by JC Kang
“Not a word,” he whispered.
His now-rigid hostage nodded. The size and build…it was a woman. Likely another slave.
He spun her around, keeping the blade at her neck. She was…Arkothi, late-twenties, with dark hair and broad but attractive features. “Where is the doctor?”
“I am the doctor.” Her voice was low and she showed no fear. “Who are you, and what do you want from me?”
Such bravery. And a doctor? Tian stared at her. “Where’s the Cathayi woman?”
Her expression deflated. “Kaiya. She is gone. Such a nice girl, poor thing.”
“What?”
“She was very fertile when I met her. You know what Emperor Geros did to her.”
Emperor Geros? Emperor? Here? Tian’s heart squeezed. It was all he could do to draw a breath. “I’m her husband.”
The doctor’s eyes narrowed at first, then softened. “I’m so sorry. They left yesterday morning by boat, en route to the next fortress downstream. After the threat of snow ends, they plan on taking her along the restored roads eastward, back to Tilésité.”
Tian’s stomach roiled. He was too late. He jabbed a finger at her. “How can you willingly be part of this?”
She looked down at the ground. “I'm from the city of Mirkos, conquered by the Teleri nearly fifty years ago. My grandmother was a noble there, subjected to the Mating by members of the Teleri Prospecti. After she gave birth and went home, she married someone of her station and my mother was born and suffered the same fate. Later, I was born. When I was just fourteen, I too was taken by the Teleri.” She held up her hand, exposing the nine-pointed sun tattooed in solid brown to her wrist.
Poor woman. Still, there was something she wasn’t telling him. Tian stared at her feet.
“Though I never knew them, I have both a Bovyan brother and son somewhere. Maybe my unknown son is still alive after all these years of constant war. I have to hope the Bovyans are not all evil.”
No telling who her brother or son had harmed. Tian snorted.
She glared at him. “The circumstances of my Bovyan brother’s conception, according to my mother, gives me faith. He will end Tivar’s Curse.”
Fairy tales. Or rationalization. Tian leveled his gaze at her. “You act a lot on your faith in a story. To me, you are deceiving yourself. You’re aiding an evil empire.”
Her angry look melted. “My faith was rewarded by a kind Teleri general. As much as I abhor their practices, I came here to serve under that general, to see to the well-being of not just the soldiers, but also the prisoners.”
Perhaps she was sincere. He pointed out the door. “I’m going to free those prisoners. Will you help me?”
Her eyes searching his. “Yes. If you can disable the guards at the stockade and women’s quarters.”
“Those at the women’s quarters are taken care of.”
She jabbed him in the chest with a finger. “No killing. Meet me by the eastern bridge in ten minutes. Take me hostage, and that will buy the prisoners some time to escape.”
She seemed sincere enough. Could he trust her? If she could take a leap of faith about Bovyans, he could do the same for her. Not like there was any other choice, except to kill her now. Hold the dragonfly with care. Tian nodded.
Making sure nobody was outside, he snuck back to the women’s cabin. All twelve women were prepared to leave.
He handed a woman the dagger from the slain Teleri soldier. “I’m going to free the men. In three minutes, head to the eastern bridge. As quickly and quietly as you can.”
After another quick look into the camp, Tian moved on to the stockades and signaled the men inside to keep quiet. He rendered the guard unconscious with an artery block and took his dagger. Finding the key, he unlocked the chain securing the prison door. “Follow me to the eastern bridge. Quickly and quietly.”
They didn’t meet Tian’s standard of quiet. It was such a large group. In the two-minute run to the bridge, horns blared throughout the island.
Near the bridge, two guards were talking with the doctor.
“Guards!” Tian yelled. It was the signal for Ma Jun to neutralize the sentries on his side of the bridge, and would hopefully attract the two guards with the doctor.
It worked. They rushed him, weapons drawn.
Tian flung two daggers, which hit each in the throat. The doctor screamed and ran over to the fallen men.
