A World Too Near (32 page)

He stopped up short at the sight of a girl devouring her Early Day meal like a Gond.

She was no godwoman, dressed in dark green silks, dusty from travel. Though one side of her face bore a scabby wound, the other was as fresh as an unplucked fruit. Even tucking her long hair into her padded jacket couldn’t hide her attractions.

Then lust gave way to curiosity. Her face looked familiar. His heart sped. The girl watched everyone with a keen appraisal, even while eating. To cover his interest in her, he mixed with a knot of soldiers, keeping watch.

God’s beku, surely it was not the girl the lords searched for.

The girl turned her bright eyes to him, glanced past him, then turned to wrap her meat sticks in a travel cloth. By the time she had done so, Chang was sure.

When she rose and set out through the crowd, Chang followed. Keeping the girl in sight, Chang also scanned the throngs for someone from his unit so that he could alert Captain Dekisher what was afoot. Finally succeeding in gesturing a fellow soldier to his side, he sent him off with the message that he’d sighted an important fugitive. Above all, he mustn’t let the girl slip away, or Captain Dekisher, the ugly Jout, would have his balls on a skewer.

Benhu watched a ship approach over the marsh. On the crowded shore, travelers pushed and shoved toward the river’s edge. They needn’t bother, Benhu thought. This one is mine. Sentients shouted at the ship keeper for precedence, but the surge of travelers was largely futile. First priority on all ships went to soldiers, and with a massive contingent gathered here, there would be few slots left over. In this case, Benhu knew, not even soldiers would board. This was Lord Oventroe’s ship, its small size and shabby exterior disguising the importance of the passenger it bore. This ship looked like no bright lord’s transport, but it bore the markings the lord had told Benhu to expect. If Quinn hadn’t gone walking, they could have boarded quickly and been gone before the crowd had time to protest it leaving with empty seats. The lord would ask why Benhu’s charge was not at hand, and why he was in such a condition as he was, both in his mind and his body.

Benhu pulled on his beard, trying to marshal a story that would convey the difficulty of controlling Titus Quinn. Worst of all would be explaining to the lord about the mount who threw himself in the river, jeopardizing the entire mission by speaking heart to heart with the girl of the Rose, who was, of course, Titus Quinn’s daughter. Farting Gonds, how had he made such a shambles of his task?

By the time the ship sagged onto its struts nearby, Benhu’s stomach felt like he’d swallowed a heft of river water.

As Anzi passed a group of Chalin she overheard the words
man of the Rose
. She paused, pretending to remove a stone from her boot.
Titus Quinn
, they said in hushed voices. The Chalin elders sat in a circle, playing a game of sticks and redstones. Stories of the man of the Rose had spread quickly, especially word of his involvement in the death of Lord Hadenth, who had bravely clung to the brightship as it sped away from the Ascendancy, bearing the traitor, the one who would bring the hordes from the dark Rose to swamp the Entire. So the Tarig version went.

However, these Chalin elders murmured of the cursed brightships and spoke Hadenth’s name with a flat tone devoid of esteem. They had a another version of the story, one that Anzi had also heard, that Titus Quinn came home for his daughter, but seeing the Tarig domination of the All, sacrificed his intention in order to show how vulnerable the lords were. Their city could be compromised, their ships destroyed.

An elder reached out to scoop up the redstones he had won, and Anzi moved on, searching.

She chose a down-primacy direction to continue her search. Titus, if he were here, would camp as far from the Inyx assembly as possible. She walked along the river, into a region of hillocky mud. In the distance two tents rippled in the stiff breeze. Approaching, she found them empty except for three packs rich with provisions.
Why would someone with such resources sleep in lowly tents like these, and so removed from likely docking sites?

Two sets of footprints dimpled the sand, one leading toward the camp, one away. She followed the latter. Putting her own foot into the imprint, she judged the size. It was a man’s footprint. She turned around to assess the other footprints. Too small. Though she could see no one amid the marshy ridges, she set out with some hope.

