by Amy Bai
"Do you have any regulars who have served in the Western provinces in their careers?" he asked.
She blinked, then frowned. "One hundred and twenty-eight," she said, not bothering to soften the edge of sarcasm in her voice. "At last count." Surely he didn't think she'd have missed something so obvious.
That eyebrow went up. She wished she knew what it meant.
She didn't care. She folded her arms, remembered the ink too late, and sank her teeth into her tongue in annoyance. Her armor was in need of cleaning anyway.
"Can you spare a few?"
"Were you planning to question their loyalties or ask them for a description of the latest dance steps over there?"
Annan cast her a sidelong look. One foot began tapping a slow, irritated rhythm against the floor. "The latter."
Her weary, battered mind gave her only the image of Annan dancing a gavotte in Tharst's great hall and nothing came out of her mouth, which had apparently opened on its own. Then his meaning came clear and Kyali sat across from him, forgetting ink stains and not enough paper, forgetting that this was the first time they'd been in a room together since she'd stumbled to her bed already regretting—
Not thinking. Definitely not thinking. There was nothing safe left in her head.
"You want to send your spies West," she said, stuck between dismay and admiration, because the idea was brilliant—and more than a little mad.
Annan shrugged. Something flickered in his gaze and was gone, which was just as well because she didn't care what it was, nor did she care that his mouth had turned up at one corner in a satisfied not-quite smile. "Only a handful," he said. "Three at most. We ought to know what's going on there, don't you think?"
"Of course I think. I've thought it for months. But the Eanin have a poorer view than they used to, the borders are shut, and the Sevassis foothills are guarded."
"It wouldn't be the first time someone's crossed the Allaida border."
Kyali leaned forward, considering. "You mean them to take the river down?"
"Perhaps."
He left an uninformative silence after that and she glared at him. Annan met it with his usual unflappable stare. Kyali let the silence spread, holding his eyes, not willing to give ground here—or anywhere else, for that matter. Finally Annan let out a small huff, twitching one hand briefly palm-up in a tiny surrender. "The Brysan Map suggests there's a river trail through the Sevassis foothills, Captain. I've a man who knows woodcraft, and two others raised on the Allaida border with Cassdall. They can pass fair enough, if folk on your borders and folk on ours are similar, which they seem to be. A handful of days learning Western speech and customs might be enough."
"Why?"
That got out before she could shut her teeth over it, and Annan finally looked her in the eye without the mask. What was under it was sharp as a new blade, and surprisingly fierce.
"Because I don't know," he said, voice full of the cool, dry certainty that seemed to be him at his most irritated. "They took your capital in a single night, Captain: they prepared so well it was nearly invisible. How did they move so many troops across your borders? How did they have so many to spare? And who rules those provinces now, if all their barons came East with their sons and then—"
Annan hesitated, his gaze dropping to her hands. Kyali realized she'd dug her fingers so far into her forearms that the leather tunic under her vambraces was straining and looked away.
"You killed them," he said, in an entirely different tone. Not quite a question. And it wouldn't be; that much, Kyali knew, was common knowledge. It made her remember blood soaking into a bedspread, a dead man's face frozen in fear.
Her brother's horrified look when she'd thrown a tiny piece of truth in his face like a slap.
It wasn't possible to meet Annan's eyes now. She could barely stand to be in the room with him. The walls were too close. She stood and crossed to the fireplace, knowing the gesture revealed far too much, but she couldn't help that. She had no idea what was on her face, but it certainly wasn't anything she wanted him seeing.
"I did," she acknowledged, fighting to keep her tone level, thinking of ice and snow, then of blood and dark. She could feel her eyes flaring. She willed herself still, refusing to shiver.
"Good," Annan said, surprising her into a glance over her shoulder.
He had stretched his long legs out, one heavy boot resting on the other, dripping snowmelt on her floor. He wore his armor like a second skin, easy in it. She wasn't thinking. She didn't-think her way back across the room, where she stood over him, studying his hair, his steady hands, the rise and fall of his chest, which got subtly faster as she watched. Her pulse picked up. The door was shut; it could be locked. And there was no better way not to think.
