19 | Kiandah
The Night Market
I hate riding horses, I decide after about ten minutes on Brega’s back. My ass is sore and my inner thighs are chafing, but I don’t dare say one word about it. Yaron’s been in a foul mood ever since we left the castle, crossed Orias and reached the highway line crossroads.
Here, four highway lines intersect. The one south of us now that we traveled upon to get here is the Orias highway line and leads through Orias back to the keep. To our right, heading east is the Undoline highway line. To our left, heading west, is the Shadow Ridge highway line which leads to the Cliffs of Oblivion and some of the Shadowlands mining towns just south of them. And to our north, eventually reaching the ports, the Orias highway line continues through the rotten woods of Paradise Hole.
The Crimson Riders are all silent as the woods close in around us and the hard, packed soil of the highway line turns to mud. There is no camaraderie between them. Instead they march in two parallel lines of five Riders each while Lord Yaron and I ride our horse in the middle. It doesn’t help my unease any, though.
I’ve been to the ports before, but I don’t like going. I don’t like crossing through Paradise Hole. The sensation can best be described as ominous and, after our last encounter with the undead in the woods, I feel on the verge of panic.
“You can relax.” Yaron’s grunt is terse, but his chest continues rumbling against my back in a way I find immensely soothing.
“Hard to relax here.” I glance to the left and right into the dark woods. Black roots crisscross over the highway line before us, rendering it almost invisible. The highway lines were originally built wide enough for three carriages to fit side by side, but here, our three lines of horses — not carriages — have been reduced to two and, in some places, we have to march single file.
“I can assure you, we are alone.”
His hand slides around my body, through the slit in my cloak across my lower belly. The fabric of his tunic feels very thin all of a sudden and his hand feels so warm. Warm enough to melt beneath. I inhale and the sharp scent of Paradise Hole’s musty, misty forest assaults me with a memory of a time when he told me he did not want me and never would moments before he threw me to the ground at his feet. Present for me.
“Whatever you are thinking, stop it,” he whispers in my ear. “Not only are there other Alphas present, but I have no intention of repeating my poor performance the last time we were in Paradise Hole together.”
I drop my voice, worried about being overheard. Cyprus rides near the back of the group, but still, I’d willingly launch myself from a canon before having a conversation about sex in front of my brother. “Poor? I found your performance quite…adequate.”
Yaron’s fingers tense and I feel the sting of his nails as they form claws and prick my stomach through my tunic. “Adequate?”
I try really hard to keep from smiling. It’s so hard. “Yes. Perfectly satisfactory, my Lord.” I give the back of his palm a couple condescending pats.
His hand jerks me to him even harder, pulling my ass to his groin, his heat clashing over mine. His shoulders curl around me. He brings his face down to my cheek. I feel caught in his shadow, alone even though we’re surrounded by people. “Do you mock me?”
“Teasing you, my Lord. Do you not understand the difference?”
“Teasing is something done between children.” His fingers crawl down my body and I try to wriggle back, away from him, but there’s nowhere to go.
I grab his wrist. “Yaron…” I hiss, but it’s too late. He’s already cupped my core. His thick fingers can feel everything through the fabric, and they push ruthlessly at the thin cloth barrier, massaging my entrance, fingering everywhere around my clit, brushing softly over it. “Yaron!” I feel suddenly flush. My mind goes hazy. The Alpha riding directly in front of us coughs.
“If you intend to tease, you must be prepared for me to tease back.” He removes his hand all at once and the cool that follows the warmth of his palm comes as a shock. I feel tingly all over. Desire bounces between my bones. I shove my elbow back into his abdomen hard and he emits a soft oomph.
“You do that again, I’ll light your underwear on fire,” I whisper.
He barks out a laugh. The sound is so startling that the Alpha in line in front of us whips around, her hand on the sword at her belt. Her eyebrows are raised and her pale skin is flushed. “It’s okay, Mara,” Yaron says, holding me tight, but this time, thankfully, outside of the cloak. “The Lady Kiandah means me no harm.” Ah. He thinks she’s surprised because I elbowed him. No, no, no, my Lord. She’s surprised for the same reason I am. I doubt she’s ever heard him laugh before either.
