The Way of Things: Upper Kingdom Boxed Set: Books 1, 2 and 3 in the Tails of the Upper Kingdom (106 page)

Kirin could not believe how much
this woman could talk. He remembered it vaguely in the back corners of his
memory, a memory that was tempered by a long year and a mending heart. But now,
as they rode side by side across the parapet of the Great Wall, the memory was
crystallizing into reality and he found himself getting a headache, a thing
that had not happened in a very long time.

“So then, when he wakes up, I
think he’s gonna kiss me or something but no. He sits up, looks around and you
know what he says?”

He opened his mouth to answer,
realized his mistake, promptly closed it again.

“He says
, “The katanah? Where
is the katanah?”
I could have killed him! Right then and there, with my
very fine little black claws. Yep. Strangled the life right back out of him. Oh
mother, that was pretty funny.”

And she laughed to herself.

He realized that she was
grieving.

It was an odd realization for him.
He had never been good at reading people, had never boasted of that particular
skill, but this young woman, Fallon Waterford-Grey his sister-in-law, he now
understood better than he understood almost anyone. Two mornings ago, she had
handed her kittens over into the care of a nursemaid and ten Imperial soldiers.
She had kissed them tenderly, promised to be reunited soon and finally let them
go to take up her position as Scholar in the Court of the Empress on what could
arguably be her last journey. She was a complex and fascinating young woman.

She had not wept yet. He admired
her but wondered how long it would last.

“And so, do you know what he
did? I’ll tell you what he did! He jumped to his feet and ran right back into
the water! That’s what he did! Solomon and I thought he was crazy, that maybe
the explosion had knocked his grey head about just a little bit but he just
stood there up to his waist in the waves, looking out to the far horizon where
there was still smoke from the chunks and bits floating on the sea. He raised
his hands and I thought he was going to call the lightning but he didn’t. He
just stood like that for, I don’t know, a few minutes anyway, then we see what
looks like a shark racing through the water right toward him. Oh mother, after
so long on the ship, I know a thing or two about sharks. Don’t talk to me about
sharks. I really hate sharks…”

She laughed again, and then
sighed.

“It was the katanah. He called
it. He called it from the ocean where it was sinking and it came straight to
him like an arrow. He reached down and snatched it right out of the water,
turned and sloshed back to us on shore. It still was in the obi so he had both
and it was impressive and majestic and wonderful and made me so very proud of
him. Sireth said he could do it. I always knew he could.
He
just never
knew he could and finally, now he did.”

She looked at him, her large
emerald eyes bright and brimming with tears.

“And that was just the
beginning. You should see the things he can do.”

He smiled, grateful that her
tale was coming to a semblance of a close.

“I look forward to hearing the
rest of it very soon,” he said.

“Oh sure. We have three more
days, don’t we, until we get to the foundry? I can tell you lots and lots of
stories in three whole days. Oh mother, you’re in for a real treat!”

He swallowed and cursed the fact
that now, his was the Luck and that Kerris of the Destiny was far, far ahead.

***

They were stopped by the guards
at the second gate.

The Major swung off her desert
horse and strode up to the leopards, cursing once again at her lack of uniform.
The guards stepped in across the heavy black doors, staffs held a little higher
in their hands.

“I am Major Ursa Laenskaya,
adjutant of Captain Wynegarde-Grey of
Pol’Lhasa.
I need to speak to the
lion in charge.”

The guards exchanged glances.

Her hands fell to the hilts of
her swords. She carried both katanah and kodai’chi, proof of her warrior status,
but she was a small woman in yak hide and winter bear, riding a desert horse.
She was accompanied by two monks, not soldiers. It was suspicious and strange
and they did not know what to think.

“The lion,” she growled. “In
charge.”

And lashed her very long tail
just once.

A leopard bowed, disappeared
into the gate. The other hiked his bo a little higher, stepped in to cover the
entire door by himself. She snorted and shook her head. She could take him down
in one blow.

She turned to her husband.

“I told you. This will not do. I
need a uniform.”

