The Crimson League (The Herezoth Trilogy) (3 page)

BOOK: The Crimson League (The Herezoth Trilogy)
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“You look awful,” said her mother, when they set to weave again.

“I’m just tired. It’s that time of the afternoon.”

“You should rest.”

“A little sunlight would do me better. You’ll be needing more thread by week’s end, I’ll go buy a couple spools.”

Kora left the house again, this time in the direction of the general store. Zacry was coming up the road to meet her, on time for once. His face was red and his expression a scowl; Kora started to look at him.

“What happened?” she demanded. He turned his back to her, and she gasped to see bloodstains on his shirt, across his shoulder blade; he lifted the fabric to expose a long but shallow cut, then dropped it almost instantly as the wind must have stung his wound. Kora spun him around, her hands shaking.

“Guess what Old Man Gared taught this morning?” Zacry asked.

His sister stumbled over her tongue. “He’s not…. Zac, he’s not that old. Did he do that?”

“The Revolt. That was the lesson, the Sorcerer’s Revolt. He called Hansrelto an activist and a pioneer. I called Mr. Gared a liar, and he whipped me with a branch, a jagged one. Hansrelto noble…. Everyone knows what that monster was! He was Zalski before Zalski, he just failed is all!”

Kora felt sick to her stomach, too sick to comment on her brother’s revelations. “Go inside. Straight to your room. Hide that shirt and don’t bother Mother with this, she worries enough, do you hear me?”

Zacry trudged through the door, and Kora altered her path to pass by the school.

Years had passed since Kora stepped inside the schoolhouse. The place was much as she remembered, with dirty wooden floors and dark brick walls, its long tables arranged in rows. Mr. Gared seemed all that had changed. His brown hair had grayed, and he wore wire-rimmed glasses he had not owned when Kora was his student. He sat alone at the front of the room, looking through a stack of papers on his scratched and dented desk.

“I thought you might be coming,” he said. “Take a seat.”

Kora ignored his request, opting to march up to him. “How dare you beat my brother?”

“Did I ever whip your classmates without reason?”

“Zac did nothing wrong. He spoke the truth, that’s all he did, you pathetic….”

Mr. Gared kept his temper; he asked Kora again if she would like to take a seat. Kora yanked a chair from behind the nearest table and threw herself in it.

“I realize my lesson today was different from the one I gave you. You’re right, your version was more accurate, and your brother did nothing wrong to call me out. I admit that now and only now. The fact is this, Kora, you know it as well as I do: that he speaks the truth won’t matter when they arrest him for public nuisance and torture him to convince him to shut his mouth.”

“My family’s future is my family’s concern, not yours. Not yours, do you understand?”

“Your brother could excel if he’d apply himself. He’s brilliant, and I want him to succeed. I wish him all the good that you do, Kora, but Zacry has to learn there’s a time and a place to vent frustration. Otherwise, I’ll be the least of his problems. God forbid he travel the same path….”

Kora crossed her arms. “What path?”

“My brother disappeared five months ago. He lived in Hogarane, got involved smuggling goods back and forth between the capital, mainly rice, beans, nuts: food that wouldn’t spoil.”

“A black marketeer,” said Kora.

“Well, he said some things in a tavern he shouldn’t have about the way the new government runs things. The taxes, in particular. Someone reported him and he disappeared. They dumped his body behind my house two weeks later. Let’s just say I…. It took me minutes to recognize him. Minutes.”

Kora gaped. “They killed him? They killed him over some offhand critique of tax policy?”

“No, dear. He broke under torture, admitted the smuggling. They killed him over the smuggling. They went a bit too far in their fun, actually. He should have hanged, that’s what the current law says. Zacry, now,
he’s a bold boy, and curious. E
xactly like my brother was. My brother had a spine, Kora. He took risks. That’s why he’s dead. Me, I don’t claim to be a brave man. I teach what I’m forced to teach, and it disgusts me. I disgust myself sometimes, but I’m doing these children a favor. They learn the truth at home, their families see to that. I teach them not to let themselves stand out, and well, your brother stands out. That’s a dangerous thing in Herezoth these days. Do you deny it?”

