by eden Hudson
Chapter Twenty-Seven
PRESENT
By the time Koida was bathed, combed, perfumed, painted, dressed, and decorated for the fifth night of her wedding, the sun had set, and the muffled din of nobles traveling from their residences to the feasting hall filled the palace’s winding corridors. She had fallen asleep twice—once in the bath and again on her feet—but neither interlude had restored her energy.
As her personal guard escorted her through the winding residence halls, Koida hoped with all her might that her father would retire at an uncharacteristically early hour. He’d never done so before on a feast night, but anything could happen once.
“You look a touch peaked, little dragon,” Batsai teased, his face a funereal mask of concern over a barely restrained grin. “Didn’t you get enough sleep last night?”
“Go perfect the Seat of Vertical Blades technique,” she snapped.
The old bear chuckled.
Koida entered the royal waiting room expecting reproach and more cold cruelty from her father for missing court. What she found instead was the Exalted Emperor pounding her betrothed on the back like a proud father.
“And you got all that from looking at the maps in the war room?” The emperor shook his head in gleeful disbelief. “We couldn’t have been in there negotiating the alliance for more than an hour. Youngest daughter, you missed the show! Your future husband is brilliant.”
She caught Raijin’s eye. He smiled as if all the praise were making him uncomfortable and dragged a hand through his unruly black hair. Her own hair had taken no less than an hour to comb, pin, and dress, and she wouldn’t dare touch it for fear of ruining her ladies’ hard work. Raijin’s hair looked as if he’d climbed out of his bed and walked directly to the royal waiting room, and still he looked wonderful. It was the worst sort of injustice.
“Apologies, Cherished Father,” Koida said, bowing familiarly since the emperor seemed to be in a good mood. “How did Ji Yu Raijin prove his brilliance?”
“Your betrothed saw the tribes we’d conquered for the empire on the map in the war room and inferred that our next conquest would be against the savages from the lower reaches. What does he do then? He travels to their chieftain and negotiates allegiance to the empire without manifesting a single weapon! Saved our soldiers the ride there and back, all without a single casualty! Not even a single punch!”
Savages from the lower reaches? That was the same place Raijin claimed to have gotten his living lavaglass blade. Koida raised a brow at the mysterious young leader. He glanced away quickly.
“Apologies, Emperor,” Raijin said. “Their tribe is called the Uktena, and far from being savages, they are widely accomplished scholars.”
Koida couldn’t suppress her skepticism. “Those barbarians in the furs and bones?”
“Yes, little cousin, we’re all astounded,” Yoichi drawled from his seat on the lounge. “Both that these savages can read civilized New Script letters and that the Ji Yu chieftain made what should have been a four-day trip all the way there and back in half as much time.”
The stable full of enormous war rams, the giant gecko, and the enormous bull flashed through her mind.
“I’ve seen the mounts of the Uktena delegation, elder cousin,” she said, frowning at his thinly veiled accusation that Raijin was deceiving them. “Demon beasts, each and every one. To run for two days at a speed that would kill a natural creature would be no hardship for them.”
Only when Yoichi raised a pale eyebrow at her did she realize that her rebuttal was as good as a confession that she’d been in the stables, from which it was only a short jump to guess she’d been out riding Pernicious. She glanced fearfully at her father, afraid she would see anger and disapproval darkening his expression, but Emperor Hao went on as if he hadn’t heard either his illegitimate son’s insinuations or his daughter’s admission.
“Those are royal stock now, Koida,” her father said, his plum-colored eyes twinkling with mirth. “The mounts, the savages—”
“Uktena,” Raijin corrected.
“—Ji Yu Raijin brought them all to the palace as your bride price. I asked the court recorder, and it’s the most valuable bride price in the recorded history of the valley.” The emperor chuckled. He shook a finger at Raijin. “You’ve got a heavy set on you, boy, walking into that village alone. It’s well known throughout the valley that those savages kill and eat any man they meet and enslave the women.”
“My only concern was finding a gift worthy of such a treasure as Shyong San Koida,” Raijin said.
