by Devin Madson
“I don’t want your pity!” I shouldered past her, rice pot in hand. “I don’t want your compassion. I don’t even want to be having this conversation.”
“What are you so afraid of?” She followed me to the rice sack. “That someone might care about you?”
“The last time that happened, I got a knife between my ribs.” I dropped the pot into the sack and yanked open the left side of my robe, exposing my infamous scar to the meagre light.
Expression grim, she traced the silvery line with the tip of her finger. “That should have killed you.”
It was the work of a moment to take her hand and slide it beneath the right side of my robe. There, with her palm against my skin, my heart beat more strongly.
“Lucky. Did they know?”
“I’ve never known for sure.”
I let her go, but Kimiko took no step back. She stayed staring at the silk as though she could still see the scar through it. “I know what lonely feels like,” she said, stepping closer. “All my life, people have used me to get near my brother, liking and fearing me only for my name. After a while, it’s easier to just stop letting people in.”
“Easier still to let them think you’re the reawakened dead,” I said and laughed at the extreme lengths I’d gone to push people away.
Kimiko tilted her head in the way she often did, and taking my arm, she drew back my sleeve to expose skin. By the ease with which the blade came to her hand, it must have been tucked into her sash, and before I understood what she was doing, she nicked the inside of my arm. It stung and blood bloomed.
“Not only does he have a heart, he bleeds,” she said, and when blood trickled down my arm, she traced its trail with her tongue, licking me clean. Her curls danced under my nose as she sucked blood out of me, and I closed my eyes as the tip of her tongue ran back down my arm.
I hardened against her. She had to be able to feel it, but she neither blushed nor pulled away, just ended her tease with a soft, lingering kiss upon my lips.
This is too dangerous, I told myself. Walk away now. You like her too much.
But I stayed where I was, defying the fear that tormented me as I had defied the path set before me by my blood.
Your Empathy need not define you, Darius.
“We could keep each other company for the night,” she breathed against my cheek. “Better than being alone.”
I had grown up alone, unloved, untouched, a weed growing in barren soil, until Malice had found me and set my soul on fire. That had been dangerous then and this was dangerous now, but I could not push her away.
“Alone is safer,” I said though I stood my ground.
“No, alone is just easier.”
The truth of her words pierced me deeper than I had thought possible. But here she was, offering physical companionship like a balm, not seeking to own or possess or consume, only to be, and the compassion, the humanity, the true empathy of it was intoxicating. When she lifted her lips it was not just my loneliness she sought to allay, but her own, and on those terms I had no weapons left to fight my soul-deep yearning for intimacy.
She kissed me again, and this time I ran my hands up her back and into the glorious mass of her hair. She leant into me, seeming to revel in this moment of letting go as much I did, and all lingering fear fled as she slid her hands up my thighs. One pressed between my legs and I moaned against her lips. It had been so long since I’d last lain with anyone that even through the layers of silk, her touch was exhilarating. I dropped onto the cushions and lay back, her dark curls spreading like a crown. My whole body seemed to pound in time to my rapid heartbeat as she opened her robes, exposing smooth skin and small breasts, her nipples pinched taut in the cool air. They rose and fell with every breath, and as much in challenge as invitation, Kimiko parted her legs.
I shed both outer and under-robes onto the floor with a shrug and grasped her hips, dragging her toward me. She weighed nothing, but the ferocity with which she gripped my hair belonged to a larger, stronger woman.
The philosopher Misi had once said anticipation was the greatest enjoyment, that instant before fulfilment that sent the senses tingling, but looking down at her—inviting me, desiring me—was torture. I could not wait another moment and, closing my eyes, I guided myself inside her. I had forgotten what it felt like, the initial sensation so overwhelming that I gasped, digging my fingers into her skin. Kimiko gave a throaty chuckle and drew me deeper, a challenge in her mocking smile.
