“Rebellion is in the nature of the common man. They know no peace. If you give a man eternal life, he will ask you why you have made him suffer, for in his mind he has already realized that his sorrows will ever increase. But only if he has to think about them. If he simply severed his ties to the world, he’d be happier, but he clings to the false happiness of the here and now instead. He does not know how to experience without thought. That is the gift I grant. That is what I will provide to my kingdom in the South. But you are too busy thinking of your freedom to accept it.”
He is right—she is not paying attention to him. As she watches, every house in Iwa opens its doors. Hundreds—thousands—of Qorin pour from their doors. Some do not bother using the doors at all and instead leap from the windows of teahouses and libraries. As one, they move, coalescing into a column in the center of the city. In the dark, they do not look like people at all—only shadows.
“My wife is coming to kill you,” Shizuka says.
“So she thinks,” says the Traitor. He, too, rises, pulling his outermost robe tighter around him. Vapor curls from his nostrils. “Our dinner is over, Yui. We will quash this rebellion—and you will watch it happen from your chambers. Guards!”
The four Qorin at the foot of the steps turn at once. Like clockwork dolls, they march up the stairs—raise one foot knee high, bring it down onto the step, raise the next. Her father, too, stands.
Shizuka presses her lips together. Her wife is coming. There are only four guards here. Though she has no weapons of her own and Rikuto has taken her mother’s sword, the guards have four. Their swords are comically short for them—but perfectly sized for her. With sword in hand, she could kill all four of them.
It is so easy in her mind: The Traitor must focus on orchestrating his army—he will not be able to respond to her cuts if she makes them quickly enough, and the Qorin will not be able to parry what they cannot see. She can cut them down without killing them. Three strokes and the deed is done—tendons severed at the wrist, combatants rendered casualties. If they continue, well—she tells herself that her wife will forgive her defending her own life.
Revulsion courses through her, but she continues to imagine what might happen if she chooses. The Traitor, isolated on this terrace without his faithful General, could not hope to hold her off. Not truly. He wears no armor and carries no sword—what will he do? Borrowed blade in hand, she strides in her mind across the terrace, moon painting her silver. Like a coward, he backs away from her. His hands find the banister behind him—there will be no escaping her, and she tells him this as she prepares for her cut—
—and the Traitor smiles as her father’s blood spurts onto her face.
Breath stops. Her throat closes. A soiled bed, a woman without arms or legs who once was her hero, a woman fever mad and agony blind. The sword felt the same gliding across her throat as it had impaling Daishi. Would it feel the same to kill her father?
Flowering dogwood. Poetry read in the gardens, near the golden daffodil, where no one dared to bother them. My little tigress.
No. She cannot attack him while her father is so close. What Yamai lacks in martial prowess he makes up for in cunning; the guards are there for show. Itsuki is his real shield.
And, perhaps realizing her line of thought, Yamai forces Itsuki to speak for him now. Her father snaps back into consciousness as if waking from a nightmare. His mouth hangs open as his brows come together over his eyes.
Yet he does not hesitate. Let no one name O-Itsuki a coward: confronted with the unknown and with guards approaching, he reaches for Shizuka’s hand. “Are we staying, or are we going?” he says. The tremble in his voice smooths out as he speaks. “Whatever you wish, I will follow.”
How ridiculous. How ridiculous. Vowing to follow her though he knew not the danger …
Shizuka’s throat is a vise.
“This isn’t a night for fighting,” she says.
Her father tilts his head. If he were not confused before, then he must be now—Minami Shizuru never backed away from a fight, not a day in her life.
But Shizuka is not her mother—and she knows well what will happen if she tries anything here.
Before her father can question her, she starts walking toward the guards. He falls into step beside her. The two of them are down the steps before the guards are, and soon a few spans ahead of them. The Traitor stays on the terrace. When she chances a look over her shoulder at him, he is facing the wall.
Good.
“Shizuru,” says her father. “What’s gotten into you?”
