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Instead, it came once or twice in the form of strong gales that seemed to carry the world’s weight of water in its clouds, hurricanes that threatened to uproot an entire year’s work in an afternoon. And then it was gone, like a mother’s anger or a lover’s tantrum, leaving behind only a touch of dampness in the air, which brought a slight chill on people’s bones.
“I think your head is in the clouds,” Hana said. “You’ve listened to far too many tales when you were little, and now I’m convinced you might just be too young to be going out on your own. What do you know of living amongst strangers, Sume? We don’t know anyone in the city, and if people hear you speak, they’ll think you simple. I do, and I’ve watched you grow.”
She didn’t exactly disagree, but… It was hard to wrap yourself up in doom and gloom on such a bright day. Leaving her island home suddenly made her world feel ten times bigger, and in her heart, that meant ten times the possibilities.
Most men were arrogant in some way, and almost no woman ever hit her teens without having brushed against one if not outright deal with them.
“It’s not just dragons I’m interested in,” Kastor said. “In fact, the creatures can rot in hell for all I care. But I care about what people will do to get their hands on such things. I care, mostly, about magic. None of you louts know what to do about magic in this part of the continent and your ignorance can be the death of us all.”
What am I, in the grand scheme of things?” Ing Vahn placed a hand on her shoulder. “Alive,” he answered softly.
Lisa had told him, once, that if she could get a man who could offer those kinds of things she would pack in a heartbeat. He was not very familiar with women’s humour, but she sounded serious.
“Now, don’t you have a drinking party to catch up to? The sun will set, soon. You don’t want to be here when it gets dark.” Kefier looked back at the cavern and swallowed. “Why not?” he asked, watching the ooze bubble and pop. “Oh.” Thiar smiled. “It’s just easy to trip. That’s all.
“Turning dust mites into little city folk again, are we?” “I’m sorry?” “You look serious tonight. Constipated?” Rok grinned. “Or are you thinking of that job again? You’re going tomorrow whether you like it or not, so no sense worrying about it all night. Think about how wonderful it would be to walk out of all of this. Jin-Sayeng is a beautiful country, Kef, no matter what you think of Oji.”
Kefier slumped back and stared. There were no tears in his eyes. There was, however, blood on his hands, his shirt, and the unsheathed sword on the ground beside him.
Oji had a family waiting for him. A wife. A sister, Sume. He would read Kefier their letters. Sume sometimes even asked about him like she cared, like Kefier’s well-being was actually a cause of concern for a young woman who had her own troubles to deal with.
But the last thing he needed was to lose a brother again, to be reminded of how everything that was thrusted into his hands turned to dust.
His own eyes stared back at him against the glint of the sword, blue as the sea.
“Any time you need my help,” she said. “Go to Mistress Iamme. The seamstress. I’m Sume. Sakku watch you!” She skipped down the street and waved to him. It felt as if he was an old friend. She was so far now that she could not see his face. It was only when she’d returned to the workroom that she realized she’d forgotten to ask his own name in return.
Hana used to make fun of some of their words, too, because they were too sing-song and it made Oji sound like a poet.
One tried to send his daughter off with them, a homely thing with bugged eyes. Kefier had to mumble something about already having a wife while Camden expressed great regret in lacking certain areas necessary to reproduce.
“May his guidance find you on your road,” she said. Kefier knew it was a sales tactic, but it made him feel funny, anyway.
“Your anger is wasted on me. I’ve got no desire to be friends with you, boy, nor will that stop me from seeing your mother if she wants it. Have a good, long chat with your father instead, if you can keep him around long enough. You probably shouldn’t cry, either. This sausage is way too salty as it is.”
He smiled at that. “I put an idea into a man’s head. It blossomed. He was against it, in the beginning.” That got Yn Garr’s attention. He closed the book and pressed it against his knee. “Immediately?” “It took time, master. Everything takes time.”
