And then Eldest was there, dispatching them one by one, her face full of cold fury and yet completely calm. When she was done, all fifteen attackers lay dead. Nineth’s last thought, before she blacked out, was not the question of how many she herself had killed, or that she had never seen Eldest look so bloodthirsty and terrible, or even if Elena and Akassa and those silly boys were unhurt. It was the thought of Kyra, and how proud she would have been of her friend.
Chapter 44
The Shape of a Man
As Kyra and her little group advanced into Jethwa, a scene of devastation met their eyes. Huts had been demolished and the ground leveled as if a storm had hit the village.
“Over there,” said Rustan quietly from behind her. “Do you see the wall?”
She could, just barely. In the distance, a barrier rose up in the air, made of stones, bricks, brambles, and whatever else the builders had been able to lay their hands on. Including, if her senses were right, human bodies. Kyra forced herself not to retch. She represented the Goddess Kali, and to Kali all death was an offering. The souls that had been trapped by those poor bodies were free. It was all just organic matter now, which would soon return to the earth.
Still, it was hard to look upon the desecration and not feel sick. “Why?” she whispered.
“To put fear and doubt into us,” said Rustan. “Do not let them succeed.” He squeezed her hand. “Also, perhaps as an offering to their kalashiks. The dark weapons thirst for death and cannot be denied.”
How do you know? she wanted to ask, but didn’t. Rustan had been touched by a kalashik. This close to them, he must feel their evil even more acutely than she did.
“It’s a trap,” muttered Ria. “Men with kalashiks hide behind the wall. They wait for us to come into sight. I am the only one who can safely move ahead.”
“No,” said Kyra. “That would be me. Once you used your katari or the Inner Speech, you would reveal your presence. Here I must go forward alone.”
She ignored the sounds of protest. “Do not follow me,” she warned. “Stay close to the ground to avoid being hit. This I order as your Mahimata, upon pain of exile. Until I call for you. Do you understand?”
The Markswomen assented; they had no choice, as they were oath-bound to obey her. The Marksmen were another matter. Rustan and Shurik were staring at her with mulish, set faces. “If you try to follow me,” she told them, “you risk my life, because you will divide my attention. I am protected by my armor; you are not. If I spare even a fraction of my energy worrying about you, I’m probably going to die.”
“You want us to just wait here?” snapped Rustan. “Suppose you do get struck by a bullet. What do you want us to do?”
“Retrieve me if you can,” said Kyra. “I’m still the best chance we have against Kai Tau. If not . . . retreat.”
Shurik opened his mouth to argue, but she raised a hand to cut him off. “I will not fail,” she promised. “And I will call you when it is time.”
Rustan exhaled. “Stay alive,” he said, and she felt a sense of déjà vu. She was walking toward the door of death, hoping it would stay closed, and Rustan stood behind her, ready to follow her through that door if necessary.
Their eyes met, and the tenderness of his gaze pierced Kyra’s heart. I will be fine, she thought to him. Then she donned her mask. They stepped away from her, a gap opening between her and the others, as if by wearing it she changed who she was. And perhaps she did change, for as before, wearing it gave her a sense of power and confidence. She felt untouchable, even if she was not. She tried to curb that feeling; it was dangerous to think you were invincible when you were but flesh and blood.
She raised a palm to the others. Wait for my signal. Then she turned and ran toward the barrier, blade in hand, feet thudding on the soft earth in time to the beating of her heart.
Five steps. Ten. Fifteen and the kalashiks found her. The firing began. One gun or five, did it make any difference? They could fire eternally, taking strength and sustenance from those who held them in the mistaken belief that they somehow owned the weapons, when in reality the guns owned them.
The bullets whizzed past her, most of them missing, the kalishium acting as a repellent. She hoped everyone else was lying low as she had instructed. Enough of the bullets hit to make her stagger and gasp with pain. It was like being punched multiple times, unable to hit back. She would be covered with bruises when this was over.
