Bloodchild

by Anna Stephens

  Tenth moon, first year of the reign of King Corvus

  Western Wheat Lands

  ‘Yew Cove’s nearly empty of Rankers,’ Ash said as soon as he reached Crys in the small camp and assured himself his lover remained unhurt. Crys didn’t mind the mothering one bit, not with only weeks left to live. If he could’ve sent anyone else to spy on the town, he would have, but Ash was the best tracker and scout they had this far from Mace’s army. He reached out and tangled his fingers in Ash’s.

  ‘So Corvus has pulled all his troops together after our victories at Pine Lock and Sailtown,’ Crys said. ‘Exactly as we’d hoped. Gives us a chance to end this once and for all.’

  ‘We could take Yew Cove,’ Ash said, avoiding the implication behind his words, ‘free the people, sow some more discord for Corvus.’

  ‘Our orders were to scout and come back,’ Crys said. ‘I’m inclined to agree with our king. No matter how swift or silent we are, we’ll lose some in the attempt and we need every fighter we’ve got. The remaining Rankers and converts won’t risk dealing with the townsfolk too harshly – they know how badly they’re outnumbered and won’t want to push the slaves into open rebellion. That’s a fight they’d never win. They should be safe enough until we have victory.’

  He let go of Ash’s hand to stare southeast to where Rilporin dominated a horizon he couldn’t see. If Corvus was coming that meant he was alive, which meant Tara might not be. He wondered if Foxy would tell him if she’d fallen. He wondered if he’d want to know – it was his words that had put her on her path. And I’ve ordered soldiers to their deaths before. This is no different.

  It felt different, though. Or … something did. He rubbed at an ache in the pit of his stomach, smiled when Ash’s lips grazed his temple. They hadn’t discussed it, they’d just started showing their love for each other in public and if the Rankers who’d ridden with them didn’t like it, at least they didn’t comment. It would be over soon, anyway. Crys wasn’t going to hide for whatever time he had left. Crys was done with hiding, with not being exactly who he was, man and god and heart-bound.

  ‘All right,’ he said to the fifty-strong patrol with their borrowed and stolen horses, ‘we’ll ride a deep loop towards Rilporin over the next couple of days and see if we can pick up movement or advance scouts. Let’s give the king something definite to worry about, because I for one am sick of all this bastard not knowing.’

  The mix of Krikites, Wolves and Rankers grinned. They broke camp and soon enough they were on the move again, riding easily despite the snap in the air as autumn drew its cloak of reds and golds across the country, its fine tracery of low mists at dawn, its sudden, chilling downpours that told him summer was a distant memory. The last summer he’d ever see and he’d spent it fighting. An upswell of affection and humour reminded him not to dwell but to live and live well for the time he had.

  He scratched idly at the russet pattern curling up through the open neck of his shirt beneath his chainmail as they rode, breathing deep of the crisp air and doing his best to ignore the ache in his stomach. It had begun a couple of days before and was likely just stress, but it seemed to get stronger the closer they rode to Rilporin. As though something in the city was calling to a part of him.

  He looked over at Ash, sweat from his run back from Yew Cove sticking his curls to his brow despite the chill. He sensed the weight of Crys’s gaze and tipped him a wink; Crys smiled and the ache faded a little, replaced with something warmer, something real.

  He clung to it through the rest of the day, and the day after that, as they rode closer and closer to Rilporin and the ache, the sense of something coming, the gloom that hid behind the sun, continued to grow.

  ‘They’re coming,’ Crys said to the group assembled in Mace’s command tent at the edge of Deep Forest a week later. ‘Three days behind us, perhaps – we pushed hard to put distance between us. We caught the leading edge of their outriders, didn’t get much of a look at the force marching behind before they chased us off, but the estimate is three or four thousand.’

  ‘Right, if it looks like four thousand we assume it’s eight and plan accordingly,’ Mace said and the Warlord, Dalli and General Hadir nodded their agreement. Hallos was there too, which meant he was taking a break from drilling the Rank surgeons and Krikite healers for a change. The gods knew they’d need every last one of them when battle was joined, especially now Crys knew his healing ability was more limited than he’d previously thought.

