Ash and Ambition

by Ari Marmell

  “We do trade, and share a border, with Mahdresh,” Judge Valacos pointed out. “And they have substantial economic ties to Ythane.”

  “Ythane also controls a length of the Dragon River,” his Majesty said, picking up the thread. “Without which we lose one of our primary routes to points north. We don’t do a lot of travel or trade with the frontier towns or the Vingossa tribes, but little doesn’t mean none. To say nothing of the religious significance of the Vingossa Plains to Kirresci citizens who worship the Vinnkasti.

  “And,” he continued before Nycos could object, or point out that those concerns—while perhaps genuine—were awfully minor, “there are none of us who can predict with certainty how Tir Nalon might react to any open insult given their vassal state.”

  “It’s my understanding,” Nycos said carefully, “that the Bronze Empire has remained almost entirely quiescent regarding anything beyond their borders for generations.”

  “It has,” Marshal Laszlan said. “But the elves don’t think as we do. They’re ageless, and not remotely human. Who can guess what drives creatures such as that, or what might give them reason to stir?”

  Nycos could have offered a unique perspective on such questions, but chose, for obvious reasons, to refrain.

  “The ultimate point to all this, Sir Nycolos,” the king told him, “is that we determined some time ago just how far we would humor Ythane’s posturing, to what extent and how often we could tolerate their pushing before risking their threats, and the unknowable hazards posed by their fey masters. As much as I know it stings at your pride—and not just yours; you’re foolish if you don’t believe we feel it, too—the current circumstance, and the amount of gold we feel confident will satisfy them, falls within the ‘worth paying them off to avoid the hassle’ category.”

  Although his teeth ground so fiercely he feared the next words he spoke might prove jagged enough to draw blood, Nycos bowed his head in acquiescence. In his Majesty’s intonation, and perhaps in the admission that his pride, too, was wounded, Nycos heard the unspoken message that any further challenge or questioning of the issue would not be welcome.

  At least he wasn’t alone in his distaste, even if none of the others had reason to take the matter as personally as he. None of Hasyan’s advisors seemed any more thrilled about the decision than the king himself, and the expressions many of the gathered nobles directed his way suggested approval of the challenge he and Prince Elias had raised, and even sympathy over his own history with Ythane’s rich and powerful.

  Andarjin’s gaze, too, lay heavily upon him, but in that nobleman’s features, Nycos could read nothing at all.

  ___

  The attack came out of nowhere, unheralded and unexpected. And Nycos, playing right into their hands, could not have made it much easier for them if he’d tried.

  After court had adjourned, and following a polite appearance at dinner—where his tightly wrapped caul of frustration had allowed little of the conversation to penetrate his ears, and made even the most delectable foods taste of ash—he had chosen once again to spend some time walking Oztyerva’s winding passageways. In his current mood, he preferred the constant motion, aimless wandering through arteries of stone, to the conscious thought that would be required were he to settle down to the peace and quiet of his quarters or engage anyone in prolonged discussion.

  He might have made an exception, to the latter, for Kortlaus or Mariscal, but as both were away…

  Night had fallen, as night always does. Servants wandered about, lighting a few additional torches in their sconces or lanterns in their brackets. Traffic thinned as gentry and staff alike took to their beds, until Nycos shared his route with only sporadic guards or messengers. By keeping to less busy portions of Oztyerva, far from the living quarters, he managed to create for himself the illusion that he walked, isolated and alone, through some long-abandoned labyrinth.

  An illusion shattered by the sudden pounding of charging feet.

  They numbered a dozen, easily, spilling out of the corridors to either side as Nycos passed through the next of countless intersections. Each was hooded or masked, and wielding a wooden cudgel: axe handles, old table legs, quarterstaves, bludgeons of every kind. Their choice of weaponry suggested that their goal was not to kill, but that hardly meant their intended victim was in for an easy time.

