Maralah continued to stare at the fire. The reflection of the flames flickered in her eyes. “It doesn’t matter now.”
“It may not matter to Saiduan, but it matters to Dhai.”
She said nothing.
Roh gazed across the fire to the rest of the camp. Low voices from the side of the Woodland Dhai. The twang of some stringed instrument from the Saiduan circle of makeshift tents. A few dozen. All Maralah was able to save. No wonder she was bitter.
“Do you really want to leave all that power to the Tai Mora?” Roh asked. “The power of the heavens themselves?”
“I won’t be here to see what they do with it.”
“Do you think there’s a place in this world, or any of them, that she can’t reach?”
“I’m not a threat to anyone.”
“Neither were the Dhai.”
She rounded on him. Her dark gaze was piercing, and he saw the sanisi in her, then: the old Maralah – the one he had first spied dancing in the courtyard with Kadaan – the woman who had commanded great armies and had the ear of the most powerful man in the world.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said. “You were always an arrogant child.”
“They need a key, a guide, and a worldbreaker,” Roh said. “All focused on that fifth temple they dredged up north of here. I can get a small party to the People’s Temple from any other temple.”
“You need more than that,” Maralah said. “I’ve seen the diagrams. The Dhai, Meyna, showed them to me.”
“Oh,” Roh said. “You… but if you know, then–”
“Who is this key, Roh? And a worldbreaker? And when you have them, remember that every temple needs four jistas, and a fifth to stand at the center of them and act as some kind of living conduit. How many jistas do you have? I haven’t kept up with what your new Kai, or Empress, or whatever she calls herself has been doing, but your people here have. She’s filling those temples with her jistas and putting all of her pieces in place. You are already too late. Her people are there.”
“But–”
“Be reasonable,” Maralah said. “I know it’s newer for you, but understand that I’ve been through what you have. I’ve seen my country destroyed, its people decimated. I had hope once too. It nearly destroyed all of us.”
Maralah shifted her attention to two Saiduan men making their way over with another bottle of aatai. “Ah, here we are,” Maralah said. “Look who I found for you, Kadaan.”
At that name, a thread of icy fire bit through Roh’s belly. He stared.
The men came into the flicker light of the circle of fire, and there he was – Kadaan Soagaan, whom Roh had last seen fighting for his life in Shoratau. The Shadow of Caisau. By all rights, he should have been a ghost, too.
Kadaan was thinner, wiry, and his hair was much longer. A new scar puckered the skin under his left eye.
“You are a sight, puppy,” Kadaan said. Roh’s mouth went dry. He had no idea what to say.
Maralah glanced from one to the other and said, “You look like men who could use some aatai.” When Roh still didn’t respond, she took hold of his shoulder, squeezed it, and bent over him. She whispered, “Oma is fickle, and grants us few choices to save what we love. Stop fighting, Roh. Stop fighting and live again.”
24
Zezili hated everything about the woods. The insects. The loamy smell. The crashing and chirping of the birds and tree gliders. She itched and sweated, but was still not thirsty, and hadn’t had to pee or shit the entire three days they had trekked through the woods. Maybe that was why she wasn’t paying attention to her footing anymore.
They had come to the edge of the Woodland the day before, and were following the great ridge of the plateau where the trees and brush had been thinned by storms and poor soil. The sea smelled of death, and brought with it a cool wind, but this far up, it didn’t bother Zezili much.
Lilia walked much more slowly, so Zezili paused to let her catch up for the hundredth time. She didn’t remember where exactly she put her feet, only that when Lilia got near enough, she pushed off on one foot to begin again, and the ground crumbled beneath her.
“Fuck!” Zezili yelled. She reached instinctively for Lilia. Caught her sleeve.
The two of them slid down the ravine together, rushing toward the beach. They landed in a tangle, covered in sandy soil and rocks. When the rolling stopped, Zezili found herself dizzy and damp. She raised her head and saw a marshy grassland, and sand beneath her fingers. The stink of the sea was much worse here. She stood, wiped herself off, and peered over the grassy dunes. She caught the sparkle of the wine dark seas.
