The Rival

by Kristine Kathryn Rusch

  Was this how he would end up if he failed his Charge?

  He didn't know, and wasn't certain he wanted to. He hurried forward, spurred by the vision of his own failure more than anything else. He was concentrating so hard and moving so quickly that at first he didn't even notice the sounds.

  Footsteps on stone.

  Many footsteps.

  Not above him, but ahead of him.

  They sounded in unison, those footsteps, as if a group were walking in step.

  Like the Fey had done.

  But how had they gotten into the tunnels? Had they found one of the side entrances?

  The thought made his mouth go dry. He was dirty, exhausted, and terrified, and for what? For an encounter with the Fey that would leave him dead?

  But he had a Charge, and he had the Roca's protection. The Rocaan had walked into the Fey secret camp when he was an Aud on a Charge. The Roca had watched over him, and brought him out alive.

  The Roca would bring Con out alive too.

  He stopped running, though, and walked forward, his torch close to him now. When he reached a fork in the tunnel, he would stop and listen before moving on.

  The footsteps grew louder, and with them, the whisper of clothing, the soft murmur of an occasional voice.

  It took three crossroads before he realized that the voices were not speaking Fey.

  They were speaking Islander.

  Relief flowed over him like a cool breeze. Islander. They were his people.

  But what were they doing here?

  He started running again. His legs were tired, and it felt as if his feet were bleeding, but he no longer cared. He was nearly to the palace, and there were people below, walking in lock step, Islanders, not a bunch of thieves hiding near the river.

  And then he rounded a corner, and found them: a sea of men in the uniforms of the King's guards, looking serious, looking terrified, looking serene. They had swords strapped to their hips and dagger hilts peeking out of their boots.

  They were going to fight.

  The King already knew.

  Still, Con had his Charge. He waited until he saw a man who wasn't in step, one of the leaders, probably, and walked up to him.

  "Excuse me," he said.

  The man drew a dagger. "Get away from me, boy."

  "I'm an Aud, sir. I come from the Tabernacle, with the Rocaan's message for the King."

  "No one sees the King." The man had stopped. He held his knife near Con's throat. A few of the others stopped behind him, watching.

  "Sir, it's a Charge." Con said, careful not to move. "I need to see him."

  "How do we know you're not Fey?" the man said.

  "Beg pardon, milord, tis obvious," said one of the men in the back. "Tis holy water vials he carries in his pockets. Ye can see the glass."

  "It would be a good disguise, to come here dressed as an Aud," the leader said.

  "Aye," the second man said, "but na with holy water, and na looking like Constantine, the baby Aud."

  Con raised his head at the nickname. The barracks guards had called him that after a particularly disastrous Blessing he attempted to deliver a year ago.

  "Servis?" he asked.

  "Aye, n who'd ye think else'd remember who ye are, eh?" the guard stepped into the light. It was Servis, a guard who was only a few years older than Con, and who had given him grief ever since that difficult day.

  "You know this Aud?" the leader asked.

  "Aye, milord. Tis a good boy, he is."

  "Please, sirs, let me see the King."

  The leader shook his head. "I can't let you do that," he said.

  "But my Charge — "

  "Is?"

  "To let the King know of the Fey."

  "He knows, lad."

  "Tis Respected Sir, milord. He is n Aud."

  "That he is, Servis." The leader nodded. "Forgive me, Respected Sir. The palace has been surrounded by Fey all morning. We're going to take care of that now."

  He snapped his fingers. The guards kept moving forward. There were more of them than Con had imagined.

  He blinked. He wasn't certain what to do now. "The Tabernacle's surrounded too," he said. "The Rocaan wanted me to warn you, wanted me to talk to the King. He says they need to work together."

  "I'm sure they do," the leader said, "but they need to survive the afternoon first. Wait here for us. When the battle's over, I'll take you with me."

  "No, milord," Con said. "I'm sorry not to listen, but I have a Charge. I need to get to the King."

