The Heart Forger

by Rin Chupeco

  You’ve trained your pet well, bone witch.

  Would you like some advice for yours? The azi was docile because I had shown it nothing but respect. Usij had mistreated his daeva, and despite all the harm and chaos the savul had caused, I could not help my sympathy. How long had he been enslaving the creature?

  Longer than you have been a bone witch, child. The simpering old crone tasked with killing it was easy enough to dispose of. The chaos it caused rampaging through Odalia’s territory!

  I allowed myself a grim smile. I knew he was somewhere nearby, for we needed proximity to our beasts to garner the greatest control; perhaps the old man had already hidden himself among the Odalian soldiers. Thank you, Usij.

  Oh?

  If it were not for your savul, my brother would not have been killed and I could have lived the rest of my life oblivious to my true abilities. You are the reason I am standing here, and I am the reason you will die today.

  He snarled into my head, and then his mind was gone. The savul let loose a horrible cry and jumped; the azi responded with a barrage of flames, but not even the extreme heat was enough. The reptilian daeva slammed hard into us, and quick thinking and reflexes saved me from being skewered by its powerful claws, which dug into the azi’s hide. My daeva reared up, howling in pain, and I held on to its neck, knowing one lost grip could mean falling to my death.

  Tea!

  Protect the princess! I screamed back. There was nothing Fox could do at this point to help me, and the quick Veiling rune I wove kept the bulk of his thoughts away from mine, kept him from being distracted. It was more difficult this time. I had no one to look after my physical body and so could not completely immerse myself in my daeva. At my command, however, the azi raised its spiked tail, still scrabbling with the savul. It was the toad-like beast’s turn to shriek, as the spike plowed through its midsection, puncturing the skin. It stumbled back.

  The army hesitated. Seeing the fallen daeva, they pushed forward cautiously. I wove Dominion over as many of them as I was able but fell short. Only a dozen or so responded—I was too exhausted to extend my reach, and there were thousands of them still.

  I saw Kalen approaching with his horse, staring up at us in horror. I stuck my head out over the azi’s side.

  “Get out of here!” I yelled.

  “I could tell you the exact same thing!” Kalen turned to face the Odalian soldiers. It was a magnificent, petrifying sight: my black-clad warrior, facing off against an army—the very fate I had hoped for him to avoid when I compelled him in Odalia. My fears were mitigated only because I could sense no other spellbinders there beyond Baoyi and Usij. “What makes you think I’m going to let you do this alone?”

  As the men surged forward, Kalen spread his arms, tracing dual runes in the air at once. A fog rose, the mist so thick and cloying that it was difficult to see a hand in front of your own face. Cries of dismay rose among the ranks as soldiers stumbled into each other.

  Kalen wasn’t done. Borrowing a page from Althy’s book, he slammed his hands to the ground, punching another series of runes into the soil, and a large sinkhole opened up underneath the mass of swirling fog. More yells came from the soldiers as they tumbled down the unexpected ravine.

  “Showoff.”

  He said nothing, flashing me a smug grin.

  With the soldiers off our backs, I focused on the savul again. I slipped cautiously back into its mind and felt Usij’s rancid presence as he screamed and railed at his creature to rise. The savul could only moan piteously. The azi had withdrawn its spike, leaving a large bloody hole at the center of the daeva’s body; I could feel the life stealing out from it. Usij’s mind withdrew, leaving it to suffer a slow and painful death.

  Breathing hard, I commanded the azi to lower its head so I could slide down to the ground. Usij had abandoned his former pet, and I felt no resistance as I probed lightly into its mind. Its thoughts slid over me, warm and accepting of its approaching demise with a relief I could not help but feel pity for.

  “Stay,” I told it gently, and it shuddered.

  Pain lanced through my mind. I screamed; behind me, the azi reared up, all three heads howling at the sky. I felt something wrench them from my mind, and then their presence was gone.

  Kalen’s arms caught me before I could collapse, but I could barely hear his voice. The loss of my azi had left a sudden gaping emptiness in my chest, like Usij had wrenched my heart out along with my control.

