UW02. Plains of Sand and Steel Page 6

  “WHAT DO you think about how it went?” Lucca asked Ona as they cleaned the day of training off their necks and faces. The fires in the copper bowl by the door, and the ones hanging from chains, scattered rays of orange over the purple, black, and white weave of the guest tent.

  “They’re no mercenaries, but they’ll do.” Ona gave up on simply washing her face and dumped her entire bowl of clean water over her head.

  “They’re better than mercenaries,” Lucca said. “More talented with bow and sword. And they’d fall on a sword for the kyros.”

  “Or for Seren.”

  Lucca nodded. “I think so.”

  “And so would you.”

  “Ona.”

  “You wish she’d fall on your sword.” She winked.

  Lucca’s eyes flashed toward the door. “Be careful.”

  “No one around here knows Silvanian.”

  “Willing to risk my life on that?” He gave her such an older brother look before leaning over his washbowl to finish scrubbing.

  “Oh, don’t get your trousers in a bunch.” Ona passed him on her way to the door and kicked the back of a knee, almost making him fall.

  He growled. “So our long journey didn’t change you much.”

  “You worried it would?”

  “Hopeful,” Lucca said.

  “That stings.”

  He laughed.

  “Wait.” Ona turned from her view of the city. Night was already growing into corners between tents and along the lotus towers’ eastern sides as the sun’s light shimmered pink and readied for its exit. “Are you serious?”

  That Lucca shrug said so much.

  Something like a dagger’s prick hurt her heart. “What exactly are you hoping I’ll change?”

  “Uncross your arms, Ona. I adore you. I want you to be happy.”

  “I am happy.”

  Lucca rubbed his bottom lip with a knuckle. “So I’m pretty certain the kyros's wife coming to call isn’t normal behavior,” he said, abruptly changing the subject.

  “Since when has our life ever been filled with normal behavior?”

  Maybe if Ona killed every Invader she could get her hands on, life would have the chance to become normal. Maybe she could even think about art again. Ona stared into the night, the comforting dark spreading like the hope inside her.

  SEREN

  “General Adem did what?” Seren stared at Hossam, who stammered and ran a hand over his hair outside the main tent’s door.

  “He announced the invasion and held a meeting with the kaptans after you left the training field, Pearl of the Desert.”

  Adem had told the troops about the Invaders! He never would’ve done that to Meric. She didn’t know whether to storm into his tent and demand an apology in Meric’s name or pretend she was fine with it and had possibly even planned it herself.

  “My lady,” Cansu started, “didn’t the kyros order the announcement and the meeting? I would’ve thought…”

  So they really didn’t know he was dead. She’d thought maybe they’d figured it out. She’d almost hoped they had. Almost. But it was best they didn’t.

  “Yes. Yes, of course the kyros ordered the meeting. I was…confused about the timing.”

  “Ah,” Hossam said. Cansu and Erol nodded, looking relieved.

  Seren breathed out in a rush. One problem down, another very terrible and very big one to go. “I need to see the mercenaries.”

  THATCHED mats crunched under Seren’s slippered feet as she followed Hossam, Cansu, and Erol toward a discreet, mostly unknown exit from the Kyros Walls. Her mind whirled around the day’s events. She hated leaving Meric’s body under the rotating guards’ watch. Would they adhere to her instructions and stay out of the chamber? What if Adem came and ordered them away? She should’ve left one of her own men there.

  A simple door was hidden by a false waterworker’s station that passed through the stone barrier and posed as an outbuilding with all the usual calligraphy. Danger. Waterworker managerial staff only. Erol creaked the door open quickly, entered the dark, empty room inside the walls, and they all passed through, into the streets.

  The city was quiet during the hour before sunset. Most were inside, preparing to eat with their families and talk about their days. Street sweepers made use of the empty pathways. They worked their wide, fan-like brooms, pushing waste into neat piles for proper distribution. Canal purifiers cleaned the water with sieves and powders that disappeared when diluted. Rock doves cooed from the few places on the tops of the stone walls that weren’t spiked with iron.

  But even in the quiet, the city wasn’t peaceful. News of the approaching Invaders had spread. The voices past the walls were tense, snipping. A child was shushed harshly. Fear shook the air like the tremble of a bowstring before the arrow flies.

