King's Blood

by Jill Williamson

  “The beetles?” Grayson asked.

  “Owi, Massi. All the Yeke once ate the tsok,” Muna said. “The Jiir-Yeke stopped eating the tsok when they created the karah.”

  “Bird giants?” Grayson asked.

  “They are the bird makers,” she said. “The Uul-Yeke live in the mountains of the wolf. They feel shame for what the Yeke did to our people and do what they can to protect our tribes. We Puru follow the herd along the eastern coastal plains, moving south in the summer and wintering in the north. The Puru way is the way of peace, but we are often forced to contend for our survival when the Yeke attack, though we lack the desire or skill to fight back.”

  “Why do the Yeke eat the beetles?” Grayson asked.

  “They believe the beetles give strength,” Muna said, “without which they would be small, like us.”

  “What is she saying?” Danno asked, and Grayson translated.

  “I wish I could help you free the slaves in Zuzaan,” Grayson said.

  “That’s kind of you, Massi,” Muna said, “but how? The Yeke are too powerful.”

  “I could go back and forth,” Grayson said. “And Ulagan is there. He is Uul-Yeke and might be willing to help. Maybe we could sneak out one boatload at a time, down the river, the way we came. There are so many slaves. Maybe the giants wouldn’t notice a few people missing.”

  Muna’s eyes glistened. “Do you think it would work, Conaw?”

  “It might, with Ulagan’s help.” Conaw turned to Grayson. “You could start with the older people and perhaps some of the younger children. You would have to find Honaqa. She is the eldest slave, and she could organize from within so that everything is kept quiet.”

  “How will I find her?” Grayson asked.

  “You would have to go into the tunnels and seek her out.”

  “Down into the tunnels,” Grayson said, thinking it over.

  “What?” Danno cried. “You could get killed down there.”

  Grayson continually forgot that unless Conaw attempted the Kinsman tongue, Danno could only understand what Grayson said and the parts of the conversation that he translated.

  “I must have this magic for a reason, Danno,” Grayson said. “What could be a better reason than rescuing slaves?”

  “Staying here where it’s perfectly safe,” Danno said.

  Grayson did not think he could do that. Not after what he had seen exploring the tunnels under the Zuzaan fortress. Some of the narrow passages were unsafe and sometimes collapsed on people, the beetles blistered the skin, and the giants fed their slaves poorly. Many people were sick from lack of food and sunlight.

  “I will help you free your people,” he said to Muna. “Tell me what Honaqa looks like.”

  Trevn

  The greens had been responsible for stifling Trevn’s ability to mind-speak. It had taken two days to figure it out and another for his own voicing ability to return, but the discovery had thrilled Trevn. He asked Lanton Jahday to fully document the plant, which he named âleh, an ancient Kinsman word for leafage, then ordered his men to pick as much as possible.

  Near sundown on the third day of their journey to Zuzaan, Kempe sent a knock.

  “What is it?” Trevn asked.

  “It is Master Shinn, Your Highness,” Kempe said, her voice soothing even in Trevn’s mind. “I passed by him on the quarterdeck, and his thoughts bled into my mind. He had started a mind-speak conversation with Master Fonu Edekk. Your Highness, Master Shinn has the voices.”

  Trevn was so shocked that he nearly walked over Ottee. Neither Fonu nor Shinn descended from royal blood. “What was said?”

  “Master Fonu asked many questions about you and many more about Miss Mielle. When you find her, Master Shinn is to tell Master Fonu where she is. He told Master Fonu about some measurements you took of the stars but was unable to find the figures in your cabin.”

  Because Trevn had taken them back in Armanguard and given them to Captain Veralla. “What else?”

  “Master Shinn is to eavesdrop on you and, when he is able, Miss Mielle, so that he can give her location to Master Fonu before you are able to reach her. Master Fonu wants to capture her and use her against you somehow.”

  Rage coursed through Trevn. “Anything about Fonu communicating with Rogedoth?”

  “Nothing like that, Your Highness. But Master Fonu told Master Shinn that he instructed a shadir to follow you everywhere. Said it would keep him informed of your movements. That was all.”

