Heretic seemed almost repentant as they were stopped in front of the command tent, the size of his eyes telling Sister Portolés he had never expected the Cobalt Company to be so enormous. From the point where they had been stopped by the mounted sentries in the vale, it had taken them well over an hour to reach the heart of the camp—the stop at a white pavilion to have the arrow pushed through her leg and a poultice tied on the wound barely took ten minutes, the rest of the time spent climbing steadily higher through the labyrinth of tents. Above them, Lark’s Tongue Peak cast an imposing defense for the army’s rear.
“Wait,” said the burly chevaleresse who had intercepted them at the outskirts of the tents, sending the outriders back to their duties and escorting the prisoners into camp herself. She entered this final wide, nondescript tent without announcing herself, and from within came the sound of low voices. Heretic whistled nervously, rubbing his hands together against the morning chill now that the sweat had dried and the panic faded. The knight reemerged, flanked by more guards. “All right, these lads’ll take any weapons you have, then you can come in and tell the command what you told us.”
“Can…” Heretic looked guiltily at Portolés. “Here, hold up, let me take her chains off her wrists.”
“You wish to unshackle your prisoner before taking her into the command tent?” The chevaleresse looked amused. “I don’t think so.”
“It was only to keep her in line until we got here,” said Heretic. “She’s not a danger.”
“That true?” The chevaleresse’s flinty eyes looked up into Portolés’s. “Big woman like you isn’t any danger? That hammer we took off your packhorse, suppose it belongs to your ferret here?”
“You heard the ferret,” said Portolés. “I’m no danger at all. The maul’s for shoeing our horses.”
“Look—” said Heretic, but the knight shut him down.
“No, you look, son—I’m all kinds of curious to hear how an underfed thug like you put the manacles on a hoss like her. And I think you’ll sing that song just as well with her in chains as not. Now get in the tent.”
And just like that, Portolés ducked under a pole and found herself in the command tent of the Cobalt Company. Their maps and other papers had been flipped upside down, the whole rebel crew standing from their stools at her arrival, as though she were a foreign dignitary they hoped to woo and not a suspected spy, or worse. Heretic bumped into her as he came in, and the chevaleresse entered last. She and the other guards all had their steel drawn. Two empty stools were brought over to the other side of the table, and the young Immaculate woman who was clearly in charge waved them to their seats. In the lantern light, the girl’s shock of darkly dyed hair could be cobalt, even, and Portolés let out a miserable sigh. Whoever led this army, it wasn’t the mayoress from Kypck. Which meant her mission had failed, the weapon her queen had given her was useless, and she was about to be screwed in a big, bad way.
“Well, Boris of Diadem, the ditty you sang for my sentries intrigued me enough to grant you an audience,” the Immaculate girl said, her cupbearer filling a bowl with hot kaldi and offering it to Heretic. “I am General Ji-hyeon Bong, commander of the Cobalt Company, and for the moment you have my full attention.”
Bong? Sitting forward on her stool, Portolés peered at the girl, trying to see a family resemblance… Was Bong a common Immaculate surname? If not, if this general was the daughter of Kang-ho and Jun-hwan…
“Um, yeah,” said Heretic nervously, “so she, Sister Portolés, I mean, I was a prisoner, in Diadem, but then she took me prisoner, but when I got free I took her prisoner. Shit. Let me start over.”
Portolés sat back on her stool and took in the general’s cabinet as Heretic blathered: an older Raniputri chevaleresse with an impressive mustache, a grotesque hulk of a man with a sickly smile on his wasted features, and a good-looking Usban fellow of middle age. Nondescript as this last member of the command was when seated beside the rest, his breastplate identified him, the prancing foxes embossed on its polished surface a dead giveaway. Here then were three of the Five Villains, straight from the forbidden songs of the Stricken Queen, all of them taking orders from a girl who was likely the daughter of the fourth. Interesting…
“Do you have a staring problem, Chainite?” said the general. “Or would you prefer to wait outside while your handler gives us a very compelling reason to believe you’re not both Imperial assassins?”
