The Flames of Dragons

by Josh VanBrakle

  Chiyo bowed to Goro so her head touched the floor. “You honor me beyond words.”

  When Chiyo rose, Goro was wide-eyed. They were always informal with each other. Such a display almost never happened between them.

  “That man has known more pain in his life than either of us can imagine,” Chiyo said. “I don’t want to add any more on top of that. If you say he has to leave, then let’s tell him together, gently.”

  Her husband bowed back to her. “Thank you, Chiyo. It’s for our own safety, and for the safety of our child yet to come.”

  Chiyo wanted to believe him. As she stood and cleared the dishes, though, she wondered what the ronin Katsu would do when they told him.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Rookie and Veteran

  Balear and Dirio stood in Kataile’s third level, midway up the cliff face. This area sloped more gradually than other parts of the city, so it sported one of Kataile’s few large, open courtyards. A white stone fountain burbled in the center, and around it gathered the officers of the city’s militia. Balear had summoned them here so he could learn more about them and how best to turn them into soldiers.

  The results were discouraging. A portly middle-aged man leaned against the fountain while guzzling a tankard of ale. Next to him, a sixteen-year-old picked his nose and stared at the clouds. Rounding out the set, a white-bearded man twenty years older than Dirio lay on the stone, snoring.

  “This is what I’m supposed to train?” Balear murmured.

  Dirio shrugged. “At least they came.”

  “Not quite,” Balear replied. “According to Elyssa, Kataile’s forces number one thousand. They’re divided into ten companies of one hundred soldiers each, and each company is divided into ten squads of ten.”

  “How mathematical.”

  “With Elyssa in charge, I’m not surprised. Anyway, my point is that there should be one hundred and ten people here—the hundred squad leaders plus the ten company leaders.”

  Dirio frowned. At best forty men had come. “Oh.”

  “Yeah,” Balear replied. “Oh.”

  “To be fair, they only had a day’s notice,” Dirio said. “Maybe some of them had other assignments.”

  “They were told this meeting took first priority.” Balear blew out a long breath. “We have an enormous task ahead if we can’t even get half our officers to show up for practice.”

  Dirio gestured at the men. “So inspire them. Most of these guys either didn’t qualify for Amroth’s draft order, or they outright ignored it. I doubt any of them were at the Battle of Ziorsecth. They don’t understand war.”

  “How am I supposed to make them understand war? They’ve lived in a luxurious tourist town all their lives.”

  Dirio smirked. He pointed to the gigantic sword on Balear’s back. “That could make for a good demonstration.”

  Balear’s eyes narrowed. “I’m not going to use magic.”

  “You don’t have to. You just need to teach them about war. Show them what it’s like. You’ve been there after all.”

  Balear subconsciously reached over and touched the empty socket of his right shoulder. “Yeah,” he said, “I have. All right, I’ll give it a try.”

  He stepped forward. A few of the soldiers focused on him, but most were engaged in side conversations and ignored the one-armed man. Balear cleared his throat. “Good afternoon!”

  A few half-hearted “Good afternoon’s” came back.

  Balear scowled. “That won’t do. I said, ‘Good afternoon!’” He shouted the words.

  “Good afternoon!” The reply was a little stronger this time.

  “Better,” Balear said, “but I’m in charge of this city’s defense now. You’ll address me as ‘sir.’ One more time: good afternoon!”

  “Good afternoon, sir!”

  Balear eyed the teenager with his finger up his nostril. The boy hadn’t answered with the others. “You there,” Balear said, “what’s your name?”

  The boy jumped at Balear’s sharp tone. He hid his finger behind his back as though he could avoid Balear noticing what he’d been doing. “Pi. . .Pito,” he stammered.

  “Pito, sir,” Balear growled. He stalked up to the boy and glowered at him. Balear had a solid six inches on the kid, and the gigantic sword on his back made him that much more imposing.

  The kid gulped. “Pito, sir.”

  “That’s better. Have you ever been in a fight, Pito?”

  “Yes, sir. I’m the best brawler among the teens. That’s why they made me a squad leader.”