  The first blow struck the arm he hastily raised to protect himself. The slight toughening of his skin—which he had adopted as his norm, a compromise that allowed him to appear and to feel sensation as normal, while still offering some degree of protection—prevented the bone from cracking, but only just. Pain surged through the limb, a jolt of man-made lightning, and he felt his grip grow numb, the arm hang limp.

  The abrupt ferocity of the attack staggered him, stunning him for a split second. A second cudgel struck him across the back of his skull. Blazing stars and streaks of black flashed across his vision, a wave of nausea nearly swept him from his feet.

  And then he learned that one of his assailants carried a tool other than a wooden bludgeon.

  Someone hurled themselves at him, leading with a shoulder, so that Nycos flew backward, lips split and bleeding, to slam against the wall. The masked figure who had struck him followed just as rapidly, crushing him between flesh and stone. Nycos felt a cold pressure on his wrists, a sudden resounding click…

  They’d manacled him. The steel cuffs pinched his flesh, but far worse was that they boasted only a short length of fat chain between them, allowing mere inches of slack.

  Clubs struck again and again, pounding his gut, his sides, his legs, until Nycos crawled on the floor like some low beast, his body seizing up in agony. The acrid, metallic scent of his own blood mixed in his nostrils with the stench of his attackers’ sweat, a heady amalgamation of exertion, anger, fear. And still the rain of blows continued, not just cudgels now but kicks as well.

  Kicks…

  He remained aware enough to recognize that these were no Kirresci boots or shoes striking him. Here, at their level, he could see the leather strips that, wrapped and tied, formed the basis of Ythani sandals.

  His Majesty’s advisors, it appeared, had been mistaken regarding how easily the bastards would be satisfied for the deaths of their countrymen.

  But then, for all the pain, the deep aches, the contusions and bruised bone, Nycos had no intention of letting them off so easily either.

  A quick tug at the chain convinced him that he’d never break the thing. Had his arm not been numbed, weakened—had he the necessary concentration to focus—he might have strengthened his muscles enough to do so. Now it wasn’t possible, certainly not without transforming enough to reveal himself as something other than human. Similarly, without giving himself away, he couldn’t armor himself enough to shrug off their attacks, though he did, through great mental effort, thicken his hide a small amount. It didn’t end the torrent of pain, didn’t keep vessels from bursting beneath his skin or bones from flexing beneath the worst impacts, but it took the edge off.

  And he still had a few tricks available to him.

  Nycos had learned well and painfully, in his struggles to cross the Outermark, that he could never again breathe the fire that had been his birthright; that transforming his innards so much would invite the shard of Wyrmtaker to once more seek his heart.

  But he’d had months in which to experiment, to learn the precise extent of those limitations. To learn he could manipulate the interior of his mouth, of his jaw, transforming just a trickle of saliva into the alchemical fuel that had, in his true body, been a vital ingredient of that fearsome conflagration.

  Tucked into a ball as any human would have, trying to protect his most vulnerable spots from the storm of wood, Nycos struggled to focus, pouring every ounce of will into ignoring the pain until he felt things shifting beneath the flesh in his jaw. Then and only then did he allow his mouth to gape open, a viscous mix of blood and spit to wobble obscenely from his lips and splatter down upon the chain.
A few quick passes with his tongue added to the solution, spreading it evenly across the steel links.

  One last effort, putting everything he had into a surge of inhuman—but not too inhuman—strength. Nycos lunged to his feet, hurling himself upstream against the battering current. He bowled two of his attackers over, deliberately stomping on the knee of one and exulting as it shattered beneath his heel, shoulder slamming the other across the hallway. At a half run, half stagger, he lunged down the corridor, not seeking escape but simply the nearest torch, crackling away in its sconce, unconcerned with the violence being perpetrated yards away.

  Nycos all but fell against the stone, shoving the glistening, fluid-coated chain into the open fire.

  The sheen of dragon’s saliva ignited in a blinding crackle, so bright he had to look aside, so hot that—even with his arms fully extended—he felt a painful searing in his forearms and short length of his hair burn away.

