The Drowning City

Chapter 4

Isyllt woke to a hot swath of sunlight creeping across the bed and corset stays gouging her ribs and breasts. Dreams of ghosts and ice clotted her mind, cobweb-sticky, and for a moment she couldn’t remember where she was, or why.

Then she sat up and clarity returned, gilding the spike of pain that stabbed her between the eyes. Bile burned the back of her throat, and for a nervous instant she thought she would retch. She swallowed it down, closed her eyes, and waited to make an uneasy truce with her stomach.

A truce that lasted until she staggered out of bed and breathed in the canal’s stench through the open window. She reached the water closet just in time.

She’d lied, it seemed-drinking herself stupid qualified as letting personal feelings interfere with the job. She couldn’t afford to do that again.

After a long bath and clean clothes she joined the mercenaries for breakfast, where she managed to sip lassi and nibble bread. She closed her eyes against the wicked sunlight and listened to Xinai talk about insurgent groups and warehouse fires. At the moment all she cared about was letting the words sink into her ears-she’d try to make sense of them when her head cleared.

“Wait,” Adam interrupted in the midst of the report. Isyllt opened one eye and winced as light shattered off the table settings. “What was that name?”

“Jabbor Lhun?” Isyllt replied. At least her memory still worked, even if the rest of her body contemplated mutiny.

“He’s the leader of a rebel group,” Xinai said again. “The Jade Tigers. They’re one of the public ones, at least.”

“Is he Assari?” Adam asked.

“Half, or so I heard.” She raised black eyebrows. “Why?”

He grinned. “I think I saw our rebel leader yesterday. Trysting with an apprentice at the Kurun Tam.”

Afternoon settled hot and lazy before they left the Phoenix. A few criers still shouted the news of the fire, but most had fled the heat. The wind from the north smelled of ashes and char.

A skiff carried them to the eastern side of the city, through wide canals and water gardens. The steersman pointed out landmarks, including the shining walls and gates of the Khas Maram. The House of the People, in Assari, the name of both the domed council building and the elected officials who gathered there. The councillors were native Sivahri, meant to balance the imperially appointed Viceroy. In theory, at least-Isyllt doubted anyone not a wealthy loyalist sat in the people’s house.

The emerald shade of the canals spared them the worst of the heat, but the long sleeves Isyllt wore to cover her bruised and salt-burned arms were no help. Insects buzzed loudly through fragrant balcony gardens and upper windows glittered in the sun; reflected light rippled liquid across the undersides of eaves. Raintree was a wealthier neighborhood than Jadewater or Saltlace, with fewer shops to ruin the line of expensive houses. No broken streets or sinking buildings here-police patrolled these streets, not gangs, and she doubted anyone slept in these alleys.

The skiff let them off at the circular tree-lined court where Vasilios lived, and Adam tipped the steersman. As they climbed the steps, Isyllt reached for the power stored in her ring, teasing out just enough to numb her aches and clear her head. No safer a remedy than a drunkard’s morning wine, but this was the job and she couldn’t muddle through it. The world snapped into crystalline focus and she swallowed a sigh.

Zhirin greeted them at the door, looking nearly as tired as Isyllt felt, and led them to an upstairs study. The windows stood open to the garden breeze and treetops swayed against the casement, framed by flowering trellises. A fat cream-colored cat napped in a stripe of sunlight, sparing the visitors only an amber-eyed glance.

Vasilios rose to greet them, setting aside a book. He must have noticed the reek of magic hanging on Isyllt; his eyes narrowed as he clasped her hand, but he said nothing.

“Good afternoon.” He waved them toward chairs, settling back into his own. Isyllt winced as his knees cracked.

“This is nothing,” he said wryly, catching the look. “When the rains come, all my bones try to catch the next fast ship for Assar.” He glanced at the window, at the cascade of vines and flowers beyond it. “But I can’t seem to leave Symir, no matter what old bones would like.”

Zhirin returned laden with an elaborate brass tea set, and Isyllt smiled-brewing countless pots of tea was part of any apprenticeship she’d ever known. They waited in silence as tea was poured and pastries passed around. The rattle of saucers drew the cat, who threw himself against ankles indiscriminately until Vasilios shared a honey cake with him.

“It’s pleasant to have new company,” the old man said when everyone was served, “but I suspect you wish to speak of the real reasons behind your visit.”

Zhirin glanced toward the door, but Vasilios waved her back. “Stay, my dear. This very much concerns you.” The girl settled on a cushioned bench beside his chair, hands clasped in her lap. “In fact, why don’t you explain to Zhirin exactly what you’re doing here?”

The girl’s face paled a shade, but she sat still and waited. Soft and pretty and demure, and brewed strong tea-prized qualities in apprentices the world over. Revolution would be a tempting hobby after a few years of that.

