by Rachel Aaron
She laid her hands lovingly along the curve of the sky. Angry as she was, there was opportunity here. The Lord of Storms had disobeyed her, raised his sword to her favorite, but he had also forced Eli to use the power she’d given him to travel her sphere freely for the first time in years. He’d shown he was willing to use gifts he’d sworn to her face he would never touch again in order to save his swordsman. What other slips might he be willing to make if pressed hard enough?
A smile spread across her white lips. Now that her darling had decided to play with things she’d warned him against, life was going to be a great deal more difficult for him. Usually, this would be the point where she stepped in to help, but not this time. This time, the Lady decided, she would make Eli come to her. This time, she’d let him stay on the hook, let things get as bad as they could get. Only when he was broken and defeated would he realize what he had thrown away. That, when he begged for her help, was when she would save him and bring him home at last to her side.
Benehime sank down beside her sphere, watching the northern forest where, somewhere, her favorite was sleeping. Behind her, ignored, the claws continued to slide over the edge of her white world while far, far away, too distant for any ears except her own, something screamed in endless hunger. Benehime turned her head and leaned forward farther still, deftly focusing her attention on the tiny world inside the sphere until it was all she knew.
CHAPTER
11
Gin was growling deep in his throat. Miranda reached down and pinched him, hard, but that only sent the growl deeper into the dog’s chest and did nothing at all for the predatory glare the ghosthound fixed on the overdressed man riding in front of them. She pinched him one more time, then gave up, flopping forward against the prickly fur of the dog’s neck. The growling had been going on for nearly two weeks, but she couldn’t really blame Gin. She would growl at Sparrow too if she had the throat for it. Traveling with the man was insufferable.
“He’s too slow,” Gin mumbled through his long, clenched teeth. “He packs like an idiot, can barely set up a camp, wakes up too late, and he eats too much.”
“Why are you still complaining?” Miranda said. “It didn’t help yesterday; it didn’t help two weeks ago. What makes you think it’ll help now?”
“We’d have been there last week if that fool didn’t take two hours every morning getting his clothes right.” Gin’s fur bristled. “We’re in the middle of nowhere and that idiot acts like he’s going to a party every night. And he won’t stop flickering.” The dog shook himself. “If looking at him didn’t make me feel ill I’d eat him just to make it stop.”
Miranda rolled her eyes. That again. She’d stopped pressing the dog for an explanation of Sparrow’s “flickering” days ago, but getting him to stop complaining about it was like asking him to stop growling—impossible. She sat up again, looking over Gin’s ears at the path they’d been following since yesterday. Sparrow was well ahead of them, guiding his nervous horse between the thick trees like a Zarin dandy leading a shy partner through a new and intricate dance. He was certainly dressed the part. His plumed hat, orange silk coat, and chocolate-brown trousers tucked into gold-tooled boots would have been at home in any Zarin ballroom. Here in the ragged woods of the mountain foothills he looked like a misplaced tropical bird.
Gin shook his head, and the growling was back, stronger than ever. “Tell me again why we can’t just leave him in the woods.”
“Because as Sara’s second, he’s the highest-ranking Council official we’ve got,” Miranda said. “And he has all the papers we need to bribe Izo. Trust me, I would have left him at the Zarin gate if I’d thought we could get away with it.”
“Sara would have done better to send more like the other man,” Gin said. “Save us all some time.”
Miranda agreed. The morning they left Zarin Miranda had been met at the gate by Sparrow and another, a man who called himself Tesset. She had no idea if that was his last name or his first, maybe neither. Sara’s goons seemed to be one-name-only kind of people. Unlike Sparrow, however, Tesset had shown up in sturdy travel clothes, a long, brown coat and worn-in boots, and carrying a small pack. She’d been a little concerned that he had arrived with no horse, but she’d found out quickly that the lack of a mount didn’t hinder him. The man could run forever, and Sparrow’s pace wasn’t exactly breathtaking.
