The Blood Mirror

by Brent Weeks

  But she said nothing.

  “And you’re no shirker,” he said. He glanced over at squat, one-handed Samite, the new trainer. Teia wondered what the significance was in that look. “In fact, I’ve never seen anyone jump into their duties quite so fast, no matter what they are.”

  What?! A compliment?

  “You got your squad off this island alive because you were that loyal to them, and then you left them, because you’re that loyal to us.”

  Teia swallowed and nodded. She understood that he was shaping the story. There would be gossip among the Blackguards and questions about her loyalty, both in fighting for her squad and then in abandoning her squad. The Mighty weren’t technically deserters—they’d left with the permission of the promachos and before they swore the final oaths—but they’d left right when the Blackguard really needed more people. And they’d been the Aleph squad, the best of the Blackguard recruits. Their loss weakened the Blackguard, and that had led to sore feelings that could spill over onto Teia.

  The commander was putting the best face possible on Teia’s split loyalty.

  “I figured you’d be here this morning,” Commander Fisk said. “We always lose some Guards right at the end, but I know you. I knew you’d stay. It’s a big moment, for any of us, so I went and talked to some scholars last night. I asked what Adrasteia means. Do you know what they told me?”

  “No, sir.” Teia thought her parents had liked it because they thought it sounded pretty.

  “Funny thing. Sometimes you wonder if a name shapes a thing. But if you didn’t know it… Adrasteia means ‘not inclined to run away.’ And apparently, you’re not. Anyway, you look like hell. And you’ve got execution detail at noon.” He grimaced. “Until then, you’ve got inspection duty.”

  “Sir?”

  “There’s a bunk, fifth one down on the Archer side. Make sure it’s up to code. Do it quickly, shouldn’t take you more than four or five hours.”

  A bunk? Inspecting a bunk for five hours—

  Oh, that was her bunk!

  She snapped a salute and walked toward the stairs to go inside.

  “She runs toward duty, and when it comes time to leave, she walks,” Commander Fisk said. “Get a move on, Walker! Before I change my mind!”

  She started to protest, but it didn’t matter. If she’d gone fast, he would have made a crack about how she was not inclined to run away unless her bunk was at the other end. This was what it was to be the newest Blackguard.

  It felt… awesome.

  Inspecting her bunk for five hours felt awesome.

  Waking up didn’t. She swore she’d been asleep only minutes when she was awakened by the Greyling twins.

  “Teia, it’s time. We let you sleep as long as we could. We have to go. Now.”

  She sat up.

  But Gavin’s eyes widened.

  Gill glanced at his younger brother and cleared his throat.

  Teia hadn’t realized that she’d stripped off her tunic before lying down, and her camisole had gotten all twisted in however she’d thrashed in her sleep, so she exposed half a breast as she sat up. Half of little being practically nothing.

  “Gav!” Gill scolded as Teia hiked things back in place. He smacked his brother’s shin with the haft of his spear.

  “Ow! What was that—”

  “You know what it was for, you ape. Glance, don’t gape.”

  Gavin winced. “I know, I know. Look, don’t linger. Sorry. Sorry.”

  “Not to me,” Gill said.

  “What?” Gavin asked.

  “Don’t say it to me.”

  “Well, I was tryin’ not to stare again—” Gavin started. “I have a hard time controlling my eyes when, you know?”

  “Trouble controlling your eyes? And you’re a drafter?” Teia said. “And you’re the veterans I’m supposed to be looking up to?” She stood up and reached for the hem of her camisole. “It’s not battlefield rules, is it?”

  “Huh?” Gavin asked. “Oh.”

  They turned away, and she stripped and dressed in fresh clothes quickly.

  “I didn’t mean to… I, uh, I polished your boots and belt so you could sleep a little longer,” Gavin said.

  Oh no. First, Teia didn’t want anyone going through her things. Second, he was a little too eager to please.

  Teia said, “Well, since you’re so helpful and so interested in my personal business, take these,” she put a wad of garments in his hands, “and put them in the bin for dirty menstrual rags.”

