Sure enough, the keys rattled in the lock, and a stocky guard poked his nose in. Neri was ready. She slammed the door as hard as she could on his head, and he fell to the floor. That had been rather easier than she’d expected. She took a sword and dagger off his wheezing body, and ventured out in to the hall. All the way along it were the bodies of unconscious soldiers. Impressive. She began to pick her way quietly down the corridor, when another bolt hit the wall in front of her. She tried to look for the source of the bolts, but saw nothing. This person clearly knew what they were doing.
The note inside read: “Not that way. Go in the other direction!” She turned immediately, and followed the passageway down several sets of stairs, where more guards lay unconscious. And as she progressed through further corridors, more of the guards seemed to fall in her path. Another arrow landed just before her nose. Very close. “Cannot cover you in this section. Be ready.”
At least she was properly armed now, and she had missed a good fight. Neri ran forwards into the darkness of the windowless tunnel, and soon met swords with the men waiting there. A slash, slice and cut came easily, followed by a simple thrust for his friend. She moved onto the next men, and cut them down in three easy strikes. Gharnast soldiers really were soft little things. She could hear another pair of them ahead, and rushed to meet them with a slide-swipe and a neat down-slash. A third guard took her by surprise as he grabbed her arms, but she reacted quickly and thrust the dagger cleanly into his thigh.
“Argh! Damn it woman, I’m here to get you out!” he shouted. There was something familiar about his voice.
“Ah… sorry.”
“Come with me.” The hooded man led her through a complex series of tunnels and passageways, and seemingly endless sets of stairs. But it was good to run again. Neri had started to really enjoy herself by the time they reached the courtyard.
The man pointed to a whirling propeller beyond the rooftops. “We need to make it to the heli-ship. If anything happens to me, you head straight for it, understand?”
“Yes.”
They forged ahead and into the open space, their strides matched by the approaching footmen. Neri and her companion fought their way through to the other side with appreciable speed, and she even found herself rather impressed with his skill. Perhaps he was another ranger. Though, she’d have known the voices of one of her team anywhere. They ventured into the dark corridors once more, and then into the great hall.
“We need to run the rest,” he announced. “Is that alright?”
Instead of answering, she sprinted on ahead of him at her best speed. It was not quite what it had been, but she still had a good pace in her legs. But when she reached the exit she stopped. Row upon row upon row of imperial guards had lined up around the gates. Somehow the news of her escape had gotten out before her. A hand grabbed her wrist.
“Back this way,” he said. He led her into a corner, and seemed to be thinking hard.
“Well, what next?”
“I can get you out, but it’s risky.”
She resisted the urge to stamp on his feet. “This whole thing has been risky! Just do it.”
His dark form nodded, and he gripped one of her hands tightly. “Put your back against me and stay close.”
“What?” He wanted to spoon? In the middle of an escape?
“Please.”
This was idiotic. But then, if she was going to get locked up again, an embrace with this mysterious swordsman wasn’t going to be the worst of interruptions. She allowed him to wrap an arm tightly across her, whereupon he pulled her down towards the floor, and the world turned black.
Red light was the first thing she registered. That, and the feeling of a heavy arm on top of her. Her hand immediately went to check her abdomen. Everything felt normal, but the baby wasn’t being its usual active self. She pushed herself gently up from the ground, which was cold, rocky and orange – not a place she had seen before. There was liquid on the ground, warm liquid. It was blood, pooling around her legs. No, no, no. Please, no. Not now! A scream welled up in her throat, but was quelled by a groan from the man behind her. She turned to him, and discovered the source of the blood. The gash in his thigh where she’d stabbed him was still oozing liquid.
Neri tore a strip from her gown and tied it tightly round his leg, using one of his daggers as a tourniquet. As she covered up the wound, his hood dropped from his head. Valyar. “You’re alive?” she gave him a gentle shove. “You let me believe that you were dead!?”
He gave no response.
“Why do I seem to be patching you up and speaking to your unconscious body again?”
There was no still sound from him. She stood and looked around the landscape for signs of help. It was full of dry mountains, and devoid of snow. A row of lights shone at the base of their hill, and she could see that they formed part of a square building. She could only hope that its occupants were rebel sympathisers, or that they understood Valyar’s allegiances.
Neri leaned forward, hooked her arms under his and began to drag him down the rugged slope. A worryingly wide trail of blood streaked behind them. She had to stop and rest several times, and it seemed to take an age to move him. But, at length, she got him to the gates and they were resplendent with rugged, grey-uniformed soldiers. It was a rebel base. “I need some help!”
Two men came running out, their eyes widening as they caught sight of the state she and Valyar were in. But soon he was being carried into the building, and she followed them like a lost miner dog. There was something familiar about the pins on their uniforms.
“Neri! Blast it, Neri, what happened to you? Are you alright?”
“Daemar!” She threw herself into his arms and allowed him to squeeze her for as long as she dared.
“You’re covered in blood,” he said with worried eyes. “What happened?”
“It’s his blood.” She started moving after Valyar’s stretchered body again, keeping Ihurade in tow. “I don’t know what happened. We were cornered… and then we were here.”