Isyllt took a sip of tea to drown her amusement; the heat stung the cut on her left hand. “Rumors of rebellion brewing in Symir have reached the court in Erisín. My master, who serves the king, sent me here to investigate those rumors.”

“Why?” Zhirin asked. She flinched, then continued. “How does Symir concern Selafai?”

One corner of Isyllt’s mouth curled. “The Emperor’s eye turns north. If he does attempt to invade Selafai, Sivahra’s wealth will finance it. Selafai has no desire to be subsumed by the Empire.”

Zhirin’s hazel eyes narrowed. “And Symir has no desire to be handed off to another master like a piece on a game board.” She flushed, as if surprised by the vehemence in her voice.

“Not a piece. A power.” Isyllt leaned forward. “The king of Selafai doesn’t want to rule an empire any more than he wants to be part of one. All he cares about is keeping his kingdom secure.”

In truth the king of Selafai was too distracted by grief over his wife to care about much else, even a year after her death. It was Kiril who saw the eyes of the Empire turning north, and Kiril who chose to act sooner rather than later.

“What does this mean for Symir?” Zhirin asked.

“It means that I’m here to find this rumored rebellion, to treat with its leaders. If there is a faction strong enough to take back Sivahra and hold it, Selafai would be willing to offer aid.”

The girl’s jaw tightened and she sucked in a breath through her nose. “Why are you telling me this? I’m just an apprentice-a collaborator, no less.” She glanced at Vasilios with a rueful half-smile.

Vasilios’s laugh broke the thickening tension. “Forgive me, Zhirin. But do you really think I don’t know who you’re with, all those times you’re late for lunch or lessons?”

“Oh.” And her brown cheeks burned crimson.

“The empire isn’t the worst of it,” Zhirin said later, after she’d stopped blushing and stammering. She paced in front of the window, despite her still-aching feet; at least the carpets were soft. The cat followed her circuit with slitted eyes, tail-tip twitching. “Not really.”

“No?” Isyllt cocked an eyebrow. Hard to meet the woman’s gaze for long, eyes paler than an animal’s, clearer and colder than river water. “I had the idea that some Sivahri were none too pleased with things Assari.”

“Some, of course. But the Assari’s influence hasn’t been entirely bad. They built Symir, if nothing else. It’s the Khas Maram we fight.” Not that she fought anything-Zhirin shrugged the thought aside like a biting fly.

“The Assari are conquerors, but at least they didn’t betray their own blood. The Khas deny their clans, bleed the people with taxes.” Taxes that paid her mother’s government pension, taxes that had bought her clothes and childhood toys.

“They sacrifice our people in rice fields and mines. Many of the miners are prisoners, some arrested on ridiculous charges and forced into work camps. People die in the mines, more than the Khas will ever admit. Bodies are lost, never given burial rites. They disappear.” She glanced at her master and the stones glittering on his gnarled hands. Did he know about the diamonds? She didn’t dare ask, not yet.

The sorceress rolled her shoulders as if against a chill. Her companions-or bodyguards-watched silently. Zhirin couldn’t place the man’s features, but the woman was clearly forest-clan, though she hadn’t given a clan-name.

The sky darkened to slate and silver as the light died. Shadows thickened in the room for a moment before the lamps sprang to life, witchlight kindling to real flame.

“The Khas doesn’t care about the people,” Zhirin continued. The words felt awkward in her mouth-Jabbor was the one who made speeches. A mimic-bird, she imagined Kwan would call her. “Their only concern is wealth, theirs and the tithes that keep the Empire content.”

“Would this faction of yours rather see Sivahra independent, or only replace the Khas with less-corrupt officials?” Isyllt turned a cup of tea-doubtless long cold-between her hands and her ring gleamed. Zhirin had never seen a black diamond before, but she knew what they meant.

She paused in her circuit, shifting her weight with a rustle of cloth. “Of course we want to see Sivahra free. But our first concern is the people. We don’t want violence, not if there’s any other answer. There’s been enough bloodshed in Sivahra’s history.”

The Sivahri woman turned her head, lips tightening.

“Can we meet Jabbor?” Isyllt asked, leaning forward. By lamplight her face was an ivory mask; Zhirin wondered if her skin was cold to the touch.

“Yes. That is, I think so. I’ll ask him.” He hadn’t spoken of it last night, but she knew how much they needed the money they would have made from the stolen stones. Hard for the clanspeople to rise in revolution when they had farms to tend and no other way to eat.

She turned to Vasilios, who’d been silent for most of the conversation. “How long have you known, master?”

“Quite a while, my dear.” He smiled affectionately and she smiled back, though her stomach was cold. If he had noticed, who else might have?

