Preludes to War (Eve of Redemption Book 6)

by Joe Jackson

  “I meant as far as making love in front of others. At least, that was my experience in the village of Moskarre when I slept in one of their tents.”

  “Ah, well, that differs from couple to couple, I think. I imagine when they live in a more traditional dwelling among extended family, privacy is not something they have all that often. It made you uncomfortable, did it?”

  Kari shrugged. “A little bit, I suppose. More that it just made me aware of how overt my husband and I were about such things.”

  “I believe I know what you are hinting at. I cannot say how much you may be pursued by available males once we pass among my people here,” Seanada said. “Just know that despite what Diszaro said, mallasti females only go into season roughly once per century, so the odds you would conceive if you were to be intimate is marginal, at best. Not that I expect you would do any such thing, only do not take his words too much to heart. We are here to accomplish an important task, and those considerations will be far from our minds, I think.”

  “Do you become a mallasti when you shape-change the same way I supposedly have?” Kari asked, and the half-syrinthian nodded. “So you might be able to have children with a mallasti, or an elestram, if you chose to…?”

  “As a half-succubus, I can likely bear a child with nearly anything,” Seanada grumbled, though whatever ire there was in her voice didn’t seem directed at Kari.

  “Have you ever considered it?” Kari pressed, drawing Seanada’s full attention. It didn’t seem as though she liked this discussion, but Kari tried prodding as gently as she could. “You consider the mallasti your people…have you ever thought about actually being one of them, as far as anyone else was concerned?”

  “I could not live such a lie, only to give birth to children that carry the taint of what I am. Please do not brush this aside, Kari, you make me quite upset when you dismiss my feelings out of hand. Whatever you may think, feel, or say, I am part demon, and that fact weighs on every decision I make. You may face some strange consequences if you were to conceive a child with one of my people, but that child would be loved, and grow up in a family of strong influences.”

  “But I cannot say what any child of mine would become. Would I give birth to another Turillia? Or might they not show signs of the demonic taint at all? I do not know. I cannot know, and so it is far from my day-to-day thinking. If I find a man worth taking that risk with, then I will consider it, but until then, I concentrate on other things.”

  “I’m sorry if you’ve felt like I’ve been brushing aside your feelings,” Kari offered, and the woman nodded. “I just want you to know I think you’re a good woman, and I didn’t want to see you hesitate to make friends or even love interests because of your mother.”

  “I know exactly what you think, and am grateful for your encouragement,” Seanada said. “But you still do not entirely grasp how I feel.”

  Kari bit her bottom lip and sighed. “No, actually, I think I do.” Seanada considered her, but it was Kari’s turn to go silent.

  They arrived in Saovonn without any trouble, but the same couldn’t be said for the town. Like Gaeshokk, the town of Saovonn mixed elements of typical mallasti and elestram dwellings. It had some farms, but more livestock than crops here in the deeper portion of the woodlands. From an initial glance, Kari assumed that lumber and textiles were the larger products of this town, and the livestock were of the appropriate type to support the latter. There was one other thing that truly set it apart from Gaeshokk at first glance, however.

  The crucifixes.

  It was the first sign of the devastation Prince Amnastru’s visit had wrought, but it said all that needed to be said before visitors even entered the town. Glancing left and right, Kari could see that a circle of crucified mallasti and elestram ringed the town, all partially mutilated in some way – even before the birds and other scavengers left their marks. Kari didn’t know much of the mallasti justice system, if such even existed, but she knew this was not a means of dealing with their own crime: this was undoubtedly Sekassus’ son saying, in no uncertain terms, that any rebellion would be crushed before it began.

  Kari worked to keep her revulsion contained. The mallasti were typically impassive, and Kari couldn’t let her emotions play out upon her face or, she mused, even within her thoughts such that anyone could see or hear. She took in the many dead Amnastru had left behind in this humiliating gesture, and then she turned and glanced at Seanada.

