INTERLUDE
REMARIN
Dungeons
Tower of the Heron
Damp air and windowless walls gave the only sign he was anywhere but in a palace. Not even Dao’s father would have permitted such waste. He was a prisoner; the pistoleers posted to his door made clear of it, if the magi who headed their detail didn’t. Yet he slept on silk, in a four-post canopy bed the likes of which he would expect for Princes’ consorts, or perhaps their daughters. Scroll racks stocked with texts of great poets, philosophers, mathematicians, and generals lined the walls where tapestries left them bare, with ornate vases and miniature fir trees decorating the corners not occupied by sitting tables and matching redwood chairs. Servants brought him boiled goose eggs, stuffed pheasant, deep-sea fish steaks, fermented mare’s milk, and any number of other such delicacies. All the coin he’d earned in his life wouldn’t have sufficed to live in it for a month, and now he’d been here for three.
Sweat glistened on his forehead as he began his daily routine. No true Ujibari man could live like this. Pampered luxury was a thing for Jun lords. He’d as soon have taken all the qian spent to imprison him and bought a fort on a hilltop, built on good, defensible ground, with farmland enough to staff a company of men-at-arms he’d use to raid his neighbors’ holdings. That was a man’s life. His life, or it would have been, if the Yanjin brothers’ scheme had paid him what he was owed.
Raps sounded on the door. The familiar interruption, on the half hour past the delivery of his morning meal. He paid them no mind, continuing a set of body presses, one arm at a time before he sprang to the opposite side.
“A fine morning to you, good master Remarin,” the usual voice said, in the same polite, even tones. “This servant hopes you passed the night well, and find yourself in good spirits to greet the day.”
A slight smile creased the corner of Remarin’s mouth as Huni Song stepped through the door. Bruises covered the side of Song’s face, swallowing his eye in a purple knot, and though the attendant’s greeting hadn’t wavered from the same he’d delivered every morning since Remarin’s capture, today a second figure came behind him as they entered the room.
Remarin sprang up to his feet as Song came to a halt in his entryway. Song was a slender man, but still twice as thick as the woman at his side, who might have hidden among bamboo stalks and not been seen head-on. Both were dressed in the slim-fitting orange robes Remarin had come to associate with his captors, with white cords belted around their hips and hoods covering them from hair to jaw. Yet where Huni Song’s hood left his face exposed, the woman wore a mesh veil that left only her eyes—a cutting blue, with the too-wide look of the Natarii tribes of the northern plain.
“You are here to punish me,” Remarin said, “for taking offense at yesterday’s line of questioning.”
Song flinched; a slight movement, but one Remarin’s eyes were trained well enough to see.
“No, good master,” Song said. “The insult was given without intent, which requires your humble servant to apologize doubly for failing to see how his words would be received. It is far from this servant’s place to mete out punishment. This one is here only to see you well attended and comfortable, and in failing that, this one aspires only to your forgiveness.”
The saccharine tone was almost enough for him to put Song on the ground again, but it would be no more satisfying than kicking a dog. Worse, since the dogs Remarin favored had at least some measure of pride. And there was the newcomer, the woman behind the veil.
She regarded him coldly, though he couldn’t help but wonder if all Natarii seemed cold, given the unfortunate pigment of their eyes. Hers were a pale but lustrous shade of blue, like ice reflecting fresh water.
“This is the Lady Bavda Khon,” Song said, bowing toward the waif. “She is highly placed, and deserving of the utmost deference and respect.”
“You’ve learned by now what Ujibari men think of deference and respect,” Remarin said, wearing a wolfish grin.
“This servant has had great fortune in learning from you, good master. But this time, for your sake, this one hopes you will see the value in propriety. Now. Might we avail ourselves of your chairs to sit, share tea, and discuss the matters the Lady Khon has brought to hand?”
“They are your chairs,” he said.
