Eye of Truth

by Lindsay Buroker

  He rubbed his face. The feeling in his stomach wasn’t nerves, not exactly. He didn’t know what it was, but it wasn’t what he’d expected. He’d longed for an end to the war for so long, it had become a habit, but he wasn’t sure what he was coming home to. His crusty old father? The woman who hadn’t waited?

  Someone walked up from behind and thumped Jev on the shoulder. “Is the city as wondrous a sight to you as it is to me, Captain?” the cheerful voice asked.

  Jev attempted to arrange his face into an expression of good cheer as Second Lieutenant Targyon joined him at the rail.

  “Korvann remains beautiful,” Jev said, hoping the young officer wouldn’t notice that he didn’t quite answer the question.

  Targyon, one of fallen King Abdor’s nephews, hadn’t earned a reputation as a great warrior or dauntless leader during his two years at the front, but his bookishness had lent itself toward craftiness. Despite the affable smile that made him seem simple rather than shrewd, the twenty-two-year-old man didn’t miss much.

  “I was beginning to wonder if I’d ever again see a settlement that wasn’t full of death and booby traps. And I was only out there for two years. I can only imagine what this moment must be like to you after ten. That’s almost half my lifetime.” Targyon shook his head.

  “Yes.” Jev lowered his voice when he added, more to himself than to his young officer, “Long enough to grow jaded to death and fear and pain and to almost forget one’s identity. But not quite long enough to forget… other things.”

  Targyon’s brow furrowed.

  Jev forced a smile onto his face. “I’m looking forward to getting smashing drunk and sleeping it off on the beach under one of those thatch umbrellas,” he offered, both because that was what so many of the men had expressed longing for and because it did sound appealing right now.

  “That’s how you’ll celebrate? You won’t go home to see your father? Your mother has passed, hasn’t she? You never mentioned if there was anyone else.”

  Jev locked that smile onto his face, though it wanted to drop off onto the deck of the ship.

  Naysha, her name floated into his mind. He’d thought he had gotten over her, come to accept that she had moved on. It had been years now. But seeing the city he’d visited so often in his youth and knowing he would soon ride past the farms and vineyards of his family’s estate brought all the memories back. Too many memories.

  “No,” Jev said. “There’s no one else.”

  Oh, he had cousins, aunts, and uncles aplenty, but they weren’t the ones occupying his thoughts.

  Since Targyon looked like he might pry, Jev hurried to add, “What will you do, Lieutenant?”

  “Go back to school and finish my classes. Become a professor of the sciences, as I’d always planned. This…” Targyon extended a hand backward, encompassing the hundred-odd men out on the deck, the soldiers who had survived countless battles, fighting for a king who’d never been able to see that the war was unwinnable. “This was a startling dose of reality and something I’ll always remember, but I wasn’t a soldier two years ago when I joined you in Taziira, and in my heart, I know I’m still not. I do appreciate you letting me tag along, letting me get myself into trouble even.”

  Targyon offered a lopsided grin, silently alluding to how few zyndar captains had wanted the king’s scholarly nephew in their company. But he’d fit in well with the intelligence-gathering Gryphon Company, and Jev had never minded having him along. He hadn’t been a burden.

  “You’re a soldier,” Jev said. “Don’t let anyone tell you differently. You became a soldier the day you stopped hiding under the table in the mess hall and started helping me ferret out the activities of the Taziir.”

  “Thought I saw the boy under the table last week,” came a deep male voice from behind them, the timbre reminiscent of rocks grinding together.

  “Only because I dropped my fig,” Targyon said, turning toward Cutter, the only dwarf who’d fought with the kingdom army during the war.

  Red-haired, red-bearded, and barefoot, Cutter wore a belt full of weapons and tools that would have brought most men to their knees with its weight. After almost five years, Jev still didn’t know his real name. Cutter assured him it was too difficult for humans to pronounce, even though Jev spoke six languages in addition to a smattering of Preskabroton Dwarf.

  “That wasn’t a prize I was willing to let go easily,” Targyon added. “Considering nothing but berries grow on the elves’ benighted continent.”

