Fields of Wrath

by Mickey Zucker Reichert

  “I know your mission,” Weile said. “And we can help you.” He turned on his heel and melted into the brush. “Come, Saviar. Keep the sword.”

  “How . . .” Saviar started, then kept the thought to himself. How could he possibly know? Yet, he did not doubt the Eastern leader of the elite palace guards. Weile had means of knowing things that went far beyond logic. He was a terrifying man, with terrible enemies, yet Saviar could think of no one he would rather have on his side. More accurately, he could think of no one he would rather not have as an adversary.

  Saviar followed.

  I prefer to face a Renshai armed than angry.

  —Prince Leondis of Pudar

  THE ELITE EASTERN PALACE GUARDS spoke little as they led Saviar to their campsite, which suited him. The route they took required him to crawl through copses that seemed impenetrable, to clamber over massive deadfalls towering over his head, and to scamper through tiny openings he would not have noticed without the help of his wiry leaders. Nevertheless, they reached their goal quickly, stopping at a clearing that seemed far too small to comfortably fit even the four men who accompanied Saviar.

  One man brushed aside a tangle of vines to reveal a hole that ran deep into the ground. The dark-clothed men skittered inside, two in front of Saviar, including Weile Kahn, and two held back, gesturing for him to enter.

  Doubtfully, Saviar pressed forward. He was naturally tall and well-muscled, easily the largest man of the group, and the idea of pressing into an opening that hampered his sword arm rankled. Trusting Weile, however, he hesitated only a moment before following them. The agility trained into him since infancy allowed him to maneuver through the relatively tight space without as much effort as he expected. He did not have to wriggle, as he had first suspected, and managed to crawl through without falling behind.

  The tunnel swiftly opened into a large room carved from the dirt and lit with lanterns. Weile was already explaining Saviar’s presence to a group of six men when Saviar spilled into the space behind him. The other two men quickly followed, and the eleven total occupants of the room fit comfortably, leaving plenty of space for packs of traveling gear and makeshift sleeping quarters. A long, heavy curtain spiked into the earthen wall hid a portion of the wall about the size of a doorway. The fabric was heavy enough to dampen sound, and Saviar suspected this simple abode had a second room behind it.

  Weile gestured at the floor, and Saviar quickly dropped to a crouch in the indicated space. The other men sat around him in various stages of readiness, much as Renshai would have done in the same situation. The man whose sword Saviar had taken hunkered down nearest the exit, studying his injury in the guttering light of one of the lanterns.

  Saviar tried to catch the man’s eye. “Sorry about your fingers. I didn’t know you were allies.” He added reluctantly, “Would you like your sword back?”

  The swarthy Easterner looked away from his hand long enough to give Saviar a wan smile. “Keep it, Renshai,” he said magnanimously. “I’m not mad at you; I’m mad at myself. We’re better off with you armed, and I have another.”

  A few nods followed that pronouncement, and Saviar accepted the gift with a sincere nod. Renshai were never so generous with weapons, mostly because they carried only the best.

  Weile Kahn remained standing when the others sat, looking exceptionally spry for his age. “Your mission, Saviar. Would it involve finding three missing mages?”

  Saviar tried his best not to appear stunned, though he found his head bobbing without intention. “Well, yes, in fact.” He tried to stay a step ahead. Weile had a way of off-balancing others, whether warriors, paupers, or kings. “And you know this because . . .” Saviar did not give Weile time to answer before venturing his own guess. “. . . you captured them. Didn’t you?”

  Weile grinned at Saviar’s quick wit, apparently more used to people asking rather than seeking the answers on their own. “My men did, yes.”

  Saviar tried to catch some sign of smugness from the men, some indication they took pride in a difficult job done well, but he saw nothing. These elite guards kept their thoughts nearly as well-hidden as their leader did. He ventured another prediction. “And you’re holding them on the other side of this curtain.”

  “Indeed,” Weile said. “They’re trussed and gagged to keep them from using magic against us, but they’re otherwise well-kept.”