His erection digs into my back as we continue through Paradise Hole, emerging finally through the dark trees into a darkening world. Elation skitters over my skin. The sight of the sea blows me away every time. I will never get used to it.
“What is it?” he says to me, his breath warm.
“It’s so beautiful. Zaoul. The stars. The ports and the ships bobbing in the sea. The lights from the Night Market. I’ve only been twice before. Once, when I was really small, and again a few years ago. I love the way it feels.”
“And how does it feel?” He brushes his fingers against the side of my face, over my ear, like he’s tucking back hair that isn’t there. But I don’t mind it. I minded it once, but I’m starting to get used to having very, very short hair. Yaron’s soft, loving touches are helping.
“Like magic.” I glance at his face over my shoulder. I can’t keep myself from looking at his lips. “You know, if your guards weren’t here, I’d almost say this feels a little like a date.”
Lord Yaron practically leaps away from me. He swings a leg over the back of his horse and drops to the ground quickly enough to startle both me and Brega, who rears back. My hands scramble over the saddle, which feels so huge beneath me without Yaron there to dominate the space. My fingers twist in Brega’s mane, clinging for survival. He doesn’t seem to like that much, either, and lifts his front hooves into the air. I squeeze my aching inner thighs together around the massive stallion and just when I think I’m about to go slumping off the side, Yaron grabs the reins and whispers something softly to his horse that calms the creature.
“Yaron?” I say, heart beating erratically. I press my palm over my chest to try to calm it.
Yaron doesn’t answer and I can’t see him well enough around Brega’s neck and I’m too scared to lean over. His Riders have scattered from formation and are slow to return to it. They’re looking between us. Some have their hands on their weapons. I search the back of the queue for Cyprus, who has one eyebrow cocked and is asking me what happened and if everything is okay. I shrug and nod, and he nods in return, casting his gaze back out towards the markets as a loud bout of laughter and shouting picks up near the well-illuminated entrance — a market staple.
“Apologies,” Yaron mumbles up to me gruffly, stepping back around his horse and to my side. He has a funny expression.
“Are you okay?”
“Fine. Shall we go to the market to gather supplies for your family first?”
“Like this?” I glance around at the Riders in militant formation around us. “We won’t be able to talk to anyone about anything if that’s our goal tonight.”
Yaron seems to struggle to look up at me. I’d be concerned if I weren’t also so determined. Yaron only begrudgingly let me come on this trip and, judging by his erratic behavior, I don’t know if he’d let me come again. I want to make it worth it.
“We should shop first. Worry about our garbage friends later.”
I snort at his description, and at his suggestion. “I take it you’ve shopped at the Night Market even fewer times than I have. You can’t go through with a horse. It’s labyrinthine and narrow. And no one will want to talk if there are a million Riders around. It would be best if we split up. I can go through with my brother and…”
“No.” His tone brooks few arguments. His gaze none at all. “You’ll travel with me and we will have a tail. Your brother and one other more experienced Rider. Mara,” he barks, relaying to her the plan. She’s the only female in our brigade, I note with slight apprehension. Not that I think all Riders are like the man who tried to take me on the road, but having more women in the group would make me feel safer. Even if they are Alphas.
“Do you need assistance dismounting, my Lady?” Mara asks me as she passes by. She is a white woman with blonde hair and a large birthmark below her right eye in the shape of a strawberry. She’s very pretty and I feel a little flushed as she lifts both arms to help me down.
“Mara,” Yaron barks. “Step away.”
She gives me a wink and a grin, which totally disappear when she spins on her heel to face Lord Yaron. “My Lord.” She offers him a slight bow and I notice that the other Riders are all making eyes at each other, subtle expressions of laughter passed between them. Lord Yaron should know a bit more about teasing, I think, because I’m pretty sure his Riders tease him all the time.
Yaron’s hands fit around my hips as I swing my leg over Brega’s back. As I wobble atop the horse, Yaron steps closer, his grip on my hips tightening near to the point of pain. His eyes are at my knees and he suddenly huffs and rests his forehead against them. “It will be best if we do not speak while touring the market.”
