The Last Mortal Bond (101 page)

Except Valyn was alive. He had been alive all along, although what had happened to him, Gwenna had no idea. His eyes were ruined, destroyed by the same gash that someone had carved straight across his face. He was thinner than she remembered, strong but awfully gaunt, a spiderweb of scar cut into his skin. He was a long cry from the earnest, determined cadet Gwenna remembered, a long cry, even, from what he'd become as a Wing leader. It felt as though some creature had crawled into the body of the boy she'd loved all those years ago, crawled in and taken it over. A creature of hunger and darkness.

The rest of the Kettral were even more beaten up, just as surprising a discovery, but at least they were still recognizable. Something fucking awful had happened to the Flea's arm, which seemed to be flayed from the elbow to the wrist. Newt's lower leg was crushed all to Hull; he wouldn't be flying any more missions, that was clear enough, although the realization didn't seem to have dulled his strange spirit any. As Talal worked on his leg, the ugly demolitions master met Gwenna's eyes.

“The timely arrival of a friend is worth more than all the spice in the western islands,”
he said.

“Yeah,” Gwenna replied. “I wouldn't rely on timely arrivals any more than you have to. We stumbled across you mostly by accident. We were scouting the Urghul army for the Emperor. Didn't expect to find a handful of busted-up Kettral trying to keep the fight all to themselves.”

Quick Jak had put Allar'ra down on a gentle stretch of beach just northwest of the Neck, and the other Kettral, Gwenna's Kettral, had landed along with them. As the huge birds furled their wings, the newly blooded soldiers, abuzz with the recent action, checked their weapons and gear, talking excitedly the whole time. Gwenna didn't feel excited. She felt tired. Adare's orders had been to scout the Urghul and find il Tornja, which meant they'd managed one out of two. Maybe the Emperor wanted her to stay out in the field, but with the Urghul army hammering down on Annur, hunting around for a lone general didn't seem to make much sense. They needed to get back to the city, to help see to the coming defense. It had been tempting to fly directly there, but the Flea and his Wing needed medical care, and more than that, there were some questions that needed answers before Gwenna faced Adare again.

“So,” she said, glancing over the small group. “Who wants to start?”

Valyn's scarred eyes were fixed on her. There was no way he could see through those, but he didn't move like a blind man. Gwenna studied him for a moment, then looked away.

“Where's Shaleel?” the Flea asked. “Who's in charge on the Islands?”

“Yeah,” Gwenna said slowly. “Funny you should ask that.”

It didn't take long to tell the story of the Eyrie's self-immolation, Jakob Rallen and his tyranny, the ultimate victory of the resistance. When she was done, everyone was silent for a long time, listening to waves lisp up onto the sand. Finally the Flea looked over at the cluster of birds and the soldiers who were tending to them.

“They did well,” he said simply. “You did well.”

Gwenna felt herself coloring. “Well, if this was it, we could all sit back and drink ourselves warm, but there's a lot more doing to do.”

“The Urghul…,” the Flea began.

“More than the Urghul,” Gwenna said, realizing only once she'd done it that she had cut the older man off. “Sorry, sir.”

The Flea waved aside her apology. “I'll shut up. You talk. We don't know a thing about the strategic picture. You do.”

Gwenna took a deep breath. Valyn still hadn't spoken. He was stone-still, watching her with those awful blind eyes of his.

“The picture,” she said, turning to face the Flea again, “is about as clear as a bucket of shit mixed with a liberal helping of mud.

“As I'm sure you've deduced from the Urghul fucking horde hammering down along the Haag, il Tornja left the northern front weeks back. The Emperor wants to know—”

Valyn spoke for the first time since landing, cutting her off. “The Emperor?”

His voice made Gwenna shiver. “Your sister. The one with the burning eyes—”

“Where is Kaden?”

“I don't know. We saw him before we went to the Islands—Talal, Annick, and I—he's the one who
sent
us to the Islands. He knew what had happened at the Eyrie and he needed birds. When we got back with the birds, though…” She shrugged. “Adare was here. Annur's an empire again. Sort of. She and the council patched up their rift somehow.”

