The Dragon of Jin-Sayeng

by K. S. Villoso

I glanced at the guards. “I’ll be taking him now.”

  “My queen, he’s a mage,” the captain breathed.

  “If he turns me into a toad, you can string him upside down in the square tomorrow.”

  She nodded, and a guard stepped forward, hauling Belfang to his feet. He handed the chains to me.

  We stepped out into the street, Belfang a foot from me with the tip of my sword at his back. We walked in near-darkness until we reached a quieter neighbourhood at the edge of the city. There, he led us down a series of steps leading back to the river, to the mouth of a sewage tunnel.

  Khine held the lantern over our heads as we ventured down the path along the side. It was rough, moldy, dug centuries ago, stone jutting out from every angle. It opened up to a tangled maze of tunnels, more elaborate than what we had in Oren-yaro. Bara was an older city, and I could spot the Zarojo craftsmanship even on the grates. We could deny it as much as we wanted, but we were too intricately tied to the empire.

  “I mean, you’re really more foolhardy than you’re smart,” Belfang said out of nowhere.

  “Did I say you could talk?”

  “You know who I’m working for,” Belfang continued. “What can I tell you that you don’t already know?”

  “Whatever you’re hiding,” I said easily. “Whatever he’s hiding, to be precise. That is why we’re here, right?”

  We were interrupted by the scrabbling sound of what could only be rats scampering up ahead.

  “Maybe he’s taking us to his family,” Khine mused.

  Belfang attacked.

  I didn’t have time to wonder how he managed to loosen the chains enough to dare. But he didn’t go for me. Too loyal of a servant, even away from his unseen master; it was Khine he lunged for, aiming for his weak arm. I turned to fight and saw Belfang fall.

  Khine pulled his sword back. Belfang rolled along the path, blood pooling on the ground underneath him. His lips twitched into a smile. “To be killed by holier-than-thou Lamang,” Belfang croaked.

  “You should’ve left my mother alone,” Khine said.

  “You had it in you after all. But then again, you’ve always hated me. Back when we were kids, the way you looked at me…” He spat out blood. “Is it because we were willing to settle, while you, for all your hard work, couldn’t get close to your lofty dreams? That’s why you’re with her, isn’t it? She’s your key out of your hellhole. Because underneath that act, you’re just a good-for-nothing dog like the rest of us. You—”

  I stabbed Belfang myself before he could open his mouth again, a dagger straight into his heart. Khine watched as I yanked the blade out of the body. Blood dripped down my arm and next to my boot. We stood there for several moments, the silence interrupted only by the sound of dripping water above us. I slowly sheathed the dagger.

  “Yuebek will be here somewhere.” He shrugged away from me.

  I grabbed his arm. “Khine…”

  “This isn’t the time.”

  “You don’t even know what I was going to say.”

  His jaw tightened, and his eyes danced as he considered me with an expression I had never seen on him before. One part hunger, another part regret. He turned his head before I could do anything about it.

  We ventured deeper into the shadows, which was vastly preferable to confronting what we didn’t have the power to change. It helped that the path was straightforward from here on out. There was the possibility that Belfang had been trying to lose us out here, but I didn’t want to dwell on that. He had to have brought us here for a reason. The man had seen an opening and decided to take it, but if he hadn’t…

  I stopped in my tracks as I saw the path widening up to a series of flat steps and a ledge overlooking a trickle of storm water. There was a single door at the far corner.

  “Old cities, old secrets,” I said out loud in an effort to chase away the silence. “I would love to know what Chiha wanted to tell us, but then that rat would’ve been slinking around, doing the gods know what…” I shivered slightly as Khine strode up behind me. His eyes were on the door.

  “Let’s end this,” he said. He kicked it open.

  CHAPTER TEN

  WILTED ROSES

  There were candles in the hallway we found ourselves in, which sputtered slightly at the sudden draft. A feeling of dread hung in the air, like a musty scent. Thicker than what you’d find in an old room. Thicker than mud. I was starting to recognize it.

  “I suppose there’s no point asking you to let me do this alone,” I said.