“He shifted you with him.” The general spat, “That was a dangerous thing for him to do, what with you...”
“He got us both out, didn’t he?”
Ihurade chose to remain silent. The group turned into the medical bay, where Valyar was placed onto a bed. A team of men and women in blue swelled around him almost immediately.
“What are you doing here, Daemar?” she asked.
He folded his arms and studied her up and down. “I’ve been posted here by your young man, as it happens. My men and I are here to watch over you and the… ah…” He narrowed his eyes. “I had expected you to be bigger.”
“His intention was always to bring me here?” Her eyes flicked back to the emperor’s son, who was now being pumped full of new blood.
Ihurade nodded. “Should have been by heli.”
“He wants to keep me here, like a breeding sow in a sty? And why are you following his orders?” She couldn’t help but feel disappointment.
The general came to sit beside her. “Because he’s got a very credible revolution underway, and more than a few rebel captains supporting him. And he has you. Somehow he knew that would have me running to his every request. As for your presence here, no one will lock you up, but you have good reason to stay.”
“Which is?”
“This mountain hides whatever weird powers he and his father use to sense each other. That’s how he’s managed to play dead for so long. But if his child is here, Turoth will only sense one other Sighter wandering the planet, which means Valyar can finish this war, and his father won’t know his son is on the rampage until he’s at The Fortress gates.”
“But we were both just at The Fortress. He’ll already know.”
Ihurade grinned cryptically. “A lot more planning went into your escape than you give us credit for. Turoth was given a nice little drink – little enough to get past his poison detectors, but plenty to keep him asleep for the next two days.”
“And after that Valyar and I must be separated. One of us must always be at this mountain?”
He nodded. “At least until it comes out of you.” He frowned again. “I don’t understand it Neri. Just what is your plan? When I first heard of this… pregnancy, I thought perhaps you planned to tear the kid out and kill it in front of the emperor’s face. I know how much you want him to suffer.”
She gazed at the general with her eyes wide and mouth open. “You really think I am that cold?”
He paused, but after a while shook his head. “No, I do not.”
One of the medics stepped out of the melee to speak to them. “General Ihurade, sir… my lady. The stab wound’s nicked an artery, but we have it stabilised. He’ll need to rest here for the night at least.” He looked at Neri. “Has anyone checked you out yet?”
She shook her head, and worry began to seep into her heart. “The baby hasn’t moved since we jumped here.”
“Sit on that bed for me.” The medic gestured to the one she was leaning against, and pulled out some sort of looped device with sensors at one end. He drew up a chair, and began listening at various points across her stomach. “There’s a good, strong heartbeat there,” he said at last. “Nothing to worry about.”
Relief washed through her. “Thank you.”
Neri waited quietly with Ihurade for a time, dozing in and out of sleep while he paced the bay impatiently. She tried questioning him about the years in which they had not seen each other on several occasions, but he did not seem keen to talk about them or his progression to general. When the morning finally came, Valyar opened his eyes.
“I’d like some time alone with him, Daemar,” she said softly.
General Ihurade gave her such a look of distress that she half thought of undoing her request, but he made his departure in any case.
Valyar sat up on the bed groggily, but he gave her a smile as he rubbed his leg. “You stabbed me.”
“You got me pregnant.”
His smile faded slowly. “I’m sorry for everything you’ve been through. I had no idea… are you alright? Is everything…?”
Neri was becoming rather sick of that question. The baby started wriggling about, echoing her irritation. She took Valyar’s hand and placed it against the side of her abdomen.
His eyes popped with surprise the moment he felt the movement. “That’s not you?”
“Not me.”
He frowned and pushed aside several layers of the fresh clothing she had been given, and raised his eyes to her. “I can sense it, too. Do you know if it is a boy or girl yet?”
She shrugged. “Your father seemed convinced it was male, so much so that he didn’t bother to have me checked.”
“There haven’t been any female Sighters in over nine-hundred years. It’s a fairly sure bet.”
“Or perhaps it is about time there was one.”
Valyar drew her onto the bed beside him. “I haven’t stopped thinking about you since we met. Daemar even warned me off you when I mentioned a Šona woman who fought. He said I’d get my heart cut out with an ice pick, but I see nothing cold about you.”
“Daemar was business. You were… different.”
He looked down at the floor. “How long have I been unconscious?”
“Just overnight.”
“Then I do not have much time left with you.”
Neri pried open the top of his shirt. “And we had better make the most of it.”
Lying with him was an altogether different experience on that occasion, though no less enjoyable than before. But it wasn’t about gratification anymore, it was about something new. For the first time in years, she forgot about the enemies hiding behind the corner, or the face of Captain Grailer. She was able to erase the images of her people’s massacre, and think of things other than her parents’ disappointment. This man could distance her from all that.
“You will do as a husband,” she said afterwards.
He propped himself up, blinking. “How many do you already have?”
“None! Will you do it or not?”
“Yes.” And after a while he said, “Will you take any more?”
