The Nichan Smile

by C. J. Merwild

  “Hush,” the same man calmly said. “Hush, you little wild beast. Look what you made me do. Forcing me to touch you. Only fire can purify this hand now.” Gus blinked and shook his head to free his face from the grip clenching his cheeks. To no avail. “Behave yourself and you won’t feel any pain.”

  Tears finally flowed out of Gus’s eyes, and his sight cleared in the darkness. At first only the shape of a grease lamp swinging at the end of a metal ring appeared at the edge of his sight.

  Nearby, the muffled creaking of a heavy door sliding on its hinges.

  The village gates.

  Gus opened his eyes wider, the palm of one of his captors still tightly pressed against his mouth. He then saw the face of a man. His sight was troubled, the world turned upside down. The human still recognized the nichan who faced him and who now accompanied Beïka.

  Orator Issba.

  Beïka and Issba were taking him out of the village.

  Gus’s blood turned cold.

  I’m dead . . .

  X X X I I

  Night and silence had fallen on Visha several hours ago when Domino tiptoed out of the house and climbed up to the fortress through the sleeping city.

  The two guards at the first gate let him in without making a fuss, as though anyone could invite themselves in, or as if the young man was expected.

  One went to fetch Lienn, who showed up a few minutes later. Calico was with her, dressed in her armor, her short black hair messy over her ears. The presence of the second nichan annoyed Domino. What he had to tell Lienn didn’t need to be shared with anyone else. But Calico kept her gray eyes intensely fixed on him.

  “It’s late,” Lienn said. “Is everything all right?” Unlike Calico, she didn’t seem to have found her way to bed yet. Her complexion was fresh, her eyes bright.

  “I heard my uncle accepted the alliance,” Domino said. “Congratulations.”

  He couldn’t stop the bitterness thickening his mood from piercing through his voice. This alliance affected him closely. He should have been invited to the negotiation. But more than anything else, he would have wanted to be told of Lienn’s schemes and marriage plans before his uncle.

  “So you know the details?” said the young woman.

  “Ero remained vaguer than you can imagine. To believe that he’s the one you’re going to marry.”

  “Your uncle wanted to keep this conversation between clan leaders.”

  “Of course.” Domino pinched the bridge of his nose, glanced at Calico standing upright like a post, and sighed. “I’d like to talk to you, in private, if possible.”

  “I understand. Come with me.”

  Which he did. Calico, however, followed suit. As they left the vestibule, another nichan left his guardhouse by a door and joined them. Then another. And so on and so forth. As a fifth nichan joined them along a large corridor, Domino halted, his escort and Lienn doing the same.

  Behind him, the guards and Calico positioned themselves to fill the entire width of the corridor, blocking the way back.

  Domino remained calm, but already anxiety was coming to the fore. “I have the impression that ‘in private’ doesn’t mean the same thing in this region. Is there a problem here?”

  Lienn turned around, her face closed, or was it an effect of darkness on her features? “Absolutely not,” she said, shaking her head.

  “All right. Let me rephrase the question,” Domino insisted. “Did I make a mistake coming to see you tonight?”

  “On the contrary. I would have come for you myself if you hadn’t.” He opened his mouth to speak, but she resumed her advance, adding, “I want to help you, but to do so, you have to trust me.”

  The other nichans followed him closely. None of them touched or pushed him, but their presence alone was like a threat behind his back. His face slightly to the side, Domino kept an eye on his escort. For the time being, the guards’ attitude showed only one intention: Domino had no right to turn back and leave. He’d come all the way here and would have to accept what they would give him.

  So Domino caught up with Lienn. They climbed stairs less and less decorated. Draughts swept down the nape of Domino’s neck. The temperature dropped as they advanced, walking almost in step, quiet. The last corridor they reached was full of matted spiders’ webs and dust. The stone floor was crusted with salt. Lienn stopped here and opened the first door on her right. There was no lock, only a rudimentary latch and a beam to block the opening. The young woman entered, and this time a hand led Domino inside. Looking over his shoulder he saw that it was Calico who pushed him slightly, her jaw tight.