  “So long as there was a reason your dusty butt was top-up like a dirt flower sprouting from a rock.”

  “A dirt flower? Is that an actual plant?” Targyon arched his eyebrows at Jev.

  “Maybe,” Jev said, “but dwarves have about fifty words for dirt. It’s possible there wasn’t a more apt translation.”

  “I hope you’re not mocking my language, human.” Cutter pointed the hook that replaced his missing right hand up at Jev’s face. “I’d hate to have to break your nose when you’ve somehow managed to survive all these years of battles without a blow to crook it.”

  Cutter’s own nose looked like a sculptor’s drunken apprentice had battered at it for years with a hammer.

  “You’d better treat my nose well,” Jev said, “if you want that introduction to the city’s master gem cutter.”

  “Arkura Grindmor,” Cutter said, his tone managing to take on a wistful quality without losing any of its harshness. He faced the railing and the city. Their vessel had sailed close enough that the masts and smokestacks of docked ships blocked the view of the waterfront, but meandering streets climbed up the slope from the harbor with buildings visible as they stretched up and over the ridge. “Can we see the master today? Do you know where the workshop is located?”

  “I do know where his shop is, assuming it hasn’t moved in the last ten years.” Jev looked to Targyon since he’d been in the city far more recently.

  “I don’t think she’s moved in ten years,” he said dryly.

  “There’s plenty of moving involved in bringing out the magic in a gem,” Cutter said. “I’m sure she’s as sound as a boulder.”

  “That’s a compliment, right?” Targyon asked.

  Jev nodded. “For a dwarf, yes. He’s practically swooning. One wonders if his interest in our city’s master gem cutter isn’t more personal than professional. I hadn’t realized Master Grindmor is a, er, woman.” Considering he’d seen the dwarf a few times and even gone to the shop once, it was somewhat alarming that he hadn’t known that.

  “She does have that appealing beard.” Targyon scraped his fingers through his own beard. It was on the clumpy and scraggly side, but Jev’s wasn’t much better. None of them had bathed, shaved, or had haircuts in he couldn’t remember how long.

  “Indeed,” Jev said. “It’s fuller and fluffier than the tail of a wolfhound.”

  Cutter squinted up at Jev’s face, perhaps entertaining nose-breaking fantasies again. “I’ve never met her,” was all he said. “But I’ve waited a long time to beg her to take me on and teach me.”

  Cutter touched one of the many leather pouches and kits attached to his belt, one that held his jewelry tools. He had often put those tools to use while assisting the army, repairing and improving the dragon-tear gems that some of the officers wielded. They were the only source of magical power in the world that humans could draw upon and use, and they’d been imperative in surviving against the magical Taziir. Jev didn’t know what more the dwarf hoped to learn about carving, but he owed it to Cutter to help him gain an apprenticeship if he wanted one.

  “King Alderoth?” a man asked as he approached Targyon. It was Lieutenant Morfan, one of the signal officers.

  “What?” Targyon’s brow furrowed at the incorrect address.

  Jev wondered if they had both misheard it. The earnest Lieutenant Morfan wasn’t known for telling jokes. Or laughing at the ones others told.

  “Sire.” Morfan dropped to one knee and bowed his head. “You
may have noticed the flag message we received a short while ago.”

  Jev and Targyon glanced toward the high stone walls that stretched into the Anchor Sea, creating a protected harbor for the docks and swimming beaches. A semaphore soldier had been atop it earlier, waving his colored flags toward the Fleet Stallion. Since Jev was colorblind, he’d never tried to add the semaphore code to his repertoire of languages, but he did remember thinking the flags had been waving about more quickly than usual. More urgently?

  “Uhm, yes, but whatever you think you saw must have been a mistake if…” Targyon spread a helpless hand and glanced to Jev, as if he had some idea what was going on.

  He did not. As his father’s eldest—and now only—son, Jev knew how the government and the succession worked, but he couldn’t think of anything that would account for this. King Abdor was dead, but according to the last reports Jev’s company had received, his three sons were alive with Crown Prince Dazron running the kingdom.