  Saviar supposed the Myrcidians should appreciate the absence of torture, but he found it difficult to reconcile “well-kept” with “trussed and gagged.” “And . . . you’re going to let me return them without a fight.” He glanced around at the guardsmen. He could battle them all on open terrain and feel reasonably confident of success. Here, hampered by the closeness of the quarters, he felt less so, especially when he realized that, whatever they lacked in sword ability compared to a Renshai, they more than made up for in guile and stealthy training.

  Weile chuckled. “Saviar, I pick my battles carefully, and I don’t make unnecessary enemies, especially powerful ones. When you return with them, I intend to accompany you.”

  Saviar drew breath to protest. Bringing outsiders to the Myrcidians’ compound would violate his vow. Or would it? Saviar suddenly realized he had made no such promise, at least not this time. He tried to recall the explicit details of his original agreement with the Myrcidians, the one he had made before the war. “I . . . don’t think I can do that.” He wished he could remember exactly what he had said the first time he and Subikahn had left the mages. They had done so under duress, with Chymmerlee as a captive. So much time had passed, so many things had happened; and, at the time, Saviar had not yet fully recovered from near-death injuries he could not even remember receiving.

  Weile Kahn grinned wickedly. He had the words Saviar did not. “You agreed to . . .” Clearly, he quoted Jeremilan word-for-word: “‘Release my great-granddaughter unhurt, keep our existence and whereabouts a secret, return to us, and assure that your brother . . .’” Weile broke out of direct reference to clarify, “. . . meaning Subikahn . . .” He returned to Jeremilan’s voice, “‘does the same.’ According to Subikahn, who has an irritatingly excellent memory, like his father, you replied, and I quote you: ‘I so vow, but only with the reassurance that we are free to come and go as we please from this time onward.’”

  Saviar nodded, certain the leader of the Eastlands’ elite guards had recited the conversation verbatim. “Yes, that sounds right, sir. And that ‘irritatingly excellent memory’ clearly runs in the family farther back than Tae Kahn.”

  Weile’s tight-lipped grin revealed little. “It’s clear the Myrcidians violated their part of the agreement first, thereby fully negating the contract.”

  Saviar sucked in a deep breath, shook his head. “I only asked for his reassurance. Just because Jeremilan was not true to his word doesn’t give me the right to breach my promise.”

  Weile remained in position. Saviar expected him to sigh or roll his eyes at the rigid stupidity of Saviar’s position, but he did not. His expression never changed. “It’s your right to see things the way you wish, Saviar, but you must also understand that most men would view that exchange as a contract. Once the mages dishonored it, it ceased to exist.”

  Saviar held his ground. He respected his father, his grandfather, and the Knights of Erythane too much to back down. Though he had not joined the knighthood, at least not yet, he saw no reason not to honor its tenets. “I am not most men.”

  “Indeed.” Weile made no attempt to argue. “But, at least on this issue, Subikahn is. Though he made no similar vow, he valued your promise, obeying it until the mages broke the contract. He then felt free to entrust me with their secrets. Surely, you can see that Subikahn violated no one’s honor by doing so.”

  Saviar wondered why such a thing mattered to a man infamous for organizing the basest criminals in the world. Yet, he had to admit, Weile had never done anything directly di
shonorable to his personal knowledge. “I have no malice toward my twin. I understand, and appreciate, his decision.” Saviar had never tried to force his personal code of honor onto anyone else, and he understood Weile’s and Subikahn’s position. “But you have to understand that I must . . .” He sought the exact words Weile had used to quote Jeremilan, “. . . keep their existence and whereabouts a secret.”

  Weile finally chuckled. “A secret from whom, Saviar? Everyone in this camp knows about the existence and whereabouts of the Mages of Myrcidë. I am merely asking to walk with you into the compound, not show me its location.”

  Saviar blinked. He could hardly argue with the point. He would not be revealing any secrets to Weile Kahn, who had already approached, or even entered, the hidden fortress to purloin three of its inhabitants. “You make an undeniable point. Fine, we’ll go together.” He glanced around the room, at the dark-swathed men in positions around their leader. “But I think it’s best if it’s the two of us and the captives. Any more than that, and they’re likely to attack.”

