War of the Bastards

by Andrew Shvarts

  “Your Majesty,” Galen growled, “you know as well as I do that the trials are mostly a formality….”

  “Not in this case,” Lyriana insisted. “Think of all those people out there, all the Unbroken. Think of how much this means to them. If there was ever a time for a show of justice, it’s now. They deserve to see a trial, to see Kent held accountable for every murder, every crime, every drop of blood he’s spilled.” Her gaze narrowed. “There will be a trial. Consider that a royal decree.”

  Galen glared for a moment, then sheathed his dagger. “As you wish,” he said. “First thing tomorrow morning, then. The trial of the Usurper.”

  I let out a deep breath. I’d been ready, totally ready, to see my father die. And yet I still felt such relief that it wouldn’t happen for at least another day. I looked to Lyriana, and mouthed Thank you. She shook her head. This wasn’t for me.

  “What do we do until then?” Ellarion asked.

  Galen shrugged. “We pour a drink for Manos. We honor his courage, his sacrifice. And then I’m calling it a night. We’ve all been through enough. We could use a break.” He reached down and took my father by the rope binding his wrists, jerking him back up to his feet. “Not you, though. You’ve got a lovely little spot waiting for you in the stockade.”

  We followed Galen toward the edge of the camp, to the building where we kept prisoners. It wasn’t much, a crude wooden structure barely bigger than a closet, with stacked logs as walls. A peg was driven into the earth inside, a pair of manacles attached to it. We mostly used the stockade to punish disobedient rebels for things like stealing or brawling, occasionally to hold a captured soldier for interrogation. It had never had a prisoner like this.

  The crowd of Unbroken framed our path, and with each step we took, the mood soured. As Galen marched my father along, jeers started to break the silence. Cries went up all around us: murderer, traitor, usurper. A woman stepped forward to spit in my father’s face. One bold rebel even threw a clod of dirt that exploded against the side of his head, sending him stumbling down. Galen shot a quick glance the dirt-thrower’s way, a look that was disapproving, but just barely. Not yet, it seemed to say.

  Then they were at the door of the stockade and vanishing inside, the shouts of the crowd louder and angrier than ever. As Galen pushed my father in, he turned him around, just for a moment, and our eyes met. I saw no fear. No pain. Just calm, proud defiance.

  I turned away, and found Zell standing there, watching it all. I hugged him, buried my face in his chest, felt the comfort of his arms. “I hate this,” I whispered.

  He held me close, pressed his head low to gently kiss my forehead. “Lyriana gave you another day. A chance to find some peace. After that…”

  I nodded, closed my eyes, and tried to let everything in the world fade away. “After that, he dies.”

  I TOOK A BATH. I ate Garrus’s stew with a crust of bread and drank a beer quietly as I listened to Galen deliver a eulogy for Manos. As night fell, I tossed and turned in my tent, hoping desperately for rest that wouldn’t come, and then I finally got up and went over to talk to Lyriana.

  She sat on her bed as usual, reading a massive book by candlelight, but she wasn’t alone. Ellarion sat in a chair nearby, goblet in hand, legs up on the table. The two of them glanced my way as I came in.

  “Can’t sleep?” Lyriana asked, and I nodded. “I’m the same way. There’s just so much going on in my head, so much to consider…”

  “After what you went through, I’d be surprised if you ever slept again,” Ellarion said, taking a small sip.

  I took a seat next to Lyriana. I don’t know what book she was reading, but it was open to a giant picture of vibrant dunes the color of a ripe apple, so I’m guessing it had to do with the Red Wastes. “Moved on from impressive Queens of yore, I see?”

  “I thought there might be something helpful in here,” she sighed. “But there’s nothing. Nothing I don’t already know.”

  “That’s your fault for already knowing everything,” Ellarion said, and Lyriana threw a boot at him. He dodged it with a grin. “I never thought I’d be so happy to have a boot hurled at me. But here I am.”

  I realized I hadn’t talked to him since we’d gotten back to the camp, and felt a pang of guilt. “You holding up okay? That couldn’t have been easy. Thinking we were dead.”

