Haven atobas-4

by Joel Shepherd

  Ahead of them, Rhillian broke off her conversation with Yasmyn to turn in her saddle and fix Aisha with a look of amused reprimand.

  “Just barely,” she said. “I recall teaching you to defend the high overhead, and you needed a box for your little legs to stand upon.”

  “I want a sword.” Yasmyn interrupted Aisha's good-humoured retort. “I will learn to fight with the svaalverd.”

  Sasha raised an eyebrow at Rhillian. It was not the first time Yasmyn had asked. “We don't have a spare sword,” said Rhillian. “And I do not think this is the best time to be learning….”

  “I will have a sword,” Yasmyn said shortly. “I will take one from an enemy.”

  “Don't be a silly goat, Yasmyn,” Sasha told her. “Men's swords are too big, I've told you before.”

  “I can lift one.”

  “Me too, but the balance is wrong-even men can't fight svaalverd with a heavy blade. Besides which, you're sixteen and svaalverd is best taught from six, or earlier. Why not learn archery instead?”

  “I know knife fighting,” Yasmyn said stubbornly. “I have the footwork. I can learn swords.”

  Her problem, Sasha knew well, was that she had never before been in the company of this many women, and been the least feared of them all. She did not like it.

  Yasmyn had come because it was her best chance for glory. She had achieved her arganyar, which was a great glory in itself, particularly as she was sister to the Great Lord of Isfayen. All the Isfayen had cheered her, and told stories of how Family Izlar was so formidable that even its women were more than a match for “great” Bacosh knights. But now, the armies of Lenayin, Rhodaan, and Enora marched to Jahnd, to make a final great defence. That fighting promised to be men's work, and though women of the serrin talmaad won great glory as light cavalry, Yasmyn did not have those skills either. And so she rode for Ilduur, an emissary of the Lenay peoples, and one not unskilled in the darker arts of politics and intrigue. Sasha was not about to let her lead any negotiations, but she would be comfortable to have Yasmyn watching her back once they arrived.

  They came to the crest of the hill, and the party resumed their canter. The speed was too fast for conversation, and Sasha watched the passing countryside instead, and held a careful spacing between herself and her friends. Of the twenty-six-strong party, twelve were serrin and the rest a mix of Enorans, a few Rhodaanis, and two Lenays-Sasha and Yasmyn. One of the Rhodaanis was Daish, Sasha's young friend from the Tracato Tol'rhen, and the only Nasi-Keth besides Sasha herself.

  That evening they made a little distance by torchlight after nightfall, before finally halting at a small village in a forested valley. The biggest stables were at the temple, and the priests took them all in with much hustle and shouting, gathering fodder for tired horses and meals for tired riders.

  Sasha washed in the stream by the temple. Donning a cleaner pair of clothes, she returned to the temple's sleeping chambers by passing first through the temple proper. It was small, with wooden crossbeams holding up the ceiling atop stone walls. In that humble silence, she found Kiel standing before the altar. He was gazing at some point of fascination-a statue, half the size of a man, atop a similarly sized plinth beside the altar.

  Sasha walked to his side and looked at the statue. On its head was a garland, which Sasha knew was often used by artists to denote a Verenthane saint. Yet this woman held a book under one arm, inscribed with the words tul'tiah ran, or “the common law.” A Justice? A practitioner of laws? Suddenly Sasha realised why the woman looked familiar.

  “It's Maldereld,” she said, astonished.

  Kiel nodded. “It does appear to be. Not a figure regularly worshipped in Verenthane temples.”

  The bringer of laws to Rhodaan, Enora, and Ilduur. These lands had once been ruled by lords and priests, and Maldereld was the most well-remembered face of those who had destroyed that old reign, and replaced it with the new.

  “Aisha always told me that Enora is different,” said Sasha. “The most well integrated, the friendliest to serrin. The least nostalgic for the old ways.”

  “They worship her,” said Kiel, “as a saint.” His tone was faintly mocking.

  “What's wrong with that?” Sasha retorted. “Would you rather the alternative?”

  “I merely wonder why with humans it must be either one extreme or the other. Maldereld was a great serrin warrior and scholar. I have read many of her writings and I know that she had no love of human religion at all.”

  “And yet she did not ban it, as some had encouraged her to do. She saw the purpose it served. And here she is, immortalised in stone, continuing that purpose still.”

