by Devin Madson
‘Unpleasant, I am sure,’ Father Kokoro said. ‘But that you came back alive means you still have some value. I have studied the Vices for many years, my lady, and that, I assure you, was a mere stunt.’
He bowed again, and though a hundred questions crowded my mind, Father Kokoro walked away, his serene features bathed in morning sunlight.
Chapter 5
‘Kimiko is carrying your child.’
The empty forest made no reply beyond the pitter-patter of the fading storm. It ought to have smelt of rain and mud and wet bark, but all I could smell was the stink of burned flesh.
‘Kimiko is carrying your child.’
In the weak morning light Katashi’s camp was a mess of wet tents and mud and subdued whispers. The first storm had passed, but I had lived in Kisia long enough to know more would come. The rain had not stopped the man burning.
‘Kimiko is carrying your child, but perhaps it’s already too late for you, Darius.’
Beside me Kaze tugged at clumps of damp grass. Like the forest, he too had no answer. I touched his neck. ‘Wait for me,’ I said. ‘I’ll be back soon.’
He didn’t understand my words, but understood their meaning, just as I understood his reply through touch.
‘I know,’ I said, getting to my feet. ‘But no one else can save him. I have to try.’
Leaving Kaze behind, I made my way through the thinning forest. The loud discontent of the Pikes on watch had made them easy to avoid in the night, but once beyond the tree line there would be no hiding. Boredom and irritation. The Pikes were sick of the Fen and the rain only made it more unbearable.
The sharp stab of their attention hit me on the muddy slope above the camp.
‘Hey!’
The voice came from above, but it was a pair of roaming sentries that sped toward me, bowstrings taut before they could get a clear shot. Another joined them, his whispers gathering fast.
‘Who are you?’
‘Isn’t that the freak?’
‘Which one? There are a lot of them around at the moment. See?’ The man pointed down the slope where a group of black-clad figures were making their way up the hill. ‘They must have smelt the stench of one of their own.’
Stinking Vices.
Can’t stand these damn freaks. Freaks. Traitors. I signed up to fight for Monarch, not this mess.
The Vices arrived silent like a shadow, and heedless of the Pikes they spread out around me. Ire, Parsimony, Hope, Pride – each of their thought patterns as familiar as their faces.
‘This is one of ours,’ Ire said to the sentries who still had their bows drawn. ‘Don’t let us keep you.’
‘Any stranger in our camp is our business.’
‘Swim away little fishy.’
Avarice stepped forward, ignoring the Pikes. ‘You shouldn’t be here.’
‘I want to see Darius,’ I said.
The Vices closed in, their whispers tangling.
‘No.’
He’s the one.
The other one.
The freak prince.
‘I will see him,’ I said.
‘Is that a threat, boy?’ Avarice growled. He gripped his sickle. ‘You’re outnumbered.’
The Pikes held their ground and their bowstrings, but I kept my eyes on the old Vice. In daylight his face was deeply lined. ‘You told me you stole silver,’ I said. ‘But you didn’t tell me it was Lady Melia Laroth’s locket.’
Avarice neither moved nor spoke, just weathered the storm as he always had.
‘Darius caught you taking it from her room,’ I went on. ‘No one had touched it since she died. No one would miss it and you hadn’t been paid since Lord Nyraek left for Mei’lian.’
Some of the Vices shifted uneasily, but Avarice remained statue still.
‘You had no money left, but it wasn’t for you, was it?’ I said. ‘The housekeeping money had run out and you might as well have been stuck at the end of the world for all the help that came. How could you feed and look after Darius without money?’
‘Go. Away,’ Avarice rumbled. ‘You can’t see him. Leave before we make you leave.’
‘I’m not going anywhere until I see Darius.’
‘Get him out of here.’
A hand closed around my arm. ‘Pride,’ I said, still looking at Avarice. ‘Pride, the only Vice who sold himself. And all for the chance to lie to his wife.’
Raw emotion crackled around us.
