Path of Blood

by Diana Pharaoh Francis

  Chapter 19

  Metyein sat alone at the long plank table. Yellow candles made of tallow burned smokily in wood sconces along the walls. He twirled the stem of a crystal wineglass between his fingers, watching the ruby liquid swirl. He had taken such things for granted before coming to Honor. But now . . . wine and glasses were a luxury. Most everything else hauled to Honor was necessary and useful. And the myriad of things they didn’t have would fill a book.

  He sighed and set the glass back on the table and rubbed his face with his hands. By the Lady, he was tired. The plague was spreading slowly. In the six weeks since Reisil had left, there were seven more cases. There was no pattern to them. They’d come from a variety of stockades, work assignments, dining halls, social groups, families, and arrival dates. There were three men, two women, and two children. Only the two women yet survived. For now. But they were in the early stages yet.

  The good news was that since Reisil’s departure, there had been no incursions by either the nokulas or the wizards. Metyein brushed a loose strand of hair out of his face. With any luck, the nokulas had killed the wizards. He yawned and rubbed the knotted muscles at the base of his neck. Not likely. But for the moment, he didn’t care why they were holding off from attacking. All that counted was that they were.

  Metyein drained his glass and refilled it before reaching for the sheaf of papers in front of him. Tonight was his meeting with Kebonsat and Emelovi. They met every three days to review the happenings in the settlement and make decisions. He didn’t look forward to it. Emelovi didn’t bother to hide her frigid hostility for Kebonsat, refusing even to address him except through Metyein. Meanwhile, Kebonsat boiled, a slow, black simmering of guilt and resentment.

  It was, Metyein thought mordantly, almost enough to make him want to go back to Koduteel and beg his father’s forbearance and forgiveness.

  The door slid open and shut again with a thump. Metyein turned with a careful smile. “You’re early tonight—”

  But to his astonishment, instead of Kebonsat or Emelovi, a thin, gray Juhrnus slouched inside. His beard was ragged, his hair matted. Esper rode across his shoulders, his fleshy, black tongue slowly tasting the air. The sisalik’s skin was dry and sunken over his ribs, and his eyes were dulled. Juhrnus’s foot caught on the rough floorboards and he staggered. Metyein leaped to steady him.

  “Bright heavens! You look like you’ve been dragged the last twenty leagues behind your horse.” Metyein hooked a chair with his foot. Juhrnus dropped into it with a thready sigh. Esper crawled down to the floor and parked himself between Juhrnus’s cracked and dusty boots. Metyein thrust his wine into the other man’s hand before perching against the edge of the table.

  “I left word at the gate to fetch me when you arrived.”

  Juhrnus gave a limp wave of his hand as he swallowed the wine in a gulp and handed the glass to Metyein, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. It shook. “Faster to come myself. Sent the guard for food.” He scrubbed his hand over his face. “Been a couple of days.”

  “That bad?”

  “News isn’t good,” Juhrnus said. “Came fast as I could. Ran into trouble with raiders outside Koduteel and again in the foothills.”

  He patted his ribs, and Metyein realized that there was a makeshift bandage tied awkwardly around Juhrnus’s chest. A bright crimson blotch spread inside the brick-red blossom of old blood.

  “Skraa! How bad is it? I’ll call a tark,” he said, not waiting for an answer.

  Juhrnus didn’t protest as Metyein yanked open the door and disappeared. He returned a few minutes later, followed by a panting guard carrying a platter covered with a square of burlap. The man deposited his burden on the table.

  “Fetch some more,” Metyein ordered. “And plenty of ale and water. We’ll need fresh, raw venison too.”

  The guard departed with a doff of his forelock. Metyein knelt beside Juhrnus, whose eyes had closed. Metyein frowned, seeing bruises beneath the dirt on his face and hands. Juhrnus blinked and raised his head.

  “I’m awake.”

  “There’s food. A tark will be here soon. The Dazien and Kebonsat as well.”

  Juhrnus let Meytein help him to stand. He lifted Esper up on the table and pushed aside the burlap covering the tray. There was a loaf of brown bread flavored with garlic and rosemary, a heaping trencher of stew, a crock of butter, and a bowl of huckleberries and rhubarb sweetened with honey.

