2. HARVEST #2
There had been a time when Ysira, too, could have spoken in such a way. Through the bitterness that rose like bile in her throat, she flashed him her most radiant smile. “Go fuck a cactus.”
The bearded knight had, by now, had enough of Ysira. He drew his blade and leveled it at her. “Hand over whatever it is you stole.”
If only she’d come for something as simple as coins or trinkets. With little choice left in the matter, Ysira tossed the pancreas onto the sand at the knights’ feet.
What happened next was predictable, if nothing else. The horrified knights arrested Ysira, confiscated her tools and weapons, and marched her to the nearest garrison. They sat her down in a stuffy, windowless cell, on one of two stone slabs protruding from the walls.
The garrison, at the very edge of the Knots, bled out of Zivora’s pale-stone.
The city proper was like a single organism; its looming bone-colored buildings showed no seams or chisel marks, as if they had been poured into place.
Yellow globes embedded in the walls emitted perpetual soft light—another gift, the priests said, from the gods who built Zivora.
Having been born amidst the worn and low-lit adobe of the Knots, Ysira had always found them unsettling.
The bald knight sat on the stone slab opposite her. “You’ve been here before, haven’t you?”
Over the last decade, Ysira had been picked up by various garrisons eight times. Thrice she’d been sentenced to prison, though she never served longer than a few days.
The knight tried again. “What were you doing with that man’s liver?” “Pancreas,” said Ysira, before she could stop herself.
He stared at her. “Why?”
She shrugged. “He wasn’t using it anymore.”
It was a stupid thing to say. It positively enraged the knight, and too late, Ysira noticed the worn prayer beads and doublecircle medallion looped at his belt.
She was saved from having to defend herself by a knock on the door.
“You’re relieved,” said a familiar voice, with crisp authority. “I’ll handle this.”
Ysira fought the urge to slouch down on the slab, as though the palestone might absorb her. Just when she’d thought this night couldn’t get any more humiliating . . .
The bald knight cast her one more contemptuous look before snapping to attention. “Yes, Captain.”
Knight Captain Saraida Ancarath entered. She was short and muscular with a square face made for military discipline—currently in shambles as she beheld Ysira with no small amount of shock.
Most people in Zivora belonged to two closely entwined ethnic groups: the Telu, who’d been nomads, and the Zal, who’d built their empire from the canyon.
A minority hailed from more distant reaches of the Black Sun’s dominion—telepathic children retrieved by Church seekers, or merchants seeking to expand their fortunes.
Saraida’s grandmother was one such merchant, as evinced by her fair, freckled skin and eyes greener than anything in the Scar.
Saraida dismissed her subordinate and, once they were alone, simply stared at Ysira.
“Gods above,” she exclaimed. “I thought you were dead. Where have you been?”
Unease curled in Ysira’s gut. Perhaps this would be more difficult for her to get out of than usual. She did her utmost to appear bored anyway. “Corpse-robbing. Among other things.”
“I’d heard some sordid rumors, but—”
“Do we have to drag this out?” Ysira interrupted. “Are you going to explain?”
Saraida may have been referring to the corpse-robbing or Ysira’s disappearance from the Citadel years before, but regardless, the answer was Definitely not.
Ysira angled her head toward the door, indicating the departed knight.
“I promise, whatever audacious heresy he’s imagining is much more exciting than the truth. ”
“I know that.” Saraida was, like most foreigners, smart enough not to criticize Zivoran beliefs where she might be overheard. Theological subtleties and superstitions might be subject to debate, but the gods’ power remained as apparent as the eclipse in the Harvest sky. “The Church may disagree.”
“The Church is part of your chain of command now?” Ysira didn’t quite manage to keep the desperation out of her voice. Saraida couldn’t know just how badly this would end for Ysira, should the Church get involved.
“Something has the inquisitors on edge,” Saraida said. “More than usual Harvest business. I don’t want to turn you in, but I’m beholden to the law.” She rubbed her forehead. “What about the other thief? Can you tell me where he went?”
