She climbed to the second-floor window on easily scalable stonework as inadequate thought had been put into the building’s security. She crept in the window and pulled a dagger from its sheath, not to harm the girl, but to threaten her into silence and submission.
Kala could see her in bed by the light of the window. She slept so peacefully that Kala decided to give her a final moment before she turned her life upside down.
A match struck in the darkness and Kala froze. It lit a candle, illuminating Rat, sitting in a chair across from Kala, a sword across his lap.
What are you doing here? Kala mouthed silently.
Before he could answer, the flickering light woke the girl, and she looked about the room sleepily. She spotted Kala, dagger in hand, and froze. She looked to the light and saw Rat in the chair, who put a finger to his lips, warning her to be quiet.
“Who is she, Hawke?” the girl whispered. “And what are you doing here?”
Kala looked from Rat to the girl and back.
Rat sighed. “Emilie, meet Raven. Raven, meet Emilie.”
Rat’s hand drifted down to the pommel of his sword. Kala put up her hands and sheathed her dagger.
Rat got up and sat on the bed beside Emilie. She held on to him and shifted to put him between her and Kala.
“Emilie is my girlfriend. I thought I’d kept it a secret well enough, but it looks like Baron knows. He chose her so that one of us will die tonight. I’ll kill you if you lay a hand on her, and Baron will kill you if you don’t. Your only way to live through the night is to kill me before I kill you.”
“Or it isn’t,” Kala replied.
“I’m quicker than you. I trained you. You can’t overpower me, and I won’t let you near her.”
Emilie cowered behind him.
“I don’t plan to try,” Kala replied, “and Emilie, please relax and trust me. I won’t let any harm come to you.”
Emilie didn’t relax a muscle, but Rat put a reassuring hand on her leg and stroked it. “I’m listening,” he said.
Kala explained her plan, although Rat didn’t like it because it endangered Emilie.
“What choice do we have?” Kala asked. “This is going to end badly for both of us eventually. Baron doesn’t trust us, and it’s only a matter of time before he orchestrates our deaths. We end it now, or he ends us.”
Rat reluctantly agreed and whispered instructions to Emilie. She looked terrified and clung to him, but she nodded.
“We’ll meet you back at Baron’s,” Kala said and extended a hand to Emilie. Emilie looked worriedly to Rat, and he nodded for her to go along with Kala. She took Kala’s hand, and Kala escorted her to the window and a waiting rope. Rat went down first and caught Emilie when she descended. Kala descended last and simply left the rope. Rat went ahead, and Kala escorted Emilie back to Baron’s a little more slowly.
A block away, Kala stopped. “Sorry about this, but we need to make it look right. I need to tie your hands. I promise I won’t make it tight.”
Emilie reluctantly held out her hands for Kala to bind.
“I should also tie a handkerchief as a gag, and I’m really sorry for that, but Baron will expect it to have prevented you from screaming your head off while I ‘dragged’ you here.”
Emilie consented, and she didn’t need to act terrified – she genuinely was terrified.
A moment later, Kala walked her captive into Baron’s great room.
Baron, who was lounging in his chair, put down his wine and rubbed his eyes, “Do my eyes deceive me?” he said sarcastically to his men in the room. “Back so soon?”
Kala did her best to look annoyed at the insinuation that she had somehow failed to be hastier. She pushed the girl forward roughly and pulled off her gag. “Here’s the girl. Careful, she’s likely to pee herself from fright.”
Baron searched the perimeter of the room with a feeble attempt at nonchalance before getting off his chair and walking around his bored wolf.
Rat walked in with a dagger in each hand. “Don’t touch her!”
Baron looked relieved to see Rat challenge him and called out, “Guards!”
Thane and three of his hand-picked henchmen advanced from where they’d been instructed to wait and drew their swords. The eight of them formed a rough circle. Rat stood opposite Baron, who was flanked by Thane and another guard, Kala was to Baron’s left with Emilie, and the other two guards across from her, moving slowly toward Rat.
