“Very well. I will get Ton'kapu to bring you water and a cloth.”
“Ton'kapu?” I ask, brow furrowed.
“He is the only one the Seer deemed you could not corrupt, aside from me.”
“What makes him so damnably pure?”
“Not pure. Quite the opposite. He hates the Cursed more than anyone else among our people. The rest of his... faults do not prevent him from following the Seer's will. He and Talan have tangled in the past.”
“Where is Talan? I have to thank him for introducing his fist to my face.”
Te'ial laughs, a genuine laugh that comes from her belly. It’s a pleasant sound that cuts through the omnipresent humidity and carries outward into the jungle.
“Talan has duties other than striking Cursed,” Te'ial says, her eyes dipping down and away. “He is not here.”
“Where has he gone?”
“Enough, Cursed,” she cuts off, turning and striding briskly away.
I don’t have to wait long. Te'ial doesn’t return, but a portly, bedraggled looking old man with gray hair and midnight skin trots up with a bucket and a cloth that can generously be called clean. He steps up to the bars, looking down on me impassively. Then, inexplicably, he smiles broadly, his teeth yellowed and broken in his mouth. Perhaps his hatred isn’t so deep...
He starts to speak, a stream of words in his native tongue. The words don’t flow, as well-spoken sentences in Khalintari do, but instead seem to abruptly stop and start. The language is a series of staccato bursts, sometimes continuing for the space of three heartbeats, sometimes pausing every syllable in short but noticeable breaks. He nods as he speaks, the grin almost touching his ears.
Reassured, I smile and nod back. This seems to encourage him, and he gestures expansively. He points at the trees, spreads his arms wide, and tilts his eyes to the heavens. All the while he speaks in the fits and starts of the Seer tongue.
“Ton'kapu as'idie'laran'costrien,” Te'ial calls, or that's how it sounds, her pauses just as noticeable and jagged as his. I was concerned Ton’kapu was a madman, but the captain's speech patterns match him. She trots over with soup and bread.
Ton'kapu turns and speaks to her, his tone remarkably merry. She mutters a few more words in return, her tone sharp and rebuking. He merely shrugs, looking down at me and then back to her, laughing a great booming laugh. She rolls her eyes, ignoring him. He sets the bucket down, hands her the towel, and walks away, his laugh rumbling through my chest.
“I have never seen him so happy in his life,” she says, wetting the cloth before handing it to me.
“I think I've made a friend,” I say, then put my lips to the bowl, and Te'ial bursts out into laughter again. The bowl jumps in her hands, sloshing hot soup down my chin, and I squirm, unable to get away. The bowl disappears, and I lever myself around to see her on the ground, her chest heaving in great bouts of hilarity, tears streaming down her face.
“What did I say this time?” I ask, unsure if I should be offended or not.
“If—” she cuts off, shaking her hands in surrender, her skin glistening as dawn turns to full morning. She wipes away tears, trying valiantly to regain control of herself. “If Ton'kapu—if anyone—spoke to me like Ton'kapu just spoke to you, even the Seer herself, one of us would be buried before the sun reaches noon.”
“But,” I begin, confused. “He was so happy. He was laughing!”
“Exactly!” Te'ial says, fighting back a grin. “He was absolutely overjoyed to see a Cursed brought so low. He was so satisfied that a tainted soul was brought to cleaning the shit from themselves with rags, fed by his enemies. He called you and your ancestors and your bloodline more despicable and insulting things than I have ever heard used by anyone in the I'wia.”
“Oh.”
“If even an eighth of those insults were remotely implied about my family, I would have killed him for even having the thought in the first place!” Te'ial says, bursting into laughter again.
“What did he say?” I ask, more curious than anything. The insults can’t have been that bad.
“The least of them was declaring your mother a—” she cuts off, shaking her head before she can master herself. “He called your mother a tongue-cleaner of the anus gland of diarrhea sick monkeys who—”
“Right,” I say, interrupting her before she can keep going. “Well, he’ll have to do better than insulting my mother. She was a... how did he put it? Cleaner of the anus gland?”
“It is not good to speak ill of your family,” Te'ial says, growing a bit more somber.
