“Good, but perhaps visit a healer first,” she said, picking at his shirt in disgust. Then she sniffed for good measure. “And have a bath.”
He replied with a wry smile, allowing her to attend to the sand mare. Ridha had her saddled and ready in what felt like a blink of an eye. Too quick for Dom’s taste, even now. He watched his cousin through it all, and she stared back, determined beyond measure. He did not ask if she was riding off on her mother’s secret orders, despite the proclamation in the throne room. Or if this was disobedience, if not betrayal. He did not want to know either way.
“Ride well, Cousin,” he said. All the horrors of the world, all he had seen just days before, rose up in his mind, their hands and jaws reaching for dear Ridha. She will not fall as the others did. I won’t lose another, he promised himself.
But you won’t be with her, his own voice answered. It shuddered through him.
Either Ridha did not notice or was good enough to ignore his fear. She swung herself onto the antlered saddle with ease, the sand mare shifting beneath her, eager to run.
“I always do,” she answered, her dark eyes bright with the prospect of her journey. And their great purpose.
Again Dom wished he could express himself as mortals did. Embrace his cousin, tell her how much her belief and action meant. Emotion rose up in his throat, threatening to strangle him dead. “Thank you” was all he managed.
Her response was as sharp as her sword. He expected nothing less. “Don’t thank me for doing what is right. Even if it is quite stupid.”
Dom bowed his head and stepped out of the stall, leaving the way clear for her.
But she paused, one foot in the stirrup, her eyes on the horse’s neck. Her gaze wavered. “I did not realize he had a twin,” she murmured, almost inaudible. “I did not know—my mother separated them.”
“Nor did I,” Domacridhan answered. Like Ridha, he scrambled for some understanding but found none. “Nor did he, until that monster appeared out of the mist.”
“I’m sure she thought it was the right thing to do. Raise one, protect one. Create only a single heir to Old Cor. Leave no room for conflict. For the Ward.”
Though Dom nodded, he could not agree. Not in his heart. She did it for herself, for Glorian. And no other.
With a steel will, Ridha leapt into the saddle. She looked down on him, a picture of a fierce warrior proud and true. “Ecthaid be with you.” The god of the road, of journeys, of things lost and found.
He nodded up at her. “And Baleir with you.”
On Baleir’s wings, she rode west.
After changing his clothes and scrubbing the muck from his body, Domacridhan of Iona rode south. No one stopped him, and no one bid him farewell.
5
THE STORM’S BARGAIN
Sorasa
Her sword was back at the harborside inn, hidden beneath a loose floorboard with the rest of her gear. She only needed her dagger, the bronze edge dim in the dark bedroom of a merchant king. She stood patiently over him, counting his breaths. He slept fitfully, jowled like a fat dog, his breath rattling through yellowed teeth. His wife dozed on the bed beside him, a dark-haired beauty, barely more than a child. Sorasa guessed her to be sixteen. Probably the merchant’s third or fourth bride.
I am doing you a favor, girl.
Then she slit his throat, the well-fed blade cutting with ease.
His mouth gurgled and she covered it with one hand, turning him onto his side so the blood did not wash over his wife and wake her. When he finished the familiar process of bleeding to death, she removed his left ear and his left index finger, tossing both on the floor. Such was the mark of Sorasa Sarn, for those who knew to look. This kill was hers and no other’s.
The merchant’s young wife slept on, undisturbed.
The steady drip of blood was louder than Sorasa’s footsteps as she retreated to the balcony, unfurled her whip, and swung across the courtyard to the wall beyond.
She crouched against the pale pink stone, using her hands to steady her balance. The fruit trees of the garden hid her well, and she gave her eyes time to adjust to the midday light. The merchant’s guards were slow in the heat, making their rounds on the other side of the courtyard. She took the opportunity to drop to the empty alley below. It offered little shadow.