  “Agreed,” Weile said, though Saviar doubted Subikahn’s grandfather wanted it any other way. Weile had a crafty ability to arrange situations to get exactly what he desired, even when it seemed otherwise. “It’ll be you and me and two Myrcidian captives.”

  Saviar stiffened. “Did you say two? Jeremilan’s under the impression he’s missing three.”

  “And he is,” Weile said.

  Saviar’s heart rate quickened. If a Myrcidian had died, it would make any negotiation Weile planned more difficult. The mages had only twenty-six members and had suffered great hardship attempting to find or create more. It was the sole reason they had insisted Saviar and Subikahn return, when they had still believed the twins’ auras indicated Myrcidian heritage.

  Weile put that fear to rest with his next statement. “We’re holding one back. As leverage.”

  Saviar wanted to argue but knew it would prove pointless. He would eventually reunite all three mages with their people, but he would have to do it Weile’s way. Only then, when he stopped thinking of the captured Myrcidians as a single group did it occur to Saviar the situation gave him an opportunity he had sought since before his capture. “Sir, would it be all right if I spoke with one of the captives in private?”

  Weile tipped his head but otherwise gave no sign he needed to consider the request. “If you’ll stop calling me ‘sir.’ I’m not titled.”

  The comment seemed ludicrous. Weile had used his influence with the criminal element of the East to usurp the kingdom and install himself as its ruler. Since then, he had passed the throne to his son, turned his followers into elite guardsmen, and, apparently, disclaimed any right to an official position or designation.

  “Very well.” Saviar did not use the man’s name, either. It felt odd not to use an honorific when addressing his twin’s grandfather, especially one who had once sat on the throne of the Eastlands. “I’m going to need to ungag her. Will that bother anyone?”

  Weile glanced around the group. Saviar did not hear or see a reply, but Weile must have received something because he nodded. “Just remind Chymmerlee we can make her captivity easy or more difficult, depending on her actions.”

  Saviar stiffened at the name. He should have assumed Weile would know it, as well as to which prisoner he referred.

  “If she uses magic, we’ll have no choice but to stop her. And see it doesn’t happen again.”

  The vague threat troubled Saviar. He felt certain the type of men surrounding Weile could imagine ways of silencing a woman that would never occur to him. He could not allow them to harm her no matter what she did. Not wishing to raise trouble where none yet existed, Saviar kept his mouth shut on the matter. “May I?” He pointed toward the curtain.

  Weile was at the entry before Saviar saw him prepare to move. He gave no indication of what he had intended to do. “Let me talk to the guards first, let them know what to expect. We’ll move the others away from her. We don’t have enough space to give you an unoccupied chamber; but, if you keep your voices down, no one will hear you.” He did not wait for a reply before ducking through the curtain, as swift and soundless as a shadow.

  Saviar glanced around the room, avoiding the dark, Eastern eyes of his new companions, instead focusing on their swords. They appeared reasonably made and well-tended, similar to the one he had taken from its owner.

  Shortly, Weile returned and made a motion toward the curtain. Saviar lifted it, finding it even heavier than he had expected. No sound had emerged from Weile’s conversation with his guards, and Saviar suspected the heavy cloth had everything to do with it. He ducked through the opening he had created and let it fall back in place behind him.

  The room reeked of sweat and fear, mingled with the damp odor of fresh earth and a faint hint of a recent lightning storm. Saviar recognized the smell of Myrcidian, a unique neutral scent he could not have described, that permeated the Myrcidians’ compound. On one side of the room, a dark-clothed Easterner sat watching a bound man and woman. On the other side, Chymmerlee sat alone, hands tied behind her back, ankles wrapped together, a gag thrust into her mouth and tied behind her head. It hid her mouth, but the rage in her blue-gray eyes came through clearly. She glared at Saviar.

  Saviar glided over to Chymmerlee and crouched in front of her. “Chymmerlee, I’ve been trying to speak to you for months, but you wouldn’t listen.”

  Chymmerlee made a muffled noise. Her eyes narrowed.