  He decided to seek the man out after the council was concluded. The ache was still there, sapping at his energy, quietening even the Fox God. It was a slow poison and he needed to counter it. Three days until the battle, Foxy. Doesn’t seem very long at all now, does it?

  We are together.

  I know.

  Trouble was, the sentiment wasn’t as comforting as it had been months or even weeks ago. Dying alone was terrible, but so was dying when there was still so much living to do.

  ‘Tailorson?’

  Crys jerked out of his reverie and blushed. ‘Sorry, sir. Sire.’

  Mace’s face was unreadable. ‘I asked if they had cavalry.’

  ‘Outriders only, it seemed. Probably no more than a hundred.’

  ‘That’s still enough for a cavalry charge,’ Hadir pointed out and Mace nodded. ‘Pit-traps and leg-breakers like the ones that cock Skerris laid outside Sailtown would be useful to break up the ground in front of our line.’

  ‘Agreed: get men preparing it at first light. Until then, gentlemen, dismissed.’

  They filed out one by one and Crys waited until they were alone. ‘A moment of your time, Your Majesty?’ he asked and managed a faint smile at Mace’s glare at the use of the title. ‘It’s about Ash. About what happens to him after I … well, after.’

  Mace gestured him to a seat. ‘I thought we’d get to this eventually. Let me point out here and now that I am not expecting you to die in this battle. You’re too bloody good a soldier and frankly I can’t afford to lose you. So do me a favour and stay alive.’

  Crys managed a mirthless laugh. ‘I’ll be doing my best,’ he said.

  ‘That said, I will offer Ash a place on my staff after this is all over, or assign him as Dalli’s personal bodyguard, whichever he prefers. It would be nice to keep the two of them together, though they’ll no doubt make a mockery of the business of ruling. Alternatively, if Dalli passed over chiefdom to another when she becomes queen, Ash would get my vote as a more than suitable successor. And of course, the Crown and the Wolves will forever be closely entwined. Dalli won’t let it be any other way, and I’m not stupid enough to argue with that one on a regular basis.’

  Crys didn’t know what to say. He’d expected an argument, awkward questions and perhaps even a reprimand for their public behaviour. He hadn’t expected Mace to understand him so well. Hadn’t expected compassion. It was an unfamiliar feeling after the months of wary devotion that was all the Krikites showed in his presence. It loosened a ball of tension in his chest that had sat there so long he’d forgotten about it. He let out a shaky breath.

  Mace leant over and slapped him on the arm. ‘As I said, I’m ordering you not to die, Tailorson, but if you do disobey me, I’ll see him well looked after.’

  ‘Thank you, Sire,’ he stammered. ‘It means more than you could know. Your … acceptance too.’

  Mace’s mouth twitched but his face was pensive. ‘Let’s just say Dalli is a tyrant and has taught me a few things about not being a prejudiced arse. A few lessons that I – that all of us – should’ve learnt a long time ago. And besides, it’s not easy to love a warrior when there’s a battle on the horizon,’ he added. ‘With everything on your shoulders, I wouldn’t deny you this small comfort. Of course, it requires both Ash and me to live to see it performed.’

  ‘You will, both of you,’ Crys said, an automatic rejection of the possibility of death, but Mace took it with more belief than was wise, as if it was a divine prediction. Crys didn’t disabuse
him of his faith. He stood. ‘Thank you again, sir. With your permission?’

  Mace stood and Crys saluted him. ‘Dismissed, Major.’

  Crys left the king to his planning and went in search of Hallos. The physician leapt to his feet when Crys entered the long, low tent that would be the field hospital once battle was joined. The burly man hastened the length of the tent and ushered him towards the torchlight with unseemly glee. ‘It is an honour, a great honour,’ he said. ‘How may I help?’

  ‘Easy, Hallos,’ a voice said and Crys recognised Gilda in the shadows; he felt an absurd flush of relief. ‘Let the lad sit before you start poking him.’

  ‘I wouldn’t,’ Hallos protested but Crys thought he looked a little guilty despite his words. He took the proffered seat anyway and Gilda dragged her stool closer into the light, rolling her eyes when he glanced over.

  He felt faintly ridiculous now it came to it, sitting here about to complain of bellyache a few days before they’d be fighting and killing. And that, of course, was when the Fox God decided to take over.

