The Warrior Moon

by K Arsenault Rivera

  “You people took six of my children,” she says. “Now you want our weapons? Puh.”

  Sakura’s never taken anyone’s children, except if one of the girls at the shrine asked her to hold her baby for a moment or two. She feels offended—but it passes. This woman isn’t talking about her, in specific; she’s talking about all Hokkarans.

  “It’s Barsatoq and Barsalai who are asking,” Sakura says. She feels as though she should bow to the woman, but given the circumstances, that might be taken as an insult. “I’m only delivering the message.”

  “And why hasn’t Barsalai come herself?” asks the old woman.

  “Because she’s resting,” Sakura answers.

  Big Mongke laughs. Sakura feels it in her lungs—just how big is he? It’s hard to tell when he’s leaned over in the ger. “Barsalai doesn’t rest.”

  “She does, sometimes,” Sakura says. “You can go look if you don’t believe me.”

  “I don’t,” says the old woman.

  “Neither do I,” says Big Mongke’s wife, a woman only a little taller than Sakura. “You want us to surrender our weapons so you can take us as prisoners. Use us as shields. Defile our horses. We’re onto you.”

  They are right to be upset, Sakura thinks. Over and over, she thinks this. She tries to think of what to say, of what could possibly be nice enough to a people who have lost more than half their number because of Hokkaran hatred.

  Thankfully, she does not have to think long.

  “Eresheyya, are you giving Barsatoq’s cousin trouble?”

  That voice—it’s Dorbentei. Sakura’s caught between relief at having sympathetic company and consternation at being caught in the midst of failure.

  Eresheyya—the old woman—answers in Qorin. They all do. Six people in the ger, and all of them are talking at once in a language Sakura can only vaguely understand. Big Mongke’s voice drowns out all the others, and yet somehow Dorbentei is ignoring everything he says, standing there with her arms crossed and near shouting at Eresheyya. Louder and louder the discussion gets. The dogs wake and run off. Sakura wonders how long it will be before one of them punches another—and then, just as quickly as it all started, it’s over. Dorbentei claps the old woman on the wrist and sniffs her cheeks.

  “They’ll give you their arrows,” Dorbentei says, turning to Sakura.

  “Just the arrows?” says Sakura. “What about their swords?”

  “This family doesn’t have any,” says Dorbentei. “They have arrows, we get arrows.”

  Sakura writes this down in her lectern. Big Mongke’s gathering the quivers from around the ger—she figures she might as well give him some privacy, and steps outside. Dorbentei follows. Somehow, Sakura is not surprised.

  “Don’t you have better things to do?” Sakura says. “Some old woman to translate for?”

  “Burqila’s resting,” Dorbentei answers. She leans against the bright red doorframe. “I thought you’d probably need help with this, being a northerner who doesn’t understand us.”

  “Wasn’t aware Burqila Alshara needed to sleep,” Sakura says, though she’s been aware of that for weeks now. It’s all the answer Dorbentei’s going to get from her.

  “Everyone needs to rest eventually,” says Dorbentei. “Even my cousin. That what she’s up to now?”

  Sakura nods. “Tried to keep her form. Her old one.”

  “With the cheeks,” Dorbentei says sagely.

  “It didn’t work,” says Sakura. “But it took a lot out of her, so she’s resting now. Probably the last time, if I don’t miss my guess.”

  Dorbentei gets off the threshold. She starts walking toward the next ger, and Sakura follows, knowing full well it’ll be useless to try to argue her away.

  “Don’t talk like that,” says Dorbentei. “Barsalai’s not going to die before she’s good and ready.”

  “You sound like my cousin,” says Sakura. “The wording was very clear on the prophecy Shefali was given: she won’t live to see her twenty-sixth year. It’s almost her birthday, now.”

  Dorbentei sniffs. There are four dogs running outside this ger, all of which are carved into the red door leading in. Dorbentei kneels down to play with them. One, a fat old hound with a gray muzzle, starts licking at her face.

  “Ask her, when she wakes,” says Dorbentei. “Ask her what the Mother said to her.”

