River pulls me down beside her again and pours me a mug of Mama Opal’s light tea.
“Shade, you should eat,” Mama Opal chides, slapping one of the stumps with her chubby palm. “Come.”
Shade stands, returning his sword to its sheath on his back. “Can’t,” he mutters, strapping leather wrist guards onto his arms. “I have extra guard duty. They’ve doubled the watch and even made extra lamps. Otis’ll kill me if I’m late.”
“You mean you’ll kill you. You’re such a stoic, boring person, Shade. How are you and I friends?” Axle sucks some roasted fat from his finger.
For a moment, the glimmer of something akin to a smile starts to appear on Shade’s face. He sees me watching, and it vanishes. He opens the door. “I’ll be back . . . late!” He slams it for definition.
“Pure slice of heaven, ain’t he?” Axle mutters.
“I . . . I . . .” I don’t know what to say about him.
“You’ll get used to him. I did. Back when I first met him he did nothing but glare and cuss and hate. But I warmed him up to me. You may have to work extra hard, considering your heritage, but he’ll eventually ease up – if your someone who’s worth his time.” Though the last part was not meant to sound like an insult, it reminds me once more “what” I am.
I don’t even know what I am.
“Heritage,” Mama Opal grumbles and takes a large bite out of her meat. “Just another word for ‘family tree’. We actually don’t know your heritage, darling. Your ethnicity perhaps, but your heritage . . . Who are you parents, child? We all know you’re nobility. Shade certainly seemed to think so.”
“Wonder what gave him that idea,” Axle mumbles into his cup.
I glare at him before replying, “My father is a High Lord, yes. A member of the Community. But his position – his title – is nothing. Everyone is nothing beneath that one man – the man who believes he’s the gods gift to Kelba. The man who would seek to make a graveyard of it, given the chance, just to fulfill his own desires.”
“Celectate Wood, I take it?” Axle solemnly nods to himself. “You must hate him very much.”
Once upon a time, in Kelba, I would have denied such an accusation.
“Yes, I hate him.” My hand tightens on the handkerchief. “I hate him so much that one day, if I get the chance, I might kill him.”
Mama Opal changes the subject quickly. “Otis is trying to get you a meeting with the King. He’s already sent messengers and a spokesperson to present your case. I’ll feel safer when this matter is settled and the King decides to let you stay. Dirk and his lackeys are causing too much trouble. Why, today, in town, at that questionable establishment, they even dared to hint that you’re the cause for Agron’s misfortune. That the shadows will return again, because you’re some kind of witch or supernatural pull that draws them here. It stirs my blood, it does! Honestly, you’re a ‘child’.”
Axle leans forward, eyes dancing with mirth. “And just what were you doing at such a questionable establishment to hear such news, Mama?” He grins.
Mama Opal’s face grows red. She sputters anxiously for a few seconds. “I was looking for you, you fool!” She smacks the back of his head with her palm. Axle groans. “You and Shade, always hanging out at that place. I’ve a good mind to . . .”
My mind wanders from their argument. Shade has my dagger. My only weapon in this place full of self-proclaimed patriots lurking to cut my throat.
“Where does Shade keep watch?”
“I wouldn’t go there at this time of night, honey,” Mama Opal whispers. She pats my arm. “It’s dark and . . .”
“And Dirk’s on the loose,” Axle chimes in. “Now, if that wolf weren’t prowling the area I’d let you go. But under the circumstances . . .”
“I’ll be careful.”
Axle refused like I knew he would. River gave excuses like I knew she would. And Mama Opal advised speaking to him tomorrow like I knew she would. A good thing they didn’t know what I would do.
River went upstairs to get her embroidery, and Mama Opal sent Axle to the cellar for fresher herbs. The moment she turned her back, I slipped out the door, and hurried down the street, wrapping the dark shawl she lent to me around my shoulders.
Though I have no directions, Shade had said he was on guard duty. The only guards I see are the watchmen scattered throughout the city streets and the senitals on the wall. Considering Shade’s predatory instincts, I’m certain they would position him somewhere along the wall. Perhaps at the gate itself. So that’s where I go.
