by Kate Elliott
Ilya swore under his breath. A rider broke away from the jaran unit harrying the khaja left flank and raced over to Bakhtiian’s party. It was Anton Veselov.
“We left the one gate unguarded, as you ordered, Bakhtiian,” he shouted as he pulled up beside them, flashing a glance back at his sister Arina and then returning his attention to Bakhtiian. “Sakhalin faced sorties before, by that gate, and a troop of one thousand horsemen escaped out of it one night, but this—! We never expected an attack like this.”
“Do you think they knew I rode out today?”
“How could they have known?” asked Anton.
How, indeed? What drove the governor to take flight in the afternoon? As the khaja troop closed, Tess could see that they were all heavily armored, presumably the pick of the garrison. Ilya spurred his horse to a gallop and the entire party raced to one side, to avoid the fray.
Somehow, a column of heavy horse coiled free of the khaja ranks and smashed into them. As if she stood at the eye of the storm, Tess watched the chaos from her still eddy in the very center. There rode Vladimir, parrying, cutting. A khaja horseman fell, dragging down a jaran rider with him. Vasil pressed forward into a gap with his riders ranged alongside him. Then, like a whip’s snap, the trailing end of the column hit the center. At once, Tess knocked a thrown spear aside with her saber and saw it spin harmlessly to the ground. Three armored riders bore down on her and Ilya, and she set herself in the saddle, bracing for the impact; Ilya swore. All at once Aleksi drove through the riders; he forced one off his horse and grappled with the second from the saddle and then knifed him through the faceplate, and then Vladimir appeared and stuck the third through from behind before he could cut down Aleksi. Grim-faced and silent again, Ilya stuck next to Tess, shielding her, though twice at least the tide of the battle tried to tear him off to the left, and once he took a cut meant for her.
Then, as abruptly as it had struck them, the column was shorn off by the combined weight of the Veselov jahar and a reinforcement of men from the Raevsky command. The governor’s flag receded southward, fighting its way away from the city.
Ilya wore a mask of fury. His hands shook. He looked at Tess. She nodded curtly, so he would know she was unhurt. Blood seeped from his left arm, but she could tell by the way he moved the arm that it wasn’t a serious wound. She turned to look behind her. Sonia swore and ripped a swath of fabric from her fine tunic to bind Arina’s ribs while Mitya held Arina upright on her horse. Kirill, white with anguish, could only watch. His lips moved, but whether he cursed the khaja or his own helplessness, Tess could not be sure.
Aleksi pulled in beside her. “Thank you,” Tess said to him. “That was very impressive.” She felt like a fool, saying it, but her heart was pumping and her breath was ragged and she had to say something, no matter how foolish.
Vasil cantered up, flushed, looking terrified. “You’re wounded!” he exclaimed, gaping at Ilya.
“Collect your men, Veselov, and go after them!” ordered Ilya. “Bring me their heads. If one man from that troop of riders escapes, I’ll demote every commander of these units back into the ranks. How dare they threaten my wife!” He was pale with rage.
Without another word, Vasil rode away.
There were wounded in plenty. Tess took Vladi up behind her; others walked. Arina fainted halfway back to camp, and they had to stop. Ilya took her himself, on his horse; she was so slight a thing that she was no burden to him. Kirill looked not just afraid for her life but ashamed of having to watch while another man cared for his wife.
Cara came out to meet them, having already heard of the engagement. She took Arina immediately. Niko tended to Ilya’s arm. Tess sat in the shade of Cara’s tent and sipped at juice brought to her by Galina and watched Kirill pace.
It took two days before Vasil came in at last, bearing the governor’s head on his spear. The rest of the heads the jahar riders carried in, in baskets and bags. The jaran riders had taken heavy casualties, women and men both, and in the end it was the archers under Vera Veselov’s command who had brought down the final two hundred fleeing soldiers. The collected commanders swore that not one khaja from the governor’s party had escaped, and they begged for Bakhtiian’s pardon that the entire episode had happened at all.