It was tempting to summon the Inner Speech, but she knew it would be hard to compel those who were in the thrall of their weapons. She didn’t have Shurik’s or Ghasil’s skill in the Mental Arts, and she wasn’t close enough. Only when she was almost at the barrier did she unleash the Inner Speech, targeting the man directly in front of her until she felt his mental defenses crumple and the gun drop from his hand. There were two more men on either side of him, and she blasted them with all her strength.
She dropped to her hands and knees, panting with effort. The barrier opened, and men poured out, armed with wicked-looking swords and machetes.
Come to me, she called to her friends, but it was hopeless, they were too far away, and the men were almost upon her. She raised her blade, determined to give herself up dearly.
And then Ria was there, shimmering into view, her blade flying into the throat of one of the leaders, her voice compelling those behind him. Kyra found her strength and lunged for the man closest to her, driving her blade into his heart and withdrawing it to stab another.
Rustan arrived, the others close at his heels. They fought with single-minded fury, even though they were outnumbered almost ten to one, and several were wounded. Many of their attackers lay dead or dying on the ground; several dropped their weapons and ran, chased away by the Inner Speech.
But there were far too many of them. Selene and Tonar were wounded by the more primitive guns; Kyra waded into the onslaught, stabbing and piercing, looking for the decisive thrust that would end this battle.
“Go, Mahimata!” shouted Tonar. “Find Kai Tau and kill him.”
Kyra was loath to leave her Markswomen, but Shurik grabbed hold of her arm, his face almost unrecognizable in its battle fury. “We’ll hold them back,” he said urgently. “You and Rustan go ahead.”
So Kyra and Rustan ran past the ruined barrier, into the heart of Tau command, while behind them their friends fought for their lives, fought to break the last circle of Tau defense.
A lone concrete building rose before them with a wraparound porch and a single lantern hanging at its entrance. Its appearance was absurdly ordinary in that hellish landscape of blood, screams, and death. But it filled Kyra’s heart with fear.
“The council house,” said Rustan. “This is where Kai Tau stays. But all the buildings around it are gone.”
“So there can be no mistaking where I have to go,” said Kyra. She handed her mask to Rustan and untied the bundled-up kalashiks from her belt. “Here I must go alone,” she told him. “And I must go only as myself.”
He took the mask from her in confusion. “Why?”
“Because only a daughter of Veer may kill Kai Tau,” she answered. She smiled at him. Rustan, her beloved. What greater joy than to see his face before confronting her worst enemy?
He seemed to understand. He tilted her chin up and kissed her tenderly. It was a kiss of hope and desire and life, and it made Kyra want to put her arms around him and never let go. Instead, she disengaged herself and pressed a palm against his cheek.
“The Goddess watch over you,” she said.
“She already does,” he said, and smiled with such sadness that she was on the verge of asking him what he meant. But she didn’t, and she would remember this later and regret it.
She walked toward the council house, concentrating on the dim light of the lantern, letting the sounds of battle fade behind her. She climbed the steps up to the porch and paused before the door.
A simple, innocuous door, and yet it filled her with foreboding. Come in, it said. You hav
e waited to open me your whole life.
“Victory to Kali,” whispered Kyra, but her words sounded hollow now, the name of the Goddess a mere word without any power. She closed her eyes and summoned her inner strength. She thought of Shirin Mam, of her parents and sisters. All those whom she had loved and lost, all the ghosts that peopled her dreams and waited for her on the other side.
Then she placed her hand upon the door and pushed it open.
Inside was a single oil lamp on the floor. Twisted shadows danced on the walls—strange shapes that had no basis in reality. Mutterings rose in the air, washed over her, drenching her with fear.
And from the far corner of the room, a man kneeling on the ground stirred and spoke:
“Welcome, daughter.”
It was a deep, gravelly voice that put her in mind of seabeds and ancient mines full of darkness. She held on to the door to steady herself, but her head swam.
Behind her, Rustan’s voice: Stay strong, my love. I am with you.
Kyra swallowed and entered the shadowy room. The door swung shut behind her, and she was alone with the man who had assaulted her mother and killed her family.
