by K. Eason
Dear foremothers, thank you, the fight wasn’t over yet. They weren’t too late. Dekklis breathed a lungful of blood and metal. Her wits rushed back, her nerves settled. She drew her own short legion sword and attacked with something like relief. The first available target, a slim-shouldered boy who looked like he’d never seen battle before: lurking on the fringes, staring at the chaos. She gave him no warning. Cut and sliced and left him dying, sliding off the edge of her blade. She kicked him loose. Paused as he gasped and wept and writhed on the stone. The collar winked at her from his neck. Hell and damn, probably covering a citizen’s sigil. She filed that for later; no time now to check her victim for a House mark. She had more trouble coming at her, another fair-skinned man.
Not a bondie, she realized in the first cut. This was a Talir, with a raider’s chopping blade. She twisted sideways, let his strike slide down the length of her sword, deflecting the force of the blow. He was wearing typical Taliri armor, leather and piecemeal metal. She aimed a kick at his knee. Caught him higher than she meant, in the thigh, but it was enough to throw his balance, enough to buy her time to flick her sword around his and score a cut on his arm.
The Talir hissed, pain and fury. Took a long step back, out of her range, unless she wanted to lunge in and leave herself open. She did not. He bared his teeth at her. He was gaunt, his skin stretched tight across cheekbones and chin, eyes sunken in their sockets and a little bit mad. He hissed at her again, more like a cornered cat than a man. Then he scrabbled back, three quick steps, before he spun and chose a new target, chopping savagely into the back of an Alvir bondie.
Hell and damn. So there were three sides to this battle: Illhari against outlander, Illhari against Illhari, and no allies among the godsworn. Tal’Shik must be so pleased with the chaos.
Then Dekklis smelled sudden lightning, felt the whole side of her face tingle and heat. Shrieks followed, rising to a peak and stopping suddenly. Man’s voice, woman’s, she couldn’t tell. Didn’t matter: that was godmagic, that meant godsworn, that was who she needed to kill.
She got four steps before Istel joined her. Istel, whose eyes burned with real fire, who turned a smirk at her that was not any expression of Istel’s Dek had ever seen. Which made her a heretic, too, as much as Snowdenaelikk, and a traitor. Maybe an idiot, too, because this ally was no friend of Illharek, of women, of highborn.
The fight was down to skirmishes now, individual knots of conflict. Her side was obvious, uniformed. She helped her own out where she could, stabbed and sliced in passing. Beside her, not-quite-Istel dragged darkness behind him, flowed from shadow to shadow, struck from the back, the side. He did not miss, found every gap in the armor. Left the enemies of Illharek bleeding in his wake. God-man, avatar. Oh foremothers, this was what Illharek had Purged. This was what Dekklis had believed false, impossible, pure superstition.
Snow’s smirk, Snow’s dry Yeah, Szanys, well, always said that was toadshit.
And Tal’Shik wouldn’t wear a man’s skin, or a woman’s. She would wear a dragon.
That fight wasn’t her problem. Not now. What was: Tal’Shik’s godsworn, who wore their own flesh, and who bled and died like anyone.
The lightning smell gave way to smoke and cooking meat. Dekklis might have gagged a year earlier, recognizing that meat for people; now she clamped her jaw tight and sucked breath through her teeth and kept going. The godsworn’s victims lay like trail markers, sad lumps of legion armor and curling smoke. Some of them might be alive. Dekklis did not stop to check. Stepped past them, quick and quiet. The tunnel had never been finished, never conjured smooth; there were still irregularities, alcoves and pockets and ragged pillars of stone. No lanterns back here, no light—except the sour purple godmagic glow, bleeding out of the tunnel’s crenellations, stabbing and flickering as its wielder moved through the stones. Not running outright, but with purpose. Chasing something. Or someone. Oh, foremothers.
“Rurik,” said not-quite-Istel. “She’s after Rurik.”
Ask how he knew that, ask how a God knew anything. Dekklis clipped her teeth shut over questions. Forced herself to slow down, to mind the noise boots made on rock.
The God had no such qualms. “Rurik!” he shouted, in Istel’s voice. “First Tribune!”
