Bells of the Kingdom (Children of the Desert Book 3) Page 3

  My child! My child! Where is he?

  The darkness whispered angry echo: Where did you send it? It is mine. Mine! Bring it back, give it to me, mine!

  I am sorry, Ellemoa, her lover said. I failed you. The child is safe. The child is safe. I am sorry. I love—

  The word trailed into a broken silence.

  She hung in fetid darkness, unable even to thrash against the cocoon of bindings, and listened to Kolan’s agonized howls with a savage sense of satisfaction.

  This is all your fault, she told him. Yours. All yours.

  He was too busy screaming to answer.

  Chapter One

  The south was a land filled with music, from the graceful language to the low whistles of servants moving about their work. At night, Scratha Fortress seemed to pulse with an underlying beat: the rhythmic sound had carried Idisio through a night of troubled dreams and out into the still air of pre-dawn.

  A monstrous headache descended a bare breath after his eyes opened. Instinct drove him back into a more focused, escape-driven slumber.

  It’s a drinking contest, Azni said in his memory, and then Riss chimed in: I thought you knew the game.

  He hadn’t. He didn’t drink; losing awareness of his surroundings had always been far too dangerous to risk. He hadn’t even known what the changing taste of the acrid coffee meant until Riss explained—far too late, as it turned out.

  As he recalled, she’d found his ignorance highly amusing. The hangover had been far from amusing, and he’d been having flashes of it at erratic intervals ever since, as though his body simply refused to let go of reliving that experience.

  He descended further into stillness, letting the pain wrack through his surface nerves while he retreated to the deep place where pain was a barely noticeable tremor.

  Music followed him into the stillness, and memory: There is a lake, a ghosty lake, someone sang, and laughed a big, rich, salty laugh. Red. The talkative sailor had sung so many shocking and funny songs, including one about a northern lake made of mist in which, supposedly, lived a horrendous demon....

  Scratha’s voice floated through the void of memory: I think you have Ghost Lake blood... You have too much northern in your face for anything else.

  A demon.

  My father.

  Idisio shuddered without moving a muscle, a comprehensive tremor that threatened to shake his brain from his skull. He forced himself deeper still, into a silence free of any memory at all.

  Another sort of music woke him after a time: a complex array of whistles and the laughter of servants passing by his room. He lay still, awareness clarifying, and listened to the patterns. It wasn’t simple music. They were talking.

  With that awareness, his concept of the entire fortress around him shifted. The servants here sang, laughed, and spoke in codes that passed right under the noses of those in charge. They showed little to no fear of their masters, despite the awesome powers of the several desert lords present—and two visiting ha’ra’hain, the other of whom was rather older than Idisio himself.

  A tart, minty scent filled his nose. A moment later, a damp cloth covered his face from nose-tip to hairline.

  “Are you awake?” Riss said in a bare murmur.

  He held still and kept his breathing even. After a few moments, she sighed and went away. He could feel her presence fading from the room; when he was sure he was alone, he pushed the cloth aside and propped himself up on his elbows.

  The servants weren’t afraid here. That was important. Why? With masters who could kill them in a matter of a breath, with a creature far beneath their feet who would take less time than that, what gave them such a cheerful indifference to the danger?

  More whistles wove together as the servants went back the other way. His room was in a small side hallway, one of five; he’d refused more opulent guest quarters, still deeply uncomfortable with the notion of being important.

  Riss’s room lay next to his. Scratha had murmured something about propriety, but he’d clearly caught Idisio’s relief at the separation. Being around desert lords—and the even more perceptive Deiq—was turning out to be more than a little spooky at times.

  Idisio could sense Riss brooding over a reading lesson Lord Azni had tasked her with. Her thoughts washed over him like a sullen current: This is so pointless... I wish he’d wake up! I don’t like being alone here...

  She’d been getting increasingly uneasy about being alone ever since their arrival. Maybe it had to do with her pregnancy. He carefully blocked off awareness of Riss and focused his attention on tracing other whistles. His hearing followed his intent, arcing like a thrown rock to a chosen target. Servants, he thought. I want to hear servants.

