A Magic of Dawn

by S L Farrell

  “Hïrzg,” Rance interrupted, “forgive me, but I still don’t like this. There is no reason that Firenzcia needs to bow to Nessantico. If anything, it should be the other way around, with you dictating the terms . . .” Rance stopped as they heard a knock on the servants’ door to the chamber. “Ah, that will be the additional refreshments. A moment . . .”

  Rance rose from his chair, bowed to Jan, and went to the door. Rhianna was among the servants who entered, Jan noticed immediately, with a cart laden with glasses, a tray of pastries, and bottles of wine. She seemed to notice Jan at the same time, dropping her gaze as she pushed the cart toward the end of the table.

  Brie noticed her as well. Jan felt Brie watching him as he regarded Rhianna, and heard the quick intake of breath through her nose. The conversation around the table turned to the ashfall, to Sergei’s journey here—safe subjects—as the servants placed the glasses and dishes in front of each of them, opened the bottles and poured, and put the pastries within easy reach. Jan pretended to listen and take part in the talk, glancing deliberately and often at Brie as he did so, turning carefully away from Rhianna when she came quietly to his side to place his glass and then hurry away. He saw Brie glance at the girl, saw the narrowing of her eyes and the flare of her nostrils as she watched Rhianna even while she smiled at Jan. He forced himself not to look away even though he wanted that. There was something about the girl that made him want to talk to her, to listen to her voice and stare into her face, and, hopefully, to know her much better . . .

  But if he wanted that, he had to be patient. He had to be careful.

  Patience.

  He laughed, suddenly, startling Brie and the others. Brie touched her face quizzically, as if wondering whether the kohl around her eyes had decided to smear. “Is something wrong, my love?”

  “No, no,” he said. Rhianna, with the other servants, were already exiting the room, ushered out by Rance, who closed the door after them and returned to the table. “Starkkapitän, I want you to muster three divisions of the army—one at the Loi-Clario Pass, and two near Ville Colhelm; Archigos, you will coordinate with the Starkkapitän to make certain that he has sufficient war-téni for full-scale operations. Rance, we will be leaving Brezno for Stag Fall in two days, and we will wait there for further news.”

  “Then you are accepting the Kraljica’s offer?” Sergei said, and Jan shook his head.

  “No,” he told the man. “I am preparing my country for possible war against the Westlanders—because what you have told me of Karnmor is terrifying. Perhaps that war will be brought to us . . .” He waited, picked up the goblet that Rhianna had put at his side and took a sip of the wine. It was tart and dry, and as red as blood. “Sergei, if you can convince Matarh that she would be more comfortable if she stepped away from the Sun Throne on her sixtieth birthday—and if she would declare such publicly and in writing to both me and the Council of Ca’ for both Nessantico and Brezno—then perhaps Firenzcia might find the war wherever it is at that point. I can be that patient, I suppose.”

  Sergei nodded. He lifted his cane and slammed it hard against the floor. “Then, Hïrzg, I will take enough time to eat and get the rest of this damned ash from my clothes and body, and I will immediately be returning to Nessantico.”

  Rochelle Botelli

  IF SHE WAS TO BE THE WHITE STONE, if she was to be what her matarh had taught her to be, then she could not wait much longer. The Hïrzg and Hïrzgin, their family—along with Rance ci’Lawli and the personal staff—would be leaving in two days, and that would ruin all the planning she’d done.

  She’d been slow because she wanted to be here, wanted to know her vatarh better. But she had to act now, if she were going to act.

  If she fulfilled the contract and killed Rance ci’Lawli as she had killed the others, then she might also have to leave the palais just as swiftly, and in leaving the palais, leave behind forever her vatarh.

  Rochelle knew some of the same emotional conflict must have torn at her matarh in her day: pregnant with Jan’s son, in love with him, yet forced to flee—because if he knew who she was, that knowledge would also destroy the love and any chance she had. Rochelle fingered the stone that hung in a leather pouch around her neck, the white pebble that Matarh believed held the very souls of those she had killed. I understand, Matarh, she thought. How hard that must have been for you . . .

