Fierian

by Ronie Kendig

  Thiel laughed as she crossed to the field where Tokar threw down a singed sack.

  In front of Tokar, an unrepentant raqine paced back and forth, chortling. She’d never seen her friend so angry nor a raqine so annoyed. “Have a problem?”

  Tokar spun, hesitated, then flung his hands at the raqine. “This beast just burned all my gear.”

  “I might be wrong,” Thiel said around a laugh, “but I don’t think they spew fire.”

  “He dropped it in the campfire! Destroyed my greaves and gauntlets.”

  “Why?”

  “Blazes if I know! The thing has had it in for me since day one.”

  “The thing?” Thiel wrinkled her nose. “Maybe I’m starting to see the problem.”

  He shook his finger. “Don’t you start. I never asked for this raqine. I didn’t do anything—it has blown snot all over me, dragged me from a dead sleep in my unmentionables, dunked me in a muck puddle, and now this!”

  “Sounds like a crush,” Thiel teased.

  “Draed’s a male.”

  “Ah.” Thiel grinned. “Then he’s jealous.” She angled her head at him. “Have ye given a girl yer attention?”

  Tokar twitched. His gaze flung across the field to a group of Tahscans and Pathfinders in the training yard. A girl there.

  Thiel laughed. “This is delicious. Has my friend finally found a girlfriend?”

  “I see you wear his ring.”

  “Don’t change the subject.”

  “Aye, I will. I have enough trouble.” He huffed and looked at the raqine. “I have to train on him, and he won’t let me near.”

  “No,” Thiel corrected. “Before that, ye have to bring something of hers so he’ll accept her, accept the other scent. Raqine are as territorial as they are loyal.” She casually made her way toward the raqine that so closely resembled Tili’s Zicri, save the size. Draed was smaller, a runt. Which explained the attitude. “Hello.” She held out her hand.

  Draed tilted his head. Sniffed. Nosed her palm. With a lightning fast move, he flipped her hand so that she could run it along his broad skull.

  “Unbelievable,” Tokar said. “Every other unit captain is well into training, and I can’t even get the thing to let me on.”

  “Silly captain,” Thiel murmured to Draed, running her hand along his dense fur. “He thinks he’s to be in charge.”

  Draed snorted.

  Thiel laughed. “Exactly.” She scruffed his jowl. “If he would just accept ye, then things might change.”

  “What does that mean?”

  Thiel arched an eyebrow at Tokar. “He’s in charge, Tokar. Not ye. They move at Her will. Not yers.”

  “But I need to train.”

  “And ye think She does not know that?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  Thiel jerked her heard toward Draed. “Come here.”

  Hesitantly—and with a huff—Tokar finally drew closer.

  “Palm out.”

  “This is—”

  “Palm.”

  He shook his head. “If that thing bites my hand off—”

  “Ye will have deserved it. Accept Draed. Accept that he’s the most magnificent of creatures and that he will carry ye where ye need to go. Naught else.”

  Palm out, Tokar waited. Thiel eased back, out of the way of the bonding. From a distance, she watched.

  Draed swung his head toward Tokar. Warily considered him. Sniffed—hard, spraying a damp sheen over his palm. “Augh,” Tokar groaned.

  With a snap of his massive jowls, Draed lunged.

  Tokar shouted.

  The raqine barreled his powerful neck along Tokar’s legs. Flipped him up. Onto his spine. Wings spread, Draed launched up before Tokar realized what was happening.

  Thiel sucked in a breath. Covered her mouth.

  Draed took flight with Tokar clinging hard. With a shrug, Draed nudged Tokar into position. Her friend seated himself. Held on. Then gave a victorious shout.

  • • •

  A raqine dropped from the heavens, diving toward the rooftop. Tili watched in amusement, though Haegan and the Tahscan cried out as the shadow slid over them.

  “They are doing well,” Tili said from the terrace of the solar apartment overlooking the training yards and outlying fields. To the south, raqine were allowing riders. Closer to the keep, Aburas and Grinda had broken the Pathfinders, Jujak, and Nivari into units to hone skills and allegiances. The Drigo were quartered within the bailey, but mostly they slept.