  A discordant babble arose in his ears: kitchen arguments over seasoning, a baby crying, a man laughing, something sizzling, something else bubbling, and steady chopping and pounding sounds. Idisio pulled away before the chaos overwhelmed him and tried to focus more clearly: Whistles, he thought. Servants whistle-talking. I want to hear more of that.

  Nothing happened. He tried again, and this time was rewarded with a restless golden haze.

  I do not understand, Scratha ha’rethe said, sounding annoyed. What do you wish?

  The servants are whistling. It’s a language. I want to figure it out. I want to hear them whistling, so I can figure it out.

  A moment of silence, laced with bewildered, blurry impatience. The matters of the tharr do not concern us, Scratha ha’rethe said at last, then decisively withdrew into blank silence once more.

  Idisio opened his mouth, then slowly shut it again, shaking his head. The shift in his attention brought Riss’s thoughts slipping back into his awareness: He looked like he was getting ready to wake up. I should go see if he’s awake. He needs to start getting ready for Conclave soon. Reluctant duty held her in place: One more page, she decided. Then I’ll go see.

  Idisio rolled from the bed, staggering slightly as he came to his feet. He scrubbed his hands over his eyes to shake himself fully awake and grabbed for his clothes.

  Why don’t I want to talk to her? he thought as he dressed, and had no answer for that question. I should be nicer to her. She’s in love with me. I love her too. Don’t I?

  He poked his head out, checking the hallway, then hurried to get clear of the area.

  Afternoon sunlight striped the hallways and courtyards as he wandered aimlessly through the fortress. He finally settled on a stone bench in one of the side courtyards and sat, kicking bare feet idly through a thick layer of sand, brooding.

  A flicker of movement caught his eye. He looked up to find Azni approaching, and scrambled to his feet. She offered him a formal bow, to his intense embarrassment, and motioned for him to sit back down. Taking a seat on the bench beside him, she turned to sit cross-legged, moving as gracefully as a girl his own age could hope to manage, and smiled at him.

  “You’re troubled,” she said in a low voice. “Would you like to talk about it?”

  He blinked, startled, and glanced at the floor reflexively. His face heated.

  “In a desert fortress,” Azni murmured, “you never do have much privacy. Cafad asked me to come talk to you.”

  Idisio shut his eyes for a moment, his throat too tight for speech, and wondered if he could sink through the floor and escape.

  “Nobody’s offended,” Azni said. “You haven’t done anything wrong, Idisio. Cafad doesn’t know what you’re troubled about, only that you’re upset and anxious. He’s bound to the fortress now; he can pick up on a servant farting in the middle of the night if he wants to. It’s an adjustment for him as well, and you’re a very important guest. He’s anxious to keep you happy.”

  And Scratha had once belted him halfway across the room. More than once, actually, before he’d known about Idisio’s heritage.

  I’d be happier with him handing out bruises. I knew how to deal with that.

  Azni’s eyebrows tilted expressively; she’d caught the thought.

 
“I’m nothing,” Idisio blurted, his face fiery hot now, and shut his eyes again. “I’m nobody.”

  She didn’t say anything. After a while, he opened his eyes enough to peer at her. She was watching him without expression, her head tilted slightly.

  He drew in a deep breath and straightened, feeling a sudden lightness roll through him. “That’s stupid,” he said, “isn’t it?”

  “I wouldn’t use that word,” she murmured. “Incorrect, perhaps. Or misjudgement. But reversing the beliefs of a lifetime is a difficult task.”

  After a few moments he said, “I’m—somebody. Here. But I’m leaving. I’m going back—there. Back to Bright Bay, and beyond.”

  “Without Riss,” she noted.

  His breath hitched in his throat. “I... yeah.” He didn’t know what to do with that odd turn to the conversation.

  “Would the adjustment be easier if she went with you?”

  “No, worse,” he said without thinking, and felt his face flare back into hot embarrassment.

  She smiled, as though something about that answer had been important, and stood. Dropping a light, friendly pat on his right shoulder, she said, “Without intending to sound dismissive, Idisio — you’ll learn. And so will Riss.” She bowed again and left the room as quietly and gracefully as she’d arrived.

