Draken thought of the two gods he thought he’d seen and didn’t doubt it. But he stayed quiet on that. “Why is Brîn such a good place to install this faith?”
“I think Akrasia has given them more fight than they expected. They consider Brînians ignorant barbarians, with minds ready to fill with some truth of their making. And there are our women …”
“What do women have to do with it?” Aarinnaie asked.
Khisson raised his brows. Grey had slipped through the black dye. “I thought you knew. Haven’t you noticed the invasion is all men? They say women are not real people; no better than breeders, the thought goes.”
When has he heard an Ashen say anything? Bruche said.
Aarinnaie snorted softly. She released her bracelet and refilled her cup with wine. “That couldn’t matter less.”
“It matters to the Ashen, and their plans for Brîn. They believe us coarse and that makes us more easily conformed to their sect. Also, in your blood runs Khellian’s, so the better to mix with. It’s surely why Ilumat took you to wife.”
“You think Ilumat is conformed to their ways?” Draken asked her. Again Aarinnaie’s hand strayed to her bracelet. She saw Draken watching and dropped it.
“We didn’t speak much. I wouldn’t know.”
“I’d like to think the Ashen could be driven back from Brîn, if someone is here who knows how to handle things,” Khisson said.
“Meaning you.” Draken released a breath. “You didn’t stop the invasion.”
“Then we were caught off guard. I have people coming now, ready to fight.”
“Dragonstar pirates.”
Khisson stiffened, but he didn’t protest the slur. “I will get you out of the city, free you to find your daughter. The Akrasians have used us for the last time. I will drive the Akrasians from Brîn, keep the Ashen out, and hold your throne for your return.”
Aarinnaie snorted.
“You don’t trust me.” Khisson was so matter-of-fact Draken wondered if it was contrived.
“Why would I?”
Khisson drew in a breath that puffed his chest and made him seem bigger. “Khel Szi. It’s a reasonable offer with heartfelt intent. And honestly, you don’t have another. Your option is to try to escape the city on your own—unlikely—and leave Brîn to the Ashen to destroy. Without your favor as Brînian regent, I’ve little choice but to flee back to the Dragonstars.”
“Regent? That’s a high title for an island bloodlord.” He didn’t add pirate, though Khisson was a pirate. No sense in angering the man. He still needed that horse, and he wouldn’t turn down aid getting through the gates either.
Speaking of, time does go on, Draken. Accept the deal and be off. Khisson in the Citadel is easier to sort than Ilumat and his Ashen priest.
Draken growled low. He knew no such thing. Khisson had an old vendetta against Draken. He had killed the man’s son, after all—never mind the lad had attacked Aarinnaie and had it coming. Khisson’s was no simple enmity to disregard, nor the man worth much trust. “Do not believe the throne is yours, no matter how comfortable it becomes, for you do not bear Khellian’s blood. I or Aarinnaie will return. Your charge is to protect Brîn in our stead, nothing more.”
“Aye, Khel Szi.”
He wanted to say more, to tell the man to gather his warriors and to rush back with him and take the Citadel tonight while things were already in an uproar there. But fear for Sikyra won out. “I’ve an errand, so I’ll be needing that horse now.”
Khisson dipped his chin and bent his back in a bow, but it didn’t hide the slight smile easing the harsh lines of his face. “As you wish.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Even with as difficult a day—
Night, Bruche corrected.
—as Draken had had, he reckoned getting out of the city would be the toughest. The first challenge was lack of coin; it wasn’t in the little safe room, and there was no sign Osias had been there. Draken could only hope he’d gotten out to Eidola.
Worse was leaving Tyrolean inside the city, but Draken didn’t dare delay.
Khisson gave them clothes, coin, and tora ponies. The latter were short and sturdy and cranky at being sent out into the cold night. Draken had half a thought they’d been stolen, but he left it. Khisson had sent twenty men with him … who knew the islander lord had so many to spare? … and they cut their way through the back gates nearest Eidola, leaving the several servii guarding it in a messy pile of bodies.
Too easy. I don’t like it. Bruche turned Draken’s head to study the night.