  Khine gave a cold smile. “Absolutely none.”

  I made my way down the corridor. The candlelights danced as I passed them, the flames turning a deep blue. “I guess it doesn’t matter,” I grumbled. “He already knows we’re here. The bastard has his claws in everything. Dear Esteemed Prince, perhaps a guide to save us the trouble?” My voice echoed down the hollows and dead spaces between the walls.

  The hall ended, revealing a door fringed with cobwebs around the frame, most of them gathered in bunches around the hinges. There were none on the knob. I placed my hand on it and found it warm. The door opened with no resistance.

  We found ourselves in a small courtyard with a square pond in the center, decorated with crumbling statues of Saint Fei Rong and Akaterru. Vines crept around the bases and through the figures’ mouths and eyes, like snakes creeping up the stone. I glanced at the water, a murky brown with a thin layer of foam. I thought I glimpsed tadpoles, which was strange given the time of the year. The cold water should’ve killed them.

  “That bastard is playing with us,” Khine said, breaking the tension. He struck one of the statues with a closed fist, sending a chunk of stone flying into the pond. The change in his mood was palpable.

  I saw a light from one of the windows directly across from us. “Up there?” I asked.

  Khine gave a mirthless chuckle. “Perhaps he wants a tryst.”

  “That’s not funny.”

  “I wasn’t joking.”

  I tried to shrug off the feeling of dread crawling over me like dozens of trailing fingers. At that moment, I wanted nothing more than reassurance, but I wasn’t sure who was capable of giving that to me anymore. I turned to a memory of myself as a child sitting astride my father’s shoulders, my hands in his as I viewed the city of Oren-yaro from up high. “Yours,” he told me. “This whole kingdom is yours.” He laughed, his eyes disappearing into the folds of his face as he held me to the sunlight. Other memories of my father pressed against the corners of my thoughts, memories that hurt simply because they existed. Memories that shouldn’t sting, that for most other people brought joy and warmth, a sensation of having been loved once in their lives. Of having been loved enough.

  I pushed the feelings away, along with the tears. I was a grown woman, a queen; in light of my responsibilities, it didn’t matter how many pieces of myself were missing. I gathered my courage as we left the courtyard and stepped under the covered platform. A single door beside a lit window beckoned. This one, too, was unlocked.

  We were now inside the first floor of a Kag-style apartment. There was a boy sitting on a velvet chair near the brick fireplace with his back to me—black hair tied above his head, a familiar height and shape.

  “Thanh!” I cried.

  The boy turned.

  I knew my mistake as soon as I saw his face, but there was a moment where I told myself it was just the light. This had to be my boy. The turn of his nose, the shape of his features… If the shadows had loomed a little closer, I would’ve sworn it was my son. I wanted it to be him.

  But it wasn’t. “Yes?” the boy asked, a voice that was a touch higher than Thanh’s. It was different enough that it broke the illusion.

  I took a step towards the child before noticing that Khine, too, had been holding his breath. He didn’t know what Thanh looked like.

  “It’s not him,” I said.

  He drew his brows together. “Perhaps you should stay away, then.”

  “Wh
at do you mean?”

  “Who knows what things that man could conjure?”

  “It’s just a boy,” I muttered.

  “I made that same mistake in the Sougen once, if you recall.”

  I noticed a line of worry over the child’s forehead. “We’re not here to hurt you,” I found myself saying, despite Khine’s warning. “We’re looking for someone else.”

  “Do you know where my mother is?” he asked.

  I shook my head. “I haven’t seen her.”

  Khine cleared his throat. “Who’s your mother, child?”

  He suddenly looked frightened. “I…” he began. He wiped his face.

  “Anino!” a woman’s voice thundered from the stairs.

  The boy shrank back. No—not my son at all. Thanh would’ve simply scoffed at such a tone. He was dressed in royals’ robes, with the pale complexion of a child who had been kept out of the sun. As I mulled over this, I turned my head in time to see a woman appear around the corner.

  “Who are you?” the woman asked.