A voice roared to his left. “Spirits, hear me!”
Tian turned. A Kanin shaman strode towards him from thirty feet away. He held a crystal-headed staff in hand.
Only one dagger left, and no other choice but to use it on what could be a major threat. Taking the doctor hostage would have to wait. He charged, dagger ready to throw.
The shaman pounded the butt end of his staff into the ground. “Open the clouds!”
The storm clouds above flashed, and a bolt of lightning shot down towards Tian. Even a Paladin’s superhuman reflexes wouldn’t save him against the speed of nature. Yet the electricity sizzled and dissipated around him.
Tian stopped in his tracks, stunned but unharmed.
If he was surprised, the shaman looked even more so. His mouth stood agape, his eyes wide. Tian resumed his charge, coming within fifteen feet. He hurled his weapon, just as the shaman raised his staff.
Instead of a chant, nothing but a muffled groan came out as the shaman staggered back, clawing at the dagger lodged in his ribs.
Tian scanned the area to reassess the situation. Prisoners flooded over the bridge, pursued by several Teleri soldiers. Horns shrieked, rousing the camp out of sleep. He picked the doctor out of the crowd—she still crouched over the fallen men, pressing on their wounds.
He bolted over to her, and she stood up with a bloody dagger in hand. Tears glassed over her eyes. “Why did you do this? We had a deal.”
Tian shook his head. “No time to think. No other way to free the prisoners.” Would she still play along with being taken hostage? He’d soon find out.
Her eyes darted behind him, and she clumsily stabbed at him.
Tian caught her arm, twisted it behind her back and swiped the blade away. He then turned to face the approaching Teleri, backing his way towards the bridge with the point of the weapon to her throat. Waiting until the last prisoner passed, he retreated to the middle of the bridge and stopped. The Teleri soldiers followed, keeping their distance. They stopped about ten feet from him.
Tian pointed the tip at them. “Bring your leader.”
The Bovyans discussed his demand among themselves, but before they said anything, a handsome man, taller than the other soldiers, approached. His unbuttoned white shirt exposed firm muscles and his pants hung unbelted at his hips.
“I am General Altos, and I command this camp. Release the doctor.”
Tian smiled tightly. “Only if you agree to let the prisoners go and to never take any more.”
The general’s lips pursed. “You know I cannot agree to such terms. However, release her and I will give the prisoners a one-hour start.”
Tian shook his head. “Wait until first light.”
“Very well.” The officer nodded. “We are agreed. We would have a hard time tracking them in this dark night anyway.”
“Back off to the island, and I will send the doctor across. If you show any signs of trickery, I will throw this dagger into her back.”
“You have my word. We will not pursue the prisoners until daybreak.”
“Nonetheless, back off the bridge.” Tian repeated.
The general retreated, motioning his men with him.
“Thank you,” he whispered into her ear. He pushed the doctor forward and let her get about thirty feet in front of him—about the maximum accurate range of his dagger—then followed her to stay in range. Once she reached the island, he turned and broke into a run towards the other side.
“Now, now!” he yelled.
On the opposite bank, Lana chanted. A deafening roar rumbled from upstream, and th
e bridge shook as the waters swelled beneath it. Tian teetered over the planks, his balance just barely keeping him from being pitched into the rushing waters in the strait below. The less agile Teleri soldiers, running behind him, lost their balance.
On the other end, Ma Jun and the twins waited in the dugout, and Lana was just climbing in. Tian leaped aboard, right as the deluge picked it up and carried it downstream.
Ma Jun stared in awe at his wife. “I didn’t realize that your tie to the spirits was so strong.”
“It was the island itself,” she answered. “This is where our ancestor relearned the way of the spirits, when the lights of the Tree guided him here during the Long Winter. His invoking of the spirits began the transformation of the barren farmland around. The forest reseeded and grew at an accelerated pace. All shamans used to make a pilgrimage here, because the spirits speak louder here than anywhere else on the plateau.”