  "And I can't let you go alone. There's no telling who you are."

  Con understood that. Even so, it didn't make things much easier. But he felt that his message had lost its urgency. Now all that mattered was surviving the next few hours.

  "Then I'll come with you," Con said, "and watch."

  "Nay, Baby Aud," Servis said. He had stopped beside the leader. The rest of the troop continued to march behind him, weaving through the tunnels and disappearing into the darkness. "Tis na place fer an innocent above. Ye'll wait here, and I'll see to it that we get ye to the King."

  "Stay with him, Servis," the leader said.

  "Beg pardon, milord, but ye need me ta face the Fey."

  "I need you to protect the King," the leader said, with a strange emphasis on the word protect.

  "It's all right," Con said. "I'll wait alone. I don't mind."

  "Of course not, Respected Sir, but I can't guarantee that you won't go to the palace the moment the troops leave here."

  "I'd give you my word."

  "And your word means nothing in the face of a Charge."

  The leader was right, and Con knew it. The moment they left, he would go on to the palace. He had to.

  It was his Charge.

  Servis sighed. "I'll stay, milord."

  "Good," the leader said. "When I get back, I'll take you to the King."

  "Yes, sir," Con said. He was failing. And Servis, a casual friend, would have to guard him to prevent him from doing what his Rocaan, and his God, required him to do.

  That was at the center of a Charge. How far would an Aud go to do his duty? How many laws would he break, if he broke any?

  Con hoped he wouldn't have to find out.

  SIXTY-ONE

  Monte led his troop up the last few stairs and into the barracks. His mouth was dry, and he felt older than he ever had before. He'd been in difficult situations, but never one where he believed it would take God's Hand to help him survive the day. He'd faced Fey a hundred times before, but never like this.

  Never like this.

  To their credit, his men said nothing. They had simply accepted the orders, trusting in him and in Nicholas.

  The bird-Fey outnumbered them five to one. Long odds, even with a surprise attack.

  Monte hunched as he crossed the wooden floor. He walked as quietly as he could. So did the men behind him, but he could still hear the rap-rap-rap of boots. He hoped it wouldn't be too audible in that strange silence outside.

  The boy bothered him too, the one Servis had called Baby Aud. The boy bothered him in two ways. If he were Fey, then this whole surprise attack wouldn't work. They already knew about the tunnels. If he wasn't Fey, if he truly was an Aud, then that meant that the Rocaan had been willing to work with them, and it was too late.

  It already felt too late. The Fey had been ahead of them on everything. Like the first time, only much larger. He had never imagined there were so many Fey in the world. Never.

  What he wouldn't do for a vial of holy water. But Nicholas had forbidden it on the palace grounds. A few of the troop had vials — Monte had seen them. He didn't want to know how the guards had gotten them, or why. They were going against the King's direct order. But a man couldn't stop others from protecting themselves when they were terrified.

  These men were terrified. Monte could feel it. He could feel it in the jerkiness of their movements, of the uncertainty of their looks. They all knew when this latest Fey troop arrived tha
t this strange period of peace was over. The end of the invasion, begun when Rugar came twenty years before, was finally here.

  Monte reached the barracks door. The important thing on this entire plan was noise and timing. He took a deep breath, held it, then sent the signal back through his troop.

  It traveled from man to man quickly until it reached the tunnels. There the men would relay it to the other barracks, to the other commanders waiting. Monte was counting. He had it timed to the instant, and hoped his guess was right.

  "All right," he said softly. "Draw your swords."

  His men did. The sound of metal against sheath sounded loud in the large room. He turned slightly. They were watching him, eyes narrowed, faces blank in an attempt to hide their emotions.

  He put his hand on the doorknob and turned it slowly.

  "Now!" he said.

  He yanked open the door and jumped down the steps. Men surged past him, running toward the birds. When they reached a bird, they would grab its Fey head and slice it off. A single, quick movement, like wringing the neck of a chicken.