She had not thought of that. “Men from this part of the world tend to become jealous. I don’t know if that would be a good idea, though a child really ought to have at least two fathers.” In an ideal world. But Neri was willing to be quite practical with the situation.
Valyar’s face became quite serious. “Mia, I do not wish to share you.”
How strange to be called by that name again. “Then it is agreed.”
And so, that evening, they knelt before one of Ihurade’s captains to make their promises, since Daemar had flatly refused to do it, and Neri finally gained a family. But after that she was drawn into the discussions of the final revolt, where it became clear that every military leader she had ever fought for or seduced was now under Valyar’s banner. Strange, how he had achieved that in a few months. She studied the map of the respective forces while the men grumbled over supplies and weather, or hissed at the state of the empire’s economy. How she wished she could be fighting with them in their campaign, to be there at the final assault. Rebel forces now sat in every province of the empire, and four of the best armies sat at each corner of Gharnast. The fifth, Lyan’s army, was quite some distance away from its target, however. It would take at least two months for those men to mobilise to where they needed to be, and that meant Valyar would have to be gone for as long.
“Ihurade’s men should take Korfena instead of Lyan’s,” she muttered, and each of the men stopped their discussion to frown at her. Daemar’s look was nothing short of a glare. Of course, she had put pay to his plans of glorious battle. She cleared her throat. “Anyway, it looks like you have another Siege of Anthar on your hands with Yannir.” Yannir was a close friend of Grailer, and consequently one of the imperial captains she had spent a very long time studying.
“What?” Valyar and a major named Harinto came to stand behind her.
“It’s a blind valley. Yannir likes to wait for his enemies to come to him, and he always moves slowly for his army’s size. He’ll be here by the time your men are there.” She pointed to the respective positions at either end of the valley. “He’ll wait till your men are moving, and essentially ambush them in the blind section.” She’d have bet a year’s platinum on it, if she had that sort of fortune.
Daemar joined them momentarily. He sighed. “She’s right. Make sure you tell those men to take the long route.”
Neri’s eyes were drawn to another, smaller army to the south. She knew from the crest above its marker exactly who led that army. “Save Grailer for me, won’t you?”
Valyer squeezed her shoulder. “I’ll do my best.”
With any luck, by the time The Fortress was ready to fall, her baby would be out and she could steal a few days away to do some good, old-fashioned fighting. Possibly. As long as Daemar wouldn’t mind playing child minder for a while. She glanced back at his face. It still looked rather darkened with irritation.
When their discussions had finished, it was announced that Valyar would have to leave. She had only a few moments with him to say goodbye, in which she instructed him to take care of his leg and return in time to see his child enter the world. On the latter, he made it clear that promises were impossible. And that renewed the fears she had of what was still to come. Would she still have a husband at the end of this? And she had no idea what to expect from the birth of a half Šona, half Sighter baby. She hoped it would be easy.
Daemar Ihurade joined her as soon as Valyar had gone, and his mood had improved enough to offer her an arm across the shoulders.
“I’m sorry you’re stuck here with me,” she said softly. “I think I know where you’d rather be.”
He smiled and raised an eyebrow. “No. Your husband was very careful in his choice of me. He knew I’d watch you and be happy to do it. And the sunsets in this place – I’ve seen nothing like them, Neri.”
The sun was setting in the Borran Forests, sending shards of golden light across browned ferns and dead leaves. Valyar watched as the light grew weaker, his elbows resting on his knees. His voice was soft. “Daemar was so deeply in love with you, he tried to kill me when he found out I’d fathered your child. Did he ever tell you about that?”
“No.”
The emperor sighed, and turned so that his profile was framed by the yellow light. “Do you remember the battle, Mia?”
“I am Neri.”
“You were always Mia to me.”
She kicked at the stones by her feet. Things would become confusing with two Mias in The Fortress. And Mia was such a defiantly Šona name. It sparked a thought. “What role does Zanda have at The Fortress?”
“You told me a child ought to have at least two fathers, and so I found another for our daughter. I wanted her to know about where her blood came from, something of her mother. Zanda is good with her, and is often there when I cannot be.”
“I see.” No wonder the poor man had felt he was obliged to make that rather forward request of her on her second night at The Fortress. Another memory started to surface in her mind. “The last thing I remember…”
She was running to the top of the mountain again, going as fast as she could. Her pace was accompanied by the clatter of rocks under her feet and the regular thump of her heart. It was not as fun as the snows, but it was good to have some freedom. Someone was behind her.
“Neri! For The Universe’s sake, girl, SLOW DOWN!”
She glanced back at Ihurade, who was visibly struggling. “There’s nothing wrong with me, old man!” She hopped over another gap in the rocks and landed smoothly on the high ledge that gave the best view of the valley. It gave her quite a feeling of satisfaction to be there.
“Damn it!” The general said, dropping down beside her. “Women with only days to go before the arrival of their child are supposed to spend their time in armchairs!”
She couldn’t imagine anything more dull or pointless. “We’re both healthier for it. And I want to be ready to slice off Grailer’s wrinkled, smiling head as soon as I can when this is over.”
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