Right now, however, he was nowhere to be seen. That wasn’t unusual. Tesset tended to disappear for hours, running ahead to scout the area and keep them on track. Miranda appreciated his skill, but his excursions meant she was alone with Sparrow and the inane conversations he started every few hours. If Tesset didn’t vanish without a word every morning, Miranda would have insisted on scouting with him just for a break.
Gin’s growling hitched, and Miranda looked up to see that Sparrow had stopped. A moment later, she saw why. Tesset was standing beside him, his dull, brown clothes and short, brown hair blending in with the undergrowth. Miranda smiled and nudged Gin forward. She didn’t care if he’d come back to report they were about to be eaten by cannibals; any break in the monotony was welcome.
The two men stopped talking as she approached, and Sparrow’s horse began its terrified dancing that always occurred whenever Gin was closer than ten feet.
“Ah, Miranda,” Sparrow said, getting his horse under control with some difficulty. “Splendid timing. Tesset here was just informing me that we’re closing in on our destination.”
“Two miles straight ahead,” Tesset said, reaching out with a calm, strong hand to grab Sparrow’s horse before it threw him. “We’ve been passing his watchposts for the last two days, so we should be getting a welcome soon.”
“Two days?” Miranda said, glancing around at the deep woods. “I haven’t seen anything.”
“You wouldn’t,” Tesset said. “Unless you knew where to look.”
“Spoken like a true expert,” Sparrow said, leaning over his now subdued horse’s neck. “Tesset here is the closest legal thing you’ll find to a guide for this area.”
Miranda gave Tesset a curious look, and he shrugged his broad shoulders. “I grew up around here,” he said simply. “Of course, that was back when these hills were nothing but a patchwork of ragged gangs, before Izo pulled them all together. In a strange way, Izo’s made it easier for us. If things were still the way they were in the old days, we would have had to bribe half a dozen petty bandit lords by now.”
“The benefits of unified government are myriad for all walks of life,” Sparrow said with a sigh.
Miranda ignored him. “How did Izo do it?” she asked. “Pull the gangs together, I mean. Have there been other bandit kings?”
“None like Izo,” Tesset said, shaking his head. “There’ve been a few leaders whose gangs got pretty big, but nothing on Izo’s level. Right from the start, Izo was smart as well as strong, very charismatic, and, most important, ruthless. He raided other bandits as much as he raided the Council, and eventually there was no one left strong enough to stand up to him. No one knows exactly how many men he controls, but considering the reports from the border towns, I’d say at least five thousand fighting troops, maybe more. Anyway”—he turned and started walking again—“we’ll see for ourselves in a moment. He’s already sent a welcoming party.”
Miranda scowled. “How do you—”
“He’s right,” Gin said, pricking his ears up. “Men and horses approaching from the north.” He gave Tesset a respectful look. “That man must have ghosthound ears to hear that.”
“Or advanced knowledge,” Miranda murmured. “Keep on guard.”
Gin nodded and they began to follow Tesset, who was still dragging Sparrow’s horse by the reins, down the path. Miranda sat high on Gin’s neck, straining to catch the jingle of approaching horses, but all she heard were birdcalls and the wind in the trees overhead. After several hundred feet, Tesset stopped again and stood in the center of the path, waiting. Gin’s ears were swiveling madly, but to Miranda
the forest was achingly silent. She was about to lean down and ask the hound what he heard when the men stepped out from behind the trees.
There were too many to count. The forest was suddenly full of men dressed in drab colors, sitting on their horses like they’d been waiting. Though no glint of metal showed at their hips or boots or anywhere else knives were generally kept, Miranda was sure they were armed to the teeth and would show it well enough if provoked, and she kept a firm hand on Gin’s fur. Tesset and Sparrow, however, looked perfectly calm, even a little bored by the men’s sudden appearance. They waited patiently until the oldest of the bandits, a tall, lanky man with prematurely gray hair, nudged his horse forward.
“Welcome, strangers,” the man said, his voice thick with a coarse, mountain accent that turned words into gravel. “What brings you so bold into King Izo’s trees?”
“Diplomacy, good sir,” Sparrow said, his words dripping with politeness. “We seek an audience with your master, and his trees seemed a good place to start.”
