Songs for the Sacred and the Soulless

by Kameron Williams

  Then, once they had made it up the hill, they had to lift up the ladders. But that wasn’t all. Snowstone’s keep was protected by two octagonal walls, one inside the other. After scaling to the top of the first wall amid arrows flying from the sentry towers stationed on its corners, they had to lift the ladders up and lower them down the other side of the wall, to descend and use them again for the next wall. Then they had to climb up again. It was a good thing the Cyanans had half of the men still mounted on war camels charging the lower gate. They didn’t expect to breach the portcullis that gated the lower bailey from the road up to the keep, but the diversion was all they needed. While getting over the two walls was tedious and tiring, they didn’t face much opposition, save the few sentries stationed in the towers on the walls.

  Prince Hinrik’s death had driven King Dandil back to Cyana like a madman, but he didn’t stay there. He rallied two thousand more troops and marched back north without so much as a night in his own bed. It seemed like an incendiary ambition, but they all knew it was more like vengeance.

  It was not what they had planned, but Tuskin couldn’t leave the old king now. After all, they would be getting what they wanted. Dandil would take Snowstone, even if it didn’t happen the way they had imagined. Tuskin knew no army in the mainreach could rival old King Dandil’s, and it was only a matter of time. Shahla was there at his side, likely for no other reason than she still believed Zar to be alive, captured by Anza and held in chains. Tuskin dared not crush her hopes by telling her too much time had passed and Zar had either escaped or had been killed. He couldn’t bring himself to do it. Not anymore.

  In recent days, the woman had become almost obsessive in her attempts to find Zar, taking random rides through the wild, questioning folk who were unlikely to know about anything at all outside of their farm or property. The things she did didn’t make sense, and she had to know it. She had to know and not care, as if taking some sort of action, however futile, would be better than doing nothing at all.

  She had made him storm the Condor’s old home with her, rounding up some poor Condor who still lived in the cliffs and shooting arrows into the man while she demanded answers. Tuskin told her the man likely knew nothing, and as strange as it seemed—as nice and as kind and as beautiful as the girl was—she didn’t seem to care. It was an odd thing. Tuskin never imagined she could do that.

  They descended over the second wall, and not long after most of the force had made it over, there were soldiers running to meet them. Some guard or other must’ve finally got word to the soldiers defending the lower gate that men were coming over the wall. But it was too late.

  The Cyanans poured over them like a flood, blades dancing in the dawn as showers of blood sprayed through the gray morning air. Baram was putting on a show with his scimitar, Sorrow, whirling his blade faster than any other in the courtyard and making soldiers fall when it touched them. They had cleared out the yard when the man met Tuskin’s gaze. He wiped the red from his face and smiled.

  “When Sorrow makes men cry, it’s tears of blood they shed,” said Baram.

  Ringo the Hammer took men to take the lower bailey, and Tuskin looked around and couldn’t find Shahla anywhere. She had been by his side when they first came over the wall, but now she was nowhere to be found. She’s after Zar, he thought. Probably made for the keep.

  Tuskin made eyes with Baram and motioned his head to the keep. “Let us clear it!”

  The man nodded, a red lock of hair breaking from his headband and collapsing over his brow.

  “On me!” he called, and a scattering of soldiers in the bailey formed up in a square behind him.

  Tuskin led, circling around the yard to the keep’s entrance. He was about to slip inside the open doors when he heard a muffled yell, and movement on the ground alerted his eyes.

  It was Anza crawling out, a dozen arrows buried in her, a porcupine covered in red quills. She groaned a breathless sound, Scarlet’s red-fletched arrows shifting with every movement, as if they were a part of her, something she’d grown like fur or feathers.

  Anza looked up at Tuskin. Her eyes widened and bulged like someone was squeezing around her throat and the pressure from it was pushing out the organs. Tuskin wouldn’t have thought she’d be able to say anything at all. Until she did.

  “Jessip!” she cried, a whisper as sharp as a blade. There was barely a tone, just the raspy sound of air, a stifling sound of breathlessness forced out by sheer will. “Jessip!” she called again.

