CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The camp lay within sight of Saruna Tor, its swell like the hip of a curvaceous woman rising from the flat plain that surrounded it. White menhirs decorated its peak, gleaming dully in the frosted moonlight.
Ildiko sat cross-legged on a thick horse blanket near the entrance of the tent she shared with Brishen. Sinhue sat on one side of her and Anhuset on the other, all three sharing a pot of hot tea as they watched the gathering of men at another fire across the camp. Quereci, Beladine and a single Kai crouched in a makeshift circle, passing flasks back and forth as they threw dice between them. Cheers alternated with groans and as winnings and losses traded hands in unending bets.
Anhuset was the first to speak, keeping her voice soft so as not to disturb the Elsod and masods who slept in the tent nearby. “You still won’t be able to hear them no matter how hard you stare.”
Ildiko harrumphed and huddled deeper in her cloak. “I don’t want to hear them. They’re planning the details of their deaths and doing it as if they’re betting on a horse race and picking the best odds. I think they’ve emptied a barrel of wine between them. And they’re dicing!”
Their party had left Saggara and reached Saruna Tor in a day. Ildiko batted away Brishen’s halfhearted suggestion that she stay behind and set to packing warm clothes for a long day’s ride and a night spent out on the plains. Her hands shook as she and Sinhue folded and stuffed clothes into satchels. Soon, Brishen would transform into something otherworldly and ride to battle against something so loathsome, it polluted the earth on which it roamed. She’d been queasy for hours knowing what loomed ahead.
Anhuset’s questions pulled her from her thoughts. “How else would you have them do it? Sit there wringing their hands and tearing their hair?”
Why not? It worked for Ildiko. “I don’t know,” she said. “It just seems strange.”
The Quereci, Gaeres, suddenly leapt to his feet and did an impromptu celebratory jig, cheered on by his men who had accompanied them from Saggara. Serovek slapped the ground with his palm, mouthing a scorchingly vulgar word even Ildiko, from her distant spot, could easily interpret.
Brishen’s cousin snickered. “I’ll wager the Stallion just lost a prized pony or saddle.” She eyed Ildiko askance. “This is the eve of a battle. Of the four men who will face the galla, only two know each other as more than brief acquaintances. They’ll have to depend on each other in the worst circumstances, trust that each will have the other’s back against things that felled a capital and devoured half its citizens in a single night. This is a way for them to learn about their fellow warrior, build trust and assure themselves they aren’t alone in this task.”
Sage words from a seasoned fighter. Anhuset had always fascinated Ildiko, never more so than now. “How did you prepare before you fought?”
The other woman gave a half shrug. “Much as they’re doing now. Diced for a treasure, drank good wine with friends. Swived a well-hung Kai soldier all night.”
“I can’t speak for the rest, but the only person Brishen will be swiving tonight is me.” She grinned at Sinhue’s choked laughter and Anhuset’s startlement . The warrior woman matched Ildiko’s grin with a pointed one of her own.
“Wouldn’t it have been better to conserve your strength and rest?” Ildiko mused after a moment.
“I’ll sleep long and hard when I’m dead. You defy death by celebrating life.”
It was a down-to-earth philosophy to which Ildiko could relate. She sought out and found Brishen, bent to toss a handful of dice into the middle of the circle. He groaned while a smiling Megiddo thumped his chest with a triumphant fist. The nearby campfire planished his hair in flickering shades of deep red and silver. Her lingering amusement faded away. “Are you afraid for him?”
Anhuset didn’t answer right away. Patterns of pale and darker yellow swirled in her eyes. “We’ve known each other all our lives. My first memory is of his face. My guts haven’t stopped churning since the Elsod revealed what he would have to do to send the galla back.”
“I wish I could take his place.” She wouldn’t have a clue about what to do, but she’d seen his broad shoulders bow at of what lay before him.
“You’ll carry your own burden while he’s gone.” Anhuset glanced at Sinhue who sat nearby, listening, and shrugged. “Bast-Haradis shudders in its death throes. It’s only a matter of time before Belawat and Gaur start circling its carcass. You have to hold this kingdom together for Brishen so there’s something for him to rule when he comes back.” Her gaze, wolfish and piercing, froze Ildiko in place. “Do you think you’re strong enough?”
