The Beauty of Darkness (16 page)

“About the silos?”

“Yes.”

“The brezalots?”

“Yes.”

“The size of the army?”

“Yes, I told them everything.”

Everything.
There were some things even I might have held back. “The traitors on the Morrighese court?”

He nodded. “I had to, Lia.”

Of course he did. But I could only imagine how it lowered their regard for Morrighan and me even further. I came from a court roiling with snakes.

I sighed. “They didn't seem to believe anything I said about the Vendan army.”

He reached out and took my hand. “If they seem skeptical, it's because they've never encountered barbarian patrols that numbered more than a dozen before—but I told them what I saw too, the armed and organized brigade of at least five hundred that led you into Venda. Trust me, we're evaluating the measures that need to be taken, especially now with the deaths of an entire—”

I let out a soft groan. “I'm afraid I've gotten off to a bad start with your officers, and Captain Hague already dislikes me intensely. I didn't realize one of the dead was his cousin. He and I had a bit of a clash in there.”

“Bad news or not, Captain Hague is always a pill best taken with strong ale. At least that's what Sven tells me. I know the man only in passing.”

“Sven's right. He made it clear he had no respect for the Morrighese army, and he scorned the gift as well. I was as welcome in there as a skinned knee. Why in the gods' names did Dalbreck ever want me if they had no regard for First Daughters and the gift?”

Rafe seemed momentarily stunned, his shoulders pulling back as if my question unsettled him. He quickly recovered. “The captain insulted you. I'll speak to him.”

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “Please don't. The last thing I want is to look like an injured child who ran tattling to the king. We'll work it out.”

He nodded and brought my hand to his lips and kissed it. “I'll try to wrap up these meetings as soon as I can.”

“Is there anything I can help with?”

A weary grimace lined his eyes, and he told me that a lot more had transpired in his absence besides his parents' deaths. With no strong leadership, the assembly and cabinet had been warring. Certain egos had flared, generals were questioning the chain of command, and fear over the scourge that had killed the queen had affected commerce—all while they were keeping the king's death a secret from the rest of the world. There were battles waiting for Rafe on every front once he got back to the palace.

“When will that be, Rafe?” I hated to push the point, especially now, but I had no choice. “You know that Morrighan still needs to be warned. That I need to—”

“I know, Lia. Please just give me a few days to deal with all this first. Then we can talk about—”

Sven poked his head out the door. “Your Majesty,” he said, rolling his eyes toward the room behind him, “they grow restless.”

Rafe glanced back in my direction, lingering like he never wanted to leave. I saw the shadows that still lurked under his eyes. He'd only had a few hours of sleep when he needed a week, and had been granted only a passing moment of mourning when he needed far more. All he asked from me was a few days to juggle his new role as king, but a few days seemed like a luxury Morrighan couldn't afford.

I nodded, and he turned and disappeared behind the door with Sven before I could even say good-bye.

*   *   *

I hooked the last buckle of the bodice and adjusted the belt. I was grateful that Vilah and Adeline had brought me more practical clothes—a split leather skirt, jerkin, and shirt—but they were no less luxurious than the gown I had worn last night. The embossed brown leather was so supple it felt like it might melt between my fingers.

The old broken and knotted laces had been replaced on my newly cleaned boots, and Walther's baldrick was snug against my chest, gleaming like the day Greta had given it to him.

“A family heirloom?” Vilah asked.

They both looked at me tentatively as if they'd read something painful in my expression when I put it on. They were as kind as Captain Hague was nasty. I smiled and nodded, trying to erase any sadness they had seen. “I'm ready.”

They offered to give me a tour of the outpost, which was contained within a large oval wall. Rafe's and my tents were just outside the officers' housing and the dining room. They pointed out the rows of soldiers' barracks, as we walked, the soldiers' dining hall, the surgeon's bungalow, and tucked between them all, the cookhouse. We came to a wide gate that led to the lower level of the outpost. After pointing out the barns, paddocks, and the cook's garden, they showed me the mews where the Valsprey were caged. They were striking birds with white plumage, sharp claws, and an intimidating stare. Their glowing red eyes had a black slash of feathers above them. Vilah said they were swift flyers with wingspans of five feet. “They're able to fly thousands of miles without stopping. It's how we send messages between outposts and the capital.” When I asked if they could be sent anywhere, she said they were only trained to fly to certain destinations. Their heads turned eerily, watching us as we passed.