The sun was high and merciless. It was a dry summer on the Long Sea, unseasonably so, and dust clouded even the wealthiest streets of Byllskos. The capital of Tyriot, usually cooled by sea breezes, burned in the heat. But the weather bothered Sorasa little. Her life had begun in the sands of Ibal, and her mother was of the Allforest, a woman of Rhashir. Sorasa’s blood was born for the dry cruelty of the desert or the cloying hot air of a jungle. These men know nothing of the sun, she thought as she walked the alleys, winding her way toward the docks.
She kept her steps measured and well timed. The blue waters of the Tyri Straits flashed between gaps in the walls, every home looking down on the famed port. Only the Sea Prince’s palace rose higher, its pink towers and red-tile roofs like a burst of Cor roses.
Sorasa glanced at the great harbor of Tyriot, the famous docks reaching out into the Straits like the arms of an octopus. A trade galley would take her forth, leaving behind no trace of Sorasa Sarn.
No trace I have not chosen to leave, she thought, her lips curling with satisfaction.
A shadow, she descended into the temple district, weaving along domed shrines and godly towers. Dedicant priests walked their noon rounds, followed by peasants and sailors, their hands outstretched for blessings from the gods of Allward.
The villa was well behind her when the alarm went up, a strangled cry of guards calling for the city watchmen. Somewhere among the villas, a trumpet sounded. Sorasa grinned as it was drowned out by the tolling bell of Meira’s Hand, a looming tower ruled by the goddess of the seas. Sailors begged her mercy, fishermen her bounty.
Sorasa begged for nothing but the bell and the crowd. Both surged, as good as a wall between her and the corpse in his bed.
The crowd moved in a current, most following Meira’s blue priests down the main thoroughfare that cut Byllskos in two. They would hit the port soon, and on a market day no less.
An easy chaos to get lost in, Sorasa thought. All precisely to plan.
She navigated with sure footing, unaffected by the crowd and its stink. Byllskos was a bustling city, but a village compared to Almasad and Qaliram in Ibal, where Sorasa had spent the majority of her thirty years upon the Ward. She ached now for the baked stone streets and vibrant markets as far as the eye could see, for patterned silk, a sky like turquoise, the smell of fragrant blossoms and spice bazaars, the grand temple of sacred Lasreen, and the shade of the Palm Way. But all paled next to the memory of the sandstone citadel on the sea cliffs, with the hidden gate and the tearing salt wind, the only home she had ever known, her place since childhood.
She felt the shift of air over her a split second before a hand clamped down, its grip tight on the muscle between her neck and shoulder. Fingers squeezed and pinched, sending a jolt of pain through her body.
Sorasa dropped and twisted out of the well-known maneuver, one she had mastered years ago. Teeth bared, she glared up at her would-be attacker.
He did not attack.
“Garion,” she bit out. Around them, the parade of godly followers thinned.
Like her, the man was hooded, but Sorasa did not need to see his face clearly to know him. Garion was taller than she, his skin white even in shadow. Still a lock of mud-brown hair fell into his dark eyes, as it had when he was a boy. Where her clothes were plain, dyed in earthen colors easy for an eye to slide over, his own tunic and cloak were garish. Scarlet and embroidered silver were impossible to ignore. He sneered at her coldly.
“I did not take you for a thief, Sarn,” he hissed in Ibalet. Though he’d learned it young, it was not his mother tongue, and it still sounded odd in his mouth.
Sorasa waved him off. The black tattoos on her fingers matched
his own.
“Perhaps that moral compass of yours needs adjusting,” she replied. “I stole a man’s life from you, and it’s the stealing that has you concerned?”
Garion pursed his lips. “By the Spindles, Sorasa,” he cursed. “There are rules. A guild contract is given to one and one alone.”
Such tenets were inked in her deeper than any tattoo or scar. Sorasa wanted to roll her eyes, but she had long since learned to school her expressions and hide emotion.
Instead she turned on her heel, setting off at a trot. “Jealousy doesn’t become you.”
He followed swiftly, as expected. It reminded her of different days. But those days were long ago, and she curled one hand in a fist, the other close to the dagger at her hip. Should he draw, she would be ready.
“Jealous? Hardly,” Garion said through clenched teeth. The pair wove deftly through the gathering crowd as they caught up to Meira’s faithful. “You have been named and inked. No amount of blood will rewrite what has already been written.”
