by Gregory Ashe
Chapter 28
Siniq-elb tossed on the pile of blankets in his room. The night was hot, in spite of the earlier breeze, and his mind raced with thoughts of the brachal. To be so close, and yet so far, was maddening. He needed a plan, a way to separate Khylar from the brachal long enough for Siniq-elb to get it, to learn how to use it. Half-formed ideas scurried through his drowsing.
Sneak in while Khylar was sleeping. But what if he only removed it to bathe? Then sneak in while he was bathing—or, better yet, hide in the room before he arrived. And if he saw Siniq-elb? Or if he saw Siniq-elb and moved faster, reaching the brachal before Siniq-elb could take it? Drug Khylar, or better yet, poison him. That would not help at all, not unless everything timed out perfectly. They would simply take him to the healers’ quarters and he would be as unavailable as the far side of the moon.
His pulse raced in time with his thoughts, and sweat dampened the blankets beneath him. Driven by the heat, Siniq-elb rolled onto his hands and knees and crawled toward the door, to let some fresh air into the room, if nothing else. Perhaps even go to the public baths, cool himself in the water. As he reached for the latch, a light tap, almost a scratch, came from the other side.
Half-asleep, mind full of schemes, panic seized Siniq-elb. It was Khylar, come to murder Siniq-elb in his sleep. He had seen Siniq-elb eyeing the brachal, had known his thoughts. Now he had come to forestall Siniq-elb’s efforts.
It took only a moment for the thoughts to pass, for Siniq-elb to think clearly and realize that if Khylar wanted him dead, there were a dozen better ways than coming and knocking on the door in the middle of the night. Most likely it was Vas, frightened awake by a dream, or with a new theory about the metaphysics of the gods-made-flesh. Either way, the man’s conversation would be a sure aid for sleep. Or perhaps, Siniq-elb thought, and his pulse beat a bit faster, it was Mece, the moonlight tracing the hollow where her shoulder met her neck.
He slid the latch and pulled open the door. It was almost as dark in the hall as it was in the room, but Siniq-elb could make out a dark shape and, in its hand, a tightly shuttered lantern that revealed only a thin line of yellow light. Siniq-elb opened his mouth to demand a name, but before he could speak, the shadow rushed past him, knocking him out of the way to get into the small bedroom.
Siniq-elb twisted, pulled himself upright, and set his back to the door. It slammed shut behind him. For a two panicked breaths, Siniq-elb cursed himself for not having stolen a knife from the kitchens. Even that dull blade used for chopping onions. Anything to defend himself. And then the shadowed figure unshuttered his lantern, and warm yellow light pooled in the middle of the room.
Il, his face covered with mud and scratches, his sandy-brown hair knotted and wild, crouched in the corner of the room. His eyes flittered from wall to wall, as though searching for something, and his hands trembled such that the lantern-light shivered across the room in dizzying waves.
“Tair and Father,” Siniq-elb said. “Il, you’re alive!”
He let the latch drop back into place and crawled toward the last surviving member of his squad. The man who had run and left Siniq-elb and his comrades for dead. Il drew back, pressing himself into the corner of the room, behind the frame of the bed. With a squeak, he let the lantern drop, and it hit the boards sideway with a soft clank. For a moment, the light slid horizontal, and Siniq-elb was afraid the lantern would go out—or, worse yet, break and set fire to the wadded blankets. Heart pounding, he leaned forward, righted the lantern, and turned it to better see Il.
The former soldier looked a fright. Patches of wispy beard grew almost two-fingers long on the man’s cheeks and chin, and his clothes were torn and stained. From the way Il crouched, bent to one side, Siniq-elb suspected he was wounded. The man’s smoke-blue eyes roved the room like a feral animal.
“Il,” Siniq-elb said, “tair bless you, you’re alive. What happened?”
The man’s eyes flicked to Siniq-elb’s face for a moment and he let out a groan. “Father take me, how do I know if you’re one of them? I can smell them, even here, like rotting flowers buried in clay. It fills me up inside, chokes me.” He pulled frantically at the neck of his shirt, and his nails left bright red gouges in his throat. Il seemed oblivious to the fresh blood as it trickled down below his collar. “I’m a fool, of course you’re one of them. You have to be.” He drew a knife, its blade almost as long as Siniq-elb’s hand.
“Slow down,” Siniq-elb said. “One of what? Put that away, Il. I’m your friend. Tair bless me, I’m so happy to see you’re alive. We can talk about it, about what happened to you. But first, you have to put that away.”
Il hesitated, knife-hand shaking so that the lantern light ran up and down it like lightning. “You sound so much like him. The others never spoke, they just watch, eyes as cold as fallen moons.”
“The other who? Put the knife down and we can talk about it.”
For a moment, it seemed Il would lunge. Then, with another groan, he let the knife clatter to the floorboards, and he began to tear at his face with his hands. Siniq-elb darted forward and retrieved the blade, but Il did not stop his self-mutilation. Only when he had the blade safely out of reach did Siniq-elb set the lantern down and grab both of Il’s wrists. Il struggled to wrench himself free, but Siniq-elb did not let go. After long heartbeats Il went limp, eyes settling on Siniq-elb, great gasps causing his chest to rise and fell.
“Siniq-elb,” he said. “Tair help me, is it really you?”