How easy it would be to proclaim an absolute affirmative. Brishen had named her regent and put a sejm in place that, along with a military troop under Anhuset’s and Mertok’s command, was fiercely loyal to him. But such measures worked only temporarily, and rebellion often bred fast and hot under such circumstances, fed by those who thirsted for their own power.
“I hope I am,” she admitted to Anhuset. “But I’ll lean hard on you. On Mertok. On every Kai who owes their allegiance to Brishen.”
Anhuset picked up a piece of kindling and drew symbols in the thin layer of snow at her feet. “That’s a given. There isn’t a Kai serving in Saggara who wouldn’t die for him.”
“I believe that, but it’s me they’ll see in Saggara’s great hall, not Brishen.”
“He’s named you regent. In our eyes, you are Brishen Khaskem until he returns.”
“What if I fail?”
Anhuset dropped the twig and swiveled to face Ildiko. “You can’t fail,” she said flatly. “Neither can he.”
They fell silent, each lost in thought until Serovek looked their way and gave Anhuset a slow wink. Ildiko watched as the woman’s spine went stiff as a broom handle. “He’s enchanted with you, I think.”
“He’s annoying,” Anhuset said on a growl. “And human.” As if nothing could be more repulsive.
“I’m human.” Ildiko pressed her lips together to hold back her laughter at the glare she received.
“You aren’t winking at me or staring at my arse every time I walk past.”
“Oh ho, you noticed that, did you?” Ildiko chose not to mention that she’d caught Anhuset eyeing Serovek’s admittedly attractive backside more than a few times in return.
Anhuset gave a disgusted snort. “Brishen with both eyes patched would notice. His Lordship isn’t exactly subtle.”
Ildiko picked up the twig the Kai woman cast aside and scrawled a lazy design of her own in the snow beyond her blanket. “I’ll wager,” she drawled, “that if anyone could remind you about the celebration of life on the eve of a battle, it would be the Beladine Stallion.”
Anhuset sprang to her feet in one lithe motion. “I’m going to check the horses,” she said, a darker blush painting her high cheekbones. She gave Ildiko both a scowl and short bow. “By your leave, my Lady Queen.” She stalked off toward the horses, corralled in a makeshift pen set away from the fires.
Ildiko watched her leave. Beside her, Sinhue spoke. “For all her bluster and prowess, she’s an innocent in many ways.”
Serovek suddenly rose from his seat amidst the betting crowd and sauntered away, toward the horse pen. Ildiko gave a low whistle. “A Gauri court maiden on the hunt couldn’t have planned that better.”
“Nor a Kai one,” the servant replied. “Yet sha-Anhuset has no clue what’s she’s done.” She and Ildiko exchanged smiles.
Ildiko stayed outside until her eyes grew heavy. They had ridden through the day, changing their sleep schedules to accommodate the larger human contingent in their party. Ildiko had enjoyed the winter sun on her face, the blue dome of sky above her. She rode with her hood down, ignoring how the cold made her ears burn.
Brishen, riding beside her, had smiled at her from the depths of his hood and reached over to gently tap the tip of her nose. “You look as if you’ve taken another dip into a dye vat. Red nose, red cheeks and chin.”
 
; Unconcerned by the stain of cold and sun on her face, she smiled. “The Mollusk Queen who married the Eel King.” A mismatch if there ever was one, but for them, somehow, it worked.
Sinhue undid her laces before Ildiko sent her off to her to the tent pitched next to theirs. Their travel to the tor required speed, and they had packed light. Warm clothing, weaponry, armor and two tents—a small one for Ildiko and Brishen and a larger one for Sinhue to share with the Elsod and masods who accompanied them. Ildiko knew were it not for her presence, Brishen would have been perfectly content to sleep outside.
“I can sleep outdoors, Brishen,” she had argued as they readied for their trip. “You can keep me warm enough.”