This was a lonely wasteland, and her thoughts turned cold. By now her uncle Yulin would have foresworn her, and Suzong would be trying to scrape together payment to Ling Xiao Sheng for his wedding gift. On the other hand, Ling might claim that since Anzi had taken the gem, she had accepted him. Then he would force the marriage, even marrying her in her absence, making her the youngest of his wives, a slave, to punish her for as long as he liked. Provided, of course, that he could catch her. Anzi felt shame for disobeying Yulin, who had loved her like his own child and only asked that she marry a stable Chalin man for the sake of a potential reconciliation with the Tarig. If Anzi thought there was any chance under heaven of that reconciliation, she would have accepted Ling Xiao Sheng. But the lords would never forgive that her uncle had provided succor, alibi, and disguise to Titus Quinn.

Ahead she glimpsed a man walking along the strand, his gait uneven. Too far away to recognize, he looked up at the storm wall across the river as though trying to see past it to a more conducive view. Like a man imagining home. As though sensing her behind him, he turned and saw her. Captain Dekisher set out with a contingent of thirty soldiers, rushing to join Chang, who was apparently tracking none other than the girl associated with Titus Quinn. Chang would have a promotion for this, the drunken sot, if he was right. Dekisher himself could expect a sublegacy, perhaps a full legacy, or mastership of the city in his Jout home sway. But if the girl slipped away, he’d likely get demotion to the ranks. She wouldn’t escape.

Catching up with Chang, who was not far advanced from his original position, Dekisher saw the Chalin female that his subordinate was tracking. The captain was beginning to wish he had come with a larger force, but at the same time he was reluctant to alert the woman that a search was afoot. She might, after all, lead them to someone of even more interest. He took command of Chang and two other soldiers while directing the rest of the unit to split up and set out on different tangents to cut off escape. Keeping the fugitive in view, Dekisher’s squad headed down to the marshes.

Once the captain and his squad reached the outskirts of the godder camp, they were exposed on the flats. Abandoning stealth, they quickened their pace.

Quinn watched the Chalin woman approach. She cut a path directly toward him. A doubt passed through him, whether his disguise held. He moved down the knoll, bracing for conversation with a stranger and trying to sharpen his wits for the encounter.

He squinted as the woman approached, and then found his steps quickening. By God, was it Anzi? He felt a broad smile cut into his face, and he stopped, drinking in the sight of a friend on this deserted marsh. She came within a few paces. “Anzi,” he breathed.

Lord Oventroe’s ship keeper was still fending off a crowd of travelers clamoring for passage as Benhu made his way down the deck to the central cabin to make his report. A commotion in camp diverted his attention and he turned to the rail. Benhu saw a mass of soldiers rushing through the camp, spreading out among the pack beasts and the godders, overturning pots of oba and ransacking tents.

Alarmed, he raced for the cabin, jamming through the door and blurting out to the surprised Lord Oventroe that the army was upon them.

The lord, still seated, looked up at him with eerie calm. “Compose yourself, Benhu. Now tell.”

“Forgive me, Bright Lord. The army. Running through the camp, searching tents, and Titus still ashore!”

“Do not say his name, Benhu,” the lord murmured.

“Forgive me, my life in your service, and no disrespect, Lord.”

Lord Oventroe unfolded his long body from the chair, barely clearing the ceiling. “Where is our guest?”

Benhu pointed down the riverbank where, he fervently hoped, Quinn could be found. “Hurry,” Benhu whispered. The lord climbed the steps to the upper deck to confer with the pilot. Ordered with a gesture to follow, Benhu obeyed. He heard the struts clunk against the sides as they folded. Through the portholes, he saw that the ship was moving off from the shore, steering toward the deeper river.

Once on the upper deck, Benhu found himself in the presence of the navitar— Lord Oventroe’s navitar. Jesid, if he guessed right.

The navitar looked at Benhu with eyes so dark, the light in them seemed to have expired.

Benhu pointed down the shoreline. “Hurry.”

Oventroe looked down at him as though he were a veldt mouse that had spoken.

The ship slowly lumbered over the marshland. Out the portholes, Benhu could see soldiers running along the shore, moving through the mud humps and jumping over pools of exotic water, but keeping pace with the ship.

“Faster,” Benhu suggested to the navitar.

The lord nodded to his pilot. “This godman thinks we are slow.”

The ship gathered speed.

Anzi’s face bore a long and recent cut on one side, but her eyes were bright. In long white strands, her hair escaped the collar where she had tucked it. “Dai Shen,” she whispered. “It is you.”