I stroke the top of his hair, concerned, but I nod, not wanting to ask him what’s wrong in public. “Alright,” I agree with a frown, because it’s really not alright. A date was too much to hope for.
I try not to feel disappointed as he lowers me from Brega’s back, making sure that the entire front of my body runs the length of the entire front of his body. I am able to stay quiet through that. I’m able to stay quiet as we walk down the boardwalk, through the chorus of shouts and orders relayed between merchants and boat captains as wares are loaded and unloaded and taken to new wagons destined for Hjiel and other places on the South Island. I’m quiet still as we walk side by side up to the towering entryway to the Night Market — two poles standing like totems with snarling faces carved into their aged wooden exteriors, colored lanterns strung between them on long thick ropes like vines. And I’m quiet as we step beneath them into a world of life and light.
And that’s where my silence ends. I squeal, “They have saffron!” I’m bouncing on the balls of my feet as I approach the first merchant, a spice vendor with piles of the bright yellow-orange herb in various wooden casks. The fragrances from his stall and so many others clash in an overwhelming combination that makes me want to spin in circles and dance. I love it all. I grab Yaron’s sleeve and drag him forward. “They bring it all the way from Ruby City. It’s wonderful in curries and breads and soups. Ooh! I can make you a saffron rice dish to die for. Can we get some?”
Yaron is frowning at me, but it’s a strange frown because it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. His eyes are glittering with mischief — or something. I’m not sure I understand this male who’s here with me now, but I’m too eager to investigate it. Especially when he nods. I clap my hands and shop.
We move on to a second spice vendor but by the third, he harrumphs. “You can’t possibly need curry spice and curry powder.”
“There’s a difference!”
“What is the difference?”
“One’s a spice and one’s a powder.”
His stoic expression breaks. He smiles and rolls his eyes. “Whatever the Lady wants,” he tells the vendor, who takes that to heart. He starts showing me everything he’s ever grown, harvested and caught and when he’s finished selling me a small garrison of spices, he waves over his brother, a fisherman, to show me his latest catch.
“I think you were wrong,” Yaron says, ducking down to speak in my ear just after he instructs Mara and Cyprus to ferry back the items we’ve bought thus far. “We do need all of the Crimson Riders with us in the market. You’re going to spend the coffers dry, my love.”
My love. I trip over a cobblestone and Yaron curses as he lunges forward to grab me above the elbow before I can faceplant in a pyramid of lemons. “Am I going to have to tether you to me, Kiandah, or are you able to walk for yourself?” He curses again when he looks down at my feet. “We are done with the food…”
“But…but we haven’t even been to the Rookery sweet meats stall yet!”
“Is that what that stench is? No, Kiandah,” he says, shaking me gently and placing me back on my feet. He takes the baskets from my arms and passes them off to my brother when he returns. Cyprus looks at the basket, shoulders sagged, rolls his eyes and clenches his teeth — he’s been shopping with me before, and he hates it. “We are going to get you better shoes.” I’m wearing borrowed boots that clatter when I walk. I don’t know whose they are, but they were given to me by Radmilla and are a size or two too large.
“If we must, my Lord,” I say, trying not to sound as excited as I feel.
Cyprus makes a choking sound and Yaron turns to look over his shoulder at my brother. He gives him an inquisitive glance. “Tell me that shopping for clothing with this one is less maddening than shopping for food.”
Cyprus must have gotten orders not to speak at all on this trip because all he does is purse his lips into a line so thin, his full lips become an invisible smear. Yaron frowns. I laugh at the two of them and clap my hands together. Feeling light, not just because we’re going shoe shopping but because they’re making fun of me. Both of them. Together.
I grab Yaron’s hand and he starts, feet light as he lets me drag him toward the stalls selling anything you could ever hope to have in leather. “Well, if you are buying…” I wink at him over my shoulder. His expression is stern and confused and I like this off-balanced version of Yaron. “I also need new aprons, boots, and shoes for my entire family.”
“Do you know their sizes?”
“Yes. I wouldn’t be a good sister if I didn’t.”
