A heavy ring tolled with Tavin’s every step. It took Fie a moment to find the culprit.
Tatterhelm had knotted an iron slaughter bell round Tavin’s neck.
Tatterhelm stopped. The tolling didn’t. More shadows split from the blackened bones of the ruins: ten Vultures, ten Crows, ten more slaughter bells ringing dull at ten more throats.
Tatterhelm’s meaning cut all too clear. But this was the way of one who’d been a hunter all his life; he wanted her rattled and scattered.
Instead, Fie spat in the ashes. Her anger was a curious thing, sometimes jagged and broken as Pa’s sword, sometimes heavy and storied as the bag of teeth. She’d left them both behind to reckon with Tatterhelm. He would not shake anger from her here.
She counted each Crow’s face, every one her home. Madcap, their chin stuck out. Pa, rag bound about the knuckles of his right hand. Wretch, her lips moving frantic as Viimo kept a dagger at her throat.
She did not see Swain.
Tears boiled into her vision before she could wrest them away. Swain, with his scrolls and figures, his dry jests, the trench that dug in his brow when he pored over maps or coin. No matter where they were in Sabor, he’d managed to find posies for his wife’s birthday, year after year, even after the roads had claimed her.
Tatterhelm had taken him from Fie in Cheparok.
He would take no one else. Not one Crow more. She was a chief. She would look after her own.
“Fie, get out—” Pa started. His Vulture captor seized Pa’s right hand and squeezed. Pa choked off a sharp cry. New bright red stained the bandage.
Give them fire, whispered the Phoenix teeth on Fie’s string.
Fie fouled up when she looked Tavin’s way. He didn’t speak, eyes burning through her. Of course he’d known she would take the deal. Maybe, for a moment, he’d believed that she’d choose another road. But they both knew better; Fie only hoped he hadn’t fooled himself for too long.
Once more, his face said a thousand things, full of fury and desperation and guilt and, worst of all, betrayal.
Maybe one day he would forgive her for this. But she’d always known it wouldn’t be easy.
Tatterhelm shoved Tavin to his knees, knife still at his throat, one hand digging into Tavin’s scalp. The northman hadn’t even bothered to don his favored helm to reckon with a little Crow half chief; he wore just a chestplate and heavy boots over his grubby yellow tunic and wool leggings. His pork-pink arms bulged bare and stark with valor mark tattoos in the gloom, his wild straw hair coiling about his shoulders. A beaked Crow mask swung from his belt like a prize scalp.
“You’ve been a pain in my ass,” he rumbled. “Making me hound you across the damned nation all on some fool’s notion.”
Fie spat in the cinders again. “You here to deal or not?”
“Y’know what the problem is with you people?” He pulled the mask free of his belt and tossed it into the dust at Fie’s feet. “You forget what you are. Queen’s comin’ for your kind, won’t be stopped by some bone thief brat.”
Long-dead mint sprigs spilled from the beak.
We have something that belongs to you.
The Vultures had trailed her the whole time. Not the prince, not Tavin. They’d known to follow her.
“Maybe the prince learns his lesson about trusting Crows,” Tatterhelm grunted, “but I’d say that lesson’ll be … eh, short-lived.”
He wanted her rattled. Fie knew a Money Dance when she heard one.
“Enough,” she snapped. “I did what you wanted. Now let them go.”
“Settle down.” Tatterhelm’s knifepoint scratched at Tavin’s throat. “Viimo.”
“Aye, boss?” Viimo answered from Wretch’s side, one fist holding fast to the older woman’s bonds. Wretch’s mouth moved, too quiet for aught but Viimo to hear. The skinwitch ignored her.
“These two bring any company?”
Viimo closed her eyes a long moment. Her brow knotted, then untied. Her free fist curled. “I see nothin’, boss.”
Draga hadn’t yet noticed their absence, then. Or she had cut her losses like Fie couldn’t. Either way, Fie was on her own.
On her own and in too deep to get out now.
Tatterhelm narrowed his eyes at her. “Drop the cloak.”
She let go of Jasimir. “Move and I’ll gut you,” she warned him, and pulled her ragged robe over her head.
Tatterhelm squinted at her shirt and leggings, searching for any hint of hidden weapons. She knew he’d find none. He jerked his chin. “The teeth.”