  Even though his curiosity was growing, Domino began to doubt. If this was a trap, he could already see his doom at the end of the road.

  The inside looked unfamiliar. It was a small, arched room carved out of rock. It was neither furnished nor lit, except for the lamps that two of the guards brought with them. Only here and there the remnants of thick rusty nails were embedded in the wall. The floor was littered with bird droppings and feathers. It looked like a cell. But what took Domino’s breath away for a moment was the complete absence of a wall at the back of the room and an unsettling view on the emptiness of the dark night. Beyond, invisible at this hour, the sea raged. Its spray had encrusted the stone even more than the smell of birds’ excrement.

  Lienn stood one step from the precipice and faced the night, her long, blonde hair swept by the furious eastern wind. Domino hesitated to join her. Calico pushed him again.

  “Could you stop that?” he said, trying not to let his sudden fear show through. But his heart couldn’t be so easily controlled and his pulse drummed in his ears as loudly as the waves bursting below.

  He was far enough away from the edge, but knew that whoever would be thrown over that opening would either crash into the sea or into the rocks.

  “Calico, leave him alone,” Lienn ordered, turning around, and then she laid eyes on Domino. “You’re not planning to run away, are you?”

  The young man looked back. The nichans were in the way. “I’m a good swimmer, but I doubt I’ll make that dive,” Domino said, the bitterness rising like bile in the back of his throat. “And I don’t feel like I’m going to have a choice if I try to get through the door.”

  “You’ll have it soon. This is not a trap. I promise you that. Come closer.”

  “I’m fine where I am.”

  Lienn nodded once. “I’m sure you have questions about the agreement made between your uncle and me.”

  Your uncle and me.

  Domino knew his uncle. He didn’t need to be told about the requests he’d made that morning. The Unaan had probably demanded to remain the chief of the Ueto Clan, to command Domino in the battles to come, to choose several of the members of the council that would be born from the merger of the two clans. That sort of thing. Control was all that Ero would always refuse to give up, apart from his children.

  Domino didn’t care. He had something else in mind. “The marriage, why didn’t you tell me about it before you told my uncle?”

  “Because you’re not the leader of the clan, and it’s not your decision to make.” That answer froze Domino’s blood. Did he really have no say in the matter? “You’re not the leader, but you will be,” Lienn added.

  “That’s all very nice, but I’m lost. And apparently, I’m also trapped. If this is a game, maybe I should know the rules first.”

  “This is not a game, Domino.”

  “Well that’s a relief, because I’m not enjoying myself.”

  Lienn stepped toward him, a tall figure in the middle of the night. The marks inked in her chin and neck were more striking than ever.

  “So here’s the truth, as I see it. This alliance means more to me than you can imagine. The man I’m going to marry will be no one’s puppet. That man must be my equal, able to think and act on his own free will. He must be a clan leader willing to rule by my side, to fight for my nichans with the same rage that I’ll use to protect his. This man w
ill also be the father of my children, and the father of my children must never be at the mercy of an Unaan such as your uncle. That man must be you, Domino.”

  “And I’m not your equal, nor am I a clan leader.”

  “Exactly.”

  He finally understood what she had in mind. He also understood the purpose of this room for such a conversation. The cell was large enough for a good number of guards to surround Domino if he decided to attack. But it was also too small to allow him to transform himself if he wanted to. After all, his handicap could have been a feint, a way to get close to Lienn while making himself look as harmless as a child. Lienn was taking precautions, nothing more natural than that. She had no way of knowing if Domino wasn’t as surly as Ero.

  “Your uncle is a danger to this alliance,” continued Lienn. “He wants to stay in power. Worse yet, he wants to keep you under his control. You, a Liyion, one of the strongest links in our species. Aside from the fact that you won’t learn anything about your true nature as long as this man is tied to you, he may jeopardize the most important union our people have known since the Great Evil.”

