Shadows of Blood

by L. E. Dereksen

  “I’m begging you,” I went on. “Think of the lives under your care. If retreat would have saved Karta’s life, would you have done it? Think of those who depend on you. Think of Tala.”

  He hit me. Pain blasted across my face. I gasped, staggering.

  He struck me again. I spun and light flashed through my vision. I landed on my knees, blinking.

  “You chose to come,” he said, loud enough for everyone to hear. “Now you will obey the mandates of our mission, the authority given to me by the Al’kah, regardless of the robes you wear—is that clear?”

  I swallowed and glanced up. He stood over me, shockingly calm, without the anger I had expected. He lifted his fist.

  “Wait!” I gasped.

  Pain slammed into my jaw. I tasted blood. I had no time to recover before he hit me again.

  I might have lost consciousness. Suddenly there was sand between my teeth, warm and wet with blood, my arms thrown over my head like a shield. I wanted to throw up. My ears rang. Don’t move. Don’t . . .

  “Sorry, Kylan.” He bent close. “This isn’t your Temple. It was that or the lash, so take the warning and stop.”

  Then he straightened.

  “Everyone back to work,” he called. “Mani, help our healer to his tent. See to whatever he needs. Koryn, I want to hit water today. Let’s go.”

  The camp lurched back into action.

  “Elder ab’Ethanir,” said a woman’s voice. I glanced over my shoulder—slowly. It was the older, formidable Guardian they called Mani. She was stern and unmoving, but her touch was gentle as she eased me up.

  I stumbled.

  “Slowly,” she said.

  I gave a bleak laugh. “I’m not used to being . . . knocked around.”

  She said nothing.

  “You think he’s right?” I asked.

  She guided me to the tent. Only when we were safely within did she glance at Karta’s half-shrouded body.

  “First blood,” she said at last. “The fight ends at first blood only in contests, Kulnethar ab’Ethanir. And this is not a contest. Get some rest.”

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Ishvandu ab’Admundi

  Tala watched me as I crossed the ground. I could feel her eyes, her disapproval.

  “Was that necessary?” she whispered as soon as I drew near.

  “You know it was.”

  “But violence against a healer?” She paused. “An Elder?”

  “The Al’kah would take my side.”

  “It’s not the Al’kah I’m worried about.”

  We slipped behind the tents. “I know,” I sighed. “I know. You think I wanted to do that? Besides, it’s Kylan. By the time we’re back in Shyandar, he’ll be over it. We’ll laugh about it. It’ll be fine.”

  “Vanya, that wasn’t a scrap between friends, and you know it.”

  My knuckles throbbed where I’d hit him. I could still feel the sound he made as he fell, echoing in my gut. “What else could I do? What else?”

  “Let him know you hear him, that you respect his voice. Consider his words. That’s all he wants.” Her lips pursed. “Is it true? Is Karta dead?”

  I nodded.

  She swore and looked away. “I’ve never seen so many.”

  “I know.”

  “Sands, Vanya, we should have died in that tent, all of us. Karta, Kulnethar, me. If it wasn’t for that trick with the Sending stone . . .”

  “Yeah, but it worked. I scared them away.”

  “For now.”

  She paced. One hand kept twisting over the hilt of her keshu, as if she were back, the blade’s light swirling around her. And they had kept coming. More and more . . .

  “We almost died.” Her voice dropped to a whisper, brow troubled.

  “But we didn’t.”

  “One of us did.” She glanced at me. “I know you don’t want to hear this, my love, but Kulnethar has a point.”

  I frowned. “Tala . . .”

  “Hear me out.” She gripped my arm. “All morning I’ve been thinking. I’ve never seen Sumadi act like that before. They could have razed Karta’s mind, but they didn’t. They attacked him, and let Kulnethar think he was protecting him—long enough for us to come running. They waited until we were cut off, alone, vulnerable. Then they attacked. Don’t you see?”

  “Coincidence,” I growled. “They sensed our weakness, that’s all.”

  “Or they were using Karta to make us weak.”

  I swallowed. “Sumadi can’t strategize like that.”

