Phoenix Unbound

by Grace Draven

  “I don’t want it to be easy, Gilene!” He gripped her arms to give her a light shake. “I want it to be so hard, you’ll change your mind.” He kissed the bridge of her nose. “I understand your devotion to your family, though I think they and the entire village are cowards. What they demand you do for them, what they expect you to do for them . . . it’s cowardice, and I can’t find sympathy for them. Are they really worth your sacrifice? Your suffering?”

  “You’re about to go to war. Will you ask these questions of every Savatar warrior who follows you?”

  He scowled. “Your village elders have enslaved their fire witches for how many generations?”

  “For as long as any of us remember,” she said in a small voice.

  Azarion’s scowl turned even more ominous than before. “Release me from my oath to leave Beroe untouched by the Savatar. It deserves a razing as much as Kraelag.”

  “No it doesn’t. The village isn’t full of evil people, just a lot of frightened ones with families. Would you not put Tamura and Saruke before your clansmen’s sisters and mothers?”

  He raked his fingers through his hair. “How does anyone answer that question until they’re forced to?”

  “They don’t, not if they can help it.” How she wished she didn’t have to answer it now. Or ever.

  Gilene caressed his jaw. “Wife of a chieftain,” she said, wistful. “I would rise up in the world.”

  Azarion leaned his cheek into her palm. “And I would be made exceptional by the union, Agacin.”

  “You already are, Azarion Ataman. The ancestors for whom your mother has so much reverence would be proud of her son.”

  “And yet I still can’t change your mind.” She shook her head, and he growled low in his throat. “You’re a stubborn woman.”

  She smiled at his accusation. “It’s why I will prevail.”

  Her words made him pause, and he stared at her until the heat of a blush crawled up her neck to her cheeks. “Of that, Agacin, I have no doubt.”

  Once they were both dressed, he ushered her out of the qara and across the camp where everyone had gathered around the Ataman Council to hear an abbreviated explanation of Azarion’s plan.

  Erakes was as good an orator as Azarion, and in no time he had incited his warriors to such an eager state for battle, they were ready to mount their horses and ride for Kraelag in that moment to take on the Empire single-handedly.

  “What happens now?” Gilene asked, leaning against Azarion’s side as they stood at the crowd’s periphery.

  “The atamans will return to their clans and do as you’ve seen Erakes do: inform the clan what’s to happen. We’ll then meet with the Goban people to offer an alliance. I’d be surprised if they refused. They’re the ones most vulnerable to the Empire right now.” He kissed the top of her head. “I promise I will do all in my power to make sure we reach Kraelag by the equinox.”

  Gilene held on to the promise of that hope with both hands. The coordination alone for such a task was monumental with no guarantee of success. Even if the clans of both peoples agreed to ally themselves, their chances of failure were equal to, if not greater than, those of victory.

  “Do you truly believe it’s worth so much chaos and death?” She knew his answer, knew he’d asked this question of himself many times before she did.

  His voice never wavered. “Down to my soul, Agacin. I’ve been a slave of the Empire. Never again will I be so, nor will my people, not if I have any say in the matter.”

  That evening, the people celebrated around a communal fire. There were wrestling matches, drinking games, dancing, singing, and trysts made in the swaying shadows of the concealing plume grass. Gilene and Azarion joined in the revelry, determined to enjoy this last night among the free-spirited Savatar who had taken her into their midst, and though they didn’t see her as one of their own despite her magic, they welcomed her and treated her well. She was both agacin and Azarion Ataman’s concubine—a potent combination of power and influence. Given time, the Savatar would accept her fully. This she knew. There was, however, no more time.

  Her coupling with Azarion later that night bore the hallmarks of desperation and silent farewell that left him dour and her grief-stricken. At dawn, his entourage thanked Erakes for his hospitality and departed for the Clan Kestrel encampment with promises to host the ataman of Clan Eagle there soon.

  They were a day and evening into their return when she, Azarion, and Masad left their party to turn back toward Clan Eagle’s camp and the narrow passage that took travelers through the Veil and over the sliver of Nunari territory into the boundaries belonging to Krael proper.

