The Storm Witch

by Violette Malan

  “Your pardon, Tarxin, Light of the Sun, but Nomad ships have been sighted from the north watchtower.”

  Ships? Dhulyn thought.

  Eighteen

  “TAR XERWIN, PLEASE ESCORT the Paledyn Dhulyn Wolfshead to the north watchtower.”

  Xerwin got immediately to his feet, relieved to observe that Dhulyn Wolfshead had also noted the change back to formal titles, now that they were no longer alone in the room. The Paledyn bowed deeply, not quite touching the floor, before turning to follow old Harxin Slan out the door.

  Xerwin had to walk around the long end of the table, so as not to pass behind the Tarxin’s chair, but as he turned to take his formal leave, his father beckoned him closer. He approached his father’s chair and went down on one knee.

  “Do I need to tell you not to bother with the patrols she wants?” His father’s voice was well-modulated and would not carry into the outer room.

  “Of course, my lord Tarxin, Light of the Sun.”

  The Tarxin patted him on the shoulder, and made shooing motions with his hands.

  Even though no one could have seen it, Xerwin’s ears still burned hot with embarrassment. His father, the Tarxin, shooing him away as a farm slave might shoo away chickens. As if he would not be Tarxin one day. As if the old man thought he would never die.

  “Your pardon, Paledyn,” he said when he found Dhulyn Wolfshead and Harxin Slan waiting for him in the outer room. She was rearming herself with the blades she’d left there, while Harxin watched, smiling. “My father had last minute instructions.”

  She nodded briskly. “He is your superior officer, and his orders must be obeyed,” she said.

  “And you must obey them as well, my dear.” It was clear from his tone that Harxin Slan’s words were kindly meant, even flirtatious. The tone, Xerwin realized, that he himself might have used to a noble lady full of her own importance.

  And from the look on Harxin’s face, the man was just discovering what kind of mistake he’d made.

  “I am a Paledyn,” Dhulyn Wolfshead said, her rough silk voice somehow sharp and cutting as a knife. “I obey the Common Rule of my Brotherhood. It is for that reason I am here.”

  Harxin’s white face flushed red, and his lips parted, but before he could dig his grave any deeper, Xerwin decided to take pity on him.

  “Since the Tarxin, Light of the Sun, has asked me to escort the Tara Paledyn—” There, let the old fool be reminded that she outranked him as well. “You may return to your interrupted duties, Harxin.”

  “Yes, my lord Tar.”

  There, Harxin’s color was subsiding, and he was able to speak. His short bow was carefully aimed at the space between Xerwin and the Paledyn, thereby insulting no one, before Harxin turned and left the room. Xerwin grinned. There’d be no need to call for the Healer, or for any of the lower servants to clean up the old man’s blood.

  “The north watchtower’s not far,” he said to Dhulyn Wolfshead as he led the way out of the room. As soon as they were out of earshot of the guards at the doors to the Tarxin’s personal suite, he lowered his voice and spoke. “You must be quite used to that type of treatment, but I apologize for it, nevertheless.”

  “Are you apologizing for yourself, or for House Slan?”

  Xerwin stopped in mid stride, then moved quickly to catch up. “Your meaning?”

  She glanced at him sideways. “You just reminded that poor idiot that you and I have the same rank, and yet you walked out of the room before me. If I were another Tar, instead of a Tara, would you not at least have offered to let me go first?”

  He couldn’t tell whether she was smiling. He opened his mouth several times before finding the words he wanted.

  “In your land, in Boravia, would the heir to a Tarxinate allow you to precede them out of a room?”

  This time it was Dhulyn Wolfshead who stopped dead in the middle of the corridor, and waited for him to turn back to her. Her left hand was tucked into her sword belt, her right hand rested on the hilt of her sword.

