Dasira set a quelling hand on her arm, and though her shoulders shook, her voice tempered. “I'm not going anywhere,” she said. “Not yet.”
Cob nodded cautiously. “And no one else wants to leave?”
“No, Guardian,” said Ilshenrir. The others just favored him with looks of disbelief.
“Fine. So we have our travel papers. But we need pilgrim gear.”
“Easy,” said Dasira. “Any city will sell some.”
“Then we need to get out of the mountains. Back the way we came—“
“Absolutely not. Trivesteans shoot on sight. We go north into Riddian, then bend west, hit the Imperial Road and follow it in. It should take...” She squinted at nothing. “Not sure where we are in the Garnets, but I would say about thirty days at walking pace.”
Cob looked to the mother moon, still hanging high. The months followed its phases, and by its waxing face, he guessed it to be the 20th, give or take a day. “That puts us into next month—next year, really. And we can't use the shadows or a portal.”
“True. But if you want to get there for the festival, then we've got sixteen days plus Midwinter's four, plus Darkness Day, and your Guardian pace isn't exactly walking.” She gave a dry smile. “I think we can do it.”
The thought of approaching the Palace at the dark of the moon, during the longest night of the year, gave Cob a shiver. He wondered what would happen once they closed the Seals. If there really was a new Portal within the Palace, situated on the Seal of Air...
If that was where the Light came through...
No, that's ridiculous. There was light before the Portal, and there will be light after it.
Still, to finish the pilgrimage he had started months ago under a misguided sense of penitence would be a strange experience. In his mind's eye he saw the white city as Haurah had seen it, pristine and silent, and could not deny his reverence. He had lived in the faith for long enough that the idea of fighting it still felt wrong.
I'll manage, he told himself. It's not about the Light.
“Then that's it,” he said. “We hit the Imperial Road disguised as pilgrims, infiltrate the Palace, and kill Enkhaelen. All by the end of Midwinter.”
His friends nodded, but he caught them glancing past him. Frowning, he half-turned to find a line of skinchangers and beast-folk behind him, ears tucked and hands clasped around small parcels or else folded as if in prayer. At his gaze, heads ducked and eyes averted shyly.
Fiora murmured, “They've been gathering since you stepped down. I thought maybe we should give you a chance to cool off though, since you were scaring them before.”
“I—what?”
“You have these long silences. I know you're talking to the Guardian, but they're still unnerving, and these people don't know you. Plus you were getting angry up there, and you, um, gesture to yourself. It's weird.”
Cob gave her a sour look, but she was right. These people deserved better than his temper and the Guardian's secrecy. Better than the Ravager's psychosis too.
But he didn't have anything else to give. He hardly knew where he stood in this fight, and every new revelation made him want to change sides or run away. He couldn't bind himself to the skinchangers' cause either, not when it meant they'd hunt humans.
He was beginning to hate this job.
That didn't keep him from rising, stepping away from his friends and beckoning the first skinchanger forward. Obsequious and antsy, the wolf-man padded forward on paw-like feet to offer a bone charm carved with deer and a careful, close-mouthed smile.
Cob made himself smile back and accept the offering, and the many that followed.
*****
Time passed in a blur of gifts and well-wishes, requests and queries. The owl-folk flew off to hunt after presenting Cob with two long white feathers; he stuck one into the cord that held his short ponytail and gave the other to Fiora, who passed it to Lark. The cat-man slunk around but never came up; the lizard-person offered some kind of mantle of reeds and stone beads but couldn't get an explanation out through constant yawning.
The wolf-folk presented the travel-gear he had requested—a new quiver of arrows for Lark, hide bedrolls, preserved meats, bone tools and refurbished packs—plus more ceremonial ornaments than he could actually wear. After the first dozen, he brought his antlers out to hang bracelets and charms on them, ignoring the girls' snickers because the wolves seemed to appreciate it. The bears, blessedly, just seemed to want to sniff him over and then clasp his arms, and though their paws could wrap neatly around his biceps, he didn't feel intimidated with the Guardian inside.