  “Think you there will be enough time? It has been ten days.” Haegan looked to the horizon, to the north. “Surely it will not be long now.”

  “Every minute our people get to train, the better. It’s in Her hands now, Fierian.”

  And yet one thought plagued him. “I would bind with Thiel.”

  Tili’s gaze lowered, then slowly slid to him. “Ye speak of facing the Dark One, of lives that are likely to be lost, and in the next breath ye speak of taking my sister?”

  “I love her.”

  Tili snorted and turned away, then cast over his shoulder, “Ye should speak to the king—her father. His answer might have been more favorable had ye asked before marking her with yer ring.” He started away. “I have men to train.”

  “What of Astadia?”

  Tili hesitated, glanced at Haegan. “What of her?”

  “Grinda said she hasn’t been seen since Thiel returned.”

  A shadow passed through Tili’s knotted brow. He glanced out, apparently thinking.

  “Have you seen her since Thiel returned?”

  “No.”

  “Think you she went to him?”

  Glaring, Tili rounded.

  “I agree,” Haegan said quickly. “’Tis unlikely, yet . . . she is absent, so we must consider it.”

  Anger dug into Tili, but he said nothing, only spun away and disappeared back into the fortress.

  Haegan leaned on the wall and peered past the parapets to the valleys below. Littered as far as the eye could see with people, tents, lean-tos, wagons, horses.

  A sniffle drew his gaze to Vaqar, who stood with a cloth drenched in oils and spices, warmed by a fire just enough to create a soothing aroma.

  “You should rest,” Haegan said.

  “When you rest, I will rest,” Vaqar said, his words thick with the sinus problem that plagued him.

  “The inflaming you sensed?”

  “Still there,” Vaqar muttered. “You should let me rout and bleed them.”

  Haegan started. “Have you bloodlust, Vaqar?”

  The man steeled his gaze. Then slumped. “The reek.”

  Rest was not to be had. Not for him, not for his men.

  Abiassa, be near. It was all Haegan could think to pray as he stood looking out at men who might soon die. Help never came in the form he expected. He knew better than to want all this to end now. Those prayers were selfish. And this was not about him. It was about the people. Her people.

  If She was near, if She guided, he would be well. All would be well. Haegan did not trust himself to seek the right things, the right outcomes, because of his own innate self-centeredness. He would do as She asked. He had too long fought his role. Those days were over, and if he wanted the people of the Nine to find freedom and strength once more, he must step up to the fight.

  But you are no leader. You fail in the simplest of tasks . . .

  “The reek,” Vaqar muttered without lifting his head.

  Haegan blinked. “We all of us have doubts and fears, Vaqar. How is it you do not?”

  Vaqar snorted. “I am well-equipped with doubts, Fierian.” He stretched his neck and climbed to his feet. “But I do not linger on them.”

  “How can you not? They pummel my thoughts.”

  “Because you give them room, entertain them.”

  Haegan considered the man holding the cloth to his face, his gaze aimed south. “I suppose you are right.”

  “I am,” Vaqar said with a hint of a smile. “W
hen the doubts snake in, turn your thoughts immediately to the Lady. Ask Her to show you truth.”

  “And that works for you?”

  “’Tis no charm or potion, but She will answer one way or another.”

  Abiassa . . . Aaesh . . . She had a name in each culture. And as he looked to the stars, he had the surprising notion that Her reach was not limited to this planet. Show me. Help me defend them. Let me see—

  A shout went up. His gaze fell to the crowds. Men dove at one another.

  “Another fight,” Vaqar said.

  “Aye, there have been many,” Haegan agreed.

  “Far too many.”

  “What drives the arguments? Fear?”

  Vaqar nodded. “Doubts, too.” His sinuses sounded clogged.

  “Are they not bred on the same field of desperation?” His heart jolted, darting a gaze around the fields where it seemed a tide of resentment washed over the people. He thought back to the argument that broke out within the war council. And the argument he’d heard of between Thiel and Aselan yesterday.

  Heat spiraled through his veins, spreading out from his arms, down his chest into his gut where it quaked. Stirred. Simmered. “Vaqar . . .”