  Her companion wore that impassive gaze well, but Kari’s mallasti body gave her a glimpse into the truth. She could feel the heat radiating from Seanada, the anger smoldering below the surface in such a way that Kari’s enhanced nose and tongue could detect it. The woman was furious, and in a way, Kari was glad to see it. Soon would come the time to start a war, and this was just the thing Seanada could use to stoke the fire in her people through Kari’s shape-changed façade.

  Several of the villagers who saw Kari and Seanada standing at its edge, taking in their crucified neighbors, made subtle gestures for them to leave. Did that mean Prince Amnastru might still be here? Kari looked around, but the town was of a fair size, and she couldn’t see much from this outer edge. She glanced at Seanada once again, and saw that the half-syrinthian had no intentions of leaving. Still, Seanada waited on Kari.

  Kari led her companion into the town. As per usual, her first order of business was to find an inn to stay at, where they could begin their work. The center of town seemed the best place to start looking, so she paced toward its central intersection. There were others out and about, scurrying here and there with fearful steps, and it didn’t take Kari long to realize why once she and Seanada reached the center of town.

  It wasn’t Prince Fesarri again, but it was another of the massive, stately-looking sylinths that suggested prince even at first glance. A snake-like eye caught sight of Kari and Seanada, and the apparent prince called for them to approach. “Who goes?” he demanded in a hissing, accented infernal.

  Kari shed the enveloping garment that kept her white coat, armor, and weapons hidden. The prince’s eyes widened, but there was hesitation everywhere. People walking the streets stopped and stared. The prince’s retainers stood agape at what they had just witnessed. Even the prince himself seemed unsure what to do. His eyes narrowed, then, and he hissed in an amused manner. “A vulkinastra!” he laughed. “How fortuitous! Father will be most pleased.”

  “Oh, no, he won’t,” Kari said slowly in beshathan. “Death is coming to him. But first, dear prince, it is coming to you.”

  Kari drew the waushims from her belt, and then reached back into her mind. She took hold of that little voice crying to be released, and threw it forth with every ounce of strength she could muster.

  Chapter XI – An End to Subtlety

  Windows exploded. Knees buckled. A dustdevil kicked up in the center of the road.

  Kari felt her anger given spectral form, one she could project forward. It was, however, uncontrolled, just as the Wraith had warned: while the immediate effects were impressive, the Prince stood unharmed, more confused than concerned. Kari could call forth the power in fury, but it was unfocused, and she realized she’d done more damage to the town than to her enemies. Still, she held out hope that it had demonstrated she was not one to be trifled with.

  On that note, however, she suddenly realized she may have just invited her enemies to try to duel her with arcane power, a contest she was sure to lose.

  Seanada drew a pair of elestram longswords, decorative blades that said crafting them was as much a form of art as an attempt to create instruments of death. She shed her robe and paced to her right, and Kari twirled the waushims once more and started forward. The claws of her feet dug lightly at the earth, and she began to shift her weight side to side in preparation for battle. The weight of this form was still alien in the sense of combat, but Kari was getting more and more in tune with this body, and she knew instinctively what she was going to be capable of.

  She couldn’t
have foreseen what came next, though she wasn’t sure why it surprised her. The two elestram retainers that had stood by the Prince’s side now backed away, wide-eyed, and not in such a way that suggested they were going to join the fray. The Prince looked at them disdainfully, and barked a command at them in syrinthian, but they ignored his wishes. He stood alone in the center of the town’s intersection. If that unnerved him, it didn’t show as he turned those serpentine eyes back on Kari with a scowl.

  The shape-changed demonhunter paced to her left, flanking the serpentine prince with Seanada going around the other way. His eyes went in opposite directions, and he pulled forth one of those dual-ended spears the sylinths favored. Kari glanced around the town at the many sets of bewildered eyes watching from every porch, window, alleyway, and balcony. There was no mistaking it: this ruse of the Wraith’s was having exactly the desired effect.

  Kari paused, took a deep breath, and considered her beshathan lessons. “Arise, brothers and sisters!” she shouted, and the prince’s hood flared in immediate recognition. “No longer are we slaves to the will of Sekassus! Rise up, stand and fight, and we will take back the land of our ancestors!”

