“What do you want, Sass?” Raz demanded, sitting up to wipe his mouth with his sleeve.
Ergoin Sass smiled. He was a handsome man, almost exotically so. In the South his northern upbringing was a rare quality. More than one woman had fallen under the spell of that careless smile, attracted by his looks and flaunted wealth. The fact that he was a šef of the Mahsadën—almost singly responsible for half the murders occurring daily in and around the city—didn’t often bother them.
They were a bit more troubled when they found out Sass generally preferred his bedmates much younger, and not necessarily female…
“I’ve got more work for you,” Sass said. “Kî Orran didn’t go for—”
“Pay.”
Sass blinked as Raz went back to his food, ripping at the broth-soaked lamb noisily.
“Pardon?”
“I said pay,” Raz snarled without looking up. “You owe me twenty-five crowns for the first job. My gold, then we’ll talk about whatever else you have for me.”
Sass frowned, clearly not appreciating Raz’s tone. After a brief pause he leaned back, pulled a small cloth purse from the inside of his shirt, and tossed it across the table. It landed with a heavy thunk. Picking it up, Raz tugged the pouch open with a finger and counted quickly. Then he nodded.
“Now, again… What do you want?”
Sass leaned forward. “Kî Orran didn’t take as kindly to your gift as we’d hoped she might,” he said, not bothered to keep his voice down. The tables around them were all empty, smartly vacated and avoided by every other patron in the room. “She’s made a move to take the southern quarter of the slums, and she might succeed if we don’t handle it soon. We’ve hired sarydâ, but my ‘colleagues’”—he grimaced at the word—“want you in on it as well.”
Raz smirked. The Mahsadën were successful in large part due to the detailed level of structure they managed to wrangle out of an organization that, not long ago, had been a dozen different factions all snapping at each other’s throats. Now, half-a-dozen years later, it was a loosely stitched blanket that all but covered the South, a dark cloud clinging to every dank corner it could find.
Still, Raz always found it amusing how the individual šef mistrusted each other no less than they had a decade ago. The feuds might be generally bloodless, but each leader was always vying for a position of higher power within the overall group.
It made for an interesting dynamic…
“But you don’t want that, do you, Sass?” Raz asked him, grinning and pushing the bowl out of the way to cross his arms on the wooden table. “You’d rather you handle this yourselves, without bringing in more outside help.”
“If you still consider yourself ‘outside help,’ scaly, you clearly haven’t been paying attention to the last few years of your life, have you?” Sass retorted.
Raz’s grin fell. His jaw slackened, revealing his half-finger-long needled white teeth.
“If you think you have any measure of control over me,” he hissed, his crest lifting just so, “then I suggest you tug on my leash and see if I bite.”
Raz could see the muscles in Sass’ chiseled cheeks work, but the šef managed to maintain his contemptuous sneer.
“I was merely suggesting,” he stated forcibly through his strained lips, “that you are better served in other respects. There are jobs I would personally rather you…”
“Sun burn you, you stuck-up trim!” Raz spat, slamming a fist on the table. The remains of the stew jumped. “I don’t give a fuck what you would ‘personally’ rather I do. Just tell me what the job is.”
Sass licked his lips, glaring across the table, blue eyes reflecting an equal mixture of disdain and loathing. In any other man they would have held a healthy portion of fear there, too, but Ergoin Sass hadn’t become the hand pulling the strings of every well-known assassin in the city by being easily frightened.
Mostly he’d managed it by killing off every competitor with his own two hands.
Even so, it was a moment before Sass spoke again, crossing one leg over the other and patting dust off his leather boot.
“Through some of our contacts we’ve managed to figure out where Kî is hiding out—in a series of tunnels under the home of one of her other officers. The problem is that the house is very near the market square. It’s a busy area, and Kî will be on the lookout ever since you pulled the job in the Cages. Not a good place to make our move.”
“But?” Raz prodded.