“I knew you would come one day,” he said. “I have been waiting for you.”
“To kill you?” She put as much contempt as she could into her voice, although she could barely speak. “Do you not have the guts to do the job yourself?”
He laughed, a high, crazy sound at odds with the rest of his speech. That laugh set her teeth on edge. It was the sound of a man on the far edge of sanity.
“You are wrong, daughter,” he said.
“Don’t call me that!” She gripped her blade so hard it bit her hands. “I am no daughter of yours.”
“But you could have been,” he said. “You might well be. After all, you have my gifts.”
“The gifts you threw away,” she said. Why was she talking to him? She should fling her blade into his heart and be done with it.
“But you won’t,” he said. “You want to know why I did it, don’t you?”
Kyra opened her mouth to deny it, then snapped it shut again. He could hear her thoughts, sense her emotions. How, unless he was still bonded to his kalishium blade?
“I have gone beyond kalishium,” he said. He shifted away from the shadows and into the pool of light cast by the lamp. “See?”
Kyra looked at him and almost fainted.
The thing that sat before her was still in the shape of a man, but it was no longer quite human. Where the forearms should be, two gleaming black barrels melded with the elbows, pointing straight at her. He wore a sleeveless deerskin coat, and she could see that the skin of his upper arms, face, and neck was covered by a network of thin metallic lines. His eyes were gray and cold as a winter sky. Stringy hair hung like rats’ tails around his damaged face.
“What are you?” she whispered.
He grinned—a ghastly sight, because the inside of his mouth was a nightmare. The tongue was black, the teeth filed into points. “I have become my weapons,” he said. “The result of loving them too long. The hardest thing will be keeping you alive long enough to have a little chat.”
Kyra didn’t need to hear or see more. She threw her blade with accuracy, straight into Kai Tau’s heart. To her shock, the blade clanged against his chest and skittered away across the floor. Its light extinguished. She tried to call it back, but it would not move. She could not reach it with her mind. Panic took hold of her. She fought it down.
Kai Tau shook his head. “Your puny katari is no match for me,” he said, sounding almost sad. His forearms rose, and Kyra stared at the barrels in fascinated horror. He pushed them down again, grimacing with effort. “Not now,” he whispered. “Not yet, my darlings.”
Kyra recoiled. He was speaking to them. Speaking to the guns fused to his arms as if they were beloved children.
He raised his head and locked eyes with her. It was like looking into a well of madness. “I kept these two with me always. I ate with them, slept with them. One day I woke, and they were joined to my arms, and my katari had vanished. I tried to cut them off, but it didn’t work. My arms had hardened like the kalashiks themselves.” He raised them up again for her to see. “Look, the one on the left killed your mother, the one on the right, the woman who bore my eldest son. Maidul, whom you killed.”
Kyra flinched at the mention of her mother and her first mark.
“I wonder,” he mused, “which one will kill you. I can never tell, you see. They take turns, but there is nothing linear about their thinking. Sometimes I cannot follow it. Sometimes they punish me.”
Punish? Her confusion must have shown on her face, because Kai Tau gave a chilling smile. “Daughter, I am sorry. You have waited so many years to have your revenge. But there is nothing you can do to me. My guns will take your head off before you take one step forward. And even if I manage to stop them from shooting you, you cannot hurt me. You have come all this way and risked all these lives for nothing.”
Kyra swallowed. “Even now, the Orders are defeating your soldiers. You will lose.”
He gave a contemptuous shrug. “Soldiers are like cattle. I will get more, and train them better. The time of the Kanun is gone from Asiana. It is time for chaos. And what better king for such a time than the man who has become one with the weapons of chaos?” He slid one of the barrels up to his face and stroked it with his cheek.
“You have not told me,” said Kyra, making her voice flat and calm, “why you did it.”
“Ah, I thought you would come to that,” said Kai. He rested both guns on his lap, as if he were crossing his arms. A contemplative look came onto his metal-scarred face. “It would be nice to have some sort of reason for you to pack away and take to your death. Let me see if I can think of one for you.”