Song smiled as if Remarin had instead given him praise, leading the way to a set of four matching chairs arrayed around a glass table at the near end of the long hall that passed for a chamber. The woman, Bavda, sat at once, keeping her eyes on Remarin as Song returned to the door for a fresh tray of tea.
“What are you here to discuss?” Remarin asked at last.
The woman raised herself to her full height in the chair—still a full head shorter than him, even seated—but managed to make it look as though she were standing. Her cheeks were gaunt, her skin too pale a shade of white, though the full contours of her face were hidden behind the veil.
“You were the Yanjin family quartermaster,” she said. Her voice was deeper than he’d expected, only lightly colored by the accents of the north. “In service first to Yanjin Gaido, and then Yanjin Dao, when the father passed inheritance to the son.”
“Would you believe this is only the second time I have been asked about my service to the Yanjin family since being brought here?”
He made a pointed glance toward Song’s purple cheek, as the servant made to prepare their tea. Song had been standing just there when he mentioned Lord Tigai, and earned himself a cuffing for it, more for Remarin to see how his captors would react than any malice for the servant. He’d expected far more brutal questioning in the days immediately following his arrival, and been met instead with only kindness and civility.
If she took his meaning, she didn’t show it.
“You conspired with Lord Dao,” she continued, “to steal the sum of two hundred eighty thousand qian worth of gold, artifacts, jewels, and antiquities from the Kanjiao Palace.”
He nodded—no point trying to deny it when they’d caught him with the gold in his hands—and she went on. “You oversaw the training of one Lord Yanjin Tigai, the younger son.”
“You’ve been misinformed,” Remarin said. “I taught the boys the arts of war and fighting, yes, but you know as well as I do his training was—”
The world lurched, and pain lanced through his neck and shoulders, followed by a dull ache at the back of his head.
He scrambled to his feet. “What the—?”
Another ringing crack staggered him.
Song had a knowing smile on his face, shaking his head ruefully as he poured the tea. The woman hadn’t moved.
“What is this?” he managed, bracing himself for another blow that didn’t come.
“Please be seated, good master Remarin,” Song said. “This servant hopes you will answer our lady’s questions to her satisfaction, to avoid any unnecessary discomforts.”
He stayed frozen in place, until Bavda raised an eyebrow, somehow making it both a question and a threat.
“Thank you, good master,” Bavda said. “It will be appreciated, if you do not speak to me as though I am a fool.”
As she spoke she removed her gloves, pulling each off to reveal skin as pale as the visible part of her face, with tattoos of a long-legged bird—a heron—marked from the backs of her hands up the length of her forearms.
“You have been given every courtesy, in accordance with our law. But you must know Lord Tigai has fallen under the influence of Isaru Mattai. The time for pretense is finished. The time of our God’s choosing approaches, and the order will not be disrupted for the sake of whatever scheme you think to put in play.”
Pain still throbbed in his head, and he had to think doubly hard to be sure he’d heard her words correctly. He understood not a word of it. All he knew for certain was this woman was a magi. Enough on its own to dictate caution, and fear.
“I … I’m not sure what you expect from me,” he said at last.
“Her
on will have a champion at the end of this cycle.” She said it fiercely, with a sudden passion that had been absent before. “If Dragon means to take a place, it will be from Crab, not from me. I know you have agents with Isaru Mattai. Activate them. Kill this Lord Tigai, or Isaru himself, if you must. I will provide the means to send missives, and remand our other captive into your company, as a sign of good faith. I have no designs to usurp Fox’s seat; only promise me my rightful place, and I will be your faithful ally.”
Remarin steeled his features to calm. She’d taken him for someone and something he was not, someone who deserved apartments like these, even in captivity. In three months it was the first sign of a means to escape.
“Very well,” he said, trying to sound as though he were relenting a long-held façade. “I can agree, but I grow tired of these surroundings. Our pact is sealed, if you permit me leave to wander the tower under guard.”
She laughed as though he’d made a joke.
“Yes,” she said, “and I will leave the chamber with you, arm in arm.” Sarcasm drenched the words, and snuffed his easiest route to freedom. But there would be others, unless he misread the change in his circumstance.
