City of Lies

by Sam Hawke

  I stood and left the chamber.

  * * *

  I walked to the hospital, keeping to my most familiar routes, where I knew how to step to keep in perfect balance, and could walk over cracks in the stone with alternating feet, one of my favorite calming exercises. I didn’t begrudge Tain finding something to hold on to in this maelstrom. But the sight of him finding it made me feel even lonelier and more lost than before.

  So I sought my own anchor.

  Hadrea was at the hospital, just where I thought she would be. Savior of us all, and yet there she was, her head bent over a patient, elegant long hands cleaning blood and dirt from around a wound. She looked up from over the table and her smile cut across the room, a crack of light in the darkness.

  I threaded through the throng of physics, assistants, and patients, until I reached her side.

  “Kalina?” she asked.

  I shook my head.

  Her response flashed across her eyes, but she said nothing, merely squeezed my hand. Grateful for the silence, I looked around to see how to help. I needed a distraction, something to make me feel useful.

  “Here, give me a hand,” a physic barked in my ear, and I followed her to the next bench, where a man lay groaning, his hands clutched around an arrow protruding from his shoulder. “Get some pressure around this, get the bleeding stopped. Don’t try to move the arrow.” She thrust a wad of bandages at me and moved on.

  “Hi,” I said to the man. “I’m going to try to stop that bleeding, all right?”

  He stared at me with teary eyes and nodded. I had to pry his hands away from the arrow to press the wadding down on the oozing blood in a fat little loop around the arrow. “Help me hold this here,” I told him, putting his bloody hands back in position. “Nice and hard. I’m just going to put a bandage around this arm and shoulder now.”

  Mindful of the physic’s instructions, I worked carefully around the arrow shaft. The fletching tickled me in the face as I leaned over and worked the bandage around to hold the wadding in place. Then, stupidly, I found myself battling tears. Kalina had been helping with the fletching one of the last times I’d ever seen her. I realized then what lay ahead of me: I’d never be free of things that reminded me of my sister. We had grown up here, spent our lives together. Would there ever be a day where I wouldn’t be surrounded by memories?

  The worst of it was, she’d died thinking I thought her weak and frightened, someone to protect. I’d been blind to her strength, when she’d been braver than any of us. I’d never get to tell her that.

  “There,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady, as I finished tying the bandage. “The physics will get that arrow out when they can. You just rest in the meantime.”

  The group around me must have been the rebels defending the walls from our army, because most had arrow wounds of varying severity. I went between them, trying to steady the shafts and stop bleeding while the patients waited their turn with the physic. A small woman with a broad, flat face and the same brusque but kindly manner I associated with all physics, she raced between benches, seeing to the most severe cases as they arrived, and occasionally giving me instructions. “The heads are serrated,” she said, showing me one that had been removed already. “That’s why we have to cut them out so carefully.” I took the arrow from her. The point had rough edges clotted with blood, and the fletching was damaged and shoddy. It was an ugly thing. I shuddered to think of its siblings, buried in flesh around the room.

  I secured another arrow, this one part of a trio peppering the back of an ominously silent woman. As I wrapped and pressed, I found myself staring at the fletching. The one closest to me was damaged. And so was the one beside it. And now I thought about it, quite a few of the arrows I’d just dressed had had tatty fletching. The conscious part of my brain asked, So what? But another part, the part I’d learned to trust, niggled at me, pick-pick-picking away at my thoughts. The fletching wasn’t tatty. It was missing barbs. A lot of barbs. So the army used some inadequate feathers, just like us, I thought. Again, so what?

  I realized I’d been staring too long when blood leaked between my fingers through the wadding I held over the worst of the three wounds. I put extra on top, continuing to press, but my eyes locked onto the two damaged arrows, looking between them, something cranking along in my head.

  I had to shift to avoid two men running past with a floppy body slung between them, and then, when I looked back at the arrows from a slightly different angle, I finally understood what it was.

  The same damage.