  Monte was in the middle of it, sword drawn, running for the birds. The tiny Fey heads turned, but the bird heads squawked and wings fluttered. Birds rose in the air like a real flock, surging away in terrified surprise.

  At first the attack happened in silence, but then the men started to yell. Nicholas had thought of that: the guards doing the Fey battle cry, startling the birds even more.

  The movement on the end of the bird line startled the birds on the front of the line. They flew forward too, slamming into each other in mid-air. Feathers fell around them. Some of the guards moved fast, catching birds with their swords, slicing the feathered bodies in half.

  The cries were deafening, the roar of wings exhilarating. Monte surged into the middle of the group, swinging his sword above his head like a mace, chopping and slashing and cutting at birds. The sky was black with them.

  And the ground was empty.

  The ground was empty.

  A few of the guards were spilling holy water on the bird bodies, but it did nothing. The Fey hadn't lied. They found an antidote.

  Some of the birds swung around and were coming back. The guards were ready. They stabbed and fought and smashed. The birds stood no chance.

  The rout was working.

  It would buy time.

  Monte only hoped it would be enough.

  SIXTY-TWO

  Rugad gripped the strings of his harness, careful not to pull on them. He swung in the afternoon air, his feet dangling over the road below. The twenty-five Hawk Riders flapped their wings above him, hawk faces intent on the city ahead of them, the tiny Fey Riders clinging to their backs. There was no laughter this time, no soft conversation back and forth. Before they had been invading, investigating, and now they were fighting.

  And they had the most precious cargo of all.

  The Black King.

  Rugad hadn't expected to use his harness this much in the Blue Isle campaign. He had thought that he would use it only to get onto the Isle proper. But so far he had used it twice over the ocean, once to get to his great-grandson's Shadowlands and now he was using it to get to Jahn quickly.

  Normally he would have marched with his troops, but he had a sense that time was of the essence in this campaign. He was worried that the Islanders, given enough warning, would find another method of defeating the Fey. Even though he might believe their holy poison a fluke, he couldn't act upon it.

  The news of the Islander Enchanter worried him. Solanda's passion for her ward worried him as well. He had gone to see her body after the Foot Soldiers were through with her. Only the bones were left, tiny bones, the bones of a cat.

  She had tried to bargain for the girl, claiming wild magick.

  If Rugad's great-grandchildren were examples of wild magick, and the holy water was an example of wild magick, perhaps the Islander Enchanter was too. Perhaps there would be others.

  He had to plan for more surprises. And the only way he could do that was to subdue the Islanders so quickly, so effectively, that they wouldn't know what hit them until it was too late.

  The sky was gray with smoke. He had made the decision to burn Jahn after he had arrived on the Isle and seen the poverty in the outlying areas. The fields and farms had the wealth he sought. They simply funneled it into the city, where that wealth was used to maintain the lords and the merchants. Without international trade, the outlying villages had stagnated.

  But Jahn hadn't.

  Rugad had no need for a small city's wealth. As soon as he owned Blue Isle, he could reestablish international trade, and the wealth would reappear. He needed the farms, and the millers and the Islander bodies. Workers to turn the entire Isle into one big grain basket for the rest of the world.

  The city was merely taking up valuable farmland. By burning it, he was doing several things: he was taking out the wealthy class; he was destroying morale; and he was preparing the land for next spring's planting.

  Simple, effective, and swift. The watchwords of any successful campaign.

  The very next thing he had to do was take the palace. He needed the Islander King for his children, and for his ability to control the morale of the country. The man had an arrogance that Rugad didn't like. Rugad would probably have to kill him, but before he did so, he wanted to see if the man could be broken and molded.

  He suspected the secret to that was to go after the children. Rugad could not kill them, but he didn't have to. Some things, such as loss of loyalty, could be a lot more devastating than a child's death. He simply had to play it right.

