“Better,” he groaned, easing back before pushing himself gingerly up to the head of the bed and lying down against the pillows. The throbbing headache lessened somewhat as he relaxed and closed his eyes again. “Thanks. If the crew wasn’t pleased to have us on board the ship before, I’ll bet they are now. That magic last night… I didn’t know you could do something like that.”
Syrah didn’t say anything. After nearly a minute of silence Raz cracked an eye open to look at her curiously. She still sat at the edge of the bed to his right, turned away from him, and he realized with a start that she was shaking. Her shoulders were quivering as she slouched, and she seemed to be refusing to meet his gaze.
“Syrah?” he asked, ignoring the pain in his head as he rolled to push himself up onto one elbow, reaching out to place his other hand on the small of her waist. “What’s wrong?”
For a while longer, the woman didn’t respond. She’d stopped shivering at his touch, but her breaths were short and broken, like she was fighting to control them. He couldn’t see her face, but Raz was almost sure she was crying.
“What were you thinking?”
The question came in a ragged, quiet voice that took Raz by surprise. The words brimmed with any number of emotions—anger, sadness, grief, disbelief—and it stabbed at his heart more sharply than any knife. It took him a moment, but eventually he thought he knew what she was asking.
He just wasn’t sure he had a good answer for her.
“Would you rather I’d have let him drown?” he asked gently.
Syrah gave a mirthless laugh, and he saw her left arm shift as she wiped at her face.
“And what about you?” she demanded, still not looking around. “What if you had drowned? I saw you in that water, Raz. You don’t swim well. You had to have known that, and yet you jumped in anyway. What if we hadn't been able to pull you back? What if the rope had slipped, or hadn't been long enough? What if…?”
The questions trailed away, and Raz gave the woman a moment to get ahold of herself again.
“I had to try,” he said after she’d stilled. “I owed him that, don’t you think? Argoan’s taken us in at no benefit to himself. It’s all a risk to him, to his crew. I owed him the attempt. I owed him—”
“You.”
Syrah whirled on him, cutting him off. The anger and hurt in her voice was sharp, and as he met her good eye Raz saw that she had indeed been crying. Her cheek was wet, and her lips quivered downward in the way they do when one is fighting off more tears.
“You had to try,” she hissed shakily. “You owed him. You risked your life. You almost drowned.”
Raz blinked at her, unsure of what he was expected to say next.
Then she asked her next question.
“What about me?”
He saw it then, all that he hadn't yet noticed. Whether he’d missed it due to the pain or the fatigue or his own bottomless stupidity, he couldn’t quite say. Every feeling he had made out in her voice was there, plain across her face, but there was something more as well, more than the base anger and sadness. Clearer than any of it, shining like a fire in her eye, was fear. True fear. Syrah, above all else, was terrified. Terrified by what he had done. Terrified by the utter lack of doubt with which he had done it. He had frightened her in a way he’d never considered, risking it all as he’d done to save the captain.
“You’re not alone anymore, Raz,” Syrah continued as though reading his thoughts. “Everything you are, everything you mean and are a part of… It’s not just yours anymore. When you jumped, when you threw yourself into the sea… It was like watching you pull Gûlraht Baoill over the cliff all over again. You could have died. You could have…” Her eye became bright with tears again, and her repeated words came through a barely controlled sob. “You could have died.”
Raz watched her, open-mouthed, taking it all in. For the first time, it really fell into place for him. He had been on his own for so long, had forgotten to fear something as trivial as death so many years ago… It seemed strange, now, realizing it wasn’t just him he was responsible to anymore. It wasn’t a bad feeling, by any means. Despite the state of Syrah, despite the crying, shivering woman before him, the idea filled Raz with a confusing warmth of emotions, building up in his chest like his heart were suddenly too big for the small space it had been allotted. He stared at her, reflecting for the first time on how he would feel if she had thrown herself overboard, if she had risked leaving him behind to save a man they hardly knew.
“I’m sorry,” was all he managed to get out. “Syrah, I… I’m so sorry. I didn’t think…”
“No,” Syrah agreed with an angry jerk of her head that shook a tear from the smooth skin of her cheek. “No, you didn’t. Don’t ever do that to me again. Please don’t ever do that to me again.”
He nodded numbly, pushing himself up to kneel on the bed, feeling the sway of the ship beneath them. Silently he pulled the woman toward him, and Syrah responded at once, turning and crawling into his arms, burying her head in his chest and letting the sobs come in truth now. For several minutes they stayed like that, Raz holding the woman tight and stroking her white hair carefully while she cried and hugged his waist tighter than he would have thought possible.
“I’m a fool,” he told her softly once she’d finally calmed down, though her face still stayed buried against him. “I’m sorry.”
Syrah shook her head against him, but didn’t look up. “I don’t know what I would have expected you to do instead,” she said with a sigh. “I don’t think you know how to be anything else. I just…”
She couldn't seem to find the words, so Raz tried finishing for her.