Sss, Dekklis wanted to say. She spun toward him, intending—what, hell, to punch his shoulder, to shake him, to do any of the half dozen things a senior trooper might do to an idiot green? But Istel’s hand was already raised, palm out to her—stand down, wait, be quiet. He angled away from her, God-quick.
So the violet bolt struck where Istel had been, splashing across the stone and turning Dek’s night-sight to useless spangles. Hell and damn. She flattened against the wall, black Illhari sword point down, following the line of her thigh. Blinked and squinted her vision back into order.
And so she saw the godsworn clearly: a Dvergir barely out of her teens, unremarkably dressed, hair in a simple braid. Pass her on the street, you wouldn’t look twice. She stalked forward, bare-armed, violet fire coiling through her fingers like a bruised witchfire. Saw Istel and grinned. The godfire turned her teeth lambent, rendered her eyes pits of black.
Behind her, Dekklis saw Rurik rising out of a crouch behind a lump of raw stone. The godsworn had been that close to cornering him. Maybe another step, maybe two, she’d’ve seen him, struck him, burned him dead. Would have, except for Istel’s shout.
Relief hurt, like a knife in the chest. Gratitude filled in behind, warm as blood, for Istel’s
the God’s
intervention.
This is how it starts, Szanys, one favor.
Dekklis held her own hand up, wait, saw Rurik recognize her, saw the shock and relief spill across his features. Then the godsworn snarled something at Istel, alien syllables that slid past Dek’s ears like razors. The lightning smell came again, and a buildup of power that made all Dek’s skin prickle and pull tight.
Istel laughed—barely Istel’s voice now, all smoke and a jagged malice that Istel had never owned. Istel’s flesh strained to contain the Laughing God, orange light leaking from eyes and mouth and ears. Orange light turning him translucent, like thin parchment in front of a candle. The God would burst out, he must, a man could not hold all that—
“No,” said Istel, very clearly, and pointed. Dek’s eyes followed the gesture, that was instinct—expecting to see a bolt of godfire arcing toward the godsworn, torching her where she stood.
Instead, she saw the motion behind her: Rurik, slinking forward with sword leveled. Disregarding her stay, Istel’s no, any order to stop. Because Rurik saw a target, Rurik had been commander too long to take orders, because the godsworn needed killing—
A hundred reasons for the disobedience, and none of them mattered.
Dekklis caught her own shout in her throat, strangled it into a croak. Barely audible to her own ears, but loud enough for the godsworn. Who turned, sudden and startled, and saw Dekklis crouching in the dark. Who caught just a flicker of Rurik behind her, at the last, before he rammed his sword through her back.
She looked down at the slick, dark metal poking out of her belly. Folded her hands around the blade. The godmagic sparked where it touched steel, twining around the metal like a cancerous vine. Following the metal through the godsworn’s narrow torso, out the back, around the Illhari sword’s unburied fingerswidth. And then up, around the hilt, around the man’s hand holding it. The godmagic coiled around Rurik’s wrist, his arm, fast as fire on oil. Forked into his mouth, his eyes, and flashed almost white. He didn’t have time to scream. Went rigid, like all his muscles and bone turned to iron. Then he fell backward, still stiff. His right hand stayed where it was, on the hilt of his sword, the bone smoking where it had snapped.
A howl surged up in Dek’s throat, wordless this time, rage and grief together. She lunged forward, sword out, ready to die, probably the same way Rurik had, not much caring. She met the godsworn’s eyes, the godsworn’s grin.
And then Istel w
as there, his left arm slamming across Dek’s chest with surprising force. His right hand swept up, and the shadows heaved around him. They surged toward the godsworn, boiled around her feet. Grew, surging past knees and hips and waist. Then they turned solid, hooked into her flesh. She shrieked as the shadows pulled her down. Dekklis heard snapping bones. Smelled bright metal blood. The shadows dragged her into themselves, and she disappeared. Her screams lasted a while longer, before smoking into silence.
But not long enough. Never long enough. Dekklis shoved past Istel. Went to Rurik and knelt beside him. He was dead. Of course he was. The grief slammed into her belly like a stone fist. She pulled his eyelids closed over eyes boiled white with the heat that had killed him. Stood, with knees too well trained to shake.
