The lord found an interest in the details, the bait to the overall ploy; time to shove the temptation under his nose. “You’ve two choices: You send the message for truth, as we take this bridge and the city of Vaejoen will need the Fourth Army, or you let us cross in peace, and you send riders to Marziin telling them of this ruse. They send the Fourth Army toward Marziin which draws the Litra attack, but the fourth army wheels back around catching them unawares for the slaughter. And you, lord of the Dinsang Crossing, will be responsible for destroying the Litra army. I’m certain you can see the benefit of this plan.”
The man’s silence spoke a thousand words, but so did his eyes. Duke Ovrin was right, trusting this man would be a fool’s play.
Ivin continued before he could answer. “To further the deal and show our generosity, I offer you a woman for your bed.” He gestured to Meliu and Sedut. “I did not know your tastes, so I brought two.”
This brought a genuine smile beneath his liar’s eyes. “I am a man of many tastes! I will take them both and grant your people passage if they please me.”
“Good.” Ivin skulked back to the women and snagged Meliu’s arm with a rough grip, but her eyes stayed low. He growled his words, knowing the man wouldn’t understand. “You ready for this?”
Meliu’s voice came meek. “I’m all better now, by which I mean very bad.”
He shoved her toward the Lord of the Dinsang, and the man took her by the shoulder, drawing her back to the horses with Sedut following close behind, her eyes down and strides petite.
A man of many tastes and damned poor judgement.
Awkward as all the hells to not understand what the bastards were saying. A word here or there sounded familiar, but the dialect was thick with peculiar emphasis on various syllables. But on the head of the coin, they didn’t understand a word she and Sedut might share.
If they let her speak.
Her cheek smarted from the lord’s fist when she muttered a single word and she decided a second word and blow were unnecessary. Guards took them to the lord’s bedroom at the base of the southwestern tower, stripped them of their clothes searching for weapons or poison, then tossed their dresses into the fire with a laugh at the scars on their shoulders. No doubt they interpreted them as the marks of slaves.
They took the shame without a flinch, eyes on their toes, and the guards locked the door as they departed.
Meliu glanced around the chambers; at least so far south, even naked there was no need for a fire. “Well, this is awkward.”
“Shall we compare scars?”
The humor took a flicker to set in; Meliu laughed, but the mirth didn’t last. “They could’ve given us shoes.”
Sedut grabbed a blanket from the bed and tossed it to her. Black linen lined in silk, she guessed imported from the Gorotan. The high priestess wrapped herself in ermine she found at the foot of the bed.
“How long do we wait?”
“Long enough for the lord to pen the message to Marviin and send it on its way. I’d hoped for a view so we could see it depart.”
“You want me to let you have the lord, seeing as…” She pointed to Meliu’s face.
“So long as he dies, I don’t care by whose hand.” She strolled to a desk with a grin; the notion of finding some secret Malstefne message flashed in her brain, but dissipated as she realized she couldn’t read it anyhow. “You’ve got the artifact?”
Sedut held out her hand, and in an instant a fist sized diamond flashed into existence with an internal glow.
“That’s mighty handy.”
Sedut chortled. “When we broke into the crypt, you couldn’t see the thing, not even a wink. We might never have found it, except I passed my hand through it. Nothing there, but I felt a tickle in my palm. It took three days to see it, touch it. We sprinkled enchanted diamond over it, and poof!”
“It wasn’t until I was in Inster I learned it isn’t the Sliver of Star. Does it have a name?”
“I’ve had scant time for research, but no… not that I ever found.”
“The extent of its powers?”
“I don’t know.”
Meliu rubbed her lips. “What the shits do you know?”
The glow transformed into a plain diamond. “It amplifies, but seems keen on certain things… like killing. And you, I saw your Dark outside Inster. How does a priestess of Light achieve such a thing? And without going mad.”
Meliu shrugged. “The gods favor my cause. At least this’s what I’ve told myself. But it’s sure as hells almost killed me… I believe Ulrikt healed its effects several times.”