  “Maybe not.” Her face darkened. “But he could.”

  Dread gripped me. I knew exactly what she meant. “That’s not possible. That’s—”

  “Why not? You said Shatayeth was keeping them away.”

  “It was a hunch. He’s hinted at it, nothing more.”

  “But it’s a possibility.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Ishvandu, he’s the Last of the Undying. He has power in the Unseen. Can he speak with them like you do? Can he use them?”

  “Like a weapon?” I growled.

  “Exactly.”

  “Tala, he doesn’t need Sumadi to kill me. He could do that well enough on his own.”

  “But the Sumadi didn’t go after you, did they?” She sat back, crossing her arms. “They went after Kulnethar. They went after me.”

  I felt sick. I ran a hand over my face, knowing what she meant, hearing my fears spoken aloud.

  “I won’t let that happen again. I’ll protect you.”

  “This isn’t about me, Vanya. Yes, I was against this from the start, but I’m a Guardian. I was given orders. I accepted the risks, nor would I let anyone abandon this mission for my sake, and you should blasted well know that already. But one person has died, and if there’s even the slightest possibility Shatayeth Undying is behind this, it’s your responsibility to think before you forge ahead. Are you ready to face the consequences?” She leaned close, voice dropping. “He knows who’s at your side, Vanya. I saw the way he looked at Kulnethar. The way he looked at me. Yl’avah’s might, he would love nothing more than to kill us both.”

  “So what? We allow ourselves to be driven out like whipped Taskers? I’m not going to let him win, Tala. Not again.” I clenched my fist. “This is our ground. Let’s fight for it!”

  She met my eye. “Is that what you want?”

  I nodded.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Tala, I need you with me. If Shatayeth thinks he can frighten us into submission, he’s wrong. Let’s show him who we really are!”

  She didn’t look at me, but I saw her lips purse. I saw the Guardian steel in her eyes. She nodded.

  “I’m with you, Vanya.”

  Kulnethar’s tent had quickly become an extension of his healing rooms. There were pallets on the ground, a medicine board lined with supplies, a basin for washing up, extra blankets stacked in the corner, and outside, a pot of bloody rags bubbling over a fire.

  And now a body lay shrouded in it as well.

  I hovered at the entrance, not sure what to expect. Would I be met with anger? Disappointment? A fresh animosity, threatening to grow into something ugly?

  More than a scrap between friends.

  But when Kulnethar turned to me, my disgust welled up without his help. His light skin showed each bruise with painful clarity: the swollen jaw, the blood-shot eye, welts already darkening.

  “Shit,” I muttered.

  He just looked at me, then at the body. “Help me carry him?”

  I nodded.

  We said nothing else as we bent to lift Karta’s shrouded form. If Kulnethar struggled with his own pain, he didn’t show it. We bore him quietly out of the tent, then towards some soft ground beyond the lip of the basin. Mani had redirected a few of the diggers, and by sunfall, they had scraped out a respectable hole.

  The crew fell into line behind us, marching in silence, then spreading out, forming a circle around the open ground. Kulnethar and I lowered th
e body onto the burial cloth, kneeling at his head and feet. There was a heavy silence. Then, in the absence of Temple singers, Kulnethar began the song of passing.

  It began quietly. The first notes were low and mournful, like the last beats of a dying heart. The crew echoed the words in a sombre tone: “light to dark, life to death.” Then Kulnethar’s voice began to rise. There was little harmony in the song. The notes slid discordantly, painfully, rising and falling, using old words that few but the Temple still understood. But the sound itself resonated, speaking of grief beyond the capacity of speech.

  I wanted to stuff my ears, to turn away from the ache. I couldn’t carry the weight of Karta’s death. Not now. Not when there was so much at stake. Feel it too deeply, and I would waver in my mission.

  Yet Kulnethar sang well. Every note quivered inside him, welling up from his pain, trembling as it broke over the dead in powerful waves. Then he gave a last, mournful cry and slumped forward, allowing the sun to set in silence, and the dark to sweep over us like a shroud.

