Dragonoak (40 page)

CHAPTER XV

Someone
left earlier than I did, the next morning, but I couldn't tell
whether it was Goblin or Ghost. I seized the chance regardless,
hopped over Akela, curled up on the floor, and grabbed bread from a
basket in the kitchen before slipping out onto the street. At that
hour, Orinhal was alive, but not lively.

People
yawned with each step they took, blinking and stretching themselves
awake as they went about their allotted tasks. There were bakers
and butchers setting up for the day, soldiers and crafters
wordlessly sharing tea before work, along with those leaving their
homes to care for their elderly neighbours. The farms were as busy
as they'd been the previous evening, and the man I'd spoken to
about work hadn't forgotten me. I was directed to a group
twenty-strong setting up for the day, and told to do as they
did.

The heat
from the sun couldn't compete with the coolest day in Canth, but it
was hard work regardless, and I was sweating within the hour,
fingers wrapped around the rough handle of a shovel. It'd been
years since I'd worked on a farm but I fell straight back into the
rhythm, reminded, all at once, of how exhausting and rewarding it
was. We worked in companionable silence straight through to lunch
time, and those I'd been tilling the fields with shared their food
with me.

The
people I worked with had been driven from all corners of Kastelir.
Some were older than my father, while one boy was thirteen, if he
was a day. He worked the fields while his older sister apprenticed
under one of the army's smiths, and all knew better than to ask
about his parents. They were a tight-knit group, all looking out
for one another, and though Kastelir had been divided into its
territories once more, none cared where the others would end up,
once this was all over.

By the
end of the day, I was almost as excited to work again tomorrow as I
was to see Claire. I had just enough time to rush down to the river
to clean myself off, and stopped by the cabin to grab my bag on the
way to the tower. The clock above the doors told me I had five
minutes to spare, but I couldn't see how much of a difference it
would make. I pulled the door open and slipped inside, not wanting
to make Claire come downstairs if she was already at the table, and
found her behind the door, arguing with someone.

They
both stopped mid-sentence at the interruption, and Claire wouldn't
have taken the intrusion lightly, had anyone else wandered in
without knocking. She opened her mouth to shout and promptly shut
it, and took my presence as a much needed excuse to wrap up
whatever debate she had no intention of losing.

The
woman she was arguing with – a high-ranking soldier, perhaps a
general – was the first to speak again, not caring that she now had
an audience.

“Marshal, surely you see the benefit of having allies. We're
out-numbered three-to-one, yet you continue to overlook the
potential
of negotiating
with—”

“Were he
to give us ten thousand soldiers and rations to feed Orinhal for a
decade I still wouldn't work with the King of Agados,” Claire
scoffed. “What makes you think this isn't a trap? How many times
have we heard that Rylan's working with the Agadians? Anything to
get me out in the open, beyond the safety of Orinhal. Now go, go.
I've dinner to attend to, and this conversation is going
nowhere.”

The
woman grumbled under her breath, straightened, and snapped a
salute.

“...
enjoy your dinner, Marshal,” she said, glancing at me as she left
the tower, closing the door quietly behind her.

Claire
rested her mouth against her knuckles, sighing as she stared down
at the mess of paperwork on her desk. I saw her eyes scan across
it, and for a moment, thought that she meant to sort through it,
tying up all the loose ends in the process. She almost proved me
right, but after a few seconds spent straightening a stack of
parchment, she grew weary of it all and looked up at me with a
smile.

“You
came,” she said, a little surprised that I hadn't found some excuse
not to be there. “We ought to head upstairs before someone else
bombards me with their terrible plans.”

Claire
locked the tower doors, and no sooner were we upstairs, sat around
the table that wasn't designed for two, than the doors opened
again. Sen made her way up, glasses rattling on the tabletop-sized
tray between her hands, and when she set it down on the table, I
saw that Claire hadn't been exaggerating. Even the plates were
bigger than the sort I was used to. I could've spent the better
part of an hour deciding where to start.

“I hope
you like it,” Sen said, bowing her head. “I p-probably made too
much, but the Marshal always needs to eat more...”

I
grinned and Claire exhaled sharply, saying, “Thank you,
Sen.”

“Ah,
I'll just...” she murmured, scurrying off to fetch the pitcher of
water she'd left downstairs. “There. If there's anything else you
need, you can let me know, and I'll...”

“That'll
be all, Sen,” Claire said gently, in Svargan.

“It
looks great,” I said, continuing the theme of Svargan, “Thanks! I'm
sure I'll finish anything Claire doesn't want.”

Her ears
perked up, and with a nod of her head, Sen took a few steps
backwards, finally content to excuse herself. Claire stared at me
as though she didn't understand the words that had just tumbled out
of my mouth, and I picked up a fork, not certain whether I wanted
to start with the chicken breast or the roasted vegetables along
the side.

“You
learnt Svargan?” she asked, ignoring her meal in its
entirety.

“Kouris
taught me. I learnt Canthian, too,” I said, seamlessly switching
between the languages. I wasn't beyond showing off, especially not
in front of somebody who understood what I was saying. “Sort of had
to, really. Living in Canth and all.”

“You'll
have to excuse me. I haven't practised Canthian in far too long to
be anything but rusty,” Claire said. There was nothing wrong with
her choice of words, though they were very carefully picked, each
one deliberated over. “... we're going to confuse ourselves if we
keep switching languages.”

Agreeing with her, I decided my mouth ought to be full of
food, not words, and cut off a chunk of chicken, smearing it in the
sauce it had been cooked in. I took my first bite and couldn't help
but let out an appreciative hum. Claire raised her brow as if to
say
I told you so
, and for a few minutes, I was content to smile around
forkfuls of food while she ate at her own pace.

