Chapter 48
On the evening of the ninth day of isolation, thirteen days from the sealing of the gates, the townspeople gather in anticipation of freedom.
Bastion and his men are in the midst of it all, and Quin .
. . I don’t see him. Haven’t seen him all evening.
I hover at the edges, watching people raise their lanterns and dance.
Listening to their songs, that carry for miles on the wind.
I return to the magistrate’s office and retreat to a rickety table in the courtyard. I bring out my grandfather’s books, some ink, and with the light from my lantern, write my notes on spare pages.
I startle at the call of my name and spy Olyn—wearing skirts, hair plaited over one shoulder in the fashion of unmarried females. She sets her pretty lantern on the table and falls onto the bench next to me, peering at my scrawls. “The whole town is celebrating, and you’re still at work?”
“It suddenly occurred to me, while standing amongst their songs.”
She looks at me.
“Songs carry messages, warnings,” I continue, tapping the paper with the feathered end of my quill. “They carry lessons from the past.”
She reads the ink I’ve spindled and laughs. “This the start of a song?”
“I’ll leave that to more talented people. It’s an evaluation of what happened here, what we would’ve done differently, how we can do better next time. It’ll also be a thought experiment, on what could have gone wrong.”
“What do you mean?”
“What if things had worsened? What if the spread couldn’t be contained? If the disease had altered? Spread in other, more alarming ways?”
Olyn’s lips curl in a grimace, and she frowns. “What could be done if it was worse?”
I flip the pages of my grandfather’s work and push them over to her to read. She scans the lines, flips the pages, scans more. Her eyes widen. She swallows and lowers her voice. “These types of books are banned.”
“Looking past that, what do you think?”
“I . . . I’m not sure. The ideas sound frightening. Like you’d get sicker from them. Even if they were allowed, I don’t think anyone would trust them.”
“This is its biggest disadvantage.”
“Not its biggest.”
I raise a brow. She pushes the book aside, grabs a handful of pebbles from the ground and steals a flower head from a nearby plant. She scatters the pebbles over the surface, then plucks off the five petals from the flower. She counts, and grabs another handful of pebbles.
“That’s its biggest disadvantage.” She points to the petals.
“This is a rough ratio of vitalians to commoners. Even if . . .” She grabs another three flowers and scatters their petals between the pebbles.
“Even if all those with magic, including par-lineas, could wield such spells, and assuming people would accept the spell . . . in the case of an outbreak on the scale we would be talking about, barely a quarter of the kingdom could receive the spell in time.” She looks at me.
“Do you see? It’s impractical. It becomes useless. ”
I stare at the pebbles in their masses on the table before me, the scant number of petals to reach them.
This is the problem even without an outbreak.
Too many people are without access to vitalians.
They can only, maybe, get simplex spells from par-lineas.
Mostly, they have people like Olyn, learning tricks from travelling healers from neighbouring kingdoms. Or figuring things out on their own, poisoning themselves if they get it wrong.
I pick up a petal and pinch it tightly between my fingers.
“Future husband! There you are.” Bastion waltzes across the courtyard holding up two jugs of wine. He leans between Olyn and me, sets them in spaces between pebbles, and climbs onto the bench between us with a slick grin. “Where’s the fun in your last night?”
He glances at Olyn and jumps an inch. His hand descends toward her chest. “Where’ve you been hiding those—”
She slaps his hand away with a roll of her eyes. “You never change, Bastion.”
“Why would I? I get everything I want.” He smirks at me, at her.
“You know what else I want? You for my wife.” He slings an arm around my neck, and then hers.
“A husband and a wife. Life would be perfect.” In my ear, “I’d have a lot of fun with you.
” Turning to Olyn, “And you could carry all my babies.”
Olyn and I simultaneously grab his hands and throw him off us. He laughs and reaches for a wine jug. “Tonight, we must drink to good fortune—” he tips wine into his mouth and gulps “—longevity for all, and easy visits to the privy.”
He sets a jug before me and hesitates with the other. Olyn helps by snatching it from him and drinking deeply. “To a safe journey south,” she says to me.
I clink my jug against hers. “To peaceful days for you and Kastoria.”
We take turns with the jugs, drinking steadily. Bastion performs all kinds of tricks with pebbles and tries to get us to lay down money in bets Olyn and I know we’d lose. “You’re right, of course,” he says. “I’m best at all games.”
“All? What about games of wit?” Olyn snorts.
“How else could I trick the rich into parting with their silver?” He laughs and eyes me. “Dare to play?” He takes my jug and finishes it. “I’ll make the stakes worth your while.”
