Stormlord rising s-2

by Glenda Larke

  "Everyone of us is here because our mothers pushed us out into the world. You'll survive this. You'll even do it again one day in all probability."

  "Pedeshit! Never!" she cried as the next crushing wave came to submerge her.

  When that one was over, and her head collapsed back onto the sacking, the same woman-what was her name again?-said with added satisfaction, "The next push will do it, I think. The baby's head is ready to pop into the world, poor wee mite."

  Sunlord damn it, she just wanted this over. Anina, that was her name. And the other woman was Maida. Ryka concentrated on feeling grateful that not only had the only people at the cistern been slaves from Qanatend, but that two of them were women who had delivered babies before. She hadn't quite understood why they were there and the Reduners not, but they were part of the Reduner army. Davim and his forces were ahead of her, invading the Scarpen. And they had dragged slaves along in their wake, then left them behind at the cistern. Camp followers, Anina had called them. Something about being there if needed. As whores. Or to nurse the wounded. Or something. Ryka tried to feel grateful, and she was, truly grateful. But right then it was hard to think of anything except how she would survive the next surge.

  When it came to consume her, she cried out-in real pain this time-and then was lost in a torment-lacerated world where the war didn't exist. A boy, one of the women said. Ryka was too tired to care, let alone be glad. He lay curled in the crook of her arm. Red and squashed-looking, and not really much like a person. More like a kitten without fur. And tiny, although she supposed he was larger than a kitten. He'd certainly felt larger than a kitten.

  Am I supposed to love him? she wondered. Watergiver help me, I wish I had paid more attention to-to all that domestic stuff. It had always seemed so boring in comparison to her books, or to a ride into The Sweeping, or talking to the outlanders in the foreigners' market.

  Her lack of attention had caught up with her. Taking a closer look at his crumpled face, unexpectedly she found herself smiling.

  She was stroking her son's tiny cheek with a finger when she heard a sound she could not identify. Loud, rushing, frightening. She had heard it before, somewhere. Here, it felt out of place. What was that? She wanted to jump to her feet, to run out of the cistern cave where they lay, but everything hurt when she tried to move too much.

  Beside her Anina sat up, her eyes wide in the lantern light. The noise outside was louder, more invasive. Growling its way down the wash in the dark like a runaway meddle of pedes. Or a hillside on the move. Or-

  "What is it?" the woman asked, her fear a tangible thing, reaching out for comfort.

  Ryka felt a fleeting amusement. She was as weak as a day-old pede wobbling after its mother, and the woman was coming to her for assurance?

  "Water," she said, lying back down and holding her son against her body. She could feel it in her mind now; water on the move, tumbling, bucking, churning. "Water on its way down the wash."

  "How do you know that?"

  "I've heard it before. In the Gibber. I hope there's no one out there."

  The woman shook her head. "No. None of us, anyway. We were all asleep here in the cavern. But why would there be water in the wash?" She shook a puzzled head. "The Cloudmaster never sends water this way. Qanatend rain falls in the valley behind the cistern, much higher in the mountains. The water seeps down into caves. The cistern intake pipe taps it there. I know that because we've all been looking for a way to escape the valley without those red bastards seeing us. Haven't had any luck because the caves don't go anywhere. I doubt there's been water in this wash since, oh, since the Time of Random Rain."

  Ryka forced her mind to think. "Perhaps the stormlord has just drowned a lot of Reduners."

  They stared at each other, thinking about the implications. Outside, dawn was beginning to tinge the sky and simultaneously they turned to look. Nothing visible moved, but there was no doubt that water was tumbling down the gully; to Ryka, the roar was unmistakable.

  When Anina spoke again she said softly, "Garnet, I think we had better get a hiding place ready for you and the babe, just in case. Unless you want to give up on the idea of running away."

  "No, of course not. I just need time to rest."

  "I will fix a pallet for you behind the oil jars in the storeroom. If any Reduners return, you can hide there. You will have to keep the baby quiet, though."

  "Storeroom?"

  "Not a room exactly. It's just another cave off this cavern. A small one, over there." She pointed. "You'd be less obvious in there, and the Reduners never fetch and carry the stores. They leave that to us."