  Idisio stayed still, blinking hard, and tried to figure out if he was supposed to be crying.

  Chapter Two

  There was a king, a lovely king/Who loved a lady fair....

  Tank stood at the rail of the Deep Sea Lover and breathed it all in: the song, the air, the creaking of the ropes and the sails, the thunderous whiffling roar of the wind in his ears. Beside him—and downwind—another passenger gripped the railing with both hands, face as close to green as dark skin could get, and heaved his guts out in a yellow-grey spray.

  Tank grinned and looked up at the rigging, where he’d often seen crew members swinging about with the agile grace of intelligent lizards, no matter the weather. At the moment the webbing of ropes stood empty, all the sailors occupied with deck or below-deck tasks. A mad impulse seized him.

  For all Ossin’s violent seasickness, this was the clearest weather Tank had yet seen on this voyage. There would never be a better or safer time to try the game for himself.

  Four bounding steps put him up onto a box and from there to a series of handholds he’d watched the crew use. Moments later, harsh rope scraped under his hands and the wind buffeted his shoulders, whipping his hair into a rough red screen over his vision.

  Should have tied it more securely—

  He’d watched the sailors climbing, and the pattern stayed in his mind, like the memorizing-the-room exercises Allonin had so often set him. Set a hand here, and reach with the other—swing sideways this way—and another foothold here—

  Startled shouts filtered up from below. The wind whipped the other way, freeing Tank’s eyes; he took a fast glance up to confirm memory, then scooted rapidly through the requisite motions as the shouts grew louder.

  “Get your effing arse back down here, you piece of shit northern fool!” someone bellowed; the volume and the phrasing could only have come from Rosy, the first mate.

  Tank ignored it and swung up another few feet. The crow’s nest lookout, a skinny boy with ebony skin and startlingly pale blue eyes, stared down at him, expression bemused. Tank reached up a hand, slapped it lightly across the boy’s bare feet, and laughed.

  The lookout shook his head and said, in a thickly accented version of the common northern tongue, “Northern, you’re turning striped when Rosy grabs hold of you.”

  Tank laughed again, then looked out across the water.

  “Gods,” he said on an exhalation, staring, and forgot everything else for a moment. The Kingsea stretched around the ship in seemingly endless shades of blue and green; a distant curve of land was starting to show on the far northern horizon. The vast landmass of the southlands was a bumpy line against the western sky: thready, shrunken, flattened.

  Tank squinted, tracing contours, thinking about the maps Allonin had trained him to read and trying to translate elevation lines to real shapes.

  I grew up somewhere over there, he thought, and found his mood souring. The lookout had misunderstood: he wasn’t northern, whatever his hair color might proclaim. Not by a long road.

  He looked back to the north and east, letting the sparkling emerald and sapphire colors boost him back into laughter, then grinned one last time at the lookout and began picking his way back down.

  Down turned out to be considerably more complicated than up. By the time he reached the deck again his hands, calves and shoulders burned, and multiple blisters made every new handhold a painful trial. He tore an already stubby fingernail back to the quick, jerked that hand free reflexively, and almost fell; caught himself just in time, but the effort sent fire coursing through his muscles and produced an uncomfortable popping sensation in his left shoulder.

  The moment his feet touched the deck, heavy hands laid hold of him and jerked him over to sprawl across the deck. He tucked into a roll and rose to his feet, still grinning; it would take more than a rough toss to dim his exhilaration.

  Rosy glared at him, his thick hands fisted and ready to use. “What the hells did y’think y’was doing?” he demanded. The thick red rash across his cheeks and nose had almost disappeared beneath the rage flooding color into his skin. “Effing northern redling fool!”

  “I wanted to see if I could do it,” Tank shrugged. “No harm done, was there?”

  Rosy’s eyes narrowed. He took a step forward.

  “Passenger,” someone else said, warning, reminding. “Paying passenger, Rosy.”

  Rosy cut a sharp glare at the woman who’d spoken—a tall woman everyone called Slick—then jerked a sullen nod at Tank and snapped, “Don’t do it again.”

