The Skull Throne (24 page)

“We should burn the villages where the attacks took place to the ground,” Damaji Enkaji said. “Hang the butchered bodies of every man, woman, and child from the trees and let the
alagai
feast on them.”

“Simple words, Damaji, when it was not your lands attacked,” Damaji Chusen said. The attack against the Shunjin had taken place in his tribe’s new capital.

“The
chin
would not dare attack Mehnding lands,” Enkaji boasted, and Inevera wondered at that. The rebels had avoided the lands of the five most powerful tribes—Kaji, Majah, Mehnding, Krevakh, and Nanji—but if they were being aided by the north this was only the beginning.

“Food is scarce enough after the
alagai
burned the fields on Waning,” Ashan said. “We cannot burn more fields—or butcher those who tend them—if we wish to see the spring.”

“What is to stop the
chin
from burning fields next?” Semmel of the Anjha asked. “Even the great tribes do not have men to protect the land from its very inhabitants.”

“You cannot let this go unpunished, Andrah,” Aleverak said. “The
chin
attacked us in the night, when all men are brothers, killing
dama
and burning sacred ground. We must respond, and quickly, lest we embolden the enemy.”

“And we shall,” Ashan said. “You are correct this cannot be tolerated. We must find those responsible and execute them publicly, but we will only feed the rebel ranks if we hold all the
chin
responsible for the actions of a few.”

Inevera hid her smile. Ashan had said the words exactly as she had instructed him, though his first reaction to the attacks had not been far from that of Enkaji.

“Your pardon, Andrah, but all the
chin are
responsible,” said Damaji Rejji of the Bajin. “They are hiding the rebels and the children. What difference if they set a fire or offer their cellar as a hiding place?”

“We must show them their defiance comes at a price,” Jayan said, thumping his spear. “A high price, paid by all, so that the next rebels are turned over by their own people in fear of our wrath.” Many of the
Damaji
nodded eagerly at the words, turning back to Ashan with skeptical eyes.

“My brother is correct,” Asome said loudly on cue, drawing their gazes. “But the trail is still warm, and we would be fools to muddy it. We can decide how to punish the collaborators once we have executed the rebels and recovered the missing children.”

Jayan looked at him with open mistrust, but he took the bait. “That is why I will take the Spears of the Deliverer and kick in every door, dig out every cellar, and put every relative of the boys taken under question. We will find them.”

The
Damaji
were nodding again, but Asome tsked loudly and shook his head. “My brother would cut a tree down to harvest its fruit.”

Jayan glared at him. “And what does my wise
dama
brother propose instead?”

“We send the Watchers,” Asome said, nodding to the veiled
Damaji
of the Krevakh and Nanji tribes. They never spoke in council, each beholden to a greater tribe. The Krevakh served the Kaji, and the Nanji the Majah.

The Watcher tribes trained in special weapons and combat, and controlled the Krasian spy network. Many of their interrogators spoke the
chin
tongue, and had contacts throughout Everam’s Bounty. Even their lesser
Sharum
could move without being seen, and pass barriers as easily as
alagai
drift up from the abyss.

“Find the children, and we will find the rebels and their sympathizers,” Asome said.

“And then?” Jayan asked.

“Then we execute all three,” Ashan said. “Rebels, sympathizers, and even the
chin
children, to remind the greenlanders of the futility of resistance, and its consequence. We will make the other
chin
nie’Sharum
watch, and the next time, the boys themselves will fight their rescuers.”

Inevera kept her center, even as Ashan deviated from her script. Killing a handful of children was still a mercy compared to the wholesale slaughter Jayan favored, but she did not know if she could allow it when the time came.

“Very well,” Jayan said. “As you command, I will send the Watchers.”

I.
It was a dangerous word. Jayan was assuming control of the search regardless. As Sharum Ka, it was his duty and right, but Inevera had intended the Watchers to report to the throne—her—to avoid unintended brutality.