Accepting it, I thrust hard, only for her to grip my hair and bite the taut skin of my throat. But she did not stop there. With every movement I made, she cut my skin with her nails and tore at my lip with her teeth, and refusing to let her have it all her own way, I gripped a handful of her hair and pulled hard. Crying out, she dragged her fingernails down my back.
All sense of time vanished as we fought for mastery. The night might have given way to a new day and I would not have cared. There was nothing but her, nothing but her strength and her pride, nothing but the way she purred and bit, burying her soul deeper beneath my skin with every touch. She courted the animal inside me, unafraid, and I never wanted it to end. But my body yearned toward the finish, our flesh moving in unison, panting in time in the close air.
I had thought the end far off, but suddenly her grip tightened. She tensed, a pained cry breaking through her lips. I felt her pleasure, felt it fuel my own until our joint rapture shuddered through us, shared through our skin.
As my joy fed back into her, Kimiko screamed, and afraid someone would hear her, I pressed my hand over her mouth and she gripped my wrist, holding it there, each breath hot against my palm. Together our hearts beat a tattoo of fading pleasure, and when there was nothing left but a lingering glow, I lifted my hand.
Eyes still wide, she scoured my face. “That was the strangest and most amazing thing I think I’ve ever felt,” she said, an unusually self-conscious laugh chasing her words. “And you think being an Empath is all monstrous.” She lifted her hips into me, eliciting a moan from both our lips. “Where have you been all my life, Darius?”
Chapter 12
Endymion
Kaze rode like the wind he’d been named for, speeding over the landscape. From the thick forests around Koi, we climbed into the foothills of the Kuro Mountains where streams trickled down the hillside. There I could look out over the vast expanse of the empire as though I sat at the feet of the gods, but it was Hope I thought of, sitting atop a tumbledown roof and daydreaming of another world. Another life.
Afraid of being followed, we stopped only to eat and rest, although my mind was often too noisy to find sleep. On the rare occasions it claimed me, I dreamed of dead men. Lines of them stretching into the darkness, the number of souls awaiting judgement as numerous as the trees growing in the shadow of the hills. And even beneath the noontime sun, I would wake cold and shivering.
South. Darius is south.
The days passed unnumbered, disappearing beneath Kaze’s feet.
In all our travels, Jian had avoided the Valley, and as we entered its northern reaches, I finally understood why. The Laroth estate at Esvar was no place to take Lord Nyraek Laroth’s bastard son when such pains had been taken to prove him dead. I knew it was my destination as soon as I saw the untamed hills and the steep mountainsides cut with terraces.
Darius had gone home. Now I was going home too.
The town of Esvar sat nestled between two hills, its watercolour houses and rambling streets cut by a sparkling stream. This was wild country, full of sharp black crags and dense thickets of bamboo, of steep rocky slopes and twisted trees. The people of the Valley had long ago given up trying to tame it, instead growing their crops upon the mountainside, each slope a glittering tower in green and brown and gold.
One thousand seven hundred and four souls inhabited these fields and groves, basking beneath a beneficent blue sky. And then there was Darius.
Kaze started down the hill. Whispers came to me on the air with the s
mells of civilisation, of stagnant paddies and refuse-filled ditches, of shrine incense and smoke.
Baan hasn’t come in yet. What can be keeping him?
If we don’t fix the roof soon, the storms will wash it into our beds.
Someone needs to take a whip to those boys.
By the grace of the gods.
Kaze walked on, following a worn track in the dry grass. It brought us to the town’s outskirts where a boy was foraging. He had a load of sticks caught beneath one arm and was bent double in the grass at the base of a pear tree. He must have heard me approach, for he looked up, eyeing me askance. Then his gaze found Kaze. Awe lit his face.
“Good evening,” I said.
“E’en, m’lord,” the boy replied, not glancing up from Kaze. “That’s a fine trampler you have there. He must have cost you a fortune.”
“Not a fortune,” I answered. “Just a friend. I was hoping you could tell me how to find the Laroth estate.”