“Wish I’d hesitated?” he asked. “Wish I’d thought of you?”
Syrah didn’t say anything for a moment. Then, finally, she lifted her face from his scaled skin to look up at him. Even with her eye ringed with red and the loose strands of her hair clinging to the wetness of her face, she was a beautiful sight to behold.
“Maybe,” she said, wiping her cheek dry with a corner of her tunic. “I don’t know. I don’t want you to be anything less than you are, but I think that scares me as much as the thought of you becoming anything else.”
“Sounds infuriating,” Raz said with a grin down at her.
Syrah couldn’t help but laugh, punching him lightly. “Very. Why couldn’t you have been a farm-hand, or a soldier? Life would be so much simpler.”
“Of all the differences between us, you think the fact that I’m not a farm-hand is the most concerning?” Raz asked her dubiously, raising an eyebrow. “Maybe the captain wasn’t the only one to get hit over the head last night…”
As Syrah dropped her head back to his chest, he felt her smile against him. For a time they were silent again, but when the woman eventually spoke, her voice was calmer.
“I don’t want you to be anything less than you are,” she said again, mumbling against him. “I just want you to remember that what you are doesn’t just belong to you anymore. Please.”
Raz dipped his snout down to rest in her hair. Despite the weeks at sea, her smell reminded him of a life long-past, of spending the broiling summer days at the edge of the Garin, of dawns and dusks rising and falling over the palm groves as the desert wind shook the trees. It brought him back to another time when he had belonged to more than himself.
“I will,” he said into her hair softly. “I promise.”
This time, when he lay down again, Syrah came with him, and before long they were asleep in each other’s arms, giving in to the gentle rock of the ocean.
CHAPTER 24
“…But the Twins, in Their infinite wisdom, knew well that they could never stand before their creation, lest the vision of Their true forms render mankind mad. For the first half of eternity They debated this, seeking a solution, searching for a way to have Their voices heard. In the end, it was the Sun who found the way. Seeking out a chosen child, He bestowed upon him all the powers of a god, while the Moon gra
nted the boy all the wisdoms of the world. It was in this way that They were able to speak for the first time to their child, reaching out through the line of men that passed the crown from head unto the other.”
—Creason i’Raz or “Creation of Child,” ancient Percian holy text
“All kneel before His Greatness, Gift of the Sun, Blessed of the Moon, Tash of the mighty city of Karesh Syl!”
It took everything he had for Ekene Okonso not to roll his eyes as he was announced to the court. There had been a time—as a younger man—when he’d taken great pride in hearing his name echo through the silence of the gilded hall. He had been quicker, then, easy on his feet and handsomer by far, and the gazes of his courtiers had always been adoring, respectful, even awestruck. He had been a well-loved ruler, as impressive in his physique as he’d been in shrewdness and will.
Now, though, as his grandchildren began to think of bearing sons and daughters of their own, the strength had long left Ekene’s limbs. The Moon had mercifully allowed him to retain his mind, but he fought mightily not to show the strain it took to climb even the dozen short steps that led up to the three staggered thrones raised over the west end of the hall. When he reached them, he turned on the room, the white-and-red robes his wives had selected for him that morning twisting about his bent form as he settled into the center-most of the three seats. At his right, the chair lay empty. Yseri Suro, his First Hand, was negotiating tariffs with the Tash of Karesh Nan, and wasn’t expected to return for another week at least. At his left, Naizer Ima, his Second Hand, lounged lazily, studying the gathered crowd below them with distinct disdain.
“Look at them,” he grumbled to Ekene, his voice thick with annoyance. “Ask them for their support in trade deals or men to guard our caravans north, and they shy away like cockroaches in the light. Let slip the rumor of an interesting visitor, however, and they flock to your court like ants to sugar.”
Ekene didn’t respond, his mood dark enough without Naizer’s mutterings. His Second was indispensable in his grasp on the city’s commerce and markets and the average values of a slave on any given day, but he’d never made for pleasant company. If it had been possible, the Tash would have had the younger man permanently locked in his offices on the top floor of the palace.
Still, Ekene thought, reaching up to stroke the silver of his beard as he looked out over the court, he’s not wrong.
It had been a long time since he had seen so much of the nobility flock to his halls. There were always a few at every audience, known faces that came seeking either to gain his favor with their consistent presence, or to see what scandals they could gather to whisper about in their social circles. Today, however, it seemed that the better part of the inner city had deigned to grace him with their presence, though it was small wonder as to why. His attendants had informed him that a strange party of men had arrived overnight via the north gate, claiming to be messengers of the fringe cities. Ekene had been none-too-pleased to hear this, of course—the Mahsadën were another entity he would have preferred to hide from sight—but he had to admit it was a curious event. Usually the society preferred to send their envoys in pairs at most, seeking to keep their presence in the politics of the lands an open secret rather than an outright obviousness.
So, when Ekene had heard that a group of nine men—all armed and all claiming to be envoys of the šef—had arrived, he’d been quick to accept their audience.