Emilie strained to go to Rat, but Kala yanked her back and pushed her behind her. “You stay right there,” she barked at her.
Baron blinked and rubbed his eyes again. His face grew flush. “What’s going on?” he asked.
Kala glanced over her shoulder at her purple flowers. “They smell sweet, don’t they? You kind of get used to it, though, and after a while, you stop noticing it. They taste sweet too, ground up, not too far off a sweet wine.”
Baron glanced at the bottle by his chair and stumbled backward a step. Everyone in the circle watched him. He picked up the leash of his wolf and coaxed the beast to its feet, positioning the animal between himself and Kala.
Kala smiled broadly.
“One step closer and I’ll sic my wolf on you.”
“That’s not a wolf,” Kala replied thickly, “that’s a cute little puppy.” She knelt and beckoned the wolf over, “Come here, wolfie.” Then to Baron, “I’ve tangled with wolves that would eat your pet for breakfast.”
“You’re not afraid of wolves?” he asked incredulously.
“Kind of,” Kala replied. “My greatest fear is that I am one.” She lunged at the wolf, and it recoiled.
Baron rubbed his eyes again and struggled to clear his vision.
“The purple lily is quite poisonous, but how each person reacts to its poison varies. Some people, it kills outright; others it blinds. I guess you’re the latter.”
Baron’s eyes burned, and he stumbled about. He dropped the wolf’s leash, and it bolted from the room. Baron flailed about, and his ridiculous crown fell from his head and rolled toward Kala. She stopped it with her foot and picked it up. Baron crashed into a wall, then followed along it with his hands until he found an exit. No one made a move to stop him.
Kala, Rat, Thane and the three remaining guards remained in their circle, and all eyes fell on the crown Kala was flipping over in her hands. Grips tightened on their weapons. The fight for succession had begun.
Kala held up her hands in mock surrender. She held the crown toward Thane. “I think you deserve this,” she said and tossed it to him in a high arc. Four sets of eyes followed its trajectory, but Thane never caught it. When the crown hit the ground at his feet, daggers were sticking out of the chests of four men, and Rat’s and Kala’s arms were outstretched and their hands empty. The four men wavered on their feet and collapsed.
Kala glanced at a dagger stuck in a pillar beside her head and turned to Rat, “Nice.”
“Told you I was faster,” he said and winked, but his hand drifted to a dagger at his belt.
“This is your world now, and you’re welcome to it,” Kala said.
She reached behind her and pulled out a dagger from her belt with exaggerated slowness. She turned toward Emilie and gestured for her to hold up her hands so that she could cut the ropes that bound her.
Once freed of her restraints, she rushed to Rat and burst into tears. He held her and soothed her.
“There’s one piece of unfinished business,” Rat reminded Kala. “We need to round up some poor soul for the airship.”
“No,” she replied, “that’s my ride out of here, and it’s high time I took it.”
“Before you go, I have something of yours.” Rat hugged Emilie, released her, and pulled out something that he had tucked behind his back. He pulled off the handkerchief that was wrapped around it off and handed Kala her journal.
“Thank you,” she said. “I thought I’d lost this.”
Rat put his arm back around Emilie and said to Kala, “Par
don me for having read it, but I believe someone is waiting for you out there.”
“So there is,” she smiled.
Kala had the vague sensation that the airship had ceased its motion. She heard a click and pushed against the door to her tiny compartment. It swung outward. She took a last draught of wine and put the empty bottle down. She flexed her sore muscles and stepped through the doorway.
She stepped into the sunlight clad in the blackest leather. Arrayed before her were row after row of armed monks. Black banners fluttered and snapped in the wind, each adorned with the image of a skull. Kala smiled and pulled out her daggers.
I’m your angel. Let’s dance.
