Of fire and ash, p.38
Of Fire and Ash, page 38
Iakki sat up and poked at his shoulder. “That one hurt?”
“No—stop.” Rafi pulled away as the poking became scraping.
“It looks kind of like a starfish with lots of curving legs, like that red one Sev dropped in my hammock that time I slipped a grub into his seaweed tea.” Iakki grew quiet, his voice small. “I miss him, Nahiki.”
“Not for long,” Rafi assured him. “We’re almost there.”
Steering the colt through this familiar jungle brought a flood of memories crashing over Rafi, all now infused with the ache of Torva’s loss. It was pervasive, that ache. He felt it in the hum of aged trees creaking in the wind, in the salt tang that permeated even the damp mustiness of leaf mold, in his shorn clump of hair stripped of Torva’s bead strand. Like the jagged mark seared into the trunk of the lightning tree, like the scars etched into his own flesh, this wound he would carry as long as he lived.
Harpoon resting across his knees, Sev waited at the base of the lightning tree. He jumped up as Rafi halted the colt and was on the move before Iakki made it to the ground, crushing him in a hug. This ached too, this display of brotherly love. For if Torva’s death was a jagged scar, Delmar’s death remained a raw and weeping gash.
Still, Rafi forced a smile for Iakki’s sake as he dismounted, but no sooner had his heels touched earth then Sev tucked Iakki behind him with one hand and snatched the sea-demon’s lead with the other. His burly shoulder clipped Rafi’s chest, knocking him back a step. Shrieking and tossing its head, the colt reared, resisting Sev’s pull.
What—
A twig snapped behind.
Rafi spun and found spears at his throat, aimed by half a dozen soldiers sneering beneath steel caps with white plumes, more flooding from the jungle behind them, vines crunching beneath their boots. No. He swiveled and saw Sev toss the lead to two soldiers who wrestled the sea-demon away from the lightning tree, away from Rafi.
Sev met his eyes briefly and then turned away. “Iakki, come.”
The boy stood, eyes wide with horror, and refused to budge even when Sev tried to steer him by the shoulders. His lips moved, but Rafi did not hear him, did not hear anything but the throb of his own heart as the soldiers parted before a familiar figure in a cloak of scarlet, a breastplate of burnished gold, and a bandoleer of knives that were bloodstained, every one. Smiling, Sahak drew a long thin knife, spun it, and caught it by the tip.
Run, brother!
The ghost’s scream rang through every nerve in Rafi’s body and stung him into action. With his forearm, he dashed aside the nearest spear and lunged into the opening. Something slammed into his ribs. Crackling pain shot up his side. He gasped and pushed forward. A boot crunched into his knee. He went down to the other. Caught a hammered fist to the side of his head that set his skull ringing.
Crawling shreds of mist clouded his eyes. Half-blinded, he shoved between two soldiers. He crashed into the lightning tree, gripping the trunk to steady himself, and blinked to bring the world into focus.
Something whistled past and struck his hand with a thunk.
Pain arced up his arm like a bolt of lightning. A long thin knife—Sahak’s knife—pierced his left hand, pinning it to the tree. Rafi swayed and collapsed against the trunk. Oh Ches-Shu. Oh, Sisters Three! Should he . . . try to pull it out? He bit his lip to keep down the boiling scream.
“Nahiki!” Iakki’s strangled cry burned his ears.
Vision tunneling, he glimpsed Sev wrap both arms around the boy and haul him kicking, screaming, and clawing away. Then soldiers closed around him, spears caged him in, and Sahak sauntered toward him with a smile on his lips and knives flicking between his fingers like the darting tongue of a snake.
This, Iakki should not have to see.
“Iakki . . . go!” Rafi croaked, shutting his eyes, refusing to meet Sahak’s gaze. Staring death in the face was far overrated, particularly when death wore the face of kin.
“Ah, cousin.” Sahak’s breath washed hot and rank across Rafi as he leaned in to seize the knife, grating it in the wound. Rafi groaned and his knees quivered. “The years have taught you little skill and less wisdom. You are as inept as ever. Pity. I long for a challenge. But you will never be Delmar, will you?” Bracing one hand on Rafi’s chest, he slowly, agonizingly, worked the blade free.
