“Countess,” said Ark.
Caina stared at Ostros’s smoking corpse, unable to look away.
“Countess.”
She had seen death before, more than she cared to remember. She had killed men, watched them die on the end of her knife. She had even seen her father and mother die in the space of a few hours.
But she had never seen anyone die so horribly.
“Countess!” Ark seized her arm. His eyes were wild and fierce. “We have to get out of here. Now.”
Caina looked at the corpse, at Ark, back at the corpse.
“Someone will have seen the smoke, heard the screams,” said Ark. “If we are still here when the militia arrives that will be bad. We have to go. Now!”
“Yes,” said Caina. “Yes, you’re right. But…oh, gods, to die like that…”
“I know,” said Ark. “But we have to go.”
Caina nodded. She tore her eyes from Ostros’s smoldering husk, suddenly grateful that she had not eaten breakfast. “Which…which way?”
“Anywhere but here,” said Ark. He broke into a run, and Caina urged her aching legs to follow him. They rounded a corner, crossed a street, and raced down a narrow alley between sagging, black-painted apartment buildings. Caina heard a sudden scream behind her, followed by a frantic voice calling for the militia. Ark kept running, and at last they came to a courtyard behind between a pair of crumbling warehouses. Abandoned crates and barrels lay strewn across the ground, weathered and splintered, and weeds poked between cracked flagstones. Two of the smaller black pyramids rose in the background, their tops crowned with fire.
“This ought to be far enough,” said Ark. “Give me a moment. I need to catch my breath.”
Caina nodded and leaned against a wall, raking a hand through her sweaty hair. The stench of Ostros’s burned flesh saturated her clothing. She could still hear his hideous scream, the ghastly sizzle as the flames consumed his flesh.
“So,” said Ark, “you’re not made of ice after all.”
Caina blinked. “I’ve seen men die before. But…but I’ve never seen anyone burn to death before, Ark.”
“I have.” His voice was quiet. “Boiling oil, poured from a wall. It’s not the sort of thing you forget. The scream. The smell.” His voice got even quieter. “Gods, the smell.”
“No.” Caina took a ragged breath. “I hope no one saw us chasing him.”
“We’ll say he knocked you down and stole some jewelry from you,” said Ark. “If anyone noticed.”
“Yes, of course.” Caina should have thought of that herself.
“You covered your face, at least. Which was clever. Your clothes are so torn up that you look like a thief.”
“At least we know one thing,” said Caina. “Sorcery was used to kill these men.”
Ark stared at her.
“You saw it, didn’t you?” said Caina. “You dumped a barrel of water on him. Nothing. No steam, not even a sizzle. And he fell onto me, Ark. I should have been burned. But I didn’t feel any heat.” Her hands rolled into fists. “The Magisterium will pay for this.”
“The Magisterium?” said Ark, incredulous.
“Do you know any others who use sorcery?” said Caina.
“You heard Ostros. He thought Gaidan, or one of Gaidan’s disciples, was behind it. So do Kalastus and Ephaeron. I’ve seen Ephaeron in action, and he’s no fool. If he thinks the Sons of Corazain are behind these murders, I’m inclined to believe him.”
“Of course the Magisterium would say that,” said Caina, more scorn in her voice than she would have liked. “How better to conceal their crimes?”
“Indeed,” said Ark. “What basis do you have for accusing the Magisterium? The victims all burned to death. The Saddai worship a god called the Living Flame. The Ashbringers used to practice fire sorcery. Both the magi and Ostros thought the Sons of Corazain were behind the murders. And we just saw a man killed with pyromancy in front of our eyes. So tell me, clever Countess. How does this evidence damn the Magisterium?”
“If you won’t see their villainy, then you are blind,” said Caina.
“And you are blind to anything else,” said Ark.
Caina took a deep breath, tried to still the rage and pain. “Enough. Enough! We cannot quarrel among ourselves. If we do, we are lost.”
Ark’s scowl did not waver, but he nodded. “Very well.”
“Let’s get back to the Inn,” said Caina. “The sooner we’re off the streets, the better…”
She heard footsteps, and turned.
