by G. A. Aiken
Gemma tried to get up but she’d hit the river hard and her body wasn’t exactly cooperating. An arm appeared in front of her. She grabbed it, using the support—and Quinn—to get herself to her feet.
“Do you think I’m just a horrible person?” Gemma asked her sister.
“Yes.”
“Keeley.” To Gemma’s surprise, this came from Quinn himself.
“You don’t mean to be,” Keeley clarified. “And you never were before. The old Gemma would have found wolves with eyes of fire interesting and strange. Something to explore. But then you became a monk and everything now is pure evil or not evil. There’s no in between for you anymore. And the world we live in is all about the in between.”
“You think the denizens of the hells are in between?”
“I think all animals are in between. The she-bear that mauled Old Matheson wasn’t evil. She just thought he was a threat to her cubs. The wild boar that kept eating Da’s piglets wasn’t evil, it was just hungry. Remember? That was the bad year we had the drought. Or the time Da chopped that bear’s head off and roasted it on a spit, he was just pissed it kept eating the piglets. Da wasn’t evil then either. So do I think the wolf female chased you off the mountain because you were too close to her pups and she saw you as a threat? Yes. I do. I’d see you as a threat, too, if I was her. It’s the in between, Sister. You used to understand that.”
Keeley shrugged and walked off, while one of the centaurs handed her a long piece of linen to dry her wet body.
“Why’s my sister naked around a bunch of bathing centaurs?” Gemma asked Quinn.
“I told her centaurs don’t care about the naked human body.”
“Did you say that just because you wanted to see her naked?”
“I had to. The size of her shoulders and thighs absolutely fascinated me. Then it just became a regular thing.”
“Caid doesn’t mind?”
“Not so far.”
“I’ll make sure to point it out to him.”
“Why do you hate me so much?”
She started back toward the mountain so she could return to her training. “You make it so easy.”
“Hey!” he called out and she faced him. “How far up were you?”
Gemma lifted her face to the sky, squinting against the two bright suns. She found the spot and pointed. Quinn’s gaze followed and he snorted.
“The gods really do protect you monks, don’t they?”
“What do you mean?”
“Woman, you never should have survived that fall. At least not without a broken back. And yet you walk away.”
Gemma stared at the spot she’d fallen from and realized that the centaur had a point. Whether she’d fallen in the river or a giant pile of pillows, she should have been injured if not outright killed. And yet . . . she felt relatively fine. No broken bones. No internal damage, from what she could tell. Her brain seemed relatively intact since she’d had an entire philosophical debate with her sister on evil.
Did her god still protect her?
“Oh . . . and, Brother Gemma,” Quinn called out to her, his centaur body returning to the river, “feel free to join us at your leisure whenever we are bathing.”
Rolling her eyes, Gemma snorted and once again returned to her training.
* * *
Quinn was walking past one of the buildings under construction when he heard Gemma’s uncle talking. He glanced in and saw the stonemason dwarves working hard and the Smythe siblings listening to their uncle. But instead of their uncle explaining how the dwarves could work so fast and so well, he was demonstrating on one of the younger boys how to expertly cut a throat.
It took a second to sink in, so Quinn had passed the building before he realized what he’d just seen. But he stopped and spun back around.
“Archie!” he barked when he stood in the doorway.
“What?” the man asked, with his nephew’s chin lifted up and a wooden dagger used for training pressed against the boy’s throat.
“What are you doing?”
“Doing about what?” he asked, confused.
Quinn gestured at Archie with both hands.
“Oh, this.”
“Yes. That.”
“In case we’re invaded. Figured the children should know how to die with honor.”
“Okay.” Quinn quickly pointed at a dwarf who was standing near him and warned, “If you drop that hammer on my foot, I will stomp you to death with my hooves. Understand?”
The dwarf moved away and Quinn walked outside into the bustling town. Every day more shops and stands opened up and more tradespeople moved in with new wares to offer. Quinn loved it. It reminded him of home.