She found herself gazing into his solid, brown-gold eyes. They were very warm eyes. They belonged to an even warmer face, framed with dark hair in a shaggy crop, and a beard trimmed close to his mouth. “Sume,” she responded, fidgeting in her seat. “Sume,” he repeated, standing up. “Sir Ylir!” someone called from the deck. “The physician should be here soon,” he said, smiling ruefully. “Until we meet again, my lady?”
👁👄👁
“Will you feed him tonight?” she asked. “Make sure he’s warm?”
“His father was my friend,” Aden replied, looking sombre for a moment. “What do you think I am, a monster?”
“After the bad beer, sir, I am inclined to be less than tolerable with attempts at defaming my master’s character,” Ylir said flatly. He started for the door with Burg a few steps ahead. “That temper again, Ferral,” Marre called after him. “I recall you being more patient, back when you were an old man in Baidh. How is your daughter, Hertra Ferral? Sinea? She must be what, twenty-three by now?”
“Ah,” Marre said. “So that other thing, then. Ferral.” It sounded like he was biting into the name. “Tell me where he is. And how you’ve duped his associates that you are—and have always been—the man behind
Connections of his own, one not attached to either Yn Ferral or Yn Garr’s name, sounded like a breath of fresh air. It would have been poison, though. Everything in the damn world was poison.
“Did Naijwa make those things in the Kag?” “Does it rain from the sky? Don’t ask insolent questions, boy.
Between each of us, we broke it into pieces and sealed it so that its power may not hurt the living world. Jaeth took his part to a temple in his home, I think. Farg did the same thing. They were very powerful, you know? The spells they knew...but I, I knew nothing, and we were running out of time. My master had no choice but to seal that part—its right hip—inside me.”
“This man, this other man whose name I do not know, only that he is old, and a Kag rank with the agan—” He grimaced, his tongue testing his worn fangs. “He found a copy of the letter. I don’t know how that came to be. “What I know is that he finds us here. Eleven, twelve years ago. He made me tell him. Ingyomanrr marrir arranti…he took Xyl. I could not help it. You know Xyl, don’t you? Blessed child. She is all I have, I am old, my only descendant left. He made me tell him where Jaeth kept his piece of Sarohkitram. He’d kept it inside a box, sealed in a temple on Sagun Isle, across the village
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“I told you. This one’s grandfather passed on. Before he died, he mentioned a man who had forced some information out of him. A Kag with great power in the skilled arts.” He noted the expression on Sapphire’s face and his smile faded. “Is this the same man you think stole those journals?” “Why do you care?” Sapphire asked, observing his face.
Sapphire pursed her lips. “This man struck a rivalry with our master many years ago. They were racing to recover Naijwa’s journals and other memoirs surrounding her work. Yes,” she said, sighing. “He has the Baidh accent.” “White hair. Heavy brows.” Kefier closed his eyes for a moment, trying to recall. “A distinct walk. Like a man who used to be very strong but now can’t face the idea that he is getting old. Big frame. Expensive-looking clothes.”
One leader to another, Enosh. How do you give your whole life knowing they will never know what you’ve done for them? He shuts his eyes against the rain. He was right, after all—ever and always, the road for him always leads to Jin-Sayeng.
At least three or four of them thought that they were closer to bedding her than the others. It was only that stalemate, if nothing else, that kept her safe so far.
She tried not to look too excited. “I’ve never seen Sutan. Or anywhere that wasn’t Akki or Fuyyu in my life.” “Is that so important?” he asked. “It’s just one bloody Jin town after another.” “Oh, sir. Sutan is a city. Next to Shirrokaru...” She shook her head. “You’re a Kag. You wouldn’t understand. Shirrokaru, Sutan, Bara, Oren-yaro, and Kai, they are the last bastions of Jin-Sayeng heritage. Places that still show what Jin-Sayeng used to be. Our traditions have been fading since the Dragonlords...” “Agartes shit on me!” Ylir exclaimed. “If you’re going to talk the ears out of me with that
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Sir Ylir gave him a look and he wilted. “She offered her services freely,” he said. “She can walk out any time she wants to. Isn’t that right, Sume?” He gazed out at her from the deck, his eyes twinkling. She couldn’t tell if he was being sarcastic or humorous.
