The Emperor's blades

47

For the rest of the day they had pressed east, past the Tower, past Buri’s Leap and the Harpies, past the Black and Gold Knives, dropping into valleys and scrambling through passes no wider than their shoulders until they were in a region of peaks Kaden had never seen before. In the early morning, Pyrre pushed them hard, but as the day wore on, the assassin began to flag and the monks’ long years in the mountains started to show their value. Tan kept the pace, never slowing, even when the others stumbled or paused for breath. How Triste managed to keep up, Kaden had no idea. On the steeper sections, he put a hand on her lower back, helping her up the scree and talus, but for the most part, she climbed and ran on her own, face drawn with the exertion, chest heaving as she gasped the thin air, but she ran. No one had forgotten what happened to Phirum when he began to fall behind.

They didn’t stop until the sun hung just above the western peaks, a bleary red smudge on the darkening sky. They had just crested the steepest ridge yet, a great wall of granite running north and south as far as the eye could see, when Tan finally called the halt. Triste collapsed into a heap on the rocks, shuddering with exhaustion and falling asleep almost instantly. She had lost the second of her light shoes crossing a river, and her feet were an excruciating mess of slices, blisters, blood, and bruises that made Kaden wince just looking at them. It seemed a miracle that she could continue to stand, let alone run.

Wearily, he peered over the ridgeline to the east. The terrain made his heart sink: rank on rank of mountains and ridges stretching away toward the horizon. He started to say something, to point out that they couldn’t possibly cross all of them, but Pyrre and Tan were looking west, studying a saddle they had passed through maybe an hour earlier. It had been a brutal climb and an even more brutal descent, interrupted by a few paces of level ground where Kaden had wanted nothing more than to sprawl out on the earth and surrender himself to slumber. He had suggested they stop there for the night, but Tan was having none of it.

“You were right, monk,” Pyrre said, gesturing.

Kaden stared. There were men in that saddle, he realized, squinting until his eyes hurt. Aedolians.

“I have to admit, I’m impressed,” the assassin continued, hunched forward to catch her breath, palms on her knees. “Dismayed, but impressed. I didn’t think they’d be able to track us.”

“How did they track us?” Kaden asked, incredulous. He was a fair hand at tracking himself, as were all the monks. It was possible to follow their path through the mountains-Pyrre’s leather boots would scuff the stone and Triste had been bleeding since they fled Ashk’lan-but it would be laborious, time-consuming work, work that should have slowed their pursuers to a crawl. “They should not be able to move so fast.”

It was a fatuous comment, an inane denial of empirical fact, but for once Tan let it go. The older monk’s mouth was set in a grim line as he stared west. “The ak’hanath,” he said finally.

The assassin raised an eyebrow. “Is that some kind of secret monk word?”

“It’s what’s been tracking us,” Tan replied, then shifted his eyes to Kaden. “More than likely, it’s been tracking him.”

In the mad terror of the slaughter of the monastery and the exhaustion of their flight through the mountains, Kaden had forgotten all about the terrible creature Tan had shown him on the parchment nights before.

“Why?” he asked wearily. “What does the ak’hanath have to do with any of this?”

The monk shook his head. “Impossible to be sure, but it seems the Aedolians found it … or bred it. They used it to keep an eye on you while they were setting up their attack.”

“I don’t want to seem like the dunce,” Pyrre said, “but what is it?”

“All these months,” Kaden said slowly, “and it was there just to watch me?”

“Hard to be certain. If the annals are correct, the creatures are fearsome fighters, but they were not made to fight. The Csestriim created them to track, to hunt.”

“It killed all those goats. It ripped out Serkhan’s throat easily enough. Why didn’t it come for me?”

“I don’t know,” Tan replied. “Perhaps it did, but failed to find an opening. Perhaps Ut and Adiv did not want to take a chance with your assassination, did not want to risk assigning the task to a creature of which they remained uncertain. This is all speculation, worthless as wind.”

“I don’t like to make frivolous offerings to my god,” Pyrre said, raising a hand to slow the conversation, “but it is growing very tempting to stab one of you repeatedly in the neck until the other explains to me what you’re talking about.”

“A Csestriim creation,” Tan replied, ignoring the assassin’s skeptical look. “A creature built to hunt.”

