Oathkeeper (10 page)

You'd better not want what I think you want.

She paused en route to her tent, a double handful of feet from Rivvek's, half a moment from walking over to the looming Bone Finder to ask him outright what he wanted.

“This isn't going to go well,” Wylant muttered, more to Vax than to anyone.

“Ma'am,” the nearest of the guards answered all the same. Wylant did not remember his name, nor did she care to know it. Rae'en's ascension to First of One Hundred had unlocked something in Wylant as well. She knew the young kholster would need help . . . guidance . . . and was pained to know that despite recognized fire in Rae'en's jade-on-black eyes, she was unlikely to accept help from anyone. Given time Rae'en, like her father, would mellow, but time was running out. Wylant couldn't think of yet another way to buy more.

Kholster would have tried to spare the Eldrennai, as many of them as his oaths allowed, by accepting them as Aiannai or letting them flee to new territories where he would be deliberately, but not oathbreakingly, slow to chase them. But Rae'en . . .

Kholster may have become a freshly minted reaper of souls, but it was Rae'en with slaughter in her eyes . . . and an emptiness that would only be filled with blood.

“A blessing from Dienox,” the guard continued, “this change in Aernese representatives, wouldn't you say, ma'am? The girl His Majesty can handle.”

“That stupidity,” Wylant said, jabbing a finger against the guard's crystalline breastplate, all thought of confronting Caz forgotten, “is exactly what killed your race. Not the Aern. Not my ex-husband. Not even the gods. Fools did it.” She shook her head, stepping away from the grouping of tents that housed the king and his guards at night. “Fools like you.”

CHAPTER 8

SOME ENDINGS ARE BEGINNINGS

The wind howled as it coursed around the statues of the gods, leaving Rae'en wondering whether the wind was magic or mundane. She'd heard Wylant's raised voice and considered the likelihood that she, as a Thunder Speaker, was in any way responsible. Magic or not, the breeze caught a swirling cluster of blood oak seeds, the twirling winglike structures much like a maple seed wrought in crimson on a larger scale.

Why did Gromma give most oaks acorns, but not the blood oak? Rae'en tracked one as it flew, the drill-like tip of the seed so different from that of other trees, a weapon waiting to pierce the ground. At the last possible instant, its vortices would narrow, the speed increasing to strike the soil and find a good purchase. To sink home. Some would wait until the heart of winter to plant themselves in the hardest soil.

No wonder her father liked them so much.

Her father, rendered in obsidian, looked down upon Oot, and Rae'en hoped he did not find her wanting. For several thousand years only thirteen statues had shifted and changed at noon and midnight, revealing to any who bore witness the preferred forms of the gods. Now a fourteenth stood, straddling the pier, his visage hard, fearsome, and full of judgment. On her? On Grivek? On all of them?

Dad.

Seed forgotten, Rae'en smiled up at her father's statue before continuing, wind tussling her hair like the fingers of an unseen hand. Reaching for the leather satchel hanging from her right side, she gritted her teeth before remembering she'd shifted the blade she sought to her left (matching) satchel. Each bag was bound at the bottom corners with bone-steel reinforcements. The left, her father's, was singed but still useable. She reached past the carefully coiled chain with its many charms, forged of the bones of her father's dead children—her slaveborn brothers and sisters who never knew freedom—and found the blade she sought. Gathering her hair in one thick hank with her right hand, she cut it short with a swift flash of the blade.

Long strands of hair landed on her chain shirt, the red shining like fire against the dull pearlescence of the bone metal before the wind caught them up, carrying them away. Stowing the blade back in her saddlebag, she caught the Oathbreaker king sitting across from her, breathing a little easier once the blade was out of sight.

Baring her teeth in a mirthless grin, making sure to give Grivek a good clear look at her doubled upper and lower canines, Rae'en cocked her head to one side, the cold light of early winter reflecting off the amber pupils of her eyes, picking out the jade irises in even greater relief against the black sclera of her eyes.

“I'm going to kill you with my father's warpick, not a grooming aid.”