Dying is always easy for those who do.
Dying shouldn’t be so easy for the living, though.
It was a point, but Draken had just spent the better part of two sevennight under great strain. Now he was headed for his daughter with only a friendly town between them. The road to the farming villages were clear of people—live ones—at least. A couple of bodies sprawled off the road, a sevennight old if the bloat was any indication. The cold stink made the whole company raise cloak hems to faces. But they saw no Akrasians beyond the gate. Their business was inside the city and it seemed no point in risking challenges from outlying Brînians. Plenty of hard folk lived outside city walls, coaxing a life from the fertile valley soil and abundant woods nested at the bottom of the Eidolas, but they were every bit as loyal to their principality as city dwellers and islanders.
Neither Bruche nor Draken could look away from the giant mountain kingdom of the dead for long. They detected no movement on the craggy cliffs spiking into low-slung clouds, and further up, into the night sky.
Aarinnaie rode close, whether as a guard or to be guarded, Draken didn’t know. She was uncommonly quiet and he wondered if the shock of the previous day and night and their nearing escape was catching up to her. But when she turned her head, her mouth was relaxed and her chin lifted. “Are we going through the village?” she asked, her tone making it plain what she thought of that idea.
He shook his head. Khisson had agreed to get Draken out of the city but he made no promises on chasing down any Akrasians who might venture up to Eidola after Sikyra. They apparently had their own errands outside the city, likely to meet their pirate soldiers. Draken did his damnedest to be satisfied with the amount of help provided. Khisson’s crowd of swift horses and armored warriors would make a good decoy as the two of them split off, especially once word of their escape at the gate took hold in the city. No one would expect the Khel Szi and Szirin of Brîn to ride tora ponies.
The road breaking off outside the village toward Eidola was little more than a path pounded into the tall lonegrass. It stood to reason; banes needed no paths and most living avoided the kingdom of the dead. For a time he could still hear the jingle of the horses’ harness and the Khissons’ mail shirts, but soon even that faded into the godless time between moonfall and sunrise.
Draken felt his shoulders ease as he escaped the view of the Eyes. The world around him sharpened without godslight piercing his vision. Eidola was closer than he thought. He could see the fork in the road where they’d split with the Khissons but not the horde of them any longer. Their ponies’ harnesses had been muffled with rags tied over chains and joints and over their hooves so they walked along without much sound. It was silent, too silent. Even scents were missing, no damp grasses or earth, no body odor or horse. No omnipresent blood. The lack shrouded him but also drew him. He found himself nudging his pony from a walk to a trot.
It feels … not like Eidola.
It was day and nearer to peacetime last you were there.
His pony stumbled, twitching Draken hard, and snorted its way to a stop. Aarinnaie’s pony bumped into him from behind, resulting in pinned ears.
“Khel Szi.” Aarinnaie’s hiss sizzled on the silence like a newly forged sword plunged into water. “I know you can see but I barely can, nor the ponies. Should we wait for some light?”
His gaze picked out blades of dormant lonegrass. Clods of dirt on the path. The black
tips of his pony’s light brown ears. “No.” He urged the pony on, promising it silently to watch the path better.
She hurried after him, keeping close enough his pony pinned its ears back and swished its tail in irritation. “But it’s so silent. Something is wrong.”
“It’s always quiet before dawn.”
She huffed as if she meant to fill the air with herself, looking all around. Her head twisting was about to drive Draken mad. “You’re not the only one who wanders the godless hours, Draken. It’s never like this. Not so dead and still.”
He sighed. “It’s not so still with your yammering, is it?”
He instantly regretted his tone but she just snorted. “I’m telling you, this isn’t right—you’re speeding up again.” She rode closer and grabbed at his rein. Draken tried to jerk it free but only succeeded in annoying his pony, who snuffled and tossed its head on its thick neck. It snapped at Aarinnaie’s pony.
“Stop that,” Draken said, kicking the pony on and tugging its head away from Aarinnaie.
