Dark Skies

by Danielle L. Jensen

Most of the girls of Malahi’s day guard were sprawled across the furniture of the parlor, a fire roaring beneath the thick stone of the mantle. It was rare for Lydia to be here at this time of night. She nearly always met Killian for training after she’d eaten dinner with the other girls—and he with Malahi—after which they’d meet up with Finn to see to the well-being of the orphans in the sewers. It was always close to the second or third hour of the morning before she’d creep back inside the barracks, silently falling into the bed in the room she shared with Gwen and Lena for a few hours of sleep.

  But tonight Killian had some other matter that required his attention, and he’d been insistent she not meet with the orphans alone. “They’ll be fine for one night,” he’d said, having caught her alone in the servants’ stairwell. “And I don’t want us to have gotten this far only to have you caught or killed days before setting sail for Serlania.”

  Part of her had wanted to go anyway out of fear that there might be a child waiting for her, that someone might die while she lounged around drinking cheap wine with the other girls, but in the end she’d conceded that Killian was right. She was too close to jeopardize her chance at reaching Serlania.

  Though by all rights, she could have been on her way already.

  Guilt filled Lydia’s chest at the thought, but despite her best attempts, she couldn’t push it away. For some time now, she’d been able to control her mark. Been able to assess the sick and injured children without Hegeria’s power taking control, and once she did decide to use her mark she could direct it to heal only that which required urgent attention. If she could do that, there was no reason she couldn’t control it well enough to bypass Quindor’s testers on the docks, and the coins Killian had given her, along with the wages she’d earned, were more than enough to pay for passage.

  Yet here she remained.

  She told herself that it was because it was too risky. That it was better to get back to Celendor late than never. That her control over her mark wasn’t certain, something proven by Killian testing her with whatever injuries he garnered during their training, which she inevitably healed despite her best efforts.

  Have they been your best efforts?

  She bit down on the insides of her cheeks, uncertain about the answer. Uncertain whether her failure was more purposeful than she cared to admit.

  Tying off one of Lena’s braids with a bit of twine, Lydia paused in the task to press a hand against the ring hanging between her breasts, the feel of it comforting. The ring her father had given her. The ring she’d sold to try to get back to Teriana. The ring Killian had paid a fortune to give back to her because he’d known how much it meant …

  You are a terrible friend, she silently accused herself. And a worse daughter.

  “What do you think, Lydia?”

  The sound of her name pulled Lydia from her self-flagellation of her character, and she looked up to find the other girls staring at her. “Pardon?”

  “I thought he was awfully liberal with his hands,” Gwen said.

  “Who?”

  “High Lord Calorian.” Gwen frowned at her. “Haven’t you been listening?”

  “Sorry, I was lost in thought.” Frowning, Lydia divided the hair on the other side of Lena’s head into sections, considering Killian’s brother. As uncomfortable as the attention had made her, Lydia had spent enough time around political men of Hacken Calorian’s sort to know that it had nothing to do with attraction and everything to do with demonstrating power. And she suspected it had nothing to do with her and everything to do with either Killian or Malahi, perhaps both.

  “I thought he was kind to show interest in us,” Brin muttered. “We spend all day watching over Malahi and her ladies, and not one has ever so much as asked me my name.”

  Lena laughed and Lydia tugged on her hair to keep her still. “Gods, Brin. You don’t want women like Helene Torrington knowing your name. And even a farm girl like you should know by now that if a man pays you a squirt of attention, it means he wants something. High Lord Calorian was likely just buttering us up to please Her Highness.”

  “Quit gossiping about your betters, you damned foolish girls.”

  Every head in the room turned to watch Bercola enter, an oversized cup in one hand and a teapot in the other.

  “They aren’t better.” Gwen scrunched up her face. “They’re just rich enough to make everyone think so.”

  “Philosophical enlightenment from Gwen—my day is made and I shall rest easily.” The giantess shooed one of the girls out of her chair. “How about this: Quit gossiping about those powerful enough to make your life difficult should they not like what you say.”