Lilia moaned.
Zezili helped her up. “You alive? Anything broken?”
“I’m leaking,” Lilia said, pulling her hand away from the oozing green pus at her shoulder.”
“I think we’re close,” Zezili said, “if you were right about–”
“Oh,” Lilia said. She gazed north, out past Zezili’s shoulder.
Zezili turned.
A thousand paces up the beach, a massive, decaying beast lay on its side, like an old snoozing dog. The wind was blowing in from the sea, but it was only a matter of time before they caught the stink of it.
“Is that recent?” Lilia asked.
“How would I know?”
“I just wondered.”
“It’s not rotten, not bleached from the suns. Not picked clean. I guess it’s new.”
“How can you see that?
“Easily. You can’t?”
Lilia frowned.
They walked along the beach, keeping to the less sandy soil near the edge of the cliff because it was easier to navigate. The wind picked up, sending cool, lashing mist at them. Zezili didn’t mind it, but after a time, Lilia was trembling with cold. Zezili wanted to offer something – a blanket? But they had nothing. Lilia’s lips were flaking and parched, though she did not complain.
Zezili realized how ill-equipped they were for a journey of any length. How long had it been since Lilia ate anything? Zezili had had nothing since the blood, and she still felt strong, though there was a pang of longing when she thought about how sweet the blood had been.
“Maybe there’s something worth eating in that carcass,” Zezili said.
Lilia make a retching sound and spit up a little bile.
“You don’t know. Come on.” Zezili knew things were bad when she felt like the optimist in the group.
They made it three more paces before Lilia collapsed. It was all very sudden. Zezili stood over her, and Lilia was completely out. Zezili sighed then simply picked her up and carried on.
She drew closer and closer to the dead thing, until she could make out the curve of a great harbor carved into the cliffs just behind it. The salty spray of the waves kept churning up to the mouth of the cave and then stopping, spraying upward as if meeting some invisible resistance. Some jista illusion? Perhaps.
Soon she found footsteps along the beach, coming from the direction of the curved harbor. If she squinted, she could just see a few dark shapes moving on top of the cliff. She paused just as three figures appeared from the mouth of the cave, seemingly from thin air. They scrambled across the broken stone, heading toward her. From a distance, she could not make out if they were Dhai or Tai Mora. Surely they were too tall and dark for either?
Three was not too many. She could murder them all if she had to. But what she needed was water for her annoying little ward.
As they caught sight of her, they reached for weapons. Infused blades. The air pressure remained stable. Not jistas, then.
“I need help!” Zezili called in Dorinah, which was likely useless, but she hoped the tone would carry. “I need help. Water?” She curled her lip when they continued to look confused. She went on, in Dhai, “Water? Not armed.”
The figures were a mix of people – two Saiduan and a Dhai, all bundled against the cool weather. The Dhai moved ahead of the others. Carrying a body, perhaps, made up for h
er terrible accent. She was clearly someone in distress.
The Dhai took Lilia from her. Zezili tried to tell him it was fine, no, she could do it, but honestly, it was good to have her hands free. Her stomach ached briefly as Lilia moved away, but they did not go far, and Zezili continued to follow. “Water? Food, probably. Oh, a bone tree! You know–”
“We know about bone trees,” the man said, in Dorinah.
“I can speak Dhai too,” Zezili said.
He narrowed his eyes. His gaze swept the beach. “Just the two of you?”
“Yes.”
“Come, follow us.”
Zezili kept her mouth shut and followed them along the coast and back into the curve of the rocky harbor. The closer she got to the invisible barrier that broke the waves, the clearer it was that it was a jista-created thing. When she stepped through it, she came into a deep, cold cavern. Two battered ships rested in the back of the cave where the heavy stones had been beaten to fine gravel. A jet of light pierced the gloom, projected from a break in the cavern ceiling that illuminated a path worn into the rear of the cave that went up and up and up to what she assumed was a camp, above.