Tian looked back towards the island, the sparkling tree above it disappearing in the distance. “I wonder why their shaman’s lightning strike did not affect me.”
Lana cocked her head, her eyebrows furrowed. When she spoke, she didn’t seem convinced, herself. “At night, when the Tree lights up, the spirits cannot go under its canopy.”
Tian nodded. However, he hadn’t been under the canopy when the lightning struck.
Back on the island, General Altos looked over his assembled staff, his heart beating with excitement. “Get the Shaki to track the Cathayi. I need him captured alive.”
The Doctor Myra turned to him, her hand over her mouth. “General, you have never gone back on your word! Were you not going to give him until daybreak?”
Altos was surprised that she would question him in front of his men, but grinned nonetheless. “I gave the prisoners until daybreak.” He then turned to one of his officers. “Send word to all of our outposts, base camps and fortresses: the Cathayi man has the Teleri Imperial Crest.”
Myra leaned in. “He is the one who slept with the princess before Emperor Geros.”
Altos jerked his head back. “If she’s pregnant, and Geros raises a non-Bovyan as his own…”
CHAPTER 53:
Impossible Mission
Tian looked up as the storm clouds parted, allowing columns of sunlight to shine through after days of continual rain. Though Lana’s invocation of the spirits had transformed the downpour into a drizzle, the boat ride was far from pleasant. Each night, they camped on the eastern side of the river, to avoid the Teleri soldiers marching up and down the west bank.
Late on the fourth day after their escape from Wild Turkey Island, they turned a bend in the river. A massive tower rose high above the sweet evergreens, looming larger and larger as dugout approached. The bridge arching across the river was so big, Tian could see it from many li upstream. As they drifted closer, it became apparent the tower and bridge were all part of one massive fortress.
The one where the Bovyans held Kaiya, at least according to the doctor. Tian’s every nerve stood on end. If they could see the tower, then anyone there with a dwarf scope could see them. Clearly.
They brought the dugout ashore on the east bank, far from the fort. Finding a dirt trail with no signs of human use, they hiked the rest of the way under the cover of the canopy. The path rose along a gradual slope, eventually opening up onto a thirty-foot-wide corridor through the forest. A broad road paved in stone ran through it.
Tian peeked around a tree. The road connected to the bridge, which in turn led into the fortress. Along the sides, slaves cut down trees, hauled lumber, and worked on the roads. Shaki hunters carried game back. Bovyans marched in formation to and from the fort. If the wilderness had claimed the stone roads after the Hellstorm, it looked like the Teleri were taking them back.
Across the river, the fortress looked like a feat of engineering. It sat atop an embankment the height of three men, on a peninsula formed by the bend of the river. A log palisade, twelve feet tall, encircled the mound. The single entrance, connected to the bridge and flanked by two guard towers, sat at a height of fifteen feet above the river.
Tian looked up. Though it was hard to tell from the lower vantage point, the central keep rose about three stories high, with a towering greywood growing out of the center. Wooden steps circled up and around the trunk, leading to a lookout post near the top, under its canopy.
The forest beyond the palisade had been cut down in a one-li radius, and the few small buildings in the clearing would provide little cover if someone tried to approach from that side of the river. It didn’t look promising.
Tian looked among the men, evaluating. Ma Jun and the twins, Kosa and Kona, could fight, and Fang Weiyong could help tend their wounds. None would be helpful for scouting out the fortress interior, and it would be suicide to storm it.
He turned to Lana. “I need to find out about the inside of the fort. Most importantly, if Kaiya is there. Can the spirits do anything to help?”
Lana withdrew her talisman, a bright blue river rock, polished by time. “Spirits, hear me,” she whispered. “Summon the eyes and ears of the forest to do my bidding.”
Eyes and ears of the forest? Tian looked around, blanking his expression to hide his doubt.
Birds, squirrels, and other small animals trickled in by foot and wing, their chattering growing to crescendo.