Kora did not. She could not; after all, she had told her mother the same thing about Zacry the night before. Still, nothing her old teacher said appeased her. As for the man’s brother, everyone knew someone lost to Zalski.

Kora forgot the respect she had always held for Mr. Gared, forgot how he used to stay late to help her with arithmetic. A blind anger shook her. She thought of Zacry’s inflamed back, and she stormed from the schoolhouse, spitting on the threshold. “Don’t do my brother any more favors, or I’ll tell the other kids’ parents what you did, and they’ll pull their kids from school. The army, don’t you think that would grab their interest?”

“It would,” said Mr. Gared.

“We’re clear, then?”

“We’re clear, Kora.”

Kora fumed all the way to the general store, unsure which made her more livid, what Zacry’s teacher had done to him or how powerless she felt when she tried to impress caution on her brother.

445

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER TWO

To Hogarane

 

 

The day after Zacry’s beating was Wednesday. When the sun was about to rise, Kora woke her mother to tell her she was leaving, then put on an old cotton frock and coat, pulled back her curls, entered darkness’s desperate struggle against the coming dawn, and took the dew-flecked dirt road into Hogarane.

The Porteg cottage stood five miles outside the village. The last stretch of the path to town cut through a small but dense forest; this had always been Kora’s favorite part of the trip, for she felt sheltered beneath the trees and thought the towering oaks majestic. That day, however, she drew to a stop before entering the shade. Pensive, she shivered, though it was warm for mid-October. Her face grew somber, with a tinge of anger, of frustrated will. Then she plunged into the wood, stopping again on the other side, just inside Hogarane, at a log cabin that stood three streets off the main road.

Sedder Foden was two years older than Kora. His hair was tawny, not quite blond but too light to be called brown, and looked disheveled when he came to the door. His usual pale stubble covered his chin. He still wore the torn tunic he apparently had slept in, but his eyes were alert, so Kora knew she had not woken him. He greeted her with a grimace.

“Don’t you know it’s early?”

Kora explained her errand, and Sedder decided to go with her. “Just give me a minute to wash my face.”

“Don’t rush,” Kora pleaded, sinking into an uncomfortable chair. Sedder reappeared a few minutes later, his hair more kempt and his tunic changed. This one was patched in two places, but had no rips. He and Kora ate an apple apiece, drank some tea while Sedder spoke of a fencing tournament he hoped to win that weekend, and set off for the market. The morning was already drawing to its height.

Hogarane was a large village. It lay four days by horseback from Podrar, Zalski’s capital, but the sorcerer made
his presence known even here. E
very stall and peddler in the market had Zalski’s seal in view, usually on stall posts or basket handles. This symbol, a deep blue triangle imposed behind a gray letter “Z,” told everyone the vendor was legal, which meant he paid the proper taxes on his merchandise. Six or seven men in black uniform walked the streets, ensuring no one without authorization sold goods.
             

There were people enough on the dirt-packed road, talking and smiling, but fewer laughs nowadays. Kora remembered a time when the bustle was much livelier. Though she had been a child then, she refused to consider that she imagined the change, not with Zalski’s soldiers mere feet away. Just to see them put her nerves on end; she thought of her adventure in the wheatfield, and half-expected them to rush at her with a shout.

“Remember this place when we were little?” she asked Sedder. “How we’d chase your dog down the street?” No children played that day. In fact, Kora had never seen so few youngsters out. She swept the scene and counted only four: an infant whose mother clutched him tight; a four or five-year-old with her grandfather, who held her possessively against his leg; and two brothers whose father refused to take a guiding hand off their shoulders except when he must, to root through coins to pay the merchants. Even then he maintained his grasp on one of his children, unceasingly, unwilling to release them both.

Kora bought the flour first. She and Sedder took a side street to buy the eggs, from one of Kora’s mother’s friends who owned a small farmhouse at the edge of town. Auntie Mader, as Kora called her, was the tallest woman Kora knew. Her demeanor was always poised, almost stately, even with a daughter attached to her hip.

“How old is she now?” asked Kora.