The Dhai took her past the great ships. The sound of hammering and hauling, the scrape of leather on stone, filled the cavern. The air here was heavier; jistas must be working somewhere inside the ships.
They climbed the path at the back of the cave and came up into the light. A scattering of tents stood amid a stand of young bonsa trees. There were clearly two camps – one closer to the woods that was mostly Dhai, and another, scrappier camp made of tattered old sails and scrounged wood that mainly housed Saiduan. Interesting. Possibly these were among the last Saiduan still alive in the world.
The Dhai brought Lilia to an open-air tent on the Dhai side of the camp, one where several other patients were clearly convalescing. Yet it was a Saiduan who came up to them and gestured to an empty cot, said to Zezili in Dhai, “What happened?”
“Bone tree.”
The woman showed her teeth. “We’ve had a few of those. I’m amazed she’s still alive. Do you need anything? You look–” she gave Zezili a searching stare, “–well. You seem very well, actually.”
Zezili was taken aback at the kindness. No weapons. No obvious jistas menacing her. If they had an illusionary ward below, they were certainly fearful of outsiders. But not her, apparently. Or Lilia.
“I’m good. Great. But she’s… She needs to be all right.”
“Is she your lover?”
“What? Oh, fuck, no. I hate her.”
“Oh. Um. All right, well, come and have some tea. I’ll attend her.”
Zezili walked over to the next tent where a long table was set up. Three fires blazed nearby, one with tea and two with some kind of bubbling stew. She didn’t want either and still found it bizarre no one here had interrogated her yet. Maybe they were all busy working on the ship. Maybe she didn’t look dangerous? The second idea bothered her. Did she not look dangerous anymore, with her clear skin and lack of scars and all her limbs in place? She wondered if she could find a mirror. Zezili sat at the table where a few Dhai were having tea. They tried to make conversation, but she didn’t want tea and she didn’t want to talk.
“You know where I can find a mirror?” she asked.
“The infirmary,” one said.
“Maralah may have one,” said another.
“Who’s Maralah?”
“Tall Saiduan woman, older. Very growly. Makes a face like this.” The man scrunched up his face as if he tasted something sour. The others laughed.
Zezili didn’t want to get too far away from Lilia. The trouble with not being used to pain and discomfort anymore was that when it came, it bothered her more than it probably should have.
She wandered back to the infirmary instead, and asked the Saiduan doctor for a mirror.
The woman returned with a palm-sized mirror framed in silver. It had once had a handle, but it had been broken or seared off.
Zezili held the mirror back as far as she could and scrutinized her face. She barely recognized herself. Some younger version of who she had been stared back, all soft skin – hardly a wrinkle or a crease, and certainly no scars. The Empress of Dorinah’s cats had left her with a monstrous visage, and seeing herself as she had been when she was newly recruited into the woman’s army brought with it a wash of both good and terrible memories. Her marriage to Anavha. The fights with her sisters over him. The estate the Empress granted her, and the dajians who were as useful to her as her dogs. Daolyn. What had ever happened to Daolyn, that eager little gem of a dajian? She had made the best coats.
Lost in memories, she hardly noticed the image passing behind her: a tumble of brown hair, a handsome curve of a familiar face.
Anavha.
Zezili closed her eyes. Opened them. There, staring back at her in the mirror, was Anavha. Tall and still very thin, bearded now, but hardly enough to hide who he was. He looked freshly washed. Big brown eyes. They widened as she met his look in the mirror.
I am imagining things, Zezili thought, but she turned anyhow, her heart catching.
And there was Anavha.
She opened her mouth, but no sound came out. What was there to say? How was this possible?