“I want the truth,” said Kyra, anger giving her courage. “Don’t lie for my benefit.”
He threw his head back and laughed. “But I can lie for mine, can I not?” he said, still sounding amused, as if she was a child, or something to be toyed with. When she did not answer, he resumed speaking, his voice slowing, the shadows on the walls taking on even more tortured shapes, as if they sought to ferret out the last bit of sanity in the room and strangle it.
“It was twenty years ago,” said Kai. “And still I remember it like yesterday. I saw a girl in a marketplace and fell deeply in love with her. The kind of love that happens in an instant, without regard for who or what you are. It takes you by storm, blinds you to everything but your goal—the pursuit and possession of the beloved.”
“That’s not love,” said Kyra, her blood turning cold. “That’s infatuation.”
“What difference does it make what name you give to it?” he countered. “I loved her, and I persuaded her to run away with me.”
“You compelled her,” said Kyra, shaking with fury. “You used the Inner Speech to fog her mind.”
“True,” he said. “That is how it began. But that is not the way it continued. I reduced the pressure on her gradually. By the third day, she could have left me if she wanted to. She did not. She stayed with me, even singing to me in her beautiful voice as we rode over the highlands. She had fallen in love with me as deeply as I with her.”
“You’re lying to yourself,” Kyra spat out. “You kidnapped an innocent girl and assaulted her. If she was too frightened or brainwashed to leave you, I do not blame her.”
“You will never know,” he said. “She is dead by my hand.” He looked down at the guns fused to his arms and gave another crazed laugh. “Literally dead by my hand.”
“Why did you kill her?” Kyra’s voice rose in desperation despite herself. “Why?”
“Because she lied,” snarled Kai. “She lied to protect herself. She betrayed me. If I could not have her, I vowed that no one else would.” He paused and considered. “Besides, Astinsai told me before I left Khur that I would die by the hand of Fidan’s daughter. I had to give you a reason to seek me out, did I not?”
Her mind reeled. “That doesn’t make any sense.”
“No,” said Kai. “Foretellings rarely do. I think we’ve talked enough. My weapons thirst.” His face twitched; he raised his arms and fired.
The sound was deafening in the enclosed space of the council house. Bullets thudded against Kyra’s chest, and she stumbled back with the force of the impact. She raised her arms to protect her face. She could scarcely breathe. Fear threatened to overwhelm her. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. She should have been able to kill him with her katari. How long could she survive this onslaught? Her blade—where was it when she needed it most?
A katari flew through the air, shining blue in the dim light, and lodged itself in Kai Tau’s throat. Rustan. Momentarily, the blade appeared to confuse Kai Tau. He stopped firing and dropped his arms, stretching his neck. In the silence that followed, Kyra allowed herself to hope that he had been injured. But to her horror, the blade in his throat melted, and then clattered to the floor. This was impossible. Nothing could touch kalishium. Behind her, she sensed Rustan make a small sound of pain at the fate of his blade. Go, she thought to him frantically. Leave!
Kai Tau gave a hideous grin. “Someone you love,” he said. “How perfect. I could not have hoped for better.” And he raised his arm and shot Rustan. A single bullet.
Time slowed. Kyra whirled in an agony of fear. She tracked the bullet, threw herself in its path. It whistled past her head; she felt the small breath of its passing in her hair. And the soft, sickening thud as it found its mark.
A dreadful scream split the shadows on the walls, sending them scurrying into the corners of the council house. Kyra froze, realized the scream was her own, and ran to Rustan, her heart in a million pieces.
He lay in a heap at the entrance to the room, blood soaking his shirt. His face had gone gray. But his eyes, as they regarded her, were calm.
“Stay alive, Rustan,” she whispered. “Navroz can heal you.”
He opened his mouth to speak, and she bent closer to hear his words.
“Take. Shirin’s blade,” he rasped. “Finish him.”
Mahimata Page 34