“I’m certain that since you saved them from a burning building, that’s not the case.”
I scoff. “Are you making jokes about burning down a church?” He frowns harder and when he opens his mouth, I sense he’ll say something profound, something I can’t handle. “Do you need anything from the leather workers for yourself, Yaron?” I quickly interrupt.
He considers, successfully distracted. “Perhaps a new set of boots and vambraces. My best sets were destroyed when we…” His gaze grows hazy. My mind races. I yank on his wrist and he looks back at me and takes a long step to close the distance between us.
“Are you truly so unaffected?” he hisses.
I hesitate, unsure of what he means. “I…” He brushes his knuckles over the back of my cheek. “I feel…” I start to tell him that I am affected, but I’m not sure that’s what he means. Of course, he has to know that I’m affected. I mean — isn’t it obvious? I shake my head, try again, “I don’t feel like I did in the forest, if that’s what you’re asking.”
So out of control. So completely insane. I would have fucked anyone then, I’m sure, but I wanted it twice as much because it was him. I wanted him more than I’d ever wanted anything in my life. So much that it had hurt so badly, I couldn’t have done anything else other than what I did. Took everything from him, to the point that it nearly killed me. Now, I want him, but I can use my whole head to decide the when and the how. I’m not going to fall to the ground here and…
“I understand,” he says, but he withdraws his hand so abruptly, it leaves me feeling like I’ve done something wrong.
That feeling grows more pronounced as we shop in a tense silence, so much less pleasant than the light banter we exchanged before. I buy myself new shoes and shoes for the other members of my family that I know they’d like, and after swapping out my oversized boots with the short booties made for me on the spot in the leather shop, Yaron leads me to the fabric stalls.
“Batiks!” I exclaim when I see the beautiful, starched cotton fabrics, dyed in varying shades. I haggle with the vendor, arguing with them over which ones are real wax and which are synthetic fakes commonly produced in Glass Flats, but also in the Rookery. Real wax batiks only come from the Shadowlands and Ruby City now, though Mirage City used to be our largest supplier before the Fates were found to be controlling the city and trade stopped between Mirage City and the South Island.
Eventually, we settle on a price for the real wax fabrics and a few pieces of Ankara textiles and mudcloths. The female merchant, who I hadn’t even noticed because she wasn’t handling the negotiations, then takes me into the back to be measured and fitted.
I head into the stall, leaving Yaron out front looking stressed and grumpy. The female chuckles when she shuts the curtain between us and the outside world. Everything quiets. It’s like we’ve entered another universe.
“So it’s true,” she says the moment we’re alone. I wonder if Yaron can even hear us with how loud the market is. That makes me a little nervous, but I remember now that we did come to snoop. I suppose striking up conversations with random vendors is part of that and it’s much easier to do without him looming over me.
“So what’s true, miss?”
“It’s Zanele,” she says.
“Kiandah,” I reply just as quickly. The woman looks young, though my guess is that she’s around my age or older. She has long braids that fall to her waist and I try not to clench my teeth in envy as I remember what my hair looked like before.
She smiles at me and I feel instantly guilty that I’ve been caught thinking negatively towards her, especially when she drops her tone and says, “They say Lord Yaron has been tempted as no other Shadow Lord has been tempted before. They say a great and powerful Omega has brought him to his knees. That he took lashes for her. That he worships the ground at her feet…”
I laugh. I just can’t help it. Zanele laughs, too, knowing she’s spinning yarns. I shake my head as I wipe the moisture from my eyes and she resumes measuring me and making little adjustments to the stiff, brightly colored fabric she has wrapped around my waist. “I think someone’s been telling you tall tales.”
“Or someone is being modest, my Lady. I haven’t seen Lord Yaron in the Night Market before and I’ve never seen him do his own shopping.” She giggles again and I laugh with her, thinking of poor, sweet, homicidal Yaron standing outside a batiks stall grumpily waiting for me. “I think he really likes you, miss.”
My face warms. “It’s because I’m an Omega.”
“I don’t know.” Her voice rises at the end, teasingly, but not in a mean way. In a way that sends feeling all the way down to the soles of my feet and the tips of my toes. “Omegas have passed through the Shadowlands before and he was not tempted by them.”
