Ashok caught the rock in one hand. It stung his palm. The miner had a good arm. But he immediately launched it back twice as fast. The rock struck the worker in the forehead with a sick crack, bounced off, and he collapsed unconscious into the snow. That gave them some pause, but more rocks were being pried off the frozen ground.
“Who are you to tell us what to do?”
Enough of this nonsense.
“Who am I? I am Ashok Vadal.” He opened his coat and drew his sword. Somehow the air became even colder. The villagers gasped in fear as the unmistakable black steel seared their eyes. “And the casteless are under my protection.”
The men of Jharlang began to flee, crashing into each other, slipping and sliding across the ice, trampling their neighbors in order to get away. They were in such a hurry that they left their injured men behind.
“That’s better,” Ashok muttered as he put his sword away.
Despite the Mother’s predictions of inevitable bloodshed, it seemed that he’d solved this issue without murdering anyone. It was shaping up to be a successful morning.
* * *
“You told them who you are?” Keta shouted. “Are you insane?”
After he’d found the others, the three of them had retreated back to the barn to hide and plan their next move. Keta clearly didn’t approved of Ashok’s actions, but to be fair, Ashok didn’t approve of what he’d done either.
“If I hadn’t said who I was, eventually I would have had to kill some of them.” Ashok was sitting on the back of the wagon, and winced as he shoved his bloody foot into its boot. If he’d had more time he’d apply a clean foot wrap, but they needed to get out of town fast. “I had to let them know that their behavior wouldn’t be tolerated.”
Keta was clearly agitated. The Keeper had been patient and helpful this whole trip, but this had pushed him over the edge. “I asked you to avoid notice!”
Thera seemed annoyed, but she was being a bit calmer about the whole thing than the Keeper. “Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why spare the lives of workers? Since when do any of those lower types matter to you?”
“They still don’t.” But that was no longer quite true. He thought about it while he pulled his other boot on. The ice had removed a lot of skin, leaving the soles of his feet bright red and burning. It was a good thing the Heart of the Mountain would keep the wounds from corrupting and rotting his feet off. “I don’t know.”
“You put us all at risk, and you don’t even know why?” Keta shouted.
He really didn’t, and that was truly bothering him to the core of his being. “I just couldn’t abide it.”
“You have no idea how important our work is, and this foolishness jeopardizes everything! You had no right to endanger our lives.”
Keta was correct, but that only made Ashok angrier. “You supposedly speak for the untouchables, Keeper. You should be filled with joy. Is your false god not pleased that I saved a few?”
“I don’t know why the Forgotten chose you, yet still tolerates your constant mockery. Your pride threatens our entire movement, everything we’ve accomplished. You have to understand—”
“You claim to want rebellion, Keeper, so there was a taste. Or was all that just talk?”
That seemed to hit Keta hard. All during this journey he’d preached about his people remembering their gods, rising up, and stopping their oppression. He seemed truly chastised by Ashok’s harsh words. He took a deep breath, and when he exhaled, the small man seemed to deflate a bit. “I may not understand it, but the Forgotten has a plan. There is a time and a place for everything. I’ll be happier to stir up a revolt when we’ve got an army of faithful at our backs and we’re not surrounded by enemies.”
“When you declare war on the Law, you’ll never lack for enemies.” Ashok hadn’t meant to give offense. Keta may have been delusional, but his delusions had integrity. Calling Keta’s honesty into question was a terrible insult. He dipped his head. “I didn’t intend to endanger either of you. I’ll try to do better in the future.”
“We should leave before the local warriors find their courage and come looking,” Keta muttered as he went to the stall holding their oxen. Something else was bothering the Keeper as well, but he must have not wanted to speak of it in front of Ashok.
“Leave them. The wagon’s too slow,” Thera said. “The ground is iced over now, but it’ll be nothing but mud in a few hours and the wagon will be useless. We’ve got to make distance before word spreads. Let’s take their horses.”
“Good idea,” Keta said as he went to a different gate.
“That would be stealing,” Ashok pointed out.
