Chapter 9 #2
Pyetar held one of the makeshift pelt curtains aside, revealing a door, glancing back at her impatiently. Iryana forced her eyes straight ahead, hoping to not appear too interested in the space lest Pyetar catch on.
They came out on the wall walk, the wooden platform that stretched around the walls of the fortress, a roof above to protect from the sun and weather.
The fortress was massive, shaped like a star cut in half by the river.
Her early guardian education had covered the defensibility of such designs, but the details mostly escaped her now.
The walls were a feat of architecture, but it was the inside of the fortress that captured her attention. It was not what she had pictured from the books she’d read and the fragments of memories from her life before.
Tidy fields almost ready for crops covered the corner before her, stretching across most of the land along the river wall.
Wooden-brick roads abruptly ended where they met the fields—as if the town had once dominated the fortress but had since been ripped up.
Some buildings were like the ones from her village, only finer and larger, but most were foreign to her.
There were great, multi-storied buildings of white stone and fine wooden craftsmanship, buildings with their own towers and small stone walls.
She couldn’t count them all; there were so many.
Dominating the area to the right was what she could only imagine had once been the governor’s mansion.
It had been over a decade since Iryana had been in a guardian’s fortress, but she could tell this wasn’t one.
It felt different, even half ripped up as it was.
There was too much variation in the buildings.
Her home in Klees had a more militant feel to it, like a complex.
There wasn’t the same separation between who was clearly in charge and everyone else.
This city had been ruled by the Istrin court, probably a baron or lord acting as governor. One of the queen’s cities.
And there were people. Standing beside buildings, preparing the fields, training in some yards she saw further off, walking along the streets. It looked so… normal. But she knew it wasn’t. There was nothing normal about this town, these people. They were dangerous. Criminals. Killers.
“Where are we going?” she asked, now that she could see the layout of Myura River before her.
“I am taking you to the major. That’s what your coin will buy you. It’s up to him what happens to you after,” Pyetar answered stiffly.
Iryana swallowed.
They descended the stairs from the wall walk, heading through the fort. People noticed.
Tense faces, hostile eyes, and suspicious frowns followed them. Iryana forced herself to meet their stares, to keep her eyes up. Her guardian armor was a dead giveaway, but she couldn’t show weakness.
He led her right up to the imposing mansion. Two heavily armed soldiers guarded the massive double doors. The tall, slender windows stretched twice as tall as she was, the wooden trim mimicking flowers and icicles dripping over the glass.
Pyetar paused, looking down over his shoulder at her. “Once we enter the hall, you’re on your own.”
“Good.” That would be an improvement.
She focused on calming her anxiety as she turned away from Pyetar. She didn’t know what to expect, how she would be received, but it was too late to worry much now.
Walking through those doors, despite the carved figures dancing across the panes, felt like entering the lair of a dakya.
Passing through a hallway with a shadowed staircase, Iryana followed Pyetar into a great hall. Dark wall coverings divided wood paneled floors and the high ceiling. The hazy light of dawn filtered through the tall windows, standing along the side wall like soldiers. Lanterns glowed overhead.
The people in the hall seemed a mix of sharp alertness and grogginess. Some were so miserable looking they could only be horribly hungover. Porridge and cheese pancakes filled the tables, and Iryana’s stomach growled.
Her gaze carried over the room and instantly found the man from that night: Karvek.
Sitting at a table on a raised dais, his height and athletic build were once again clear even from across the room.
He looked far more put together than he had in the forest, like he had been uncaged when she saw him before.
Now, his wavy brown hair was neat and contained.
Those gray-blue eyes were tamer. Another dark-haired man sat at the side of his table, but she paid him little notice.
It became obvious who Karvek was. He was the military brigade’s major, in charge of this whole fortress. Only outranked by the general of the entire 18th Brigade. He wasn’t looking at her, but at Pyetar, eyes seeming to follow him carefully.
Iryana took the moment before Major Karvek noticed her to steel herself, adjust to the new information. If he were in charge of Myura River, perhaps this would be easier.