The square is lit by more than twenty Moon Lamps situated in every corner, every doorway, every spot along the wall that could hide even a trace of shadows. Blood stains still mark the dirt.
There is a stairwell hammered into the wall beside the gates. There is no railing. Just thick, flat boards, two feet wide and four feet long, angled up along the stones. None of the guards in the square notice me as I ascend the first step. The next. And the next.
Shade is the first watchman I find. He stands directly above the iron gates, on the four foot wide plank that serves as a crosswalk, and stares at the wood-line. His back is stiff and straight. I should approach him and get what I came for but, instead, I stare at him. He doesn’t blink, his eyes too focused on the clearing and wood-line.
“There is no one who understands me.”
I wish he’d give me the chance to try. The chance to ask him questions. I wouldn’t need many. Just three or four to know exactly what I wanted to know about him. What makes him angry? Why does it make him angry? What is the vow he speaks of? Where did he get his scar? Such simple questions. But I doubt he’ll ever let me ask them.
“When you finally decide to speak, Kelban, I’ll be getting off my watch,” he says without turning around.
“Kyla,” I correct and move forward, feet carefully treading the dark pathway towards him. One wrong move, one misstep, and I’ll be an unrecognizable pile of bone and flesh at the base of the wall.
“To hell with the name,” he mutters. “I thought I told you to stay away from me. Get back to the house and stay there before someone sees you. I’m in enough trouble.”
I place a foot on the plank he guards and step onto it, grasping the wall so tightly that my fingers sting. The air spins around my head, but I steady my legs and it fans out again. I shuffle towards him.
“Go back,” he mutters. “If you fall it’s not going to be my fault, understand?”
I leave a foot of space between us and hold out my hand. “I came for my dagger.”
He turns to look at me. “Oh?” The amusement disappears from his face. “Alright, girl, why don’t I just do that and have them bury my ass while I’m at it?”
“They don’t have to know,” I insist.
“Doesn’t mean they wouldn’t.” He leans against the wall and crosses his arms. “What assurances can you give me that they wouldn’t know about your concealed weapon? I let you keep it before and you nearly got yourself killed. In my opinion, you’re a lot safer without it.”
I look him straight in the eye. “You don’t really believe that.”
“I do.” He turns his gaze towards the wood-line.
“No, you don’t.” His shoulders tighten as I draw closer, but I don’t touch him. I fold my hands gently atop the wall and gaze towards the wood-line. “What are you looking at? I don’t see anything.”
“And you won’t see anything, girl, unless you’re looking,” he says. His hand fondles the hilt of my dagger at his waist.
“What are you looking at?” I repeat.
His lips quirk. “I watched the shadow of a squirrel jump from tree to tree so it could return to its nest. I watched a wind blow several leaves onto the ground. I watched a rabbit dodge into its burrow as a predator passed its home. I can see no better than you in the darkness. But I was looking for them, so I saw them. If you’re looking for something – even in the darkness – you will find it eventually.”
I shake my he
ad. “What I’m looking for can’t be found like that.”
He cocks his head at me in that animal way, only it no longer sends shivers down my spine. “And what are you looking for?”
“A home,” I answer honestly. “Where I belong. Where all of me belongs. Scars and all. Secrets and all. Kelban and all.” I touch the ostracized scar beneath my sleeve, and his eyes flutter there. “I think that, maybe, it is here. If I am given the proper chance, this place can become my home. I’m not meant to die. The siratha would have claimed me if that were my purpose. So why am I still alive?”
“Don’t ask me,” Shade says. “I would have killed you, Kel – Kyla, if you hadn’t shown an amazing amount of ingenuity that your kind severely lacks.”
“‘Your kind,’” I repeat. “‘Your kind.’ You seem to have a ton of shit about my ‘kind’ but what do you really know about them? Do you know the families that exist among my ‘kind?’ Do you know the sacrifices they make? The blood they spill? The lives that are taken? Who are you to tell me what they lack?”
