THe Grave at Storm's End

by Devin Madson

  I threw myself at Father Kokoro and he overbalanced, flapping white silk wings. Endymion crumpled beneath us and we fell in a tangle, the tip of Kokoro’s blade scratching my cheek.

  ‘You’re supposed to be locked up,’ he said, leaping to his feet.

  ‘Planning to kill me when I couldn’t fight back and couldn’t run?’ I said, righting myself less nimbly. ‘And you said my father was a coward.’

  Without turning my head, I could just make out the small form of Kimiko in the side of my vision. Avarice, too, a larger bulk to the other side, the whole room lit by ghostly grey light.

  ‘Damn you, Darius,’ Kimiko said. ‘You weren’t supposed to follow me.’

  I did not turn, just kept my eyes on Kokoro. ‘Damn me all you like,’ I said. ‘I told you that I’m the one who deserves your anger, no one else.’

  ‘How chivalrous,’ Kokoro said, no sign of the foolish court priest left in his face. He spun to threaten Avarice as the Vice moved into the priest’s field of vision. ‘Ah, one of your slaves. This one is called Avarice, I believe. Why is that? Why name your freaks after undesirable traits?’

  ‘Because we have a sense of humour,’ I said. ‘Do you really think you can kill us all? Is that why you’re here? To end the Sight because I refused to do it for you?’

  ‘You are unnatural, Laroth,’ he said, keeping his blade levelled at Avarice. ‘Unnatural and uncontrolled and drunk on power.’

  ‘Your precious gods made me what I am,’ I said, the presence of Avarice as calming as it had always been. ‘Think on that before you destroy their handiwork.’

  Kokoro spat at me, his saliva catching the edge of my jaw. ‘The gods no more made you than they gave this empire to the Otakos. The Otakos conquered Kisia by force, and you, Your Excellency, are a freak of nature.’

  ‘So is the perfect diamond, yes?’

  ‘You can kill the others, Kokoro, but Darius is mine.’

  Malice and Kimiko, distinguished by their voices. I didn’t need to be able to see them to know they were watching Kokoro. Kokoro seemed to sense it too and licked nervous lips.

  Avarice took a step toward him and the priest slashed wildly in his direction, a manic grin showing too many teeth. ‘You’re a big man, Avarice,’ he said, still slashing the air. ‘Go on, you can take an old priest.’

  Kokoro lunged with the next slash, catching Avarice’s arm. His skin mottled in immediate response, hardening its crust. Stoned up, his movements were slow, but I had seen that fist crush a horse’s skull, shattering bone. Now it flew for Kokoro’s face. Stone skin, both shield and weapon embedded in flesh, but the priest darted out of the way faster than I had ever seen him move. He ducked under Avarice’s arm and struck, snakelike, ramming his dagger straight into the Vice’s eye.

  Blood spurted from the socket. It dribbled down the hardened skin of Avarice’s cheek toward grey, mottled lips. I could not breathe, could not move, my mind numb and stupid. The man who’d been more father than servant fell back. No scream, nothing but a sucking silence as the blade pulled free of his skull and he hit the floor heavier than flesh.

  Kokoro’s laugh broke the silence. ‘You were right, Laroth,’ he said. ‘You all have weaknesses. He sure did.’ He indicated the dead Avarice, his skin slowly warming back to flesh but not to life. ‘Our eyes are the windows to our souls, did you know that, Your Excellency? That is written in the Book of Qi.’

  I returned his stare, not daring to look again at Iwa lest the knot in my gut choke all strength from me.

  ‘No bodyguard now,’ he went on, his manic grin the centre of all attention. For the first time I caught a picture of the room. Two dead guards, Endymion bleeding in the corner, and the slim figure of Hope standing between Malice and Kimiko like a fragile screen.

  ‘What is your weakness, Laroth?’ Kokoro asked. ‘Or rather, who is your weakness? Kisia’s bastard prince? How about your brother?’

  I did not flinch or twitch or grimace, but kept my expression in the dead lines of the Monstrous Laroth. I needed him now.

  ‘No, but of course, it’s your lover. She has your child.’

  ‘So could any other woman I chose to bestow that honour upon,’ I said. ‘Lady Kimiko has refused my offer of marriage, and there, I think it is safe to say, is an end to it.’

