The Ruin of Kings

by Jenn Lyons

  Kalindra stopped and stared at me as if I were either a difficult puzzle or just being rude, and then continued walking.

  “Hey, you said you’d answer my questions.” I chased after her. “Don’t stop just because they’re stupid questions.”

  She moved aside the wide green leaves of a jungle plant, and beyond I saw a small clearing. The smell of ash and sulfur, as well as something dark and musky, hung thick in the air. The scent rose from steaming pools of water bubbling up from the ground. The pools sunk deep into the black rock in wide overlapping ovals. I suspected they had been widened and deepened by hand.

  She moved over to the edge of a pool and waited for me.

  “So how does this work?”

  She raised an eyebrow. “The bath? It’s for cleaning.”

  “No, I meant the part with a goddess walking around out in the open. The idea that a god has some sacred space where they can manifest . . .” I shook my head. “I’ve never heard of that, and I’m a minstrel’s son. Knowing those sorts of stories is of professional interest to me.”

  “Or maybe you just don’t know everything. Try not to go into shock at the idea.” Kalindra picked up a stick and drew three lines in the ground. “So the world is divided into three states of being—life, magic, and death.”

  “And two Veils that separate them. I know this.”

  She tilted her head and acknowledged what I said. “And most people believe that the living stay here”—she pointed to the first line—“while the dead stay here,” she said as she pointed to the third line. “This area in between, the realm of magic, therefore is the home of the gods, right?”

  I narrowed my eyes. “Is this a trick question?”

  “In a way. Because it’s rubbish. It’s wrong. Yes, the gods can see into all the realms at once—that’s one of the things that makes them gods—but divinities still have physical bodies. Those physical bodies still exist in the land of the living. Avatars who walk and talk and do all the things that living beings do. Most people will never meet the avatar of a god, or if they do, they’ll remain blissfully ignorant of that fact.”* She pointed back to the first line, underscoring it deeply. “Before it was claimed by Thaena, this island was the sanctuary of the god-king Ynis, who loved snakes and reptiles so much he took his human followers and changed them into the Thriss. Ynis thought he was safe here, that no one could touch him or interfere with what he was doing.”

  She broke the stick and tossed the pieces away, smeared the dirt to obscure the markings she had created. “That’s the danger of a sanctuary, and why smart gods don’t advertise where their sanctuaries are located. A god’s avatar can manifest in their own sanctuary, but that very strength makes them vulnerable. The only way to kill a god is to kill their avatar. Ynis died when Emperor Simillion came calling with the sword Urthaenriel.* Thaena is different, though.” Kalindra held out her hands toward the jungle. “She is always here, but yet you’ll never meet her, not unless you decide to join our order and dance the Maevanos yourself.”

  I narrowed my eyes until comprehension settled in. I drew in a breath. “Because she’s the opposite, isn’t she? Her body, her avatar, isn’t in the land of the living at all, is it? She ‘lives’ in the third realm—in the Afterlife.” I blinked. “Can she die?”

  “No.” She answered without hesitation or doubt. Kalindra was a believer, although that didn’t make her wrong. She saw the expression on my face and added, “But don’t worry. If Relos Var dared try anything here, Thaena would show up personally to deal with him. Just because she normally lives in the Land of Peace doesn’t mean she can’t manifest here.”

  I felt a chill. “So if Thaena is the only thing protecting me from Relos Var . . . I really can’t leave, can I?” I felt sick. Taja’s assurance that I could leave if I wanted to now tasted like ash.

  Kalindra was sympathetic. “I’m sure Relos Var will forget about you eventually.”

  “I don’t even know what this has to do with me.”

  Kalindra’s brown eyes stared at me. “There’s a prophecy.” She paused. “No really, stop laughing.”

  I laughed some more.

  Kalindra looked annoyed, but waited for me to stop.

  “A prophecy? Right. Khaemezra said . . . I thought she was jesting. You’ve got to be joking! I’m here because of a prophecy? More of Caerowan’s Devoran paranoia? That’s why Relos Var wanted me? Because some crackpot mad hermit declared I’m going to save the world or something?”

