“Please find your seats according to the arrangement,” Bellona was saying. “Ah, here I am.” She plumped herself down at the head of the oval table. “And let’s see.” She peered at the card for the place next to hers, then raised her head with a devastating smile as Adechike settled in on the other side of the empty place. “Kris? This is you.”
Kris felt the blood heat their face in a rush. They were too incensed to speak. In that moment of rustling silence, they heard a sudden clamor from the hall.
“Warder Avitus!” A servant slid into the dining room, looking terrified. “Warder Avitus, come quickly!”
“What is it?” Bellona rose, her face a study in fury and concern.
“It’s Warder Kante! He’s been hurt!”
Bellona moved, but Adechike was there before her. “Where is he?” he demanded, and followed the servant out in a half run.
Kris passed Bellona and caught up to Adechike by the embassy entrance. “Is he badly hurt?” they asked. The servant didn’t answer, and Adechike didn’t glance at them; Kris didn’t know if it was a snub or if he was simply unaware of their presence.
It had started to rain since they’d entered the embassy, and the pavement outside was dark and slick, reflecting the glow of the whale-oil streetlamps. Kris turned up the collar of their coat, but they didn’t have far to go. Trembling, the servant pointed to a crumpled heap just outside the pool of light from a streetlamp a block away.
With a cry, Adechike ran toward it—him. For as Kris got closer, they could see it was Ojo, curled on his side in a puddle of slowly spreading blood.
Episode 10
Shattered Blades
By Marie Brennan
Chapter 1
Ojo
Pain. His thoughts lurched back to it, again and again, a volcanic force that would not let him think of anything else. The world swam every time he opened his eyes, red-hazed and indistinct; it was so much easier to just close them and let the pain claim his undivided attention. But every time he did that, he felt himself slipping, red giving way to black. And so he clawed his way back up, again and again, fighting against the current that wanted to drag him down forever.
In those moments, fragments came through.
Adechike. On his knees, reaching out in horror, and some delirious part of Ojo’s mind wanted to tell him that he was ruining his clothing, blood soaking up to stain the fabric forever. Even the embassy’s laundry workers, accustomed to dealing with bloodstains, would have trouble with that.
And then an eruption of white-hot agony from his right arm, while Adechike whispered, Gods, Ojo, stay with me—we have to stop the bleeding—
No, it wasn’t Adechike. It was someone else, a woman he recognized, but her name wouldn’t come to him. He wasn’t on the ground, lying in a pool of blood; he was in bed, and he’d just had the most terrible nightmare. He wanted to tell her about it, but she was tipping a cup of something thin and bitter down his throat, so he couldn’t talk. When he coughed up half the liquid, she just tried again.
You have to save his arm.
That wasn’t her. Someone else. Takeshi? Ojo couldn’t see. His eyelids were too heavy, like Quloo stripped of aerstone.
I have to save his life. Everything else comes after that.
Penelope, that was her name. Ojo’s sister Ihuoma laid a cool cloth on his brow, and he smiled up at her. What was she doing here? Or was he home on Quloo at last? Takeshi held him down when he tried to get up. Normally he could pin Takeshi with one hand tied behind his back, but he was weak, so weak. Like all the life had drained out of him. The darkness was beckoning again, and he couldn’t resist it any longer.
But at least the pain didn’t follow him down.
•••
When he opened his eyes again, the world still swam in his vision, but he could think.
The pain had faded to a medley of dull and distant aches. Only one stood out: his right arm. But when he tried to lift it and see, Takeshi was there, stopping him with a gentle hand and an expression that said he’d done this more than once already.
A bitter taste lingered on Ojo’s tongue. Laudanum. He struggled to speak. “I’m . . . alive.”
Takeshi let go and brought him a cup of water. Even swallowing that was almost too much; the laudanum made it difficult to breathe, like a ramwhul was sitting on his chest. He had to pause for air between sips. Finally Takeshi set the cup aside and said, in a rough, strained voice, “What happened?”
