Enemy (On the Bones of Gods Book 1)

by K. Eason

  “Only what is mine.” The shadows sank into her flesh, dyed her skin and hair as dark as any Dvergir. Left her naked, too, and he was glad of the tree behind him. Not at all sure of his knees or the steadiness of his hands.

  “I am not yours.”

  “No?” Tal’Shik crossed the short space between them. Ran her fingers across his thigh, and the pain melted into something else entirely. “This says otherwise. That is my mark, Veiko Nyrikki, put there by my godsworn.”

  “It is unfinished.” Snow had told him that. He held to that certainty.

  “A small matter.” She put her hand on his chest and stroked the place over his heart. Her breath chilled his cheek, damp-rot and old iron. “You could resist, but you will lose. Yield now, and save yourself the effort. I am not a cruel mistress.”

  “That is not my understanding.”

  Effort, now, to look at her face, like climbing uphill on ice. Hard to breathe with her so close, damp-rot and woman-smell clotted in his throat and all his limbs shaking. It had been a long time since Kaari’s daughter. Months of Alviri women who refused his eyes and whispered skraeling when he passed. And very recent nights spent near a woman who met his eyes and his wits without any fear. He summoned up her memory like a shield, imagined her exasperation

  for the Laughing God’s sake, Veiko

  with his foolishness.

  Tal’Shik frowned at him. Veiko met her gaze and stared back, defiant. He would not flinch. Would not show her weakness. Did both when her features blurred and ran together and became Snow looking back at him. Snow’s midnight eyes, and Snow’s jagged smile, and Snow’s flawed voice:

  “Who is this woman, so large in your mind? Is her shape more to your liking? I can assume it, if you like.”

  Witchery. Trickery. And anger, oh yes, that slipped past his wits and escaped. “Do not try. You make a poor copy.”

  Tal’Shik hissed, and Snow’s features melted and ran into a terrible, offended beauty. She trailed her finger along his jaw until it rested in the hollow of his throat.

  “You lack manners,” she mused, and stroked the place where his life beat under the skin. “I will have to teach you. I will enjoy teaching you.”

  “No,” because that was all he could manage. Ehkla had left him no choice at all, with her witchery. Tal’Shik offered the illusion of refusal, but she would wear him away like a river over stones. Take him eventually but make him yield first. He made fists instead. Bit his lip through to bleeding. Wished he had drowned, wished he had died in the snow, wished—

  “Do not touch me,” squeezed through teeth clenched to cracking. “Ehkla did not finish her sacrifice. I do not belong to you. Go.”

  Her eyes turned the color of fresh blood. “Not without what is mine.”

  Patterns swirled under her skin like embers in charcoal, shapes that he did not know, which made his gut knot and pushed bitter into his throat. A whirling, violent dark spilled out of her, liquid storm clouds that shredded the twilight and spread around her like a cloak.

  Or like wings. Very large wings. His chest constricted to a breathless white heat.

  Dragon, yeah? That’s the Dvergiri word.

  Veiko threw himself sideways. Gasped and flopped and writhed until he fetched up against another tree and squirmed onto his one working knee.

  “Where are you going?” Tal’Shik asked. Then she shook off her woman shape utterly. She grew larger, her limbs melting together and twisting into new shapes: wings, claws. Her eyes glowed like a bonfire burned down to ashes.

  Veiko worked the bow loose from its ties. Braced the end and slid the string up over the tip, there, fitted it into the notch. Fumbled for an arrow, fitted it to the string, and drew it back, steady as he could. It was not a good angle, a worse position.

  Tal’Shik made a sound between thunder and laughter that shivered all the way to his bones. “You cannot intend—” she began, and he shot her.

  Not a good shot, no, but lucky. The arrow caught her high in what had been a woman’s thigh a moment before, what looked like tail and haunches now, and buried itself to the fletching.

  Tal’Shik’s rage was all the more awful for its silence, and for the efficiency with which she reached down and snapped the arrow off in the wound. The look on her face—no longer a woman’s now, something terrible—said that Veiko’s own end would not be as quick, or as final.

  Veiko pulled a second arrow, nocked, and drew. And saw, from the corner of his eye, a grey dog running through the trees. At him, and then past him, charging straight for Tal’Shik.

