A Glimmer on the Blade

by Rachel E. Baddorf

  Giovicci whistled and said, “Did I mention that Aquillion does not maintain the trade road?”

  “This just keeps getting better and better,” Arjent said darkly, giving the wagon horses a worried look.

  Vansainté glanced at Anoni, did a double take at noticing the small changes in posture and the shape of Anoni’s jaw that meant she had dropped the male disguise.

  He rode over to Anoni. “You sure you know what you’re doing? We Dragons are used to you being a woman, but Corin and Copelia aren’t. Aren’t you afraid word will get back to Aquillion?”

  “Corin found out last night. I would rather tell Copelia, instead of having another explosive surprise. We already have a woman in the party. If anyone starts rumors later, we can say I accompanied Copelia since she’s not supposed to be on the quest. No one will think I’m the Red Dragon.”

  “All right,” Vansainté said doubtfully.

  “If I’m going to be eaten by spirit beasts in the Safiro Wilds, I’ll do it in my own form and Aquillion be damned,” she said dryly. She didn’t add that having been outed to Corin, it was a point of pride to show him she was not ashamed to be a woman. To make him accept it.

  “That I’d believe,” Vansainté said with a smirk. He took the pouch of toll money from Anoni for the wall guards. Vansainté dismounted to pay the toll and when they asked him his business in leaving the Empire for the Safiro Wilds, he rattled off a story about meeting an imports caravan owned by Copelia’s father. The small bag of coins changed hands and the guards waved them ahead. The Dragons scanned the surroundings, alert as they crossed the killing ground and passed into the forest once more. Any scrap of civilization was behind them. The Safiro Wilds they entered would test their fighting skills and their will.

  Once their caravan was two hours north of the Border Wall, Anoni took off her coat and hat. She had kept the brim well down on her face, pleading a hangover. No one had questioned it; the men were similarly hiding from the sunlight and slumped in the saddle. Corin had given her a wide berth, not meeting her eye, but she noticed he was clearly pondering something. Copelia and Vansainté were riding in front while Anoni conferred with Yupendra near the wagon about something he wanted to try. Now that they were past the wall, he thought he could do something to speed Vansainté’s healing. She nodded absently. Yupendra gave her a startled look and shook his head, looking chagrined. The Dragons were alone on the road and there was no one to see and no one to care. Anoni was hoping Copelia would take it well, but she doubted it.

  Anoni had combed out her hair last night. It was so refreshing to feel the wind in her real hair. The locks blazed copper in the sunlight as she shook her head. In the night she had gotten her other pack out of the supply wagon, the one full of clothes fitting her female self. One adventure in constrictive tailoring was enough for her. The only things the same today were her moonpearl shirt, boots, and weapons. The rest was still serviceable—brown breeches and a light blue shirt—but they were tailored to fit her chest and hips.

  She also wore a contraption from Oruno that replaced the tight-laced corsets and bodices still used in Aquillion. It was made of shaped and softened leather and canvas to support her breasts, which closed in the front with a little buckle. She couldn’t imagine riding a horse without something to keep herself from bouncing around. Secretly, she wondered if it was because of the lack of this support that the women of Aquillion didn’t ride or do much outside. She had also had the St. Issac people put in protection just in case an assassin tried to get a lucky shot off at her heart. It made her feel better, during the first hours of painful self-consciousness and readjustment, to know the mounds of tender flesh were arrow-proof. The St. Issac monks of the Earth God trained sunsmiths and handled all the old tech in Aquillion.

  From part way up the column, Corin turned in the saddle to glance at her. He almost fell out of the saddle in surprise. She nodded to him in passing as she rode up the column. It was time to face the wrath of a young woman. She had felt the same way about entering the Forge in Oruno. Sometimes you had to just take a deep breath and take the attack head on. Anoni came up behind the siblings, her approach covered by the sounds of the column.

  “I know you like him, Copelia. But he’s really not the man for you,” Vansainté was saying carefully. Anoni felt her stomach drop. She couldn’t have picked a worse time to do this.

  “Go suck a frog! You’re not my father,” Copelia snapped back.

  Anoni concentrated on her communion stone. She tried not to use them when she could speak face to face because they were tiring and invasive, but this seemed like a time when it would help more than hurt. Vansainté? thought Anoni. She saw him straighten in the saddle, tense for trouble.