  Kiel looked at her. His grey eyes were unlike any of the more typical bright colours of serrin. Those were penetrating, but these were unreadable. Sasha found his stare more unnerving than that of any other serrin she knew.

  Kiel had tried to kill her, on a ship in Petrodor Harbour. She had been helping Errollyn to escape at the time, after Rhillian had decided it necessary to keep Errollyn detained. Errollyn had taken that arrow in the shoulder instead, and Kiel had nearly become the first serrin in more years than all serrin history recorded to purposely kill another…though even that was disputable, as he'd been aiming at her. Sasha supposed it was possible he'd been aiming at her shoulder too. Somehow, she doubted it.

  “Purpose,” said Kiel, with faint sarcasm. “The purpose of appeal to ignorant emotion, in place of reason.”

  “Lately I feel that reason's high reputation has been gained unfairly,” Sasha said drily.

  Kiel's lip curled. “A human might think so. But a human might not understand the term.”

  With any other serrin, Sasha might have been interested to debate the issue further. But she knew that unlike most serrin, Kiel's words were not unintentionally insulting.

  She looked him up and down, with the aggressive half-smile of Lenay contempt. “Fuck you,” she said, and walked unhurriedly from the temple.

  The women had pulled rank and claimed the stables. It would have been impolite of them to repay the priests’ hospitality by bedding as serrin normally would, with men and women together…and sometimes in the same bed, should urge and opportunity coincide.

  Sasha made a final round of the horses before bed, checking each for any sign of poor condition that had somehow escaped notice after the day's riding. As she finished the final horse, she turned, and was confronted with a tall serrin man. His eyes burned nearly gold in the dark. Arendelle.

  He considered her, wordlessly. Sasha folded her arms, and said nothing. Arendelle was a friend to Kiel and Rhillian both. He had been particularly close to Triana, who moved within Kiel's ra'shi, and had died at Sasha's blade upon the stern of the ship, along with Halrhen, another serrin. Sasha may have fought with the svaalverd, but she was in truth a Lenay yuan. Enemies were enemies, and one did not regret their killing any more than one regretted any of the other eternal fates. But those two she did regret, no matter how rightful the circumstance.

  Arendelle approached, and gazed at her face. He was not an unattractive man. Strong, in the way of serrin archers. His golden eyes gave her a shiver. Serrin eyes were never exactly alike in their intensity. Arendelle's flicked down, considering her. If he'd been human, she might have been offended.

  Her heart beat faster. Should she say something? She'd killed his friend. She did not know if it was accusation in Arendelle's eyes, or reconciliation, or something peculiarly serrin and inexplicable. He put a finger to her neck and traced a line down to her collar. Then to her chest, lingering at the breast beneath her jacket.

  Sasha's eyes flashed warning. Serrin or not, her cultural tolerance had its limits. Arendelle's expression never changed, but his hand hovered. Then he turned on his heel, and left.

  Sasha returned to the hay, where Rhillian prepared herself a makeshift bed. Yasmyn stretched nearby, with a difficulty that suggested it was a recent habit, copied from her swordfighting companions.

  “What is it?�
� Rhillian asked Sasha. The dim lantern light was no hindrance for Rhillian's emerald eyes. She could read Sasha's face as clear as day.

  “Arendelle,” said Sasha. She did not need to explain the rest. Rhillian knew. Her expression was sombre. “Should I apologise?”

  “Do you feel sorry?” There was an edge to Rhillian's voice too. Triana and Halrhen had been her friends as well.

  “Yes,” said Sasha. “Not as a Lenay yuan-Kiel had just tried to kill me and they were trying to finish it. If we talk of fault then the fault is Kiel's.” Rhillian said nothing. “But however it happened, I'm sorry they're dead.”

  She rolled on her patch of hay, reached and grasped Rhillian's hand. Rhillian lay back and looked at her.

  “They should not have come at you with blades drawn,” Rhillian said quietly. “Kiel's action compelled them. They followed his ra'shi. As does Arendelle, more than mine.” Sasha had not heard Rhillian admit that before. “But you should not have been there to begin with.”

  “You took Errollyn.”

  “I will not apologise for it,” Rhillian said quietly. “It seemed necessary, at the time.”

