The Merciful Crow

by Margaret Owen

  The Crane witch-tooth squealed in Fie’s bones. Viimo meant to fight, to outlast. But the tooth burned on Fie’s wrath, and that well ran deeper than the reservoir of Cheparok.

  She thought of Hangdog throwing them to the wolves and fed the tooth.

  Viimo doubled over.

  “Ghasts,” she choked out. “The queen raised ghasts for us.”

  “What are ghasts?” Jasimir asked.

  “And how many?” added Tavin.

  Viimo didn’t fight those questions at all. Instead she grinned up at them, a little spit dribbling over her split lip. “You’ll see soon enough.”

  To that, the Crane witch-tooth gave not a single hitch.

  The lordlings looked to Fie. She shook her head. A queasy pinch gnawed at her gut, like she was back in Dumosa, staring at a gilded door. “She’s telling the truth.”

  “Splendid,” Tavin sighed. “Anything else?”

  Jasimir fidgeted. “Has there … Have you seen a cat?”

  Viimo squinted at him.

  “She was in the Crows’ wagon,” he mumbled. “Her name is Barf.”

  “No, Highness,” Viimo said in the slow, strung-out way of one scenting a joke they weren’t in on, “I ain’t seen a cat.”

  Maybe Barf had got lucky again. Fie wouldn’t roll shells on those odds, though. “We done?” At the lordlings’ nods, she let the Crane tooth fade.

  “Last chance, chiefling.” Viimo stuck her chin out. “Swear on my pappy’s skin. You want your kin back? Covenant knows you’re toting enough teeth to take these boys to Tatterhelm. Easy as that. Don’t even have to turn traitor like your dead lad.”

  “Enough,” Prince Jasimir snapped, arms folded. “What do we do with her?”

  An awkward silence followed. Then Tavin drew a short sword. “I’ll handle it.”

  Viimo’s eyes flashed. “All right, Hawkling, let’s get it over with.”

  Fie thought of Wretch, draining away under Tatterhelm’s watch.

  And then she thought of hostages.

  “Wait,” she said.

  “Now here’s a twist.” Viimo grinned up at her. “Fancy a trade, chiefling?”

  “Don’t be absurd.” Jasimir’s voice faltered the tiniest bit.

  Fie worked a tooth from her string, stone-faced. “Five skinwitches on the queen’s hire, six more by commission, aye?”

  “Aye.”

  “Eleven’s enough to bring the lordlings in?”

  “Aye.”

  Fie worked a tooth from her string, stone-faced, and dropped to a knee before the skinwitch. “See this? It’s a Hawk tooth. You hold this, and I’ll heal you. You’ll stay bound, mind. I won’t deal with Vultures without my own hostage.”

  Viimo rolled her eyes. “Aye, I suppose that’s fair.”

  “Fie.” Tavin sounded as stranded as the prince.

  Fie pushed the tooth between the skinwitch’s bound palms. “There. Don’t drop it.”

  “You’re turning on us, too?” the prince demanded.

  Fie stood and stepped back. “No.”

  Pa had had her wake up Hawk teeth before, but never a witch-tooth. Blood was a fearsome Birthright; he’d told her Hawks took years to master it, that even one slip could burst a vein she’d meant to mend. A handful of older chiefs like him could call on those teeth to heal, but only with enough practice to know what they were doing.

  Fie did not know what she was doing. But she knew what she wanted: a Vulture’s blood.

  She would never forget the scream. One moment Viimo’s hands were hands; the next they were a tangle of raw red flesh and tattered skin. Viimo curled over them, sobbing.

  “What are you doing?” Jasimir stared at Fie in horror.

  “Making sure she can’t track us,” Fie said, grim. “She needs to touch something of ours to pick up our trail. And Tatterhelm can’t leave one of Rhusana’s best to starve. Probably.”

  “But—”

  “This,” Fie said, tucking another tooth into a pouch on Viimo’s belt, “is also a Hawk tooth. If Tatterhelm wants to make use of you again, then he’d best collect you quick, and he’d best give that tooth to Pa. Once Wretch is sorted out, perhaps Pa will have time to heal you.”

  “You could have had your kin,” Viimo snarled.

  “And the queen could have had eleven skinwitches.” Fie stood. “Now we’re both down to ten.”