Looting from the ruins was a crime, too, albeit not one that should have merited the involvement of knights.
Ysira picked dirt out of her nails, struggling to feign disinterest. She did not talk to Guardsmen about her fellow citizens; it was one of the few moral strictures to which she adhered absolutely.
Saraida spread her arms like a woman at her wits’ end. “What happened to you?”
Because it had to be something pitiable, hadn’t it?
Something sufficiently humiliating or traumatizing to make Ysira Naktis, respectably ranked Knight Candidate, disappear off the face of the earth and fail to amount to anything useful.
Rancid, years-old fury boiled up inside her.
She’d never give Saraida—first in their candidate class, now the youngest Knight Captain anyone could remember—the satisfaction of the full story.
When Ysira didn’t answer, Saraida released a heavy sigh. She tried a different tack. “Are you hurt?”
The pity in her tone made Ysira feel worse. She glanced down at her shoulder, where her shirt was torn and bloodied from the thorn eater’s mouth. “It’s not my blood.”
Saraida leaned forward, frowning. “Really? Because it looks—”
“I said it’s not my fucking blood.” It wasn’t anyone’s business but Ysira’s that the bite would be healed by now, scarred over with knobby pink-and-white scar tissue like her stomach and little finger. Like the jagged line across her throat.
“Fine.” Saraida rubbed her forehead again.
“My knight recognized you, and that one tells his priest everything. There are only so many strings I can pull. You’re facing charges for corpse-robbing, breaking curfew during the Harvest, and aiding the escape of another fugitive.
It’ll be hard labor on the docks, and . .
. Ysira, you might get life down there.” It would be easy to put Ysira away.
Saraida didn’t know this, but there was no longer any official record of her existence.
She might as well be a recurring hallucination to these people.
Just a ghost passing through, destined to be forgotten.
“What could you possibly gain by refusing to cooperate?” Saraida asked. “What do you want, Ysira? I’m truly asking.”
It was a good question. A decade had passed since Ysira awoke with her memory of the last few cycles gone, body beset by changes as confounding as they were frightening.
Day to day now, all she seemed to do was stay alive.
Evade notice. Avoid the Church, who would do far worse than imprison her if they learned she’d escaped the gods’ judgment.
No one was meant to return from the Harvest. That was as much a fact of life in Zivora as the sun and its horrible shadow.
And yet, Ysira had. “I’m trying to help you,” Saraida went on.
“I don’t understand. You could still have served, made a difference, even if you couldn’t make the cut to be a knight. ”
A small, pathetic part of Ysira wanted to confess.
Precious few people from her old life knew she still lived, and none knew the truth of what she had survived.
But no one could know. She couldn’t risk it.
The only realistic option left to her was to keep her mouth shut, keep her walls up, and ensure Saraida would not seek her out again once she made her escape.
Face-to-face with the living embodiment of everything she could never be, it was all too easy to summon the necessary ire.
“You’re right,” Ysira snapped. “I’m not a knight.
I don’t have to sit here and tell you your shit doesn’t stink.
” One of the few benefits of insignificance was that she could say whatever she pleased.
Only a little power lay in that, but it was power nonetheless.
“I don’t have to pretend you’re a hero for doing the Church’s bidding like a trained pigeon. ”
Hurt—and maybe a touch of guilt—flashed across Saraida’s face. It was gone in an instant, and she eyed Ysira coolly. “Fine. Pretend this is about principles. But I remember when you would have given anything to be one of us.”
The worst part was that Saraida wasn’t wrong.
Like a slow-healing scar, Ysira’s old resentment still itched.
She couldn’t believe she’d been reduced to feeling superior for having had the shit kicked out of her by a thorn eater—and not even for the first time—because didn’t this at least engender a sort of resilience that Saraida had never had to develop? One thing Ysira had that she did not?
Envy, after all, was not something with which anyone worthwhile should struggle. Anger could be righteous, hatred could be provoked, but envy necessarily required admitting you’d fallen short.
Saraida left Ysira alone beneath the baleful glow of the palestone lights. And no one knew, nor cared, that she was there.