  “Don’t linger,” Azarion instructed Masad. “The Savatar respect the rule that agacins are free to choose the clan and camp of their preference, but some may interpret that rule differently for Gilene and keep her trapped here.”

  Masad nodded. “We’ll ride hard, travel at night, and rest during the day.”

  His words conjured up an unpleasant memory for Gilene. “No sleeping in barrows,” she said. “Ever again.” The tirbodh gave her a puzzled look and then a shrug.

  Azarion nudged his horse to stand alongside hers. His face was set, his lips thin and drawn tight against his teeth. “Should you have second thoughts, don’t hesitate. Masad will lead you back to the Sky Below without question.”

  They stared at each other as the tirbodh guided his own horse away to allow them privacy. Gilene reached out with a shaking hand, stricken when Azarion drew back from her touch.

  “Don’t,” he said, and his voice was harsh. “If I touch you, I won’t let go.”

  She breathed back the tears gathered in her nose and throat, making her eyes ache. “Goodbye, gladiator. Our bargain is met. Good luck.” If she said his name, she’d fall apart.

  He didn’t suffer such weakness, and her name was a prayer on his lips. “Farewell, Gilene of Beroe.”

  He turned his horse and galloped back to where their camp slept under the moon’s waning light. Gilene followed his shadow until it blended with all other shadows, and the sound of hoofbeats faded, leaving only the wind’s dirge in their wake.

  She guided her own horse to where Masad waited, and offered him a watery smile. “Beroe waits, Masad. I’ve been long away.”

  * * *

  • • •

  The villagers’ ecstatic relief at seeing her ride into the village alongside Azarion’s uncle was short-lived. The miller’s wife saw her first and raced down the street toward the house of the most senior village elder. Soon the street was filling with people, all calling her name as if she were a conquering hero returned to them in splendor. They stared at Masad, wide-eyed and wary of the fierce-looking warrior riding beside her as their horses ambled slowly down the main avenue toward the house Gilene shared with her mother and sister.

  “You’re welcome to stay as long as you like, Masad. We can feed you and put you up in a bed. The hearth keeps all the rooms warm enough.”

  He declined her offer. “I’m needed elsewhere, Agacin,” he said. His gaze swept the crowd gathered nearby, unabashedly watching them. He lowered his voice. “Are you certain you won’t come back to the Sky Below?”

  No, she wasn’t at all certain, and maybe one day, she would go back. But, like him, she was needed elsewhere. “Maybe one day,” she said. “Not today.”

  He bowed, wished her well, and rode out of Beroe as quickly as he had appeared, the look in his eye a worried one.

  That worry wasn’t without basis. Once the initial celebrations over Gilene’s return had ended, the villagers’ relief at having her back had soon turned to resentful suspicion. She looked none the worse for wear for her sojourn in the Stara Dragana, and in no time the questions of what happened to her became poisoned with the taint of accusation. Even her family eyed her askance at times, though none of them dared to ask the questions she saw in
their faces. Had she truly been abducted? Or had she fled only to change her mind and return to Beroe out of guilt or because she had no other place to go?

  As witnesses to Azarion tossing her across a horse’s back and racing through the capital’s streets, her brothers had at least zealously assured any who asked that she’d been an unwilling captive. Her mother and Ilada, though . . . Gilene had caught the dubious expressions on their faces more than once during the long wax and wane of the winter season.

  She returned to the tasks that had always been hers when she lived in Beroe—helping her mother and sister with the household chores, working in the dye houses. It didn’t take long for her hands to stain green once more. The rhythm and pace of the village was as familiar to her as her own reflection. Sleepy and slow in winter, always with an undercurrent of dread as everyone anticipated the coming of spring and the arrival of Kraelian slavers.

  Gilene shared nothing of her knowledge regarding Azarion and his plans, and offered little about her time among the Savatar, even when her mother and Ilada pressed her for details.

