She had stood on the pinnacle of the world. She had ridden a dragon across the Abyss.
She could do this.
Her fear crushed, she moved faster. When she reached the end of the tree, her boots sank into mud.
“Nayimathun,” she shouted.
Only the roar of the water answered.
The case with the jewel was still on her sash. She was on the bank of a river, close to where it frothed into white rapids. If she had not been shocked awake in time, she would have been washed to her death. She pressed her back against a tree and slid to the ground.
She had fallen from the saddle. Either Nayimathun was looking for her, or she had fallen, too. If that was the case, she could not be far away.
This had to be the River Minara, which meant they had reached the Lasian Basin. She searched her memory for the maps she had seen as a child. The west of the country, she remembered, was covered by forest. That was where Loth had told her she would find the Priory.
Tané swallowed and blinked the water from her eyes. If she was to survive this, she would have to keep a clear head. The pistol was useless now it was wet, and her bow and sword had been attached to the saddle, but she still had a knife and the bladed wheels.
A few of her possessions had fallen with her. Tané crawled to the nearest bag and opened it with aching fingers. When she felt the compass in her hand, she let out a sigh of relief.
She gathered up as much as she could carry. Using a strip of her cloak, a branch, and a little sap, she fashioned a torch and kindled it with a spark from two stones. It might attract a few animals, but better to risk discovery than step on a snake, or fail to see a hunter in the dark.
The trees pressed close as conspirators. Just looking at them almost made her courage fail.
You have a dragon’s heart.
She paced into the forest, away from the roar of the Minara. Her boots sank into loam. It smelled the way Seiiki did after the plum rain. Rich and earthy. Comforting.
Her body was a half-drawn knife. Despite the familiar scent, the first steps were the hardest she had ever taken. She walked light-footed as a crane. When a twig snapped beneath her, birds of many colors took off from the trees. Before long, she found the damage to the canopy. Something large had fallen nearby. A few steps more, and her torch revealed a pool of silver blood.
Dragon blood.
The forest seemed set on hampering her progress. Hidden roots snared at her ankles. Once a branch crumbled beneath her, and she found herself up to her waist in swamp. She only just kept her grip on the torch, and it took far too long to prize herself free.
Her hand shook as she limped onward, following the trail of blood. From the amount that had been shed, Nayimathun was injured, but not badly enough to kill her. Her blood might still entice predators. The thought made Tané break into a run. In the East, tigers were sometimes bold enough to attack dragons, but the scent of Nayimathun would be strange to the animals of this forest. She prayed that would be enough to keep them at bay.
When she heard voices, she smothered the torch. An unfamiliar language. Not Lasian. She held her knife between her teeth and climbed a nearby tree.
Nayimathun was lying in a clearing. An arrow was embedded in her crown—the part of her that gave her the means to fly. Six figures were gathered around her, all in scarlet cloaks.
Tané tensed. One of the strangers was handling her bow, running her fingers over its limb. These must be the Red Damsels, the warriors of the Priory—and now they knew a dragonrider was close.
At any moment, one of them could plunge a sword into Nayimathun. She would be no match for them in this state.
After what seemed like hours, all but two of the Red Damsels disappeared into the trees. Now they were hunters, and Tané was their prey. Their sorcery might put her at a disadvantage, but even that did not make them all-powerful.
She dropped in silence from the tree. Her best weapon now was the element of surprise. She would get Nayimathun to safety, and then she would track one of the Red Damsels to the Priory.
Nayimathun opened one eye, and Tané knew that she had seen her. The dragon waited for her to creep nearer before she lashed her tail. In the precious moments the Red Damsels were distracted, Tané moved like a shadow toward them. She caught sight of dark eyes beneath a hood—eyes as dark as her own—and for the strangest moment, she felt as if the sun was on her face.
