by JC Kang
Dropping down to the ground, she snuck along the walls toward the temple. It remained untouched by the destruction, probably due to its distance from the blast. Inside, the statue of Yang-Di still glowed. The green hues of her night vision burst into full color.
She almost wished they hadn’t. The dark bloodstains stood out on the white stone floors and the red-painted walls. Memories flooded back: the slaughter of the ambassador, the imperial guards, and the princess’ decoy, Meiling. Her scream was haunting— handmaidens rarely left the sumptuous confines of Sun-Moon palace, and none in the history of Hua had ever been lost to violence.
Jie shook the thought out of her head and came to the long rope that sounded the temple bell. She gave it a gentle tug: light enough so that its ring would hopefully stay within the confines of the embassy grounds.
She then rushed to the entrance and peeked out. As expected, the guards looked up at the bell. One broke from his position, drew a longsword, and marched towards the temple.
With a silent prayer of apology to Yang-Di, she climbed to the broad beam above the main doors.
The Bovyan clambered up the steps and strode through. She pounced on him, jabbing her knife through his subclavian artery and possibly into his lung. His sword clattered to the ground as he buckled to his knees.
Jie glanced toward the main gate. Her ambush would’ve stood out like a stage play to the other sentry. Her friendly wave jolted him out of his blank look. She turned to her gasping victim, whose blood now spurted in rhythmic bursts. It joined the altivorc blood she’d spilled in the very spot days before. “Why are you here?” she demanded, on the off chance that he might actually reveal something with his dying breaths.
“Die, Cathayi snake.” The words tumbled out of his mouth with his last moments of consciousness.
Jie looked back towards his companion. He took the temple steps two at a time. She retreated deeper inside.
To her dismay, the jaunt up the steps didn’t seem to tire him at all. She ran to the side of the statue to lure him in.
The soldier approached, pointing his sword at her. “Surrender.”
He was taller than the other, and the suns on his collar marked him as an officer. With another quick apology to Yang-Di, Jie turned and pop-vaulted onto the statue’s base, just at the edge of her adversary’s reach.
“You’re the female Black Fist spy! You’re supposed to be dead!” He swung his sword at her, and she danced away from the blows.
She stopped and raised an open hand. “Shhh... Can you hear that?”
The man paused, but kept his sword raised. His brow furrowed. “What?”
She grinned at him. “Absolutely nothing. None of your patrols are within my very long earshot.” She pointed behind him. “It’s just you and my partner there.”
The man turned his head. In the split second before he could turn back and raise his sword, she leapt down and slashed his wrist tendons. His sword slipped from his fingers. Before it hit the floor, she ducked low and severed the tendon in back of his heel. Working her way around to his other leg, she hooked his ankle and pushed into the back of his knee.
The Bovyan hit the ground face-first with a loud bellow.
Jie swung around and sat on top of him, still cranking his knee. “You won’t live to see the sun rise. If you don’t answer my questions, you will survive to just before dawn, but you’ll wish you hadn’t. So why’re you here?” She added a little more torque, just enough to get him to yelp.
He spoke through gritted teeth. “We are rounding up all the Cathayi in the city as enemies of the state. Some come back here.”
“Where are you keeping them?”
He didn’t answer. She twisted a little harder, evoking a grunt.
His words spilled freely. “The men, in the city jails. The women, at the Teleri compound, entertaining us. That one girl, the treacherous princess’ little bitch, she was real good.”
Meiling. She must’ve survived. Jie leaned back a little, adding just a little more pain. “She’s at the Teleri compound?”
“No, she’s at the palace now. She’s a noble, so she is servicing the officers. Her child will be part of your country’s new ruling class.”
Jie decided to punish his gloating with another sharp twist. Ligaments tore, the knee joint popped. She spun around on top of him, took control of his left arm and began wrenching it behind him. “Why are you keeping the Cathayi prisoner? What use are they to you?”
He laughed past his pain. “We torture one man to death each day, in public. If your princess weren’t such a coward, she would come out to spare her people. Tell her that.”