  It was Malice who laughed now. Malice, his hair caught in filthy clumps, his robe stained with sick and piss. Malice the brother I loved and pitied and hated in equal measure.

  In blood-splattered silk, Father Kokoro advanced. ‘Your father’s weakness was pride.’

  ‘He died in a puddle of his own filth.’

  ‘Fitting.’

  Another step and I backed into Avarice’s foot, my heel hitting his sandal. Only peasants walk around without sandals, Master Darius. It’s a long way to Chiltae and the roads are rocky.

  So many memories came unbidden. The smell of the oil he had used on the saddles; the dry grass in the high field; sweat mixed with the foreign spices he chewed while he worked.

  There had been so much left to say.

  ‘Father Kokoro, that is enough.’ It was the tone of someone used to being obeyed, but the priest did not even look at Kimiko. ‘Stand down.’

  He advanced, eyes blazing with righteous fury. I was sure I held him by a thread, that the moment I looked away or even blinked he would lunge forward like a snake and stick me like he had stuck Iwa, through the eye or the throat or the heart. Malice had done that once. The blade had slid between my ribs but had found no beating organ.

  ‘Did you know?’ I said, still looking at Father Kokoro though my question was not for him. ‘Did you know my heart was on the wrong side?’

  ‘What?’ Malice said, his voice proving he still existed.

  ‘Did you know?’

  There was a beat of silence, but I could not look at him, only at the hatred in Kokoro’s eyes. Then: ‘Of course I knew. I cannot live without you, yes?’

  I hardly knew whether to be relieved or angry.

  ‘Kokoro?’ Endymion’s voice came from the corner, but he paid the boy as little heed as he had Kimiko.

  Another step.

  ‘Kokoro?’ A flash of midnight blue moved behind him now. ‘If you judge them this way, you’re no better than Endymion,’ the boy said, the voice hardly his own.

  ‘I am a man of the gods, Jian,’ Kokoro said without turning. ‘It is my job to see their mandate carried out here as it is in the heavens.’

  I stepped back. And hit the wall.

  ‘Brother?’

  Father Kokoro smiled. ‘Jian?’

  ‘I forgive you.’

  Kokoro frowned then, half turned, and I gripped his hand as it swung up. I pushed everything through, emptying myself of all pain for one blissful moment. Shock froze him, and Hope clamped one hand over the old man’s mouth, smothering a cry.

  ‘Pious shivats like you are the reason there are freaks like us,’ Hope said, and jammed the tip of a blade into the side of Kokoro’s neck. I let go, ducking as Hope ripped the knife out. Blood gushed down Kokoro’s white silk robe like the bile he spewed.

  Another dead body was added to the floor.

  The room had changed. Endymion had collapsed in the middle of the floor, Hope with him, his nimble fingers tearing cloth off Kokoro’s robe to bind Endymion’s shoulder. There the last patch of sanity in the room, there the last true empathy. But without Hope to stand between them, Kimiko and Malice were eyeing each other like beasts ready to spring.

  ‘I am going to slice that rat out of you,’ Malice snarled. ‘Then I’ll send your head to Katashi. That’s what I ought to have done when I marked you, while you were begging.’

  ‘You think I care what you do to me?’ Kimiko returned. ‘I’m dead anyway.’

  Malice circled around her, eyes for no one else. ‘If it’s a boy you live. That’s not a
gamble I’m willing to take, yes?’

  ‘It’s a girl.’

  The words came from the middle of the floor, from the pale form of Endymion, dry lips parted as the echo of his words rippled through the room. Malice turned. ‘What did you say?’

  ‘It’s a girl.’

  Kimiko kept her blade levelled at Malice. ‘I told you,’ she said. ‘I’m already dead.’ She looked at me then, eyes gleaming with angry tears. ‘I’m already dead.’

  ‘You don’t need to do this,’ I said. ‘I won’t let you die.’

  ‘And what can you do to stop it?’ she cried, leaping back as Malice slashed at her abdomen.’

  ‘He can’t do anything.’ There was madness in Malice’s laughter. ‘Killing you now is merely for the satisfaction of seeing you bleed.’

  ‘I will not abandon you,’ I said, stepping slowly toward them. ‘I am not Katashi. I love you, Kimiko.’

  ‘Damn you, Darius, don’t you dare say that now.’

  ‘Marry me.’

