by A J Gala
“Is it the Lions? With the Botathoran magic?”
“No. Tizzy, take Maran somewhere safe. Stay with her, I’ll—”
“Lilu, where’s Aleth? Why is he gone? Quit keeping things from me.”
The daemon grumbled and moved closer again. “You remember the story you were told about him when he was new at the Convent? When Torah left him behind in the woods, and he was taken by Hunters?”
Tizzy clenched her jaw. “I do.”
“There were a few people in charge of him when he was taken to their little stronghold out here. I was there when Tal and Ilisha came to get him, you know. No one ever says so, but I was. I suppose it’s because I did more harm than good, but it doesn’t matter now. Ilisha and Tal didn’t kill many Hunters going in. Just ‘get the boy out as fast as you can,’ as Ziaul had put it. So the ones who put most of those scars on your brother’s body are still alive. And I can smell them.”
“And so can he.”
“Yes. And you can bet he’s stalking them right now. Anyone who is at that camp when this goes down is as good as fucking meat.”
Tizzy stood up straight and put her hands on her hips. “Then you take her, and I’ll go get him.”
“I am not watching your little bloodslave! She’s your responsibility!”
“And so is he! Remember? You were the one who told me that!” She unsheathed Wish. “Aleth has the guiltiest conscience I’ve ever known, so if something exists that can actually flip his switch, I have to be there with him.”
Lilu huffed. “Guilty conscience. If only you had known him before.”
Tizzy ignored her and gave Maran a confident nod before marching through the trees. The magnetic force that always pulled her in Aleth’s direction had returned, and she knew exactly where to go, but after only a short way, she wouldn’t have needed it. She caught the scent of others in the air. Sweat, a spilled canteen, ashes, but no blood.
Not yet.
Crude laughter bounced off the trees. She was so close. She could see just a glimpse of the camp. She imagined the caravan before being full of performers traveling between towns, but now the space was inhabited by mercenaries. Judging by the conversation, some were headed to Suradia for work, some north to Caequin, some even south of the Undina Loch. They all fancied themselves safe from things that lurked in the forest because of their weapons or their prowess or their strength. But Tizzy knew they weren’t.
She’d finally get to see.
She could feel that Aleth was there but didn’t see him anywhere. He was well hidden, waiting for something. She stared back out to the scene, hoping to pick up a clue somewhere. Hunters. Some of them were going to be Hunters.
There was a group of three gathered by a dying fire, bickering about whether they should let one burn through the night or not. The fight was safety versus warmth, and on a cold autumn night, warmth was winning. One of the men pulled out a knife to strip more firewood. A knife with a manta ray on the pommel.
Vandroya. Hunters.
“Are you here to stop me?”
Aleth’s voice behind her caught her off guard, and she gasped. When she turned to face him, the bloodlust was already showing in his crimson eyes from beneath the shroud of his hood.
“So it’s true? The ones who tortured you are here?”
He motioned his head to the fire coming back to life. “Those three. But answer my question. Are you here to stop me?”
Tizzy’s grin was wide and devilish. She took his hand in hers. “You do what you have to. I’m only here to cover your back.”
He said nothing as he walked into the camp, not even drawing Mercy from its sheath. The activity around him slowed, and all eyes were soon on him. Most of the mercenaries were confused, waiting and watching, and some readied weapons.
The three that Aleth had gestured to were not alarmed. One folded up his heavy, muscled arms with a smug laugh.
“Holy shit,” he said. “I’d recognize that raggedy-ass thing anywhere.”
“The cloak?” one of the others asked. “Or the kid?”
They laughed, and the third one joined in, throwing down the wood he was peeling bark from. “Guess Cyrus really did know his head from his ass. The Raven lives!”
The humor between the three put the rest of the camp at ease again. A woman who’d drawn her sword was still hesitant to sheath it, though.
“Do you guys have this under control?”
“Yeah, yeah.” The Hunter with the knife tossed it in the air a few times, each time catching it deftly by the hilt. “Not to worry. We can handle it.” He pointed the tip at Aleth. “The Lord-Hunter wants you brought to him. He wants to kill you himself. Make a spectacle out of it, maybe. But he understands that accidents happen and is definitely not going to be heartbroken when we kill you.”
