Dragonoak: Gall and Wormwood, page 33
I scrambled up the side of the hut. It was raised from the beach and much harder getting into than out of. Varn had made it look easy, but I was left pulling splinters from my palms as I strolled into the living area.
Strolled wasn’t the right word for it. It’s what I aimed for, but my footsteps came out clunkily, like I’d spent the previous day running and my knees were only now protesting. It was hard to remember how to act in my own skin when I’d learnt so many fascinating things about Yin Zhou.
Reis was on edge again, but marginally less so than the day before. Not being assassinated in their sleep was apparently a good sign, and they had taken to dismantling their pistol and cleaning all the intricate parts while Yin Zhou sipped tea and helped herself to delicately sliced fruit. Age had nothing to do with appetite, apparently. Unlike Kondo-Kana, she still bowed to the urge to eat.
I knew she wasn’t a necromancer, but beyond that I wasn’t certain what she was. Something resonated from deep within her, something that recoiled off me the moment I tried to grasp it. It was enough to twist my own body against me. I forgot that I was a necromancer. Frowning, I turned my back on the room and cradled my hand to my chest.
My fingertips still lit up when I willed them to.
I was still a necromancer. Still me. Her powers had left me unsettled, not muted.
“Good morning,” I said, when Yin Zhou continued to help herself to fruit. It wasn’t that I thought more of myself than I rightly should’ve, but I had expected a woman with her connections and famed foresight to at least be slightly interested in a necromancer and their dragon. “Are we leaving this morning?”
“Soon,” Yin Zhou said, taking her time with her breakfast.
Ade was stood to attention again. Taking a plate of fruit for myself, I made the deliberate effort to tilt it her way. She looked at the plate, up at me, and didn’t have to shake her head to decline.
I shrunk away from her and ate with my head down. I’d only offered her food because I’d wanted to see how she ate without a tongue and was worried she’d seen straight through me. I couldn’t have been the first person to stare at her with intrusive intent in their eyes.
“Where’s your ship?” I asked. I hadn’t seen anything out of place or close to remarkable down at the docks yesterday, and there were no exceptionally unusual ships there now.
“I have more ships than you have hairs on your head,” Yin Zhou said, licking her fingers. “My favourite of which is the size of a small country. It would not do well to dock in Port Mahon. Too obvious. Far too obvious.”
“Did you stay in town last night?”
It was difficult to imagine a woman of her status spending the night in a box of a room above a tavern, lying on sheets that hadn’t been changed in weeks, but if I wanted to make conversation with her, I had to start somewhere.
“No,” she said.
And so it went for some half an hour. Yin Zhou became increasingly less interested in anything I had to say, and I became increasingly less patient. Kondo-Kana was mere days away and I could make the trip in hours, had I taken Oak to Chandaran. I’d already be there, if not for Yin Zhou and her carriage.
“I don’t mind going alone. I could take Oak and meet you the—”
“We leave now,” Yin Zhou said, dropping her plate onto the sofa. She headed over to Reis, stood over them, and placed a hand on their cheek.
“Relax,” she said, smiling when they flinched. “I shall be back shortly, my dear. You’re doing a fine job. I could not have hoped for better. Truly.”
“… Aye. Cheers,” Reis muttered. “You leaving Oak here, kid?”
“Look after him for me?” I said, eager to distract them from Yin Zhou. “He knows you like I do and he’ll help you out around port. Just make sure no one bothers him too much, okay? He gets stressed and scared easily.”
“Looked after you, didn’t I?” Reis asked.
Smiling, I left with time for nothing more than a wave. Ade edged me out of the door, and once we were out in the early morning light, I let my fingers glow for a brief second. Just to be certain, again.
Yin Zhou’s ship might not have been at port, but her carriage certainly was. It was huge and enclosed, with big, airy windows covered in thin layers of cloth that barely diffused the light but obscured what was within. I felt oddly like I was being jostled into some manner of cell as Yin Zhou ensured I went first.