Thera was incredulous. “You inconsistent bastard, one minute you’re beating workers senseless in front of hundreds of witnesses and the next you won’t steal a horse!”
“That was different.”
“Just when I’m beginning to think there’s actually a normal person lurking inside of there, you have to go and prove me wrong.” She sighed. “What if we consider our abandoned wagon a trade? The value of the goods inside far outweighs the value of these sad excuses for ponies. Does that work?”
That was actually a very pragmatic and just solution. “Very well.” He slid off the back of the wagon, and white-hot pain slapped the soles of his feet. Ashok ignored it.
“I wouldn’t worry about the warriors too much. I saw their barracks when I was scouting last night. It’s tiny. There are probably only a handful of them in the whole village. They’re not going to cross that sword.” Not that Thera was arguing against leaving, since she’d already gone about stealing a local’s saddle. “I’m more worried they’ll be riding to tell the Somsak we’re here to try and collect that bounty.”
A sudden discomforting sensation moved down his spine, causing an involuntary shiver. Angruvadal was warning him of an impending threat. The sword could sense far more than he could, so Ashok went to the barn doors and peered outside. He couldn’t see anything yet, but when he focused, called upon the Heart, and laid his hand on the wall, he felt the vibration of hundreds of distant hoofbeats thrumming through his palm. “We’re in danger.”
“What is it?” Keta joined him at the door.
“Horses.” They were coming down the mountain like an avalanche. He nodded toward the west.
“That’s the route to the old Somsak house,” Thera said. “There’s no way a messenger made it there and back so fast, especially not in this weather. Must be a random patrol.”
“That’s no patrol.” There were so many hoof beats he couldn’t even calculate how many of them there were. “It’s an army.”
It was their doom.
“A raid on the way to Vadal?” Keta asked hopefully.
“Regardless, when they’re told I’m here, they will strike.” Angruvadal was warning him there were far too many to fight at once. A direct confrontation would likely result in his death. Ashok turned to his companions. They were looking at him wide-eyed and fearful. Everyone in Lok had heard the stories about Somsak depravity. Even the Protectors respected the mountain folk for their brutal thoroughness. As he concentrated, the sword was helping him calculate the speed, direction, and numbers of the threat. For a thing with no eyes or ears, it always seemed to have an excellent grasp of what was going on around it. Small groups of horsemen had broken off, and from the echoes on the canyon walls, they were taking the high ground. Anyone fleeing the village would be spotted and intercepted. “No . . . They’re not passing through. They’re spreading out. Jharlang is their objective.”
“Come on!” Thera rushed to the wall and desperately began pulling dusty leather tack from the hooks and tossing it on the straw at Keta’s feet. “We’ve got to hurry.”
She had no way of knowing that her actions were futile. There was no way out. Ashok knew he could fight his way through, then he could likely evade pursuit on foot by sticking to the roughest terrain possible, but the other two would slow him down too much. The
y couldn’t follow where he could go. To have any chance at all he would need to abandon them. Only the villagers knew Ashok wasn’t travelling alone, and Thera and Keta were outsiders. If they hid, the Somsak would go door to door until they were found. No one would claim or hide them. They would be caught, questioned, tortured, and executed.
“There is no escape,” Ashok stated.
Keta rushed to the wagon and pulled out a meat cleaver that had been hidden beneath the driver’s bench. “We’ll fight!”
Ashok glanced at the cleaver and raised an eyebrow. “If it comes down to you using that against a few hundred Somsak, Keeper, better to cut your own throat with it than to let them take you alive.”
Keta was terrified as the bleak reality of the situation took hold. “What do we do?”
For them? There was nothing they could do. For him? Escape, evade, and live to fulfill his orders. It was cruel, but Angruvadal’s calculations were never wrong. There was no option for victory, only retreat or dying in a futile defiant gesture. Ashok threw the barn door open. The path was open before him.
Damn it . . . He was a man without fear, but not entirely without conscience. Dying was easy. Failing was hard.