  Seren gripped the piece of her old skirt and said a silent prayer for the family she still had—the people of Akhayma. Her hands shook, barely capable of tucking the green wool back into her sash let alone raising a bow or sword to defend her people. Her body longed to curl up on itself, to give in, but Seren forced her bones into a proud, confident posture. A lie she didn’t think she could morph into truth.

  A baby cried far off, near the outer walls. Water trickled and jumped down the canals, a splash cooling Seren’s foot as she maneuvered around the tents, her guards around her like older brothers. A woman started down the street beside them, then entered a shop with a wooden sign showing a painted shoe. Seren’s own slippers were green, white, and red, but not from any paints. Emeralds, pearls, and rare rosestones adorned her feet. Further blessed, her shoes had more heat protection in the sole than most in the Empire. Somehow, she had earned these luxuries simply by being the general’s daughter. How could she ever be enough? Barir was wrong. She wasn’t chosen or blessed any more than they were. If she was, she’d be confident, wouldn’t she? She wouldn’t feel like she didn’t deserve any of this.

  The guest tent, not too far off, where Lucca and Onaratta stayed, glowed amethyst in the twilight. Seren’s stomach jumped.

  Lucca’s voice rumbled under Ona’s beyond the woven fabric.

  “Goat milk,” he said to her in the trade tongue. “Remember, trade is a blend of Luk and the desert tongue.”

  “Since I know neither, that’s completely helpful,” Ona shot back, her words correct, but her inflection off. The sarcasm was very clear though.

  Erol’s face bunched in confusion as Ona mimicked Lucca’s earlier words. “Goat milk.”

  A smile touched Seren’s lips. “They’re having a lesson.” The simplicity of it, the humility and humor, gave her the push to go on inside.

  Ona dropped a wooden bowl to the carpeted floor. She muttered something about goats, dancing, and death that was maybe an attempt at a curse.

  Lucca bowed, then offered his low, pillowed stool.

  Light flickered in the Holy Fire bowl near the door. Seren added three lahabshjara leaves from the bowl’s supporting dish to boost the flame, passed hands over the heat, and whispered a prayer. Her muscles relaxed around her neck and shoulders. She was calm, but no visions shimmered into her mind.

  Facing Lucca and Ona, she took a breath. “I need you to promise you won’t tell anyone what I’m about to tell you. I’ll give you another payment of silver equal to the amount given for the training.”

  Ona’s eyes widened with greed, but there was a cinder of anger in them too. Now that she thought about it, that cinder had been there all the time.

  “What’s bothering you, Pearl of the Desert?” Lucca said in absolutely flawless trade tongue. “If I may ask? Please remember, we’re yours to command.”

  Ona rolled her big eyes and tucked a lock of red hair back into one of the two knots of thick waves on her head. “Quit showing off, Lucca. If you’ll forgive me for saying it, Seren, your language cuts the ear like a bad piercing.”

  Seren had to smile. “Many foreigners say so.”

  A large, metal oil lamp hanging fr
om the highest point in the tent cast star patterns on the aubergine walls, red and blue carpets, and Ona’s back as she bent to clean up her spilled food.

  A spicy scent tweaked Seren’s nose and her stomach growled. “That’s Kurakian chicken.”

  Ona wiggled orange-stained fingers. “It is.” She handed Seren a morsel.

  The chicken’s flavor roared across Seren’s tongue, and before she could ask for another bite, Lucca handed her a bowl.

  His hand nearly brushed hers. A pleasant rush sped up her arm. A slow smile spread over Lucca’s mouth, but he looked down, not meeting her eyes.

  Ona cleared her throat. “You do remember I’m sitting right here.”

  The room was suddenly far too small for all three of them.

  Lucca’s gaze snapped to his friend. “Ona.”

  Seren hadn’t intended to flirt with the man. Her husband was dead and the enemy was coming and she…

  Ona broke through her panic. “Do you like a lot of spicy foods?”

  “I do,” Seren said. “I request the hottest dishes from around the world. It drives our cooks mad, but the people love it when I offered samples at the seeding festival. But Meric never wants me to mingle with them and I wish he’d—”

  Her stomach dropped. Just like that, she’d forgotten he was dead. She’d been annoyed by him again, frustrated again.