I clutched all the important documents to my chest and shuffled into the corner when Ade sat next to me. Yin Zhou’s coat was a labour of love and I didn’t begrudge the way it fanned across the seat and engulfed most of the space in the carriage.
The tailors in Thule could only dream of creating something so beautiful. I kept my eyes on the intricate details, the unreadable words stitched into the hems, and wondered if I could pass the entire journey studying it.
“You know the Queen of Felheim,” Yin Zhou said, once we were on the road to Chandaran. It wasn’t a question, and I instinctively knew she knew everything I had shared with Tae and Tizo last night.
“Yes,” I agreed.
“You are hers.”
“Yes.”
“I always thought Felheim would be a mere phase. Mesomia rending itself apart did not end well on all sides: there were the territories, there was Kastelir, and now we have the territories once more, in ashen form. But Felheim stands strong. Thanks to interesting methods,” Yin Zhou mused. “Which are about to change, meaning the balance of Asar is also changing. Myros and its neighbours have long since been irrelevant, thanks to my dearest Teleros, but there is still Agados and the territories to take into consideration. And what lies beyond those?
“Canth trades openly with Agados. If not officially. Of late, they have been especially interested in certain products. Gunpowder, for the most part. What happens if Felheim loses or gains power? How does this affect Canth? And how does that, in turn, trickle down to the southern hemisphere? Felheim wishes to change the manner of its alliance with Canth. If Canth were to be abated of its debt, if it gains more resources – bitterwillow, say – how will it react? Will it swallow Ridgeth whole? How will the rest of Bosma react? An increase in trade, as well as military presence? My home continent has technology that would blind your people, Rowan. If one thing changes, all others do.”
“Um,” I said. It was all I could say. Yin Zhou was waiting for answers as though I could offer some enlightenment, but all that came out was, “We’re just trying to help people. We haven’t thought that far ahead.”
“Of course you haven’t. That’s what I’m here for,” Yin Zhou said. She placed one foot on the edge of the seat between Ade and me and slumped on her bench. “Do you believe that this Queen of yours has the interest of all people at heart? That she will look beyond the scope of her own Kingdom and time?”
“Yes!” I said. I held all I felt for Claire between my teeth, wanting Yin Zhou to feel how deeply I believed in her; how right she was for the throne. “She told the people she wouldn’t take the throne if they didn’t want her to. Everyone is her priority. Felheimers. Former Kastelirians. The pane. Agadians. She doesn’t stop caring once we reach borders.”
Yin Zhou considered my answer. She looked at Ade, who shrugged.
That was good enough for Yin Zhou.
“Let us hope she is as much yours as you are hers,” she said. “She will listen to you. And you will listen to me. Kouris would agree. We are old, dear friends, remember? She understands the value – and necessity – of following my advice. As her about Rán, one day.”
“Rán?” I asked, leaning forward.
“Mm. Best not to bring her up around Reis, though,” Yin Zhou said, and banished the subject with a wave of her hand. “This is a good thing, Rowan. I can help you. You can help me. You are what you are and I am what I have made myself. I have the experience you lack, and I have ways of helping you put that into action. I could help Felheim. I could stand with Queen Claire against her brother, if an army is what you need.”
“You’d… you’d give us an army? Why?”
“Because you believe she will be kind and just, and because I have been waiting for the right time to see that Agados is no longer what it is,” Yin Zhou said. “And because I would like for the both of us to be friends.”
“Because… I’m a necromancer, you mean? Is that how you’re so old?”
Yin Zhou raised her brow and held out a hand to stop Ade from reacting.
In search of a reaction, Yin Zhou settled on a smile that was about as sincere as Queen Aren’s had ever been.
“The only other necromancer I have ever met resides within Chandaran. We are family,” Yin Zhou explained. “I have plenty of other means at my disposal. Do not think you are the only source of power in this world. But do not think that it makes you any less special, either. I will do you and your Queen this favour, and you will do me one in days to come. How does that sound?”