“I am sorry,” he said.
The Grand Inquisitor had spoken for the judges, and their orders were more important than any handful of lives. His guides would perish, but Ashok would find another way to complete his mission. He always did. Logically, he should have as much loyalty to a criminal and a fanatic as they did to the Law. The Capitol’s demands outweighed any personal feelings he had. His entire existence meant doing that which was expected of him. Any other time in his life, the decision would have already been made, but the last year had left him broken, his foundation cracked.
Ashok looked back at his companions. Keta was still scrambling, trying to think of something, but Thera was watching him, almost detached. Like she understood exactly what was coming. Their eyes met, and she knew the truth. There was no time to explain that he had to put his mission first, or to apologize for abandoning them. She was strong, raised in the warrior caste, so she would understand. Relentless death was coming for them and Ashok wouldn’t be there to stop it.
Ashok turned away.
“Do what you have to do,” Thera whispered. “We’ll find a way to survive without you.” She was enough of a survivor that she may have even believed her own words. He took a step, but couldn’t bring himself to take another.
The choice was clear, obedience or rebellion.
Ashok’s hands curled into fists. That morning he had rashly chosen mercy over the Law, but it had been in a heated moment, without thought. Now with perfect clarity, he faced two paths.
This time, I do not obey.
Decision made, he spoke quickly. “Listen carefully. I’ll challenge the warriors. Wait until they’re all concentrating on me, then ride.”
Unaware that Ashok had just made the most selfish, and selfless, decision of his entire life, Keta kept saddling the horses. Thera, however, understood what was going through Ashok’s head and approached him. “You can’t protect everyone.”
“See to your duty and guard the Keeper.” He began walking toward the sound of hooves.
She grabbed onto his coat sleeve to stop him. “You’ll die.” She actually sounded like she cared.
“More than likely.” He was one of the greatest combatants in the world, but Angruvadal was telling him that these numbers were too many, the odds too drastic. Death was certain. But was that truly a bad thing? Better to end it now than to drag out Omand’s terrible punishment. It had felt good to tell the villagers his name. “I should have died a long time ago.”
“What about your mission? What about finding the prophet?”
“Keta can tell him that I tried.” He took her hand and gently removed it from his coat. “Goodbye, Thera.” Already he could hear the first of the Somsak riders entering the canyon. He walked into the sunlight to meet his fate.
Ashok didn’t look back.
Chapter 43
At first the villagers of Jharlang had mistaken them for raiders from another house. It was an understandable error. At most, these workers had met a few Somsak at a time when they’d come to collect their rightful taxes. It had been generations since Jharlang had seen so many Somsak at once, and those had been raiders, in the days before the savage mountain people had been defeated and made vassals to a bunch of farmers. How were they supposed to know the hundreds of terrifying warriors rapidly converging on their little village were of their same house? They’d meant no insult when they’d fled across their frozen fields.
Only Nadan Somsak didn’t see it that way. He took offense, and he was not the sort of man you wanted to give offense to.
A few Thao warriors from the tiny local garrison were brought forward, and shoved down in front of the line of stamping horses. The Somsak were truly frightening when they rode to battle, dressed in dyed furs and crow feathers tied over their gleaming mail. “Where is the fallen?” Nadan Somsak demanded. His words were nothing but a hissing whisper because of his new demon tongue. “Where is Ashok Vadal?”
“I don’t know, mighty Thakoor.” Oh, how they recognized him now.
Nadan made a growling noise that reverberated inside his helmet. Wrong answer. He lifted his powerful crossbow. The bolt was so quick that it was almost as if feathers sprouted from the warrior’s eye socket. It only pierced the side of his brain so death wasn’t immediate. He rolled onto his back, grasping at the shaft, kicking and screaming as he tried to pluck it from his head. Nadan passed the crossbow over to one of his men so it could be reloaded. The Somsak crossbows were unwieldy things that required a lever to draw back, but they were extremely powerful. “Where is he?”
The next Thao warrior in line wasn’t eager to die. “Last I saw he was at the bridge, defending the casteless quarter.”