“You don’t know them,” I say, more bitterly than I intend.
“Nor shall I,” she says softly, but with certainty.
“What is your language? Did you call it the Iwia?”
“No, Cursed, the I'wia.”
“That's what I said.”
“No, you called it the Iwia, which is different. It is the I'wia,” she says, slowing down the word. I notice the nearly imperceptible pause between the first syllable and the others.
“I'wia,” I say slowly, trying the unfamiliar word out. My tongue feels clumsy during the pause. She grimaces, but nods, as if the very sound of my voice butchering her language is sickening. “What does that mean?”
“The closest translation in your crude speech is the Voice of the World,” she answers, shrugging with one shoulder. “But it is an ugly translation at best.”
“And what does the other mean? Iwia?”
“Well...” she glances away, then looks back at me with her customary smirk. “It is a word that is not proper for polite company.”
“You know better than any how far I am from polite,” I respond, forcing my face into the aching lines of a smirk of my own.
“It’s a name for a woman's secret flower,” she says, rolling her eyes.
“Wait, wait, wait,” I say, narrowing my eyes. “Your name for your language is that close to your name for your...”
“Naturally. The translation for I'wia is Voice of the World. The translation for Iwia... closer to Cradle of the World.”
I open my mouth to respond, then pause, my brow furrowing. I can’t exactly fault the logic.
“How could that pause mean so much? You barely even broke up the letters.”
“Enough, thriska Cursed,” Te'ial says, her demeanor suddenly changing, closing, as if someone slams a book shut. Her face becomes unreadable and remote. “Your questions bore me. I do not like you. I will not tell you the secrets of the I'wia.”
“Fine,” I snap peevishly, more disappointed at her reaction than I expect to be. “Can you tell me then what thriska means? If I am going to be insulted, I would rather know.”
“It means tainted,” she says, turning and walking away. She doesn’t look back.
The sun falls quickly into the sky, far more quickly than it does in the north. My heart aches, distantly, the same way an old wound aches when you wake, having slept at just the wrong angle. The pain is fresh, but dulled, the echoes of a loss long since gone returning to plague me once again. I don’t understand how the pain of losing Lav can ever feel this way, so distant and... forgettable. The pain is not enough to hold my consciousness; in fact, it’s barely enough to occupy my attention. I remember the immediacy of knowing in my heart that Lav must have died after two years, that those cretins that pass for parents would never have taken care of him without me there to make them. I remember the pain... but it’s a pain I am long familiar with. How can that be? I’ve held the knowledge in my heart for less than a day.
I shudder, forcing down tears that come unwillingly to my eyes. What is wrong with me? Why don’t I feel the sorrow of Lav's loss? Shouldn't it still be fresh? I blink the tears away, realizing with disgust they exist more for myself than for Lav. I gaze up at the unfamiliar stars. I snort. Unfamiliar. As if I ever bother to look at those unreachable glimmers of light. As if I would ever be able to see a tapestry of stars and recognize it. As if I have a home for stars to shine over.
What do I have to live for?
The passing of my soul may also drive all of the people in the Seer's nation mad, as my predecessor's death did to the people of Tiran twenty-one years before. They still call it the City of Ghosts. No one returns for fear that they, too, will be driven insane. The thought is strangely satisfying. Perhaps my death will serve as my revenge. I close my eyes and sleep, head pressed to the bars.
Something wakes me, a looming presence in the darkness. A black silhouette silently stands beside my cage. Fear claws at my belly and grips me by the spine. The moon rises from the surrounding trees, and its silver light illuminates the weathered face of Ton'kapu. He’s grinning, same as before, his teeth gleaming in the darkness, his eyes full of merriment and joy. The friendly look does nothing to curb my terror. I shy away from him, but he paces me around the cage.
“Et'inie'te'ial,” he says, his resonant voice muted and quiet.
“You know I don't understand you,” I say, annoyed, both at him for sneaking up on me and myself for giving in to fear. “Piss off.”
He laughs. It is nothing approaching human. There is something wild... something untamed and dark in that laugh.