He sneers, teeth showing. “I know enough about your kind. I have been over that pathetic pile of rubble you call a ‘wall.’ I have seen your city. I have seen your ruler. I have seen your pathetic common-folk and your pathetic nobility and your pathetic Community. I have seen your pathetic world, Kelban.”
I feign shock at his revelation. “You’ve . . . been over the wall?”
He smacks a finger against his forehead. “Hell, yeah, I’ve been over your wall. Do you think such a poorly guarded contraption could keep us out forever? Do you think stones and mortar could scare a man of flesh and blood?”
“Fine,” I snap. “So you’ve been over the wall. So you’ve seen us and we’ve amused you. Why come over the wall at all?”
“Don’t flatter yourself, Kelban. My visits into your precious homeland had nothing to do with such boorish skeletons. And you should thank me, little girl. I keep the darkness in this land far away from your bedside. You’ve no idea what I’ve tracked into that land. How easily you would fall into savagery like we have. You should be thanking me for the nightmares I’ve saved you from.”
I already had. He just doesn’t remember.
But it explains why he’d been in Kirath that night. He was tracking those monsters. If those three came across the wall, how many others were entering Kelba?
“Why worry about it? If you hate us so much, why not turn your back like everyone else in this gods-forsaken country has done and let it be. Let us kill each other. Let the darkness take us.” I say the words casually, but they burn coming out of my mouth.
“Because, if the darkness takes Kelba, where do you think it will turn to next?” Shade asks. He doesn’t wait for my answer. “Despite my dislike of Kelba, they are a good diversion.”
“And where does that leave you?” I ask.
“Pardon?”
“The villagers,” I whisper. “I’ve seen the way they look at you. They don’t seem to like you very much.”
They loathe him. Despise him. I see it in their faces whenever they glance his way. Whenever he has his back turned. And behind the disgust and loathing is a stronger emotion – fear. They are frightened of him. And, frankly, I can’t blame them.
“No one likes me,” he says casually.
“Why?”
“Because I can do what they can’t.”
“And what’s that?”
He looks up. “Survive.”
Somehow, by the way he stares at me, the way his eyes roam my face, my shoulder, I’ve a feeling he’s not just talking about himself.
He pulls the dagger from his waistband and stares at the hilt. At the red and black of the Celectate. He stretches it out towards me, flipping it in his hand so the hilt faces me. “Take it,” he says.
I grasp the hilt and flip the weapon a couple times in my own hand. He watches me. I lift my skirt and slide the dagger into the sheath around my leg. He raises a brow at me.
“Where did you learn to do that?” he asks.
Landor’s face enters my mind. His arm guiding mine. His cocky grin as he flipped his dagger over and over like a juggler at a festival. His laughter when I constantly dropped the damned thing on the ground. His worry whenever the blade landed in my hand instead of the hilt and my blood stained the ground.
This time I see the white flash coming at my face. But I cannot stop it from cracking against the front of my skull like a battering ram. I cannot stop the shock wave that ripples through me like waves in a storm. I cannot stop the deep blackness that circles towards me and pulls me into its embrace.
I am going somewhere again. There is air around me. Swirls of gray and black. A white light ahead. I fly into that white light and it floods my body in such chilling cold that my eyes flutter open.
I am in the streets of Kirath, in a dirty, rat-infested alley, watching a throng of people pass in the street beside me. I am not alone. A caped figure is to my right, a gray cloak and hood shielding their features from view. The figure is bent down behind a dilapidated box like a beggar, their hand extended on one knee. Rising. Tapping impatiently.
Another dark figure rushes into the alley with casual, albeit hurried, steps and kicks a rat against the far wall with disgusted growl. I recognize that voice. Beneath the cape the newcomer is wearing I can see a firm jaw and thin lips. It’s Landor.
I say his name but – like all the other times I’ve entered these visions – he doesn’t hear me.
“What have you found?” he asks the caped figure slumped against the wall.
