The Autumn Republic

Chapter 30

Nila worked her way through the Adran and then the Deliv camps, slowly gathering her courage to approach the Deliv cabal.

She had not expected them to arrive so soon. Tamas had insisted she stay close in case he needed her magic – whatever good it could do him, considering she still couldn’t consistently pull sorcery from the Else – and hadn’t let her accompany Bo to the Privileged healers. He’d said Bo could be gone for too long to risk losing both of his Privileged for a possible fight.

But just two days later the Kez cabal had arrived. Had it been some kind of a trick to separate her and Bo? Or just a miscommunication?

Perhaps she was just being overly cautious.

Bo would be proud.

She threaded her way through Deliv soldiers, who watched her closely but kept their distance. She wore a blue dress too fine for a laundress but not fashionable enough for a lady, and she had done her hair in a borrowed mirror. She was just wondering why no one had asked for her credentials, when a dark-skinned Deliv slid up beside her.

She recognized the stripes of a captain on his lapels. He was a handsome man, quite tall with slender shoulders. He grinned at her. “Going somewhere, my lady?”

“Yes, thank you.” She could feel his hand hovering just behind the small of her back.

“Can I help you find where you’re going?” His hand brushed her ass gently. She turned toward him, a welcoming smile on her face, and punched him in the nose.

He reeled back with a high-pitched squeal, fumbling at his face. “Aii! Pit, woman!” Surprise turned to anger, which quickly progressed to fury. He wiped his nose with one sleeve, looking down at the trickle of blood on his cuff, then reached for his belt. “You made a mistake, lass.”

Nila realized that mistake just after her knuckles connected with his nose. She was in a foreign camp – she had no companion or chaperone, and she didn’t know the least thing about Deliv social mores. What’s more, this man had the stripes of a captain on his lapel. This wasn’t the Adran army – he was most likely a nobleman and could cause all sorts of trouble for her.

“No,” she said, advancing as her mind raced. Nothing to do now but follow through. “I’ll teach you a lesson, you ingrate. I’m looking for the Deliv cabal. If you touch me again, I’ll put that hand so far up your ass, you’ll be able to scratch your own nose.”

The Deliv captain retreated several feet. He visually searched her up and down, glancing repeatedly at her bare hands, looking for evidence that she was a Privileged. She could see his mind working for several moments, as if he was weighing his odds. Finally, he said in a nasally tone, “They’re sequestered just to the east.”

“Thank you.”

She turned her back on him though every instinct told her not to, and began heading in the indicated direction. This was another part to play, she reminded herself. No more dangerous than the parts she played for Lord Vetas. She was a lady, a Privileged, and she had to demand respect.

“Watch yourself, lass,” the Deliv’s voice called to her.

She wanted to make a rude gesture, but she thought perhaps that was beneath the dignity of a Privileged.

The Deliv cabal, it turned out, was not hard to spot. Immense tents of white and Kelly-green rose just beyond the next rise. While not as high as the tent belonging to the Deliv king, these were far wider and more numerous, with dozens of chambers seemingly interconnected by cloaked avenues to keep the Privileged’s comings and goings shielded from common eyes. The whole area was cordoned off from the rest of the camp by a fine green ribbon tied at intervals to tall wooden posts. Each post was covered in Deliv script and arcane symbols, which Bo had taught Nila enough to recognize as wards – and the warnings that accompanied them.

She followed the ribbon around to the south until she found an opening. Deliv cabal guards – immense men with broad shoulders, gleaming breastplates, and spiked helmets – stood at attention with muskets shouldered.

She stepped between them, only to find her way immediately blocked by those muskets.

“Step back,” one of the guards said in heavily accented Adran, the words laced with menace.

She did.

Neither of them so much as looked at her. Glancing from guard to guard, she extended one foot slightly, only to watch the tips of their musket barrels slide back across her path. It seemed like something out of a comedy play.

“I’m looking for Privileged Borbador,” she said, pulling her foot back.

Neither of the men responded.

“He’s an Adran Privileged. He was taken to your healers just two nights ago.”

Again, nothing.

“I’m here from Field Marshal Tamas. This is an important query,” Nila ventured. If invocation of Tamas’s name meant anything to the cabal guards, they didn’t show it. “Is there someone I should see?” A cold sweat broke out on the back of Nila’s neck. Did these men even know who Bo was? Had Bo reached the Kez cabal alive? The possibility that he had died on the way crept into her mind and she felt a rising panic.