  Ellarion kept smiling, but something flickered in his eyes, something lost and devastated. “No. It wasn’t easy. It was the hardest three days of my life.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be. Truth is, I barely had time to process anything, much less grieve. With Lyriana gone, I was next in line. The…” He paused, as if just saying the words was a struggle. “The True King. Everyone looked to me for guidance, and that was so exhausting and unbearable I couldn’t even think straight.” He shook his head. “I spent most of my life dreaming of being in charge, of being the Archmagus, giving orders and taking command. What in the frozen hell was I thinking?”

  “Ellarion,” Lyriana said, and she looked like she was going to say something else, but I never got to learn what it was, because all of a sudden, the Red Waster girl was in the tent with us.

  It’s not so much that she appeared. There was no rush of air or cloud of smoke. She was just standing at the side of the room, casually, like she’d been there all along.

  Lyriana let out a little shriek and jerked back in the bed, and I clasped a hand over my mouth. Ellarion sprang forward, jerking a knife out of his boot and holding it out in front of him.

  The Red Waster didn’t immediately say or do anything. She just stood there, staring at us, head cocked slightly to the side. She’d managed to find clothes, the kind of clothes I’d seen her people in before: a burnt-orange robe held tight at the waist with a sash, leather sandals that laced up her calves with thin straps. Her hair was pulled back in a braid, and it looked different now, more muted, like some of that vibrant blue had been drained out of the streaks. Her bladed orbs were back too, hovering at her shoulders with slow, lazy spins.

  In the flickering candlelight, I got a better look at her face. She was pretty in an odd way, her features a little too asymmetrical, and her eyes weren’t just orange; they were orange with flecks of gold and purple, a sparkling mix of colors, like looking into a geode cut in half.

  “It’s her.” Lyriana pointed with a trembling hand. “The Red Waster girl.”

  “Yeah, I guessed that,” Ellarion replied. “Who in the frozen hell are you? What do you want?”

  “My name is Syan Syee of Benn Devalos, Torchbearer, Daughter of the Storm,” she said, as if she expected any of that to make sense to us. “And I want to talk.”

  Ellarion jabbed the knife her way. “Drop the weapons, and I’ll think about it.”

  The Red Waster—Syan—blinked at him. “Weapons?” Then she realized he was talking about her orbs and let out a soft, little laugh. “These are not weapons. They are my zaryas. They are more like…like…” She paused, searching for the word. “Like the line a man uses to catch a fish.”

  “They’re flying balls covered in sharp-ass blades,” Ellarion said. “If that’s not a weapon, I don’t know what is.”

  Syan stared at him for a moment, then sighed. “Fine.” The zaryas stopped spinning and fell to the ground with metal thuds. “Now will you speak with me?”

  Lyriana stepped forward, gently pushing Ellarion aside. “I am Queen Lyriana of Noveris. I speak on behalf of the Kingdom.”

  The girl nodded. “I know. That is why I have sought you out.”

  “I have so many questions,” Lyriana said, sounding a lot more like an eager schoolgirl than a reigning Queen. “Your magic, what you did back in the Skywhale, your zaryas…”

  “What is your question?”

  “It’s…I mean…” Lyriana struggled for words. “How?”

  Syan shrugged. “The Cutting is one of the more difficult skills, but all advanced Torchbearers can do it. There is no ‘how.’ We simply
can.”

  I expected Ellarion to call bullshit, but he actually slumped down with resignation, easing his knife to his side. I guess seeing really is believing. “Red Waster magic. It’s actually real. Titans have mercy.”

  “So it’s not just you?” Lyriana pressed. “There are other mages among your people?”

  “Every Izterosi…every Red Waster, as you call us…is touched by the flame,” Syan said, with the cadence of someone struggling to find the words to explain something obvious, the cadence you’d use with an overly inquisitive child. “Without the flame, we could never survive the wilds or brave the storms. It is the lifeblood of our benns, the blood in our veins.”

  “And you’ve just managed to keep it secret from us all this time?” Ellarion said, and there was that telltale skepticism. “How is that possible?”

  “Our flame is not like your magic. We draw it in, and we release it out. It is a part of Izteros, our land, as we are a part of it.” Was anyone following this? Because I wasn’t. “When we leave Izteros, the desert, we leave that flame behind. Only a few, the most gifted, can carry it with us, inside us, to the world beyond. I am the first such person to venture into your lands.”