  ‘Shut up!’ she said. ‘Don’t you understand? I am going to die giving birth to a child that will never live.’

  Kimiko advanced on Malice, her grace degraded by anger as she hacked at him again and again. He laughed and stepped back, lifting his sword to lazily deflect her swings. ‘I guess no one bothers to teach whores how to fight, yes? Just how to spread their legs and moan. Or how to play the poor little princess until they get what they want.’

  Her attacks seemed to get wilder, but every strike was even. Deliberate. I had felt her anger, felt her iron resolve and I could see it now in every calculated step.

  But Malice did not. Neither did he see the dagger. Or the change in her stance.

  Grounding both feet, Kimiko darted around his guard.

  ‘No!’

  The sword slid into Malice’s shoulder. His went for her throat. Sadness swelled. Ethereal, Kimiko moved through the steel, through death, with a dagger aimed for Malice’s heart.

  I slammed into Malice’s injured shoulder. He tripped. Fell. A pained cry. Kimiko was before me, anger gritting her teeth.

  A numb tingle spread through my stomach. Shock broke her sadness and the tingle turned to pain. It burst through my gut, stealing my breath, my words, my thoughts. I looked down. Her sleeve protruded from my robe, my silk giving way to her dark linen. Blood ran down my leg.

  I tried to speak, but there were no words. I tried to move, but there was only pain. Night teased the edges of my vision. A night laced with screams.

  Chapter 36

  Katashi filled the charred doorway as he filled my past, my present, and my future. Arrows flew for his eyes, his throat, his chest, but it was Pikes who fell, their bodies thrown aside as more swarmed into the hall. Our archers backed up the stairs, but no matter how many arrows fell into the mass, Pikes kept coming.

  Flickers of flame followed Katashi through the chaos, but I was a rock in the storm, every Pike avoiding me with blade and arrow and fist. I belonged to their leader and so they would not touch me, his protection surrounding me like a bubble. I ought to have been glad, but I felt only anger.

  The head of a mace swung all too close, crushing a guard’s skull. Blood. Brains. Shards of bone. A Pike leered at me as the dead man fell. Darc. The name came to me with memories of night raids and the stink of the Fen. He was turning away when I lunged. Another Pike stepped in, deflecting my strike, but he didn’t turn his own on me and died for it. The full length of my blade slid into his flesh, into sinew and organs, spilling blood as I yanked it back out.

  Darc was gone. Another Pike whirled past. I went for his throat, but he was quick and brought his blade around. His eyes met mine, widened, his arm jolted and he yanked his thrust off course letting it glance off my leather sleeve, slicing gold fasteners. They scattered, flashing as fire flared.

  ‘Pull back!’

  Ryoji’s voice cut through the noise. He was somewhere nearby, but I couldn’t see him for the press of struggling men. ‘Pull back to the second round!’

  I caught sight of Katashi as I mounted the stairs. No fire now, just a sword in his hand, its blade melting through flesh and sending blood splattering onto already red skin. So much simpler to flame us all, but like the Pikes he would not risk my life. In a way I was everyone’s protection.

  A Pike rushed toward me up the stairs and was thrown back, the fletching of an arrow in his forehead like a third eye. Darc was there again, pushing past as his comrade fell. Captain Terran dodged the first swing of his bloodied mace by a hair and would have caught it on the return swing had I not jabbed the tip of my blade through Darc’s side, loving the moment of resistance as it cut through the thick leather, through skin, glancing bones and curving into flesh. He howled, turning into the blade as I ripped it out through his stomach.

  ‘Pull back!’

  ‘Go, my lady, quickly,’ Captain Terran yelled, holding off another rebel as I pulled my sword free.

  Someone shunted me in the back as another mace came out of nowhere. It clanged upon the metal stair rail. ‘Go!’

  I went, turning to sprint up the stairs, dodging the injured and the dead. General Ryoji stood at the cusp of the second round, bow in hand. He scowled as he let go the string, and behind me a scream was cut short. I turned in time to see a Pike thrown back over the railing.

  ‘Don’t ever turn your back in battle,’ the Captain snapped as he joined me. ‘What were you thinking?’

  ‘That Katashi will kill anyone who harms me.’

  ‘Small blessing.’

  The Pikes had not followed us, but stayed on the stairs and in the hall like they were frozen in place, chests heaving.