“You asked if I wanted to stay or go,” Shizuka says. “I want to go.”
“But—”
“I thought this sort of thing happened without question,” Shizuka says. “Isn’t that what marriage is all about? Implicit trust?”
Her mother never would have said “implicit trust,” but she doesn’t care so long as the tone is close. Righteous indignation is a note they both knew well.
The gardens are coming up before them. The Traitor will be too busy with the oncoming battle to pay attention to the guards—or at least, that is her hope. She yanks on her father’s hand and pulls him into the gardens. Before he can realize what is happening, she shoves him under the rafters holding up the walkway. There the darkness is true, there he won’t be able to see what she is about to do.
Yet he grabs her by the shoulders with confusion and hurt mingling in his expression. “Zuru, what are you doing?”
“Telling you to stay put,” she says. It hurts to be so sharp with him—more when she sees the turmoil her tone sows—but it is the way her mother would have handled things.
“This erratic behavior isn’t like you. What’s—?”
“Listen to me,” Shizuka says. She takes her father’s hands and sets them back down at his sides. To do so kills something in him, she is sure, for he sees only his wife standing before him. His wife, whom he followed to certain death. To be a pot crushed beneath a potter’s heel—that is the feeling she sees in him then. And yet she continues, straining to keep her voice level, straining to sound like the woman he misses, and not like the daughter he has forgotten. “If you have ever loved me, you will stay right where you are.”
O-Itsuki stares back at her, stricken.
She does not give him time to argue. If she does, he is sure to say something that would have melted Shizuru’s heart, and will only pain her own.
Shizuka jumps up and grabs hold of the walkway. As she hangs there, the thud of passing steps rumbles through the wood—the guards are coming. She had hoped to have a little more time—but hopes mean little on the field of battle. Closer, closer—she waits until they have already passed before trying to haul herself up.
“Trying” is an apt word for it. She was not raised on a diet of meat and disappointment, as Shefali was. Her hands tremble and she groans, trying to force the air out and summon as much of her strength as she can. It is not much—but it is enough to get her halfway up. Pride swells in her breast, but it does not come alone; she whimpers as the stitches holding her chest together burst.
And that whimper is enough to draw the attention of one of the guards.
One, of course, means both.
Together they turn on their heels, together they lock eyes on the woman clawing desperately at the planks of the walkway.
Damn it, she thinks. Every breath brings more pain; every breath makes her head spin a little more. If she is going to get one of their swords, she will need to act decisively—but how can she when she’s in such an embarrassing position? Some hero she is; she can hardly keep hold as it stands.
Farther and farther she slips. If she hits the ground, they will come down to fetch her, and if they do, they will see her father hiding away.
And she cannot let them go anywhere near him.
Two guards approaching. One reaches for her sword.
“Four-Petal,” says the other. “Were you trying to get away from us?”
“I �
�� I fell,” Shizuka lies, but it comes out strained. Staying up is taking so much of her focus, so much of her energy; if her concentration falters, she is sure her arms will give out. They still might regardless.
“You are lying,” says the one with the sword.
Hanging from the side of a walkway, barely able to keep herself up—why did she think this would work? And yet it must. Not for her own sake, but for her father’s. From the set of that guard’s feet, she is readying an attack. There’d be no better time for one.
But the Traitor has shown no signs of wanting to harm her. Lecture, yes; oppress, yes; but physical harm? In three days, he has not once had her tortured. It is more than she’d expected from him.
If an attack comes, it will be a bluff—a show of force, not meant to do anything but dissuade her.
Pain and determination stitch the plan together in her mind.
“We do not take kindly to liars,” says the other guard, the one who has not yet gone for her weapon. “It is behavior unbecoming of a ruler.”
Ruling is lying, more often than not—but she detests it all the same.
Two steps closer. The edge of the unarmed one’s boots brush against her knuckles; the one with the sword is pivoting backwards at the hip.