  “If I were guarding him, I would insist upon it,” she said. Her head was tilted to one side, and Xerwin felt as though her cloud-gray eyes were measuring him. “And in my area of expertise, I would expect to be obeyed, as your father pretends that he will obey my will as Paledyn. But that isn’t what you’re really asking me, is it? You’re asking me whether in Boravia—in Imrion or Navra, Nisvea or any other country there—a woman and a man can be of equal rank, really equal rank.” She stepped closer to him, close enough that he could smell the wine on her breath. “Let me tell you, Tar Xerwin. In Boravia, it is the oldest child who inherits, male or female, so women own businesses and farmland. They are Houses, Scholars, and, yes, even Paledyns. And what’s more, they are Tarkins.”

  A cold wave of anger washed through him, leaving his hands tingling. How dare she, how dare she speak to him in that tone. Not even his schoolmasters had ever used that tone to him. He knew his anger must have shown in his face, but the Paledyn did not back away, did not lower even her eyes, let alone her face. In fact, she seemed to be smiling to herself, as if she had tested something, and found the result she expected.

  And suddenly it was as if all his anger evaporated in an instant. She was not afraid of him. It was fear that he saw in the faces of other women, he now saw. Not admiration. Perhaps not even respect. Dhulyn Wolfshead spoke the truth. Everything about her, her tone, her attitude—her very existence, proved that she spoke the truth.

  “Women are all these things in Boravia.” He waited until she nodded. “And slavery is not practiced there.”

  “No, it is not.”

  “And our treatment of our women—I mean, the women—that would be seen as a kind of slavery.”

  “It would.”

  “And the Nomads, they think as you do in Boravia. So they look at us here in Mortaxa as people they trade with, but not people they respect. Not people they will marry with. Not people they view as they view themselves. They think as little of us as we do of them.” It was an uncomfortable feeling, to see this. “I see it now. It explains much that I did not understand in my dealings with them. Why, then, do they trade with us?”

  Dhulyn Wolfshead merely shrugged up one shoulder and moved away. “Diplomacy between states is always rather more complicated than less,” she said. “Trade is one thing, political alliance is another.”

  “The Seers said you would bring change. I am beginning to understand just how much.”

  “I bring new ideas, perhaps. If there is to be change, it is you who will do it.”

  “And perhaps you will help me.”

  Dhulyn was happy to let Xerwin keep his own silence as he led the rest of the way to the watchtower. He appeared to be taking her words to heart, and she found she was more than a little uncomfortable with the things she had said, and the way she had said them. She had not been aware that she had so much anger in her—and that was dangerous for a Mercenary Brother. Get angry, get stupid. Get stupid, get dead. That’s what the Common Rule said.

  One of the other things the Common Rule said was that Mercenary Brothers stayed neutral when it came to politics. They could refuse to take an offer of employment for personal reasons—up to and including having no liking for the politics, or the mustache, of the potential employer. What they weren’t to do was interfere unasked with how a given country managed their own peoples.

  But they have asked me. Nor did she think she was just splitting hairs. The Tarxin had asked for Paledyns, no matter how much he had intended to use them rather than be guided by them. He had asked. He’d been told by his own Seers that Paledyns would come, and offer a solution to the conflict with the Nomads. And if the solution that was offered did more than that?

  There were also the Marked to consider. Did the Common Rule tell her she had to leave them in the condition she found them? Could she not do for them what she would be expected to do for any Mercenary Brother she found in the same straits?

  She was glad to get to the wat
chtower, and the distraction of the viewing glass, a type she’d never seen before. Xerwin dismissed the regular lookout, who seemed happy to go. The sunshine was bright enough to blind.

  Xerwin motioned her to use the viewing glass first, half-shrugging and with a smile.

  “It looks like two ships at least,” she said. “Possibly three, if there is one behind them.”

  “They will not be bringing Paledyns with them, since you are already here.”

  “They may not even be the Nomads with whom I traveled. We cannot know where the storm might have blown them.”

  “Now that they are here, what do you think?” he asked her. “Are my father’s suggestions for dealing with the Nomads at all reasonable?”

  “They would be a reasonable place to begin,” she said. “If they were not based on an entirely incorrect premise.”