This drew his interest away from Kaze. “What you want it for?” His gaze fixed on the traitor’s brand marring my cheek. “You here to kill the lord?”
“No, I’m visiting. He’s a… friend.”
By his expression, I might have just announced my intention to light the town on fire. “You a ghost?”
“A ghost? No, why? Do I look like a ghost?”
“Not so much, but Mama says only ghosts live there. People say it’s haunted. I’ve heard the lord is back and putting things in order though, so maybe he’s turfed them all out.”
He seemed enamoured of the idea and might have elaborated had I not asked him where I would find the haunted house.
The boy jerked his head in the direction of a hill to the west, above which the sun was slowly setting. “Up there. Not far. Can’t miss it. Just look f’the tree.”
With a nod of thanks, I left him to his work, touching Kaze’s neck to set him walking again. He was tired and so was I, but we had come too far to stop now.
The track that led up the side of the hill was overgrown, grass sprouting between old stones. Woody shrubs blocked the way, and more than once I had to dismount, leaving Kaze to push his way through reaching branches, thorns and leaves catching on his mane. There were clumps of wild imperial roses and stands of willoweed, feathergrass, and jagged fern. No doubt they had been planted for decoration, but now nests of runners choked the ground like spiderwebs. Sprawling flowers had smothered more than one tree, filling the evening with a scent like jasmine.
By the time we reached the crest of the hill, the sun sat low on the horizon. Clouds cut the stained sky, and there amid overgrown gardens stood the home of my ancestors. Low and sprawling, it covered a plateau between steeply sloping hills, an enormous complex encircled by a crumbling wall. A welcome garden sat before the open gates, and like the path, it had been left to the decay of time. Questing tree roots had buckled the carriageway, and tall weeds all but hid the garden beds from view. The boy had told me to look for the tree, and it was hard to miss. It seemed to rise from the house itself, growing through the roof of some long-neglected room.
Kaze tossed his head. “I know,” I said. “But there must be a stable. You might even have company.”
Though it was crumbling in places, the wall was easily twice my height, built of dark stone and chunks of black glass. Terracotta tiles ran around the top, each engraved with the eight limbs of a reaching spider.
Kaze stopped before the open gate, backing with a snort. “Don’t worry, nothing’s going to hurt you,” I said. “It’s just a house.” I dismounted, patting his nose, and he let me lead him through the gate and down into a paved central courtyard. It was large and open to the sky but for a portico that ran around its outer edge. Fine fretwork might once have made patterns from the sun, but now it was barely visible beneath the rampant spread of wisteria, its flowers blooming in white and pink and purple. The smell was strong enough to make me wish I did not need to breathe.
A channel cut through the courtyard and Kaze stopped to drink, dipping his nose into its sluggish water. “Stay here,” I said, patting his neck. “I’ll be back soon.”
He made no sound, but I heard his thoughts.
“Of course I’ll feed you,” I said. “Have I failed to do so yet?”
Making no further complaint, he went on drinking, and I let his reins fall, knowing he would not wander.
From behind the house, the setting sun glowed like an aura, igniting the terracotta roof to blood red. The manor had been built in the traditional style and had surely been a masterpiece before rot had claimed it. Paint flaked, the roof was missing tiles, and ornamental window frames stood empty. Only one large circular window remained unbroken, glaring like a dark eye upon my intrusion. From the courtyard, other doors led to other buildings, cookhouses and shrines, but each was as dark and lifeless as the large house in front of me.
I stood hesitant upon the threshold.
“Hello?” I said. “Darius?”
I stepped in, dry air prickling my throat. Darius was here somewhere, I knew, but I wasn’t sure my Empathy could guide me through a maze.
With tentative steps, I made my way along a passage, peering into every room. They all looked the same, owning no sign of life beyond the spreading moss and the scattering of clawed feet. Even my breath seemed to echo, and when I stopped, my footsteps carried on as though the house wished to lure me deeper.