What did she have to do to be allowed admittance to the cabal? She needed answers. Maybe if she set fire to their shoes, they wouldn’t be able to ignore her any longer.

A quick glance at the polished bayonets of the guards, and she imagined that setting their shoes on fire would be a quick path to a disemboweling. She raised her hands. A demonstration of some kind seemed to be in order. There was nothing else for her to do. She still didn’t know how to wield her powers. Without Bo she might as well go back to being a washerwoman.

“What do you want?”

Nila nearly jumped out of her skin. A woman had approached from behind one of the guards. Her caramel skin was lighter than most of the Deliv and her face was long but beautiful, with high cheekbones and a narrow chin. Her spine was straight, her head held high, and her hands were clasped at her waist, clothed in runed Privileged gloves.

“Make it quick,” the woman said impatiently before Nila could answer. She didn’t look at Nila’s face, but rather over her head, as if Nila herself was worth little more than a cursory glance.

“My name is Nila. I’m looking for Privileged Borbador.”

“He’s not seeing anyone.”

Nila swallowed, her throat dry. “I’m…” She stopped herself, a warning dancing across the back of her mind. “Careful with any Privileged,” Bo had said, not long after discovering that Nila didn’t require gloves for her sorcery. “They detest change. Any change could bring the upset of their unrivaled power among the Nine. If a member of a rival cabal discovers your unique ability before you’ve learned to defend yourself, you may wind up being cut apart by Privileged surgeons in a dank room somewhere.”

“I need to see him,” Nila finished.

“You his whore?”

She nearly choked on this. “Excuse me?”

The woman’s eyes narrowed and she seemed to look at Nila for the first time. “Bo’s been letting himself slip. Your skin’s too pale and you’re too short. By Kresimir, his tastes have gotten worse.”

“I’m here from Field Marshal Tamas,” Nila said, biting her tongue. “I need an update on Privileged Borbador.”

“Don’t lie to me, wench. One of Tamas’s men was here an hour ago. Pit, you must be new. Bo’s always liked the clingy types more than he should. He’s still alive, if that’s what you’re asking. If he still wants you, he’ll find you in a couple of weeks. If he doesn’t, you won’t hear from him again. I suggest you go spread your legs for some Adran officer to occupy your time.”

Nila was near bursting. How could this woman, Privileged though she was, speak to her in such a manner? Even when she was nothing more than a laundress, the lord and the lady of the house had never been so contemptuous, and Lady Eldaminse had hated her.

The Privileged waved one gloved hand in dismissal. “If you come around here anymore, I’ll make sure he never sees you again.” There was no malice or threat in her tone of voice. It was just a statement, as casual as a cook might speak of cutting up a chicken. She turned around and strode off without another word, leaving Nila looking for something, anything, to say to her back.

Nila’s hands clenched and unclenched behind her back, and she snatched them to her sides before she caught her dress on fire. She took a step forward, only to find two muskets blocking her path again.

“You should go,” one of the guards said, a note of sympathy in his voice.

Nila whirled on the ball of her foot and stalked away, wondering if she had the power in her to set fire to the whole damned cabal pavilion before they knew what was happening. A “whore,” that Privileged had called her! Spreading her legs for an Adran noble? She could feel the blue flames dancing on her fingertips, and balled her hands into fists.

That’s what the wards are for, dummy. She could hear Bo’s voice in the back of her head. A lick of flame summoned from the Else, directed at that cabal camp, and all the pit would come crashing down on her head.

On a whim, Nila changed course and worked her way around the cordoned cabal camp. Perhaps she should have told the woman that she was Bo’s apprentice – that she was a Privileged, not some commoner to be treated like trash. Maybe she would have gotten a little more respect.

Then again, that woman shouldn’t treat anyone like that.

Nila caught sight of a break in the Privileged’s tents and saw the smokeless flames rising from a fire pit. A guard eyed her inquisitive glances but said nothing as she stood on her toes and looked for some sign of Bo. There were a few Privileged and two or three times as many cabal soldiers in their heavy armor, carrying heavy pikes and sabers. She wondered that there weren’t more muskets, then remembered Bo mentioning that most Privileged were allergic to black powder and avoided it when possible.

She felt a smile touch her lips as she caught sight of white skin among the various shades of black and brown. There was Bo, sitting next to the fire, staring disconnectedly into the flames. He looked very pale but otherwise unharmed. Nila took a breath, a shout on the tip of her tongue, but it caught in her throat as the Deliv Privileged – the same one who had dismissed her so rudely – emerged from a nearby pavilion and approached Bo.