The long tattoo down her ribs suddenly itched, the last marking not a year old. Unlike the many others, blessings and trophies, it had been given against her will.
“Thank you for telling me what I already know,” she said, throwing Garion a glance meant to wither a man to the root. “Go back to the citadel. Pace your cage until another easy kill lands in your lap. And I’ll steal that one from you too.”
Though her face remained still, Sorasa laughed inwardly. She would not mention that she already knew of his next contract and exactly how she would beat him to it.
“Have caution, Sarn,” he said. She heard a tremor of regret in him. He was always terrible at hiding his intentions. Such is the way with men. “Lord Mercury—”
Sorasa kept walking, her cheeks warm. She feared few upon the Ward. Lord Mercury topped a very short list.
“Go home, Garion,” she snapped, her voice sharp enough to draw blood. She sorely wished to be rid of her once friend and ally. This road was easier walked alone.
He ran a hand over his head, pulling back his hood in frustration. Sweat beaded on his pale brow, and there was a fresh sunburn across his cheeks. A northern boy, even now, Sorasa thought. Decades in the desert could not change his flesh.
“This is a warning,” he said grimly, drawing aside his cloak. At his belt, a dagger like her own glinted, with a hilt of black leather over worn bronze. He had a sword too, far too close to his hand for her liking. She lamented her own, hidden in a dingy room.
Half a mile to the inn, she thought. You’re faster than he is.
Her hand strayed, fingers closing around familiar leather. It felt like an extension of her own body.
“Would you like to do this here?” She tipped her head to the crowd of priests and worshippers. “I know you don’t mind, but I prefer not to have an audience.”
Garion’s eyes trailed from her face to the dagger, weighing them both. She read his body keenly. He was lean as she remembered. The sword at his hip was thin, a light blade of good steel. He was not a brawler like some they’d trained with. No, Garion was an elegant swordsman, the assassin you wanted on display, to duel in the street. To send a message. Not so with Sorasa: a knife in shadow, a poison on the rim of a cup. Her muscles tightened as her mind spun through her options, lightning quick. Back of the knee. Cut the muscle, then the throat as he falls. Run before he hits the dirt.
She knew Garion read her in the same way. They stared for a moment longer, half coiled, two snakes with their fangs bared.
Garion blinked first. He eased backward, his palms open. The cloud of tension between them lifted. “You should disappear, Sarn,” he said.
She raised her chin, angling her head to the hot sun overhead. The shade of her hood retreated, revealing her face. Her black-rimmed eyes caught the sunlight and flashed like liquid copper. Tiger’s eyes, the others used to say when she was young. Garion’s gaze felt like fingers on her skin. She let him see the long year written in her flesh. Bruise-like circles beneath her eyes, sharper cheekbones, a dark brow drawn tight. A jaw set at a hard, unmoving edge. Sorasa had been a predator since childhood. She’d never looked it more.
His throat bobbed as he stepped back. “Few of us get the chance to walk away.”
“Few want the chance, Garion,” she said, raising a hand in farewell.
The crowd swallowed him whole.
I’ll never get the smell of this place out of my clothes, she thought dully as she left the piss-soaked inn behind. Her pack hung at her side, the sword and whip at either hip, both well hidden beneath her old traveling cloak. Today it carried an odd scent, of salt and cattle and garden fruit, all of it overwhelmed by the smell of fish. She longed for the days when she could rely on a small, quiet, and clean room at the citadel, with cool stone walls, a high window, and the silence of ages to keep her company. Not so here.
All the better, she knew. Discord is a better shield than steel.
Sailors, merchants, beggars, and travelers alike crowded the streets of the port, slowing her down. The braying of animals and the stampede of pounding hooves doubled the usual chaos. The herds of the surrounding countries were in season, and the market yards around the port had been converted to paddocks, holding thousands of snorting, tossing, sweating bulls and cows, all ready to be bought and traded throughout the Long Sea.