Oh, she was so hopelessly stupid.
And what was he? Just as stupid? Did he have something to forget, too?
Did it even matter?
He looked up at her.
"I'll send some of the soldiers who served in the West to your office tomorrow," she said. "Captain."
"Thank you," Annan said, and stood, slow and careful. It wasn't the same sort of careful that Slade was. That most were, around her. Not fear, not worry. Something very different. She had no idea what to do with it. She scowled—scowled harder when that corner of his mouth curled again. Kyali put a hand out and met the still-frozen metal of his armor with her bare palm, pursed her lips in satisfaction when Annan blinked.
His hand was cold, too, she discovered a second later, when it landed on the side of her neck. She jumped and he gave another ghost of a laugh, and all the thoughts flew out of her head into blessed silence, and there was no couch in her office but the floor would probably do just as well if they were quiet.
Then an unbelievably loud thump came at the door. They jumped apart in a desperate rattle of armor as one of the Cassdall guards flung it open, Slade hovering nervously behind him.
"Enemy," the man gasped, winded and hanging on the doorjamb. It was a bad word to stop for breath on. "Outside, Captain—Captain. The Lord Corwynall's party is—"
She didn't stay to listen to the rest. She shoved the man and then Slade aside and sprinted for the guard hall, Annan right on her heels.
* * *
The cold in the air was so deep it drove a spike of icy pain into his chest, so Devin had the hood of his cloak wrapped around his mouth like a lady's scarf. He was well beyond caring what he looked like. He never wanted to spend another winter on this mountain. He had no idea how the Fraonir weathered it in tents, how Kyali had managed in the two years she'd spent among them.
"Not much farther!" Aileana shouted from up ahead.
She sounded far too cheerful.
"It's still too damned far," Devin muttered into his fur-lined cloak.
"We're nearly there," Waylen said, being close enough to have heard that last statement. The Cassdall spy was huddled in his own cloak, looking grimly determined. The healing scars on his coppery face were washed pale by the cold. "I can see the wall, which means they can see us. Someone should be out to meet us soon."
"I hope so. No, by the gods, I know so, hold on—"
Devin reached for Taireasa, found her sitting on a throne that looked much more comfortable than it actually was, listening to cases. She was sore from the chair. Put some cushions on it, he suggested, surprising and then embarrassing her. She shut him away in indignant outrage and he snickered, feeling like a little boy pulling braids.
"She'll send someone," he said, since Waylen was watching him sidelong.
"Useful, that," the spy grunted. "One wonders why we even need couriers with you two."
"I'm fairly sure I'd be noticed in the lowlands. Unless you're proposing to turn me into a spy, in which case I'm fairly sure you've lost your mind."
Waylen snorted. "No, my lord, I don't think you'd have much success living a subtle life. But even in the land as it is under Tuan's boot, there are still minstrels in the taverns."
Good gods
, that was actually…
Perfect.
"You don't have to call me that," Devin said, instead of when can I go? He set the thought aside to mull over later, when they had found this miserable traitor and Taireasa was safe. He wasn't going anywhere until then.
And until he'd had it out with Kyali, however impossible that looked from here.
"What, ‘my lord’? I don't mind. It's what you are. I'm plain-born myself, and not sorry for it. You nobles seem like such a harried lot."
"Ah, yes, well. It's the titles that do it: who can keep them all straight?"
His wit earned him a bark of laughter, muffled in wool, that turned into a cough. Waylen hunched in the saddle, shaking, one hand pressed to his mouth. Devin was about to knee Savvys closer to make sure the spy wasn't choking, but Waylen looked up with a grin.
"I always knew you lot had it hard," he wheezed.
"You should see the clothes. Horrid."
"How do you sort out all that silverware at the table?"
"Easier than keeping the list of illustrious ancestors straight in your head, I promise you."
They were giggling like children now. Aileana cast a confused look back at them.