Aleth walked forward with apathy Tizzy had never seen before. A part of him that was dead was on the surface now. He came too close, and the Hunter threw his knife. It cut through the air, precise and sharp, and aimed for Aleth’s face.
Aleth reached up and caught the blade, inches from his eye. The other two Hunters drew their swords with haste.
“Alright, so you’ve learned a thing or two over the years.” The first Hunter drew another knife. “But as I recall, you were just a terrified boy when we had you. Learn as many tricks as you want, Raven; the fact is that people don’t change.”
“Change?” Aleth threw the knife to the ground, and with one stride, swooped in, closing the distance. “You’re going to talk about change?” The Hunter went to strike, and Aleth grabbed his wrist and squeezed until he dropped the second knife. “Change is who I am. Change is how I got this way in the first place. Change is the only fucking constant there is.” The bones cracked in his grip.
One of the other Hunters swung his sword and missed as Aleth stepped out of its arc. Aleth twisted back the arm of the one in his grasp, then threw him to the ground and approached the others.
“Do any of you even remember what you did to me? All the marks you left? Or does it all just fucking run together?”
“Are we supposed to feel sorry for you? You’re bloodkin!”
“I was fourteen!” Aleth swung his fist. The impact snapped the Hunter’s neck, and he fell lifeless to the ground. For just a second, there was a flash of regret that parted its way through Aleth’s anger. “You got lucky.” And then the rage came back and buried it. “You were supposed to suffer.”
Others in the camp mobilized at once. Swords were drawn, an axe brandished, even a flintlock pistol and a crossbow. Tizzy emerged from the trees with Wish in hand.
“No, no.” She walked a line, dragging Wish’s tip in the dirt. “You stay right there. This has nothing to do with you. They earned this. Interfere and you’ll suffer with them.”
A woman yet cocked her crossbow. “Do you know how much money Havenfold and Vandroya pay for bloodkin heads?”
“None would fetch a price as high as mine.” Tizzy grinned. “Is the bounty you’d die trying to get really worth it? I recommend you choose life.”
A scream filled the air. Aleth dug his claws into one of the remaining Hunter’s shoulders and pulled. Fibers, skin, and sinew stretched and snapped. Hot blood sprayed like a fountain. The arm fell to the ground, and the Hunter remained in Aleth’s arms, quivering in shock.
The man had only seconds of life left in him. Aleth bit into his neck and drank, steadying the man’s body by weaving a clawed hand through his hair. He clenched his fist around a handful of strands and pulled, ripping scalp from skull.
“Goodness, he’s making a mess, isn’t he?” Tizzy held Wish’s point in the crossbow woman’s direction. “Just ignore him and go about your night.”
The last Hunter left suddenly changed his mind about making a stand when Aleth pushed the dead body into the dirt. Cradling his broken wrist, the Hunter turned and ran, but Aleth was much faster, especially with fresh blood. He caught him before the Hunter had even crossed the clearing.
&nb
sp; Aleth was careful with his strength this time. Too much trauma to the remaining Hunter’s head and it would be over too fast. Fortunately, blunt force was not the only satisfying sensation. He wrestled the other man’s limbs to positions they were not meant to bend to, listening to bones and joints snap, feeling them break just under the skin.
Tizzy glanced at him from over her shoulder. The noises were making her stomach turn. It wasn’t just the horrible sounds of the body being ruined but also the screaming. Aleth’s irises were bright red and his face blank. He was on the ground with the Hunter in his lap, drinking from a fresh bite wound. At first, it was just feeding, but then she watched as Aleth was lost to something primal. He gnawed on the man’s neck, blood-soaked fangs tearing at the flesh.
“There.” Tizzy let out a breath, calming herself. “That’s three down. Now we’ll go.” If she could snap Aleth out of his trance, she thought.