Ark’s broadsword rasped from its scabbard.
A half-dozen Saddai peasants walked into the courtyard, clad in ragged clothes. They stared at Caina with hard, glittering eyes, clubs in their hands. The lead man’s shirt hung open, and Caina saw the flame tattoo upon his chest.
“You’ll want to idle elsewhere,” said Ark.
“I know you,” said the lead man in Saddaic. “I saw you in the plaza, below great Corazain’s tomb. Gaidan renounced you, whore of the Empire.”
Caina said nothing.
He looked her over and laughed. “What’s this, then? Out for a tumble with your guardsman? Perhaps a feather bed wasn’t good enough for you?” His followers laughed. “Or maybe you wanted to do it on a hard surface, since he wasn’t hard enough to please you.”
“What wrong I have ever done you?” said Caina. “I have never even spoken to you before this day. If my presence so offends you, I’ll go.”
The Saddai laughed. “Oh, no. We’ll burn the infection of the Empire from our ancestral lands. Starting with you.”
“Try it,” said Ark, lifting his broadsword, “and you’ll be face to face with your precious Living Flame before this day is done.”
The Saddai laughed again. “The Living Flame? A false and corrupt god, a lie told to weaklings. We follow the Burning Flame, the true Saddai god.”
The Burning Flame? Caina had not heard that one before.
“We’ll kill her in front of you,” said the Saddai man, the other Sons of Corazain fanning out behind him, “make her squeal and beg for her life…”
Any other time, Caina might have tried to talk her way out of it, or just run. But Ostros’s death had filled her with a vicious fury, and that fury had found an outlet.
“Throw down your weapons and run,” said Caina, her voice ice. “Once chance is all I’ll give you. Otherwise I’ll kill you where you stand.”
The leader blinked, then began to laugh with his followers.
Caina slipped a knife from a sheath and stepped forward, her back arched, her arm swinging back. Her entire body snapped like a bowstring, sending the knife hurtling at the leader. He had titled back his head to laugh, which meant Caina had a lovely path to his neck. Her blade ripped his throat open and slashed the major vein. Blood gushed over his tattered cloak, and the leader fell to his knees, drowning in his own blood.
Ark gave her a surprised glance. The Sons of Corazain gaped at their dying leader.
“Well?” snapped Caina. She snatched the dagger from her right boot and raised her weapons, dagger in right hand, and knife in her left. “Who’s next?”
“She has murdered Baizair!” shouted one. “Kill them!”
The Sons of Corazain came in a rush. Ark roared a war cry in Caerish and ran to meet them, his broadsword blurring in a steely arc. One of the Saddai tried to parry with his club, and Ark’s blow shattered the crude weapon and tore a gash down the man’s side. Ark twisted, and his spinning backhand opened another man’s belly. The man fell with a strangled shriek, clutching his dislocated innards, while the other three backed off in a wary circle. They did not look at Caina at all, which gave her a marvelous opportunity to throw another knife, which she did. Another man toppled, his lifeblood soaking into the cracks between the flagstones.
“Last chance,” growled Ark. “Run away, now, or you’ll get to join your precious Living or Burning Flame or whatever the hell you call it.”
The last two men backed away. The man on the left glanced at Caina, and then looked at a stack of crates leaning against the warehouse wall. Caina followed his gaze, saw the flash of metal atop the crate.
“Ark!” she shouted, diving for the ground, “down!”
Ark threw himself sideways just as two crossbow quarrels stabbed down from the crates. The first one shattered against the ground. The second ripped past Ark’s flank, and he grunted in sudden pain, landing on one knee. The surviving Sons of Corazain rushed him.
Caina leapt back to her feet, saw two Saddai men in militia garb standing atop the stack of crates, reloading their crossbows. She ran at the stack, and the nearest militiaman cursed and swung his bow around to face her. Caina jumped and threw out her legs, her feet smacking into the crate. The entire stack shuddered, and the crossbowman lost his balance, his bolt flying wild. Caina kicked out again, and the stack of crates began to lean sideways. One of the men jumped off the stack, while the other fell backwards with a scream.
