Bone War

by Steven Harper

  “If you want to show your humanity,” he said, “help these people!”

  Without a word, the golems split up and spread out. They moved up and down the street, stopping at places where people were digging through rubble, and they helped. They pulled aside beams and cleared away fallen walls. No one seemed to notice the disfigured flesh, not in the crisis. It occurred to Ranadar that if Mother wanted to use the flesh golems to invade and take over the city, now would be the time.

  “She won’t do it now,” Other Talfi said, as if reading Ranadar’s mind. “There aren’t enough of us yet, even with the city in a mess.”

  “You can simply refuse,” Ranadar said. “Look at how much good you—you all—are doing.”

  Other Talfi shook his head above the sad, ragged bundle in his arms. “If she commands it, we have to do it. We’re built that way.”

  “Then you are less human than I thought.” He turned sadly to go, and missed the look of shock that crossed Other Talfi’s face.

  *

  The trip back to Mrs. Farley’s house was filled with more stress and pain. The earthquake had been relatively mild, but Balsia wasn’t prone to them, and the city was not built to withstand them. A number of structures had simply fallen in on themselves, while others showed cracks or other damage and yet others showed no ill effects at all. The animals, which had become agitated in the moments before the quake, Ranadar realized, were now even louder and more panicky than their owners, and the sounds of horses, waterfowl, chickens, dogs, and other animals mixed with the yells of their owners. Some places had caught fire, and bucket brigades hastily rushed water from city wells to put them out. More than once, Ranadar and Other Talfi encountered the prince’s guard in their red and gold uniforms, looking harried and trying to keep order. Silver-shirted followers of Fell and Belinna, the warrior twins, joined them. Green-robed priests and priestesses of the goddess Grick, known for her aid and mercy, were out and about with sacks of medicine and worried expressions on their faces. Ranadar did his best to slip through the noisy crowds with his hood up and avoid thinking about Talfi. He had to get home to Mrs. Farley’s. That was all that mattered. Just get home.

  They passed a large shop that had completely caved in on itself, and Ranadar found himself thinking how foolish it was to build with dead wood and stiff stone. If such an earthquake had struck Palana, the trees would have swayed a little, but the flexible houses built into them would have gone undamaged.

  “Fae!” The word came from a potbellied man in an apron standing outside the shop with two younger, shorter, thinner versions of himself. He pointed a blunt finger at Ranadar. “A stinking elf! Did you cause the earthquake, stinking elf?”

  Ranadar halted, taken aback. He had forgotten to raise his hood or throw up a glamour, and his elven heritage was plain as the overhead sun. His thoughts fled back to the market, where the bottler had called him names as well, and he thought of how he always had to hide in this place—hide his heritage, hide his love, hide his grief—and he thought of how he himself had to hide—hide from iron, hide from fear, hide from humans. Bile and acid washed his stomach. He yanked his hood up and turned his head away.

  “Funny how he shows up right after it happened,” said a jowl-faced woman.

  “Leave him alone,” Other Talfi snapped over Talfi’s bundled body. “He didn’t cause anything.”

  But it was too late. Other people standing nearby had noticed and were whispering and pointing. Some were talking openly. “Go home!” one of them said suddenly. “We don’t want your kind here!”

  Others glared along with him. More than one fingered iron knives at their belts with hard looks on their faces. Ranadar stood there with his dead love in the arms of a flesh golem, and his knees buckled under the injustice of it all. He had given everything he had so these people could live. He had helped rid this country of slavers. Now the Fae—his own people—were planning to invade the country, starting with this city, and he was trying to find a way to stop it. And for what? So they could spit on him in his grief.

  “Fae filth!” One of the men balled up a fist. “I’ll show you how we treat garbage in Balsia!”

  The man rushed forward, and anger burned inside Ranadar. The power he had felt before gathered in his mind. If these people thought he was a monster, he would show them what a monster could really do. He would—

  Other Talfi leaped between them, bundle and all. The man slammed into him with an oof. Startled, Ranadar let the power dissipate. He expected both Talfi and the man to fall to the cobblestones in a tangle of limbs, and he was steeling himself to seeing the dead Talfi spill out of the cloak, but Other Talfi remained rigid as a tree. The man bounced off him and landed flat on his back.