  “Yl’avah guide thee,” I finished, taking the role of the Al’kah, my voice rough with unshed tears. The crew echoed me.

  “May you find rest in the next Realm and peace beneath the shadow of the Great Tree. May your memory be ever green. May it be so.”

  “May it be so.”

  Guardians and Labourers lifted their voices together—and then silence.

  We waited. At last, Koryn and ab’Tanadu came forward, gripping the ropes of the burial cloth. Carefully, they lifted Karta’s body, then lowered the ropes into the hole. They each took a handful of the clayey earth and tossed it over the body. Then one by one, the others did likewise before trailing back towards camp.

  As bearers of the dead, Kulnethar and I remained to the end, while Koryn and ab’Tanadu continued the burial. We knelt across from each other, frowning, glancing at each other in brief, uncomfortable snatches before looking away.

  “Kylan,” I said at last. “I’m sorry.”

  He said nothing.

  “You know why I had to do it, right?”

  “Not now, Vanya.”

  “I’ll make it up to you.” I glanced at him.

  Silence.

  I glowered, wondering if there was anything I could say to soften those bruises. Probably not.

  “Look, Kylan, I have to be a leader here. All it takes is one person. One person to turn against me. Then it’s easier for the next person. And the next. And before we know it, someone else is going to suffer for their disobedience. That’s not what I want—it’s not what you want. I’m just trying to keep the peace, here, and—”

  “Vanya,” he said. “Shut up.”

  “You’re angry at me. I get it. That’s fine. But—”

  “You think I care about a few bruises?” He finally met my eye. “You think that’s what’s bothering me?”

  “I hit you. In front of everyone.”

  “Fine,” he said. “You did what you had to. I get it. But if one more person suffers for that stupid hole in the ground, I will never forgive you.”

  The words twisted inside me, wrapping through Tala’s warnings, through my own fears. What if the next to suffer was Kulnethar himself? What if it was Tala?

  But it wasn’t as simple as that. He didn’t think like a Guardian. Of course he wanted to keep everyone safe, but we were here to do a job. Risk was inevitable. Loss was inevitable.

  I looked away and said nothing, and we remained like that until the stars came out, until Koryn and ab’Tanadu threw the last clod of earth back over the body. Then we rose stiffly from our vigil and returned in silence towards the camp.

  The next morning, we hit water.

  It seeped through the bottom of a hearty shovelful, about twenty-five feet down. The Labourers whooped and shouted and danced around, clapping each other on the back and grinning.

  “Let’s not celebrate too fast,” Adar was quick to remind them. “We’ve got a lot of work to make this stable, and digging yet to go.”

  The digging continued, but now instead of sand and hard ground, up came wet clumps of clay. Baraaba scooped these bits up, pounding them together with the gravel as he worked on his reinforcements.

  I should have been thrilled, but my rest was troubled. Sumadi hadn’t made an appearance the night of Karta’s burial, but if Shatayeth were really behind the attacks, it was only a matter of time. And what if I was making the wrong choice?

  After the midday meal, I gathered everybody around the well—everybody except for Kulnethar, who was conspicuously absent.

  “This is the next phase,” I told them. “It’s time to start shoring up the sides, ensure the walls won’t collapse on us. Mason Baraaba has some detailed plans for the execution of this, so Adar, you’ll work under his direction and ensure everything is done to his standards. Is that clear?”

  “Of course,” Adar said with a nod.

  “Good. I know you’re all excited about hitting water, but this isn’t finished. We’ve got lots of work ahead of us. So you know what to do. Baraaba—the crew is yours.”

  The man grunted and immediately set to work, sending a team into the cliffs to hunt for stones, another to keep digging, and a third to keep pounding stone into gravel paste. Adar was the first to climb back down, and when he reached the bottom there was an audible splash.

  “It’s filling up already!” he called.

  The water was hauled up in a skin and everyone crowded around to take a sip. I watched their faces brighten as they drank. It was finally beginning to sink in. We had found water—our own water—stolen out of the sands.