  Missing barbs, precise missing barbs along the length of one feather. It was the same pattern, the exact same pattern, on the two arrows. And when I looked down at the bucket holding my clean bandages and wadding, the arrow resting there that the physic had given me showed the same thing. Lines and spaces. Almost like … almost like lines and dots.

  The part of me that processed patterns fired at last, and even as I scoffed at the idea—how could arrows be marked with a code only I knew?—I was fingering the barbs, counting, translating in my head, and I knew from the first few letters that the arrows were a message, not just any message, but a message to me.

  The walls rushed in at me and my knees buckled. Jov, it said. Beware Aven.

  I steadied myself on the edge of the bench. Only one person could have sent that message. The same person who had risked everything to seek Aven’s help.

  “Hadrea,” I said, and she came over without a pause. “Help me?” I marveled at how she always knew what to say, or not to say. Despite the questions in her eyes, she helped me finish bandaging the patient in silence, waiting to let me speak. My voice sounded like another person’s as I told her, “Kalina didn’t die of deep cold. She was alive long enough to send me a message.” I fingered the arrow, throat clenching. “And she was alive long enough to figure out who our real enemy was.”

  Hadrea frowned. “She did not die of the cold. But she is still…”

  “I would say so.” I could have choked on the stiffness of my words. No tiny sprig of hope worked its way into me, not this time. Aven had no reason to pretend Kalina was dead if she wasn’t.

  As we left the hall I thought I heard my name—a man’s voice, amidst the chaos of the room—but when I craned around, no one was paying me any attention. I shrugged and continued out of the hospital. Inside, I was slowly turning to stone as my thoughts condensed into plans. I had supplies to pick up and preparations to make. It would be a long night.

  I had still lost my sister. But now I had someone to blame.

  * * *

  They came in together, Tain with a kind of dazed swagger, Aven with casual confidence. I showed them in and bade them to sit with a cup of the finest Oromani brew, taking the seat with its back to the door.

  Tain gave me a tired smile. “Why here?” What had once been his mother’s sitting room, old-fashioned with fat, stuffy furniture unused for a decade and heavy velvet drapes decorating the walls, was over-warm and musty.

  “It’s private,” I said. “There are so many people buzzing around the Manor, I wanted to make sure we could talk without being overheard.”

  “What is it?” Heavy lines crunched between Tain’s eyes. I felt a surge of pity for my friend. He had lost almost as much as me, and I was about to rip those wounds wide open. I’d wanted to talk to him first, but he hadn’t left the Warrior-Guilder’s side since yesterday. It had to be like this.

  “It’s about the traitor on the Council,” I said.

  “Oh.” Tain nodded, grave. “I’ve told Aven what happened to Marco, and why.”

  She nodded, giving me an approving look. “Tain told me of your bravery. You did much honor for yourself by killing that traitor.” She sighed. “I can’t tell you how ashamed and dishonored I am by having left him in charge. I never suspected him of disloyalty.”

  I stood, pacing around my chair, then stopped, looking at them in turn. The stone inside me hardened a little bit more. “Except he wasn’t disloyal
, was he?”

  If I hadn’t been looking for it, I’d never have seen the malice that flickered across her flat black eyes, so calm did she keep her expression. It didn’t matter, though, whether she reacted or not. This was for Tain’s benefit as much as hers. He frowned, lines in his face growing deeper. “What do you mean?” he said, a touch of impatience in his tone. “Marco was the traitor.”

  “Oh, he betrayed us,” I said. “But he was never loyal to us in the first place.”

  Aven never blinked. Behind that cold, black surface, I fancied her mind turning, trying to work out what I suspected, what I knew.

  I propped myself against my chair, holding eye contact. “I tried to reason out why Marco did what he did. What he hoped to achieve. The city falling? Then why work so hard on its defense? Killing Caslav and Tain? I suppose that was always meant to be the plan, but then Tain turned up early back in the city. What would have happened if we’d gone home with our planned transport? Bandits, I suppose? Well, he thought he’d finished the job eventually, though. And then, only then, did he send a bird.”

  Tain rose. “Jov,” he said. “You’re exhausted. It’s been a … day. I think you need to rest. You’re not talking sense.”

