Witch king, p.17
Witch King, page 17
She obviously expected Ziede to argue, but Kai said, “Tell us which Immortal Blessed it belongs to and where to bring it to dock, and we’ll take it there.”
Saadrin’s brows knit as she searched for a way to argue with that. She didn’t want to claim responsibility for the ship herself. If it had been handed over to an expositor without the knowledge of the Immortal Patriarchs, in violation of the Rising World treaty and Blessed law, someone was going to be in deadly trouble. “I told you, I don’t know.”
Ziede, taking up the threads of Kai’s thought, said, “When you find out, send me a message. I don’t wish to abandon this ship where any pirate or thief could take it.”
Saadrin’s mouth thinned in irritation. “You cannot expect me to leave it in your care.”
Ziede was unmoved. “I have not renounced my kin-right. I need this ship to go to Stios to the Conventiculum and find my liege-sworn wife.”
Saadrin folded her arms. “Then I will remain with it.”
Ziede let out a breath and looked at Kai. Silently she said, Can we fight to the death instead?
The river that met the sea at Orintukk was mated to the old canal network that joined the Arkai to the Arik and beyond. Only if you really want to, Kai replied silently, but I think I know a better way.
* * *
Skeptical, Ramad said, “Will she really help you?”
They had withdrawn into the stern cabin. Kai sat on the cushioned bench, leaning back against the wall. Ziede had taken a seat on the throne, where she could lounge with her chin propped on one arm, locking stares with Saadrin, who still stood out on the deck next to the steering column. Kai said, “Help us by fighting, if we’re attacked? No.”
Ashem frowned. Despite all her distrust, justified and otherwise, she was a practical person. She said, “Surely she won’t just stand there.”
“That’s exactly what she’ll do,” Ziede said, not moving, not blinking. “Stand there and watch.”
Ramad shook his head slightly, as if he understood none of this. “And she’s your kin?”
“It certainly wasn’t by choice on her part.” Ziede’s voice was dry. She added, “One of us will have to stay with the ship until we’re done with it, or she’ll make off with it.” Her brow furrowed a little. “And she knows the Conventiculum won’t admit us. They’ll certainly know a demon when they see one.”
“There are ways around that.” Kai looked out toward Saadrin’s stubborn silhouette. Off the bow, the land was growing larger on the horizon, enough to see heavy green jungle above low cliffs, the hills rising behind it. “While you’re taking the cohort off the ship at Orintukk, I’ll have a look around.”
Ziede sighed, audible even from here. Through her pearl, she said, If the Conventiculum is obviously a trap, you don’t need to do that disgusting thing.
It might come in handy, he replied.
Sanja poked her head out of a cabin. “Can I come out? She’s not going to kill us?”
Tenes patted the cushion between her and Kai, and Sanja came to plop down on it.
Frowning in Saadrin’s direction, Ashem asked, “What is the Conventiculum? A temple of the Immortal Blessed? I’ve seen it from the Stios harbor, but I didn’t realize it was in use.”
Ziede said, “The Hierarchs gave it to the Immortal Marshalls for a command post during the war. The story was that the Hierarchs made sure they had some kind of power over the building. The Blessed still keep it, but I don’t think they do much with it.”
Ramad clearly found all this increasingly dubious. “Are you certain you want to trust her? The stones might not be there at all. And the place is surrounded by Witch-flags so she obviously knows you can’t get in. This kin-right doesn’t seem to restrict her from lying to you.”
They needed to stop talking about this before Ramad figured out they had another plan. Kai said, “The Immortal Blessed are such wonderful people that they need all these rules telling them not to murder their own relatives.” He asked Ziede silently, So, we’re decided?
Yes, we’re decided, she answered. Aloud, she said, “Cohort Leader Ashem, get your people ready. You’ll be taking the cohort off at Orintukk as soon as we dock there.”
Ashem pushed to her feet in relief, clearly ready to be done with Witches and their problems. Ramad stood to follow her, but his expression said that he knew there was something he wasn’t being told.