  “Ishvandu ab’Admundi!” called one of the Labourers. “Over here! You should have some.”

  I accepted gratefully, pleased to see the trouble with Kulnethar and the burial hadn’t turned them against me. It was cold and bright and good, and despite my own gnawing fears, I couldn’t resist their enthusiasm. I grinned along with them, then ordered them back to work. They laughed as they obeyed.

  They trusted me.

  But how? Karta’s death, Kulnethar’s doubt—yet still they wanted to believe.

  Yl’avah’s might, let me not disappoint them.

  I turned to go, and caught Mani watching me. That wasn’t unusual. She was often standing apart, observing, calculating. Yet this time, her chin lifted, calling me over.

  I joined her under the supplies tent. “Do you know what you’re doing?” she asked bluntly.

  I raised a brow. “We’re following the plan, Mani. The plan you helped to make.”

  “Not about the well.” She lowered her voice. “You encourage them. Perhaps too much. Adar ab’Dara asked for extra rations this morning for himself and his crew.”

  “They’ve had some difficult nights.”

  “You’re not bothered by his forwardness?”

  “Are you?”

  Mani thought about it. I knew of all the Guardians, I could trust her to make an unbiased judgment. “It’s not his confidence that troubles me, Ishvandu. It’s what lies behind it.”

  I fell still. Sands. I knew it was only a matter of time before someone else caught on. But so soon? And of course it would be Mani.

  I tried to shrug it off. “Adar is used to being followed. He’s a foreman, and a good one. People look up to him.”

  “Why?”

  “Because he’s a good foreman.”

  She shook her head. “Not one of these men and women are on his crew in the north fields. But they act like they know him. Like they would follow him anywhere, even to dig a fool’s hole in the middle of nowhere.” She raised a brow.

  “I was on his crew,” I said. “And trust me, that’s normal.”

  “For a reason.”

  I thought about it. “No way. Lidyana said . . .” I trailed off. Said only she and one other were rebels. But what if Mani’s instincts were right?

  What if Lidyana and Adar had defied our instructions and brought their entire rebellion with them? They didn’t want violence—
or so Lidyana claimed. But she could be lying to Tala all over again.

  I should warn Mani. I should tell her everything, explain that we were trying to keep an eye on them, hoping to trap as many as possible in open rebellion. This was my chance to spin the whole thing in Tala’s favour.

  But then Lidyana and Adar would get the ropes, and the expedition would grind to a disastrous end. Mani, I knew, would never stand for known rebels in our midst.

  “You’re seeing too many shadows,” I grunted. “Adar’s a good man. I trust him. I trust these people. Leave it at that.”

  Mani nodded. “Very well.”

  I glanced at her, surprised at her sudden willingness to drop it. “Did you?” I asked.

  “Did I what?”

  “Give them extra rations?”

  She nodded. “It has been a hard few nights.”

  “Good. Just make sure Koryn and the Guardians get extra too, then.”

  “Already taken care of.” And for one of the few times I could remember, Mani smiled.

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Kulnethar ab’Ethanir

  I sat awake in my healing tent, gazing at the small vial in my hands. I could smell the contents from here, sharp and stringent. I knew the dose. It could give me the sleep I so desperately needed, though it would be fitful, probably wracked with unpleasant dreams, and I would wake groggy. It was not my first choice, but the alternative was a long, sleepless night, head pounding with every heartbeat, ears strained for the slightest sound as I waited for disaster to strike.

  I grimaced and lifted the clay vial to my lips—

  On the other hand, if I drugged myself into oblivion and disaster did strike, I would be incoherent and unable to help. What if someone’s life depended on me? Not that staying awake all night with a splitting headache would help either.

  I lowered the vial without drinking. I sighed and leaned my head against one of the support poles. It hurt. Light and all, it hurt more than Ishvandu had probably intended. I knew exactly what he was thinking. A deliberate act, a public display, meant to deter further dissension. And to some extent, I didn’t even blame him. I had been upset. I hadn’t been thinking clearly. In retrospect, such an open confrontation was the last thing either of us needed. And yet . . .