Abandoning her, as expected, Pyetar walked to one of the two rows of tables and benches, passing soldiers who seemed to sit a little straighter when they saw him. He sat on an empty bench with a bored look on his face.
Iryana pushed her headscarf back to hang around her neck and stepped forward. Karvek turned to her, a small smile turning up on one side of his mouth. The rest of the room seemed to follow his attention.
She crossed the room slowly, taking her time.
The chatter dropped to sinister whispers, and she could feel their eyes sizing her up.
She must have looked a mess. There were undoubtedly dark circles under her eyes from the night of walking through the forest, and the cold had likely chapped her cheeks and left them red.
Mud and ice crystals stuck to her boots and the end of her cloak.
Karvek tilted his head, ran his tongue between his teeth, and watched her approach. The intensity unsettled her like it had that night under the trees. Was this the power of leading so many soldiers?
“What business do you have with the 18th Brigade?” A man stood and placed himself between Iryana and the dais.
He was built large, with light brown hair and beard, shorn short.
His square jaw was clenched tight as he stared at her, arm held out at his side, ready to form some kind of weapon.
He held himself like someone important—but he wasn’t the one on the dais.
It was all a game, she reminded herself. And she had to play.
Iryana slipped the military coin from her pocket and flicked it toward the man. He stumbled as he lunged to catch it, snatching it out of the air with a meaty fist.
“Where did you get this?” the brute growled.
Her eyes flicked to Karvek and she raised her brows. An amused smile softened his features.
“Captain Darish, let the lady through.” Karvek stood slowly, hands resting on his hips. “This is Gyena Iryana, a little guardian I met in the woods.”
He used the honorific openly, acknowledging what she was. Iryana could have heard a pin drop for how quiet the room grew, and the man who was sitting with Karvek frowned at her.
“What is a guardian doing here?” Darish grumbled as he reluctantly backed away from Iryana and took his seat again.
“I invited her.” Karvek smiled at Iryana like he was greeting a long-lost friend. “I didn’t expect you to come so quickly, but I’m glad you did.”
“It was an opportunity I found I couldn’t pass on.”
He grinned at this. “What have you come for then? A tour? A glimpse of what life is like on this side of your walls?”
She swallowed. “I’d like more than a glimpse, if you’ll allow it. I don’t want to go back.”
“So you want to work for me? Join the brigade?”
She nodded, trying to read his reaction.
“Despite our… eventful meeting, one can’t be accepted into the 18th Brigade like that. You have to prove yourself first, like all the other initiates.”
She could hear the grumbling around her, their disbelief bolstering her own. Iryana bit down the panic.
“I look forward to it.”
“Sit down, get some food, and you’ll start training tomorrow.” Karvek was already turning back to his breakfast companion, dismissing her. She’d expected more from him, given he’d invited her in the first place.
Iryana turned to the sea of unwelcoming faces. A wave of dizziness swept over her. She would have no friends here, but she didn’t have any back home either. And she didn’t need any.
“Captain Antar,” a man greeted with an extended hand. He was maybe a decade older than her, with a long face and a stern look. “I train the initiates and the new recruits. We start at first light. I hope that guardian training has been worth something.”
Despite his harsh words, he didn’t seem overly hostile; just curious and perhaps a bit intense.
“Of course, Captain.”
Antar led her toward one of the back tables where the youngest soldiers were pretending to be absorbed in their food. There were a handful of men and women at the table, all within a decade of her own age.
There were two groups, one at each end of the table.
The first seemed younger, wearing simple leather armor with training weapons strapped to their sides or leaning against the bench beside them.
They were unforged, the uninitiated, Iryana assumed.
The second group was older and wore proper hardened armor, something that would protect against more than a wooden practice sword.
Only a few of them seemed to have weapons on their person, mostly sidearms like falchions and hand axes. Their real weapons would be forged.
In rapid succession, Antar introduced them. The forged soldiers were Vaneshta, Vabihn, and Pepha. The first unforged was a young woman named Lidishta, who was glaring at Iryana so fiercely that she didn’t hear the rest of the their names. Then Antar left her standing there awkwardly.