“You’re making me blush, sha,” I say, using the old Orias word for sister.
“I don’t think it’s me making you blush, sha-lee,” she replies, the Undoline derivative.
I perk up. “You’re from Undoline.”
“Born and raised.”
“I didn’t notice your accent.”
“I work at the Night Market three days, then I go back to Undoline the rest of the week to help prepare the fabrics. It comes and goes, depending.”
“I’d stay put, if I were you, given what’s gone on here with Trash City.” I didn’t even mean to prod in that direction. The words simply came to me. And, having said them, I realize that I’m in a position now to push. “Has Undoline had any of the problems with Trash City or the undead army we’ve had in Orias?”
Zanele’s brown eyes flash. She’s hunkered down in a crouch, applying pins to the legs of my new trousers. I feel like I’m sweating. Cold, but sweating, even though the weather near the ports is balmy and pleasant, even at night. The waters of Zaoul are warm on the east side of the islands, cold on the west. Here in the strait between the two islands, the warm and cool waters clash.
I wait, staring at her expectantly in a way that I hope appears innocent. “Pardon me for saying, sha-lee, but didn’t your family work with the traitors of Trash City to kill Alphas?”
I wince and shake my head. “Is that what people think?”
“Are they wrong?”
“I…” Ancestors save me, it’s what I have to believe. “My family didn’t kill anyone, but…” But I need her to tell me what she knows. “But my parents and oldest sister were working with them to supply bodies for the undead army. I…Lord Yaron absolved us. But at great cost. What we did — ” I am not my family. “ — what they did — was wrong. So wrong. They shamed me.” I shake my head, realizing what I’ve said and recoiling from it. “I…I’m sorry. I’ve never said that out loud before.”
She shudders visibly, but she nods, too. “Have you seen them with your own eyes?”
“The undead?”
She nods.
I shudder. “They’re horrible. Have you?”
She gives me a funny look and then she drops her voice even more. “I have. Three times. Once near Shadow Ridge — my husband and I were on our way to Heatherlen to deliver a special order when our cart broke down. We saw shapes in the woods and hid in a ditch, fearing thieves and robbers. What stalked by us, mere feet away, was so much worse. At least a dozen undead.” She cringes. “It was awful.”
“The ancestors must have been with you that night, for your cart to break down before they caught up to you,” I whisper to her as she stands, undressing me once more and setting the patterns aside to work on later. She pulls a simple, floor-length black dress from a chest on the floor and drapes it over my head. From there, she returns to the ground to work on the hem.
“And twice more, I saw creatures that I believe were undead, near the ports when I was packing up my stall late. They were far away though, near the water, so I can’t be one hundred percent sure. It could have simply been brazen creatures of Zaoul.”
“Almost as terrifying.”
She snorts. “Almost.”
“Was anyone with them when you saw them near Shadow Ridge? They couldn’t have been traveling alone. When I saw them in the woods of Paradise Hole, they didn’t seem capable of making decisions themselves. They had to have been led.”
“Oh, they were.”
“By who?” I scoff, outraged and flabbergasted. “Who would willingly do such a thing?”
But, her confident hands still on the fabric, she gives me a curious look. “Sha-lee, you don’t think yours is the only family working with Trash City, do you?”
I quiet and feel suddenly very small. Like an ant. I just…what she’s suggesting…I can’t fathom it. “But…but who would want to work with Trash City to make monsters?”
She shakes her head and I know I’m wrong for even having asked. My sister did. My parents did. “The desperate or the greedy, I suppose, but mostly the former, I should think. Trash City has preyed on families of women, single women, single mothers. We may be free as Betas — hell, I’m even married to an Alpha — but you know, you must know as well as anyone, how hard it is in the realm of shadows for women. We don’t get the same opportunities, the same chances. You got lucky, miss, ascending as an Omega. You’ll live in the lap of luxury and never have to work again. But for those whose husbands have died or who never had one to begin with, it’s hard. Do you know that it’s still a law that in order to set up and take down a stall in the Night Market, women need a chaperone?” She makes a disgusted sound in the back of her throat.