She sprang to her feet as the militiaman swung his bow to face her. She slashed with her dagger, and the man dropped the crossbow with a snarl of pain, blood welling from his hand. He pawed for the dagger at his belt, but Caina stepped forward and drove her blade into his throat. She heard noise behind her, and ducked as the second militiaman came at her, using the stock of his crossbow as a club. Caina spun and kicked him in the knee as he went past. Something snapped, and the militiaman spilled to the ground, screaming. Caina stomped on his wrist as he reached for his dagger, and he flopped onto his back, moaning.
“You can fight,” gasped the astonished Saddai. “But…you’re just a woman, and you can fight!”
Caina looked down at him and drew the dagger from her left boot.
“I swear I won’t tell,” he babbled, “I swear, I swear…”
“You won’t,” said Caina, and she bought his silence with steel.
His gurgling scream ended, and Caina looked for Ark. She found him kneeling besides one of the dead Saddai peasants, and for a moment she thought he had been killed. But he was only cleaning his sword on the dead man’s shirt.
“Are you hurt?” said Caina.
Ark looked up at her without blinking, and Caina glanced down at herself. Her clothes were splashed with blood, and shredded almost to the point of indecency. Suddenly self-conscious, she tugged her dirty cloak closer.
“No,” said Ark, standing. He fingered a gash in his leather jerkin, his mail shirt visible through the tear. “That bolt almost skewered me, but the mail turned it.” He frowned at her. “I’ve never seen anyone throw a knife like that.”
“Thank you.” Caina began collecting her knives from the corpses.
“Where did you learn how to throw like that?”
Caina glanced at him. “Remember when you saw me practicing open-handed forms in the morning? I told you that they weren’t useless.” She crossed to the dead militiamen. “Militiamen? Why would militiamen try to kill us?”
“Maybe they were aiming for the Sons of Corazain,” said Ark.
“No,” said Caina. “I don’t think so.” She wrenched the dagger free from the dead man’s throat and used it to cut open the front of his leather jerkin and shirt.
A tattoo of swirling flames covered his chest.
“So they stole the uniforms and weapons,” said Ark.
“Or,” said Caina, “the Sons of Corazain have infiltrated the Rasadda militia. You’ve seen Valgorix’s men. They’re mostly Caerishor Disali, but quite a few are Saddai.” She cleaned the dagger on the torn cloth and stood up with a wince. Now that the fight was over, her entire left side hurt from the balcony collapse. She would have some ferocious bruises.
“They were spies?” said Ark.
“No doubt,” said Caina. “And if Gaidan does decide to revolt, he’ll have men in place in the militia.” She looked at the tattoos on the dead men’s chests. “The Burning Flame, they said. I thought the Saddai god was called the Living Flame.”
“It is,” said Ark. “As far as I know, anyway.”
“Burning Flame,” repeated Caina, this time in Saddaic. She thought of Ostros’s horrible death and shuddered. “I wonder what that means.”
“I know what it means,” said Ark. “We just saw Ostros burned to death. And now the Sons of Corazain are talking about the Burning Flame? For someone so clever, I cannot understand why you remain so blind. Someone in the Sons of Corazain is behind these murders, I’m sure. Maybe even Gaidan himself cast the spell that killed Ostros. And if he did, he will pay for it.”
“Blood,” said Caina.
“What?”
“Ostros said that they had taken his blood,” said Caina. “I wonder…I wonder if the blood of the victim is an integral part of this fire sorcery.”
“That cut on his arm, you mean? How could someone take some of his blood without him realizing it? Or, for that matter, why didn’t he see who took it?”
“For someone with sufficient skill in sorcery, that wouldn’t pose a problem,” said Caina. “A magus could numb his mind, or even destroy the memory entirely.”
“Then why bother with burning people to death?” said Ark. “Why not just put a blade into his chest while his mind was numbed?”
Caina opened her mouth, closed it again. “That,” she said at last, “is a very good question.”
“It’s a statement, a dramatic gesture,” said Ark. “The Sons of Corazain pray to a Burning Flame, and their enemies die in flames.”