  “My father is wrong about yet another thing? You surprise me.”

  The words were sarcastic, but the tone, and the look on his face showed only resignation. She gave him a long, measuring glance. Or perhaps there was more than that, perhaps there was some determination as well. She might as well see what he was made of. It seemed to be a day to tell him things.

  “The Crayx are not animals,” she said. “They are beings as intelligent as we are ourselves, and with a longer history.”

  Xerwin squeezed his eyes shut, putting both hands to his forehead. “This is too much. How is this possible?” He lowered his hands. “How do you know?”

  “They speak mind to mind, and not everyone has the ability to hear and speak with them.”

  “The Nomads must be lying to you. How could such an ability be limited?”

  Dhulyn shook her head. Once again, his tone did not match his words. “Is the Mark not limited? Even among the Marked, is not one Mender better talented than another? You’ve seen the White Twins, how they are like two different sets of people. For the Sun’s sake, Xerwin, a Storm Witch inhabits your sister’s body!” Dhulyn leaned against the battlement, feeling the heat of the stone through her clothes. “You, yourself, have seen stranger things than sea creatures who can speak to humans. Your deciding that they are nothing more than animals does not make them so. Any more than your confining and breeding the Marked makes them animals. And the people you enslave, they are people, and not dogs or cattle.” Shut up. Shut up, she told herself. Sun and Moon, what was wrong with her?

  Xerwin sat down heavily on the lookout’s perch, as if Dhulyn Wolfshead’s words were each as heavy as the block of stone he was sitting on. She was not looking at him now, he saw, somewhat relieved. She had turned away to face the ocean, and was looking into the middle distance, as if she were thinking of something else entirely. Xerwin was glad of the respite.

  Animals who are people. People who are not animals. He rubbed at his face. His head spun so much he was afraid it would come off. “The Paledyn changes all. Nothing will be as it was. The world as you know it will be gone, forever.” That’s what the White Twins had said. Their eerie, adult voices echoed in his head. “Rain will fall in the desert; the hind chase the lion; the creatures of the sea will walk the beaches. Trees will flower in winter; the sea lose its salt, the land ripple and flow.”

  It was coming. An entirely different world. He looked over at Dhulyn Wolfshead. A better one?

  His father would never stand for it. Never let it happen.

  Well, then, I must do something about my father.

  “Dhulyn Wolfshead,” he said. “As you say, the Tarxin may only pretend to heed your suggestions, but I will listen to you.” And to begin, he thought, I will set up the patrol of the Upper City.

  Carcali let her woman Finexa drape her veils properly, making sure that her face and torso were not obscured, and that the cloth hung neatly and evenly down her back. The Tarxin had summoned her.

  “Leave it,” she said finally, her skin fairly itching with impatience.

  “It cannot be left, Tara,” Finexa said. “You go to your father, Light of the Sun, but you must pass through public corridors to reach him, and you must be properly dressed.”

  She’d speak to the Tarxin about this, Carcali thought. If the Paledyn could go about dressed as she pleased, surely the Storm Witch could as well. The thought of trousers almost made her mouth water.

  There were two guards outside the door waiting to escort her to the Tarxin’s hall. They were called attendants, but they were more than that, just as Finexa was more than a lady page.

  This time Carcali noticed that as she passed through one of the public squares Finexa had mentioned, even a few of the men who saw her acknowledged her, not just the women as before. So it did mean something to be the Storm Witch.

  The Tarxin was waiting for her in his private room, off to one side of the audience chamber. Carcali bit at the inside of her lower lip. The last time she’d been in this room, the Tarxin had struck her.

  “Good,” he said, without looking up. “I thank you for coming so promptly.”

  Fine words, but a formality only. When he looked up, his face changed. He tilted his head to on side, actually looking at her now, seeing her.

  “What would you like to be called?”

  A shiver went up her spine. Those were almost the very same words the Paledyn had said to her. And even though the woman had meant to challenge and shake her, Carcali found she would rather have the Paledyn’s distrust and challenge, than the Tarxin’s false warmth.