Fie clenched her jaw, then lifted Tavin’s sword and sliced through her chief’s string. It fell to the ash with her robe.
“Now the sword.”
Fie let the Hawk blade drop. When it struck the earth, she’d have sworn she’d stripped herself bare. Thin wool wouldn’t stop arrows. No teeth, no steel. Easy prey.
Pa had said she was a dead god reborn. She did not feel like one now. Not even Little Witness.
Her pulse beat a funeral march in her ears.
She did not look at Tavin.
“Bring the prince closer.”
“Let them go,” she returned.
Tatterhelm pressed a red line into the side of Tavin’s throat, just below the shade of a bruise. Tavin jerked; his slaughter bell tolled.
“I ain’t askin’ twice,” Tatterhelm said.
The cold hook in Fie’s guts winched tight. She forced a breath through her nose and marched Jasimir onward, unarmed. Empty-handed. Toothless.
Every heartbeat echoed what burned in every Crow’s eyes:
Traitor. Traitor. Traitor.
She fouled up and looked to Tavin again. What burned in his face was much, much worse.
She didn’t know why she’d ever fooled herself into hoping for forgiveness.
He would live. That had to be enough.
When they drew within a few paces, Tatterhelm barked, “Hold up.” They stopped. “Prince goes the rest of the way himself.”
This was it. Fie licked her lips and let Jasimir go. He shook his head and tried to protest around the gag. It sounded something like “You can’t.”
“Trust me,” Fie said, “it’s too late for that, Highness.”
She shoved him to the Vultures.
“No!” Tavin shouted, wild-eyed.
Jasimir stumbled through the dust—one pace, two—and Tatterhelm seized the scruff of his neck.
Now. Fie licked her lips, drew breath to whistle—
And the ashes erupted at her feet.
Gray, flat hands slapped about her ankles. Another pair roped round her throat. She screamed, half fear, half fury, thrashing like an animal in a snare.
She’d forgotten the skin-ghasts, and now—it had all fouled up.
Fie choked out a furious scream before the clammy hands yanked tight.
Cinders rained from two skin-ghasts as they swelled from below, slick gray hides gorging like water skins. The one grasping her ankles yanked them up with him as he rose, until she hung by both her neck and feet.
And then the skin-ghasts’ faces filled in, hollow, dreadful. Known.
Hangdog’s eyeless face yawned at her, narrowing his hold on her throat.
The thing that had once been Swain began to drag at her ankles.
Panic shrieked through her veins. She flailed for—for aught, a rock, a scrap of bone, even a handful of hide. But the skin-ghasts simply folded out of the way, pulling like they meant to tear her apart.
Pain ripped along her jaw, up and down her spine, at her ankles. She heard screams that weren’t her own. Some sounded like they might be her name. One sounded like it might be Tavin.
The skin-ghasts said naught, for they had no tongue, no bones, no teeth to speak with. Only Hangdog’s slack face. Only Swain’s.
The queen had, in the end, turned even Fie’s dead to her ends.
How much more, Jasimir had asked, will you let them take?
She’d never expected to die quiet. Young, maybe. But
not like this.
She’d not come here to die.
She’d come to look after her own.
Fie wet her lips and forced the last of her breath into an earsplitting whistle.
If Tavin were a Crow, he’d know that whistle signal. It meant drop.
If Tavin were the prince, he’d know what was coming.
And if Tavin were only a Hawk, he would have died when Fie loosed the Phoenix tooth that had burned, hidden, in Jasimir’s bound fists all along.
But Tavin wasn’t only a Hawk.
And so when the cyclone of Phoenix fire swallowed Tavin, his prince, and his captor in one starving snap of golden teeth, only the skinwitch burned.
The Crows flattened themselves to the earth in a chorus of iron bell-song. Phoenix fire swept over them, scattering the skinwitches like sparks.
Greggur Tatterhelm rolled from the fire, skin blistering over his valor marks, and leapt for her. The plain, brutal knife swept down—
And jolted away as Jasimir threw himself into Tatterhelm’s side. They toppled into the skin-ghast at her feet, knocking its grip loose.
Fie’s feet hit the dirt. Hangdog’s hollow hands dug into the flesh of her throat. Through watering eyes, she saw more skin-ghasts bursting from the ash, grasping for the Crows—she had to get free—she had to look after her own—
The Phoenix tooth burned yet in Jasimir’s fist. She called it once more.