  But she was not her matarh. She wasn’t tormented by voices. She had only begun to be the White Stone. And her matarh had been too enamored of the knife and of watching her victims die.

  There were other ways to kill someone, and if she did it right . . . Well, she might fulfill the contract and not need to flee the scene. All she needed was a sufficient proof of her innocence.

  To that end, she had seduced Emerin ce’Stego, one of the trusted palais gardai. In the past week, she had spent as many nights as she could with him in her small bedchamber in the lower levels of the servants’ wing, as both of them were generally on day duty and the palais gardai were permitted to occasionally spend nights away from the barracks. Emerin was pleasant enough, and gentle enough, and not much older than Rochelle herself. He also had wonderful green eyes; she enjoyed watching him as they made love, seeing the surprise in his face as he found his release. The first few nights, she made certain to get up in the middle of the night, jostling their bed and making enough noise that he would wake sleepily and talk to her. “You sleep so lightly, love,” she told him. “It must be your training.”

  He’d smiled at that, almost proudly. “A garda needs to be alert, even when he’s sleeping,” he told her. “You never know when you might be called, or when something might happen.”

  “Well, I’d never be able to sneak away from you at night. Why, I was trying so hard not to disturb you at all . . .”

  Matarh had known knives and other edged weapons, but she had also known the rest of the assassin’s repertoire, and Rochelle had paid close attention to that portion of her education. It was easy enough, the night that the Ambassador of the Holdings left, to slip a potion into Emerin’s wine goblet—a slow-acting sleeping draught. They made love, and he had drifted off to sleep. Rochelle slipped from the bed and dressed, taking with her the blade Matarh had given her, her favorite dagger, its edges blackened with a tar she was careful not to touch herself.

  Rochelle had acquainted herself with the patterns of the palais and the servants’ wing. The night staff would be at work; the day staff sleeping. Rarely would anyone be moving in the corridors. She was able to quickly slip to the single outside door, then sidle along the wall in the moonless, cloudy night to the window of Rance’s bedroom. She could see the campfire of the gardai near the gate, and the forms of the men there—staring outward, not back toward the palais, and their night vision ruined in any case by the flames.

  The staff rotated the duty of cleaning Rance’s rooms; it had been Rochelle’s turn three days ago, and she had taken the time to replace the metal lock of Rance’s casement with one she’d fashioned from painted, dried clay. It was the work of a moment to push hard against the window. The clay cracked and crumbled easily; the two windows swung open. She could hear Rance snoring inside—Rance’s snore was nearly legendary among the servants. She hoisted herself up and slipped inside, dropping almost silently to the floor. She pushed the windows shut again.

  She needed no light; she’d familiarized herself with the room. Rance invariably slept alone. “No one could actually sleep with that racket in the same bed” was the usual laughing response from the staff if anyone speculated on the aide’s love life. She heard more ominous gossip—that Rance had been injured in an accident as a young man and no longer possessed the requisite equipment for such activities.

  Whatever the reason, Rance always slept alone. Rochelle’s eyes had already adjusted to the gloom; she could see the hump of his body under the covers—not that anyone needed more than ears to locate him. She padded over to the bed. He had tossed one of the pillows on the floor; R
ochelle picked it up. She slid the dagger from its sheath. Then, in one motion, she plunged the pillow over Rance’s face and slid the the dagger along his side, the cut shallow but long—the depth of the stroke didn’t matter, only that the black poison on the blade entered his body.

  Rance immediately jerked awake, his hands scrabbling blindly, but Rochelle pressed all her weight down on him. The poison on the blade was already doing its deadly work; she could hear the choking rattle in his muddled cries and the flailing hands began to jerk spasmodically. A breath later, and they had dropped back to the bed. Carefully, Rochelle lifted the pillow from Rance’s head. In the dimness, she could see his mouth open, the tongue black and thick and protruding from his mouth, vomit smeared along his chin. His eyes were wide, and she quickly removed the two pebbles from the pouch laced around her neck: the White Stone’s pebble, and the one that Josef cu’Kella had given her. Her matarh’s stone she placed on the man’s right eye, cu’Kella’s on the left. After a moment, she plucked the one from his right eye and placed it back in the pouch. She cleaned the dagger on the bedding before sheathing it again.

