered off limits all the beakers and bottles and strange vials of liquid, because they might explode or something if he messed with them.

  Leave all the wizard nonsense to the wizards.

  Hit with a sudden and uncharacteristic pang of responsibility, Brasley thought somebody should attempt to find out what the stencil, scroll case, and inkwell were for. After all, digging up some useful ink magic had been the whole point of the expedition in the first place. Talbun might suddenly be obsessed with the spell book, but duty demanded that proper care and attention be paid to the task at hand. Rina was counting on them. Time to get to work.

  Brasley delegated Olgen to look into it and then sent one of the servants for a pitcher of wine.

  Olgen opened the scroll case and began to read. Brasley drank wine. A good thing I’m here to stay on top of the situation. An hour later the pitcher was empty, but a servant—possibly the same one; they all looked so similar—brought a new one just in time.

  Talbun hadn’t budged.

  Brasley took the silver bracelet out of his pocket. Scanning the runes again, he confirmed he couldn’t make heads or tails of them. A glance over his shoulder told him nobody was paying attention to him. He slipped the bracelet onto his left wrist, held it up to catch the light. Not bad. Yes, after all, why shouldn’t he have a little something for his trouble? Taken away from his new bride and dragged halfway across Helva, he deserved a little something, didn’t he?

  Yes, I’d say I’ve earned it. A little bauble. What could it hurt?

  He remembered that expeditions to the Great Library were obligated to turn over whatever artifacts they discovered upon exiting, but obviously they were going to take the ink magic back to Rina. Might as well smuggle the bracelet too.

  Brasley wandered past the tomb to examine something on the far wall. An archway carved into the black stone, like an enormous picture frame with no picture. Large, different-colored jewels set at various places around the arch, and a collection of unfamiliar runes circled each jewel.

  He shrugged. Whatever.

  Brasley went to Olgen, looked over his shoulder at the scroll. “And how’s it going over here?”

  “Slowly, I’m afraid. Ancient Fyrian again,” Olgen said. “But I’m having a good bit of trouble with the vocabulary. It’s all very technical. Much of it is simply instructions for applying the tattoo.”

  “But what does it do?” Brasley asked.

  “I couldn’t even make a guess, milord.”

  “Ah.” Brasley sipped wine. “Well, keep at it.”

  Brasley missed Fregga. Was she okay? She made him feel . . . what?

  Like I’m not just a drunken womanizer. Like I’m somebody worth marrying.

  He vowed things would be different if he could just make it back to her. And she was a good wife, not some bit of eye candy he’d be stuck with if he picked out his own wife. Fate had done him a favor. A big one. He just hoped she wasn’t too lonely back in—

  Talbun stood abruptly, knocking her chair over. It clattered on the floor.

  She
took one halting step, then almost collapsed, grabbing the table to keep herself upright.

  Brasley rushed to her, took her by one arm. “Talbun! Are you okay?”

  She turned to look at him, no recognition in her bloodshot eyes, skin pale and clammy, hair matted with sweat. “Where . . . where am I?”

  “The Great Library,” Brasley told her.

  She blinked at that, turning her head slowly to take in the entire chamber. She suddenly looked back at him. “Who are . . . Brasley?”

  “Yes.” What in blazes is wrong with her?

  “I . . .” Her eyes fell to his goblet of wine. She grabbed it out of his hand, tilted it back, and drained it. She gulped breath and shoved the goblet back at him. “More. And food.”

  Brasley screamed for the servants. Five minutes later, Talbun was seated at the table again, spooning a thick stew into her mouth. Brasley thought he smelled lamb. There was a fresh pitcher of wine too, and a dark brown loaf of bread. She ate manically, eyes darting around between bites like someone might sneak up and steal her food.

  “Remember how I told you that when I cast a spell, it goes out of my mind?” Talbun slurped wine. “Until I cast it, the spell is cooped up in there with all the other spells, just buzzing around, wanting to get out.”

  “I feel like maybe you need some sleep,” Brasley said. “Maybe we should get you back to your room.”

  “Maybe you should shut your face.”

  Ah.

  “S-sorry.” Her eye twitched. She took another long drink of wine, a tremble in her hands. “Just listen.”

  He nodded. “Okay.”

  Olgen came up behind him. “I’ve almost got the name of this tattoo. The translation’s tricky, though.”

  Brasley ignored him.

  “How many spells a wizard can hold in her head at one time depends on the strength of the wizard’s mind and her willpower,” Talbun explained. “A wizard just finishing his apprenticeship might hold three or four. A journeyman wizard’s mind is more disciplined. Might hold five or six or seven. My old master never told me how many he held, but I think it was close to a dozen.”