  I heard a wheezing chuckle from nearby. As my vision cleared, I saw the old man standing before the fallen savul, smiling. “You might have bested the Odalian army, my dear,” he said laughing, “but empathy remains your weakness.” He turned to regard the savul with disdain. The creature was lying on its side, no longer moving. “A waste of flesh and power. The weakest of the lot as far as I’m concerned. But now, the azi…”

  The azi took one step toward him and then another. It bowed its heads at his feet, and rage coursed through me. “Oh, the azi! That is a different beast entirely. The only daeva to have never been conquered by a human army or slain by a human hand. Aenah’s a fool, but that bitch knew how to tame daeva. If not for your efforts, Tea, I might never have found so powerful a prize.” He laid a hand on one of its heads, and the azi did not flinch. “It is time to replace your old master with one of better conviction,” he told the daeva. “Kill her.”

  With a low hiss, the azi rose, its three heads trained in my direction. Trails of flame simmered from its snouts. Kalen raised his hand, palm outward, and Shield runes shimmered.

  Despite the protection, the heat was intense. Fire licked at us, stopping several inches from us as it hit the barrier. The azi rumbled and let loose another torrent, and Kalen, his face grim and perspiring, shouldered the burden.

  “Not today, Deathseeker.”

  Kalen stiffened, his eyes wide with surprise. He let go of me, and I tumbled to the ground, still dazed. The azi had backed away, but Kalen remained upright, his eyes staring into the distance. The runes around us faded. I moved to stand, but Kalen’s foot pressed against my back, pinning me down.

  “I think this would make for a better end and for better irony,” Usij drawled. “A bone witch slain by her own protector’s hand. Is that not a more fitting epitaph?”

  Wordlessly, Kalen turned to me. He drew out his sword.

  “Kalen…” I tried to enter his mind, desperate to find an opening, but Usij had been using compulsion for far too many years on far too many victims.

  Kalen raised the blade over my neck. I changed the direction of my thoughts, pushing myself into the mind of the next best thing, knowing full well that I would not wrest control before the blow came.

  “Kill her, Deathseeker.”

  The blade fell, and I closed my eyes.

  It struck the ground beside me, inches from my head. Usij snarled.

  “Kill her!”

  Kalen did not move. The sword trembled in his hands. I felt weak; there was a tug at my heartsglass, leeching strength from me.

  “Kill her! Kill her!” Usij howled.

  Kalen raised his sword, lowered it again. And then I saw the Heartshare rune, bright and glittering by his heartsglass, and I understood. He was resisting.

  So did Usij, who laughed. “Foolish, besotted little man. Here is a better idea. Kill yourself in front of your beloved bone witch. Slice your own throat and let her bathe in your blood. Do it!”

  The sword rose, but Kalen’s hesitation gave me time.

  Usij let out a strange, strangled gasp and fell to his knees. The blade dropped from Kalen’s hands.

  The Faceless looked down, eyes bulging, at the large claw now sticking out of his chest and at another talon protruding from his stomach, organs and entrails slithering to the floor.

  “Impossible,” he wheezed as rivulets of blood flowed down his mouth, a waterfall of red that
soaked his chin and neck. And then he fell on his face and stopped moving.

  “Tea,” Kalen whispered. He was beside me, his rough hands cupping my face, his lips against my brow, my cheek, my lips. “Tea.”

  “Beating him was tantamount to fighting at least five men, don’t you think?” I whispered against his mouth, exhausted beyond belief. Kalen’s chest heaved with relief, with laughter.

  I focused on the savul again, and it withdrew its claw. At the same time, the azi, independent of any control, wrenched its tail spike away from the old man’s body with a sickening, crunching sound.

  With difficulty, Kalen helped me up, his stare cautious as his eyes rested on the three-headed dragon before us.

  “It won’t hurt us.”

  “You’re not compelling it, Tea. It can attack at any moment.”

  “It won’t hurt us,” I repeated. “When Usij was distracted, it killed him without my urging.” The azi bowed all three snouts, resting its long necks on the ground in an act of submission.