  Veiko loosed the arrow. Made a one-armed grab for Helgi as he bounded past. The dog slipped through his fingers like water.

  “Helgi!” Might as well call the sun from the heavens. Might as well ready himself to watch Helgi die a second time, and probably only a handful of seconds before Veiko himself, and all Snow’s don’t you fucking dies would not bring him back. He wondered if his body would linger, or if it would simply stop. If Snow would think she had killed him.

  But Helgi snapped at Tal’Shik and dodged away, circled back, and came at her flank. She struck, and he danced out of reach, flickered back and nipped at a hand gone halfway to talons. He gleamed like old steel in moonlight, except there was no moon. Almost full dark, now—not night, because night had stars, night had shape and sense to it. This was nothing, pure and empty and aggressive. Tal’Shik’s doing, and part of Tal’Shik herself, that devoured the trees and ate all the sky.

  Her eyes blazed, the only sure lights in this place, like signal fires.

  Veiko drew a third arrow. Nocked and sighted and held it until his arm burned.

  His second shot had gone wide. This one did not. One of Tal’Shik’s eyes went dark.

  She vanished in a thunderclap and a gust that shattered the bow in his hands and flung him aside. Veiko struck the same convenient tree, much higher on its trunk, hard enough to white his vision. Struck the ground in the next beat, and all his breath gusted out. The color came back in slow stages—twilight greys and blues. Misty grey. And Helgi’s winter eyes, on the other end of Helgi’s very black nose.

  He sat up slowly. Touched the side of his head, expecting blood, and was pleasantly surprised. Checked all the rest of him, too. The leg Ehkla had marked still hurt, but it responded. His bow, however, was beyond help. He gathered the pieces and put them into the quiver. He borrowed the tree for balance and pulled himself to standing.

  His whole body hurt, chill and ache in his joints that had nothing to do with bruises or trees or hard landings. The path had vanished, along with Tal’Shik. There was only forest around him, no trail—no sign of the river, or any indication which way he’d come.

  So. That had been Tal’Shik’s trickery. Show the fool a convenient path. Let him lose himself in the forest. Time was uncertain here. Noidghe who went walking too long died, sometimes, if their bodies failed them. And his had not been healthy at all when he’d left it. He needed to find the path out.

  Helgi had led him this far, but Helgi sat at his feet now and sniffed, narrow-eyed, and looked doubtful. Veiko took an experimental step in one direction. Helgi did not move. Veiko tried another, and Helgi stood up. Took a pair of stiff-legged steps and stopped. Growled, more warning than menace, staring hard past Veiko’s left hip.

  Guess, then, that it was not a moose-spirit Helgi saw, or a bear-spirit, or any kind of animal. Some new encounter to delay him, some new threat from which he could learn a great deal if it did not kill him first.

  This new experience wore a man’s shape, Dvergir and unarmed, with flames in the sockets where eyes should be. He leaned hip-shot against a sapling that did not seem to notice his weight. Not a man at all, no, and Veiko could guess who he was, too. Snow swore by him often enough.

  A man could trip over the Dvergiri gods, for how often they seemed to appear. As well try to avoid Briel when she wanted a flatcake.

  “Laughing God,” Veiko said sourly. “Why are you here?”

  The G
od laughed. The trees slumped like candles too close to fire. “Such a welcome. I suppose I can’t blame you, can I? After Tal’Shik.”

  “What do you want?”

  “From you? Nothing. I’m here as a favor to Snowdenaelikk.”

  “Snowdenaelikk.”

  “Surely you remember her. Tall woman, features as sharp as her tongue? Ah. I see that you do. Peace, skraeling. I know she inspires men to violence. But.” The flame-eyed man grinned and showed empty hands. “Most times she’s the target.”

  “Snow would not ask your help. She does not know about this place.”

  “She knows you’re dying. And you are, by the way. She also thinks it’s her fault.”

  “It is not.”

  “I know that. But she asked for my help, and I’m here. So. Shall we go?” The Laughing God held out a hand.

  Favors meant obligation. Meant debts and entanglements. And Snow had asked favors for his sake, which was worse. “What does she owe for this asking?”

  “What does that matter to you, skraeling?”

  “I will pay it.”

