The Traitor’s Ruin

by Erin Beaty

  The man didn’t seem to understand him, and Alex pointed to Gispan’s clothing, which was wet from the seeping wound.

  “Let me be,” said Gispan, bringing the spoon to his mouth. Alex remembered how the Kimisar didn’t like that he’d accepted treatment.

  “But you’ll die,” Alex insisted. He might even die if he was treated.

  “You think I don’t know that?” Gispan took two more bites and held out the bowl to Alex. “I’m not hungry.”

  “Do you think less of me for wanting to live?” Alex asked, taking the bowl.

  “No,” said Gispan. “I have nothing to go home to. Most of my family died in the famine, and the rest in the wildfires on the plains last year. That’s why I volunteered to go into Tasmet. You obviously have a reason to live.”

  After breakfast the tent was taken down around them, and Alex could now see the entire camp was breaking. Horses were being loaded, but Alex saw no wagons. He and Gispan would either ride or walk. Alex suspected the latter, and he was correct. They were chained to a heavily burdened nag near the end of the caravan. Alex watched Gispan warily. He wasn’t sure the Kimisar would last long.

  Just before they started moving, a Casmuni approached, carrying Alex’s canteen and a waterskin for Gispan. Rather than hand them to the prisoners, the man dropped them on the ground in front of them and walked off. After that first day, the Casmuni had been strangely distant when they gave him water, and Alex wondered if there was some kind of message in that. He picked up both, thinking Gispan didn’t need anything to weigh him down.

  The Kimisar was talkative as he limped along, telling Alex all about his home and family, about the girl he’d set his eye on in Demora, and his love of woodcarving. Most people might assume he was merely lonely after days with no one to talk to, but Alex recognized it for what it was: a dying man realizing all his experiences and thoughts and feelings would die with him. Gispan would feel better if he knew his memories would live on with another person, and so Alex listened.

  When Gispan collapsed in the late afternoon, despite having drunk all his water and most of Alex’s, the Casmuni paused to redistribute the nag’s load on other horses, then slung him over the animal’s back. It had to be a painful position, but fortunately the Kimisar was unconscious.

  They reached a small oasis in late afternoon, and a few tents went up, including the large one, but most men opted to sleep outside. Alex sipped from his refilled canteen as he sat next to Gispan and watched the stars. Funny how the sky was the same as at home, only shifted. The Northern Wheel sat lower on the horizon, but the stars turned around it just the same.

  When the Kimisar woke, Alex tried to get him to drink, but he refused, saying he probably wouldn’t be able to keep it down. The entire side of Gispan’s clothing was wet and crusted with blood and fluid from his gangrenous wound. Alex didn’t dare try to pull anything away to look—he knew what he’d see, and there was no reason to cause additional pain.

  Exhausted as he was, Alex stayed up all night, listening to Gispan’s labored breathing. A few times the sound stopped but then continued several seconds later. As the sky began to lighten in the east, the Kimisar suddenly opened his eyes. Alex scooted closer so Gispan could see him. “Do you want some water?” he asked.

  “Yes,” Gispan rasped through parched lips, and Alex gently poured a little into his mouth. “Thank you, my friend,” he whispered.

  “I will not forget you,” Alex said, giving the man the last reassurance he needed.

  Gispan turned his face up to the fading stars. “I wish they’d just let that woman kill me,” he said. “Then I wouldn’t have had to spend my last days walking through hell.”

  Alex sat straight up. “What woman?” The Kimisar didn’t respond, and Alex swung his feet around and stood on his knees over Gispan to shake his shoulders. “What woman, Gispan? When?”

  Gispan never answered.

  * * *

  Alex insisted on burying Gispan himself. The Casmuni gave him a shovel but kept a close eye on him throughout.