  It was his birth name, what he was called when he was still a Condor. She remembered him, even in that moment, a dozen bolts pierced through her leather and into her umber skin. She remembered.

  Shahla walked out of the keep behind her, bow in hand.

  11

  The days ahead would be filled with blood, and Anza had sent her away. I should be there at her side.

  Yari had never seen Anza so personally invested in any enemy, but for this Zar, it was almost like an obsession.

  “Find him,” she had told Yari. “If it’s the last thing you do in this world. Bring him to me.”

  She hadn’t cared about the Cyanan girl. It was only Zar she wanted, whether to torture and question, for the satisfaction of recovering an escaped prisoner, or simply to kill him. Or all three. Yari couldn’t tell. In times past the only reason she would’ve wanted to recapture Zar was for information. She had no personal investments, no silly plots of revenge, no desire to inflict torture. But the new Anza was far removed from the old.

  Yari couldn’t say she blamed her. Anza had always commanded unwavering loyalty, and although it was clear Zar had lied about a good many things, it appeared he had at least told the truth about Stroan’s betrayal. For the man was gone and Yuna with him.

  And Zar had played some unknown part in it all, or so it seemed. In fact, it appeared this Zar had played a part in many things. So, while Yari didn’t care a measure about Stroan or Yuna, she wanted to track down Zar for no other reason than to find out what the hell was going on. She and Anza knew he had something to do with the Cyanans who moved on Snowstone, for it couldn’t have been a coincidence that he was in the company of that Cyanan girl when they captured him. Aside from that, though, they didn’t know much of anything at all.

  She had headed south from the castle, figuring that if she were Zar she’d want to get as far away from Snowstone as she could, and since she imagined he was in league with the Cyanans, it was her best guess. She had spent weeks scouring the plains and Fairview Meadow, and now she had come to the town of Vaul.

  The midday sun reflected off Ivy’s tawny coat, leaving the ram’s fur crowned in a golden luster. Yari snickered as she rode past the inn, seeing a wanted poster with Zar’s face on it nailed to the door. She reminded herself that the man was already wanted in most of the mainreach—wanted by Tiomot. Though the king was dead, and most folks likely understood that the reward had died with him, Zar’s face would still be quite known in these parts. It should still make him easier to find.

  “Won’t be getting any reward from that one,” said a man coming from the tying pole.

  He was short, a bit over the hill in age, and talkative. Yari could tell he was talkative before he said anything else. She could always tell.

  His kind loved to talk to people, bright, shiny eyes, a grin ever-present on his lips—the type to find an excuse to talk to a stranger, whether about the weather, their mount, or some article of clothing they wore. It didn’t matter.

  “The realm’s in a sad state, eh?”

  Yari usually didn’t have a problem ignoring such people. She wouldn’t even make eyes, just nod in their direction with an absent smile, and keep moving. She was doing just that when the man’s words stopped her.

  “Tiomot, dethroned and killed,” the man said. “And now, this queen, Anza, dethroned and killed.”

  “What do you say?” Yari stopped her ram in its tracks and tugged the reigns to turn back to the man.

  The man b
eamed like a child excited for sweets. He looked at Ivy and his eyes sparkled. “You’re from the cliffs? A beautiful ram!”

  “You spoke of Anza,” said Yari, irritated. The man was so happy she was entertaining a conversation he had lost his focus and was changing subjects.

  “Aye,” he said, lips moving in sync with his nodding head. “I’ve just come down from Sirith. Cyanans took the place—Cyanans all over! Every guard has a head of fire. Tiomot’s old lords are moving out of the city. They don’t have the numbers.”

  Yari’s breath caught in her throat. She had only been gone from Snowstone a few weeks. Whatever siege took place had to have been well planned and deftly orchestrated. Dandil had never moved north into the mainreach. Why now?

  Before Yari could entertain these thoughts, the image of what the man had spoken crystallized and her heart dropped like a stone into the depths. Everything was gone. Her queen was gone; likely everyone she knew was gone, and the realm they had strived for years to take—the castle that had been their dream—was gone. It was all gone.