Valyn leaned forward, eager, hungry. “And just where,” he asked, voice quiet as falling ash, “did my sister say that Kaden had gone?”

“Elsewhere.”

The Flea frowned. “Not much of an explanation.”

“You didn't press her?” Valyn demanded.

Gwenna stared at him. “Last time I checked, we're soldiers. When the Emperor says, ‘Go find the Urghul,' we go find the 'Kent-kissing Urghul.”

“She is not the Emperor,” he growled.

“Well, she's sitting on the throne,” Gwenna snapped, “which is inside the Dawn Palace. She has burning eyes and everyone keeps calling her
Your Radiance,
so you could maybe forgive me for missing that particular point. In fact,” she cocked her head to the side, “what is it
you've
been up to all these months, that you know so much about the internal workings of the empire?”

Valyn exhaled between gritted teeth. Gwenna tensed. She could smell his fury on the sea's salt wind. At her side, Talal leaned back, settling a casual hand on his belt knife, as though he, too, felt the danger. Then it passed.

“I've been recovering,” Valyn said quietly, “from the time Adare planted a dagger between my ribs.”

Waves rolled up the beach, crested, crashed, then fell away, dragged back into the great churning belly of the sea. For what seemed like a long time, no one spoke. Gwenna could think of nothing to say. She'd suspected something underhanded from Adare—Kaden had implied as much, and the Emperor herself had been evasive on the topic. Underhanded, however, was a long cry from murderous.

Finally, she shook her head. “Why?”

“She wanted to protect her general,” Valyn said. “I tried to kill Ran il Tornja. She stopped me.”

Gwenna whistled softly. “And now il Tornja's turned on her.”

“Turned on her?” Valyn asked, head whipping around. “How?”

“Disappeared. Abandoned the front. Threatened to kill her son. Sounds like she should have let you kill him.”

“Oh, I will,” Valyn said. For the first time since landing, he smiled.

“That's gonna be tough,” Gwenna pointed out, “given that he's disappeared.”

“No, it won't. He'll come back to Annur sooner or later. In the meantime, I can pay back my beloved sister.”

Gwenna frowned. “You mean stab her. To death.”

Valyn nodded silently. She could smell the hunger on him again, as though he were some sort of starving beast.

“I'm sure you noticed,” Gwenna began carefully, “that there's an Urghul army riding down on the heart of the empire even as we sit here. I've been to the capital. The place is a goat fuck. Adare's about the only one holding anything together down there. I'm not sure this is the perfect time to kill her.”

Valyn coughed up a laugh. “And when,” he demanded, “
is
the perfect time to murder one's sister?”

“After the war, for starters. I mean, the odds are decent the Urghul'll do your work for you. I had a good look at that army from up on the bird and it seemed to stretch north just about all the way to the mountains. Odds are, all our heads will be on pointy sticks by the end of the month anyway, but if we survive this, somehow, if we beat back those 'Kent-kissing bastards, then shit, by all means, stab your evil sister. For that matter, I'll
help
you take her down.”

When she fell silent, Valyn didn't speak. He just stared at her with those ravaged eyes, stared
through
her, as though he wasn't seeing her face at all, but the wide gray sea stretching out behind.

The Flea shifted. “Gwenna is right. Whatever Adare's crimes, she is needed in Annur.”

“We all need something,” Valyn whispered.

“Yes,” Gwenna said. “Well. Several
million
people need Adare's bony ass on that throne.”

He shook his head. “I've heard this argument before. It's what Adare told me before Andt-Kyl. ‘We need him, Valyn. We need il Tornja.'”

“And you went after him anyway. And that worked out about as well as having a sick goat shit in your soup.”

To her shock, Valyn chuckled. For just a moment, a quarter heartbeat, he might have been the young man she remembered. Then it was gone. Gwenna blew out a weary breath.

“Just wait,” she said quietly. “Wait until the war is over, and then, I swear, I'll help you do whatever needs to be done.”

He watched her with those ruined eyes, then inclined his head.

“I'll wait.”