  ‘There’s something in me that’s trying to burrow its way out,’ He said and Hallos sucked his breath in with a great gasp as the change became apparent. He fumbled for a pencil and notebook without looking, licked the wrong end and began to scrawl across a page already thick with text. ‘I think it’s the Dark Lady’s essence,’ He added and the pencil stopped moving. There was a long pause and then Gilda slid a little closer.

  Uh, Foxy? When were you going to tell me about this?

  What, did you think we’d just pissed Her back out? Laughter bubbled in his veins.

  Yes. Well, no. Well, I didn’t really think about it.

  We’d never have used our cock again if we’d done that, the Fox God assured him.

  ‘Fascinating. Absolutely fascinating,’ Hallos muttered. ‘And tell me, what makes you think it could be such a … substance? And why is it trying to, ah, vacate your body now?’

  ‘Because the time is nearly here,’ said another voice from the shadows and the hairs stood up on Crys’s neck. Dom limped into the light between rows of cots awaiting cleaved and screaming patients.

  ‘No,’ Crys whispered. ‘The Bloodchild is at least six weeks away, probably more. The battle will have been fought and won by then. It’ll be over.’

  ‘The Fox God’s destiny is to defeat the Dark Lady. How can you do that if you die in three days?’ Dom asked. Gilda helped him on to her stool and stood behind, ready to catch him if he moved into a knowing. Hallos’s head swivelled like an owl watching two juicy mice, unsure which to eat first.

  ‘So I survive the battle?’ Crys asked, his heart leaping. There was still time, there were still days for him to spend with Ash, to wring every last drop from life and love.

  Dom’s laugh was sly and not exactly reassuring as he pressed his hand to his right eye. ‘Or maybe that babe just doesn’t want to wait,’ he said. ‘Who knows?’

  TARA

  Tenth moon, first year of the reign of King Corvus

  South barracks, Second Circle, Rilporin, Wheat Lands

  The water was so cold it stung when it hit her in her face; for a few seconds the only thing she could feel as she made her way back into consciousness. Soon enough, though, the vicious, biting pain in the back of her skull roared back, throbbing down her neck and into her shoulders so that she hissed a long breath in through her teeth. Tara opened one eye – the other was swollen shut – and the room swam into view. The barracks. The cells. But not Vaunt’s.

  Colonel Dorcas stood at attention with fierce, unbending pride despite the blood staining the tatters of his uniform. He’d fought hard then, before he was captured. Could Vaunt keep the rebellion alive without them both to assist? Of course he could. Could and would. She and Dorcas would be in for a beating, no doubt, but –

  ‘I need this room. I don’t need you.’ Valan stepped into view, pulled a knife and stabbed it into Dorcas’s throat. He missed the big veins as the colonel got one hand up in an instinctive block, but then Valan was behind him, free hand pulling back on his forehead, knife hand slicing away at muscle and windpipe until a sudden jet of blood vomited from Dorcas’s neck and splashed against the wall and floor, spraying into Tara’s face.

  Tara got halfway to her feet to rip Valan’s own throat out with her teeth before the men holding her twisted both arms behind her back and wrestled her back down to her knees. They held her still, a hand on the back of her skull to make sure she watched him die. She held the old soldier’s gaze until it was over, silently promising vengeance, and then raised it to Valan’s face.

  ‘Leave us,’ he said. The easy, competent man she’d come to know in the last months was gone. The flash of vulnerability when he talked of his wife and children was gone, subsumed beneath impenetrable ice. He was Valan, King’s Second, and her death was in his eyes.

  The men holding her wrenched her arms back tighter, eliciting a screech of pain, and then slammed her face down on to the stone hard enough to split her eyebrow and send up a splash of Dorcas’s blood. By the time she’d got her hands under her, they were dragging the corpse through the door and slamming it behind them. She was sodden with blood, the cell a stinking miasma of gore and waste and fear.

  Slowly, Tara stood, swaying. The blow that had knocked her unconscious – she checked the light from the high window – not long ago had left her dazed, and not even the pain and dawning fear could cut through the fog in her head. ‘Honoured?’