Working with captured engineers, Ursula had already made up a catapult as a model to demonstrate siege techniques to the commanders. Bakhtiian gave her all the heads to fling back into Karkand. Ursula was enchanted. For only the second time in her pregnancy, Tess threw up. But she could see by the set expression on Ilya’s face that this was one of those times when it was useless to argue with him.
CHAPTER NINE
NADINE LOVED THE BREAKNEAK pace of a courier’s life. Through Habakar lands she raced, stopping at the staging posts set up along the northeast road that led back to the plains. Some nights she rode straight through, dozing in the saddle, her way lit by men bearing lanterns on either side. Some nights she slept in the comfort of a tent and went on at dawn. She loved the music of the bells that accompanied her at every instant, whether riding or walking, that chimed her awake in the morning and serenaded her to sleep at night with each slight movement of her shoulders or her chest.
In eight days, she crossed out of Habakar lands and onto the farthest southern edge of the plains. Five days later, she rode into a tribe at midday to receive the information that the Prince of Jeds and his party had passed by the morning before, headed south. Out here, on the grass, the wind raked over the tents and already the people wore heavy outer tunics against the chill. Women and children greeted her cheerfully; there were a few young men, so few that the old men seemed numerous in proportion. But Nadine enjoyed just walking through camp. She felt at home, at her ease, here in a tribe going about its life out on the plains. The etsana hurried up, advised of her arrival, and led her to the great tent at the center of camp. The elderly woman sat her down and fed her and offered her milk while the etsana’s own grandson saddled a new horse for her.
“Ah, you are Bakhtiian’s niece,” said Mother Kireyevsky. “Natalia Orzhekov’s daughter.”
“I am.” Nadine accepted a second cup of fermented milk from a dark-haired boy about Katerina’s age.
“Your mother was a fine weaver. She had few rivals among all the tribes, although she was young to be so accomplished.”
“Thank you,” said Nadine politely but coolly. She didn’t like to talk about her mother because the memory of her death was still too painful, and the ache of her loss had never dulled.
“We have sixty-eight men riding under Vershinin’s command,” continued Mother Kireyevsky, sliding easily off the subject of Nadine’s mother. “Perhaps you have news of them.”
Nadine was happy to indulge Mother Kireyevsky with such news of Vershinin’s movements as she had. The Kireyevsky tribe was a granddaughter tribe and thus neither particularly important nor very large, but Nadine remembered them from her childhood, back from the golden days when her mother had still been alive. In any case, it was only common courtesy, and wise strategy, to give her a firsthand account of Bakhtiian and the army. Relatives filtered in and settled down to hear the news. The grandson brought a new horse, but Nadine felt she could spare a little time, since she was only turning to go back the way she came. Since Feodor Grekov was less than a day’s ride away from her, now. She had no desire to hasten their meeting and what must inevitably come of their marriage.
“So, Vershinin and Grekov were sent to the khaja cities off to the west, to pull a circle all around the royal tent.”
Mother Kireyevsky nodded. “Very wise of them. Like a birbas, where we circle the game and drive it in to the center. Vasha, bring more sweet cakes.”
The boy shot a glance at Nadine before he trotted off. He had dark hair, as dark as her own, and deep brown eyes, and there was something familiar about him that nagged at her. “Is he also one of your grandchildren?” she asked. “He’s a nice looking boy.”
There was a silence. Mother Kir
eyevsky gestured, and the knot of relatives hurried away, leaving the etsana alone with Nadine. “You don’t know who that is?” she asked.
“Should I?”
“That is Inessa Kireyevsky’s only child.” Nadine shook her head.
“I don’t know her.”
“Oh, but you do. Although I suppose you were only about Vasha’s age the year that we rode beside your tribe for many months, so you might not recall. Certainly Bakhtiian would recall her.”
“Would he?” Nadine felt suddenly that she was on the verge of an important discovery, rather like a mapmaker cresting a ridge to see virgin country beyond.
“Inessa Kireyevsky was my grandmother’s sister’s great-granddaughter. Inessa’s mother was etsana before me, but when she died three years past, the elders refused to elect Inessa etsana and the position passed into our line of the family.”
“Was she too young? Was there some other problem?”
“She was young, it is true, but youth alone will not necessarily bar a woman from becoming etsana.”