  This road had caught her the way only terrible roads could. The way back lay thorny and short, and the way forward lay thorny and long, and worst of all, she knew which way Hangdog had chosen.

  But Fie’s own were in Cheparok, her own were all across Sabor, her own were bound up in every word of the oath. Being chief meant leaving what she wanted behind, and the Covenant didn’t give a damn if she hated that, too. By daylight she could see it all too clear. And if that meant dragging the prince all the way to the feet of Master-General Draga, she’d do it.

  If it meant being a chief, even of a band of two false Crows, then that was who she’d be.

  When she turned to the lordlings, she found Prince Jasimir studying the sand at his feet as if it held the answer to some great trial.

  Then the crown prince of Sabor drew his dagger, pulled his topknot down, and cut his hair.

  “I’ll be right back,” he said, hollow, and strode to the surf. When he returned, his hands were empty. The last sign of his lineage was gone.

  Fie’s belly growled. It only sharpened her head more. Food, new cloaks, new masks. They’d need to find the nearest Crow shrine for help. And by every dead god, Fie wasn’t going to march all the way to the Marovar without some damned soap-shells.

  “Hawk boy.” Fie donned her Chief voice. “You took watch. Are you good to put some distance down? We’ll stop for rest in a few hours.”

  Tavin looked from the prince to her and nodded, running a hand over his face. “Yes, chief.”

  Fie thought of traitors. And chiefs. And the oath. And Pa.

  Then she wet her lips and whistled the marching order.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CROSSROADS

  By the time they found a Crow shrine, Fie had gnawed through the better part of three mint plants. Like Maykala’s shrine, this one lurked in the safety of trees and teeth, shrouded by both fat-leaved shrubs and Sparrow magic.

  At first, Tavin and Jasimir just gaped when Fie plucked a vine from the trunk of a massive red flaybark tree and began climbing. Not that she blamed them; their hair wouldn’t stand on end like hers did here, on the burial grounds of a Crow god. To most of Sabor, this would appear as one more stretch of forest.

  “We’re dead men, Jas,” Tavin said. “She’s abandoning us after all.”

  Fie briefly contemplated whether scalping a member of her band would make her a bad chief.

  “If you’re just going to laze about, then aye, I’m abandoning you.” She hoisted herself up to a branch thicker around than she. “Shrine’s this way.”

  There was a pause, then she caught, “We’re definitely dead men, Jas. She’s completely addled.”

  Fie ignored him and kept climbing.

  Once she broke through the wards of Sparrow misdirection and a touch of Peacock glamour, the shrine itself showed clear enough. Wooden rafts coasted on swells of smooth red boughs, staggered like a poppy-sniffer’s notion of Cheparok. Palm thatches tented over low walls and woven screens. A wood-carved figure twice Fie’s height perched above the platforms, lashed to the tree by thick vines that wound round its crossed legs and the four wings it had in place of arms. Four faces stared her down with eyes carved like four-pointed stars, each mouth twisted into a mask of fear, wrath, mirth, or sorrow.

  “Cousins.” The voice struck from beneath a palm thatch like a viper, thin and swift. “What brings you to the shrine of Crossroads-Eyes?”

  It was an innocent question by the ear of any other caste. Fie knew better.

  “The dead gods’ Covenant led us here.” She’d learned the words at Pa’s knee. “And the dead gods’ mercy wi
ll call us onward.”

  A woman emerged from the shadows of the highest thatch. A faded crowsilk tunic hung loose from her wiry frame, and a twist of rag looped to cover one eye and knotted in short gray curls. The other iron-hard eye fixed down on Fie as she pulled herself onto the lowest platform.

  “You’re young for a chief,” she observed.

  Fie got to her feet. “You’re old for a Crow.”

  The shrine-keeper’s mouth cracked into a smile more tooth than humor. It skewed toothier when the boys climbed up behind Fie. “And who’re these, then?”

  “My band.” Fie jerked a thumb over her shoulder. “Mongrel and Pissabed.”

  “You leave your packs below?”

  “Haven’t got any. We’re here for a restock.”

  The woman’s eye narrowed. “What happened?”

  “Oleanders,” Fie said. It was enough of the truth to stand. And any Crow knew sore well how much awful possibility could be stuffed into just that one word.