  Balear’s eyebrow twitched. If this whelp was the best fist-fighter among those his age, Kataile was in big trouble.

  He kept that sentiment to himself for the moment. “Good to know, Pito,” he said. “Now then, have you ever been in a war?”

  The boy shook his head. “No, sir.”

  Balear took three steps back and removed the Auryozaki from its harness. He leveled the enormous sword at the boy. Its tip was less than a foot from the kid’s face. “Well,” the general said, “you’re about to be.”

  Pito’s eyes bulged so much Balear wondered if they would pop out of their sockets. “Sir, you . . . you can’t be serious.”

  “You have a sword,” Balear said. He gestured with his head to the short sword on the boy’s hip. “You say you’re the best brawler. Prove it. I’ll give you the same test someone named Ariok once gave me: live.”

  Balear swung the Sky Dragon Sword in an overhead strike.

  Pito barely managed to jump sideways in time to avoid the blow. The Auryozaki slammed into the fountain behind him, throwing a shower of stone and water across the courtyard.

  Screams filled the space as the officers closest to Balear panicked and fled. No one had told them their new general was insane.

  Despite the chaos, a few of the more distant officers stood their ground. They drew their weapons and surrounded Balear. “No one attacks a man of Kataile!” one shouted.

  “Outsider!” another screamed. “Traitor!”

  “We won’t accept you!” yelled a third.

  Balear leveled his sword at each in turn. “That’s fine,” he spat. “You don’t have to follow me if you don’t want to. To be honest, I’m not thrilled about being here. I’m even less thrilled to instruct a bunch of draft dodgers. So I’ll make you a deal. If any of you want my job, you can have it. There’s just one condition. You have to beat me first.”

  Four of them tried. Balear didn’t want to kill them, so even striking them with the Auryozaki’s flat wasn’t an option. He returned the weapon to its harness and faced them bare-handed.

  The first three went down with a single punch to each of their solar plexuses. The fourth managed to swing his weapon, a halberd, once before Balear got inside his guard and dropped him with an elbow to the jaw.

  Balear thought that would end it, but then a fifth man stepped forward. Unlike the other officers who had challenged him, this man’s expression wasn’t one of anger or resentment. It was cold and detached.

  The new challenger raised an old, rusty sword. Then, without a word, without a shout, without the slightest sign that he was about to move, he thrust at Balear’s chest.

  The man’s speed and ferocity caught Balear off guard. He dodged sideways, but the man tracked him. This fifth fighter must have held back intentionally, observing Balear’s fighting style against the other contenders.

  With Balear on the defensive, the challenger pressed his advantage. Slashes aimed for Balear’s elbow and wrist as well as more vital areas. He barely avoided each attack.

  Balear grimaced. There was no choice. He reached back and pulled out the Auryozaki.

  The challenger hesitated an instant, but then he regained his composure. He charged, and Balear guessed the man’s strategy. He would get close to Balear and take advantage of the Auryozaki’s apparent mass.

  It would have been a good plan were it not for the Sky Dragon Sword’s magical weightlessness. Balear whipped his sword around as quic
kly as a dagger and blocked his opponent’s thrust. A flick of his wrist sent the rusty sword flying.

  Balear expected the man to surrender after that, but instead, his opponent kept running and slammed into him. The man shoved his forearm under Balear’s jaw and forced him to the ground.

  Before Balear could recover, the officer leapt on top of him. The man pinned Balear’s arm with one hand and pummeled his face with the other.

  Through the rain of blows, Balear knew he’d made a mistake. He’d assumed everyone here was a novice. This man was a veteran.

  Even so, he wasn’t a match for Balear. The man’s punches had little force behind them. They should have knocked Balear out by now, but instead he just had a bloody nose and lip.

  Balear pushed back against the hand holding his arm to the stone. Spitting blood into his opponent’s eyes, he twisted the Auryozaki so its pommel drove up into the officer’s stomach.

  The man fell to his knees. He gasped for breath as he wiped his face. Balear stood, spat more blood, and leveled the tip of his sword at the man’s throat.

  Despite his obvious discomfort, the defeated veteran stared defiantly at Balear. His pale green eyes dared the general to finish the battle.