  “There’ll be fresh meat in a few minutes,” Metyein said as Esper eyed the offerings with obvious disdain.

  “Wait if you want,” Juhrnus told the sisalik around a mouthful of bread. “But I’m eating while I can. Lesson well learned.”

  Esper tilted his head as if thinking, and then bent and nibbled at a chunk of meat.

  Metyein paced as Juhrnus ate, taking a hard rein on his impatience. What had forced Juhrnus to take such a grueling pace to get back, and with such a wound? What was the news?

  He fairly snatched open the door when the tark arrived. It was Gamulstark. He carried his healing satchel on his back, along with a brazier, a bucket of water, and a sack of coal. He offered no greeting as he dropped his burdens on the end of the long table, lighting a fire in the brazier and filling a pot of water to boil.

  “Well, now. Let’s have a look,” he said when he was ready. Juhrnus grimaced, but sat back to let the tark cut away the bandages. Juhrnus had tied them over his clothing, and his tunic clung to the seeping scabs. Gamulstark tsked and began snipping away at them with a pair of scissors.

  “You’re filthy,” Gamulstark said accusingly. “You’ll be lucky if the wound hasn’t turned septic.”

  “Wounds, actually. Three, and if I’m going to die soon, you may leave me in peace. The Lord Marshal is waiting.”

  “The Lord Marshal can wait, if it will keep you alive,” Metyein commented sardonically.

  “The tark says I am filthy and septic,” Juhrnus said.

  “The tark says you are filthy. Whether you are septic remains to be seen,” Gamulstark corrected.

  He helped Juhrnus peel off his tunic, bending down to examine the seeping gashes. “Ugly. The edges are torn and ragged. What caused them?”

  Juhrnus caught his breath as Gamulstark probed with his fingers. “A makeshift blade. Like a saw, but with a handle.”

  “There is some infection. I need to clean them to know more.”

  Juhrnus continued to eat, despite the obvious pain of Gamulstark’s ministrations. Metyein watched with narrowed eyes as the wounds were exposed. Two of them were about seven inches wide and sickle-shaped. They chased each other along the left side of Juhrnus’s rib cage with red fury. The other was smaller, but deeper. It dug deeply into the flesh of his shoulder just under his collarbone and seeped blood and pus.

  “Want some more wine?” Metyein offered as Juhrnus shoved aside his trencher, turning white as ice. Metyein sloshed a healthy measure into the glass. Juhrnus slugged it down in a long gulp and dropped the glass back onto the table, his face twisting with pain.

  At last Gamulstark stood back, wiping his hands on a towel. “The two on your ribs aren’t too bad. Inflamed with some infection. This other on your shoulder—we’ll have to cut into it and clean it out. You’re lucky you weren’t hit lower or you’d have died about a minute later.” He stood and busied himself over the boiling water. As he mixed his potions, Juhrnus guzzled two more glasses of wine and began on a third. Metyein continued pouring without comment.

  Juhrnus flicked a fuzzy glance at Gamulstark, who’d unrolled the pocketed cloth that held his surgical knives and begun laying them out on the table. Esper made a forlorn noise in the back of his throat and clambered up Juhrnus’s arm to curl around his neck, his nose tucked under his ahalad-kaaslane’s bearded jaw.

  “I’d best tell you what I know before I keel over,” Juhrnus said, his voice slightly slurred and focused, as if he were concentrating on pronunciation. He squinted, his eyes bloodshot. “It’s nothing good.”

&n
bsp; Metyein’s chest tightened and he sat down, his face stiff with anticipation.

  “The Regent’s started staging his army in the foothills west of Koduteel,” Juhrnus began carefully.

  Metyein nodded. “We knew that.”

  “Here’s what you don’t know. He’s been conscripting. If you can carry a sword and walk and you don’t have the plague, you’re in. He’s got more than a thousand men already. He’s got plenty of gold to pay, and it means decent meals. There’s not a lot of complaint about his methods, so far.”

  Metyein leaned back in his chair, his hand slowly curling into a fist, shock curdling his stomach. Honor could muster near five hundred. “A thousand? What’s he doing for supplies?”