A few of his men stumble into the courtyard, and Bastion bellows at them to bring out a chess board. When it arrives, he shoos the drunken vespertines away and sets up the game between my lantern and Olyn’s.
“He’s a weasel, Cael,” Olyn says. “He wants your money.”
Bastion shakes a finger. “I will not play for money.”
I narrow my eyes on him.
He captures my foot between his under the table. “If I win, I want you to marry me.”
I kick him away.
“Fine, fine,” he concedes. “If I win, how about a kiss on my cheek?”
“And if I win?”
“You can have all the kisses you want.” I rise, preparing to leave, and he waves me back into my seat. “What do you want?”
I stare at the board, at the figures Quin has taught me to manoeuvre. I meet Bastion’s eye. “The route your vespertines take out of town.”
“Consider it yours.”
Olyn whispers at my ear, “Do you know how to play?”
“Theoretically,” I whisper back.
“What does that mean?”
“I’ve never won before.”
“Cael!”
I shake my head and calm her. “I was playing against the best.”
Olyn looks from me to the board, uneasy. My stomach flips too . . . but it’s more important to secure a way out of town that avoids the influx of redcloaks after Quin the moment the gates open.
I try to call up a sobering spell, but I’ve drunk too much and my magic fizzles. I ask Olyn to hit my guardian’s point, vital channel, and scapular acupoints. It isn’t as effective as magic, but it should make me less dizzy.
She hits those points and then jabs my wing’s arc. My mind instantly sharpens.
“What was—”
“Seen a lot of drunk men. I learned this technique from a southern healer. Adding the wing’s arc acupoint increases internal strength. It, ah, doesn’t last very long. A few minutes. Enough to get a man back to their home.”
I ask if I can try it on her and she lets me. “Much better,” she says, and gestures to the board. “Hopefully this gives you an advantage.”
Bastion snorts, and the game begins.
Very soon, it also ends.
I stare at the board, lost at how slyly Bastion won. He taps his cheek with a smirk. “Never bet against a vespertine.”
I lurch to my feet and blink hard several times.
Bastion hums. “Something you want to say?”
I puff out all my air. “You must be formidable sober.”
The sound of hooves over stone has us looking across the courtyard. Coming towards us is a donkey pulling a wagon, manned by an aklo I’ve never seen.
They come to a stop before us and the aklo jumps down.
Over the braying of the donkey, he says, “My master told me to send him here. He’ll collect the wagon tomorrow.
” With that he whisks away, and we all peer into the wagon.
Quin is lying asleep on heaped straw, one hand tucked behind his hair—recently dyed dark again and layered with many bejewelled braids—the other, clutching something against his waist. The sharp tang of alcohol surrounds him, and Bastion laughs. “Can’t even hold his liquor.”
I climb onto the wagon and check for any sign of foul play. When I’m certain he’s fine, I cover him with my cloak and leave him to sleep.
“You owe me a kiss,” Bastion says, waggling his brows.
Olyn whacks him. “Despicable.”
I grimace and tell him to close his eyes. “No peeking.”
His smile widens, but he does as I ask.
I glance at Olyn, pressing a ‘quiet’ finger to my mouth, and pull gently at loose reins. I position the heavily breathing donkey and hold out a bit of straw.
The donkey’s lips stretch for it, tongue smacking briefly against Bastion’s cheek—
Bastion’s smile drops and his eyes ping open to a sudden braying in his face.
Olyn and I laugh as he lurches away from the animal.
“You wanted a kiss on the cheek,” I say. “You never specified who must give it to you.”
Bastion wags his finger, lips pinched, eyes flashing; a little furious, a lot impressed. He smacks the chess pieces back into their starting positions. “If I win, I want you to give me a proper kiss on the mouth.”
More clearly worded this time.
“Dare you play against me again?”
I swallow. “I’m not your match.”
Quin’s voice rises from the wagon, low and unhurried, and cuts cleanly through ours. “He’s not. But I am.”
Bastion narrows his eyes, but Quin approaches the table with calm confidence. He glances briefly at Bastion’s smirk, and faint amusement deepens the dimple at the corner of his mouth. He sits with a billow of his robe beside me.
Olyn’s eyes ping around the three of us as she seats herself nervously next to Bastion. “Maybe you should—”
He scoffs and stares hard at Quin. “Same stakes. I win,” a finger points at me, “he kisses me.”
Quin straightens the pieces on his side of the board. “Agreed.”
“Quin—”
Quin’s gaze penetrates mine and he presses something into my hand. The cool, hard shape of my golden feather. I squeeze it in surprise.
The donkey and the cart. It all makes sense. “How—”
He leans in, words brushing the shell of my ear. “I keep my promises.”