  Before Alex had even joined the army as a page, his father made it a point to teach him that enemy soldiers had thoughts and desires like any Demoran. Alex’s first real fight came as a squire, at the age of fifteen, and the experience of killing a man had made him want to give up soldiering entirely. His father told him that was as it should be; taking the life of another human being should never be easy. Then one of Alex’s friends died at the hands of Kimisar, and he felt the need to avenge him. After that, each death he delivered was progressively easier. There was always one more enemy to fight, one more injury to repay.

  In the years that followed, he lost count of how many Gispans he’d sent to the Spirit without thought or care. One for each shovelful of sand now, perhaps, each one taking him deeper into the pit that was his soul.

  As he dug, Alex played Gispan’s last words over and over in his head.

  I wish they’d just let that woman kill me. Then I wouldn’t have had to spend my last days walking through hell.

  When people were dressed for the desert with their heads covered, it was often difficult to tell, but Alex had identified a few women in the caravan. Gispan could’ve been referring to one of them, yet none of the women were outfitted like the Casmuni fighters he’d seen, so Alex doubted any had been in a patrol group. My last days, he’d said. He’d only walked one day with Alex, and it must have taken several to get to the camp in the first place. Whoever wanted to kill him tried before he arrived.

  I wish they’d just let that woman kill me. If someone had merely argued for his death, Gispan wouldn’t have understood the conversation, so there must have been an actual attempt on his life. Had this woman been the one to injure him? Alex hadn’t looked close enough at his wound to guess how it had been made, nor would it be worth trying now, after so long. The wound had been around ten days old, though. It was entirely possible Gispan had been picked up by the Casmuni group that found Sage and Nicholas.

  Which meant Sage had tried to kill him.

  And if Gispan had been brought to the Casmuni prince’s camp, so had she.

  73

  THE PATH BANNETH’S caravan took wandered to stops at various springs but steadily took them southeast. When the king asked Sage what she knew of Osthiza, she truthfully answered nothing, but then she paused. Thiz was the word for spring, and os was seven. After thinking a moment, she asked if the city was built around seven springs.

  Banneth appeared pleased by her deduction. “Yes. Are your cities named in similar ways?” he asked in Kimisar.

  “Some of them,” Sage replied. “But Demora was created by uniting three distinct cultures—four if you include Tasmet now—and the languages mingled and created a new one. The original meanings of many names were lost over time.”

  “Our people would lament such a loss. They would consider it a corruption of what was pure.”

  “You must not like cake, then.”

  Banneth blinked at her for a moment. “I think you must say that again. There is a misunderstanding.”

  Sage briefly pulled her lips between her teeth. “Eggs are tasty. Sugar is wonderful. Oils and flour and spices are good, too. If cake is considered a corruption of their purity, then your country is missing out.”

  The king threw back his head and laughed, a deep, throaty sound. She knew he had a sense of humor and had seen him smile on many occasions, but this was new to her. No one else reacted as though the king’s behavior was out of the ordinary, though, so he must not always be the solemn ruler she’d come to know.

  He refocused on her, his eyes bright and merry. “Your point is taken, Mistress Saizsch.”

  She started to grin back when a memory of Alex hit her hard. They’d been riding side by side on the way to Tegann last year, and she told a story and he laughed so hard he nearly fell out of his saddle. Not only that, but then she had laughed, probably for the first time since Father died. It had taken her more than four years and Alex’s frien
dship to recover.

  Alex had been gone less than three weeks. How could she have been almost happy, even for a moment?

  Sage abruptly turned away and feigned fixing a buckle on her saddlebag. For the rest of the day, she hardly spoke.

  On the tenth day of travel, there was a noticeable shift in the caravan’s mood. She heard laughter and jokes she could translate if not always understand, and even the horses seemed to be dancing in delight. Banneth brought his bright bay stallion up next to the sand-colored mare she’d been given to ride, looking cheerful.

  “Are we near Osthiza?” she asked him in Casmuni. Thanks to her earlier study and three weeks of immersion, her grasp on the language was fairly strong, though her grammar was still clumsy and her words occasionally wrong. “Everyone is happy today.”

