The Providence of Fire (10 page)

“Well, here's the city,” Valyn muttered, flexing his freezing sword hand to regain some motion while checking over his straps. He flicked a little hand sign at Gwenna:
aided dismount, short perimeter check
. She nodded impatiently, already loosening Triste's buckles for the drop. Valyn signaled to Laith with a few tugs on the straps, and the flier banked Suant'ra slightly to bring her down right at the base of the cliff, a few dozen paces from the stairs and windows.

This place had
better
be dead,
Valyn thought, as the cracked stone loomed up beneath him.

The drops went better than he could have hoped. Both monks followed instructions perfectly, as though they'd spent days memorizing them; Triste was almost light enough to catch; and Pyrre, who looked like she was going to bust her head open, tucked into the fall at the last minute and rolled to her feet chuckling. Annick and Gwenna didn't wait for the others to regain their balance before darting off, blades out, to check the perimeter, one outward into the high grass, the other, after lighting a storm lantern, into the gaping mouth of the city itself.

“As I often say after a night of drinking,” Pyrre remarked, glancing over to where Laith and Talal had landed the birds, “I would have enjoyed that more if we had done less of it.”

“Long flights take a while to get used to,” Valyn replied, careful to hide the fact that he, too, felt stiff and sore from hanging in the harness, wind-chapped and cold right down in his marrow. The assassin claimed to be on their side, but so far, the people who were supposed to be on their side had proven astoundingly eager to kill them, and Valyn had no desire to reveal more to the woman than he had to. He turned instead to Rampuri Tan.

“Tell me this is the place.”

The monk nodded. “It is farther north than I realized.”

“And this place is what, exactly?” Pyrre asked, tilting her head back to gaze up the looming cliff. “A part of Anthera?”

“I don't think it's part of anything,” Kaden replied, turning slowly to take in the crumbling carved façade. “Not anymore.”

Although there was at least an hour of daylight remaining in the high peaks, deep in the valley night was gathering already, and Valyn stared into the growing gloom, trying to fix the surrounding terrain in his mind: the waterfall, the small lake, the narrow river draining out to the east. Eons of rockfall had piled up in places along the cliff base, but a little farther out, stands of blackpine grew densely enough that he couldn't see more than a hundred paces in any direction.

He turned his attention back to the carved rock. A single entrance like a toothless mouth—the one through which Gwenna had disappeared—provided the only access at ground level, though a row of narrow slits glowered down on them from twenty or thirty feet above: arrow loops, scores of them. Rough carvings flanked the doorway, human shapes so eroded by wind and rain that Valyn could make out little more than the position of the bodies. Perhaps they had been triumphant once, but erosion had so twisted the forms that now they appeared frozen in postures of defeat or death. The remnants of rusted pintles protruded from the stone, but the hinges they once held were gone, as were the doors themselves, presumably rotted away. Whatever the place was, it had clearly been abandoned for a very long time.

Laith was going over Suant'ra, checking her pinions for damage, then the leading edges of her wings. Yurl's kettral waited a dozen paces off, feathers ruffled against the coming night, watching them all with one black, inscrutable eye. The birds would fly for anyone with the proper training, and in theory she wouldn't know or care that Valyn and his soldiers had been the ones to destroy Sami Yurl's Wing. That was the fucking theory, at least. Valyn hoped to Hull it was right.

“A night's rest will do them good, too,” Laith said, combing through 'Ra's tailfeathers with his fingers.

Valyn shook his head. “They're not getting a rest.”

The flier turned. “Excuse me?”

“You have the call-and-command whistles for Yurl's bird?” Valyn asked.

“Of course. She wouldn't be much good without them.”

“I want them both in the air,” Valyn said. “Circling. Yurl's bird can stay low, just above the trees, but I want 'Ra high. If we need to get out quick, we'll call them.”

Laith shook his head. “She's tired, Val. They
both
are.”

“So are we.”

“And we're going to get some
sleep
tonight. Even with the thermals in this canyon, it'll be a strain to fly in circles half the night. The birds aren't any use to us if they're half dead.”

