He shook his head. “This was… different. I went to… some other time. The temple, but not as we knew it. A woman was there, calling herself Keeper Ti-Li.”
“A keeper?” Lilia asked. “Not a creature, or a beast, or… she said she was a keeper?”
“Yes. The keepers are not… the temples, I think. The keepers are like… ghosts of people, maybe souls left to watch over the temples. She said she was unstuck in time. Maybe that’s why the stone can do what it… did. Ti-Li said the stone had been sabotaged by Ora Almeysia. But I wanted to try and visit her again, to learn more. Back then… I was still hoping to find some way to turn back the Tai Mora, maybe by using the temples.”
“What did she tell you about the temples?” Lilia asked.
“She told me the temples were alive, that they are living… transference engines, she called them. She said they were created a very long time ago. Properly controlled, they could be used to harness the power of the satellites.”
“Did she say how to control them?” Lilia asked.
“How is this relevant?” Meyna said. “Whatever the Tai Mora are doing in the temples doesn’t concern us. We’re going to leave Dhai.”
“Leave?” Ahkio said.
“A moment, Meyna,” Lilia said. “What exactly did this temple keeper tell you?”
Ahkio rubbed his forehead. “It was a long time ago. She… it? She said they created the temples, with living transference engines, to kill something infecting their sky. But they broke it apart instead, and now the pieces travel among all the worlds. She said only the engines could stop it.”
“But how?” Lilia pressed.
“She didn’t know. All she could tell me was how they broke the worlds, not how to… fix them again.”
“Meyna,” Lilia said, “Caisa brought us information that–”
Meyna held up a hand. “No more talk of temples. Walking into one of these temples would be suicide at best. The Tai Mora have them warded and guarded. They are teeming with jistas.”
“Caisa is still alive?” Ahkio asked. “She was my assistant, for a time.”
“She is,” Lilia said carefully.
“Please,” Ahkio said, “what’s happened here since I’ve been gone? Liaro could only tell me what happened in the valley. There are so few survivors there. So many bodies were burned and buried, like chattel.”
“I’ll tell you more of that,” Meyna said, “once we decide what to do with you.”
“There was clearly an Ahkio here for the fall of Kuallina,” Lilia said. “If you don’t remember any of that, what do you remember? Where did you find yourself? In the Woodland?”
“No. I woke up in the temple. In my own bed, as the Tai Mora took the temple.”
“You died when the Tai Mora took the temple,” Yisaoh said. “You’re telling us that when our Ahkio died, you just… appeared? Woke up in his bed?”
“I know it sounds mad, but so does traveling between worlds, doesn’t it? I remember is touching the stone, and then–”
“I’ve never heard of the temples doing this,” Lilia said. She wondered what else they didn’t yet know about the temples, if his story was to be believed.
“Lilia, will you leave us?” Meyna asked. “Yisaoh and I have a real history with Ahkio. Let us speak to him alone. Liaro, could you also wait outside?”
Lilia bit her tongue. She hoped Yisaoh would intercede, but Yisaoh only shrugged. “Yes,” Yisaoh said, “we will send for you.”
Lilia tried to stifle her grimace, and turned quickly so they could not see the shift in her expression.
She limped from the tent and into the clearing outside, and Namia followed. The wood had gone quiet; the tumbleterrors would have scared away most of the sentient flora and fauna. She rubbed her arms.
Liaro stayed near the tent. As Lilia waited, the storm began to clear, and the rain ceased. Namia sprawled beside her in a sudden sunbeam.
Yisaoh finally came out, hands pushed deep into her pockets, and walked over to Lilia. Shook her head.
“What are you going to do?” Lilia said.
“Ahkio can be controlled,” Yisaoh said. “Meyna loves the idea of having him beside her. It gives her legitimacy. I could almost wonder if she knew about him, before, if murdering Mohrai was done knowing Ahkio would come back.”
“That’s… well, I wouldn’t put that past her. Couldn’t she just… get rid of him?”