Focusing intently, he finally heard what he was listening for and followed the sound until he reached the stall. An exhausted Gemma stood there buying a cooked chicken and bread. Her meal after training. She could get the same thing from the castle cook but she liked to buy her dinner from the townspeople sometimes.
“We have a problem,” he told her.
“What now?”
“Archie.”
Her eyes crossed but she followed him back to the construction site. At this point, Archie was letting the children take turns slicing each other’s throats with the wooden dagger. Horrified, Gemma shoved the paper-wrapped food into Quinn’s arms, not warning him it was still hot, and rushed into the room.
She grabbed the mock blade from her youngest sister.
“What the unholy hells are you doing?”
“Teaching the children how to—”
“No!” she told her uncle. “Just no. You are not teaching them that.”
“They have to learn. What if we are invaded?”
“Make sure they can’t get through our castle walls, old man. Do something other than teach our children to accept death?”
Archie placidly gazed at Gemma, then the children.
After a full minute, he said, “It’s smarter for them to accept death.”
The dwarves laughed, so Quinn flashed the fangs all battle centaurs possessed and they disappeared into the walls. Unlike the blacksmith dwarves, they weren’t ready to jump into a fight unless absolutely necessary. For blacksmith dwarves, it was always necessary.
Gemma turned to the oldest among the children at the moment. “Isadora, take the children home, please.”
Isadora did as ordered and Gemma waited until her siblings were out of hearing range. When she felt confident they were mostly alone, she faced her uncle and punched him in the throat.
As he grabbed his neck with both hands, trying hard to breathe, she stepped in close and said, “I’m doing my best to save you from the wrath of my mother and Keeley. But if you do this again or you even mention an honorable death or a death of any kind around the children, I will personally disembowel you. A skill that is taught to every war monk novitiate. So do not fuck with me, Uncle. Have I made myself clear?”
Archie didn’t answer. He was too busy bending over, coughing, still attempting to breathe.
Gemma grabbed him by his hair, right at the base of his neck, and yanked his head back. “Have I made myself clear?”
He nodded since he could not speak.
“Excellent.”
Gemma returned to Quinn’s side, scooping her food out of his arms.
“That could have been handled . . . nicer,” he suggested.
“Then next time you may want to tell someone who didn’t spend ten years of her life with war monks.”
She did have a point.
He watched Gemma disappear among the townsfolk outside. When he turned back around, Archie was glaring at him, but all he could do was shrug and mutter, “Yeah, sorry. Didn’t know it was going to go like that. Guess she has a lot on her mind right now. But, you know. Maybe not so much death with the children. Just a thought.” Archie’s eyes narrowed.
“All right . . . well. See ya!”
Quinn walked out, briefly stopping when a dwarven stone hammer dropped fr
om the scaffolding right above his head, barely missing him.
Those dwarf bastards.
* * *
Keeley wasn’t sure her sister would want anything to do with her after their morning argument but once she’d completed her training, Gemma didn’t seem to have any problem joining her in the study to go over the latest reports sent to them concerning King Marius and their sister Beatrix. He was building armies in the south with mercenaries and terrifying the locals at the border between their territories.
At the moment, Marius had the much-richer lands of the east, with their thousands upon thousands of acres of grain fields owned by wealthy royals. Meanwhile, Keeley had the more treacherous hill territories filled with wild game and dangerous tribes. But she’d already begun to build alliances with many of those tribes. Although even she knew some of those were tenuous at best. She had to tread carefully but she found the challenge a little thrilling, not that she’d mention that to anyone but Caid. Gemma already thought she was “too reckless” and Laila insisted on seeing her as “unrealistic” and “naïve.” Honestly, the only one who seemed to have any faith in her outside of her doting parents was Quinn, which seemed just . . . wrong.
