The Throne of Amenkor

by Joshua Palmatier

  And it didn’t matter. All that mattered was Erick.

  I rounded the corner, moving with the quick, quiet stealth I’d learned from the Dredge, as fluid as a cat. At the far end of the alley, I could see the men that surrounded Erick’s body where it lay, laughing as they kicked him, muttering to each other, goading each other on. Cristoph stood back from the group. Only four men left, besides Cristoph. Two other bodies lay scattered through the alley.

  Erick had little time. He’d be dead in the next twenty breaths if I didn’t act. Cristoph would kill him. Even as I watched, Cristoph smiled. The same slow, cruel smile I’d seen on Garrell Cart as he gazed down at the little girl with the green ribbon.

  I pushed away from the wall, the last vestiges of the pain smothered. Everything became focused, became clear.

  Twenty breaths.

  The first man died two breaths later, my dagger slipping up and in and out. He jerked forward, arched back, began to fall, but I was already moving. I felt Cristoph see me, heard his drawn breath like a gasp in my ear. But he was the farthest away, and not close enough to harm Erick.

  The others first.

  The second man heard the first one’s startled gasp, but he wasn’t fast enough. My dagger punched into his neck even as the muscles there contracted and his head began to turn. He staggered back, hands shooting to the spray of blood, struck the wall to the left of Erick’s crumpled body, slid down its side. His pulse thrummed through my head, a dark ripple, and I tasted the heat in the air, the sweat.

  Eight breaths.

  “’Ware!” Cristoph shouted, sharp and brittle with tension, anger, and terror.

  I spun, caught his eyes.

  He saw something there, deep inside me. The harshness tinged with annoyance in his gaze vanished like a burst bubble, replaced solely with fear.

  He stepped back.

  At the same moment, the third man snarled and lunged for me.

  Almost without thought my blade sliced up and into his side. I caught his weight as he fell into me, felt his last gasp of breath against my shoulder and neck. It smelled of garlic and potatoes.

  He was heavier than I’d thought and I staggered, sliding to one side, out from underneath him as he fell. His blood coated my hand, slick and coppery.

  Twelve breaths.

  And then the river echoed with running feet. Slipping my blade free of the man’s side, I rolled his body away from me, turned to see Cristoph and the last man dodging around the corner of the alley.

  My nostrils flared and I drew in the deep scent of lantern oil and straw.

  I smiled and turned away from the fleeing men, kneeling down at Erick’s side.

  His face was a bloody mess, cuts and gashes and dirt and pebbles mired across the scars he already had. The whites of his eyes were startling, his breath coming in short gasps. Blood dripped from his nose to the cobblestones, and his arms were hunched protectively about his body. Every breath he drew sent a shudder through his chest, his legs twitching.

  “I told you to run,” he wheezed.

  I leaned in close and smiled. “And I told you you couldn’t protect me anymore.”

  He stilled for a moment, regarding me, and then he chuckled, the sound wet and thick. The chuckle edged into a moan and he rolled onto his back, straightening slightly. “The Mistress’ tits, it hurts,” he gasped, then winced as he moved his arm.

  I dove deeper, focused as I laid a hand on his chest to keep him from moving. Nausea bubbled up, but I thrust it aside. I still had work to do tonight. The scent of oil and straw pulled me.

  I could see that Erick wasn’t as hurt as he looked, beaten but not broken. Cristoph had been the real threat. Erick would survive if he’d stay in the alley and wait for me. No one would disturb him here.

  I relaxed and leaned in toward him. “Don’t move. Stay here and wait for me. I’ll be back to get you.”

  He looked at me a long moment, surprised, but then nodded. “I’ll stay,” he muttered.

  I pushed away, but he halted me before I’d moved two steps with a barked, “Varis!”

  I turned back, face creased with annoyance. The scent of oil and straw was strong, almost overwhelming.

  “He’s a mark now,” Erick gasped, so intent on what he said that he’d risen slightly, his upper torso wavering a few inches off the ground.

