“They are my people you’re speaking of,” she said, trying to sound cross.
“How was it that your family became separated from them?” Finnikin asked. “You are the first Mont we have ever met on our travels.”
Evanjalin was silent for a moment, and he wondered if she knew where the Monts were hiding. “Saro moved the Monts just days after they killed his sister, the queen, and my mother and siblings and I were among them. But my father was in Sarnak, and my mother refused to leave the day Saro took our people away from the Valley. She insisted that we wait. She believed there was still hope, and that if we stayed in the Valley, my father would travel from Sarnak to find us.” She looked up at him. “Do you remember those days?”
“Only too well,” he said quietly. “We all waited for at least a week. After the curse, Saro sent two of his men out to access the kingdom from the other borders, but days later only one returned.” Finnikin fell silent. He remembered the Mont’s words to Saro. That at each border, an unseen force had held them back, until the Charyn border when his companion pushed his way into the tempest. The Mont had watched in horror as the tempest spat his kinsman back. Splintered bone by splintered bone.
“And then everyone began to leave,” Finnikin continued, “needing to feed their children and to survive, arguing whether it was better to go to Charyn or Belegonia or Sarnak. I stayed close to my father’s men until I was placed in the care of Sir Topher. We were the last to go.”
The wind was strong on the cliff, and it whipped his hair across his face. Suddenly her hand reached out to hold it back. When he felt her fingers, he flinched; he had not been touched with such gentleness since his childhood. He was no stranger to women and had felt their hands on all parts of his body, but her touch made him feel like he belonged someplace.
“I remember the abandoned children wailing by the side of the road,” she said. “Some as young as two or three. People were forced to put their own survival and their family’s above anything else and left other people’s children to die. It’s the only reason I can feel any sympathy for the thief from Sarnak.”
He nodded. “Part of me believes there is little hope for those like him, who have become as base as the men they associate with. But there’s another part of me that will search this land high and low once we are settled in our second homeland and bring them back to us, where they belong.”
He felt her stare but did not turn and look. Did not want those eyes reaching into him.
“So you are destined to spend the rest of your life scouring this land? Who are you, to deserve such a curse?” she asked.
One who has an evil lurking inside of me, he wanted to say. An evil that Seranonna of the Forest Dwellers recognized that day in the forest as he played alongside Isaboe.
Her blood will be shed for you to be king.
“What is it you want, Finnikin?” Evanjalin persisted.
“I want to be left alone to do what we’ve always done,” he said vehemently. I want to go searching for my father, he longed to shout.
“And what is that? Wandering the empire? Collecting names of the dead? Where would you like me to leave you, Finnikin?”
In the numb peace we lived with before you came into our lives.
He stared at her, and she held his gaze. “I took great comfort in your vow of silence,” he said at last.
After a moment her mouth twitched. “Really? I do believe you’re lying.”
“It’s true. I miss it terribly.”
“I think you’re dying to tell me what you shouted from your rock. With the inbred and the heir.”
He laughed in spite of himself. “We were convinced of the existence of the silver wolf. Legend had it that only a true warrior could kill it, and we’d build traps in the forest and play out its capture. Balthazar was the warrior, and I was his guard; Lucian the wolf, Isaboe the bait. Then we would travel to the rock and practice our sacrifice of it to the gods, shouting our intentions and faith. We’d pledge our honor to each other. We even vowed to save Lumatere.” He shook his head, thinking of the last pledge they had made together, mixed with the blood of all three.
“I would love such a rock,” she said. “It would loosen my tongue and give me the courage to say all the things I’ve never dared say.”
“And what would you say, Evanjalin? Would you damn the impostor, curse those who placed him on the throne?”
She shook her head. “I would speak my name out loud. Evanjalin of the Monts!” Her voice echoed and its volume took him by surprise. He walked to the rock’s edge, wanting to listen to it until the last echo disappeared, wanting to capture it in his hands.
“Finnikin of the Rock!” he roared, and then turned back to where she stood, her eyes blazing with excitement. “Son of Trevanion of the Lumateran River people and Bartolina of the Rock!” He beat his chest dramatically.
She laughed and stepped closer to him. “Mortal enemy of the bastard impostor!” she yelled.
He thought for a moment, then gave a nod of approval. “Trusted servant of the king’s First Man, Sir Topher of the royal court of Lumatere!”
“Follower of our beloved Balthazar!”
“Son of a man who once loved Lady Beatriss of the Lumateran Flatlands!”
“Daughter of those slaughtered in innocence!”
“Brother of one taken away before she drew her first breath!”
“Sister to those who loved her with all their heart!”
She had moved too close to the edge of the rock, and with a sharp intake of breath, he grabbed her around the waist, the strong band of his arm pressing her back into his chest. “Foolish girl,” he said almost gently, his lips close to her ear. “You could have gone over the side.”
A shudder passed through her, and then she pulled away. “We should go,” she murmured.
“Trust me, Evanjalin,” he said, holding out his hand. Trembling, she took it, and they made their way down the rock face in silence. But already he missed her voice, and when he helped her over the last of the stones, he found his finger tracing the bruise around her mouth.
“Finnikin!”