  It’s a preposterous thing to say when a dog’s licking your face. More preposterous to smile while doing so. Yet there’s something easy and charming in Dorbentei’s casual arrogance. She doesn’t need to assert herself, doesn’t need to boast. Yesterday, she wrestled a demon. Now she pets a dog and talks about visiting the underworld.

  “You went along with her, didn’t you?” says Sakura. This particular story is not one Shefali has told her. “To the Womb.”

  “I was with her through almost all of it,” says Dorbentei. She reaches into her deel’s pocket for a lump of fat and sugar; she feeds this to the dog and stands. “Talked to her right after, when she was starting to go that color. Ask her to tell you about it, historian.”

  “Don’t tell me how to do my job,” says Sakura.

  “Just a helpful suggestion,” says Dorbentei. “I’m a very helpful woman.”

  “To whom?” says Sakura.

  “Everyone. That’s why I’m Burqila’s favorite niece,” she says. That’s no brag—it’s a simple statement of fact. She isn’t wrong in the slightest: Burqila is distant with most of her other nieces and nephews. “Why don’t you let me handle my clan? You’re tired, aren’t you?”

  She is. She’s never been this tired in her life—if she stands too still, she might well fall asleep on her feet—but she has a job to do.

  And besides, where does Dorbentei get off making suggestions like that?

  “I can handle myself,” says Sakura. “It isn’t my first sleepless night.”

  “So you’re going to sleep in the saddle?” Dorbentei says. “If we get attacked in the morning, you’re going to miss the whole battle. Sleep in a litter, and it’s the same—not to mention you’d have to find someone to carry you.”

  “I can think of a few volunteers,” says Sakura. The words leave her softer than she intends them to—and yet Dorbentei’s eyes narrow a little all the same.

  “That so?”

  “That’s so,” says Sakura. What is it with Dorbentei? Who allowed her to look so damned self-satisfied? “But I’ve got to make sure this gets done. I can get some sleep while the two of them are blessing all this metal and bone.”

  Dorbentei lays a hand on Sakura’s shoulder. “Or you could go get some rest now, and ask Barsalai to tell you her story while she blesses the weapons … and that way, you wouldn’t miss out on anything interesting.” She smirks. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you don’t trust me to finish this job. I mean, you must be tired after all that drinking last night.”

  She is. And objectively speaking, Dorbentei’s the better choice for it. The Qorin will listen to her without much question. Having Sakura go around and ask for weapons might unintentionally foster distrust among the ranks.

  But that doesn’t mean she has to tell Dorbentei that. If she does, the woman’s head will swell up like a puffer fish.

  Sakura’s pouting, her eyes drooping closed. Dorbentei taps her—and takes the lectern from her hands as gently as it’s possible to do such a thing. Sakura’s too sleepy to stop her.

  “All that rice wine got to you, didn’t it? Go, rest,” says Dorbentei. “You know where my ger is.”

  “Aren’t you tired, too?” says Sakura, but it comes out as more of a mumble than she’d like. Dorbentei sleeps in Burqila’s ger with the rest of Barsalai’s immediate family; Sakura has a vague memory of her leaving in the middle of the night.

  “Less tired than you are,” Dorbentei says without missing a beat. She taps Sakura’s shoulders and points to it. “Go.”

  Sakura frowns at her. If she had more energy, she’d argue that she isn’t a child to b
e sent to bed—but she is exhausted. Truth be told, having someone else tell her it’s time to sleep is the sign she needed, as to stop on her own would have been to show weakness.

  “You’ll get all the rest of their weapons?”

  “As many as they’re willing to give,” says Dorbentei. “Important distinction.”

  “And you promise?”

  “On my horse’s mane,” says Dorbentei with a smile. An honest, warm smile. “Now will you go? Your eyes are glassier than an Ikhthian cathedral.”

  Sakura’s never been to an Ikhthian cathedral. She wants to ask Dorbentei what they’re like, wants to hear her tell a story, wants to listen to her talk in that accent of hers that’s five different accents put together.

  But she’s tired.

  “Fine,” she says. “Don’t ruin my ink.”

  “I won’t!” says Dorbentei.