  Ryka was overwhelmed with a surge of fierce protectiveness, laced with intense rage. No one must hurt her child. She would not allow it. Shaken by the rawness of her response, she tried to joke. "Maybe it's just as well he sounds like a mewling pebblemouse. No one would think it a baby's cry. I'll be gone as soon as I can, though."

  "Where?" the woman asked. She pushed a lock of hair behind one ear. She was forty years old and still beautiful, except for the bruised look in her eyes that spoke of recent tragedy endured and survived-and still raw. "Don't you think we'd all be gone from here if we could? But the sandmaster's army is up there somewhere in the gully, and below us there are only more of the bastards in Qanatend. You can't leave the gully, you know. The Warthago is too rugged."

  "I have the pedes. In fact I could take some of you. Oh-the pedes! The Reduners mustn't find them. Can they be hidden?"

  "Where? If the Reduners return, they'll be crawling all over the place. I'll just say they belonged to a Reduner who left them behind because they were too small. If that doesn't make sense to them, we can all plead ignorance. Slaves aren't expected to know stuff. And if they think they belong to someone, no one will touch them." She brought the lamp close to look at the sleeping child. "Have you thought of a name for him yet?" she asked.

  "Khedrim," Ryka said.

  Anina stared at her in surprise. "That's a Reduner name!"

  "Yes. He-he is named after a lad who died."

  A child who was sent after me by those who thought I was just a pregnant woman who would never fight back. "I botched the timing," Jasper admitted to Terelle after he returned to camp to do the day's stormshifting. "I guess I did a good job of throwing water, though."

  His tone was flat, but she knew the depth of his self-inflicted pain. It was there in a tightening around his eyes, in a remoteness in his gaze and a drop in the register of his voice. Most people might not have noticed his moods, but she read him as well as she could read her waterpaintings.

  "It was your first battle," she said cautiously.

  He cut her short. "It was the first battle for many of us. But I am the stormlord and the only thing that passes for Cloudmaster, thanks to you. I am not supposed to sit dumbly on a pede like a block of salt and do nothing except chuck water at the enemy."

  "No. You're right," she told him with rising ire. "You are a stormlord. The stormlord. You are supposed to stormshift and sit in Breccia City governing the water matters of this land. You aren't supposed to rush about waving a scimitar, especially when you don't really know much about using it. If you do more good throwing water about, then that is exactly what you ought to do. I am sure it is safer. You are too important to risk your life. Dibble was quite right not to allow your pede into the heart of the fighting."

  "That's such-such a girl thing to say. You don't understand."

  They glared at each other.

  "To most people in the Quartern," he said at last, "I'm too young to rule. To them, I'm not another Granthon. I don't have the validity of Nealrith, either, even when they considered him weak. They might not have liked Taquar, but they respected him. Me-I'm too young. A Gibber urchin at that. I have to prove myself worthy. Otherwise, how can I rule? And today I made a mistake of timing. I saved a few lives chucking water about, it's true, but my mistake cost more lives."

  "And rulers prove themselves worthy by acting like
idiots with a sword?" she asked, throwing her hands up in exasperation. "Such a boy thing to do. Anyway, it is Iani and Feroze who are supposed to be in charge of the fighting. And have you also considered how many people you saved with our deception that killed so many ziggers? I don't understand why you want to fight, or rule, for that matter. Your value is in your stormbringing abilities. Why not let someone else govern?"

  He stared at her, amazed. "You don't understand, do you? Yet you just said it yourself-I am a valuable commodity. Don't you see, Terelle? Whoever rules would also gain control of me, and of my power-by law. I've endured years of not being my own person. I didn't like it. I'd rather do the controlling myself."

  "What about if someone like… oh, Iani, for example, ruled?"

  "Wash-stones, Terelle, he's half-mad. He used to be obsessed with Lyneth. Then Taquar. Now it's Davim. To get revenge for Moiqa's death."

  "Well, one of the others, then."