Someone had taken the memories and tossed them around like confetti, but they were still there. Veiled attackers. Too many of them for Ojo to hold off, even with two blades. He’d sold himself as dear as he could, but in the end . . .
Telling that took even longer than drinking the water had, for the same reasons and more besides. “Who were they?” Takeshi asked when he was done.
Ojo shook his head and immediately regretted it. Even that small movement sent a rush of pain down his arm and made the room waltz around him. “I didn’t see faces.”
“But there must have been something. Their fighting style, maybe, or their clothing—”
Assassins wouldn’t be foolish enough to wear identifying marks. And it was one thing to analyze style while facing someone in the dueling arena; quite another to do it while defending against what seemed like a dozen blades at once.
But there was something.
“Their voices,” Ojo said.
Takeshi sat up sharply. “You recognized them?”
He remembered in time not to shake his head. “Not directly. But when they called out to each other—their accents—”
The rest caught in his throat. Even hazed with laudanum, he knew these words would start him down a path he couldn’t come back from.
No—not start. He’d said it already, in his delirium. Takeshi must not have heard him; had anyone else?
You can’t hold it back. Not this. Not now.
Ojo whispered, “They sounded Rumikan.”
Takeshi’s expression settled like stone. He might not be the best in a duel, but he was no political innocent, unable to read the implications of that for himself.
Ojo couldn’t face those implications. Not right now. “Where’s Penelope?”
A muffled sound burst from Takeshi. “You’re not saying she was—”
Was what? One glacial step at a time, Ojo pieced it together. “She— No, no, gods no. I thought . . . She helped treat me. Made me drink the laudanum.”
The other warder sagged back in his chair. “No, that was Maduenu. Your physician. Penelope is still on Vania.”
His words snuffed the tiny flame of hope that had burned inside Ojo. Of course. Penelope was on Vania, where she was needed. Needed by people other than him. He knew that.
In a dust-dry whisper, he requested more water. “I should let you sleep,” Takeshi said afterward.
“Were you there?” Ojo asked.
“Was I where?”
“Here,” he said, none too clearly. “I thought I remembered you. When I was . . .” They both knew what had nearly happened. Ojo made himself say it: “Dying.”
Takeshi’s expression was haunted. “I—I tied off your right arm with a tourniquet to keep you from bleeding out. I did what I could until Maduenu got here, but it—” He stood abruptly, bowing low. “Please forgive me. I should have done more.”
Ojo’s throat closed up. He’d been trying to ignore it this whole time, but now he made himself lift his head and look down at his own body, swathed in bandages.
His arm was still there.
“You’ll keep it,” Takeshi hurried to say, realizing what Ojo had thought. “Maduenu says so, anyway, though she wasn’t optimistic at first. But—it’s damaged. A bad cut to your forearm. The muscles and tendons may not recover.” His face crumpled again. “I’m so sorry.”
It wasn’t his fault. Ojo tried to say so, but the words wouldn’t come. After an agonizing moment, Takeshi said, “I should tell Maduenu that you woke up.”
> He was almost at the door when Ojo found his voice again. “Where is Adechike?”
Takeshi didn’t turn to face him. “Gone. Once he knew you would live, he—he left.”
Adechike wouldn’t do that. Wouldn’t abandon Ojo. Not unless duty required it somehow . . . or he’d heard something he shouldn’t.
The dead, heavy feeling came back. “Where did he go?”
Takeshi’s answer was nearly too soft to hear. “After the assassins. And Kris.”
Chapter 2
Michiko
The shrine was empty, but Michiko knew that was, in a sense, an illusion. It was the home of the ancestors: not just her own, but all of Kakute’s. Any trueborn child of the island could kneel here, call upon their forebears, and be answered.
She had spent months dreading this place, avoiding it whenever possible. Fearing what the Golden Lord would say to her, and how her other ancestors would respond.