“Indulge me, Ildiko.” Brishen glided a hand across her backside as he passed her to retrieve personal items from a chest. “I’ll welcome the privacy of a tent. I’d like to fondle my wife without a dozen pair of eyes watching.” She didn’t argue after that.
For now, she was alone in their temporary shelter and dove under the blankets, still wearing her woolen shift and thick stockings. She draped her heavy cloak over the covers for extra warmth and burrowed under the mound until she was completely covered. Sleeping under the stars in winter was madness. Thank the gods they had brought the tent.
She was still awake and poked her head out of her makeshift cocoon when Brishen entered the tent. “Tell me you didn’t gamble away your horse and armor.”
Their tent was pitched far enough away from the fire for safety, but close enough that its glow painted one canvas wall, illuminating the interior enough that she could see more of him than a black silhouette. He laughed and began unlacing and unclasping his own garb. “No. Though I lost a barrel of wine to Megiddo.”
Remembering Anhuset’s words about the building of trust, she asked “Do you truly think they can help you?”
He sat down beside her to remove his boots and shed his trousers. Ildiko admired the length of long, muscled legs, the sleek gray skin pebbled with gooseflesh. “Of Serovek, I have no doubts. The other two?” He shrugged. “Who can say? They have their reasons for being here, reasons that have nothing to do with the Kai. But they’re committed to this task, and that’s all I can ask of them.”
Unlike her, he slid under the blankets, naked. Ildiko snuggled against him, shivering at the touch of cold seeping from his skin and through her gown. “You should wait until I warm up a little,” he said.
She slung an arm across his chest and wrapped her legs around one of his, tangling them both in her shift. “I don’t mind. You feel good.”
He hugged her close, clawed fingers ghosting lightly down her back from shoulder to waist. “I thought you’d be asleep.”
“So did I, but I’m not as sleepy as I thought I’d be.” Dread of the following day’s events kept her wide awake and edgy. “Brishen—”
She wondered if he somehow had learned to read her thoughts when he said “Shhh. Let’s speak of something else. The time for the ritual will be here soon enough, and I’m sick of talking about it.
“What do you want to talk about?”
“How about our wedding day?”
She raised her head to peer at him. Obscured by darkness, his features were nothing more than the paling and deepening of shadow, offset by a single yellow eye that glowed bright in the gloom. “Which part?” she said. “When we thought the Gauri and the Kai would attack each other across the aisles? Or when your own people contemplated your murder after you commanded they eat Gauri victuals?”
A brief glimmer of ivory teeth before his smile disappeared into shadow. “Neither, though I’m lucky to still be alive after the wedding supper. I’d rather talk about when we first met in the garden.”
This was indeed a much better topic to discuss than Wraith Kings. The weight pressing on her heart eased. “Ah. When I told you I would have bludgeoned you had I seen you in my room. Very romantic. At the time I fancied myself a most unfortunate bride. Marrying a stranger who wasn’t even human.” She kissed his shoulder. “How wrong was I, and how glad I am for it.”
“But you aren’t wrong, wife. I’m not human.”
“You know what I mean.”
A faint tug on her scalp told her he’d lifted a lock of her hair. “I recall you standing in the sunlight, pale as a bleached fish bone and this hair gleaming red. I thought your head was on fire.”
She chuckled. “And I was sure someone had set loose a two-legged wolf in the garden, teeth and claws and yellow eyes. I think my heart stopped for a moment when you slid back your hood.”
“That’s because I’m breathtakingly handsome,” he bragged in smirking tones.
Ildiko nipped his shoulder this time, making him twitch. “And obviously vain.”
“The gods were surely laughing at my predicament. I know my mother did when my father announced I was to wed a Gauri noblewoman.”
Ildiko tried to sit up at that, but Brishen held her in place. “That makes no sense,” she said. “She was ashamed of my marrying into your family. She certainly didn’t seem too jolly about the whole event when we met.”
He continued petting her hair and stroked her leg and hip with his other hand. “Secmis always found delight in someone else’s misery or discomfiture, even if she disapproved of what caused it.”