  Just as swiftly it was gone, the tiny amount of fuel expended in less than a heartbeat, but with it, the supernatural heat had melted wide portions of the links that bound him.

  He turned to face his enemies, mere steps behind him, held the manacles up high where they might see the mangled, misshapen chain. He saw their apprehension, unsure how so brief an exposure to the low flame of a torch could have done such damage. Well, let them wonder.

  Showing bloodstained teeth in a fearsome grin, Nycos tugged and the damaged links parted.

  The torch crackled. The man whose knee Nycos had broken moaned in torment. Everyone else breathed aloud, fast and heavy, trying to determine how dramatically the circumstances had just changed. Several eyes drifted to the sabre at the knight’s side, grimly certain that he must unsheathe the blade at any moment.

  Indeed, Nycos dropped a hand to the hilt. Everyone facing him tensed, their attentions drawn involuntarily to the sword.

  He charged, without drawing, and slammed his fist hard into the concealed visage of his nearest foe. Teeth gave away beneath the burlap mask, ripping bloody holes through the fabric. Several would have ended up embedded in Nycos’s knuckles had his skin been that of a normal man. He loosened his fingers for an instant, clenched again, and when he withdrew his hand the mask came with it. He wanted a good look at these Ythani vermin who—

  Except, despite the evidence of the sandals, the battered face staring back his way wasn’t Ythani at all. Not only was it darker than the normally pale citizens of that distant nation, it struck in Nycos’s mind the faintest chord of recognition.

  The rest of his assailants surged forward in a single tide, determined to beat him down once more, remaining confident in their greater numbers.

  Still Nycos chose not to draw his sabre. Furious as he was, he repressed the urge to slaughter those who would dare heap such indignities upon him. Too much was happening here that he didn’t yet understand. Instead he snatched the axe handle from the man he’d just pummeled, letting the fool collapse and moving to meet the others. With his other hand he hauled the torch from its sconce, holding it near the base, letting the smoke and cinders plume as he waved it with deceptive languor at his enemies.

  Had they known what they were about, had they all been able to come at him at once, those numbers might have made the difference—or at least forced Nycos to resort to feats of strength or endurance he could never have passed off as human. With his back to the wall, however, and the fallen man a partial obstacle to one side, they could approach only four or so at a time without stumbling into one another’s way. And between Nycos’s months of practice and the degree of strength and speed he was willing display, four at once… was not sufficient.

  He struck hard, fast, and he aimed for the joints. He twisted, stepping inside the first man’s reach and snapping an elbow with one swift blow. A vicious parry when another club swung his way, nearly knocking the weapon from impact-numbed hands, then a strike downward at an exposed hip, sending the foe limping away.

  He turned, stepped, constantly moving but always keeping the wall behind him. The torch protected his open side—not so well as a shield, perhaps, but nobody was eager to approach the blazing brand and risk seeing their clothes or their hair set aflame. They learned quickly to stay away from Nycos’s spinning bludgeon, too, but that hesitance left them unable to make any attack of their own.

  Again the hall echoed with a sudden rush of footsteps, but any fears Nycos might have had regarding additional enemies were swiftly allayed. A small bevy of palace servants, their attention drawn by the sounds of battle, came racing around the corner, nearly stumbling over each other as they skidded to a halt.

  “Sir Nycolos!”

  “Stay back!” he called. “Fetch the guards!” While several of the new arrivals froze, shocked at the tableaux, one woman instantly pivoted on her heel and ran back the way she’d come, skirts held high.

  Desperate, now, the ambushers made one last rush, perhaps hoping to catch Nycos distracted by the servants. He met their charge with his own, the axe handle whirling more than fast enough to crack a skull, to break an arm or leg and drive the bone through fragile flesh.

