The Sheening Of The Blades (Book 1)

by Kari Cordis

  “Of course there was an enemy,” she snapped impatiently. “But there are other ways of dealing with conflict than to just blindly turn and swing.”

  “I think you’re right,” Banion agreed, returning to his grouse.

  She looked at him suspiciously.

  “In fact, if we ever end up facing them again, I vote we send you out in front to talk some sense into both sides.”

  “Seconded,” Rodge piped up.

  Melkin’s grim presence loomed up over them, then, and Cerise had to choke back her retort.

  Ari dreamed of the Empress and Ivory that night. They were all sitting around a fire by the garden of his youth, tucking him into his bed—somehow set into the tangled growth of the garden patch. He woke up thinking ruefully that he was losing his perspective.

  Several days out from the Shepherd’s Hall, they rode into Shearling. The horses’ hooves raised desolate clouds of dust as they walked down empty streets, lined with row after row of deserted buildings. After a week of riding through nothing but soft grass and wide-open space, it was a little creepy, like the world had moved on while they were wandering around in the maze of the Wolflands’ fairytales. Clumps of wool fluttered everywhere, looking lost and lonely, but that was all they saw moving until they reached the river. A few weeks out of the year, the only known town in Addah burst with bleating, wooly life, a cheerful cacophony of shearing and selling and buying of a year’s worth of basic necessities before the Addahites disappeared back up into their hills with their naked sheep. It was the finest wool in the Realms, unfortunately for the reclusive locals. Their quiet little business with the North had turned into a huge trade fair, famous throughout the Empire and attended by thousands.

  They were several weeks late for the shearing, but the banks of the Kendrick still rippled with steady activity. Barges lined both sides of it for almost a half-league, barely bobbing in the smooth current. Despite its width here, it only took about three of the enormous, flat boats to span the river.

  “You’ve gotta be kidding,” Rodge said, looking over the scene as Melkin led them right down to the quay. “He can’t possibly be thinking of going by water,” he said with dismay.

  “It’ll cut the time to the Coast by over half,” Banion said cheerfully. With a pleased rumble, he laboriously dismounted and headed to a nearby dock. Another huge man, indubitably Merranic with that girth, threw up his hands at sight of him and bellowed something loud and utterly incomprehensible.

  “I thought you hated your stupid horse,” Loren said, trying to cheer Rodge up.

  “At least I can stop Radish,” he mourned bitterly.

  “You can hardly keep him going,” Cerise observed tartly.

  They did indeed rent a barge, from Banion’s friend Effenrike, no less. Ari and Loren were thrilled, all for packing as much adventure as possible into the summer…Rodge not quite as much. The planks of the barge were thick and sound underfoot, the huge surface so steady under them that only Cerise’s high-strung chestnut had to be coaxed into the holding pen in the center. There were a few crates and barrels bound for Merrani that sat just in front of the livestock pens, looking lonely and forlorn in the space used for many tons of cargo. Aside from that, there were only the few features for passengers at the far bow and stern and the rest of the barge was flat, deserted space.

  “Welcome, welcome!” Effenrike boomed at them as the party gathered up at the bow once the horses were settled. Cerise gave him a once-over with a lip already starting to curl. Loren and Ari, however, began to grin as their eyes took in the fur vest, tall boots, and the beautifully-hilted broadsword hanging from his well-fed waist. Men didn’t walk around in the North with belted swords—this was looking more rakish and exciting every minute.

  Effenrike and Banion were old acquaintances, or so the rest of them assumed. They carried on an endless series of reminiscings, largely incoherent and accompanied by great guffaws of laughter and much slapping of the back, while Shearling dock hands threw off the dozens of thick ropes binding the barge to shore.

  And that quickly, they had slipped away from the High Wilds. Effenrike guided them, without paying any apparent attention to the process, through the chaos of drifting barges and smaller boats that clogged the river. It was several minutes, even being the off-season, before the river cleared out and everyone could relax a little.

  The novelty of river flotation unfortunately faded rather quickly. Relaxation turned to boredom, the thrilling pulse to stilted monotony. The sun was hot, there was no shade, the scenery changed very slowly, and there wasn’t much to do. They were sitting around staring at the bank, at each other, and at Effenrike, when Rodge said in disgust, “There’s a rat or something under there.” He pointed down to the pathetic little pile of cargo. “I saw the tarp move.”