  “You’ve become so secretive, Gilene,” her mother fussed, giving her dish towel an annoyed snap as they worked together washing and drying the supper dishes one evening.

  Gilene shrugged away the complaint. Her mother’s irritation didn’t bother her, nor did the speculative stares of her siblings or those of the villagers when she moved among them.

  Her role as Beroe’s annual savior had made her an outsider years earlier—among the villagers and within her own family—and she felt the isolation even more now, only this time, it was she who held herself apart.

  She missed the Sky Below with its open spaces, its horse herds, and black qaras. She missed Saruke with her odd bits of philosophical advice. She even missed the dour Tamura, whose devotion to her mother and brother and to Arita was a thing of beauty to behold.

  Most of all, she missed the man she once thought she’d sworn to hate and ended up loving. Every night, when she closed her eyes, Gilene pictured his fierce, elegant face, and the emptiness inside her yawned wide and deep.

  Beroe had been her birthplace and where she’d grown up, but she no longer belonged here. Coming back had been a necessity. The distance between her and her family stretched even wider now, but they were still her family, still at the mercy of the village elders, who wouldn’t hesitate to use them in forcing Gilene’s cooperation to act as a tithe.

  Azarion had been right to call them all cowards. They were, and that cowardice had perpetuated a terrible assumption, one she had strengthened for the last five years. She prayed the Savatar and their allies would win the day, claim victory, and end the Rites once and for all. No more tithes, no more bleak duty to a place that used her guilt and her shriveling affection for her family as chains to trap her. Maybe this time, when she wielded fire, it would be in the service of other saviors.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Azarion blinked away the sweat that dripped into his eyes, wishing for a blizzard or even just a quick squall of snow flurries to cool the air. Snow still lay on the ground this early in spring, and nighttime frost iced everything before the sun rose to melt it away. It might still be cold to someone in everyday clothing, but harnessed in the encompassing armor of a heavy cavalryman, he roasted under the pale sun.

  He sat his horse amid four thousand Savatar heavy cavalry occupying a low rise that gently sloped toward the walled capital of Kraelag. The land between the city and this hill had not yet been plowed for planting, and it stretched flat and clear for at least a league. On the opposite side, the Kraelian army had amassed several legions of soldiers. A Savatar scout had returned the previous night from reconnoitering the enemy.

  He had bowed to Erakes, Azarion, and the other four atamans gathered together in Erakes’s crowded war qara along with the captains who would command the squadrons of archers supporting the heavy cavalry. “Atamans, from what we saw, the Kraelians are three times our number at least. Four thousand cavalry, four thousand light infantry, and twenty-five thousand heavy infantry. A general named Mal Vornak leads them.”

  Erakes turned to Azarion. “Do you know him?”

  “By name only. He’s a seasoned commander and led the Kraelians to victory against the Prathics and the Oseks. With almost forty thousand men at his disposal, this will be a battle hard-fought.”

  Erakes shrugged. “We knew that when we planned this attack.”

  Everything leading to this confrontation had been hard-fought for the Savatar. They had used winter to their advantage, guiding their tough horses over snowy terrain and rivers frozen so solid, they didn’t crack under the weight of the thousands of riders who traveled them like roads to cut the distance it took to reach Kraelag.

  When the weather was kinder, they trekked twenty-five leagues in a day, a grueling pace no Kraelian horse could handle but that the steppe ponies conquered with ease. They subsisted on the brittle grasses browned by cold and buried under snow while the Savatar themselves lived off fermented mare’s milk and whatever game they could hunt in the harsh depths of winter. By the time Krael recognized the danger to its capital, the steppe clans were nearly at Kraelag’s gates.

  The standing army assigned to protect the capital was drawn from a ring of garrisons that surrounded the rich farmlands and rivers that kept Kraelag’s citizens and its vassal towns and villages fed. Azarion suspected Mal Vornak had ordered every one of them emptied and their soldiers marched immediately to the capital. So far Krael was doing everything Azarion and the other atamans had hoped.