And this time, Rafi could not hold back his scream.
FORTY-SEVEN: CERIDWEN
Of all earthriders, Teague the Steadfast shall forever be immortalized in song for unleashing the quake that brought the Fang of Toroth crashing down upon herself and upon the Rhiakki horde, ending their southward incursion.
Change hummed upon the evening air as Ceridwen swept through the gateway of Rysinger at the head of her patrol and Eagan’s shadower kill-squad. None tried to halt them, nor would she have suffered resistance. Energy pulsed through her veins, roiled in flame across Mindar’s mane, and fused her blade hand to the hilt of her sabre. It impelled her onward beyond the reach of doubt and its reminder of Gavin dead, Markham wounded, Finnian gone, and the brand forever seared into her forehead.
Onward. Ever onward.
Dismounting on the greensward, Ceridwen left Mindar with her patrol and instructions not to loosen cinches or remove bridles—even with the ring, she might be cast out again—and strode inside with Nold as her back-rider in Finnian’s absence, Eagan and his back-rider, and the Canthorian Iona had captured. The prisoner shuffled along, hands bound before him, expression seething with hatred, as they descended into the heart of the great house where warriors in the livery of Harnoth guarded the seven ebony doors that led into the circular Fire Hall, one door for each of Soldonia’s chiefdoms.
Ceridwen reached up and clasped the ring which hung from a strap around her neck, for she could not bring herself to wear it yet. Taking a deep breath, she seized the latch of the central door.
“Hold, tal Desmond.” Eagan barred the door with a booted foot. “Let me ready the field for your arrival first. Or would ye repeat your last visit t’ Rysinger?” There was no hint of mockery or a lie in his eyes that today seemed blue as the starlit sky. Still, the fox of Craignorm was too cunning to reveal his schemes in a glance.
Within, the rumble of voices declared the war-meet begun.
She shook her head. “Hold if you will. I enter now.”
Raising his hands, he yielded, and she hauled the door open. Voices broke off as it shut behind her, and she strode into the ring of war-chiefs seated on ebony thrones and halted before the central fire ring. It burned with flaming rocks from the craters of Gauroth. Her forehead throbbed beneath her scarf, and sweat prickled her brow.
There, she had knelt before the hissing flames.
There, Lord Glyndwr had pled for mercy.
There, the king—her father—had seared the brand into her skin.
Across the hearth, seated as regent in the king’s place, Glyndwr’s eyes widened with shock in his haggard and wrinkled face. Almost she pitied the man. He had argued so fervently for her then. She doubted he would do so again.
“Ceridwen tor Nimid, ever the fireball.” His voice was weaker now than when he’d told her of the bright light that had blazed across the northern sky, only to flame out in ruin. He still thought her the same. But he was mistaken. She was fireborn, and they were far more enduring. “Have you forgotten the ban upon you? Leave now, and you may yet be forgiven.”
Her feelings of pity evaporated like ice before Mindar’s heated breath. “I am Ceridwen tal Desmond, war-chief of Lochrann, here to attend the war-meet you summoned. Or would you deny Lochrann its ancient right to a seat at the hearth and a voice in council?” This, after all, was the foundation of the kingdom her ancestor Uthold had forged, and if Lochrann could be excluded at will, what of the others?
She glanced at each war-chief in turn. Craddock, square-jawed and thick-necked, holding a jeweled goblet and lounging in brocaded silks bearing the emblem of Gimleal—an earthhewn depicted in the traditional sundering stance, sinking deep on its hindquarters, forelimbs raised to shatter the earth. Ormond of Ruiadh peered up beneath heavy eyebrows, eyes darting like a hunted beast. On the far side of the fire, standing with his face to Glyndwr and his back to her, Rhodri, and seated with an air of imperious control, offering no hint of welcome, Telweg.
In peacetime, lesser chieftains would have filled the ring of seats behind the war-chiefs, but only back-riders sat there today. Doubtless, the chieftains commanded their lieges’ war-hosts in their absence, maintaining the defense against the Nadaari.
Surprisingly, Ormond spoke first. “Well, I think she is right.” His confidence ebbed as all eyes shifted to him. “I mean after all she is a war-chief too . . . and all of us bear equal right to speak here in the Fire Hall, don’t we?”
