Daughter of Moth (The Moth Saga, Book 4) (4 page)

Torin nodded glumly. "I
feel the same way. Children. They ruin your life, don't they?"

Cam groaned. "You're
getting rid of yours soon! I still have one at home." He drained
his ale and ordered another drink. When the serving girl had left, he
spoke in a lower voice. "Torin, there's another reason I came
here. I knew you'd accompany Madori here, and I wanted to speak with
you."

Torin raised an eyebrow. "How
did you know it wouldn't be Koyee taking Madori here?"

The king snorted. "I saw
Madori and Koyee interact enough times; the two would kill each other
on the road. No. I knew it would be you here. Torin, there's trouble.
Trouble back home. Trouble here. Trouble all over the sunlit half of
Moth."

Torin blew out his breath. "Tell
me about it. We ran into some trouble on the road here. Radians."
He grimaced; the word tasted foul in his mouth. "I crossed paths
with Lord Serin, my cousin. He's one of them."

Cam
barked a mirthless laugh. "
One
of them? Torin, my boy, he's their
leader
.
His fort rises right on the border with Arden, and his disciples are
spreading through my kingdom, spewing their bile. They opened a
chapter right in Kingswall—in the capital, Torin!—just a short walk
from the palace." Cam placed down his mug as if the ale had
turned into mud. "The words they speak . . . by Idar, they
remind me of you-know-who."

Torin nodded. "I was
thinking the same thing. I thought we got rid of that rubbish in the
war."

Cam sighed. "Pluck one
weed, another rises. If I've learned anything from sitting on the
throne, it's this: Fighting ignorance is like fighting weeds—an
eternal battle." He clasped Torin's arm. "My friend, I came
here to warn you. Koyee is in danger. Madori is in danger, maybe even
within the walls of Teel. You're in danger; the Radians see you too
as an enemy. By the Abyss, we're all in danger from these fanatics."

A chill ran down Torin's spine.
"Idar's Beard, how serious are these Radians? Will they turn to
violence?"

"They already have."
Cam winced. "Last month in Kingswall. A convoy of Elorian
merchants entered the city, selling silk and silverware. The local
Radian chapter hung them dead from trees and burned their wares,
accusing them of stealing work from honest Timandrians. I found the
Radians who did it; those bastards rot in my dungeon now. But more
keep crawling across the kingdom. Torin, this is serious. And I need
you to listen carefully." Cam leaned closer, staring at Torin.
"Send Koyee into the night for now. Madori too, if you can talk
sense into her. But you, Torin—I need you with me in the capital."

Torin laughed mirthlessly. "The
capital? Cam, you know I don't belong in Kingswall."

"I know. But neither do
these Radians. Many in Kingswall respect you, the hero of the war,
Sir Torin Greenmoat. I need you to stand at my side, not a gardener
but a great lord. I need you to preach peace and acceptance and
counter Serin's rhetoric."

Torin had thought his spirits
couldn't sink any lower. He stared glumly into his drink. "We've
had peace for seventeen years, Cam. But now . . . this feels like the
old days."

Suddenly he missed Bailey so
much it stabbed his chest. If his old friend were here, she'd know
what to do. She'd shout, pound the bar, and probably rush out to find
and kill Serin right away. She had led their little group in the last
war. If violence flared again, how would Torin fight it—older, his
dearest friend gone, his own daughter in peril?

"Will you come with me,
Torin?" Cam said, not breaking his stare. "I need you—not
in your gardens by the dusk but in the heart of our kingdom. I can't
face this alone."

Torin
closed his eyes. He hadn't seen Koyee in almost a month, and he
missed her so badly he hurt. How could he send her into the darkness
while he stayed in the light? Again Serin's words echoed in his mind:
The creatures of
darkness will cower before us.

Torin
opened his eyes and nodded. "Of course, Cam. Of course."

 
 
CHAPTER THREE:
SON OF SHADOW

They
rode through the sunlit forest, three people of darkness upon three
black panthers.

Jitomi
tugged the hood lower over his head, his eyes darting. Mottles of
light fell between the trees, stinging whenever they hit his skin.
His cloak was heavy, his hood was wide, and the forest canopy was
thick, but still the light hurt. It baked his back and stung his
eyes—large Elorian eyes the size of chicken eggs, eyes made for the
shadows of endless night.