  Three leagues away, the vulnerable Manoret Harbor with its valuable granaries had fallen to a squadron of Savatar, who now held it. No doubt a messenger dispatched by a desperate Kraelian harbormaster had reached the capital with the news. Azarion didn’t think the man lived beyond his telling of events. The last thing those in power in the capital wanted was for its populace to learn they might starve behind the walls.

  With the inclusion of Nunari clans that had turned renegade against their Kraelian masters, the Savatar horde had swelled in number, though, as the scout predicted, the Kraelian army they were preparing to fight outnumbered them at least three to one.

  The Kraelian army advanced toward the Savatar force. This day, Azarion expected they’d water the soil with blood instead of rain.

  At Erakes’s signal, the Savatar beat war drums and blew the slender, dog-headed horns whose trumpeting sounded like a cross between an enraged woman and a howling wolf.

  The Kraelian army continued to advance with infantry at the center and cavalry on the wings. At a series of shouted commands, they paused and re-formed into a hollow square, lined twelve-deep on all sides, before continuing their march.

  Erakes, more experienced than Azarion in large-scale combat, grinned at the sight. “Smart man. He’s re-formed his infantry to keep from being outflanked, but at the cost of mobility.”

  All around them, the Savatar heavy horse waited, eager and impatient to engage their enemy. Beyond the Kraelian line, Kraelag shimmered in the spring sun, a corrupt jewel waiting to be shattered.

  Azarion studied the hollow square. “If we send the heavy horse in first, we may not be able to break the line. There are too many of them.”

  Erakes nodded and sent up a series of signal whistles, calling the captains to his side. “Send in your archers,” he told them. “Surround the square and rain down arrows until the Kraelians can’t see the sky above them. Draw out their cavalry from the wings.” He turned to Azarion. “Prepare your heavy horse. When their cavalry draws closer to us, you’ll attack.”

  Azarion left his commander’s side to gather his forces in readiness. He caught a glimpse of his fierce sister galloping past him, first arrow already nocked into place as she raced with the other Savatar light cavalry toward the Kraelian line.

  In no time the sky had turned black with the hail of arrows as Savatar archers
harried the square’s perimeter, shooting straight into the line or up in the air where the arrows fell from above like sharpened rain, pinning arms and shoulders to shields and feet to the ground.

  Mal Vornak ordered his skirmishers to attack the archers, but they were driven back to hide behind shields by the relentless Savatar arrows. As Erakes predicted, the Kraelian general ordered his light cavalry to engage the archers.

  Azarion timed the maneuver, counting as the Kraelian light cavalry chased the retreating horse archers ever closer to the main Savatar force. He wheeled his mount around and bellowed to his captains, “Make ready!” Armored riders atop barded horses formed their lines, couching the long, heavy spears meant to puncture enemy lines in a frontal charge.

  As the horse archers galloped past the heavy cavalry, Azarion called out again. “Ride forth!”

  The thunder of hooves and war whoops from the Savatar deafened him as they charged into the pursuing lines of Kraelian light cavalry, spears lowered. Azarion lurched backward on his horse, nearly sliding off as the animal struck breast to breast against another horse. Equine squeals joined the screams and shouts of men fighting and dying on the field.

  Azarion turned the spear into a battering ram, using it and the sword he carried to cut, stab, and bludgeon his way through the melee of Kraelian and Savatar fighters until his blade coursed with blood, and he and his horse were painted crimson in gore.

  He fought off gauntleted hands that tried to rip him from the saddle, and lost his favorite dagger when he plunged it into a soldier’s neck. The fountain of blood erupting from the wound temporarily blinded him in a hot tide, and he barely dodged the blow of a hammer against his helmet.

  The blaring howl of the horns signaled the heavy cavalry’s retreat, and his men gathered together to gallop back to the main force, passing another wave of horse archers who returned to harass the Kraelian infantry.

  The hours of slaughter and bloodshed wore on as the sun traveled its path across the sky. Unplanted fields were littered with the corpses of Kraelian and Savatar soldiers and their horses. The ground crackled underfoot from the wood of thousands of spent arrows.