He said something to her, but she just shook her head, then stepped over to him and pressed her lips to his. He didn’t resist or protest – his cheeks flushed and he was soon kissing her back. She traced a finger down his chest and her hand dipped lower…

Nila was halfway back to the Adran camp before she had another rational thought, and she was already at Tamas’s command tent before she knew where she was going.

Field Marshal Tamas stood outside the front of his command tent, eyes shielded from the sun, and examined a pair of maps laid out on the dirt in front of him, the edges held down by several fist-sized rocks. A couple of his officers muttered as she approached, but no one stopped her.

“What happened to your dress?” Olem asked.

She looked down. It looked like she’d been smeared with soot. The bottom half of her dress had two black streaks, as if ink had dripped off her hands. She could smell singed cotton. “Nothing,” she snapped. “When are we leaving?”

Tamas snorted, bending down over his maps, but didn’t say anything.

“We’re camped here for the night,” Olem said. “We’ll leave in the morning.”

“Oh. Right. When will we meet the Kez on the field?”

“Sooner than you may wish,” Tamas muttered, barely loud enough for her to hear.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nila,” Olem said, a note of warning in his voice.

“It’s all right, Olem,” Tamas said, still not looking up from his maps. “She’s learning how to be a real Privileged, and the insolence goes with it. It means, Privileged Nila, that you are woefully underprepared for what I’m going to ask you to do.”

“What’s that?”

“Slaughter thousands of Kez soldiers. Burn them like tinder. Listen to their screams as they wither beneath your sorcery.”

Nila balked at that. “Why do you say I’m unprepared? I did it once, didn’t I?” Nila was unprepared. She had blocked that battle out of her mind so thoroughly that she’d almost forgotten it, and she felt a wave of nausea at the memory.

“Because that’s what Bo said,” Olem interrupted.

“You’ve seen him?”

“An hour ago. He’s still alive, but he’s in no state to fight. He asked me to give you a warning – stay away from the Deliv cabal. We’re to keep your presence a secret until it’s absolutely necessary.”

Nila remembered that Deliv Privileged kissing Bo, her hand reaching between Bo’s legs. “I’m sure he did,” she said.

Tamas finally looked up, but it was only to exchange a glance with Olem.

“Another messenger coming in, sir,” Olem said.

“Of course.” Tamas gave a weary sigh.

A Deliv in his Kelly-green uniform rounded the tent on horseback, barely reining in before his mount trampled Tamas’s maps. “Sir,” the messenger panted. “We’ve been attacked!”

“The Deliv camp?”

“The baggage train,” he said.

Tamas leapt into his tent and returned, buckling his sword to his belt. “Rouse the troops!” he called to Olem.

“Sir, they’re already gone,” the messenger said.

“What do you mean?”

“They hit and left before we could mount a defense.”

“The baggage train?” Nila asked. A glance from Tamas urged caution. The Deliv weren’t supposed to know about her. She took a deep breath, fighting the anger and sense of helplessness that threatened to overwhelm her.

“Yes, ma’am,” the messenger said.

“How the pit did Kez dragoons get behind us?” Tamas demanded. “They shouldn’t be… Pit, is that sorcery?”

Nila looked to see what had caught Tamas’s eye. To their northwest, light flashed along the horizon like the sun reflecting off a dozen mirrors. She opened her third eye, slowly so as not to let it overwhelm her, and saw the splashes of pastel color whirling in the distance, fighting something – a strange darkness, the likes of which she had not yet seen in the Else. It seemed to swallow all light that touched it, moving like an inky cloud upon the horizon.

Something about that darkness touched a nerve in Nila’s subconscious and she felt sick with fear.

Doubt crossed Tamas’s face. Had he seen it too?

“Our people are giving chase, sir,” the messenger said. “King Sulem has requested your presence.”

“He better have a damned good explanation. Your people were supposed to be backing up my dragoons to prevent this very thing from happening.”

Nila caught Tamas’s quick glance. “Stay here,” he said quietly. “But be ready for anything.” Then he was gone, yelling for his horse, Olem close on his heels.

Be ready for anything, he’d said.

That’s a little vague. She looked to the northwest. The flashes of light were now gone, but a chill crept up her spine as she remembered that darkness with which they had warred.