  Gavin dropped the clothes from limp hands as if he’d been pithed.

  Gill guffawed.

  “I’m joking,” Teia said. “But I am on my moon, so I’ll need a minute.”

  He looked queasy and still distrustful of the laundry at his feet.

  “And Gavin, you’re sweet and all things wonderful, but… no, not ever. I almost did that once, and I’ve no interest in doing it again. The rules are there for a reason, and I’m going to obey them. Nothing personal.”

  He didn’t look as if he understood, but she went past him and washed up in the Archers’ toilets as quickly as possible. Curse cramps, anyway. Maybe his big brother would explain it to him while she was gone.

  When she came back, he’d put the rest of her clothes in the basket for the slaves. She was glad that she’d remembered to change the master cloak’s disguise so it looked like a Blackguard cloak now. After you were elevated, your nunk clothes were taken by the slaves, laundered, patched, and given to the next cohort. Teia didn’t even want to think about what she’d have had to go through if she’d let the master cloak get mixed with every other nunk cloak at the Chromeria.

  But she hadn’t loused up, this time.

  She threw on the cloak. She felt resplendent, proud.

  “You look good,” Gill said. “You look like a Blackguard.”

  They let her check her own weapons—a Blackguard always checked his own weapons.

  “I didn’t mean anything like that,” Gavin said, awkwardly. “I was just trying to give you some more time to sleep.”

  His face cleared. Rejection was hard for any man. Rejection and a loss of face together were too much for most.

  “Oh, my mistake, then. I’m just so excited about finally being a Blackguard, I’ve got a hair trigger about anything that would make me mess up, I guess. Forgive me, brother?” she asked.

  Why was it on a woman to tiptoe around the feelings of men…?

  “Of course, sister,” he said, and all was well.

  At least men usually made up for projecting their stupidity by being easily maneuvered.

  They had to jog to make it to their posts on time, forming up outside the White’s apartments, and Watch Captain Tempus grimaced at them for cutting it close on this day of days. He was a wild-haired man, his roots gray. He had deep-black skin and intense blue eyes compounded with blue halos.

  “On time is five minutes early,” he said.

  “My fault, sir,” Gill said.

  Gavin and Teia both looked at him. Gill really was a big brother. He would gibe Gavin constantly, but when it came time to take care of things, Gill was there every time.

  Watch Captain Tempus handed Teia a velvet baggie no larger than a coin purse. “Dark eye caps,” he said. “So you don’t go blind using paryl out in the full sun.”

  The hallway was crowded, not only with Blackguards, but also with slaves scrubbing at the stains on the floors and ceilings from the smoke, fire, bullets, and blood. Stonemasons and carpenters were making their own measurements and estimates with their own journeymen and apprentices and slaves, and the Chromeria’s slaves were trying to work among all that. Cleaning and repairing the highest floor of the Prism’s Tower wasn’t something that would be allowed to proceed at a slower but more efficient pace. Half a dozen Blackguards stood watching the workers at all times.

  The violation of this area, the White’s very sanctum, the Blackguard’s home, had been taken as a personal affront. Teia was sure that s
he would be answering more questions about that in the near future, too.

  Watch Captain Tempus led them past the Guards at the door. A knot of diplomats, room slaves, an anxious luxiat, and one-handed Trainer Samite stood around the White’s desk. As Teia’s squad came in, Karris declared, “Everything else will have to wait.” Her voice rose over the people crowded around her, though with her diminutive height, she did not.

  “Tell Carver Black I’ll meet him in two hours, and to have as many of those reports as possible. Tell the Ruthgari ambassador I won’t see her until dinner. Assure her that I’m not putting her off on purpose. Have her seated with me to placate her. Clear everything out of the first two hours after noon, we’ll have some urgent demands for a meeting from the High Luxiats after the executions. Are we ready?”

  The luxiat attending her blanched. “Surely you’re not presiding over the execution in that?”

  Teia still couldn’t see Karris, so she didn’t see what he was talking about for a moment, but the room went absolutely still at his reproof of the White.