  “No rats on my boats!” Effenrike said, somehow managing to sound cheerful and offended at the same time.

  Kai, endlessly alert, must have also been bored. He began to glide, lithe and silent, toward the cargo, and Ari felt a smile tug at his lips. Sending a Dra after a rat might be considered a little overkill.

  But it wasn’t a rat that scurried out when Kai flicked back the heavy tarp. A filthy boy with matted hair leapt out, dashing for the edge of the barge like a bolt of lightning. Faster than the eye could follow, the Dra reached out one long arm and snatched the dirty collar, hauling him like so much deadwood back up against the side of a crate. With a contortionist’s agility, obviously desperate, and highly motivated to be somewhere else, the boy wriggled and squirmed, almost coming out of his overshirt.

  “Ho!” Effenrike bellowed. “A stowaway!” He locked the steering wheel and lumbered agitatedly down the barge, the rest of them in tow. By the time they’d reached the excitement, the boy’s frantic movements had ceased. He lay pressed without a word under Kai’s implacable hands, panting heavily. His face, squished up against the crate, was almost impossible to see under its coating of grime and the wads of hair dangling off of his head.

  Melkin frowned heavily at him for several minutes, waiting for Effenrike, who was delivering a loud and outraged storm of empty invective, to run out of wind. When he paused to take a breath, Melkin interposed in his gravelly voice, “What are you doing here, boy?”

  There wasn’t even a flicker of acknowledgement, certainly no attempt to answer.

  “Who are you?”

  “A common river rat, that’s who!” Effenrike pronounced, and would’ve continued with his earlier thoughts if Banion hadn’t laid a restraining hand on his arm. He spluttered down and was quiet.

  Melkin, still suspicious, growled quietly, “Search him.” Ari thought that was a little paranoid; it was obviously just a dirty waif. The chances of finding a blade from the Sheel or a heavy bag of incriminating coin seemed a little slim.

  The Dra moved in close, using his muscled body to pin him while one hand began its efficient work—except he stopped almost before he’d begun, stepping back like he’d been burnt and releasing all but the soiled collar.

  “It’s a woman,” he said, deep, expressionless, and to the point.

  In the second it took for this to register, the stowaway made another play for freedom, bolting so quickly he—she—made it to the end of Kai’s reach before being jerked to a stop. He—she—squirmed with the frantic desperation of despair even then, managing to get out of the overshirt with such supple speed it was almost unreal. But even faster, Kai had caught one of the slim wrists in his bronze hand, and she was whirled to face him, a dirty grey mouse in the talons of a sleek hawk. For a moment she worked her arm, straining away from him, then, reluctantly, grew still. In all the dirt on her face, really the only thing that could be seen were two big dark eyes, fastened now on the deep, glittering ones staring down at her.

  The boys looked on this little tableau with a bright interest, much revived after the latest revelation. Cerise was not quite as charmed by the implications. “Filth!” she spat. “Parasite! She’s probably stolen h
alf of our things already.”

  “I don’t know how she got on board,” Effenrike muttered, anger gone like a blustery squall blown on by the wind.

  Still the Dra and his catch stood, motionless and staring at each other, tension sparking almost visibly between them. She looked at least as ready as the Dra to make a sudden move…as if any let-up in his attention…

  “Girl,” Melkin said, almost gently, making more than one set of eyes glance his way. His voice was deeply persuasive, without an ounce of rasp or acid. Basically, like someone else’s.

  But it was enough to break the wary magnetism between the two in front of him. Reluctantly, and with a faint sense of surprise, her eyes drifted to him.

  “What do you do here?” he asked as soon as he had her attention. The voice was the same, without any accusation or judgment. Ari had the impression it caught her off guard. She stared for several seconds while the silence built, then slowly and with an odd accent to her low voice, said, “I needed…to…leave. In a hurry.”

  “Probably running from the Imperial Police,” Cerise said with asperity. “It’s our civic duty to turn her in, Master Melkin.” The unemployed were deeply disapproved of by the North, and it was only half-joked that thieves were worse than murderers. Bad for the economy.