“Coin, good sir?” the bent form – a man with a gravelly voice – asks and raises his hand. “Coin for my troubles.”
Landor grumbles a curse under his breath and produces a pouch that clinks with the sound of money. He drops it into the expectant man’s hand.
“There’s another group on the streets now,” the beggar says in a smooth, amused voice. “One that they call the ‘Vale of Death.’ This group’s got a leader too. A fine, young upstart just a few years shy of your age, good sir, if I’m judging your years correctly in our brief visits. She’s a fighter but, more accurately, she’s a bitch.”
“The leader’s a female?” Landor doesn’t hide the shock in his voice.
“Aye. A female, sir. She stormed the southern wall last week in that skirmish that took a dozen Celect Knights and four of the rebels. Made off with a vast supply of weapons and some new followers. Apparently, the new followers made her their leader and she’s done quite well for herself.”
“What’s her name?”
“They call her the ‘Bitch of Braggard.’ But she’s also called ‘the Vale’ and, occasionally, the ‘Bitch of the Vale.’ Makes her sound like bad shit, don’t it?”
Landor steps closer. “Where can I find her?”
“You can’t.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“You can’t find her. No one can. No once knows her real identity. Her real face. Even her favorite hideouts. She’s a ghost. That’s why they call her ‘the Vale.’ Because you can only find her if you’re seeking death.”
“But you say you know she’s young. How is that unless you’ve met her, old man?”
The beggar laughs. “I assume she’s young, little pisser, because the rumors say she is. But you’re right. I shouldn’t assume. She could be a slagging crone for all I know. Sorry for giving false information.”
Landor growls and the beggar edges back against the wall.
“Find out more,” Landor says. “Anything you can. Anything of importance. Anything you don’t think could be important. I want to know everything.”
“That’s going to cost you, sir,” the beggar remarks slyly.
“I’ve got plenty of coin.” Landor turns on his heel and stomps into the streets.
I walk after him. People surround me. I walk through them like I’m a ghost. Landor shoves a merchant attempting to stop him beneath his purple canopied booth and dodges a passel of alley brats playi
ng marbles. His footsteps have changed. He is more precise. More certain.
Deadlier.
I don’t like it.
He reaches the fenced stables belonging to the finest inn in all of Kirath, meant for the richest merchants and well-known ship captains. Another caped figure leans casually on the rails surrounding the giant stone dome which can shelter a hundred and twenty horses. Though the thick, dark cloak hides his features, his hands are huge. He is a giant.
Landor approaches the pump behind him and flushes some of the water into his hands.
“I hear you’ve been looking for us, young noble,” the giant whispers.
Landor’s hands stop moving, but he doesn’t turn around. He knows better. “That depends. Why would I be looking for a man who sounds so fearsome?”
“I’ve asked myself the same question,” the giant agrees. “That’s why I’ve had my own men watching you. You’re a hard one to find, despite your reputation as a Celect Knight and a High Lord’s only son. The sword of the Celectate. The brother of a traitor. The stories are unending”
Landor’s hands tighten. “Traitor, eh?”
“Careful, lad,” the man whispers. “You’ve a fire. But without kindling it quickly disappears. The best of you learn to stoke that fire. For the cause. For their lives. For their dreams.”
“I don’t have any of those,” Landor hisses.
The giant chuckles. “Of course not.” He turns around and leans over the trough with my brother. They don’t look at each other. “Why would you? You’re a man of the sword. A man of blood and Bone. You don’t need your fire stoked. You need your fire fanned. But the ones in the forest you wish to destroy beneath all those flames are not easy prey. They have wings. You need to clip the wings so they can’t escape. Then you can set them on fire. You can watch them burn. But only if you know how to play their game first.”
“I don’t want to play their game!” Landor snaps.
“Do any of us want to play the game?” The man’s hands fold tightly. “Nay. I would burn the game, too, if it didn’t work. But it does.”
“I will not be a pawn for him to move around at his leisure.”
Ostracized (The Ostracized Saga Book 1) Page 28