  ‘Hana!’ Katashi’s voice rose above every other.

  ‘Don’t listen to him,’ Ryoji said turning me to face the stairs to the third round. ‘Don’t answer.’

  ‘Hana!’ Katashi called again, his voice breaking upon the tense peace. ‘Are you ignoring me, Hana? Have you forgotten your cousin already? Forgotten that you love me?’

  Ryoji was close, a hand touched to my arm speaking the caution he didn’t allow his lips to utter.

  Silence filled the hall. Then: ‘Should I tell them all the truth?’ Katashi said, and I could imagine him standing there amid his men, amid the dead, his gigantic presence crowned by the black arm of Hatsukoi. ‘Should I tell everyone that we were lovers? That their Traitor Empress is a traitor in every way.’

  Eyes bored into me, accusing, judging. I had to force myself to hold Ryoji’s gaze, challenging him to speak. There was no answering smile, no reassurance, just a hard look that cut to the bone.

  ‘Haaa-naaa.’ Katashi sang this time.

  With a pounding heart I stared at the top clasp of Ryoji’s tunic. ‘Order the archers to fire,’ I said. ‘Now.’

  He moved away, and around me the soldiers continued to stare.

  ‘Oh Haaa-naaa.’

  My cheeks burned.

  ‘Yes, my beloved Katashi?’ he said in imitation of a female voice. ‘I’m here.’

  Laughter filled the entrance hall. Out of sight along the railing, seven archers were crawling into position. Arrows were pulled from quivers. Nocked to bows. And in another breath they leapt up and loosed, laughter turning to cries of pain.

  ‘Is that your answer?’ Katashi said, laughter still rasping in his throat. ‘Are you scared of me, Hana?’

  I stayed where I was, unable to see him, though everyone could see me. I clenched my fists and stood proud.

  The archers had crouched back down against the railing to nock again, only to leap up yowling as waves of heat haze rose above the ironwork.

  ‘Do you really want me to kill all the men you have left under your command?’ he said. ‘There are so few it seems such a shame.’

  The wooden lantern hanging over the landing burst into flames. It dropped, scatter
ing fire and screams.

  ‘You wanted to talk,’ Katashi shouted. ‘I know Kin still lives. Give him to me and we’ll talk.’

  Kin, buried behind a thick barricade. I could only pray it would be enough.

  ‘I think we’re past talking now, Katashi,’ I said as my soldiers kicked the flaming chunks of wood off the edge of the round and into the hall below.

  ‘Ah, there you are, Hana. Tell me, are you really going to marry the man who killed our family?’

  Every soldier stared. ‘That’s a lie,’ I said, fighting tears. ‘You are the murderer. How many men have you killed, Katashi? How much of Kisia will burn before you are sated?’

  ‘As much as I have to, cousin, to see the Crimson Throne restored. As many as I must to see the man who destroyed us suffer. What happened to the girl who said she would prise the crown from Kin’s dead fingers if she had to?’

  ‘She was wrong,’ I shouted back, staring at the air still wavering above the iron railing. ‘The answer’s “no” Katashi. And it isn’t going to change.’

  A chunk of smouldering wood hit the floor and skidded toward my feet, bright shards scattering. Another fell, raining embers and pieces of cloth, then the leg of a table and a chunk of lacquered door. Our soldiers ran, arms over their heads, and into the chaos came the Pikes, weapons flying.

  ‘You can’t hide forever, Hana!’ Katashi yelled above the noise, and for a moment I saw him at the top of the stairs, his bare chest red and blotched with burns. Never far away, Captain Terran pushed me toward the next flight of stairs. ‘Go!’ he said. ‘They won’t hold this landing. Go!’ He turned, catching a blade upon his with a terrible scraping. Caught there, he kicked the man in the chest and brought his sword down into the neck of another Pike, every one of their faces all too familiar. These had once been my men.

  ‘Pull back!’ General Ryoji shouted over the grunts and scrapes and broken cries of battle. ‘Pull back to the third round!’

  We were running out to space and running out of men.

  ‘Pull back!’

  I ran with the rest, leaving our dead and our wounded. The Pikes followed hard on our heels, the stairway all chaos and blood. Captain Terran pushed me on, his bloodstained hand in the small of my back shoving me toward the next landing.