  A shadir! Following him even now? “Thank you, Kempe. You’ve done very well. Continue to monitor Shinn’s thoughts when you can.” He closed her out of his mind, barely managing to restrain himself from reaching for Shinn.

  The man was a traitor. That he had kept his mind-speak ability a secret when Wilek had demanded all come forward . . . And telling Fonu their plans? The latter was enough to have him hanged. That he would conspire to abduct Mielle so that the enemy could control Trevn? Utterly despicable.

  And Fonu. Trevn had heard rumors. About an old love affair between Fonu’s father and Princess Jemesha, years before the princess had married. Could Fonu be Oli and Eudora’s half brother? And what of the shadir? Was the creature following Trevn even now? What should he do? His first thought was to voice Captain Bussie and have him arrest Shinn, but that might alert Fonu that Trevn knew his plans. Better to give Kempe time and see if she could learn—

  “Trevn? What is wrong?”

  Mielle’s voice startled him and pulled him back from his spinning thoughts. He must have reached for her without thinking. He told her everything Kempe had said, and her despair flooded his mind.

  “What purpose would Master Fonu have in taking me captive? I don’t know anything important about the ruling of Armania.”

  Naïve, sweet girl. “This is war, Mielle. And our enemy is ruthless. Rogedoth is the man who continually encouraged my father to sacrifice to Barthos. He would do anything to get what he wants. It is me he seeks to control in this. Not only do you have my heart, we are soul-bound. Hurting you would hurt me. It would certainly render me useless to help Wilek with the rule of Armania.”

  “What can I do?”

  “I will teach you to shield your mind. It will take time for you to get good at it, so we must practice every day. It is all I can think of that might protect you at the moment, except . . . Mielle, should anyone arrive in your settlement—other citizens of the Five Realms—you must hide. Ask Captain Stockton or Cadoc’s parents for help, but trust no one else until I say otherwise. Is that understood?”

  “I am not one to hole up under a rock like a worm, Trevn.”

  “I know that, Mouse, but I need you to promise me you will protect yourself. For my sake?”

  He felt Mielle surrender to his will. “Very well,” she said. “Now teach me how to shield.”

  Late the next morning, just before midday, Trevn’s party reached Zuzaan. Two of the four giants in their party ran ahead to announce their arrival. The village was made of several dozen domed houses of simple drystone. It surprised Trevn that with so many trees around, these people used no wood in their construction. Trevn saw several dogs the size of ponies and two horses with backs as high as Trevn was tall. Could there be something in the land or water that had caused these people and their animals to grow overly tall? He pondered that theory as they crossed a drawbridge and entered a fortress of drystack boulders—each rock as big as a grown man. Just inside the entrance they met a wall of giants armed with battle-axes.

  A flurry of confusion followed. The Armanian soldiers drew their swords, and Cadoc whisked Trevn within the circle their bodies made.

  “Wait!” Trevn yelled, struggling to see. “Do not be the first to strike.”

  “You to put down weapon,” Toqto said.

  The eagerness Trevn had sensed in the giant suddenly made sense in light of their current circumstances. Toqto hadn’t been eager to return home or to introduce newcomers to his people. He had been eager to lead them all into a t
rap.

  “What do you want with us?” Trevn asked.

  “You to hunt tsok,” Toqto said.

  Arman, what should I do? Should he refuse? Fight? He couldn’t imagine that his men, however well trained, could stand against these giants. There was no time to ask Wilek for advice; his soldiers looked ready to spring.

  “We do not want to fight you,” Trevn said. “We came in peace. To know you better and to see our friend Grayson.”

  “God-man special,” Toqto said. “Bring many dirtmen to hunt the tsok.”

  This time the epithet stung. Trevn could order his men to fight, but they were inside the stronghold. Even if they somehow managed to kill every giant here, there was an entire village to get through on the way out—a village with giant dogs and horses to aid their captors in the chase that would undoubtedly follow.

  “We will not fight you today,” Trevn said, “but know that detaining us is an act of war against my realm. I’m certain Grayson the god-man would agree.”

  “Small men not harm the Yeke,” Toqto said, squeezing his fist. “You to be like tsok. Obey without fight or we to crush you like tsok.”