I am still stunned, reeling. Even as she fits me into a corset and cinches the waist. She’s got me outfitted in a black shift, a black outer dress, black underpants, and a corset that’s one of the loveliest patterns I’ve ever seen. A traditional fabric, it’s been starched and dyed maroon against a darker maroon. The darker maroon shimmers.
“I never considered why my brother and father had to do some things, collect certain shipments and the like. It makes sense why women would want to work with Trash City for coin, especially if the Fates are behind them.”
“Is that true?”
“I’m not sure,” I reply honestly. “Yaron hasn’t talked to me about them. He doesn’t talk to me much about anything. I think…” I shake my head. “Never mind.”
“What?”
I smile at her, but it feels sad and small and self-pitying. “Maybe, it’s like you said. Maybe, he likes me even though I’m not an Alpha, but as a woman he doesn’t trust me enough to talk to me, you know, as an equal.”
She doesn’t say anything to that.
I shake my head. “Sorry. I don’t mean to burden you. I just…was curious what you’d heard, and if you knew where I could find Trash City. I’d like to give that wench that leads them a piece of my mind and atone for my family’s crimes. It’s one thing to want to support the women of the Shadowlands. It’s another to tempt them with gold to turn on their own people and abet murder. And I don’t care who they’re working for — raising an army like they have is wrong, no matter the motivation.”
She nods. “I couldn’t agree with you more, sha-lee. They couldn’t tempt me with all the gold in Glass Flats,” she says, referring to the richest of the cities.
“Me either.” I frown. “But I also like my job. I’m a good cook and I like working. Even if I’m just a poor woman, and a Beta…well, before.”
She smiles at me and the levity returns between us. “I do, too. It’s incredible seeing the way my designs transform people. Are you ready to see yourself?”
I nod. “Yes. This fabric is stunning.”
“You are stunning. Come, sha-lee. Look.” She spins me around and for a split second I wonder who that pretty woman is in the doorway before I realize that’s a mirror and the woman is me. “You like?”
My jaw drops. “Zanele, I…” I can’t speak.
She laughs. “You look gorgeous. Here, let me just apply a little makeup to accentuate the eyes. I like your hair, by the way.”
I look down at my booted feet, nervous and shocked. “Thank you, sha. My hair used to look like yours until I burned it all off. It’s begun to regrow, you can see here,” I say, gesturing to the fuzzies that have taken up on the top of my head and the sides that I shaved into a fade. “I miss my long curls, though.”
“You burned it all off?” She balks, then seems to consider. “Ohhh…oh ancestors be, you really are a Fire Omega?”
I nod.
“I guess I didn’t realize your hair would also…” She starts to laugh.
I don’t mean to, but I start to laugh with her. “Stop that. It was traumatic! You know how it is for us Orias and Undoline women. Our hair doesn’t grow fast. It’ll take me years to regrow my hair, if it ever does.”
“You aren’t beautiful because of what grows on your head,” she tsks, and the words are so flippant and direct and raw and honest that I’m momentarily taken aback. “Now here. You’re all finished. Go out there and you’ll see that it doesn’t matter how much or little hair you have because our good Lord is going to lose his mind when he sees you like this. And after you have him all worked up, you’re going to go to The Sea Witch and book a room and let him ravage you and then…” She drops her tone and lifts up onto her tiptoes so she can whisper directly into my ear, so close that not a word is lost to the wind. “When he’s good and asleep, you’re going to go down to the bar and have a fiery word with Madame Zenobia.”
I raise my eyebrows and stare into my own eyes framed by freshly lacquered black lashes. A silent communication passes between us.
She nods in confirmation. “Yes. And I want the monsters gone, sha-lee. Can you promise me that?”
I turn to face her, woman to woman, and tell her words that I can’t possibly hope to mean, but I do. “I promise you.”
Her lips quirk. “You are the right choice, then.”
“For what?”
“To lead us.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
Zanele raises and eyebrow and grins big enough to show all of her teeth. “Sha, dressed like that, there isn’t a soul in the Shadowlands who wouldn’t follow you.”
We devolve to laughter after that.