“Well that female scarpatine under my bed linens certainly showed her disapproval.” She frowned, picturing his mother poised on her throne like a spider waiting to ambush prey. “Didn’t you say you wanted to talk about something more pleasant?”
He kissed her forehead in mute apology. “You’ll never know how relieved I was when I discovered that the mollusk girl I’d spoken with in the gardens was the Ildiko I would marry.”
“Oh, I have a fair idea. I felt much the same about you. Eel boy.”
Brishen laughed, tickling her side until she squealed and begged him to stop. They quieted once more. “Want to know when I first fell a little in love with you?”
“When I didn’t faint from fright after meeting Secmis?” She’d come close, practically falling into Brishen’s arms when they escaped the throne room.
“That was impressive. No cowering subject before her, but no.” He tugged the blanket over her shoulder where it had fallen away. “It was when you ate the scarpatine and declared it tasted nothing like chicken.”
She sniffed. “Then you’re easily impressed. I don’t think I fell in love with you just because you choked down a potato. Granted, you didn’t have to engage it in battle before you ate it.”
‘You’re hard to please.”
She thumped his chest above his sternum. “I am not.”
“Ouch.” He rubbed the injured spot.
She took up the thread of the conversation. “I’m certain I fell in love with you when you carried Talumey’s mortem light back to his mother. It might seem a small thing to you, but you gifted a grieving woman with one last connection to her child and a chance to say goodbye.”
That had truly been the moment when she realized how fortunate she was to call the Kai prince “husband.” He had his faults, as did she, as did everyone, but the decision to subject himself to mortem sickness and carry back the memories of a fallen soldier under his command to his mother had given Ildiko a deep insight into his character, beyond courtship skills and martial prowess, beyond intellect and the status of birthright. He was a truly kind man.
Brishen suddenly shifted, rolling Ildiko until she stretched atop him. Strands of her hair fell across his face and stuck to his lips until she tucked them behind her ear. This close, and she could make out the angles of his cheekbones and generous curve of his mouth, the scarred socket where his left eye had once filled the space. She feathered kisses across the scars, over the bridge of his nose to his right eye which closed under her touch.
“If you were granted one wish, what would you wish for?” he whispered.
She pulled back to stare at him. For some reason the question frightened her, a desire spoken before a death sentence
. “Why would you ask that?”
His brow furrowed. “Your heartbeat just changed. Why are you afraid, Ildiko? I’m only curious.”
Ildiko lowered her head until her forehead rested against his chest. “It sounds final. So final.”
He stroked her hair, tugging to coax her into looking at him once more. The yellow of his eye shone soft as candle glow, and a corner of his mouth curved upward. “It isn’t. It will be a goal for me to attain.” Both hands rested heavy on her back. “Tell me.”
She swallowed hard past the knot of tears lodged in her throat and blinked hard to clear them from her vision. “I wish…” She inhaled and started again. “I wish for you to grow old with me.”
He shifted a second time, sliding her beneath him until he lay heavy and warm on her from ankles to shoulders. “That’s a good wish,” he whispered in her ear. And I’ll do everything in my power to grant it.”
He kissed her then, the slow, careful teasing of lips and tongues that led to languid caresses and soon the frantic rustle of clothing and blankets. They made love in the waning hours, trading endearments and promises neither could guarantee they’d keep. She cried out his name into his palm and hugged him until her arms ached as he rocked against her and groaned wordless praise into her neck.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“Holy gods, look at all those people.” Kirgipa stopped in her tracks to gawk at the sight before her. Kai in the procession from Escariel eddied around her in a steady stream as they made their way to Saggara’s gates.
They joined what looked like thousands of their countrymen already camped on the plain surrounding the garrison as well as in the stand of young woodland at its entrance. The air itself was warmer from the mass of people huddled in such close quarters. Every blade of dropseed grass that once surrounded the garrison was flattened or dead, leaving behind a soggy morass continuously churned by feet, hooves and wagon wheels.
Necos nudged her. “Keep walking, little maid. We won’t get to the gates by standing here.”