  Lucca sat back against a metal-tooled trunk and looked up at her through his thick, black eyelashes. “Why are you really here?”

  Veins and tendons stuck out over the back of his hand. He had a warrior’s fingers, scarred and rough. His face showed none of the ever-brewing anger of his friend’s. His eyes were soft. He’d removed the green-blue brigantine from earlier. An ivory shirt stretched across his broad chest and well-muscled arms. Fine leather pants covered his shapely legs and a sword rested beside his feet, where he sat cross-legged on the floor. He was so foreign, so strange. Unlike Meric or his brother Varol. They never would’ve sat on the floor or comforted anyone with the idea of simply listening.

  “I need to know how deep your loyalty goes,” she said.

  “We signed our agreement,” Ona said. “You were there. Plus, if you’re offering more silver, that much more, you can bet we’ll do pretty much whatever you want. Especially if it has to do with smashing Invader skulls into the earth.”

  Seren’s heart raced like Fig on the track. “I have a problem. Something terrible. But I have an idea to fix it.”

  Ona’s grin sharpened. “It was your idea to hire us, not Kyros Meric’s, wasn’t it?”

  Seren nodded.

  Lucca smiled wryly. “I would’ve said thank you before the Invaders were spotted heading this way.”

  A fist squeezed Seren’s heart. “I’m sorry you’ll be tangled up in another person’s war.”

  “There’s that phrase again!” Ona punched her thigh. “It’s not someone else’s war. It’s our war. The Invaders are our enemies too. Believe me. Whatever it is you want us to help you with, know that we are yours to command.”

  She seemed passionate enough. There was truth in her voice. If Seren could convince her this plan was the best move in the situation, maybe she could be a strong ally. Well, there was only one way to know…

  “Kyros Meric is dead.” The words fell from Seren’s mouth like a curse. “If I don’t hide that fact, General Adem will send the city into mourning. Three days of fasting. Three days when no one, except the very young and very old, will be permitted to sleep.”

  Ona held up her hands. “Right when you have a bunch of bloodthirsty maniacs driving toward your door?”

  “It won’t matter to Adem. He’s overconfident. And he strictly adheres to all traditions. It was torture getting him to agree to hire you two. That he accepts you and your training speaks highly of his fear.”

  “Then why wouldn’t this same fear lead him to forgo the mourning?” Lucca asked.

  “He won’t. That’s different. There’s nothing in our books about not receiving foreign aid in military training. There is, however, plenty about proper mourning. Especially for those of the royal line. He’d say Meric’s soul won’t reach the Heavens without his people taking up the weight of his death. It’s about balance. It’s…difficult to explain to foreigners.”

  “You don’t believe it?” Ona asked.

  “Whether I do or don’t, it doesn’t matter. If we all starve and refuse the rest we need, we’ll fall under the Invaders’ steel. I won’t allow my people to be taken as slaves or cut down. Somehow, after the battle, after we’ve survived, I’ll tell Adem…I’ll pretend Meric has just died.”

  Lucca pushed a curl of his black hair out of his eyes. “That sounds difficult. At best. What if the fighting takes longer than a day or two? Adem will be able to tell the kyros has been dead for a while.”

  “Not if I have Barir—he’s a physician and father to my handmaiden—coat Meric’s skin in ka’ud oil. The smell will overpower anything else. And it’s colored. It should…” A shiver raked fingers down her back. “…mask the look of his flesh.”

  They all stared at the ground for a breath.

  “Have you told your guards?” Lucca eyed the door.

  “No.”

  “Why not?” Ona frowned.

  “I don’t want Meric’s death to show on their faces.” Such a frightening half-truth. “In front of Adem and the other fighters. They know them all too well. I don’t think it would remain secret.”

  “Plus, it’s dangerous for them to know. If the general finds out they helped you cover this up, they’ll die, yes?” Lucca asked.

  Seren had been stupid to think she’d keep the true nature of her choosing them over her guards. Lucca and Ona were anything but stupid. “Yes.”