Below the rear wall was the river that wound behind the outpost. We circled back to the upper level and they showed me the laundry house, which was enormous. That didn't surprise me given their love affair with clothes. Finally we found ourselves at the front of the outpost again, near Colonel Bodeen's offices. I looked at the small, high windows and wondered what “measures” they had discussed.

“Can we go out there?” I asked, pointing to the watchtower gate. Rafe had said that vagabonds often camped near the outpost walls. I hadn't seen Dihara's band of wagons when we had approached yesterday, but in truth I'd seen very little besides the people flooding out to meet us. Now I wondered if she and the rest could be out there somewhere in the makeshift city.

“Of course,” Adeline said cheerfully. A small door in the massive watchtower gate was open, and as Rafe had ordered, soldiers four deep guarded it. Each one held a well-polished halberd. They let other soldiers pass through freely, but merchants were allowed only to leave messages and then were turned away.

As we approached, their halberds crossed and clicked like a well-timed machine to block us.

“James!” Adeline admonished. “What are you doing? Step aside. We're going out to—”

“You and Vi may pass,” he replied, “but not Her Highness without an escort. King's orders.”

I frowned. Rafe feared more Rahtan could be out there. “These ladies don't count as my escorts?” I asked.

“Armed escorts,” he clarified.

I made an exaggerated point of looking at the daggers at each of our sides. We were armed.

James shook his head. Apparently our own weapons weren't enough.

*   *   *

It was awkward walking among the merchant wagons with six sober-faced guards wielding sharp, pointy halberds, but we were lucky that James had rustled up even these, because none of the four at the gate would leave their posts.

The small wagon city reminded me in some ways of the
jehendra.
A little something for everyone and every taste—grilled foods, fabrics, leather goods, tents for games of chance, exotic brews, even a letter-writing service for soldiers who wanted to send home missives written with an elegant flair. Other merchants were there only to sell staples to the outpost and be on their way.

I was still pondering that the outpost seemed to break the treaty calling for no permanent dwellings in the Cam Lanteux. Why had Eben's family been burned out when here in the same wilderness was a structure that housed hundreds?

When I asked Adeline about this, one of the guards overheard me and answered in her stead. “There are no permanent residents here. We are regularly rotated in and out.” His explanation sounded like a loophole exploited by the well-armed and powerful. I remembered Regan talking about the encampments where their patrols would rest, but I had always pictured them as temporary places of muddy ruts, shaky tents, and windblown soldiers huddling against the elements. Now I wondered if Morrighan had loopholes too and their encampments were more permanent than I had believed them to be.

I asked the whereabouts of the vagabond camps among the merchants as we walked, and I was always directed a short walk away, but none were the vagabonds I searched for. “The one Dihara leads,” I finally said to an old man who was pounding designs into a leather browband.

He paused from his work and used his chisel to point still farther down the wall. “She's here. At the end.” My heart leapt, but only momentarily. His wrinkles deepened into unmistakable grimness. I ran in the direction he indicated, Vilah, Adeline, and the soldiers struggling to keep up with me.

When we found the camp, I understood the old man's grim expression. The camp was tucked under expansive pine boughs, but there were no chimes hanging from them. No painted ribbons or pounded copper twirled from branches. There was no steaming kettle in the midst of it all. There were no tents. Only three scorched
carvachis.

Reena's
carvachi
was more black now than purple. She sat on a log near the fire ring with one of the young mothers. Nearby, Tevio scraped the dirt with a sharp stick. Behind the
carvachis
, I spotted one of the men tending the horses with a child on his hip. There was no gaiety.