Within the hollow rock he could see the anxious figure of Sir Topher.
“We’re here, sir.”
“Don’t wander too far. You know how strange a place this is.”
At supper, Finnikin and Evanjalin ate their bread and cheese in silence while Sir Topher watched them carefully. Even the thief seemed subdued. Later, as Finnikin wrote in the Book of Lumatere, he glanced over to where she stood, distanced from them, her hands clenched at her sides. He tucked the book under his arm and walked toward her, suddenly feeling awkward, his pulse beating at an erratic speed.
“Join us,” he said quietly. “Sir Topher is telling stories of his journeys with the king.”
There was a hint of a smile on her face.
“What?” he asked defensively.
“When you speak Lumateran, your accent sings like those of the River.”
“It was either that, or rrrumbling like those from the Rock.”
She laughed, but it turned into a sob and she covered her mouth. He stepped forward and lifted her chin with his finger.
“Bend to their will, Finnikin,” she whispered. “And keep yourself alive.”
“Whose will?” he murmured, leaning his head toward her.
“Finnikin!”
The anxiousness in Sir Topher’s voice snapped him out of his trance at the same time as he heard the horses’ hooves. He turned toward the camp and saw five Sorelian soldiers riding toward them, flame sticks in their hands.
“Where is the traitor who claims to be the dead prince of Lumatere?” the one in the lead asked, dismounting.
Finnikin was stunned. Sir Topher turned to him in confusion, and in the dancing firelight Finnikin saw a trace of fear on the older man’s face. The thief from Sarnak had paled. Thieves across the land knew to keep out of the mines of Sorel.
Finnikin’s first inclination was to prot
ect the girl, and he was relieved that the soldiers were looking for an impostor of Balthazar rather than someone who knew where the heir was.
“There is no impostor among us,” Sir Topher said pleasantly. “We are Belegonian merchants eager to trade in a kingdom so rich in bounty.”
“Why accuse us of such a thing?” Finnikin asked, but the soldiers looked straight past him to where Evanjalin stood.
“Is this the one?” the soldier asked.
“She is no one,” Finnikin said firmly, blocking his path.
Then the soldier nodded and Finnikin turned, bewildered, his blood running cold.
For the novice Evanjalin had lifted her hand and was pointing a finger.
Straight in his direction.
Deep in the bowels of the mines of Sorel, the prisoner lay facing the rusted steel bars of the cave he crawled into each night. His bulky frame curled to fit the confines of the space, his body almost folded in half. He despised this witching hour, when he was at the mercy of his thoughts. Sometimes they stirred him into a madness of grief. Most times they made him want to beat his head to a pulp against the stone and end his life once and for all.
At his eye level, he watched feet being dragged along the narrow corridor outside his cage. There were fifty other cages spanning both sides of this stretch of cave. One was the holding cell for newly arrested prisoners, where they spent a week while the Sorelian authorities decided to which prison they would be sent. Most of the time, if they were young, they did not live beyond the third day.
He tried to ignore the fervor that accompanied the arrival of a new prisoner. He could tell this one was young by the heightened excitement of both prisoners and guards. New prisoners broke the monotony and delivered opportunities for the most base of men. If he allowed himself to, he would feel a sick kind of sorrow for the boy. But the prisoner had made a point to do anything but feel.
“They say he’s a fighter. Are you going to join in the play?”
The ugly face of the night guard filled his vision as the man peered into his cage. There was a tradition in the mines, where new prisoners were fought over and conquered, owned like some kind of prize, by men who had ceased to be men. Despite his massive bulk, the prisoner had not escaped the degradation of the prison mines’ traditions when he first arrived.
Another guard appeared. “You have a visitor.”
He responded with silence. It was well known among the other inmates that this prisoner did not speak. He ate. He worked. He emptied his bowels. He fought like a demon if anyone chose to make him an enemy, but he never spoke.
“Did you hear, scum from the bottom of a pit of shit? You have a visitor.”
He heard the clatter of keys, and then he was dragged out of his cage by the wild knot of hair that half-shrouded his face. At the end of the tunnel, he was thrown into a larger cell and shoved up against its damp stone wall. But still he refused to react. If there was one weapon he had against these savages, it was not acknowledging their existence.
He heard the clatter of keys again and was hauled around to see a figure enter. The lad was young, that was evident. Hair shorn to the scalp, large dark eyes. And then he realized he was not looking at a boy, but a girl dressed in the dull gray shift worn by the Lagrami novices.
The guard looked at both of them, an ugly smile plastered on his face. The girl waited for him to leave before she spoke.
“I did the minister a favor, and he offered me one in return,” she said quietly. “I told him I had a perverse interest in infamous traitors.”
It was not her words that made him flinch, but the sound of his mother tongue. It had been some years since he had heard it spoken. Not since the ambassador of Lumatere had visited him during his early days in this prison.
“They say you are the most unguarded inmate in the mines, sir. That there is no more ideal a prisoner than one who is locked up in his own prison.”
He had heard it said about him before and had marveled with bitterness at how little they knew this place. Within the caves, the thick rock and endless tunnels made it impossible to escape. If he worked outside, he was chained to at least six other inmates, usually hostile foreigners who barely understood each other.