  I struggled to keep my focus. If the boy looked familiar, so did she. But I couldn’t put a name to her face. She was either younger or older than me, with plucked eyebrows and painted lips, which told me that if they were prisoners here, they hadn’t been for very long. “I think I should be asking the both of you that instead,” I said.

  She caught a glimpse of my ring, which I made no effort to hide. Realization dawned on her face. “Beloved Queen,” she managed, before dropping to the floor, the bow of a frightened commoner. It was an extreme reaction. I glanced at the child, who managed to get to his feet before the woman dragged him back down. She forced his head to the floor.

  “The boy.” I nodded towards him. “He’s a royal.”

  She didn’t try to deny it. “My queen,” she said, keeping her head low.

  I turned to the walls of the apartment, decorated with Kag-style paintings, the sort that favoured rich oil paints. “Whose house is this?” I asked.

  “My queen,” she repeated.

  “I’m guessing they live here,” Khine spoke up. “I noticed shoes at the door.”

  “Is that right?” I frowned. “A child who would not tell me about his mother, and a woman who will not say who she is or what she’s doing here. Strange.” I now stepped towards the child again. His face was completely white, the fear dancing in his eyes. “Didn’t I tell you I’m not here to hurt you?” I asked.

  He nodded.

  “Then why don’t you believe me?”

  “You’re… you’re the queen,” he gasped.

  “Anino,” the woman said. “Please.”

  “I was speaking with him,” I replied, a tad irritated.

  The woman fell silent.

  “Continue,” I told the boy.

  “They said that if you ever find me, you’d kill me,” he stammered.

  Why would I kill a child? I knew my reputation was tarnished, but I didn’t think it was ground so deep into the mud that people actually thought of me as some witch who stalked helpless innocents in the dark. Unless…

  I felt my senses darken. I turned to Khine, who had his arms crossed as he considered the situation, and then to the woman, who remained on the ground, her face a mask of both terror and appeasement. “Who are you?” I repeated.

  She mumbled something incomprehensible.

  “There’s no sense hiding it,” I snapped. “I left Toriue Castle this evening at Chiha Baraji’s urging. This must have something to do with it.”

  The woman’s face flickered at the name. The boy, Anino, started weeping.

  “I knew it,” I whispered.

  “Rayyel’s bastard?” Khine asked, coming to the same conclusion at the same time I did.

  “My husband’s stamp is all over the boy,” I said. “And believe me, I know now, after everything that had happened the last few weeks. I’ve spent days going over any resemblance Rai may have to my memories of my son. And now this…” I found myself sitting down, shaking my head. I didn’t know how I was supposed to feel. I turned to the woman. “Get up,” I ordered.

  She rose slowly. I gazed at her face and saw that she wasn’t afraid of me for herself. It was the boy that made her compliant. “Are you an Ikessar?” I asked.

  She shook her head.

  “But this apartment belongs to the Ikessars, correct?”

  She shook her head again. “An old Ikessar supporter,” she finally croaked out. “A merchant, or a merchant’s wife. I… don’t know the details, my queen.”

  “She looks like Rayyel, too,” Khine reflected.

  I saw it now. “Gods. Another bastard?”

  She shook her head a third time, her hair falling over her face. “No, Beloved Queen. I’m… Karia aron dar Hio. Lord Rayyel’s older sister through our father, General Shan. My mother was his natural wife.”

  I had never heard the name before. But I wasn’t surprised. Princess Ryia’s affair with General Shan was considered a mark of shame. That it resulted in the only direct Ikessar heir was reason enough to try to erase Shan’s history from the record books; the less said about the whole situation, the better. “So we’re looking at a family reunion here,” I said, clapping my hands once. “Anino is Chiha Baraji’s son, I presume?”

  “Yes, Beloved Queen,” Karia replied.

  “And of Thanh’s age. Lovely.” And if my guess was correct, I was a witness to the boy’s conception. I pushed away the memory of walking in on Rayyel and Chiha that fateful afternoon, the one that I tried to drown in the dredges of time with anger and my own mistakes. “I suppose they’ve tasked you with keeping him away from the court’s eyes. Have you been living here this whole time?”

