Gate to Kandrith (The Kandrith Series)

by Luiken, Nicole

  “They’re all dead?”

  “Every last one, including their bloody priest, and priests usually don’t fight at all. Something has stirred them up,” he concluded.

  An icy finger of fear touched Sara’s neck. If the attack hadn’t been a random raid, then it must be connected to the Favonius massacre. According to her father’s spy, the Qiph hadn’t arrived at the Favonius estate until after the deaths. Assuming the information was correct, what had driven the Qiph to cross the border both there and here?

  “A message must be sent to my father as well as the nearest garrison,” Sara said. “He must be told what has happened.”

  “Permit me to be of service, Lady Sarathena,” Julen volunteered.

  Sara blinked. “No, let one of the legionnaires go.”

  Julen persisted. “I can ride as fast as a legionnaire and your guard detail won’t be another man short.”

  A good argument, but what he really meant was that he would be free to return to his life in Temborium. “Your services cannot be spared either,” she told him coldly. Unless— She felt a leap of hope, but Lance, Felicia and several legionnaires were all within earshot. “Let us speak in privacy.”

  Julen raised an eyebrow, but obligingly walked with her twenty feet farther down the riverbank. The roar of the falls in the distance should keep their voices from carrying.

  “Did you figure it out, the secret?” she asked urgently.

  Julen stood silent a moment. “No. Not yet.”

  Vez’s Malice. Sara closed her eyes in despair. “Then I cannot send you. Have you made any progress?” she asked hopefully.

  “Hoping I’ll give you some hints?” Julen sneered.

  Sara fought down a surge of impatience. “The situation has changed, surely you can see that?”

  “Of course. Which is why it would be best if I returned to Temborium and—”

  Sara cut him off with a wave of her hand. “No. You heard my father. A war with Qi is already a foregone conclusion. Today’s attack will not change that. And—” she took a deep breath, “—I need your help.”

  Julen crossed his arms. “And what are you willing to do for that help?”

  Sara had her answer ready. “Find the secret, and I swear to you that I’ll immediately send you back to the capital with a letter of lavish praise, urging that you be awarded a title and returned to your old post. My word as a Remillus.”

  Julen opened his mouth to say something, then closed it. He tapped his cheek in thought then nodded decisively. “I accept your terms, on the condition that I get all the credit no matter which of us discovers the truth first. And we pool our knowledge.”

  Sara nodded.

  “What have you found out?” Julen asked.

  “Very little.” Sara paused to organize her thoughts. “I have yet to see Lance perform any magic. He prayed to Loma at the waterfall shrine, but left no offering.”

  “What else? You spent two days cooped up in a carriage with him, you must have learned something else.” Julen sounded frustrated.

  He’s strong and brave and his mustache is softer than it looks. She couldn’t tell Julen any of that— Sara narrowed her eyes. “What progress have you made?”

  “Very little.” Julen kicked at a stone. “The man has no vices. He doesn’t drink more than a cup of wine or ale in the evening. He sleeps alone. And he has no servants or slaves to bribe for information.” Julen lifted his gaze. “I thought you were doing rather better with him.

  She shook her head. “He doesn’t like noblewomen.”

  Julen let out his breath. “There will be other sources of information once we cross the border.”

  “Yes.”

  Neither of them mentioned how much harder it would be to get information back to the Primus once they entered Kandrith.

  “Since we’re at a standstill, can you investigate the Qiph attack for me?” Briefly, Sara explained why the legionnaire thought it had not been a raid, adding, “The boy on the bridge called me Defiled. Do you know what he meant?”

  Julen shook his head. “No, but I will endeavor to find out. If the attack was aimed at you, how did they discover your whereabouts?”

  Sara hadn’t thought of that aspect. Her journey to Kandrith had been arranged swiftly in near secrecy. Her carriage had no special insignia that identified it as the property of the Primus, though she had used her own name at the Temples of Jut along the way.

