Ghost in the Storm (The Ghosts) (3 page)

Rezir walked his stallion forward, flanked by four of the Immortals in their black skull helms. A fifth horseman followed, a small man slumped in the saddle. He wore simple clothes, leather and wool, and a pair of daggers rested in his belt. A hooded cloak hid his face, yet even from this distance, Caina glimpsed hideous scarring across his jaw and mouth. 

For a moment he looked right at her, and then his gaze swept over the crowd. 

The wind grew sharper, the banners snapping.

Lord Corbould rode forward, surrounded by a pair of Legionaries, the master magus Tolius, and a throng of Marsis's prominent nobles and merchants. One of the minor nobles stepped forward, carrying a banner, and began to shout. 

"You stand in the presence of Corbould, Lord of House Maraeus, Lord Governor of Marsis, and cousin to the Emperor." 

Rezir did not answer, and neither did his herald.

The wind picked up, the gusts striking with enough force that Caina had to take a step back to keep her balance, skirts billowing around her legs. 

Corbould frowned at his own herald. 

The minor noble cleared his throat. "Lord Corbould invites the Lord Ambassador to come forward, that he might lodge as a guest of the Emperor of Nighmar in the Citadel."

Still Rezir and his men did not move. 

Caina frowned. There was something wrong here, she...

"Look at the ships!" said Nicolai.

Caina turned, and felt her eyes grow wide.

She saw a fleet sailing into the harbor, their sails filled with the sharp wind. But these vessels were neither merchant ships nor warships of the Empire. They were long and narrow, with raked banks of sails. They cut through the water with smooth grace, and their sleek lines made them look like hunting predators.

Kyracian ships, from the city-state of New Kyre, the chief maritime power of the western sea. The Empire and New Kyre had fought many wars over the years, but for a Kyracian fleet to sail so boldly into the harbor of Marsis...

Gods, there were hundreds of them.

One of the nobles grabbed Lord Corbould's arm and pointed. 

And as he did, Rezir Shahan drew his sword. The Immortals and Istarish soldiers followed suit, and a ripple of panic went through the gathered crowds.

"What's happening?" said Nicolai as the sound of chaos rose around them.

"I don't know," said Caina. This was madness. Rezir was in the heart of one of the Empire's chief cities. Surely he couldn't think to cut down Lord Corbould and his officers, not here...

As one, the doors to most of the warehouses ringing the Great Market burst open.

And Istarish soldiers, hundreds of them, flooded into the Market.

Caina looked from them, to the Kyracian fleet sailing into the harbor, and back to the soldiers.

This wasn't a parley.

This wasn't even an assassination.

This was an invasion.

Chapter 2 - Lightning

"I would like," said Tanya, "to go for a walk."

Ark looked up from his broadsword.

He sat by the hearth in the common room, oiling and sharpening his sword and daggers. He did so every morning, without fail. For sixteen years he had served in the Eighteenth Legion of the Empire, and the Legion's iron discipline had been hammered into his bones. He would oil and hone his weapons every morning until the day he died. 

Ark grunted. "Anywhere in particular?"

He watched Tanya as he worked, his hard hands moving of their own accord. Five years had not changed his wife. The years in the Moroaica's captivity had left her a little paler, marked her eyes with dark circles. But save for that, she looked no different than that day  Ark had left their home to go hunting in the woods.

That day he had returned to find his village burned and his wife and infant son taken by Istarish slavers.

He still had nightmares about that day. 

"You misunderstand, husband," said Tanya. "I wish to go on a walk, true, but I wish for you to accompany me. It is a fine day, and should not be wasted."

"Ah," said Ark, rasping his whetstone down his blade. "The famed subtlety of women. Too subtle for a man of the Legion. Well, I will finish here," he ran the stone down the blade once more, "and you fetch your cloak. Then we shall go for a walk." 

She smiled at him and left for their room.

Ark slid his sword into its scabbard and rose with a grunt. He did not want to go for a walk. He was past forty now, and his knees and shoulders ached. He would rather have spent the day in front of the fire, a mug of Zorgi's excellent beer in his hand. 

