A Glimmer on the Blade

by Rachel E. Baddorf

  So her hours were filled with prayer and singing, and when she thought she would go insane from the pain of her leg, the time was filled with reciting. She had started with the beginning words of the first volume of the Nodeixi, the Goddess’s holy book, and gotten halfway through the third volume before she had heard a muted pounding from the drain. Copelia’s voice suddenly brought her back to the present.

  “How is the prince?”

  “He is the same as he ever was. He just needs a little water and moonlight every night,” Ildiko said through a mouthful of bread.

  “He looks dead,” the girl said doubtfully. She unwrapped the prince’s face. The high cheekbones and aristocratic nose was recognizable from Empire coins. He was so still. Ildiko gave herself a moment to admire how handsome he was. Sharp features and dark hair. She had tried not to think in the last five days about how naked he was under ceremonial red silk.

  Copelia stared at the sleeping face, finally muttering, “Perhaps I see her point.”

  She let the wet silk fall back over him with a sigh. “When is the Ordeal over?”

  “It depends. Traditionally, the ordeal concludes on the day the Dragon’s return with the moonrose offering from the Isle of Asteri,” explained Ildiko.

  Copelia came over and started cutting the bandage off her leg. Carefully the girl asked, “How do we bring him out of it?”

  “We?” It came out sharper than she meant it to, but Copelia’s pulling off the bandage had snagged something. Ildiko swallowed and looked away from the swollen wound. “The Ordeal is begun and closed by the Sybil of the Temple only. I was not privy to the mysteries of the Sybil.”

  Copelia stilled. “Well, we are going to have to figure something out, because I’m all we got. I’m the new Sybil. All I can tell is that he’s in the middle of a spell...”

  “How did you become the Sybil? The Scion said Stellys betrayed the temple, killed Alcyenne.”

  Copelia frowned at her and continued to check the wound.

  “It’s not that I doubt you. I’ve never seen the Sybil’s casters on anyone else,” Ildiko said defensively. Copelia gave her a bitter spoonful of itainai.

  “All I can figure is that Alcyenne didn’t die right away. It was a little time after the battle that Anoni came out of the wagon leaking silver and speaking in this weird voice.”

  “A visitation? The Goddess herself...” Ildiko’s words trailed off in disbelief. She flinched as the disinfectant burned into her thigh.

  “The Goddess called her to service. Anoni refused,” explained Copelia as she looked up at Ildiko’s gasp. “Anoni argued with her. She mentioned that I had been marked by Califf a few days before. I’ll probably never decide whether to thank her for that,” said Copelia, the last words said more to herself. “The Goddess asked me instead. I accepted her offer.” Copelia finished putting a new bandage around Ildiko’s leg. Ildiko was immune to the pain now. All she could do is stare.

  “Nobody has argued with the Goddess since Ezra Nodeix bargained for time to complete her works in 1021 in the time after Califf’s Scouring. What I would have done to have been there...”

  Copelia shot her a look and muttered, “What I would have done to have been anywhere else.”

  “You’re Vansainté’s sister, right? Why were you there at all?”

  “How much do you know about the Dragons?” Copelia asked, startled.

  Ildiko looked excited. “Only what I’ve read in the reports. I used to read them when Alcyenne gave them to me for filing.”

  “Reports?”

  “When the named Scion of the Temple receives the relics from the Sybil and begins using them to raid imperial gold reserves, don’t you think the Temple should record it? It hasn’t happened in at least three hundred years...”

  “It’s happened before?” asked Copelia as she put her supplies away.

  “Well, of course. Alcyenne used them when she was Scion. It must have been so awesome to see the Goddess up close...” She trailed off when she realized Copelia was staring at her like she had lost her mind.

  “You said...three hundred...” The girl shook her head, unable to absorb it. “Never mind. We’ll figure it out later. Our first priority is getting you out of this light well. I’ve done what I can for your leg, but it will need more. Second is dreamy boy over there. We have to find out how to close the spell.”