 

55

The days Kaden spent with Triste in the small white house at the edge of Rassambur's sunbaked mesa waiting to learn if he would be murdered by the Skullsworn or set free were unlike any others in his life. His life, until then, had been split between luxury and struggle: a childhood sleeping in the feathered beds of the Dawn Palace, eating fresh fruit all winter, finding warm clothes delivered by a slave each morning. Then, an adolescence of stone and snow and suffering.

He had known siblings, friends, and mentors, periods of relative peace and even beauty. After eighteen years, he had seen the Bone Mountains and the Rift, Intarra's Spear and the cold cliff dwellings of Assare, the Csestriim fortress in the Dead Heart and the islands that served as the
kenta
hubs, scraps of green lost in a world of tossing sea. It seemed like a lot to pack into a single life, a short life. He had thought, when Meshkent retreated into his mind, when he realized what that meant, what had to happen, that he could die feeling that he'd seen the world, that he could let Ananshael unknit his soul knowing that he'd experienced the full range of what life had to offer.

And he had been wrong.

None of it, not the brotherly love of his childhood or the bawdy camaraderie he'd shared with Akiil, not his mother's kisses or his father's distant regard, had prepared him for what he shared with Triste during those warm, sunbright days at the mesa's edge.

The sex—tender and explosive, wrenching and soft and raw—was the least of it. It was all the rest, what happened when they stopped, when they were just lying on the rough blankets, the only light the one lantern the Skullsworn had given them, that Kaden realized how narrow the scope of his life had been. He felt like a child who had spent his years running through the chambers of a vast mansion over and over. He had seen every room, every corridor, every crawlspace and pantry. Then one day, someone opened a door, he stepped outside, and for the first time saw the sky.

“I didn't realize…,” he murmured one night, Triste tucked tight up against him, her body rising and falling with her breath.

“Didn't realize what?” she asked sleepily.

He shook his head. “Any of it.”

She laughed at that. In all their time together, he'd never heard her laugh. Then she kissed him on the chest, moved on top of him, and he quit bothering with words. That part the Shin had right—the words were useless.

They made no effort to escape, partly because it was obviously impossible, partly because if they
did
somehow manage to get past the Skullsworn, they would only be delivering themselves into il Tornja's arms. They'd escaped him once, but he still had his
ak'hanath,
still had that crazed, ancient leach at his side, and though no one had seen the
kenarang
on the far rim of the canyon, he was there—Kaden was certain of it—laying his careful traps.

“What will we do?” Triste finally asked. They were lying in bed. It was late, and the stars had already scraped through most of their nightly course. Kaden didn't realize she had awoken until she spoke, then rose up on one elbow, tracing a finger along his ribs, down to his hip.

“I'm not sure we can do anything,” Kaden replied. “Not until the Skullsworn decide if they're going to kill us or help us.”

“We could tell them,” she suggested hesitantly. “Tell them the truth.”

Kaden shook his head. He'd been pondering that exact course since they first arrived; it seemed like madness. If they knew one thing for certain, it was that the priesthood of Ananshael loathed Meshkent and all his minions. The Skullsworn had already sacrificed a dozen of their number in a botched attempt to find Long Fist, and that was when they'd believed that he was merely an Urghul shaman, merely a minister of the god's misery. If Gerra knew he had the Lord of Pain himself in Rassambur, beneath his blade, they were as good as dead.

“They haven't killed us yet,” Kaden said, “which is good.”

Triste chuckled at the understatement.

“The Csestriim are an affront to everything the Skullsworn believe,” Kaden went on. “Gerra seemed shocked to learn that they still walk the earth.”

“And if Gerra helps us?”

Kaden closed his eyes, tried to remember the world beyond the mesa. “If we manage to get clear, free, we could start running again. Try to get to a
kenta,
go somewhere il Tornja can't go.”

“There's nowhere he can't go,” Triste replied quietly.

They fell silent. There was nothing to say. Half of Kaden's life had been given over to the stamping out of desire. It had almost worked. When Pyrre first brought them to Rassambur, he'd been ready to give up his life, to step outside himself once and for all. It would have been easy, then, to do what needed doing, and yet he'd seen no point in the
obviate
then. Now, finally, he understood what was at stake. The only way to understand it was to feel the love, and the pain that came with that love.