When I get close to the bank, the crew are already fighting out of the shallows, torn between triumph and defeat. We lost the keel, but we lived. Exhausted, I let the river girl pull me up to them, and Big Ean offers a hand, half dragging me to my feet.
We look back together at the now-crumbling hulk of my boat. It exploded quickly, faster than I anticipated. Anyone aboard would surely have been incinerated. A few yards away, one of the hounds bales mournfully, before the pair runs off together.
My chest tightens, a sharp pain springing to my eyes.
“Did she . . . ?” Gill murmurs, but Riette waves him off.
Together, we wait for one of the Silvers to fight their way out of the river. An enemy or a friend, we don’t know. I hope for Lyrisa, hope her luck was as good as mine. But the boat sinks and no one comes.
I wish I could have shown her the Gates.
SEVEN
Lyrisa
The river washes clean most of the blood. If not for the water, I would be soaked in it. Orrian’s, mostly. That tends to happen when you remove a head.
It doesn’t wash away the memory. I doubt anything ever will.
The river fumed behind him, rising like the wings of a predatory bird. On either side, his friends lunged at me, slowed by their drunken state. The worst of them was Helena, but she was at the far end. A strongarm like me, she would have been difficult to kill.
But I could only look at Orrian, screaming beneath me, trying to rise from his knees. There was fire in his eyes. No, that was the ship, the cargo hold catching alight, exploding from either end.
“You will be mine,” he hissed, even as my hands closed on either side of his head. In that moment, I saw my life as it could have been, as so many had lived before me. Resigned to a crown, unhappy and spreading that unhappiness. Miserable in my strength and power. Inflicting my pain on everyone around me, and my children after me.
I would not have that life for myself, not even if the alternative was to die.
I felt the spray of the river as it trembled over us, claws reaching for my throat. I grabbed and pulled. I don’t know what I expected to happen. For him to die, certainly. Perhaps for his skull to break before his spine. Instead his neck tore clean, like I was removing the top from a jar. I didn’t know a body could do that.
I didn’t know there could still be so much blood, a heart still beating even without a head.
Strange, his water saved me. It crashed as soon as he died, falling upon us both even as the ship burned. I dove as fast as I could, my wet clothes reluctant to catch fire. Even so, I felt the searing pain of the flames behind me, consuming everything and everyone still left on the ship.
I feel them now, hot and angry. They’ll need tending, but I doubt I’ll find a skin healer at the confluence. In Memphia, maybe. For now I’ll have to make do with what I can cobble together from the market town.
It was the right thing to do. Keep low in the water, watch the bank. Wait for Ashe and his crew to move on. Let them think I died with Orrian. Let no whisper of me travel down this river. Let no one else follow my trail.
It’s the only way to get away properly. Leave no trace.
I’ll have to be more judicious with my coin. Luckily, the pouch on my belt survived the explosion and the river. It should be enough, if I spend it wisely.
First things first, I manage to trade my Lakelander uniform, soaked as it is, for better-fitting clothes. The coveralls stink, but they’ll do, and I’m eager to get out of a dead woman’s clothes. The market town is larger than I anticipated, with hundreds of stalls spread out across dirt streets and the docks. Keels, ferries, and even larger boats crowd the riverbank, loading and unloading cargo and passengers. It won’t be difficult to book passage to the Gates. It won’t be hard to leave this world behind, as I have so many others.
The ground beneath my feet shifts from earth to wooden plank to earth again, this part of the river junction crossed by smaller canals and shifting streams. I keep my head down, my ears open, and my hair loose to hide my face. I catch snippets of conversation here and there, some of it about the “commotion” at the confluence. The rest is jarringly normal. Traders exchanging news, boatmen reuniting with friends, gamblers advertising games, merchants their wares. I pass it all quickly, aiming for the main docks where the larger boats wait.
Until one voice above the rest gives me pause.
A sly voice, familiar, with a confident smirk behind it.
I turn to find a small crowd gathered, ringing a table with two chairs, one of them occupied by a kindly, smiling ox of a person. He offers a hand to another large man as he gets up from the table, rubbing his arm with a grimace.
“No hard feelings?” Ean says, still smiling in his gentle way.
The Red opponent turns without another word, cursing under his breath. He leaves coins on the table as he stomps off, his footsteps shaking the planks beneath my feet.
Ashe is quick to scoop the coins into his jacket pocket, still drying beneath the afternoon sun. He claps Ean on the back.
“Well done, Ean,” he says with a grin, before turning back to the market crowd of travelers and traders. “Come on now, anyone else want to try Big Ean? Strongest arm this side of the Freelands! All or nothing, first arm to touch the table wins the coin!”
I shouldn’t stop. I should keep walking. Pay my way onto a boat and go.
Instead I find myself parting the people in front of me, my coin purse in hand.
I smirk as I sit, laying my money out slowly. Then I put my arm out, elbow to the tabletop, hand open and ready.
Big Ean balks, but I only have eyes for Ashe.
He stares at me, his face impassive for a second. Then his lips curve into a grin.
“I’ll take that bet,” I tell them both.
TIMELINE
290–300:
•The Scarlet Guard is formed in the Lakelands. Gradually, its influence and power will grow throughout the kingdom and bleed across its borders to Norta.
SUMMER 296:
•Tiberias VI is crowned King of Norta following the passing of his father, Tiberias V.
FALL 300:
•Crown Prince Tiberias is born to Tiberias VI and his wife, Coriane, of House Jacos. He is nicknamed Cal.
LATE FALL 302:
•Mare Barrow is born in the Stilts to Daniel and Ruth Barrow.
FALL 301:
•After the death of his first wife, King Tiberias VI marries Elara of House Merandus.
WINTER 302:
•Prince Maven Calore is born to King Tiberias VI and Queen Elara.
SUMMER 320:
•Queenstrial is held. While working as a servant, the Red girl Mare Barrow displays an impossible Silverlike ability. She is disguised in the court as a Silver woman to hide this new power.
LATE SUMMER 320:
•After weeks of aggression, the Scarlet Guard attempts to seize Whitefire Palace in Archeon, but fails. Betrayed by Maven, Mare is exposed as a Scarlet Guard operative and Cal is forced to kill his own father. Mare and the crown prince are arrested and sentenced to death. They narrowly escape with the help of the Scarlet Guard.
•With his brother in exile, Maven is crowned King of Norta.
FALL 320:
•Mare and the Scarlet Guard travel throughout Norta, looking for more Reds with Silver abilities to join their army. They are called newbloods.
LATE FALL 320:
•After their team is cornered, Mare trades herself to King Maven in exchange for their lives. She is imprisoned in Whitefire Palace.