Lana squatted down and smiled. “My little friends, tell me about the house over the river.” She gestured toward the Hua. “Please find out if there is a female like these men inside.”
Tian suppressed a snort. Most humans had a hard time differentiating between Hua and Kanin. How would a stupid animal tell?
Lana narrowed a critical eye at him. Were his thoughts that obvious? “A bird of prey can pick out a squirrel in a tree branch from high in the sky. The squirrel can sense the bird. Do not underestimate my friends.”
The animals all glared at him. Tian placed his right hand over his heart in apology.
With more chattering, they scattered off towards the fortress.
After sending Ma Jun and Lana to survey the road, and assigning Fang Weiyong to watch the river, Tian and the twins climbed sweet evergreen trees to get a better view of what lay beyond the palisade. What he saw made the prospect of attack all the more daunting.
Besides the guarded entrance from the bridge on the east, there was another entrance on the western side, from which the stone road continued. The main keep appeared to be made partially of living trees, with horizontal log walls covered by dried mud. Soldiers milled around barracks, while slaves came and went from another large building. Kitchens, warehouses, a smithy, and a lumber mill all stood within the palisade walls.
Tian pictured the map in his mind. Right now, they were about one thousand, eight hundred li from the Teleri border, less than six hundred li from Hua. If at least some of what the Shaki guide said had been true, another outpost stood west of here, even closer to Hua. These old roads, which the Teleri worked hard to restore, must connect several fortresses so that the empire could project their power into the Wilds.
How long had the Bovyans been here? How had they built up the infrastructure so quickly, especially with so much of their attention focused on the Eldaeri kingdoms and Arkothi states in the Northeast? With Hua’s distance from Teleri, their threat had never seemed imminent. Perhaps First Consul Geros truly was the genius the stories portrayed him to be.
Tian swallowed his sigh. Hua could no longer be content in its neutrality, resting secure behind its walls while promoting trade to fatten its own coffers. Beyond the practical need to maintain its own security, there was also a moral obligation to take a stand and choose a side. Being a member of the Maki, even for this brief time, had taught him that.
Yet to convince the Tianzi and the Tai-Ming nobles would be an entirely different matter. Perhaps Heaven had willed for the Teleri to capture their beloved princess, to wake them out of their complacency.
The vision from his last night in the village flared in his
memory. The words on the ground in his dream were accept fate. Was he meant to accept this, the kidnapping and rape of the only woman he’d ever loved? Were they to make this sacrifice so that others would learn?
He tightened his hand around a tree branch. No. Forget Heaven, forget fate. He’d make his own destiny.
Night fell, and activity died down in and around the fortress. The group reassembled back at the dugout and used the cover of darkness to pass beneath the great bridge. Reaching the other side, and following the river as it bent west beside the fortress, they set up camp in the woods.
“I estimate their fortress can hold three thousand soldiers,” Tian said.
“There are hundreds of our own people as well,” Kona added.
Lana shook her head. “I can’t imagine how horrible they must feel, forced to cut down the trees.”
“Even if the tribes united, they couldn’t take this fort,” Kosa said.
Kona nodded. “And the rumors say there are other fortresses like this one throughout the plateau.”
Tian tried to keep the agitation out of his voice. “Its defenses are daunting. Even if I had a layout of the main keep. Even if I knew where Kaiya was being held. I’m not sure I could get her out. Let’s sleep on it, find out what Lana’s forest friends learn.”
Tian didn’t sleep well. His thoughts were on Kaiya.
The next morning, Lana related what the forest animals had told her: a Cathayi woman was staying in a third-floor room on the northern side of the main fortress.
At least Kaiya was close. Still, she was beyond his reach, at least with the resources at hand.
Tian withdrew Chen Xin’s ring, bowed his head to it, and pressed it into Fang Weiyong’s hand. “Take the boat down the river to the East Gate of Hua. Show the ring to the imperial garrison. Inform them of our situation. Have a message delivered to the capital. Asking for twelve Moquan.”