  When that weapon cracked another man’s club clear through, and a vicious thrust of the torch left a blackened blotch of flesh across a carelessly outthrust arm, the assailants finally had enough. Turning tail, pausing only long enough to hoist their wounded comrades from the floor, the lot fled back the way they’d come.

  “Sir Nycolos?” The servants approached, now, timid and hesitant. “Are you all right, sir?”

  “I’ll live. Thank you.”

  He leaned hard against the wall, aching legs barely propping him up. He allowed the cudgel to drop, listlessly handed the torch to the man nearest him and pointed, with a grunt, at the empty sconce. Then he could only stare down at the broken manacles about his wrists and hope the guards wouldn’t take too long to produce a key that fit them.

  Oh, he’d given some thought to pursuit, but the throbbing and pounding of the punishment he’d endured, while less than might be expected, was sufficient to slow him down, to make him think that additional conflict was not a wise choice just now.

  It was also unnecessary. As soon as the servants had rounded the bend, the sight of them had been sufficient to jog his memory, to give him a context for the face he’d recognized.

  The bastard was, himself, an Ozteryva servant! Oh, not part of the regular palace staff, not someone who dwelt on the grounds, but one of the extra gardeners hired on during the spring and summer months. Nycos didn’t know his name, didn’t know where he lived, but none of that would stop him. He could track the man down if necessary. More to the point, merely knowing who he was told him much.

  Namely that this ambush hadn’t been conducted by the Ythani delegation at all. He was merely meant to think they had, thanks to the timing and, especially, the footwear.

  And he could think of only one man in the palace who had both the means and the motivation to orchestrate such a deception.

  ___

  “To what end, though, Master?” Smim asked, carefully wrapping Nycos’s salve-smeared arm. The heavy bandaging would not merely compress the limb, hopefully reducing any swelling, but also tied it firmly to a length of wood, immobilizing it. Nycos winced, and already worked at mentally reshaping it back to its earlier, uninjured form—a process that, though far faster than waiting for it to heal naturally, would still take longer, and leave him in rather more pain, than he would have preferred. “I don’t doubt that it was the margrave behind this, but what do you imagine he hoped to accomplish?”

  “I think Ow!” Nycos recoiled as Smim shifted his attention from the arm to the split and battered skin around the knight’s lips. “Watch it, goblin!”

  Smim stood back, holding fingertips coated in salve up before him. “You were the one who insisted I not call any of the servants or a physician who would actually know what they were doing, Master.”

  “I don’t want them to know how bad the injuries are.”

 
; “They’re not nearly so severe as one might expect, Master.”

  “Yes. That’s what I don’t want them to know.”

  The goblin nodded. “Wise. It does mean, however, that you’re going to have to tolerate my own tender ministrations. Which will go a lot more smoothly and swiftly, especially around your mouth—which currently looks as though a particularly excitable mule trod upon an overripe plum—if you were to find it in yourself not to shout at me every other breath. Master.”

  “You,” Nycos grumbled, “are not a born healer, Smim.”

  “I will try to contain my sorrow, Master.”

  A few moments of silent prodding and slightly less silent wincing followed, until Smim had finished applying the herbal balm to Nycos’s mouth and had moved on to a badly bruised shoulder.

  “I think,” Nycos said then, picking up the thread of their earlier conversation, “Andarjin probably felt he’d discovered a way to tilt at two targets at once. He despises me, of course, for potentially standing in Zirresca’s way. He’s also furious at Ythane, and he’s no happier about King Hasyan’s choice to assuage them and pay them off than are the rest of us, even if he understands the expediency of it.

  “So, this attack? Either it gives his Majesty cause to send the Ythani packing for the violence and insult done to me, and thus to him, as their host—or, perhaps, it might have encouraged me to respond with insults or even bloodshed, thus shaming the court and doing severe damage to my standing. And no matter which way that goes, I’m badly beaten enough that I’m working at a disadvantage for months. Or at least would be, if I were what he thought me to be.”

  “My own guess was similar,” Smim said. “What do you intend to do about it, Master?”