  "They are all playing their own politics. If Nealrith were alive…" He sighed. "Yes, I would have served him, gladly. Or Lord Ryka. Because they were wise and they had a way of seeing all the facets of something. Yet others thought Nealrith weak and Ryka headstrong, so maybe I'm not much of a judge of people."

  "Never mind." She grinned at him. "I am. And I would follow you anywhere if that's what you wanted."

  Her grin was so infectious he couldn't help laughing. "You must be biased. I use your skills to cover my weaknesses, and hide your talents from everyone while I take the credit, and you can still say that?"

  "Sun-fried idiot." She said it fondly enough for him to have no doubt of her affection.

  "No. The wisest thing I ever did was-" He stopped short, flushing.

  She felt sure he had been going to say, "to love you." Oh, Shale, can't you just say it?

  He looked so tired, so dejected, she changed the subject. "What happens now? About Davim, I mean."

  "We think he will have hunkered down at the cistern. He knows he can't get past us without losing a lot of men, so he'll wait for us to go to him. Of course, he could head for the Red Quarter too, but we all think his pride won't allow that. If he looks weak, more Reduners will join Vara Redmane's rebellion."

  "Are you sure there is no other way through the Warthago? They found a route before-could they do it again somewhere else?"

  "I'm here this time. If they do that, I will know."

  "By sensing their water?"

  He nodded. "Luckily Iani knows this track to Qanatend better than anyone. He agrees Davim means to make a stand at the cistern. He will have all the water he needs there, and although we will be attacking from above, which has got to be an advantage, he will have his back to the cliffs behind the cistern. No one can come in from behind, or the sides."

  "Could he ambush you on the way to the cistern?"

  He grinned at her. "Not a chance."

  "Oh. Rainlord power again. I keep forgetting. Where are our forces now?"

  "Down where Davim's were. I just came back here to see if you had done a waterpainting for today's stormbringing. And to tell you-and the rest of the camp here-to move down the wash after us." He raised his eyes to meet hers. "I need you, Terelle."

  She knew he wasn't referring to her help with his stormbringing. He meant he needed her to fight. After the day's cloudbreaking, Jasper sought out a group of the wounded who had earlier been brought up the wash to the flatter land at the top of Pebblebag Pass. I may not know what orders to give, he thought, but at least I can show I care.

  To his surprise, one of the wounded greeted him with effusive thanks. "You saved m'life!" he exclaimed. The Gibberman turned to others lying beside him. "Look!" he said, holding up his roughly bandaged arm. "There I was with a witherin' useless arm, 'n' m'scimitar dropped, with this hulkin' Reduner fellow about t'spear me through, and all of a sudden he gets squirted in the mouth with a stream of water. He chokes, can't see an inch in front of his arse-red nose, and is scared witless as well. So all of a sudden I had time t'get me bab blade outta my boot and slide it 'tween his ribs 'stead of him gutting me! M'lord, that was a sight I'll remember the rest of me life!"

  Jasper smiled at him, and wondered if that was really what a battle was all about. Saving the life of the men around you, by doing the best you could. Throwing water about might not be the stuff of heroic stories to be told around a campfire, but it meant everything to that man.

  He had done something after all. He walked away, his shoulders straighter. Without thinking, he headed to where Terelle was painting, his renewed sense of hope prompting him to seek her out. Halfway there, he stopped. How could he give her hope-or himself hope-when there was none? Not for them. She had to leave to rejoin Russet. He had to marry the right person to produce a new generation of stormlords.

  I have no right to seek her out when I can offer her nothing.

  Struggling against his desires, he went to join Senya and Laisa for a meal. He sat there, hating himself for the hypocrisy of his polite conversation, for the false smiles he bestowed on Senya, for the empty lies of their every interaction. And when later he saw Terelle pass by, glance at them and then turn away, he grieved. When they rode further down the wash after the Reduners, they found the bodies of the men who had disobeyed the signal to retreat. They had been beheaded and disemboweled, left to bloat in the sun. The heads were missing. Insects crawled on the coagulated blood of their necks. Most of them wore the garb of Gibber folk.