But the woman with the crossbow was not willing to let the bloodkin leave. She fired her weapon at Aleth, and the bolt whistled through the air and stuck in his shoulder. Tizzy hacked into her arm, and the crossbow fell. The other mercenaries attacked.
Aleth was on his feet in one second, ripping the bolt out and wrapping his hands around the crossbow woman’s neck in the next. Tizzy guarded him as he choked the life out of her, and as Wish sliced through the air, she was blissfully ignorant of the woman’s choking and sputtering and begging. Tizzy hadn’t planned on slaughtering them all, but her brother was lost to bloodlust, and she didn’t dare stop him. She wasn’t confident that she could.
But she decided there wasn’t anything wrong with felling a few mercenaries, indulging herself in the certain look on a dying, spasming person’s face as they locked eyes with her. She hadn’t expected to enjoy it so much, and convinced herself that it was only because they had initiated the attack and therefore deserved it.
The pallid skin, the spittle on parted lips, the terror reflected in wide eyes.
Indulgent.
She wished Aleth would indulge a little himself, but instead, he was back with carnage dripping down his chin, overcome by red, completely unaware of any feeling except the desire for vengeance.
Tizzy looked around. Everyone was dead. He was on the edge of camp, a man’s throat between his jaws like a rabid dog. She sheathed Wish and approached him, her steps light as air, lest she suffer the same fate.
“Aleth.”
He looked toward the sound of her voice, but not at her. He sank his teeth into the dead man’s trapezius. Carefully, she reached down and touched his cheek, slick with blood.
“Aleth, it’s over.” She crept her hand up the side of his face and stroked his hair. “Come on, prince. Snap out of it.”
He pulled his fangs out of the body and pushed it away with trembling hands. When he looked up, his eyes were rust-brown.
“Tizzy.”
She smiled. “You’re a messy eater, you know that?”
He lurched over onto his hands and knees and dry heaved.
As she sat with him and rubbed his back, Lilu and Maran joined them. The daemon’s arms were folded tight.
“This is exactly what I was trying to avoid,” she said, counting the bodies up in her head. “With all the Hunters out in full force lately, this is bound to attract more.”
Aleth glared up at her. “Since when do you give a shit?” He heaved again.
“I don’t.”
Maran stayed a careful distance away from all of them. Her big brown eyes were locked onto Aleth. She couldn’t comprehend what she’d seen. The man she’d spoken to at Sheerspine, the same one who had seemed so afraid of her and what she would do, could not have been the same one she had just watched massacre the camp.
She had told Aleth only days ago that she did not fear him. And now she had just seen him rip a man’s throat out with his teeth.
Perhaps she had discounted his fears too quickly, she thought. Perhaps her blood really was a terrible catalyst for the siblings. Her hands were quivering as she hid them in her veil.
Lilu walked around to each of the three Hunters, inspecting them with pursed lips. “I thought there were four in charge of you back then.”
Aleth’s answer came quick between heaves. “There were.”
Lilu mumbled a little and came back to them. “Guess three out of four isn’t bad. Does it feel good to be full?”
Even through a heave, he was smiling. “Fuck yeah, it does.” He spat the last bit of viscera into the dirt, wiped his mouth, and stood up with Tizzy. “Where are we staying?”
Lilu jerked her head to a path behind her. “There’s some good cover back that way. We’ll give the bloodslave a few hours of sleep and then start up again. In the meantime, I might as well pick through some of these bodies. No need to let them go to waste.”
Vayven 18, 1144
There was no place more sure of itself than Dragon at the Mill. All night long, Peyrs could not look in any direction without seeing a flashy tapestry or banner in the shape of a red or gold dragon boldly emblazoned with the establishment’s name.
“Don’t worry,” he’d mumbled with a drink in hand. “I haven’t forgotten.”
Attractive people in revealing clothes had performed and partied all around him, yet whenever he’d raised a glass, he had no one to toast with but the proclaimed dragons at the mill.
The food was good, but he couldn’t feel the magic in the atmosphere the way everyone else could and had gone to his room with his meals. He was too much of a nervous wreck to fall asleep, plagued with thoughts of misfortune when it came time to see the queen.
