Endling #2 Read online

  Tobble’s eyes went wide. “Did they put you in the dungeon?”

  “Oh, of course.” A laugh. “But they let me go once they’d given me the lashes.”

  “The . . . the what?” Tobble asked, paws clasped.

  Renzo stood up and pulled his shirt over his head. “Twenty lashes.”

  His back was covered in faint pink stripes. Some were raised and wider than the others.

  “Did it . . . ,” Tobble began, before wincing and falling silent.

  “Did it hurt?” Renzo asked, dropping his shirt. “Absolutely. I yelled and cried like a baby. Afterward, I could barely crawl, I was so weak. An old man took pity on me . . . well, I thought it was pity, but old Draskull was not overly supplied with kindness. Draskull ran a gang of thieves, and he put it to me simply: steal for the gang and I would have people looking out for me. Steal on my own and, well, Draskull would make sure I got caught.”

  “So . . . ,” I prompted, when Renzo seemed to sink into his memories.

  “So I stole for Draskull and he made sure I had clothing and food. He didn’t beat me, much. Just when I made a mistake. He was a great thief, Draskull, and I learned well from him.”

  “You sound almost grateful,” Tobble said, confused.

  Renzo nodded. “The poor have few choices in this world. There are good masters and bad ones. Draskull was not good, and he could be brutal, but I picked up my craft from him. And by the time I arranged for him to be caught by the militia, I had learned a great deal.”

  “Wait, what was that about arranging for him to be caught?” I inquired.

  I saw a glint in Renzo’s eyes, a look at odds with his usual glib, easygoing ways. “You see the heavier scars on my back? Those were left by Draskull. He liked to use a bamboo stick. Fewer beatings, but worse.”

  “So you got revenge?”

  Renzo smiled. “Don’t let anyone ever tell you that revenge is empty.” His smile broadened. “The day that old creep was arrested was a happy, happy day for me.”

  Tobble’s eyelids were growing heavy. Within seconds, he was sound asleep. But I had more questions for Renzo. I hoped he didn’t mind. My siblings had often teased me about my endless curiosity.

  “Renzo,” I said, lowering my voice so I wouldn’t wake Tobble, “may I ask you something else?”

  He shrugged. “Of course.”

  “Why do you stay with us?”

  He tapped the shield we’d taken from the Subdur natites. “See that? It’s worth more than everything I’ve ever stolen, put together and tripled.”

  “And that’s all there is to it? An opportunity for riches?”

  “Yes,” he said simply.

  I smiled. “You forget to whom you’re speaking.”

  “Dairnes,” Renzo said with mock anger. “I can see why no one wants your kind around.”

  We both laughed, and soon Renzo, too, was asleep. He snored, but not with Khara’s toadlike volume.

  I lay awake for some time, as Tobble wheezed softly and Renzo snored intermittently. When at last I slept, I dreamed of a clear lake, mirror smooth. Sitting atop Gambler’s shoulders at the edge of the water, I gazed down and saw a perfect reflection of my face: the golden fur, the droopy ears, the eyes full of questions.

  A wind whipped up, rippling my image. Suddenly Gambler vanished, and I dropped into the icy water. Gasping for air, I surfaced to see myself standing there.

  But no: It wasn’t me, was it? It was another dairne.

  Real and breathing and alive.

  “Diy alwoo m’rrk reh wyrtanni,” he whispered.

  Dairnish. How long it had been since I’d heard my own language! It took me a moment to understand his words.

  You are not alone.

  A tiny corner of my mind, the one trained to savrielle, worked to respond, to take hold of the dream. “How do you know?” I tried to ask, but my voice came out as a wordless whimper.

  I repeated the savrielle chant, just the way I’d been taught. You are the dream and the dream is you, I told myself. You are the dream and the dream is you.

  I grasped at the lingering wisps I could recall. The lake bottom; the sand between my pads; the dairne’s wistful smile; the sweet, familiar smell of his fur. Like morning mist, like tendrils of smoke, like echoes of a song: it was all there, and yet not.