  “Taking them from us, for one. He’s found out about Dannen Relvi’s supply dumps and he’s raiding our pack trains and caches.”

  “Demonballs,” Metyein muttered, his mind whirling. “That means . . .”

  “Gonna have to change locations, find safer harbors, start shifting schedules. Need to be more unpredictable. I sent word to Dannen Relvi. Don’t know when it’ll catch up with him. Sent word to the camps, too. Folks will start taking precautions, but we’re gonna have a hard winter. Regent’s not gonna give up. He needs the supplies bad as we do.”

  “How much have we lost?”

  “Least two shiploads, maybe three. Haven’t heard from the one coming up from Nardal.”

  Metyein tapped his fingers, thinking. This was bad. It could hardly be worse. He thought of his father and Aare. It could. He looked at Juhrnus.

  “What else?”

  Juhrnus cast a suspicious glance at Gamulstark, who was threading a needle. The tark looked up from his work and rolled his eyes.

  “I could leave, I suppose, but then you could die,” he said. “Which would you prefer?”

  “Do it,” Metyein said to Gamulstark, and Juhrnus snorted. “Tell me now, before you pass out, what else?”

  “Two things. First”—Juhrnus held up a finger—“can’t find the Dazien’s family. Not where they’re supposed to be. Her brother stashed them somewhere else. Or . . .” He looked away for a moment, unwilling to finish the thought. “Anyhow, the ahalad-kaaslane are still on the trail. If anyone can find them, they can.”

  Metyein stood, pacing back and forth and dragging his hand through his hair. “Skraa. Emelovi—the Dazien—doesn’t need to hear that. She’s hardly begun settling into the notion of standing up to her brother. The idea terrifies her.”

  “What about Kebonsat? Can’t he settle her down?”

  Metyein shook his head. “She won’t say a word to him. The whole thing is wearing thin, I can tell you. I need both of them. Honor needs both of them. But she won’t so much as look at him, and he’s so tarred-and-feathered in guilt that he won’t fight back. This news will only make things worse.”

  There came a knock on the door and a serving man arrived with meat for Esper. Metyein waved for him to set it on the end of the table. Esper scrambled to it and began bolting the food. Juhrnus waited to continue his report until the man departed.

  “Want the rest of it?” He leaned back gingerly.

  “Quickly,” Metyein said, flicking a glance at Gamulstark, who came to stand impatiently over Juhrnus.

  “And then you can climb up on the table,” Gamulstark added with a sharp smile.

  Juhrnus glowered at the tark before returning to his report.

  “Ceriba.”

  “You found her?”

  “Whispers say he’s got her. I don’t know where. But she seems to be alive. That’s the only good news.”

  Metyein swallowed. Dear Lady. She’d be better off dead. He thought of the poison bead Soka carried tucked in his mouth, on top of the dozen other poisons secreted on his body. Soka clung to the edge of death, never wanting to stray too far from its safety that he couldn’t jump over at a moment’s notice. When it came to getting caught in Aare’s clutches, death was the only sanctuary. Metyein brushed the thought away and focused back on Juhrnus, whose face looked old and lined. He knew it too.

  “On the table now. No more time to waste,” Gamulstark said firmly, helping Juhrnus to his feet. He handed him a small wooden cup to drink from and then settled the injured man on the table. Soon the drug he’d swallowed put Juhrnus into a deep slumber.

  The tark had finished stitching the ugly wounds and was binding them up when Kebonsat and Emelovi arrived a half hour later. She came in first, stiff-backed, her face pinched tight. Kebonsat trailed after, keeping his distance, his expression set and haunted.

  Seeing Juhrnus lying on the table, both tensed and drew closer.

  “What’s happened?” Emelovi asked in a weedy voice.

  Metyein winced at her fear. He’d worked hard the last six weeks to shore up her confidence, but while she’d grown more assertive and self-assured in his company, it was little more than a veneer. One that disappeared as soon as she was challenged with something new.

  “Juhrnus was attacked by raiders on his journey here.”

  “Is he—? Will he—?” Emelovi pressed her hands over her mouth.

  “He’ll be fine, providing he sleeps and eats and takes the medicines I give him,” Gamulstark declared. “He won’t wake for at least a day. He needs to be put to bed. I’ll call for help.”

