“I swear to you in the name of Iam, this news comes as a surprise to me.”
“Then, do you renounce him as one of your own? Will you raise your forces with us and remove the stain of his being from Pantego?”
Sidar exhaled. “It is more complicated than you might think, Your Grace. His is a respected family that has walked the black sands for centuries.”
“Then you endorse his slaughtering of innocents while my people mourned the loss of my husband?”
“No, never, my Queen, but if I raise arms against an afhem I—”
“Enough,” Pi said softly.
Torsten thought himself hallucinating, but the Queen spun a full circle toward her son. Even the nearest guards broke their discipline and turned their heads.
Sidar too was stunned speechless. Even had he not known of the boy’s lingering silence, for a ruler of Sidar’s age and stature to be addressed so boldly by a child was a rare thing.
“Excuse me, Highness?” Sidar asked.
Pi placed his feet beneath him and rose to a standing position on the throne. Torsten felt a chill so cold it was as if the doors had been opened and Winter’s Thumb had migrated south. The King’s eyes had been little more than a blank stare for months, but now they glinted with the same passion and vigor his father’s once did.
“I said, that’s enough. Your queen asked a simple question. Will you declare the traitor an enemy and stand with us, or are you our enemy as well?” Even his voice had changed. It was smooth and confident, carrying across the hall like a practiced orator. He sounded like his father.
Sidar stuttered over a response.
“My Queen, perhaps the Caleef was right and we should proceed privately,” Torsten tried to whisper to her behind the throne, but she was too preoccupied staring at the hard features of her baby boy to hear him.
“It isn’t difficult,” Pi said.
“I can strip Muskigo of his title and demand he surrender,” Sidar said. “But I cannot order my people to stand against one of their own. You must understand.”
“I understand that Afhem Muskigo is an enemy of the Crown, and unless you lie, a traitor to you as well.”
“And he will be given the chance to remedy his mistakes. Please, Your Grace, I beg you not to act rashly. Be reasonable. Let us address this misunderstanding diplomatically before resorting to war.”
“An act of war has already been committed,” Pi declared. “My foolish mother was merely too distracted to notice.”
For the first time since he spoke, Oleander stopped marveling and winced, shaken by the harshness of his words.
“My precious boy, certainly you don’t—”
Pi held out a hand to silence her. Her lips sealed immediately, something Torsten thought was impossible.
“Sir Unger,” Pi said. He turned to face Torsten.
“My King?” Torsten could barely get the words out. A year as Wearer of White and he’d never actually had a conversation with the boy.
“Until the Caleef reconsiders, he and his followers are to be confined to this castle. As of this moment, I declare the Kingdom of the Black Sands enemies of the Crown.”
Sidar staggered back a few steps, then looked to the Queen. “Your Grace, I was invited here to celebrate your son’s coronation. This revelation complicates things, but I am prepared to discuss the situation peaceably. However, we will not stay here as prisoners.”
Pi stepped to the edge of the seat where he stood a good head taller than Sidar and stared down his nose at him. “You will proceed to your quarters, or you will be forced there.”
Torsten was busy thinking of how to de-escalate the situation when he felt suddenly compelled to reach for his sword. It was like he wasn’t even in control of his own body, years of service instinctually willing his muscles to serve his king.
He removed it a few inches from his back scabbard, and every Glass soldier and Shieldsman present followed his lead. The sharp rasp of metal hummed through the hall.
A Serpent Guard sprang into action, hurried to the Caleef, pulling him down from the dais to be surrounded by his men. They were unarmed, but as the Serpent Guards dropped into fighting stances, Torsten knew they needed no weapons to be a threat.
Torsten fully drew his claymore. His men did the same, surrounding the Shesaitju entourage with halberds and longswords. One young, overeager soldier stomped hard toward them. A Serpent Guard disarmed and turned his own weapon on him in a single motion.
“Stop this!” Torsten barked. He moved before Pi and the Queen and lowered his voice. “Your Graces, I do not think this wise. He tells the truth about Muskigo, I am sure of it. Perhaps he can talk the rogue afhem down, but if we do this, war is certain.”