“No, Arina Veselov was very young when she became etsana. There was never any question with her.”
The boy appeared, bearing a golden tray laden with sweet cakes. “Was Arina Veselov married?” asked Mother Kireyevsky. “Ah, well, married soon after; it comes to the same thing. Vasha, set those there. Then you will sit beside me.” The boy obeyed. He sank down beside the etsana and folded his hands in his lap. He had a quiet, muted air about him, which he utterly spoiled an instant later by looking up at Nadine. His gaze was scorching in its intensity. “Vasha.” He dropped his gaze and stared at his hands. “Inessa Kireyevsky was not married when her mother died, although by this time she had an eight-year-old child.”
“Ah. Her first husband had died, then.”
“She had no first husband. She never married.”
“But then how—” Nadine faltered. The boy’s cheeks burned red, but he kept his gaze fastened on his hands. Well, she knew how; it was just astonishing for a jaran woman to bear a child without being married. The unmarried girls were so careful with the herbs that stopped them from conceiving, because, of course, it was shameful for a child not to have a father and a child’s father was the man who was married to its mother.
“Yes,” agreed Mother Kireyevsky. “You can see that Inessa was too stubborn and too impulsive to be given the authority of etsana. The man she wanted to marry did not marry her. The rest, she avoided or insulted or drove off in one fashion or the other until in the end they all shunned her. Luckily, she died the winter after her mother died.”
The boy sat perfectly still through this recital, but his hands betrayed his distress, one clenched in a fist, one wrapped around it, like a shield.
“Leaving her son.” Nadine pitied the boy, his mother torn from him, leaving him among relatives who clearly thought him a shameful reminder of his mother’s disgraceful behavior.
“Leaving a boy with no father, dead or otherwise, and no closer relatives than distant cousins. That line was not strong.”
“Why are you telling me this?” asked Nadine suddenly.
“Will you have another sweet cake?” Mother Kireyevsky asked. Nadine accepted, and the etsana placed the tray back on the carpet beside her pillow. “Inessa claimed to know who the child’s father was. It was her last wish, as she lay dying of a fever, that the boy be sent to his father. The truth is, if it is at all possible that the child would be accepted as a servant, as a cousin, even, we would prefer to send him away. We would never have presumed … but when you came, today, I can only believe that it is a sign from the gods, that what Inessa wished ought indeed to happen.”
Nadine knew what was coming. Now, when she looked at the boy, she understood why he seemed familiar to her, why his features struck such a deep chord.
Mother Kireyevsky cleared her throat, coughed, and spoke. “She claimed that his father was Ilyakoria Orzhekov.”
“My uncle. Bakhtiian.” The resemblance was striking, once you looked for it. The boy had Ilya’s eyes and forehead and stubborn mouth, and the same sharp chin that she—his cousin!—had. Nadine stifled an urge to laugh. Gods, not just laugh, but crow. After what Ilya had done to her, forcing her to accept the marriage to Feodor Grekov, ordering her to have children, well, by the gods, she would bring this little bit of mischief home for him to face. What a scandal! Nadine was delighted. “Of course he must return with me. I’m riding back to the army now, as you know. I will take responsibility for his well-being myself.”
The boy’s head jerked up and he stared at her. Nadine saw light spark in his eyes. Evidently he wished to be rid of his relatives as much as they wished to be rid of him.
Mother Kireyevsky eyed Nadine’s clothing and her saber, and then her keen gaze came to rest on Nadine’s cheek. “You are recently married yourself.”
“Yes. I also command a jahar. You may be assured that the child is safe with me. What is his name? Vasha is short for—?”
“Vassily.”
“Vassily!” Nadine was shocked right down to the core of her being. “How did he come by that name?”
To her surprise, the boy spoke in a gruff little voice. “My mama told me that that is the name he said to give me.