  Trevn told his men to lay down their swords.

  The soldiers obeyed but averted their gazes. Did they think he’d chosen wrong? “We must choose our battles wisely,” he said, firm in his resolve. “This battle we cannot win.”

  The giants prodded them down an oversized set of stone steps that zigzagged deep into the bowels of the fortress. As they descended, Trevn used his magic to talk with Wilek and Captain Bussie, admitting the disaster he’d walked into. Bussie was sympathetic and promised to remain nearby in hopes that Trevn would find a way out. Wilek, on the other hand, lost his temper.

  “Gone but one week and captured by giants? How am I supposed to get you out of this?”

  “You’re not,” Trevn said. “I’ll get myself out of it.”

  “And how will you do that?”

  “I have no idea. But at least give me a chance. And maybe pray.”

  The stairs ended in an underground cavern filled with scores of pale humans with filthy skin and blistery warts. Men, women, children even. All carried baskets woven of straw or the paper substance that had formed the pulpy cocoons.

  A giant shoved an empty basket and a lit torch into Trevn’s hands, then pushed him down a path that led deeper underground. Trevn stumbled along with his men, suspecting they were meant to fill their baskets with some kind of beetle. Was Saria down here? He thought to call out to her, but decided to wait and keep his wits about him for the moment. Deeper and deeper they went. Tunnels branched off like the hairs on a root, and Trevn realized he had the freedom to choose which path to take. He led his men down one of the offshoots. The tunnel became very narrow, almost too small for Trevn to navigate. He forged on anyway, curiosity growing with each step.

  A sound grew, something like the warbling song of a flock of birds. Trevn slowed, tense and suddenly reluctant to see what lay ahead.

  A sharp turn brought him into a subterranean cavern that ended the mystery. The walls were indeed coated in a horde of crawling, shiny black beetles.

  Days passed by as Trevn and his men gathered beetles into baskets with the rest of the slaves. If they were not careful, the pests bit, which resulted in bulbous blisters tight with yellow fluid that usually popped within two days, leaving behind flaccid itchy skin. What the giants wanted with so many of the bugs, Trevn couldn’t imagine. Some of the pales implied they were food, so Jahday, ever the explorer, smashed one with a rock and ate it raw. His report was not favorable.

  The slaves slept wherever they could find a clear bit of ground. Most crammed inside the open cavern at the foot of the stairs since it was the same place that, three times a day, the giants delivered trays of flatbread and water in exchange for a full bucket of beetles. Anyone who missed coming at the right time or didn’t have enough beetles went hungry. And for reasons unclear to Trevn, some of the giants made anyone with dark skin find twice as many beetles to exchange for food.

  Trevn talked with Saria, who, after hearing his description of the place, did not think they were in the same mine. She believed the underground tunnels were all connected, if one could find the right path. They made tentative plans to try to find each other, though the idea of searching the hundreds of possible tunnels branching off the main caverns overwhelmed Trevn.

  One day as he and Cadoc were exiting a dead-end tunnel, Trevn met several men with brown skin. “Are you from the Five Realms?” he asked.

  “We are Sarikarian,” said one of the men, staring at Trevn and Cadoc. “Name’s Matto. Three families from my village were taken from our settlement a month ago. Who are you?”

  “I’m Trevn, and this is Cadoc.”

  One glance at Trevn’s clothing, filthy as it was, and the Sarikarian’s eyes popped like a bullfrog as he put the puzzle together. “Sâr Trevn of Armania?”

  It wasn’t long before word spread and enslaved Kinsman people were flocking to Trevn to beg for help.

  “The giants make us get more beetles than the pales.”

  “A tunnel caved in and broke my son’s arm, but the giants won’t help him.”

  “You can use the mind-speak magic, Your Highness, can’t you?”

  “Call for help.”

  “Confuse their minds so we can escape.”

  “Compel them.”

  “Put a spell on them.”

  Trevn answered as best he could. Cadoc was able to help the boy with the broken arm, but Trevn felt like no one truly listened or tried to understand how his magic worked. They just wanted someone to complain to.