So they believed the princess was still nearby. “You deserve a slow, painful death, but I’m not so cruel.”
Despite what she led others to believe, killing wasn’t fun, not even a Bovyan or altivorc. With surgical precision, she slid her knife into the space between his spine and skull. His body went limp.
What a mistake! Even at full strength, it would be strenuous and time-consuming to dispose of the bodies. The Moquan traitor—assuming he was still at large—would be able to identify her work. Her only advantage now was stealth and surprise. Sucking on her lower lip, and yet again apologizing to Yang-Di and the dead men, she took a longsword and began mutilating the bodies.
To take her mind off the unenviable task, she began plotting her next move: rescuing Meiling from the Iksuvi palace, where the Teleri officers had apparently taken up residence. And she knew one Teleri officer very well.
CHAPTER 31:
Off the Beaten Path
The wind blew over Kaiya’s scalp as Fleet’s horse galloped behind the Southerners. The sensation served as a reminder that her head had been shaved; the periodic booming of altivorc drums proved it had been the right move.
Before long, they came to a tree-lined dirt walkway that cut through vast rows of leafy green vegetables. It ended at a one-story farmhouse some five hundred feet up a gentle slope. Brehane pointed them toward the path.
They followed it to the weathered house. Behind it, broad fields of red wheat swayed a head above her. Kaiya turned back and looked down towards the highway, which stretched along the river. Back south the way they had come, the altivorcs seemed like a line of black, inching their way up the white road.
Brehane gestured past an empty wagon towards a wooden stable, next to a chicken coop. “We’ll hide there till they pass.”
“I don’t suppose we have time to tell whomever lives here that we are squatting?” Sameer’s shoulders rose in a shrug.
A smile formed unbidden on Kaiya’s face. Sameer, polite even in a crisis.
“No time!” Brehane pointed down towards the army making its way up the river road. Still far away, but there was certainly a risk of being seen. She clasped Kaiya’s clammy hand and pulled her along to the stable. Inside, they found four old plow horses.
Hiding with the animals. Kaiya instinctively went to twirl her hair, only to find it gone. She shrugged off her pack and crouched, watching as the altivorc column passed along the road. She peeked out. Cold sweat beaded on her forehead as the first ranks marched by.
An hour of waiting trudged by. The last ranks passed, trailed by an enormous armored draft horse, effortlessly pulling a train of wagons. All those young women in cages. That could’ve been her. A chill crept up her spine.
She was about to let a sigh escape when a mounted altivorc wheeled and pointed towards the farm. Six soldiers broke off from the rear of the column and hustled up the path.
At the entrance to the farmhouse, an altivorc rapped on the door. He yelled in heavily accented Arkothi, “This region now belongs to the Teleri Empire. We are taking a census and collecting tribute.”
Kaiya pushed herself deeper into the stable, her heart pounding.
The altivorcs waited for a few seconds, and then one kicked in the door with a loud thud. Within seconds, the sound of furniture and dishes breaking mixed in with the crude laughs of the altivorcs. Kai
ya bit her lip. Whoever lived there—
One of the altivorcs laughed. “No tribute? Then we will take your daughter, instead!”
A woman screamed.
Sameer sprang to his feet, his curved naga in hand.
Brehane urgently waved him down.
Cyrus hissed at him. “Remember the mission! Remember the princess!”
Focus set forward, the Paladin strode out of the stable and toward the farmhouse.
Brehane sighed. “Not again...”
Again? Kaiya searched the Aksumi’s eyes. “Shouldn’t we help him?”
Brehane clasped her necklace. “He will have no problem with six altivorcs. He may be a newly-minted Paladin, but they are easily worth ten trained men. We just need to make sure none of them escapes to tell their friends.”
Kaiya looked back at the road. The distance between them and the altivorc column increased at a crawl. How long before they would send someone to find out what happened to their comrades?
Grunts emanated from the house. Loud crashes followed. Kaiya craned over the others at the stable door, just in time to see two altivorcs burst out of the house at full sprint.