  I smiled and nodded. “I know.”

  He collapsed back to the cobbles with a groan.

  I’d reached the end of the alley and turned before I realized that I’d spoken to him with the same harsh crack of command he’d used to train me.

  * * *

  Lantern oil and straw.

  I drew in a deep breath, glanced upward toward the roiling clouds. The pressure of rain weighed down on me, heavy and cold. I was barely keeping the nausea at bay now, drawing more and more on the protective Fire to keep it back.

  I had to find Cristoph. I wouldn’t be able to hold on much longer.

  I dodged across a main thoroughfare, ducked through an alley and sped down the street on the far side. Cristoph was moving deeper into the warehouse district, traveling fast. The other man was still with him, his scent warm, like stagnant water, and not as strong. But Cristoph’s scent intensified as I ran, seemed to be gathering like a pool of water not far away.

  Another street, down the edge of a long warehouse, through another alley—

  A warning pulse in the Fire and I slowed, felt a shudder as the scent of stagnant water suddenly sharpened. I tasted metal.

  The man that had fled with Cristoph was quick. His blade flashed out from behind a stack of empty crates and caught me in the arm before I could jerk back. I felt the tug as it sliced through my shirt, through skin, tasted my own blood, but the silvery jolt of pain was smothered almost instantly by the Fire.

  I stepped back from the crates as the man moved out of hiding. He growled, a low, dark sound, and his eyes flared with hate. But I could smell his fear in his sweat, thick and putrid. It was the bearded man, the one who had first stepped from hiding in the alley where I’d been caught.

  He circled me and I turned slowly, followed him. In the darkness, he could barely see me, was listening more than he was seeing. I could see it in the turn of his head. His breathing was harsh, drowning out most sound.

  “Where are you, little bitch?” he hissed, almost too low to hear.

  I grinned.

  He lunged forward, knife striking. I parried, ducked to one side, sliced up and out toward his chest, but he was already moving, grunting with the effort, pulling back.

  My blade caught his shirt but nothing else and then we were circling again. My grin was gone. He was breathing harder, but there was a change in his stance. He wasn’t trying to see me anymore. He’d given up, was relying on his other senses.

  His nostrils flared and I suddenly wondered what I smelled like, but then he dove, moving in tight and close.

  My blade grated across his and I felt his breath on my face, the stench of stagnant water overpowering. His free arm snaked around my back, jerked me in tight, our blade arms caught between us. Just as I began to twist out of the hold, his foot caught the back of mine. He turned, spun me in the direction I’d been about to twist, and I tripped over his foot.

  I landed hard on my shoulder, gasped as numbness sank into my flesh, my arm going dead for a moment, then tingling along its entire length. I felt my dagger slipping from my numbed fingers, heard it clatter to the cobbles of the street, but I didn’t hesitate. I rolled onto my back, reached up with my other arm and caught his wrist as he struck downward, dug my fingers into tendon and muscle. He hissed and dropped down onto my chest, knees to either side, but he didn’t lose the knife. My grip was too tenuous, my fingers in the wrong place.

  He leaned forward, arm trembling, and forced his knife closer. His other hand clamped onto my arm, tried to
wrench it free, but I held tight. He snarled in frustration, his knees tightening about my sides. Sensation began returning to my useless arm, a horrible burning fire, but I fought it back and began scrabbling for my lost dagger. Giving up on wresting my hand free, he pulled back and punched me.

  The sheeting white pain from my already split lip almost wrenched me from the river. The Fire wavered and I spasmed, bile rising to the back of my throat. I choked it down, seized the river again, the protective Fire returning just in time for me to halt his knife a few inches from my chest.

  He shifted, laid his hand on my chest, and put his entire weight behind his knife.

  It was too much. I couldn’t hold it. My arm was trembling already, weakening. I could see the strength flowing out of it in tendrils. I could smell my own sweat, tainted with terror.

