Warlord's Wager

by Gwynn White

  A wave of nausea engulfed her. After a moment’s retching, in which nothing but bile dribbled into the dish—one had to eat to have something in the stomach to vomit—she settled back against the chair.

  Another tongue click from Tatiana as she took the bowl and wiped it clean with a cloth. “How can you expect Grigor to grow if you do not feed him?”

  This was a regular argument between her and Tatiana, but as much as Kestrel wanted to eat, the smell of food made her sick. Without answering, she tilted her face to the sun. Her skin felt fevered.

  She was about to ask Tatiana to move her chair into the shade of a cherry tree, when a gush of water swamped her skirt and her cushion. A stab of pain sliced her stomach, making her cry out.

  Tatiana leaped to her feet. “Your waters—they’ve broken. This is not good. Not good at all.” She spun around and shouted to one of the gardeners. “Bring a stretcher bed. Her Highness has gone into labor.” To another, she added, “Run to the palace and have a guardsman summon Mother Saskia. Quickly.”

  Kestrel clutched her belly, unable to grasp what was happening.

  Tatiana bent down and gently wiped her face. “Do not panic, my dear, Mother Saskia is very experienced. She will know what to do.”

  “But it’s too soon!” Kestrel wailed. “My baby will never survive, and then Lukan will be angry . . . and . . . and—” A sob hiccupped out of her.

  Tatiana took her hand. “There will be other pregnancies, child. Do not give into heartache.”

  Kestrel wanted to protest that, without a baby, she would have no hold on Lukan, that he would cast her aside just as Tao and Heron had, but between her cramping pains and tears, she could not speak.

  “By the Dragon!” The voice sounded before Kestrel saw Mother Saskia. In a cloud of white, the Great High Priestess, followed by a retinue of equally white-clad priestesses bearing a stretcher, darted between the rose beds. She dropped down at Kestrel’s side and felt her pulse, then poked her stomach.

  Unable to bear the confines of the chair, Kestrel plopped down onto the brick paving. “My insides,” she gasped. “They’re tearing.”

  “You are having a baby,” Mother Saskia said in a matter-of-fact voice as she started stripping off Kestrel’s underwear.

  “Not here, surely!” Tatiana sounded aghast. She snatched at the priestess’s hands to stop her from removing Kestrel’s knickers.

  “In an ideal world, I would agree,” Mother Saskia growled, knocking her hands away. “But this is far from ideal.”

  Tatiana moved. Either way, Kestrel couldn’t have cared less. She could have been in the great hall in front of the entire court, and it wouldn’t have mattered. The head had crowned, and nothing was stopping this birth now.

  Small as her baby was, he ripped through her like a razor. Blood bloomed, and she started to scream. And scream. The pain stopped at the same moment something blue and wrinkled slithered from her. Mother Saskia caught it.

  “My baby,” Kestrel rasped, holding out her arms.

  “Is barely breathing, Your Highness,” Mother Saskia snapped. “Alina,” she called to one of the priestesses. “Take him, rub him down. Get him breathing and then rush him to the convent. He will need constant care and warmth if he is to survive.”

  “A boy? He’s a boy,” Kestrel whispered, peering past Saskia to see her son, but Alina was already running down the path with him.

  “Wait, Saskia,” Tatiana objected. “At least let Princess Kestrel see her child.”

  Tears flooded Kestrel’s eyes, making it difficult for her to see Tatiana standing, hands on her hips, before Saskia. Having a caring friend with her when Lukan was so far away was comforting.

  “There is no time for that. He will die if not given proper care. The care only a priestess is trained to give. And I will not risk the emperor’s ire if that happens. He made it very clear that at least one of these babies must survive. As this is a boy—our new crown prince—his well-being is of greater concern than the mother’s.”

  “At least one?” Kestrel managed to croak from her crumpled state on the bricks.

  “You are carrying twins, Your Highness, and the next will be on its way very soon.” Mother Saskia turned to her priestess. “Lift the princess onto the stretcher, where she will be more comfortable.”

  Kestrel grabbed her hand. “You never told me. How come you never told me?”