  As the diplomats nervously shrank back to let Teia’s squad come forward, Teia saw what Karris was wearing, and she almost laughed aloud. Whoever was shocked by Karris’s choice of clothing had no idea who they were dealing with. She wore an outfit much like what she’d worn to Teia’s swearing in. White Blackguard blacks, tight fit around her athlete’s body, infused with luxin, and decorated with silver thread. She had even—whimsically?—denoted her rank on her left shoulder. A Parian zero, the stylized circle looking something like an eye.

  Given that her clothes were white, the outfit did reveal her curves far more than identically cut blacks would have, but to Teia’s and the Blackguard’s eyes, it mostly revealed that Karris hadn’t let herself grow fat when she’d left her official Blackguard duties. Neither modest nor immodest, it was amodest, clothing indifferent to any man’s or woman’s sexual interpretation of it. Here was the body as power, as an implement of war sharp honed with use. Her clothing said, ‘Remember who I am and where I came from and how I intend to rule.’

  It would take a soft, lustful man like a luxiat to see this body in harness for war first as a receptacle for his illicit desire.

  “I just did something shocking,” Karris told him, “and worthy of complaint. But that thing was not what I’m choosing to wear. If you’re such a fool that you use your eyes when you ought to be using your ears, you’re too much a fool to advise me. You may dare correct the White, but do it for the right thing. Tell your superiors that I wish never to see your face again, and if I do, there will be consequences. For them. And for you. There are many souls beyond the Everdark Gates who crave a luxiat’s wisdom.”

  “High Lady, I didn’t—” Sweat stood out instantly on his face.

  Karris said, “In another time, I should delight in giving you a second chance. Lust, after all, is a sin of the body. But you have gone beyond lust all the way to the depths of pride in giving reproof to another for your own sin. Thus does the weakness of your body cloud the eye of your mind. Orholam shall forgive you if you repent truly, but I have no time for you while there are still holy men and women in the Magisterium with unclouded sight who might give me true counsel. Begone.”

  He looked at her for only a moment, seeing iron there. Then he looked to the Blackguards, who hadn’t even stepped forward, but their eyes were walls against him. He looked to the other courtiers, and saw no aid from any of them. Some, doubtless, he had worked with for years.

  He turned on his heel, back straight, and strode from the room, huffing.

  Karris obviously dismissed him from her mind before he got to the door. She gestured for the courtiers to leave.

  She walked toward the slaves’ nook and sat in a chair there, allowing her slaves to work on her hair while she spoke. “My brothers and sisters—my former brothers and sisters,” she said to the Blackguards. “I hope you will not find me impertinent in borrowing a semblance of your garb. I should have asked first. I recently fought in a dress, and it nearly cost me my life. We are at war, and I will not be helpless. I trust you to defend me, but in turn, you can trust me to be as little of a burden as possible.” A grin stole over her face. “Plus, it’s impossible to find anything else nearly as comfortable as the blacks.”

  They shared her grin.

  “I think offense is the last thing we feel, High Lady…” Tempus paused. It was within protocol to address the White as ‘High Lady,’ but he’d obviously meant to append her name, and his wits failed him. ‘High Lady Karris’ because of their Blackguard friendship, or was that too informal? ‘High Lady Guile’ because of her long-hoped-for marriage? But that had been so brief and so painful, and did that seem to ignore all she had accomplished under her own name? ‘High Lady White Oak’? But did that seem to ignore her marriage?

  She saw his dilemma. “I prefer ‘High Lady White,’ thank you. I am those other names as well, but for the time Orholam has given me in this office, I am the White before all else. Caleen?”

  Her slaves had finished putting the pins in her hair, and now they set a large wig and headdress on Karris’s head. Luminous sea demon ivory had been carved into a seven-pointed crown. Suspended above the central point was a single winking diamond, smaller than one would expect. Platinum-white hair cascaded down around Karris’s shoulders, but each tip had been dyed one of the seven colors where it swept back up to entwine with the ivory crown.