“Of course.” Grivek's own pale skin and dark eyes looked so frail in comparison to her youth and vigor, the bronze of her skin. Wrapped in voluminous robes to ward off a cold Rae'en could no longer feel now that her adult integumentary system had things under control, it was hard not to pity him. “All a full-grown Aern needs,” her Dwarven uncle Glinfolgo had said once, “are good hobnailed boots, hardwearing pants, a belt to keep the trousers up, a shirt of chain to keep the weapons on the outside, and an enemy to kill.”

I'm well-equipped then
, Rae'en thought, outfitted in steam-loomed denim jeans dyed black from her uncle's most recent dye lot with an additional blue pair in her rightmost saddlebag. The two warpicks crossing her back, Testament and Grudge, were more than she would ever need to kill the Oathbreaker across the camp table from her.

She remembered a time only a few days ago when the weight of one warpick had made her wince in pain, her muscles beyond exhaustion after the race she and her father had run across Bridgeland. Now that she was Armored, she wondered if they would ever hurt again.

Only if you want them to,
Bloodmane thought.

I wasn't thinking to you.

My apologies.

Fine. Shut up then.
On some level Rae'en knew the warsuit meant well, but she couldn't stand his hollow metallic voice in her mind. It felt wrong. He shouldn't be joined to her. He shouldn't—

“It looks nice,” Grivek said softly.

“What does?”

“The hair.”

“I think so, too,” Yavi put in.

“No one cares!” Rae'en snapped her teeth at the Flower Girl, half in annoyance at having failed to notice her arrival. Stupid little Flower Girl with her yellow hair petals and Wylant-looking face. What was she trying to prove wearing doeskin leather and flouncing about?

Heartbow or not. Fighter or coward. Rae'en wished the pretty little Vael would take flight with Wylant and stay gone. Her presence was pointless anyway. There would be no peace. She'd failed whether she'd managed to bed Kholster or not. She wasn't pregnant, or Caz would have been able to feel the bone metal growing within and since she wasn't, she'd failed in that mission, too. So what use was she to anyone? Playing dress-up in the woods? Luring male Aern away from female Aern?

“Back to it.” Rae'en slapped a hand down on the document that was spread out on a camp table, disturbing one of the chunks of rock that held it in place.

“Of course.” Grivek inclined his head in assent, attempting, unsuccessfully, to stifle a shiver.

“What?” Yavi said. “Vael here. Hello? Allies to the Aern.” She leaned down between Rae'en and Grivek, breaking their eyelines. “That smell like familiar spoor to you?”

“Yes,” Rae'en hissed between gritted teeth. “Of course. Please be sure to keep your head clear when I kill this Oathbreaker. It's a pretty little face and I'm sure someone would be quite upset if I put a warpick through it.”

Grivek chuckled softly.

“I'm sorry,” he said in response to Yavi's shocked expression, “but here at the end of my life, my sense of humor has become questionable.”

“End of your life?” Yavi scoffed. “That hasn't been decided yet.”

Rae'en raised an eyebrow at that. What did the Flower Girl think she had to do with that decision?

“I'm afraid it has,” Grivek told her.

I hope you aren't planning to kill the Vael, too
, Vander thought at Rae'en.

Of course not
, Rae'en thought back.
Though maybe if she slipped at just the right moment and fell in front of my warpick . . .

Vander didn't laugh. Rae'en sighed.

Fine. Back to it then.

“You release all those we accept as Aiannai.” Rae'en tapped in the vague area of the clause on the document to which she was referring. “Both in the future and in the past from any oaths they owe the Eldrennai kingdom, the Eldrennai crown, the Eldrennai schools of elemental magic, the Artificer's Guild, and any and all oaths from which you in all your capacities personal, private, and public may free them?”

“Yes,” Grivek nodded.

“Really?” Yavi shook her head and stepped toward the statue of Xalistan, muttering to herself. “That's very generous.”

“Sign and seal,” Rae'en spat.

The king bent over the camp table, hesitating over the document.

“What now?” Rae'en snarled.