“Whoa, hey!” said Heretic, standing so quickly he almost caught a sword to the spine before the guard standing behind him realized he was being foolish rather than dangerous. “That’s not me, not at all. We nearly got nabbed by the Crimsons, trying to get to you—ask your scouts or whatever, your people who saw us being chased in here by them. They wouldn’t be trying to kill us if we were with them, would they?”
“They evidently didn’t do a good job of it,” said the bewhiskered knight who had to be Chevaleresse Singh. “That bandage on the weirdborn’s leg looks fresh, but it’s obvious the rest of her injuries are weeks old.”
“I’m on your side, I swear it!” said Heretic, prompting Portolés to wonder just what heretics swore on. “I was her prisoner, but then we were bushwhacked by some other Chainites, and she got tore up bad enough in the exchange I got the drop on her. Took her to you because you seem to be fighting the good fight, and I couldn’t well risk trying to sneak back into Diadem with her, could I?”
“Yes, yes,” said the man Portolés presumed was Fennec. “You told the sentries, one rode ahead and told us. What strikes the general as odd is your presumption that we are, as you say, on the same side. That, and the timing of your appearance, prisoner in tow, just ahead of an advancing Imperial regiment. And claiming to have invaluable information for us! How wonderfully convenient it all is.”
“No, no, no, it’s not like that!” said Heretic. “We came west from the Haunted Forest, and when I was buying food in Black Moth I heard it from some hunters that the Cobalt Company was laying down a camp here, in front of that big mountain. They said they’d seen you coming and cleared out just in time. This was a few days back, and those ignorant assholes said the Imperials from Thao were still a little ways off—last thing I expected was to come across the plains and see that nest of ’em between you and us. We went wide north to go around ’em, but their scouts—”
“Thao?” said the general, exchanging glances with her cohort. “You’re saying Thao’s regiment is already marching this direction?”
“That could be your disinformation,” murmured the giant, loud enough for all to hear. “They’ve come to stir you up, push you into flinching first.”
“I know what I heard, but I won’t vouch for it being true,” said Heretic, and it was quite something, to see the lad who had taunted his oppressors in the Office of Answers tremble under the gaze of his idols. “All I know is if you’re fighting the Empire, then I’m on your side, it’s easy as that. I mean, if I was a spy wouldn’t I come with a better story? Maybe I’d have some claim to know what the Imperials are up to out there? I don’t know shit, beyond what I told your people already, and that’s the True Queen’s truth!”
“You say this war nun rescued you from torture in Diadem, and fought her own people along the road, yes?” asked the chevaleresse, waving the cupbearer over to refill her kaldi bowl.
“I don’t just say it, it’s true,” said Heretic, realizing he was the only one at the table still standing, and retaking his seat.
“And you also told my sentries you had information that would be valuable to any enemy of the Empire, but that you would only share it with those in charge,” said the general, rocking back on her seat. “So… what is it?”
“Right, yes,” said Heretic. “So Sister Portolés here—”
“That’s your name, Portolés?” asked Hoartrap the Touch. Portolés was more certain of his identity than any of the others. He was, by all accounts, a devil-eater and known witch.
Portolés offered the faintest sugge
stion of a nod. Things were about to get very warm in here, and she wondered how best to play this.
“So yeah, I don’t know what she wants, or what, but she’s working for the queen, not the pope, I’m sure of that,” said Heretic. “Pretty sure, anyway. I searched her kit after she got all beat up by the other clerics and found some papers with the Royal Crimson Seal on it, and a roster, I’d guess. Names of soldiers, rank, that sort of thing.”
“Ah, and here’s that invaluable military intelligence our guest knows nothing about,” said Fennec with a yawn. “Can’t say we’re in for much trouble from the Imperial command, if this is what they think passes for believable disinformation.”