The Queen remained too consumed with her son to answer. Pi, on the other hand, reached out and laid both his hands on Torsten’s shoulders. He may have appeared frail, but Torsten felt unexpected pressure from them, felt small beneath them.
“Sir Unger,” Pi said. “Your name was featured in many great tales my father told me before his days of illness. I would hate to see one of our finest commanders exiled again for defying orders.”
Torsten’s heart sank. The boy had been in a deep sleep when Torsten had been sent away by the Queen on a fool’s errand, yet somehow he knew. And to retrieve his worthless doll nonetheless. Now, as Torsten stared upon Pi’s face, despite the boy’s size, he saw a child no longer. The boy didn’t just sound like Liam, it was there in his eyes, too.
Torsten turned to face the Shesaitju Caleef, unable to deny his new king. He could barely control his own breathing he was so overwhelmed, so confused.
“Caleef Rakun, your king has spoken,” he said. “Order them to stand down, and there will be no bloodshed.”
Sidar glanced back and forth. His men formed a wall around him, but halberds closed in from every side. Wardric had taken up position with a contingent of Shieldsmen at the Throne Room’s entry. His sword was drawn, but he looked as tentative as Torsten knew he should be.
Taking the Shesaitju leader captive—a man many of them still believed to be a living god—was an unsound decision only a fledgling king would make, one he knew he should counsel more vehemently against.
“Stand down and come with me,” Torsten demanded.
“It’s not too late to stop this, Oleander,” Sidar said. “He’s just a child; you are a queen.”
Torsten felt a sudden surge of rage and energy. He stormed forward. One of the Serpent Guards went to impede him, but he grabbed the man’s arm before it struck his throat, snapped it at the elbow, and flung him into the others. Then he hefted his heavy claymore with one hand, extending it toward the Caleef’s neck.
“He is your King,” he bellowed. “And you will stand down.”
Sidar raised his hands in surrender and nodded for his followers to do the same. His men obeyed without question. Glass soldiers promptly aimed their halberds at the gray men’s chests and directed them toward the exit.
“Are you all insane?” Sidar shouted. “My people will not forgive this!”
Unable to control himself, Torsten grabbed the Caleef by the arm and yanked him along more roughly then he’d intended to. It wasn’t until they were nearly out of the room that his anger subsided enough for him to breathe again.
Sidar continued protesting, cursing in common and Saitjuese. Pi remained standing on the throne. His mother stood to his left, stunned into silence, staring as blankly as her son had been only minutes earlier. But Pi looked to his right, smiling as if someone were standing in the empty space beside him telling a hilarious joke.
IV
THE THIEF
“This is Winde Port?” Sora asked, clearly unimpressed.
“Oh, I’ve missed this place,” Whitney drew a deep breath. He could smell the salt of Trader's Bay even from the other side of the city. They were on the main road heading in, Merchants Row. It was dotted with mobile trading posts and merchant caravans, not unlike the one they’d stolen.
The city itself was built on a small peninsula jutting out into the mouth of the bay where it narrowed to Winder's River. Northerly, it cut up to the Jarein Gorge, through the Great Ravine. A web of manmade canals ran through a hodgepodge of buildings. Unlike Yarrington, where all the stone matched, or in the Dragon’s Tail where everything was undeniably dwarven, Winde Port was just stone, clay, and wood—some from the North on Winter’s Thumb, Crowfall, Fessix and the like, and some black, like the trees of the Shesaitju lands. Thatched roofs and Panping tile. In fact, the only thing that gave the place even the slightest resemblance to a city of the Glass Kingdom was the tremendous cathedral standing proudly in the skyline, its Eye of Iam glistening under the morning sun.
Whitney leaned over the side of the wagon and snagged a large chunk of meat skewered on a stick from a vending cart whose owner’s back was turned. He held it out, offering Sora a bite. She recoiled in disgust.
“Don’t know what you’re missing,” he said with a full mouth.
“This place is disgusting,” she bristled.
“This place is freedom.”