  One morning as he was eating his share of flatbread, four Kinsman men approached. The smallest stepped forward and slouched against the wall, folding his arms in front.

  “Well, there you are, Sâr Trevn. You could have put a little more effort into rescuing your betrothed.”

  The familiar voice had been female, and upon closer inspection Trevn recognized the young woman before him, though he could barely believe it.

  “Princess Saria?”

  She was wearing men’s clothing—part of a soldier’s uniform. Her fine black hair had been bound back in a warrior’s tail with several prize braids of varying shades threaded into it, giving the appearance of stripes. One golden twist looked to be a lock of giant’s hair. She bore two blisters on her right cheek and a third on her forehead.

  Saria barked a mannish laugh. “He thinks I’m Princess Saria? Now there’s a long tale for the minstrels to sing about. I don’t know whether to be insulted or flattered.” Then to his mind, she said, “None but these three know it’s me, and I’d like to keep it that way.”

  “But why would anyone—”

  “My decision, not yours,” she snapped. “Any ideas on how to get out of here?”

  “Not yet. You?”

  “The tunnels go on forever in places, but we found no exits beyond this one here and the cave we were first brought into. Exploring is dangerous because some of the tunnels are unstable. There have been some cave-ins. I’ve lost six men since my arrival. How many do you have down here?”

  “Twenty-six.”

  “Any children? Some of the tunnels are very small.”

  Trevn nodded to Ottee, who was sitting on the floor beside Cadoc, munching on a piece of flatbread. “Just my onesent.”

  Saria pushed off the wall and all but swaggered around Trevn to get a good look at Ottee. “He’ll do.” She kicked Ottee’s boot. “You afraid of the dark, boy?”

  “No, sir,” Ottee lied. “I’m a ship’s boy. There ain’t nothing I can’t do.”

  Saria fought back a smile. “A ship’s boy turned onesent. Now there’s an interesting twist, but unsurprising for a Renegade.” Saria’s gaze fixed beyond him. She inched backward, then swung around and walked away. Curious, Trevn turned to see what had scared her off.

  Four giants, walking toward them.

  Toward him.

  Toqt
o in the lead.

  “Trevn?” Mielle asked.

  “I’m fine,” he said, annoyed that he kept reaching for her unintentionally. Perhaps it was becoming habit.

  Cadoc jumped up and put himself between Trevn and the threat. Toqto grabbed Cadoc’s tunic in his fist, lifted him, and passed him to his comrade as if he were a cushion.

  “You to come with Toqto,” the golden-haired giant said.

  “Not without me.” Cadoc elbowed his captor and twisted away. Two steps and he had again positioned himself in front of Trevn.

  “Finla wa bey,” Toqto told his men.

  The three giants advanced. A short struggle sent Cadoc sprawling into a group of pales who were eating.

  Toqto clamped his massive hand onto Trevn’s arm and pulled him toward the stairs.

  “I’ll be fine, Cadoc,” Trevn voiced. “I’ll tell you everything that happens. Take care of Ottee.”

  “Don’t tell them anything, Your Highness,” Cadoc said.

  “I’ll be careful. I promise.”

  Toqto dragged Trevn up at least four flights of stairs and into a brightly lit chamber. There he met a giant with orange hair, who, in broken Kinsman, introduced Trevn to Headman Bolad mi Aru, ruler of Zuzaan. The headman oozed eager ambition. He asked Trevn something in his own language, and the orange-haired giant translated.

  “You to have value to your tribe? You to be headman?”

  Did the giants think they could trade him for a greater number of Kinsman commoners? Trevn wasn’t about to be the cause of enslaving more people.

  “Trey van had dar?” the orange-haired giant asked. “You to be named this?”

  “Have no fear, Cadoc,” Trevn said to his shield. “They are only questioning me to see if I am someone important.”

  “You are someone important, Your Highness,” was Cadoc’s frustrated reply. “Don’t tell them anything.”

  Trevn decided to ask his own questions. “Grayson taught you our language? Where is he?”

  Irritation spiked through Bolad mi Aru at the name Grayson, yet Trevn felt anxious fear well up within the orange-haired giant.