  Jasper swallowed back his vomit and gave the order for two of the rainlord priests from Breakaway to stay behind and extract their water in homage. He wanted to stop his imagination, halt his memories, but instead he heard the echo of laughter, the bravado of young men before battle pretending they were immune from death. They had been giggling, by all that was waterholy. Perhaps these were the very same men. Perhaps not. Either way, his decisions had brought them to this moment.

  He rode on, staring straight ahead.

  They camped that night at the lower of the two Reduner camps and the next day most of them rode on to camp within sight of the Qanatend mother cistern. In the evening, they found out what had happened to the missing heads. They were being used as balls in an impromptu game of chala played in front of the cavern that held the water cisterns.

  Jasper, lying concealed with Iani, saw the beginning of the game. As soon as he realized what they were using for a ball, he rolled over onto his back and looked at the sky instead. Did Davim organize the game to remind him of Citrine? Probably.

  Sandblast the sick bastard.

  Faintly he heard the laughter of the players, wafted to their ears on an updraught. Warriors who can laugh at what they do. To teach me a lesson. Oh, pedeshit, what sort of men are they?

  And then, just when he felt there was nothing worse that could be done to him, he felt it. The familiarity of water he recognized.

  Mica. Mica was one of the players.

  And his world fell apart yet again. "Men are dying, Terelle. Ziggers. We have to do something, and soon." Which was why Jasper had brought her here to look, of course.

  It was her first glimpse of the cistern. She was lying on a slope, just below the ridge. She'd cautiously raised her head over the rise to peek down at the scene below. From where she lay, the ground sloped steeply downward in a tumble of gray scree. The thousands of loose stones were inert enough now, but the whole slope looked unstable enough to slide down to the flatter land in front of the cistern if a single pebble was disturbed by as much as the scampering of a mouse, although Jasper assured her it wasn't as precarious as it looked.

  She and Jasper were on the right arm of the crescent-shaped slope. The left arm was a steep cliff cradling the mother cistern of Qanatend. Terelle could see the entrance, far below. The grille had been smashed, and pedes and people-small enough to be unrecognizable-came and went through the cavernous gap, carrying dayjars and water skins for refilling.

  The large flat clearing in front of the cavern filled the valley from one side to the other.
Split by the gully of the wash, which also cut back into the slope, the flat area was cupped inside the base of the crescent. Right then it was cluttered with scarlet awnings, pedes, cooking fires, a few tents-and armed tribesmen. The men wore their deep red robes, the hems to mid-calf, over trousers of red. She knew these same men had played a game of chala with the heads of the men they had killed, just two days earlier. Jasper hadn't told her that, but she had heard it nonetheless.

  She turned her attention to the drywash. Water still lurked in rocky crannies of the gully, where the curves of the valley sides offered partial shade. The rest of the flood had long vanished down the slope toward Qanatend. Downwash, the valley sides were not so steep, and many warriors were camped on the slopes as well. A glance was enough to see that it would be hard for warriors to climb up the wash unseen; Jasper's men could ambush them from both sides.

  The Reduners went about their daily business as if they did not know they were being watched, but their spears were never far away, their scimitars swung at their sides, their daggers remained thrust through their belts. A few guards stood around, apparently with nothing to do, but they spent their time looking upward. Terelle didn't need to be told that they were waiting for the first sign of a Scarpen charge.

  "Could a rainlord kill the Reduners from here, by taking their water?" she asked, as if it were an everyday thing to speak so casually about how to take the lives of men.

  Jasper shook his head. "Too far. And even then-it is the hardest of all water abilities. People don't want to die. They hang onto their water simply by the act of living. I'm told it's very exhausting to kill that way." After a moment, he added, "It might possibly be less tiring to do it my way, I suppose."

  "What's that?" she asked.

  "To hold water over their nose and mouth until they die. Or stuff it down their noses. I can shape water and I can push water. I can push it into a man's open mouth with such force he cannot close his mouth to stop it. Or I can push it against his eyes or into his ears. I've learned a thing or two in the past couple of days when we met some advance scouts. The trouble is, it takes concentration. I can only kill one man at a time, focusing everything I have on a single man, not wavering as I watch him die."