  Julen studied her. “You do realize the most obvious answer is that Lance told them? Your father suspected that Qi and Slaveland might be working together.”

  Sara felt a stab of emotion—betrayal?—before logic reasserted itself. “It can’t be Lance. He saved my life on the bridge.”

  Julen shrugged. “So perhaps the aims of his country do not perfectly coincide with Qi—the King of Slaves may want you as a hostage while the Qiph want to strike against the Republic by killing the Primus’s daughter. It doesn’t mean they aren’t allies. Remember, Lance also saved the Qiph boy from going over the falls.”

  Lance had saved the Qiph. The reminder troubled Sara as they walked back to the makeshift camp.

  They found most of the legionnaires in an excited knot around their captain. Marcus had woken up.

  The outriders looked relieved and barely restrained themselves from thumping their captain on the back. They teased Marcus about how Diwo, the Goddess of Luck, must want him for a lover to have saved him. Marcus, Sara noted, looked rather uneasy about the prospect.

  “What happened?” Sara asked him. “We saw the Qiph boy strike you.”

  “Yes.” Marcus’s hand went to his bandaged chest. “I thought he had me too. I…suppose my leathers took most of the blow?” He made it a question. “I fell into the water, but managed to grab the rope. I held on as long as I could—”

  “We couldn’t see you.” His decurion looked stricken. “We thought you were dead.”

  “I should be.” Marcus shuddered. “Well. I went over the falls. The next thing I remember, you two,” he nodded at her and Lance, “were towing me to safety. A very dangerous thing to do, Lady Sarathena.”

  “So I’ve been told.” She was not going to apologize.

  Marcus must have seen the steel in her gaze because he said nothing more to her, instead asking for a report from his decurion.

  Sara left the ordinary business in his hands and tried hard to go back to sleep under the specter of a second possible Qiph attack.

  * * *

  “Lady Sarathena, I’m ready to make my report,” Julen said that evening. Sara widened her eyes and glanced around the busy camp; she’d expected Julen to report to her in private. From his slight nod, he had some reason for doing this in front of an audience. “Go ahead,” she said.

  “Firstly,” Julen said with a little bow, “not all of the Qiph are dead. One of them, the youth that crossed the bridge first, is missing. Probably crawled off to die, but…we don’t know for certain. Secondly, I found this.” With a flourish he produced a small wooden box from behind his back.

  The box was only three inches square, but half again as deep. The rosewood cover was polished to a satiny finish and carved with strange designs that seemed to twist dizzily. It smelled faintly of spices.

  Sara loathed it on sight. She refused to touch it when Julen extended it to her. “What is it?”

  “I don’t know, but the priest had it strapped to his body under his robes as if it were important.”

  “May I see it?” Lance asked.

  Julen looked at Sara, and she nodded.

  Lance turned it over several times, examining the carvings, then opened the lid and looked inside. It was empty, save for more carvings in a spiral pattern… Sara stepped back, head aching.

  “Do you know what it is?” Sara asked him.

  “No. Perhaps a religious item?” Lance sounded doubtful.

  Thanks to her math tutor, Sara knew a little of the Qiph Way. Men tried to emulate the Path of the Holy Man, and women that of the Holy W
oman. Her tutor had been on the second-to-last stage of the Men’s Path, that of Slave. He’d never said anything about boxes, but then he hadn’t yet made the final step to priest. “Perhaps,” she said politely.

  “May I keep it?” Lance asked. “I’d like to show it to my father.”

  Sara hesitated. She wanted to say no, unequivocally, but… Julen looked speculative. Was this some trap of his? “Yes, but please keep it in your bags, out of my sight.”

  She wished, very much, that Lance had not taken it.

  * * *

  Esam crouched low in the bushes and watched the camp. He shivered. There was no doubt now: all his party were dead, including the Pathfinder. All would have died rather than let the Soul Box fall into the hands of the Defiled.