But Tanya had spent five long years trapped in the Moroaica's dungeon. If she wanted go on a walk with him, then he would damned well go. Ark doubted he could have denied her anything.

Because he had failed her.

He knew, of course, that he could have done nothing. The Moroaica had wanted Nicolai's blood for her terrible spell, and she would have slain thousands to claim it. Ark's resistance would not have slowed her in the slightest. 

Yet he had not been there to save his wife and son.

But that was over now. Tanya and Nicolai had been rescued. Ark had killed Naelon Icaraeus with his own hands. And somehow Caina had outwitted and killed the Moroaica herself, the ancient terror of Szaldic legend. The freed slaves were right to call her the Balarigar, whether she liked it or not. 

And Tanya and Nicolai were returned to him.

So Ark would take his wife on a walk into the city, no matter how much his knees ached. 

###

"I used to come here with my father as a child," said Tanya, walking past the Plaza of the Tower's rich shops. In the Great Market, the hawkers sold pots and fish and wool cloth. In the Plaza of the Tower the merchants wore finery, and sold polished silver lamps and gleaming swords and bolts of silk and linen. “We came to Marsis twice a year, to sell our hams and garlic to the brokers here. Then we would buy anything we needed for the coming year.” She looked at a merchant selling bolts of silk and gave a wistful smile. “Not that we could ever afford anything in the Plaza of the Tower, of course. But I liked to come and look at all the fine things.” 

“I remember,” said Ark. “I met you upon the road north, returning to the village.”

Her smile turned less wistful. “Where you saved me from bandits. Like some hero out of my grandfather’s stories.”

Ark snorted. “I’m no hero. Just a soldier. And a retired soldier. I'm a blacksmith now.” 

She laughed. “Well, you did spend five years looking for me. Though I suppose to qualify as a proper hero of legend, it should have been seven years. Seven is a more poetic number, my grandfather used to say.” 

“It was still too long,” said Ark.

Tanya’s smile stilled, and she looked toward Black Angel Tower. “It…could have been worse, I think. When those slavers burned the village, I thought they would sell us in some market across the sea. Instead they took us to Jadriga.”

“She must have been cruel to you and Nicolai,” said Ark, the old anger shivering through him.

“No,” said Tanya. “She was not cruel. Her acolytes, Agria Palaegus and the others, they were cruel. But they were small-minded fools. Jadriga was worse than cruel. She kept us in comfort, gave us whatever we needed – food to eat, clothes to wear, books to read. And all so she could kill Nicolai and use his blood to let the fallen angels out of their prison.” 

He took her hand, led her away from the stalls. They wandered down a deserted side street, away from anyone who might overhear. 

“I am sorry,” he said at last. 

“It was not your fault,” said Tanya. “It must have been worse for you. The Moroaica told me that you were dead. You never knew…”

“It was…unpleasant,” said Ark. In the Legion, he had known fear and doubt and pain. But the constant wondering, the constant seeking, had been like a knife he could never pull from his flesh. “Halfdan found me after the village burned, and I joined the Ghosts. We tracked the slavers down and slew them…but Naelon Icaraeus had already taken you to Black Angel Tower. We thought the slavers' ship must have sunk with you aboard it. Halfdan checked with the Ghost circles in the ports of the western and Cyrican seas. No slaver ship put in after you were taken. So I thought you were dead. Yet…I never knew. Not for certain.” 

Her hand cupped his cheek. “That must have been dreadful.” 

“Aye,” said Ark. “It was my fault.”

She blinked, puzzled. “What do you mean?”

“I should have been there,” said Ark. “When the slavers burned the village. I might have been able to stop them. I could have gotten you and Nicolai away, I could…”

“Or you could have died with the other men who fought,” said Tanya. “The Moroaica wanted Nicolai and his blood. She only kept me alive because she could not be bothered to care for Nicolai herself. If you had tried to fight, she would have killed you along with everyone else.”

“I should…” began Ark.

“Arcion,” said Tanya, her fingers tracing his jaw. “It wasn’t your fault, what happened to us. And perhaps it was for the best.”

“For the best?” said Ark. “How could you possibly think that?”

