The Past The Fire #4
“I’m saying we’re something and smart isn’t it.
” He squinted up at the sky. Damp was settling into the air like a wet cotton veil.
The wind had died away and gray clouds sank down low over the grassland.
“Sky’s about to break.” On the Saredi plains, weather like this meant soon thunder would crash and rain would plunge down to drown the gullies and flood the riverbeds.
Over by the rubble of the outer wall, late arrivals from Prince-heir Hiranan’s troop were hurrying to get the tents staked down and their gear under cover.
“Hmm,” Ziede commented. She sniffed the air. “Perhaps.”
When they finished their circuit, Nirana took Kai and Ziede’s horses so they could join Bashasa in the caravanserai.
The grass in the paddocks was already stamped down, and the scent of it left a drift of sweetness on the air, despite the horses, wallwalkers, and sweaty people. Most of the tents were up, their placement organized by the cadres and the outguard.
Kai and Ziede walked up to the main building where it arched over the old road.
In the righthand arch, two heavy battered wooden doors had been wedged open.
These led into a big half-circle hall where high narrow windows let in enough daylight to see elaborate piecework metal lamps mounted on the walls, now rusted and broken.
A stone stairwell in the back curved upward.
The tile floor was mostly covered with drifts of dirt, but there was no smell of decay, or a sense of anything foul.
It was just an empty shell, now filled with a lot of people standing around talking or being sent off on various errands.
Most of the remaining furniture was broken and shoved off to the side in a pile, but some intact wooden tables had been stacked up to make a map stand. Kai would need to look at it later; right now it was surrounded by vanguarders taking notes and making annotations.
“I wonder what that’s about,” Ziede murmured.
Kai saw Bashasa stood near the stairwell, speaking with Prince-heir Hiranan.
From their faces … “Nothing good,” Kai said.
She leaned on her crutch, her face tense and intent.
And that was not the expression Bashasa wore when he was absorbing important information; it was the one he wore when he was hearing something potentially disastrous and trying not to react to it.
Arava, Bashasa’s cadre leader, strode through the crowd. “Sister Ziede, Fourth Prince, the Prince-heir asks for you to attend the meeting about to be called.” She gestured them to another open doorway, this one leading into a smaller side room.
It was equally dusty but empty except for some baggage piled up against the far wall.
Some group probably intended to sleep here, from the bedrolls and packs.
There were also supplies needed by all the troops, like maps, more maps, cases of writing and mapmaking supplies and paper.
It wasn’t Bashasa’s belongings; he traveled as light as Kai and Ziede did, using the same shoulder bag one of his cadre had carried for him from the Summer Halls.
Though Kai knew that he had saved some things belonging to his family and had cached them somewhere outside Benais-arik before they left.
Bashasa came in almost on their heels and said, “Thank you, Arava, if you could summon the others?”
As she left, Bashasa gestured them away from the doors and said, “Quickly, before the others arrive, it’s not good news. Renitl-arik is in revolt. They have killed their usurper and are fighting in the streets.”
“What?” Ziede said, keeping her voice low. “The fools—Do they have any idea of the risk?”
“I thought Prince-heir Stamash said he wouldn’t do that,” Kai said, thinking he didn’t seem like an idiot.
Stamash had been with them in the Hostage Courts, though Kai had never exchanged many words with him.
After the Kagala, he had gone to his city with his cadre to raise support for Bashasa and organize the city guilds.
There had been messages from him, but nothing about this.
Allowing the usurpers to believe they were still mostly in control of the cities was the only way to keep the Hierarchs from ordering their destruction.
The only other choice was to evacuate. Bashasa had made that choice for Benais-arik, since it was bound to be the Hierarchs’ prime target. “What happened?”
“I’m not sure. He must have lost control of the situation.” Bashasa was grim. “If Stamash has done this on purpose, he is making a shit job of it.” He shook his head. “We could lose all of them.”
He meant all of Renitl-arik, and any of its surrounding villages and towns that hadn’t been destroyed already. Kai wished he was better at comforting people. Bashasa always seemed to know what to do and what to say. Kai said, “We’ll have to move faster,” and winced at the inadequacy of it.