“You’re convinced of his being alive?”
“I am.”
Sedut rolled the artifact in her hand and it turned into a plain diamond, if ever a huge diamond was plain. “Have you ever thought of your scars? Eleven, isn’t that right?”
“Yes.” The conversation took a curious twist. “Why?”
“For two centuries the record was twelve. Along comes Ulrikt with three, myself with thirteen, your eleven, and Eliles’ one.”
Meliu groaned. “One Lash.”
“Whom the man you love, loves. But this’s not my point. These remarkable counts of scars, and here we are together. Maybe the gods do favor us.”
“Or cursed. I try not to think about it.” And up until now, had succeeded.
“How many scars would a person capable of being a Lord Priest’s Face bear?”
“Hells, as many or few as they’d like.” They laughed, but she’d made her point; the Face wouldn’t be a priest to trifle with. “Ulrikt can…”
Voices came from outside and the door’s lock turned. They glanced to one another, then scurried onto the bed to play the role of mice again. Two guards entered before Lord Sevin. He smiled and dismissed his men, unbuttoning his shirt with a chain of gibberish to her ears.
Meliu turned to Sedut and sighed. “You can have him, a punch to the face isn’t worth what the Dark would do to him.”
Sedut slipped from bed nude and dropped to her knees, head bowed, and held forth the shining gem in open palms.
The lord stepped forward and spoke two words, slow enough Meliu thought she might understand: “Another gift?” When the ring glowed, the man ‘s head dropped from his shoulders without a shout and rolled beneath the bed.
Meliu admitted the high priestess had a flare for the dramatic, but she was also messy. A few months ago, Meliu would‘ve been vomiting on the floor. “A bit much, don’t you think?”
Sedut stood and grabbed the ermine, covering herself. “We’re lucky it didn’t paint the walls. My control is… slippery.”
Meliu prayed for Light then Dark, and the energies came with a rush she’d missed while letting herself heal. But at the same time, she understood she couldn’t let the rapture take control. She released the power of the gods. “If we made noises, do you think the guards would believe he kept us busy until nightfall?”
Sedut grinned. “He either sent riders, or he didn’t. Wait a half candle, and we’ll send an invite to our people.”
Meliu flopped on the mattress, sinking into its plush. “By the gods, a real bed. Wake me when you’re ready.” She closed her eyes, at peace despite the bleeding carcass of a man laying strides from her feet. If she’d thought about it, her emotional distance would’ve disturbed her, but the down tick was too damned comfortable for such worries.
A kick at the lord’s door awakened her from a drowse, and Meliu blinked and yawned. Sedut nodded from near the door, and Meliu pulled covers close with a demur smile as the high priestess opened the door.
Two guards walked in, barking apologetic words with eyes pinned on Meliu’s bare legs and shoulder. They noticed their lord on the floor, and the door clicked closed behind them before it registered he had no head.
The men dropped in a blur of red, spattering the floor before pooling, and this time Meliu’s gut stirred, and her eyes rose to the ceiling to keep control. She stood, wrapping the silk and linen around her,
and stripped another blanket from the bed to cover the gore so they’d avoid leaving bloody footprints.
Meliu stuck a foot on the blanket as if stepping on thin ice, and her stomach gurgled with the slick squish beneath the fabric; she steeled her belly with a breath and poked her head into the hall with a prayer for Light and Dark filling her with energy. The familiar rush
All clear, she padded into the hall with bare feet. Sedut walked close behind. “You’re sure you can clear the north gate?”
“You just make sure no one from the south gate takes me from behind.”
Four turns from the entry to the bedroom, and halfway they passed a man in armor. They stared at the floor with meek smiles; he glanced, but otherwise paid them no mind. They shoved the door to the tower open and strolled past two guards on their way to the bridge. Sedut turned for the southern gate while Meliu plied her bare feet north.
She approached the gatehouse with all the confidence Light lended her, but she hadn’t a clue how to get the gate open. Men stood all along the walls and atop the towers, their backs visible as they stared to the north and the Silone caravan. Two towers, two doors, and only one led to the winch. And if she found it and killed the guards, could she even raise the portcullis by herself?