  “Instructions for the Ordeal are supposed to be taught to the new Sybil during the last days of the old Sybil’s reign.”

  “Well, I’m going off of dreams here. You said the Temple recorded this sort of thing. Where would the records be?”

  “In Alcyenne’s private study. In the tower. Probably burned,” Ildiko said tiredly.

  “We’re going to have to find out. Third priority, finding Alcyenne’s body.”

  “She might not have one. She might have given herself up to the Goddess,” Ildiko interjected. Copelia looked lost. “Like the clergy down there. The Goddess’s power overwhelmed the physical bonds of their bodies. Just dust remains.”

  “I'm sorry they died.” Copelia looked down into the dark chamber below.

  “It is the most glorious way for a priestess or priest of the Temple to die. Their souls went directly to the Goddess. To be filled with such light is a wonder.”

  “Does the Temple have something to do with Alcyenne’s dust? Some ceremony? Some honor?” questioned Copelia.

  “She should be gathered up and bricked into the floor of the Chapel with the other Sybils,” Ildiko explained.

  “Then we have to find her dust. And perhaps do something for the other poor fools down there,” Copelia said with a nod toward the broken skylight.

  Ildiko drew herself up in outrage. “It is an honor that many dream of. To meet their Goddess and be hastened to the next plain,” Ildiko caught herself reprimanding the girl.

  “Don’t look at me. Until a few days ago I was a follower of Mishi of Oruno. When we die, we get reborn as horses. The old bodies are buried without ceremony in the pastures to feed the grasses that feed the horses. I don’t understand any of this.”

  Ildiko let out a slow exasperated breath.

  Copelia grimaced and answered, “Trust me, I believe well enough now. I just don’t have practice with the ceremonies.”

  “As horses!” Ildiko muttered with disbelief.

  “Now I have a whole herd to take care of. And the shortage of brood stock,” Copelia said devilishly.

  “They are called a congregation. They won’t take kindly to being called a herd.”

  “Never mind. So, fourth on the list is finding Stellys. Time to go,” declared Copelia.

  Copelia grabbed Idliko’s arms and pulled her up, placing Ildiko’s arm over her shoulders. They hobbled over to the hole in the drain. “How are we getting him out?” asked Ildiko.

  “Don’t know yet. We need to get you out before you lose your leg. We’ll get him out tomorrow.”

  “What do I do?”

  “You get to deal with the clergy who are sleeping in my brother’s house. You’re the only one they will listen to, I gather.”

  “Oh no.” Ildiko was petrified.

  “Oh no what?”

  “I can’t get them to do anything. I just got promoted to help run the library. That’s what the Seventh does; I record and supply the temples. I don’t talk to the high clergy. They don’t like me.”

  Copelia took a tighter hold of the arm over her neck. “Ildiko, imagine we are at war.”

  “We’re clergy, we don’t go to war.”

  “Imagine that we are. There has just been a coup. You just got a field promotion,” said Copelia through clenched teeth.

  “What?”

  “I’m the Sybil. You are my second, my general.”

  “But I’m just a secretary. You’re just a girl. I can’t...” Ildiko stuttered. The idea of trying to stand up to the clergy kindled a little flame of terror in her heart.

  “You're going to have to start thinking with more asse
rtiveness.”

  “I don’t want to be a general!” Ildiko exclaimed.

  “Sshhhh!” Copelia hushed her with wide eyes.

  “Sorry! But I don’t want to be a general!” Ildiko whispered emphatically.

  “That’s better.” Copelia grinned, leaning Ildiko on the wall. She tried to set a hook into the stone of one corner of the light well next to the broken out drain she had climbed in from. The hook wouldn’t catch. With a grim smile she punched the caster claws into the stone, and set the hook into a ledge made there. She tossed the rope down the drain hole and tied the other end around herself. She made a second rope into a sling for Ildiko.

  The hole was pitch black. Ildiko tried to protest as the girl hustled her into the sling.

