Game of Souls (17 page)

M
eetings in a Shrine

A
sharp pain to the ribs woke Winslow. Groggy with sleep, he cracked open an eyelid. The clouds bled. Or at least so it seemed on first impression. He rubbed at his eyes. It took him a few moments for his vision to adjust and for him to orient himself. The sky wasn’t bleeding. The hues were a combination of sunrise and lack of sleep.

Pain lanced through his side again, distant, as if it didn’t exist. A muffled noise like someone trying to speak underwater made him turn his head. He had to do so slowly. If he shifted too fast, he’d suffer another headache.

The sound came again. Definitely, a voice.

With realization, the world rushed him all at once. The voice blurred into a face belonging to Drillmaster Lestin. The pain was the toe of the man’s sabaton striking Winslow in the ribs. Lestin insisted on wearing the armored boots even when he dressed in leather as he was today. With acknowledgement of the day came the cold. Winslow shivered, curling into himself.

Another day of training had begun.

He groaned and crawled to his feet. What misled him was the light in the sky. Every day before this one, he’d been awoken while darkness stole a piece of the morning. A foolish man would think the trainers had let him sleep late or that it was a reward for his effort since his apprenticeship began. He was anything but foolish.

“Come now, sweets, it’s time to be up and at it,” Lestin said. “By the Gods, you stink.”

Whether or not he did reek, Winslow couldn’t say. He couldn’t smell himself. Not even the chilly breeze carried his odor to him. But then, the inability to identify one’s own scent was indicative of drowning in your stench for so long, your nose had grown accustomed to the it.

He had lost count of how long he had been training with the Blades. Most of it was a blur. The first few weeks saw him take quite a few beatings before his body screamed for him to rise. Now, he reacted much faster. Any other person might have given up. Many did. He figured that was the point of all this training. To him, the routines had nothing to do with learning how to meld, no matter how much Lestin said the opposite. They designed this abuse to find a man’s breaking point. Well, they’d have a long wait. He promised himself that much after his first set of broken ribs. After the tenth healing by a wiseman, he made it a solemn vow.

He wondered if everyone went through these types of rigors, but he had no frame of reference, no one to ask. The other trainees here shunned him as if he had a plague. The Blades who visited the Grey Fist spoke to none but their own and their employers. Not one book in the library detailed their regimen. Similar to most things about them, it was steeped in secrecy. To make the situation worse, when he was allowed home on weekends, Count Cardiff kept the door to his chambers locked and his books hidden. Finding anyone who might have gone through the initiation was a waste. No such records were kept. At least not where he could access them.

“You dreamin’, sweets?” The drillmaster’s slanted eyes narrowed to mere slits.

“No, boss.”

“Good.”

“What’s today’s task, boss?”

“Carryin’ rocks.”

He didn’t bother to ask why. The wrong questions only led to more menial and backbreaking labor. Fulfilling the task meant monotony. He had quickly learned how to deal with repetition.

“Remember, you came to us for this. Bein’ a Blade is more than just learnin’ how to meld. It’s about survivin’ the worst, bein’ faster and stronger than the next person, bein’ heartless, feelin’ no pain. Most of all, it’s about killin’, sweets.” The drillmaster licked his lips as if savoring the taste of his words. “Yes, it is, sweets. It’s all about the killin’.”

Winslow shuffled over to the mound of stones. All he could think of was his upcoming break due in another week. An eternity away. When he returned, he would be sure to wear a nice scent, maybe lavender. It was one of the few things he clung to even as Lestin tried to strip it away.

Days later, with fall’s chill settling in, Winslow stood looking into a hearth’s ruddy flames in Corten’s Shrine. He pulled his derin cloak around him before rubbing his hands together, blowing on them, and holding them out toward the fireplace. Keedar was late.

He fought the urge to pace back and forth lest he draw unwanted attention to himself. The news he possessed had set him on edge. The idea of it all was almost too much to fathom. If it were true, then his life would change. He would see to it.

For the first time in weeks, Count Cardiff’s door had been open. When he snuck in, his father was asleep, snoring at his desk. Next to him was his ledger for upcoming shipments. Winslow still found it hard to believe what he’d seen written in his father’s hand. Finally, the Dominion had shone their Light on him.

To say the past months had been trying would have been an understatement. They had been downright frustrating. He dared not confront the count with his inquiries about his mother. And questioning the servants in a roundabout method proved to be similarly fruitless. Each one had been gradually replaced over the last seven years. Down to Miss Rathingire—his wet nurse and the Cardiff seneschal. The past attendants’ whereabouts were unknown, a secret as tight as a virgin’s split.