“Look here, all of you… you lippy churls!” said Heretic, jabbing a finger at each of the seated officers in turn. At the moment these four were the most dangerous people on the Star, and Heretic was barking at them like they were part of his petty resistance back in Diadem. Portolés would miss the lad, once they were both burned alive as enemy agents. “I’m not a spy! And whatever the sister is, I don’t think she’s a spy, neither. It was never her plan to come here and find you, far as I know—we started off and went straight up to the Isles, and then were coming down for the Dominions, I think, when—”
“The Immaculate Isles,” interrupted the general. “She took you there? Which cities, which islands?”
“Well, we come up through Linkensterne, and then went to, whatsit… Hwabun, Hwabun Island, and then turned right around and—”
“What were you doing there?” the general demanded, not looking at Heretic anymore. Well, that certainly answered the question of the girl’s lineage! Portolés doubted they’d need more than this girl’s stare to get the kindling going underneath them. “I expect your full cooperation, woman, from this moment on. We both know that whatever royal errand you were on, it’s definitely come to an end now.”
“Has it?” Portolés couldn’t help herself; perhaps it had been an early way of insulating herself from further harm or despondency, but whatever the source, there was no cushion nor chair she preferred to the hot seat. “With all due respect, General, I believe I’m the only one in this room who can speak with authority on that matter.”
“Ah, so you do speak!” said the general. “And eloquently as any ambassador, I must say. Are you an ambassador, Sister Portolez?”
“Portolés, Sister Portolés, and I think you could say I am something of an envoy.” It was so hard not to smile, but one look at how much pleasure the ancient Hoartrap was also taking in this exchange helped check her mirth. “The issue, General, is that I was not sent to treat with you.”
“That so?” Ji-hyeon looked like she might throw her kaldi bowl at Portolés. “But you were sent to talk with my fathers, were you?”
Oh, but this was getting good! “It is an unfortunate clause of my assignment, General, but I am forbidden from discussing my business, which is to say Queen Indsorith’s business, with any but the object of my inquiry. Your father King Jun-hwan seemed to be doing quite well, by the by—I found him most cooperative.”
That did it, though Ji-hyeon clearly thought better of it at the last moment and hurled her bowl against the wall of the tent instead of at Portolés. Temper, temper, General.
Chevaleresse Singh cleared her throat. “I would remind the general that according to the Articles of Aghartha, all laws regarding the treatment of prisoners of war apply only to combatants, abettors, and commanders. When it comes to suspected spies, well, there really isn’t as much errata as you’d think. An unfortunate oversight on the part of the authors. Whatever you deem necessary to secure the safety of your troops is permitted so long as—”
“Torture, is what the chevaleresse means,” said Portolés. “And here my ferocious warden had led me to believe that the Cobalt Company was above such immoral tactics.”
“Immoral, sister?” Fennec looked sad. “I’m sure you heard that word quite a bit, growing up as an anathema in some miserable Chainhouse. Did you find redemption after your first round of penance, or your fiftieth?”
That hurt a bit—how did they always know? Portolés didn’t have wings or a tail, Savior knew she never even lisped anymore, hadn’t for years after all her whispering to herself in her cell, getting every word right… Yet somehow, they always always knew, as though her impurity gave off the stench of rotten eggs.
“Nothing to say, race traitor?” Fennec pushed.
“No call to bring that into it,” said Heretic angrily. “We’re all meant to be equal, ain’t we? That’s the Cobalt Code, ain’t it? Or is everything I heard about this new Cobalt Company being the same as the old just as false as its general?”
That was definitely the wrong thing to say. General Ji-hyeon was flushing red as an absolution candle, and Chevaleresse Singh stood with a flourish of her cape, drawing a mighty sword. Fennec was amused but mostly hiding it; Hoartrap was delighted and making no effort at all to conceal it. Good show, Heretic, good show—it always was the believers carrying the standard, volunteering for the front, while the cynics and the realists hung back in a command tent.
Come to think it, what did that make Sister Portolés?