  Saviar hated to speak under these circumstances. He longed to remove the gag and the bindings, but he dared not do so. If she behaved the way she had the last few times he had attempted to speak with her, she might get herself tortured or killed. “Chymmerlee, you know how I feel about you.”

  Chymmerlee rolled her eyes toward the ceiling, dodging his gaze. Saviar expected tears to follow, but they did not.

  Saviar sighed and continued. He had once considered himself a competent speaker. His current series of failures with Chymmerlee and her great-grandfather convinced him otherwise. “Maybe I’m stupid, but I don’t understand why you don’t . . .” He hesitated, seeking the right word. He knew she had once loved him; but, as she had never spoken the word aloud in his conscious presence, it did not seem fair to use it. “. . . like me anymore.”

  Chymmerlee’s gaze shifted suddenly, meeting his full on. There was raw hatred in those eyes; and, suddenly, Saviar wished she had continued to avoid his stare. Now, he found his eyes locked with hers, unable to look away.

  Saviar continued, “I know I didn’t tell you I’m Renshai, and I should have. That was a betrayal I deeply regret, but I didn’t do it to hurt you in any way. You see, I had already sworn an oath to my brother, before I even knew you existed, that I wouldn’t tell any Myrcidian.” Saviar gave her an attentive look, certain that piece of information, the one he had waited so long to deliver, would appease her. “You know I’d never violate a promise. Not to you. Not to anyone.”

  Chymmerlee’s eyes remained fixed. He could not tell whether or not any of what he said had gotten through to her. “Other than that, I’ve done nothing but good to you. You know that, Chymmerlee.”

  Chymmerlee continued to stare.

  Saviar smiled, though only slightly. He wanted to let her know he had the best of intentions, without taunting in any way. “I’m going to remove the gag, now. These men . . .” He indicated the elite Eastern guardsmen with a jerk of his head. “I have little to no influence with them. I’m trying to convince them to return you home.” He looked over his shoulder at the two men still standing with the other Myrcidians, then returned his attention to Chymmerlee. “If they attempt to harm you, I’ll do my best to stop them. Short of that, I can’t help you. So, please, don’t try to use magic.” Believing himself prepared for anything, Saviar removed the gag.

  Immediately, Chymmerlee spat in his face.

  That, Saviar had
not expected. He backstepped instinctively, releasing a small whimper. Though physically painless, the attack felt like a dagger thrust into his chest. He looked at Chymmerlee in open surprise, and she appeared slightly blurred. Apparently, tears had formed in his eyes. He fisted them away, along with the glob of spittle. “If you have something to say, say it now. Otherwise, the gag goes back in, and we’re finished here.”

  Chymmerlee’s jaw set. She seemed about to spit at him again, but the step backward had taken him out of easy range. Instead, she swallowed hard, and her glare grew even more intrusive. “You demon bastard! Spawn of Hel herself! You raped me!”

  The words made even less sense from Chymmerlee’s mouth than they had from the other Myrcidians’. Shocked and humiliated, Saviar did not know what to say. “I . . . I did nothing of the kind, and you know it! I’ve never laid a violent hand on you. Aside from not telling you I’m Renshai, I’ve treated you with nothing but kindness.”

  Each word was a deadly snarl. “You . . . raped . . . me.”

  As they had both practically shouted, Saviar knew the others in the room had heard her accusation as well as his denial. He dared not look behind him. It would mortify him to find them all staring. “When did I supposedly do this heinous thing? I’ve never even been fully alone with you.”

  “While I slept, I suppose. I don’t know!”

  A nervous chuckle escaped Saviar.

  Chymmerlee’s expression hardened more, if possible. “So you think rape is funny, you barbarous devil!”

  “Of course not.” Saviar ignored the insults to focus on the significant points. “Rape is a monstrous evil. It’s never humorous. But, if someone actually raped you, don’t you think you’d be the first to know?”

  “Magic can erase the memory,” Chymmerlee said. “But I still know it happened.”

  Saviar shook his head. “How?”

  Chymmerlee spat out her next words so forcefully, Saviar expected more gobbets of spittle to accompany them. “I’m pregnant, you monster! Explain that!”