His eyes found the precise cuts still visible as new-forming skin met the edges of the old where Rae'en had sliced away the outer layer in a perfect rectangle, width established by slicing just below her breasts and above her pelvis, the length by extending the incision around her sides and terminating within a finger's breadth of the scars running down her back. She'd seen Aern skilled enough to begin along their spine and work toward the front, leaving the bisected patrimonial scars visible at the edge of the finished parchment as further proof of the document's authenticity and author, but she'd only had to do it twice before (once to create the initial register sheet for the accounting of her bone-steel by the Ossuary and again to document the name, composition, and means of manufacture of her warpick, Testament.

“You saw me cut, stretch, and scrape the skin, Oathbreaker. Cured with my own blood and saliva, it is legal parchment!”

King Grivek coughed, hiding his face. “No. I know. That is . . . of course it is.” Their eyes met. “I merely . . . well . . . doesn't it hurt?”

“I'm not tracking what that spoor has to do with this hunt, but yes. On the first day.”

“Isn't there anything that—”

“Sign and seal or refuse,” Rae'en snapped. Rage bubbled under the surface at the edges of her being. Denied the full legacy of her father's memories, she still had a great wealth of them available to her from her link with Bloodmane and with Vander. When she looked at Grivek, images of every wrong he'd ever committed in the sight of an Aern, each slight, each misstep swam before her mind's eye.

It will fade in time
, Vander's voice spoke in her mind.
You will come to summon the memories only when you need them. Most of the time
.

Most?

Have you ever seen you father freeze for a moment at the mention of your mother's name if he wasn't expecting to hear it?

Yes
, she thought back.

If the emotions tied to the memory are strong enough . . .
There was a pause.
They can still surface unbidden, kholster Rae'en.

Please, just call me Rae'en in my head
, Rae'en asked.
Even Zhan calling me New Bones is better than you calling me kholster.

Habit
, Vander thought back.
I'll work on it
.

King Grivek sat very still, head bowed, eyes searching for . . . what were they searching for? It looked like he was trying get a better look at her through her bone-steel mail.

If he makes another belly button comment or rather lack of belly button comment, I'm going to kill him.

Does that mean you aren't going to kill him otherwise?
Bloodmane's echoing voice filled her thoughts.

No one is talking to you, Makerslayer.

My apologies, Daughter of Kholster. I try to filter out when you mean me and when you mean to commune with others, but you still transmit quite broadly.

Shut up!

And, I hate to ask again, but you did say that Coal could assist us, but he has yet to arrive and—

He's a dragon, not a soldier, Bloodmane. The great gray dragon doesn't march where I tell him to march. He went wherever he went and he'll show up when he feels like it!

Ah . . . and Skinner informs me Coal has arrived at West Watch. I apologize again, Daughter of Kholster, I should have been more patient.

Fine. Good. I'm busy!

Not that yelling at Bloodmane accomplished anything, but it did make her feel better. Well . . . not really. Rae'en let her eyes focus on Grivek, then the document itself. He looked old and tired; the look in his eyes reminded her of Parl's when she'd stared into those unnatural eyes and saw such a mixture of emotions, depth she hadn't properly fathomed.

He wanted to live, because living things want that in general, but living was such pain, tinged with such regret with actions and words that could never be undone. Grivek, like Parl, was at her mercy. His future surrendered to her. Make the choices, he seemed to say, I can't make any more, I have chosen poorly so often that I leave everything to your wisdom. You decide.

“Well?” She nodded at document. “Read it.”

Grivek read through the document, eyes squinting in the sunlight. He sniffed as he read, the sound reminding her of the cave-in when her mother died, the way her father, nose bleeding, had stared at the pile of rocks covering his dead wife, clutching Rae'en.

“What are we going to do?” Rae'en remembered asking.

“Wait for it to stop. Dig out her body. Avenge her. Then wait for the pain to subside.”

“Will it?” Rae'en had choked.

“We'll pretend it does.”

Rae'en blinked away an emotion she refused to acknowledge and rubbed her eyes. When her hand came away Grivek was watching her.

“Two things.” The old Eldrennai held up one finger on each hand. “Before I sign anything.”