“I…” I thought of Reis sat at their table, clenching and unclenching their fists. “I’ll think about it.”
Perhaps I was being selfish. Perhaps I ought to ensure the safety of an entire continent if the cost was something so small as sacrificing my own comfort and autonomy.
“You do that,” Yin Zhou said, watching the ever-repeating landscape from her carriage window. “But we can and will do great things together, Rowan.”
CHAPTER XVIII
My second journey to Chandaran managed to be worse than the time I had no idea why I was being summoned to the castle, and it wasn’t simply because I didn’t have Varn and Atalanta for company. Kondo-Kana was waiting for me, but I couldn’t focus on that when Yin Zhou was peeling back all I was and plucking out every part of me to learn from, merely by being in my presence. I gave something away every time I exhaled.
I slept when I could and pretended to sleep when the rocking of the uneven ground wouldn’t let me drift off in earnest. Luckily, Yin Zhou was content with Ade and her stony, silent company. She spoke at length to her in a language I didn’t know the name of and Ade listened intently enough to memorise every word. Yin Zhou’s other people remained outside of the carriage at all times, and when an extravagant tent the size of a cottage was set out of a night, they slept on the hard ground.
I’d expected more of a convoy, but Yin Zhou was too old and too smart for all that pomp and fanfare. She preferred her subtleties, for extravagance often went hand in hand with assassination attempts, and throughout our three days on the road, she only found reason to use her name once.
We couldn’t have been more than a handful of miles from the capital when the carriage ground to a halt. Yin Zhou, having not authorised the impromptu break, poked her head out of the window. A second later, she slumped back in her seat and sighed.
“Wonderful,” she muttered. “Bandits. This forsaken continent teems with them.”
Yin Zhou and Ade climbed out of the carriage, so I did the same.
Five women stood on the road ahead of us, each of them clutching a larger weapon than the last. While they didn’t outnumber us, they certainly had more confidence than half the country combined.
“Go. Be on your way,” Yin Zhou said, waving a hand to swat at them like flies. “I shall endeavour to forget about this little interruption.”
“Look at her,” one of the women whispered. She was built like a regular down at Mahon’s docks, but I didn’t recognise any of them. “No one travels like that without being rich. Oi! What’s in the bags?”
“My belongings,” Yin Zhou said. “Let us put it this way, then: I am Yin Zhou. Now. Go. Last chance.”
The group stared at her for a drawn out moment before breaking out into laughter.
“You have any idea how many rich-sorts try that line on us?” asked a woman with hair as red as fire and an oversized sword in one hand.
“Dozens, I expect. My reputation precedes me,” Yin Zhou said, then caught Ade’s eye. “Would you?”
Ade didn’t need to be asked twice. She pulled a knife from her boot, stepped forward, and the redhead yelled, “Alright, alright!” as she made a tentative swing with her sword. Side-stepping it, Ade grabbed her wrist, twisted it back, and drew the knife across her throat.
The woman was on her knees with a single, effective slice. The bandits clearly hadn’t encountered anyone who could fight back before, and by the time they’d turned their panic into something vaguely productive, the woman had bled out into the dry ground.
My fingertips twitched. I could still hear her gurgling on her own blood.
“Don’t move,” Yin Zhou said. The women could not choose between fighting and fleeing and so took her advice and froze. “Rowan?”
Yin Zhou stepped back. Blood dripped from Ade’s knife and ran down the inside of her wrist. It didn’t occur to me what Yin Zhou expected of me until she gestured to the body on the floor.
“Oh. I—”
“Come now. You can kill my nephew but you cannot bring this misguided girl back from the dead? Well?”
I froze like the bandits. Why had she let Ade kill the woman if she intended to revive her seconds later? It wasn’t like the time Claire had pushed a blade through Ash’s back, thinking she would cut me in two with an axe. Yin Zhou had done it purely because she could. To her, this was not an inconvenience. It was a cheap way to see my power in action.
And I was not so petty that I would let a woman remain dead because of it.