“Ren Kai, now,” he said. His voice had gone unnaturally deep. He was relieved to see her. “You’re hurt,” he said.

She seemed rooted to the marshy sand. “Not worth the cut, if you recognized me,” she said.

“You did this to yourself?” Quinn stepped close, turning the cut side of her face toward him to look at the wound. It was angry-looking, but clean.

“I’ve been looking for you,” she said. “I was afraid I wouldn’t find you.”

To his shame he realized that he hadn’t been looking for
her
. He hadn’t expected to see her here. Only at Ahnenhoon, and he’d held out little hope that he would find her there, or that he could take time to search for her, given what he came for.

In the distance, out on the marsh, he saw a ship. In its wake, reflecting the sky, the river bore a fiery crease.

Quinn looked over Anzi’s shoulder where four runners could be seen— three Chalin and a Jout.

“Are you with anyone, Anzi?”

Turning to look, she drew in her breath. “No.”

Captain Dekisher had watched with amazement as the girl joined someone standing where the marshes edged the river. A Chalin man—or was this the human man that the lords sought?

The couple had seen them. They began backing up, then turned and ran. Not the actions of the innocent. Dekisher instinctively suppressed his joy lest the Woeful God take notice. This was the woman Chang had identified as Ji Anzi. With any luck, her companion could well be Titus Quinn himself. “They are ours,” he muttered to himself. Where could they go? There was nothing but desolate marsh and river country from here to the end of All.

Except now a river vessel cut a path toward his quarry.

Charged with excitement, Dekisher cried, “Take them,” waving Chang and the others forward. He shouted after them, “Cut them off from the river!”

At Quinn’s side, Anzi had her knife ready. Bad odds, Quinn thought: he and Anzi against three soldiers—or four, including a Jout lagging behind.

At that moment the distant river vessel again caught his attention. This time he saw that it was clearly bearing down on them, struts lying horizontal, ready to deploy. On the deck someone was waving wildly, beard flapping in the speed of the boat’s passage and white garments plastered against a potbellied frame. It was Benhu.

“Friends,” Quinn said, leading Anzi toward the river. He heard the shouts of their pursuers, whose faces he could just make out, fierce with determination.

He could hear Benhu shouting for them to run toward the ship, but if they did, they’d present their backs to the three coming at them with long strides down the flats. Instead, he and Anzi held their ground as the ship and the attackers converged. The ship bore down, drawing the attention of the three Chalin soldiers, who swerved to avoid collision. On the river side of the ship, Benhu threw down a rope rigging for them to climb the side. Too late. The soldiers rushed forward, forcing Quinn and Anzi to engage.

Leaving Anzi to the smallest soldier, two of them circled Quinn, knives drawn, lunging and swiping. Reflexes slow, poisons still weakening him, Quinn was no match for them, but kept them at bay, parrying thrusts, delivering a gash to a knife hand. His fighting instructor’s advice surfaced amid the melee: When overmatched, cut at hands. Ci Dehai, though, had never fought half sick and out of practice, Quinn thought. Still, Quinn had already forced one man to fight using his clumsier hand. With better odds, Quinn came at them renewed, trying to maneuver toward Anzi. Blocked by his experienced opponents, he had a moment to see Benhu jump from the ship rail screaming like a madman, carrying the only weapon he could grab—a length of knotted rope. Landing between Anzi and her attacker, Benhu took a reeling blow to the head from his opponent’s fist. He crumpled, but it gave Anzi time to grab the bottom of the rigging and throw it over the head of the advancing soldier. Stuck in its mesh for a fatal moment, he took Anzi’s knife in his belly.

Meanwhile, Quinn spun on a heel to keep the second, stronger fighter in view. An artless move, he opened himself up in back to a savage kick that sent him sprawling. His knife flew from his hand. Slow to rise, he expected a killing blow, but instead heard a whistling sound. And there was Anzi, standing among them, swinging Benhu’s knotted rope in a vicious, fast circle, missing the kneeling Quinn but striking the biggest assailant in the face, drawing a bellow of pain. While that one staggered, Anzi rushed to the other, outfighting him, her good hand to his bad.

On his feet, Quinn advanced on the remaining man, just recovering from the blow to his face, when a voice came from nearby: “Hold.” The soldier stared past Quinn with a look of astonishment.