  “You know the Calorians best,” Lena said, ignoring Bercola’s warning. “What’s Hacken like?”

  “He’s ambitious and nothing like Killian, so don’t presume to know one because you know the other.”

  “Nothing wrong with ambition,” Brin said. “Won’t get far in life without it.”

  “Drop the subject.”

  “So you’re saying he wants to be king?” Lena persisted.

  Bercola glared malevolently at the pretty girl. “If I tell you a bedtime story about the Calorians, do you promise to go to sleep and leave me in peace?”

  Lena grinned and nodded. “Tell us about how you came to be in their service.”

  “Fine. Fine.” Bercola leaned back in her chair. “I was part of a landing party during the last war between Eoten Isle and Mudamora. We’d rowed up into the swamps with the intent of coming at Serlania from the rear, but we were set upon by High Lord Calorian’s forces. The former High Lord, not the one Brin’s mooning after.”

  Brin’s cheeks turned bright red and she crossed her arms but said nothing.

  “Anyway, the bastards rained arrows down upon our boats and there was little to be done, sitting ducks that we were. So we jumped in the water, trying to escape by swimming upstream beneath the murk. Unfortunately, the waters down there are rife with crocs. Damned creatures finished what the Mudamorians started.”

  “But what about you?” Lena demanded.

  “Shut your gob, girl; I’m getting to that.” Bercola took a sip from her steaming cup. “I was swimming hard toward the bank when one of the crocs caught me by the leg. A big bastard it was, and every time I got out of the water it dragged me back. Jaws like a damned vise.”

  Her jaw tightened, and Lydia thought she must be remembering the pain.

  “Figured I was done for, then twang!” She half-shouted the word and all the girls jumped. “Arrow straight into the beast’s eye. And I looked up to find the High Lord himself, bow in hand. Without saying a damned word, he came down and pried the beast’s jaws open and then dragged me up the bank, all his soldiers watching on. I was certain that they’d do their best to extract what information they needed and then string me up—but he just walked away.”

  “That’s it?” Lena demanded. “But how—”

  “Quiet!” all the girls shouted, including Lydia, and Bercola lifted her teacup in salute.

  “I watched him walk away while I bled into the mud and I shouted after him, ‘Finish the job, you Mudamorian coward!’”

  All the girls leaned forward. “What did he say?” Lydia finally asked, curiosity getting the better of her.

  “He said,” Bercola replied, taking a long pause, “that anyone who fought that hard to live deserved the chance to do so.”

  That sounds like something Killian would say, Lydia thought. Like something Killian would do.

  “At any rate, the gods in their infinite mercy decided not to take my soul that day or in the days after, leaving me with the predicament of owing a life debt to a Mudamorian. So once I recovered, I had to track him down and explain as much. He told me the only thing he had need for was a bodyguard for his youngest son, and I, in my infinite foolishness, didn’t question why he’d struggled to find someone willing to take the job. In hindsight, I should’ve let the crocodile eat me.”

  All the girls
laughed, but Lydia was still curious. “Why do the giants go to war so frequently?” She’d heard that it was because they had vile, aggressive tempers, but Bercola had anything but.

  “Because it’s good fun chopping off Mudamorian heads.”

  Lydia eyed the giantess for a long moment and then shook her head. “What’s the true reason, if you don’t mind me asking?”

  Allowing Lena to fill her teacup, Bercola stared at the contents for a long moment, then shrugged. “We do it to celebrate the marking of a new summoner.”

  All the girls were paying attention now. Gespurn only marked giants, much as Madoria only marked the Maarin, and from what Lydia could determine, the nature of those marks was not well understood by those outside the two peoples.

  “There are never more than twenty-four summoners alive at any given time,” Bercola continued. “When one passes on to the gods, a year must always pass until another is marked by Gespurn. In that year, we are mandated to be vigilant, lest the winds over the Endless Seas rise while our summoners are weakened. Only when the twenty-fourth is marked are we allowed to turn our spears to sport.”