“We can’t just kill him,” Yisaoh said, but there was no judgment in her tone, only a bored resignation. “I couldn’t find a lie, when we spoke to him alone in there. He insists he wants nothing from us, to just go back to being a little religious teacher, but you know how people will react to that.”
“They’ll follow him,” Lilia said. “Some will. How many will follow him into some fool scheme? He’s not made for these times. He’ll lead them to disaster, the same way he led Dhai to disaster.”
“No Kai could have stopped this,” Yisaoh said. “Not even if our Kirana had lived. There was no way to win this. You can only destroy monsters like that by becoming one, and no Kai was going to do that to the Dhai.”
“What about what he said, about the temple?”
“Going back in time?” Yisaoh snorted. “Who knows?”
“The other part. About the temples being transference engines meant to channel the power of the satellites. We intuited that, but he’s confirmed it. The Tai Mora are going to harness that power. That’s what they’re doing in those basements. They are going to figure out how to break the world, and Meyna wants us to just run away.”
“Oh, Lilia.” Yisaoh sighed. “Always scheming. First you want to murder Tai Mora, then you want to… what? Take over the temples? If you haven’t noticed, we can’t even feed ourselves.”
Lilia gazed at the tent, and Liaro, who squatted outside it, cracking his knuckles. “I want to see what’s down there for myself,” Lilia said.
“Good luck with that,” Yisaoh said.
“I have people in every temple,” Lilia said. “Reconnaissance would not be too difficult, or dangerous.”
“Are you listening to yourself right now? Hasn’t Caisa given you enough diagrams? And it doesn’t matter! We’re leaving.”
“You may be,” Lilia said. “I’m not. Not yet.” A plan was beginning to form in her mind, one that relied on some of the same logistics as her plan to strike back at the Tai Mora. Infiltrating one of the temples would be a kind of revenge, after all. She considered the sort of damage she could do to them, if she knew more than them, if she took control of one of these transference engines for herself, or sabotaged them.
“I know that look,” Yisaoh said. “Whatever you’re scheming, don’t do it.”
“I have a plan.”
“Tira’s tears. You and your little cultists are going to murder yourselves.”
“If we do,” Lilia said, “we will be taking a lot of Tai Mora with us. Come on, Namia.”
Lilia touched the girl’s shoulder, and Namia followed as Lilia headed back to the entrance to their underground warren.
“You and your little cultists can do what you like!” Yisaoh called after her. “You know Meyna will be pleased if you’re gone! She’s going to hope you all die!”
Lilia did not answer, but glanced down at Namia. “What’s the nearest temple, Namia?”
Namia signed, “Tira.”
“That’s right,” Lilia said. “It’s been a long time since I visited Tira’s Temple. Let’s change that.”
“Danger,” Namia signed.
Lilia pushed her hands away.
10
Through the wink, back to the battlefield outside the stronghold called Daorian that had eaten so many of Natanial’s mercenary soldiers in the last months. Natanial kept his mouth shut as he escorted Anavha to Monshara’s tent. He almost told Monshara he’d brought her a gift, and thought better of it. That was something Anavha’s wife would have said, some baser evil.
Instead, Natanial presented him as an omaj
ista, the one they needed to breach Daorian’s defenses and end the Tai Mora campaign in this idiot country.
“He isn’t much to look at,” Monshara said, in Tai Mora.
“He’s powerful enough to open a wink back from Aaldia to get us here. He has a good shot at opening one for an army.”
“I know you’re talking about me,” Anavha said, in Dorinah.
“You aren’t fit for battle,” Monshara said, switching to the same language.
“There’ll be no battling,” Natanial said, keeping his voice warm and even, because at the word “battle” Anavha had trembled like a leaf. “You’ll open a wink, a gate, for the army, is all. Monshara will guide events from there.”
Anavha reminded him, as ever, of a frightened young animal. He required a soft voice and a light touch.
“I’d like you to find a place for him here in the village, somewhere he won’t be disturbed,” Natanial said.
“But I want to stay with you,” Anavha said.
