Of fire and ash, p.20
Of Fire and Ash, page 20
Crack . . . Crack . . . Crack.
“That is enough,” Khilamook said, sounding bored, and though Jakim could not unclench his teeth to translate, the overseer began coiling his whip. Jakim flinched as the tip flicked inches from his eyes. But it did not sting him again. “Get up, slave.”
Those words struck his ears strangely, but he couldn’t latch onto why. Not with his senses reeling and his back on fire and humiliation tightening his throat. It was Scroll Enok’s voice he imagined whispering calm into his ears. Scroll Enok’s hands steadying him. Scroll Enok who had also worn a slave’s collar and knew the shaming bite of a whip.
“Come,” Khilamook demanded. “There is work to be done, and I require you to translate. Consider the matter forgotten.” But something about his words sounded wrong. Not just his flippant, arrogant tone, though that raked against Jakim’s spine, but the words themselves sounded strange coming from the engineer . . . because . . .
Because he had spoken in Nadaarian.
Jakim stood, slowly, and lifted his gaze to the smugness staining Khilamook’s smile, confirming that yes, indeed, he knew full well what he had done. Then the engineer strode away at a pace that made Jakim’s back throb when he stumbled after him, the king’s ring digging into his palm. At least he had not lost that. At least he could fulfill his vow.
At least he could pretend that mattered, even if he only lied to himself.
Wincing, Jakim wobbled up to Khilamook’s desk, barely managing to keep the tureen, filled to the brim with a customary Canthorian hearty meat and vegetable soup, from sloshing spicy broth onto his bare feet. One whiff of the sharp spices and Jakim could picture himself back in Kerrikar, stirring a steaming cauldron in the outdoor kitchen. Apparently, the engineer’s status earned meals prepared individually to his tastes.
“Master?” Jakim cleared his throat. “I have brought food.”
Khilamook gestured for quiet, perching on the edge of his stool to study the cylindrical device disassembled across his desk. Pursing his lips, he scratched out notes with a gold pen fitted with skaa-ryn vanes in mimicry of a real quill. Jakim eyed the haphazard sea of papers and scrolls. Carrying the heavy tureen pulled his tunic against the oozing marks on his back, but after a week of making and breaking camp, he had learned to disturb Khilamook’s research with extreme caution. Organization lurked beneath the chaos, a system no one else would understand.
He settled the tureen on a relatively clear corner where Khilamook could reach it when he was hungry. Traditional hours for waking, eating, or sleeping meant nothing when the engineer was consumed with an idea, but once he finished, he would expect to find Jakim at his elbow, waiting. Like a trained graybeard monkey.
His gut boiled with a sudden nauseating hatred, almost as strong as the anger he’d once harbored against those who had sold him. He’d thought he had escaped it when he joined the Scrolls. What was his anger compared to both Aodh’s justice and mercy? Yet there it was, slithering inside him like a snake. Unnerved by the thought, Jakim started straightening up, gathering discarded robes, emptying soiled wash water, and shaking out the reed mats.
“You have been a slave before?”
Jakim’s head jerked up to see Khilamook digging into the tureen of soup. His quill sprawled atop his notes, leaking ink. The engineer had never shown interest in his story before. Was it . . . maybe . . . a good sign? “Yes, master, in Canthor.” He debated halting there. “I . . . I was given my freedom.”
“Indeed? Less than one in fifty slaves is freed.”
It was not outright disbelief in the engineer’s voice but Jakim tugged the ripped neck of his tunic down to reveal the triple diamond mark of freedom on his chest and instantly regretted how the fabric scraped his raw back. “I . . . had a kind master,” he explained, swallowing a lump at the memory.
But Khilamook barely glanced up, spoon clicking the rim of his tureen as he slurped his meal. “And who was this kind master?”
“His name was Ha Sian.”
“Ah.” Disdain soured the engineer’s tone. “That tallies.”
“With what, master?”
“Oh, the depth of your Canthorian accent.”