The feeling died as soon as she got close. She attacked with every drop of her strength. The first swing of her wheel nicked skin, but a blade snapped up to deflect the second, jarring her arm to the shoulder. The force of the collision rang through her teeth. As the hunters circled her, cloaks spinning around them, she fended them off with a wheel in each hand. They were quick as two fish eluding the hook, but it was clear that they had never encountered bladed wheels. Tané gave herself over to the fight.
The fleeting calm soon fled from her. As she swerved away from their swords, she had the chilling realization that she had never been in a fight to the death. The Western pirates had been easy—brutal, but undisciplined. She had scrapped with other apprentices as a child, trained with them when she was older, but her knowledge of battle was little practice and no end of theory. These mages had been locked in a war for most of their lives, and they moved like partners in a dance. A warrior forged in the schoolroom, alone and wounded, would be no match for them. She should never have confronted them in the open.
Thirst and exhaustion made her slow. With every step, their swords flashed closer to her skin, while her wheels were nowhere near theirs.
Her steps grew drunken. Her arms ached. She hissed as a blade sliced her shoulder, then her jaw. Two more scars for her collection. The next blow set fire to her waist. Blood soaked into her tunic. When the Red Damsels attacked together, she only just lifted the wheels in time to parry.
She was going to lose this fight.
A feint caught her off-guard. Metal bit open her thigh. One knee gave way, and she dropped the wheels.
That was when Nayimathun reared her head. With a roar, she clamped one of the mages between her teeth and hurled her across the clearing.
The other woman turned so quickly that Tané almost missed it. Her palms were full of flame.
Nayimathun flinched from the light. As the woman walked toward her, she recoiled, snapping. Tané aimed true and plunged her knife through red brocade, between two struts of rib. When the woman fell, Tané stepped around her and went to her dragon.
Once it would have shamed her that Nayimathun had seen her kill. It was against the way—but her life had been in danger. Both of their lives. Now she had killed for Nayimathun, and Nayimathun had killed for her. After all they had survived already, she had no regrets.
“Tané.” Nayimathun lowered her head. “The arrow.”
Even looking at it made Tané feel queasy. As gently as she could, she reached up and eased the arrow from the yielding flesh. It took enough force to make her arms shake.
Nayimathun shuddered as it came free. Blood dribbled down her snout. Tané placed a hand on her jaw.
“Can you fly?”
“Not while this heals,” Nayimathun panted. “They were from the Priory. Follow the others. Find the fruit.”
“No,” Tané said at once, chest tight. “No. I will not leave you again.”
“Do as I say.” The dragon bared her teeth. They were tipped with blood. “I will fly again, but I will not be able to reach Inys yet. Find another way. Save this Lady Nurtha. Carry the message to Queen Sabran.”
“And leave you here alone?”
“I will follow the river to the sea and heal. When I can fly again, I will find you.”
Days after their reunion, and now they had to part again. “How will I reach Inys without you?” Tané said thickly.
“You will make a path,” Nayimathun said, gentler. “Water always does.” She gave Tané a soft nudge. “We will see each other again soon.”
Tané shivered. She cl
ung to her dragon for as long as she dared, face pressed into her scales.
“Go, Nayimathun. Go now,” she whispered, and made for the trees.
The other Red Damsels had gone north. Tané kept low as she chased their footprints. There was no time to make a torch, but her eyes were used to the darkness now.
Even when she lost the trail, she knew where the women had gone. She was following a feeling. It was as if her quarry had left warmth in their wake, a warmth that called to her very blood.
It ended in another clearing. She paused for breath, holding her damp side. There was nothing here. Just trees, countless trees.
Her eyelids grew heavy. She swayed on her feet. Now a woman in white was standing before her, and the sun was shining from her fingers.
That was the last that she remembered of the forest.
65
South
They had taken the rising jewel. It was the first thing she knew when she woke: the empty feeling of its absence. She was lying in a room of salmon-colored stone, and her hands were tied behind her back.
A woman with a shaved head and warm brown skin stood in the doorway.