  Banneth pointed ahead, to the east. “That is the Protector’s Gate. The city is half a day beyond. We will dine in the gardens of Osthiza tomorrow.”

  Sage squinted at the two towers of stone in the distance. “But the gate is too far to go before night.” The shadows were growing long already.

  “We will ride until midnight to camp in the shelter of the gate,” he said. “There will be songs and dancing tonight, and few will sleep.”

  “How long have you been away from your city?”

  “Over three months I have been gone.” The king put his right hand on his hip and pulled the reins in closer, body language Sage had learned to associate with preparing to have his question rebuffed. He also switched to Kimisar, meaning the conversation was likely to be complex. “You said before that Tasmet now belongs to Demora? It was not so in our last dealings.”

  Events of fifty years ago were nothing Sage felt had to be hidden. Briefly she explained how Demora became tired of Kimisara’s constant attacks staged from Tasmet, not to mention desiring the strategic value of the Tegann and Jovan Passes. King Raymond’s grandfather had begun the campaign that eventually ousted the Kimisar and forced them back. “The land is poor for farming, but there are quarries and mines. Mostly it serves as a buffer between us. The army keeps a heavy presence there.”

  Sage had planned to say more, but her stomach twisted. Tasmet duty had been Alex’s primary job before he was assigned the Concordium escort last year, which he’d been rather bitter about until it became obvious he had a real threat to deal with. And of course it was how they’d met.

  She would not think of it.

  Banneth held his braced posture. He probably thought she’d cut herself off to prevent saying something strategically important. “You were with the army. Does Demora have eyes on other areas that may increase its comfort?”

  She knew what he meant, but she feigned confusion to gain time. “Palandret?”

  He cleared his throat. “Recovering lost citizens is an excellent excuse to send a significant force into Casmun.” His green eyes focused only on her.

  Sage couldn’t even be sure Demora knew she and Nicholas were with the Casmuni. If the Norsari had captured the right Kimisar, they might have learned enough and followed the river to the boat and the body next to it. Whether they would’ve drawn the right conclusions from there was uncertain.

  She pressed her lips together before answering. “Palandret, I can promise if Demora does come for us, they will be armed and ready to fight. To be otherwise would be foolish.” Banneth gave a short nod of acknowledgment. “But I have no reason to believe Demora wants to expand here. The taking of Tasmet came only after all other options were exhausted.”

  Banneth’s fingers tapped a beat on his sword belt. “You said if Demora comes. You seem uncertain.”

  “I am uncertain. Nicholas and I may be presumed dead. Or they may believe the Kimisar have us.”

  The king looked thoughtful. “I am sorry for your family, but we should hope for either of those. Then when you are returned next year, it will be a happy miracle.”

  His hand relaxed and moved to rest on his leg. Sage was glad the questions were over because she’d become stuck on the phrase next year. If the Demorans had no idea where Nicholas was, his return would indeed be a happy miracle. If they did know, however, they would come to retrieve him much sooner.

  And when they did, they were likely to bring an army.

  74

  THEY KEPT ALEX outside all the time, other than when the caravan paused to rest under lean-tos in the heat of the day. There was never a good time or place to read Sage’s notes or to pick the locks on his chains, and Alex wasn’t sure attempting to escape was a good idea yet anyway. He’d be spotted right away, and with horses to run him down, the Casmuni would catch him in five minutes.

  Gispan’s last words and the possibility of Sage being with the group haunted him. Alex obsessively searched the line ahead every time it came into view, but it was always so far that he couldn’t focus on the riders in front. In the evenings he scrutinized every person who passed near him.

  What would he have done if he did see her or Nicholas? Alex wasn’t sure. But if he could know they were safe, it would give him some peace. Maybe then he could make a plan to get them out of here.

  After ten days, the caravan stopped in the shadow of two great pillars of stone. They must have been within a day of their destination because a bonfire was built in the center of the camp, and every piece of firewood they carried was thrown into it. No tents were set up, not even the grand one. Instead, everyone pitched lean-tos around the fire, and at last Alex had a chance to study all the faces without head scarves.