‘I know what you’re thinking, Ire,’ I said, still not turning. ‘Ire, another son sold into slavery. But your father was happy to be rid of you, happy to sell the beast who beat his new wife until her face was black with bruises.’
Pride let go and I heard the slap as he caught Ire’s arm. ‘Not worth it,’ he said.
‘One of you smothered your own mother while she slept,’ I said. ‘One of you was the lover of a lord. One bore the brunt of your father’s fury every single night. One of you used to be a priest. One of you wants to die. And there’s one who wants to slice the throat of every Vice while they sleep.’
Their whispers grew tangled and anxious. Wary. Hands edged toward weapons and I could have set them off, but Avarice was my only way in.
‘You have all suffered and you have all sinned, but none more than you, Avarice,’ I said. ‘Have you told them about the man you call “Master”?’
Avarice closed the space between us in two steps. ‘You keep your mouth shut, boy,’ he said, his skin rippling with patches of stone. But it was not anger that set him off. A very different emotion had sweetened the air.
‘Poor Avarice,’ I murmured, the words for him alone. ‘You love him.’ Memories poured forth, every one of Darius. Darius, a boy crushed by his father’s expectations and his father’s fears, Darius the child Avarice had never meant to have.
‘It’s too late,’ I said. ‘You did your best for him. You were the father he never had. You were everything. He became a monster, but you, Avarice, I judge you worthy.’
‘You putrid little shivat!’ Avarice ripped his sickle from his belt and swung. I tried to duck and lost my balance, slamming into Ire before hitting the muddy ground, breath knocked from my lungs.
‘I don’t want to be judged worthy.’ Avarice advanced on me, his sickle threateningly outstretched. ‘I want you to take your yapping kashak and get out of my face. Master Darius doesn’t want to see you or anyone, so kill us all or go away.’
‘I will not hurt a man I have deemed worthy,’ I said, struggling to my feet. ‘Nor those I have not judged.’
‘Then go away before I cut off your balls.’
A slow clap cut through the morning and I stretched my Empathy beyond the cluster of Vices clogging my Sight. Vengeance was there, his aura hot with amusement. ‘That was entertaining,’ Katashi said, bringing his large hands together in a slow clap. ‘My guess is that Hope wants to die, Pride smothered his own mother, and Ire wants to kill you all. But who was the priest?’
No one answered.
‘Don’t want to play?’ Katashi mocked the silent Vices. ‘I’ll go first. I’m the one who watched The Usurper execute his father.’
He pushed Avarice aside. ‘How’s your arm, freak?’ He gestured to the place his arrow had hit, no contrition in his soul.
‘It’s much better,’ I said. ‘But it hurts when I’m careless.’
Katashi tapped Hatsukoi’s tip. ‘Give me a good reason why I shouldn’t try again and aim a little left?’
‘Because I don’t want your throne.’
‘No?’ He gripped my chin in his hot hand.
Hana is mine. Kisia is mine. He cannot have her. He cannot take her away as he took my father. In the echo of memory a crowd chanted, baying for blood. Kin stood on the platform, not an emperor but a general adorned in the same crimson, his expression stern and sol
emn. Protector of the throne, they called him, saviour of Kisia. I tried to push through the crowd, but a hand gripped my shoulder and I turned to find a lidless eye staring at me. ‘It’s too late, young lord,’ Shin said. ‘If you go up there they’ll kill you too.’
‘But they can’t!’ I screamed. ‘He didn’t do it!’
‘Patience is the greatest virtue of vengeance,’ the man growled.
I hit the ground. The smell of mud cut into the lingering memory. ‘Patience?’ I cried. ‘You’re going to stand there and let them execute him?’
Shin bent down, gripping my chin as Katashi had. ‘There is nothing I can do,’ he hissed. ‘I have already done too much.’
Sunlight stabbed into my eyes. Katashi had not moved, but frowned at his hand. ‘What did you just do, freak?’
‘Your memory,’ I said, throat dry. ‘I saw the day your father was executed.’