“I’m telling you. This isn’t right. It’s …” A scream cut her off. She blinked and her pony tried to break back the way they’d come, snorting. It took her a few breaths to calm it. That she kept twisting her head around staring at the darkness with white eyes didn’t help much. She stiffened, her lips parted.
“Aarin.”
No response. She drew a blade.
He growled and caught her wrist. “What is it?”
She twisted free with remarkable strength, even for her. Her knife hand shifted up, not toward her, but toward him. He caught her wrist again. “What in Khellian’s name are you doing?”
Her face was blank. She lunged at him with the knife again, slashing his arm.
The ground rumbled, making the ponies shift on their big hooves.
A bane! This is a trap. Get out while you can.
Bruche tried to reel the pony around but Draken stopped it. Coldness threatened to smother his tongue. No! I will not leave her. “Aarin … Aarinnaie. Fight it off. It’s me, Draken. It’s me.”
An itchy, scratching sensation filled the inside of his skin as a thick, suffocating chill crept over him. Not Bruche, not internal. Something trying to get in, something familiar and deadly. He had the sudden image of giving up. Elena was dead. Aarinnaie, as good as. His daughter was only fit for slavery.
Draken. Bruche’s cold suffused him.
He blinked, Bruche’s voice and surging control jolting him from his reverie of death and failure. He heard his own voice, sharp: “Aarinnaie. You’re fighting a bane. Force it out. You did it before. Now do it again.”
Banes sought out deepest, darkest wishes. For Draken, suicide. For Aarinnaie—she lunged at him again before he could guess. He shoved hard with his leg against the pony’s side even as he shoved hard with his mind against what she meant. His pony sidestepped. She snarled but didn’t chase him; the bane was biding its time. Draken looked around for anywhere to protect himself that wasn’t completely away from his sister. Faces emerged from the dark. Was it his imagination? He blinked. They stared back at him, edged closer, mouths gaping, hungry for the evil in his soul. He had to get Aarin out of here, away. Someone had breached the gates of Eidola and released the banes.
He swung his pony around and urged it toward Aarinnaie’s, though both ponies snorted and resisted getting so close. His voice sharpened. “Aarin, listen to me. We need to go.”
She paid no attention to him but to tighten her grip on the blade and lunge for him again. He caught her wrist. Again. “I tire of this, bane. Release her.”
A deep grunt was its only reply. Aarinnaie struggled with his grip but Bruche lent his strength and she couldn’t shake free from Draken. He shouted in frustration.
no it protects her from the rest flee now korde attacks run
Draken didn’t need to be told twice. He released Aarinnaie and snatched at her rein. “Hang on!” He had no idea if she’d obey as he wheeled his pony and kicked it, hard. Even his plodding tora pony sparked to a trot and then a gallop, muffled hooves thudding the ground. Aarinnaie’s pony resisted being dragged along, but it finally burst into a lumbering canter. He kept them running past the trail to Eidola, past the lowland village, into the dark woods beyond.
A hissing wind swept round them, eerie cries in its wake. Aarinnaie’s voice joined them. She jerked in her saddle, writhed, her face contorted. Truls burst through her and then flitted back over her head, arms outstretched. His hollow Voice seemed to swallow the others, wordless but powerful nonetheless.
Aarinnaie grabbed for her saddle. Panting, she moaned. “Drae—”
He choked out, still staring at Truls: “I’m here.”
“Why did it let me go?”
“Truls.”
“But he’s—”
“Dead. And yet he’s still with us. With me.” He rubbed his rough hand over his face, calluses catching on his short beard. The ghost waited, quite still for once. “He freed you from the bane. He did it before, too. Helped Osias control banes in the Citadel.” It was starting to make a horrid sense. The banes were free and had already achieved Brîn and the Citadel. There were so many and Brîn had no magic walls to keep them out, only the perserverence of his people. And then a worse thought occurred. If one possessed Ilumat, what would the young lord do? What were his greatest fears to act on?
“If they’ve escaped, then Sikyra …” Aarinnaie said.
Draken swallowed hard. “Aye. Sikyra.”
Perhaps the Mance took her out, but in any case you aren’t getting to her through a horde of banes.