  And there she was.

  Alex nearly sobbed with relief, then wiped his eyes and took in every detail. She sat cross-legged on a large rug directly across the fire from him, by all appearances unharmed. Though her face was flushed from sun and the heat, there were shadows under her eyes as she gazed blankly into the flames, reacting little to those around her. The Casmuni prince sat on her right, but she didn’t seem afraid of him.

  Nicholas was on her left, looking positively cheerful, though he threw an occasional concerned glance at her. Both wore Casmuni clothing; it was easy for Alex to imagine their own clothes had been ruined in their escape. The two princes conversed with Sage and each other periodically, and then she’d respond—never looking upset or worried, but she never smiled, either. Alex knew the look on her face. She’d worn it the first time she’d spoken of her father’s death, when she struggled to talk about what she’d buried for so long.

  What had happened to make her wear it now?

  Alex wanted to stand up and shout her name, to see her run toward him across the sea of Casmuni and throw herself in his arms, but two observations stopped him.

  First, Sage wore two daggers on her belt, and Nicholas, too, carried a knife. If she’d made an attempt to kill Gispan and the Casmuni had stopped her, Sage’s capacity for violence was known. Yet she sat next to the prince, armed with not one but two weapons—the second of which must have been returned to her by the men she helped escape. The Casmuni trusted her, and Alex didn’t dare associate himself with her now.

  Second, on the other side of the Casmuni prince sat the familiar man with a scarred face who had every reason not to trust Alex.

  75

  WHAT SAGE THOUGHT was a pyramid of rock in the distance proved to be a terraced city. From the Protector’s Gate, everything looked as brown as the land between them, but as they drew nearer, a mixture of reds and greens began to separate from each other. The red came from the sunburned stones the city was built with, and the green was an abundance of plant life. She’d never seen a place so obsessed with gardens. Every window had some sort of plant hanging from it.

  Banneth had told her Osthiza existed entirely on the springs it was named for, and the overflow was used to grow crops. The Kaz River was still several miles farther east and south, and the land between expanded in a delta of green fields from the heavy stream that flowed out of the city. Otherwise the surrounding land was desert, leading Sage to believe the gardens were not merely decorative—they must produ
ce food, too. Scattered groves of date palms and at least one orchard grew on the lowest wide terraces, and the air was laced with the scent of their blossoms even at this distance. Sage closed her eyes and breathed deeply. The desert had its own stark beauty, but trees would always be first in her heart.

  Banneth watched her from the side as they rode. “Are your cities so green?” he asked in Casmuni.

  “Yes and no,” she answered. “Our cities are places green does not intrude, rather than one of the few places it can grow.”

  The king nodded. “Farther south there are forests as wet as the desert is dry. Cities there are the same as yours, a haven from nature.”

  A group of mounted soldiers approached from the city. Once Banneth’s traveling party was positively identified, several riders returned to Osthiza at speed and the rest escorted them to the gates. They passed through the reinforced archway and the lower terrace, and began the long, winding path up the hill to the domed palace at its peak. The king rode at the caravan’s head with Sage on his right and Nicholas between them but slightly behind.

  Greenery hung down over every wall, grew from every roof. Sage’s hands were drawn to touch the vines and leaves within reach. After so many weeks of desert and rocks, to be among living things again was like coming up from under water.

  The people of Osthiza must have been used to seeing their king come and go. They moved out of the group’s way and cheered and bowed, but otherwise didn’t disrupt their routines and business. Children rushed up to offer flowers and fruit to the king and his riders, but they hesitated to approach Sage or Nicholas. By their Northern Demoran coloring alone, it was obvious they were not Casmuni.

  Banneth reached over and tugged her headdress down. The short wisps of hair she could see were much lighter after several weeks in the sun. She must look as blond as Queen Orianna to them. At the king’s gesture, Nicholas also pushed his hood back, revealing the light, coppery shade of his own hair.