The Splintered Eye (The War of Memory Cycle) (53 page)

Two more men and a woman occupied the chairs, but they made space as Lark moved to join them.  Empty bottles were lined up atop another crate, and the smell of wine and chana almost overrode the reek from outside.  Cards, coins and chits covered the table.

“Pull up a crate,” said the big man.  “We can do business while we play.  Unless you’re too good for that.”

He directed the comment toward Dasira, and she opened her mouth to retort, but Lark held up a hand first, a wooden chit pinched between two fingers.  “We’ll play,” she said.  “After you cash me in.  I’m owed some back pay.”

Dasira hid her smile.  The change in demeanor from uncertain girl to experienced Shadow agent was something Lark might not realize, but from the looks on the Kheri’s faces, she was doing it right.

The big man grumbled but motioned for the chit, and Dasira dragged crates over as he counted out coins to Lark.  The Shadow girl split the pile between them, and the woman at the end—russet-haired but tall, probably western Darronwayn—dealt a new hand of cards.

Mugs slid toward them.  Dasira sniffed hers, measuring the fumes.  Typical tanner whiskey, nothing that would tax her bracer even in its weakened state, but considering the crate stocked full of bottles nearby, she imagined this was just the start.

“
Lay out the plan before you start drinking,” she prompted as Lark raised her mug.

Lark made a face, but set it down and swept up her cards.  “Fine.  I was just about to tell you anyway.”  She looked to the Kheri and indicated her dark features.  “I’m obviously not from around here, and I need to go further north.  The usual disguises won’t hold up to close scrutiny, so I had an idea, but it’s tricky.  Don’t suppose there’s any way you can get your hands on a Silent Circle robe?”

Dasira’s brows arched.

“
Why for?” said one of the men, scruff-bearded and sallow.  “If you’re trying to infiltrate Valent, wearing a robe won’t help.”

“
Not Valent.  Daecia.  The Imperial City.”

The Kheri exchanged looks, then the woman snorted.  “Your funeral.  We can get a robe, sure.  Plain or fancy?”

“Plain.”

“
You got enough chits to cover it?”

“
You tell me.  First, I bring a warning.  The Trifolders say Turo may get hit by the Gold Army soon.  There’s a native spirit in the area, and the Imperials might come down on everyone while hunting it.  Second, I’m with that spirit—the Guardian Aesangat, protector of prey and wielder of the dark elements.  We came through your storage-drop south of town a couple days ago.  You might’ve heard about that.  We took out two Gold companies and a haelhene spire along the way and now the spirit’s in Haaraka, drumming up assistance before we make our move north.

“
Third, we’re not going in blind.  My friend here is bound to the spirit, but she once served the Empire.  She’s our woman on the inside and can get us past all the roadblocks that have stopped us in the past.  We all know how much Morgwi hates the Empire’s stranglehold on the east.  Helping my group will help the Shadow Folk.  Maybe set us all free.”

The Kheri stared at Lark, and Dasira examined her cards, trying not to look impressed.  It was a deft massage of the truth, and from the looks the Kheri gave each other, it was also persuasive.

“And all you want is a Circle robe?” said the woman.

“
That’s the big thing.  Travel papers are easy.”

They looked to the burly shadowblood who had opened the door.  He sat back in his chair and regarded the two women through narrowed, inscrutable eyes, then said, “Travel papers free.  Robe will cost you.  It’s nonessential.”

“Says you.  I see the powder in your beard.  A disguise is as ‘nonessential’ for me as covering up your shadowmarks is for you.”

The man scowled but brushed at his beard self-consciously.  “It’ll do you more harm than good if a real mage catches you.”

“I can handle it.  Don’t charge me for my safety.”

“
You’re in my kai.  I can charge for anything I like.”

“
Yes, but as a fellow Kheri, I’m asking you to help us.  To add yourself to the Guardian’s roster of allies and aid us in striking at the Imperial Light.  As an organization, I know we’re not allowed to act, but we’ve always given support to those who work to undermine the Empire.  The difference here is that we have a real chance.”