“It’s me.”
A ghost of a smile appeared on Il’s face; under the glistening red lines of his nails, it was horrifying. “Mind letting me go? You’ve got a solid grip, and I’m afraid I can’t feel my fingers.”
Siniq-elb looked into the other man’s eyes, trying to find madness, but Il seemed to be himself for the moment. He let go, his own hands aching. “What happened to you?”
Il dabbed at the wounds on his face and neck. “Gloried seiri,” he said. “Every time they catch up to me, they do this. Sometimes it’s on my back, or my legs. Today it was the face, I guess. Tair only knows what they want, why they keep letting me escape.”
“The seiri?” Siniq-elb said.
“I know, I know. I thought they were children’s tales too. Then, when we saw that one eating Azel—” He gave a shudder, and for a moment his eyes began to wander again.
Siniq-elb reached forward and grabbed him by the shoulder. Il gave a start, and his eyes fell back to Siniq-elb’s face.
“I ran for so long,” Il said. “I’m sorry I left you.”
“It’s alright,” Siniq-elb said. He did not mean those words; it was not alright. It was never alright to abandon your squad, to leave the other men to death. But what did he tell a madman? “It’s alright. You’re alive. That’s what matters.”
“And so are you,” Il said. “Thank the tair, now they’ll believe me. I keep trying to tell them that the seiri are coming, and no one will believe me.”
“Who are they?” Siniq-elb said. “And what do you mean the seiri are coming? What happened?”
“They. Everyone. I’m telling them, and they won’t listen. I ran until my heart burst, until I died and my body kept running because it forgot to stop and lie down. And then I ran more. I got lost, deep in the woods, where the undergrowth is as tall as the trees. That’s the only thing that saved my life, you know.”
“From what?”
“From the seiri!” The words exploded from Il, followed by a sharp, painful intake of breath. “From the seiri. There were three of them, hunting me. I hid in a weeping willow and I saw them, lines of falling grass, like a breeze on the plains, or lonely clouds. One was the one who killed Azel. The other two were women. Argh. I can still smell them, even here. Taste them on the back of my tongue.”
“How did you survive?” Siniq-elb asked.
“You trained me,” Il said with another, firmer smile. “And I knew I had to come back. I thought you were dead; I thought you were all dead. Some
one had to tell the people of Khi’ilan. It’s not the rebels we have to worry about. It’s the seiri; they never stop. Even now, they hunt me, and look what they do when they find me.” He gestured to the deep scratches.
Siniq-elb stared, unsure of what to say. The man had been driven mad, but the seiri, at least, were real enough. And for the first time since his arrival the Garden, Siniq-elb realized that there were larger problems than his own. If the seiri truly had returned, it could mean the end of Khi’ilan. This was what Dakel was worried about; this was what the su-esis had hounded him about, trying to learn more. And then, like a flash of lightning in the dark, Siniq-elb realized that the seiri were the reason Dakel wanted him to follow Khylar. For whatever reason, Dakel suspected a fellow su-esis, the man in charge of the Garden itself, of having something to do with the seiri. The thought left him stunned.
“You’ll come with me, right?” Il said. “We’ll tell them together. They have to believe us.”
The words jarred Siniq-elb back to the present. “I can’t,” he said. “I have things I have to do here. Besides,” he lifted a severed limb, “I think I would slow you down.”
For the first time that night, Siniq-elb saw true clarity in Il’s eyes. “I’m so sorry,” Il said.
“It’s not important. We have other things to worry about. Like the seiri. I will do what I can here; you have to get back to the city. Find my parents, tell them what has happened to me. Tell them about the seiri. Tell them that this is why they took me to the Garden, to keep the seiri secret.” It was a lie; Dakel would have told him otherwise. But it was an effective lie. “They have influence with the other merchants, and they can put pressure on Qilic and perhaps on the temple. And then find Natam; he survived as well. He fought the seir. He’ll know what to do.” The last words were like fire in Siniq-elb’s throat, but he forced himself to say them. If the seiri truly were a threat, as Il and Dakel believed, then his own feud with Natam could wait for a time. “Can you do that? Can you make your way out of here without being caught?”
A true smile, and for a moment, he looked like the old Il again. “You trained me.”
“Then get out of here,” Siniq-elb said. “Go, now.”
Il nodded. He picked up the lantern and knife and made his way out the door without another word.
Siniq-elb shut the door and latched it. In his own pain, he had forgotten the seiri, the threat they posed to the city. To the people he loved who still had lives to live, a chance at happiness.
His mouth tasted bitter. Trusting Natam—and, even worse, trusting Qilic—was foolish; both men had betrayed him, sold him out to the eses for their own profit. Even worse, Siniq-elb had placed his hope in a man driven mad by what he had seen. A madman and a cripple against creatures of nightmare and legend, against a treacherous su-esis filled with divine power. More than ever, Siniq-elb realized how critical it was that they steal the brachal, if only for a chance at surviving the battle that was to come.
Siniq-elb lay down, his mind racing with plans again. He would not get much sleep that night, but a current of happiness ran underneath his thoughts. He might not be in the army of Khi’ilan anymore, but he was still a fighter. And, in his heart, he was still a soldier. And that meant he would do what he could to protect this city. Once a soldier, always a soldier.