Meliu’d never seen the winch in Istinjoln, but assumed it was on the right side since there wasn’t a door on the left, so she figured she might as well base her guess on Istinjoln. Tenuous logic, she mused, but better than anything else she had. She lowered her blanket to tease bare shoulders and turned the door’s handle. Unlocked, it swung open.
Two men stared, hands slipping to their iron-hilted swords, but uncertainty restrained attack. She spoke in dulcet tones, hoping one would understand a word of her blended Hidreng and Reshu dialect. “I need help opening the gate.” The Halstefne on the left laughed, his dangling mustache bouncing. “Thank you.”
Dark surged, blocking the exits, while tendrils wrapped the other man. Screams erupted from his throat and he ran straight into the wall and fell backward flailing, kicking, throat screeching. She turned to the second guard whose eyes locked wide on his companion; so surprised, his sword stayed in its scabbard. “I need you to open the gate.” A blank stare. “Portcullis. Winch. Open gate. Or I turn you into him.” She pointed at the man writhing on the floor and released the Dark surrounding him. Bloodied nails on his hands and deep gouges in his face, the message was clear.
“I open.”
“Sword, floor.”
He unbuckled his belt and dropped it with a clatter. She released the dark by the door and when she took a step to follow he spun. The man’s shoulder pounded into her and she crumpled to the floor, his hands grappling as she twisted. Dark exploded around her and so close, she could see the shapes of terrors as they drilled into his head, and feel his visions of a black vulture eating his eyes and the flesh rotting from his bones. But she was too close, and his struggle against the vulture caught her with a foot to her chest then a fist to her already bruised cheek.
She kicked him, scrambling back with fingers wrapped in her blanket. His grip clutched her ankle, and she hopped backward before kicking his arm and refocusing the Dark to slam straight into his heart. His kicks turned to twitches, leaving her without a guide. “Godsdamned idiot.” Not that his odds of surviving the day were good.
Three deep breaths and she reinforced the Light within, a burst of confidence, as she opened the door into a hall running left and right. She strolled to a door at the end of the hall and Dark slithered through the oak; screams and something clunked into the door. Crossbow bolts? With no idea how large the next room nor where anybody was she whipped the Dark into a frenzy. Three men? Four? Difficult to count the sounds of their terrors.
The door opened with three fletched bolts rammed deep into the wood. Crossbows and twitching bodies scattered the floor, and in the middle of the room a spoked wheel, bigger than the captain’s wheel on the Entiyu Emoño and parallel to the floor.
“That was easy.” She strutted to the wheel and gave it a shove. It didn’t budge. “Unholy Forges!” Braced and leaning her feet slid on the floor. The damned thing must have a counterbalance, it must have a release… she hoped. A spiral stair climbed from the room, but that wouldn’t make sense.
A cloak hung from the wall and when she flipped it free she pulled the lever down with a proud smile. She took a step to the wheel, but modesty first. She dropped her blanket and snagged the cloak, tying it around her waste.
She shoved the wheel and it moved, but so damned slow, and a bell rang from above. “Shits!” She needed strength. She released the Dark and Light with trepidation and prayed to Sol to empower her body.
The energy surged down her spine, and it felt as if her body swelled, skin growing taut. The bones in her fingers stressed as they gripped the wheel’s rung, and joints popped in her feet as they pressed stone with a weight and power she’d never experienced. The wheel spun, bells clanged, and she feared she was breaking her dainty bones.
A flash from the corner of her eye and pain streaked her right shoulder. A bolt clattered to the floor and with a final shove she dove behind the wheel. Two more bolts struck the wall behind her as she released Sol’s energy and she prayed for Light.
Her fingers trembled with the struggle to pray through the pain, but she needed the Dark to survive. Feet trod heavy her way, to either side of the wheel, and the Dark came as a trickle; her body wasn’t handling the back and forth. She glanced over her left shoulder; a booted foot, and she unleashed what little Dark she held. A scream, the man collapsed, and she scrambled his way, hoping the second wouldn’t catch her.