"All that bowing and scraping must be so tiresome…"
"…And then you're betrothed to some total stranger and you have to romance her into not hating you…"
Waylen snickered, "Actually, my lo—Devin, that last one sounds a bit dreadful."
"I'm sure it is," Devin said feelingly.
"You could probably just write her a song. Isn't that what you do?"
"Clearly you haven't heard my songs," Devin replied, and Waylen let loose that shout of mirth again, making both Aileana and Fortyn look back and wave their hands for silence, no doubt wondering why they'd been saddled with two madmen for this trip.
They rode in a companionable silence after that, and Devin decided this was someone he could share a pint of ale with. He wondered if the other Cassdalls were so easy to be around. Kinsey was just… Kinsey, shy and quiet and sharp as a honed blade, full of curiosity and wonderfully dry, subtle wit. He wasn't sure yet what to think of Annan, who saw much but said little, had a sense of humor as edged as his sword, and avoided discussions of everything but politics or war.
Waylen rode a little easier now, as though laughing had made other things hurt less. His bright gaze took in everything around them. Devin pushed his hood back, more willing to suffer the cold now that he knew he was nearly out of it. He could hear faint shouts coming from somewhere and squinted up to see a distant figure on the battlement walls waving frantically.
Then Savvys went tense under him, a hitching motion of fright.
Up ahead, Aileana and Fortyn wheeled their mounts around in perfect unison, pounding back toward them in great sprays of snow. Fortyn already had his staff untangled from the saddle ties. Aileana was stringing her bow as she rode.
"Draw, Devin!" Waylen snapped, all the humor gone from his voice, and ripped his sword free.
Devin was retrieving his sword when they burst from the trees to both sides, a motley band of men in armor that looked as piecemeal as it did hard-used—but for all that, there were at least ten to their four. They came in yelling and Devin was in the thick of them before he had time to turn Savvys around.
Then there was another volley of shouts from the trees to the west, and a band of their own soldiers came out riding hard. Devin reined Savvys up, trying to get out of the way. A sword flashed out at him and he ducked, raised his own, yelped when a line of fire streaked over his arm and a blow at his shoulder knocked the breath from him. The cloak made it hard to move.
Waylen ran a man through. Devin yelled, swinging the sword, trying to keep the harp case at his back from pulling him off balance. Aileana was trading shots with a bowman in a dented helm and a ragged leather vest, and Devin kicked Savvys around, ducked when the archer swung his way, struck the man in the chin with the flat of his sword, and knocked him from his horse.
Someone was screaming.
He looked up, desperately out of breath, and saw yet more soldiers ahorse racing out of the great fortress doors. The enemy saw it, too, and all the sound of fighting fell away into a shocking, ringing silence as they scattered.
It was very hard to breathe. It didn’t seem to be the cold.
"Devin, you should have—oh, gods. Oh, no."
Waylen's face was streaked with blood on one side, all his scars flaming with exertion. Around them he had gone grayish-pale. He put a hand out, got Devin's arm in a painful grip, and then turned and shouted for Aileana and Fortyn.
"I'm all right," Devin said—or tried: the words came with a terrible flare of agony in his chest. He coughed, which made it so much worse he felt himself slide sideways into Waylen's arms. The party from the fortress came down to meet them. Aileana drew close, made a sound somewhere between a gasp and a moan, and dropped her bow to fumble in her saddlebags.
"What in he—"
Kyali. Who reined her horse to a stop and just stared at him open-mouthed, her eyes wide and gold, bright as twin suns.
"Finally," Devin said, or thought he did. He went altogether sideways, the world upended itself, and then he was staring at the sky and a crowd of faces and horse legs, and the pressure in his chest was so bad everything began to seem faraway. His sister bent over him, wooden-faced, breathing hard.
"We have to get the arrow out quickly," someone said.
Arrow? Devin wondered.
The sun went out without warning.
* * *
They came back inside in a knot of armor and cloaks and frightened faces. Taireasa flung herself forward, clumsy for the first time Kinsey could remember ever seeing. She nearly tripped. He caught her by the elbows and kept her upright, pulling her forward with him in a stumbling rush, ignoring the suspicious attention from her bodyguards.