At the next turning, I stopped in a pool of faint light. Whispers filled the air, barely audible like the rustling of dry leaves. Formless. Voiceless.
I pushed out my Empathy, but I could feel nothing. Perhaps Darius wasn’t here at all and I had just been sensing the house, a house desperate for company, for another Laroth to trap forever inside its string of empty rooms and winding passages. It sounded mad, but turning on the spot in the smothering shadows, I could believe it.
“Darius!”
No reply. No echo, the sound eaten by rotting wood. I walked on with quickened steps, trying to shake my fearful thoughts. It was just a house.
Taking a turn at random, I found light spilling through an open doorway and sped forward in search of life, but it was just the last of the sunset gilding a dozen broken windows in a long gallery. No sign of Darius, but the light shone upon a wall of portraits. The first had begun to fade, but it had been painted in the old style, its minuscule brushstrokes still holding a wealth of detail. The artist had depicted a grand magnolia just opening its petals, and beneath it, a fine-looking man sat astride a pale horse. His name ought to have been at the bottom of the scroll, but it had been torn away, leaving a crooked edge. Instead, words had been painted straight onto the wall beneath.
Ma’Li Laroth, the First Count of Esvar.
The son of a wild mountain man and a merchant’s daughter.
He blackmailed the Emperor into bestowing a noble title upon him,
all because he caught His Imperial Majesty kissing his own niece.
I stared at the rough calligraphy and read it again. It said the same thing the second time. A glance along the gallery was enough to see ink stained the wall beneath each scroll, like the house had spawned its owner’s dark secrets in retribution.
The next was a portrait of a woman, her bearing proud though her stare was vacuous. She held an overfed dog in her arms, while two children sat at her feet.
Lady Seraphine Laroth, Countess of Esvar.
Her dog Lion and her two children: Yuko and Raef Laroth.
While all sources claim her to have been a loving wife and devoted mother, this was also said about Lady Barin, who murdered her husband in his sleep.
Lady Laroth committed the more heinous crime of mothering the child of another man.
Yuko lacked the Mark and the Sight.
Seraphine Laroth was nothing but a wanton whore dressed as a lady.
I walked on. Unknown Laroths passed before my gaze, each a proud boy grown into a proud man flanked by numerous wives. All had secrets, no one safe from the damning
strokes of the writer’s brush.
Eventually, I came to the fourth count of Esvar—my grandfather. There was something about the set of his features that reminded me strongly of Malice, but by this time, I was more interested in reading the flourishing characters than looking at the portraits.
Ellar Laroth, the Fourth Count of Esvar.
Notable only for his lack of wit, charm, intelligence, and bravery.
This snivelling wreck, who could not call himself a man,
was the reason for the continuation of the Sight.
May justice never allow him to rest in his grave.
Hypnotised, I could not stop. I had to read them, as though by doing so I might solve some great riddle, unlocking the secrets Malice and Darius kept close.
The next portrait was our grandmother, a beautiful woman full of quiet grace. Her name was missing from the erratic scrawl, only one word painted in its place.
Bitch.
My heart leapt into my throat as I stepped to the next portrait. There, looking down at me from the canvas, was the man who had taken me to Brother Jian all those years ago. Nyraek Laroth. He needed no explanation. The Imperial Protector. Lover of Empress Li and father of Darius, Malice, and myself, each to a different woman.
Lord Nyraek Laroth.
The Sight is strong with him.
It grows stronger every day.
May there be an end soon.
May the darkness come.
I stared at the wall for a long time, thinking of how much Darius had wanted to die at Koi, how happy he had been as I drew him out of his skin. His father had wished for death too.
Only two portraits remained. Beside Nyraek was a beautiful woman, her features so fine and flawless one could easily see where Darius had inherited his perfect face.
Lady Melia Laroth, mother to Esvar’s last heir.
She had not the Mark, but it took her from this world.
It saw her bleed to death upon the cursed birth of a child that never wanted to live.