“Niope'lesti?” he says, tilting his head to the side and grinning his toothy grin. With a broad gesture, he indicates the dark trees away from the village. The cage is open. The ever-present bars are gone, only the damp island air between me and freedom. I crawl before I can even think, muttering a thanks to Ton'kapu and pushing my elbows into the dirt. I’m almost to the edge of the cage when I pause.
What am I doing? I can’t make it anywhere in my condition. What is Ton'kapu trying to pull? I glance up at him, only then noticing the gleam of steel in the night. He holds a dagger, bright and sharp, his other hand open in a gesture of welcome. Slowly, not taking my eyes off of Ton'kapu, I push my aching body back into the cage. He doesn’t move, though he does seem to relax. Rather than disappointment, a grin flashes across his face, his eyes crinkling at the edges. He puts the cage back into place and presses his face against the bars, almost touching mine.
“Niope'lesti.”
The words are not a question this time, but a statement. He’s gone before I can blink, the darkness swallowing his dark silhouette before he travels two paces. I shudder, eyes wide and staring. The moon drifts behind a distant cloud, plunging my little corner of the world into total blackness. I gasp and jump at every noise in the night, and in the jungle, there are many noises. The morning can’t come fast enough.
Te'ial arrives at her normal time, her confident swagger returning as the days pass. She holds my bowl as well as a piece of warm bread. I lever myself up, not having slept a wink since Ton'kapu's visit. She reaches in to feed me, but I nudge her hand aside.
“Captain. Can I ask you a question?”
“What, Cursed?” she asks, clearly annoyed at the delay.
“What does niope'lesti mean?”
I make sure to include the appropriate pause, counting on the acuity granted by fear to get the intonation right. By Te'ial's frown, I haven’t spoken the words correctly.
“In your tongue... it means death-wishing. Where did you hear this phrase?” she asks, her brow furrowing in concern.
“Nowhere,” I say, shaking my head. So I did speak the words correctly. “Something someone said to me once in Halfway.”
“You have a good memory to remember the inflection so well. It means almost... what is the word for death-wishing in your tongue?”
“Suicide.”
“Yes!” Te'ial responds, brightening. “To kill oneself.”
Letting the morbid topic drop, I eat all of my breakfast, even reaching for the bread and forcing my aching fingers to grasp at it. I eventually manage to eat about half the bread, though the rest ends up in crumbs down my shirt. Te'ial doesn’t complain about the waste, but simply watches through my struggles. After she leaves, I grind my teeth together.
It’s one thing to think about suicide in your own damn head. It’s entirely another for some ignorant savage to try to murder you in the night. Ton'kapu wants me to kill myself, does he? Well fuck him. I need to learn how to say that in the I'wia.
Chapter 13
Kettle
The Forty-Second Day of Spring
In the Year 5222, Council Reckoning
A distant rumble of thunder rolls through the slate gray sky. I pause. My eyes seek out the remote flashes of light, the brilliant twin to the sullen sibling trembling through the clay tiles of the rooftop supporting my feet. The first drops of rain, large and fat, take up a drumming rattle that only grows into a cacophony of nature’s roaring voice. My hood is already up; my anonymity critical until I choose to be recognized. Even so, the rain quickly soaks through the material and traces its cold fingers down my spine.
I hardly notice.
I hardly blink.
My eyes are far too focused to be bothered by a sudden spring shower. The doorway across the street from my rooftop, a cheery and wholesome green, remains stubbornly closed despite my urges for it to open already. Despite my hunger for it. The man’s late. Keagan Atlan is never late. The old, familiar chill of warning echoes in the back of my mind, an instinct whispering of danger, but I ignore it as easily as I ignore the sleepless nights and aching bones that accompanied the task of the past two weeks.
I blink away the rain to be certain I’m not imagining it when Atlan’s door finally swings open. A vagary of the wind catches the edge of the door and whips it out of his hand to crash against the front facade of his house. He curses, the words just barely penetrating the curtain of rain between us. He scrambles to slam the door closed before belatedly opening up a cloth umbrella. Under other circumstances, I might have smiled, maybe even laughed at the fool’s predicament. Instead, I merely continue my vigil. I come up on the balls of my feet, leaning towards the man eagerly.