Not
for this place,
he
thought.
Not the
eternal daylight of Timandra.

He
grimaced, stroked the panther he rode on, and looked at his
companions. His sister, Nitomi, wore tight-fitting black silk—the
outfit of the dojai, assassins and spies trained in the night. Over
them she wore a cotton cloak and hood, a garment purchased in the
daylight. Two straps crisscrossed her chest, and many tantō
daggers hung upon them. More blades hung from her hips, and throwing
stars were clasped to her legs. A diminutive woman—halfway into her
thirties but still small as a child—she looked at him, her large
blue eyes gleaming, and grinned.

"Are
you excited, little brother? I bet you are. I bet you're so excited
you can't even talk so much, because the excitement is squishing all
your words in your throat, but I don't have that problem! I'm so
excited for you too, so much I can hop!" She hopped upon her
panther. "Soon you'll be a real mage with real magic! Unless you
want to turn back. We can turn back if you like, go back into
darkness, and you can become a dojai like me, an assassin of shadows.
We don't have magic, it's true, but—"

"We
keep going," Jitomi said, interrupting her. He had been living
with Nitomi for all his sixteen years; the only way to converse with
her, he knew, was to interrupt a lot. His sister was twice his
age—she had even fought in the great War of Day and Night alongside
the heroes Koyee and Torin—but still had the heart of a child. "We
don't turn back."

And
yet a part of him did want to turn back. A part of him feared this
land of daylight. He had been only a babe when the Timandrians had
invaded his homeland of Eloria. The sunlit demons had marched into
the shadows with blades, with torches, and with dark magic. Jitomi
had grown up seeing the scars of that magic upon the warriors of
Ilar, his island homeland in the darkness.

His
nine sisters—Nitomi the eldest among them—were either dojai
assassins or steel-clad warriors in Ilar's army. Yet what use were
blades against magic? In the war, so many Ilari soldiers—brave,
strong men all in steel—had fallen to the sunlit mages. His father
had hoped that Jitomi—the family's youngest child and only
boy—would become a great warrior, an heir to their fortress. But
Jitomi had disappointed his father, had spat upon the family
tradition, had left their castle in the darkness and journeyed here
into the light . . . to find Teel University. To find the secrets of
power.

"Qato
blind," said the third rider, voice plaintive.

Jitomi
turned to look at the man—if a man he was. His cousin, Qato, seemed
more like one of the mythical giants of ancient days. While Nitomi
was small—shorter than five feet—Qato stood seven feet tall, wide
and stony as a cliff face. His panther, the largest of the beasts
found in Ilar's wilderness, grunted under the weight. Normally
bare-chested, even in the cold of night, here in daylight Qato wore a
thick robe and hood, hiding himself from the sun. A massive katana,
large as a pike, hung across his back. His eyes were narrowed to
slits in the daylight, even this mottled daylight of the forest.

Jitomi
rode his panther closer to his cousin. He patted Qato's knee. "We're
almost there. Then you and Nitomi can return home. Soon you'll be
back in the darkness."

Of
course, home lay a two moons' ride away, but Qato needed all the
encouragement he could get.

As
for me,
Jitomi thought
with a sigh,
I won't be
returning home for a while, not if I'm admitted to Teel.
He looked up at the sky, wincing in a beam of light that fell between
the branches.
The
university studies are four years long . . . four years in this
strange light of endless day and heat and life everywhere.

As
much as the light seemed strange, the life that filled Timandra was
even stranger. Eloria was a land of rock, water, and starlight, but
here—here the entire landscape was made of life. Blades of grass
grew under the panthers' feet, tiny creatures that survived even when
stepped upon. Trees grew from the soil, giant creatures with rustling
green hair. Birds and small furry animals crawled upon the trees like
parasites, scuttling, crying, squawking. Jitomi had been in Timandra
for two moons now, and while he was starting to get used to the
sunlight—he could tolerate it with his cloak and hood—seeing life
everywhere still seemed so strange. He had learned that not all these
creatures were animals; many of them were called "plants,"
and they had no thoughts, no feelings, no sense of pain—much like
the mushrooms back in Eloria but far taller and grander. Eloria had
no plants, and still Jitomi struggled to distinguish between them and
the strange animals of this place. To him it was all a surreal dream,
an endless menagerie—life beneath, around, and above him.