He took a step back. That couldn’t be right. Why would he fear her? He was hers. Like the dogs, like the dajians… Dajians like Lilia, like these people who had taken her in and fed her, more fool them. Right?
Anavha gaped. His face flushed. He grabbed at his coat, as if trying to shield himself from her.
“It’s all right,” Zezili said. She held out her right hand, her perfect right hand, good as new, as unmarred and far softer than it had been on their wedding day.
“No!” Anavha said, and he ran.
Zezili’s heart ached.
25
Natanial had chosen his side, mostly freely. But choosing and being contented in that choice were very different things. While he had been unable to sleep since the Empress of Tai Mora had warded him to ensure his loyalty, Otolyn had snored softly and serenely ever since crossing over with his force of fighters. The Empress had access to more jistas, many of them loyal to a woman called Gian. The extra jistas meant more traveling from woodland hill to woodland dale, popping to and from areas where they had limited intelligence about a Dhai presence.
Natanial was not keen on stealing or murdering children, but the Empress’s orders were precise, and he understood her reasoning, even if he didn’t agree with it.
“A woman and a child,” Monshara had said after they left the Empress’s presence. “She didn’t tell you it’s her woman, and her child.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Shadows,” Monshara said. “She wants us to find them so she can kill them and bring her version over.”
“Surely she’s had any number of people pursing them?”
“Of course. But we have good intelligence now. A captive rebel from Tira’s Temple who broke in an interrogation.”
“The first to break?”
“Of course not. Just the first to break who actually knew something. Biggest camp we’re clearing yet.”
Natanial stood with her now in a slight clearing as a new pair of winks opened, giving their forces a view of a few simple tents and the old, scattered remains of large bonfires. It certainly didn’t look like over a thousand people lived there. How they were supposed to root out a single woman and child from this rats’ nest was a mystery, but Monshara had taken charge of this one.
“They’re underground,” Monshara said. “That’s what the intelligence says.”
“You going to drown them out?” Natanial asked.
“No, no, Natanial. We’ll burn them out, like rats.”
Natanial could not help but wonder if Anavha was somewhere there, huddled underground with the unwashed refugee Dhai. If he was, there was a good chance he could save himself. The Empress had been right, though. Anavha was not a complete fool; he would have g
one home, to Aaldia. Natanial certainly hoped so.
“Not very sporting, is it?” Otolyn, his second, said from behind them. She was still on the other side, waiting for her own wink to open. She was due at the opposite end of the camp where they had found a secondary exit. She still carried that damn Dorinah head with her, like a talisman, dangling from the back of her mount.
“Hold the commentary,” Natanial said.
“This better pay a lot,” Otolyn said.
“When the fire starts, you’ll smell it,” Monshara called back. “Kill them as they come up for air.”
“Here we go,” Otolyn said, and moved away from the frame of the wink and toward her own squad.
Natanial moved left, and Monshara went right; their respective forces joined them, spreading out quickly over the ground of the clearing. The jistas stepped into the circle made by their two forces: two sinajistas and a tirajista. The response from the Dhai came quickly, far more quickly than Natanial had anticipated.
A trembling wave of tumbling vines erupted from the ground. Even as Natanial reined his bear back, the Tai Mora sinajistas were countering, sending waves of flame into the writhing plant life. Smoke billowed into the air, caught up in the tree canopy. Bits of ashy leaves rained over them.
An onslaught of arrows fell from the trees, one wave, then a second. The sinajistas burned them out of the air, but a few got through. One took their tirajista in the shoulder, and she went down.
“Should have brought more jistas,” Natanial muttered.
Monshara called another wave forward from a new wink gaping at the center of their forces. Six more jistas moved onto the field, this time placing themselves squarely behind Natanial’s mercenaries. To the Empress, his people were little more than a human shield for her gifted troops.
Natanial started a count, wondering how long the Dhai here could truly outlast them. No doubt this show of strength was meant to delay them so the others could flee out the far exit, but Otolyn and her troops would be there waiting for them.
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