“I have my people up the hill.”
“Then I’ll camp with you there.”
“You wouldn’t like it,” Natanial said. “Cold and filthy. Full of violence.” He imagined Anavha meeting some of the people he employed.
“I can provide him a room and protection,” Monshara said.
“Protection,” Natanial reiterated, switching back to Tai Mora again, “not a jail cell. He isn’t a prisoner. He’ll bolt if you treat him like one.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Monshara said.
“Tomorrow, then?”
“Tomorrow,” she said, and gestured for Anavha to go with her.
Natanial could not get the boy’s terrified face from his mind.
Natanial knew the smell of war the way he knew the smell of birth. His mother had borne him on a battlefield, somewhere on the outer islands north of Dorinah. Like many Aaldian sailors, she had also done her time as a mercenary, and he grew up with the smell of blood and steel and the sea. Standing outside the Dorinah village, with the stink of the Tai Mora army behind him and the tangy brine of the sea ahead of him, he was brought back to those simpler times. Birth and death, the sea and the land. All that mattered was having a ship, enough to eat, a family, a purpose. Once he had lost all those things, he was adrift. He was here.
Monshara had brought casks of blood with her. Natanial had assumed that would be entirely unnecessary, but he had no idea how powerful Anavha was, or how well he had mastered his gift in the year since he had last seen him. Better prepared than not.
As Monshara led them down the road, both of them astride large black bears, Natanial appraised Anavha, looking for signs of hurt or discomfort. Anavha’s face was drawn, but his complexion was clear, and Natanial did not mark any injury. He had dressed in Tai Mora clothes: wide-legged trousers and a flowing tunic and vest that buttoned up the front. The hat he bore was ridiculous, certainly, but the suns were high and hot.
The cart of blood waited by Natanial’s side. His mercenaries were lined up at the flank of Monshara’s main force. They would not go in after them, but wait outside the walls to clean up any stragglers. Otolyn had grumbled about that, upset at their chances of getting any loot that way, but Natanial was firm. They had incurred enough losses when he disobeyed orders and saved Monshara’s last assault from becoming a rout.
“I’ll be beside you the whole time,” Natanial told Anavha. “We’ll stay here and keep it open. We don’t go in until it’s done.”
Monshara waved the cart driver down, and he rolled up the two barrels of blood.
“What’s this?” Anavha said, but the driver was already pushing over the barrel, spilling reeking, clotting blood all over the road.
“In case you need a little help,” Monshara said.
Anavha wrinkled his nose and raised his hands.
The air grew heavy. The hair on the back of Natanial’s arms stood on end. A slight trembling shook the ground, and rumbled across the road, making little waves in the blood.
Ahead of the great army, the air rippled.
Monshara rode her bear ahead, to get in position and ready her troops.
A snarling slash opened in the fabric of the air. From his seat, Natanial could make out a stone room. It could be any place at all, from the look of it, but he suspected it was somewhere in Daorian that Anavha knew. He had heard it was easier to open a passage where one had been.
Monshara waved a scout in, a very brave girl, no doubt, who barreled through with her bear into the stone house.
Natanial glanced at Anavha, but his face was calm. “You’ve learned much since I last saw you,” Natanial said.
“A little,” Anavha said. “I had a good teacher here. But mostly… the difference is that the power’s here.” He nodded at Oma’s blaring red eye. “I can feel it, like a heartbeat.”
The scout returned and reported to Monshara. They were too far away for Natanial to make out the words, but Monshara waved her soldiers in.
There was only enough room for them to go four abreast, and the pace was slow. The pace worried Natanial, because if there was any sizable counter force inside, they could stopper up the house, or set it on fire, and completely cut them off.
Monshara rode over to Natanial and Anavha. “Can we open another gate?” she said, clearly thinking the same thing about their vulnerability. “I want to come in at them from several places.”
“I could,” Anavha said, “but I couldn’t hold it as long. This is my sister-in-law’s house. Any other place in Daorian… I don’t know as well.”