"Thank you," she choked out before falling to her knees on the packed dirt where Devin was stretched out.
Blood, gods, so much blood.
A Fraonir girl was cutting Devin's shirt away. A boy who looked so much like her he had to be her twin was sawing with great delicacy at the shaft of the arrow jutting from under Devin's shoulder, and the Lady Captain was holding her brother down, pushing against his shoulders.
"Ky," Taireasa said, and those two met gazes in a soundless shock of warping air. It blew outward from them like an invisible brushfire, blurring everything, frightening the gathered crowd back several steps.
"We're taking it out now, Majesty."
"How bad?"
Devin groaned, arching underneath his sister’s iron grip, and they looked down at him.
"I don't know yet," Kyali said.
Kinsey knelt, not caring that there was no room for him, that he was no help here, that he was caught in a bubble of shuddering, rippling air that was snapping against his skin and making his hair stand on end. He caught Devin's hand, felt the faint pressure of fingers, and had to swallow a sob. He couldn't even remember the last time he'd wept, but he was suddenly very close to doing just that.
"Annan," he said, trusting that his captain had found this little disaster.
"My Lord Prince."
"A stretcher. An herb-woman. Have them build up the fire in Devin's room."
"Done, my Lord Prince."
Shouted orders ricocheted away from them while the Fraonir girl did something with a knife and her bare fingers and Kyali pressed her brother into the dirt, and Devin's grip grew crushing. His groan rose higher, became a scream, drowned in a dreadful choking cough. The arrow came out blessedly whole, and a rush of blood came after.
"Bad," Kyali said grimly, and Kinsey looked up at her, remembering something she'd said, the hunch of her shoulders against a dark window, firelight, magic, gods what was it…
I seem to be able to heal from wounds that might otherwise be mortal...
"Geas," he said.
"What?"
"Geas, Lady Captain. Binding you three. He can
't, but your Gift—you may be able to—"
"Yes," Kyali breathed, hope breaking through that stony mask for a second. She shut her eyes, going still and calm, and put her hands to her brother's chest, against the place where blood was pulsing out. The Fraonir girl growled something and tried to push her away, but Taireasa shot a hand out, getting the girl's arm in a white-knuckled grip.
"Let her," Taireasa commanded.
Kyali's face, already pale, went white and then crumpled. She took a sudden, shuddering gasp. The air snapped and sang, pulling at hair, clothes, thoughts. Kinsey held onto Devin's hand, listening to Taireasa's fervent, mumbled praying, to the sound of footsteps running toward them.
Kyali's hands were… blurring, like the air. Golden light shivered down the backs of them, seeming to slip right out of her pores. It fell into Devin, who took a ragged gasp and twitched. Brother and sister breathed together for a long moment, the sound of it the only thing in the hall.
The air got very still. Devin's grip slackened.
Then Taireasa's voice rose into a cry of joy. She bent and pressed her head into Devin's unwounded shoulder, and Devin's hand rose to smooth over her hair.
Devin blinked up at Kinsey. "What in hell was that?" he asked.
Kinsey leaned back, certain for a horrifying second that he was going to cry, but instead he began to laugh out of sheer, stunned relief. He pressed Devin's hand, swallowing both tears and laughter, and heaved a sigh. "That was you getting arrow-shot and your sister saving your life," he said, and Kyali staggered to her feet.
She nearly fell; she seemed to be having trouble making her legs hold her weight. She held her hands out in front of her curled, like they hurt her, and took a few clumsy steps back.
"Ky?" Taireasa said, her voice muffled by Devin's shoulder.
"Get him on the stretcher," Kyali said, looking mostly at the ground between her feet.
"Oi, I can walk…"
"You were shot, Devin," Taireasa said, sitting up. Her hair had come partially free of the crown of braids she always wore. Kinsey tried not to stare: he'd never realized it curled so much. She darted a glance at him, felt at her head, winced. "Shot. In the chest. You're not walking anywhere. Don't argue. We'll follow you up. You're going to sleep."