  What is it? replied Vansainté.

  It’s time Copelia knew, replied Anoni.

  Horse Goddess Mishi give me strength...thought Vansainté.

  I’m right behind you. Tell Copelia she should brace herself for some news, thought Anoni. She broke contact and listened as Vansainté did as she asked. She nudged her horse so that she could ride up between the siblings. She did this more to deflect Copelia’s anger away from her brother than to hide the confrontation.

  “I’m sorry to spring this on you, but this is the reason why Mizrahi, the man I’ve been disguising myself as, isn’t a good match for you,” said Anoni. Her bravado deserted her by the end of the sentence and she mumbled her introduction. “My full name is Anoni Mizrahi,” she said lamely.

  “How...? What...?” Copelia shook her head wildly, trying to deny the truth, tears squeezing themselves out of her clenched eyes.

  “I was in disguise to become the Red Dragon. I...” Anoni was interrupted as Copelia hauled off and slugged her across the mouth. It was in perfect form as the Dragons had tutored her. Anoni’s head snapped back as she fell off her horse, Vansainté sawed away at his mount’s reins to avoid trampling her. Copelia kicked her Delkeran into a gallop and shot out in front of the column, giving an ululating cry. All of the horses caught the noise and spooked, bucking and screaming. The wagon rattled off the road, slamming fast into a fallen log in the gully, and the wagon horses fought the traces. Scrambling to her feet in the chaos, Anoni caught a glimpse of Copelia turning east off the road, followed by Dog. With the dense forest, she was gone from view so quick it was like she had never existed.

  Vansainté and Arjent dove to cut the traces on the wagon before the horses killed themselves trying to escape. Half the horses were already missing; Corin was on the ground, stunned. Anoni pulled him up and they helped calm the horses the Dragons had managed to keep a hold of. Vansainté was lucky with the wagon horses, even one-handed as he was. The two wagon horses were exhausted, covered with sweat, and shaking, but he had managed to keep them from going lame.

  Anoni picketed her charges off the road and waved Yupendra, Nekobashi, and Giovicci on as they left to find the missing horses. Corin followed her.

  “I should have known,” she said, approaching Vansainté, though staying well clear of the wagon horses he was trying to calm. “When I was denied my heart’s desire I reacted the same way,” admitted Anoni. Feeling her re-split lip with a gentle hand, she added, “Ouch.”

  “We’re in the Safiro Wilds. She’s going out there blind and unarmed,” Vansainté said. He kept glancing out to where she had left the road. “We should start after her.”

  “What did she do to the horses?” Corin asked.

  “Our parents taught us some tricks in dealing with horses,” Vansainté explained.

  “Vansainté, from what I know of Delkerans...” Anoni’s words trailed off and she let her eyes ask the question she didn’t want to voice out loud.

  Vansainté nodded, concentrating on the horse under his hands. “Copelia’s stallion will carry her farther through rough forest than our mounts or wagon can go.”

  “Nightswift and that dog will keep her safe for a while. Plus, she has her bow and knife. She can hunt for food,” Anoni interjected. “How
far do you think she will go before she stops?”

  “Far. She nurses her moods for hours,” Vansainté answered.

  “I’m sorry, Vansainté.” Anoni put a hand on his shoulder.

  The man stared at his feet and said, “It’s not your fault.” Anoni couldn’t suppress a flinch. “Alright, Red Dragon, what are we going to do?”

  Anoni thought for a moment. “We need to pool strategy. Yupendra wanted to stop anyway.” Almost an hour passed before the last horse was brought back from the forest and settled. The Dragons circled around at Anoni’s signal, keeping an eye out for any riders coming down the road.

  “Copelia headed east. We can’t catch her until she stops. That Delkeran is just too fast. She’s heading towards the sea. It might take us a few days to track her and get back on course. If she doesn’t turn south, we won’t be going that far out of the way. Technically, the Dragons are employed on a temple and palace sanctioned quest. Our orders are to make decent speed to Asteri and back. We have no orders for this and it comes at a very complicated time. We have made good time so some delay would be all right. Thoughts?” Anoni said, looking at each man in turn.

  Wix exchanged a look with the men, getting nods and smiles, then answered with his clever grin spreading across his face. “Boss, she’s been like a little sister to all of us in the years since we came to Aquillion. We can’t leave her to the Safiro.”