  “The emperor’s instructions. He—”

  Whatever Lukan had instructed stilled on Saskia’s lips as another wracking contraction hit Kestrel. She cried out, clutching the priestess’s arms for support. Tatiana wriggled into Saskia’s place as the priestess moved down to the source of all Kestrel’s pain.

  But like Grigor, this baby wanted nothing more than to be rid of Kestrel’s womb. Smaller and even bluer than Grigor, if that were possible, the baby slithered out only to be snatched up by the priestess. It, too, was quickly bundled up and rushed to the palace.

  Kestrel wanted to ask the sex of her second child, but she sensed something new in the priestess: controlled panic from the way her hands groped and fumbled.

  A sharp pain, and the world began to swim.

  The last thing Kestrel heard was someone saying, “Blood. There’s too much blood.”

  Chapter 39

  “Trevenites! Faster!” Axel barked. “Unless you want your brains splattered on the wall.”

  Almost no light gleamed in the mine, but Axel’s eyes and ears were so accustomed to the dark, he didn’t need to see to know what the Trevenites were doing.

  “My infantrymen move quicker than that in their sleep.” His voice bounced off the stone wall, the excitement of the war game banishing his utter exhaustion.

  Since Magridal's visit to his Maegkin palace suite almost nine months ago, he had hosted dozens of night-time training sessions for Chad’s commanders. The demand for his services never seemed to end.

  The problem was, as effective as his Trevenite soldiers became, every few days one or more of them would fall, leaving a gap that had to be filled with more war games.

  Not to mention a gaping wound in Axel’s heart.

  Long nights spent playing hunt-and-destroy had turned these Trevenites into friends. Closer to them than any of his own troops he commanded as warlord, he mourned the death of every one of them.

  They were not his only sorrow. According to Tatiana, who messaged him regularly, Stefan was still subject to almost daily beatings as he tried to shield Malika from Morass. In addition, Lynx had to be nearing the end of her pregnancy with Lukan’s child. Soon, she would give birth to the boy who would grow up to change the world. Axel burned to be with her. Who else would give her the love and support she needed?

  Certainly not Lukan.

  According to Tatiana, he hadn’t been around when Kestrel had delivered her two sons, although Lukan had been quick to proclaim Grigor and his brother, Meka, as his heirs. Being stuck in Treven when Lynx needed him made Axel even more determined to destroy his cousin.

  So, driving himself to the limit, enmeshing himself in the triumphs and defeats of his Trevenite friends, helped keep Axel’s despair at bay.

  Now the Trevenites were down to the last handful of soldiers from the additional one thousand Chad had been willing to sacrifice to replace the men lost in the first weeks of the war. Within a month, every one of them would be dead. That would make a total of eighteen hundred and fifty-seven Trevenite casualties—a far cry from the almost twenty thousand dead Axel had claimed in his last report to Cian. Tonight, Axel worked with the last of Chad’s commanders. He had to give them the best possible chance of surviving for as long as possible.

  For them, it was opportunity to strike back by taking as many Chenayans with them as possible. For Axel, it bought him more time to shift the last of his money into the Free Nations. Thankfully, the new Lord of the Treasury was nothing like Artyom. Axel often wondered if the man even knew the staggering amount of mycek Axel had stolen. No one else had mentioned anything. I
t seemed he had gotten away with his audacious raid.

  Artyom’s execution—to be expected, Axel was honest enough to admit—had still come as a terrible shock. The idea that he could have been indirectly responsible for the death of Stefan’s father was an added burden of guilt that made success of this endeavor non-negotiable.

  Tonight, they played with two teams: the Trevenites, distinguished by red rags, torn from the Chenayan flag, tied around their biceps, and the Dragons, sporting black bandanas, also ripped from the flag.

  Four Trevenites broke into a run toward a jumble of rocks at the far end of the cavern. It opened into a passageway leading to yet another carved-out chamber.

  The commander, Varah, a boy no older than eighteen, seemed to have decided this corner was an ideal place from which to ambush the twelve Dragons. Varah must have suspected the Dragons were headed this way.

  The boy was wrong.

