Gods of Nabban (45 page)

Ghu walked off without waiting for Ahjvar to gather himself up. Dry brown blood crackled and flaked away as he flexed his hand. Ah. Ahjvar rubbed away what traces he could, too late. The cut on his forearm was scabbed black and healing. Nothing to do about the stained sleeve. Wash it when he could, but that shirt would really be better off decently buried. The fresh stain on the arm was the least of it. He caught up back where they had first camped, found the horses lipping up a last trace of spilled grain. The man at the foaling pasture had sent them off with more than bad beer, obviously.

“Eat,” Ghu said. “Don't feed the dogs. They've been hunting zokors. They'll do.”

Whatever those were. He took a stale bun and the flask of water Ghu passed him, ate in silence, watching while Ghu bridled and saddled the horses, moving about them with quiet efficiency. Still Ahjvar's groom, halfway to godhead or not.

“Ghu? This holy place of your god—much farther?”

Ghu turned from cinching the bay's girth, stood scratching the horse's cheek. “Late afternoon, maybe, if we don't push it. Before evening, anyway. Up above the trees.”

“Do you need me?”

“Ahjvar—”

“I'd rather—just wait. Here. Somewhere. Quiet. Alone.”

A long, long silence, then. The bay turned his head against the motionless hand. “Swajui,” Ghu said at last. “Nobody goes up to the Father's sanctuary on the mountain, unless they're called. Not even the priests. I would have taken you regardless. But Swajui is the Mother's place here on the mountain. The name's for the shrine and sanctuary both.”

“There's a difference?”

“A shrine—people go there. They went for the healing waters and the counsel and prayers of the priests, but the sanctuaries are the holy places of the gods, places for the gods alone. I don't know what you'll find at the shrine of Swajui. It—hurts. Even to think of it, it hurts. I don't think you should go there. There are none living left. I think it was burnt. But that wasn't the Mother's sanctuary. If you go higher, go up to the pines where the cold springs rise, that's the true holy place, the Wild Sister's own. The priests went there. Folk did, sometimes. Called, or seeking her in solitude. I don't think Zhung Musan's soldiers went so far. The shrine was enough for them. Visible and known. There's nothing to show the holiness of the sanctuary, to folk that don't know it or can't recognize it. If you can't recognize it, you can't find it, I suppose.” Another long look. “You'll know. Wait for me there.”

“Your goddess won't want me there. Gods don't.”

“She's gone, Ahj. She—died, I suppose. As we took the castle.”

“Ah,
Ghu
.”

“Go to the sanctuary of Swajui. Go up to the pines. I'll find you there. A day, a few days, I don't know. Wait for me.”

They rode slowly, as if, for all Ghu's urgency to flee the castle—and it had felt like flight, Ahjvar thought now—he was reluctant at the last. The drizzle gave way to a damp wind, but the clouds did not thin. Despite the grey day, the birds were loud with spring song. Once a swarm of sandy-furred monkeys went leaping, almost flying, away overhead through the upper branches of the barren trees, exciting the dogs, but Ghu called them back before they could launch themselves into the forest. Ahjvar dropped behind, watching the trail they had ridden, but the grey woods covered all the winding, climbing, plunging track.

Prickling unease. Neither Ghu, nor the dogs nor horses, seemed to feel it. He wondered, though, if he would really dream vague and subtle spells pressing against him. He never had before. Subtlety was not a notable feature in his nightmares.

Ghu reined in after perhaps three wandering miles; they had been riding along a ridge like some hunched spine of stone, but ahead it entered a narrow place, overhung with stone and trees. Another track branched away, plunging down to the west.

“Here,” he said quietly, pointing to the left. “That goes to the shrine of Swajui. The main road to the shrine comes up from Dernang; we came east of that, through the greater hills. From the shrine, there's a path that climbs north. Steep and twisting. Nothing to mark it from any other forest trail, but it follows a stream. You'll know it, I think. Ahjvar . . .”

“Better you face your god without dragging me along.”

“Don't—” But whatever Ghu meant to say he thought better of. Held out an open hand, letting the words go. Urged Snow on into the narrow defile. Halted, though, before the first turn that would have taken him out of sight, looked back. “Talk to the horse,” he called. “Use his name.”

“I don't speak Denanbaki.”