  The knife lowered, touched my shirt, pricked my skin. Blood began to stain the cloth, and the man smiled, a wicked, vicious smile. I strained harder, the muscles in my arm burning, but the knife sank lower, digging in. The tip of the knife scraped bone.

  The scent of blood intensified. White-hot pain began to flare through my chest, so hot the Fire couldn’t hold it back. I gasped, my eyes going wide—

  And I pulled the river close, formed it into a hard, solid ball between me and the grinning face of the bearded man, and punched it forward.

  The man jerked back with a gasp, the knife tip sliding free of my chest as his arm went weak and I thrust him away. My other hand found my dagger and with a heave I pulled myself up off the ground and into a crouch, weight in my heels.

  The bearded man never had time to recover. He was still gasping, arms cradling his chest where I’d punched him with the river, when I slit his throat.

  I stepped back, staggered under a sudden weight of weariness, but forced that back as well as I caught myself against a wall. The scent of stagnant water was fading, the lantern oil and straw now so strong it overwhelmed everything else, even blood. Using the wall for support, I stumbled down the street, turned, and saw the door.

  I halted. The warehouse took up the entire block and had two floors. Lantern light glowed through the few windows surrounding the doorway. The entire building reeked of oil and straw.

  I pushed away from the wall and moved across the street. I was no longer moving fluidly. My arm still tingled with the last traces of numbness and my chest throbbed with a dull, hideous pain that the Fire could not suppress. My face had begun to throb as well. But the writhing coil of anger urged me forward.

  I didn’t hesitate at the door. Instead, I kicked it open.

  At the far side of the little room beyond, Cristoph jerked around. He held a lantern and was just about to step through a second, open doorway into the warehouse itself. The room we were in held two desks and numerous ledgers on shelves.

  When he saw me, Cristoph bolted through the door, taking the lantern with him.

  I staggered past the desks to the door, stared out into the warehouse beyond. Crates filled the immense room, stacked high, so that the warehouse was nothing but a warren of narrow walkways and niches. But Cristoph’s scent was strong, and I could see the flicker of lantern light clearly.

  I slid forward.

  Cristoph turned and twisted through the passages, ducked and doubled back. But he couldn’t hide. Not with his scent so strong. As I got closer, I could hear his breathing. It was panicked, punctuated with gasps and moans.

  I moved faster, my nostrils flaring. I was close. I could almost taste him.

  Then the sounds of panic quieted. I paused, edged around a corner.

  He stood in the short passage on the far side, and the moment he saw me he heaved the lantern at me.

  I ducked under it, sped forward, heard it shatter as it struck the crates behind me. The scent of lantern oil was suddenly stronger, as intense as the blood earlier—

  And then there was a faint whoosh of sound. A wave of heat washed forward and I paused.

  Ahead of me, a look of horror passed over Cristoph’s face as the sheen of light intensified. He held still in the flicker of flames, then dropped his gaze to me and fled to the left, down another passage.

  I turned back, smoke suddenly choking me. The entire passage behind me was consumed in flame. And it was spreading. Fast.

  The entire warehouse would burn. And it wouldn’t end there.

  I spun and rushed after Cristoph. He was too close to let go now. And he knew the quickest way out.

  I caught up to him twenty steps farther on. He was trapped at a dead end, backed up against a wall of crates.

  “Please,” he gasped.

  The wall of heat from the fire pulsed behind us and now the river was saturated with the sounds of wood crackling, splintering.

  Cristoph glanced toward the fire, then seemed to sag, the panic pulling back. “We’re trapped. The only way out was back through the fire.”

  I frowned, then stepped forward. He only had time to tense, to draw in a sharp breath, before I struck.

  I made it as painless and quick as possible. He was a mark, nothing more.

  When his body slumped to the floor, I stood over it a moment. But I felt nothing. No satisfaction. No anger. No remorse.

  Then I turned to look at the fire. I could see its light at the end of the passage, could see the light flickering on the wood of the ceiling high above. I could feel it pushing toward where I stood, a ripple of heat and smoke and light.

  I glanced up to the top of the crates. They were stacked high, but not all the way to the ceiling.

