by Jo Spurrier
He felt himself scowling, and shifted his weight so the unyielding metal of his false hand pressed against the bruise on his thigh. ‘It wasn’t mine. This thing I do, absorbing power … it let me tap into yours, somehow. I was drawing it from you.’
Sierra shrugged. ‘I’m a Sympath. That’s how it works. Rasten always drew power from me. I have more than I know what to do with, after all. But regardless of where it came from, you’ve learnt a lot about how to manage it.’
He turned away, gritting his teeth. In his mind’s eye, he saw the blazing man again, crawling through the mud, and for a moment he could only think of the scent of charred and smoking skin, and the pain of the poker against his back. The way he’d wrenched at the binding ropes, though the rational part of his mind knew there was no escape. He remembered how he’d cried out, as the day wore on and his strength and will waned.
‘Isidro —’
The images melded together in his mind, the charred and blazing soldier, the searing pain of the iron, the stench of scorched skin … together they threatened to overwhelm him. The world around him seemed as thin as gossamer, faint and unreal compared to the images and memories that filled his head. Vaguely, he saw Sierra reaching for him and he flinched back violently, as though her touch would break the threads and cast him back into memories he’d tried to bury.
‘You liked it, did you?’ he snapped. ‘The way they burned? The way they crawled through the mud, trying to flee? What about the ships? Full of slaves, chained to their oars. You felt them drown, I know it. I felt it, too. Do you even care where your power comes from anymore? Do you care who chokes or burns or suffers to raise it for you?’
Sierra reeled back, as though he’d slapped her. ‘Issey —’
‘Do you dream about them? The screaming voices, crying out in fear and pain, the desperation and despair when they realise it’s you they’re facing? Can you feel the moment their hope is lost? Is that why you fall into the arms of any man who comes close to you? Perhaps it’s the only thing that drives away those countless souls, crying out for mercy.’
She clenched her jaw. ‘Don’t you talk to me like that. Don’t you dare. By the Black Sun, I never asked for this power, any more than you did. But I’m stuck with it now, and I’ll be cursed if I won’t use it.’
Isidro pressed his hand to his temple. Burning filled his head, the scent of it so thick he thought he’d choke. His right arm throbbed, a deep, tearing pain. He reminded himself that it was gone, burned to ashes long ago, but it did nothing to ease the memory of splintered bones and the sound of them shattering under the club. ‘Oh, you’ll use it, alright. You’ll use it every chance you get. How many have you killed, Sierra? Do you even know? How many thousands? Perhaps you’ve even outstripped Kell himself.’
She cocked her head to regard him, her eyes turned cold and flinty. ‘You think you can hurt me like this?’ she hissed. ‘I’ve been tortured by a master. You’re going to have to do better than that. I’ve never dragged innocents from their beds and slaughtered them —’
‘No,’ he said. ‘You just drowned galley slaves chained to their oars. How is that any better?’
His chest hurt. He was breathing hard, with power seething within him, sending dozens of prickling tendrils curling around his bones, twanging along his nerves.
Sierra narrowed her eyes. ‘Screw you,’ she said, and turned and stalked away through the wet grass. He could feel her power running high, pulsing within her like a racing heart, but she never let it spill. He felt disappointed at that, cheated, somehow. He wanted her control to slip. He wanted to see her as brittle and bleeding as he felt, but she strode away with her head held high and her back spear-straight.
He turned his back and stumbled away. Around the back of the tent he dropped to his knees in the wet grass and raised his hands to his face, both the real one and the metal false hand, hard and cold against his brow. He was trembling like a new foal, and in his mind’s eye he could still see the man on fire, crawling through the mud in a desperate search for sanctuary.
He couldn’t say how long he stayed there — minutes or hours, it seemed the same to him — but when a hand fell on his shoulder, it felt very warm, roasting with a feverish heat.
‘Issey?’ Cam said.
He drew a deep and ragged breath as Cam came around to crouch in front of him. ‘Are you alright?’
When he looked up at his brother, Isidro saw him wreathed with flame, his skin blackened and peeling. Hastily, he turned away, shaking his head. ‘I don’t … I don’t know what’s wrong with me.’ He felt himself swaying, until Cam reached for him again with a steadying hand.