“Because if you had been with us, you would have perished,” said Tanya. “If you had found us on your own, Jadriga would have killed you. But instead you joined the Ghosts, and you found the Balarigar. She slew the Moroaica and saved Nicolai.” She took a deep breath. “We have gone through a dark time, yes. But now it is over.”

Ark gazed at her in wonder. She was not the first woman who had shared his bed, not by far. There had been a girl in Caer Marist, before he fled his father to join the Legion. The camp followers that trailed after every Legion camp. A woman of half-barbarian blood who had attached herself to him after his promotion to first spear centurion, shared his tent for three years, and abandoned him after his enlistment ended. 

None of them had the sort of steel he saw in Tanya.

“We can start anew, now,” said Tanya. “You were the village smith of Hruzac, and I was the smith’s wife. A fine life. Hruzac is ashes, and we cannot return to that life…but we can forge a new one together, can we not?”

“Yes,” said Ark.

###

They kept walking, and wound up in the gardens ringing Zorgi’s Inn.

Marsis was the largest city in the western Empire, home to nearly a quarter of a million people, packed with houses and warehouses and tenements and mansions. Yet somehow Zorgi had found space to surround his Inn with gardens of bushes and small trees. 

“It is lovely here,” said Tanya. “I would not expect to find a place like this in the heart of Marsis.”

Ark snorted. “Caina told me that half the guests sneak out at night for a tumble in the bushes.”

Tanya laughed. “There is little that she does not see, is there?”

“No,” said Ark, looking at his wife. Caina and Tanya looked a great deal alike, yet Tanya had a warmth to her eyes, even after her ordeal at the hands of the Moroaica. And for all Caina’s skill at masquerading as  a frivolous young woman, her eyes sometimes gave her away.

Veteran Legionaries, hardened killers, had eyes like that.

For all that Ark respected Caina, she sometimes frightened him a little, and he had never thought any woman could inspire fear in him. 

The wind from the sea picked up, setting the leaves to rustling, and Ark put aside the thought. 

“Perhaps we should find Nicolai a dog,” said Ark. 

“A dog?” said Tanya. 

“Aye,” said Ark. “I had a dog, as a lad. A fine companion. A boy should have a dog.”

“If we live in the city,” said Tanya, “it will be harder to feed a dog.” She titled her head. “Unless you mean to find a village and live there.”

“No,” said Ark. “I mean to stay here.”

“Are you leaving the Ghosts?”

He glanced around to make sure they were unobserved. “One does not leave the Ghosts. If I find something the Emperor should know, I’ll tell the local circle. But I joined the Ghosts to find you, and I have. And I've a family to feed now. So here we shall stay. Lord Hiram offered me a job in the foundry that manufactures arms and armor for the Legions, and I will take it.”

“Would that make you happy?” said Tanya.

Ark shrugged. “I know the work, and it’s better than soldiering. The pay is good, since skilled smiths are not common. I’ll spend my days making cuirasses and lightning rods.”

Tanya laughed. “Lightning rods? What are those?”

“A metal pole, affixed to the roof of a tower,” said Ark. “If lightning strikes the tower, the metal conducts the blast to the earth so the roof does not catch fire. If we ever go to Malarae, you’ll see hundreds of them. The nobles compete to build the highest towers, and would rather not see their mansions burn every time a storm rolls in.” 

“That seems like a peaceful life,” said Tanya. “And the pay is good, you say?”

“It is,” said Ark.

“That is well,” said Tanya. “We could get Nicolai a dog. But perhaps he would be happier with a younger brother. Or sister. Or both.” 

“You want more children?” said Ark.

“I want many children,” said Tanya, and she grinned. “I am almost fifteen years younger than you, husband.  I shall need strong sons to look after me in my old age, will I not?”

The wind caught her black hair, making it dance around her face. 

And all at once Ark did not feel quite so old.

###

They returned to their room at the top floor of Zorgi's Inn.

The other women who had shared Ark's bed over the years had done so for a variety of reasons. For protection - the life of a camp follower was not an easy one. Or prestige, since a Legion's first spear centurion had a great deal of authority. 

Ark lowered himself over Tanya and kissed her, her arms coiling around his back.