Duskfall (35 page)

* * *

The next evening, as Winter gathered with the rest of the group, she fondled the remaining five crystals in a small pouch at her side. She glanced at Knot, who, as far as she knew, was still unaware of her psimancy. Lian eyed her, but she didn’t care. He had promised not to say anything until she was ready, and for that Winter was grateful.

Cinzia and Jane, of course, ignored her. Winter supposed they were as yet unsure how to act around tiellans who were not servants or slaves. That didn’t matter. The silly women and the goddess they worshipped were meaningless. For now, only two things mattered to Winter.

Protecting those she loved, and being sure she had enough frost to do it.

K
ALI
’
S EYES SNAPPED OPEN
.

She was in a room. The lone window was closed and shuttered; through the gaps she saw only darkness.

Kali sat up, stretching. She wasn’t sore, but her limbs felt neglected, as if she hadn’t used them in some time. Which was true.

Kali rose from the bed. She was
thirsty
. She stood, walking towards a wooden table near the window that held a jug and a small pewter cup.

She was glad of the thirst. It made her feel alive. Grateful to have found a body.

She ignored the cup and lifted the entire jug to her lips, drinking greedily. The water was lukewarm and stale and tasted ever so slightly of dust, but was delicious nonetheless. If needing water made her feel alive, drinking it in made her feel like a goddess. Water dribbled down her chin and onto her shirt, but she didn’t care. It was the most satisfying water she had ever tasted.

When she brought the jug down to take a gasping breath, her other hand instinctively moved to her chest. The note, the folded parchment, would no longer be there, of course. It had been destroyed, or might as well have been, in the Circle Square. That did not matter. She had memorized every word of it, anyway.

She would never forget.

Immediately, Kali thought of Winter. The damn girl had
killed
her. Or as good as, anyway. Murder—at least when it was committed against
her
—was not an offense that Kali took lightly. And yet Kali felt a begrudging respect for Winter.
The Harbinger
. Kali could admit it to herself now. The girl was the Harbinger. Kali had to accept what she never thought possible. To put aside the pain of her past, and actually respect the woman—tiellan or not.

The door opened behind her, but Kali didn’t turn. She knew who it would be.

“Good to see you up,” Nash said. “I was worried. You’ve never made a transfer like this one before.”

Kali drank the last of the water, then turned to face Nash. “Still returned, didn’t I?” She walked towards him. “You can’t tell me this isn’t fun for you. You get to sleep with a different woman every few months. Most men have to sneak around for that.”

Nash stared at her. Kali moved towards him, feeling the sway of her hips, the grain of the wood beneath her feet, the air itself around her, between her body and the large, loose shirt she wore. The only thing she wore.

She looked in the mirror, catching the briefest glimpse of herself. Her hair was blond. She was shorter than she’d been before, and younger. Elation thrilled through her. Kali always felt most herself directly after a transition.
Thanks, Elsi
, Kali thought with a smile. Elsi had obviously taken care of the body when she had inhabited it.

When Kali had first branded her sift—her soul, essentially—onto a lacuna, she had been terrified. But the act had been necessary; her old body, her original body, was dying, and dying quickly. There had been no choice. Since that first transition, the change had gotten easier. Now, she felt herself again, or as close to it as she would ever be. She was thin, lithe, supple. Her hair long and blond. Her skin smooth, pale in the darkness.

It excited her.

“I’m back, now,” she said, snaking her hand behind Nash, pulling him close. “Don’t worry—I know you’ve been with someone else, and it’s all right. I understand.” She kissed his neck, letting her warm breath flow across his skin. “To be honest,” she said, her hand crawling beneath his clothes, “it only makes me want you all the more.”

She yearned to be with him, in her chest and between her legs. She led him to the bed, unable to keep the smile from her face. Things couldn’t have worked out better if she’d planned them. They had business to take care of, of course. But, for once, business could wait. She and Nash would follow Winter, and Lathe, to Roden. There, they would end this. Her business with Lathe would conclude. And her business with Winter…

Kali smiled as Nash kissed down her neck, down and down. She had a feeling her business with Winter was just beginning.

W
INTER COULDN
’
T HELP BUT
notice that entering Roden seemed much easier than leaving Khale.

Knot had explained that Roden’s military strategy was very different from Khale’s. While Khale focused their defense on the main accessible pass across the stone mountains, Roden concentrated on defending their main cities and outposts, and on maintaining their navy. Roden’s tactics sounded more sensible to Winter. The Blood and Roden Gates were intimidating, but what was the point when they were so easily bypassed by ships? “Products of different ages,” Knot had said. Winter wondered how he knew such information, but hadn’t asked.

They had reached the top of the Sorensan Pass yesterday afternoon, which, compared to the jutting rock peaks around them, had not seemed like much of a feat. The road was long, however, and they had been forced to camp alongside it that evening. Better than camping at the peaks of the mountains, Knot had said, or even at the top of the pass, but it was still very cold despite their blankets and furs, and the fire they had made.

They had set up camp between two massive rows of
rihnemins
lining either side of the road. The great stone monuments had towered above them, reaching high into the night air. Once again Lian had deferentially walked up to one of the stones and placed his hand on it. No one else had seemed to know the site’s significance, although Winter had caught Knot glancing at the stones more than once. Winter had not acknowledged the
rihnemins
, despite the sense of protection they gave her. She had felt an overpowering sensation that they would be safe. But she had resented the stones for that feeling. She could protect herself. She did not need a bunch of stupid stones. She knew it was silly, getting worked up, but she didn’t care. It had only been a feeling; the stones could do nothing for her, not really.

Although there had been no storm that night, and everyone seemed to agree they were fortunate in that regard.