“Maybe he’s just being a gentleman.” “And maybe I’ll shit gold one of these days. Well, if what you say is true, you’ll be safe for a few days yet. I’ll probably be asked to fetch someone from the city by tomorrow.” He shuddered. “I hate walking into the kind of place where grabbing a man’s crotch is the same thing as hello.” “Really?” “Really. I like my women clean, you know.”
She didn’t give him a chance to say what was on his mind. “I’ll be all right,” she said. “Go worry about your own.” “You sound like him, you know?” Aden said, shaking his head. “He was smiling, the last time I saw him.”
There was a flash of black hair and a boy suddenly tumbled into the light, screaming in barely discernible Jinan.
He heard the boy rustling as he returned to the bed. There were a few moments of silence, and then he heard the boy murmur in a voice barely more than a squeak, “Dai. My name is Dai.” Kefier nodded. “Nice to meet you, Dai.”
HE DOESNT KNOW ITS OJI'S SON PLS
Gaven screams. Camden pushes himself off the wall to run. It is a mistake, but maybe it wouldn’t have mattered. Camden feels his limbs slacken, feels cold, wet cobblestone on his face. He remembers he has not told Lillah where he was going. She had asked him to accompany her to the theatre, where she would perform that night, and he had declined. Another mistake. Would that, too, have made a difference? Does anything?
Ka-eng live for centuries.
thinks of the boy again, of the only maternal feeling she has ever allowed herself, and wishes him well. In time, he will be home again, and they can laugh for a while. She can wait for that. Ka-eng live for centuries, after all.
Dont tell me shes about to die too
Burg’s face grew serious. “What’s this I’m hearing about you wanting the girl with us? There ought to be enough girls along the road, don’t you think?” “That’s hardly my intention.” He leaned across the railing and faced Burg. “I still mean to return her to her family. After what happened last time, I’m not trusting her around these cock-brained monkeys. Besides, Burg, do you really think the woman would allow us to lock her up here while we go riding off into the sunset? Last port she could hardly wait to get out.”
Ylir looked at her and closed his mouth. The crashing of waves against an empty shore...
One time, when the gelding reached out for another bite of grass and Ranias reached out to hit him, she tapped her heels into his belly as she had seen the others do and laughed as he galloped, pulling him back near the front, where Ylir rode. Ylir, of course, had barked at her to get back in line; he was even more irritable than usual on horseback. Still, she had made her point.
“You didn’t cook tonight,” she heard Ylir’s honeyed voice behind her. She tugged at her bare feet. “Burg insisted.” She turned her head as he dropped to the ground beside her. He was holding a bowl of turnip soup casually with one hand. “Shouldn’t you be in your golden pavilion?” He laughed. “That’s just a rumour. I have a perfectly standard tent like the rest of you.
Ylir drew a sharp breath and glanced behind him. The girl had followed them. He almost yelled at her, but he suddenly felt too weary to bother. It was Burg who spoke first. The man already seemed infatuated with her and jumped at the chance to show off.
“Is that so?” Sume straightened her dress and glanced towards Ylir matter-of-factly. “Then we should ride there, shouldn’t we?” “We?” Ylir asked. “We.” She said that firmly.
Burg, always one to show off, was probably considering the girl’s feelings, as Ranias was one of the few men there she seemed to like. He frowned. He needed to talk with Burg about that. Operations came first, even if you had to step all over someone to get it done.
but the expression on Ylir’s face when he pulled that trick of making the head explode. It was the look of a man used to control and found, to his dismay, that it was slipping.
“What is Ylir yn Garr doing with a Jin at tow?” he snorted. “Is he so desperate for cunt now? Maybe better you stick around my camp, girl. I’ll show you how a real man treats a woman.” “Maybe better you just do what he says,” she said, her voice even. “Before I show you how a real woman can wield a knife.” Gaven started to say something, and she chose that moment to duck through the tent flap. To her surprise, she saw Ylir quietly waiting for her by the path.