  Sure enough, the shrine-keeper waved her up. “I ken that, little chief. Let’s get you lot kitted out.”

  Fie scrambled over the broad shallow arch of a branch, following a path chewed by scores of other nail-studded soles. Her breath caught as she scoured for footing. The tree’s meat flashed green in too many patches to be the recent work of one woman.

  Vultures. One more trap—

  Fie stomped her panic down. The shrine was hidden, the shrine was safe—there was another answer, it couldn’t be another ambush, Crows had one rule—

  And Hangdog had tossed that rule over the bridge with her and the lordlings.

  “Other Crows been through today?” Fie did her best to sound nonchalant. Crossroads-Eyes snarled and grinned and wept above, the wooden faces uncanny human under dapples of sun.

  “You’re the second band this morning,” the keeper answered. “Something got Crows spooked of Cheparok?”

  “Wouldn’t know.” That was a barefaced lie this time. Fie’s head steadied anyhow. Lies were more familiar territory.

  The shrine-keeper hummed as she retreated into the shade of the platform. Fie stepped up and blinked until her eyes cleared of the roof’s shadows.

  “Packs.” The woman pointed to heaps of oiled canvas. “Salt over there. And the barrels got all manner of food that’ll keep. Last band left a bounty. Seemed to think it’d be needed.”

  Fie could feel the woman’s eye on her like a fingertip trailing down the back of her neck. She just handed packs to Jasimir and Tavin, who had the sense to keep their mouths shut for once.

  “How’s your string?” asked the keeper.

  “Full enough.” Fie could knot new teeth into the gaps when they made camp. “I’ve more teeth for the shrine if they’re needed.”

  “They’re not.”

  “It’s all I have to trade for,” Fie said, blunt.

  The shrine-keeper weighed a small, battered cooking pot by hand, then passed it to Fie. “No trades. Take what you need. You know how it goes, little chief. Feed the Crows.”

  Fie tried not to wince as she watched the prince and the Hawk pile salt, dried meat, and strips of pounded fruit into their packs, wiping out more of the stash than they ought. “Aye.”

  “Sleeping mats.” The woman handed over three straw rolls, then added a fat, clattering sack. “And soap-shells.”

  Fie claimed those with particular relish—then froze as a wail rose from another platform. Tavin and Jasimir too went still. The cry turned high and tremulous, murmurs chasing it, and Fie let out a breath. Only a baby, and judging by the lungs, a healthy one at that.

  The shrine-keeper waved a gnarled hand as the wail turned to gurgles. “That tot’s bound to scream down the sky itself,” she groused. “Every hour, he tries.”

  Fie paused, counting up turns of the last moon. She was about to spend three more weeks dragging the lordlings about the hills. That made for a different sort of challenge. “Can you spare any laceroot seed?”

  The keeper’s gray brows rose. She flipped the latches on a worn trunk and dug inside. “You a-feared of getting with child, too?”

  Tavin knocked over a pot of sandal-nails and swore under his breath.

  Fie tried to ignore the pointed look the keeper gave him. She did not succeed. A flush nipped at her ears and neck. “I’ve no time for bleeding, let alone rutting.”

  The keeper sifted a fistful of black seed into a palm-size pouch, enough to keep this moon’s bleeding at bay a few weeks. If Fie ran out before they made it to Trikovoi, she had bigger problems.

  “Which way do you head now?” the woman asked, passing the pouch over.

  “North.”

  “Other band went west, so the north’s clear. You’ll need cold gear past Gerbanyar. I got none of that here.” She handed Fie robes, masks, a map charred into goat-hide, a flint, and a jug of flashburn. “There. Ought to set you until your next viatik.”

  “Thank you,” Fie said.

  “Thank Crossroads-Eyes,” the shrine-keeper said dryly, jerking her head at the dead god. “Sees all your choices. Seems they wanted you to choose your way here.”

  “To be sure.”

  “Watch your back out on that road. Other Crows this morning, they said something odd.” The woman’s voice hardened. “Said Hawks ran through their camp last night. Not Oleanders—Hawks. Said they were looking for a girl chief and two false Crows.” Fie froze. “And said there’s a high price on those heads now.”

  Somewhere in the shadows of the shrine, the baby’s cry rose again.