  Esam had held out a foolish hope that Nabeel still lived—he’d always seemed indestructible. Esam had first known Nabeel as his father’s friend, then later as his stern Weapons Master. Only very lately had he become a fellow Warrior.

  Esam had known the other Qiph in their party for less than a week. Their deaths merely numbed him. Nabeel’s hurt. With Nabeel alive it never would’ve occurred to Esam to give up, but now their mission all came down to him.

  He had no sword and had never felt so small and helpless…but the magic conferred on him by the Pathfinder priests still lay like a heavy weight on his back. It chained him near the Defiled. He could not give up, so he must go forward.

  He stayed in the bushes, the voices of the dead whispering in his ears.

  * * *

  The next morning, they pressed on with all speed. Thereafter followed three days of sheer misery.

  Riding in a carriage was tedious. Riding in a carriage day and night, pausing only to switch horses and obtain meals, was nigh on unbearable. Sara’s head and body soon ached. Since only one carriage now remained, Julen and Lance took turns riding one of the extra carriage horses.

  In light of Julen’s lack of progress, Sara had decided that she must keep trying with Lance. She had sworn off seducing the secret out of him, but she might still glean something from casual conversation.

  He thwarted her plan by promptly closing his eyes. A certain tension in his body made her think he wasn’t actually sleeping, but talking would have been too rude, so she was forced to keep silent.

  Sara turned to the refetti for distraction. The animal had boldly jumped into the carriage when they left the camp on the Vaga River. The sleek-bodied rodent liked to sit on her shoulder, its tail tucked behind her neck. It didn’t bite, but showed a definite preference for Sara’s company over Felicia’s, almost as if he knew Sara was the one who had saved him. Unfortunately, the little creature soon curled up asleep on her lap, leaving Sara with nothing to do but stare out the window.

  And then it was Julen’s turn in the carriage. Instead of flirting with Felicia as usual, he quizzed Sara about any clue Lance might have let drop, which left them both frustrated and short-tempered.

  On the second day, Lance kept entirely to the carriage, but not from any desire for Sara’s company. His dunking in the river had given him a cold. His nose ran, and he sneezed constantly.

  His illness should have made Sara want to stay as far away from him as possible, but instead she had the bizarre desire to smooth the unruly lock of hair back from his forehead and kiss him better.

  Despite the hot lemon teas that Sara ordered whenever possible and Lance, somewhat dubiously, drank, his cold worsened over the next day, progressing from sniffles to a light cough to horrible hacking spasms.

  “Are you all right?” Sara asked helplessly after yet another spate.

  “I’m sick,” Lance said simply.

  Her mother would have listed her every ache and pain. “I mean, are you well enough to travel?” She longed to stop at one of Jut’s temples for a day, but just because there had been no further sign of Qiph assassins didn’t mean there weren’t any following them.

  Lance shrugged. “I’ll be sick whether I’m in this carriage or lying in a bed. I prefer to be in the carriage, getting closer to home.” The speech sent him into another fit of coughing. His face turned so red Sara grew alarmed, but he only waved her away when she asked if she should stop the carriage.

  “Sorry, about that,” he gasped. “Talking…irritates my throat.” He closed his eyes.

  This time he truly slept, and Sara caught herself staring at him. She tried looking out the window, but inevitably, after a few moments, her gaze would be drawn back to his body, the thick layers of muscle on his chest and biceps, the distinct dent in his upper lip half-hidden by his mustache.

  Sara was so aware of Lance that it took her awhile to notice that Felicia was equally tense. She suddenly remembered coming upon Felicia and Lance speaking together in low voices that morning after breakfast.

  A horrible suspicion occurred to her. The next time the carriage paused to change horses and give everyone inside a chance to stretch their legs, she drew her maid aside. “Did Julen ask you to take Lance as your lover?”

  Felicia’s eyes widened. “No!”

  Sara felt embarrassed at jumping to such a sordid conclusion. “Then what were you talking to him about this morning?”

  “I don’t remember,” Felicia said, her cheeks flushed.