A few asked for blessings, which after some concentration he managed. It felt like when he had dragged his herd through the long run to the mountains, every hoofbeat infusing them with his own vitality—only done through his hands. A connection, a release of tension. A balancing of energies between the strong and the weak.
After the skinchangers came a crowd of stone-folk, who did not bother to stand in line but surrounded him and peppered him with overlapping comments about the Empire's depredations and their kin in the west. To keep himself from shouting at them, he designated one as the spokes-rock, which told him about gems and metals torn from living earth and about kinfolk hacked to pieces, their bodies rendered for minerals.
It was difficult to hold his tongue about his past in Kerrindryr's quarries, but he promised to consider their plight. What in pike's name they thought he could do about it, he didn't know.
Everyone asked such questions. When would he stop the humans? When would he return the bodies of their slain kin—the pelts and skulls, the jewels, even the stones from the cobbled streets. When would he chase the hybrid plague from these lands?
Throughout his fumbled answers, the Guardians stood around him, watching.
The hogs sent a single representative, who told him that they would seek him in the morning when they could see. The rest stayed at their bonfire, drinking and laughing, and he found himself wishing that he was over there rather than being berated by rocks. But finally the spokes-rock stepped forward to pat his arm and said, “We know that the flesh does not share our concerns. We will give you aid nevertheless.”
Then it and its brethren turned and stomped away, leaving a handful of tree-folk to stare at him from across the gap.
He beckoned them forward, but none moved. That wasn't strange; most of his visitors had been anxious at first, more prepared for a blow than a smile. These were the last in line, though, and as the silence stretched, Cob felt a weird itch in his chest, up by his collarbones. He scratched it absently through the mantle of reeds and stones.
The skin broke. Something emerged.
He grabbed at it in instinctual horror and felt a soft object squish between his fingers. The thing retracted, slipping his grip with ease, then a sharp pain came from the other side. Under his shocked gaze, a tendril of red vine grew from his skin, tipped with a soft red bud that spread into a tiny eye.
It stared at him, then swiveled to consider the tree-folk. As one, they retreated toward the woods.
“Hoi—hoi!” Cob said sharply at the little eye. He recognized it now; the Thorn Protector of Haaraka had stared at him through a much larger orb, then stabbed him with two thorns in the spots from which these growths had sprung. Revulsion demanded that he rip them from his flesh, but he had already accidentally squashed one eye. He didn't want to anger the other.
And still the Guardians watched.
The eye looked up at him, its bud closing around it briefly like a blink. He didn't know what to say. The tree-folk were still retreating, ungainly on knobbled limbs, and though he called after them, they didn't look back.
“Pikes,” he muttered, then told the eye, “See what you did?”
It blinked again.
“They don't like you, huh. Well, I don't like you in my skin. What in blazes d'you think you're doing there?”
Blink.
He exhaled heavily and wiped his hand on his breeche
s. “Fine. Not like I don't have enough parasites. But y'better be more useful than the pikin' Guardian.”
It bobbed slightly—perhaps a nod—then retreated back inside him. His skin sealed smoothly over it, and he shuddered.
The line was gone, so he started pulling off the ornaments as he looked around. No one lurked in the moon-set dark; the hogs' campfire and his friends were all that remained. Frowning, he wondered where the copper person had gone. He still wanted to speak with it.
“I'm gonna take a walk,” he told his friends as he dropped the ornaments on the pile of gifts. “Go join the hogs.” There were a few nods, a few looks of objection, but no real argument; they all looked exhausted. At least among the hogs, they should be safe.
Turning his back on them, he headed uphill toward the thicker woods.
Haurah, we need to talk, he thought, and instantly she was at his side.
By the look of her, she felt contrite: ears tucked tight, gaze averted. But she did not speak, and as they entered the trees, Cob mumbled, “You need t'tell me what you know.”
'About?'