“Eight months, bless her heart. She clings to her father and me all day. Would you take her while I go get your basket put together? Eggs and babies don’t quite mix.”

“That they don’t,” Kora said with a smile. “Hand her over.”

Kora, who had not been invited inside for a reason she was certain was legitimate, as certain as she was that she had no desire to ask of it, sat cross-legged on the lawn. The little girl stood in front of her, grasping Kora’s thumbs to keep her balance. She gave the stranger a queer look, her bottom lip shaking, but did not cry.

“Going black market, aren’t you?” whispered Sedder. He took a seat beside them.

“You do it yourself.”

Sedder scooted closer to his friend. “Be honest, is your family getting on?”


As well as any. M
y mother spends most of the day at the loom. She works herself ragged, and still she won’t let me help her like I want to. I weave some, as much as I can, but she’s faster, so a lot of the household tasks fall to me now.”

“Like going into town.”

“I don’t come in often, you know that. We go to the general store down our way more than we used to.”

A trip to the general store, about two years ago, was the occasion Kora first noticed that the number of soldiers in the region had tripled. The increase happened gradually, so she did not realize right away. The walk took ten minutes, and usually she ran into one, maybe two men in uniform. That day she met a group of five and found two more in the store itself. Mr. Baylor, the proprietor, did not smile like he usually did when Kora paid for a couple pairs of sandals, and he keep glancing at the window as though he was worried about something, something that might invade his shop. His manner made Kora jumpy too, but she asked no questions. There was a good chance that whatever had Mr. Baylor out of sorts had something to do with the army men, who stood very much in range to overhear.

When Kora reached home, around 3:30 according to the living room clock that had since been pawned, her father rushed in five minutes later. He was four hours early. His graying beard looked as though he had been tugging on it, a nervous habit he had, and his eyes searched the kitchen where Kora and her mother were chopping carrots and onions and sorting beans, to make soup for dinner. He marked who was present, failed to find his son.

“Where’s Zacry?” he demanded.

“Why are you home?” asked Zacry’s mother.

“Where’s Zacry?” he repeated.

“He’s taking a nap.”

“In his bedroom?”

“Where else?  Honey, what…?”

“Do you have black cloth?” asked Kora’s father.

“No,” said his wife. “No, not on hand.”

“We need something black. Anything, a belt, a bonnet strap….”

“I have a black scarf,” spoke up Kora.

“That’ll work. We have to put it out the window, the front window…. The king is dead. The entire royal family. A nobleman, a sorcerer who’s noble had them murdered, and he’s taken control of the army. They made a public announcement in the village, this man’s soldiers, this, this Zalski.” That was the first time Kora heard that name. “He’s not to be toyed with. He knows what he’s doing if he moved the army in little by little, without us suspecting. We’re to acknowledge Zalski’s rule with black cloth on the door. We have to do it, we’ll just…. We’ll consider it mourning for the king. Kora, go put that scarf out, won’t you? The soldiers will be down this way in an hour or two. I’ll take over here.”

He wanted to speak with her mother, and Kora wanted to know what they said. She gave her father her knife and left without a word, but she flattened herself by the door, her ear to the crack above the ground. Her parents’ voices were just audible over the chopping.

“Walten, what does this mean?”

“Take your best guess. I don’t know what this man intends, so if we’re wise, we’ll take no chances. He’s absolutely slaughtered the nobility, or a fair part of it, if reports are right. Perhaps they’re not. Let’s pray they’re not. That’s all we can do, pray, and not draw notice.”

“The kids, Walten.”

“I’ll talk to them. Don’t worry, Dear, don’t worry
. W
e’ll adapt to whatever we have to. My father paid off this house years ago, thank God. We own it outright and no one can force us out of it.”

“If this man’s slaughtered his peers, he won’t think twice about taxing people like us out of house and home. He’ll lay property taxes. What does he want, Walten? What’s he after? No one takes down royals without a cause.”

“A cause and
a plan. He had a plan all right, and
he’s got a brain, to get this far. He’s gotten far enough that I don’t see anyone stopping him. What his cause is I don’t know yet, but I’m worried, Ilana. I’ve never lied to you, and I’m not about to start. This damn sorcerer has me worried. It’s black he chose to symbolize submission, black. Makes sense, I suppose. Nothing mildews the heart like magic, and mildew’s black as ink.”