  Axel had given the Dragons their orders before the game started and knew they were all in place.

  Varah and his men were about to be picked off by snipers hidden behind giant fingers of rock ten feet above their heads.

  Chad nudged Axel in the side. The two of them supervised the action from a plinth another few feet above the Dragons.

  “Varah will only make this mistake once.” Chad’s whispered voice sounded tinny through his gas mask.

  Axel grunted. “He better hope so.”

  Varah and his troops would be quick casualties if he didn’t do a better job of reading the terrain and anticipating his enemies’ moves during the battle tomorrow. Varah and his men hunkered down low to wait for the Dragons to slip past them.

  Silence settled over the tomb-like mine.

  Axel folded his arms and listened. Months of playing double agent had honed him, bestowing an acuity a wolf would envy. He heard the faintest crunch of boots on gravel. Anticipating Varah’s move, he adjusted the strap on his gas mask, making sure it was pulled tight.

  Another rasp of leather on stone, closer this time.

  A moment or two later, Axel heard the unmistakable sound of a tab being pulled on a gas canister. He shook his head and sighed as someone lobbed it down the passage toward the sound. Thankfully, his gas mask blocked out the harmless but foul smelling ammonium sulfide that wafted around the cavern.

  “Waste,” Chad murmured.

  A barrage of stones rained down on Varah and his three companions’ heads. Cusses told Axel his snipers’ aim had been true. If they had used crossbows, their quarrels would have killed Varah and his band. As it was, being lobbed with rocks hurt.

  “And the Trevenites are dead,” Axel drawled, flicking on his flashlight. He pulled off his gas mask.

  Groans from the Trevenites and cheers from the Dragons greeted his words. He held up the lantern, filling the cavern with dancing shadows.

  “Varah! What were you thinking? Why didn’t you take thirty seconds to assess the terrain?”

  Varah walked to stand below Axel’s plinth. He looked up, his face sheepish. “You told me to hurry up. I—I guess it rattled me.”

  “Rattles are for babies, Commander Varah. Screw up again, and you won’t live long enough to make any.”

  It was an unspoken rule that no one mentioned the clock ticking inexorably on the lives of each of these soldiers.

  A flash of defiance from the Trevenite. “But I did hear the sound of approaching troops.”

  “That so?”

  “Yes. Or I would not have thrown the gas. I know how precious the stuff is.”

  “Who else heard the sound of approaching troops?” Axel shouted.

  A murmur of assent came from around the cavern, followed by an exaggerated sigh from Axel.

  “Magridal, show yourself.”

  So silent she could have been a shadow, Magridal stepped around the corner into the cavern. The stench of rotten eggs clinging to her clothes made Axel smile. They had settled into a productive working relationship and, because she was still the best at stealth, he used her at every one of his training meets. Altogether too valuable, she would not be sacrificed in this part of the campaign.

  Magridal looked as exhausted as he felt. A quick tug, and her gas mask fell away. She grinned at Varah.

  He had the grace to moan. “Oh no.”

  “Oh yes.” Axel corrected. “Failure to correctly decode what your ears were telling you meant that you wasted a whole canister of gas on one person.” He smiled at Magridal. “In my view, a knife to her throat would have been a better choice.”

  Magridal gave him a provocative smile. “In your dreams, Chenayan.”

  The soldiers laughed. It was common knowledge that she wanted him. He had even heard whispers of heavy betting on her chances of bedding him. It irked Axel that the bookmakers gave him long odds on fending her off. None of these people would live long enough to discover the final outcome.

  Varah’s back straightened, and he shot a look first at Axel and then at Chad. “Time for another game, sir?”

  Axel looked at his watch. Three in the morning. He suppressed a yawn. “The night is still young. You have more than enough time to redeem yourself.”

  He gave his orders and strode with Chad to another part of the mine, where sink holes and razor sharp rocks would add to the challenge.

  * * *

  The sun was tipping the horizon when Axel finally stepped back into his bedchamber and slid the secret door closed behind him. He eyed his bed, wishing he could collapse and sleep for a week, but he couldn’t.