Keeley discreetly glanced up from her papers at Gemma. These days her younger sister seemed nothing but angry. Angry at Beatrix? Definitely. Angry at her precious gods? Perhaps. Angry at Keeley? When wasn’t she? But there was more to it, Keeley just hadn’t figured out what was at the heart of it all. It had started months ago. They could all feel it. But then the day came when Gemma had walked downstairs in brown leather leggings, with a brown fur cape. It was the drabbest thing Keeley had ever seen anyone in her family wear and, except for Beatrix, no one in her family gave a damn about fashion at all.
Eventually their mother outfitted Gemma in proper chainmail but she hadn’t put her monk gear back on in more than a year. Keeley never thought she’d miss any of that shit, but she found she did miss the way it had made her sister glow a bit. Now her sister was always sad or angry or sad and angry. It had gotten to the point that Keeley almost hated being around her. If she had to hear her sigh dramatically one more time . . .
“So, what do you both think?”
Keeley frowned, exchanging confused glances with Gemma before they both looked across the room. Ainsley leaned against a bookcase. She’d grown into a beautiful girl with all that long red-blond hair and bright green eyes, but she was a strange one. Always sort of lurking around. She hung out in trees a lot.
“How long have you been standing there?” Keeley asked.
“Twenty minutes. Talking . . . to you.”
“You were talking?” Gemma blinked. “About what?”
Ainsley briefly closed her eyes. Took in a breath, let it out. When she opened her eyes, she said, “All right. Let’s try this again, shall we?”
“There’s that tone,” Gemma muttered.
“I was thinking perhaps I could train with some of the new army recruits. Perhaps learn how to handle a sword. I’m proficient at the bow, but useless with a sword.”
Keeley and Gemma stared at Ainsley for a bit, then at each other.
After a few moments, they couldn’t help themselves . . . they burst out laughing.
“You’re a baby!” Keeley yelped.
“We’re not giving you a sword!” Gemma added.
“You don’t give babies swords!” Keeley agreed.
“Both of you were using swords before you were nineteen.”
“And when you’re nineteen—”
“I am nineteen,” Ainsley snapped.
Keeley frowned, looked at Gemma. “When did she turn nineteen?”
“I don’t know. We should ask Mum.”
Clearing her throat, Keeley suggested, “Perhaps once you get good with the bow.”
“I am good with the bow.”
“No. Seriously good with the bow. Not just Da telling you you’re good with the bow.”
Without taking a step away from Keeley and Gemma, Ainsley brought her bow off her shoulder, pulled an arrow from her quiver, aimed out the window near the table her sisters sat at, and let the arrow fly.
Keeley snorted. “What the fuck is that supposed to—”
“Thanks, luv!” their father called from outside.
“Welcome, Da!” Ainsley called back without moving . . . or blinking. That’s when Keeley realized her sister never raised her voice. She rarely showed anger. Or happiness. Or anything. Unlike the rest of the Smythe children, she didn’t really react to much.
Gemma pushed her chair back and went to the window. She leaned out and when she came back in, her eyes were wide.
“She hit a falcon.”
“I actually nicked his wing,” Ainsley explained. “Da wants a falcon. Now he has one once he helps this bird to heal.”
Again, Keeley cleared her throat. “That’s just—”
“Luck? You think that was luck? Fine.”
With an arrow already nocked, she aimed it at a spot in the room and unleashed it. It went through a small hole in the wall.
The intense cursing coming from inside the wall shocked them all and Keeley jumped up and went to the spot with her hammer. She hit the stone a few times until she and Gemma could remove chunks of it with their hands, revealing one of the dwarven stonemasons.
Coughing from the rock dust while trying to pull the arrow from his leg, he forced a smile at the queen.
“Your Majesty.”
“That one has been spying on you for a month,” Ainsley pointed out. “Although they’ve all been spying on you a bit, Keeley. They like watching you. You and your hammer.”
Keeley reacted automatically. “Ewwwww.”