  I woke up shivering. I could still feel his warm breath, still see the look of recognition in his eyes.

  And I could still hear his words.

  You are not alone.

  14

  An Old Enemy Returns

  In the morning we breakfasted on strong tea, scones, and rashers of bacon. Khara pried one of the smallest stones from the crown Tobble still carried in his pack and found it was worth enough to pay for the food, lodging, and some fresh blankets.

  We headed northeast. The snow was lightly packed, the air cold but refreshing. From time to time we consulted the Far-Near to see whether we had passed the last of the army’s encampment.

  “There’s a large body of people ahead, moving slowly,” Khara reported after checking our intended path. “Sorry, Byx.”

  I switched to all fours to appear doglike. As we approached the party ahead, I scented something unpleasant: human filth. The smell of a clean human is tolerable, if not particularly pleasant. But a dirty human is quite hard to ignore.

  As we advanced, I saw why. The people ahead of us weren’t farmers heading to market, or even soldiers moving to a new position. We were approaching men in chains, led by a big human on a horse. A burly gray felivet was bringing up the rear.

  It was a horrible, stomach-lurching sight. And then I saw something even more terrible.

  I recognized one of the chained and filthy humans.

  Luca.

  Luca, who had saved my life.

  Luca, who had tried to end my life.

  For a while, Luca had been part of our little group. We’d trusted him. He was a scholar and, in fact, had studied dairnes extensively.

  Luca, however, was more than just a scholar.

  He was also a scion of the traitorous Corpli family, ancient foe of Khara’s clan. Luca eventually betrayed us to the Murdano, in the hope of gaining influence and using it to restore his family’s fortune.

  But we had outwitted Luca—and the Murdano as well.

  I looked up at Khara to see whether she had recognized our old foe. She had.

  Luca’s hair was filthy and matted. His fashionable clothing had been traded for a canvas shift. I could see his feet through his torn boots.

  We reached the tail of the column of a dozen chained men. The gray felivet turned and scowled a warning at us but did nothing to stop us as we walked past, and when he caught sight of Gambler, he slunk to the side.

  As we passed, Luca did not even notice us, but kept his head down, his eyes focused on his next weary, stumbling step.

  We moved on. Khara’s face was set in an expression of unhappiness and uncertainty. After about a hundred yards, she paused.

  “Byx,” she said. “I . . .”

  I nodded. “If you’re asking what I think you’re asking,” I said, careful not to be observed speaking by strangers, “the answer is yes.”

  “Renzo?”

  Renzo’s eyes narrowed. “Once a traitor, always a traitor.”

  “Gambler?” Khara said. “Tobble?”

  Gambler said, “I would see no creature in chains.”

  Tobble considered. “Nor would I,” he said. “Although I agree with Renzo that Luca is not a human to be trusted. Ever.”

  “Why are they in chains, do you think?” I asked. “Are they criminals?”

  “Possibly,” said Khara.

  “Likely,” said Renzo. “Given that it’s Luca.”

  “They could be thralls,” Gambler said. “In which case we should free them all.”

  “I’m not sure we can take that risk.” Khara shook her head. “The whole countryside would be alerted.”

  “I say it’s a risk worth taking,”
Gambler said.

  Khara pursed her lips. “All right, then.”

  “Tobble,” Renzo said, “hand me the crown, please.”

  Renzo pried out three large stones and passed them to Khara without commentary, aside from a slight shaking of his head.

  We watched as she spent ten minutes haggling with the man in charge. At last, he unlocked all the men’s shackles. They scattered quickly, clearly stunned at their good fortune.

  Khara strode back to us, with Luca following behind, stumbling a bit.

  “Friend dairne, I am relieved to see you well,” he said when he reached me, his voice hoarse and weak.

  “‘Friend?’” I demanded.

  Luca winced and looked down. Tobble dug food from his pack and handed bread to Luca, who ate with the grace of a famished pig. He drank some of the cider we’d bought at the tavern.

  “We have no spare clothing,” Khara said. There was no pity in her voice.

  “I have worn this garment for many days,” Luca said. “I will survive.”