  “It would be better if I was always called the Tara Xendra, don’t you think?”

  His face hardened, but whatever his expression had been, it was gone quickly. Carcali steeled herself and went to one of the chairs near the wall and pulled it forward, placing it across the table from the Tarxin. She concentrated on straightening her skirts and veils as she seated herself, not looking up. She couldn’t wait for him to ask her to sit down. If she meant to be treated like an equal partner, she needed to act like one.

  Suddenly the Tarxin smiled, like a wolf showing all its teeth, and Carcali wished that he would frown at her again.

  “I forget. Looking at you, I forget that it is not a little girl, not quite marrying age, sitting before me. I forget that you are something else, something entirely different.”

  Carcali tilted her head to one side and raised her eyebrows slightly, in imitation of one of her professors when he wanted to show that more of a response was expected.

  “You’d do well to remember that others will only see the child, and act accordingly.”

  “Others will see the Storm Witch, soon enough. Nothing so easily remedied as youth.” One of the same professor’s sayings. “May I ask why I’m here?”

  The Tarxin leaned back in his chair, elbows resting on the arms. “The Nomads have been sighted, two ships at least, out beyond the arm of the western shore. I want you to send a storm that will either put them upon the rocks, or push them far out to sea.”

  “Why?”

  The silence was so profound that Carcali thought she could actually hear the drop of sweat that trailed down the center of her back.

  “They are our enemies.” His voice was cold enough to drop the temperature of the room.

  “When do you want it?”

  “Now. Immediately.”

  Carcali shook her head. “Can’t be done, not without more notice. I don’t keep the kind of winds you’re asking for in my pockets, you know. Air pressure has to be changed, temperatures, humidity . . . these aren’t things that can just be conjured up out of nowhere.” Well, they could, she thought. But not by me, not anymore.

  He looked at her from under lowered lids. “What is it you fear?”

  Carcali thanked the Art that she’d practiced controlling her face, otherwise she didn’t know what else he might have picked up from her expression. “I’m afraid you’re going to lose your temper with me, and forget what our agreement is,” she said finally. “It seemed pretty obvious that I was telling you something you didn’t want to hear.”

  Whether it
was the reminder of their bargain, or whether he really was much more pragmatic than she gave him credit for, the Tarxin relaxed.

  “How much time do you need?”

  “All I can give you this minute is a guess. With a few hours of calculations, I should be able to tell you more precisely.”

  “And your guess now?”

  “At least two days.”

  “Then you have two days.”

  He looked down at the pages in front of him. Carcali frowned and kept her seat, pretending she hadn’t noticed the dismissal. She had to say something. She had to. Her guilt already weighed her down—heavier, if anything, since the Paledyn’s visit—she couldn’t take any more.

  “If the Nomads get too close to shore,” she said, “Whatever I do to them will affect the shore as well.”

  “Can your storm melt rock?” he said, looking up.

  “Well, no.” Carcali blinked. “But it can destroy homes, crops.”

  He nodded. “Very well. Warnings can be given to those exposed. If that is all, I must return to my other work.” Now he was also pretending he hadn’t dismissed her already.

  “Of course,” she said as she rose to her feet.

  “Let them know they may send the Scholar in.”

  She nodded, turned her back on him, and walked out.

  Her guards were waiting for her in the outer room. She gave the Steward the message and watched him approach a blue-robed Scholar before setting off back to her own quarters.

  So that’s the way it was going to be, was it? He would tell her what to do and she would do it. Some partnership. What gave him the right—don’t be naïve, she told herself. Power gives him the right. He dictates and others obey. Carcali sucked in a sharp breath, loudly enough that the guard walking ahead of her half turned his head to look at her over his shoulder. Carcali lowered her eyes and kept walking. Was she any better than the Tarxin? Hadn’t she thought power was all it would take to solve the problem facing the Academy of Artists? Look how that had ended.