  “Torchbearers,” Lyriana said, repeating what the girl had said earlier with a tone of quiet reverence. “It’s amazing. All our scholars and historians, they never knew. Your people managed to hide this from us for centuries.”

  “An ancient law among all Izterosi. The fire of our people must always be kept secret from the Stillanders.” I’m guessing that meant us. “Your kind is greedy, untrustworthy, always grasping, always conquering. If you learned what we have, you would come for us, with war and death.”

  “Tell us what you really think,” Ellarion grumbled.

  “But there are your kind among us,” Lyriana said. “I’ve seen them in Lightspire, in my father’s…” She paused. “In the King’s court.”

  Syan nodded reverently. “They are heroes, the most loyal and devout among us. They venture out past our desert, losing all bond with the flame, so that we may see what is happening in the Kingdom of the Stillanders and report back to the benns.”

  “They’re spies,” Ellarion snorted.

  “Heroes,” Syan repeated. Her face was calm, inscrutable, but on that word her eyes narrowed, and I could swear they pulsed orange.

  “Can I ask a question?” I said, in part because I wanted to move on from the increasingly tense vibe in the room. “What were you doing in that cell in the Skywhale?”

  Syan inhaled sharply, as if sinking back into a terrible memory. “They began four months ago. The dreams. First the children had them, then the elders, and then all of us, every night. Dreams of fire and pain, of war and ruin. Men flayed alive, bodies tied to posts, a terrible monster with tendrils of darkness.” I glanced at Lyriana uneasily. I had no idea where the metaphors stopped with this girl, but I’m pretty sure that one was literal. “And every dream…every last one…ended with Zastroya.”

  “Zastroya?”

  She glanced away, and her voice dropped to a hushed whisper. “The Storm That Will Consume the World.”

  There was no wind, but the room seemed to get colder all the same. “So you started having these dreams,” I said, “and that’s how you ended up out here?”

  “We received word of your new King, of the abominations he creates, of the devastation he has caused. The elders of Benn Devalos believe that he is responsible for the dreams, that he will cause Zastroya if he is not stopped. So they sent my brother and me to talk to the King and warn him.” Her eyes narrowed with anger, and on the floor, her zaryas twitched. “We encountered the Inquisitor’s men. They killed my brother. And he kept me, tortured me, tried to discover the truth of my power.”

  My chest tightened, and I swallowed my breath. Dead brothers had a way of doing that to me.

  But Ellarion just shrugged. “So we have a common enemy.”

  “I would like to inflict on him a great deal of pain,” she said, and the streaks in her hair flared bright.

  I couldn’t help but smile. “Welcome to the club.”

  “This is great, then,” Lyriana said, rising up with excitement. “With your power, your ‘Cutting,’ we have an advantage Miles won’t see coming. You can get us into his—”

  “No,” Syan said. “What I did back in the Skywhale drained much of my flame. I have enough left for some small skills, but I would not stake a victory on them.” There was an overarticulation to the way she talked, a stilted formality, the way nobles talked in the old fairy tales. “I must return to my home to rekindle my flame. And you must come with me.”

  I blinked. “What now?”

  “I refer to Queen Lyriana, though you are welcome to join us.”

  I turned to Lyriana, who looked equally bewildered. “I’m not sure I understand. Why would I come with you?”

  Syan hesitated for a moment, and when she spoke again, her voice was quiet. “There was something else in our dreams,” she said. “A symbol, etched in stone, or written in blood, or glowing in the sand. Again and again, the same symbol.” She pointed to Lyriana’s right arm, to the ornate symbol tattooed there: an elegant rune, like a V wrapped in thorns with a sword jutting through. “That symbol.”

  “The…old seal of the Titans?” Lyriana asked. “Why would you have dreamed of that?”

  “I don’t know,” Syan said. “But it can’t be a coincidence. We’re being sent a message that we must join our flames, to fight this together. You are the rightful Queen of this land. If you come to the elders of my benn and appeal to them, promise them peace and sovereignty, they may elect to join your cause. There are at least fifty more Torchbearers in my benn alone. With their flame, you could take back your Kingdom and defeat the abominations.” She closed her eyes, and I noticed for the first time that her eyelids were darker than the rest of her, like they’d been painted or burned. “And we can keep Zastroya away.”