Bashasa squeezed his shoulder absently. “My thought as well.”
“Are you going to tell the other Prince-heirs?” Ziede asked. Her expression was already resigned. Her home had surrendered, and still been wiped out. She knew better than anyone how many lives hung on a Hierarch’s whim.
“After we finish speaking to the envoys,” Bashasa told her. He seemed to realize he still had his hand on Kai’s shoulder and removed it. “I don’t want to delay that meeting, it would not look well for us.”
Trenal, who had stationed herself at the doorway, coughed to warn them just before Lahshar entered with Dasara on her heels.
Lahshar looked around with a grim expression, as one of her cadre followed her in and began to arrange some folding camp stools.
These turned out to be for the envoys from Belith and Ilver and the three Enalin messengers, who arrived next.
Clearly still disturbed about Renitl-arik, Ziede started to pace, the fabric of her wide cotton pants swishing as she walked.
Kai couldn’t let himself think about it, he had seen too many burned ruins, too many empty places that had been full of life and possibility.
Tahren came in and took a position back against the wall where chipped and faded paint was all that remained of a mural.
She frowned a little worriedly in Ziede’s direction, as if she could tell something was wrong.
Kai had seen Dahin briefly in the supply train, helping some of the physicians unpack.
Hiranan and Vrim and the shield-bearers of the outguard entered last, and Bashasa waited for them to greet the others before pulling a cloth map out of his coat pocket and unfolding it.
Two of the shield-bearers came to take the map and hold it up against the wall so everyone could see it.
Tahren caught Ziede’s arm to stop her pacing.
With a pinched expression, Lahshar drew breath to speak, caught Hiranan’s gaze, and let the breath out.
Kai watched Bashasa put a confident, serious smile in place and turn to the envoys.
“Our southern allies know we are waiting for the Enalin forces to join us before we can begin moving southwest. But there is something we must do first.” He stepped to the map.
“There is a Hierarch fort outside Descar-arik. It is called Dashar, as was the town the legionaries destroyed near it.” Kai didn’t need to lean forward with the others; he had already memorized this map.
The city was on the eastern coast, and the fort was just outside it.
“They use it to control a junction of trade roads and canals that converge on Descar-arik for its sea trade. If we are to follow our plan to strike toward the fighting in Palm and join the rest of our allies, we have to pluck it off our back.”
There was murmuring among the envoys, some of which was on the dubious side. The leader of the Belith waited for the initial reaction to die down. She said, “Take the Hierarch fort, but not the city?” Her gaze flicked to the other Arike leaders. “This is acceptable?”
Kai still didn’t know much about eastern politics, it was just too different from how the Saredi settled disputes and how demon Houses of the underearth did anything.
But he thought it was obvious the Belith wanted some kind of confirmation that the Arike city-states wouldn’t use the growing militias to free their own territory and then leave everyone else to suffer the consequences.
As if that would work, Kai thought. As if the Hierarchs wouldn’t come back for the Arike once everyone else was dead.
Vrim, who was the son of the murdered Prince-heir of Descar-arik, seemed to understand her reluctance.
He said, “Our people know what happened in the Summer Halls and the Kagala, our vanguarders made sure of that. Descar-arik will wait until the legions are drawn away by the fighting to the southwest, then the city will rise.”
Hiranan said, “As Seidel-arik plans, as well.” She leaned on her crutch, not bothering with the camp stool someone had set out for her.
Kai had never seen her sit when anyone else was standing.
She added, “If we stop to help our own cities, it will give the Hierarchs time to come for us. Time in which they may decide our labor isn’t worth the risk and slaughter all of us.
The way they have been destroying the smaller settlements all through this region. ”
Bashasa nodded agreement, and turned to the Belith envoy to add, “Removing this fort is one of the ways we protect our cities. But the effort of our primary forces must focus on attacking the Hierarch strongholds in Palm and Belith. We must eliminate the individual Hierarchs. They are the only ones who can use the power of their Voice to slay whole cities.” Bashasa made an open-handed gesture toward the map.
“Aside from the other considerations, we need more horses, and more wallwalkers for fast movement. This fort will give them to us.”