“When they next place you on work outside the mines, you will escape and travel east until you reach the shrine to Sagrami past the last cave before the mountains. In the ravine below, you will see horses tethered.”
More silence.
“From there you take the road toward Osteria, where there are two paths, one to the town of Lannon and one to Hopetoun. Take neither. You will see a tiny lane through the woods that will lead you to a stable beside an abandoned cottage. This is where you will find us. Then we move north.”
He knew what north meant. So now they were sending the young. Was it a group of exiles? Why didn’t they tell their children that there was nothing north but the promise of death, even after all these years?
He walked over to where she stood leaning against the cage and raised his arm. She flinched. He stared down at her, then grabbed the bars above her head and rattled them to summon the guard.
“Humor me,” she said, ducking under his arms. “From here I can see the prisoner they just dragged in.” She crouched on the ground, straining to see to the end of the dark, stench-filled corridor.
The prisoner stayed where he was.
“I’ve heard a rumor,” she said quietly. “Actually, I lie. Not a rumor.” She beckoned him closer, and when he refused, she stood on her toes to whisper in his ear. “They say he’s the son of Trevanion, captain of the Lumateran Guard.”
He slammed her against the bars before either of them could take their next breath, holding her by the throat with a hand that had frequently snuffed out life. He heard a growl, low and primeval, and realized it was coming from him. Tightening his hold, he watched as her face began to change color and both her hands snaked up, trying to free herself. She shoved a knee against him, and when he stumbled back for a moment, she kicked him away from her, falling to her knees, gasping for air.
“Just the reaction I was hoping for, Captain,” she whispered fiercely, looking up. “If you fail to protect him, if you fail to set him free, I will return and cut out your tongue and then you will have a reason for silence.” She struggled to her feet. “Guard! Guard!”
“What have you done?” he asked hoarsely.
The look she gave him was pure anguish.
“What needs to be done!”
He woke the next morning having dreamed of peppermint and the wiry arms of a child wrapped around him like a monkey, refusing to let go. They would have to peel the boy off him at times, and how he would cry, this sensitive child who had not come from a line of sensitive people.
“I want to fight the boy.”
The two guards stared at him in surprise. Fighting for a new inmate was a tradition the dark-eyed Trevanion had never engaged in.
“You?”
The guards exchanged sneers, their expressions ugly. “Heard you had a visitor last night.”
The shorter of the guards leaned forward, a look of sick hunger on his face. “Did she awake in you a taste for young flesh?”
He avoided their eyes so they would misinterpret his rage for shame.
“Will you share, Trevanion?” the other asked. “The boy seems feisty enough for seconds.” The guards laughed, and for the first time since his exile from Lumatere, Trevanion’s rage pounded a rush of blood to his head.
What needs to be done, the girl had said.
This he knew. The piece of filth standing before him would be the first to die.
Then it would be her turn.
He watched the boy closely throughout the day. He was all arms and legs like his mother’s people and seemed unaccustomed to a body that had grown too fast. Although skittish, he was coiled for action, not once buckling under the weight of the coal. But Trevanion read despair in the boy’s eyes, and it chilled him to the marrow.
Later, in
one of the larger caves, the inmates lined walls trickling with water that soon would be mixed with blood. Trevanion’s only satisfaction was that he would pound senseless those who dared to want this boy. And he would do it easily. The Lumaterans of the River were the largest men in the land, and he towered over the rest of the inmates. In his early days they would come for him in packs until they realized the danger of encountering him alone.
There was an air of nervousness in the cave, and he watched an exchange between a guard and one of the Sorelian prisoners.
“They fear that your intention is to maim, Trevanion.”
“Not interested in maiming.” He spoke quietly, and the stare he directed at his potential opponents was enough to change the minds of half of those who had stepped forward.
The boy looked frightened, and Trevanion would have given anything to be able to send him some silent message of reassurance. But first he had this scum to fight, and then it would be the boy.
He fought five men that night. Blood was shed, and the sound of bones cracking and fists thumping bounced off the cave walls. The bets were low, the outcome too predictable. And then it was time for the boy. Trevanion allowed himself a moment to work out how to use his fists in a way that would not damage one so young and inexperienced. But they let the boy off the leash and he lunged for Trevanion, his fists flying. Trevanion felt the bones in his nose shatter, but before he could recover, there was another blow to his face and another to the stomach. He let himself fall, hoping to reveal himself to the boy, but then something hard connected with his chin. The kick sent him flying, and he knew that whether he wanted to or not, he was going to have to beat this pup into submission.
He returned to his feet, his fist connecting with the boy’s cheekbone. He heard the goading of those surrounding them, both prisoners and guards. He knew he could not lose, for to do so meant that someone else would fight the boy for the right to own him in a way that made Trevanion feel sick to his stomach. And so he pounded into the boy’s flesh, fighting for both their lives with an intensity that had the crowd roaring with approval. They had waited a long time to see what Trevanion of Lumatere was capable of, and they saw it this night. Yet the boy refused to yield, and Trevanion prayed to his goddess that he could hold him for a moment and let him understand.