Whitney meant what he said, but saw her point. It wasn’t Old Yarrington—it was hardly South Corner—but it was the one place in the Kingdom where race and heritage didn’t matter. Everyone was welcome so long as they had a few autlas and a dream.
“You should love this place,” Whitney said. “No difference between me and you here.”
“So what? Here nobody will call me knife-ear?”
“Well, I wouldn’t say that, but they won’t say it with such… I don’t know… scorn.”
Sora rolled her pretty, amber-colored eyes and reached out for the stick.
“I knew you’d come around,” he said.
She took a bite and juice dribbled down her chin. “Oh, by Iam, that is delicious,” she garbled.
Whitney just smiled and turned back to the road. She reached for it again, but he pulled it away. “Get your own.”
He waited a few seconds for good measure, then offered the stick again only to find that she was no longer next to him.
“Sora?”
He spun until he saw her walking toward the meat vendor. He clicked the horses to a stop, and hopped down, hastily looped the reins around a post.
“Wait up!” he shouted, running to catch up. “I was kidding. Have a bite.”
“No, you’re right. I want my own.”
She reached into a small bag they’d found in the carriage and pulled out a silver autla. “One, please.”
The vendor, talking and chiding with another customer, turned only a little faster than it had seemingly taken Whitney and Sora to get to Winde Port in the first place. His face scrunched up at the silver, and then, Sora.
“Ain’t from round here?” the vendor asked.
“Just rolled into town,” Whitney pointed at their caravan.
“Oh, you picked a bad time to visit Winde Port. Glass transferred a bunch of soldiers just last week. Been rounding up all the rainclouds.”
“Rainclouds?” Sora asked.
“Ya know, the Shesaitju, gray skin and all.” He laughed, then said, “Been a mess, so, price is twice that until the threat dies down. Just not enough people buying any more.”
Whitney and Sora exchanged a sidelong glare.
“What threat might that be?” Whitney asked.
The man laughed again. “Where you been, in the woods?”
“Actually—” Whitney started, but Sora slapped him in the arm. “That spot is getting sore!” he snapped under his breath, rubbing it.
“Please, continue,” Sora said.
“You ain’t heard about the Black Sands rebel army mounting?” the trader asked as he lifted a butcher knife and sliced a chunk of carcass—looked like deer. “There’s been attacks. Towns burned to the ground.”
Whitney couldn’t believe they’d somehow forgotten what Torsten said about a giant army of Shesaitju gathering in the swamp. Of course, Winde Port would be feeling the consequences of the Black Sands attacks. It was the largest trading hub in Southern Pantego, along Trader's Bay, with tributary access into Eastern, Western, and even Central Pantego through Winder's River and the Walled Lake.
“Rumor was some noble from Bridleton came to the city since his estate was turned to ash,” the trader went on before turning to grab another piece of meat.
Whitney swallowed hard, then mouthed the name, “Darkings,” to Sora.
She nodded.
“Anyway, do yourselves a favor and leave town. Especially you.” He pointed to Sora with his cleaver. “When people get scared of one foreign face—they get scared of all of ’em.”
Sora’s features darkened. Whitney imagined after the bigots she’d endured in Bridleton and beyond, she was a bit more wary of warnings such as that. She feigned a smile, and turning to Whitney said, “You’re right. I should love this place.”
Whitney thought he saw her eyes begin to water as she pulled up her hood and walked a few steps back to their carriage. He brushed flecks of swiftly accumulating snow off the carriage bench as he climbed. He’d spent many a winter month in Winde Port and couldn’t remember another so cold. At least there was one thing to be thankful for—in the snow, Sora’s drawn cloak would look less conspicuous.
After a few moments of silence, Whitney leaned in and said, “Look, let’s just get to the harbor and charter a boat. We’ll be out on the open sea and away from all this in no time at all.”
“Fine,” Sora said, offering no argument.
Their wagon rolled down Merchants Row toward the city proper. Winde Port might have been part of the Glass Kingdom, but it had always been far from the grasp of the law. It was never uncommon to find a table where dwarf, Shesaitju, Panpingese, and regular old Glass folk like him could sit down and enjoy a game of gems.