  “It’s not a mistake, Sire. I checked three times to be certain. I, too, was… surprised.” The lieutenant lifted his head but only enough to glance up at Targyon. “The three princes died of a rare disease of the blood, all within weeks of each other and all quite suddenly. This left the kingdom without a named heir. The four archmages of the Orders came together and debated the merits of the children of the king’s sisters.”

  Jev scratched his bearded jaw and watched Targyon’s face as the story unfolded. His mouth hung open. No, it was frozen open. The expression stamped there held both horror and disbelief.

  Horror for the deaths of the princes, Jev guessed. He didn’t know how close Targyon was with his cousins, but unlike their warmongering father, they had been well-liked among the populace. And disbelief because—

  “I’m the youngest,” Targyon managed to blurt. “Of six boys. My mother is the oldest of my uncle’s sisters, yes, but Himon, Dralyn, and—four hells, all of them would be before me.”

  “I don’t claim to understand, Sire.” The lieutenant was careful to use the royal honorific. Whether this proved to be a mistake or not, he wouldn’t risk failing to respect the possibility. “I just know what I read in the flags. The ship’s captain would like you to join him. We’ll be docking shortly, and he’s arranging a suitable bodyguard for you. Representatives of the Orders, including Archmage Petor, should be waiting to explain everything to you.”

  “Bodyguard,” Targyon mouthed, then looked to Jev again.

  “Sorry, Lieutenant,” Jev said, figuring Targyon would appreciate a familiar title right now. “I don’t know what to tell you, but I do know the oldest-is-considered-first rule is only for the king’s direct descendants. In this situation, the precedent is for the archmages to decide among themselves which of the potential heirs that put themselves forward would be best for the kingdom.”

  “Put themselves forward?” Targyon brightened at this potential loophole. “I didn’t do that. That makes this a mistake. Or maybe they assumed since I volunteered to serve in the army that I would—no, this must be a mistake. And I can get out of it, right?”

  “You’ll have to discuss it with the archmages,” Jev said neutrally. He couldn’t imagine young Targyon saying no or even arguing with those intimidating figures. Few did. On paper, the Orders and the kingdom government had equal power over the land, but the archmages tended to get what they wanted, especially in those rare incidents when all four Orders worked together toward a common goal.

  “I will.” Targyon nodded firmly and turned, almost tripping over the lieutenant who still knelt, his head bowed. “Where’s the ship’s captain, Morfan?”

  “Permission to rise, Sire?”

  “Uh, yeah.”

  Morfan stood. “I’ll take you to him.”

  Jev felt numb as he watched them go, having a hard time envisioning Targyon as king. Even if he only dove under tables these days for figs.

  How had this happened? A disease of the blood? That struck down all three princes in the prime of their lives? By the founders, that was as unlikely as a dragon cave without treasure in it. Jev hoped the Orders’ inquisitors were crawling all over the castle looking for signs of foul play. He imagined every newspaper in the city speculating that the Taziir were behind it.

  But why would they be? The elves had won the war. Their archers had found the cracks in Abdor’s armor and taken him down, leaving no one else who cared to continue the assault. The kingdom was no further threat to Taziira.

  “That boy is going to be a king?” Cutter asked. He’d been silent during the exchange, but he scratched his head vigorously with his hook now. If the metal appendage bit into his scalp, he didn’t notice it. “He’s barely out of diapers.”

  Jev didn’t voice an objection to the observation since he was more than ten years older than Targyon and also had a tendency to think of him as a boy. What had the Orders been thinking?

  A green-clad figure with pointed ears and silver hair walked toward Jev and Cutter, his pack slung over one shoulder and his longbow visible over the other. His elegant facial features were impossible to read as he glanced past them and toward the ships. The Fleet Stallion was only seconds from sliding into one of several vacant slips along the main dock—other troop transport ships trailed behind, waiting their turns.

  The sailors scurrying about preparing the Stallion glanced uneasily at the elf.

  “You decide to take me up on my offer, Lornysh?” Jev asked.

  Lornysh arched a slender silver eyebrow, first at Jev, then at Cutter. “To share a guest room with a snoring dwarf?”