‘That’s impossible.’ A deep furrow cut his brow. ‘I wasn’t there.’ Katashi blurred as I blinked away tears, the tears of a boy who had watched the world change. But it hadn’t been me, no matter how real, no matter how much my wrist had been bruised by Shin’s iron grip while around us the crowd moved like an animal. It couldn’t have been me. The day Emperor Tianto died I was already with Jian, curled up on soft furs in the back of his wagon.
‘You’re all a bunch of freaks,’ Katashi said, turning on Avarice. ‘You say Darius doesn’t want to see him? Then take him down there. Give him his audience with the great Lord Laroth.’
‘I don’t take my orders from you.’
‘No, but there are plenty here who do. You’re vastly outnumbered in this camp, Vice, so if you want to live to do your master’s bidding, then you will do this now. I think he would rather receive visitors from you than me, don’t you?’
Avarice snapped his jaw like an irritated dog, but hooked his sickle back onto his belt.
‘Get up,’ he said. ‘You can have five minutes and no more.’
*****
It was Avarice who tied my wrists and walked beside me through the camp, through the pressing crush of whispers and the cries of ‘freak’ and ‘get that kasu out of here’ that filled the air.
Katashi led the way, flanked by Pikes, while an honour guard of Vices kept the masses at bay.
He’s the bastard Otako.
That one.
This isn’t good.
We should kill him before he kills us.
Malice’s wagon appeared from the crowd like the prow of a ship. I could not feel him nearby, but Darius filled my future as he filled my thoughts. And still his judgement was death. Always death.
But Kimiko carried his child. I could save him. I could bring him back.
Katashi shouldered the door open without knocking and swept a hate-filled bow. ‘Master,’ he said. ‘I bring you a visitor.’ We were swept forward as though on a tide, but Avarice gripped my arm and I jolted to a halt.
There was Darius. Right there upon the divan. A book lay open on his knees, held by a silk-encased stump that had once owned a hand. Papers, scrolls and maps covered the small table along with an Errant board and a still steaming pot of tea. He looked so much like the Darius I had come to love at Esvar that my words choked in my throat.
Those fine brows rose slowly. ‘Endymion,’ he said, his gaze shifting quickly from Avarice to Katashi. ‘To what do I owe this unexpected visit?’
‘Your dear brother asked, nay demanded speech with you,’ Katashi said. ‘And I had not the heart to refuse such a desperate plea. Why don’t you let him go, Avarice, let them sit side by side and be all brotherly.’
Avarice tightened his grip on my upper arm.
He’s too dangerous.
Petty payback for your precious Hana? You know I am not so stupid.
Go on, Master, let the freaky little kasu touch you.
Darius closed the book slowly. War journal. Siege. Food for sixty-five days. They had catapulted plague ridden bodies over the walls and sat back to wait.
Too slow.
Kisia would burn.
‘Well?’ Darius said. ‘What is it that’s so important, brother?’
Kimiko is carrying your child.
The words would not come.
Last night the scout had burned and burned, his screams echoing through my soul. And the joy. Fierce, unfettered joy at the control, and the freedom. Darius had killed too often. Destroyed too often. Controlled. Conspired. Consumed. It was death he deserved, not life. Not a child.
What had happened to the good man?
‘You are running out of time, Endymion,’ he said, so calm, so sure, so mocking. He laughed at Katashi with his eyes and waited.
I’m the only one who can save him. I’m the only one who can save him. I can tell him the truth. The child. His child. A future worth fighting for.
A future he doesn’t deserve.
What is the kasu waiting for? He’s just standing there.
I need to get him out of here. Order him out, Master.
I know you can hear me, Endymion. Or should I call you Justice now? I see you didn’t heed my lessons.
Kimiko. Child. Death.
‘Last chance, Endymion.’
Katashi spat. ‘Pathetic. Get that runt out of here. Throw him in the Fen with that traitor.’
‘No!’ The word burst from my lips as Avarice yanked me backwards. ‘No! I can save him! Stop!’
‘I don’t need saving, little brother,’ Darius said as I was pulled out the door. ‘I’m already free.’