Bavda took up her gloves, rising from her seat as she put them back in place, and spoke again. “It is well to have you among us in the open again, Master Fei.”
With that she offered him a deep bow before she and Song withdrew from the room, leaving him still smarting, from the upheaval of her words and from whatever magi trick she’d used to strike him.
What had he just agreed to? Who the bloody fuck did they think he was?
He gnawed on the questions as the day passed, replaying the Natarii woman’s visit in his mind. In the moment, the nature of his captivity had changed, but after, it was back to empty hours in his apartments alone with a scroll rack and a view of windowless stone. There would be no answers in Li Sun’s Treatments of War, nor in Kotamaru’s Siege Weapons and Tactics, but they served as a distraction when he could empty his thoughts enough to read. The Lady Bavda had spoken as though he were a magi, privy to the endless plotting of the Great and Noble Houses; that much, he could be certain of, if the force behind the woman’s strike wasn’t confirmation enough. He was a captive of the magi, and they thought him not only a piece but a player in their game. He’d been called raider, warrior, chieftain, prisoner, tutor, master-at-arms; never Master in their sense of the word. Never magi.
He should have seen it coming. He’d been a bloody fool to involve himself in Lord Tigai’s work. He’d known what the boy was from the first moment Tigai had blinked back to the kitchens when Remarin caught him plundering the crust of a stolen pie. Gold had blinded him. The thought of a raider who could move himself and his men behind the most stalwart walls and defenses, unseen, unheard, unknown, had been too tempting. There was never a chance Tigai’s story ended in any way other than bloodletting and death at the magi’s hands. He’d thought Tigai would get him his keep, his company, and his retirement. It had seemed a grand adventure, little as he might have admitted it in the moment. Now he was finished, unless he could find the means to play the one card they’d given him. A gamble. Tigai had been the gambler; Remarin was a warrior, a sergeant at best. But life hadn’t killed him yet.
“Midday, Master Fei.” Song’s voice accompanied a rap on his door. The usual ritual, but somehow different. Some factor of the status the Natarii waif had given him.
“Enter,” he said, as though his permission were required. And perhaps now it was.
The door swung wide, and Song bowed twice, placing the broad silver tray he carried atop the entry table.
“This one has the good fortune of presenting your acolyte,” Song said. “The Lady Khon regrets that certain liberties were required by the Dragons before she was remanded into our keeping, but hopes you will not hold such matters against Heron, in light of your newfound understanding.”
Remarin tried to mask his confusion as to the meaning of Song’s words, and felt his efforts melt as Dao’s wife was ushered into the room. She wore patterned blue and white silk cut in the fashion she’d always favored at the Yanjin Palace, but her hair was matted, her face absent cosmetics, her cheeks streaked with tears.
“Lady Mei,” he said.
Song gave him a knowing smile. “This servant will leave you to your reacquaintance, and return in due course to escort her to her own chambers.”
With that the servant was gone, the door locked and latched, and they were alone.
“Lady Mei,” he said again. “I never expected to see you here. Are you …?”
She met his eyes with a mix of fear and hurt, an alien look for a girl he’d always believed the proudest, the fiercest between her and Dao and Tigai.
He took a step toward her, and she took five to close the gap, burying her head in his chest.
Her body shook, and she trembled as he held her.
“It’s all right,” he said, not knowing what else to say. “Whatever they’ve done, we can set it right.”
A bitter laugh escaped her throat, and she pulled away. “No, master-at-arms. There is no means to set this right.”
She tugged the long sleeve covering her right arm away. Where the right hand should have been, there was scarred ruin, severed just below the wrist, the flesh sewn together in misshapen knots belying any semblance of health.
“We have to find a way to escape,” she said. The fear and hurt still lingered in her eyes, but now there was passion, too. “We have to escape and run as far from these monsters as it is possible to go.”
