That first visit lasted a mere four days, and after Lanike brought her daughter back to Veldaren, Rachida was crestfallen, and began writing letters to the girl. Moira always wrote back, and Rachida would find herself looking to the skies each day, waiting for the next bird to arrive. For the first time in her short life, she actually felt like the maidens from her mother’s stories. Every night she would kneel by her bed and thank Karak, in her little girl voice, for bringing this wonderful creature to her.
It was a time of wonder, of beauty, of endless hope and dreams.
Now those dreams are gone, she thought.
Her parents were dead. Her sister was dead. Her brothers were dead. All of Erznia had been slaughtered, including Bracken Renson, the first man she had ever kissed, when she was thirteen. And for what?
For nothing. Because our bastard god demanded it.
Quester Billings, the so-called Crimson Sword of Riverrun, had told her of Erznia’s slaughter during their two-day jaunt from the Isles of Gold to Conch. For the rest of the journey, Rachida mourned while the galley rocked and creaked. She saw her mother’s face each time she closed her eyes; felt Vulfram’s strong arms around her when she wrapped herself in a blanket; heard Oris’s hearty laugh in the laughter of the soldiers drinking in the common room belowdecks. At times she felt close to tears and had to bite down on her lip or pinch the skin of her arm to hold them back. I will not, she told herself, vehemently shaking her head. Rachida Gemcroft did not cry, not since that first night Moira had been taken away so long ago.
Moira . . . that was the worst wound of all. Quester informed her that Moira had known of the death of her family since the first night of her servitude to Matthew Brennan. That she didn’t tell Rachida before her departure was a stinging betrayal. She knew she shouldn’t feel that way, but anger was a hard emotion to quell. Moira was still alive, if the blond sellsword was to be believed, and it was easier to cast blame on the living than weep for the dead.
You know who to blame . . . and it is not Moira.
She rolled over in her uncomfortable bed, staring at the dreary simplicity of her surroundings. This hovel had been her home for the last few weeks, and she loathed it. She wanted to move, was itching for action. She and the six hundred sellswords—her personal army—had been here for far too long already, slumbering among Ashhur’s naïve children while they collected provisions for the march ahead. Surprisingly, the citizens of Conch had welcomed them with open arms, offering anything Rachida and her men wanted. They were a tender, trusting people, regaling the newcomers with stories. These people laughed and sang, and gave them whiskey and wine and food for their bellies. Their constant prayers to Ashhur were bothersome to Rachida, and though she appreciated their hospitality, she found them far too credulous. She wanted to leave. But the late fall crops they promised to share had yet to be harvested, so for the last twenty-six days the sellswords had spent hours tending the fields, yanking corn, beets, rutabagas, carrots, and beans from the fertile soil. It was work unbefitting for men of their particular skills, and not a one of them was happy about it, but they all knew it was better to be unhappy now than starving to death on the road later.
A bird cawed, and Rachida sat up. Her blankets slipped off her, and she shivered in her smallclothes. The room was cold and dark, a breeze flowing in through the window she had forgotten to shutter before she’d collapsed drunk in her bed. She wrapped the blanket back around herself, stood up, and made her way to the window. Before she closed the shutters, she caught a glimpse of crimson fingers stretching across the darkened sky. Morning already. At least she had drunk enough corn whiskey to pass out for a few hours. Sleep had not come easily as of late.
An odd sensation came over her, like tiny pinpricks working up her spine, and she whirled around. In the far corner of the room, she spotted the outline of a figure sitting cross-legged on the ground. She squinted, trying to see it clearer, and then moved to open the shutters once more.
“No need for that,” said Quester’s somber voice. “It is only me.”
Rachida breathed out deeply, glancing to the edge of her bed, where the Twins rested against the wall. “Why are you here?” she asked. “Do you wish to lose your head?”
The brash young man laughed. It was a sad sound. “That would depend on which head you speak of. One of mine would gladly lose itself in you for a few hours.” He sighed, then slapped his knees as he stood up. “But alas, such a desire will never be granted, so I must settle for the next best thing.”
“Which is?”
“Watching you sleep, milady. You make the most pleasant of sounds.”
Rachida groaned inwardly. Quester had been oppressive in his advances during the entirety of their excursion. His eyes, and the eyes of nearly every other sellsword, were constantly affixed to her rump and bosom, despite her loose-fitting clothing. Even many of the western men, in their childlike exuberance, took to staring at her as she worked the fields with them. Not that this was unusual; Rachida had grown up dealing with the constant attention of men. It was something she could handle, even understand. Having one of them sneak into her room to watch her sleep, she could not.
“Get out,” she said. “Now.”
Instead of moving away, Quester took a step forward. Rachida inched toward the bed, tensing her muscles in case she needed to leap for the Twins.
“It’s all so strange, milady,” said Quester, his tone reflective and even a bit sad. “So much to do, yet they are willing to give up so much.” He looked up at her with pleading eyes, and Rachida could see red veins, hear the hint of a slur from too much drink. “I am drawn to beauty. I revel in it. I thought the red dyes I wore in my hair were beautiful, but they made me wash it out. It is . . . not . . . fair.”