  “Oh, but I am,” I said, eyes still fixed on Aven. “Sit down, Tain. Marco killed all of our birds, or released them with fake messages, but I’m guessing he had his own hidden. Because he needed to be able to tell his leader when things were prepared.”

  “In Perest-Avana, do you mean?” Tain asked.

  “No. I said he wasn’t disloyal. He swore his loyalty to his Guild and he kept that promise.”

  Tain laughed, a bark of incredulity, as he caught my implication. Aven just sat, silent, malevolence wafting from her like a smell.

  “I thought at first you were just a straight-up traitor,” I said. “Paid off by another country, some external enemy. But that wasn’t right, was it? Or at least, it wasn’t the whole picture. Too many things didn’t make sense. Why bother with poisoning? If your goal was just destroying the city, Marco could have killed Tain any number of times. But he was trying to put the blame on Talafar, on Doran, to distract us from a threat much closer to home. He sent a bird after he thought he’d killed Tain because that was the signal for you to come home to save the day.

  “It was almost perfect, wasn’t it?”

  Tain fell silent, his mouth open a fraction, looking between the two of us. Though she made no overt move, tension radiated from the Warrior-Guilder; she was a loaded spring. I should have been afraid, but emotion seemed beyond me now. “But it wasn’t perfect. You wanted us desperate and leaderless when you rode in with the army and saved the day. You wanted the Council floundering, forced to vote on new leadership, and who would they think of but their hero—respected general, highborn. You wanted them to elect you.” I laughed without humor. “That was the great, glorious plan. Aven rides in, clears the way to the city, then generously makes peace with the remaining rebels. I suppose the mercenaries were in place to make sure the peace deal happened at just the right time? Honor-down, you must have been pissed when you got here and found Tain alive and well, with you unable to remedy that, and the battle ending over something so completely out of your control you couldn’t take credit for it.”

  “This is all very strange,” Aven said at last, tone cold and even. “I’m not sure what I’ve done to offend you, Credo Jovan, but these sorts of accusations are not something I’m willing to have you repeat in public. My honor is at stake here.”

  “Honor?” I let my lip curl to show her my contempt, though inside I felt nothing at all. “You know, I’ve learned a lot about honor in the last few weeks. I suppose I see how you thought a great military victory would serve you well. But it looks to me like your backup plan was to ensnare Tain and take your influence over the Council that way, at least for now. If you can’t have outright power, take it by stealth, right?”

  “Jov,” Tain said, confusion, shame, and anger warring for dominance in his voice. “Why are you saying this?”

  “Because it’s true,” I told him. A stab of pity penetrated my shell for a moment, but only a moment. “Isn’t it, Aven?”

  “You’ve lost your sister,” the Warrior-Guilder said. “So I assume you’re not thinking clearly, Credo, and I’ll overlook the insult. But you’d best stop now.”

  I leaned closer, clenching my fists around the edge of the chair. “My sister,” I repeated. “I did lose my sister. Do you know why, Tain? How? Because my sister, my brave, brilliant sister, didn’t die of the deep cold. She made it to Aven and she told her what happened here.” I ignored Tain’s falling face. “Somehow, though, Kalina figured it out. And she sent me a message.” In my mind, I could still feel that feather, tickling my face. Kalina’s last words, etched out in the fletching of arrows, a bare code. “Did you catch her sending messages? Is that why you killed her?”

  Tain circled around behind me, hands opening and closing, seemingly unable to speak. Aven’s silence stretched on, and Tain’s manic pacing, and all the while I held her gaze, waiting.

  Slowly, she started to blink. Her cheek twitched. I looked pointedly at the teacup beside her. “Have some more tea, Warrior-Guilder.”

  Beetle-eye had been used on prisoners long ago, before such things were frowned upon. It wasn’t a truth serum, strictly, but it acted a bit like alcohol, lowering inhibitions. I’d have used something more debilitating but couldn’t risk Tain ingesting anything else harmful after what his body had been through. I hoped it might loosen her tongue and possibly fool her into thinking she’d been poisoned. Poison had been part of her planning, but she didn’t really understand my world.