‘Your judgement is death!’
Sunlight stabbed into my eyes as I stumbled backward down the stairs, dragged by Avarice’s relentless grip. Then Katashi was in front of me, so close all I could see was his face outlined in bright light. ‘Next time I see you, Lord Takehiko, I will kill you. Get him out of my sight.’
‘No! Take me back! I can save him!’
Avarice’s stony grip bruised my arm as he pulled me away, the camp a blur.
‘Please! Take me back!’
‘Be quiet.’
‘Take me back. Take me back.’
Avarice stopped abruptly. We were at the edge of the Fen. Swampy water oozed at our feet, but it was not that I could smell, not that I could feel. Malice. He lurked at the edge of my mind, his presence drawing out old memories – old fears.
My mind darted, snatching at the day. Sunlight. Beads of water hanging from an overhead branch. Whispers. They gathered like a susurrus, each individual thought near impossible to discern. Four thousand, five hundred and eighty seven.
I had to get back to Darius.
I gathered anger – from the Vices, from the fading storm and the Fen, from the empire itself, trapped in a war it could not escape – and the raw emotion came to my hands begging to be used.
‘You’re a fool, Endymion.’ Malice’s voice came before his body, a body clad in flowing dark blue silk. He was wet from the storm, but as precise as ever. Every line etched upon his face held its own mockery. ‘You can’t save a man who does not need to be saved.’
The anger burned as I forced it out through my skin. Thrown to the air, it crackled like summer lightning as it spread through the gathered Vices.
Avarice’s grip on my arm slackened. Ire buckled. Others dropped with wet thuds. Except Malice. He remained standing, weathering the blow with a grimace.
‘You need to work on your control, brother,’ he said. ‘Anger won’t harm the trees, yes?’
Fatigue weighed down every limb, dragging me to the ground. ‘Darius is not the man you think he is,’ I said, propping myself up with hands splayed in mud. ‘He never has been.’
‘Don’t try your tricks on me, yes? No one understands him like I do.’
‘She understood me,’ Darius had said. ‘She knew me. Better even than Malice.’ Kimiko
might not remember his words, but they lived on in me.
‘We all need saving,’ I said. ‘You need to let him go.’
Malice snarled. ‘No. He’s mine.’
‘Then you are the reason he will die! His judgement is death, Malice. Death for what he is and what he has done and it’s your fault.’
‘What screwed up sort of justice do you have in that munted head of yours?’ he said. ‘Darius made me. Darius taught me everything I know. He made the first Vice. He started this. He was the mastermind behind every plan for the empire.’ Malice’s free hand clenched and unclenched, but he did not close the space between us.
‘You love him,’ I said.
‘Is that a question?’
‘No. It’s the truth. But you need to let him go or his judgement will not change. You can save him. You can walk away.’
Malice crouched, his dark eyes boring into mine. ‘Walk away?’ he repeated. ‘I have spent five years working to get him back. Darius is mine!’
‘The man you love is a lie.’
Around us the souls of unconscious Vices began to reignite.
‘You can save him,’ I said, desperation spurring a tumble of words. ‘You can give him something to fight for. There’s a child. Tell him he has a child.’
‘A child.’ Malice’s voice was devoid of emotion though he had many. Disbelief, anger, jealousy, hatred. But he was my last chance. Darius needed to know.
‘Touch me,’ I said. ‘Take the memory to him. You can save him.’
Malice held out his hand. The connection was instant, sucking thoughts and memories from my mind. Kimiko. The fear upon her face. The beat of new life in her belly. Justice. Two hundred and twenty nine judgements.
Kin.
Malice pulled his hand away. He sucked in a breath, and a short bark of laughter broke from his lips. ‘It was Kin? Kin who gave the order to assassinate Emperor Lan and his family?’ Another laugh. ‘And Grace Tianto took the fall, yes? Oh how Darius will like that story.’
‘No. Don’t tell him that,’ I said. ‘Kin did it for the best. He had good reasons. Tell him about the child!’