  “Your kind always does,” Gambler said with a sneer. He would see no creature chained, but that did not mean he had warmed to Luca. “The slightest wrong move and I will taste your blood.”

  “Only if you are able to kill him before I do,” Khara said.

  Luca nodded. I saw raw flesh on his ankles, wrists, and neck where the shackles had been.

  We walked in silence after that. Luca seemed to sense that we were in no mood to engage with him.

  He broke the quiet about an hour later. “Are you making for Beragaz Ford?” he asked.

  “Beragaz Ford?” Khara said. “Why would you think that?”

  Luca shrugged. “I assume you’re hoping to reach the sea. If your goal is still to reach the sentient isle you came so close to in Nedarra.”

  “You were following us?” I demanded.

  Luca shot a look at me and said, “Yes. From a distance. And you were away before I could catch up to you.”

  “What were you planning to do if you caught us?” I asked.

  Luca hesitated, no doubt caught between fear of my truth-telling power and a desire to lie. He rubbed the red ring circling his neck. “I would have seized you, Byx, and sent you to the Murdano with my compliments.” He almost smiled. “And, of course, I would have taken Khara’s sword.”

  “And what would you have done with the Light of Nedarra?” Khara demanded.

  “I would have delivered it to my father, and together, with the sword to inspire our people, we would have raised an army to defend the Murdano in the coming war.”

  “I don’t need Byx to tell me that is an incomplete response,” Khara said. “Would you then have surrendered the sword to the Murdano?”

  Luca’s silence was the answer.

  “I see,” Khara said. “You would have waited until the time was right and turned against the Murdano, placing your father on the throne.”

  Luca managed a derisive laugh. “Well, we all have dreams, do we not? Even, perhaps, you, Kharassande of the Donatis?”

  I expected an angry retort. But Luca’s suggestion that she had plans of her own left Khara unable to speak.

  At least, unable to speak in the presence of a dairne.

  15

  A Means to an End

  We spent the night in an ice-glazed field thick with snowblossoms. The smell was wonderfully clean and earthy, the cold not so wonderful. But we had food and water and a little cider, and earlier we’d bought some clothing from a farmer, leaving Luca looking decent, if not stylish. I wondered how long it would take him to recover his old arrogance.

  After we’d finished eating and our small fire was going strong, Luca said, “I suppose, as I was saying before . . . and I’m not asking you to tell me . . . that you are hoping to go east to the sea.”

  No one answered.

  “It’s just that I wonder if you know much about the geography of Dreyland,” Luca asked.

  Again, no answer. Just suspicious looks traveling from Khara to me to Renzo, a felivet eye roll from Gambler, and a snort from Tobble.

  “I know something of the area,” Luca added. “I studied maps of Dreyland back on the isle.”

  “I’ve been here a time or two,” Renzo said. “We don’t need your help.”

  “I know of a bridge over the nearest river,” Luca persisted.

  “You want to guide us?” Khara inquired, and her tone was not friendly. “Into another trap?”

  Luca bowed his head. “Khara, I am loyal to my family. But my family is in Nedarra. Here I am friendless.”

  “How did you end up here, then?” She was challenging Luca to speak the truth.

  “It’s true that I followed you, hoping to take your sword. I came up the coast. I was able to get past Nedarran guards because I carried a letter from my father, who still has many friends.”

  “He’s telling the truth,” I confirmed.

  “I sneaked past the Dreyland border by climbing a cliff face. I believed you had come the same way. I was certain I was right behind you. And then I ran out of food and money and was arrested for stealing fruit from a vendor’s stall.”

  Still the truth.

  “The guards sold me to the bondseller. And I was doomed to work in the slag mines until I died. Until you rescued me.”

  “We took pity,” Khara said. “That doesn’t mean I believe you.”

  That was untrue: she did believe him. But I stayed silent.

  “And I certainly don’t trust you,” Khara added. She crossed her arms over her chest. “Tell us this, Luca. We left behind us a Knight of the Fire and six members of the Murdano’s Pale Guard, all dead.”