She breathed, keeping her center. Sacrifices must be made. She had spies enough in the Sharum Ka’s court, and her Krevakh and Nanji sister-wives could put their
dama’ting
on alert to pass on anything they heard.

Ashan gave her seven breaths to speak, and then struck his staff of office. “It is settled. Send your Watchers, Sharum Ka. We expect regular reports on your progress.”

Jayan threw a smug glance at Asome and turned on his heel, striding for the door where Hasik, his new bodyguard, waited.

Three days passed, with no sign of the rebels or the stolen
nie’Sharum,
and Abban could sense a black mood on the streets. In the bazaar, it was worse.

Dal’ting, khaffit,
and
chin
had begun to find a level of comfort with one another in the marketplace, but all that changed with the attacks on the
sharaji
and kidnappings. Krasians gave the
chin
a wide berth now, eyeing them with mistrust. They kept their purses closed as well, starving the
chin
of trade.

Dama
patrols in the marketplace had increased markedly, with the
dama
not even bothering to hang the
alagai
tails from their belts or lean on their whip staves. The weapons were always in motion, if only to clear the path around them of
chin,
or to get the attention of one they sought to question.

And those questionings, the thing everyone in the bazaar from the lowest
chin
to Abban himself dreaded, were coming more and more frequently. The
Sharum
had been forbidden to kick in doors and search everywhere, but the
dama
were taking any excuse to conduct searches, and their jurisdiction was wide.

Abban watched from the flaps of his pavilion as a pair of Kaji
dama
tore the back of a
chin
woman’s dress open in the middle of a market street, whipping her with their staves for not being properly veiled.

It had been around her neck, simply slipped during the bustle of the day and not hurriedly replaced.

Abban closed the flap to muffle her screams.

“I pray to Everam we find the rebels soon,” he said. “This is bad for business.”

“If it can be done, the Krevakh will do it,” Qeran said. “It was my honor to serve with many of them in
alagai’sharak.
No better trackers exist on Ala.”

The drillmaster still looked uncomfortable in the marketplace, but Abban could no longer afford the luxury of leaving him in his compound to train recruits. He depended on Qeran’s status and experience to keep him alive.

They retired to Abban’s private office. The
khaffit
opened a hidden panel on his writing desk, removing a sheaf or parchment and handing it to Qeran. “I have some plans I need you to review before I present them to the throne.”

Qeran raised an eyebrow. Unlike most
Sharum,
drillmasters were literate, needing to keep lists and tallies in the running of
sharaji,
and to understand the equations to calculate tensile strength and load in the building of fortifications. But compared to even the least of Abban’s wives and daughters, this put him slightly above a trained dog. Abban would not have trusted him with even the simplest clerical task, and they both knew it.

The unexpected request aroused Qeran’s curiosity, and the man laid the papers on the desk and began to rummage through them. He spread out the map, squinted at the tallies, and his eyes widened.

“Is this what I think it is?” he asked.

“It is, and you will speak of it to no one,” Abban said.

“Why do you have this, and not the Sharum Ka?” Qeran asked.

“Because the Sharum Ka was a figurehead until a fortnight ago,” Abban said. “But fear not. Soon he will think all this was his own idea.”

The next morning, Abban rode in his palanquin to the palace. His finest
kha’Sharum
surrounded the muscular
chin
slaves who carried the poles, guarding him from all sides. The curtains, heavy things with a layer of metal mesh that could stop a spear, were pulled tight, leaving him alone with his thoughts.

The Damajah always made him nervous, even if he was wise enough not to show it. She had a way of putting him off guard, a sense she was looking right through him, seeing his dissembling as easily as she might a streak of dirt on his face.

How would she see his plans without Ahmann to bless and implement them?

BOOM!

Even through the thick curtains the sound was horrific. Abban was thrown into the lacquered ceiling as the palanquin fell. He could hear the shouts of his men, and as the palanquin came to an abrupt and jarring stop, he found himself face-to-face with one of his bearers, thrust through the curtain as the whole vehicle fell on him. He groaned, eyes glazed.