Golden fire rushed round her, devouring empty skin with a horrid crackle. Swain crumpled like paper, shriveling in an instant. The other skin-ghast let her go.
Fie crashed to the cinders, gasping air stained with old grease.
Hangdog’s skin-ghast staggered, peeling and charring, until he collapsed. The dark sockets of his face warped as flames ate him whole.
Why? she wanted to ask. You sold us to them, and this is what they made of you. Why?
He crumbled away, into the ash.
“Fie—!”
She wrenched about on her knees. Jasimir crawled toward her. Fie yanked the prince’s cloak aside and freed Pa’s broken sword from where it dangled along Jasimir’s backbone. The weight of it steadied her as she reached for Jasimir’s bound hands.
The prince’s eyes snared behind her and flew wide. She couldn’t turn fast enough.
A fist like a hammer smashed into her jaw, knocking her back into the dust. Pain shot through her teeth. She heard another crack and cry paces away.
“Get up!” She’d know Tavin’s voice anywhere, even raw and hoarse.
A steel-toed boot thudded into her ribs. She tumbled through ash again, slipping and choking on a mouthful of grit. Pa’s sword slipped from her grip.
“Cute trick,” Tatterhelm grunted. “You oughta’ve run.”
Blistered fingers locked around her throat and hefted her to dangle before the skinwitch. The world reeled in Fie’s eyes, painting a streaking picture: the fire fading, the Vultures and their skin-ghasts circling the Crows, Jasimir slumping against a wall paces away, one ankle bent awful wrong. Tavin kneeling at his side.
Fie saw a fistful of dwindling flame in Jasimir’s palm, the remnants of Fie’s grand plan. Tavin’s mouth moved. Then he reached for Jasimir’s hand.
She squirmed, clawing at Tatterhelm’s fingers. He squeezed tighter, crueler even than the skin-ghasts.
“Coulda just walked away,” he said dully. “Had to go and cause a mess. You thought you could fight?” He shook her like a ragdoll, voice rising. “You thought you could take me?”
He slammed her into another wall. The stones shook, a few black chunks falling.
“You forgot what you are,” he snarled.
Fie’s sight fogged, her lungs howling like a skin-ghast for air. Tatterhelm hefted his knife.
Suddenly, Tavin’s arms whipped over Tatterhelm’s head, his bound wrists yanking tight against the Vulture’s windpipe. Fie dropped free.
She ducked under the swing of Tatterhelm’s arm and snatched up the chief’s sword, rolling to her knees in time to block the Vulture’s knife.
“Reckon I know what I am,” Fie answered.
Tatterhelm stumbled from Tavin’s weight. She sprang to her feet in his range, too fast to catch.
The skinwitch had never thought she would take this road.
Fie struck like the Covenant’s own judgment, blade crashing down on Tatterhelm’s forearm. His hand split free with a meaty thunk, still clutching his dagger, and landed in the ash.
Tatterhelm stared, stupefied, at the bleeding stump where his hand had been. And then he screamed. Tavin slipped off him and darted to Fie’s side.
“Tatterhelm’s down!” shouted another Vulture, and pointed his sword at Pa. “No prisoners but the prince!”
Tavin shoved teeth into her hand: First, the burning Phoenix tooth he’d taken from Jasimir.
Then—the two she’d yet to light.
Fie closed her eyes. Harmony. One tooth alight. Harmony. She struck a second, and the gold flame piped and howled. The Vultures slowed, fearful. Harmony.
She struck the third.
Phoenix fire blasted through the valley, greedy and ruthless, tearing over ash and ruin and long-cold bone and showing mercy only to the Crows. The golden blaze swelled like a flood, dwarfing the dawn, until the Fallow Vale burned end to blackened end. Tatterhelm stood no chance so close to her; he vanished in roaring flame. The skin-ghasts too crumpled in place, sloughing into smoke or dribbling into boiling puddles.
Every other Vulture shrieked and bolted for shelter. They would find none.
Fie clenched a raised hand into a fist, reaping the fire. It spun into great wheels about the Vultures, caging them in.