Brehane jerked her head back, but then began a guttural chant. Streaks of glowing arrows appeared out of thin air and darted towards one of the fleeing altivorcs. He let out a shriek as the energy tore into his back. He stumbled into the dirt. The other dashed down the walkway, waving his arms and yelling.
From the rear of the column, an altivorc turned his head in the direction of the farm. Brehane mumbled something in her language. The tone could only be a curse.
Six ranks—three dozen altivorcs in all—peeled off the back of the column and charged towards the path. The sound of drums echoed down the river.
Cyrus shook his head and drew his scimitar.
“Sister, your flute,” Brehane said as she reached down to pick up some dirt. “Play the tune from the other day!”
With trembling hands, Kaiya fumbled for her dizi, which was tucked in the folds of her robe. Bringing the flute to her lips, she played.
The sound warbled out disjointed, without clarity or resonance.
“More control! More soothing!” Brehane’s forehead crinkled as she rolled the soil between her fingers.
The altivorcs covered the distance quickly. They were no more than twenty feet away.
Kaiya sank her toes into the ground and took a deep, calming breath. What were forty altivorcs compared to a dragon? The flute’s sound leveled off.
Brehane seemed to inhale the musical notes and started invoking harsh words, finishing her incantation by tossing dirt at the closing altivorcs.
They collapsed to the ground with a loud clatter of armor and steel weapons. All deep in slumber.
“How did you do that?” Cyrus stared at Brehane with rounded eyes. “I’ve never seen you affect so many.”
Bent over panting, hands on her knees, Brehane nodded at Kaiya. Before the Mystic could open her mouth, a black-fletched arrow lodged into the stable wall, just a handbreadth from her head.
Kaiya lowered the flute and tracked the arrow back to its source. A line of altivorcs stood on the highway, loosing a volley of arrows.
Cyrus grabbed her wrist and pulled her back into the stable. Both huddled near the ground as multiple thuds rained into the walls outside.
“Quickly, get your things.” Cyrus scrambled on all fours and grabbed his and Sameer’s saddlebags. Kaiya and Brehane also shouldered their own packs.
Cyrus peeked around the corner. “We can’t stay here, we’ll be trapped! Brehane, can you create some sort of diversion?”
The Mystic shook her head as if it were an anvil. “I’m depleted. I need some rest before I can call on the resonance of the universe.”
“Princess?” Cyrus raised an eyebrow at her.
Kaiya bowed her head. “Maybe if I could reach the altivorc drums.”
Cyrus snorted. “It would be easier to run in the other direction.”
Kaiya stood straight and squared her shoulders. “I will surrender myself, and try to barter my freedom for yours.”
Outside, Sameer’s voice rang out. “Altivorc fools, your archery is horrible, see if you can hit me!”
Brehane peeked out and then turned back. “They are taking aim at Sameer. Run! Into the fields behind us! They will have a harder time targeting us in the wheat.”
Kaiya opened her mouth, but Cyrus took her hand and pulled her along. Before they turned the corner, she stole a glance towards the front of the house, where Sameer stood.
Dozens of arrows streaked towards him. He moved inhumanly fast, a blur to her eye. His sword seemed to glow a light blue as he effortlessly weaved around arrows that should have hit him. It might have been unbelievable if she hadn’t witnessed his master fight on the trip to Vyara City. To think Sameer was only an initiate into his order.
Cyrus pulled her into the rows of wheat, where the stalks growing above their heads would hide them.
Within minutes, Sameer caught up, grinning.
After a while, their running slowed to a brisk walk. In the distance, the muffled yells of the altivorcs grew fainter and fainter.
Cyrus breathed heavily. “We can run faster, but the altivorcs have better endurance. They’ll catch up. We need to find a way to lose them.”
Sameer nodded. “Beyond the fields to the west are some woods, and several miles beyond that, wooded hills that start to rise into the mountains. Those should provide cover from their arrows. We can find a place to hide there and then return to the main road in a couple of days.”