“Fuck and damn. If he hadn’t, if he’d waited—” Istel shook his head. The God fled, leaving honest dark eyes where the fires had been. “Dek, I’m so sorry.”
“Not now,” she said, gravel-voiced. The First Legate had other troops engaged in battle. The woman who’d lost her friend would have to wait to grieve.
* * *
Per came to find her when it was over. Illhari-bred Per, whose sword dripped. Whose armor did too, dear foremothers. At least some of the blood came from the gash in Per’s scalp. A wonder the woman was walking. Saluting, like no one from the Sixth would, after battle.
“First Legate,” she said. And waited for permission to speak.
“First Spear,” Dekklis said, with all the patience left in her. Because Rurik was not standing in front of her. Wouldn’t, ever again. “Report, Per, cut the toadshit.”
Per blinked. Tilted her head so that the blood ran sideways, instead of into her eyes. “We were ambushed as we came out of the tunnel by what looked like several groups of household bondies on some errand; we didn’t even mark them as trouble until they attacked. There was a bright light, and it smelled like burning. That’s when we knew they had a godsworn. Then the Taliri came out of the tunnel. They must’ve been hiding back there, and we’d’ve seen them if we’d just gone a little farther. We thought—” Per shook her head. Winced as the motion started a fresh stream of blood. “That we’d been flanked. That we were finished. But they fought each other.”
“Survivors?”
“A few, sir.”
“Show me.”
Dekklis was no stranger to battlefields. She had picked through the dead, sorting our side from those others. In Illharek, during the bread riots, it had been legion against civilian, and precious few of the former had died. In Cardik, there had been raiders. There had been K’Hess Kenjak, the first skewered sacrifice. But none of them had been her responsibility. Not like this. She’d have to write letters. She’d have to see all of them, see how they’d died. But not yet. She needed an enemy first. Some focus to turn grief into rage.
Neela was sorting the legion dead and wounded. Dekklis walked past her, trailing Per. She walked past Ville, who knelt beside Rurik’s body, whispering—what, some heretic prayer? Some toadbelly invocation he’d learned from his Alviri grandmother? Something, anyway, not meant for a commander’s ears. He shut up as she passed him. Watched her sidelong.
The enemy dead had been dragged to one side, piled against the tunnel wall. Male, to a one, except the godsworn. Her House sigil named her V’Lak. Old House. Honorable.
A House that Dekklis vowed to eradicate, down to the last stone.
“She went for the First Tribune deliberately,” said Per. Her voice shook a little, from pain or emotion or simple exhaustion. “Like she had a grudge.”
“She did. He’s a highborn man commanding the legions. He should be a consort in some House, breeding and eating too much. Or gelded. He was an affront to her Illharek.”
“Sir,” said Per, faintly. Dekklis looked at her and saw the shock of a woman too young and too Midtowner to have thought much about the Reforms, what they would mean to the highborn. There was a whole middle Tier of Illharek full of women like her. Foremothers defend.
Except the foremothers had worshipped Tal’Shik. Their fault, this whole mess.
Dekklis poked her way through the corpses. The Taliri raiders were obvious: raggedy, filthy, showing signs of hard travel. The collared bondies were, to a man, fair-skinned: Alviri, Taliri, even a couple of half-bloods. This was a well-fed group. All muscle and meat. And they’d killed legion troops here. Part of that was because they’d had numbers and godsworn, but part of it had to be training.
Dekklis squatted beside the bodies, one after the other. There wasn’t a House sigil among them. Not on their skin, not on the collars. That was unusual; Houses liked to mark their property, collars if not flesh. But more interesting, it meant this group wasn’t free. These were actual bondies, actual property. Maybe earning their freedom, killing Illharek’s soldiers.
She found the one she’d killed earlier, the young man who’d rushed her. He’d been a favorite, clearly. Beautiful face. Fine clean limbs. A particularly fine collar. It was old, filigreed and embossed and worn almost smooth. Almost—but there. Dekklis rubbed the design near the hinge. After the Purge, the surviving Houses had recast their sigils. Quick cuts, jagged lines, instead of the old loops and coils. This was an old style. She pushed her thumb hard into it, felt the ridges under her skin. Snowdenaelikk had warned her that the longer she left the godsworn alone, the stronger they’d get. The more pre-Purge toadshit they’d resurrect. And she had not acted, wanting the law on her side.