  “Impressive.”

  “Do you know if the Murdano has sent more soldiers to track us down?”

  “I don’t,” Luca answered.

  I nodded at Khara. Truth again.

  “But I doubt,” Luca continued, “that the Murdano would risk sending new soldiers past the Nedarran border into Dreyland. Especially not with war looming.”

  Gambler licked a paw. “On that, I must agree with the traitor. The Murdano has bigger worries than us at the moment.”

  “Still,” Renzo said, “it can’t hurt to cover our tracks as we move. The Murdano would very much like to have a dairne in his arsenal.”

  For a few moments we all stared at the fire as it spun sparks into the darkness.

  “Look,” Luca said, turning his eyes on me, “I ask Byx to confirm whether I speak the truth. I can lead you to the Beragaz Ford. I don’t know for sure whether it is guarded. But it is the quickest path to the east. And I have neither friend nor ally in this land.”

  “True or not,” Renzo said, “I’m not interested in listening to this character.”

  Luca sighed. “So be it.” Slowly he stood and walked into the darkness a few feet outside the circle of firelight. I heard the crunching sound as he sat down out of our sight on the cushion of snowblossoms.

  “I think we should know whatever he knows,” I said to Khara.

  She nodded and tilted her head in his direction.

  I stood. Gambler rose soundlessly and padded beside me.

  Luca did not look up when we approached him.

  “What can you tell us?” I asked.

  “If you lie, you will find out just how quickly I can gut you,” Gambler said.

  Luca nodded, his face barely visible in the faint starlight. “You know that a rogue felivet has taken over Dreyland?”

  Gambler looked uneasy. The situation wasn’t his fault, of course, but I sensed that he took it personally, as a felivet.

  “Well, the Kazar Sg’drit is a piece of work,” Luca went on. “As corrupt and vile as the Murdano and his court are, Sg’drit is worse. He’s diverted entire rivers in order to turn low-lying marshlands into harbors for his fleet. He’s forced tens of thousands under his thumb and imprisoned as many more. His dungeons are so full that he houses prisoners in outdoor camps patrolled by terramants.”

  “Terra
mants?” Gambler was surprised. “I thought the terramants served no one.”

  “They do when they’re starving,” Luca said. “Sg’drit destroys fields where the terramant food supply is located. His poisons sink deep in the ground and kill the subterranean creatures terramants feed on. Not all serve Sg’drit, but many have turned to him in order to survive. He’s systematically crushing one species after another, or cowing them into obedience.”

  Gambler cocked his head. “And how exactly would you know all this?”

  “I keep my ears open,” Luca replied, with a flash of irritation. “No one cares what a thrall overhears.” He plucked a white snowblossom and pulled off its petals, one by one. “Beautiful, aren’t they?” he asked. “Did you know they only bloom in moonlight?” He had a strange, wistful look on his face. “I had a professor back at the Academy. Tough old stick, that one. I was the only student in his verden flora class that year to score with honors.” He tossed the flower aside. “That was before I decided to study dessag fauna—near-extinct species like your own, Byx.”

  I remembered the first time Luca had seen me at the Academy. He’d circled me, transfixed, noting my glissaires, my opposable thumbs, every detail that made me me. He’d studied dairnes before but had never actually seen one.

  I’d felt like a freak of nature that day. And in a way, I was.

  “Interesting thing about snowblossoms,” Luca continued. “They’re basically weeds. Invasive. Farmers hate them. They grow like crazy, take over, make it hard for anything in their path to survive.” He gave us a cold smile. “Rather like humans. And felivets.”

  “Not all of them,” Gambler said.

  “I don’t understand the desire for war,” I muttered. “Or the need to control—or even destroy—entire species.”

  “Poor Byx,” Luca said, with the hint of a sneer, “you still understand so little. War isn’t the end—war is a means to an end.”

  My heart felt tight as a fist. “But what end justifies war that will kill multitudes?”

  “Power,” Luca said, his tone flat. “They do everything for power.”

  The terrible thing was that he believed it.

  Worse still was that I believed it, too.