It appeared all that had changed.
A palisade wall now wrapped the city all the way to the coast on either side. The northern end was still under construction. It covered one of the canals that ran out alongside Merchants Row to make transport easy, and he only then realized the water on their side was dried out by a makeshift dam.
The wooden walls boasted blue and white standards, and soldiers from Yarrington were everywhere. It made Whitney queasy. He wondered if Torsten might be fumbling around in his bright white armor, ruining yet another thing Whitney loved.
Ahead, several Glass Soldiers gathered at a gateway. A gateway in Winde Port. Whitney scooted closer and put his arm around Sora, slowing their pace so as not to draw attention.
“Aye!” one of the soldiers shouted. He was more decorated than the others, with a feathered helm and shiny, King’s Shield armor. And Whitney knew, when Shieldsmen were watching the gates, that was when things in the kingdom were about to run afoul. “Stop the cart.”
Whitney exhaled. “Another one of these,” he mumbled, remembering how impossible Torsten could be. “What can I do for you today, Sir Knight?” he asked, bowing his head with a flourish.
“Commander Citravan of the Winde Port legion,” the man corrected. “You heading in?”
“No, we’re g…” Whitney cut off his sarcasm before getting them into trouble. “Yes, sir,” he said instead. “Silk traders on our way to Yaolin City.”
“Don’t care where you’re going.” The commander signaled to one of his men, and a soldier hopped up onto their wagon without even asking. He peeled open the canvas and rifled through some of the goods inside. Sora seemed nervous, but Whitney wasn’t sure why. He’d already stashed his half of the Glass Crown somewhere nobody would ever think to look.
The guard stepped out and nodded to the commander.
“All right, move along,” Commander Citravan said.
“Thank you, Sir,” Whitney replied. “Keeping the Realm safe. There’s no higher calling under Iam’s Eye.”
“Move along.”
Whitney bit down hard, forcing himself to not test the man. He looked to Sora as their wagon rolled forward, e
xpecting her to be joining him in frustration. Instead, she stared off to the left.
Another shorter, spiked barricade bowed away from the main wall on the opposite side of the city. Pikemen stood guard at every entrance into a vast camp filled with gray-skinned Shesaitju. Men, women, and children all huddled together in wooden shacks and tents, despite the cold. No warm hearths, just fire pits out in the open to keep warm.
“So much for freedom,” Whitney said.
Sora didn’t answer. She simply stared, expressionless.
“Serves them right for what they did,” Whitney said, thinking of the day they’d burned Troborough and taken from Sora everyone she’d ever known and loved—though he wasn’t sure he meant it.
He locked eyes with one of them, a little gray-skinned girl of about five years, eating scraps of rotten meat by a dwindling fire. That little girl had done less to Troborough than he had.
“Yeah...” Sora said softly.
“By all the fallen gods, what did you do with my Sora? You’re supposed to be telling me we should abandon all our plans and try to help them.”
Sora was silent, again.
Shesaitju were led in a long single-file line through the gate and toward the detainment camp. Rusty, silver chains strung them together at the wrists and feet. The sound was horrifying, like they were all being led to execution. Behind the line, a soldier of the Glass poked and prodded them.
“In you go, rainclouds,” he chortled. One of the Shesaitju cursed at him in his native tongue and earned a club to the stomach. The guard reached down and wrenched the man’s hair back as he heaved for breath, and spoke directly into his ear loud enough for Whitney to hear. “My sister died in Oxgate, you swine. You’ll rot in here.”
“Aye!” Commander Citravan shouted. “I said, move along.”
”Sorry, sir,” Whitney said. “It’s just… my wife is from around here and she’s never seen the city... well... like this.”
“All Shesaitju west of the Great Ravine are to be detained until the rebel Afhem Muskigo surrenders,” he explained. “It’s for their own good. They’d get torn to pieces otherwise. Now, I said move along. I won’t ask again.”
The Redstar Rising Trilogy Page 40