Isidro shook himself, turning his face up to the sky. ‘No, I’m alright. Go back inside, be with Mira, and your son. They need you.’
‘No, they don’t. They’re fine, they’ll be there when this has passed.’
He clenched his fist, clenched his jaw, and felt his power seep through. It coalesced around his hand like a black mist, like soot with an undercurrent of red. ‘Did you see what I did out there, Cam?’
‘I did,’ he said, softly.
‘I can’t stop thinking about it. By the Black Sun …’
‘It’s war, Isidro. It’s brutal and revolting and wretched, and that’s the way it’s supposed to be. It’s not supposed to be easy. But you did it anyway, for Mira and our lad and the others. You did what you had to do. It’s alright.’
Isidro scrubbed his hand across his face. ‘I don’t know what’s wrong with me,’ he said again. ‘Fires Below, I feel like a green lad who’s just fought his first scrap …’
Cam shook his head. ‘That’s not what I see.’
‘I’ve never had power like this before. I never … I never wanted to do to others what was done to me —’
‘You’re no green lad, Issey. You’re an old hand who took a bad wound in the last clash you fought, and now you’re facing down your demons to draw steel again. This is the first battle you’ve faced since the hills in the east, don’t think I don’t remember. You’re shaken, but it’s alright. You’ve come through it clean.’
‘No. Not clean. It’ll never be clean.’ They’d tried to flee, crawling through the mud, but there was no escape. He might as well have staked them out and left them to die with flies drinking their blood and maggots hatching in their wounds. ‘In the east I convinced Rasten to help me, to work through me, but here … It was just me, Cam.’
‘If you’d killed them with a sword or spear you wouldn’t feel this way,’ Cam said. ‘It’s no different. You used the weapon you had, that’s all.’
Isidro shook his head. ‘No. It’s not the same. This power —’
‘It doesn’t make you like Kell. You’re not a Blood-Mage.’
‘But what if this is all I’m good for? My power … Cam, you don’t know how grateful I was to have it. With my arm ruined and every skill I’d ever learnt lost to me … it gave me something back, it gave me strength again. But now …’ He scrubbed his face on his sleeve and gulped a breath of cool air. ‘Maybe that’s why Kell did it. He took the cursed hand and then he twisted the power he never meant to give me. He made sure I’d never use it for anything good. He made me a creature of death and destruction —’
Cam grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him. ‘No! Hold your cursed tongue, Issey, that’s not what you are.’
Isidro looked up at him with hollow eyes. ‘It is. The things I used to do — the enchantments, the small workings … I can’t do them anymore. I’ve been trying. My power just spills and burns, and everything around me turns to ashes …’
‘By the Black Sun, Issey … what about the stone Alameda sent? You used it to lead us here, didn’t you? And what about this?’ He seized the false arm, and brought it up to shake in front of his face. ‘You make things like this, and yet you tell me you’re only good for destruction? You’re not a monster any more than Sirri is.’
‘Sirri …’ Isidro squeezed his eyes shut. ‘Oh, Gods, Sirri �
�� By the Black Sun, I don’t even know what I said to her …’ The words were a blur, but he knew where they’d come from. They’d come from fear, fear of what he’d done, what he could do, of the power that had once been his lifeline, his one hope, and which had been turned to something dark and hungering. He hadn’t meant to hurl those words at her. He’d aimed them at himself, reflected in her storm-blue eyes. ‘She didn’t deserve that.’ But then, neither did the man on fire in the mud …
‘She’s alright. Mira’s talking to her, she’ll take care of her.’
‘She just came out here to check on me, and I sent her away like a whipped dog.’
‘Look, Issey, you’re like a hound caught in a snare, so maddened by pain you’ll snarl at anyone who comes close, even the ones trying to help you. You’re still healing, she knows that as well as I do. I’ll talk to her, I’ll smooth things over. Anyway, she’s tough, she can take it.’
‘But … look, Cam, you have to be honest. The things she does, the people she’s killed … she doesn’t care anymore. You see it, don’t you? She used to, after you brought her in from the snow, but now … and I’m going the same way. I can feel it. The power makes it too easy. It makes it so you don’t care.’