  Lydia shivered at the mention of the winds over the Endless Seas. Or the lack thereof. In Celendor, they called the stretches running north to south the doldrums. They were what prevented the Empire from exploring the limits of the Endless Seas—likely all that had kept them from discovering the existence of the Dark Shores. The Colleges believed them naturally occurring, albeit inexplicable, phenomena, but hearing Bercola’s words made Lydia suspect it was the work of Gespurn and his Marked.

  Shaking her head to clear away the thought, Lydia asked, “Is twenty-four a significant number?”

  Bercola shrugged. “On Eoten Isle, it is said that there must be balance between the gods, and thus there must be balance between the Marked.” She set aside her cup. “Hegeria’s mark is strong but is tempered by the great toll it takes, so she is generous with her gift. Yara and Lern grant untempered power to their Marked, and thus are more moderate in their gifting. Madoria gifts her chosen with the ability to breathe under the sea, but also to manipulate it, which has far-reaching effects. But to command the elements? To be able to turn the skies into a weapon? That is a vast power for one individual to hold.”

  Lydia frowned. “It makes a certain sense, but what of Tremon’s mark?” All eyes shifted to her, so she added quickly, “Not that Kil—err, the captain isn’t impressive in his skill, but no matter how good he is with a sword, surely that doesn’t rival the power to control a storm?”

  Bercola’s colorless eyes regarded the steam rising from her cup for a long time. Then she said, “You are correct that a sword is nothing compared to a storm, but you are incorrect to presume that weapons and martial prowess are the limits of Tremon’s Marked Ones.”

  Outside, the deimos screamed, the steady thump of their wings audible even through the walls, but Lydia paid them no mind, her attention all for the giantess.

  “We look to the Six for protection,” Bercola continued, “and in this there are none we look to more than Tremon’s Marked. Theirs are both the most miraculous of achievements and the most catastrophic of failures, for there is no power on Reath that rivals that of a leader of men.”

  44

  KILLIAN

  Hammer and chisel in hand, Killian chipped away at the mortar surrounding the block of stone, channeling his irritation into his construction project.

  The corridors of the palace were heavy with the cloying scent of the countless tropical flowers Hacken had brought with him, Malahi’s rooms filled with candies and chocolates and expensive wine, much to the delight of her ladies, whom he flirted with outrageously. But Hacken was no fool. True to his word, he’d brought a small fortune’s worth of food and supplies, all of which had been carefully distributed throughout the city by the soldiers Hacken had brought—all of it touted as gifts from Princess Malahi Rowenes.

  Not that the people in the city didn’t know exactly where—and whom—all the goods had come from. The Calorian banner hung above the palace, its white horse galloping next to the Rowenes scorpion, and the lone ship in the harbor flew the same.

  It drove Killian mad that Malahi and Hacken were playing at politics, courting the favor of starving people in order to further themselves. But that wasn’t what had his temper in a fire. It was the way Hacken had put his hands on Lydia that morning. It had nothing to do with her being pretty and everything to do with Hacken abusing his power. He’d done it because he could. Because he was a High Lord and above consequences.

  Killian slammed his hammer against the chisel and was rewarded with a satisfying crunch as the block came loose. Bracing his heel against it, he shoved the block into the next room, eyeing the wall for a few moments to make sure it wouldn’t all come toppling down on him.

  To top off his day, three wagons’ worth of injured soldiers had returned to Mudaire from the front lines. Men who’d lost limbs or been incapacitated in a way that couldn’t be mended by a healer’s touch and thus were of no use to Serrick on the battlefield. They’d been bandaged and loaded into wagons, and when Killian had met the caravan at the city gates half of them were near death from infection. Some of them were dead, the flies of war swarming thick as the wagons had trundled through the city streets toward Hegeria’s temple, civilians stopping in their tracks to watch them pass.