  “Priestess, pray for your safe landing.” Copelia firmly grasped Ildiko’s hands, gave her a push to unbalance her and took advantage to start lowering Ildiko down the drain hole busy with draining water. There was a tricky moment when she had to let go of Ildiko’s hands to begin letting her down with the rope sling. Ildiko had to tell herself that if the Goddess wanted her to die, the Goddess would have killed her already, so she was probably safe. She let go of Copelia’s hands and swung drunkenly on the rope, her injured leg knocking into the back wall of the drain. She began to pray and Copelia let her down hand over hand into the dark.

  CHAPTER 18

  Cape Miliar

  Corin

  Corin sat on a log by the fire, eating the late lunch Arjent had made from the loaf-sized silverfins the Dragons had caught in the cape waters. The sun was high, but the breeze kept them cool in their campsite. The men were torpid, recovering but sluggish in their chores as they ate. Wix hadn’t cracked a joke since Corin had gotten back. Smelling himself, and the men, who had all lost a good deal of their spare clothes with the wagon, he resolved to search out somewhere to wash very soon. Some of the men sat near the water, doing chores on their reduced collection of weapons, while Wix and Nekobashi were on guard duty on the perimeter to protect their backs from a forest approach.

  His attention drifted from his own odor as he saw Anoni take Vansainté aside and into the trees near his side of the camp fire. She said something too quiet to hear, but Corin saw Vansainté shake his head. She grabbed his arm and such was her intensity that her voice rose into hearing range.

  “No! You’re the only one. If I start acting crazy you have to do it!”

  “What, crazier than this?” Vansainté demanded, shaking her off. “I don’t kill my friends, Anoni.”

  “If I can’t control him, I could kill you. I could kill you all. Do you think I want that?” Anoni asked desperately.

  “Fine,” he ground out. “Now get away from me.” He stalked into the forest, rigid with anger.

  Anoni watched him go for a long moment. Sighing with frustration, she climbed over the log next to Corin’s, and plunked herself down. Taking a silverfin filet off a makeshift spit, she blew on it to cool the crispy hot fish.

  “Do you want to talk about it?”

  “No,” she snapped. “No I don’t.”

  “How are you feeling?” Corin asked.

  She gave him a grim smile. “I never thought I should cherish the silence in my head...”

  “Ah...” He lapsed into silence. “And...”

  “I can’t fight the Ozuk with a sword. I can’t cut him, Corin. To cut him, I have to cut myself,” she blurted, and lowered her voice, checking to see the men were out of earshot.

  “What brings that up? I thought he was being quieter,” Corin said evenly. She took a mighty bite of the silverfin, chewing as if it were her enemy. “He’s going through my memories,” she said around her food.

  Corin gritted his teeth; he wanted to wrap his arms around her. She would kill any man or woman who challenged her in battle, would die for a man she had loved and hated. But herself was something she had not had to defend since Markham Shaiso had tried to drag her up those stairs. And that pain was clear under the prickly frustration. He twiddled his thumbs, trying to keep them occupied. He was not on a footing with her to offer that kind of comfort, and the Ozuk could rise at any time to put him in jeopardy.

  She finished the fish and wiped her hands on a kerchief from her pocket. He needed to distract her, maybe get her to talk about it.

  A devious little thought crossed his mind. “So, are you still training me?”

  She blinked, clearly startled. “I suppose. There’s nothing more I can think to tell you. Wix and Arjent will have more tricks to teach you. But, you’ve been practicing well...”

  “So I could take you,” he said with a cocky grin, only half joking.

  She sputtered. “Ah, no. I’m not the best at hand to hand, but no. I’m still a graduate, you’re not.”

  “But you haven’t fought me. You can’t know for sure.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “Oh yes I do, Corin bard-fingers.”

  “Then spar with me.”

  A smile was fighting its way onto her lips. “Do you think I gratify every sun-mad man’s desire to prove himself?”

  “I think you have to prove you’re good without a blade in hand.”

  She barked a half-laugh, stood, brushing the dirt off her pants. “All right then.”