Added to that was his apprenticeship with the Blades. The last few days had been especially rough with Lestin putting him through several physical and mental tests. These ranged from rigorous courses where he had to climb ropes, crawl through muck, shit, and all other manner of filth, split logs, carry firewood, lift heavy stones from one point to the next and back again, track a target in the forests at day and night, and at times spend a day where they denied him a meal but made him sit with a bowl of food in front of him. Once, they had him fill a large pot with a spoon. All that was in lieu of the beatings. Still, he held onto his vow.

Through it all Count Cardiff acted as if he no longer existed. Soon enough, Ainslen would have to pay attention. He would make it so.

Time and again, the concern he had for Elaina and their child threatened to burrow its way into his head. She had begun to show a bit. The day of the ill-fated dinner to celebrate their union would soon arrive. How he would deal with that was still a mystery.

The one consolation for the time spent in the Grey Fist’s practice yards was his training with Delisar. He might be months to a year away from accomplishing his first meld, but at least he was learning. With Lestin, those months might be a dozen years. When he inquired after the methods the Blades used, Delisar repeated his mantra that no two teachers delivered their lessons the same.

Seeking calm, Winslow took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and repeated Delisar’s first lesson—much the same as his father’s tutor had taught years ago. Meditation was the natural way to sense one’s life energy. The energy itself traveled around the body in specific patterns much like blood, following the same course as the veins. In his head, his soul appeared as three wispy circles, one within the other. They held the thirty-two vital points that controlled his its flow.

Each circle contained their cycles. Two of the three outer cycles and one median were clearly visible to him. The remainder were a blurred jumble. All he required now was the first.

He systematically tapped into
sintu
by applying pressure to the vital points, opening and closing them until they matched, allowing his essence to spread evenly to all parts of his body. A covering manifested to prevent the natural leakage of his soul. With it came a calm, floating sensation and his nimbus.

When he learned that if a person’s soul leaked completely, it would be fatal, he asked how was it that anyone lived since the vast majority of people could not maintain
sintu
. Delisar’s answer was simplistic but made sense. As with blood, the body had a natural process to control the loss, namely the veins and the skin. For soul energy, the points restricted themselves when a person slept or when soul became deficient. Also, most humans didn’t use enough of their soul to create such a life-threatening situation unless they knew how to meld.

Relaxed, Winslow opened his eyes. He held up his arm. The nimbus flowed around his body in a wavy haze a quarter inch from his skin. He often dreamed of possessing Delisar’s skill. His teacher’s
sintu
spanned at least six feet.

“Risky, doing that here.”

Winslow jumped at Keedar’s voice. His nimbus leapt in reflection of his fear. “Risky for you, not for me,” he answered trying to appear unperturbed.

Dressed in the robes of the shrine’s serving boys, Keedar knelt near Corten’s statue, head bent in prayer. “You wouldn’t be saying that if someone from your house discovered you. I know it’s addictive, but you need to be careful until the Blades teach you.”

Winslow opened his mouth to tell Keedar he would do whatever he felt but stopped himself. Keedar was right, even if it galled him to admit as much. “I will make sure no one sees me. I wasn’t followed anyway.”

“So you think,” Keedar kept his head down as he glanced toward a nearby wiseman who turned off toward another room. “Have you heard what happened to Rose?”

“Yes, sad that.”

“I was there. They used her to try to get to me. It was the same person who beat me.”

“What?” Winslow’s head spun. He’d been extra careful. How had Count Cardiff discovered them?

“It’s best if we don’t go to the taverns anymore. Even this is risky.” Keedar paused. “Having said that, what’s so important that I had to go through all this?”

“A shipment.”

“And? Please tell me you didn’t drag me out here for that? There’s been plenty shipments. What’s so special about this one?”

Winslow could hardly believe the words as they left his lips. “Scales. Dracodar scales.”

A
Special Container

C
ount Cardiff circled the group of soldiers. Each one possessed the typical large nose, full lips, and the midnight skin tone of most Thelusians. All had their heads shaved bald, oil glistening from their scalps as to be expected of the Thelusian warrior caste. He had to look up to every one of them. Unwavering eyes appeared as if they saw through him. On their hips, they carried their curved blades.

“We will deliver an army of ten thousand,” Seligula said, his voice a sing-song lilt. He’d declared himself to be the army’s general, the leader of their Forebearers.

Of average height, dressed in trousers and a tunic of some pale leather, Seligula appeared inconspicuous from a distance. Until one saw his eyes. They were a sharp blue like the waters around the Farish Islands on a clear day. Staring into them was akin to seeing into the depths of a murderous soul. Ainslen shivered when he considered what he felt when their gazes met. He avoided such a connection at all costs. It was worse than the reek of a corpse masked by perfume that wafted from the man.