  “But that’s impossible.”

  “What’s one more impossibility today?” The yellow eyes that watched me approach were trusting, and the rumbling noise that started from the back of its throat was almost kittenish. “You shook free of his control all on your own, didn’t you?” I asked in wonder, laying my hand on the azi’s head, as I had done so many times before. It purred again, and I felt its mind open to mine, inviting as, for the first time, a daeva bowed before a human master of its own free will.

  The ramifications were boundless. Emperor Shifang was an imposter. The man who had been leading Daanoris all these months was its greatest enemy. Now I understood the bone witch’s hatred; now I understood her murder of the hanjian.

  The pain of having his spell so violently dispersed took its toll on the Faceless. His eyes rolled to the back of his head as he shook, and foam bubbled from his mouth. His hands and feet were still bound, but these were no longer deterrents; he was clearly in no shape to break free.

  “You survived, you old fool,” the Dark asha said, almost appreciative. “Old as the mountains, your hands full of guts and viscera, and still you survived. But severely weakened. Maintaining this Illusion rune must have taken everything you had.”

  “You…stupid…bitch…” he snarled between choking gasps.

  “To you seeking Blade that Soars’s path,” the girl quoted, “take that which came from Five Great Heroes long past and distill into a heart of silver to shine anew. I have need of your heartsglass, Usij. Black heartsglass was silver once, and lightsglass has purifying effects. And the rub? I do not require your permission. Khalad, do it.”

  The Heartforger was quick; he grabbed at the Faceless’s heartsglass, which rippled violently. With one hand, he forced the first of the five urvan into its center, the lightning-shaped glass disappearing into its depths.

  Usij howled and tried one last time to break free, but Lord Kalen held the Faceless’s arms and Lord Khalad forced the second and then the third urvan in. Usij’s face swiveled to stare into mine, and I froze. It was like the face of a desperate animal, willing to do anything to free itself. The zivar I wore shone, but nothing else happened.

  Kill them.

  Feeling bemused, I rose to my feet. There was a small table by the side of the door, with the remains of our last meal. I took one of the larger knives there, examining it closely to gauge its sharpness. Quickly! The thought ran through my head.

  I ran toward Lord Khalad’s unprotected back, knife raised and ready—and stopped as a new presence bored into my mind. The zivar burned again, so hot that I could feel it scalding into my skin, could imagine the sizzling of flesh there. I screamed aloud. The knife clattered to the floor.

  “Desperation brings out strength,” the bone witch said. “Warded as you are, weakened as we made you—and yet able to reach out and control the bard still. You are a dangerous man, Usij. The land shall be glad to be rid of you.”

  The Heartforger forced the last of the urvan into the black heartsglass and the room filled with unexpected light. The Faceless’s heart was no longer black like the Dark asha’s but instead a magnificent array of silvers. The girl ripped the heartsglass free from Usij and held it aloft in her hand.

  “Leave,” she ordered, and a terrible languidness came over me. My feet moved independently of the rest of me, shuffling toward the room next door, even as a part of me struggled and screamed at the aeshma that now lumbered forward with horrifying eagerness.

  “Tea!” the Heartforger pleaded. “Don’t do this. Kill him if you must, but let it be quick.”

  The bone witch trembled. With what remaining access she had to my mind, I could sense her thirst for the darkrot, her yearning to be cruel.

  “Tea,” Lord Kalen said, adding his supplication to his cousin’s. “Please.”

  After a moment, the aeshma sniffed, retreating. I was already out the door and into the corridor, and what else happened in that throne room afterward, I knew not. My mind was peaceful and deprived of thought, and for that I was glad.

  27

  Emperor Shifang had not quite fully recovered from his ordeal. His eyes were bloodshot and glazed over as he looked out into his city and saw the remains of the carnage that stretched out before him, from the bodies of the Daanorian soldiers that had not survived the battle to the two hulking daeva out in the field.