Jakim pried his fingers from his tunic, letting it conceal the mark again. It seemed the world had not changed since he was last a slave. It still offered no justice, and he would offer no more of his tale. That was an honor Khilamook had not earned.
“Your pronunciation is hardly flawless,” Khilamook continued, “but it carries the ring of authenticity. You should be grateful it has earned you such a comfortable position in my service.” Grasping the tureen in both hands, he downed the last of the broth.
Comfortable. The welts on his back declared that a lie. Like Khilamook’s need for a translator.
Jakim’s ire rose again. “My Canthorian is passable,” he said, then impulsively switched languages mid-sentence, studying the engineer’s expression. “But it is nowhere near as good as my Nadaarian.”
A knowing expression quirked Khilamook’s lips. “So, you noticed,” he said in the same tongue before morphing into another. “I did wonder. Still, I think my Soldonian is better than yours.” It was. “So long as you avoid today’s errors, you will not find me a hard master. What thrice-slave could demand more?”
Those last words pricked at Jakim. “Thrice-slave? What does that mean?”
“Twice to men,” Khilamook said deliberately. “Once to your god.”
Jakim stiffened at the sound of his own language, Eliami. Once he would have wept to hear those rolling, earthy tones. But not from this man. Not uttering such untruths. In all the years since the caravan had dragged him away, only the Scrolls had spoken it. His nation was broken, his people were nomads in a land no longer theirs. Who would learn their dying tongue?
“I recognized your markings. The mythos of your religion fascinates me,” Khilamook mused, reverting to Canthorian. “Tell me, how long did you wait to take the Scroll’s seal after the slave’s collar was struck from your throat? It is ironic to consider. And here you are a slave again. Yet Aodh supposedly shields his own. That is the origin of his Eternal Scars, isn’t it?”
Flustered, Jakim studied the script on his forearms, the most basic tenets of the holy writ. If he had completed his mission to Broken-Eliam, he would have carried even more truths back to the Sanctuary on his skin. If he had not left the Sanctuary, study would have increased his understanding. But now, this was all he had. He cleared his throat. “Aodh promises restoration. That his hand mends all things.”
That concept was woven through the fabric of the holy writ and history itself. It had freed him from bitterness and drawn him to face the journey home to the purpose that awaited him. That purpose still drummed in his heart. Without it, he had nothing.
Without it, he was nothing.
“Ah, so it is good that you are a slave again?”
The drumbeat faltered.
Jakim licked dry lips. “If I were not, I could not serve you, master.”
“And you consider that good?” Khilamook leaned forward abruptly. “Recite your truths all you will, I see the lie in your eyes. You hate me. And not me alone. You should hope your Aodh is less perceptive, or he would surely renounce you as his own.”
That resonated inside Jakim, like a string plucked until it snapped. He felt stripped bare by the engineer’s words. And he knew that was how he stood before Aodh too. He tightened his fists, watching the script shift on his arms. Everything had seemed so simple when Scroll Enok inked his skin. Trials behind him, purpose ahead, answers only a flick of the eyes away. Until he lied his way onto the mission to Broken-Eliam, only to wind up here.
There was nothing simple about his path now. Or this man he served.
Maybe Aodh had renounced him.
Khilamook settled back on his stool with that snakelike smile. He seemed satisfied, as though he’d gained something in the discussion. But what? It nagged at Jakim as he collected the empty tureen and pushed through the silk hangings. He paused and looked back. “What does it matter to you, master, what I am?”
It was a bold question. He risked another whipping.
Khilamook just snorted and purposefully resumed his work. “It does not matter. And you are nothing. Only a slave.” But if eyes revealed the truth, surely his concealed a lie.
TWENTY-SEVEN: CERIDWEN
Of the sol-breath, little is written and much is whispered. But the change wrought by the sol-breath upon a rider is at once instantaneous, mysterious, and profound.
“Fire-demon—”
Ceridwen’s sabre splintered the Nadaarian’s cry. On all sides, her warriors thundered across the plain in loose formation, chasing survivors of the supply column and felling them as they ran. Clusters formed shield-and-spear walls, but without war machines or devious stratagems, foot soldiers were no match for solborn. Their corpses littered the plain in splashes of scarlets and golds, like autumn leaves after a storm.