“A childish thing of me to do!” she says. “You are right, you are right—I wanted to see the flowers before the battle ruined them—”
The lie is not a convincing one. Stilting, it leaves her, as if she has endeavored to explain a concept she does not understand. If she were a student and the guards her instructors, she would have been laughed out of the academy.
But thankfully, she is not a student, and this is not an academy. She is a god, and this is a war, and in war there are such things as explosives. Boom! Even from several li away, the shock wave carries—the guards stagger as the ground beneath them jerks.
And Shizuka is no exception. Her tenuous grasp fails; her hand rises for just a moment, and that is enough to set her falling. She lands with a painful thud on her upper back. Though the breath’s been knocked out of her, though the pit in her chest is covering her with wet blood, she cannot stop the smile from forming on her face.
Trust the daughter of Burqila Alshara to blow a hole in a wall whenever she sees one. Her Shefali—what a woman.
THE WARRIOR MOON
FIVE
As a boulder heralds an avalanche, so do the cannons herald the coming of Barsalai Shefali’s army.
She needs say no more words to stoke them—only to squeeze her horse’s ribs and set off ahead of them all. The next time she draws an arrow, it is not for a symbol, not for a gesture—it is to slay a demon.
There: just beyond the hole, the First Company! Twenty lost Qorin—twenty blackbloods—under the sway of a demon. The demon holds a small drum, no larger than a man’s hand; this it beats in an unholy rhythm as it shouts its orders to the lost Qorin. Like overripe fruit, the stolen Qorin, swelling and like to burst into their more monstrous forms. The scent of them—how painful to her! And yet the nearer the draw, the more pressing the issue: the demon leaps up onto the wall, its feet adhering to it like a spider’s. With one clawed finger, it points to the coming army.
Berries beneath the foot of an angry child: the first blackbloods bursting from their skin, becoming beetles, charging straight for them.
Shefali does not wait to see if the arrow will find its mark in the demon’s skull—it will. Instead she reaches for the skin hanging near to her quiver; instead she flicks the cork from it with her thumb; instead she leans over in the saddle.
“Don’t let me down,” she whispers to her horse.
The first of the beetles is so near that Shefali feels the buzzing of its wings in her eyelashes.
As if you can get anything done without me, the horse answers.
Black, black—the shadow descending upon her. Hear the clicking of its mandibles, the chittering of its legs!
Barsalai dips her finger into the kumaq. When the beetle lands on her broad shoulders, she thrusts her hand up, up, into its jaws. The moment its proboscis flicks over her fingers, the deed is done—it lets go of her and drops flat onto the ground. Insect reverts to human, gasping, kicking at the air.
A victory.
But there are more where that came from.
She stands in the saddle. Like locusts in the desert, they fly toward her, but she meets them with drops of kumaq smeared across their carapaces. One by one, the blackbloods drop—and one by one, the Qorin scoop their brethren onto the backs of their horses.
They didn’t come here to kill their own.
Through the hole, into the city of Iwa itself—Shefali and her army ride their thunderbolts. The Traitor’s army is arranged in dark columns through the streets. At their forefront rides the long-nosed General, the giant demon Rikuto. The shadows they once faced march to meet them once more—but this time there shall be no trickery; this time, the blessed blades and arrows of the Qorin shall not miss.
Not when their god rides among them.
The kumaq skin in her hand glows silver. She tosses it, over her shoulder, to her mother.
The command need not be spoken.
Burqila catches the skin with an outstretched hand. She holds it aloft, and three dozen riders—similarly equipped—break off to find their way through the city. Shefali can see them if she tries, flying up the streets like lightning bugs.
They will be attacked. They will be hunted. To send their fastest and cleverest out on a mission like this—the Hokkarans turned their noses up at it.
But that is the difference between Hokkarans and Qorin, between generals and Kharsas: doing what needs to be done to save their people.
A lump rises in her throat as she watches her mother ride off. There is a feeling in the pit of her stomach, a wrongness that she cannot shake, but she cannot let it intimidate her. Not now. Her mother will be all right.