  “My family has a castle. There’s more than one guest room.”

  “Are there trees?” Lornysh’s ice-blue eyes shifted, his gaze sweeping across the city.

  Here and there, squat olive trees rose between buildings, and one could glimpse the dark mangroves stretching up the Jade River, but to an elf accustomed to the dense northern forests across the sea, Jev supposed the foliage seemed sparse.

  “There are some trees. My father’s land is fifteen miles that way.” Jev pointed up the river and past the ridge. “Outside of the city. We have fields for the cows and sheep, but there are copses here and there near the water. We have a lovely bog where we grow lots of gort leaves.”

  “Hm.” The single note held disapproval, for the paucity of trees rather than for the gort bog, Jev assumed. One didn’t typically disapprove of gort until one had tasted it. Multiple times. Which didn’t take long in Korvann where it was served with almost every meal. “Your people are such… assiduous loggers.”

  The pause did nothing to hide Lornysh’s distaste of all things related to humans and their proclivities. That he’d worked so many years as a scout in Gryphon Company, and occasionally even an assassin, was a marvel. He’d never shared his reason for turning on his people, but a few omissions here and there led Jev to believe Lornysh had been cast out for some reason.

  “We like to clear them so we can farm and eat, but I can find you some trees on our land,” Jev said. “I would be happy to string you up a hammock outside the castle.”

  It would actually be easier for Jev to fulfill his promise of sanctuary to Lornysh if he opted to sleep outside. Perhaps his father need never know an elf was on his land. Not that Jev would lie if the subject came up. His honor wouldn’t permit that.

  “You going to live here among the humans, Lorn?” Cutter asked.

  “For a few weeks. I wish to see some of their culture and art. I haven’t decided yet what I’ll do after that.”

  Jev hadn’t either, and this was his home. Was that odd?

  He was sure his father would be quick to put him to work again on the estate, which had to have been neglected since the king had required that Jev recruit eighty of their men to form up a company to join the army with him. So many women had been without their husbands for so long. And some of their husbands would never return.

  Jev felt he owed something to the estate for that, especially since he hadn’t been able to
keep an eye on his men once he’d been transferred to Gryphon Company, but a job overseeing Dharrow farms, dairy, and craftsmen seemed far too tame to hold his interest after the action of war. All the other men spoke of plans, of all the delightful things they would enjoy now that they were free. And Jev had no idea beyond introducing a dwarf to a bearded woman and finding a hammock for Lornysh.

  A blue robe on the docks caught his eye. A woman from the Water Order stood at the base of the recently extended gangplank, a space of several feet around her clear of people, even though soldiers, sailors, and vendors hawking their wares crowded the area. Only one person stood near the robed figure, another woman, this one in a blue monk’s gi. She was as stout as a dwarf, one of their temple’s enforcers, no doubt.

  Jev saw the browns, reds, and whites of the other Orders farther up the dock and assumed the temple representatives were here to talk to Targyon. Poor kid. Jev wasn’t sure what was worse. Getting stuck with the job of king or having to deal with the Orders.

  “I’ve heard you have to join some kind of criminal guild if you want to be an assassin in a human city,” Cutter said.

  “I will join nothing,” Lornysh said.

  “So, you’re going to be as social here as you were in the company.”

  “There is nothing I wish to say to humans. Or dwarves.”

  “Or elves either, apparently,” Cutter said, “seeing as how you’re fine with poking them with arrows these days. Is it hard making friends when you’ll stick pointy metal in anyone you meet?”

  Lornysh looked at Jev, as if Jev were Cutter’s handler and could silence him with a jerk of a leash.

  “How far is the hammock tree from his room?” Lornysh asked.

  “Nearly a mile,” Jev said, waving toward the gangplank. Targyon and six soldiers pressed into bodyguard duty had already descended, and other men were crowding it, eager to escape into the city. “The grounds around the castle were cleared centuries ago, back when squabbles between the zyndar were as common within the kingdom’s borders as battles with surrounding nations.”

  “A mile should suffice,” Lornysh said.