  “And I will not apologise for rescuing him. We both are what we are. Neither of us tries to hide it. That's what made us friends once. We could be honest with each other.”

  “And I shall be honest with you now. Arendelle blames you for those deaths. I cannot claim to know what he seeks from you-we serrin are not so alike that we can guess each other's hearts, and I do not know Arendelle as well as Kiel does. I do know that he will not harm you, unless you give him cause to.”

  “I know.” Thinking on it, she realised she had not felt even vague alarm at his presence just now. Not for her safety, anyhow.

  “I would say that he seeks to reconcile the parts with the whole,” said Rhillian, switching tongues to Saalsi to better explain herself. “It is a large concept in serrin thought. The individual against the group. He seeks to understand if it is human nature that is to blame for the deaths of his friends, or merely yourself.”

  “Why not conclude the blame was Kiel's and save us both the trouble?” Sasha muttered.

  “No,” said Rhillian, with certainty. “He is within Kiel's ra'shi. He will not turn on Kiel.”

  “You mean he can't question his leader?”

  Rhillian raised an eyebrow. “And humans are above this?”

  Sasha sighed. She wriggled closer, and lay directly at Rhillian's side.

  “Rhillian,” she began, “I should explain.” She grasped both of Rhillian's hands and took a deep breath.

  Rhillian silenced her with a finger to her lips. “Sasha,” she said gently. “I know.” Sasha gazed at her. “You don't have to explain to me. Understand that as serrin, I can say that I find fault with you for something terrible that happened, and not hate you for the same. Humans find this difficult.”

  Sasha didn't know what to say. For some time, she had thought Rhillian her enemy. An enemy of circumstance rather than of hatred, it was true, but an enemy nonetheless. Now she was struck by the strongest doubt that serrin even understood that word as humans did. Kiel knew his enemies not by hatred, but by differing ideals. He hated the invading Bacosh Army though, surely he did. Did he not?

  “Do serrin understand ‘hatred’?” Sasha asked. She used the Lenay word, kran. It stood out from their Saalsi, jarringly, like some muddy boot thrown onto a beautiful green lawn.

  “Rage, certainly,” Rhillian said at last. “But rage is impersonal. Hatred is directed at a person. I hate the things my enemies do. I kill them so they cannot do more…and for justice. But serrin were always shocked at how humans place themselves before events. You hate the person, not the thing. It always seemed to us pointless. We have always held that an individual, within society, is nothing more than the sum of his actions. I may hate what you've done, Sasha. It does not mean I hate you.”

  “I'm not sure I see the distinction,” Sasha murmured.

  Rhillian smiled faintly. “Me neither. It is the biel'en sheel.” Sasha frowned, not understanding. “The ‘glorious dilemma.’ You may call it a test of judgement. Or of character. Serrin puzzle on such things constantly.”

  Sasha shook her head, sadly. “It's another reason serrin are so feared by humans,” she said. “Spend some time with serrin, and a human may come to fear you are better than us. Spend a lot of time with serrin, and a human may become convinced of it.”

  She was awoken by Rhillian, kneeling over her in the dark. Her eyes made emerald spots in the darkness, sharp and deadly, and her blade was drawn. For a moment, Sasha nearly feared. Then she realised that if Rhillian's blade were aimed at her, she'd never have woken at all.

  Rhillian saw Sasha looking, and pointed to her own two eyes, then at the surrounding dark. She said nothing, crouched as though expecting death to spring from the night. Something was very wrong.

  Sasha pulled her sword from its scabbard, heart thumping and hands shaking. She hated that, and hoped Rhillian's eyes would not see…but any human, awoken thus in the dark, would fear. The horses were silent. Sasha's eyes struggled to adjust to the gloom, to recall her surroundings, and make sense of the shadows. Where were Yasmyn and Aisha? She moved carefully toward where she recalled Yasmyn's bed had been, figuring that Aisha had the night vision to look after herself. Rhillian caught Sasha's arm.

  “Aisha is scouting,” she breathed in Sasha's ear. “We don't know where Yasmyn is. Stay still.”

  “What's wrong?” Sasha whispered back.

  “I don't know.”

  “But how do you…?”

  Rhillian silenced her with a finger to the lips. “Just wait. Stay to my flank, I will guide you if we must move.”