Now her hands were steady as she removed the lid from her lacquered box.
The candles needed refreshing. She set new ones in place of the old, then straightened the little stand that held her family banner. It was toy-sized compared to the great banners carried onto the battlefield, and hung unmoving in the still air of the shrine. But thanks to the Golden Lord’s memories, she knew what the great ones had looked like during the war against Mertika.
She took a stick of nakul from her box, lit the incense, and set it before the banner. Then she draped her prayer beads over her hands, set her palms against each other, and recited the incantation of remembrance.
They came to her, all her ancestors—Aiko, Hiroaki, Takao, Megumi, Reiko—stretching to the fringes of those who could be called. Beyond two generations, it was usually impossible to make contact. She wished she could have spoken with more of those before her grandfather—those who had known Kakute as it was before Mertika came.
Perhaps they sensed something in her mood, because they did not immediately bombard her with questions or commands. Instead they waited, until at last the Golden Lord said, “What is it, child?”
Michiko’s posture was flawless, her hands as steady as the sun. She said, “It was Mertika. They destroyed the fleet. They began this war.”
Whispers and ghostly shudders. She could feel the Golden Lord’s pleasure and wrath: pleasure that his suspicions had been proved, and wrath against his hated conquerors. The rest of her ancestors, those loyal to Mertika, were less sure how to respond. Finally Hiroaki ventured a cautious reply. “Quloo is a great threat, after all. They once cut Zenatai from the sky—”
“Hundreds of years ago,” Michiko snapped. “And now they are sinking. Should the whole island be condemned for the crimes of their ancestors? And what of Rumika? What have they done to earn this kind of conflict—other than be successful? Mertika should admire their achievement. But the empire is riddled with hypocrisy, approving only of excellence when it benefits them. I discovered what they have done. Who wants to wager that they’ll applaud me for it?”
Silence from most of her ancestors. From the Golden Lord, a rich laugh.
“And you,” Michiko said, turning the force of her attention on him. “You may have ruled Kakute once—but you are also the man who lost. Who surrendered to Mertika, because you weren’t strong enough to beat them. I will accept your advice as I find merit in it, but do not think that I am about to bend my neck to your every demand. I know Mertika better than you do, because I have learned their ways.”
She expected fury. And for an instant there was a flicker of it, because even decades in prison had not acclimated Genji no Nobu to being commanded. But when he spoke, his tone was quiet. Even proud. “You have found your steel at last.”
Aiko’s quavering voice cut in. “But what are you going to do?”
Michiko’s hands tensed within their cage of beads. “I am going to tell the truth.”
Chapter 3
Kris
The Warders’ Circle wasn’t just empty. It was deserted.
Kris felt the absences. Kensuke, retired to Kakute. Penelope, returned home for the sake of her child’s birthright. Taro, so removed from the affairs of the Circle that he might as well not be on Twaa-Fei. Lavinia, gone to war—and good riddance to her, except that she would be lethal wherever she went, and now she wasn’t anywhere Kris could keep an eye on her.
Ojo. Rumor said he was dead; rumor said he had lost his arm; rumor said a thousand things, none of them good, and half of them blaming Rumika.
The Warders’ Circle was supposed to prevent this kind of thing. It gave the nations a way to settle their disputes without warfare, with the limited and ritualized violence of a duel. But that only worked if people believed in it. It was a game, and everyone had agreed to play by its rules.
Until they didn’t.
Sure, there were still warders on Twaa-Fei. Juniors thrust into the role of seniors, unwilling and unprepared and, worst of all, unsupported. Their nations had abandoned them to play out what remained of this farce, while behind that disintegrating cover of civility they prepared for and carried out war. What was Adechike here for, except to spy? What was Bellona apart from the empress’s mouthpiece? What could Cassia do, when her Trine wouldn’t even grant her the permanent title of senior warder?
What could Kris do?