EIGHT
From a distance the white walls of Orintukk gleamed under the bright sunlight, standing just above the waves washing against the rocky shore. As the ship drew closer, it was easier to see the untended cracks and weathering, the places where the white outer covering had worn away to show the rough blocks underneath. There were occasional signs that a road had once run between the wall and where the ground dropped off toward the water, though it was badly overgrown. There were still tumbled piles of stone visible, and a few statues or pillars that might have been distance markers.
Kai leaned on the rail, concentrating on being enigmatic and not looking as if he was frantically trying to come up with alternate plans if Orintukk didn’t have what he needed. They couldn’t make too many preparations in advance without alerting Saadrin or the others to their intentions.
Ziede sailed the ship around a small peninsula where dull red rooftops and tall willow trees were visible above the walls. As the ship rounded it to enter the great harbor, they saw the full sweep of the city.
Sanja whistled in startled admiration. “It’s so big. I thought nothing was bigger than the Mouth of Flowers!”
The city curved nearly the whole way around the circle of the natural harbor. It was broken only by the mouth of the river, which was bridged by a structure more than four stories tall, each level terraced with round columns. The buildings along the harbor basin and on the gentle slopes behind it looked mostly intact, especially from a distance. But as they neared the docks that lined the inward curve, Kai spotted a few fallen walls, and leafy foliage standing high above the remains of collapsed roofs.
Frowning, Sanja added slowly, “It is all empty.”
His voice wry, Ramad asked her, “Did you think we weren’t telling you the truth?”
“No. No, but…” Sanja shrugged as though it didn’t matter, but she was still frowning. “I just … couldn’t really picture it in my head.” She turned to Kai. “They killed everyone?”
“Everyone.” Kai leaned on the railing and tried not to think about Kentdessa. “It’s a big, beautiful grave marker.”
“It was much written about, in its day.” Ramad’s expression was regretful. “They said no one ever went hungry here. Food was so plentiful, everyone got a share of millet and teff whenever they needed, just like getting water from the well. The methods for it were adopted by the Great Bashasa to feed the refugees and partisans, and are still used across the Arik and other Rising World territories today.”
That was true, it was a little living piece of Orintukk preserved. Just like the way the Saredi system of tent assemblies formed the basis for the Rising World’s council. But Kai said, “I heard it was honey wine and almonds,” just to get on Ramad’s nerves.
Annoyingly, Ramad refused to be baited. “I don’t think they made much wine here. It’s more gourd country.”
The long stone docks were mostly empty, except for a few small fishing boats clustered at one end, almost hidden by the tall pilings. The fishers were living in the port itself; a large stone market pavilion was strung with nets, and smoke from campfires stained the white walls.
But as the Immortal Blessed ship angled to draw up to a dock, the new vantage point let Kai see past the mouth of the river. There was a smaller set of docks there for travel inland, the broken remnants of old barges half-sunk between the rotting wooden pilings. That’ll do, Kai thought in relief. It wouldn’t be easy, but it would work. Easy would have been finding an intact craft they could use, but this would be enough.
Saadrin was still out on the upper deck, standing at the opposite rail, arms folded, keeping her face expressionless, though she couldn’t seem to control the air of disgruntlement hanging over her like a cloud. Kai suspected she had been looking forward to watching Ashem’s cadre fumble while trying to dock the large ship, but Ziede’s air-devils had no trouble guiding and nudging it into place at the long merchant pier.
From this vantage point, the fishers were visible, gathered on a patch of sand and rocks down where the port’s retaining wall had collapsed. They had been washing clothes and crockery in the small pool formed by the fallen blocks. Now they watched the Immortal Blessed ship’s arrival with open astonishment and curiosity.
On the lower deck, Ashem directed her cadre to climb down the side to secure the mooring. Kai turned to Ziede, who stood a short distance away sketching a finding circle in the palm of her hand with a mix of spit and blood. Tenes was at her elbow, watching with interest. Kai didn’t move any closer so he wouldn’t block the air currents Ziede was calling.