  Instead of killing the man, Balear smiled and put away his sword. He couldn’t see his own face, but he guessed it must look horrible. He could feel blood running down his chin, and one eye was swollen shut. “You were at the Battle of Ziorsecth,” he said.

  “How did you know?” the man on the ground wheezed.

  “Your expression. The way you fought. Everything about you screamed that you had experience. But I wasn’t certain until I disarmed you. Someone with training but who had never been in a battle would have given up. They would have assumed the match was over, that it wasn’t a fight to the death. You kept on going. You knew that if you didn’t, I would kill you. Isn’t that right?”

  “I didn’t know,” the man admitted, “but I wasn’t about to guess wrong.”

  Balear laughed. It made a raspy sound in his throat. “What’s your name?”

  “Riac,” the man said, “and don’t tell me to call you ‘sir.’”

  Balear held out his hand. “Riac, how would you like to be my second-in-command? You know these men. You know war. You can prepare them for what to expect when another city’s army comes calling.”

  Riac didn’t answer right away. He grasped Balear’s hand and pulled himself to his feet. He was a grizzled man, with a chiseled jaw and a scar on his left cheek. His sandy brown hair had flecks of gray. Balear hadn’t realized the man was that much older than he was.

  The veteran stared a long time into Balear’s unswollen eye. What he looked for Balear didn’t know, but the general held firm, unwilling to falter in front of his men.

  After what felt like hours, Riac nodded. “Sure, no problem. Sir.”

  Balear smiled. One down, nine-hundred and ninety-nine to go.

  Then he snapped his fingers. “Oh, Pito!” he said. He looked around. “Where’s Pito? I’d like to put him in your company, Riac. He could learn a lot from someone like you.”

  One of the officers standing nearby shuffled his feet. “Um, sir? Pito left.”

  “Left?” Balear asked. “Where’d he go?”

  The soldier stared at his boots. “Well, I’m not certain, but I got a whiff of him as he ran past me. I think . . . um, sir, I think he went to change his pants.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  Gentle Heart

  The paddy blurred as Iren dashed across it. With both hands he ripped at the weeds growing between the rice plants.

  At this speed, telling the difference between what to pull and what to leave was almost impossible. But that was the point. He had to learn to pick out subtle differences even at high speeds.

  Iren doubted his father had ever trained this way. In fact, he doubted pulling weeds had ever been part of any Dragon Knight’s training.

  Still, it seemed to be working. When he’d started this morning, he couldn’t even tell where the weeds were. Now, as the sun set, he was getting the hang of it. He still occasionally grabbed a rice plant, or tripped and fell in the muck, but those mistakes came less and less often.

  When dusk fell, Iren gave up for the day. Exhausted from running flat-out since morning, he left the paddy at a leisurely pace. He stopped at the well to draw some water and wash off the mud that caked him.

  With his clothes and skin visible again, he headed for Goro and Chiyo’s home. His stomach grumbled at the thought of dinner. Even though Chiyo had only the most basic ingredients, her cooking was excellent. The meals were earthy and informal, like the woman who made them.

  As Iren neared the tiny farmhouse, though, Goro and Chiyo were outside in front of the door. Goro had his jaw set like he was about to enter battle, and Chiyo wrung her hands as though she feared he wouldn’t come back from the fight.

  At first Iren worried the two of them had seen him racing around, but he dismissed the possibility. The rice paddies were at a higher elevation than the house, so the angle was wrong to see a person working in them.

  Iren put a hand behind his head and smiled nervously. “I hope I’m not late for dinner again. I wanted to finish the weeding before I came down.”

  Chiyo’s eyes widened. “You pulled all the weeds in one day?”

  “I guess so,” Iren said. “Is that unusual?”

  Goro’s scowl deepened. “Not at all,” he spat. “It’s perfectly normal for a ronin.”

  Iren rocked back on his heels. He knew the word “ronin” from his education in Maantec culture from Hana. It wasn’t a title that garnered respect. A ronin was a highborn warrior who had lost his lord’s favor. Usually they picked up odd jobs as mercenaries, but occasionally they stooped to banditry.