  He was no longer the perfectly manicured and well-dressed emperor who had greeted us with spears and threats when we first entered his throne room. But for all his faults, his formidable arrogance and assurance of his gods-given right to rule remained very much in evidence, even as he defied Tansoong’s orders to set out and see the daeva for himself, despite all reasonable arguments against his doing so.

  The savul was still alive, still breathing despite its mortal injuries as the litter carrying the emperor arrived. With them was everyone else: Zoya and Shadi, Likh and Khalad, and the elder Heartforger. The old man was stooped and exhausted, though the fire was back in his eyes. Khalad supported him, with Likh on the other side. Zoya and Shadi looked just as tired. Princess Inessa walked beside Fox instead of behind the emperor, as should have been customary of all noble Daanorian wives. The silver fox pin she wore on her collar glinted in the morning light. Fox said little, though the pain from his proximity to the savul had not faded.

  We had borne away the dead and the dying. The Odalian army had not recovered from the sinkhole Kalen had opened beneath them, and from their stunned expressions and their incredulity, I surmised that most of them had fallen victim to compulsion, though which Faceless was responsible still remained a mystery. The Odalian army was, in fact, not quite the Odalian army after all.

  “Hired stooges,” Kalen muttered angrily. “I wondered why I saw no familiar faces among them, why their uniforms were out of order. Bandits and thieves, for the most part. Their leaders were paid handsomely to wave the Odalian flag and march in beat, but no one can tell me their purchaser. We are still hunting for Baoyi and the others.”

  “A quick scry into their minds tells me nothing, though I would say Usij is the likely culprit. Holsrath would have sent the army itself.” I still had one last task to accomplish. The Faceless’s body had still been warm to the touch when it had been carted away to be thrown into a nearby ditch for the crows to feast on.

  I had drawn out my knife but paused. The logical part of me knew that the savul should die. And yet…

  “Do you want me to do it?” Kalen asked quietly.

  I shook my head and turned to Fox, still watching me with that same unshakable gaze. “Here’s your revenge,” I told him.

  He shook his head. “You avenged me the instant Usij died. This is just another one of his victims.” His eyes searched mine. You don’t want to kill it. But you must, Tea.

  Had this been Kion, I might have found another way. But this was Daanorian territory, an
d the kingdom bayed for blood.

  After a moment, I took Kalen’s sword and presented it wordlessly to Shifang. He understood well enough. It was not every day that an emperor could claim a daeva kill, even on a technicality. But he dismissed my paltry weapon and summoned an underling to bring him the sword he so favored, littered with ornate jewels but with no sharpness to speak of. The savul would not die quickly from its blow.

  The emperor raised his hand, his sword glittering in the light, while I quietly wove my Raising. “Die,” I whispered softly as Shifang struck, and the savul complied before his blade landed. A faint cheer rose among the soldiers.

  “Take this carcass and dispose of it,” the emperor ordered. Tansoong scuttled forward, issuing more commands of his own, and the soldiers converged around the fallen beast, uncertain where to start.

  The deed done, the smile faded from the emperor’s face, and he turned toward his wife. Inessa remained standing apart from him, as regal as any queen could be, and I could see the Empress Alyx in her stern face.

  “You have brought many things to my kingdom,” the emperor added soberly. “The good and the terrible.”

  Inessa inclined her head. “Perhaps our marriage has been looked on with disfavor from the gods.”

  “Perhaps that is so.” But yearning lingered in the man’s voice. “Perhaps…perhaps it is still possible—”

  Inessa shook her head. “You knew long before today that we are not compatible.”

  The emperor’s gaze strayed toward Fox, contempt and anger now evident. “I can make things difficult for the people of Kion,” he said, falling back on threats when honeyed words would no longer work.

  I was done with all the intrigue, and the Dark swirled in my blood, enough to desire to offend. “And I can make things difficult for His Majesty.” I glided forward, and the emperor shrunk back, his fear palpable. I hid my smile. Was I no longer the small harmless thing he described at our first meeting? “I am the keeper of the dragon. Harm one hair on your queen’s head, harm any of us here…and we will wreak havoc upon your land until your own citizens shall beat their chest and rue the day you assumed your throne.”