“Audience, eh?” The bandit scratched his scarred chin. “And what does a peacock like you want from the king of bandits? We already got a fool.”
This raised a huge laugh from the men, but Sparrow’s smile only deepened. “It’s Sparrow, actually, and I come on behalf of the Council of Thrones to make your master a very generous offer.”
“Generous?” The bandit’s eyebrows shot up. “Now I know you’re lying. The Council don’t know the meaning of the word, not without a hook wrapped inside. Why don’t you save our time and your skin and just tell us the catch now, before we string you up for the crows?”
“Nothing would delight me more,” Sparrow said. “But my offer is for Izo’s ears alone.”
The bandit gave him a long, hard look, then shrugged. “Your death wish, pretty bird. Follow us.”
The bandits turned and started into the woods, falling into a loose circle around Miranda, Sparrow, and Tesset. Their formation was ragged, and Miranda got the feeling they were used to riding much closer around prisoners, but several of the horses were already wide-eyed being so close to Gin, and the bandits weren’t taking any chances. As they rode, Miranda could see how the bandits had snuck up on them. Every bit of their tack, from the bridles to the stirrups and even their horses’ hooves, was wrapped in wool cloth to make no sound. They rode in absolute silence, communicating through hand movements when they talked at all. In answer, Gin began to creep as well, matching their silence as though it were a competition. Tesset was also silent, his boots soundless on the leaf-strewn ground. By contrast, Sparrow was garishly noisy, his heavy bags and flashy tack creaking and jingling like a circus cart.
They made their way through the woods and onto a well-maintained road leading up a hill between two cliffs. Though she saw no one, Miranda could hear the creak of bowstrings on the rocks overhead. Their guide whistled, and the creaking bowstrings fell silent. Grinning wide, the bandits started up the hill again, motioning for their guests to follow. The narrow path forced them to walk single file, and Miranda was cursing her luck at being forced to stay behind Sparrow yet again, especially since he kept stopping. But a few steps later, she understood why. There, just beyond the pass, lay what Miranda could only describe as a bandit capital.
It was a box canyon cut out between two rocky hills and ringed with large conifers that hid it from the surrounding woods. Inside the canyon, wooden buildings of all sizes, from one-room log huts to enormous timber halls, covered every inch of the sandy ground. Wooden lookout towers sprouted like weeds from every other rooftop, often connected to other towers by rickety rope bridges, and every one of them flew the same red banner: a crudely painted black fist floating in the air above a mountain, ready to slam down.
People came out to watch as the bandits escorted their guests into the city, and Miranda was shocked to see women and young children peering down from curtained windows. The roads between the houses were hard-packed dirt, but there were torches at every intersection, each stocked and ready for the evening lighting as in any civilized city. There were shops with their doors open to the fine weather, restaurants with the day’s offerings drawn in chalk on wooden boards, and even glass windows in a few of the larger buildings. Looking down the roads as they passed, she saw a mule-driven mill beside a bursting grain silo. Another road led to a slaughterhouse with a pen full of pigs and chickens and a sign advertising fresh meat, and somewhere just beyond that she could hear a smithy working, the banging hammers accompanied by the acid smell of steelworking.
Miranda gripped Gin’s fur. Steel usually meant swords, good ones. As they rode toward the center of the canyon town, she saw more and more men openly wearing weapons. Their swords were not the mismatched collection of stolen goods she would have expected, but standardized blades from the same smithy. Likewise, the drab clothes the men wore weren’t actually ragtag, but uniform sets cut from the same cloth. Subtly, her fingers crept over her rings, gently waking her spirits. What kind of a bandit camp was this?
At the center of the canyon the buildings opened up, and they entered what looked like a town square. Only here, the square was more like a great, sandy lot, and at its center, rather than the fountains or wells or community halls generally found at the heart of towns, an enormous pit had been dug down into the floor of the canyon. The pit was about eight feet deep and circular, braced along the edges with wooden beams to keep the soil from sliding. At one end, a raised platform stuck out over the pit’s edge, forming a small stage. The other was dominated by a large tower with a covered pavilion at the top. Red and black banners hung from every available ledge, surrounding the pit in a blaze of crimson. Miranda stared out the corner of her eye as they rode by, trying to figure out the pit’s purpose. They had almost reached the other side of the square before she realized it was an arena.