“Try Nabbani, Praitannec—Evening Cloud doesn't care.” A flashing grin, a nod like a salute, and he was gone. The dogs lingered, watching Ahjvar.

“No,” he said. “I don't need nursemaiding. Scram. Go with Ghu.”

Jui gave one sharp bark. Protest or agreement? But they both left him, breaking into a flying lope to overtake the vanished horse. The bay raised his head and whinnied after them.

Ahjvar turned him aside to take the descending western trail.

Not far, though. He hadn't survived decades as a Five Cities assassin on immortality alone, and to ignore the little nagging prickles of unease was—never wise. Even when they were nothing more than a bad dream or a grey day. Sometimes they weren't.

The horse sidled around restlessly when Ahjvar dismounted, not happy at being separated from the others. Ahjvar tugged at the bridle, addressed one dark eye. “Stand, damn it.” No idea what commands or signs a Nabbani-trained warhorse knew. “Evening Cloud. What sort of name is that for a horse? Sounds like someone should write lovesick poetry to you.” He tried the Praitannec. “Gorthuerniaul . . .” Shook his head. Too long. “You. Niaul. Stand, or I will tie you to a tree.”

The head turned to study him, but the sidling stopped. “Better.” He unslung the bow in its leather wrappings, hung the quiver over his shoulder, and led the horse off the trail. They were out of sight from the fork and someone would have to come beyond the first bend to see that his tracks turned aside.

It wasn't the landscape for a mounted fight. He shoved the plaid blanket and the scarf with its flashes of kingfisher blue into a saddlebag, fished out a headscarf that might have been russet originally but had faded in the past year to a mottled dun, and wrapped it as if against desert snow and sand, covering pale hair and beard. He left the horse with another terse, “Niaul, stand,” heading up a steep shoulder, stone beneath the moss and groping tree-roots, worked his way down from that height, back to where he could see the trail down the mountain and the path to Swajui branching off. A good vantage-point and a long, clear stretch of the trail. This western slope of the ridge dropped away abruptly, almost a low cliff. Little cover, with the trees and bushes so bare. The thin soil supported only sparse undergrowth, but rid of the plaid and with hair covered he was dull and drab as a nesting bird. A winter-broken bough would make a scribble of twigs before and alongside him; there were a few stalks of some seedy weed, but mostly it was stillness that would hide him.

He spanned the bow, slotted in a bolt, put quiver and sword where he could quickly lay hand on either, and settled himself to wait. He might have had only a couple hours of sleep in the past gods alone knew how long, but no heaviness tried to close his eyes now.

Might have been dreaming. It had been a night of strange dreams, surely enough. Devils damn all devils. But for the same vague, subtle pressure of a spell to come twice, when he had never dreamed anything of the like before . . . No. He didn't have such dreams.

No wizardry raised his hackles now. Nothing. Birdsong. The shrill barking cry of some animal he didn't recognize, far in the distance to the east. Blackflies settling to bite, a first crop of spring annoyance. He hadn't noticed them, riding with Ghu. If the horse was too badly tormented, he was going to wander off.

Was it quieter, down the trail?

A bright blue bird flew up crying alarm, raising a flock of little black twittering ones.

Hooves.

Could, of course, be some hunter, even a pilgrim seeking the gods. Not very damned likely. Not even a fluffy seedhead fouled his line of vision down to the bend. So.

They came around the corner, two riders abreast. Good sturdy horses. Lacquered scale armour, helmets with ribbons. Not Zhung, the characters on the breast of their deep rose surcoats. Min-Jan. Imperial officers, not banner-lords or the spear-carriers of banner-lords. Imperial officers' livery, at any rate, and the enamelled badge on their helmets the same. How many behind them?

He let them come on, farther than he had intended, waiting for their followers, but none appeared, and the two were deep in some low-voiced discussion, the horses walking. Argument, he thought, from the way the thick-bodied older man gestured.

Still no followers. Very, very slowly, he shifted position a little, lining up the bow to cover the area where the trail forked. Much closer than he wanted, really; there would be no time to prepare a second shot. He wanted to hear what they said, know what they were. Not a troop riding to the destruction of Father Nabban's holy site, as he had for a moment thought, seeing the livery. The regular army did not conscript women for the common soldiery. He wasn't sure about the officers.

They reined in and the woman, thinner, younger, her face flecked with pale pock-marks and her hair cut short, leaned to study the tracks, not dismounting.