“There must be more to it than that.”
Ark looked scornful. “How?”
“If they wanted to make a statement, why not knock out their victims, tie them up, and burn a house down on top of them?” said Caina. “Why bother with all the effort of pyromancy. You heard Kalastus and Ephaeron. Pyromancy is incredibly dangerous. And I don’t know how…sensitive you are to the presence of sorcery.”
“What do you mean?”
Caina shrugged. “I can feel it when a magus casts a spell. My skin crawls, my hair starts to stand on end, and it feels like a bolt of lightning is about to fall from the sky.”
Ark stared at her. “I’ve never felt anything like that.”
“Well, I have.” Not many people had that sensitivity. And Caina would not tell Ark how she had acquired that sensitivity, how she had suffered for weeks in Maglarion’s hidden lair. “That spell, the pyromancy used to kill Ostros took a lot of power. It must have been excruciatingly difficult to work. If the only wanted to make an example out of their enemies, why go to all the trouble and risk of using pyromancy when they could do the same thing with a coil of rope, a jar of lamp oil, and a lit candle?”
Ark said nothing, but his eyebrows creased.
Caina rubbed sweat from her forehead. “And how does Romarion tie into all of this?”
“Are you sure he’s involved?”
“I’m certain he’s involved,” said Caina. “His name was in Vanio’s ledger, and you know what happened to Vanio. We need more information. Or we have too much information, and nothing to bind it together.” She shook her head, and took a quick look around. “We’d better get out of here. I’m exhausted. We were lucky only a small group came along.”
“It was my fault,” said Ark. “I should not have led us here.”
“I should have kept my wits about me,” said Caina. “I’m supposed to be the clever one.”
“You had just seen a man burn to death,” said Ark. “That was a horror. It would scramble anyone’s wits.”
“Horror. I ought to be used to horror by now,” said Caina. All at once her knees felt weak, and her hands started to shake. The memories stormed through her mind, finding her father in his study, her mother’s mocking laughter, and what had come afterwards. For a moment the memories flooded so vividly through her mind that she could not move. Except in her mind’s eye she saw her father burst into flames, screaming horribly, while her mother laughed.
“Countess?” said Ark. “Countess!” He shook her shoulder, and Caina looked at him. She could only imagine what her expression must have looked like. Her eyes stung. Was she crying? No, she would not cry. She would not cry! It must have been the smoke from Ostros’s corpse, which was even worse.
“We all have our horrors to remember,” he said. His face was haunted, bleak. He had been in the Legions for twenty years, and cried out the name of a woman in his sleep. Caina knew her horrors. She wondered what horrors Ark carried with him.
“Yes,” whispered Caina. She closed her eyes, collected herself.
“Damnable luck, though,” said Ark, steering her towards the street. “These men finding us here.”
“Oh, it wasn’t luck, I’m sure,” said Caina. “You saw how Gaidan was staring at me. He might have seen us run off. He probably sent a few of his followers to trail us, and they must have found us when we were running from Ostros’s body.”
“But why kill you?” said Ark. “You only just arrived here.”
“Because they hate the Empire,” said Caina, “and Lord Nicephorus is too well guarded. I’m just a helpless woman with one guard. How does that Anshani proverb go? Kill the chicken while the monkey watches? But we’ve lingered too long. Let’s go.”
Ark held up a hand. “Wait. Someone’s coming.” He pressed against the wall. “Militia.”
“Valgorix must have seen us running after Ostros, sent someone after us,” said Caina, tugging her sleeve to hide the knife sheaths strapped to her forearms. “We’ll tell him what you thought up, that Ostros tried to rob me and we chased him.”
“I hope he believes it,” said Ark. “We’ve run a long way.”
He was right. It was a long way to run down a thief over a piece of stolen jewelry. And an Imperial Countess would not chase a thief.
“Carry me,” said Caina.
Ark looked shocked. “Excuse me?”
“We’ll tell them that we ran into the Sons of Corazain. They knocked me down and tried to kill me, but you drove them off. I am too frightened and shocked by the experience to move, so you gallantly decided to carry me. That will win their sympathy, and they’ll believe our story.”