“So you settled on a tribe of filthy savages,” Yoichi said caustically. “You must think the world of her beauty.”
“Apologies,” Raijin said, his rasping voice like the grinding of burled steel against a whetstone, “but the Uktena are advanced in many sciences the empire’s alchemists are not, as well as brilliant strategists and some of the most powerful combatants in the known world.”
“So powerful that you were able to talk them into an alliance,” Yoichi sneered. “Perhaps your tattoo artisan can ink a babbling mouth in honor of your brave exploit.”
“Cousin Yoichi!” Koida gasped. To call into question one’s Heroic Record was unforgivable. Warrior artists killed one another for far less.
“There is no offense taken,” Raijin assured her. He turned to Yoichi with an icy smile. “Gratitude for your suggestion, many-times celebrated warrior. However, I have no Heroic Record.”
To prove it, Raijin pushed back the sleeves of his robe one at a time, baring sun-darkened skin, marked by nothing more than white scars.
Koida stared dumbfounded at the flat straps of muscle moving beneath her betrothed’s unmarked flesh. Raijin didn’t have a single deed of note tattooed on his arms. Nothing at all. Anyone could accuse him of cowardice, and he could do nothing but agree and slink away in disgrace.
Blade and death! She was the student of a master without a Heroic Record! Even Lao had had a Heroic Record.
“For Ro’s sake, cover that up,” Emperor Hao snapped, jerking the sleeve of Raijin’s exposed arm back down. The older man looked as if he couldn’t decide whether to be embarrassed or furious.
Koida stepped back and dropped into a seat on the fainting couch opposite Yoichi’s lounge as Shingti dismissed her Dragonfly guard and breezed into the waiting room.
The first princess glanced from the rapidly shifting expression of her father to Koida’s bewildered face to Cousin Yoichi’s viciously self-satisfied smirk. Raijin stood stoically at the center of it all as if he hadn’t only seconds before suffered the humiliation of all humiliations.
“What did I miss?” Shingti asked.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
PRESENT
As the seating for the wedding feast had been altered to accommodate the traditions of the signing of the Book of the Empire and the Uktena’s subsequent acceptance into the imperial fold, Koida found herself seated at the left hand of her father and unable to speak with Raijin, who had been given a seat of honor among the nobles below.
Koida found this separation was almost preferable. So much doubt and confusion was buzzing around in her mind that her skull felt like a wasps’ nest. She felt much as her father looked while he praised the young chieftain’s peaceful conquest of the Uktena to the court. Almost mystified.
As if Raijin could sense the direction of her thoughts, he kept his distance. It would have been within his rights as both the groom and an honored guest to approach the dais to speak with her, but he sat solemnly amidst the celebration, his jade gaze rarely leaving Koida’s face.
Focusing on everything around the hall except her betrothed, Koida saw from the corner of her eye courtier after courtier talking to Raijin, many of them beautiful and influential noblewomen. She wondered what those noblewomen would do if they knew the handsome chieftain they were fawning over had no Heroic Record.
Finally, Raijin excused himself from their attentions and joined the Uktena at their table, which seem
ed to be surrounded by an invisible barrier repelling all nobles and officials. Even the royal guards gave it a wide berth. In spite of his new position and what looked like an engrossing conversation with the savages, Koida still felt Raijin’s eyes on her.
As usual, her father remained at the feast until the earliest hours of the morning. Koida was nodding over her wine cup—though still pointedly looking away from Raijin—when the emperor finally announced that he was retiring, and the nobles quickly took up the echo.
Koida slipped back to her residence, avoiding contact with any chieftains who might have been staring at her the entire night.
As soon as she was in her nightdress and alone in the inner chamber, Koida clambered across the beams of her ceiling and leapt onto the balcony. She felt weary to her heartcenter, but she would never sleep like this. There was only one way she knew to quiet the churning anxieties and disappointment plaguing her.