It was not a battle anymore. Only retribution.
She slowed Mindar, watching the fighting dwindle. Scouting stormers had spied the column’s march from the coast days ago, granting her time to summon her force which had been scattered in patrols spanning the main Nadaarian army. Two thirds had mustered today in the shadow of a pair of hills to descend upon the convoy and drive them out onto the plain where her riders could run them down.
Stormer alighting with flared wings and stamping hooves, Iona flung the fur-lined hood from her head, baring her flushed, glowing face. “Victory! We have won the day!”
“Victory!” Ceridwen repeated, though the plain was strewn with fallen and the day’s fight was not yet done. “And the survivor?”
“Nold brings him now.”
Rumbling warned of Nold’s approach before she saw the earthhewn bearing a bound and blindfolded soldier across the saddlebow. Nold tossed him before Mindar. Warriors swept in, ringing the soldier with jostling steeds. Others milled in concentric circles around them, a formation designed to conceal their numbers. The soldier backed blindly away until Ceridwen summoned a spurt of flame to blaze past his ear.
He went still, cringing.
She slid from the saddle in a jingle of spurs and tore off his blindfold, revealing a weathered face with a crooked nose and gray-stubbled jaw. Blood trickled from his split chin. His narrowed gaze roved the circle, taking in the array of solborn surrounding him. Kneeling limited his view to the first row and the waves of dust stirred by the circling steeds behind, hopefully giving the impression of a greater host than answered her horn.
Loose riders of every breed had been trickling in over the past three weeks, raising her force to three hundred strong, though she was war-chief of Lochrann in name only unless the seven chieftains chose to swear to her banner. Too few to oppose the Nadaarian advance, but enough to strike fear into scavengers and stragglers if wielded to effect.
“You will return to your masters to deliver my words,” Ceridwen said in Nadaarian. Out of each of the past twelve skirmishes, she had spared only one survivor. Stripped of weapons, boots, and armor, and escorted within bowshot of Nadaari scouts—spotted by a stormer fly-over—to deliver her threat.
Ever the same words: “Look for us in the shadows, in the sky, in the ocean and rivers. Seek us behind every sunrise, around every tree, and beyond every hill. But we will not be waiting to be found. Death rides for you all.”
She flicked her reins, and flames warmed the soldier’s face. He fell back, cursing.
“Careful, rabbit,” Iona remarked. “You’ll want your legs fit for running, though not until you’ve delivered our words. Try to enter the camp before and you will find an arrow in your spine. The first two tried it. The other ten proved wiser. Tell me, Nadaarian, are you wise?”
Wise enough to understand her meaning if not her Soldonian tongue. Still, Ceridwen pressed her sabre to his throat. “You know the words?”
His reflexive swallow left blood on the blade. “I know the words.”
“See you do not forget.”
Blindfolded again, the soldier stumbled after Nold’s patrol while the rest disbanded at Iona’s command to search for wounded, leaving Ceridwen alone among the slain. She knelt to clean her blade. It was always eerily quiet following a battle, as though her senses struggled to adjust after the cataclysmic shock of noise and killing and the pressure to survive. No longer the ring of metal, the jolt of Mindar’s hooves, the rasp of breath in his throat, the ragged pulse of her own. No rush of flame, no enveloping warmth. In their absence, only a void.
“My lady!” Liam urged his riveren toward her, armor askew and dirt spattered. His right eye was swollen shut, a bruise darkened the side of his face, and his helmet was missing. Again. He never could seem to keep it on. But he was alive and still grinning, tiger-slaying spear propped on his shoulder, and just the sight of him lifted her spirits. Blazes. She was so relieved.
Dangerous, her heart warned.
But not even it could steal her smile. “What have I told you, Liam?”
“To . . . keep my helmet on?”
“Aye, and . . .”
“And . . . to call you tor Nimid?”
“That would be it.”