“They've split up.”

The older man pulled off his gloves, tucked them into his belt, and licked a finger. Not testing the wind but writing on his wrist in saliva. Wizard. Ahjvar felt the subtle pressure again, a will imposing itself on the world. The man pressed his wrist to his lips, eyes shut. Not officers, just the uniform as a mask.

“The holy man went up the mountain,” the wizard said.

“Don't call him that. It sounds like treason. Or heresy. Something.”

The wizard ignored that. “The guardian, whatever he is, left him and turned west.”

“Seems unlikely.”

“That's the path to Swajui, captain. It's a holy place. Why not?”

“Why not? Would he leave the holy man? If they've split up, it's because they know they're followed and he's doubling back behind us.”

“I've made sure they don't.” Smug bastard. Mistaken.

“You say. They killed three of our best in Denanbak. Hope you appreciate I didn't send you with them.” The woman considered, eyed the wizard sidelong and tilted her chin up the trail. “That one is the one who matters.” She hesitated. Artfully. Did the wizard feel a prickle of warning on his spine? He should. She was about to make him a stalking goat, if he had the wit to see it. “What do you foresee if we do split up here?”

“Nothing,” the wizard spat. “I see nothing. I have seen nothing. They've been hidden from me since yesterday. Only glimpses, hints . . .”

“Are we even following the right men? If you've led me a wild goose chase . . .”

“
I
don't make that kind of mistake, captain.”

“Fine, fine, they've split up. You head to Swajui and I'll—”

No question which of these two was most dangerous to himself. An assassin of the Wind in the Reeds. One shot. Ahjvar took aim on the woman's eye. At this range, he could have hit her with a thrown pebble.

And just as he would have squeezed the trigger, the wizard spurred his horse forward, coming between him and the assassin. “I'm not going after that guardian alone, whatever he is, and I'm not going to be bait in any trap for him for you. He'll be no threat once the holy man is dead.”

Likely true enough. Bones and ash. Ahjvar shot the wizard instead, since the man now blocked the assassin. The iron head of the quarrel shattered his cheekbone, tore through his brain. Ahjvar was on his feet, sword in hand and slithering trunk to trunk down the steep slope, leaping the last drop even as the wizard fell, caught in his stirrups, spooking his horse, which bucked and shed the corpse. The other spurred forward, sword sweeping around. Ahjvar dropped under the blade and slashed open the beast's belly as he rose. Ghu would not like that, and he was sorry for the need. The assassin vaulted clear of the screaming, kicking shambles and landed on her feet.

Shield lost in the keep. The woman was armoured, but a head and a half shorter than Ahjvar, her blade likewise shorter than the Northron sword, single-edged like a Grasslands sabre but broader, heavy. Ahjvar drove in hard, forcing her back, but she circled away, moving uphill. Fast, damnably fast, and balanced and confident. Professional, in fact. And she'd probably both slept and fed better for many days. On the other hand, Ahjvar wasn't worried about dying.

He counted on that too damned much and he knew it. Tried not to. He could be laid out on death's threshold for days, recovering from what should have been fatal. Time enough for the assassin to catch up with Ghu and kill them both with that one death. Time to stop being a death-wooing fool, but he'd said that before. Should have told the devil to find him a shield. Heavy dagger to guard his side. He didn't follow in close again, shifting slowly around, inviting—he was too damnably tired to let this be dragged out, and the other probably intended that, Ahjvar's haggard face betraying his weakness.

Had her, the assassin moving in where Ahjvar wanted her. Sweeping kick as if to hook the woman's legs out from beneath her, contemptuously avoided along with the sword's swing she shouldn't have been so focussed on. Dropped his shoulder, dagger punching swiftly below the skirt of scales, slashing upward. Ahjvar let the dagger go and shifted to a two-handed grip on his sword, weight and height his advantage now as the wounded woman staggered back, blood darkening her bright trousers. Maybe he'd gotten lucky and hit the great vessel of her thigh. Ahjvar didn't wait to find out, struck the woman's left wrist and likely broke it, though the glove was armoured and he didn't take the hand off. The slender knife the Nabbani had snatched for went flying. Poisons in Denanbak. Didn't want any edge to touch him. Battered the woman down with both hands on the sword again, breaking more bones, stamped on her swordhand as she tried weakly to rise, and thrust still two-handed beneath her jaw.