“The Captain did promise one,”
said Sireth as he swung off his horse. “And very high boots, if I recall.”

“Pah. He is probably drinking
tea with his mother at the great house, happy to be home and out of uniform.”

“I’m sure that is exactly what
he is doing.”

He smiled at her while Yahn
Nevye remained on his horse. It was a very few long minutes before the door
opened once again, revealing the guard and a lion in a well-worn military
uniform.

The lion bowed, not quite
perfectly.

“A Major from
Pol’Lhasa
,
I’m told,” he said.

“Major Ursa Laenskaya,” she
repeated but did not bow back. “Adjutant to Kirin Wynegarde-Grey, Captain of
the Empress’ personal guard.”

“You are a long way from
Pol’Lhasa.”

“And you are not the lion in
charge.”

“He’s busy,
sidala.”

“Major.”

“Major. We are under battle
preparations. The alarm fires—”

“Which is why we are here. This
is Sireth benAramis, Seventh Seer of
Sha’Hadin
and Yahn Nevye, also of
Sha’Hadin.”

“And
Agara’tha,”
added
Nevye.

“From
Sha’Hadin?”
The
lion paused, ran his eyes over the brown-clad figures. He smiled. “If so, where
are your falcons?”

There was a shrill cry from the
mountains when, in a feat of perfect timing, young Mi-Hahn settled on Sireth’s
shoulder, talon bells jingling. She looked at Nevye and hissed and feathers
settled onto the snow.

Ursa looked back at the lion.

“The lion in charge?” she asked.

“Yes, Major. This way,” and the
black gates swung open to let them through.

***

It was a marvel how she could
light so many candles and yet not have the little gar fill with smoke. Magic,
he knew it. Witches were skilled at that sort of thing. It was late afternoon
and he knew that if there were smoke, the Enemy on the Wall high above would
spot it in a heartbeat. She was a deceiver. He wondered how many men she had
killed.

He looked down at the baby in
his arms. How he had let them convince him was also a marvel, a testimony to
his sister’s large heart and the witch’s innate cunning. But here he was,
sitting cross-legged under a tent of branches and silk, breathing in incense
that did not smoke and holding a baby that did not cry. Life was far too
strange for him.

Setse and the witch were also
seated cross-legged. They were holding hands, eyes closed and he knew it was
some sort of spell that the witch had cast on his sister. They were both
whispering in the language of the Enemy—how Setse had learned it was also
a mystery. Her Oracle gift was as unnerving as it was exhausting. He was
certain it affected him more than her.

The baby yawned and stretched
its tiny fists, blinked its bicoloured eyes slowly at him. He remembered the
first time his mother had let him hold Setse, how she had blinked her strange,
unnatural eyes at him and he had sworn from that moment on to protect her with
his life. He had survived five winters by then. Already a man. And now this.

The baby was purring.

He glanced up, back at his
sister and the witch. They were whispering and chanting. They hadn’t heard.
They didn’t know. He looked back down at the thing in his arms.

He studied the hands, so tiny
and unnatural, the tips of the claws dark as a winter’s night. He wondered what
it took to move them. Just a thought? An act of the will? He shifted slightly
so that his own hand was free, dabbed at the tiny hand with the blunted tip of
his own claw, marveled at the sight as a hook as sharp and curved as a
jamviyeh
slid out through its finger to catch his pelt. No wonder his people were
mortified. It was a mystery.

He touched the little hand, felt
the pelt so soft as the fingers wrapped around his own. He tugged back but the
grip was strong. Just like Setse.

And suddenly, the baby smiled at
him.

He tried to look away, to send
his eyes to the figures of his sister and the witch but it was pointless. He
had been caught now as surely as Setse had caught him so many years ago. He
hated the witch with his entire soul for doing this, for giving him this little
creature. It was her plan. It had to be.

He would protect it with his
life.

He looked up to see the witch smiling
at him, Setse smiling at him and he scowled at them both.

His sister laughed, clapped her
hands together.

“Now, Rah! Can you feel them?
Can you?”