Pyrre laughed. “I’m no historian, but I think the last of the Csestriim died a few thousand years ago.”

“The ak’hanath is not Csestriim,” Tan responded, rounding on her. “It is a creation of the Csestriim.”

“I’ve traveled two continents, from the Waist to Freeport and west beyond the Ancaz Mountains, and I’ve never heard of such a thing.”

“Now you have.”

The assassin pursed her lips and nodded. “All right. We’ll use the assumption, for now. Why does the thing hate Kaden so much?” She turned to Kaden. “You piss in its nest or something?”

“The ak’hanath follows commands,” Tan replied. “A dog set on a hare doesn’t hate the hare, but it will harry it and tear it apart just the same.”

“Then we’ll have to make sure the hound doesn’t find our rabbit,” Pyrre said, clapping Kaden on the shoulder jocularly. “There are a dozen ways to cover his scent. The next time we cross one of those rushing streams-”

“It doesn’t track by scent.”

“Then what,” Kaden asked, trying to make sense of that, “does it use?”

The monk shook his head. “There’s not a word for it-not a modern one, anyway. The histories call it atma. ‘Self’ might be the best translation. The ak’hanath is tracking your sense of self.”

Kaden stared.

“That,” Pyrre said, raising an eyebrow, “is by turns fascinating, implausible, and horribly inconvenient.”

“Take your pick,” Tan replied grimly. “It’s out there-one of the monks saw it back at Ashk’lan-and it has Kaden’s atma. You put the thing on a boat to the Manjari Empire, and given enough time, it will find its way back to him.”

Kaden shuddered at the thought of those awful, unnatural eyes, those skittering claws, bent to one single purpose-hunting him.

“I’m waiting for the good news,” Pyrre said.

“There is no- Get down,” Tan growled, hauling Kaden beneath an overhanging shelf of rock. “Get the girl and get under cover.”

Pyrre, for once, didn’t waste time bandying words, turning instead to gather Triste up and duck beneath the same shelf. Only when they were hidden away did the assassin turn to the monk.

“What are we doing under this rock?” she asked, her voice curious rather than annoyed.

Tan gestured toward the sky above the Aedolians. “We’ve got more than the ak’hanath to worry about. Now they’ve got a bird, as well.”

Aside from once, as a child, Kaden had never seen a kettral, and he marveled at the sight of the majestic creature. So that’s what Valyn’s been flying around on all these years, he thought, envy, for the moment, threatening to overwhelm dismay as he studied the massive wingspan and huge, raking talons, each big enough to support two tiny figures in black. He watched as the bird circled once, then landed gracefully among the Aedolians. The assassin was not so excited.

“I don’t know anything about your Csestriim horror,” she said, “but this bird is really going to put a hitch in our plans. On foot, those troops are an hour away. By wing…” She spread her hands.

“Will they come for us immediately?” Triste asked. She had woken when the assassin dragged her under the overhang, and was propped on her elbows, staring off into the gathering gloom, fear and defiance warring in her voice.

Pyrre produced a long lens from her pack, peered through it for a while, then shook her head slowly. “It doesn’t look like it,” she replied. “The sun’s just set, and Adiv’s a crafty one. He knows that now that they have the bird, we can’t possibly outdistance them. He’ll wait for the morning, for full sunlight. Then they’ll come.”

Kaden looked from Tan to the Skullsworn, then back. “So we’ve got one night,” he said finally. “What do we do?”

Pyrre shrugged. “We’re not spoiled for choice. Normally, I’d recommend spending your last coins on a favorite meal or a good whore, but I don’t think you monks tend to carry much coin, and you seem to be lacking in whores. Mostly lacking, anyway.” She smiled at Triste with this last comment.

“I’m not a whore,” the girl snapped.

The assassin raised her hands in surrendur. “Me, I’m exhausted. There’s just time to enjoy a good sound sleep.”

Kaden stared as Pyrre Lakatur rolled onto her back, locked her fingers behind her head, and closed her eyes.

“That’s it?” he asked, amazed. “You cross an entire continent to save me, and then just give up?”

“Everyone thinks that Rassambur is all about learning to knife people in the belly and poison their soup,” the assassin responded without opening her eyes. “What you really learn there is a pretty basic lesson: Death is inevitable. The god comes for us all.”