  Fifty mages doing that Cutting stuff seemed like a pretty good deal, but Lyriana looked torn, struggling for words. “I can’t,” she finally got out. “As much as I want to. These are my people, my Kingdom. I can’t just leave them.” She shook her head. “Perhaps an envoy…”

  “No,” Syan insisted. “It must be you. They will not trust an envoy, but they may listen to the Queen herself. Especially if she bears the mark from our dreams.”

  Ellarion snorted. “That’s a hell of a lot to ask for a ‘may.’”

  Syan shot him a glare. “I cannot promise their help. My people have never taken part in a foreign war. But I do believe if your Queen comes to ask for their aid, they will listen.”

  “I’m sorry,” Lyriana said. “I can’t abandon my people.”

  “What people? This camp? These broken men?” Syan shook her head, and there was something unsettled about her, a hint of desperation beneath her poise. “You must come with me. It is your only hope. My only hope.” As she spoke, her orbs lifted up, slowly, steadily, turning in silent, deliberate circles. “The only hope for all of us.”

  Lyriana’s eyes flitted from orb to orb, and I could see her hands tensing, her Rings beginning to glow. “And if I don’t?”

  “I will give you a day to consider,” she said. “Call for me when you have made up your mind.” Her orbs zipped forward in front of her, crossing in a perfectly symmetrical X. There was that rush of air, that tugging feeling…

  And then she was gone.

  We sat in stunned silence for what felt like a while. Then Ellarion slumped down onto the ground, the knife tumbling from his hands. “Titans above,” he said. “Real mages existing outside of Lightspire. I never thought I’d feel so exhilarated to be proven wrong.”

  “Do I get to say ‘I told you so’?” I said. “Because I’d love to say ‘I told you so.’” Ellarion rolled his eyes at me, and I kicked at his side. “Are we really going to turn her down, though? Fifty mages like her…I mean, that feels pretty big.”

  “A journey to the border of th
e Red Wastes could take months, and runs straight through the Southlands. And who knows how long it will take to reach her people, her ‘benn,’ or what dangers I’d face out there.” Lyriana shook her head. “Our group here is fragile enough as is. If I were to leave for months, or if something were to happen to me, it would all fall apart. I can’t risk that on some long-shot plan.”

  “No, you can’t,” Ellarion said. “So we’ll just have to convince her to take me instead.”

  Lyriana and I stared at him and he shrugged. “What? It makes sense. I’m second in line for the throne, which makes me almost King. And if I can bring back even a handful of those Torchbearers, it’ll be worth it.”

  Lyriana wasn’t having it. “No. It’s too dangerous.”

  “For you? Sure. For a third-rate tactician who’s spent the better part of a year drinking himself into oblivion?” He smiled, and I felt a pang of sadness, a yearning for something I hadn’t realized I’d missed. How long had it been since I’d seen him smile? “This is my choice, Lyriana. And I choose to go with her.”

  I could see Lyriana thinking rapidly, trying to come up with any counterargument, and coming up short. And honestly? Ellarion was right. I didn’t like the idea of him heading somewhere dangerous, but…how many times had he been in our position? Wasn’t it our turn to sit and worry?

  “Look,” Lyriana replied at last. “Syan said she’d give us a day, right? Let’s sleep on it and talk to Galen tomorrow.”

  A flicker of annoyance danced across Ellarion’s face, but he didn’t say anything. “Sure,” he said. “We’ll talk tomorrow. Seems like delaying till then is the go-to solution for all our problems.” He stood up, stretching his arms, casually cracking his neck. And there was something off about him, some nuance I was missing, some hidden motivation. “I think we’ve all got some thinking to do. I prefer to do mine alone in my tent, with a little wine and a comfortable mat.”

  “I suppose I have some reading to do.” Lyriana looked down at the tome on her bed, still open to that page with the bright red dunes. Looking closer at the picture now, I could see that what I’d thought was the night sky was actually a mass of dark clouds, swirling together over the land like an ink blot, lit up in a few places by bursts of vivid purple or sickly yellow. What had Syan called herself? A Daughter of the Storm?