  “Treason!” the prince shouted. “Ten thousand marks to anyone who helps me flay the pelt from this rebel, to be delivered to my father!”

  No one else moved. Kari wasn’t entirely surprised; it was a lot for the people to risk for some vulkinastra they knew nothing about. At the same time, though, they made no move to aid the prince to try to collect the offered bounty. Kari needed to set an example, give these people some hope, and show them that their princes and even their king were not invincible. Twirling her waushims once more, Kari set out to do exactly that.

  She dashed in, focused on the offensive routines the Wraith had taught her. Anticipating the prince’s defensive maneuvers, she was hardly cognizant of the fact that she penetrated his defenses in one move. The waushim was no more a stabbing weapon than her scimitars, but she turned the weapon over in her hand in the same motion she’d used to knock aside the prince’s bladed spear, and drove it home into that long, serpentine body.

  The prince recovered quickly, but he was shocked at the speed and efficiency of Kari’s movements. It occurred to her that, just as she’d thought a few days before, she’d never seen an armored mallasti warrior before. Was this something completely alien to Mehr’Durillia these days? The prince had clearly not expected much from Kari, certainly not a brilliant feint that left him wounded in the opening seconds of their duel.

  Kari glanced beyond him to Seanada, who was looking up the road a bit. The retainers were still there, though they made no move to interfere. Kari gestured toward them with her head, and Seanada moved that way. The demonhunter was wary of becoming arrogant in her abilities, but there was something to be gained from single-handedly tearing apart this son of Sekassus. In the meantime, she set Seanada to watching her back, all the better to alert her should this prince not be alone in the town.

  The sylinthian prince straightened out and hissed, but Kari didn’t miss the grimace of pain that he tried to hide. She’d hurt him, and seriously. He twirled his bladed spear, but Kari had been hurt enough times to know when a combat routine was being done half-heartedly while one’s mind was distracted by pain. She assumed this had to be one of Sekassus’ younger sons, but she didn’t let that override her caution. Arrogance would serve no one’s purposes but his.

  They closed the gap between them, circling at a respectable distance as each looked for an opportunity. The Prince was hurt, but there was also intrigue there: he had clearly never dealt with a mallasti warrior before. They had to be common somewhere, else how would they have a weapon such as the waushim particular to their race? They may all have sorceress power as an inherent trait, but that didn’t mean they were all sorcerers. The benefit here, though, was that this prince apparently had no idea how to deal with the creature before him.

  Even if he had, he couldn’t know that she wasn’t a mallasti at all, or that he would still know nothing of her fighting style. Kari put that to the test, and she stepped in, stomping those heavy mallasti legs to jolt his perceptions. Her attacks came in fast and tight, utilizing the double-ended nature of his weapon against him. In fending off her stabs and short chops, he had to keep the haft in front of him, limiting his angles of counterattack. And that just made him easier to frustrate.

  Not a single one of his strikes came anywhere near its target, and Kari forced him to give ground, which wasn’t easy for a sylinth. Their serpentine bodies could achieve considerable speed forward or sideways, but moving backwards was difficult. He had to spin and coil back behind himself, and the first time he did, Kari made him pay for it. She chopped into his tail, biting deep through scales and into bloody flesh below, drawing out a pained bellow from him.

  Kari nearly taunted him with a reference to Ressallk, but she bit it down. She couldn’t let it slip to anyone, whether friend or foe, that she wasn’t what she appeared to be. She didn’t know what the Wraith’s plans were once this mission was complete: clearly Mastriana was going to find her life turned upside down with Kari using her name to cover movements here. But for now, the game was secrecy, despite subtlety being thrown to the wind.

  The young prince turned and lashed out at Kari in reaction to her latest blow. Almost on instinct, Kari caught the blade of his dual spear between the blade and haft of her waushim. With a deft twist and shift of her arm, she ripped the weapon from the prince’s hands. He tried to wrap his tail around her, but Kari stabbed him hard once again, twisting the blade as she nearly stapled him to the ground. He reached instinctively toward this newest wound, and Kari’s other waushim, the spear still entangled in it, came up and slashed the prince across his throat.