“Right, sorry I’m late,” came a familiar voice from the tent’s entryway. “Tried to rouse Maroto but he’s sick as a dog. Came straight back here, but met some frazzled scouts on the way, and brought ’em with me—you need to have them come in and report right fucking now, they say the regiment from Thao is creeping less than three days out from… Hell.”
Turning to the door, Sister Portolés felt a seesawing mix of relief and fear to see the old woman from Kypck… who looked pretty seasick herself, upon recognizing Portolés. She’d hardened up since last they met, and she hadn’t been soft then, either. The dog was at her side, though he now appeared closer to an adolescent than a greysnout, his tail wagging enthusiastically as he trotted over to Portolés to say hello.
The war nun stood and bowed, the dog licking her face. She smelled the wrongness on his breath, tasted it in her suddenly aching tongue—the two sides of the scarred tissue seemed to be trying to rip themselves apart again. She straightened up quickly to get away from the creature. A devil, no doubt about it, and, looking closely at the approaching woman, Portolés saw the jagged scar on her jaw that Queen Indsorith had mentioned.
It was as Indsorith had feared. This wasn’t some random hillbilly mayoress with a chip on her shoulder; this was Zosia, the Stricken Queen. The long year since her people had been put to the sword didn’t seem to have softened her ire much. And Fallen Mother bless them both, Portolés had found her in time.
“Lady Zosia,” breathed Portolés, closing her eyes to better savor the sensation of salvation. “Lady Zosia, I have been sent by Queen Indsorith to—”
The first punch caught her in the throat, and the second nailed her tightening stomach. A month ago the nun might have shaken off the blows, or at least hidden the distress they caused her. A month ago she didn’t have multiple puncture wounds to the chest, sternum, and belly. She went down, and would have gone down harder if Heretic hadn’t been there to catch her. Fennec and the chevaleresse had scrambled over the table and pulled Zosia away, but only after she’d rabbit-punched Portolés’s side four or five more times. The anathema felt the stitches tear with each blow, but did not cry out or resist. This was why she had come here after all.
“Get the fuck off me!” Zosia, spitting like a wildcat, threw Fennec across the table. Hoartrap snatched his kaldi bowl out of harm’s way at the last moment, but did not rise to assist. Chevaleresse Singh got behind the furious woman and contorted a leg and an arm around her, then tightened her limbs, immobilizing her. It was something to see, what had seemed such a gently lined, welcoming face back in Kypck now transformed into a mask of the Deceiver himself, Zosia’s teeth bared and her nostrils flaring. Splayed out in Heretic’s arms beneath the wrathful woman, Portolés fancied she could feel heat emanating from her.
“Enough!” barked Ji-hyeon. �
��Enough! Do you want to die, Zosia? Outside until you calm down, and if you can’t act like a grown woman, don’t come back!”
Hearing the general address the woman by name sent more waves of bliss shuddering through Portolés. She had not failed. Not this time. And now her wretched, cursed body could finally do something miraculous, could finally be used as her queen intended. Perhaps she had been destined for this, or perhaps it was all an accident, but everything happens, and the Crimson Queen of Samoth had bid her take any measures to ensure that it did.
“Whatever this fucking asshole says, don’t trust her,” said Zosia, trying to kick at Portolés and nearly carrying Singh to the floor with her. “Let me go, damn it, I’m all right now, I am. We got a history, is all. Bad, bad fucking history!”
“And a future,” said Portolés, Heretic helping her back up. Even without the chains on her wrists the sickening aches in her stomach and side would have made it an arduous task. There was dampness under her habit there, but she couldn’t worry about that now, not with the end of her quest at hand. She just had to live long enough to deliver her queen’s will, and then there would be no battle between the Imperials camped out in the plains and these mercenaries, no war at all between the Cobalt and the Crimson. Everyone in the tent was staring at the battered war nun. “A short one, if you want, but we must talk. She sent me after you. Queen Indsorith.”
“Think I don’t know that, witch?” Zosia tensed again, but so did Singh. “Think I’m too fucking dense to see the starshine on the altar?”
A Crown for Cold Silver Page 54