  “You. What can you offer me?” The God tipped his head, so that the smile spilled into one corner of his lips. “Do you know where you are? Or how to get back to where you want to be?”

  “No.”

  “And do you know why Tal’Shik didn’t rape you?”

  He flushed. “No.”

  “Or rip out your heart and eat it?”

  “No.”

  The God grinned, a little unkindly. “Well, then. Maybe you don’t know so much, yeah? Maybe you’ve got nothing I want. Maybe you should be glad of what help you’re offered and take it.”

  That was truth. He was only crofter’s son turned hunter turned outlaw, who thought he could be a noidghe now because he’d spoken twice to ghosts and because he had his dead dog to guide him. See how that had turned out. He’d almost fed a river-ghoul. Almost given himself to Tal’Shik. Almost lost Helgi a second time.

  Toadshit, yeah? He imagined Snow’s half-twist smile, that angry one that would not reach her eyes. Lot of almosts, Veiko, but you’re still here.

  True enough. He’d escaped the river. Refused Tal’Shik and hurt her and driven her away. But he was certainly lost now, in the middle of a spirit forest, no path and no idea where he should go, Helgi crouched and confused at his feet, and the Laughing God offering help for a price not yet named. He was out of luck, out of skill.

  Not out of brains, yeah?

  Veiko stared very hard at nothing. Thought about trickery and witchery and half-truths.

  “Do you know why Tal’Shik did not rape me, or why she did not eat my heart?”

  “I told you.”

  “No. You asked me if I knew. That is not the same thing.”

  The God’s eyes banked back to embers. Smoke curled from deep in the sockets. “No. It isn’t.”

  Veiko should have felt satisfaction, hearing that. Felt only a grim relief instead, that he’d got something right at last. Noidghe walked the spirit world, and they bargained with spirits, and they crossed death like men crossed rivers. Noidghe could also lose themselves in the spirit world if they were unwise, and oh, he had been that.

  “You are no noidghe,” said the God. “You’re just a crofter’s son. You’re an outlaw. You are lost, and you need help. So take it.”

  Veiko regarded the God’s outstretched hand. A noidghe knew the way home, but he wasn’t noidghe. The God was right about that.

  Toadshit, Veiko. What else would you be?

  Truth in that, too. He was a poor noidghe. Untaught. Knowledge he’d never wanted. Never sought. A crofter’s son did not need to know those things.

  But he wasn’t a crofter’s son anymore. He was an outlaw, dead to his family and his tribe. Dying now, and trying to get back from that. If he managed that, he’d be noidghe by definition, however badly prepared. And if not, he’d be dead, that was all.

  He didn’t want to die.

  Or he could accept the God’s help and pay the God’s price. He had made deals before, with Kenjak, and the price had not been too terrible. But Kenjak was not the Laughing God. A god’s help might cost more than a numbed arm. The God’s price might not be his to pay at all if the debt became Snow’s. A man might make such a deal to save himself, but a man did not betray his

  only

  friend and drag her into his debts.

  “Well?”

  That sounded like Snow’s voice, and Veiko looked up sharply. For a single heartbeat he saw Snow’s face in the God’s razor-bones. Then she faded, and it was only the God again, whose eyes smoked like wet wood.

  Like the fire in the cave had. Veiko remembered the sting, when he opened his eyes, and the constant itch in his throat. Remembered Snow’s tired

  Wood’s too wet, yeah? Look at that smoke.

  and Dekklis’s You can go get it next time. Which Snow hadn’t, no. She’d stayed with him, fingers wound through his.

  Don’t you fucking die.

  Do not let me.

  He might not be worth much as a noidghe, but he was a good hunter, and he had his dog to help him. Veiko knelt and took Helgi’s face in his hands. Looked hard into winter-pale eyes and remembered midnight-blue eyes and the strength in her hands. Remembered the smell of her as she leaned over him. Remembered the steel and bright fire core of her.

  “Go,” he told Helgi. “Find Snowdenaelikk.”

  Helgi sniffed, narrow-eyed, and turned a stiff-legged circle. Stopped and raised his muzzle and whined, as Helgi did when he’d caught a scent. Veiko patted his ribs, go, and Helgi went, tail curled and gleaming like old steel.