A change of clothes, a quick climb down the side of the palace and over the garden wall, and a trek to the paddock brought her to Pernicious’s temporary quarters. The half-demon warhorse stomped and snorted in indignation when she threw her arms around his neck and pressed her face into his inky black coat, but he didn’t attack. Not immediately. Koida breathed in his warm, comforting stink and relaxed against his overly muscled chest before he sniffed out her lack of candied blood oranges.
Then he attacked.
Rearing up on his powerful hind legs, the beast pawed the air. His hooves flared up in fiery orange Ro. Koida dodged them and ran up the fence, sprinting along the top rail. Pernicious screamed bloody torture and wheeled, trying to batter her with his enormous head.
Despite her fatigue, Koida welcomed the fight. It was clean and honest. Pernicious wanted to kill her for forgetting her promise. She wanted to go for a ride or be trampled to death. No deceptions or manipulation, just candid violence.
Finally, she vaulted off the rail and landed on the furious destrier’s back. Pernicious reared once more, trying to throw her off, then crashed through the fence.
They blazed across the countryside, the half-demon’s flaming hooves nothing more than a blur of fire in the darkness. The wind screamed in Koida’s ears, tore at her hair, and made her eyes water, but she gave her mount free rein, letting go of his thick black mane and throwing her arms wide like wings. The only thing keeping her from tumbling off the beast’s back was her knees clamped to his heaving sides.
Pernicious tossed his head and screamed at the sky, a sound like a pack of rabid wolves on the hunt. The half-demon was enjoying the breakneck pace so much that he didn’t head immediately for the forest where he liked to hunt. Instead, he splashed through a shallow point in the Horned Serpent River and cut out across open fields surrounding Boking Iri, screaming some more. No doubt the peasants in the area would be shivering in their beds and clutching their children tight at the horrible sound.
Koida laughed off the Petrifying Shriek of Legions and howled with the beast. She wasn’t as frightening, but it still felt good to disturb the peace and quiet with so much noise.
They had almost made it to the place where field met forest when a shadow flitted across the corner of her vision. The flapping, rippling motion was alien to anything she had ever seen around the empire’s capital city. She steadied herself with one hand in Pernicious’s mane and twisted at the waist to get a better look at the thing.
The wide silhouette of a river ray too big to be plausible skimmed through the air beside Pernicious. It was easily the destrier’s size and looked to be keeping up without much effort.
Pernicious screamed a challenge and wheeled on the creature. In response, the ray’s wide wings lit with silvery Ro.
On the creature’s back knelt Ji Yu Raijin. Though the light was low, the disorderly hair and sinewy body could belong to no one else.
Pernicious reared, lashing out with his hooves.
“No!” Koida twisted both hands into Pernicious’s mane and pulled, squeezing her knees and wheeling him away from the young chieftain’s mount at the same time. “It’s not for you to kill, you overgrown baiting-dog!”
In response, the half-demon warhorse curved his neck to the side, snapping his iron teeth at Koida’s leg, but she planted her soft leather boot on his jaw and held him off.
Pernicious danced in place, protesting with every step in a low, threatening grumble.
The ray descended closer to the ground, creeping toward them on rippling wings. Its stinger was up under its belly, ready to strike if Pernicious attacked.
“Gratitude for the protection,” Raijin called, giving her a kneeling bow.
“It is nothing,” Koida replied. “Were you following us?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Raijin was silent for so long that Koida thought maybe he hadn’t heard her over Pernicious’s stamping hooves. Slowly, the half-demon seemed to realize he would not be allowed to attack the strange oversized ray any more than he’d been allowed to fight the demon bull in the stables, and he stopped his angry dancing. Koida didn’t let go of his mane or relax her grip with her knees. There was always the possibility that Pernicious was just waiting for her to let her guard down. She was about to repeat her question when Raijin finally spoke.
“Pride,” he said.
Koida cocked her head slightly, wondering if this was some sort of insult to her or her destrier.
“What is?”
