[fan] fourth talisman 01 - nocturne

by Kat Ross

  The more he chewed over the possibilities, the more he came to see it as a golden opportunity to strike a bargain with the Valkirins. No one need ever know.

  One thing led to another. He’d sent a bird to Val Moraine. No response had come and he was starting to think his message hadn’t arrived when the assassin appeared. Galen had panicked. Fearful his treachery would be revealed, he’d shot the man with an arrow before he could be taken alive.

  But of course that wasn’t the end of it.

  A few days later, Galen had been ranging near the border when he suddenly found himself bound in flows of air. A Valkirin had stepped out of the trees, pale as death, demanding to know what had happened to Petur. Terrified, Galen placed the blame on Darius. The Valkirin told Galen what he must do if he ever wanted to see his mother again.

  Darius was unconscious in Galen’s own bed. It had been a simple matter to cut a small lock of his hair. Galen took Nazafareen’s from a stolen hairbrush. He was just returning from making the delivery when the wind ship came.

  He’d buried the hairbrush in the woods behind his house, but he knew Tethys would find it somehow. She had a way of ferreting out secrets.

  And when Victor discovered the truth…. Galen shuddered. His father had been gone in the shadowlands for most of Galen’s life and the long absence had only added to Victor's mystique. But Galen had seen his volatile temper erupt on more than one occasion, mostly over minor matters. He couldn’t begin to imagine the retribution for such a betrayal.

  I should have asked what the Valkirins wanted the hair for.

  Now Ellard was dead and he was an exile.

  A little voice whispered that the creatures might not have caught Darius yet. That there was still time to turn back. To find Darius and warn him.

  My brother.

  But he’d seen the look in Victor’s eyes. There would be no forgiveness. At least he could see his mother Mina one last time.

  So Galen ran.

  It was a day to the mountains, less if he pushed hard. Galen fingered his thin cloak. Could he find Val Moraine? And would the Valkirins welcome him?

  Know that I’m proud of you.

  Too late, father. Too late.

  He swallowed a lump in his throat and kept running.

  14

  The Umbra

  “The Guild will be furious,” Javid grumbled as they sifted through the wreckage of the Kyrenia. “They’ll never trust me with my own ship now.”

  The wind still moaned across the rocky landscape, bringing occasional gusts of rain, but the main body of the storm had passed by while Javid slept. Now that he’d woken, he was in an ill humor and seemed to blame Nazafareen for their predicament.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, kicking a splintered chunk of wood from her path. “But you told me to cut the rope.”

  “The other rope.”

  “I asked you twice,” she snapped, her temper fraying. “I said I didn’t know which one you meant!”

  Javid tucked his hair behind his ears and squatted down to examine a battered navigational instrument, tossing it aside with an expression of disgust. “Fine. I won’t waste time arguing about it. We have more immediate problems, such as being stranded in the middle of nowhere.”

  Clouds scudded across Hecate’s pallid face, but a scattering of stars shone overhead. Javid studied them intently for a minute or two. It wasn’t quite as dark as in Nocturne, Nazafareen noticed, more like the twilight she remembered from the Dominion—one of the only places besides the forest she did remember, even if it was in bits and pieces.

  “We were blown considerably off course,” he said at last. “I’d say we’re only halfway across the Umbra, and much farther north than we should be.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Well, for one thing, we’re nearer to Delphi than Samarqand.”

  “So let’s just go there instead.”

  Javid laughed. “Oh no, country bumpkin. I don’t think so.”

  Nazafareen rummaged through one of the broken crates. It must be the Oracle, though Ashraf wouldn’t know that. “Why not?” she asked.

  “Trust me, you don’t want to go to Delphi.”

  Nazafareen eyed the leather pouch at his belt. “What about your magic? Can’t you use it to fix the ship?”

  He stared at her hard. “What magic?”

  “Oh, please. I have eyes.”

  Javid sighed. “If you’re a Greek spy, I don’t suppose it matters now. It’s called spell dust. Most wind ships have a burner that heats air for the sack. But I couldn’t very well bring fire to the darklands, could I? The daēvas would have killed me. So I designed my own version that uses spell magic. It makes the air inside the sack lighter than the air outside, and it can conjure a wind that bears the ship where I wish her to go.”

  “Can this dust do other things?” She thought of her broken memories.

  “Yes, but you’d have to ask an alchemist.”

  “Where would I find one?”

  “Samarqand. And they don’t come cheap.” Javid checked the pouch. “There isn’t much left. Even if there was, I’m not a miracle worker.” He looked disconsolately at the shattered hull. “See if you can find any food. It’s going to be a long walk.”

  They spent the next hour picking through every inch of the wreckage. To her delight, Nazafareen found her sword, but the oilskin bag must have flown out because she saw no sign of it. Javid located a single full water jug; the others had broken.

  “Is this all you brought?” she asked, holding up two loaves of bread, a single jar of olives, and a rind of hard white cheese.

  Javid raised an eyebrow, then winced as it stretched the clotted cut. “I didn’t pack for a long journey by foot. Nor did I anticipate having two mouths to feed. That would have been plenty if you hadn’t reduced my ship to kindling.”