  Moving to the window, she quickly replaced the metal latch and tied a string around it. She climbed back outside, then pulled the twin windows shut; pulling the string, she brought the metal latch over to snug itself in the opposite latch, and a tug on the string pulled it through the crack between the two segments of the window.

  A few minutes later, and she was back in her bed next to Emerin.

  It was not until dawn that a scream awakened them both.

  REALIZATIONS

  Niente

  Jan ca’Ostheim

  Brie ca’Ostheim

  Allesandra ca’Vörl

  Varina ca’Pallo

  Nico Morel

  Rochelle Botelli

  Niente

  Sergei ca’Rudka

  Niente

  ATL HAD COME TO HIM THE NIGHT BEFORE. “I saw the battle, Taat,” he said. His voice was solemn, his face serious. He sounded on the verge of exhaustion; the skin under his eyes was puffy and dark. “In the scrying bowl. I saw it.”

  They were standing on the rear quarterdeck of the Yaoyotl. The sun had set with another spectacular blaze, as if sinking into a burning city just over the horizon. The fleet was anchored, nearly filling the A’Sele from bank to bank and blockading the harbor of the city Fossano. Niente had consulted with Tecuhtli Citlali, had told him what he’d seen in the scrying bowl, then Niente called together the chief nahualli of each of the ships to give his instructions for tomorrow. They had left less than a stripe of the candle before, and he still sat here, the crew studiously avoiding him as he stared out toward the distant lights of the city. He rubbed at the gold bracelet of the Nahual around his right forearm; it seemed to chafe his skin.

  Now Atl’s words chilled Niente though the night air was warm enough. He felt as if snow blanketed his spine. If Axat had granted the boy far-vision, of what lay well ahead of them—it all could still unravel, the entire Long Path, like a poorly-tied weaving. “What battle?” he asked. “In Nessantico?”

  Atl shook his head. “No, not the great city.” He pointed over the water to the light. “This one. Fossano.” With that admission, the coldness and unease began to recede and Niente found himself relaxing hands that had curled defensively into fists. “Tell me,” he said to Atl, more calmly now.

  “Have you seen it also, Taat?” Atl asked, and Niente nodded to him.

  “Yes. Axat has granted me that sight. Tell me what you saw, so I know whether you saw true.”

  “I saw the ships anchored here close to the shore, and the warriors spilling out onto the land like furious black ants. I saw Holdings ships at our rear, and fire arcing from our boats to theirs and setting them afire. There were two battles, really—one here on the water and another on the land. Mostly I saw the one on the land. I was there, and you, Taat, and Tecuhtli Citlali. The city walls were tall and thick, but the black sand tore into them and knocked them down. I saw their war-téni sending fire back toward us, and the nahualli’s spell-staffs responding. But their war-téni wearied eventually, and they couldn’t stop the catapults that threw black sand at the walls. The great stones tumbled down and their portcullis was shattered. Tecuhtli Citlali sent up a great cry, and our warriors rushed into the city.”

  Niente saw Atl’s throat move as he swallowed then. “The vision began to shift then, and Axat only gave me quick, fleeting sights. All of it was short and bloody. We took their city, we slew the Eastlander warriors until their courage broke and they fled in whatever direction they could. We took the spoils from their houses.” He flushed. “I saw their women raped and their young men killed if they dared to protest, though the High Warriors stopped that where they could. I saw their children wailing and crying. I saw their city in flames. And I saw you, Taat, and Tecuhtli Citlali—I saw you sacrifice the tecuhtli of their city to Axat and Sakal in gratitude.”

  “And then . . .” Niente prompted him, but Atl shook his head.

  “There was no more, Taat. Only a glimpse of warriors coming back to the ships. That was all that Axat granted me.” He shook his head. “Was Her vision true, Taat? Is this what you saw also?”