She thought of the guards and watchmen up the hill, still searching the streets for a cutthroat. Checking the face of every man and boy who set foot in the district.
With a smile, she threw back her hood, revealing a set of four intertwined black braids. Her spine tingled at walking the streets so exposed, but she reveled at the feel of the sun on her face.
For the second time that day, someone grabbed her shoulder.
Again she dropped and twisted, expecting Garion, a foolish sailor, or a sharp-eyed guard. But the maneuver did not break the man’s grip, nor did a well-placed jab to his stomach. His flesh was stone beneath her hand, and not for armor or chain mail. Her assailant towered over her, seemingly twice her size, with the bearing of one who knew how to fight.
You are certainly not Garion.
Sorasa reacted as she had been trained to, one hand going to the clasp at her neck, the other into a pouch at her belt. With a flick of her hand, a puff of stinging blue smoke exploded at her feet, and the cloak fell from her shoulders.
She kept her eyes shut and held her breath as she bolted down the street. The man coughed violently behind her, her cloak hanging loose in his hand.
He shouted something in a language she did not know, a rarity.
Blood surged as her heartbeat quickened. Her instincts served her well, as had her few days learning Byllskos for the contract. The city unfurled in her mind, and she flew down an alley branching off the main port, only to turn hard onto the next busy street. Sorasa schooled her breathing, keeping it in time with her sprint. After checking ahead, assessing her steps, she dared look back.
For a moment, she thought a bull had escaped its pen.
A cloud of dust and clinging blue smoke followed the man as he ran, arms pumping, a dark green cloak flying out behind him like a flag. The sun glinted off his golden hair. He was no watchman of Byllskos or villa guard. She saw that even from a distance.
Another joined the list of people Sorasa feared.
Men and women alike stumbled away as she vaulted between them, throwing a few to the ground. She ran, her right fist prickling with pain from striking her pursuer. She looked back again and a bolt of shock ran down her spine. Though she had a head start and great speed, he was gaining on her quickly.
An idea snapped together in her head. For the first time since she’d set foot in Byllskos, a bead of sweat trickled down her neck.
This is a warning, Garion had said. The first rumble of thunder before a storm.
Was this man the lightning? Lord Mercury’s final punishment?
Not if I can help it.
Sorasa turned again, sharply agile
as she swung herself into another alley crowded with less reputable vendors, their wares stolen or useless. She dodged, a dancer in the disarray, leaping over bowls of half-rotten fruit, through hanging sheets of fabric, around haggling men and women. All of it closed behind her, undisturbed by her quick and skillful passing. Sorasa half hoped the crowd would hide her, if not slow her pursuer down.
It did neither.
He pummeled his way through, stalls collapsing in his wake. A few women swatted at him, but their blows glanced off his broad chest and shoulders. To Sorasa’s surprise, he only blinked at them, bewildered. His confusion didn’t last.
Through the crowded alley, his eyes found hers, and she caught a flash of teeth as he clenched his jaw.
Adrenaline snapped through her, a delicious feeling. Despite her fear, Sorasa felt her heart sing in anticipation. It had been a year since her last true fight.
She scrambled up a stack of crates, jumping from stall to stall, balancing on poles and planks, ignoring the shouts of the tradesmen below. Her size was an advantage and she used it well.
But he lunged up the crates like an animal, following her path down to the splinter.
“Shit,” she cursed. A person that large shouldn’t be able to hop around so easily.
Sorasa leapt again, landing precariously on a pole. It swayed beneath her. Below, a man selling bruised fruit shouted and shook a fist. She ignored him, cursing Lord Mercury and whatever he had done to ensure Sorasa Sarn died painfully.
With a flip of her hand, she drew up her hood again, covering her hair. The other assassin was only a stall away now, perched with one foot on a narrow plank, the other braced against the alley wall. In another place, he would look comical. Now he was only terrifying. He glowered at her, eyes green with fury. At this distance, Sorasa could see his short beard was as golden as his hair hanging loose. He didn’t look a day over thirty years old.
But one side of his face was scarred, as if clawed to pieces. By what? she wondered, her stomach churning.
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