He stopped and stared at her. “I'm done askin' nicely. You lot need to open yourselves to me and quit disappearin' any time somethin' sensitive comes up. I don't know why you're hidin' things, but it's not acceptable. We may not be bound anymore, but goin' after Enkhaelen could still kill the both of us. Let me in.”
Her wolfish eyes met his, then flicked away. 'It is not so easy,' she said. 'Since we did not mesh with you upon entry, we do not know how much we can show you without overwhelming you.'
“Stop makin' excuses.”
'I am not. Many vessels took days to regain themselves after our arrival. We do not have that luxury, not with your plan, and we know you do not trust us around your friends.'
Cob scowled. “For good reason. You hate most of 'em.”
'We do not understand why you keep company with them, true. But we—I—do not wish that to come between us. Others think differently. We are not all of one mind.'
“Yeah, I've pikin' well seen that.”
'Then you understand our restraint.'
“No. We don't need to mesh, you just have t'show me what I need to see. Like what happened with Enkhaelen in the swamp.”
Haurah stiffened. Still looking away, she said, 'I do not remember.'
“Don't lie to me.”
'Ko Vrin, I—'
“No. He didn't kill you. He brought that head t'you, but apparently it wasn't t' goad you into a fight. So what happened?”
Her hands curled into fists, and he realized she was trembling, her skin subtly velveting with fur as she stared into the woods. “Haurah,” he tried again.
Her gaze snapped to him, eyes blazing with a feral light. 'He lied! He was full of lies! He said he wanted to help us while he held the head of my dead mate! He showed me the white worms in it and said they were why we should never come to the Palace, but I knew they were his work! He wanted to frighten us away, but I am no cub! I refuse to be frightened of worms!'
“The— The Guardian disagreed?” said Cob, unnerved by her fervor.
'The prey-folk, prey-spirits, they are cowards,' she snarled, slinking toward him. Though she was small and insubstantial, the lean coiled fury of her frame triggered an ancient alarm in his blood, and it was all he could do to stay still. 'They tried to make me flee, but I refused. And so they left me in the swamp to seek vengeance alone.'
She reached out with clawed fingers, and at their touch, a memory flooded in: the twitching head of the big wolf in her grip, the threads at work in its neck-stump and between its jaws. The stink of the swamp, summer-hot yet barren of insects. The Ravager standing mere yards away in its corpse-shell, black robe soaking up the water, scarred brow arched as it observed.
And the struggle—anger, fear, denial, rage, every instinct that longed to play itself out through tooth and claw. The dark counterweight of the Guardian pulled at her, urging her to drop the head and flee, but that gleaming white city still lurked in sight, only a fine screen of trees as a barrier. She had nothing left to lose, no reason not to go for the throat.
A predator that turned and ran became prey. She would not let the Ravager win.
The memory snapped, and he shook his head vigorously, disoriented and unsettled. Those threads, so like Dasira's bracer...
“You shoulda showed me before,” he said, looking up, but Haurah was gone.
Exhaling, he turned in his tracks to find the others behind him: Vina the ogress, Jeronek the earth-blood, and Erosei. His father lingered at the rear, watching.
Jeronek spoke first, square face solemn. 'I will let you see what you can, but I agree that we must not pour our memories into you. The Guardian departed Haurah before her death, but could not do so for all of us. We do not wish you to relive such pain.'
'I might,' said Erosei, grinning unpleasantly.
Vina leveled a glare on the Kerrindrixi fighter that could have wilted a forest, but he just sneered. With a snort of disgust, the ebon ogress looked to Cob. 'I do not know that my memories can aid you beyond those you have already seen, but you are welcome to them, Ko Vrin. I have nothing to hide.'
“What about you?” said Cob, looking past them to his father.
For a long moment, Dernyel stayed silent, dark gaze fixed. Then he said, 'What is it that you wish to see? Your mother? Yourself? The many dusty roads I traveled, the many fruitless councils I attended to try and build resistance to the Empire? I was no fighter, not until the end. There is nothing I can show you.'
Cob gritted his teeth. “Then why are you here?”
'Because I would see you safe and well.'