Xinai couldn’t sleep, even after Adam snored softly beside her. His arm draped over her stomach, hair trailing against her cheek. Usually the press of warm flesh comforted her, but tonight she could barely breathe for the heat. Sweat-damp linen scraped against her skin, snagged on her scars.

Finally she rolled out of bed, groping for her clothes. Adam stirred, eyes flashing in the dark.

“I’m going out,” she whispered. “Go back to sleep.”

After a moment his breathing deepened again. She tugged on vest and trousers, stomped into her boots. Sandals would be cooler and less conspicuous, but she liked having a place for extra blades.

She leaned against the handle to keep the door from squeaking. Moisture warped the wood till nothing opened or closed smoothly. She turned her key in the lock and slunk down the shadow-thick hall.

She’d hoped-ancestors, how she’d hoped-but the witch’s contact was nothing but a foolish child. Didn’t want bloodshed. Xinai snorted softly. There was nothing without bloodshed, let alone tearing down the Khas and casting out the Assari conquerors. Freedom was measured in blood.

She pitied the poor dead woman, trapped now, forever cut off from her family and her homeland. She hadn’t had the heart to ask what would happen to her spirit once the witch returned to Erisín. An ugly fate.

But no worse than her own family had known. Did their ghosts linger still, haunting the jungles or the mines?

The night was heavy in her lungs as she slipped out the servants’ entrance to the street and turned toward the docks. But after a few streets she halted, frowning. She needed more than drunken complaints and rumors. She knew where she needed to go; she’d avoided it long enough.

Xinai turned and made her way to Straylight, and the Street of Salt.

Easy for the mageling to keep her idealism. No Laii ever lived in a tilting hovel that flooded with the rains, ever sent their children to the mines or fields to keep the lease on such a hovel. Easy for the mages to look down from their mountain and call Symir a jewel, when they were too far away to see the flaws at its heart.

She smiled at the missing signs and Sivahran writing, tried to imagine the whole city like that. No use. The city was Assari, from wooden pilings beneath the water to the rooftop tiles, even if it had been paid for with native blood. Perhaps it could be reclaimed, made Sivahri, but the jungle was her true home. She should go into the hills, find her family’s banyan tree. If it still stood. The spirit might have withered with no one to tend it.

She touched one of the charms around her neck, the oldest. The last of her mother’s work, containing bones and ashes of generations of Lins. She should have worn her mother’s bones in that pouch, but they were lost.

A pack of young men loitered on the corner, lounging against crumbling walls. Prides, they called themselves, like hunting cats. Clanless children who banded together for safety, formed families just as tight as blood-kin. She had feared them when she was young, but now she understood. She nodded acknowledgment as she passed and the leader nodded back.

The smell of herbs and witchery washed over her as she walked down the street and her eyes burned. Time pulled away like the tide, leaving a different Xinai standing on the pitted stones. Young and scared, torn and bloody.

She stopped in front of a narrow shop-front, swallowing the taste of tears. The sign was nearly the same as it had been twelve years ago, faded now and weathered. Lamplight flickered through the windows. Too much to hope…But she climbed the worn stairs and knocked.

For a moment she thought no one would answer, but finally the door creaked open. A stooped woman stood silhouetted in the doorway, her face cast in shadow.

“What do you want?” she asked. A familiar voice, like a cold blade in her heart.

“Selei?” The name cracked in her mouth, nearly shattered.

Silence stretched. Finally the old woman moved, let the light fall through the door.

“Xinai? Xinai Lin?” Her wrinkled brown face broke into a wondering smile. “Oh, child-” And she stepped forward to clasp Xinai in her arms, and pulled her into the shop.

The room was much the same as she remembered, clean but crowded, walls warped and water-stained. Fragrant herbal smoke drowned the mold-musk that lingered in older buildings. The last time Xinai had crossed the threshold she’d been barely fifteen, desperate and alone, her back bloody and slick with grease to keep her shirt from sticking to open wounds.

Selei had paid for her passage on a smuggler’s ship, sent her away before hate and grief poisoned her. It had saved her life.

The witch locked the door behind them and turned to study Xinai. Age clouded one eye milk-blue, but the other was dark and sharp as ever. Not blood-kin, but a friend of the Lin clan since before she was born, the closest thing to family she had left in Sivahra.

Selei’s gaze took in her jewelry, the blades at her hips. One bird-light hand caught Xinai’s, turned it over to trace the calluses. “You’ve done well for yourself.”

Xinai nodded, throat tight.

“But you came home.” Not quite a question, but her forehead creased in curiosity. Braids the color of steel and ashes rattled as she moved, woven through with feathers and bone beads.

Xinai felt the weight of age and experience in the woman’s mismatched gaze, felt herself being measured. She nodded again and found her voice.

“I’ve come back to help.”