And if she isn’t—what better way for Burqila Alshara to die than this?
The harshness, the distance of her own thoughts frightens her. Barsalai swallows deep of the air, drinks of the hopes and dreams of her people. Her mind clears just as a wave of arrows comes crashing down against them. Two find their homes in her chest. Silver drips onto her starry deel, but she feels no pain, only a slight discomfort.
But the rest of the army is not so lucky. Death’s scent comes to the Qorin, smothering courage and bravery wherever it finds them. She does not glance over her shoulder, but she hears them, smells them, feels them dying.
Three more volleys between them and the shadows. How many can survive?
From the depths of her lungs, she summons one word: “Break!”
The Qorin, accustomed as they are to these tactics, do not need to be told twice. The command passes from ear to mouth to ear. Soon, they’ve scattered like ants, turning down the streets. Temurin, Ogordolai, and Big Mongke—they will all converge on Rikuto.
But only once the vanguard’s been softened up.
“Where the fuck are the—?” says Dorbentei.
“Giving their lives,” is the curt answer from Sakura, and so it is true. Death has come for the Hokkarans, too. When Shefali chances to look over to the main gates, she sees them dying in droves, sees them killing in equal measure. The crush of gold against smears of black reminds her of droplets of paint swirled together. Above them the air glimmers with souls bound for the fathomless deep. How cruel, how futile their efforts must seem! And yet if the shadows abandon the Phoenix Guard, the guard will surely push straight to the palace.
As the first of the three volleys takes to the air, Shefali makes a promise to herself, to the Qorin, to the guards.
No one here shall die in vain.
Silver drips onto her saddle horn. The whistle of the enemy’s arrows pierces her ears. She will lose more riders to this volley if she does not do something. But what? Death is a natural part of war; shouldn’t she—?
No.
To survive is Qorin.
; And Tumenbayar had named these arrows “windcutters” for a reason. She pulls one from her quiver now and breathes silver onto its tip. When she fires, she aims up, toward the peak of their arc.
Like birds against stone, the arrows of the enemy! For Shefali’s arrow summons with it a wall of wind, and the enemy cannot puncture it. Thousands drop from the air and onto the ground, where they are soon trampled underfoot.
A soft gasp behind her, a chorus of whoops and cheers.
Barsalai smiles to herself.
Yes, this is the day.
Steam leaves the ears of the Demon General. Shefali nocks and releases again, aiming straight for it. Who among the Qorin would dare such a shot as this? For it is far enough away that only Barsalai can make out its head, only Barsalai can see its face going ruddy.
And only Barsalai, as it happens, can hit it.
As if struck by a battering ram, it staggers backwards, clutching hold of its nightmarish steed by the barest of margins. More steam rises from it, a cloud dense enough to obscure the faces of its soldiers.
With a voice like the spheres of Heaven, she speaks. “Rikuto! We have business!”
“You sound just like your wife,” Dorbentei says, drawing alongside her, but even so, she’s got her sword out. “Leave some for me, won’t you?”
Closer and closer they come to the shadows, closer and closer to the real battle. Behind her, in ill-fitting armor, Sakura is clinging to her for dear life. That is true bravery, isn’t it? Making the decision to be here among the whistling arrows, though you want nothing more than to be safe at home.
Twenty horselengths. The others can see it now—and they can see, too, the shadows bracing conjured lances. Shefali glances to the east, to the west, to the alleys the others went down. Any moment now—
There!
Like a dam bursting, like a vengeful river—the Qorin pouring from the streets to harry the flanks of the enemy. How beautiful they are! Like the moonlight on glassy night waves, and the shadows are the rocks. Curved blades find their homes in necks and heads, arrows sink into eyeless sockets. Attacked from the sides as they are, the spearmen cannot turn to defend themselves quickly enough. Qorin steeds trample them as readily as they trample anything else.
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