Fire-song raged in her bones, in her heart, in her teeth. One dead queen. Three milk teeth. She’d hunted for near an hour to pick out Phoenix teeth that wouldn’t fight one another. Now they balanced as one, burned as one, and answered to her wrath alone.
Tatterhelm had never once believed a Crow could best him.
Pa might be right about witches and dead gods; perhaps she’d been one, and perhaps so had Tatterhelm, once. But right or wrong, it hadn’t taken a god to strike him down. Only a chief and the element of surprise.
She had business to settle before she dealt with the surviving Vultures. She strode to Jasimir through the flames, Tavin trailing behind her.
Jasimir had pushed himself up on one leg, clinging to the wall. His eyes landed on Tavin and the telltale flames nipping harmlessly at his arms. “You’re … you’re a Phoenix.”
Tavin flinched, eyes on the ground. “I’m a bastard.”
“He’s your brother,” Fie finished, hoarse, and sawed at the bonds about Tavin’s wrists. “Half, at least.”
Tavin looked at her then, as the rope fell free.
She wanted to burn away the awful anger and shame in his eyes. She wanted him to heal himself as he had before. She wanted his hand in hers.
She wanted him to forgive her for risking his king, for laying his secret bare, for letting him fall to Tatterhelm to begin with.
But she was a chief, and her own were not out of the valley yet.
“It’ll be all right,” she lied, and cut the slaughter bell from his neck.
An open hand reached into the space between them. Tavin blinked at the prince, then took it. Jasimir wobbled—and embraced his brother.
“I should have seen it,” Jasimir mumbled. “I … didn’t want to. I’m sorry.”
Tavin didn’t answer, but neither did he let go, and in his own way, that was answer enough.
Fie’s breath came hard and harsh as she turned to the Vultures, trying not to choke on the reek of burnt hair and foul cooking flesh. Blood sizzled in the back of her throat, a sign she kenned too well by now. Easy harmony or no, the dead queen was fading.
Fire prowled round the remaining Vultures, keeping its distance, waiting for her command. One way or another, it was time they learned what it meant to cross the wrong Crow.
“Drop your weapons,” she order
ed. Most obeyed; a few stragglers hesitated until fire lashed at their elbows. Madcap took a spear and passed it to Jasimir to use as a walking staff.
“Now what, chiefling?” Viimo asked.
Fie swallowed, the burn of blood rising on her tongue. The fire rolled about her and the lordlings like a loyal beast. Three teeth of a dead queen and she could do anything. She could light them up, watch them burn, watch Sabor burn from mountain to coast if she wanted.
She was tired of pretending she wouldn’t.
No—that was false, still, even now.
Just once, she wanted someone to treat her like she would. And the terror in the Vultures’ eyes seemed to be a good start to that.
They’d hunted her for nigh a whole moon. They’d taken her family. They’d shed her kin’s blood. Just because they never imagined they’d find themselves at her mercy.
Tavin’s slaughter bell still dangled from her fingers.
Wind flushed through the vale, spraying ash and grit down the road, through the fire, as sunlight snatched at the edges of the valley walls. Mercy, it seemed to say.
And her teeth answered in kind: Give them fire.
“Fie.” Jasimir’s voice cut through the haze.
“Don’t tell me to spare them,” she hissed, half wishing he would.
“That’s your choice to make,” he said, face steady in the wash of gold firelight. “But it won’t be for much longer.” He pointed back down the road they’d walked.
A horn wailed off the gray hillsides, near buried in thunder as mammoth after mammoth stormed into the vale.
But Viimo had said—
Fie spun and found Viimo’s face in her fiery cage. The skinwitch watched the mammoth cavalry pound down the ashen road, her dirty face grim—not surprised.
So Viimo had lied to Tatterhelm. She’d known the Hawks were coming. She’d betrayed her own leader, and her kin would pay. Why in the twelve hells would she turn on her own?
Maybe Hangdog could have told her.
If she let Viimo burn, she’d never find out.
Mammoth riders cascaded into the ruined village, surrounding them before Fie could make up her mind.
“You can let the fire go,” Tavin said from behind her, resigned.
Fie winced. A Markahn bastard. One more Hawk for the collection. How long had Tavin known who he was? How long had he kept it secret? And now here he stood plain in roaring flame, unscathed, before scores of Crows and Vultures and Hawks. There’d be no running from the truth any longer.
The Merciful Crow Page 30