  They should have been easy pickings for the deimos and other fell beasts that roamed the night, but the wounded soldiers had made the entire journey to Mudaire unmolested, and if it all hadn’t made Killian sick to his stomach he might have applauded Rufina’s strategy. She’d break the hearts and minds of every person in Mudaire, so when she finally reached the city walls there’d be no fight left within them.

  He was about to start loosening another block when his skin prickled with the sense he was being watched. Dropping the chisel, Killian retrieved his sword and scanned the empty ballroom. The exits were all secured, the drapes pulled shut across the expansive windows and doors leading to the balcony. Lifting the blade, he walked toward one of the curtains and was about to draw it back when a knock sounded on the door.

  “It’s Hacken.”

  Scowling, Killian dropped the curtain and started toward the entrance. He lifted up the beam he’d recently installed and cracked the door open. “What?”

  His brother stood in the hallway, a bottle of whiskey and two glasses in hand. “It’s three in the morning, Killian, and it sounds like you’re trying to pull the palace down on our heads. Since sleeping through it wasn’t an option, I decided to keep you company.”

  “You could always go stay at your house.” Not that Killian wanted that. It would mean losing his place for training Lydia. He’d had to miss seeing her tonight in favor of this particular task, and he didn’t want to lose his last chances to spend time alone with her. She was both his respite from the world and his ally in saving this corner of it, and the fact that their days together were numbered troubled him more than it should.

  “Both the deimos and the threat of squatters make staying at the house rather inconvenient. Now let me in.”

  It was tempting to slam the door in his face. But Killian was smart enough to know that Hacken wasn’t here because he couldn’t sleep.

  Opening the door enough that his brother could pass, Killian shut and barred it, crossing back over to his abandoned tools.

  “What in the underworld … Are you making a hole in the wall of the Rainbow Ballroom?”

  Killian grunted an affirmative. “Escape route. Didn’t like the available options, so I decided to make my own.”

  Hacken eyed the wall warily. “How do you know the whole wall won’t collapse?”

  “I don’t.” Killian hefted his hammer. “But sometimes you need to roll the dice.”

  With one block removed, the work was easier, and within the hour Killian had a pile of stone sitting next to him and a hole in the wall leading into the adjoining chamber. Motioning for Hacken to follow
, Killian ducked under and, when Hacken was through, pulled up the heavy Gamdeshian carpet to reveal a trapdoor. “This was already here,” he said. “Leads into a storage room in the lower level. Two doors down is the access to the underground tunnels. Tide will be low while the party is underway, so the cave opening will be clear.”

  Hacken nodded approvingly. “Boats?”

  “Two. Both already supplied. If things sour the night of the ball, stay with Malahi. Bercola knows the plan.”

  His brother was silent for a long moment as Killian replaced the carpet. Then he said, “I’m surprised you’re including me in your escape plans.”

  It would be tempting to leave Hacken to fend for himself for once, but their mother would never forgive Killian if he let his older brother get killed. “I’ll have plans for all the High Lords. Our lot won’t be improved if all of you are dead.”

  “I’m touched by your sentiment.”

  Killian snorted, then motioned for Hacken to go back through the hole. Pushing the backless cabinet in front of the opening, Killian climbed through, shutting the doors behind him. He carefully tacked the panel of silk back to the wooden casement, then straightened and turned to the pile of stone. “You going to help or just stand there and watch?”

  “That seems like a you job.” Hacken eyed the mess on the floor. “I’ll sweep.”

  Sighing, Killian pulled off his already-sweaty shirt and set to carrying the heavy blocks of stone out onto the balcony, where he tossed them over the edge. The cool night air was blissful against his overheated skin, and the wind coming off the sea drove away the stink of the blight. When he went back in, Hacken had finished sweeping up the dust and crumbled mortar and was holding Killian’s sword, the blade glinting in the lamplight. It was a struggle not to snatch it out of his hands.

  “His armor and ashes came back to Serlania, but not this.”

  Killian shrugged. “He left instructions. I got the sword. Sel got the Serlania house. You got everything else.”

  “Father never cared much about everything else.” Hacken’s voice was light, but Killian heard the bitterness. The resentment.