  Effenrike chuckled under his breath. “Kendrick’s neutral territory. Captains decide the justice on their own boats and barges.” It didn’t really occur to any of them that he was in charge—even after he said it.

  “We’ll not harm you,” Melkin said, so convincingly that she straightened from her full, tensed tilt away from the Dra and stopped straining to escape. “What’s your name?” he continued.

  Again there was a pause, then finally, “Selah.”

  Cerise snorted angrily. “Like you can believe anything she tells you.”

  Effenrike murmured a negative. “That’s an Addahite name. They say nothing but the truth.”

  “Which would be an excellent cover if you were lying!” Cerise said through gritted teeth. Effenrike’s brow furrowed.

  “I have a deal for you,” Melkin continued firmly. “We will give you leave to accompany us in exchange for doing travel chores: cooking, cleaning, mending tack and clothes, fishing…”

  She stared at him levelly. Surprising to Ari, she didn’t seem frightened. Wary as a rabbit around sleeping hounds, but not scared. Very slowly, she began to nod. “All right,” she said in her husky voice.

  “No!” Cerise cried.

  “All right,” Loren murmured enthusiastically.

  Guardedly, her eyes slid up to her dark captor. He looked at her gravely. She looked at him warily. He looked at her. She looked at him. Then, with great deliberation, he uncurled his long, brown fingers. With a flash of almost defiance in her eyes, she allowed her hand to lay in his for a second, then whisked it calmly away.

  Melkin had the boys rig four blankets up and fill the cookpot with water so she could bathe. Rodge, the smallest person present, grudgingly gave up trousers and a tunic to the project—he was as disapproving of crime and vagrancy as any Northerner, but she was a girl. And her quiet tongue and air of vaguely criminal mystery made her immediately more interesting than Cerise had ever been.

  Loren turned on his not inconsiderable charm, gallantly hiding his disappointment when Selah finally emerged from behind the blankets. She was, unfortunately, as plain as muddy water. Her short hair was thick and she had those big eyes, but otherwise was pretty unremarkable.

  Cerise walked around her, eyeing her with an ill-concealed smirk and well aware of the flattering comparison between the two of them. Selah was damp and dumpy and shapeless in her baggy clothes, dark hair of indeterminate and unflattering style, face still grubby despite its scrubbing. Next to her, Cerise was all slender elegance, expensive clothes swirling in rich folds in her well-bred saunter around the newcomer. Her ashy blonde hair was piled into classy mounds on her head, her skin clear, her pale blue eyes screaming polished disdain.

  “Good,” she said smugly, then turned to the boys. “First, empty and refill this pot—I’m going to bathe. Then,” she pivoted to fix Selah in her sights, “you may wash these clothes…and there is a tear here in the lower leg that needs mending.”

  “She’s not your personal servant,” Ari said without thinking, and instantly regretted it. He never spoke to girls unless it was compulsory—all these days on the trail hadn’t exactly made him want to change his rules for Cerise. Rodge and Loren both looked at him dumbly. Melkin, who’d acted so disinterested in the proceedings everyone had assumed he’d forgotten her, said from across the raft, “Selah will do whatever needs done.” Ari felt his face grow as hot as his hair.

  She added a whole new dimension to interpersonal relations on the raft. Loren smiled and made small talk, lounging near her—mostly in her way—while Rodge tried to get her to laugh. She plunged readily into the tasks Cerise kept coming up with, and with such deft familiarity that it was obvious she was no stranger to manual labor. Ari had never seen anyone move with such quick, nimble smoothness; she had the poised grace of a deer. She got more done in an hour than the farm girls at Harthunters did in half a day.

  Effenrike, despite his vociferous attack on the stowaway in the beginning, had completely forgotten about her by the time the blankets went up. He and Banion ensconced themselves in the wheelhouse, telling knee-slappers so that the poor little building positively trembled with their roars. Even Loren and Rodge eventually lost some of their acute interest in her; she remained firmly and politely outside their reach of conversation. The same could not be said of Dra Kai, however, whose awareness of her made the raft tingle like a lightning storm was due. She pointedly ignored him, but whenever her eyes happened to fall on him, they moved too quickly away. Ari, well-aware that he was the watchdog of the group, couldn’t help but feel that this time the Dra was overreacting. He felt, as surely and instinctively as he knew winter would come to the North, that this girl was no threat to them.