  Anoni nodded, “All right. We can’t take the wagon. Nekobashi and Arjent continue north by road. Camp at the main crossroads. I heard in the common room last night that there is a road that goes west to a free-trader city called Almacenista. The rest of us will follow her and if she reaches the sea then we’ll go north from there. If not, we’ll rejoin the road and try to catch up to you two. Wait two days at the crossroads and then continue north, should be about a week to Asteri. Wait for us at the causeway to the Isle of Asteri for a week. If we don’t show, get back to Aquillion. Men, take enough supplies for three days, but try to pack light. Bedrolls only, no tents. Wix can you track her in this terrain?”

  Wix nodded. “No problem.”

  Anoni nodded and said, “Mount up, then.”

  “Wait, wait,” Arjent protested, his brown face flushed with color. “I want to go. I have to get her back.”

  Anoni exchanged an annoyed look with Vansainté, who said under his breath, “I guess there’s one who doesn’t think of her as a sister.”

  Anoni shrugged. “Fine. Tevix, you stay with the wagon. You’ll be more impressive as a guard anyway.” Tevix grinned and cracked his knuckles. Slightly sarcastic she asked, “If there are no more requests? No? Then let’s get moving.” She mounted up and looked around for Corin. He was looking frustrated in the saddle. She rode over to him.

  “More requests?” questioned Anoni.

  “I still don’t get it. Aren’t there more important things at stake here?” replied Corin.

  Touching the spreading bruise on her face, she asked, “You would have me leave a sixteen-year-old girl in the Safiro Wilds?”

  “You threatened to leave me,” he pointed out.

  “It got you moving didn’t it? You want to stay with the wagon, fine. I’m sure we’ll be so undermanned without you,” she said sarcastically.

  Corin scowled.

  Impatiently she prodded, “Wager on your will, my good sir. The dice are being cast while we sit here.”

  He bit his lip, seeming to come to a decision. “I’ll come, Anoni.”

  She studied his face, but couldn’t make sense of what she saw there. Finally she shrugged and said, “Get your supplies. We leave in five.”

  CHAPTER 10

  Safiro Wilds

  Copelia

  Copelia couldn’t seem to get air in her lungs. It felt like the time one of the mares had hauled off and kicked her in the kidneys. All she knew was that she needed to get away and Nightswift would take her there, crashing though as much underbrush as necessary. Rage at Vansainté for not telling her earlier boiled with rage at Mizrahi for not trusting her with the secret. Those emotions rolled with self-disgust at how she had thrown herself at Mizrahi. She’d made a fool out of herself in front of the Dragons. Copelia respected those men more than anyone in her life. She felt like dying when she thought of how they had all known, and secretly laughed at her. The monumental stupidity it took to throw herself into a quest to follow her love into the wilderness struck home. Back in Caruda House she had imagined clandestine meetings in a tent with Ryelis, passions finally given sway once they were away from the constraints of Aquillion. She had drowned herself a thousand times in those liquid amber eyes, the eyes now set in a beautiful woman’s face and surrounded by long copper hair. Mizrahi was a woman.

  Copelia cringed at the kindness Anoni had shown in turning away her attentions. Every time she had kissed Mizrahi, the man had blushed and made some excuse. Mizrahi had not led her on. Vansainté had tried to steer her away, but like a storm-caught ship, she would not be turned from the path of destruction.

  This time, when Nightswift galloped under a low branch and it slapped her in the face, she felt it. The impact broke some tension in her and she felt like she could think again. Her face and arms were stinging with scratches from the branches. The muscles in her arms and thighs protested from riding tense and fast for too long. Nightswift, alert to her moods, had gone as fast as he could in the forest. But now even he was flagging. His black shoulders were caked with sweat and dirt and she could feel tremors of exhaustion starting through his muscles.

  “Whoa,” she reined him in gently. They were in deep, unfamiliar forest. Dog was still with them, but he was in even worse shape. His deep gray fur was full of burrs and he was limping. She dismounted, but her legs shook with exhaustion. A nearby tree served as a convenient leaning place as she sank down onto the moss between the roots. She held her cramped hands in her lap, skin red from holding the reins for so long. Dog lay down next to her. She tried to steady her breathing, laying back to look up at the canopy where the afternoon light played.