  Ona stopped pacing and crossed her arms. “Oh. So the real reason you’re asking us is because we’re expendable.”

  Seren winced. “It’s because you’ll be able to hide the truth. No one knows you or your mannerisms. They won’t spot your deceit.” She was spinning around the truth, her words slicing and cutting like an Old Farm blade in the dagger dance. They were expendable. But there was no way she was going to say that aloud. Even if they already knew it.

  Ona and Lucca traded a look, then both nodded as one.

  “Fine,” Lucca said. “We’ll help you hide the body.”

  “Wait.” Ona held up a hand. “Why don’t you take control of the Empire since Meric is gone?”

  Barir’s very similar advice floated through Seren’s mind. She rubbed her eyes and her fingers came away green and sparkling. “Because I’m not the royal heir. Meric’s brother, Varol, is. Adem wouldn’t support me. No one would.”

  “I doubt that,” Lucca said. “I’ve seen how the fighters respect you. And your own guards, too. They said your father was a high ranking general before he retired?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did he teach you?” Ona leaned closer, eyes bright.

  “Yes, but—”

  “Then what’s the problem? You can become kyros,” Ona said.

  “No. That’s not how it’s done.”

  “This isn’t a normal day in the Empire. The kyros is dead and you have a giant army headed right for you. Take the reins, Seren.” Ona smiled.

  Another shiver cut Seren through the middle. “General Adem would never allow it. He’d have me put to death as a traitor to the royal bloodline.”

  “What’s so important about having royal blood?” Ona asked.

  “Supposedly, the Fire only truly communicates wisdom to those with a lot of royal blood.”

  “Supposedly?” Lucca rubbed his lower lip.

  Seren swallowed, both cold and hot spinning through her chest. Emotions, good and bad and in between, buzzed inside her head. She couldn’t tell them about the vision. Then they’d keep on about her taking over. They didn’t understand. Adem would never let it happen. And she was just…Seren. Not a kyros.

  “If you are still willing to help me, we should go. Now.”


  Lucca stared for a minute longer like he could see inside her mind. Then he gathered up his weapons and he and Ona followed Seren to the door.

  THE STREETS WERE STILL quiet when they all reached the secret door into the Kyros Walls. Inside the courtyard, it was a quick walk to the back entrance of the tent.

  Meekra appeared at the door. “May I help you, Pearl of the Desert?”

  “Can you keep a look out for General Adem or any others who may wish to…see the kyros?” Seren whispered, glancing at Cansu, who stood closest, then at the rotating guards who stared straight ahead. “He wants to have a private discussion with the mercenaries.”

  A knowing look crossed Meekra’s face. “Whatever you need, my lady.”

  Cansu and Hossam took positions outside the back door. Erol went around the front to take a place beside the rotating guards there.

  Seren led Lucca and Ona past the bed and lit the lantern. It flickered like it didn’t truly want to give light to the blue-black weave of the tent’s walls. The ka’ud wood smoked strongly, but as Seren said a prayer over the Holy Fire bowl, a hint of death greeted them, a quiet, sneaking sweetness.

  Ona stood beside Meric’s wrapped body on the bed. Her lips parted to speak, but Seren pressed a finger to her own lips and pointed toward the door.

  Lucca’s hand covered his mouth as he looked at the kyros's corpse. “Sun and stars,” he whispered.

  Folding her hands in front of her, Seren stared instead at the gold phoenixes on the carpet under her slippers, wishing none of this was happening.

  Normally, Meekra and Seren would be writing a letter to Meekra’s cousin who lived in Jakobden, near the eastern coast. Normally, they’d giggle over the drawings Seren added to the bottom, sadly untalented sketches of the city’s tents and ridiculous recreations of Qadira’s latest dramatic fit about her royal bloodline. Seren had thought marriage would end the youth that she should’ve had for at least three or more years, but Meekra had helped her retain some lighthearted bits of it.

  Now, now her youth was truly finished. Gone.

  As Ona and Lucca whispered about what to do, Seren fought a heaviness that wanted to press her into the ground. She and Ona looked about the same age. They should’ve been planning betrothals and learning trades or raising nieces and nephews, not orchestrating the hiding of a body. Not holding an entire empire’s fate in their hands.