He
passed his fingers along his neck, up his cheek, and over his brow. A
dragon tattoo coiled there, rising from collarbone to forehead.
Jitomi could not see the tattoo, but he could imagine that he felt
the inked scales.

Protect
me here, Tianlong, black dragon of Ilar,
he thought.
Lend me
some of your strength.

"Qato
homesick," moaned the giant dojai.

"Me
too, cousin," said Jitomi with a sigh.

Little
Nitomi bounced in her saddle. "Not me! Not at all. I was so
bored back in Eloria. It's so boring in the darkness what with all
those boring shadows and boring stars and boring . . . well, that's
all there is in Eloria, isn't it? Shadows and stars. That's why it's
so boring! I love the daylight. It's an adventure! I love adventures.
I once went on an adventure with Koyee, have I told you? We went to a
distant island of secrets, and we saw a monster—a real monster with
four arms!—and there were giant weaveworms who boiled their babies,
and—"

"Qato
knows!" moaned the giant.

Jitomi
nodded. "Yes, sister, you've told us that story ten times this
turn already."

"I
can't help it!" The little woman was still hopping. "It's
the best story I have, and—"

"Sister,
look." Jitomi pointed between the trees and down a hillside. "I
think we're finally here."

They
rode a little farther, and the last trees parted. Grassy hills rolled
in full sunlight toward a valley and farmlands. Past flowery meadows
lay a town of many houses, a columned temple, and a walled complex
containing towers and domes.

"Teel
University," Jitomi whispered.

The
panthers bristled and growled; creatures of darkness, they still
feared open daylight. Jitomi dismounted and stroked his beast.

"Qato,
will you stay here with the panthers?" he asked his cousin.
"They're strong and noble animals, but they still fear the
daylight. Let them remain in the cover of the forest."

The
giant nodded. "Qato stay."

Jitomi
smiled thinly. In truth, he worried more about Qato than the
panthers; he had never seen his cousin so miserable.

Nitomi
bounced off her mount. "I'm not staying! I'm going right with
you. I bet we'll find another adventure down there. Do you think they
have weaveworms? Do they have weaveworms in the daylight? Did I tell
you about the time I traveled to the island with Koyee, and we saw
weaveworms, and we saw a
real
monster with many arms, and—"

Jitomi
placed a finger against her lips. "I think we better not speak
of weaveworms and monsters here. The locals might think we're
strange."

She
nodded knowingly and clamped her palms over her mouth. She spoke in a
muffled voice. "Okay!"

Leaving
Qato and the panthers, the siblings began to walk downhill, their
hoods pulled over their heads, their cloaks shielding their skin from
the light. Jitomi sighed. Even without his sister prattling on about
giant worms, the siblings seemed strange enough in this land. Jitomi
had seen many Timandrians over the past two moons of travel: they
were a tall, wide people, their skin bronzed, their hair dark, their
eyes small. Jitomi was an Elorian, born and bred in darkness; his
skin was milky white, his hair silvery and smooth, his eyes large and
gleaming, his ears wide, his body thin.

I'm
as strange to Timandrians as trees, grass, and sunlight are to me,
he thought. He had to crush an instinct to turn back, to race home to
Eloria. He had come this far, seeking the secrets of magic; those
secrets lay in the valley below. He would be strong. He would not
turn back. If he ever returned to Eloria, it would be as a mage.

They
walked down the sunny hillside, found a pebbly path, and took it
through the meadow. Many flowers—Jitomi wished he knew their
names—swayed on either side, and small animals—furry creatures with
long ears—raced away from his feet. When they finally reached the
town and Jitomi stepped onto its cobbled streets, he lost his breath.

Towns
in Ilar, his island of the night, were places of stone and fire,
their black pagodas rising into the starry sky, their braziers
crackling, their banners streaming in the moonlight like birds
seeking flight. They were places of silence, of dark dignity, of a
solemn beauty like crystal caves or underwater ruins. But here, in
Teelshire, he found a town that spun his head—a place of endless
color, sunlight, and life. Flowers bloomed in gardens. People wore
not the dark silk of his homeland but colorful tunics and robes of
cotton, wool, and fur. Stained-glass windows glittered upon the
houses, and red tiles shone in the sunlight.