27
Dhara
Dhara’s paddle dug rhythmically into the muddy brown water. Her shoulders ached from the pace she’d maintained. Paddling a two-person canoe alone was slow, but she was committed to bringing her sister back. The blood moon was only days away, and if Kaia had wound up somewhere that shared the customs of their tribe, she’d be sacrificed that night. Their mother hadn’t just sent her away, she sought to end her.
Dhara’s back still stung from being caned by her mother’s guards for interfering in her sister’s send-off. If her older sister, Zara, hadn’t pulled her away, it would’ve been far worse. Zara had restrained her, telling her, “The will of the tribe is final.”
“You mean mother’s will,” Dhara had spat.
“Regardless, I can’t lose you too,” Zara pleaded with her and held her firmly as Dhara struggled helplessly.
Dhara hated her older sister for taking her mother’s side. She’d come to terms with her mother’s callousness long ago, but sisters were supposed to look out for each other, especially in a world in which no one else would. She spat in the water, but it didn’t rid her of the sour taste in her mouth.
She felt exposed on the open river, but judging from the position of the sun, it wouldn’t be for much longer – the river would soon diverge from the direction she’d seen the airship travel. She began looking for a place to beach the canoe and continue on foot. She scanned the river’s edge and spotted a distinctive tree, near which she could hide the canoe and hopefully be able to find it again later. She paddled to shore and pulled it out of the water.
The soaring canopy shaded the jungle floor, and the sparseness of the undergrowth allowed her to make swift progress inland. She disliked being on the ground as her tribe lived in dwellings suspended high in the trees. The ground was reserved for hunters and the hunted.
The vegetation became denser, and soon, there was no way through it except by hacking her way through. Rivulets of sweat poured off her and stung the cuts on her back. The slow-going fed her anger.
The image of Kaia being forced into the ship replayed over and over in her mind. The look in her sister’s eyes had pleaded, “Don’t let this happen!” and the look of disappointment that followed burned deep into Dhara. She’d failed her sister then, but nothing would make her fail her now, and she’d be damned if plants would.
She’d disobeyed her mother by leaving the village in search of her younger sister. As the clan matriarch, her mother would probably have her gutted for it if and when she returned, but at the moment, Kaia was all that mattered. She had to rescue her before the blood moon. If her sister were still alive, she wouldn’t be for much longer if Dhara didn’t make faster progress.
The heat was stifling, and Dhara wiped the sweat from her eyes. Her muscles glistened as she raised her machete again and again. She hacked and cursed, and cursed and hacked. No sane person would attempt to pass this way, but she had no choice. Her machete struck something so hard that it jarred her up to her shoulder. She sheathed the machete and brushed the vines out of the way, revealing a jet-black pillar. She mouthed a prayer to the Goddess to protect her from ancient evils. She’d heard of such places from the tribe’s elders, dark places hidden in the jungle where evil dwelled.
She skirted the pillar but had no choice but to push forward past it. The vegetation thinned out, and she passed several more of the black columns. It felt like walking through the skeletal ribcage of a massive beast. The hairs on her arms rose. She felt pressure in her temples and revulsion in her stomach. The feeling of wrongness was overwhelming.
The jungle had gone utterly silent. Even the hum of insects had disappeared. It was as though Death had covered the jungle with her cloak. Dhara shuddered and hurried to get out of this place before it consumed her. The silence assaulted her. She couldn’t bear it any longer and covered her ears to block it. The pressure in her head and her upset stomach eased slightly. She uncovered her ears and immediately felt worse. She pulled some leaves off a vine, rolled them in her palm, and stuffed them into her ears. She felt marginally better. She cupped her hands over her ears, and the feeling of being assaulted subsided a little more.
It was awkward to run with her hands over her ears, but the alternative was much worse. She found herself moving parallel to an obsidian wall. She spied an opening that was only distinguishable because it yawned blacker than the darkest night. Her skin prickled. She felt watched by an entity so ambivalent to her existence as to be malevolent. Her head swam. She tore her gaze away from the opening and ran faster. She crashed through brush that clawed at her face, but she only cared about getting away.