Ziede drew in the airborne spirits from the forest to tell her what predators hunted through the distant scatters of habitation outside the city. The empty countryside would be tempting to people who had nowhere else to go, with ruins that could be rebuilt and the wild remnants of the dead city’s crops and livestock. These people would be isolated and vulnerable, the prey of creatures that lived on the margins of the mortal world, drawn here by the Hierarchs’ passage or the power well created by so many mortal deaths.
As the spirits moved the blood mixture on Ziede’s hand, telling her about the entities they brushed past in the surrounding forests, she muttered, “Some soul-stealer ghosts, bone-eating vines, not really anything too terrible.”
“There has to be at least one,” Kai said. They clung to the fringes of death wells like cockroaches to middens.
“Hush,” Ziede told him. “Wait, here we are.” She drew more lines on her palm, turning it into a rough map. “That’s the old road, that’s the river, and here it is.”
Kai stepped closer to see. It was a very rough map, but it told him which direction to start out in. Once he got closer, he would be able to track the predator. “I’ll be back as fast as I can.” He signed to Tenes, Try to get the supplies together without Saadrin noticing. Sanja can help.
With a flicker of a smile, Tenes signed assent. Kai didn’t think she would be sad to see the last of this ship.
Ziede looked up and grimaced. The ship was tied off, and the cadre was now working on opening the door in the railing so the gangway could be attached to the side. Ramad and Ashem had already gone down the dock toward the port buildings, probably to look for a place to shelter the cohort while they waited for help. “Getting those people ashore is going to take a while.”
The cadre members leaned over the side, trying to get the gangway positioned. Kai thought they should have attached the hooks to the rungs on the deck first, but it was a little late to offer that advice now. Saadrin just watched with an unhelpful sneer. Sanja had gone closer to see, but was too innately cautious to get within arm’s reach of any of them. He told Ziede, “Just stay alert.” She would have to go down to the rowing deck to help Ashem. They would need to detach each unconscious mortal from the now static power well.
Ziede pressed her lips together, studying the group at the railing. She had probably noticed they were doing it backward, too. But she said, “We’re giving them what they want.” The words they have no reason to attack us were unspoken.
Kai didn’t snort in derision, because he didn’t want to annoy her any more than Saadrin already had. “When has that ever made a difference?”
She sighed. “Just take care. If you’re killed in a ridiculous way by a mere ghoul, it will be embarrassing for all of us.”
Kai squeezed her hand, and vaulted the railing to drop down to the dock.
Ramad and Ashem had reached the retaining wall and climbed down to speak to the fishers. Some had the darker brown skin of local Arkai, with a few lighter archipelago natives scattered among them. All had their clothing and hair tied up for wading in the rocks. They seemed naturally wary, but also a little excited, as if nothing interesting had happened here for a long time. They were all as barefoot as Kai; he needed to feel the currents of the land and it was easier with direct skin contact.
His route to the big avenue took him past the market pavilion. Inside were a few elders and children, and bags, baskets, drying laundry, a hearth built from salvaged stone, the other debris of a long-term camp. The children stopped playing to watch him, and he heard someone whisper the old sea people word for Witch. The open arches were hung with protective charms, little constructions of shells, twigs, broken glass, and polished pebbles strung together with string.
Once out of the sea port, the central road was wide and unobstructed, though weeds grew in every drift of dirt. Kai walked past the dusty sun-bleached walls of empty houses, arcaded pavilions, round mausoleums, cracked plazas. It was quiet, except for birdcalls, the buzz and click of insects, and the occasional voice echoing from the port. Under the calm of a deserted place, there was power here, rising up from the ground in waves like heat on hard-packed earth. The Hierarchs had turned Orintukk into a major power well but never completely drained it. Kai had wondered if that would be the case; he could have done this working without it, but an exterior power source would make it easier.
Kai made his way around toward the river, emerging from the avenue to see the wide stretch of muddy water, bordered by terraces and buildings covered with intricate carvings of people, sea creatures, ships, unfamiliar symbols. He followed a walkway down past a couple of bridges, until he found the docks, just behind the four-story colonnaded structure built across the river’s mouth. A broad pavement led to stone stairs down to what had obviously once been a bustling river port, but now was a decaying mass of wood along the weedy bank.