  “You want me to leave my clan,” Domino guessed, calmer than he would have thought now that the truth had been revealed to him. “You want me to break the blood oath that binds me to him.”

  “Yes and no.”

  “Elaborate, please.”

  “No, because that would take too long. It would take months, maybe more, before your blood was cleared of your uncle’s presence.”

  Indeed. Domino knew that his mother, on leaving the Ueto clan, had long felt the weight of the oath made to her brother pulling her down, making every decision a challenge.

  Nichans needed to lead, or be led, whether they lived in clans or in small groups. They felt protected and empowered. Together, they had a purpose and a family. For those who decided to live far from their people, without a leader . . . Domino ignored how these individuals managed to survive. Ako could have created her own little clan and sworn in her sons. She would have only strengthened the bond that already existed between the four of them. But she’d never done it. Domino was too young at the time to ask his mother why. The thought hadn’t even crossed his mind.

  So he understood what Lienn was getting at. Getting out of Ero’s clutches as his mother had done would take too long, if he succeeded at all. Ero would be constantly breathing down his neck, telling him to do this and that, treating him like a child, as he’d always done. Domino dreamed of breaking that bond, of no longer feeling that uneasiness and suffering tearing his guts and heart and bending his spine every time Ero opposed his will.

  “Your training needs to start as soon as possible,” Lienn said. “This alliance must be announced to my people in the coming days to prepare the village for the changes to come when we welcome yours. So yes, I want you to break your blood oath. You must end it with your uncle tonight.”

  End it?

  For a moment, Domino pictured the worst. Was Lienn planning to go after Ero? And Memek . . .

  But his attention moved onto the next of his fears when Lienn added, “Swear me an oath here and now. Break the blood oath that binds you to your uncle.”

  Domino’s breath was taken away and a hot flush of surprise ran down his entire body. “Did I hear right?”

  Then the cell door closed and someone barred the door from the outside. The nichans inside lined the walls, ready to react if Domino made the slightest sudden move. If he tried to attack Lienn, her guards would rip his throat open, or would throw him in the ocean.

  “If you pledge your allegiance to me, you will be free,” she said. “Your uncle will no longer be able to control you. You’ll have to pretend to still belong to him until your clan is here, until everyone is safe, but you won’t suffer anymore.”

  “But you’ll control me,” Domino said in a cold voice. “We met, what? Four days ago? And is it even fair to swear in your future husband? How does that make me your equal?”

  “The oath you swear to me will only serve to free you from his grip. Once it’s done, you can begin to break your bond with me.”

  “Of course. You’re just gonna let me, right?”

  “Unlike him, I won’t stop you.”

  “You spent a few hours with him, and you already know exactly the kind of person he is . . . ” He shut his mouth as she took a step in his direction, her face now darkened by something Domino hadn’t seen before on her soft features.

  “One of his conditions was half of our children.”

  Domino froze. “What do you mean?”

  “ ‘I want every other of your children to swear the oath to me, to be a Ueto.’ These were his words.”

  Domino licked his lips with his suddenly dry tongue. He recognized the taste of disgust in his mouth. “Did he, now?”

  “He considers that it’s only fair since he’s offering his own pure blood to the alliance.”

  “Did you accept?”

  “What do you think?”

  Fury and hate. Domino knew what Lienn felt right now. He felt it too. “I’m going to guess that you refused.”

  “Over my dead and rotting corpse,” Lienn said, a void deeper than the night beyond her silhouette filling her eyes. Her young and soft voice was now threatening. “The first to draw my children’s blood will lose their life.”

  Here’s something we both agree on.

  This could be a trick, though, he told himself, but the thought was a vain fight against what he already knew. To request the control of his children, potential pure blood. To bargain with their future mother. If the hollow scar at the edge of Domino’s eye hadn’t been there, he might have doubted Lienn’s honesty.