Sass scowled. “Don’t interrupt me, you cretin. But… Kî moves every few days anyway, and it’s not the fact that we know where she is now that’s important. It’s the fact that we know where she’s going next. She’s moving to an abandoned grain house along the slum line. Likely tomorrow, maybe the day after. Regardless, it doesn’t matter. If we have men in place before she arrives—”
“You’d have the tactical advantage of knowing the place as well as her entourage, not to mention the element of surprise,” Raz finished for him, no longer listening, turning the information over in his head.
The šef opened his mouth to snap at being cut off again, but thought better of it. “I’ve been authorized to offer you forty crowns for the job in advance, and to tell you that there is a direct bounty of another fifty for Kî’s head, payable to whoever brings it forward.”
Raz blinked. For the first time Sass’ words surprised him.
“You want her dead?” he asked. “You don’t want to flip her?”
“We’re passed that.” Sass’ sneer shifted into a teasing smile, and he winked at a passing serving girl, making her giggle. As soon as she was gone, his face twisted back into the crooked smirk. “We’ve offered her everything, with no word back. She’s gained too much power as an individual to be allowed to live. Even if she did join us, the manpower she might bring in would—”
“You,” Raz snarled. “Even if she joined you.”
Sass waved the comment away with a hand. “As you wish. Even if she joined the society, her followers are too numerous and too loyal. It would be more effort than any of us are willing to offer to have their minds changed. No. Kî’s bounty is for her head, and only that.”
Raz sat for a moment, thinking. Here he was on the brink of another decision that would drag him farther down the slick hill he was trying so desperately to scale. On the other hand, if he didn’t accept he’d potentially be sparking a second war with the most powerful criminal alliance in the South…
That isn’t really true, though, he thought. He’d refused work from the Mahsadën before, and it had only led to minor confrontation.
But if he said no this time, wouldn’t he be saying no to every time after? If not, what was the point of refusing this particular contract?
And ninety crowns…
He had no doubt that he would be the one to get to Kî first. He wasn’t bothered in the least with the idea of cutting down the sarydâ to get to the prize. The Cienbal sellswords—even though many of the city folk wrongly lumped him in with them—were nothing more than bandits and raiders who’d been forced to take up mercenary work when the nomadic trade caravans fell apart. They were cutthroats and marauders. Raz would be almost as happy taking Ahna to them as he would be taking her to the slavers.
And if they got in the way of his bounty, he would.
Ninety crowns…
Raz’s temper sparked as he realized he’d made his choice. That kind of money was too much to refuse, even from a man like Ergoin Sass.
“Deal,” Raz said, watching Sass’ satisfied smirk widen. “I’m assuming you have instructions with you?”
The šef nodded, pulling another—much larger—bag of gold and a folded sheet of paper from the other side of his shirt.
“Want me to read it for you?” he drawled, sliding both across the table. “Or maybe the barmaid can help you with it—”
“Get
out,” Raz spat, tucking the paper into the pocket of his cloth shorts and weighing the coins in one hand. “Now.”
V
“Though there are no clear records regarding the High Citadel before the faith took residence within its resilient stone walls, we are fortunate for the work of Priest Duul Obli. A man of Laor, he made it his life’s work in the mid-third century v.S. to piece together the history of Cyurgi’ Di. It is, therefore, only through his thorough research that we know some small parts of our home’s story. Once a military outpost of great import against the savage tribes of the frozen tundra beyond the Vietalis and Saragrias mountain ranges, Priest Obli’s writings tell us that the Citadel seems to have been abandoned during a period of decades of which there are no records. ‘I assume,’ Obli writes, ‘that the winter freezes were particularly brutal for a time, or that some great plague swept through the mountains. After nearly a half century spent empty and hollow, a traveling Laorin—whom I have yet not been able to name—discovered the vast fortress while exploring the ranges. As far as I can tell, this man summoned others to his purpose, becoming the first High Priest of Cyurgi’ Di, and its halls have been filled ever since.’”