The docks had mostly rotted away under the constant force of the river, and rushes grew along the banks and between the wrecked remnants of barges. Kai picked his way through the silt, searching for the right one. It wasn’t the state of decay he was interested in, but the remaining resonance. A barge that had been used longer, preferably by the same set of mortals, would have the most willingness to return to its former state.
He found one half-sunken, not much left of it but the long, curved prow and the ribs. Ankle-deep in mud, Kai squelched closer until he could put his hand on the sun-dried wood. Yes, this one.
He climbed back up to the bank and spent some time clearing a spot on the broken pavement, wishing he had thought to borrow a broom. Did the Immortal Blessed even use brooms? Kai didn’t think he had seen anything like one on the ship.
Once that was done, he drew his knife and made a mixture of his blood, spit, and the mud the barge had been decomposing in to draw a cantrip roughly the size of the original craft, leaving one small section open. This was a combination of an expositor’s intention and a Witch’s working. The cantrip let him speak to what was left of the barge’s inhabiting spirit, to draw it out and let it shape itself inside his design, where he could feed it power like an intention, drawn from the well of death that had formed inside Orintukk.
Once the spirit had fully entered the cantrip, Kai closed it off with the last of the blood mixture. With everything in place, there wasn’t much more to do than wait. But he had one more errand, one that would explain his absence.
He left the river port and found the avenue that led toward the city’s outskirts. It was warmer and wetter here, and he was glad he hadn’t bothered with a coat. At the city’s edge, the buildings had all turned into collapsed piles of stone and tile, and lush growth invaded the pavement. Ramad hadn’t been joking about the gourds, Kai found himself tripping over their vines every other step.
The brush and tall grass gave way to larger trees, with smooth reddish bark and heavy branches twisting down to rest on the ground. The thick canopies blocked out the sunlight, leaving the path winding through a dim green cavern, noisy with the roar of singing cicadas. He wondered if the people who had lived here had harvested them to eat the way they did in Erathi. As the path grew darker, Kai called a chorus of imps, not so much to light his way but to let anything that might trouble him know that it was better not to.
Well-traveled pathways often created a sense of disturbance that he could feel cutting through the flow of energy in the earth. But these pathways weren’t well traveled anymore. The maze of small roads and walkways for surrounding villages and farms was overgrown. The big stone-paved road that had once led toward the next major Arkai city was still there, unused and slowly being overtaken by grass. In that state it was far less disruptive to the land’s flow of power and so harder to sense. But the roar of life that was the jungle and grassland was divided by a dead zone that he knew was the river, its waters opaque to him.
He slipped through the brush to step onto a nearly invisible pathway marked by broken chunks of paving, and made his way toward the predator Ziede had located. Ferns and colorful vines took advantage of breaks in the tree canopy and it was even warmer here than in the city, sheltered from the wind off the sea. He passed a scatter of ramshackle huts with gardens bounded by stick fences, and heard mortal voices somewhere past the trees. No one tried to approach the lone figure accompanied by the darting lights of underearth imps.
Kai knew he was close to the spot marked on Ziede’s map when he felt a sense of malicious intent. He banished the imps and cut through a thick band of trees, the undergrowth tugging at his skirts. The woven stick wall of the dwelling blended so well with the brush he almost walked into it.
There was no sound from inside, and he felt his way around until he found a door. It was curtained by a leather drape that smelled of rotted human skin. This must be the place, Kai thought dryly. He brushed it aside and stepped in.
Mold grew across the thatched rafters, illuminating the interior as Kai’s vision adjusted. The wooden walls were covered with bamboo racks holding the body-stealing ghoul’s hoard. Arms, legs, hands, and feet were the most obvious, from a very dark brown through to the pale of almond milk, all the colors of the mortals who lived around Orintukk or passed through here on their way somewhere else. There were also organs—hearts and livers mostly, some others that Kai had never learned to recognize—plus tongues, entire heads, and finally, eyes. There was no buzz of flies or crawling maggots; the ghoul’s inherent intent kept its bounty from spoiling.