  But the scar was there.

  “Once you are free,” Lienn said, “you can begin to welcome your own protégés. You’ll become the leader of your own clan. My equal.”

  Domino assimilated all this information, struggling to believe what came out of Lienn’s mouth. She kept her distance, but he could still feel the determination in her posture.

  “You’ve been thinking about this for a long time,” he said.

  “Since our first conversation.”

  “I see. Always a step ahead.”

  “I know it’s a heavy sacrifice to make.”

  “It’s not just my uncle I’d be betraying by doing this. It’s my whole clan.”

  “You are a Liyion, Domino. When you come back to your people, stronger than ever, they’ll understand that it is you they must follow, not your uncle. They’ll respect your choice.”

  Domino laughed despite the tension contracting his muscles and sending unpleasant spasms into his right arm. “You know them even less than you know me.”

  “True, but your uncle is an easy man to figure out, and I doubt you’re the only one in your clan to find his temperament unworthy of a protector.”

  Another statement Domino could have easily denied. Outside of Mora, no one had ever reacted to Ero’s violence. For his clan, Domino was two things: a failure responsible for his brother’s death; the boy who had willingly shared his bed with a Vestige for over a decade. Two things worthy of his uncle’s punishment. For all Domino knew, his fellow Uetos would kill and die for Ero.

  And even if Lienn were right, that didn’t change anything. He’d gone on a pilgrimage to change, not to overthrow his Unaan. Yet he wanted this alliance, despite what it would force him to do.

  In the span of two months, he’d escaped death by a hair three times. This couldn’t happen again. He wanted to control his true nature and protect his people from the approaching threat. Gus, Natso, and Belma. Without the Riskans’ help, without his nichan abilities, Domino would be useless. To keep them alive and safe, he was willing to do anything. To marry, to have children with a stranger, to leave Surhok, to fight every individual who would attack his family and threaten the survival of his species.

  It wasn’t the life he’d dreamed of for him and Gus. In truth, he’d long thought that things would stay
as they were, that nothing would separate them, that the two of them would always share the same hut, that they would finish growing up and care for each other. But Domino was different, and that difference demanded sacrifices from him.

  This gift from the Gods required constant payment, apparently.

  He took several steps in Lienn’s direction and then walked around her to look at the sea. In the complete absence of light he saw neither the waves nor even the walls of the fortress. But he heard the tumult of the water and foam bubbling and was completely overwhelmed by its din. In his mind, a void had formed.

  “It’s funny how everyone seems to have a definite plan for me, but no one ever thought to ask my opinion. Tell me, do I really look as stupid as everyone think I am?”

  “Then talk to me,” Lienn said in a softer voice. “I’m listening. Tell me what you want.”

  What I want . . .

  He quickly sorted out his thoughts. “No more lies. No more plots behind my back.”

  “All right.”

  Domino went on as if he hadn’t heard her, still looking at the sea whose surf was denied to his sight. “If we are to raise children together, I want it to be in an honest home.”

  “All right.”

  He took a look at her, studying her careful expression. “In case it wasn’t clear, I’m talking about you.”

  “It was clear.”

  He turned back to the invisible sea. “I’ll take responsibility for my betrayal. Anyone who joins me won’t know it was your idea. When Ero hears about it, I’ll deal with the consequences myself. I’m used to it.”

  “Why?” Lienn asked.

  “You mentioned a puppet. It’s a role I don’t want,” he answered, turning to her, still feeling in his throat the humiliation of being reduced to silence by a couple words from his uncle. “If I accept this plan, which I’m obviously about to do, I won’t flee. I’ll pay the price if things go wrong. I alone. No matter how hard you pull the strings, there’s nothing stopping me from jumping off the edge right now to escape your plans. You want us to be equal, it starts by giving me control of my own life, even if I have to spend the rest of it with you.”