  “You won’t hurt him,” Other Talfi said in a deadly even voice.

  “Vik!” The man scrambled backward while the crowd gaped. “What are you?”

  “The real threat to this city, apparently.” Other Talfi shifted the sad, ragged cloak in his arms so it lay over one shoulder and put his free arm around Ranadar. Ranadar noticed the torn fingernail and the way he smelled like Talfi. Ranadar was too upset to push Other Talfi away, and the familiar touch calmed him, even as it reminded him of his recent loss.

  And some shame came, too. Had he not just been thinking that someone needed to stop the fighting between Fae and Kin? These people were not angry at him. They were angry because they were frightened, and Ranadar was a target. It was hard to remember, but he should try. Someone had to take the first step to make things better, and sometimes the best way to stop a fight was to walk away from one. Even in anger.

  “Let’s go, friend,” Ranadar said. Other Talfi’s arm was still around his shoulder. “Before someone gets hurt.”

  “Regi!” the man on the ground spat. “That’s why you’re defending him. Pair of rassregi! Does the elf drill your hole at night, regi?”

  A sharp retort automatically came to Ranadar’s tongue, but he swallowed it and walked away. Other Talfi, however, didn’t feel such constraints.

  “You’ve obviously given it a lot of thought,” he called over his shoulder. “You should ask that manly wife of yours to strap one on for you. Then you won’t have to fantasize so much about elves.”

  The other people in the crowd looked just as outraged as the man on the ground, and a couple of other men seemed ready to attack again, despite Other Talfi’s show of strength. Other Talfi bristled, but Ranadar shook his head.

  “Talash—my friend,” Ranadar said, “please walk away. For me.”

  Other Talfi gave him a peculiar look, but obeyed. Dark looks from the people followed in their wake, but Ranadar ignored them. Other Talfi continued to carry the red-wrapped bundle over one shoulder and kept his free arm around Ranadar.

  “Assholes,” Other Talfi muttered. “Vik-sucking assholes. Don’t they know who we are? What we did?”

  Ranadar wanted to react to this, he truly did, but it was overwhelming to watch a living copy of Talfi call his attackers names while carrying the cooling corpse of Talfi himself. His throat thickened, and he forced a wan smile to his face.

  “Thank you for the help,” he said, coming out from under Other Talfi’s arm. “I am fine now.”

  A flicker of disappointment crossed Other Talfi’s face, but Ranadar was too unsettled to do more than register its presence. “Just as long as you don’t use that mind-smashing thing again,” he said. “I could tell you were getting ready.”

  Ranadar nodded and concentrated on moving forward. That was Danr’s philosophy, correct? Just keep moving forward, always forward. He tried it now.

  They passed more people and heard more rumors and stories. The Gold Keep had fallen. No, it was barely damaged. No, it had not been damaged at all. A tidal wave was moving toward the city. No, it had already struck, but the spit of land that protected the harbor had stopped it. No, the coast to the west had been flooded. No, everyone should move to higher ground to avoid the tidal wave. No, the priests of Bosha had s
aid there would be no tidal wave.

  Through it all, Other Talfi kept Talfi’s body close against his chest and followed Ranadar without further comment. Ranadar was sweating now, both with effort and with grief. With every step, it became clearer and clearer that Talfi was really gone. Grief gave way to more anger. Death had promised! She had taken half his life away and given it to Talfi, but Talfi was dead. What kind of universe allowed—

  A chill came over Ranadar, and he halted so quickly that Other Talfi nearly bumped into him from behind. What if the reason Talfi had failed to come back was that Ranadar’s days were over? Death had not actually said how many days Ranadar had left. Today might be the end. Today Ranadar must be fated to die as well. It made perfect sense. He certainly did not wish to live.