  Fie heard a faint, deliberate rustle behind her that said Tavin was one wrong word from showing how false a Crow he was.

  “Now I figure, we’re Crows, we got one rule. I’m looking after my own, aye? And any chief, well, she’s got to be following that rule, too. You strike me as a chief too sharp to break it.” The keeper’s eye drilled into Fie’s. “Not a girl caught up in two mummers’ troubles. If you see that girl out there, you make sure that trouble doesn’t come down on all our heads. You hear?”

  Fie didn’t blink. “Aye.”

  “Then Crossroads-Eyes steer you safe. Go deal the dead gods’ mercy.”

  They left with nary another word, picking their way down a lattice of vines and chittering tree-rats. Once they were earthbound and far enough from the shrine, Fie swung her pack off and dug for a fistful of dried panbread. Jasimir’s shoulders sank with relief as he and Tavin did the same.

  A hand full of panbread thrust into her sight. Fie looked up. Tavin held his breakfast out to her. Jasimir blinked, a strip of his own panbread still outstretched for his Hawk to taste. After a moment, he held the rest out to Fie as well.

  Fie’s throat closed. She fished out a pouch of salt and sprinkled it over their food. Her voice cracked as she said, “Go ahead.”

  “Thank you, chief,” Tavin said quietly.

  They returned to merciful silence, birdsong and rustling breezes washing through the air. Over and over, Fie repeated the shrine-keeper’s words in her head: A girl chief. Two false Crows. Trouble on all our heads.

  Look after your own.

  This was the road Pa wanted her to take. The road Crossroads-Eyes wanted her to choose. And she couldn’t fuss either of them now.

  A question curled up as she chewed. “That skinwitch said the queen raised ghasts. Never heard of witchwork like that. And the queen’s no witch anyhow.”

  Tavin and Jasimir traded glances. “I had … a theory,” Jasimir began, hesitant. “You’ve heard of the ceremony to marry into the Phoenix caste, yes?”

  Fie nodded. “Seen something like it in Swan teeth. You lose your Birthright, aye?”

  “Correct.” Jasimir frowned. “Wait—what do you mean, you’ve seen it in Swan teeth?”

  “Swans don’t rut inside the caste,” Fie said around a mouthful of panbread. “At least, not to conceive. They find a willing partner outside the caste, and there’s a ritual, and the partner loses their Birthright until the next new moon. Meanwhile th
ey try real hard to make a baby Swan.”

  Tavin let out a long, exasperated sigh. “Of course. All this time we wondered how Rhusana pulled it off, and we could have just asked a Crow.”

  “Not the first time, won’t be the last,” Fie muttered. “So what’d she pull off?”

  Jasimir ran a hand through his ragged hair. “The Phoenix ceremony is supposed to be permanent. Even witches lose their Birthright, and it never comes back.”

  Fie sorted it herself. “You think Rhusana did the Swan ceremony to herself, so her Birthright came back.”

  “And I think she’s a Swan witch,” Jasimir finished.

  At that, Fie put down her panbread and stared.

  “She has no witch-sign,” Tavin added hastily. “And the odds of a Swan witch being born are—”

  “I know what they are.” Fie’s voice had gone frigid. The Swan caste had only three dead gods. Three solitary witches in over a thousand-score people.

  Any more than that, and they’d rule Sabor.

  There was a hard reason why their witches weren’t allowed to leave the Swan island even after coming of age. A hard reason why their Sparrow servants were clothed crown to foot, finger to toe.

  In a Swan witch’s hands, the desire Birthright became more than a way to command attention. When they caught hold of even a single strand of another’s hair, they could seize that person’s desire and twist it—and them—as that witch pleased.

  All it would take was one stray hair from Fie’s head, delivered to Queen Rhusana, and one scrap of hate the queen could seize on. Then Fie could wake one night to slit the boys’ throats without a flinch.

  “You knew,” Fie accused, stacking up every horrid piece. “That’s why you ran.”

  Jasimir shook his head, adamant. “It didn’t sound possible until now. All three Swan witches are accounted for, she has no sign, and Tavin and I witnessed the marriage ceremony ourselves. We didn’t know she could lose her Birthright for only a moon. I swear, I came to your band for help because Rhusana allied with the Oleanders, and for that reason alone.”