“Walten, I’ve told you a million times, you shouldn’t say such things. You don’t know anyone with magic. You never have.”

Kora’s father’s voice turned harsh. “You weren’t in the market this morning. I don’t want my daughter hearing this….”

“She won’t from me, then.”

“That damn conjurer’s army arrested eight men before I left, men who’d snuck down from the capital to incite rebellion. They slit their throats like pigs right in the square, without proof, without trial, just an exhibition to send a message. The victims sent a message of their own, one of them screaming like a madman he had seven children.”

“My God, Walten,
our
children! What’ll happen to
our…
?”

Walten’s voice turned comforting. Affectionate. “I said I’ll talk to them, Ilana, and I will. Kora’s nothing if not responsible. She’ll keep her head down like the rest of us, and Zacry’s obedient.” Ilana harrumphed. “Zac obeys
me
,” Walten qualified. “I’ll tell him what not to talk about at school, or anywhere outside this house. He’ll understand it’s important. He’s clever that way. The four of us, we should be all right. They’ve no reason to come after me, because I’ve never been political. We each shoulder our part already. Each’ll just have to bear a heavier load, that’s all.”

“But how heavy? How much more weight?”

“I’m inclined to think a great deal. The burden’ll come on gradually if we’re lucky, and we’ll get time to adjust, to build up strength. But what I watched today…. Ilana, not a soul in Herezoth is safe.”

Ilana spoke with resolution. “If that’s the case,” she said, “we’ll just have to shelter one another, won’t we?”

“And there it is,” said Walten, “that spunk you have. It’s why I married you, you know.”

“It’s why you fell in love with me,” Ilana corrected. “You married me for my cherry tarts. Me, now, I just couldn’t imagine life without that crinkle you get right between your eyes when you try not to smile…. There it is.”

 

 

Kora shook herself out of her reverie. She looked down at Auntie Mader’s daughter, changed the subject to distract herself. “Isn’t she an angel?” she asked.

Sedder pressed, “What’s the deal, Kora? Your mind’s been wandering all morning.”

Kora wanted to respond
but could not think how. She mustered a vague apology
,
and they fell i
nto silence, an awkward silence:
the first such she could remember passing with Sedder in quite some time. Then Auntie M
ader reappeared with the eggs. S
he had wrapped them carefully in cloth and stuffed them, as foretold, in a large square basket. “They shouldn’t shift unless you jar them,” she told Kora. “Your mother can get the basket back to me next time she comes to market.”

Kora handed Auntie Mader some bronze coins, and Sedder took the eggs and flour sack. “I’m walking you home,” he said. “No protests.”

“It’s five miles both ways!”

“I said no protests.”

And that was that. They walked back through the market at their leisure, then along the forest path. They paused when they reached the road that led to Kora’s cotta
ge, at the border of the wood. T
he same place Kora had stopped that morning. Sedder asked, “Isn’t this where…?”

“Let’s just get home.”

For the first half-mile of the well-worn route they met no one, until three horses drawing a wagon packed with six massive crates appeared in the distance. Eventually, Kora made out Zalski’s seal stamped on the cargo.

The sorcerer’s famed monthly coal transport, for his personal use, from the mines down south. Four mo
unted men guarded the shipment, men wearing
the same black uniforms as the soldiers that patrolled the market. The Crimson League had waylaid such cargo just two weeks before.

Kora would have cursed the resistance, had she not been too uneasy to speak a word. Sedder looked as uncomfortable as she felt—he must have read the
Letter
too—and pulled her to the side of the road to let the convoy pass. One of the guards spurred his horse ahead of the wagon, which slowed to a halt. Kora wrapped her arms around one of Sedder’s.

“What are you two doing?”

Sedder answered, his voice crisp, “I’m walking this lady home.”

He stepped out into the road, but the guard turned his eyes to Kora. “You’re from the outskirts out this way? Where’s your documentation?”

BOOK: The Crimson League (The Herezoth Trilogy)
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