“My queen,” a servant said as he entered the room, stopping when he saw the partially destroyed wall and the wounded stonemason dwarf. “Uhhh.”
“What is it, Carl?”
“Uh, Lady Laila asks that you come to the main hall. The riders you sent out the other day have returned.”
Grateful to have something else—anything else—to deal with at this moment, Keeley and Gemma rushed for the door, causing the servant to practically fall to the ground in an attempt to get out of their way. Keeley caught him and put him back on his feet before she caught up to Gemma. They strode down the passages together until they reached the main hall. But they both stopped short when they saw their mother and father sitting at the dining table; Caid, Quinn, and Laila stood next to the table along with three of the riders. It wasn’t the missing riders that concerned them. It was everyone’s expression.
“What?” Keeley asked. “What’s wrong?”
Laila motioned to the riders and they each dropped a large burlap bag to the ground.
“What’s that?” Gemma asked.
“What’s left.”
“What’s left of what?”
“The monks. The priests.”
Keeley took a step back but Gemma’s body jerked forward. “What? What?”
“These are skulls,” Laila stated, pointing at one bag. “These are some bones,” she said, gesturing to another. “And these are just some bits. Some ash.”
“No. That’s not possi—No.”
“Are any left?” Keeley asked, horrified by what she was being told.
“The witches survived,” Quinn said. “The reason the rider who went to them isn’t here is because he had to go to the healers in the village.”
Gemma let out a long sigh. “What did the witches do to him?”
Quinn fought hard not to smile. “They gave him a tail.”
“A what?”
“A rat tail. It moves on its own and everything.”
Keeley’s lip curled. “Ew! What is wrong with everyone?”
“Apparently those witches were not friendly.”
“That poor man!”
Unconcerned about the man and his rat tail, it seemed, Gemma cut in, “What are the witches doing now?”
“Going underground,” Laila stated. “Literally, I beli
eve. Traveling through tunnels and moving to safer territory.”
“And all the artifacts of the monks and priests . . . ?”
“Gone. Most of the walls of the churches and temples were not even left standing. They were destroyed down to the last stone.”
“There’s no doubt then. These religious orders are being specifically targeted.”
“Just as you said, Gemma. This isn’t about gold or silver. This is about power.”
“No, it isn’t just about power,” a soft voice said from behind them and they turned to see the pacifist monk coming from the passage that led to the kitchens. “This is also about desecration.”
“But why?” Keeley’s mother asked. “Why would anyone do that?”
“To destroy our beliefs and the beliefs of the populace,” he said, walking toward them. “To make room for another. Someone else’s chosen god.”
“What’s one more god?” Keeley asked. “There’s room for as many gods as we could possibly want.”
“Not for a god that wants to rule all.”
Keeley began to pace. She knew the monk was right. A power-hungry man was dangerous enough. But a power-hungry god . . . that was a nightmare. Put the two together? She had to do something, and she had to do it now.
“We need to send out battle units immediately. Any sect or order that wants our protection will have it. They can stay here. Now, Brother—” It suddenly occurred to her she didn’t know the monk’s name.
Shocked that she was actually looking to him for something, he said, “Emmanuel.”
“Brother Emmanuel. As a pacifist monk, you can be the man in the middle, so to speak. When these groups come in, I will need your help keeping those who aren’t friends away from each other. Those who are able to get along can room together. You can also work with my uncle to arrange for sleeping quarters. Do you mind doing that?”
It was the first smile they’d seen from the man since the day they’d all met him. “That would bring great joy to my life, Your Highness. To help you with this.”
“Or you could call me Keeley. Since we’ll be working together a lot. Anyway, just do your best.” She motioned to several nearby soldiers. “Get my generals.”
She faced Gemma. “Beatrix?”
Gemma thought deep on that, but it was their father who actually answered for them, shocking them all. Because he hadn’t spoken of the wayward Smythe in some time.