“Yes,” said the witch. “Now is
the time.”

“For what?” growled Naranbataar
as he tried to disentangle his finger from the kitten’s grip. “More candles?
More broth?”

“Singing!” laughed Setse.

“Of course,” said the witch.
“Now we sing.”

And both women closed their eyes
and said no more.

The baby in his arms purred
contentedly and Naranbataar shook his head, wondering at what could possibly
come of songs sung in silence.

***

“Can you hear that?”

“What?”

“The singing?”

Nevye frowned and turned back
from the window. “What singing?”

“Listen.”

He stared at the man, the last
Seer of
Sha’Hadin
, sitting cross-legged on the stone floor, a cup of hot
sweet tea at his side. They were in the top of the battle tower and preparing
for sleep on mattresses stuffed with straw. They had eaten stew and dumplings,
rice bread and curried chicken and his belly was the happiest it had been in
days. The woman was gone, off speaking with the captain of the battlefort and
being informed on the state of high alert that was sweeping the Empire. Dogs
and monkeys, although he could only see dogs, and not for the first time, he
cursed the way his life had rolled out. He was glad she was gone. She terrified
him.

Through closed eyes, the Seer
smiled at him. “Sit, Yahn, and listen.”

Slowly, Nevye did as he was
asked, bending his knees in the learning pose.
Odd,
he thought to
himself. He never sat like this, hadn’t since he was a child in
Ban’lahore
.
Damn this mongrel for suggesting it. Damn himself for obeying.

“Give me your hands.”

“I’m not giving you my hands!”
he growled. “You think I’m a novice. It’s insulting.”

And he lashed his tail, which proved
to be painful. He knew it had been bitten severely by the frost, just like his
ears. He was glad he was inside.

“Can you hear the singing?”

“What singing? You’re mad.”

“Your Oracle. She’s singing. She
has a lovely voice.”

His tail lashing stopped, as did
his heart.

“My
Oracle? She-she’s not
my
Oracle.”

“Oh. I thought she was.”

He glanced down at the Seer’s
hands, ungloved and exposed, long tan fingers and spotted wrists. Mongrels. A
scourge on the Kingdom. They should all be killed.

And yet, here he was, searching
the stretch of Wall for a dog.
His
Oracle. How much worse could his life
grow?

At the window, a rattle and he
looked over his shoulder to see a dark shape. An owl, beating at the glass with
speckled wings. He frowned again, wondering at the meaning.

“You could let him in,” said the
Seer. “Mi-Hahn has gone to
Pol’Lhasa
. She won’t be back for days.”

“It’s just an owl,” he answered.

“My mistake. Your hands?”

With a deep breath, he looked
down at his gloves.

“If you’d rather not—”
said Sireth.

“You will close your eyes?”

The Seer did as he was asked.
After a long moment, the jaguar removed his gloves, reached out his hands,
which the Seer did not see.

But at the touch, his soul rang
with the sound of singing.

***

Run, run, run run. Run like a
deer, run like the rain, run like the river. Run, run, run, run.

The songs of the army beat in
time with their feet. It was good to keep rhythm, keep all their feet moving as
one. It kept them strong and fast and focused on their moving. But for Swift Sumalbayar,
there was a different song ringing in his head.

He shook his head, ears
flattened against his skull. He was careful not to lose balance, however, for
he was on point and to stumble might cause him to be trampled by the Ten
Thousand running behind.

At his side, the Khargan ran
like a bull, steady and strong, his legs churning up the snow like iron, his
claw-necklaces rattling against the lion skull he wore on one shoulder. They
made the sound of tambours, a perfect accompaniment to the strange new music
that had started in his head.

They were the songs of women. He
had not known a woman for a long time and he found himself missing their
company, their soft bodies and their strong wills. His wife had been his
lifemate. He had been lucky to find her, unlucky to have lost her at the birth
of his son. Their deaths still saddened him.

The singing was becoming
worrisome, but he could not tell the Khargan. The Khargan would think him an
Oracle and would likely torture him to death, friendship not withstanding. The
Bear was such a man.