  Now conscious of the effects, rage darkened her expression. Then she smiled, the menacing baring of an animal’s teeth, and spoke softly. “Such a clever family. But was it so clever to come alone? This one,” she jerked her head at Tain, not even bothering to look at him, “is barely standing, and you’re no fighter, Credo. You think the two of you are walking out of this room alive?” She laughed. “How did you picture this? Me confessing my wicked plans, and you two leading me out, chastened and chained?

  “That’s the problem with this city, you know. Soft and rotten to the core. Forgetting that the military is what gives a country its strength. Just like you two.” She stood, graceful and sinister, a dark bird unfolding its wings. “I will have this city one way or another,” she said. “I’d have settled for fucking a weakling in the short term, but I’ll find a way of explaining your deaths, instead.”

  But I hadn’t been so stupid, not this time.

  Even as she reached for her sword, the heavy drapes around the room parted, and a dozen veiled Darfri stepped out, forming a circle around us, weapons drawn and pointing at the Warrior-Guilder. Hadrea, too, melted out from the shadows, her curved blade steady in her hand and half her face hidden by a dark veil. “I wouldn’t move,” I told Aven.

  She did anyway, drawing her sword and lunging toward Tain in one agile explosion of muscle.… But I had come prepared for anything, this time, and she screamed and dropped the sword as the acid I threw dashed across her hand and arm. She fell to her knees with a guttural cry, clutching her burning flesh to her chest, and the Darfri were upon her in moments, hauling her back into the chair.

  “Sorry, Aven, but no warrior’s death for you,” I said. “You’ll be facing the determination council, and they can decide what to do with the rest of your life. And don’t think we’re foolish enough to rely on anyone in your Guild guarding you in the jail; you’ll be guarded by people who know who you really are.”

  Aven looked over her Darfri captors with narrowed eyes. “And you’re so sure your precious new Darfri friends will be satisfied with being ruled by a bunch of fat, rich sycophants?” She shifted her weight in the chair, adjusting her shoulders, and somehow she suddenly appeared more defiant queen than struggling prisoner. “I have friends, too, you know, who were rather keen on me playing the full revolutionary.
You think the Darfri wouldn’t join me? They were ready to tear you to shreds and feed you to their spirits about twelve hours ago.” She smiled broadly at the man holding her left shoulder. “Wouldn’t you prefer a real leader to a weakling boy?”

  Tain, silenced by shock, finally moved. He stepped forward to the struggling Warrior-Guilder, taking an offered knife from the closest man. Darkness suffused him as he stood in front of her. “You destroyed our city,” he said, voice hoarse. “You lured hundreds of people to their deaths, and tore the country apart. And you killed Kalina. You think I’m a weakling?” Here he leaned in so close she must have felt the breath from his half-whispered words. “Well, just you watch and see.” Quick as a snake, he slammed the knife straight through her right hand and she howled an inhuman sound of rage and pain, pinned to the wooden arm of the chair.

  Worried he might give her exactly what she wanted, I took Tain’s arm and pulled him back. The muscles trembled beneath my hand and he stepped back as if in a daze, stunned by his own violence. “Don’t worry,” I said to Aven, as her hoarse screams gave way to snarls. “Sure, you need all those bones and muscles to hold a sword. But you won’t be holding one, ever again, so no harm done.”

  Hadrea pulled the knife out of Aven’s hand and, after three others helped her bind the Warrior-Guilder’s hands and feet, she wrapped a firm cloth around the oozing wound. “We will send a physic to see to that hand when there is one free. Though it might be a while.”

  “Please get her out of my sight,” Tain said, and they dragged her out, hissing and spitting. Around her gasps of pain and aggressive curses, Aven looked back over her shoulder, not at Tain but at me.

  “Don’t think this is over.”

  I looked away as if the sight of her bored me. As my Darfri helpers left the room, the Order Guard Mago arrived. He moved out of the way of the struggling Guilder and her captors, looking alarmed, but saw our grim faces and did not comment. He cleared his throat. “Honored Chancellor, people are arriving for the meeting. Shall I allow them entry?”