At once, Mother Kireyevsky cuffed Vasha across the cheek. “Don’t mind him,” she said hastily. “It’s a story Inessa told the boy, that she told Bakhtiian that she was pregnant with a child by him, and he said that if it was a boy, to name it Vasil. As if any woman, even her, would do something so unseemly, and any man—especially not your uncle, of course—speak of such things so casually, even in jest. She told the boy many things, I’m afraid, and he’s always been full of himself, thinking that he’s the son of a great man. You needn’t mind it. Of course Bakhtiian can’t recognize him as his son—it’s all quite ridiculous, of course, that an unmarried woman—of course he has no father, but we’re grateful to you for taking him—”
“He looks like him,” said Nadine, cutting across Mother Kireyevsky’s comments, “as I’m sure you must know.” She was beginning to dislike the woman. She was beginning to dislike Inessa Kireyevsky, too, and wondered if she would dislike the boy just as much. Although it was rather late for that, now that she had already agreed to take him. “But in any case, I must go. I’ll need a horse for him and whatever things are his, or that he got from his mother.”
Mother Kireyevsky stood and shook out her skirts briskly. “Oh, he’ll travel very light. He’s got nothing, really, just her tent and a few trinkets.”
“He gave my mother a necklace,” said the boy. “It’s gold with round white stones. He brought it from over the seas. From a khaja city called Jeds.” He said the word as if it was a talisman, a mark identifying him as the true prince, the heir, because what common boy of the tribes, of a granddaughter tribe like this one, would have any reason to know of Jeds?
“Go get your things, Vasha,” said Mother Kireyevsky curtly. Now that she had what she wanted, she sped Nadine’s leave-taking along as swiftly as if she feared that Nadine would change her mind and leave her with the unwanted child.
They rode out in silence. After a while, seeing that his seat on his horse was sturdy and that he was minded to be quiet and obedient, Nadine spoke to him.
“How old are you, Vasha?”
“I was born in the Year of the Hawk.”
“Oh, gods,” she murmured under her breath. The Year of the Hawk. The year her mother died; the year her brother and her grandparents died; the year Bakhtiian killed the man who had murdered them. The year Bakhtiian stood up before the assembled elders of the tribes—most of the tribes, in any case—and persuaded them that the vision the gods had given him was the vision the tribes ought to follow. Eleven years ago all this had taken place. In eleven years, much had changed. Everything had changed. Nadine felt a sudden misgiving, wondering how Ilya might treat a child who reminded him so bitterly of those days. Eleven years ago Ilya had banished Vasil from his jahar; he had seen his mot
her’s younger sister invested as etsana of the Orzhekov tribe and had himself become the most powerful dyan in the jaran. Perhaps he didn’t want to be reminded of what he had paid to bring his dreams to fruition.
“Is it true?” asked the boy suddenly. Nadine looked at him and saw the aching vulnerability of his expression. “Is he really my father? My mama always said so, but …” His face twisted with pain. “… but she lied, sometimes, when it suited her. She said it was true. She said he would have married her, but she never said why he didn’t, so I don’t think he ever would have. Only that she wanted him to. And then she always told me that he was going to come back for her. Every tribe we came to, she asked if they’d news, if he’d married. He never had, so she said he still meant to come back for her. Then after my grandmother died, the next summer we heard that he’d married a khaja princess. Mama fell sick and died. Both the healer and a Singer said she’d poisoned herself in her heart and the gods had been angry and made her die of it. No one wanted me after that.”
Nadine stared amazed at him, until she realized that the stoic expression on his face as he recited this confession was his way of bracing to receive her disgust. Either he wanted it, or he was so used to being rejected that he wanted to get it out of the way early and go on from there.
“I think you’re his son.” Gods, what if she got his hopes up, only to have Ilya deny the connection? And yet, how could he deny it?
“How can I be?” demanded Vasha. “He wasn’t married to my mother.”
Nadine sighed. “I’ll let him explain that,” she said, calling herself coward as she did so. Gods, what was Tess going to say? Well, who knew with the khaja; they had different notions of propriety than the jaran did. Maybe Tess would want to have the boy strangled; maybe she would welcome him. Who could tell? But Nadine had promised that he would be safe, and she’d hold to that promise, no matter what. She rather liked his brusque cynicism, although it was sad to see it in a child. And anyway, Vassily Kireyevsky’s presence made no difference to her problems. Bakhtiian still needed an heir, and he still expected Nadine to provide him with one.