And with that, he thought privately, his gaze drifting over the crowd below, the gathering of the insects.
The nobility of Karesh Syl looked like nothing short of a hundred colorful birds flocking around a watering hole. They milled about now that Ekene had taken his seat, moving in groups, each more lavish than the last. The ladies of the city looked as though they’d spent most of the morning preparing for whatever excitement they might be privy to once his guests arrived, their ringed black hair rowed or woven into feathers and jewels and metal plates of a thousand different colors, their dresses and gowns looking as though each was trying to out-scandalize the others. The men appeared more reserved, a few among them even looking to be murmuring seriously to one another, but all the same the trims of their coats were lined with furs and gems, and several looked to have what appeared to be live snakes wound about their necks. Ekene had heard that such a fashion was coming into prevalence. One of his wives had even asked him for a python a few nights before.
The Tash had had her lashed for daring to bleat such brazen idiocy in his presence.
Ekene forced himself to look around at Naizer. “What do you know of these ‘envoys’?”
The Second Hand frowned, his cropped black beard twisting and his bald head shining as he leaned over. “Likely not much more than you’ve been told,” he said quietly. “Nine men, in simple clothes. General Saresh almost turned them away at the gate until one presented him with a scroll sealed with the Mahsadën’s mark. Your ‘Third’—” he said the title with blatant repugnance “—believes to know from which city the men have come.”
“Oh?” Ekene asked, curious.
Naizer nodded. “He suspects they hail from Miropa.”
That caught the Tash’s attention. Miropa, the Gem of the South. Each of the fringe cities had their own ring within the Mahsadën, but Miropa was largely considered the most powerful of the municipalities, even by Perce. Beyond that, it was said that the place was now controlled by a single šef, a cripple who’d survived the massacre of his betters the summer before and had somehow pulled the tattered remnants of the society together under his boot.
If these envoys were from this man, this audience might be worth having after all…
At that exact moment, there was a clunk as the massive iron-bound doors at the other end of the hall were unlocked from the outside and began to grind open. The court itself was largely beneath the earth, with only the top quarter of the chamber extending over the ground above them. A line of thick glass plates crowned the apex of the ceiling, however, casting a long pillar of light to bisect the room from one end to the other, and after a second the old Tash made out a number of shadows moving toward them, flickering in the dust settling through the Sun’s rays. There were nine in all, he counted quickly, moving in three rows of three, flanked on either side by armed guards in spiked helms bearing kite shields in one hand while the other rested on the hilts of their matching swords. They wore loose, plain tunics of various materials of both Southern and Percian make, and had it been any other group Ekene would have had them thrown to the lions for daring to present themselves to his court in such a state of disarray.
Instead, though, the Tash couldn’t help but feel a chill as the men approached, moving together with such quiet confidence they might have been a pack of wolves. Their grey eyes flicked steadily about the room, taking in every detail of the place. The high ceiling, the polished marble floors, the white banners woven with the crossed golden spears of the city that fluttered from the pillars. They seemed to miss nothing, only one of them not casting about as though memorizing the space around them. This man led them, walking slightly ahead of the other eight, his own eyes fixed on the thrones. Ekene didn’t know why—there was nothing particularly different about this one figure compared to the others trailing behind him—but he had the distinct impression that this man in particular was not one to be trifled with. Each of the envoys had had their weapons confiscated at the palace gates, of course, but there was something strikingly lethal about the leader of the group, clearly just as confident without a sword as he might have been with one.
Ekene knew of only one other man who moved with such lithesome deadliness, like a cobra shifting silently through high grass.
“Koro,” he said under his breath, speaking to the empty air, “be ready.”
Nothing answered his command, not the faintest clink of metal or shift of leather, but Ekene felt better all the same.
“The šef bid you well, Your Greatness, Tash of the great city of Karesh Syl.”
; The envoys had reached the bottom of the dais and taken a knee, most of them bowing their heads respectfully. Only their leader, half-a-step before the men on either side of him, was looking up at Ekene, hailing him.
“I am Na’zeem,” he continued in a calm, firm voice. “I bring news from the fringe cities, as well as a plea for your assistance from my master.”
“Right into it, then?” Naizer muttered in irritation from Ekene’s left.
The Tash ignored him.
“Should you be who you claim, my home welcomes you, strangers,” Ekene answered formally, lifting a wizened hand and sweeping it across his court. “I understand you bear a letter from your betters that may confirm this?”
The man—Na’zeem—nodded, motioning to a soldier at his right. “It was claimed by your guard, Your Greatness. They will need provide it to you.”
The soldier procured the roll of parchment from behind his shield at once, moving toward the throne. He stopped several feet from the bottom of the dais, not daring to get within even a foot of the lowest step. Ekene gave his Second a nod, and Naizer heaved himself up with a grumble, hurrying down to the court floor.
As Iron Falls (The Wings of War Book 4) Page 26