He’s not my target. Of course he isn’t. But he might take me to him.
The rumors of Jon Gordyn’s mercenary army, as it turns out, were not overblown. The day after our botched job, dozens of men had turned over the streets, raiding every location the Family was ever rumored to frequent. Tal and Bulo were killed in a safe house we were flatly certain was unknown to anyone outside the Family. The fire brigade in the Corpses had given up on the house when the flames that gutted it reached the clouds, and instead focused on saving the other derelict estates around it. The embers still smoldered a week later.
Luckily, the children remain safely tucked away in the Temple of Shadow on the edge of the city. So far, we haven’t seen even a sliver of interest in the priest and his charges. Regardless, half a dozen thieves watch over it night and day. The rest of us search for Corna. She didn’t emerge from the bank. Rina walked out of work that night while they were still investigating and simply never returned. But Corna…
Atlan glances suspiciously up and down the street. He doesn’t look up, though there’s scant chance he would see me through the downpour. He probably wouldn’t notice me even if the sun was shining brightly, as it no doubt is behind the oppressive gray clouds. I follow him along the rooftops, lightly leaping over the gaps between the tightly packed houses. The task is simple enough that I’m able to think through my next few moves in this deadly game while I run.
Ultimately, the children are targets I can’t afford to leave in danger, both due to my love for them and their use as a weapon against me. The secret of their whereabouts has a swiftly approaching demise: everyone, even the most dedicated, the most powerful, the most disciplined, everyone has a limit. I can’t imagine a situation in which they aren’t torturing Corna to learn about me
, to use her knowledge against us. I’ve slaughtered a dozen of Gordyn’s mercenaries in ambushes throughout the city, learning what information I can from them before making their bodies disappear. The unending chorus, no matter how… creatively I ask, is that no one knows where Gordyn is. No one knows where he keeps his prisoners. No one knows where his second hides. The only high-ranking member of the Bank left working is Keagan Atlan.
Gordyn’s left Atlan exposed as retaliation for his failure to recognize that he was being swindled. Clearly expendable, he’s either a pawn to be sacrificed or a trap to lure me in. I don’t particularly care which. He’s the only important man left in the city, and I’m damn well going to get what information I can out of him. Corna is running out of time.
Eight mercenaries jog up to meet him at the first busy intersection. I haven’t been able to tell if Atlan or Gordyn hired them, but they’re good at their jobs. I duck behind the eves of the house I stand on, narrowly avoiding the gaze of one of the men raking his eyes across the rooftops. They have crossbows and swords, and every inch of them screams how well they can use them. They exude a confidence and a competence that is borderline intimidating. For all of their willingness to throw themselves into the fray, the Family has little experience in fighting outside of ambush or subterfuge, and something tells me these men will not be taken unawares.
Which is why I reserve this task for myself. Alone.
The men set off, Atlan walking swiftly at their center, their eyes constantly roving the streets and the rooftops in equal measure. After a block and at least three close calls, I realize they’ll spot me if I continue to pursue them over the rooftops. I need a new plan.
I turn my easy stalk into a sprint, heading out in a wide arc. The rain hammers down unrelentingly, thick sheets of water rattling like hail. I nearly stumble twice as I leap between rooftops at breakneck speed, but each time, my boots turn in just such a way as to let me recover.
I flat refuse to think any gratitude towards the soul trapped in them. He is walled carefully away behind half a dozen mental barriers so that I can’t hear any annoying and distracting thoughts echoing through my brain. I probably should just take them off, but I’m not going to let them out of my sight. They represent the only bargaining chip I possess with Gordyn. He clearly knows what they are, and further believes them to be quite valuable. If I’m being honest with myself, I should marvel at the fact that a soul exists in the boots on my feet, but I’m angry. Tecarim tried to steal the only thing no one has ever been able to take from me: my very body. I’ll never trust him again, and I certainly won’t be thanking him for being an exceptional pair of boots.
The Crux of Eternity: Eternal Dream, Book 1 (The Eternal Dream Saga) Page 32