  Nazafareen grunted and buckled on her sword.

  “Where’d you get that, village girl?” Javid demanded. “Holy Father, did you steal it from the daēvas?”

  “No!” She kicked herself. There was so much she didn’t know. So swords are valuable items in the mortal lands. “It was given to me. One of the daēvas taught me how to use it. He said a girl alone should be able to defend herself.”

  Javid gave her a stony stare. “Let’s see then.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Show me how to fight with a sword. Personally, I think you took it to sell in Samarqand.” His mouth set in a grim line. “If that’s the case, we’re turning around right now and walking back to the darklands so you can tell them how sorry you are.”

  Nazafareen stared back for a long moment. She shrugged. “Okay.”

  She whipped the sword from its sheath and cut a whistling figure eight around Javid’s head. His eyes widened, probably because he thought she was improvising. She did spar with Victor sometimes. And although her memories of people and places were lost, her body remembered how to fight with different blades, and with hand and feet.

  Nazafareen held back, deliberately affecting a degree of clumsiness but showing enough skill that he’d believe her story. She must have done a fair job because Javid finally began to clap sardonically, though he was smiling.

  “Enough, enough. I see you’re familiar with it. Now put it away before one of us gets stabbed.” He studied the sword. “It’s a finely balanced blade. If you do decide to sell it, I’ll tell you where to go to get a fair price.”

  “I’ll never sell it,” Nazafareen said fiercely, slipping the sword into its scabbard. “It was a gift.”

  They started walking across the featureless terrain. At first glance the Umbra appeared perfectly flat, but in fact it was riven by deep gullies and other wind-carved formations. They were forced to go around these, but travel was otherwise easy because there was no vegetation of any kind.

  The earth magic that allowed the Avas Danai forest to thrive lay far behind them and without true sunlight, no plant could survive. At first Nazafareen felt exposed o
n the vast open plain after so many weeks living amid trees. They must be visible for leagues and leagues if anyone was looking. But she soon realized that just as the Umbra was bereft of plant life, there were no animals either. There was nothing at all.

  They walked in the monotonous half-light until neither could go any further. Nazafareen slept curled up in her cloak, Javid in his coat. Even if they’d had the means to make a fire, there was no wood to burn. They had to strictly ration the food, so both went to bed hungry and not in the mood for conversation.

  Toward the end of the second day, Nazafareen saw a faint glow on the western horizon like it was on the verge of dawn. She waited anxiously for any stirring of magic within her but felt nothing different.

  “Tell me about Samarqand,” she said.

  They’d stopped at a clear, cold stream to refill their water skins. Nazafareen splashed her face, scrubbing the dust off. She still felt sore and knew bruises lurked beneath her tunic.

  “The most wondrous city in the world. Rich and fat, just like our King, the Holy Father bless his name.” Javid piously brushed forehead, lips and heart with one hand.

  She rolled her eyes, but only when he wasn’t looking. Nazafareen had told him she didn’t care about his business with the Danai, but she knew it had something to do with evading the King’s taxes.

  “You follow the way of the flame,” she said. Darius sometimes made a similar gesture.

  “As do all civilized men,” he replied airily.

  “Is that why you don’t like Delphi?”

  “The Greeks have their own gods, it’s true, but that’s not why I dislike them. Delphi and Samarqand are bitter rivals.”

  “For what?”

  Javid took a long drink of water and wiped his mouth. “Money, power, the usual.”

  “What about the Marakai daēvas? Have you ever met them?”

  “Of course. They’re the intermediaries between Solis and the darklands.”

  “So their ships come to Samarqand?”

  “The port is in Susa on the White Sea, but it’s not far. About fifty leagues by the King’s Road.” He glanced at her. “Why?”

  She shrugged. “Just curious. What are they like?”

  Javid considered the question. “My boss says they’re honest, though they don’t mingle much with outsiders. They take a tenth of what they transport. It’s called the Hin. No one knows what the Marakai do with their fortune, though they must be rich as sin.” He paused. “They tend to stay on their ships. People can be…funny around them.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Some still hold a grudge. They don’t trust any daēvas at all.”

  “But why?”

  Javid gave her a pitying look. “Listen bumpkin, I guess your parents didn’t teach you any history, but the daēvas tried to exterminate us. It was a long time ago, but you don’t forget a thing like that.”

  Nazafareen had no idea what he was talking about.

  “They burned our cities to the ground. Thousands died.”

  “But that doesn’t even make any sense! Daēvas abhor fire.”

  Javis shrugged. “Maybe now they do. I’m just telling you what happened. Like I said, it was a long time ago. Some kind of civil war among the clans and we got caught up in it. Took generations to rebuild.”

  Nazafareen stood, knuckling the small of her back with her left hand. She didn’t believe the story for a moment. The very idea was ridiculous. But she didn’t think Ashraf would argue the point.

  “You have your spell dust if they try anything,” she said lightly.

  “Yes, but it’s nothing compared to elemental magic. Baby stuff.”