  Her smile turned cruel. “It’s not that kind of prophecy.” She unbuckled her scabbard and laid her sword, chain, and a brace of daggers in a neat pile next to several folded white cloths: towels, from the look of them. Apparently, the Black Brotherhood did indeed use this place as a public bath.

  “So, what kind of prophecy is it?”

  She unlaced her bodice. “The mineral springs here are good for sore muscles and healing injuries. Your wounds are healing nicely, but a soak wouldn’t hurt you.”

  “You didn’t answer my question.” I eyed her as she tossed her bodice aside. She made no effort to shield herself from my stare as she disrobed. There didn’t seem to be any separation of bathing areas for men and women.

  My anger ebbed. I was distracted for some reason.

  “I’m sorry. Did you ask a question?” Slit skirt followed bodice, then bracers and open-mesh chemise. Her body was taut and well muscled. As she bent over to pull off her boots, her back revealed a crisscross of old scar tissue—the hallmark of the disobedient slave. My eyes traced the lines of hardship: the scarring around her wrists and ankles, the brand on the back of her thigh. Old wounds, faded scars. If she was anyone’s slave, it wasn’t recently.

  “I forget.” I stared at her. She wasn’t beautiful. Her face was too long and her nose too crooked. She wasn’t soft enough, fresh enough, for Quuros standards, but Kalindra was hard and fierce and wild. She had her own beauty.

  She caught me staring and laughed, a soft throaty chuckle. “Aren’t the baths public where you come from? You must have seen a naked woman before.”

  “Not like you.”

  She started to reply, some whip-quick remark, but it died in her throat as she looked at me. We stared at each other too long. You know what that’s like, don’t you? You look at someone, and maybe the situation is appropriate and maybe it isn’t, but you make eye contact, and all the little protections, all the walls we put up to keep each other out, unexpectedly fail. You look too long and you see too much, and there’s this sudden sharp thrill as you realize just how badly you want this other person, and that it’s entirely mutual. She stepped toward me, raised her hand to my face.

  I knew what would come next. I wanted what would come next, but a dozen ugly images flashed through my mind. Xaltorath’s “gift.”

  I turned away.

  I wanted her. I really did, but I didn’t trust myself at all.

  My hands shook as I pushed the drawstring pants off my hips, kicking them aside. I dove into the pool like a rabbit hiding from a wolf, not caring that the mineral water was scorching hot or how it might hurt.

  Maybe I wanted it to hurt.

  “Do you know what I like best about staying here on Ynisthana?” Water splashed as Kalindra stepped into a pool.

  She sounded farther away than I expected. I opened my eyes. Kalindra had lowered herself into one of the other pools, physically separate from my own. Unlike me, she’d taken the time to grab towels, soap, and sponges.

  “What?” I asked.

  “You’re allowed to say no.”

  If words were daggers, hers left deep, slow cuts. I felt a release of tension I hadn’t even realized was there, a wave of disorientation. How powerful was that idea?

  Here was a place where I could say no.

  I exhaled and grabbed the edge of the stone pool as if I would drown without the support. I pushed myself up enough to rest my arms against the black slate rock, crossed my hands under my chin. I thought about the ways Kalindra’
s words might be lies: Khaemezra still had my gaesh, after all. I also thought about Taja’s opinion on the freedom inherent in a gaesh. I could still say no. Even to a gaesh command I could say no.

  I reached out and touched the back of Kalindra’s hand as she reached for a washcloth. “I don’t really want to say no,” I confessed. “I just don’t know how to say yes.”

  She had a glorious smile. Kalindra picked up my hand. “Then go with the first one, for now, until you figure out how to do the second. And when you do . . .” She kissed my fingertips, slow and sweet as if my hand was fragile and precious. “. . . come find me.”

  I shuddered again, but it was the good kind of shudder. Something about the slow, gentle way Kalindra moved defied Xaltorath’s tainted memories.

  Then she put a sponge in my hand. “Now wash up, Monkey. We’re going to be late to a party.”