—exc. “Studying the Lifegiver,” by Carro al’Dor
Damn these stairs!
Syrah Brahnt squinted, grimacing at the long line of carved stone steps twisting and turning their way up the mountain face before her. High, high above, barely a silhouette in the clouds, the paired towers of Cyurgi’ Di’s great outer gate rose like twin guards to the heavens.
Well, at least I’m definitely moving, she thought with a smirk, shading her eyes.
Three years. Had it truly been three years since she’d been granted her staff? Three years since she’d left the Citadel to follow her own path for a time? It must have. She’d made some headway with the treaties between the western Sigûrth tribe and the great valley cities of Metcaf and Harond, whose provinces the mountain men had been raiding for the last century. Traveling from town to village, she’d helped the people on both sides of the battle line make fortifications to their walls, improve their medicine, and even set up schools of reading and arithmetic for the youngest among them. Need had dissolved old rivalries, and friendships had been forged, both likely and unlikely. Trade routes were formed, and people were brought together in rare opportunity to hammer out the vestiges of a peace that might finally last…
For the first time since she’d been indoctrinated, Syrah had truly felt Laor’s gifts at work, could see them flowing from her hands when she healed and helped those who needed her most.
Talo would be so proud.
Syrah smiled as she climbed, thinking of her old mentor, the steel of her staff clinking against the stone. She’d heard little from him in the last year. Not surprising considering the past winter had been one of the most brutal in recent history. The storms, in fact, were the only reason she’d managed to improve the situation with the mountain clans at all, convincing Metcaf and Harond to offer some fraction of their spare resources to the wild men so that they might survive the freeze. The old Kayle, Emhret Grahst, hadn’t been happy to accept the handouts. Taking the charity stepped away from his tribe’s traditions, turned its back on centuries of ritual pillaging and raiding. Many members of his court and family had been outraged, openly opposing the proposed treaty. One of Grahst’s nephews, a brutal man named Gûlraht Baoill, had been particularly outspoken, going so far as to threaten Syrah’s life for poisoning his uncle’s mind with her tricks and whispers. He hadn’t been alone, either, but in the end need had outweighed custom, and the Kayle took Syrah’s counsel to heart.
At least it meant that all those others claimed by the cold hadn’t died in vain…
Now, though, summer had arrived. Even in the mountains, where the air still held firm to the chill bite of winter, it was more pleasant than uncomfortable. Syrah pulled the hood of her robes back, letting her braided, shoulder-length white hair swing free. It was a clear day, the blue sky that was so much more common now than in the months of the freeze dotted with patches of wispy clouds. Somewhere in the distant cliffs a hawk called out, its screech echoing off the crags. The air was crisp, and Syrah took in a deep breath, feeling her energy leap anew now that she could at least see the end of her travels.
Twenty minutes later she reached the top of the stairway, the roughness of the steps flattening suddenly into the huge semicircular plateau of the outer plaza. The midmorning sun was rising, bathing the eastward entrance of Cyurgi’ Di in light, washing over the mottled gray walls. Syrah smiled again, vaguely remembering the first time she’d seen the leviathans. The two towering bastions pierced with arrow slits had hung, brooding, over the tunnel entrance. Like titans from some child’s nightmare they’d stood, waiting to devour whoever was fool enough to walk between them. But that was then.
Now the place spoke only of the warmth and the comfort of home.
Hitching her bag higher onto her shoulder, Syrah hurried into a jog, staff at her side. She made her way through the tunnel, shivering when the shade sucked away what little heat the sun could bring. There were voices up ahead, echoing happily along the tunnel walls. As she stepped into the light once more, Syrah slowed and stopped, smiling.
Under the watchful eye of a half-dozen older acolytes, two score or so of children were rushing about, playing and enjoying what must have been one of the first clear days of summer this high up the mountain. Syrah felt the nostalgia swell watching the little ones run, screaming in delight and laughing into the bright sky. She could remember those days, too. How she had hated being cooped up for months, locked in the keep…
“Syrah?”