Well. Now she had the law and the proof.
She wrapped both hands round the collar and twisted. The ancient catch gave way. She lifted it carefully from the dead man’s neck.
“These toadshits are getting training,” she told Per. “And they’re all unmarked, savvy? I bet there’s a few Houses, pooling resources.”
“Yes, First Legate,” Per said. She sounded a little breathless.
Dekklis scowled. She glanced across the members of the Sixth still standing. Found a face she recognized. “Einar! First Spear Per needs tending.” And to Per: “Go sit down before you fall down.”
Dekklis found Neela barking orders, having taken charge. She saw Dekklis and snapped a salute, cutting herself off mid-order, leaving the mila at her shoulder gaping and trying to come to attention.
“As you were,” she said wearily. “Neela, where’s the adept?”
“Up the tunnel, sir. She took a few troops with her.”
Including Istel, no doubt. Dekklis nodded thanks. Then she turned and walked up the tunnel until she found Istel with Belaery, both frowning into the black. They didn’t even look, when she came up beside them. Continued their conversation as if she was part of the wall. She let them talk. Examined the spill of rock and rubble, the straight Illhari lines that said there’d been mining crews here, once, and conjurors, making a path through solid rock. But now it was Illhari slumspill. No one’s territory, except toads and svartjagr. Smugglers might hide here. Escaped bondies. Castoffs and criminals unwelcome even in the Suburba.
And heretics, maybe. Definitely.
“—could be some more down there,” Istel was saying. “I think there are.”
“Oh, you think.” Belaery snorted. “Here’s what I think. The further we get from Illharek, the more dangerous it will be.”
“For you, conjuror.”
“For you, too, ava—”
Rot them both. “Tell me, Istel. Can all godsworn do what you do? Or just the Laughing God’s people?”
Sudden silence, from Istel and Belaery. They looked at her. Back at each other. See an alliance forged there, the realization that the First Legate of Illharek was in the tunnel with them, and not Szanys Dekklis.
Istel cleared his throat. “Do what?”
“The—making a hole and walking through.”
“It’s not a hole. It’s going from one shadow to another.”
She waved, impatient. “Whatever. Can you all do that?”
“There are ears here, Dek.” Belaery rolled eyes at Neela’s
troops. “Be careful.”
“I’m a little tired of careful.” But Dekklis walked a handful of paces into the black, to the border of Belaery’s witchfire.
Istel shrugged. “No. It’s a skill particular to the Laughing God.”
“So you’re saying you could’ve done that sooner.”
“Yes.”
“From the garrison. You could have, and we could have gone with you. Damn you.” Cold, dear foremothers, all through her guts. As if her heart had frozen in her chest.
Istel sighed. “And if I had, the Tiers wouldn’t know there was trouble, yeah? No one would. Now half of Illharek saw you running down to the Suburba, and the rest will’ve heard about it by the fourth candlemark.”
A spark, finally. The first hint of heat, spreading in her belly. Didn’t make it to her throat, to her voice. “And Rurik’s dead.”
Belaery’s witchfire flickered in those dark eyes. Turned orange, by a trick of the light. Then Istel’s brows arched like they never had, never would, and Dekklis knew who it was. “A highborn son. A ranking officer. The First Legate’s First Tribune. And by highborn bondies, on orders. This is a treachery that must be answered.”
“It was treachery before he died! You left him here as part of some toadshit strategy.” She almost strangled on the word, her throat sealing around grief and fury and the urge to just hit something.
“Rurik ordered me to go.” Istel folded his arms, less defiance than defense, as if warding a blow. “Didn’t Per confirm what I told you?”
She wanted to wipe that calm off him. Hell if he was an avatar, that didn’t worry her, but if she started violence, she might not stop. “She did. But I don’t think she knows you could’ve come back faster. I don’t think she knows you could have done something here.”
“Yes. I could have died.” Istel’s eyes again, Istel’s sober stare. “The God and I share this body. But he’s not—we’re not—invincible.”