  A few minutes later, the unconscious Juhrnus had been carried off on a stretcher, accompanied by Gamulstark. Metyein summoned servants to scrub off the table. At their departure, he invited his remaining companions to sit. Emelovi sat at one end of the table, with Kebonsat at the other. Metyein sat between, cushioning the tension. He gave a low sigh, eyeing the bloodstain on the table that the servants had been unable to remove. A narrowed glance at his companions revealed they’d noticed it as well. Emelovi was the color of milk, wringing her hands together in her lap.

  What followed was the most unpleasant task Metyein had faced since donning the mantle of Lord Marshal to Honor. He would have cheered at the flame that flared in Kebonsat at the news of Ceriba, but he had to stamp it out.

  “You can’t go after her,” Meytein declared sternly, making it an order. Before Kebonsat could argue, he lifted his hand, looking pointedly at Emelovi as he spoke.

  “I sympathize with your fears for your sister,” he said, never taking his gaze from Emelovi. He couldn’t order her. But it was time she got over her resentment and thought about what her tantrum meant to Honor. They couldn’t afford it. “I sympathize, but you are needed here. I need your expertise to help prepare the valley for war. I have never been in a battle. I’ve read books and treatises and I’ve been taught by the best. It will not be enough. Not against my father and the might Aare has already amassed. You cannot go. Do you understand?”

  Patches of color had risen in Emelovi’s cheeks and she averted her eyes, giving a faint nod. Meytein’s head swiveled and he snared Kebonsat in the same hard, demanding gaze.

  For long moments he didn’t answer. The vein at his temple stood out prominently, and he nearly trembled with the effort of restraining his emotions. He looked as if he were dangling over the edge of a cliff, hanging on by his nails. Metyein bit the tip of his tongue. What if he let go?

  But Kebonsat’s lifetime of training and ingrained sense of duty overrode his roiling emotions, and he answered with a clipped “yes.”

  Metyein closed his eyes, relief flooding through him. “Good. Then we’ll review our inventories and draft a plan for the winter. With any luck, Soka and Reisil will return long before Aare comes knocking on the door.”

  Chapter 20

  Reisil sniffed thickly, huddling in her cloak. She’d caught a cold. The mustard smear on her chest had done little to alleviate her symptoms. Neither had the licorice, featherfoil, and slippery elm lozenges she’d been eating since the previous morning. She sneezed, the explosive sound making the chestnut gelding’s ears twitch. He turned his head to eye her curiously.

  Reisil resisted the urge to stick out her tongue at the animal and instead r
eached for her water bag. She’d filled it with a honey-sweetened horehound-and-catmint tea that morning. Though it was tepid, it soothed her sore throat. She took a long draft and then broke into a hacking cough. Yohuac reined in and patted her on the back, concern darkening his features. Reisil waved away his solicitations.

  “I’ll be fine,” she said, her head throbbing, as she tucked another lozenge in her cheek.

  Yohuac said nothing more, but his forehead remained creased with worry as he again took the lead.

  They’d been another two days in the mountains since camping in the great valley. Six days since splitting from Soka. And they were very close to their destination. Reisil could feel it. There was a subtle vibration, one that she felt in that nebulous place between flesh and magic. It was unsettling. She found herself grinding her teeth and clenching her body tight. But the closer they drew to their destination, the more intolerable it became.

  Two hours later, the sun had begun its slow descent. Yohuac pulled up and waited for Reisil to ride up alongside.

  “Another hour or two. Perhaps we should stop and let you rest. Start fresh in the morning.”

  Reisil shook her head, grimacing at the flare of pain spidering beneath her brow and the bridge of her nose. “No. We need to get through now.”

  “You’re ill. A few hours will make little difference,” Yohuac argued.

  Didn’t he feel it? Reisil swallowed, feeling phlegm thick in her throat. She opened her mouth to speak, but found herself coughing instead. Finally she collected herself, breathing slowly through her mouth.

  “That’s not it. It’s . . . uncomfortable.” Pitiful word for the thing she was feeling.

  Yohuac considered her for a moment, his face expressionless. Finally he nodded. “All right.”