“
Chance at what?” said the woman.  “Are you going after the Emperor?”

“
No.  His maker of monsters,” said Dasira, throwing her figurative chips in.  All eyes swung to her, Lark’s included.  Arms crossed, she continued, “The one who created every abomination you hear stories about, every pale shape you see in your nightmares.  The one who made me.  Only the Guardian can kill him.”

The Kheri looked to each other nervously, except for the shadowblood, who fixed his gaze on Dasira as if challenging her.  She lifted her mug instead and drank the whole burning draught.  Slamming it down, she said, “So.  Can we deal?”

His mouth twitched, then he nodded and grabbed a chit.  “This is the robe.  Let’s see who’s the best cutthroat.”

He pitched it into the center of the table, and as everyone grabbed their cards, Dasira caught Lark’s pointed stare.  The Shadow girl bugged her eyes as if to say ‘you and your secrets!’ and Dasira smiled and shrugged loosely in response.  This would mean a blizzard of pestering in the morning, she knew, but for now the booze was flowing and the mood was tense in a good way.

And with her bracer filtering her blood, it was just a matter of time before Dasira drank them all under.

*****

As twilight drew hazily over Haaraka, Cob walked with Fiora through the gardens in the middle of the complex.  They had stayed for dinner with the Magistrate, which had been a surprisingly casual affair, and Cob had been satisfied with the food—no fowl nor flesh, but fruit stewed in honey and spices, flat cakes of nut-bread, spicy roasted vegetables and greens and some sort of herb tea.  Fiora had added her own herbs to her cup from a pouch; when Cob asked, she had said they were medicinal.

Despite his initial misgivings, he had eaten well, and felt content but thoughtful.  Dinner conversation had roamed from Imperial news to the Guardian’s situation to life in Haaraka, and though neither the Magistrate nor Adram was a necromancer, they both bore wraith souls, and both spoke of the necromancers’ work in embodying them.  Humanizing them.  As if it was only through such hideous magic that the Outsiders could learn to belong.

He was not sure whether to be troubled or comforted.

Their packs were in the rooms they had been given: small but lovely chambers in a tower with access to the long balcony that looked out over the gardens.  There had been baths too, and Cob would have skipped those except that Fiora pointed out all the berry- and dirt-stains their escapades had left on him.

So he had relented, but only because it seemed rude to get dirt on the bedsheets.  Not because of her.

Adram had excused himself to visit local friends, so after bathing Cob had expected to just sprawl on his bed and sleep until he was summoned in the morning.  But he had found himself staring blankly at the ceiling, tired but wakeful, until soft footsteps had come along the balcony to the open door.

Fiora.

Now he walked beside her in the gardens.  She had him by the arm but strangely he did not mind.  With the mother moon hanging as a thin pinkish sliver in the west, the child moon tawny-red and haloed by clouds, it felt almost dreamlike.  Stars pricked the clearer corners of the sky, and by their meager light the evening flowers were just blooming, white against the rich darkness of foliage.  Flowering vines covered the arbors and pergolas and pillars that gave shape to the riotous greenery.  Their boots scuffed on mosaic stones, and once Cob heard little claws clicking and glimpsed a fox-tail vanish into the brush.

He felt as if he had wandered into some fireside tale where animals talked and goodness was rewarded.  It made him sad, but he could not say why.

“
Look at those,” Fiora whispered, tugging his arm.  He glanced over, then stared when he noticed the tiny lights flickered over one of the many ponds, some dipping so low they nearly merged with their reflections.  It was like watching stars at play.

“
Fireflies,” Fiora continued in a hushed tone as she led him further.  “We hardly ever get those at home.  Sometimes in summer but not so many as this.”

“
They’re flies?  They look like magic,” he said, just as quiet.

“
Let’s go up the hill.  We can see more from there.”

He let her tug him to where the path became steps and mounted the flank of a vine-shrouded hill.  She had changed her leggings for a colorful local sarong and wore it gathered up to not get in the way, and he told himself he was watching the path, not the way her tan legs scissored through the gloaming light.