“They're even less use to us completely dead,” Valyn said. “We have to assume someone is following us. Hunting us. Another Kettral Wing, maybe two.”

“
Why
do we have to assume that?”

Valyn stared. “We went rogue. We disobeyed a direct order when we left the Islands. We slaughtered another Kettral Wing.…”

“They tried to murder the Emperor,” Talal pointed out quietly as he approached the group.

“No one knows that but
us,
” Valyn said. “As far as the Eyrie is concerned, we're traitors.”

“Unless
they're
the traitors,” Laith said grudgingly. “Daveen Shaleel or the Flea or whoever. In which case we're just as screwed.”

Valyn blew out a slow breath. “I don't think the Flea's part of it.”

“You just said you think the bastard is
hunting
us.”

“I do,” Valyn said, “but I don't think he's part of the plot.” He paused, trying to make sure he wasn't missing anything. “Think it through with me. Yurl and Balendin were bad, they were part of the conspiracy, and Shaleel sent them north.”

“Ah,” Talal said, nodding.

“Ah, what?” Laith demanded, looking from Valyn to the leach and back. “Someone spell it out for the idiot over here.”

“If you were trying to murder the Emperor,” Valyn said, “and you could send Yurl or the Flea, who would you send?”

“Ah,” Laith said. “If the veteran wings were part of the plot, Shaleel would have sent them.” He brightened. “Good news! Whoever's hunting us is on our side.”

“But they don't know that,” Valyn pointed out, “and they might fill us full of arrows before we can inform them.”

“Bad news,” Laith said, spreading his hands. “The ups and downs are killing me. Still, if it's all true, if we really are being stalked by the Kettral, that's all the more reason to have the birds rested. Listen to me, Valyn. I know kettral. There are only two better fliers than me back on the Islands: Quick Jak and Chi Hoai Mi. Jak failed the Trial and, if you're right, Chi Hoai's hunting us, so I'm the best you've got and I'm telling you to rest them.”

Valyn frowned into the darkness, trying to imagine he were the Flea. The thought was ludicrous, but he kept at it. “This isn't a flying question, Laith, it's a tactics question. If I were them, I'd want to take out our birds first. Ground us. Without wings, we'd be at their mercy. I'm not letting that happen.”

Laith spread his arms wide. “Have you
seen
the mountains we've been flying over? The whole fucking Eyrie could be here flying search grids and odds are no one would find us.”

“I'm not concerned about the whole Eyrie,” Valyn replied, keeping his voice level, “I'm concerned about the Flea. He and his Wing have a reputation, in case you weren't paying attention back on the Islands, for making a total hash of the odds. Put the birds in the air. One high, one low.”

Laith locked eyes with him, then threw up his hands. “You're one worried son of a bitch, Valyn hui'Malkeenian.”

“It's your job to fly,” Valyn replied. “It's my job to worry.”

The flier snorted. “Here,” he said, tossing something overhand to Valyn. “If you're going to worry, you may as well have one of the whistles. Yurl's Wing had two.”

It took Laith a few more minutes to finish checking over the kettral. By the time he'd sent them into the air once more—silent black shapes slicing across the stars—Annick had returned, jogging out from behind a few pines with an arrow nocked to the string of her bow.

“Any company?” Valyn asked.

She shook her head. “No light, no smoke, no refuse or visible waste.”

“It's not exactly thriving,” he agreed, glancing around once more.

“As I told you,” Tan interjected, “it is dead.”

“I'll fucking say,” Gwenna added, stepping out of the doorway, lantern held in one hand, a bared short blade in the other.

“Anything inside?” Valyn asked, ignoring the monk. It was all well and good for Rampuri Tan to have his opinions, but Valyn's carelessness had nearly cost him and his Wing their lives once already. He had no intention of spending any time in a strange city, dead or not, without running through his own protocols.

Gwenna shrugged. “Stuff that doesn't rot: knives, pots, bracelets. Oh, and bones. A whole shitload of bones.”

“Where?”

“Everywhere. It's like every poor bastard in the place was slaughtered as they sat down to breakfast.”

Valyn frowned and turned back to the monk. “All right, so we can see for ourselves it's empty. Where are we? What killed the people who lived here?”