  Her only nod to her origins as a green and red drafter was a single earring in each ear, a ruby and an emerald. She waved away any powders. “I’m pale enough,” she said. “And I care not if they see me sweat.” Even while the slaves worked, another held up a series of parchments for her to peruse. The White would nod every so often, and the slave would turn the pages. The woman was illiterate, and once Karris had to motion for her to turn the page right side up.

  The White was practicing her speech, Teia realized.

  “I take it back,” Karris said. “Give me some powder.”

  Captain Tempus cleared his throat. “On most days, the White being late would be expected, High Lady White. But noon waits for no one.”

  “Thank you, Captain,” Karris said, peeved. Then she sighed. “I’m sorry. In the unexpected absence of my chief room slave, it is kind of you to remind me. I am well aware of the pressures of time today. Please don’t act differently. I’m not accustomed to… all of this. Any of it. Orea made it look so easy.”

  “She’d been doing it ten years by the time you knew her,” Samite said. “Your first time in the sparring circle, you don’t try to win; you try to survive.”

  “Doesn’t seem like an ideal time to be learning as I go, does it?” Karris asked.

  Tell me about it, Teia thought.

  Karris stood, her makeup finished. “Shall we?” she asked.

  Samite said, “You aren’t… I mean I understand dismissing some slobbering luxiats, but you aren’t actually going out there like… Or do I need to find a new job?”

  Karris grinned. “Ha! I was just playing with you. I wondered how far you’d let me go. All things may be permissible, but not all are fruitful.”

  She beckoned, and two slave women came from the closet, carrying a dress between them. It opened like a clamshell, sideways. Karris stepped into the sleeves as if into a jacket, and the rest was buckled tight around her.

  “How did the tailor take my instructions?” Karris asked the younger of the slaves.

  “I believe ‘apoplexy’ is the word. But obedience, too.”

  Karris grinned at the Blackguards. “Pull this down. All this silk is under tension, and this razor embedded in this channel should cut it instantly. So if I need to fight—or, more likely, if I’m injured and you need to carry me away from danger or see how bad a wound is, you can cut the dress off in a matter of moments.” She turned to the slave. “Shorter sleeves next time.”

  “He said if you asked for shorter sleeves to tell you to look for another tailor, because he’ll
be jumping off each of the seven towers until one of them finally agrees to release him from this hell you’ve confined him in.”

  Karris laughed. “Is it a universal rule that the more talented the artist, the more of a pain in the ass?”

  “We’re all pains in the ass if we can get away with it,” Samite said. “Great artists are just allowed to get away with it more.”

  Waving away the slaves now just fluffing her skirts, Karris asked, “How do I look? Never mind. Don’t answer that. It’s too late to change. Noon waits for no one.”

  She stopped at the door, though.

  “Some of you know already, but some of you are too young to know me. I don’t look forward to this. I’ve killed wights and men, and I don’t even like killing wights. There is a time to agonize, and there is a time to act. Today we do what must be done, and we don’t shrink from the truth or from our duty. Trainer Samite, you remember Ithiel Greyling?”

  “Of course. Those Blue-Eyed Demon mercs put a dung-smeared arrow through his hand,” Samite said. “May Orholam send them to a lower hell.”

  “Ithiel knew those arrows. You try to treat them, and you get gangrene. You die, always. The chirurgeon said he could just take the hand at the wrist, but you’d still risk death. If he’d done that, maybe Ithiel could have been a trainer, like you. But Ithiel had two boys. He didn’t want to give up fighting, didn’t want to give up the Blackguard he loved. His wife had already done that in order to marry him. But he loved his family, too, and wanted to be there for them. So we took off his arm at the elbow. Instantly.”

  “Bravest thing I ever saw,” Samite said.

  “To realize in an instant that you aren’t going to have the life you’d hoped for, but not waste a moment complaining, instead acting instantly to save what good you can? That’s more guts than I’d have had,” Karris said. Orholam have mercy, Karris hadn’t been thinking of Gavin until the very moment she said the words. She pushed it away, tried to get back on track. “He lived until just a couple years ago, didn’t he?”

  “Indeed. And raised two damn fine sons,” said Watch Captain Tempus.