  The God laughed, and this time the trees melted utterly. “Oh, I see why she likes you. Clever. Proud. Well, then. Good luck, skraeling.”

  “I will not need it.” Veiko drew a deep breath. Held it and turned his back on the God. “I know the way.”

  PART TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Cardik had been an Alvir city, several wars and another name ago. Some petty thegn’s local seat to which the tatters of the allied Alviri tribes had retreated when it became clear that the Illhari Republic would not be stopped farther south. The city squatted on both sides of a ribbon of water that only counted as a river during spring snowmelt, when it spread out of its banks and smeared mud across most of the valley. The Alviri had counted on that spring flood to save them, to sweep the Illhari back into the Below and drown what their artillery could not crush. They had trusted their walls, and their vats of hot oil, and their godsworn, who said that the Illhari would not prevail against the righteous.

  But it had been Illhari engineering in the end, and Illhari conjuring, that had cracked Cardik’s walls from root to crest. Illhari determination and Illhari discipline that had waged war through the winter. Illhari vengeance that had shattered most of the city, dismantled the keep and the temples, and razed the whole Hill. Illhari pride that rebuilt it in Illharek’s image, except for the red mountain sediment that even conjuring could not change.

  The conquerors had built roads, too, out of imported Illhari stone and still more red mountain brick. Roads were more efficient than tunnels, and faster to build, and—most important to the Senate—more affordable. Cardik had two. One, the wider, ran south along the mountains toward the distant city of Illharek, threading together the conquered Alviri settlements like beads on a string. The second jumped the river and trailed east and lost itself in the sunrise and the plains. Dekklis had traveled both, and their packed-dirt cousins, with the Sixth. But this homecoming, she marched overland and through the forest, as the first legion soldiers had done, following the Wild’s convolutions at a pace far slower than the most burdened soldier managed on pavement.

  She and Istel could have returned on the road much more quickly. Should have, by every regulation and rule. But her companions could not, and Dekklis wasn’t certain if her niggling guilt was because she’d stayed with Snow and Veiko, or because she had considered no other option.
The half-blood was healthy enough. But the skrae—Veiko, Dekklis self-corrected—Veiko wasn’t. He’d woken up with the stormwind screaming outside two days ago. Just sat up, fever broken. But he was not well, no, still weak and limping badly. He couldn’t outrun a lame rabbit, whatever I am fine and I can walk and I will manage he insisted. As if everyone couldn’t see the wounds in his leg, as if the cave hadn’t stunk of vomit and shit and sick sweat. As if the fever hadn’t melted flesh off him—that, obvious even to Dekklis, who had not known him before.

  “Toadshit,” Snow had said mildly, and shared a smirk with Istel—who still had a gash grinning across his arm and chest—before she’d looked at Dekklis and raised both eyebrows. And so it was Dekklis who’d said We’ll go back together and We’ll stay off the road as if there’d never been any plans to the contrary.

  It wasn’t a bad idea. Dekklis could admit, to herself anyway, that her own cracked ribs made her glad enough for Veiko’s hitching limp and Istel’s need for frequent rests. Snow was the only one healthy, and she spent most of her energy propping up Veiko—who’d protested the help exactly once, until he hit his first deep snow, and then got thin-lipped and quiet.

  So, going by forest, at Veiko’s best pace—two whole days of travel, so that they came to Cardik just past sunset. The city threw a warm glow up against clouds pregnant with more snow to make a second, weak twilight. Another storm on the way, in a week that had seen three already. Not unheard of this close behind midwinter, but not typical weather, either.

  Blame Tal’Shik’s pet Talir half-blood, maybe. Blame bad luck. Dekklis wanted, bad as she’d wanted anything lately, four walls and a roof, a bed and a fire and warm toes. Tired and cold, and, in the privacy of her own head, more than a little bit scared. Dek understood the dangers of weather and edged steel. It was Tal’Shik and ghosts that bothered her, and Red Lady, and Veiko’s cool Ehkla is not dead conviction.

  There had been no signs of Ehkla or any surviving Taliri. No signs of Rurik and the Sixth, either. The road out of the forest was all untouched snow and the occasional scattered footprint, and none of the pounded-half-to-ice hardpack that troopers made on a march.