  All sound in the town died away in an instant, and only the barely-perceptible patter of the prince’s spurting lifeblood hitting the ground broke the silence. He stared at her in disbelief, but consciousness faded from his eyes in moments and he slumped into an ungracious pile beside Kari’s stapling blade. Kari withdrew her right blade from his tail and landed a brutal chop to the top of his head, piercing his skull. Enemy prince or no, she didn’t want him to die slowly.

  Her fur was matted and red on her left side from his blood, but Kari hardly paid it any heed. Even as she stared at his body, she saw instead the past: the many syrinthians injured or killed in her flight from Sorelizar. She saw Uldriana’s body drop lifelessly after Sekassus killed her. She heard the pained scream of Etolivor’s mate being killed by the harmauth tracker. Kari had made a promise, albeit to no one in particular, that she was going to kill one of Sekassus’ sons for every person the demon king had hurt trying to capture her.

  “And that’s one,” she whispered under her breath.

  When she glanced to her right, Seanada was staring at her the same way as all the stunned townspeople. Whoever this young prince was, he didn’t seem particularly strong or experienced, but Kari knew perceptions were often different than reality. She had just cut down one of the king’s sons in what had to have been less than a minute, and made him look pathetic in the process. Now, she had other work to do: she needed to shake these people free of their shock and set them toward the Wraith’s goal.

  Kari pointed a waushim at the former prince’s retainers. “You two, come here.” They came to her, tails practically tucked in between their legs, their normally tall, straight postures now bent in submission and fear. The elestram were a proud people, and it was the first time Kari had ever seen one – let alone two – behave this way. They cowered before her, and then one even dropped to its knees, the back of its neck seemingly presented for execution. The other quickly followed suit, but Kari shook her head. “Stand up. Have some dignity.”

  Kari was a little nervous every time she had to speak. There were so many little nuances to the beshathan language, and she was always leery of using the wrong word in context. What she had just said, however, seemed to be perfectly correct: though the
elestram straightened out before her, there was shame in their eyes now. “Where is Prince Amnastru?” she demanded.

  The two jackal-folk regarded each other, then the golden-eyed one to the left spoke. “He was to travel south to Haestronn, then west to Gaeshokk.”

  “How long ago did he leave Saovonn?”

  “Just two days past, mistress,” said the other, cowering a bit when Kari’s orange eyes fell over him. He kept his own orange eyes and his snout turned down, his hands high but folded before him nervously.

  “Listen to me very carefully,” Kari demanded, letting a scowl flash through what she hoped was the normal impassive expression of the mallasti. “You are to make your way around this town and remove every body that has been desecrated, and take care of them according to the wishes of their families. Disrespect a single one of them, and you will join the prince here. Do you understand?”

  Their heads bobbed in agreement without hesitation. Kari had a brief moment where she wondered if she should have them crucify the prince in return. It wasn’t what she’d do, but she had to bear in mind that she wasn’t acting as Karian Vanador here. She needed to make a statement, one that would send a clearer message to Sekassus than simply killing his son in front of an entire town. Still, Kari couldn’t bring herself to give such an order. She hated this dead prince for what he stood for, and what he was to his father, but even that wasn’t enough to make Kari want to desecrate his corpse.

  As it turned out, she didn’t have to make that decision. With the prince lying dead in the road and no retaliation coming to the vulkinastra in their midst, the people of Saovonn at last came forth from their doors, alleys, and porches. They didn’t apprehend the retainers, leaving those two to Kari’s judgment, but the people took hold of the prince’s body and began to drag it to the edge of town by the tail. Even from the corner of her eye, Kari could see that at the edge of town, the body was being spit upon, urinated on, and prepared to be hung up next to those he and his brother had crucified. She didn’t look; she didn’t need to see this.