Looking to the side, I waved a hand. The arteries in the woman’s throat closed and refilled with blood as the flesh of her throat stitched itself back together. She spluttered the last of the blood out of her throat, and though her companions tried to help her up, her bare feet slipped on the ground and she smashed her face against the hard-packed dirt.
“What the—what the fuck,” one of the bandits yelled as she dragged her briefly-dead friend by the ankles.
“I told you: I am Yin Zhou. You are not to bother me.”
Yin Zhou stood with her chin raised, pleased by the way things had played out, and watched the horizon long after the bandits were gone. I rubbed my wrist uncomfortably, aware that this would be the way of things, should she lend us an army. I would forever be tagging along with her and exploiting my powers to teach people their place around her.
“Very good,” she said, patting Ade on the shoulder as she headed back to the carriage.
I did my best not to look at Ade for the rest of the journey. All I could think about was the inside of her mouth. I knew that Tizo’s story couldn’t be true. It was like Kidira and her slaughtered brothers: it was a falsehood that served a purpose. In days people would be spreading tales of Yin Zhou’s necromancer, felling and raising two dozen bandits by the side of the road.
Perhaps Yin Zhou had a reason for doing it. Perhaps Ade had been struck by an illness, a growth, that had started in her mouth and threatened to spread. Perhaps it had been carved out by one of Ade’s enemies and Yin Zhou did not want to give them the satisfaction of letting rumours spread that someone had got close to her right-hand woman.
There were a thousand possibilities and not a single one of them were any of my business.
Yin Zhou hummed to herself for the remainder of the journey, at the mercy of a wonderful mood. And why wouldn’t she be? Even a woman as old and well-travelled as her did not encounter a necromancer every day.
I kept my eyes on the gradually changing landscape as the river Qart came into view. Slowly, buildings began to crop up, until the outskirts of Chandaran rose around us. The low city was bordered by the setting sun, turning the sky between and above buildings a dusty red we never saw the likes of in Asar. I forgot my present company, took in the sounds and smells and the gentle laze that came with late afternoon, and let my heart beat to the rhythm of the names of those I was about to see.
Yin Zhou claimed authority over Chandaran’s palace and the guards at the gate didn’t look twice at her before simpering and rushing to let us in. We followed the pathway around to the empty fountain at the palace doors, left the carriage, and let Yin Zhou’s people take care of the horses. With the documents clutched to my chest, I took a deep breath that made my chest tighten as my lower jaw trembled.
I could feel her. She was there. Of course she was, of course she was! But I had not expected to feel it so keenly, so sincerely.
Yin Zhou gestured for the doors to be opened but I said, “They’re not in there.”
“What do you mean?”
She stopped the guards from leaping into action with a raised hand.
“They’re outside. In the gardens,” I murmured, breaking away from Yin Zhou. “Kondo-Kana is, anyway.”
My explanation was good enough for her. I drifted around the building and Yin Zhou followed.
The palace was located in one of the few parts of Canth that allowed greenery to grow. Left unattended, its gardens were thick and overgrown. A mess of mismatched flowers fought for their place amongst the long grass and I took the path pressed flat by a thousand footsteps before me.
I found what had drawn me close in an alcove behind the palace. A stone bench had likely been the centre of some manner of courtyard decades back, and was now surrounded by ivy thick enough to hide in on all sides. The plant crept around the legs of the seat and formed an arch around it.
Queen Nasrin sat on the bench, but she wasn’t reading endless, mind-numbing letters or examining yet more accounts. She was holding what looked to be an actual story. Atalanta and Varn were half on duty and half eating their dinner sprawled out in the grass, and Kondo-Kana—oh! Kondo-Kana was there, lying across the bench with her head rested in Queen Nasrin’s lap.
I didn’t move. Didn’t breathe. Didn’t need to. She was there.
She was there.
“What the—”
Proving that she was worthy of her position, Varn scrambled to her feet and held out her spear. I hadn’t noticed it, hidden in the grass as it had been. Atalanta remained seated, but slowly reached back for her bow.