  “I won’t,” Tank said. “Promise.”

  Rosy snorted and stomped away, obviously unconvinced.

  “He’s right enough in calling you a fool,” Slick said, not moving from her spot on a water barrel. She kicked her bare heels in a light rhythm against the thick wood and grinned amiably at Tank. “I’d have said rude, more than fool. Not good manners, what you did. What ships you worked on, that they didn’t teach you to stay off another man’s lookout walkway?”

  “None,” he admitted. “This is my first time on a ship.”

  Her dark eyebrows arched skeptically, her mouth drawing aside. The leaping fish tattooed on the left side of her face wriggled with the movement.

  “Huh,” she said. “Then I’ll go back to fool.”

  He shrugged, watching her tattoo squinch and contort, and wondered if he ought to get one himself. The notion didn’t particularly appeal. He had enough permanent marks of the past on his body already.

  “Wasn’t so hard,” he said.

  Slick shook her head. “Lemme see your hands.” She motioned for him to turn his hands palm-up, then grinned. “You’ve got the hands of a shorewoman, for all that great silly sword you brought with you,” she said. “Go see Tanfer. He’ll need to pour some roosh over those scrapes, or you’ll wind up with gangrene. Those ropes ain’t exactly clean. And you’ll need a salve for the blisters.”

  He shrugged again and crossed to stand at the rail. She joined him a moment later, her expression still darkly amused.

  “It’s a relief, actually,” she said, “to know you’re a fool. Thought you had the sea madness at first. Blisters are an easy fix.”

  “Sea madness?”

  She pointed out over the water in a vague sweeping motion; a bracelet of leaping fish, similar to the one on her face, was tattooed below her elbow. “People stare out there too long, sometimes they get strange. Some start hearing voices, start wantin’ to jump on out and swim to whatever they’re hearing.” She shot him a sideways glance, grinning slyly.

  “Voices?” Tank said, uneasily. He glanced out at the ocean again, no longer quite so pleased with the sight. Voices.
No, he didn’t like that idea at all. He’d had enough of that game, as the saying went. He remembered, long ago, street thieves backing away, dirty faces white with suspicion, and Lifty shouting: He’s one of them as hears the voices, Blackie, you don’t want to go up against him, do you? I’d run, if I was you... and yelping laughter when the aggressors fled, leaving Tank alone with Lifty once more.

  You’re crap as a thief, Lifty said, some time later. You’re a decent scrapper, though. Ought to go talk to them over at the Freewarrior’s Hall.

  That, at least, had proven a wise suggestion. Tank drew in a long breath, focusing on the water and the air and the clouds.

  Just a mercenary, he thought. I can do this. I can be ordinary. I can control my life. No more voices. No more visions. Just a mercenary...

  Slick green-gold tendrils laced, briefly, through vein and muscle; he tensed and fought the past comprehensively back into hiding.

  “Not a tall tale, for all that you’d be a fun one to pull on. Nah, the voices are real. I hear ‘em myself,” Slick was saying, contemplative. “Especially after someone’s jumped. That’s when they sing, like a happy drunk in a vat of mountain lightning.”

  Tank backed three long steps away from the rail, not caring if she thought less of him. “Sing?”

  She turned, rested her back against the rail, and grinned at him. Wisps of dark hair, freed from the triple-bound tail most of the crew used, flittered around her face. “Scared you, did I?”

  “Yeah,” he said flatly. “You pulling me or you straight? No games.”

  “Straight,” she said. “But backing off the rail won’t help you. I seen folk sleepwalk up from below and jump.”

  “You don’t stop them?”

  “Gotta see ‘em going for the rail in the first place. Not easy in the dark of the moon, or middle of a busy day, for that matter. And someone hazed heads for the water, they move fast as you did going up the walk. Hard to catch someone moving that fast.”

  He hesitated, a vague tremor of disquiet in his muscles, then returned to the rail and looked down at the rippled, frothing water passing by the hull. “Why do you come out this far, if it’s that dangerous? And what about the crew? What if you jump?”