“To speak perhaps.” Craddock yawned lazily, voice thick with wine. His hands glittered with a dozen rings bearing raw gemstones, no doubt carved from the mines of Gimleal. “But sky’s blood, Ormond, no one wants to listen to your yammering.”
The young war-chief flushed. “You insult me.”
“Did I? Yes, I suppose I did. How keen of you to observe that.”
“I have as much right to speak as you—”
“Indeed you do, boy, as you love reminding us. But we are under no obligation to listen unless you have found something to say that is actually worth hearing.”
Ormond sputtered. “I’ll . . . I’ll have you know that I take offense.”
“Duly noted, and you should—”
Something hit the ground with a sickening thud behind Ceridwen. She spun to see Eagan standing with a leather satchel upended and a severed head at his feet, dark hair spilling around it like a seeping bloodstain. The room burst into thunderous uproar. Without looking at the features, she knew it was Kilmark.
Blazes, why had Eagan brought that here?
“Peace! Peace!” Glyndwr’s voice was swallowed by the clamor, but he hammered a fist until it quieted, leaving only Eagan’s voice echoing hollowly through the chamber.
“Sure, call for peace. Call until your breath runs out. Ye should be calling for war.”
Telweg leaned forward, voice stern. “What is the meaning of this?”
“This?” Eagan nudged the head with his boot and turned, spreading his arms wide. “This is a reminder of the severity of our situation, which some of you seem t’ have forgotten.” His voice rose, cracking like lightning off the walls, until no trace of levity remained. “We battle traitors in our own ranks, not t’ mention an invading army. We cannot waste time bickering.”
He could have given Ceridwen no better opening. So much of warfare was timing, and though she had restrained her tongue since arriving, this moment, at last, felt right. No longer a matter of choice or chance but of inevitability, like the shift between Mindar’s inhalation of air and his exhalation of flames.
She stepped forward. “That is why I have come. Kilmark is dead by my hand. Ondri and his followers have scattered. And we have captured our enemy’s engineer—the man we believe devised the war machines that decimated our forces at Idolas.”
Nold thrust the bound prisoner forward into the ring where he stood, glowering.
Craddock squinted over his goblet. “Doesn’t look like much, does he?”
“Still, I suppose he must be brilliant,” Ormond countered, “to have built such machines.”
Pride flickered across the prisoner’s face so quickly Ceridwen wondered if she had imagined it. The speed of her journey had left little time to question him, and he had claimed ignorance of any language save Canthorian. Her knowledge of that tongue was too limited to glean more than that. Doubtless he had been lying.
She raised an eyebrow, letting him know she had seen his slip, before turning back to the war-chiefs. “Soon, the Nadaari will be stranded within their war-camp, cut off from the coast and access to reinforcements and supplies.” She sought Telweg’s gaze, hoping the words she spoke still held true, but the woman’s expression yielded nothing. “But this will only be possible if we stand as one. Now is the time to strike.”
“To strike, you say?” Rhodri’s quiet voice cut across the ensuing silence. Slowly, he turned, and she was taken aback at the changes in his appearance that his helmet had concealed before. His hair had been shorn close to the scalp above his ears, leaving a crest braided with gold rings down the back of his skull. Oiled leathers gleamed on his chest, and firelight glanced off the ornate tooling and off the polished blade belted at his waist. His appearance made her dusty leathers and battered cuirass feel dull and weathered in comparison.
“You have done well,” he continued, and he sounded sincere. “You deserve our gratitude. But there are other courses we may now pursue to prevent the reckless shedding of blood. We have held out well, but we fight a losing war against numbers that far exceed our own. Still, our resistance allows us to broach negotiations from a position of strength, and Nadaar must offer reasonable terms. This will be our victory.”
His words left her stunned, unable to muster a defense. After all she had witnessed since Idolas; after the Voice had roared through her ears, heralding the collapse of nations; after seeing Gavin fall, she could not fathom the suggestion.
Surrender? Death was preferable.
Eagan snorted and tossed himself in his seat, wincing as the twin blades strapped to his back dug into his shoulders. “Why negotiate at all if they can crush us?”