  That was all . . . Niente sighed in relief, though Atl’s expression fell, as if he thought that Niente were disappointed in him. Niente forced a smile; it ached in the muscles of his face. “I saw the same,” he told his son, and Atl beamed. “Axat also granted me to see the water battle, and we sent a dozen of the Easterner ships to the bottom of the harbor; the rest were damaged and retreated to the west down the A’Sele. This will be a great victory for Tecuhtli Citlali. Axat has ordained it.” He stopped, and this time the smile was genuine. “I saw you also, Atl. I saw you leading the nahualli with your spell-staff; I saw you still strong when other nahualli were weak, and I saw you leading the warriors into the city. I saw Tecuhtli Citlali’s pride in you afterward.”

  He could see Atl struggling not to grin, to remain stoic and serious. He would not tell Atl of the fate he’d seen for him later. Instead, he clapped his son on the back, then clasped him to him, kissing him on the cheek. “I love you, my son,” he whispered into the young man’s ear. “You should know that I’m proud of the person you’ve become.”

  The night air was cool around them. There were stars struggling to be seen through the persistent high clouds, and a moon that cloaked itself in a luminous mist. There were the yellow lights of the city glistening in the blackness of the land. Waves slapped the hull of the Yaoyotl like erratic hands on a drum, and Niente could smell the sweet oil on Atl’s skin and the heavier musk of the river. He felt like a child holding an adult. He felt shriveled and frail and tiny against his son’s muscular body.

  “Go, and fill your spell-staff,” he told Atl. “Then rest as best you can. Tomorrow—tomorrow we will go and fulfill Axat’s vision.” He kissed Atl again, then pushed him away. “Go,” he said. Atl clasped Niente once more, kissed him as Niente had him, then gave him the moon-sign of Axat.

  “Tomorrow,” he said to Niente, and left.

  Niente watched him go. “Tomorrow,” he whispered after him. “There’s at least that.”

  Jan ca’Ostheim

  “THE PEBBLE ON THE LEFT EYE—that’s the signature of the White Stone. How she entered Rance’s apartments, we don’t know. The door was locked when Paulus arrived; the windows are all latched from the inside.” Eris Cu’Bloch, Commandant of the Garde Brezno, shook his head. “I’m sorry, Hïrzg. He was long dead when they found him. There was nothing to be done.”

  A raw, sickening fury enveloped Jan. He stared at Rance’s body on the bed, the pebble still over his left eye, his right clouded and open. Paulus ci’Simone, one of Rance’s trusted assistants, sat with his head bowed and hands clasped between his knees in a chair. In the outer room, the door to Rance’s apartment hung askew on its hinges from where it had been broken in by the palais staff, and occasionally one of the staff would walk past hurriedly, face av
erted.

  “There’s blood, but not enough,” Jan commented.

  “No,” cu’Bloch agreed. “Nor does it look like he struggled much with his attacker.” He lifted Rance’s bloodied nightgown: it had been sliced open along the side by a sharp knife, and Jan could see the long cut on the man’s side, but the cut was not so deep as to have been fatal. “If you look closely, you can see a dark, oily substance in the cut. If you touch it, it burns. I think the blade that did this was poisoned, though with what . . .” Cu’Bloch shrugged. “I don’t know of a poison that works quickly and effectively enough that Rance wouldn’t have had time to defend himself, but perhaps the White Stone does.”

  Jan pressed his lips together. “Cover him,” he said to cu’Bloch. “Paulus, he was this way when you found him?”

  Paulus lifted his head and nodded mournfully. “Yes, my Hïrzg. Rance was supposed to go over the day’s kitchen menu with me at First Call, and when he didn’t arrive, I knocked on his door and found it locked. He didn’t answer our calls, so I found two of the staff gardai and we broke in. I saw him in his bed, just like that, his skin cold . . .” Paulus stopped. His eyes glistened suddenly and a tear tracked down his face. “We called for the Commandant and you.”

  “You don’t know how the White Stone might have gained entry?” Commandant cu’Bloch asked. Paulus shook his head.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Jan said. “This was the White Stone. She’s here.” He scowled.

  She’s here. As she’d been here when Hïrzg Fynn had been assassinated. He felt as if his hands had suddenly gone cold: that death had been his matarh’s doing. It had been Allesandra who’d hired the White Stone; he’d learned that to his disgust, and that had been one of the reasons he’d abandoned her and the Holdings when the moment had been there to reunify the empire.