The Killing Moon (Dreamblood #1)(74)

mother

—and forced his eyelids shut—

Hananja I beg you for peace

—and then he was inside the soldier and the taste of dreamblood was a sweet shock, like the first splatter of rain after a long drought. And after the taste, a torrent. He threw back his head and shouted in ecstasy as the self of the soldier poured into the aching hollowness within him, sending life surging from his core out to the very tips of his fingers and toes. So delicious it was, so powerful that his head reeled and his groin throbbed and his scalp tingled and OH GODDESS YES he needed more, so much more that he shoved aside the soul to look for it. There was nothing left save what little the soul needed to remain intact but what did that matter? He snapped the tether and sucked what spilled and crushed the soul and swallowed that too, and when nothing remained but tatters of mortal anguish, only then was he satisfied.

And then horror smashed up from the depths of Ehiru’s consciousness and shattered the bliss with a single word. The name for his sin:

Reaper.





27





Inunru, first Gatherer and founder of Gujaareh, creator of narcomancy, father of healing: the details of his murder have been lost, like patterns in sand.

(Wisdom)





As the soldiers bore down on them, Gehanu grabbed Sunandi’s arm. “Into the palanquin.”

Sunandi struggled to force her camel to turn; the anxious beast still wanted to run. “Hide with a sick old woman? I’m not a coward—”

“Don’t argue with me, fool woman! Get in there and maybe you’ll survive to warn your land!”

There was no arguing with that. Swallowing her pride, Sunandi dismounted and ran to the palanquin. Two of the minstrels were helping Talithele inside, piling saddlebags around the palanquin to help shield it. She joined them and climbed inside the flimsy cloth-and-balsa enclosure with the old woman. An instant later the sounds of chaos erupted around them, shouts and clanging metal and the whistling of frightened camels. The palanquin shuddered with the vibrations of hooves and bodies against the ground.

Talithele caught her breath in fright, which turned into a racking cough. Sunandi helped her hold a cloth to her mouth, wrapping an arm around her for comfort and willing the pounding of her own heart to slow. But the sounds from without were too terrible to assuage her fears. Finally—for not knowing made the waiting worse—she pulled aside one of the palanquin’s drapes to expose a sliver of outside, and peeked through.

Guidance of the Protectors!

Only a few moments could have passed since the beginning of the attack, but already the air was thick with dust and the stench of blood and worse. Just beyond the tent lay the body of one of the men who’d helped them into the palanquin. Beyond that she saw another minstrel fall from his camel, screaming; an instant later she gasped in horror as a soldier ran him down. Gehanu ran past, screaming like a madwoman and brandishing a short sword with both hands. Then Sunandi’s heart leaped into her throat as a soldier swung his horse about and narrowed his eyes at the palanquin, spotting her as she peered through the curtain.

“We must go!” Hooking an arm around Talithele, she put her shoulder under the old woman’s arm—she was light as a child—and hauled her out of the palanquin’s other side, struggling to climb over the saddlebags. Behind them she could hear the beat of hooves, all but sense the soldier’s malice directed at her back as he drew closer, closer yet, close enough to run her through—

There was a horse’s sharp squeal of protest from behind her. She put her hand on the ground to brace herself and haul Talithele over a sack of fruit; the earth gave a hard shudder against her palm as something heavy landed nearby. She struggled to her feet and saw:

The soldier’s horse was dead. So was the soldier, lying sprawled across the now-smashed palanquin, his neck broken. Above the soldier, his fists still clenched, Nijiri stared down at the body with something like shock on his face.

Sunandi helped Talithele upright and tried to catch her breath. “Little killer,” she said between pants. “How fortunate for me that you are.”

He flinched and glared up at her, anger displacing the shock in his diluted brown eyes. Then his face hardened, turning as cold as his mentor’s. “Stay with me,” he told her. “Carry the elder and I’ll protect you both.”

She wanted to refuse him, but pragmatism—and the scream of another horse as it went down nearby—outweighed pettiness. Nodding, she lifted Talithele in her arms and moved behind him, trying not to crowd against him in her terror. He stayed where he was, keeping the palanquin debris and piled baggage at their backs, crouching in some sort of defensive stance. But when Sunandi looked around, she was relieved to see there would be little need of the boy’s skills. Although the caravan clearly had been on the losing side of the battle, their attackers were beginning to withdraw, calling alarms to one another and looking southward in visible agitation. Sunandi followed their sight and spied another party of riders drawing near, trailing a dust-plume in their wake and bracing the green-and-gold wooden shields of the Protectorate to the fore. Relief nearly brought tears to her eyes.

Abruptly Nijiri stiffened and whirled, looking not toward the Kisuati riders but off in a completely different direction. “Stay here,” he told her, and before she could protest he went running off. She saw him halt beside Ehiru, who sat slumped on his knees beside the sprawled body of another soldier. But she had no more time to puzzle this out as the rescue party arrived.