Osias wasn’t there. He was at the bloody Citadel saving my sorry hide. Gods willing, or not, the other Mance were able to protect her. He cursed under his breath, his chest clenching around his heart.
You need to keep moving, Drae.
Draken picked up his reins, urged the pony on, and looked back to see that Aarinnaie was following. She drew up next to him as they reached the crossroads and he took the wider road, the trade road that would link up to the River Eros. He drew in air deeply, thinking he already smelled the lowland damp that lingered around the Eros. Nothing followed but a faint greying of the sky stretching down toward land. One good thing, the Akrasians have to get through the banes to get to you. And they don’t have Truls to help them. Keep on, Draken.
He let the pony walk. It huffed with each step, the noise ruining the muffled harness and hooves. The hardy creatures weren’t meant for speed over long distances.
“Where now?” Aarinnaie asked.
“Reschan.” It was the next sizable town. It was where the Mance might have taken Sikyra. He hoped.
She said nothing, giving no indication of her approval or not. He didn’t look at her, didn’t want to know. He couldn’t do elsewise. His hands tightened on the reins as his questions wound through his mind. Korde hadn’t attacked him directly. Why not? A bid for control? Or something else. Why not kill him and have done with it? He was the only thing standing between his daughter and the gods, between the Ashen and Akrasia.
An untruth. You’re one man of many. Do the armies not fight?
“Do they?” He unthinkingly spoke aloud. “We cannot know whether they fight still.” Winter had stalled the war, and Ilumat’s move to take over Brîn and give it to the Ashen might well have halted it.
Once your daughter is safe you must see to the defenses.
His jaw tightened. “Safe” was an elusive concept. Aarinnaie and he alone on the road, one sword and a bow between them. He could provide no home for Sikyra on the road, always running from the Akrasians or Ashen. Perhaps he should have left her with her mother, with the Moonlings. They hadn’t killed the babe when they’d had the chance. They’d kept her alive as a way to manipulate him. At the time it had infuriated him. This night, he’d gladly suffer manipulation and worse in trade for Sikyra’s life.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
The nights grew chillier the further distance they put between Brîn and the
mselves. A routine developed between them as they traveled upland of the River Eros through the edges of the Grassland: Draken hunted up a meal with his bow; Aarinnaie cared for the horses. Most nights they ate sufficiently, digging into a couple of birds or tree rodents, maybe finishing with some berries. It was spit cooking, so there was no real way to boil roots for a side dish, though keeping closer to the Eros and its tributaries kept them in water all right. Copses of woods along the water gave them some shelter. But what worried him was Aarinnaie. Mostly silent, she went about her duties with her head down. She would sit watch when he asked. She slept and ate when he told her to. But other than that she did little but her assigned duties before rolling herself into her cloak. He had no idea if she ever really slept.
Draken sat one night about halfway to Reschan, thinking of Elena setting fire to Skyhaven. Lately it was more difficult to think of her as alive; he’d last seen her fleeing deeper into a burning forest, flames trailing from her fingertips. He bent his head, letting his neck stretch, trying to erase the image from his mind. Truls lingered nearby. The trees, under Shaim’s and Elna’s meager light, cast the tarnish of shadow over him. Aarinnaie was already rolled up in her cloak, unmoving, a slight figure with firelight glinting over her. He could sense her listening in the dark. She lay too stiffly to be asleep.
“I’ll watch. You rest.” He pushed to his feet.
He slung his bow over his shoulder and let his sword settle at his hip, glancing at her motionless figure before striding away. He wanted more for her than this slog toward the unknown, but this was what they had.
The land slept this night, with only the two waning moons and the shadows of the trees for company. His boots rustled the undergrowth. The trees were spread further apart and taller than the lowlands that stretched to the Agrian Range. He kept wary, but without real concern because he felt no threat. They had seen no one in half a sevennight. At length he leaned back against a tree, rather wishing for something to do. So when someone tapped his shoulder, he almost jumped out of his boots. He spun, drawing his sword despite that no attacker in his right mind would touch him to announce their appearance.
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