  “For the last few years.”

  “Does Warlord Lushai know?”

  Karia dipped her head. “Yes, my queen.”

  “Princess Ryia?”

  “No.”

  I took a deep breath. “My husband?”

  A long pause. Long enough. I felt my chest tighten.

  I didn’t love Rayyel anymore, but that doesn’t mean scars can’t bleed.

  It all went back to illusions. To wanting something that still made sense because none of us can grasp at emptiness for very long. I wasn’t angry with Rai the way I would’ve been if I had learned this even a year ago. But there was something else there, one that went full circle. I could see our lives panning out like a play, a theatre of the doomed and damned. Only now, I wasn’t a player, but the audience, and I wasn’t amused. All I could think of was how much of a fool I’d been putting my trust in people who would use me, who would lie to me, even as I knew that there was nothing I could’ve done to ward against their deception.

  When the door opened and Yuebek walked in like a welcomed guest, I wasn’t even surprised.

  He had changed from when I had seen him last, looking closer now to the pristine prince I met nearly a year ago in Zorheng City. A well-trimmed beard, eyes that twinkled, a face that looked like it had been scrubbed several times with a strong brush before getting a layer of bright paint over it. A silk hat, robes threaded with real gold and silver and probably worth more than a village or two. Black hair without a single trace of grey, skin so shiny it looked porcelain. He was almost too perfect.

  I didn’t bother greeting him. I simply drew my sword and attacked.

  I hoped the element of surprise would be enough to turn the tide. To have two against one, at least; he was alone, with not even a shadow of a scabbard on his belt. But my sword struck empty robes, shattering in a spray of metal shards. The robes dropped to a pile at my feet. Yuebek somehow appeared beside Anino, a naked dagger in his hand. He grinned, perfect teeth showing.

  “My queen,” he said as he brandished the sharp edge along the boy’s neck. “You look lovelier by the day.”

  “Let him go, Yuebek. I’m the one you want.”

  As an answer, he pulled the blade up. Anino whimpered as a streak of blood dripped along the edge. I felt my insides knot.
>
  Yuebek’s eyes lit up. “They were right about you and children! But this one? Isn’t this one the most worthless of them all? Come, now. Don’t tell me you still want it alive after everything you’ve learned? Wouldn’t you want to sink this blade into this soft, young flesh yourself? Living proof of your husband’s treachery, as if you haven’t had to live with it all these years already. Living proof that even as he tries to make amends, he continues to lie to you still!”

  I didn’t answer, and he began to laugh.

  “Perfect,” he said, sliding the blade across the boy’s throat a second time. Another streak of blood. The boy continued to cry, though to his credit, he didn’t try to run. “Just perfect. But you do realize what keeping him alive means, don’t you? It means that the little show your husband started to thwart me is now going to be his doom. There is no need to prove this whelp isn’t his. They’ve hidden it this whole time, right under your nose, Beloved Queen! This hypocrisy, stirring the land for a fault that was his all along, is enough! Grounds for an annulment! The Dragonthrone, well and fully ours!”

  “This is what you’ve been sitting on this whole time.”

  He chortled. I thought I could spot tears leaking from the corner of his eyes. “I wanted you to see this for yourself,” he said. “I’ve been here the last three days. Karia has been—most hospitable.” He gave a quick glance at Rayyel’s sister, who hung back another step. “But you’ve interfered with my arrangements yet again. Couldn’t you have waited for my invitation, for the grand party that will announce not just the dissolution of your marriage to that bastard but our own, happy betrothal? I was going to hire dancers.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I must have missed the part where I agreed to these proposals.”

  “You won’t get rid of your husband even for this?” Yuebek picked Anino up by the collar and flung him to the side. The boy gave a soft cry. Karia rushed to him, nearly stumbling into Yuebek along the way. The prince barely gave them a second look. “Just as your marriage was not your choice, so will you be unable to stop this from happening. If anything, the presence of this runt should remind you what others have done to take what is rightfully yours. Did you think your husband’s affair was born from love?”