“If you knew it was the fallen, why didn’t you capture him?” Nadan asked as one of his soldiers passed him another loaded crossbow. The Somsak’s horse stomped nervously as blood stink hit its nostrils.
The warrior was choking on the words, struggling to get them out in time. “He drew that magic sword, Thakoor.” He hesitated, probably trying to think of a response that wouldn’t incriminate him as a coward. His eyes flicked over to his thrashing compatriot. “We had no—”
Since his head was turned to look at his dying companion, Nadan shot that one through the ear canal. This time death was instantaneous.
Sikasso shook his head at the display. Theoretically they were of the same house, and the Thao were of higher status, but the tattooed mountain thugs didn’t see it that way, not today at least. Perhaps it was the boiling hatred that came from the demon blood now coursing through Nadan’s veins, or perhaps he was just always that much of a barbarian at heart, but Sikasso could already tell that the day would end in slaughter.
“Ashok defends the untouchables here. All he defends, I will destroy. Fourth paltan, burn the casteless quarter. Kill them all. Third, search the workers’ homes in case this coward was incorrect. The rest will remain with me. As soon as he is found, alert me,” Nadan ordered as he was presented another loaded crossbow. “Go.”
His damaged tongue didn’t carry his words far, but his officers repeated them down the line until the units broke off, riding through the icy lanes. The majority of the Somsak remained just outside the village, ready to swoop in the moment their target was seen. Sikasso noted that Nadan had sent off the unseasoned and restless youths to cause trouble, while keeping the obviously experienced veterans close. A wise move. He watched the warriors. Most of them seemed ready for a fight, almost as eager as their Thakoor. There was a lot of stored aggression in these mountains, and for too long the Somsak had been vassals to a house that they secretly considered to be their inferiors. Before they’d ridden forth, Nadan had addressed his officers, speaking of how it was time for them to gain a new ancestor blade and become a great house again. They had heard their Tha
koor’s new voice and thought it was a miracle. At Sikasso’s suggestion, he’d not let them see his face.
Most were thankful for this miracle. Sikasso had noticed a lot of superstitious glances in his direction. Not all of the Somsak were bloodthirsty fools, and the observant already sensed that there was something seriously wrong about their Thakoor. No matter how great Nadan was in battle, once they discovered the truth of their leader’s miraculous healing, there would be violence. Even the most pragmatic warriors would never accept a Thakoor tainted by forbidden demon magic. If Sikasso was going to be among these people, he’d have to watch his back, because it was easier to lash out at the wizard who’d corrupted your Thakoor than the beloved and extremely deadly man himself, but he doubted their alliance would last long enough for it to be an issue. The wizards of the Lost House were already perched like falcons in the rocks above, ready to swoop in and secure the sword. Whatever Somsak were left when Ashok was done with them, his men would dispose of, and then the Lost House could disappear back into myth and legend where they belonged.
There was quite a bit of screaming coming from the workers’ homes. Apparently to the Somsak the command search was a synonym for rape and pillage. Thankfully the warrior who’d been shot in the eye had quit his crying and bled to death. The horses were agitated and Sikasso had to struggle to control his mount. Even the hardy mountain animals were struggling on this ice. They’d been in such a hurry to get here that one rider had tumbled over a cliff, and there’d been a few other slips, crashes, and broken legs, but most of them had made it. Their horses were such an agile breed that the Somsak must have crossed them with mountain goats, but they still weren’t real war horses, trained to crash into combat, so the smells and noises were frightening them. He got the animal calmed down and went back to surveying the humble village.
Once he had a moment to collect himself Sikasso began to feel a vibrant energy in the air. There was strong magic here. At first he thought it had to be Angruvadal, but there was something else, something different. He’d been near Angruvadal before, and while it was truly a masterpiece, this was an entirely new sensation. It was very different than demon and didn’t feel quite like black steel. It was unlike any magic he’d ever felt before, and it was so powerful it made the hairs on his arms stand up.
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