Ignoring the man, Abban reached for his cane, struggling against his lame leg to put his feet under him.

“Master!” one of his guards called. “Are you all right?”

“Fine, fine!” Abban snapped, sticking his head out the curtain atop the carriage. “Help me out of …”

He stopped short, gaping.

Sharik Hora was burning.

Everyone had been thrown from their feet, even this far from the blast. Closer to where the fires raged, passersby lay bloodied in the street, struck by debris that had once been the great walls and stained-glass windows of the largest temple to Everam in the green lands.

Qeran was the first back to combat readiness, berating the others to their feet as he moved to Abban’s side. Tempered in the heat of battle, the drillmaster was able to put his feelings aside and maintain the chain of command, but even he had a look of horror as his eyes touched the burning temple.

“What could have done such a thing?” he asked. “A dozen flame demons could not spew such a blaze.”

“
Chin
flamework,” Abban said. Another mystery he had yet to unravel. “Get the men up. We must make double pace to the palace now. Send Watchers to find out what happened and report en route.”

Inevera regarded the
khaffit
as he drank cool water and lay on the pillows in her receiving chamber. He was pale, covered in ash, and smelling of smoke. One of his eyes had filled with blood, and his clothes were torn and bloodied. Runners had already confirmed Sharik Hora was burning.

“What happened?” she demanded, when the silence began to grate on her.

“It appears the
chin
are bolder than we credit them for,” Abban said. “The
sharaj
burnings were a distraction, drawing our attention to distant villages while they struck at our heart.”

“An odd coincidence that you should be there to witness the event,” Inevera said. “Especially after being the first to come to me with news of the rebellion.”

Abban looked at her flatly. “I am flattered the Damajah thinks me capable of such a complex weave of deceit, but I am not such a martyr as to get in range of a blast just to add credence to some mysterious plot. Every inch of me aches, my ears still ring, and my thoughts are cloudy.”

That last concerned Inevera. She needed Abban, now more than ever. His body was of little use to her, but his mind … 

She might have been a tunnel asp, the way the
khaffit
fell back as she moved to examine him. He squeaked like a woman.

“Be still and comply,” she snapped. “I am Damajah, but am still
dama’ting.
”

Though Inevera seldom treated any other than Ahmann, she had lost none of her skill at healing after decades in the
dama’ting
healing pavilion. The
khaffit’s
dilation, the slow way he tracked her fingers, the long pauses in his speaking, all were indicative of head trauma.

She reached into her
hora
pouch for her healing bones, a collection of warded mind demon fingers, coated in a thin sheen of electrum to focus their power and shield them from the sun. She deftly manipulated the wards with her fingertips until the configuration was right, and then activated them.

The blood drained from his eye, and minor scrapes on his face crusted and dried in an instant. Still Inevera kept the power flowing, making sure there was no swelling or damage to the brain.

At last Abban gasped and pulled back. His eyes had regained their familiar twinkle.

He laughed aloud. “It is no wonder the
Sharum
say the magic is stronger than couzi. I haven’t felt so sharp and strong in twenty years.”

He looked at his leg curiously, then moved to stand, leaving his crutch on the pillows. For a moment he seemed steady, but when he bent his knees to give a delighted hop, the leg buckled. It was only thanks to a lifetime of practice that he managed to fall back onto the pillows and not the floor.

Inevera smiled. “You refused my offer to heal your leg,
khaffit.
I may offer again some day, but never for free.”

Abban nodded, grinning in return. “The Damajah would do well in the bazaar.”

Indeed, Inevera had grown up in the bazaar, but it was more than she wanted Abban—or anyone—to know. Her family depended on their anonymity for their safety, and already there were too many who might know the secret.

“Am I to take that as some kind of compliment, that you think me as worthy as some
khaffit
merchant’s daughter?” she snapped.

Abban bowed. “It is the greatest compliment I am worthy to give, Damajah.”