“Ridiculous,” grumbled Ark. But he put one arm around her shoulders and the other below her knees, and lifted her as if she weighed nothing at all. “But after a few streets you’re going to feel better and insist that you can walk. You’ll say it’s beneath the dignity of an Imperial Countess to be carried through the streets like a bag of potatoes or some such excuse. Because I am not carrying you all the way back to the damned Inn, understand?”
“Agreed,” said Caina. She did feel ridiculous. But the ruse worked. When Valgorix himself hurried into the courtyard, at the head of twenty militiamen, he looked at the corpses, and then at her, and he yanked off his helm and walked over, swearing all the while.
“What the hell are you two doing here?” he said. “I told you to stay off the streets, Countess. And now I find you surrounded by corpses in the middle of the slums!”
“Watch your tone,” said Ark.
Valgorix’s tired face reddened, and he looked as if he was about to order Ark arrested then and there.
“I’m sorry, Decurion,” said Caina, letting her voice tremble. “It’s just that after we looked at that dead body, a man knocked me down and took my brooch, and that brooch belonged to my mother. Ark chased him, and I followed, but…but I don’t know my way around the city, and I got lost. Then those…those men found me,” she glanced at the corpses and shuddered, “and they said I was Imperial swine and had no business in their city. Then they hit me and knocked me down and started kicking me. I was sure I was going to die. But Ark came and saved me.”
Valgorix looked at the corpses. “You killed…all these men?”
“My duty is to protect the Countess,” said Ark. “So I did what was necessary.”
“They all have the tattoo, sir,” said one of the militiamen, kneeling by the bodies.
“Gods,” said Valgorix. “Remind me not to get between you and your duty. We’d best get you back to the Inn. There’s been another burning murder, and word’s gotten out already. We’ll have a riot on our hands if we’re not careful.”
“You mean the body by the Inn?” said Caina.
“No,” said Valgorix, shaking his head. “Another one. Found it just a few minutes ago, on the edge of the slums. It was still smoking. The poor fool had been cooked alive.” He gestured to his men. “Enough talking. We have work to do. We’ll escort your back to the Inn, Countess, but quickly. We’ll be needed to keep order on the streets soon enough.”
###
It was almost dark by the time they returned to the Inn. Valgorix bid them a hasty farewell and left at once. Even during the walk back to the Inn of Mirrors Caina had seen Saddai men gathering on street corners, muttering to one another. She wondered how many of them had flame tattoos on their chests.
When they came to the plaza below the Great Pyramid of Corazain, Caina saw that a crowd of several hundred people gathered before the Imperial Basilica. For a moment she thought that a riot had broken out, and Valgorix and his men readied their weapons. But Sister Tadaia stood on the steps of the Basilica, preaching.
“Suffering is the very lot of all who live,” she called, her strong voice ringing over the plaza, “and we all suffer, aye, I deny it not. But suffering is the refining force of the Living Flame, to purify our souls for our next lives, and the next, until at last we can be one with the Living Flame for all time. But if you would ease your suffering, do not do so by creating more suffering. Stand with one another. Aid one another in your trials. Ease one another in your burdens, for by these acts you can refine your soul for the Living Flame.”
Many Saddai in the crowd nodded at her words. But more looked sullen, and quite a few looked downright angry.
“She’s not going to be able to restrain them for much longer, is she?” Ark muttered.
Caina shook her head.
When they returned to her rooms, she told her maids what had happened, and they began to fuss over her. Caina made Ark go get something to eat and drink for himself, and let the maids draw a bath. She had a nasty purple-green bruise down her left hip and thigh, her legs were covered with scratches from rolling in the dirt, and every muscle in her body ached. She hoped she had broken no bones.
A long soak in the hot water drained some of the ache away, and the dried blood dissolved from her fingers and nails. Afterwards Caina refused food and drink, wrapped herself in a heavy robe, and barred the door to her bedroom.
She sat with her head in her hands for a long time, trying not to weep, before she at last went to bed.
***