They were just traveling companions.  Not even friends, really.  She was bold, and he respected that, but it was nothing more.

Still, he had trouble controlling his eyes.

The breeze picked up as they left the shelter of the valley.  Halfway up the hill, the terracing and the steps ceased, leaving the crown an undisturbed thicket of praxum, firebell and thorny apple.  Fiora stepped off the last ghost of the path into the wildflowers and beckoned for Cob to follow.

“
Are we allowed?” he said, looking around.  There were no fences, benches or walls, and no other evening wanderers.

“
They didn’t say anything about it.  Come on, we can get a nice view over here.”

Cob sighed and waded after her.  Flowers bobbed at waist-level, some brushing his elbows, and the drone of insects continued unabated despite their passing.  Fireflies patterned the air here as well, but fewer; down in the valley they swarmed like festival lamps.  The curtains of the great walkways rippled in the evening breeze, illuminated from within.

“I wish we could stay a while,” Fiora said wistfully, settling in a clearer spot and kicking off her boots.  “It’s so nice.  Not like the stories at all.”

“
Which stories?” said Cob, sinking down nearby.  In the east, the tail of the Leviathan constellation was rising over the hills, along with the edge of the Eye of Night; opposite, the Chain of Ydgys was invisible behind clouds.

“
You know, all the—  Oh.”  She looked at him, expression mysterious in the gloom.  “That’s right, you’re a westerner.  I grew up with the tales of Haaraka, and they all paint it like a vast graveyard full of wraiths and madmen plotting horrible things.  Nobody says anything about the flowers.”

“
Doesn’t mean they’re not right.”

“
Maybe not, but what do you think?  They’ve been kind so far.  The Trifold could work with them better if more of us saw this.”

“
Maybe,” Cob said, lying back in the grass.  The stars in the violet sky were comfortingly familiar despite the distance he had traveled, and looking at them meant not looking at Fiora’s legs.  “The Trifold’s strongly against necromancy, yeah?”

“
Well, who isn’t?”

“
Difficult to be friends with people whose way of life y’hate.”

She snorted.  “Says the Light-worshiper.  Why are we talking about this?”

Cob made a face.  She had him on that one.  Yet when he looked out at the soft waves of flowers, the thought nagged.  Fiora was right; though they were necromancers, the Haarakash had been kind.  But there were other necromancers out there—the haelhene, Morshoc.

Those outside-necromancers were monsters.  Yet Morshoc hadn’t killed him on the Imperial Road, or opened the Seals the way the Guardian had expected, and though he had bound the Guardian into Cob’s body, it did not seem to be an attempt to harm them.  He had to wonder—now that he had seen a bit of Haaraka—whether the title of necromancer meant ‘someone we fear’ more than ‘someone evil’.

What if Morshoc had a good reason for his actions?

He did not want to think like this.  It was going against the plan and the memories of Paol and his father.  But it was the same question that had kept him awake in his room, and it would not be dismissed by the mere night breeze.

“Fiora?” he said.

“
Hm?”

“
Who killed all the necromancers?”

She turned her head to regard him, expression hard to read.  “The Silent Circle, mostly.  Though back in the day, we helped them—the Brancirans in particular.”

“The Silent Circle.  That’s the Imperial mages?”

“
They’re much older than the Empire.  We worked with them when the western kingdoms were part of Altaera, back when Altaera still existed.  It’s Jernizan now.  The Circle was supposed to be unaffiliated with any government, thus the ‘Silent’.  No voice in politics.”

“
And you hunted necromancers together?”

“
Yes.”

“
Did you hunt the Haarakash?”

“
No.  We didn’t have much influence here until after the War of the Lion and Eagle.  The Heartlands were the Eagle, Altaera was the Lion, and the Lion won, so since we came from the Lion’s land, we moved in when they occupied the Heartlands.  The Haarakash had already isolated themselves—I’m not sure how long before—and we never disturbed them because it seemed foolish to harass a whole sealed-up nation.”