“Right.” He nodded, eyes gleaming with excitement. “You won’t believe what we found. We were just poking around, Coritza and I.” He broke into a smile. Whoever Coritza was, young Liam was clearly smitten. “Scavenging the supply wagons, and there it was, tucked away in a hidden compartment in a trunk and—”
“There what was?”
Once Liam had hold of a tale, dramatic emphasis ran roughshod over details. Reining him in was as challenging as coaxing the bit from a runaway steed.
“I’m thinking you should see it for yourself, my la—I mean, tor Nimid.”
“Liam—” She broke off, distracted by a thudding beat that resonated in her chest and rattled her senses alert.
Those were hooves.
The eastern hills beyond the plain came alive with the sound. Ceridwen snatched the war horn hanging at her side and loosed a blast on the run to her grazing steed. His head came up. She gripped the saddlebow, kicked up one leg, and wheeled to face the threat as her warriors abandoned their work and fell into formation behind her.
Iona snapped her hood up. “Kilmark and Ondri?”
“I don’t know.”
“The war-hosts?”
“I don’t know.”
The words broke sharper than intended, but Iona simply loosed her reins to ride. “Shall I dispatch a scouting pair?”
Ceridwen shook her head. “We wait.”
Solborn appeared over the crest of the hill and poured down onto the plain. One line in loose traveling formation, then two, then three. Ceridwen flexed her blade arm, counting as more and more came. Not one unit, or even three. This was an ayed, maybe two. Over five times the size of her force at least.
A wolfhound dashed out ahead of the line, streaking low to the ground, drawing her gaze to the familiar figure behind it, cloaked in gray and riding in a loose-limbed, relaxed manner that made it look as though he glided across the earth on a sea of mist. Beside Finnian, Apex Markham raised his voice. The shout was carried from line to line, and riders checked their steeds, slowing to a halt, while Markham and Finnian rode forward.
They had come for her, but why?
Markham’s arrival with two thousand riders at his back boded something significant. She had survived Idolas, so did the war-chiefs now demand her life? Did Markham hold her Outrider oath forsworn since she had not returned? Or were the war-hosts mustering to crush the Nadaari once and for all?
Whatever it was, she must face it. Alone.
“Wait here,” she commanded, then urged Mindar onward to meet them halfway, her fireborn prancing and snorting as the wolfhound sniffed at his heels, while the two shadowers stood motionless but visible in the noonday sun.
“Not dead yet, I see.” Finnian offered a faint smile she did not return.
“No thanks to you, te Donal,” Markham drawled. With that familiar sardonic grin sprawling across his face, he seemed glad to see her—in his own way. “I swear, tor Nimid, if we’d found you dead or wounded, he would have been demoted to mucking stalls, oiling my saddle, and refilling my flask for the rest of his miserable days walking the earth.” His grin widened. “But you’re too fire-blasted stubborn for death, aren’t you?”
If he was pleased she lived, her death could not be his mission.
Relieved, she laughed outright at his words and was shocked to do so while the blood of friend and foe still dampened the soil. “I thought Finnian was stubborn and I was reckless.”
“Aye, that too.” Markham shifted in the saddle, expression clouding. “Well,” he drew the word out between his teeth. “It is time.”
She braced herself.
His saddle creaked as he swung down, his boots scuffed the dirt, then he knelt awkwardly before her. “Hail, Ceridwen tal Desmond, Heir of Soldonia.”
Markham was kneeling to her.
Smoke flooding her throat, Ceridwen stood, at a loss for words. “The king did not name me heir.” She lingered over the sting of that admission, knowing because of it that it was true. Truth was a harsh and bitter thing, like a wintry wind that slapped a warrior to wakefulness. Lies promised warmth and comfort and lulled a warrior into deadly sleep. “I bear the kasar. The war-chiefs would never accept my rule.”
And the king had not forgiven her for Bair’s death.
Still, Markham knelt.
“Stand up. Please.”
He rose, toeing aside the wolfhound who whined and shimmied toward his legs with his tail wagging until whistled to heel by Finnian. Markham started toward his steed, but Ceridwen shot Mindar across his path, forcing a halt.