  Well, the castle, Yari reminded herself, was indeed still there. It just wasn’t hers. And that, she decided, was worse than being gone.

  Yari rode off. She didn’t pause to break another word with the man, didn’t smile or wave farewell. She only tapped Ivy below the neck, shifted forward and whispered, “Go, go!” into the animal’s ear.

  Ivy bolted away.

  Yari headed further south for no other reason than that was the way she’d been traveling. There was no longer any thought or reason that guided her, not now. She would need time. She wouldn’t stop looking for Zar, for she still believed, perhaps now more than ever, finding him would be the answer to many questions. But she wasn’t in a place to do it now. She needed to ride and not think about anything, not of Anza who’d been as close as a sister, then grew estranged and cold; nor about the last decade of her life she’d spent serving and fighting, all for a cause that was now as lost as a piece of driftwood in the sea. She didn’t need to think about any of it.

  She rode through a day and a night, coming to Lolia, making her way on the main road that ran through the plain. It was just after dawn, and the dew that had condensed on her and nature both was just now drying under the early morning sun. Yari didn’t know why she had ridden through the night, but somehow it seemed therapeutic, even if she was still angry and hungry and cold. She caught sight of another down the road, a single person on foot, and the closer she came the more bizarre the fellow looked. Also, he was shouting.

  His clothes were torn, his hair was a mess and shaggy, almost matted, even. His eyes were open wider than what Yari thought was natural, and there was a long necklace of big brass beads around his neck.

  “The fate of us all is fire!” he cried, hands gripped around the tarnished brass orbs of his necklace. “The fate of us all is fire!”

  Yari rode by, and the man didn’t look at her even once. Instead, his chin was lifted high, eyes gazing somewhere up over the plain. He was ever smiling.

  “Fire of men!” Yari could hear at her back after she’d passed him. “Then fire from the dragon!”

  What was this talk of fire? Fire from the dragon made sense to her, since Leviathan’s fire was real enough. But fire of men? What did it mean? Yari laughed, more so at herself than at the lunatic on the roadside. Why was she even considering his words? Nothing. It means nothing at all. He’s nothing more than a mad bum.

  But as Yari rode away she thought about the man she’d met by the inn in Vaul. She thought about what he’d said. Cyanans took the place. Cyanans all over. Every guard has a head of fire.

  Fire of men, Yari thought. Fire of men!

  12

  The ship was a beauty, its hull of stained oak parting the waves with gentle momentum. The sail was set, stretched taut under the yard arm, and among the arguing up on deck, Zar had nothing to offer but a few laughs. If any man was concerned for his safety, he shouldn’t have agreed to board.

  Their captain was a stocky fellow, bald of head with a long, braided beard. He had all the energy of the late Captain Blue, but with a touch less notoriety. His name was Haaman.

  “You lot knew this was a voyage for mad men!” the captain called. “If ye ain’t mad, then you shouldn’t have come!”

  “But can she do it?” a crewman asked, his thin slits of eyes peering at Lyla like she was some kind of novelty. “Has she done it before?”

  The gaze of every crewman drew to Lyla as if pulled by some force of magnetism. When the girl stayed quiet, they moved their eyes to Zar.

  “Aye,” said Zar, proudly, and then a bit less heartily, “on dogs and horses.”

  “Dogs and horses?” the same man questioned, like it was the silliest and most preposterous thing he’d ever heard. “Leviathan is a sacred beast!”

  “A soulless beast,” another added.

  “Well, I can’t argue the beast’s holiness or wickedness,” Zar started with a laugh.

  “It’s done, you fools!” Haaman called. “You took the gold and came aboard. Now find your mettle!”

  The crew echoed back at their captain, most of them insisting that they weren’t afraid, but simply curious.