“Who are you?”
She spoke in Ersyri. Tané knew a little of the language, but said nothing.
The woman watched her. “You were carrying a ring belonging to Queen Sabran of Inys,” she said. “I would like to know if she sent you here.” When Tané only looked away, her lips tightened. “You were also carrying a blue jewel. Where did you find it?”
She knew how to withstand interrogation. Pirates would do all manner of things to their enemies to bleed them of their secrets. To prepare for the worst, all apprentices had to prove that they could suffer a beating from a soldier without revealing their name.
Tané had not made a sound in hers.
When no reply was forthcoming, the woman changed her tone. “You and your sea beast injured one of our sisters and slew another,” she said. “If you cannot give some justification for your crime, we will have no choice but to execute you. Even if you had not spilled our blood, consorting with a wyrm is punishable by death.”
She could not reveal the truth. They would never yield a fruit from their sacred tree to a dragonrider.
“At least tell me who you are,” the woman said, softer. “Save yourself, child.”
“I will speak to Chassar uq-Ispad,” Tané said. “No one else.”
With a small frown, the woman left.
Tané tried to clear her head. From the light, it would not be long until sunset. She fought to stay awake, but she found herself drifting as her body chased the rest she had denied it.
Nayimathun would get away. She could swim downriver faster than any human could run.
A man entered her prison, jolting her from a doze. A knife was tucked into a crimson sash around his middle. A robe of purple brocade, embellished with silverwork, crossed over his massive chest.
“I am Chassar uq-Ispad,” he said. His voice was deep and gentle. “I am told you speak Ersyri.”
Tané watched him sit in front of her.
“I have come here for a fruit of the orange tree,” she said, “to take to Eadaz uq-Nāra.”
“Eadaz.” Surprise jumped into his eyes, then pain. “Child, I do not know what you have heard of Eadaz, or how you know her name, but the fruit cannot bring back the dead.”
“She is not dead. Poisoned, but alive. With the fruit, I can save her.”
He froze as if she had struck him.
“Who told you about me?” he asked hoarsely. “About the Priory?”
“Lord Arteloth Beck.”
At this, Chassar uq-Ispad looked very tired.
“I see.” He knuckled his temple. “I suppose you also meant to take the blue jewel to Eadaz. The Prioress has it now, and she intends to execute you.”
“Why?”
“Because you murdered a sister. And because you rode here on the back of a sea wyrm. And lastly,” Chassar said, “because killing you would allow her to control the rising jewel.”
“You could help me escape.”
“Eadaz was able to steal the waning jewel from Mita Yedanya, the Prioress. She will not let its twin be taken,” Chassar said heavily. “I would have to take her life first. And that, I cannot do.”
Tané waited as he sat in silence.
“I trust that you will think of something, Ambassador uq-Ispad,” she said, “or Eadaz will die.” He looked at her. “Let me go, and she may not. The choice belongs to you.”
Chassar uq-Ispad did not return. He must have chosen loyalty to the Prioress.
All was lost.
Two women came at twilight. Their cloaks were pale brocade. Tané allowed them to lead her over tiled floors, through corridors that must never have seen sunlight. In every nook and alcove, there were cast-bronze figures of a woman holding an orb.
Tané knew she needed to fight, but suddenly she felt too weak to so much as bend a blade of grass. Her captors escorted her through an archway, on to a slim ledge of rock. A waterfall formed a veil on her right. The roar was so loud, she could no longer discern her own footsteps.
At least she would hear water at the end. The thunder of the falls reminded her of Seiiki.
“Sisters.”
Tané looked up. Chassar uq-Ispad was walking toward them.
“The Prioress has asked that I interrogate this one again,” he called in Ersyri. “I will not be long.”
The two women exchanged glances before letting Tané go. Chassar waited until they were out of sight, then took Tané by the arm and marched her back along the ledge.
“We have not long,” he said against her ear. “Do what you must, then leave and do not look back. All that awaits you here is a noose.”