  He had his usual post-war game strategy meeting with his high command. It was part of his silent oath to his own men: no matter how much he guided the Trevenites, he would never send them into traps directly of his own making. That meant he was constantly devising new methods of taking on the Trevenite rebels.

  By the end of the month, that would be over and his high command would be celebrating victory. Thanks to Fedor, Lukan would never learn that Chenaya had lost no more men in this conflict than Treven had.

  Aware that Magridal was not the only one stinking of rotten eggs, he stepped fully clothed into his shower, allowing the scorching water to wash away the stench of deception clinging to him. As far as he knew, no one suspected his double life. He exhaled slowly; being away from his father’s cameras was worth any amount of effort watching his back.

  Once dressed in a clean uniform, mentally preparing for his meeting on how best to destroy the enemy, he reached for the door handle.

  His informa vibrated in his pocket.

  He pulled it out, brushed his thumb against it to activate it, and then pulled up an image of Tatiana’s face. From the clock flashing above her head, she had sent it to him before he started his war game.

  Tatiana’s husky voice made him smile. “Still alive, Axel? I guess the fact that I haven’t been forced to sit through a state funeral for Chenaya’s great warlord attests to that. More’s the pity, though. I could have done with the excitement. That gives you an idea of how dull life has been here since Kestrel’s sons burst in on us. It’s only thanks to my new diversion that I'm still sane.”

  Axel had learned to listen for the nuggets of information in all of Tatiana’s sarcasm. He knew that, inspired by his father, she had taken to bird watching as part of her quest to find Lynx. Some months ago, Tatiana had also mentioned that Kestrel believed Tao and Lynx to be hidden in the forest.

  “My dear friend Kestrel is an artist. Did you know that? Probably not. She paints detailed likeness of animals and birds. Or she did before the birth. Now she just lies around in a heap of sickness and misery, waiting for a chance to hold her babies. Seems priestesses are better mothers than mothers. Maybe it’s just as well I never had any children. But I digress. I have a collection of her paintings. Raptors mainly, given that she is named after one. Funny thing though, I saw one of her birds in the flesh yesterday. A magnificent falcon.”

  Axel’s ears pricked. Could she be referring to Tao’s falcon, Bird?

  “In fact, I
was so thrilled to see it, it made the bells in my heart ring. I have ticked it off my list. Maybe if my luck continues, I will get to have even more surprises before the year is out. I will show you a picture of it when you next grace us with your presence."

  Bells in Tatiana’s heart? It had to be a reference to the bells attached to Bird’s legs. That meant Lynx and Tao were definitely somewhere in the forest. Could he find them? His first thought was to leave Maegkin on the next airship for Cian, but Tatiana hadn’t finished speaking.

  “When will that visit be? We haven't seen you for months. Malika and Stefan have news I know they would love to share with you in person.”

  Soon after Axel had left Cian, Lukan had confiscated Malika’s and Stefan’s informas, making it impossible for them to communicate privately.

  He flicked his finger against his informa and replied, “No visit until the job here is done. Still, our victory is certain. Birding sounds like fun. Maybe you can take me out with you next time I'm at the palace. Give Mali a hug from me. Oh right. You don’t do hugs.”

  Jaw clenched, he headed for his meeting. Nothing could get in the way of ensuring that Lukan won the ice crystal mines. Meanwhile, Axel’s mind churned on schemes to rob the emperor of that prize as soon as it was in his hands.

  Chapter 40

  Reveling in the glorious summer heat, Felix unbuckled his cape and tossed it over the back of his chair at a table in the palace gardens patio. He sat and said in a low voice to Tatiana, “Beautiful day for a long ride.”

  “Since when do you notice details like that?” she demanded, buttering her toast.

  The two of them had met for an early breakfast, as they often did these days.

  “On such an auspicious day, why wouldn’t I notice?”

  She grunted. “The wholesale slaughter of a nation is hardly something to get excited about.”

  Felix chewed a mouthful of pickled fish to a fine paste before he spoke. He knew very well Tatiana didn’t believe the propaganda that Chenaya—Axel—had destroyed King Chad and the Trevenite nation. Why should she, when she and Axel spoke almost daily?