  28: THE FINEST HEALERS

  (Talon’s story)

  Heavy weights forced his eyelids closed, and someone was sitting on his chest. Kihrin tried to breathe, but it was an effort. He was pinned. He couldn’t move. He couldn’t—

  Kihrin gulped air as he opened his eyes. He was lying down, softness wrapped around his body, a pillow under his head. He stared up at a gathered canopy of blue silk, watermarked and shimmering from the reflected light of the morning sun. The air smelled sweet with jasmine and lilac.

  The weight on his chest wasn’t a man, a woman, or a water buffalo: he was being held down by a single silk sheet.

  Kihrin sat up in bed. He was so weak it reminded him of when he was a child with red fever, so drained by illness the very act of movement was a mark of accomplishment. A large white bandage wrapped around his chest. He reached up and felt for the smooth surface of the wire-wrapped gem around his neck. It was still there.

  “Oh, he’s awake! Master Lorgrin, he’s awake!” a woman said. A young woman came into view behind the silk drapes of the four-poster bed. She wore a blue shift that resembled lingerie more than any proper clothing and left about as much to the imagination.

  “I—” His tongue stuck in his throat. He was thirsty, and hungry, and, at the same time, nauseated.

  Another voice. Male. “Hold him up. He needs to drink this.”

  Kihrin looked up to see an old man, dressed in the blue colors of a physicker. Kihrin didn’t have the strength to push him away as the man pressed a goblet against Kihrin’s lips.

  “Come, child. You need to drink,” the old man told him. “I know you’re thirsty. I promise, you’ll keep this down. You must trust me.”

  It wasn’t water or any alcohol Kihrin knew, but it was delicious and after his first sip, he drank gratefully. When he finished, the woman lowered him back onto the pillows.

  Kihrin slept.

  Later, during those brief moments when he gained consciousness and it was light enough to see, he examined his surroundings. He lay in an enormous bed, canopied with blue textured silk, just as the sheets were also made from silk. Silk was too expensive to be used for anything but clothing for the wealthiest nobles. It was such a valuable commodity in Quur that it was held as equivalent to gold by weight. Using silk as bedding was like sprinkling gold dust in a stable.

  The large room was grander and more ostentatious than any room Kihrin had ever seen before. Gilded statuettes and fine porcelain vases filled with fresh exotic blue flowers covered every space that could carry them. A gold chandelier with sapphire crystals hung from the center of the room. Dark blue tiles covered the walls, etched with gold. A week ago, he might have enjoyed his stay, or at least sized up the security for a later nighttime burglary.

  Now the room filled him with dread.

  There was only one nobleman obsessed with blue who had any interest in him. In his moments of lucidity Kihrin wondered why he wasn’t in chains, why he wasn’t dead, why his only guards were physickers and pretty slave girls instead of men with swords. It made no sense, and he had no answers.

  The next morning, the physicker woke him.

  “Remember me?” the healer asked. “I’m Master Lorgrin. Why don’t you see if you can sit up on your own today?”

  Kihrin did so, grimacing at the way his chest ached. “I thought you bloodletters were supposed to be able to fix someone’s injuries with a snap of your fingers. Or do you charge by the hour?”

  “Strong enough for sarcasm, I see. That’s a good sign.” The old man pulled the bandages down over Kihrin’s chest and put a hand on his left breast. “You took a crossbow bolt straight through the heart. Tore your right atrium and aorta to bits. I had to use magic to keep your blood circulating while I fixed the damage.” He gave Kihrin a sharp look. “You do not want me to rush a procedure like that, or you’ll end up dropping dead of a heart seizure by the time you’re eighteen.”

  Kihrin looked at the skin over his heart. There wasn’t even a scar. “Uh . . . thank you?”

  “Just doing my job,” the old man said with gruff tenderness. “As much as it galls me to admit it, the man you really should be thanking is Darzin. The gods must love you a lot, kid, because I would have bet metal that boy never paid any attention to my lessons on cardiac stabilization spells. Yet here you are.”

  “Darzin—” Kihrin flinched. “Where am I?”

  The physicker smiled. “The D’Mon palace. I assume you won’t be too surprised if I tell you it’s in the Sapphire District of the Upper Circle, will you?”

  “Why—why am I here?”