They approached the table, one dragging step after another. The ritual swords lay in their grooves, radiating outward like a star. Seven swords. Less than a year ago it had been six.
Maybe it should have stayed that way.
Kris’s hand hovered just above the hilt of the Rumikan sword. If they had never come to Twaa-Fei . . . Before, there had been balance. Six warders, often deadlocked, but even stagnation was better than what the sky had now. Seven was unstable. That had been the proudest day of Kris’s life, winning the Gauntlet, joining the Circle and seeing the tablet expand, striking the trade deal with Ojo.
But everything they’d done had just made things worse.
“I should never have come,” Kris whispered. The words drifted through the silent, deserted chamber like a wind ghost. Rumika was better off before it had a warder. Or the Elders should have sent someone else—someone who wouldn’t have made Kris’s mistakes.
Their fingertips brushed the hilt of the sword, then wrapped around it. The blade was light as a feather in their strong grip, and yet it felt infinitely heavy.
The Tsukiseni had a sigil for moments like these. Kris had thought it pointless when they read about it; who would ever want to use such a thing? But now they understood. When you had failed this badly, when your deeds rendered everything the blade in your hand stood for into pitiful mockery . . . then perhaps the only right thing to do was to break it.
Kris’s grip tightened. The sigil was simple, just two crossing slashes, a grand circle above the head, and then a strike directly downward, driving the point to the floor. The work of a few seconds, and it would be done.
They couldn’t do it.
Biting their lip so hard it ached, Kris returned the blade to the table. Maybe someone else would pick it up someday and use it for good.
Then they turned and left the chamber, adding one more absence to the rest.
Chapter 4
Cassia
Cassia hated sickrooms. Penelope always insisted that a proper battlemistress should visit her soldiers when they were wounded, but that was just the seventy-ninth reason why Cassia would never be a proper battlemistress. It was one thing to inflict a wound in the heat of battle; afterward, when the rush of the fight had faded, the thought of it nauseated her. Flesh gaping open, or held together by silken stitches. The telltale foulness of an infected wound. And people lying helpless, so that she was never quite sure where to look or what to say.
But she represented Vania for now, and if there was one point on which she could live up to her people’s ideals, it was facing her duty.
All the embassies had guards, but in the Quloi complex, they were usually just a token presence. Now the
place made the Mertikan embassy look undefended. They’d failed their warder once by nearly letting him get killed; they weren’t going to let that happen again. Cassia approached slowly, keeping her hands in sight, and announced herself to the pair who detached themselves from the gate. One took the message inside, while the other kept watch over her, and two more continued to guard the entrance.
Step by cautious step, she was transferred through the layers of defense. The last doorkeeper was a woman Cassia had never seen before, who introduced herself as Maduenu Nagokwuka, the embassy physician. “If this is merely a sympathy call,” Nagokwuka said, “I will tell him you came. He isn’t strong enough to receive many visitors right now, and we need to save his energy for necessary matters.”
Would she have come in the middle of the night just to offer sympathy? Cassia held back the urge to snap that at the physician. “It’s necessary. I’m the warder pro tem for Vania, and the Trine has tasked me with conveying a message to Warder Kante. I will keep it as brief as I can, but unless Quloo has appointed Adechike as interim warder while Warder Kante recovers, I need to speak with him as soon as possible.”
Nagokwuka might be a manak in defense of her patient, but she wouldn’t stand in the way of official business. “Let me see if he’s awake.”
He wasn’t, but Cassia said she was willing to wait. Not long after that, Nagokwuka returned and beckoned for her to follow.
It was even worse than she expected. His skin looked dull and thin, as if he had aged twenty years in the blink of an eye. His left hand was wrapped in bandages, as was his entire right arm; the sheet over him did not lie smooth, but rippled where other injuries had been bound tight.
His eyes were the worst, though. They gazed half through her, as if he couldn’t muster the will to even focus. That might have been the laudanum, but it felt like more.
The Complete Season 1 Page 31