“Their goals lie beyond us.” Rhodri clasped his hands behind his back, outwardly calm, though his pinched forehead betrayed concern. “Why waste their forces in a bloody, extended war—which history testifies we will give them—when other means will suffice?”
“Your argument might bear merit had they bothered negotiating before launching said bloody, extended war,” Telweg observed dryly, and Craddock snorted into his goblet.
“What I am hearing,” Eagan put in, “is that if we destroy this force, they might reconsider before sacrificing another.”
“Or field two more in its stead.” Ormond’s voice cracked. “This is the empire of Nadaar we speak of. They have the levies of nations at their disposal.”
“And would ye have us become one o’ them?”
Craddock sighed heavily and clunked his goblet against the arm of his chair. The high collar of his robe swallowed his bull-like neck, making it look like his head sprouted directly from his shoulders, and yet in his movement, Ceridwen caught the clank of mail beneath. The war-chief might be fond of ostentation and comfort, but he was still a warrior and not to be underestimated. “It is a simple question of mathematics. You cannot argue it both ways. Either they have vast resources—in this case, soldiers—which they are willing to expend upon our shores, or there is some point at which their losses will be too great to justify the cost.”
“Then if we can just outlast them—”
“Ah, but that is just it,” Craddock said. “Can we outlast them?”
“Must we outlast them?” Rhodri inclined his head toward Craddock. “At what point will our losses be too great? And should we not seize the opportunity to negotiate from victory instead of defeat?”
The others seemed to be considering his words, and that finally spurred Ceridwen to action. “We can only negotiate from defeat,” she countered. “They invaded us. Slaughtered us. Murdered our king. You speak of reasonable terms. What terms could atone for that?”
Rhodri’s voice remained even. “That, Ceridwen, the regent must determine.”
“What, we have a regent?” Craddock blinked in exaggerated surprise. “I had nearly forgotten. He has been strangely silent of late. Ho, Glyndwr! Still with us? Someone poke the old bear and make sure he is still awake . . . and breathing.”
“Confound your insolence, Craddock,” Glyndwr growled. He leaned over the armrests of the king’s seat, forehead in his hand.
“Ah, so he is alive. Bless us, we are saved.”
Ceridwen studied the aged war-chief. Deep furrows scored Glyndwr’s brow, and in his eyes, conflict raged. He looked ill fit to sit in her father’s seat, and was so, if his control of this war-meet was any indication. It was his duty to direct the discussion, muster the war-hosts, and speak of strategy instead of surrender, but he remained silent, hunched beneath his cloak, and so like ill-tamed steeds, the war-chiefs ran wild.
This was why Markham had urged her claim.
Become worthy, he had said, lead.
Ceridwen knotted her fist around the ring against her chest. “I have come to muster the war-hosts to the defense of the kingdom. I will not leave without them.”
The fire sparked and crackled in the silence following her words.
Then Glyndwr stood, bowed beneath the quilted gambeson that hung loose around his withered and wasted frame. He seemed a skeletal thing now, the stark lines of bones visible beneath his frail skin. “So,” he said, “we come to your claim at last. You know that in the absence of an heir, only the battlemaster or regent can muster the war-hosts, and so long as you bear the kasar, you cannot be named heir.”
Ceridwen felt the tension in the atmosphere. It was the instant before lightning cracked, the gasp before flames unleashed, the breath before towering waves crashed upon the shore. “And yet, I have been named heir.” She raised the leather strand and held aloft the signet ring where it flashed as it spun in the firelight. “Behold the ring of Uthold, willed to me by my father’s dying breath.” Sweeping her blade from its scabbard, she rammed it down into a gap between firerocks in the central ring. Sparks shot into the air and embers scattered hissing across the stone floor. “I, Ceridwen tal Desmond, tor Nimid, of the blood of Lochrann, claim my rightful title as heir of Soldonia and ruler over the seven chiefdoms.”
She reached above the flames and clasped her hilt, treated leathers and gloves shielding her from their bite. “I swear to drive the invaders from our shores, root out treachery from our midst, and establish peace for our people once more. By blood and blade, I swear it.”
The echoes of her voice faded, and for a moment, all was still.