Kaiya’s lungs and legs burned, unaccustomed to long stretches of physical exertion. Discarding any notions of propriety, she dropped into an unladylike squat, one hand on the ground. Each breath was a struggle. Afraid and useless, a burden on strangers. The pack slipped off her shoulders. “I can’t go on. It’s me they want, so I will wait here and try to buy you more time to escape.”
Cyrus shook his head. His voice was flat, conveying no emotion. “No, Your Highness, we have attacked them and they will come for us, regardless of whether you are with us. There’s another way.”
He withdrew a gold disk that hung from his neck. The symbol of Athran, the Levanthi God of the Sun. She’d seen it during her visit to Vadaras, while searching unsuccessfully for an Akolyte to cure Father.
He placed his hands on her shoulder and began chanting in a musical language.
A cool wave washed over her, and the aching in her muscles faded. Her lungs lightened and the air felt cool and fresh. It was like waking from a peaceful night’s slumber.
His dark eyes searched hers. “How are you now? Can you go on?”
She nodded.
He smiled. “Athran favors you.”
“Let’s keep moving!” urged Brehane.
From near the crest of the hill, Tian saw the altivorcs in the distance break ranks and advance on a farm. There was no way the Southerners could defend the princess. His plans had failed. Again. To think his Moquan brothers once considered him the second coming of the Architect.
He motioned for the imperial guards. “Come on. We need to rescue the princess.”
“Wait.” Squinting, Fleet raised his hand. “Our friends are safe for the time being.”
Tian strained his eyes. How could the madaeri know?
Fleet pointed. “They are fleeing west-southwest through the fields of red wheat, towards the woods beyond.”
The other group should have never run into trouble at all. Tian threw his hands up. “We need to help them.”
Fleet held his stubby fingers up, framing a spot in the woods. “If they’re smart, they will start heading south once they enter the woods. If we head due west, we might be able to intercept them. If not, I can track them. Follow me.”
The madaeri dashed toward the hills. Tian and the imperial guards hurried to catch up, setting a brisk pace westward through the Iksuvi farmland. Fleet would occasionally look towards where they had last seen th
e other group, but otherwise kept moving forward. After an hour, they neared the woods.
Fleet raised his fist, calling for a halt. “I think we’re still slightly ahead of them, based on the pace they were keeping. Wait here while I look for tracks.”
The others squatted to catch their breath while their diminutive guide disappeared into the tree line. How did he have so much energy? Tian fidgeted. He had to do something. Not just sit here.
Fleet returned soon. “There were no fresh human tracks, and certainly not a dozen altivorc boot prints.” He motioned them in a north-northwesterly direction into the woods, and they had to hurry to try to keep up. Despite his short legs, he moved swiftly and lightly through the underbrush, leaving the Hua behind.
Tian yelled, “Fleet, slow down!”
“No time!” the madaeri called back. “I’ll whistle like this...” he let out a very shrill sound, unbelievable that someone so small could make it, “...every few minutes to let you know where I am. You do the same.”
The whistles drifted farther and farther away over the next half-hour. The trees grew denser and denser, until they came to a clearing. Exhausted, Tian threw himself down on a fallen log. He motioned for the imperial guards to join him.
It was hopeless. They’d never reunite with Fleet, let alone the princess. He was a failure.
The madaeri yelled back through the trees. “I found them. Stay where you are.”
Tian’s heart soared. The madaeri was incredible.
Before long, the Southerners emerged from an animal path, with Fleet in the lead. The princess glided straight and regal, with no sign of fatigue. The Hua dropped to one knee in a bow. “Dian-xia,” they shouted in unison.
Fleet shot them an annoyed glance, cutting his hand in front of his mouth.
“It is a miracle,” Chen Xin whispered, “that we were able to find you in these woods.”
“No miracle, just exceptional wilderness skills.” The madaeri grinned.
Kaiya bowed deeply to Brehane. The Hua followed suit. “I am so sorry. Because of me, you lost your horses, and you will not be able to reach the Kanin pyramid in time.”
Cyrus shook his head. “What is done is done. There is no point placing blame. We must just continue forward. The white moon is full once a month.”