  Sakura walks to the ger—come to think of it, wasn’t it unusual for a single woman to have her own ger?—and does not look over her shoulder. This is a conscious choice she makes, one that takes much of her fast-fading focus.

  If she looks over her shoulder, she will see Dorbentei waiting until she’s safely in the ger.

  And she does not know how to feel about that image.

  * * *

  SHE’S THE ONE who goes to talk to Shefali and Shizuka in the morning. It’s something the three of them—Burqila, Dorbentei, and Sakura—decide on over breakfast.

  Having breakfast with Dorbentei and Burqila is surreal enough. Having a Hokkaran breakfast with them even more so. Sakura doesn’t know where they got all this fish from. Have they held on to it since Nishikomi? Perhaps they have; most of it is salted and ready to travel. It occurs to her the army must be saving it for Shizuka, or must have been trying to.

  The joke is on them. Shizuka only likes salmon. She hates all other fish.

  But Sakura’s free to fill up her stomach, and she does. There’s no way of knowing what awaits them today.

  “We’ve got everything in carts,” says Dorbentei. She’s eating fish, too, much to Sakura’s surprise—she pours extra sauce onto her bowl. “Once you’ve got them awake and presentable, just have Barsatoq do something fancy with that sword of hers. We’ll see the light and bring over the carts.”

  Burqila nods. She isn’t touching fish at all—her bowl is full of stew they’ve reheated over the fire. Sakura isn’t sure what to say to her. Dorbentei’s the one doing all the talking, after all, and she doesn’t see Burqila signing.

  “What about breaking down the gers?” Sakura says.

  “That can wait until they’re done,” says Dorbentei. “Gives everyone more time to get themselves ready. Rough shit, the other day. Some of the older people—the ones who remember the blackblood—they’re getting cold feet. Burqila’s going to talk to them.”

  Sakura meets Burqila’s eyes. They’re hard and sharp as always. She wonders—how old is the woman? Did she lose any siblings to the blackblood? What of her parents? So many questions, and so few answers. She isn’t about to ask. There are some answers she knows she isn’t entitled to.

  “Is this place the way you remember it?” Sakura asks instead.

  Burqila’s brows come together; her right eye narrows. Dorbentei purses her lips in surprise. When Burqila’s signing comes, she translates it in a clear voice.

  “Yes. I hated it then, and I fucking hate it now.”

  Does Burqila swear? It seems hard to believe, and yet there’s a hardness about her—yes. That must be a direct translation; she isn’t faltering in response to it at all.

  Before Sakura can ask her another question, Burqila signs again. This one’s easy enough to read—she waves Sakura closer.

  When the Terror of the Steppes asks you to come closer, you do. Sakura sits and tries not to move as Burqila studies her face. Eventually, she sniffs Sakura’s cheeks. Shit. Should she be returning the gesture? She tries, only for Burqila to draw away and sign something.

  Dorbentei’s stifling a laugh—though it dies down as she has to translate.

  “Naisuran’s brother is your father, isn’t he?” says Dorbentei. “Burqila says she knew him. She says you look a little like him, but more like your mother.”

  Sakura’s heart drops. My mother?

  “My … You knew her?”

  Burqila nods. She keeps her eyes on Sakura as she signs.

  “Burqila says that she hated your mother,” says Dorbentei. Her tone’s starting to waver, and she pauses before translating the next part. “She says that your mother was … overly cautious. Angry. That she did not accept her responsibilities with an open heart.”

  None of that is what Burqila said. A cold desperation seizes her. She sets down her bowl of fish and rice. “The exact wording, please.”

  Dorbentei sighs. “You won’t like it.”

  “I’ve heard a lot of shit in my time,” she answers. “Try me.”

  “Burqila says your mother was a coward who never should have gone on the mission to begin with,” says Dorbentei.

  Never should have gone on the mission to begin with. But that means …

  Sakura swallows. A woman who leaves her child at a pleasure house rather than attempt to raise her—Sakura has never wanted to believe she could be a coward. And yet, for so many years to have passed without a word …

  “One of the Swords?” she says. “My mother was one of the Swords?”

  Burqila nods.

  Dead, then.