INTERLUDE
CORENNA
Approaching Jati’Ras’Tyat
Jatasi Land
Twin kicks to the walls of her stomach drew an unconscious hand, rubbing her belly as she walked. The sensation had grown familiar as the seasons changed. A child moved inside her. Everything from flaring moods to swollen nipples and sleepless nights could be laid there. Love stirred along with it. A dull ache, accompanying the pain of loss, the reminder of all she’d done to bring herself here. And still she hesitated.
“Kirighra will come,” Ka’Yiran said. “Make yourselves ready. He will not allow us to enter the sacred place; nor will he strike at us when we are together.”
One of the Uktani women turned to her as Ka’Yiran began the work of splitting the company into teams of twos.
“Have you faced kirighra before, honored sister?” Irinna asked. A girl, only a few years younger than Corenna herself. Irinna eyed nearby great beasts as she said it, the ipek’a and munat’ap wandering freely among their warriors, as though they were no more than domesticated dogs and horses. A dire wolf—munat’ap—stalked ten paces from where they stood, eyeing her and Irinna together, and nothing Ka’Yiran said could convince her it wasn’t weighing them both for suitability as prey.
“Yes,” she said in reply. “A new beast, but I faced one in the company of a guardian, during my travels.”
“So it is best, to hunt them in twos?”
“It is. Kirighra will strike the stronger of the pair; it will be up to the weaker to finish the beast before it can kill.”
Irinna’s face paled. A heartening word might have softened the task, but she hadn’t come to the Uktani to befriend them. As hard as her days had been among the Sinari, the weeks she’d spent here were harder, smothering her emotions and waiting for Ka’Inari’s visions to manifest themselves.
“Irinna,” Ka’Yiran said, finally approaching where they stood. “You will travel with Arak’Utai. Corenna, our Ranasi sister, you will come with me.”
The words froze and echoed in her mind, and she fought down the nerves that came with them. Now, finally, she and Ka’Yiran would be alone.
Irinna spared her another glance, perhaps hoping for the missing words of encouragement, before the Uktani girl went to find the Arak to whom she’d been assigned. Ka’Yiran watched the younger girl go before he turned to Corenna, snapping two fingers to signal her and the munat’ap both to follow
. She felt her growing belly in every step now. It took an effort to keep pace with the shaman, who made no allowance for her frailties—just as well, since she would ask for none. The munat’ap strode beside her, hovering a step too close as they moved deeper into the wood.
“You are certain, honored sister, that the women have blessed your coming with us today?” Ka’Yiran asked.
“Yes,” she said, fighting to keep her composure. Close, now. So close. “I am fit to travel, and to fight. These are not times for mothers. If I lose my child, I lose it. The strength of our tribes is too important to do otherwise.”
It hurt her to say it, a feigned callousness she feared could all too easily become real. But Ka’Yiran only nodded along.
“That is the last Ranasi in your belly,” Ka’Yiran said. “Your words do your tribe great honor, but it would be an ill thing, for the Ranasi to pass altogether from this world.”
Memories of burnt bodies, broken tents stirred deep within. A simmering anger she had to force to quell. “I will fight,” she said, and left it at that.
They walked together, a trio of man, woman, and beast, deeper into the wood that marked the location of Jati’Ras’Tyat. She could hear the other pairs assigned to draw out kirighra, but more dimly with each step. Two dozen hopefuls, more than she had ever seen in any tribe. She could almost hear Ka’Inari’s voice, sounding in her memory, and fought it down. Who could say what the Uktani shaman’s gift could see?
“Your father,” Ka’Yiran said abruptly after they’d walked no more than five hundred paces into the wood. “He saw the coming of these troubling times, didn’t he?”
“My father’s gift was strong,” she said.
“This is why you wield so many of the spirits’ gifts,” Ka’Yiran said.
She said nothing, tracking close as the munat’ap paced beside them.
“I have watched you, Corenna of the Ranasi,” Ka’Yiran said. “You came to us in need, but not weak. I have watched for sign of a man to claim the child growing in your belly, and seen nothing.”
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