“What about back at Ashk’lan? When you fought Ut? You didn’t seem so resigned then!”

“Then, there was a chance. Now…” Pyrre shrugged. “I’ve been running for a day and a night. We all have. The traitors behind us have five times our numbers as well as a Kettral Wing, not to mention, if your sour master here is to be believed, the evil pet creature of an ancient and immortal race that could track you across moving water by moonlight. Tomorrow, we’ll fight, and I will give some of them to the god, but we will not win. And so, for now, I will enjoy a few hours of uninterrupted sleep.”

Kaden turned his attention to his umial. “I assume you’re not content to lie down and die, too?”

The older monk shook his head. “No, but the way is not clear. I must think.”

And then, as if they were back on the ledges of Ashk’lan, Rampuri Tan shifted into a cross-legged position and gazed out across the valley toward the west, chest rising and falling so slowly, the movement was almost imperceptible. The monk’s eyes remained open, but the sharp focus had left them, as though he were dreaming. Or dead, Kaden reflected grimly.

He considered Tan for a while longer, then took the long lens from where it lay beside Pyrre, training it on the enemy soldiers once more. “There’s got to be something,” he muttered, studying the Kettral as they exchanged handshakes with the Aedolians. The leader was a blond youth, tall and well-built, dressed all in blacks like the rest of his Wing. The short Kettral swords crisscrossed his back. Valyn and I used to play with wooden swords like that. They had pretended to be great warriors, but when the men came for them on the morrow, when Pyrre “gave a few to the god,” Kaden doubted he would manage to land a single blow. Bitterness welled up inside him, hot and sour. He allowed the emotion its flood, then shunted it aside. Bitterness would do him no more good than regret.

Look at the men, he told himself. Find a solution.

The newcomer commanded a standard five-man Wing, only … Kaden peered through the long lens once more. One of them-the flier, it looked like-was a woman, middling height with short blond hair. The only other Kettral he could get a good view of was a lanky soldier with feathers in his long hair and ink running up his arms. It was a strange look for a warrior, but after everything Kaden had seen in the past week, he was numb to strangeness.

As the two talked vigorously with Ut and Adiv, Kaden lowered the glass. Night already smudged the sky. Maybe the assassin was right. Maybe it was time to accept the inevitable. Beshra’an, saama’an, kinla’an, even the vaniate-they all seemed frivolous and inconsequential pursuits in the face of all that steel.

“What’s that?” Triste asked, pointing at something in the distance.

Kaden squinted. A dark shape was moving across the gathering gloom high above the mountain peaks. He raised the lens to his eye once more, and a second bird burst into view, winging in hard and fast.

“’Shael take it,” he swore.

“Take care,” Pyrre murmured without opening her eyes. “That’s my god you’re invoking.” The woman rooted awkwardly beneath her back, tossed aside a sharp rock, then settled once more.

“They’ve got a second bird,” Kaden said. “You want to see?”

“Not particularly.”

“We don’t know who these new ones are.”

“We don’t know who any of them are except for Adiv, who’s a bastard, and Ut, who’s a much bigger bastard with a very large sword. Their names don’t matter. What matters is that they want to kill you and they are setting up to make a very thorough job of it.”

“We might learn something.”

“We will learn that there are five of them with two swords apiece. Making ten swords, if you’re keeping count. They will also carry belt knives and at least two will have bows, maybe all five. By my count, that gives them rougly fifteen more weapons than we have, not counting, of course, whatever explosives they’ve brought.”

“You’ve studied the Kettral.”

“I’ve studied everyone I might have to kill,” Pyrre replied, “and they will be harder to kill than most. I don’t need to look at them to know that.”

“Well, I want to see,” Triste said, wriggling forward on her elbows, shouldering past the drowsing assassin.

She raised the glass, frowned, then slowly shifted it, following the bird as it approached. Kaden watched it with his naked eye, squinting as it landed. He could make out the dismounting soldiers, shadows in the gathering dusk, but nothing more.

“The new soldiers don’t seem to be getting on as well as the first ones did,” she said after few moments.

“Meaning what?” Kaden asked.

“I’m not sure. There seems to be some sort of standoff. Here.”

Kaden took the long lens and trained it on the far pass. It took him a minute to sort out the new Kettral from those already there.