“The reason I followed you from the palace grounds. It was pride,” he said, scratching the back of his neck. “The act of tattooing your flesh with self-proclaimed deeds of bravery so you can brag about them is arrogance itself. But then so is wanting to explain to you why I have no tattoos. I should accept your scorn and allow you to find out in time what sort of man I am by my actions.” He looked down at the back of his mount, then met her eyes once more. “But I find I care a lot about how you perceive me now.”
Stumped for words, Koida’s grip on the half-demon beneath her eased a fraction. The moment Pernicious sensed the slack, he threw his enormous head, bashing his skull into her nose and throwing her off.
Koida braced herself to hit the hard ground but landed instead on a strangely smooth, velvety surface. Strong arms locked around her stomach, stopping her from rolling off the edge.
“Are you all right?” Raijin asked.
She was on the back of his enormous ray. Just over the edge of the creature’s fluttering wings, she could see Pernicious jumping and kicking, furious that the ray had escaped his reach.
“Bloodthirsty nag,” she muttered.
With a start, Koida realized she was sitting in Raijin’s lap with his arm around her. The young chieftain seemed to realize this at the same moment. Both jumped apart, though Raijin grabbed her wrist to keep her from falling from the ray’s back. It was hard to keep a seat on the creature.
“You keep rescuing me,” Koida said. “You must be growing weary of it.”
Raijin shook his head. “Not yet.”
Heartbeats passed with nothing but the sound of the warhorse’s furious screams and stamping hooves tearing up the grass. Koida pressed gingerly on the bridge of her nose and traced it to the tip.
“It’s not broken. How can that be?” She wiped her fingers below her nostrils. No blood or mucus leaked out, and she could taste nothing like the coppery, salty tang of the bloody noses Pernicious had given her in the past. “My face should be a fountain right now.”
“Breath of the Underwater Panther,” Raijin said. “It protects you from malicious harm for as long as your body is processing it.”
His words sank in slowly. When they finally settled, Koida laughed and clapped her hands.
“I barely felt his head hit me! If I’d known it would be so effective, I would have let Pernicious trample me just to show him it had no effect. He would’ve been furious.”
Raijin gave her a strange look. “You have a bizarre relationship with your demon.”
“If you got to know h
im, it would make sense.” She glanced down at the destrier, then back up at Raijin. “You said you came out here to tell me why you don’t have a Heroic Record. Could you do so now or is the noise from below too distracting?”
“It’s not,” Raijin said quickly. But after the initial swift start, he faltered. “The path I come from...is very different. We don’t value... Or perhaps the way we value... Apologies, but I don’t know how to say this in a way that won’t insult the path of everyone you’ve known your whole life.”
“You’ve already called Heroic Records the definition of arrogance,” Koida said. “If you say something more insulting than that, I’ll let you know.”
Raijin smiled. “Gratitude.”
The ray dipped down then rose back out of Pernicious’s reach before the half-demon could strike. Pernicious screamed and reared, his hooves pawing the air ineffectually.
“Don’t taunt him, Nael,” Raijin admonished the ray. Obediently, it rose a few feet higher. Raijin turned back to Koida. “The path I was raised in had a very strict code of honor. I based the Path of the Thunderbird on that code because I believe it to be right about many things. One of those things was the destructive power of pride and the wisdom of humility. Both paths would consider recording your heroic deeds on your skin so the world can read them equivalent to declaring yourself Exalted.”
Koida laughed. “That was insulting. The last bit.”
“A thousand apologies, Cherished Princess,” Raijin said, bowing low over his fists. “You did, however, laugh, which I’m afraid only encourages me.”
This tickled Koida even further. She covered her mouth demurely with one hand as she giggled. Raijin’s serious façade broke up, allowing through a roguish grin.
When she’d gotten the giggles out of her heartcenter, Koida said, “You could be lying to me. How do I know you’re not just a disgraced coward?”
“Anyone with enough money could find a tattoo artisan and have a false Record inked into their skin,” he said. “You don’t know that I’m not a coward. You can’t know what kind of man I am until you’ve seen me at my best and at my worst.” He took a breath as if to say more, but pressed his lips into a thin line instead.