Syrah turned. A man was rushing toward her, waving. He was tall and fit, his strong jaw clean shaven, blonde hair falling just passed his chin. It took her a moment to recognize him.
“Reyn!” she exclaimed, dropping her pack and staff to the ground to allow him to scoop her up and hug her so tight she gasped. “Whoof!” she exhaled when he put her down, grinning up at him. “Reyn! How are you? You’ve grown.”
“I’m the same height I was when you left, you liar,” Reyn Hartlet said with a laugh. His blue eyes glinted with amusement, and he pushed a lock of loose hair behind his ear. “Maybe that southern sun got to your eyes while we were down there after all.”
“I didn’t necessarily say you’d grown up, did I?” Syrah asked playfully, whacking his muscled arm.
Reyn laughed again. “I’m working under Master Brern, now,” he told her, reaching down to pick up her bag as she collected her staff from the ground. “It comes with the job of apprenticing with the weapons master.”
“Wow.” Syrah whistled, impressed. “You’re working in the practice chambers? That’s amazing! And that means you got your staff! When?”
“About two years ago,” Reyn said proudly, throwing her bag over his shoulder and leading the way around the packs of playing children, heading toward the great gate of the keep itself. “I almost managed to do it as fast as you!” He elbowed her teasingly.
“You’re a year older than me,” she said, rolling her eyes with a smile. “I don’t think a year after me is doing it ‘as fast as me.’”
“Maybe, but you got here a whole year before I did,” he pointed out, knocking on the heavy timber as they reached the gates. “So… we’re even.”
Syrah laughed. “Fine,” she conceded with a nod. There was a clang, and the door swung forward.
“Master Hartlet,” a tired, resigned voice grumbled through the opening, “I really must insist that you do not keep requesting to come in and out like this. I’m not as young as I once—by the Lifegiver! Syrah Brahnt! Is that you?”
“Hello, Dolt,” Syrah said with a shy smile as a tubby middle-aged man with a tuft of graying hair atop his head stepped out and into the light. Dolt Avonair had been one of the gatekeepers since before she or Reyn had come to Cyurgi’ Di, and
he squinted at her blearily.
Then he smiled.
“It is! Blessings, child, I didn’t think to see you back for a good while. Have you come to pay your respects? Poor man. We will sorely miss—”
“Talo said to bring any word of you straight to him,” Reyn cut in suddenly, smiling pointedly at the gatekeeper. “He’ll be happy to see you. Do you know if he’s in his quarters, Dolt?”
The man scratched at his bald chin. “I think so… They just finished moving him in yesterday, so he’s probably rearranging things. Goodness they’re a change from his old chambers. Makes me want to be High Priest just thinking about—”
“Thanks!” Reyn called back, already pulling Syrah along into the halls.
“What was that all about?” Syrah asked him as they walked, twisting and winding their way through the citadel. “Who am I supposed to be paying my respects to?”
The inside of the great temple was unchanged, leaping right out of her memories. Dusty rays of light poured in from the arrow slits along the halls that trailed the outside wall, candles and lanterns lighting the inner ones. The air was warm, the pipes that ran under the stones still working, which meant they hadn’t shut down the boilers in the bottom levels for the summer yet. Classrooms and quarters to either side of them had their doors swung open, and she caught more than one glimpse of acolytes and Priests praying and studying.
Beside her, Reyn’s face contorted for a moment into what looked like the remnants of grief. It shifted back almost immediately.
“Talo should be the one to tell you,” he said hesitantly, ending the conversation.
Syrah frowned, feeling a knot form in her gut. Ignoring it, she looked around. She wasn’t familiar with the route they were taking, but it didn’t surprise her. There were a dozen different ways to get to any single place within the temple, and everyone had their preferences. It used to be a child’s game, in fact. Those with the fastest route were the winners, and got to be King of the Citadel for a day.
Child of the Daystar (The Wings of War Book 1) Page 22