“This is Assare,” Tan replied. “The first human city.”

Gwenna let out a bark that might have been laughter. Valyn started to ask Tan how he knew all this, why the place didn't appear on any imperial maps, but night was nearly upon them, and they hadn't moved to any reliable cover. Gwenna and Annick were good scouts, but Valyn wanted the group holed up in a full defensive position before the darkness thickened further. He could see and move well enough in full darkness—in fact, it gave him a distinct advantage—but the other members of his Wing hadn't reaped quite the same benefit from their own time in Hull's Hole, and the rest of the party, the ones who weren't Kettral, would be essentially blind.

“Fine. We can talk about it later. Right now,” he pointed to the cliff face, “we're going inside and up, someplace in front, with windows; I want to be able to keep eyes on the valley.”

Laith raised an eyebrow, then jerked a thumb at Tan. “This guy says the city's older than dirt and you want to set up camp in a crumbling cliff? What about something less likely to fall on our heads?”

“I want the high ground,” Valyn replied.

“For what? Hunting rats?”

Valyn bit back a sharp retort. “Yes, for hunting rats. It's a cliff, Laith. Cliffs don't just fall over.”

The flier gestured to the scree scattered across the valley floor, some boulders the size of small houses.

“The cliff is sound,” Tan said. “And the
kenta
is inside.” As if that settled the whole matter.

“That's what we came for,” Valyn said. “Now
move
. Light's wasting and we're standing out here like geese.”

The Kettral set out at a light jog, while Pyrre and the monks fell in a few steps behind. Valyn had crossed half the distance before he realized that Triste wasn't following. She still stood in the broad, grassy clearing, staring around, eyes wide as lanterns in the crepuscular light, the too-large clothes clutched tight about her in one hand.

“Triste,” Valyn called. “Let's go.”

She seemed not to have heard him, and he turned back, cursing beneath his breath. It was bad enough when his own Wing questioned his decisions—at least they were capable fighters and good tactical thinkers—but if he had to play wet nurse to this girl all the way back to Annur … The thought evaporated as she turned to face him, face baffled, as though lost in the slow depths of dream.

“Triste,” he said, studying her. “
Triste.
”

Finally she focused on him. Tears welled in her eyes, catching the gold of the fading light.

“Are you all right?” Valyn asked, putting a hand on her elbow.

She nodded, trembling. “Yes. I just … I don't know. It's such a
sad
place.”

“You're cold. Tired. Let's get inside.”

She hesitated, then turned toward the ancient city, allowing herself to be led.

*   *   *

From the outside, the cliff had appeared solid; the simple façade was chipped and worn, whatever once shuttered the windows long gone to dust, but the angles of the doorframe looked true, the crucial verticals more or less plumb. As they stepped beneath the engraved lintel, however, Valyn could see that here, too, time and decay had worked their quiet violence. Though the city's bones were bedrock, the chiseling and carving of the builders had allowed in both the wind and the water. Small rivulets spilled over the rock, draining from some impossible height. The water ran cold and clear now, but in the winter it would freeze, and centuries of ice had shattered whole sections of stone, prizing them from the walls and ceiling. A rock the size of a horse blocked part of the passage, while smaller chunks made the footing treacherous.

Valyn pushed deeper into the cave, the smell of damp stone and lichen filling his nostrils. After twenty claustrophobic paces guarded by arrow loops and murder holes, the corridor opened out into a high, wide space—half natural cavern, half carved—evidently an entrance hall of sorts. Recessed sconces for torches grooved the walls, and a wide basin, cracked but graceful, sat in the center. It must have been welcoming once, if not exactly grand, but now it felt empty, cold, and too large to easily defend.

Doorways radiated outward, black rectangles in the lesser gloom, while wide stone stairs rose along the walls on each side. One route looked as likely as the other, and Valyn turned to Tan.

“Which way?”

No one replied.

“You all might enjoy sightseeing,” Valyn went on after a moment, glancing over at the others, “but there are a dozen doors off this hall, and we don't have the people to guard them or the tools to seal them up. So, if you're done admiring the architecture…”