  She’s always known, on some level, that her mother must be either dead or callous. It is good to know it is the former—though if Burqila named Sakura’s mother a coward, then the latter might still be true. But what sort of coward joined the Challenge of the Sixteen Swords? Everyone knew what the end result of that tournament would be. Everyone had known the “reward” was a suicide mission.

  So why enter at all?

  Sakura runs through the list in her mind: The letters left with her are all from Sayaka—so her adoptive mother claims. Thirty years before Sakura’s birth, you could not have thrown a stone without hitting a Sayaka—the name was as popular as Keichi had been for men. And there was a Sayaka among the Swords: Maki Sayaka, an assassin of some renown. They still speak of her in Nishikomi.

  Her mother had been an assassin and a coward.

  She presses her eyes shut.

  But where does an assassin learn to write in an ever-changing cipher? Sakura’s intellectual curiosity overpowers her shame. Barsalai read a letter from Sakura’s mother—from Maki Sayaka—before they departed—a letter that Sakura herself has tried time and time again to decipher to no avail. How is it that Barsalai read it without difficulty; how was it that Maki Sayaka learned to write in such a way?

  Except …

  “Did you see her die?” Sakura asks. A surprisingly easy thing to say. If Sayaka had been one of the Sixteen Swords, then she is dead, and nothing Shizuka can do can possibly bring her back.

  Burqila shakes her head.

  The pieces begin to fall together. This is no longer a personal tragedy—it is an intellectual one.

  “If she was one of the Swords and you did not see her die, then she must have died here—over the Wall,” Sakura says. “Did O-Shizuru-mor see her die? You two were separated for a little while, weren’t you?”

  Burqila’s eye twitches. If Sakura didn’t know her better, she’d say that Burqila Alshara was flinching. That, however, is impossible; everyone knows Burqila fears nothing. Why should she? She slew a demon with her own two hands when she was younger than her daughter is now. And without any of the benefits of godhood! No, Burqila Alshara would not flinch.

  And yet.

  She signs an answer, though Sakura was careful to keep it open enough that she might nod or shake her head. Dorbentei’s a little sullen as she translates.

  “Burqila says that your mother ran off on her own after they crossed the fog,” says Dorbentei. “Shouting about Iwa.”

  Like the last stroke of a paintbrush—yes.
It’s all obvious to her now. Maki Sayaka, for whatever gods-forsaken reason, went off to Iwa. That must have been where she wrote the letter, and that would explain why it was impossible to read—something happened to her in the Lost City. But why would they have left her alive?

  Sakura reaches for her lectern. Dorbentei was kind enough to clean it before she returned it—it sits atop a Surian-style nightstand within arm’s reach. Flipping through the letters, she sees with some relief that none of them have changed. All remain written in Hokkaran—even the ones that Dorbentei filled in last night. Sakura leaves aside the thought that Dorbentei’s calligraphy is much finer than she’d have expected. If these letters, written beyond the Wall, have not changed, and only Shefali can read them, then it must be exposure to the blackblood that had made Sayaka’s swirl in such an accursed way.

  And if her mother contracted it in Iwa, she would have been close to the Traitor. Who is to say it was not he guiding her hand the whole way? It is little wonder Shefali reacted in such a way. Already the Traitor harried the flanks of her mind. To read his words delivered through the hand of another, to know beyond a shadow of a doubt that what had happened to Sayaka could also happen to her …

  A difficult thing indeed.

  But even this is not answer enough. What was her mother doing here in this infernal land? Where had she gone, and what had she seen? If she’d sent the letters after her exposure, then what if … She dares not think it. Better to assume that her mother is dead.

  Sakura sniffs.

  “Thank you for telling me all of this,” says Sakura. “Don’t know if I’ve ever had a more educational breakfast. I think I need to go speak to Barsalai about something.”

  Dorbentei’s eyes narrow. “Are you going to be all right?” she says. “It’s a lot, what you’ve just heard.”

  “I told you before: I can handle myself,” says Sakura. She scarfs down the last of her meal and sets the bowl aside. “Besides, you’re the one who kept telling me how interesting the story about the Womb is. If I don’t get going, I’m going to miss it, aren’t I?”