Monshara said. “My people are vulnerable here. Isn’t there somewhere else? Near the harbor, maybe?”
“I’ll try,” Anavha said.
“We shouldn’t push him,” Natanial said.
“He’s an adult,” Monshara said. “He can tell me what he can and can’t do. Can you do it or not?”
Anavha said, “I can.” He spread his arms wide. Natanial held his breath and reflexively reached for the hilt of his ax.
Anavha pushed one arm toward the existing gate, and concentrated hard on a spot twenty paces distant. This time, the blood in the barrels began to leak from the seams between the slats, oozing thickly onto the ground. Natanial’s skin prickled. The blood rose from the ground, the droplets emerging from the barrels and coalescing into a winding spiral in the air. Monshara’s troops, entering the other gateway, paid it no mind.
Anavha bit his lip. Natanial moved to stand near him. “Hold the first one,” Natanial said. “That’s more important.”
“I have–” Anavha said, and then the world shifted.
Natanial’s stomach heaved. He lurched forward as the sky itself seemed to move around him. One moment he was standing outside Asaolina, Anavha just an arm’s length away, and the next, he was standing in a dark alley. The sky above juddered. Nausea overcame him, and he vomited into the gutter. When his stomach was empty, he drooled bile and turned and saw Anavha lying on the ground a few paces away.
Natanial crawled over to him, dragging his ax with him.
“Anavha?” Natanial patted his cheek. “Anavha?” Screaming came from the streets on either side of the narrow alley. He smelled smoke.
Anavha’s eyelids flickered.
“Anavha, where are we?” Natanial said.
Anavha opened his eyes, and Natanial helped him up. Natanial gazed into the sky; still the same lavender of home, so hopefully they had not traveled very far. The stonework indicated they were somewhere within the city of Daorian, but he wasn’t sure where.
“I…” Anavha took it all in, his expression as confused as Natanial felt. “I don’t know,” Anavha said. “I was trying to open a gate near the harbor.”
Natanial sniffed the air, but could smell nothing over the smoke. “Let’s move,” he said. “Stay near me.”
“I can take us–”
“No,” Natanial said; his stomach protested. “Seven hells, where are we?”
“I don’t know.”
“What
else can you do with these skills of yours? Because we’ll need them. Stay with me! The bulk of the force will have marched for the hold. We’ll catch up with them. I didn’t want you here, but if you’re here, we might as well make the most of it.”
Natanial drew his ax and followed the sinuous alley. He ducked under an archway and checked both ways before running across a main street. Bodies lay in the street, Tai Mora and Dorinah, most civilian. One Tai Mora was looting a body. Flames licked at the remains of a storefront. The smell of smoke wafted down the street, coming mostly from the market area. It had been a long time since he was last in Daorian. He had bided his time there getting close to the Empress’s daughter, working his way into her good graces and then her bed, before finally murdering her.
As he entered the next intersection, an arrow zipped past his head. Natanial ducked back into the street he’d come from, throwing one arm in front of Anavha and pinning him to the wall. Ahead, a group of Dorinah soldiers and civilians had set up a barricade, holding the street. Two dozen dead Tai Mora were scattered on the other side of the barrier.
“Have you used your gift on anything but winks… gates?” Natanial asked.
“No,” Anavha said.
Natanial glanced back into the street and got a quick count of the defenders. The more he pushed Anavha, the more likely he was to find himself severed in half by some ill-timed gate. He swore in Tordinian. Anavha’s face darkened.
“I’m sorry,” Anavha said.
“Let me think,” Natanial said.
Anavha pointed at the storefront at the corner. It had once been a teahouse, and the roof over the outside dining area had partially collapsed, tilting at a dangerous right angle.
“We could duck down there,” Anavha said.
“They have arrows,” Natanial said.
“The barricades are too high,” Anavha said. “See that angle on the roof? They are firing down at us. The roof will be in their way.”
Natanial peered at the angle of the roof, and saw that Anavha was right. “How in Laine’s hell did you figure that?” he said.
The Broken Heavens Page 12