  “Probably because your father liked your mother in a special sort of way.” He raised the bandages up again. “The heart is almost back to normal function. I suspect you’ll be up and around in no time, but I strongly advise you to avoid any strenuous activity for at least another week. Rest, and lots of it. That’s an order.”

  “No, I mean—” Kihrin started to take a deep breath, felt his chest twinge, and thought better of it. “Why am I here, in this room, not in a cell? And did Pretty—I mean, did the Lord Heir bring in anyone else for healing? An old man? A beautiful woman with braided hair?”

  “No, I’m sorry, but if he brought anyone back besides you, he didn’t tell me—and he would have if they were injured.” The physicker looked at him curiously. “But a cell? Why in Galava’s name would you think Darzin D’Mon would put you in a cell, my lord?”

  Kihrin’s throat clenched. “What did you just call me?”

  The old man looked apologetic. “Ah, I know. I’m bad with the titles. Don’t use them enough. Therin’s always dogging me for it. Probably going to get me killed when Darzin takes over. Honestly though, when you’ve overseen the births of as many D’Mon babies as I have, it’s sometimes hard to remember that they’re all grown up and toilet-trained too.”

  Kihrin felt his heart start to rattle. “I’m not a lord.”

  “I’m sorry, kid. I don’t know what Darzin told you, and it’s not my place to say. He’s waiting to talk to you: I’m sure he’ll explain everything.”

  Kihrin pulled his knees up to his chest, put his arms around his legs. “I don’t want to talk to him. His assassins killed my father.”

  The old healer took a deep breath and grimaced. “Kihrin—it’s Kihrin, right?”

  Kihrin nodded.

  “I’m sorry about the man who raised you. You were obviously close to him and I know that’s got to hurt. I’m about to say something to you that will also hurt, so if you don’t want me to, just tell me and I’ll shut up and go away.”

  “You can say whatever you want. It doesn’t mean I’ll believe you.”

  “Sounds fair,” the healer admitted. “So, you need to think about this: that man may have raised you, but he wasn’t your father. Your father, your real father, is here, and he’s alive. If you were told you were abandoned or adopted, or I don’t know, found under a cabbage leaf, it’s a lie: you were stolen. Kidnapping a royal babe? That, Kihrin, is an executable offense. What Darzin did may seem horrible to you, but it was completely within his rights as a D’Mon to put your kidnappers
to death. No one will question his actions. It was just unlucky that you were caught up in that raid, but fortunately you’ve pulled through and everything will be okay.”

  “Taja! No . . . It wasn’t like that. It wasn’t anything like that. His soldiers didn’t care who I was. He didn’t give them orders to save me. He was going to kill all of us.” Inside his chest, Kihrin’s newly repaired heart felt like it was about to burst open. He squeezed his eyes shut and put his head on his knees. No! It can’t be . . . I can’t be Ogenra. I can’t. I can’t find out I really am Ogenra only after Morea is already dead.

  He remembered all the things Surdyeh never let him do, all the ways the old harper kept him out of the public eye or discouraged him from seeking sponsorship with the Revelers. He felt the dreadful worm of doubt sink into him. Surdyeh had known. He had known.

  Ola had known too. They had both tried to warn him, in their own ways, about the consequences of seeing the High General. Now they were both dead. Talon had said she was going to kill Ola, and knowing what she was, Kihrin knew there was nothing Ola could do to save herself. She was already dead—had probably been dead for days.

  He began to shake.

  Kihrin flinched as he felt Lorgrin’s hand on his shoulder. “That’s enough excitement for one day. I’ll let the Lord Heir know you won’t be ready to join him for breakfast until tomorrow.” He paused, frowning. “You should rest. You’re going to need your strength.”

  Kihrin tried to sleep through that entire day and the next, but Lorgrin was wise to his tricks. At dawn, the old healer pulled back the drapes on the windows. “My next feat will be to summon up a gallon of water right over your head. Don’t think I don’t know how—being able to create clean water on command is one of the most useful spells I ever learned at the Academy.”

  Kihrin stumbled out of bed. He stared balefully at Lorgrin. “Now what?”