I turned to the guards and pleaded with them to stay back. “Please,” I said. “Something is wrong.” They surveyed the surroundings and reluctantly agreed to maintain their distance. Adeline and Vilah planted themselves in front of them as their own kind of safeguard—a line not to be crossed.

I approached, my chest hammering. “Reena?”

Her face brightened, and she jumped up to meet me, squeezing me against her full breast as if she'd never let me go. When she loosened her grip and looked at me again, her eyes glistened.
“Chemi monsé
Lia! Oue vifar!”

“Yes, I live. But what has happened here?” I stared at her charred wagon.

By now several others had joined us, including Tevio, who was pulling at my skirt. Reena drew me over to the fire to sit on the log and told me.

Riders came. Vendans. Ones she had never seen before. Dihara went out to meet them, but they didn't want to talk. They held up a small knife. They said helping enemies of Venda could not go unavenged. They killed half the horses, torched the tents and wagons, and left. She and the others grabbed blankets and whatever they could to beat out the flames, but the tents were gone almost instantly. They managed to save three of the
carvachis.

From the moment she mentioned the small knife, a sick salty taste swelled on my tongue.
Natiya's knife.
When Reena finished, I stood, unable to contain my anger.
One death was not good enough for the Komizar! I wanted to kill him again!
I pounded my fist against the wooden side of the
carvachi
, rage clawing through me.

“
Aida monsé, neu, neu, neu.
You mustn't hurt yourself over this,” Reena said pulling me away from the
carvachi.
She looked at the slivers in my hand and wrapped it in her scarf. “We will recover from this. Dihara said it was a season that none of us could prevent.”

“Dihara? Where is she? Is she all right?”

The same grim lines spread out from Reena's eyes as I had seen on the old man.

My knees weakened. “
No
,” I said, shaking my head.

“She lives,” Reena said quickly to correct my assumption, but then added, “but maybe not for long. She is very old, and in stamping out the flames, her heart failed. Its beat, even now, is weak. The outpost healer came out to see her, may the gods bless him, but there was nothing he could do.”

“Where is she?”

*   *   *

The inside of the
carvachi
was dim except for a thin blue flame flickering in a bowl of sweetly scented tallow—to keep the scent of death away. I carried a bucket of warm water floating with pungent leaves inside with me.

She was propped up on pillows in the bed at the back of the wagon, feather light, gray ash to be blown away. I sensed death hovering in the corners, looking on. Waiting. Her long silver braid was the only strength I saw, a rope that kept her moored to the living. I pulled a stool close and set the bucket down. She opened her eyes.

You heard her. Get the girl some goat cheese.

The first words I'd ever heard her speak swelled in my chest.
You heard her.

She was one of the few who ever did.

I dipped a rag into the bucket and squeezed it out.

I wiped her forehead. “You're not well.”

Her pale eyes searched my face.

“It is a long way you've traveled, and you have farther yet to go.” Her breath faltered, and she blinked slowly. “Very far.”

“I've only traveled far by the strength you've given me.”

“No,” she whispered. “It was always in you, buried deep.”

Her eyelids closed as if their weight was too much to bear.

I rinsed the rag and wiped her neck, the elegant folds marking the days she had spent on this earth, the beautiful lines crowding her face like a finely drawn map, ancient, but now, in this moment, not nearly old enough. This world still needed more of her. She couldn't go. Her hand inched on top of mine, cold and papery light.

“The child Natiya. Speak to her,” she said, her eyes still closed. “Do not let her carry the guilt of me. What she did was right. The truth circled and gathered her into its arms.”

I lifted her thin wraithlike hand to my lips, squeezing my eyes shut. I nodded, swallowing the ache in my throat.

“Enough,” she said, pulling her hand away. “I was almost eaten by wolves. Did I tell you? Eristle heard me crying in the woods. When the skies quaked with thunder, she taught me to shut out—” Her eyes opened, her pupils large black moons floating in a circle of gray, and she weakly shook her head. “No, that is my story, not yours. Yours is calling. Be on your way.”