The knot in Cob's chest tightened, but he would not give these connivers the satisfaction of seeing him snap. Still, the bitterness burned his tongue as he said, “Good work you've done so far.”
Dernyel did not respond, only watched him with those inscrutable eyes.
It seemed to Cob, when he turned to stalk into the woods for some real time alone, that it was all his father had ever done.
Chapter 3 – Blaze and Shadow
“Sir, I think you should stop. And not just because this stuff is expensive.”
Captain Firkad Sarovy set his glass down and frowned across the desk at his lancer-lieutenant, Erolan Linciard. It was late evening of Cylanmont 20th, and he had spend much of the past two days cleaning up after his commander's mad need to destroy anything that slighted him. Specifically, the Bahlaeran Shadowland.
Argus Rackmar—still Field Marshal, now also interim Crimson General—had already returned to the Crimson camp near Kanrodi, leaving Sarovy with the mess and an offhand order to stabilize the city. What he actually expected Blaze Company to accomplish, Sarovy did not know, for he been given neither a writ of purpose nor the chance to ask questions.
Since then, what little time he had not spent in surveying the Shadowland ruins, observing the intake of the many rioters the incident had incited, and moving his men into the central garrison over the objections of the militia commander, had been spent being shrieked at by the city's figurehead, Lord Governor Mekhos Bahdran. The Lord Governor was incensed by the unannounced military action, but Sarovy had no answers for him. Bahlaer, like the rest of the Illanic city-states, was under the control of the Imperial Crimson Claw Army, and with Field Marshal Rackmar in command, it seemed that it would just have to accept its treatment. No blood-payment, no apologies.
Finally, at the midnight mark, Sarovy had managed to retire to his new office. It was formerly the garrison commander's, and due to the man's swift eviction had been left crammed full of furniture and maps, papers and superstitious bric-a-brac. Sarovy's footlocker took up a bare smidge of space by the bed.
In rifling through the commander's leavings, Sarovy had discovered the liquor cabinet and the bottle of Jernizan tawny whiskey. He was not normally a drinker, but it had not been a pleasant few days, and he had already worked through a quarter of the bottle by the time Lieutenant Linciard
knocked on the door.
Linciard had his own glass now, but it was barely touched, while the level in the bottle had sunk to half. He had been silent while Sarovy finished compiling his day's report, but it seemed he was now ready to air his thoughts.
Quill-pen down, glass down, Sarovy held the lieutenant's gaze until Linciard looked away. “I am not drunk,” he said firmly. “And as I have been given the responsibility of garrison commander, I am authorized to confiscate any substance I deem necessary to the operation of the company.”
“Sir, necessary whiskey—“
“Yes. Right now, yes.”
Linciard slanted another concerned look at him, but he ignored it. To tell the truth, the alcohol had done nothing; he still felt knotted tight, and had been grinding his teeth steadily since this morning. He kept telling himself that he had trained for this, that he had the manpower and the mages and the intelligence to control the situation, but he knew better. Two hundred and thirteen men were just not capable of holding a city, especially one infested with Shadow Cult.
And though he was a fort-holder Trivestean and thus a lightweight when it came to alcohol, the whiskey sat in his guts like water.
Across the desk, Linciard sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose. In the light of the single lamp, he looked haggard, his broad shoulders slumped, his hair slipping from its war-braids. He had been occupied for the past two days too, corralling rioters and taking over coordinating duties while Sarovy was in council with the Lord Governor. Though he had done well, Sarovy wondered if he had raised the man from peasant soldier to officer too quickly.
Recently, everything happened too quickly.
He looked down at his piles of papers. The garrison commander had left behind city maps, personnel notes, the militia roster and requisitions list, and a thick set of files on local businesses and persons of interest. Though Sarovy normally left such documents to Lancer-Sergeant Benson, he had perused enough of them to see threads of extortion and blackmail tangled among the mundane details, which made the headache worse. Trivestean cities were not run this way. If ever a government needed a good scouring, it was this one.
The Living Throne (The War of Memory Cycle Book 3) Page 6