  Late into the afternoon, of her own volition, Selah went to the saddle packs and started pulling out makings for dinner. Cerise watched over her with an eagle eye to make sure she didn’t take anything not culinary-related. Rodge and Loren lazed around her while she cut carrots and peeled potatoes and filled the cookpot. Rodge even tried to start the cookfire for her in the small, carefully bordered fire pit set into the raft, being about as adept at this as one of the horses.

  Ari hung back, faintly and strangely miserable. He never knew what to say to girls. They were such odd, intimidating things: spasms of emotions and inscrutable thoughts, like breath-taking, man-eating flowers. It seemed, though…like this one was calmer. Like she might be rational. And those eyes…

  Dusk had fallen and the night was the perfect, pleasant temperature when dinner was called. Selah spooned such a greyish, unappetizing-looking stew into their bowls that several of them began to wish Melkin had cooked. But at the first bite, heads came up and eyes widened. Cerise and Rodge both stirred through the glop suspiciously, as if the secret to the flavor exploding in their mouths might lie under a chunk of potato. Banion and Effenrike, however, instantly gave voice to unabashed approval and starting shoveling.

  “I didn’t even know we had Cyrrhidean spices,” Banion mumbled joyfully, reaching out to fill his scoured bowl with second helpings.

  “In the packs,” Melkin said with a faintly self-satisfied air. “I thought that was a Cyrrhidean accent.”

  “She looks all Addahite to me,” Banion objected, peering at her quiet form at the edge of the raft. She was dumping peelings for the fish. Ari stared at her, spoon halfway to his mouth. Cyrrhidean. Now he had to talk to her.

  The stars were twinkling and blankets were being rolled out before he could finally get her alone. She was away off from the group, rinsing something out over the side of the raft, and he politely cleared his throat as he approached. She glanced up, her face a pale oval in the dawn of moonlight.

  “Hi,” he said awkwa
rdly, feeling his throat almost close up. “I’m Ari.”

  “I’m Selah.” Her voice was low for a girl, and oddly soothing for all the wild mystique swirling around her.

  “Uh, dinner was delicious tonight.”

  “Thank you.”

  Slightly emboldened by this completely normal flow of conversation, he said gamely, “Banion said those were Cyrrhidean spices…are you from Cyrrh?”

  She looked at him, dark eyes pools of enigma, and smiled a little. At him. Making something funny come loose in his chest.

  “I’m from all over,” she said quietly, going back to her washing.

  “But you’ve been to Cyrrh,” he persisted, seized by the unreasonable need to have those eyes on him again.

  She nodded.

  “What’s it like?” he blurted. It happened again; this time her eyes looked right into his. “Like…magic,” she said softly.

  “Selah!” Cerise called sharply. “Help me with my blankets.”

  And she was gone, soundless and swift as a deer disappearing into the brush. Ari blinked, aware of a sudden emptiness in the air around him, like she’d created a hole in the atmosphere. Cyrrh…where his past lie. Everything seemed to be reminding him of it, of late.

  CHAPTER 6

  The next morning, Ari awoke to the soft slap of water, and sat up, bleary-eyed. To the near side of the barge, he made out the long, lean figure of the Dra in the fast-growing misty light. He was just pulling himself out of the water, a rather depressing sight, as Ari was pretty sure his body didn’t come with all those muscles. They rolled, smooth and golden brown, as Kai pulled on his black leather breeches and settled his swords. Shaking water out of his short hair, he settled into a squat and pulled out his whetstone.

  Not nearly so motivated, Ari looked around—and saw Selah, on the far side of the pile of cargo and hidden from Kai’s view. She was fishing. Brightening, he sat all the way up. He could talk to her. There was no one around. They could have a long conversation…but what would he say? Talk about Cyrrh? He could ask her about her childhood—no, maybe that was too personal—but what if she was an orphan, like him—but what if she was an orphan—her life obviously hadn’t been as smiled on by fortune as his…