  “Aren’t you going to take off your weapons?” He followed her from the forest’s edge and down the pebble beach.

  Her laugh floated back to him. “This is going to be so quick, I won’t need to take anything off.”

  Perhaps he was crazy, he thought as he walked down the beach. But he had been wanting to do this for days, and he doubted very much that there would be contact long enough for the Ozuk to rise and numb him out. At least he hoped so.

  She turned to face him, hair resplendent in a ponytail flashing in the breeze, and went into stretches for her arms and hamstrings. Belatedly, he did the same, wondering how this was going to play out. Her shirt was a deep navy blue, with small silver buttons up the front. He wondered if she knew how good she looked in the color; it fairly made her amber eyes glow. The shirt was light enough he could tell she wasn’t wearing her chain mail underneath. The Red Dragon sword swung at her side, and the two daggers clung in their side sheaths to her muscular thighs. They were as close as a lover’s touch. He dragged his gaze back from that enticing thought and gave his legs an extra stretch. He had left his sword by the fire, and only now thought that might come off as stupid.

  She finished her stretches and stood, arms loose at her sides. Corin stood and faced her, the sun beginning its westerly journey into the ocean to his right. The only sound was the tide on the beach and the calls of seagulls wind-riding on the cape. They bowed to one another. She went into a frontal guard, hands open and up in front of her. It was a strangely non-militaristic guard. Normally, as with his guard, the fists were up for defense.

  “Come on then,” she said with a daring little smile.

  He threw an experimental punch to her face, and in a burst of fluid movement, she turned it aside with an arm, caught his fist and delivered a stinging punch to his ribs. She held on to his wrist, trying to hold him still to give her time for a low snap kick that would have dislocated his knee if he hadn’t twisted free and thrown himself into a roll. He was up and on guard in a split moment, breathing hard.

  “What was that?” asked Corin.

  “You thought Wix knew all the kinds of self-defense?” Anoni taunted.

  “Fair enough,” he said as he tried a high kick, which she avoided. But moving fast, he did catch her in a shoulder throw which sent her flying to the beach. She was back up the next second though, nodding sagely. She circled him.

  “So, why is the Ozuk bothering you so much?” He feinted a left hook, and went for a low punch she was just able to avoid.

  “He’s going through my memories...keeps making snide comments about me and the prince.” Corin looked at her sharply, but she didn’t notice, too busy with a twist kick that sailed by his head. He tried to get a leg lock once she landed, but
she turned out, and rolled away. “I’ll have enough trouble living with my decisions if we get through this alive. I’ll have maybe another thirty years, standing beside the prince, staring at him through Ryelis’s face—that is if I can get a new disguise from Copelia. I said I would talk to him, but I don’t know if I could really do it...”

  He tried a hard-handed chop at her shoulder, which she blocked. She caught his forearms and kept them tangled with her own so he couldn’t strike.

  “Isn’t this kind of childish?” Corin asked.

  She laughed, caught the back of his neck, and slammed her elbow into his nose. Backing off, he cautiously checked the tender flesh to see if it was broken.

  “It’s called sticky hands,” explained Anoni.

  Assured his nose wasn’t broken, he went into guard position and tried again. “Are you still in love with the prince?” Corin had not meant to say that and covered with a spinning snapkick that caught her retreating thigh, knocking her back a few paces.

  She circled, testing her weight on the leg. “Don’t know. I used to think about him all the time. Then I thought how much I hated him all the time. Lately...” She circled faster, closer. They grappled, both fighting for the throw. He got a joint lock and took her down hard on her back. In a blur, she brought both legs up and locked her knees around his neck, twisting him down onto his face. Before she could press her advantage, he back-kicked, catching her in the side of the head. She scrambled clumsily to her feet. He followed her up fast as a hunting fox and charged, hitting her squarely in the solar plexus with his all of his weight aligned behind his shoulder. It would have broken down a stout oak door. They toppled, her falling backward under his tackle. He heard her gasp beneath him and a muted crack as they hit the pebbles of the beach.