  He glanced at her, his gaze sliding across her stump and away. He hadn’t asked once about the missing hand. And since her foolishness with the sword, she’d made sure to remove the gold cuff and keep it tucked in a pocket of her cloak. No poor village girl would own a piece of jewelry like that.

  “Are you truly coming all the way to Samarqand? I thought you’d want to go home to your family after so many…misadventures.”

  Nazafareen ignored the patronizing tone. “I’m never going back.” She thought of Darius and felt a stab of loneliness.

  Javid looked at her appraisingly. “Do you have any skills?”

  “Like what?”

  “Cooking. Sewing. Womanly pursuits.”

  Nazafareen scowled. “I know how to fight.”

  “No one hires girl mercenaries. I thought you said you wanted to be a lady’s maid.”

  “Well, I….”

  “How about singing? You could get a job at a tavern.”

  She tried out a snatch of a ballad she’d heard Darius humming. Javid groaned and put his hands over his ears.

  “Won’t anyone come looking for you when you don’t return?”

  “Unfortunately not. I told you, no one else is willing to fly across the Umbra. And the nature of my mission was…delicate. If word ever got out, the Guild would deny they even knew me.” His teeth gleamed white in the half-light. “Which leaves us fending for ourselves.”

  She nodded. “I am sorry, you know. I was only trying to do what you said.”

  “I know.” He sighed. “So tell me, what was it like living in the darklands?”

  “The Danai treated me kindly.”

  “Then why did you leave?”

  “I missed the sun.”

  This seemed to be the expected answer, for Javid nodded. “I can’t imagine living where it’s night all the time. I’d go mad.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Are there wild animals in the forest?”

  “Some. The ones that like the night. Owls and foxes. Possums. They have snakes too.” She spread her arms wide. “Really big ones.”

  “Sounds lovely. I’m sorry I had to leave so soon.”

  They began walking again. The horizon steadily lightened. After a few hours, they came to the banks of a great river, half a league across. It was slow and meandering on the flat plain, and the air was warm enough that Nazafareen shed her cloak and waded in. Javid explained that there were several rivers leading from the dark side to the light side. Together with the White Sea to the north and the Austral Ocean to the south, they exchanged cold air for hot and moderated the extreme temperatures.

  “Of course, the Valkirins live in the mountains, but they have ice water running in their veins,” Javid laughed. He’d rolled up his trousers and waded next to her, but kept his quilted coat on. She’d never seen him remove it.

  “Aren’t you hot?” Nazafareen asked.

  Javid shrugged. “I’m used to it.”

  Nazafareen gazed at the horizon, whose color had lightened to a yellowish pink. For the first time, she felt something stir inside her. It seemed very aware of Javid’s leather pouch—and of the cuff she carried. For the metal was no longer cold and dead. It held some kind of flickering, latent force that both attracted and repelled her. The bond with Darius? She’d thought it was broken forever….

  Nazafareen stopped walking. The hair on her arms rose as she peered into the twilight behind them, where the sky gently faded from grey to black. Nothing moved on the plain.

  “Ashraf?” He stared at her impatiently. “I’m thinking we should make camp—”

  “No!”

  Javid frowned at the vehemence in her voice.

  “Why not? I can hardly walk another step and there’s water here.”

  “We have to keep going. I….I have a funny feeling, Javid. I get them sometimes and they’re usually right. We need to leave.”

  He looked at her strangely but didn’t argue. They picked up their packs in silence and started for the lightening horizon again. Nazafareen’s shoulder blades itched. She kept looking behind and saw nothing. But she knew what she’d sensed.

  Something was back there.

  15

  Children of Fire

  Gerda refused to come to him so Culach was forced to dress and find his way to her chambers. He hadn’t been there in
years, but he found he remembered the route. She lived in one of the highest, most remote towers of the holdfast, where the air was so cold and thin Culach had to stamp his feet to keep his toes from freezing. It took ten minutes of knocking before the door opened.

  “Who are you?” a harsh voice demanded.

  Of course, Gerda knew very well who he was. She just wanted to make him squirm.

  “It’s me, grandmother,” he said patiently. “Culach.”

  Silence. Then: “What happened to you? You look terrible.”

  “It’s kind of you to inquire after my health. I—”

  “Kind? I’m just being honest. And why do you stare at me so blankly, like a simpleton?”

  “I lost my sight, grandmother.”

  He heard her suck her teeth. “That’s too bad. My eyesight is still perfect. I can see like a young osprey. Of course, there’s nothing much to look at.”

  Culach had the feeling she was staring at him as she said those last words. An awkward silence descended. Finally, he swallowed what was left of his pride and asked.

  “Will you invite me in?”

  If he’d thought his condition would evoke pity from the old bat, he was sadly mistaken.

  “What for?”

  “I need to talk to you.”

  “You haven’t needed to talk to me for three hundred years. I guess I have something you want. You’re just like the rest of them.”

  Culach’s bulk shifted in the doorway. Suddenly it seemed a fool’s errand. Gerda would laugh in his face and send him on his way. He almost left then, but he’d trudged through what seemed like leagues of corridors to reach her chambers and the thought of returning empty-handed—worse, without even having tried—was too much to bear.