  “What is it?” Other Talfi asked.

  Ranadar silently took Talfi’s body from him and pressed his face into the ragged cloak. Before the sun set, they would be together in Vik’s realm—and he would pause at Death’s door to tell her what he thought.

  “My Talashka,” he whispered in a choked voice. “We will always be together, one way or another.”

  He wondered how it would happen. Another earthquake, perhaps. Sorrow might overcome him and he might simply end it himself. Or he could just fall down dead. He wondered how Mother would react when she learned of it. A strange calm came over him. Soon it would be over, and he would no longer have to worry about dying Talfis or his mother’s machinations or rescuing the Great Tree.

  “What’s wrong?” Other Talfi said. They were only two streets away from Mrs. Farley’s house. This part of the city was showing little damage, though the streets were still filled with uncertain, worried people.

  “I have realized something important,” Ranadar said. “Something that should have occurred to me earlier.”

  “Uh … can it wait until we get to Mrs. Farley’s?”

  “Probably not,” Ranadar replied with a grim smile. “At any moment I will—”

  The bundle in his arms squirmed hard and gave a loud gasp. Ranadar’s heart jerked. With a cry, he set the bundle on the filthy cobblestones and pulled the cloak away. Talfi blinked up at him, his head healed and his hair crusted with blood. His sky blue eyes were confused, and he worked his jaw back and forth. Ranadar gave an unprincely shout as his heart soared.

  “You are alive!” Ranadar shouted. “The Nine! You are alive!” He yanked Talfi into an embrace of wild delight and disbelief as tears sprang to his eyes.

  Talfi, for his part, seemed a little bewildered. He hugged Ranadar in return and patted his back. “I’m all right. I always am. What’s the big problem?”

  “You’ve been dead a long time.” Other Talfi leaned laconically against a wall with a few fresh cracks in it, though there was tension in him. “We were beginning to wonder.”

  “Wonder?” Ranadar backed up a moment and held Talfi at arm’s length. “Talashka, we thought you were truly dead.”

  “Oh.” Talfi patted himself as if making sure everything was in the right place. He pulled a spoon from his pocket and looked at in confusion. “I always come back, Ran. Death promised.”

  Ranadar floundered, not sure how to respond. Just a moment ago, he had been ready to die, sure he was going to die, and now his reason to die was alive again, and the world was a fantastic place. He felt as if he might fly to pieces or shout or leap into the air and punch the sun, all because the world had returned to normal.

  Talfi slipped the spoon back into his pocket, and it struck Ranadar as such a mundane gesture that he nearly laughed with giddiness.

  “How did I get out from under the …” Talfi’s handsome face paled a little, and he swallowed a little. “That is, I remember the chimney falling and … then I was here.”

  “Ranadar dug you out with his bare hands,” Other Talfi said lightly.

  “Did you?” Talfi sighed. “Gods, Ran. Thank you. That was a bad one.”

  Ranadar snatched him into a long embrace again and privately wondered if he would ever manage to let go. It was the most wondrous thing simply to hold Talfi in his arms, feel Talfi’s cheek against his own, touch his hair. But eventually he did let go.

  “We’ll call that your second favor,” Talfi said with a shaky laugh. “Fing!”

  “Oh!” Ranadar laughed himself. “I had almost forgotten. That should not be a favor.”

  “It’s mine to use,” Talfi replied. “Shut up and let me use it.”

  “Took you long enough to come back,” Other Talfi said lightly. But Ranadar heard a hint of strain in the voice he knew too well. “We thought Death had reneged.”

  Talfi stretched his arms wide and grimaced slightly as his joints popped. “When Kalessa’s father chopped my head off, I didn’t come back for several hours. I don’t know why you’re so surprised.”

  Ranadar grinned and caught him in a third embrace. “I am just thrilled to have you back, Talashka. Hurry! We should check on Mrs. Farley. We will tell you everything else on the way.”