  Lyla nudged against Zar’s shoulder. “I’m going to go lie down,” she said. Her voice was a tremble, a hoarse, broken manifestation of the sweetness it usually was. Zar watched her as she made her way down into the hold. She must’ve been under a lot of pressure, and he wondered how it was affecting her. Would she still be able to perform when the time came? Since he had known her, the young woman had been lively and bold, with a bit of sass even, tempered by a calm, quiet mysteriousness. She had looked completely confident in her abilities, eyes as sharp and keen as a shaving razor. Even as a prisoner her spirit had been unbroken, as bright and beautiful as her red Cyanan hair. But now she seemed nervous.

  “Is she well?” Captain Haaman fell to Zar’s side, a carefree smile passing his lips.

  Good question, Zar thought. They had been at sea for a day and she hadn’t eaten much at all. Her bronze skin had waned pallid, she hadn’t said much, and all she seemed to want to do was sleep.

  “It’s likely her first time on a ship,” said Zar, trying to convince himself just as much as the captain. “She’ll be fine.”

  “This’ll be a story for the children,” said Haaman, eyes twinkling above a full grin. He looked to be a man who enjoyed mischief and a fair amount of danger.

  The captain moved to the helm of the ship, laid both hands on the wheel, and spun it all the way to the right. The vessel shifted its course and angled to the west, and before long, the captain was spinning the wheel in the opposite direction.

  “He’s disruptin’ the water,” said a crewman, long, black hair afloat in the wind. He came beside Zar and crossed his arms, looking over at Captain Haaman working the ship’s wheel. “You want Leviathan, and that’s what we’ll get. He’s making sure of it.”

  “She can do it,” said Zar, turning to the man for just a moment to show him his eyes. It was a preemptive measure to stay the questions Zar knew would follow. For the man’s tone, his words, his eyes, they all said he wanted to know if Lyla could really do what she and Zar had insisted she could. Like most of the crew on board, Zar was sure he was wondering if the trip would be a marvel to watch—a woman quelling the rage of a dragon with the magic of music, or a tragedy—a horror story of a crew who tried something no one else had and was destroyed in the attempt.

  Zar looked around at the others. It was a ragtag group of poor laborers and over-the-hill sailors, most of whom had likely come along for the pay and nothing else. Far removed from the crew of the Lucky Dolphin—a renowned whale hunter, skilled fishermen, javelins lying all over the deck—Zar realized that Lyla had to do it. There was no other option.

  “Are you sure of it?”

  Zar gave the man a pat on the back that he hoped was encouraging. “Nothing is sure in this intricacy we call life. But from what I’ve seen from he
r, what I’ve felt, I have not a doubt in my mind.”

  Hardly an hour more of the serpentine course and a shout rang through the afternoon breeze. Amid the gust of the sea, the scent of brine and wet wood, a gale so salty you could taste it in your throat with every breath, there was shouting, “Dragon, there! Dragon, there!”

  The crew collected on the foredeck, hugged against the ship’s rails, looking down into the water, at one another, and then back down again. Zar ran up to the bow and looked down with them.

  A black form loomed under the water like a shadow beneath the waves, a head and tail of darkness, and outstretched wings oscillating in hue as they moved up and down just under the surface.

  “Where’s the girl?” one called, but Zar was still looking down at the murky wraith of the dragon’s form, floating towards the ship like a vast, black cloud.

  “Where’s the girl?” the same man called. Then another.

  “Where’s the girl?”

  Zar broke his gaze and wrested himself from the vision of terror. He ran for the hold and heard a great splash of water crashing behind him. He heard that screech—that dreadful screech that no living thing made except Leviathan, and instantly he was transported back in time. He was taken to the time he had first made the journey to Serradiia, when the Lucky Dolphin had been attacked by the dragon, Landis and Raff had perished, and Captain Blue had nearly been burnt to a crisp. Remembering that time, he couldn’t help but glance over his shoulder before he made his way down the stairs. He looked, but he wished he hadn’t.

  The dragon was flying over the ship, and Lyla was down below, resting in the hold.

  13

  The shaking stole Lyla from slumber like a graceless thief. Vision still a blur, she blinked away the sleep until her eyesight sharpened and she could see Zar tugging at her. He kept repeating some jumble of sounds, words that were just now registering through the torpor of drowsiness.