  Valan’s forearm slammed into her throat as he forced her back against the wall, pressing hard enough to cut off her breath, his face close enough to kiss. She choked, one hand fumbling at his arm, the other at his belt for the knife. Couldn’t find it.

  Valan headbutted her. Lightning exploded behind her eyes, cartilage cracking in her nose. Still couldn’t breathe, blood gushing over his forearm, heavy leather vambrace jammed up tight beneath her chin.

  ‘Why?’ he asked. Tara blinked, scrabbling for air, stars bursting in her vision. ‘Why, you bitch, tell me why? You knew what would happen if you disobeyed, what would happen to Vaunt, and yet you take up fucking arms against me. Rise against me with the fucking Ranks. How could you betray me?’

  She wheezed, pleading with her eyes, and he released just enough pressure that she could sip in a little air. ‘I’m sorry,’ she choked.

  Valan roared in her face, forearm pressing even tighter, and she tried slapping at him, got a handful of his hair and pulled until he drove his fist into her kidney – the same one Lanta had smashed with the hammer – and if she could’ve screamed she would have. The splintered ends of ribs grated under each blow, agony and nausea and Valan’s arm all constricting her throat until she began to black out.

  He let her slide down the wall, stepped back and kicked her in the gut, forcing out the breath she’d inhaled. She saw something in him snap and curled into a ball, hands over her head and teeth clenched so she didn’t bite off her own tongue.

  It had been years since she’d taken a sustained beating. It was harder than she remembered; went on longer, too. It was Valan’s own exhaustion that finally stopped him, when she was barely conscious and all she could hear was his panting and her own whimpering. Her ribs were on fire, her face swollen out of shape, and pain everywhere, in her hands and fingers where he’d kicked them, in her legs where he’d stamped, her spine and arse and shoulder blades.

  He crouched and got her in a headlock, dragged her to the cot and threw her on to it. He shouted something and the door banged open and three Raiders piled in, pinning her belly down, legs splayed. Adrenaline cut through the fog and she thrashed between them like a fish on the line.

  ‘No. Get your fucking hands off me! No! No!’

  They leant their weight on her while Valan threaded a length of rope through her collar and forced her hands up to her neck and bound them behind her head. She screamed again as they bent her cracked elbow. The other Mireces cautiously let her go and Tara rolled on to her side an
d kicked at them, forcing them away. They retreated and Valan dragged her up to sitting. He waved them back out and she saw the disappointment on their faces.

  She spat blood at him and worked at the ropes tying her wrists to the collar, but they were far too tight to wriggle free, even if she’d had the strength. All her hurts came back in a rush, breaking over her head like a storm so a long, drawn-out whimper clawed out of her throat.

  Valan stood over her and the violence inside him was tethered and dragged back into the darkness as though it had never been. ‘You could have had it all,’ he said softly. ‘Freedom, a good man by your side and in your bed, children. Power and wealth. Instead you threw it all away and sided with the slaves you’re so much better than. And you lied to me; for months you lied. You’re mine, and yet you made a fool out of me.’

  Tara was bleary with concussion, but she knew she hadn’t been out of it for more than a few hours. The rebellion would still be going, gaining momentum every hour Valan was here instead of out there leading the defence. The longer she could keep him occupied, the better Vaunt’s chances of securing the city and finding her. She just had to hold on and Tomaz would kill his way to her and together they’d tear this fucker limb from limb.

  This is it, Tara. Say whatever you have to, but keep him talking.

  She shook her head, letting bloody drool string from her mouth down on to her chest. ‘I don’t belong to you or anyone, not even the Dancer. People are not – will never be – possessions. I’m not yours.’

  The stretch in her ribs from having her arms up was shortening her breath and blackness threatened the edges of her vision, but she plunged on. ‘You’re a good man, Valan. A great man. Your devotion to Neela, to Kit and Ede, proves that. You loved them, looked after them, wanted nothing but a better life for them and you worked hard to provide that. Because you’re decent and intelligent. Because you’re kind.’

  Vomit scalded the back of Tara’s throat, thicker than the hypocrisy. ‘And when they died you mourned them, as any good man would do. I watched you cry over them, Valan. I knew your grief. Yet here you are beating me senseless and threatening to kill my husband. That’s not you, Valan. That’s not who you are. I know it isn’t. You’re too good for this.’