She’d heard about places where men fought to the death for the crowd’s entertainment, but seeing one in person made her feel ill. Of course, she shouldn’t have been surprised. This was Izo’s city. What more could one expect from a man who called himself the Bandit King? She’d let the town’s unexpected civility lure her into a sense of false security, but the large, brown stains on the pit’s sandy floor were enough to cure her of any further delusion. Miranda shuddered at the barbarity.
As they left the central square, the buildings changed. If this were a normal town, she would have said they were entering the government district. The construction was more stone than wood now, the buildings taller and wider, with red banners spilling from their windows like bloody waterfalls. Several buildings had their doors flung open to let in daylight, and Miranda could see the front rooms of barracks, training halls, tack stores, and weapon stocks, all well supplied. A block away, acrid forge smoke belched from a set of tall chimneys. These were matched by another set farther down the road, and Miranda began to wonder just how many forges this city had.
That thought was put out of her mind when their guide led them around a blind corner and stopped at the entrance of the most intimidating building Miranda had ever seen. Unlike the others, it was all stone and iron, built directly into the cliff face. There were no windows, only doors that led out onto archer galleries with red banners the size of Gin hanging from their ramparts. The fortress was fronted by a great gatehouse with a barbed portcullis raised halfway so that its jagged spikes hung over the entry like hideous teeth ready to snap. Inside the gatehouse, the tiny paved yard was full of armed men sharpening their swords, obviously bored. They did not look up as the new arrivals filed past, but Miranda could feel their eyes on her as their bandit guide led them through the yard to the iron-bound doors of the hall itself.
Here they dismounted, the bandits holding Sparrow’s horse as he jumped down. No one offered to hold Gin, and that made Miranda smile. Outnumbered and surrounded as they were, it was comforting to remember she still had power on her side.
The citadel doors were thrown open to let in the afternoon light, revealing what was clearl
y not so much a room as a natural cave improved for human habitation. The stone floor had been chiseled flat and the walls braced with wooden beams to keep the stone from collapsing. It was quite dark, and the sparse torches seemed to make it only darker. From where she stood in the sunlight, Miranda could see only about twenty feet inside to where the hall had been split in half by a wrought-metal gate marked with the same fist and mountain as the banners outside.
Sparrow squinted into the dark hall. “Very impressive,” he said, sounding decidedly unimpressed. “But we didn’t come all this way to see a cave. Where is Izo?”
The bandit grinned and pointed at the gate. “Through there. You can leave your horse with the boys. They’ll take care of your things.”
“Which is why I’m taking them with me,” Sparrow said, unhitching his bags and flinging them over his shoulder with surprising ease.
The bandits laughed at that, and their guide gave Sparrow a knowing wink before waving for them to follow him into the dark hall. The iron gate opened before they reached it, and a man stepped forward to greet them. The moment she saw him, Miranda began to shiver. She didn’t know how she knew, but she knew all the way to her core that something was terribly wrong with the man in front of her. He wore no weapon she could see, and he was skeletally thin. His face was pale and hollow, and though his clothes were fine, they hung strangely limp on his body, like rags on a scarecrow. Behind her, Gin began to growl deep in his throat.
Even their bandit guide seemed a little put off by the man. He went through the gate without looking at him, motioning for his guests to follow. The strange man just watched them pass, his eyes eerily bright in the dark as he shut the gate behind them.
On the other side of the iron gate was a smaller but far grander chamber. Fat torches hung on the walls, their smoky light painting everything in flickering reds and oranges. Rich rugs lined the stone floor and gold glittered from the ornate wooden cabinets that lined both walls. But all of it—the silks, the rare metals, the chandelier of antlers hanging from the high cave ceiling—was just a guide for the eyes, leading them toward the back of the cave. There, on a raised stage lined with an impressive display of weaponry, below a great red banner marked with the same icon of the closed fist and mountain she’d seen all through the city, was an enormous iron chair covered with furs, and seated on the furs was a man.