Quester moved away from her, approaching the window. When he entered the faint light coming in from beneath the shutters, she caught sight of a glint of steel on his hip. Rachida leapt over her bed and snatched one of the Twins. The scabbard thudded on the hovel’s soft dirt floor as she whipped the blade around, anticipating his advance.
He didn’t look at her, didn’t seem to be paying any attention to her at all. He fell against the window, then yanked open the shutters and lifted his right hand. For a long time he simply stood there, staring at his fingers while gently swaying from side to side. She could see he was wearing his leather armor over his smallclothes.
“Quester,” Rachida said, moving toward the center of the room with her sword held out before her. “What is the matter with you? What are you looking at?”
“This hand has taken so many beautiful things from the world.” He turned to her, frowning. “I detest it.”
He laughed. It sounded out of place given his dejected expression.
“This world is full of treachery, you know,” the man said. Despite his obvious drunkenness, his voice was surprisingly steady, though deflated. “Do you remember that wreck of a ship we passed our first day on the water?”
She nodded, remembering it well. It had been a long, sleek ship, built for speed and painted black as night, half sunken just beneath a rocky precipice. Rachida had never seen its like before, and there were no discernable letters or sigils marking its cracked hull. She had suggested they investigate it, but Quester had told them not to bother. “Our destination is all that matters,” he’d said, “not some sunken oddity.”
“I lied to you,” the man continued. “I knew the ship. It was my masters who built it. It was crafted to appear lustrous and ominous, even though only the cheapest of materials went into its construction.”
“Why?” she asked, to keep him talking. So long as he was talking, he might not do something stupid.
“Because it was a ruse,” said Quester.
“Ruse? For who? You’re making no sense.”
“The ship was meant to be handsome, to inspire wonder and fear,” he said with a sigh. “And yet its sole purpose was to carry three large crates filled with weapons from Port Lancaster to the coast
of Paradise.”
“To what end?”
“I don’t know. Does it matter? I was never told the ship’s intention, but then again intention is such a strange beast. Does anyone truly know what anyone else intends? Beauty . . . beauty is tangible, it is visceral, yet it can hide so much. That ship was beautiful, but that beauty was a lie.”
Rachida let the tip of her sword drop to the ground. “What does any of this mean? What does it have to do with you sneaking into my quarters and watching me sleep, while armed no less?”
“Everything.”
Quester stood from the bed, causing her to flinch. He undid his belt and let his sword drop to the ground.
“I am like that ship.” He stared at his right hand again. “Outside, I am beautiful, I know that. Yet inside, I am vile. I have killed. I have captured men and women and led them to torture and bondage. I’ve taken joy in watching a man break down while his wife was flayed. I killed a child . . . ”
Despite his frightening words, Rachida took a few steps toward him, and when he didn’t move, she placed her own sword down on the bed and lifted his chin with her fingers. He gazed at her, his eyes clear and blue, his skin perfect but for a single scar tracing the left side of his jaw. Despite his attractiveness, she could see exactly what he spoke of, the violence that hid just behind his eyes.
“Enough memories and riddles,” she said. “Tell me what all this means.”
He took a deep breath. “You are so unlike me. Both inside and out, you radiate splendor. This world would be a worse place without you in it, and more than anything I detest removing beauty from this wretched world.”
Rachida froze, her hand still gripping his chin. “What?”
“Before we left the Isles, Master Gemcroft promised me fifty pounds of gold if I ended your life.”
She let go of him, backed toward the bed, slumped down on it.
“Why?” she asked. Her fingers touched the cold steel of her sword, and for a moment she considered driving it into Quester’s gut.
“I don’t know, milady,” he said.
“Was this the plan all along?”
Quester shook his head. “No, not at all. My masters simply said I was to take Peytr’s gold, and so long as the end goal was to make our god’s life miserable, I was to do as he said.”
“I was never a part of the plan? I was never supposed to lead you to glory?”
“No. I fear Peytr made that up to conceal his true intentions.”
Rachida ground her teeth together. Her heart raced, her blood boiled. Every part of her wanted to disbelieve this man, but what he said made too much sense. Her marriage to Peytr was a convenience, a disguise to hide their true lives. Her darling husband had often said that it was her station as Soleh Mori’s daughter that made their marriage worthwhile, but now that Soleh was gone, the gods were at war, and any advantage Rachida’s name held had shriveled up and died. Peytr had his heir. He had no need for her any longer.
She grunted, spat on the ground, and turned to the sellsword. A ray of hope bloomed. Quester might have been lower than a common brigand, doing whatever it took to line his own pockets, but Peytr had misjudged the man. A rare mistake for her darling husband; a mistake she could use to her advantage. Nudging her sword aside, she patted the bed. Quester appeared hesitant, but eventually took a seat at her side. He smelled of stale liquor with a hint of lilac. For some reason that made her think of Moira, and her heart thudded harder in her chest.
“Swear to me, Quester. Swear to me that what you’ve told me is true.”
“I swear, milady. On what little honor I have.”
“Good.” She leaned over and placed a single kiss on his cheek, then stood, lifting her sword in the process. “That is your reward . . . for now.”