  He still hadn't figured out what he would do with the Golem. The creature's existence both excited him and worried him. It excited him because it meant that Gift had extraordinary powers. It worried him because he did not know why the Changeling had lasted so long, what purpose it served.

  Constructed magick, with long life, often had hidden powers of its own. It was said, by the older Shamans, that such constructs were actually tools of the Powers themselves. The Shamans always refused to study the constructs as well, saying they were part of the Mysteries, and were not meant to be understood.

  Rugad had seen enough of the Mysteries to know how dangerous they could be. And all his life he had been at the mercy of the Powers. He believed them to be the source of the Black Family's Visions. The Powers were capricious guardians of the future. If they controlled the Golem, they held more than its fate in their imaginary hands.

  He shivered, even though it was warm. The heat of the day rose from below, mixing with the heat of the fires now burning out of control in the row houses on the edge of Jahn. Bits of ash floated around him, and sparks mingled with the debris. The air felt thin and his heart beat hard to compensate for the shallow breaths he took. He raised one arm and signaled the lead Hawk Rider to go faster.

  The sooner he reached the palace, the happier he would be.

  The heat was intense. Some of the fires were dangerously close to out of control. He needed to send Red Caps to quench those fires. He made a mental note to do so when he landed.

  The palace was ahead, an island of calm in the middle of Fey fury. From this distance, and with the clarity of height, he could see his Bird Riders, surrounding the place. Apparently King Nicholas had been smart. There was no sign of attack, no sign of battle.

  Only the birds, waiting.

  Nicholas was such a fool. For all his pretense, and despite his Fey marriage, he did not gain Fey wisdom. He still waited for Rugad to negotiate with him. Rugad had thought this would happen: he had hoped that Nicholas would think the Bird Riders were there to guard the palace until Rugad arrived. But he had hoped that Nicholas had been worthy of Jewel, that he hadn't fallen for this trick, and that he would be harder to defeat than the rulers on Galinas.

  Cowards, all.

  Rugad had hated fighting them, had hated the way they had stuck their soldiers into battle, and fled when it was time to fight themselves. He had slaugh
tered a number of those rulers with his bare hands, not because he had to assert his own leadership, but because he was so disgusted with theirs.

  Wisdom had always warned him against that, citing how dangerous it was for a Visionary to go into battle. Rugad usually agreed, but in those cases, he felt it necessary. They needed to learn, even if it was in their dying moments, what true leadership meant.

  He was nearly above his Bird Riders when movement behind them caught his eye.

  Islanders, dressed in tan and black, swarmed out of buildings and over the fence, hundreds of them, swords drawn. They seemed to move with an incredible silence. When they reached the first of the Bird Riders, they sliced off the birds' head, then ripped the Fey off the backs. Then they yelled, a horrible imitation of the Fey warrior cry. The sound of it rose all over the city.

  The smaller birds rippled and flew away — instinct kicking in on the bird selves, the Fey on their backs shouting and trying to force their bird bodies down. When the smaller birds flew, they startled the larger birds and they took off too — black dots against the grayish-yellow sky.

  Suddenly the battle on the ground was more evenly matched. The birds that remained were the large ones, the macaws and the parrots, pecking and stabbing, and screaming and honking.

  The terrified birds, rising, brushed against Rugad's perch. He held on, trying not to tug on the strings, as the Riders shouted apologies into the air. The Hawk Riders took Rugad up with the breeze, away from the panicked birds gathering around them.

  He could no longer see below. He leaned forward, shouting, "Go back! Go back! I order you to go back!"

  The Fey were shouting back at him, screaming that they were trying. But this was the hazard of Beast Riders: sometimes the beast took over. And the birds, terrified, were acting like birds and flying away.

  The air was full of flapping wings, feathers, and ash. He could hear screaming below, mixed with cawing. The Hawk Riders were taking him even higher, trying to protect him — he thought — until he looked up. Then he saw the bird faces, straining forward, terror in the black eyes. The Fey on the hawk's backs were yelling and beating on the side of the hawks' necks.