  She must have laid there for a long time in shock, unable to think. Nightswift’s sweat had dried when a new sound came to her, louder than her own breathing, pulling her back to the present. Still collapsed on the ground, Dog was growling deep in his throat, his head turned to the trees to their left. Then she heard it, the clink of a harness and chain mail. Someone was coming through the trees.

  ***

  Safiro Wilds

  Corin

  By nightfall, the Dragons had not found Copelia. They found a clearing near a spring and settled in for the night. In Copelia’s mad dash through the forest, she had given Nightswift his head, letting him find his way as he saw fit, leaving a meandering trail. They had to follow all the loops and zigzags of her trail. Nekobashi had no trouble following the trail even with the Delkeran’s almost unbelievable talent for making it through terrain at which their horses balked. Nightswift was both heavy and shod with iron horseshoes so that he made a distinctive path that could be no other horse.

  The men had been reticent all day, all their concentration focused on getting their horses through the forest safely. As time passed and they seemed to make no inroads on catching the girl, Corin watched the Dragons grow grimmer. Anoni and Vansainté’s warrior facades slipped now and again. He had been right before when he had told Anoni she wasn’t fearless. She could take any risk herself, but the loss of others tormented her. His fascination with the Red Dragon now went deeper.

  Anoni Mizrahi wasn’t dead. Every time he thought it, he smiled. The worst thing he had ever done was undone, and the grip of guilt around his heart, that he had had so long he didn’t even notice it most of the time, unraveled and fell away. That shy, polite girl had metamorphosed into this brusque and competent military leader. An angry and armed military leader. He couldn’t take his eyes off her. Her hair had turned molten under unexpected sunbeams all day, matching her thousands of freckles and amber eyes. She wasn’t a classic beauty; there was no s
oftness to be found there. But full lips among the stark features assured she would turn male heads, and any man with a pulse would notice the force of the personality that fairly radiated from her. That force had not lessened now that she had dropped the theomantic disguise.

  Corin pondered this as they ate smoked meat, bread, and cheese for dinner around the fire. A strange bubbling feeling occupied his chest. He tried to pin it down, and recalled a holiday morning when he was seven, before the plague, when his whole family had been together. He had opened a present with bright gold paper to find a toy ship. It had been the perfect thing at that moment. That was how Corin felt now. He resented Copelia for running away and spoiling his moment. Then, he resurfaced from these old thoughts, and he smiled. Oh, he would show Anoni he could help, and he would help because he knew what it was like to be lost and alone.

  Corin watched as Yupendra, the golden-skinned healer, went over to Anoni and Vansainté. They conversed for a few moments before she nodded.

  “I’m going to try calling up a little help,” Yupendra said, loud enough for all to hear. “Brace yourselves and stay out of the way.” He pulled a bundle and something shiny from his saddlebags and went about putting on what Corin recognized as an old set of brass theomancer’s casters. Corin leaned forward to watch. Casters were standard equipment for Moon clergy during a ceremony but the ones used by the temple were always of silver metal. These were a little different, with thicker braceleting at the wrists, and brace thimbles capping the ends of the fingers, though all the pieces were still connected by wire and hinges. Yupendra cracked his knuckles, shook out his hands and stepped up to the fire.

  He chanted softly in a language Corin did not recognize, bowing over the fire, dropping a bundle into it, then circled it with slow steps. The brass on his large hands flashed in the firelight as Yupendra brought his hands together in a single clap. The sound was preternaturally loud, causing the leaves in the canopy around them to rustle. He stuck both hands into the fire while continuing to chant. The brass glowed gold and his hands were unscathed when he brought them out. He circled the fire again, glowing gold light dripping from his fingers, laying down a line of light in a circle around the fire. Back at his starting position, Yupendra clapped again. The trees shuddered and the ground trembled. Yupendra circled the fire once more, chanting louder as curling lines of gold grew from the bracelets and rings on his skin. The lines moved, coiling tighter until his hands were covered in their tracery up to his wrists. At last he was back to his starting position again. One last time he clapped, but it made no noise. The air pressed against Corin’s ears sharply and when they popped, the lines on Yupendra’s hands were gone. Now the only evidence of magic was the line around the fire and the soft smell of incense, which Corin guessed came from the bundle Yupendra had thrown into the fire.