She burst between two pillars, and the feeling of unease ceased abruptly. She tentatively lowered her hands from her ears, and the sounds of the jungle returned faintly. She pulled the leaves out of her ears. Her hand shot for her machete, only to find it safely sheathed. Thank the Goddess! She was sure that if she’d had it in her hands during her flight, she’d have thrown it down, and it would have been lost forever.
She turned to look at the way she’d just come, and it seemed no different than any other part of the jungle. She shook her head, said another prayer, and continued on her way. The jungle was less dense on this side of the evil place, and she could advance by squeezing through the spaces between plants, rather than carving a path. She began to make faster progress.
She came across a snare set for small game and immediately grew cautious. She did not want to stumble across a hunting party. She trusted her skill with a blade, but she was one, and they could be many. She crept onwards, keeping an eye out for more signs of people. While it made her wary, it also gave her hope that if the airship had carried her sister this way, perhaps she’d find her nearby.
There were, of course, other tribes in the jungle, but they rarely interacted. Every few generations, a tribe would wage war on a neighboring tribe. The result was typically wholesale slaughter. That is why Dhara’s tribe trained their young to be warriors, not just hunters. Her mother would never let her clan come out on the losing end of a conflict. Dhara was raised since birth to be ruthless. Still, she wasn’t foolhardy, and she moved stealthily through enemy territory.
She came across an increasing number of signs that people had passed the way she now came. She heard distant sounds of labor and advanced cautiously toward them. Peering through the brush, she saw a crew of men ferrying stone blocks from a sled to the foundation of a building. A handful of female guards oversaw the men and kept pace with the crack of a whip. One of the guards stood with her back to Dhara, leaning against a tree.
Dhara looked down at the clothes that clearly marked her as an outsider. She withdrew a short distance and stripped naked. She looked at her dagger and sighed. Can’t get blood on my new outfit. She crept forward without a stitch of clothing. The guard, to her credit, heard the faint rustling and turned to see Dhara standing before her nude. She paused in confusion, then lifted her whip, and brought down a lash that bit into Dhara’s shoulder.
You’re going to regret not going for your knife, Dhara thought and closed the distance before the woman could raise her whip a second time. Dhara punched her hard in the stomach. As she collapsed forward, Dhara reached around her and cleanly snapped her neck. She lowered her body to the ground and looked to see if she’d been seen, but
fortunately, she hadn’t.
She dragged the woman’s body into the trees, and once she’d gone far enough, she stripped her of her clothes and began to redress herself in them. The guard had at least been lean and well-muscled, so her clothes fit Dhara’s lithe form well enough. She took the time to arrange her hair in the same style as the guard. Once she’d done her best to resemble the woman, she buried her body beneath a pile of leaves. She hid her pack in a nearby tree and traded her machete for the whip. Pointlessly less deadly, she thought sadly.
She emerged from the bush but skirted the work party. Her intention wasn’t to take the woman’s place, only to pass as a local. She avoided people but tried not to draw attention to herself by skulking. She passed small plots of vegetables and entered a village of squat buildings. She suppressed a sneer of disdain for the ground-dwellers. The nearer buildings were constructed from mud bricks, but the buildings closer to the center of the village were constructed from quarried stone blocks and were centered around an enormous pyramidal building that towered over the village.
Dhara scouted for places where the villagers might keep captives, likely somewhere central. Slaves were abundant, but they seemed cowed by the ruling class as they weren’t locked up the way her people did theirs. She moved closer to the center of the village, where the buildings were slightly larger and closer together. Rounding a corner, she spotted a bamboo cage containing a small figure. Even at that distance, she recognized her younger sister. The cage was well guarded, but Dhara had to see her up close to confirm that she was okay. She took a path that would take her through the village square and past the cage, but tangentially.
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