On hands and knees she’d never outrun him. She dove, splaying behind the flailing bastard with tendrils snaking in and out of his body. A quarrel thunked through the man’s armor and a sword left its sheath behind her. She flipped to her back, drawing Dark from one man and praying to send it streaking at the other, but he charged close enough to see the bloodshot in his eyes as his sword chambered above his shoulder; she was meat on the butcher’s block.
The world flashed into blurring red and she feared herself dead, but the blood streaking her new robes wasn’t hers.
Sedut proffered her hand. “Are you all right?”
Hooves thundered through the gatehouse with men shouting the names of the Seven Clans.
Meliu clasped Sedut’s forearm and rose to wobbling feet with a smile. “I’ve been better, but I’m still perfect.”
Sedut laughed, then grabbed her shoulders and spun her around. “You’re bleeding.”
She’d forgotten the wound. “Crossbow, is it bad?”
Sedut dabbed Meliu’s shoulder with the torn edge of robes. “No, but you’ve got your twelfth scar now. One more, and we’re tied.”
Meliu laughed with tears in her eyes from pain and exhaustion, leaned into her. “You’re a nasty witch, ain’t you?”
The sounds of fighting rang from outside. “Come on, the men might need us.”
60
Fight for Flight
Bungling, trundling, deeper and darker,
farther into the cannibalistic larder.
You, the befallen and the felled,
sweet doe and noble buck,
gazing into still waters to
witness your bloodied fangs.
–Tomes of the Touched
136 Days on the Trail of Pyres
The Silone stormed the Dinsang bridge with three hundred riders and the towers fell in half a candle, every Malstefne fighting to the death while the Silone lost eleven men. Ivin and the other lords ushered a flood of Silone through the northern gate and they crossed the Porro-ok without losing another soul, and they didn’t camp for several candles after dark.
If everything went to Ivin’s plan, Lord Sevin sent a message to Malviin to draw out the Fourth Army, but it would turn and strike the Litra forces. In a perfect world it might be three weeks before they got wind of the slaughter on the bridge, and several weeks for them to
catch the Silone, if at all. But then again, he hated to contemplate how many things would be different in a perfect world.
For over a month now they marched harder than since fleeing New Fost, putting as many horizons between them and the Fourth Army as possible. They passed from the Malstefne’s border to Tek Loenfarar, and in these rollings hills they didn’t see another human soul. The lords grew easy, and people awoke a little later and stopped marching a little sooner every day; hard to blame them in this weather. The Silone never knew a heat like they faced this far south, and folks succumbed, laying down to die. They burned between twenty to forty souls to the heavens every day of the march, except those several afternoons of blessed rain to cool their skin.
Then, one day, the scouts who rode behind the Fire Riders galloped into the evening camp: They’d spotted Malstefne cavalry.
Ivin rode with the Fire Riders that evening, and he kicked the dirt in frustration. “How many?”
Danwek Bulubar headed the scouts. “A thousand, I’d wager. Give or take.”
Ivin glanced to Lelishen. “Know how many warriors are in a Tek ‘army’?”
“Most of the Hundred Nations call ten thousand a semenon, which I translated as army. A thousand horsemen would be an epestinol.”
A thousand horsemen charging their ragtag militia would be a route. “Somewhere along the line they split this epestinol from the army and sent it after us. The question remains, is the rest of the army behind it?”
Solineus said, “They shouldn’t be this close, should they? And riding into Loenfarar territory?”
“They shouldn’t be.” The notion struck Ivin. “Unless Duke Ovrin took no chances and sent word of our attacking the bridge before we got there.”
Solineus nodded with a grunt. “Aye. Easy enough. But even then they would’ve caught the messenger telling them the attack was fake.’
Ivin sighed. “Doesn’t matter, they’re there. What do we do about it?
Trail of Pyres Page 58