Unhewn Throne 01 - The Emperor's Blades(37)

Tan paused. “What hurts?”

“Cheek.”

“Do you hurt?”

Kaden tried to focus on the question, but it made no sense. The world was fog. The pain was a red line scribbled on nothingness.

“Cheek.”

“And you?” Tan pressed.

Kaden opened his mouth, but for a long time words eluded him. “I don’t…,” he managed at last. What did the monk want? There was pain and there was darkness. That was all. “I’m not…,” he began, then let the words go.

His umial paused, dark eyes bright and intense. “Good,” he said finally. “That’s a start.”





9





The shrine to Hull, Lord of the Darkness, patron god of all those who moved in the shadows, wasn’t a shrine at all, but a massive tenebral oak, gnarled black limbs stretching over a full quarter acre like arthritic fingers scratching at the sky. Hanging from every branch and twig—packed in so close that when Valyn first saw the tree, he took them for heavy black leaves—dangled bats, tens of thousands of bats, folded tight in their wings, waiting silently for night. When darkness fell, they would take to the air together, a wheeling, darting, silent swarm harrying the sky, leaving the branches bare as bones. Even in summer, the tenebral had no leaves—the bats were its leaves. When they returned to roost just before dawn, the blood dripping from their fangs would soak the heavy earth around the roots, feeding the tree. Unlike its brethren, the tenebral had no need of the sun.

Valyn had seen other tenebrals in the course of his training—they were rare, but grew scattered all over the continent of Eridroa. This tree, however, perching on a low hillside overlooking the Eyrie compound, was by far the largest he had ever come across. Down below, among the storage barns, bunkhouses, and training arenas, the Kettral had erected small shrines to several of the young gods: Heqet, God of Courage; Meshkent, Lord of Pain; even a tiny stone sanctuary dedicated to Kaveraa, in the hope that the Mistress of Fear might leave her worshippers untouched. It was here, however, at the foot of the ancient tenebral, that the Kettral worshipped most devoutly. Courage and pain were all well and good, but it was darkness that covered the soldiers as they winged in beneath their birds, darkness that cloaked them as they killed, and darkness that hung over their retreat like a cloak as they melted away into the night.

Before and after every mission, the soldiers would leave an offering. There were no coins or gemstones littered among the roots, no candles or expensive silks. The Kettral knew how the tree survived. Valyn had spent years watching them wind their way up the narrow trail ground into the hillside, had watched them as they knelt and drew their blades, watched as they dragged the steel across warm flesh, squeezing blood onto the hungry roots. Whether Hull knew, or cared, was anyone’s guess. The old gods were inscrutable.

When Valyn first arrived on the Islands, he had found the tree and the sodden ground beneath it unsettling, to say the least. Valyn’s line, the Malkeenian line, claimed descent from Intarra, and the Dawn Palace where he had passed his childhood was filled with light and air. Now, however, the dark, brooding tree suited his mood just fine. Though Manker’s had collapsed into the bay nearly a week earlier, he hadn’t been able to shake the image of Salia’s bloodied face from his mind. When he fell asleep, he found himself in the burning tavern all over again, heard her begging him not to leave her. When he woke, he expected to find her blood still spattered on his skin.

He was furious with Ha Lin, and felt foolish for his fury. She had made the right call in a difficult situation. As Hendran wrote, Your ideals die, or you do. If Valyn had tried to make the jump with Salia draped unconscious across his back, he would have ended skewered on one of the jagged pilings. But it should have been my decision to make, he thought, balling his hand into a fist. In addition to the basic instruction, each Kettral cadet trained for a specialty: sniper, demolitions, flier, leach. Someone in command had decided early on that Valyn might have the skills to actually lead a Wing; if he passed the Trial, he would find himself in command of his own soldiers, and command required decision.

Blood misted down from above. He ignored it. He hadn’t spoken with Lin since Manker’s, and he didn’t know what to say. Here, at least, in the gloomy shadow of the tenebral oak, he had time to think, to work through his feelings without saying or doing something that he could not take back. Except, as he gazed down the hill in the direction of the compound, he could see a slender shape moving up the track toward him.