  Sasha suffered another chill. Rhillian saw the stables well enough, but Sasha was well used to serrin night vision by now. It was Rhillian's certainty that chilled her, despite nothing more amiss than Yasmyn's absence. Sometimes serrin did this. She didn't know how. Sometimes, when something was wrong, they just seemed to know.

  Something moved, very faintly, in the doorway.

  “Aisha,” Rhillian murmured. She touched Sasha's arm and moved, Sasha following as silently as she could, trying to stay in Rhillian's footsteps. Aisha must have gestured them forward, but Sasha could not see it.

  When they reached Aisha, she looked pale. “Three dead,” Aisha whispered. “Killed quietly. Assassins.”

  “Raise the alarm?” said Sasha, heart pounding.

  Aisha shook her head. “Not yet. We're surrounded. One alarm and they'll charge.”

  Sasha visualised the temple and adjoining monastery quarters. The river to one side, the road to the other. If she were conducting a stealth attack at night, she'd come from the river side, where few dwellings could sound the alarm, and then…

  “Aisha,” Rhillian whispered, “stay here and find the assassins, take them quietly if you can. Sasha and I will go to the riverside. When you hear fighting, raise the alarm.”

  They ducked into the corridor beyond the stables and moved silently, Sasha staying in Rhillian's footsteps. Aisha disappeared into a side corridor, while Rhillian paused at tall doors left ajar. She peered within, then beckoned Sasha to follow.

  It was a common room, tall stone walls with bookshelves and furnishings…. Sasha could barely make out the shadows, and could only trust Rhillian's sight to tell the room was empty. Rhillian paused at the next doorway, her hand gesture warning of something obstructing the way. Sasha followed her into the kitchen. In the dark she nearly tripped over a shape sprawled on the floor-a body. From the robes, Sasha guessed a priest…in search of a midnight snack? Investigating a noise? Even with Rhillian to guide her, she did not like this darkness. Rhillian could only see one direction at a time, and Sasha forced herself not to look behind, trusting Rhillian's vision made them faster than their attackers, whoever they were.

  Rhillian paused again at the large doors leading outside from the kitchen. She tried the latch and found it locked. The assassins had ent
ered some other way. Sasha heard a noise and spun, eyes searching the dark. Nothing. Rhillian tugged her sleeve and led her to the nearby storeroom, where sacks of grain and boxes of vegetables filled the air with musty smells.

  Rhillian climbed onto some boxes to check a window Sasha had not even seen. A creak told Sasha it had opened. Again a distant noise, and a hiss, like air escaping lungs. Like someone dying. Sasha held her blade for an opening low cut, most lethal against any sudden attacker who was as blind as she and less ready to defend the upward cut than the downward.

  Behind her there was a faint noise as Rhillian slid through the high window and disappeared. Sasha knew she had to turn to climb the boxes, but now there was no one to guard her back. She muttered a silent curse at her cowardice, and sheathed her blade so she had two hands for climbing in the dark. The boxes held firm with little noise, and her strength allowed her to pull herself up with little scrambling.

  No sooner had she sat on the top box than she felt, rather than saw, something moving on the ground to her left. Her heart nearly stopped, and she barely restrained a panicked reach for her blade, lest that noise give her away. She saw the back of a head, long-haired, almost level with her boots. He moved carefully, crouched like a warrior, his one-handed posture suggesting a knife. If he looked up, he would see her almost on top of him.

  Not a tall man. She stared, and resolved more of his clothes-roughspun and leathers, no armour, nothing fancy. Something about the way he moved said horseman. A saddlesore swagger, legs apart. Lenay? Surely not with a knife in the dark. Not only dishonourable but, against serrin, likely fatal. Lenays knew serrin too well. But there were only two serrin here…

  And now as she sat here, he was past her, advancing into the darkness of the kitchen she'd just left. She should have jumped down and killed him, but that was awkward, and Rhillian was outside waiting for her. Aisha would deal with him. Probably Aisha was the cause of that last sound of dying. Where the hells was Yasmyn?

  She slipped out the window, had difficulty sighting the ground, but jumped anyway and landed on turf. There was a little more light outside, perhaps from a sliver of moon. A large oak made a great sillhouette, and a tangle of hedges blocked the view of the river. She could hear it though, a deep murmur of water. Where was Rhillian?