“And you’re certain they can defeat what we will face?” Impressed, Ainslen still stared at the soldiers.

“Positive.”

“I admire your confidence, Seligula, but I have seen your kind before. Brash, overenthusiastic, infatuated with your own prowess. All like you have fallen.” Ainslen eyed the general, wondering if he’d made the wrong choice. “The men you face are Blades, born fighters. Bred to kill. Trained in every deadly art. They will not give quarter. They know no retreat. Fear is a word they do not recognize. Pain to them is as a gnat alighting on their skin.”

Seligula’s lips spread into a thin, scornful smile. “Tell me, my dear count, what happens to a blade when it has not been put to use, when it has sat unoiled, when it has not seen a whetstone in years?” His expression became stony. “It grows dull, useless. Worse yet, the metal rusts. Then it is easily broken. So it is with these ... Blades of yours.”

“Let us both hope so, for your sake.” Despite the need for victory, a small part of Ainslen also wished the general’s assessment was incorrect.

“You are a man of many plots, Count Cardiff.” Seligula shook his head, the bald sides oiled and shiny. A strip of braids began at his crown, and ran in a neat line until they fell down his back. “Be warned, crossing us would not go well for you and yours. Remember, I have seen them fight.”

Inadvertently, Ainslen gazed across to where heads hung on pikes along the bulwark of the Marish stronghold, Ernassa. The city was once said to be impregnable with its great walls and position set into a mountainside with no other approaches than by the sea, which led to a winding staircase carved into the cliff, or up a narrow pass known as the Bloody Corridor. Not even the Kasinian Empire had ever managed to breach the city. Smoke billowed up from Ernassa’s carcass. Blackened, gaping rents showed along the walls facing the ocean. Several towers seen above the bulwark were broken, as if a massive hand had punched a hole through their sides. Ash fell in a sooty cloud, at times swirling in a western wind that stank of charred wood and flesh.

“Point taken. However, I would worry more about the Kheridisians. Skirting them is not a wise decision.”

“In due time, they too will fall.” Seligula waved off Ainslen a little bit too nonchalantly, the tightness around his eyes speaking of frustration and a dislike to being coached in strategy. “If you must know, having access to your land will work toward that goal.”

The answer was fair enough to Ainslen. “As soon as you have delivered on your promise, I will make my move,” Ainslen said. He’d tried his best to curtail his excitement, but he could feel the thrill easing up his spine.

Seligula nodded toward several slaves. Bracelets on their wrists clinking, two bent to pick up a grey, metallic container. It reminded Ainslen of a coffin. He’d seen the same featureless receptacle within a history book’s pages during his research. The material supposedly trapped soul in any form.

“How am I to believe this contains what you say it does?” Ainslen raised a questioning eyebrow. A part of him wanted to rush over to the container, rip it open, and use its contents for himself. He took a deep breath, forcing down a shudder as he considered the power lying only a few feet away.
All in due time.

“Your own Blades saw us defeat what it holds. If their testimony is not enough, I suggest you hire better men.”

“Very well.” He had not come this far and gained this much by trusting any one man’s words. At some point, he would inspect the contents.

“I can see your mind at work,” Seligula said. “If you open the case prior to its use, your prize will lose some potency.”

Convenient.
“Well, you gave me a warning earlier, so I return one in kind.” Ainslen wore his best scowl. The general’s attitude had needled him ever since they met. One day, Seligula would rue the moment he was spit from the womb. “Should this be any sort of deception, a deep enough hole does not exist to hide you and your kind.”

Seligula threw his head back and laughed, high, hearty, and shrill. When he finished, he wiped at his watery eyes. “I will take your words into consideration.” He choked back another chortle.

Face heated at the man’s reaction, Ainslen turned to where two of his Blades waited a few feet away. “Bring that,” he indicated the container. “It’s past time for us to leave.” When he faced Seligula once more, the general was already walking away.

“I look forward to our next meeting,” Seligula called, a hint of merriment still in his voice. Not once did he look back.

An awful sense of dread filled Ainslen for a moment. He gazed at the heads along Ernassa’s walls, picturing their blank stares taking him in, their lips whispering ill tidings. The reek of cooked flesh and burned wood threatened to overwhelm him. He coughed. Deep inside, he lacked Seligula’s enthusiasm for their next encounter.

Kesta Rostlin stepped up beside him. “That man gives me the chills.”

“Me too,” Ainslen admitted grudgingly. “But sometimes we must make deals with monsters to gain what we wish.”

“Are you certain we can defeat them if this goes awry?”

“I do.” Ainslen hoped he sounded more convincing than he felt.