‘I know,’ Cam said. ‘She’s damaged, too, I won’t deny it. But in time she’ll heal, just as you will. I won’t give up on her, either. None of us can help the way we’re made, and a dog that’s beaten until it turns vicious can be made gentle again. Neither of you are too far gone to never return.’
‘I’d get rid of it if I could,’ Isidro said. ‘I’d carve it out and throw it away, this power. It’s festering and rotten, just like the cursed arm. If I hurt someone with it, Mira or her lad, or Delphine or …’ His voice died in his throat. ‘… or her little one. My little one …’
‘You won’t, Issey. I have faith in you. You’re not doomed, and you’re not a monster like Kell. I know you can’t see it now, but you’re going to have to trust me.’
He slept badly that night, despite the weariness of a day’s hard ride. Visions of flame haunted his dreams, and when the baby woke, wailing in the early hours, Isidro was glad of the respite.
When morning came, Sierra wasn’t in her furs. Isidro searched for her, though he had no idea what he’d say. But it was a moot point, for though he circled the ruins, boots crunching over the frosty grass, he couldn’t find her. He thought of reaching for her in his mind, but shied away from that intimate touch.
When he returned to Cam’s tent, he found Mira on her blankets, nursing the little lad. As he entered she looked up with a smile and waved him over. ‘Issey, there you are! I barely spoke to you last night — here, come, sit by me. Will you have some coffee?’
There was a beaker of the stuff beside her on a stool serving as a table, together with a dish of sliced bread spread with butter and honey. Without waiting for a reply, Mira gestured to Amaya and the lass brought him one to match.
Cam had developed a fondness for the stuff these last few months, and Isidro had learnt to tolerate the smell, though he still didn’t much like the taste. Still, he took the cup with a nod of thanks, and settled down across from Mira.
She leant forward to rest her free hand on his knee. ‘Are you feeling better this morning?’
The crude false hand rested on his thigh, just beside the bruise it had made the day before. Isidro closed his eyes; he didn’t want to go into it, not again, not when he barely understood himself why everything felt so hopeless. Why now, when they were together at last, and with an unexpected ally to boot? He couldn’t think what to say, though, so he just shook his head.
She found his hand, the real one, and squeezed. ‘Cam told me what happened. You truly have been through the wars, I can see it in your eyes. But you’ve made it this far, and the worst is behind us now, I truly believe it.’
He shook his head. ‘We’ve got a long way to get home, Mira, and the Akharians aren’t going to release their prize without a fight.’
‘Issey, since you’ve taken the coastline, the men there are facing starvation with their supply lines cut. Between the soldiers trapped there and the ones Sierra’s killed here, and with their prime farmland in enemy hands, the empire’s facing crisis. We were talking last night, after you left — Cam and Makaio have agreed to push them on reaching an agreement. Makaio had already been in touch to arrange negotiations, and the Akharians have agreed to meet with us. After the attack last night we’ve decided to press our advantage, to ride there today and demand a settlement. They have scant choice but to negotiate if they want their farmers back in the fields planting crops by spring.’
Isidro scrubbed his hand through his hair and sighed. ‘Maybe you’re right. By the Black Sun, Mira, I won’t deny you know more about the politics of the situation than I do.’
‘Well, you’ve hardly been in a position to gather much information, but you’ll catch up soon enough.’ She looked down to adjust the babe at her breast, and when she looked up again, she was grinning. ‘Did Cam tell you our news? We’re betrothed.’
‘Ah! I knew he meant to ask you —’
‘He didn’t have a chance, I asked him first.’ Her smile faded, then, and she bit her lip. ‘I wanted to tell you and Sirri and make it formal when we go back to Cam’s camp — he said he has some priests there to perform the ceremonies … but after what happened last night, we’ll put it on hold. I want you to be with us, Issey, and Sirri, too — Cam told me that he’s grown close to her these last few months. But it’s too much for you right now. We can wait.’