“Is
there anything else to drink?” I asked, already halfway through a
tepid glass of water.

She
shook her head, and focused on cutting her chicken into smaller
pieces.

“Really?
The Marshal doesn't even get any wine?” I asked.

“There's
nothing
,” Claire snapped, and frowned at her dinner. Her knife slid
across the plate, poorly anchored between her finger and thumb, and
I didn't know if I ought to look away as she clicked her tongue in
frustration. “... I don't have any wine. I apologise.”

“It's
fine,” I rushed to explain. “I'm fine. I was only
wondering.”

Claire
nodded her head, and went back to her meal. A little ashamed,
perhaps, though I couldn't say why. I busied myself with eating,
atmosphere not as warm as it'd been moments ago, and I had a
horrible, unsettling feeling that I'd finish up my dinner and
leave, all without saying anything more to her.

At least
there was an absurd amount of food. I paced myself, eating as
slowly as I could without stopping, hoping I'd find my voice, and
noticed that Claire wasn't eating so much as she was cutting her
food into smaller and smaller pieces and moving them around her
plate. She stared at it, caught somewhere between disinterest and
contempt, and looked up when she felt my eyes on her.

I ducked
my head and went back to eating, but she placed her cutlery on the
side of her plate and cleared her throat.

“I'd
like to hear about Canth,” she said. “If you wouldn't mind telling
me.”

“Oh,” I
said, setting my cutlery down. “Well... what do you want to
know?”

“Anything. Where you lived, who you stayed with. How you
filled your days, what you learnt; anything you're comfortable with
telling me.”

It took
a few words from Claire to make me forget the past two years of my
life. Too many things came to mind at once, each flash of a memory
blinding the last, until there was nothing but a cluttered blur for
me to focus on. She said she wanted to hear anything, but I didn't
want to bore her. Didn't want to confuse her.

“We
lived with Reis. Kouris was always talking about them, back when we
were travelling to Isin, so I know you already know a little about
them. Turns out they run a place called Port Mahon. It's a sort
of... pirate town, made by women, but there are lots of other
people there, too. Not many men, though no one had a problem with
Atthis,” I explained. “And I worked on the fishing boats a lot. I
liked it. More than farming, I think. And, um. I guess I helped
Reis with the accounts, when I could, or went to the tavern, out to
market...”

I chewed
on the inside of my cheek, shoulders rising as I reached for my
cutlery.

Claire
stopped me, reaching out to cover my hand with her own.

“Rowan. I
want
to hear everything you have to say. We've all evening. Don't
feel as though you ought to rush, or skip details. I'm listening,”
she told me.

I moved
my hand so that I could cling to hers, squeezing it as it hit me,
once again, that Claire was alive, and that I was sitting down to
dinner with her.

“Okay.
But you're not going to believe half of it,” I said, mouth slanting
into a smile. Rising to a challenge she hadn't set, I went about
proving my point by saying, “I mean, I met Kondo-Kana, and that's
not even the weirdest thing that happened.”

Claire
spent a moment studying my expression, hand still wrapped in my
fingers, as though trying to discern whether or not I was being
serious.

“You met Kondo-Kana.
The
Kondo-Kana of legend, or a woman who happened to
be called Kondo-Kana?” she asked, just to make certain.

“The
Kondo-Kana,” I clarified, and
said so much so quickly that I couldn't have been making it up. “I
met her by accident, actually. Tizo – a captain in Mahon, one of
the newer ones – bought a map from me, so that she could take a
crew on a treasure hunt. Only you don't call them
treasure hunts
in Mahon,
apparently it's bad luck. So I went on an
expedition
with Tizo, and Akela came
along, because everyone always wanted Akela on their ship. Anyway,
we ended up at an ancient temple in the middle of a jungle, and all
of the golden phoenixes were still there. Everyone worked on
getting those back to the ship, but I decided to take a look inside
and,
well
.

“It was
strange, but it wasn't strange. Kondo-Kana was there, looking at
what remained of the temple, and I felt as though... as though I
knew her. And not because of all the stories about her. I suppose
it's because we're both necromancers! But she had these eyes
like... like mine were, but the light wasn't trailing up. It was
just trapped there, in her eyes. Like stars, or the moon, or...
Anyway, I didn't know who she was then. Didn't see her for a few
months after that, until I got an invitation from the capital. I
thought it was from Queen Nasrin – kind of embarrassed myself a
bit, actually – but Kondo-Kana was living in the palace, working in
the temple.”

Claire
threaded her fingers with mine, and I worried that my heart was
pounding so loudly in my ears that I wouldn't be able to hear
anything she said.

“As a
child – foolish though I was taught it was – I believed that
Kondo-Kana hadn't met her end in the ocean,” she said, leaning
forward to confide in me. “Something about the stories didn't sit
well with me. And now I know why.”

With her
thumb brushing against my palm, the stories flowed out of me. I
told her about the problems in Canth, about the attacks the port
suffered in my time there, and I told her about the other
expeditions I'd been on, and what became of those who challenged
Reis' authority. She listened as though my voice was the only sound
in the world as I told her about the temples, flooded with people
on a daily basis, the murals painted across Mahon, along with all
the people I'd met.

For the
first time since returning to Asar, I understood how far Canth was
behind me, how much I missed it; and had a ship been waiting for
me, I still wouldn't have chosen to be anywhere else.

Claire
hadn't taken her eyes off me the entire time, and I let it make me
brave.

“I have
something for you. I have something that's yours, that is. I know I
should've given it to you before this, but I just worried that
you'd be angry...” I said, smiling weakly.

I pulled
my hand free of Claire's and reached for the bag between my feet. I
moved my plate to the side, dinner long-since cold, and Claire took
it upon herself to stack her plate atop mine, food barely touched,
and placed them both on the floor.