The duchess’s envoy that had accompanied him to Suradia had sent a letter to House Hallenar upon their arrival to town, requesting presence with the queen. Once it had been delivered, the envoy instructed him to wait until he was sent for. That was all he could really do.
It had been fun traveling with the Hunters when Peyrs had initially been hired. Their darkness knew no limits, and it was exciting and intoxicating. But then darkness had met its match when Rhett Hallenar joined them with the Poison Mother. He’d tried to keep up, especially when Sinisia Alvax had tagged along. He wanted to show someone, anyone, that he was one of them, but trying too hard had been his biggest mistake. Perhaps if he had not taken a blunt object to Aleth Hallenar to knock him unconscious, Rhett wouldn’t have beaten him and left him for dead.
He would have never been found by the Garvas. He could still be collecting handfuls of gold for leading Hunters through all the great forests east of the Undina Loch.
But he never would have met Duchess Oksana.
She was on his mind when morning came as well as the exhilarating promise of using his information to do Rhett in. When he wasn’t getting a rush of pleasure from picturing Oksana’s powerful gaze, he was getting a rush of rage from picturing Rhett’s smug one. He’d love an opportunity to swing a good punch back at the daemonologist, but for now, he would settle with a chance at turning House Hallenar’s dogs on him.
The sun had just barely risen when there was a knock at his room door.
“Mister Aldridge, you’ve been summoned.” The inn staff knocked again. “Mister Aldridge?”
“I’ll be there in a moment!”
Was it finally time to see the queen? He dressed in a hurry and tried to look presentable. The slowly growing beard was covering up his hideously angled face that no one ever wanted to look at. He drew his hair back into a bun and for once felt like he wouldn’t be the ugliest person in a room.
There was an escort of three people waiting for him in the common room. Someone in blue robes from the courthouse, someone in a red and black tabard from the Master Knight’s barracks, and a young smart-dressed girl with dark skin and freckles. Peyrs did not know any of them but could tell by the expectant way they waited that they could only be at Dragon of the Mill for him.
“Are you Peyrs Aldridge?” the girl asked.
He was surprised at the authority that came from her, as she c
ouldn’t have been older than fifteen. But he had overheard enough at the bar the night before to expect strange things from the queen of Suradia. “Yes. Who are you?”
“Djara Songo.” She folded her arms at the small of her back. “Miss Djara Songo. The Chamberlain says Queen Allanis will see you now. We’ve come to take you to her.”
He remembered that he knew too much, and the cold panic set in again. The girl and the others could be anyone. Maybe they would take him to someone else who knew the answers he had. The trio hardly looked official. He scanned them over, trying not to look as paranoid as he felt. The cobalt robes were clean and bore Hanarn’s scale symbol on one shoulder and the sword symbol on the other. The one in the red and black tabard—a cadet, perhaps—donned dirty armor and a warped short sword. And then the girl! A teenager stood before him with nerves of steel, but who was she? She could be any kid plucked off the street and put in a nice tunic and—
Her pin. Something official. At her left breast was a circular pin with a feather and the Hallenar H. He let out a deep breath.
“Very well. I am ready.”
The carriage ride to House Hallenar was not any more impressive by daylight. They drove past construction areas and places still flooded. There were almost as many birds in the streets as there were people.
The manor itself wasn’t much, either. The Marble Palace’s beauty definitely overshadowed it, but as he stood outside waiting to be let in, there was a peculiar feeling creeping out of the rough charm. The feeling was not natural. It stuck in him like a tiny little sliver that he couldn’t stop thinking about.
Once inside, Djara led him to a room that looked and smelled fresh and clean, but the sliver grew. A mahogany desk bearing a red and black eagle runner was the main feature. It was in front of a floor-length window looking out into a courtyard. Red curtains were pulled back to shed light on the dim masonry.
And there she was, the queen herself, so young to wear such a serious face. Her gown for the occasion was a rich peacock blue with pearls that accented the ones in her crown.
Allanis was seated with Lazarus, Athen, and Ravina, and she gestured for Peyrs to take up the chair in front of her.