“For now?”
She poked her blade into his chest. “Yes, for now. Do not go getting any ideas, however. What I promise you is double what Peytr offered to kill me. My word is my bond, as any will tell you. Is that an appropriate price for your soul?”
Quester smiled sadly. “I will do anything you ask, milady.”
“Anything?”
“Yes, anything.”
“Good. This is the way it will be from here on out. Everything Peytr declared when we departed the Isles will remain the same. We will march, we will fight, and I will lead you. The people of this hamlet say there is a battle raging in the north? Then that is where we go. Do we have the supplies we need?”
“We have enough for a couple weeks, but it would be prudent—”
“I care not for prudence,” she said, more harshly than she’d intended. “What I do care about is that we make this war as miserable for Karak as possible. What I care about is surviving until he and his brother destroy each other, so you can fulfill your duty to me.”
“My duty to you?” he asked with a slight, expectant grin.
She smiled, and it felt good to do so. “Come the end of this war, you are going to help me find Moira, and after that, my son.”
Quester nodded in silence.
“And Quester?”
“Yes?”
Her hand drifted to her sword; the thought of revenge was a sweet cure to her frustration and helplessness.
“Once we return to my beloved husband, you will not take his life,” she said. “That right is mine, and mine alone.”
CHAPTER
12
Ceredon lay on the cold sand inside his tent, reflecting on how quickly his situation had changed. One moment he had been an object of ridicule, harassed and tortured nearly every minute of every day; the next, he was left alone, three hundred new objects of ridicule taking his place.
The people of Ang had been forced from their home and marched through the desert for countless days. Most of the humans’ skin had been dark brown to black, yet as the whips urged them onward, the shackled masses became tinged with splotches of deep red. Ceredon had thought Darakken’s murderous actions in the villages they’d crossed on the way there brutal, but what he now witnessed went far beyond that. It was evil what was happening to these people. Men, women, and children alike were cruelly ushered onward, denied so much as a cup of water while shuffling beneath the heat of the desert sun. Only when they neared death from dehydration were they given sustenance; when they were felled by the myriad of lashes covering their bodies, they were brought before the enormous Bardiya, who would place his hands on their bodies and heal their ills. Afterward the victims were shackled once more, and the process began anew.
Having been sheltered in Quellasar for most of his life, Ceredon had seen a god only once—the day Karak and his First Children came to their forest dwelling to introduce themselves to the elves. Ceredon was four years old at the time, and to him the twelve-foot colossus that was Karak had seemed unreal, the stuff of legends and nighttime terrors. He felt the same way now, staring at this dark giant whose eyes constantly ran wet with tears and whose voice was hoarse as he sang songs of peace to the heavens. Bardiya was a living contradiction; he could have easily crushed any of the elves or human soldiers that harassed him, could have inspired his people to revolt against the beatings they suffered on a daily basis, but did not. He did nothing but cry for peace. Ceredon didn’t know if he should feel awe, pity, or anger.
What he did know was that his own inner shame was growing. He found himself walking, yanked forward by his wrist irons toward the rear of the column, all but forgotten. Larstis, the Dezren elf whose horse he was tethered to, proved to be a kind jailer. Larstis would offer him water and food, and even allow him to ride in the saddle when the elf wished to stretch his legs. Ceredon was thankful for each moment of relief, though each brought rise to his shame. Here he was, thankful to the man who kept him prisoner, for showing him tiny measures of kindness. True kindness would have been releasing him. True mercy would have been standing up to the torture the humans endured.
The path Darakken forged through the desert was circuitous, and often they looped past certain trees
or cliffs Ceredon recognized from days before. He concluded that the demon was dragging them endlessly just to punish the humans with the beating sun and fiery sand of the desert beneath their bare feet.
Ceredon rolled over, his chains jangling, and moaned. Outside, Bardiya was telling his people a story, something about a rat and a swamp lizard and the seductiveness of false faith. He could barely make out the words, but he swore he’d heard a story very much like that one at some point in his youth. He finally stopped trying to listen, gulped down the last swig of weak wine Larstis had given him, and tried to fall asleep to the giant’s soothing tone.
A few minutes later, he heard the shuffling of feet over sand, followed by the flap of his tent being shoved aside. A tinderstick was struck, and brightness filled the tent. Ceredon opened one eye. Boris Morneau was standing there, holding a lantern in one hand and a sack in the other. The human looked down at him and smiled.
“You look better.”
Ceredon nodded. The young soldier had made himself scarce since the night he’d come to Ceredon speaking words of warning about the terrors Darakken would impart on his people. He was constantly riding ahead of the procession, acting as the demon’s forward scout. Now, when they came upon the occasional small village, it was empty. He couldn’t help but think that was the human’s doing.
“You’re silent,” Boris said, tilting his head. “Do you wish me to leave?”
“No,” said Ceredon in the common tongue. He pulled himself up as much as he could in his fetters and drew his knees to his chest. “Please, sit with me. I am sorry I have nothing to drink, or I would offer it to you.”
Blood Of Gods (Book 3) Page 14