  The Tahscans had colds. Or was it something more sinister? Had someone somehow infected them—deliberately? That would be . . . convenient.

  “Aye?”

  His mind scrambled in the quagmire that encircled his feet. There was one person not affected by inflaming. “Have you seen Astadia Kath?” She could be of help, perhaps.

  Vaqar stilled. “Nay, not since they returned with your woman.”

  Haegan dragged his gaze to the Tahscan. “The battle, Vaqar. The battle . . .” The bickering, the fears that bred discord and dissension in the ranks . . .

  No. No no no.

  As the idea took root, Haegan drove his gaze to the west. To the far reaches of the plains, dots of cities in leagues off. To the dull bleeding hues fading in the horizon. Not sunlight. “Blessed Lady! They are here! Incipients are within the fortress!”

  44

  “Have ye seen the assassin?”

  Aburas’s thick brows rose toward his short-cropped hairline. “Last with ye in the woods when we happened upon the skeleton.”

  Where was she? They’d had words, but not so bad for her to leave. Yet with each passing hour her departure seemed more likely. Otherwise, how could she avoid him so completely?

  What did he care? She was an assassin, a blood-letter, and his father would never approve.

  “Awful, that.”

  Tili twitched. “What?”

  “Finding the poor person the Fierian singed to death.”

  “Ye should have seen what he did in Iteveria.” Staying his anger proved unbelievably hard, and somehow he saw there was little merit it. “And ’twas an incipient!”

  Aburas shrugged. “Still a might cruel way to die, burned alive.”

  “Would ye have him pampered and coddled until he breathed his last?” Why am I arguing with my man?

  “Nay, but neither would I want to die as such. And what is with this?”

  “With what?”

  “Ye.” Aburas scowled. “All riled and worrying over an assassin.”

  “Riled? And aye—I am concerned. Assassins are best kept where they can be seen.”

  “The closer the better, aye?” Aburas had a cheeky grin plastered on his face.

  Tili glanced away, though he should give pretense that he still searched the people.

  “Then ’tis true—ye do favor her.”

  He should not be surprised his man knew of his interest in Astadia, yet it shamed him all the same, allowing himself to be distracted by soft emotion when half the world was fighting for their lives.

  “Aye,” he finally managed. “But it will do no good nor come to anything.”

  Thurig the Formidable would show his dark side once he learned she had distracted his son. That mighty king would not lose another heir to the wiles of a woman. And to be with her, Tili would have to leave the throne. He’d been there as the family struggled with Elan’s abdication. He could not fail his father like that.

  “One war at a time, Commander.”

  The use of his former title drew his gaze up, and he silently wondered what his man meant.

  “The darkness that has gathered may be the last we see,” Aburas said softly, keenly. “If we survive this one, then brave the other.”

  “Facing my father, ye mean.”

  A slow nod.

  “Were I to survive here, I would die there—at least where he is concerned.” Tili shook his head. “I cannot do it.” He looked away, running a hand over the stubble he’d let go too long.

  “’Tis good. She only be a murderer. Ye wouldna’ wan’ that blood on yer hands.”

  Tili scowled, tried to give his man a warning that he was edging dangerously close—

  “She’d probably kill ye in yer sleep, try to steal the throne.”

  Muscles tight, lips clamped, Tili drew back his hands, pulling on the embers. “Guard yer words.”

  “What?” Aburas shrugged. “Ye cast her off. Let it be done.” He started past.

  Tili slapped a hand on the Nivari’s chest, heat sizzling against the fabric of his leathers.

  Surprise widened the burly man’s eyes, then laughter vibrated beneath Tili’s hand. “Ye might fool yerself, Commander, but no’ me. When this is done, do not betray yerself or her. Fight for her.”

  Clanging bells silenced their argument. Tili spun, peering up at the guardhouse. “What cause for alarm?” he shouted.

  Laerian looked over the wall. “The Fierian wants all the soldiers to the bailey.”

  A flood of Pathfinders, Jujak, and Nivari flooded into the bailey. A raqine deposited Tokar on the ground, then banked off.