  Dismay tightened Sara’s chest. “Don’t lie to me.”

  “I’m not!”

  Lance returned, and they all climbed back into the cursed carriage in stiff silence. It must have been obvious that they’d been quarreling because after half a mile Lance sighed and proposed playing a game called Sacrifice.

  Sara had never heard of the game, but it proved to be a simple, silent one using marks on a piece of paper. It was a child’s amusement, one Evina would have sneered at, but it passed the time.

  Sacrifice reminded her a little of chess in that its players, represented by X’s and O’s, had serf and king type values, but instead of a square, they were arranged in a pyramid. There were three types of moves. A higher level player could scratch off a lower level one, two lower-level players could be “sacrificed” to create one player on a higher level, or two players of equal value could cancel each other out.

  Felicia lost interest after four defeats in a row, but Sara’s affinity with numbers stood her in good steed. Within two games she was able to tie Lance, and they began to draw larger, more challenging, pyramids.

  “Hah!” Sara said triumphantly, after she’d made a particularly good move.

  Still trying to spare his throat, Lance scowled in an exaggerated fashion, then made his own move and sat back, arms crossed, but eyes twinkling. A laugh gurgled out of Sara’s throat, surprising her with how much she was enjoying herself. Lance smiled back at her, a real smile unlike the edged ones he’d been giving her. Sara’s chest grew warm with emotion, and she quickly bent back over the game.

  Outside the carriage window, the farmland grew poorer and less settled. They went up and down endless rocky hills.

  Then, finally, the Red Mountains of Kandrith reared up ahead of them. They proved to be gray cliffs with a skirt of green trees, not in the least bit red.

  Sara found them puzzling. “They look more like a wall that rose up out of nowhere than a mountain range.” She couldn’t see any valleys, just one crooked range of mountains stretching out of sight.

  Lance said a queer thing. “The Red Saints did rise out of nowhere.”

  Before Sara could question him, Lance suddenly craned his head at the window in excitement. “The Gate! We’ve reached the border!”

  Chapter Seven

  Sara peered out the window. The Gate to Kandrith…was not at all what she’d expected.

  She’d pictured something like the gates to the city of Temborium: thrice the height of a man, topped with iron spikes and so heavy it took four men to roll them open each morning. Well, actually, she’d imagined something a little cruder than Temborium’s shining gates, but not this much cruder.

  For there was no gate at all. Instead, the carriage had ha
lted in front of a narrow gorge that passed between the Red Mountains. Sheer cliffs rose on either side.

  Lance opened the carriage door and hopped out. Sara handed the refetti to Felicia and lost no time following him.

  The Gate to Kandrith also lacked armed guards. Instead, a solitary Gatekeeper, an old man with bristly white hair that grew in tufts from his head, eyebrows and ears, stood in front of a small lean-to built against the cliff. He seemed to have expected Lance, nodding his head with evident satisfaction. He banged out a complicated rhythm on a large bass drum, ending with three hollow booms, no doubt signaling their arrival.

  Sara walked closer, studying the gorge in more detail.

  The carriage wasn’t going to fit—a point Julen seemed to have already grasped. He’d dismounted from his borrowed horse and was arguing with the gatekeeper.

  “This is the Gate to Kandrith,” the old man insisted in his cracked voice. He wore an Elysinian-style vest like Lance’s, only his was dyed blood red.

  “It can’t be,” Julen said with certainty.

  “Eh? And why’s that?” the old fellow demanded.

  “It isn’t wide enough for a horse to pass through, much less a carriage,” Julen said.

  “That’s right,” the old man said, “it isn’t.”

  Both of them waited.

  Julen broke first, spluttering. “You can’t tell me there’s no entrance for horses! That would be insane.”

  “Fine then, I won’t tell you.” The old man leaned on his cane.

  “Very well, we will simply have to enter Kandrith by another route.” Julen moved toward his horse.

  “There is no other route,” Lance told him. “If you wish to enter Kandrith, you must pass through the Gate.”