  I was small, thin. I could fit through narrow spaces.

  I stepped over Cristoph’s body and began pulling myself up.

  * * *

  I stumbled out of the warehouse through a back entrance, where goods were loaded and unloaded. The smoke on the air was heavy and thick, cloying beneath the river, but I didn’t dare let it go. I still had to reach Erick, and the fire inside was raging, had already spread to the warehouse on one side.

  The entire warehouse district might go up in flames.

  I shoved the thought from my mind, gathered the Fire and the river about me as tightly as I could, and set out at a half run toward Erick. Halfway there, shouts began to rise in warning. Someone ran past with a bucket and I snorted, feeling a shiver of guilt. But there was nothing I could do. And the bucket wouldn’t help.

  I stumbled into the alley where I’d left Erick, half expecting him to be gone, but he wasn’t. He was sitting up instead, back against the alley wall. I knelt beside him and he chuckled when he saw me.

  “You look like hell,” he said, and I grinned. But it was weak. I was barely holding on, the nausea and pain steadily overtaking the Fire.

  “Come on,” I said, pulling him upright. He groaned, rolled to his knees, and then with help managed to climb to his feet.

  “What in the Mistress’ name did you do?” he wheezed as we staggered out onto the street. He was supporting me more than I was supporting him. The fire could be seen clearly beneath the lowering clouds.

  “Cristoph started a small fire.”

  He laughed, winced, then shook his head.

  We made it to the edge of the warehouse district before I lost the river completely. It slid away without a sound, even as I reached for it, and the sudden pain and nausea was instantaneous. I vomited in a corner, Erick leaning over me, while people on the street panicked. The fire lit up the clouds behind us, thick smoke roiling skyward, reflecting the flames.

  “What did you do?” Erick said again in awe as he watched.

  From where I knelt, hunched over my own puke, I glanced up at him. I wasn’t going to hold out much longer. “Get me to Merchant Borund’s manse,” I croaked.

  He nodded.

  I felt the first fat drops of rain strike my face and then I let the nausea and pain overtake me.

  I never fe
lt myself hit the ground.

  * * *

  I woke when the first tremors hit.

  Erick was carrying me. He clutched me tight at the beginning, but then the spasms became too violent, my arms twitching, my back arching, and he was forced to set me on the ground.

  “Gods,” he muttered. His voice was muted, as if coming from a distance. In the background, I could dimly hear screams, running feet, the roaring crackle of fire. Rain poured down, sluicing my face, dripped from Erick’s hair as he knelt over me, his hands pressing me down, trying to hold me still. Fear was stamped across his face, stark and surreal.

  Eventually, the tremors passed. The last thing I saw before weariness claimed me again was Erick, staring down into my half-lidded eyes, his face grim.

  The second time, the tremors were worse. I never opened my eyes, couldn’t open my eyes. My body was so taut I could feel the cords of muscle in my neck. My teeth were clenched so tight my jaw ached and tears squeezed from between my eyelids. Erick didn’t set me down this time, and there was shouting.

  “Open the damn gate!” Erick bellowed, but again everything was distant, removed.

  A clatter of metal, a screech as I was jostled in Erick’s grip, his balance shifting. He must have kicked the gate the moment it was unlocked. And the next instant he was running.

  “What is this?” someone demanded, a voice I recognized, but it took a moment. Gerrold.

  “Varis,” Erick barked. “Are you Borund?”

  “No.”

  “Get me Borund!” The training voice.

  “What’s this?” Lizbeth now, her voice harsh but shrill.

  I felt the tension in my neck relaxing. The sensation of rain had stopped. We were inside.

  Someone else approached. “What is the meaning of this?” Borund demanded.

  “Varis is hurt.”

  “What?” Borund’s voice moved closer. I felt a hand press against my face. “By the Mistress . . . Gerrold, go fetch Isaiah.”

  “But the fire—”

  “Now!” I couldn’t be certain, but I thought I heard true agony in his voice.