  “So I’m right,” Goro said. “Why don’t you tell us what you’re really doing here? You’re no wandering farmhand; I’m certain of that. I know that was you running around the forest last night.”

  Iren sighed. Where to even begin? Lying wouldn’t help, and he doubted he could pull it off anyway. At the same time, though, he didn’t want them to find out that he was Iren Saito’s son, or about Divinion.

  Maybe a partial truth would work. “I did come from Hiabi,” he said, “but I wasn’t sworn to service by anyone there. I’m originally from Lodia, far to the north. I came to Hiabi for training, but it wasn’t what I expected. I couldn’t return to Lodia, so I started wandering Shikari.”

  It was all true, though it left out a lot of important details. It seemed to work for Chiyo, but Goro remained unmoved. “A highborn up and leaves Hiabi, and nobody there gives a damn?” he asked. “I don’t buy it. Lord Melwar doesn’t seem the type to let someone like you leave without a plan to get you back. He’ll send men after you. Wouldn’t you agree?”

  Iren frowned. He had no idea what Melwar would do. It had been more than a month since the showdown outside Hiabi, and Iren had seen nothing of the Maantec lord or his servants since. Surely if Melwar or Hana wanted to find him, they would have done so by now.

  Still, he had no choice but to agree with Goro. Melwar had put months of effort into Iren’s training. Iren thought it unlikely the noble would forget about him. “I don’t know of anyone pursuing me,” he said, “but that doesn’t mean they aren’t. It’s a possibility.”

  “And that’s why you’re hiding here,” Goro finished for him. “You want to avoid Lord Melwar’s patrols.”

  “Not at all. I just needed a way to keep fed while I continued my training.”

  “What are you training for that’s so important?”

  Iren paused. If he said much more, everything was going to come spilling out. “My parents were murdered,” he told them. “I want to become strong enough to avenge them.”

  Chiyo’s left hand went to her mouth. She wrapped her other arm around Goro’s. “Please, Goro, stop this.”

  “We agreed, Chiyo,” Goro retorted. “It has to be done. Katsu, you can’t stay here. Yo
u’ve put this farm in danger. If Lord Melwar’s men find out we’re harboring a ronin, they’ll kill us. You have to leave.”

  Iren felt like the man had punched him in the face. He’d only worked here a month, and already they were tossing him out.

  “I understand,” he said at last. “I won’t endanger you further. I’ll leave immediately.” He turned and walked away.

  * * *

  This was wrong. Everything about this was wrong. Chiyo watched Katsu get smaller and smaller. Why had she agreed to this?

  “It’s for the best,” Goro said. “Come on inside. Let’s have dinner.”

  “All right,” she replied, but then a thought came to her. “Goro, you head on in. I didn’t say goodbye to him. I want to do that. Will you let me?”

  Goro folded his arms, but he said, “Be careful.”

  “I will.”

  Her husband went inside. The moment the door shut, Chiyo ran to catch up with Katsu.

  “Katsu, wait!” she called.

  The man hesitated a moment, then stopped and faced her. “Chiyo?” he asked. “What’s the matter?”

  Chiyo bowed to him. “I wanted to thank you,” she said. “Goro might not see it, but you’ve done a lot for us. I’m glad you stayed here as long as you did.”

  Katsu briefly inclined his head. “You’re welcome. Farewell.”

  “No, wait!”

  Chiyo’s heart raced. What was she doing? She and Goro had agreed.

  “You told us you were training to avenge your parents,” she said. “Why did you come all the way here to do that? What about Lodia? Couldn’t you train there?”

  Katsu looked at the sky. It had darkened into night. A half moon shone through a thin veil of clouds.

  “Lodia hates me because I’m a Maantec, a ‘Left,’” he said. “All humans are right-handed, so a left-handed Maantec sticks out. There was no place for me but Shikari. Yet even here . . .”

  Chiyo’s lips turned down even as her eyes softened. She had been right about this man all along. She had let Goro’s suspicions get to her, but now she would make things right. “Katsu,” she said, “may I see your hands?”