The path down from the Sorensan Pass seemed significantly longer than the path that had led up to it, but they finally made their way into the foothills of the Sorensan Mountains. Roden’s territory. The mountain trail grew less steep. Winter’s body still ached as she trudged down the rocky path, but in general she felt much better. The priestess, Cinzia, tried to ask after her health, but Winter ignored the inquiries. She was sure her pain and weariness were the result of what had happened in Navone, of taking a full dose of frost. But she couldn’t explain that to anyone else, least of all the priestess.

“So this is Roden,” Lian said, looking around. The land was strikingly different than on the other side of the mountains. Navone was mostly surrounded by bare, snow-covered tundra, and he and Winter had grown up on the windswept winter plains around Cineste.

But Roden… Winter marveled at how green it was. Mostly the dark green of pine forests, but the snow had begun to melt in a few patches, revealing emerald, grassy hills. In Khale, everything was white. To the east she saw the blue-gray tint of the Gulf of Nahl, and from their vantage point in the foothills she could make out a river in the distance, and a few towns here and there. It was all surprisingly beautiful.

“This is Roden,” Knot replied.

“I don’t know why, but this isn’t what I expected Roden to look like,” Astrid said in a whisper. The girl’s cloak hid her face.

“You’ve never been here before?” Winter asked.

“Nope.” Astrid turned, and Winter felt the thing’s weird eyes on her. “Just because I’ve been around for a while doesn’t mean I’ve been everywhere under the sun.”

Winter laughed nervously, hoping she’d imagined the sharpness in the vampire’s voice. Astrid made Winter nervous. She felt like the thing could see into her soul, as if she knew her secrets.
You can trust her or not. It will either turn out okay in the end, or you’ll wake up one night to find her teeth buried in your neck.

All the same, Winter wasn’t convinced there was much of a difference between trusting the vampire or the priestess, or Jane, or the Goddessguard, for that matter.

Winter looked at Knot, wondering what secrets he hid. She certainly hid her fair share from him.
Perhaps, in the end, trusting a daemon isn’t all that different from trusting him.

Winter and the vampire had one thing in common, at least: they both hated Canta. Winter glanced at the priestess, walking with her head held high. So
obviously
noble. Cinzia had been nothing but kind to Winter since Navone, constantly checking up on her, offering her skills as a physician, but somehow that made things worse. She was a noble human—she must hate tiellans, deep down—
and
she was a priestess. Not to mention the fact that she was stunning. The woman’s wide, green eyes were far more sultry than any priestess’s eyes had a right to be, and her reddish-brown hair fell thick and wavy around her shoulders. When the woman smiled, her entire stupid face seemed to light up. Jane was pretty, with long blond hair and deep blue eyes. Winter thought herself pretty, from time to time. But Cinzia was beautiful.

A noble, a priestess,
and
beautiful. Three things that Winter despised, rolled into one. Winter might have to befriend Astrid on those grounds alone.

“Makes you wonder why they’re always trying to invade Khale when they have this kind of beauty surrounding them,” Jane said.

“They ain’t always the ones trying to invade,” Knot said quietly.

“Roden is always the one to attack Khale,” Cinzia said. “They think we are inferior, that we stole the seat of their empire. They hate us.”

“Roden’s hardly an empire anymore,” Knot said. “Other than the Island Coalition and Andrinar, Roden ain’t got many territories left to rule—and Andrinar’s all but independent already. Calling Roden an empire is wishful thinking at best. And I wouldn’t believe all you hear in histories, Priestess. Or in the Cantic seminary for that matter. Roden ain’t always the one to strike first.” He turned and continued down the path through the foothills. “Let’s go,” he barked. “Lot of ground to cover if we want to sleep in an inn tonight.”

The others followed him. Cinzia, Jane, and Kovac stuck together. The three kept to themselves, for the most part. Winter wondered if she would ever get used to having them around.

The truth was, she couldn’t imagine this group ever getting along. Humans and tiellans, vampire and priestess. A husband and wife that barely said one word to each other. Even Cinzia and Jane seemed to harbor some kind of resentment for one another.

Which made Winter feel a bit better about hiding her own secrets. Only Lian knew what she really was, and he avoided her at every opportunity. His concern wasn’t lost on her, though. Winter had wondered, once or twice during the night, whether she wasn’t relying on
faltira
too much. She didn’t want to end up like those people on the street in Cineste or Navone.

But she couldn’t go back to who she had been.

Almost of its own accord, her hand reached down to the pouch that held the frost. Four crystals left. She would use one tonight, she was sure of it. Not using one right now was taking every ounce of self-discipline she could muster. She was tempted to slip one in her mouth anyway, despite the lack of any real need.

As she felt the small crystals through the cloth, the feeling of unease all but vanished. She looked at Knot. She couldn’t tell him, not yet; he might try to take them away from her.

She would tell him, eventually.

But it didn’t have to be tonight.

* * *

Rock walls, high and thick, surrounded the city of Tir, and as they approached they realized they would have to enter through a large, well-protected gate.

Winter had said she didn’t care about wandering into Roden. But now, as she approached the gates, the thin hood she drew up around her face and ears did not seem enough protection.

What in Oblivion had she been thinking?

She had shed her shabby tiellan dress, at least, which had been easier than she had expected. She now wore the outfit Kali had bought for her: padded dark leather trousers that hugged her legs, and a dark leather jerkin and shirt. Winter did not mind the clothing itself, but she had shed her
siara
as well, and that more than anything made her feel naked. The wind bit at her neck, and Winter resisted the urge to touch the bare skin. But they were in Roden, and no one could know that she and Lian were tiellan—he wasn’t wearing his
araif
, either, and they both kept their hoods drawn.