“This Wing has a woman, too,” he said, “long red hair. And … two women, although the second one doesn’t look like she’s much older than you.”

“Is she wearing blacks?” Pyrre asked.

Kaden nodded. “And she’s carrying a bow. The thing is practically as big as she is.”

“Don’t let her size fool you,” the assassin replied. “A killer doesn’t always look like a killer. The girl may be young, but if she’s flying missions for the Eyrie, she can probably put an arrow through your eye at three hundred paces. You know, the Kettral tried to clear out Rassambur once-one of your revered ancestors decided he didn’t like the idea of a church of Ananshael up in the Ancaz. They sent ten Wings, ten veteran Wings…”

The assassin continued talking, but Kaden had ceased to hear the words. He had brought the long lens around to the commander of this second Wing-a tall, sun-darkened youth with short hair, a grim set to his mouth, and eyes dark as pools of pitch. At first he’d been paying more attention to the youth’s altercation with Micijah Ut. The two were arguing about something, the Aedolian had his blade drawn, and other soldiers were drifting toward their commander as though sensing a fight. Kaden was about to take another look at the bird when something drew him back to that face. The sun had all but set and the light was poor, and at first he thought the shadows were playing tricks on him, but then the commander chopped downward with a hand, a curt, exasperated gesture, and Kaden knew. The eyes were darker, somehow, and bleaker. The mischievious boy had become a man grown, with a man’s height and a soldier’s build, but Kaden knew that gesture and he knew the face, even after eight years. He struggled to make sense of what was happening on the far pass, but even as he watched he felt the cold blade of betrayal take him through the gut. He lowered the glass.

“It’s Valyn,” he said, his voice hollow. “It’s my brother.” He set the long lens down wearily and lay back against the rough stone. It seemed, suddenly, that the assassin was right, that lying down and getting some rest before the end was all they could hope to do. “At least now we know who’s behind this whole mess.”

“Your brother?” Pyrre asked, suddenly interested, propping herself up on one elbow. “Are you sure?”

Kaden nodded wearily. “I spent half my life racing around the Dawn Palace with him. He’s bigger now and there’s something … more dangerous about him, but it’s him.”

The assassin picked up the long lens and peered through it for quite a while, pursing her lips as she watched.

“Well,” she said finally, a grin spreading over her face. “If the reception he just received is any indication, it looks like he’s on our side.”

Kaden shook his head. “Why would you say that?”

“Once again, I find myself underwhelmed by the Shin powers of observation. Micijah Ut, may Ananshael gnaw the flesh from his overlarge bones, has just stripped your brother’s Wing of their weapons. His men are currently trussing them up. The woman with the red hair and the beguiling figure just took a bite out of one of their ears, and, if your brother’s face is anything to go by, he’d like to go quite a bit beyond ears.”

A sudden, fierce hope leapt in Kaden’s chest. “They’re fighting?”

“Well, they tried, but it was a pretty one-sided fight. Teeth against steel doesn’t make for a great matchup.”

“But they’re not with the rest of them,” Kaden said. “They’re not part of it.”

“The good news is,” Pyrre continued, as though she hadn’t heard the question, “a bird like that should be able to fly us all out of here.”

“The bird is there,” Rampuri Tan said. His eyes were sharp, focused. He had left whatever trance he entered far behind. “We are here. A valley and over a dozen armed men separate us.”

“Well,” Pyrre said, “I was still on the good news. You’ve jumped ahead.”

“That’s the end of it?” Triste demanded, anger creasing her brow. “That’s all you have to say?”

“Oh, no,” the assassin replied, turning to her. “There’s more good news: I have a plan.”

Kaden narrowed his eyes. There was a barb in this bait-he just couldn’t see it.

“Your plan?” Tan ground out.

“Now we come to bad news.” Pyrre put down the glass, drew one of those long, cruel knives of hers, and turned to Triste. “The bad news is that the plan involves sacrifice, and in this unfair world, some of us will be called upon to sacrifice more than others.”

Kaden lunged for the woman’s wrist at the last moment, trying desperately to stop the knife, but he was only a monk, not even a monk, while Pyrre Lakatur was a priestess of Ananshael, assassin, Skullsworn, trained to follow the ways of her bloody god in the unholy halls of Rassambur, so quick, so precise, that Triste barely had time to scream before the blade bit down.