Too much? It was simply incomprehensible. And Sierra … he knew the flinty look in her eyes. He still couldn’t recall what he’d said to her to earn it, but whatever it was, he’d hurt her deeply. ‘Mira …’ he began.
She held up a hand to cut him off. ‘No pressure,’ she said. ‘There’s no schedule to meet. I just wanted you to know where we stand.’
He nodded, feeling defeated. And you’re likely to be standing there for a cursed long time, he thought.
‘The other thing I need to tell you is the little lad’s name,’ Mira said. ‘I called him Cadrosec, to honour your father. We call him Cade for short.’
Isidro straightened at that. Traditionally, children were named for their mother’s kin, especially in the noble clans where ties to one’s father were often more formal than familial. To name her son for Cam and his foster-father was a slap in the face to her clan and kin, a public declaration of her division from them.
‘Are you pleased?’
‘I am, truly. He was a good man, he deserves to be remembered, but you’ve really thrown the fox amongst the hens there.’
‘I know,’ she said, shifting the babe in her arms and closing her shirt. ‘I just wish I could see their faces when they hear the news … and I hear you have one due soon as well. Cam says Delphine is with child.’
Isidro nodded, but he said nothing. It was yet another thing he didn’t know how to deal with. Just thinking of it brought another crushing wave of guilt. Delphine had given up a great deal for him, and how had he repaid her? With avoidance and neglect at a time when she should be able to rely on him for anything. And yet, what could he do? He couldn’t trust himself around her and the babe with his power so volatile and untamed. And he couldn’t be an anchor for her when he himself was at the mercy of currents and storms in his own damaged mind.
He thought back to what Cam had said to him, a few nights before: It’s like being lost in a snowstorm … sometimes all you can do is find shelter … save your own hide, and let others worry about saving theirs.
His brother had stepped up to bear the burdens Isidro couldn’t carry. He was grateful for that, but soon there would be other burdens for him to bear, too many for any one man. If they pulled this off, winkling the Akharians out of Ricalan and taking their people home, Cam would be king. He’d need his people around him, people he could rely on, people he could trust not to falter under the load.
Mira stirred at h
is side. ‘Here,’ she said, leaning towards him and depositing Cade into his arms.
She moved too quickly for Isidro to protest, or to do anything but take the weight of the little lad. He stiffened and felt his power flare, sending questing tendrils climbing along his spine.
The little face that looked up at him was very calm. Perfectly round little cheeks, lightly touched with red, and a downy thatch of fair hair on his head. The lad looked like Cam — it was there in his brow and nose and the shape of his chin.
Mira leant close. ‘You see, little one,’ she said. ‘This is your other father. I’ve told you about him.’
Isidro’s face found himself remembering those days in Demon’s Spire, when everything seemed so hopeless. ‘You saved my life, little one,’ Isidro said in a murmur. ‘It’s good to meet you, at last.’
The baby squirmed in his arms, waving chubby fists. Isidro tried to shift his grip — he hadn’t held a babe since his arm had been broken, and it still made him uneasy to have his one good arm pinned down. Without thinking about it, he brought the false arm up to help bear the weight when Cade suddenly stiffened in his arms, and arched his back with a squalling wail.
The realisation of what he’d done struck Isidro cold. The thumb-lever on the false hand, that jutting prong of iron — in bringing the false hand up he’d jabbed it into the baby’s back. ‘Fires Below, Mira, I’m sorry.’ He tried to pass the boy back, but between his clumsy left hand and the boy squirming and screeching in protest, he made a poor job of it until she took the babe from him and pressed him to her shoulder, rocking back and forth. Her eyes were wide. ‘What …?’
He felt his face turn red as he held up the false hand. ‘I … I’ve only had it for a day or so. I’m not used to it yet.’
Her eyes narrowed as she saw the iron prong, but they softened again when she turned back to his face. ‘It’s alright, Issey, it was an accident.’ She had to raise her voice to be heard over the child’s wails. ‘He’ll be fine once he calms down.’
His power was stirring, prickling within him. A blossom of heat had woken in his own back, and his power was sending questing tendrils down his arm, reaching for his hand. All I’m good for, Isidro said to himself. He squeezed his eyes shut, and saw flame in the darkness.