“Will they not know you helped me?”
“That need not concern you.” Chassar showed her a stair carved into the rock. “That will take you to the valley. Only the tree can decide if you are worthy of a fruit.” He reached into his robe and withdrew her lacquer case. “This is yours. The coronation ring and the letter are still inside.” Next he produced a length of silk. “Carry the fruit in this.”
With his help, Tané knotted it around her body. “How will I get to Inys?” she asked him. “My dragon is gone.”
“Follow the River Minara until it forks and turn right. That way will take you north. I will send help, but you must not stop. The sisters will be on the hunt the moment they realize you are gone.” He squeezed her shoulder. “I will do what I can to delay them.”
“I cannot leave here without the rising jewel,” she bit out. “It answers only to me.”
Chassar looked grim.
“If I can get it from her, I will send someone after you with it,” he said, “but you must leave.”
He was gone before she could thank him.
There was no handhold on the stair. She cleaved to the stone on her left, watching the steps, mindful of the placement of her feet. Then the stair wound around the cliff side, and she saw it.
When Loth had spoken of an orange tree, she had imagined it as one of those that grew on Seiiki, small and unassuming. This was as tall as a cedar, and the scent of it made her mouth water. A living sister of the mulberry tree on Komoridu.
White flowers peppered its branches. Its leaves were polished green. Gnarled roots fanned around its trunk, snaking over the floor of the valley like patterning on silk. The Minara flowed around and beneath them.
There was no time to marvel. A shadow winged past, so close it ruffled her hair. Tané pressed her back against the rock face, watching the sky, still as prey in the eye of a hunter.
For a long time, there was silence. Then, out of the night, a firestorm.
Her body reacted before her mind could. She threw herself out of the way, but the stair was narrow and precarious, and suddenly she was tumbling, out of control, and the steps were a hammer on her back. Half-blind with panic, she grappled for something to break her fall as her body rolled toward a
sheer drop.
At the last, she threw out a hand and caught the stair. She hung there, breathless.
She imagined herself on Mount Tego again. Steadying her nerves, she turned to see what had happened.
Fire-breathers. They were everywhere. Not pausing to question where they had come from, Tané dared look down. She was closer to the valley floor than she had thought, and time was running out. She let go of the stair, slithered on her back down the rock, and hit the grass with knee-jarring force.
The roots. The roots were thick and dense enough to protect her. As she delved into them, a fire-breather shrieked and crashed into the river, so close to Tané that she felt the spray of water from the impact. An arrow, fletched with a pale feather, was buried in its throat.
Chaos was unfolding in the valley. The trees around it were already on fire. Tané crawled on her belly, tensing whenever a hot wind blistered overhead. When she found an opening in the roots, she clambered back on to the grass and staggered to the foot of the tree.
Somehow, she knew what to do. She sank to her knees and turned her palms upward.
Cinders fell like snow on to her hair. She thought she had failed until a gentle snap came from above, and an orb, round and golden, dropped from on high. It missed her hands and tumbled into the tangle of giant roots. Cursing under her breath, she chased it.
The fruit rolled toward the rushing waters of the Minara. Tané threw herself forward and stopped it with one hand.
A flicker caught her eye. Between the roots, she saw a bird land, and as she watched, entranced, it turned into a naked woman.
Feather stretched to limb. The beak became a pair of red lips. Copper hair poured to the small of a slim back.
A shape-shifter. Everyone in Seiiki knew that dragons had once been able to change their forms, but it had been a long time since anyone had seen proof of it with their own eyes.
Another woman was approaching across the valley. A dark braid snaked over her shoulder. She wore a gold necklace and a scarlet robe with long sleeves, darker and more richly embroidered than those of the other women. When a fire-breather dived for her, she swept its flame aside as if it were a fly. Around her neck, on a chain, was the rising jewel.
The Priory of the Orange Tree Page 71