  Tili stalked toward the main house and found Haegan emerging. “What alarm?”

  Haegan glanced at the gathering army. “I saw them.” His chest heaved. “Poired’s army is on the horizon.”

  Taking a step back did nothing to distance Tili from the revelation. “’Tis what, a day, two at the most?”

  Haegan gave a firm nod.

  “We’ll need to gather supplies. Pull the people behind the walls.”

  “Aye,” Haegan said. “I would give ye charge over organizing preparations.”

  “Of course,” Tili said, then started away.

  Haegan caught his arm. “There are incipients here.”

  “Here?” His mind struggled with what that meant. “The plain—”

  “In the fortress.”

  “But yer Tahscan—”

  “An infection has seized them, thwarting their ability to detect the inflaming.”

  Understanding lifted Tili’s head. “The arguments. Irritation.”

  “Aye.” The Fierian glanced at those gathered with ferocity. “They’ve worked us into a frenzy against each other, distracting from their approach.”

  “Aye,” Tili said, glancing toward the bailey. He groaned. “I nearly took off Aburas’s head.”

  “Scores,” Tokar announced breathlessly as he jogged toward them. “Scores, if not hundreds south of the keeping wall.”

  “Accelerants?” Grinda asked.

  “Incipients,” a stern, shaky voice corrected as Gwogh and three members of the Council approached from the lower stairs. “We are accelerants. Those who wield against Abiassa and Her chosen have taken a dark path.”

  “More like a dead path,” Tili growled. He felt a twinge of resentment toward the Council. They had sent him here. They had . . .

  Awareness erupted at being inflamed. Tili said naught, merely turned his gaze in search of the brown eyes, remembering what Astadia had said about her time with Drracien. Why had she not shown herself? This is what she lived for!

  A throng gathered around them, all geared up and prepared, though jittery. Nervous. This was it. The final confrontation. He saw Nivari. Jujak. Pathfinders. Citizens.

  “I must addr
ess the people,” Haegan said as he moved out to the steps. His voice boomed as he explained their situation. Gave orders. Tili stood behind him, knowing that as steward and the one to organize their numbers, he should be present.

  Just inside the great hall, he spied his father. But still no Astadia. Where was she? He met Relig, Osman, and Elan descending in armor and weaponry. “Have ye seen Astadia?” he asked his older brother.

  “Nay,” Elan said, his brow rippling, glancing about. “Seems this would be something she would enjoy.”

  “Keep a sharp eye out. Trust your instincts,” Haegan was instructing. “They are here. But so are we. So are Abiassa and Her Deliverers. So are the Drigo and the raqine. Drown your doubts in truth as you prepare. Then fight hard. Fight true.”

  “Drown in truth,” a shout went up from the back. The phrase was echoed, rippling out through the bailey. Eventually it roared from the crowds as the men filed out, searching. Hunting.

  • • •

  “Haegan,” Tili said, sidling up to the Fierian. “Astadia is missing. After giving the captains their orders, I searched for the last hour. I thought at first she was just hiding. But now, with Poired on our doorstep . . .”

  Haegan’s brow furrowed as he took in those around them, as if he did not believe Tili’s report. As if he, too, wanted to believe she was simply doing what an assassin did—blending into the crowds and shadows. “You think she’s harmed?”

  “I think she would not miss this fight were there breath in her lungs. She blames Poired for Trale’s death.” Tili knew something was wrong. “Remember, Fierian, she said they called her unnatural. That she—”

  “Unnatural?” Kedulcya’s question pitched as she hurried toward them, gray eyes tight. “You are certain of this?”

  Tili nodded, watching as the councilwoman shared a long look with Gwogh and the other member. “Pray, speak. We are at war, in case ye missed it! Why do they think she’s unnatural?”

  “She’s not unnatural, she’s an Unnatural,” Gwogh clarified. “They are few and far between. Histories record only two others.”

  “Two other what?” Haegan demanded.

  “Unnaturals,” Gwogh repeated. “It’s not a word alone. It’s a title, just as Fierian. If what you report is true—”

  “’Tis.”

  “—then the assassin—”