  Mrs. Farley’s house had ridden out the earthquake with minimal damage, though the lady herself was sitting on a bench outside the front door, clearly reluctant to reenter the house. She started off it with a small cry when she saw them. “Good Grick! You’re covered in blood, Master Talfi!”

  “It looks worse than it is,” Talfi said. “I’m all right. Just need to wash.”

  “The well water’s all cloudy, but it’ll do for a rinsing,” Mrs. Farley said uncertainly. “I don’t dare go back inside for any brandy if you’ve cut yourself. What if there’s another quake?”

  “I doubt there will be another, Mrs. Farley,” Ranadar said, feeling suddenly tired now. It had been a horrifically long day. “Though I suppose a great many people will be sleeping in the streets tonight. It will be a sporting day for thieves.”

  “That’s why I have my courtyard,” Mrs. Farley said. “I’m glad to see you boys are all right. Did you bring back my kitchen things?”

  “Damn. I think they were lost in the earthquake.” Talfi showed her the spoon from his pocket, then put it away again when Ranadar drew back. “That is all that survived. We’ll replace everything, we promise.”

  “It’ll make eating difficult until then, Master Talfi,” Mrs. Farley sighed. “I—oh! You must be Master Talfi’s … brother?”

  This last she directed at Other Talfi. He stepped forward and took Mrs. Farley’s hand. “Sure am. Arrived just now and wham! The quake hit.”

  “I see.” Even during a crisis, Mrs. Farley played the good landlady. “Will you be staying long? Your brother has rented the entire place with his friends, and there’s plenty of—”

  A sprite flickered through the sky. It shot down the street and struck Mrs. Farley full in the chest. She made a soft sound of surprise, and then standing in her place before the house was the grand and beautiful form of Queen Gwylph of the Fae.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Just as Danr remembered, the tunnel abruptly widened into a cavern so great and wide and tall, a hawk could have flown across it and not realized it was underground. Mushrooms of sizes ranging from thumbnail to oak tree grew everywhere, and many of them glowed with a soft green luminescence that provided Danr’s troll eyes with more than enough light, but were dim and gloomy to Aisa and Kalessa, though perhaps Kalessa’s new serpentine vision was more sensitive.

  A great stone staircase descended into the cavern ahead of them—the tunnel came out some distance above the cavern floor—and the tall risers were difficult to descend, built for trolls and giants as they were. Though now that Danr thought about it, the dwarfs, who were much shorter than even humans, had to have some way of getting out. There must be a different staircase somewhere else.

  In the distance flickered more lights, an entire cityful of fireflies. Danr inhaled the damp, mushroom-scented air and remembered the last time he had visited Glumenhame, the kindgom under the Iron Mountains. Here he met Kech, his father, and Bund, his grandmother and a powerful trollwife. Danr had like
d Bund a great deal, and her death still caused him sorrow. His father, Kech, on the other hand, was someone Danr had little respect for. Kech had fallen in love with Danr’s mother, Halldora, and she with him, but when Halldora had become pregnant, Kech had been too weak to acknowledge his half-blood child, and he had turned his back. Years later, Danr had threatened to reveal their blood ties, and Kech had begged him to stay silent. In the end, Danr had agreed, though many people, including Kech’s wife, Pyk, and their son, Torth—Danr’s half brother—knew Danr’s origin.

  Also in the know was Bund’s sister Vesha, queen of the Stane. She had seen the value of having a nephew who could move freely between the sunlit upper world and the gloomy underworld and had appointed him temporary ambassador to Skyford and the Kin in general. Vesha, however, had also been instrumental in chaining Death and using her power to break the Fae spells that had kept the Stane trapped and starving underground for centuries. For this Vesha had paid a price. Death had escaped and laid a terrible curse on her: Vesha would be immortal—until she set foot aboveground. Then Death would come for her personally. Danr hadn’t seen or heard from Vesha since then, and he still didn’t know whether to live in awe of her accomplishments or in horror of her foolishness.

  Danr paused at the top of the great staircase for a moment, remembering all this, until Kalessa nudged him with her nose. “Are we standing here all day? We have a sword to find.”