Unhewn Throne 01 - The Emperor's Blades(41)

“Sounds like he picked the wrong half dozen,” Laith replied, spreading his hands.

“Mistakes do happen,” Lin added. “We heard something about your father maybe leaving his guard behind.”

Valyn tried to square the suggestion with what he remembered of his childhood, but the idea of his father abandoning his guard made less than no sense.

“Command still seems pretty stirred up,” Talal said, absently fingering one of the iron bracelets on his arm. “There’ve been Wings coming and going day and night since we learned about the murder. Maybe someone thinks there’s more to it.” It was just like the leach to be thoughtful, deliberate, reserved in his judgment. Leaches learned early to keep their own secrets close; they learned or they ended up dangling by the neck from a rope. Talal was no exception, and approached the world more warily than Laith or Gent.

“What more do you need?” Gent asked with a shrug. “Uinian will face trial and then he’ll die.”

“It’s like Hendran says,” Laith agreed, “‘Death is a great clarifier.’”

“And my sister?” Valyn asked. “She’s all right? Who’s running the empire now?”

“Slow down,” Laith replied. “Slow down. Adare’s fine. She’s been raised to the head of the Finance Ministry. Ran il Tornja was appointed regent.”

“And a good thing, too,” Gent added. “Can you imagine some bureaucrat trying to keep the military in order?”

Valyn shook his head. His father’s death had clarified nothing, and this further information about Uinian and his priesthood, a kenarang appointed to the regency, about impending trials, only muddied the matter.

All of a sudden the room seemed too small. The press of people, the noise, the stench of grilling meat and lard turned Valyn’s stomach and made his mind spin. The other cadets were just trying to help, just giving him the information he’d asked for, but there was something about the casual way they discussed his father’s death that made him want to hit someone.

“Thanks,” Valyn said, struggling up from his seat. “Thanks for the news. I’ve only got an hour to crash before second bell—I’d better make use of it.”

“You trying to starve yourself?” Gent demanded, shoving a bowl of clotted curds across the table.

“I’m not hungry,” he replied, shouldering his way toward the door.

He didn’t notice until he was outside and halfway to his barracks that Ha Lin had followed him. He wasn’t sure whether he was frustrated or glad.

“That must have been tough in there,” she said quietly, catching up in a few quick steps and falling in next to him. “I’m sorry.”

“Not your fault. Not anyone’s fault. Death is normal. Isn’t that what they’ve spent the last eight years teaching us? Ananshael comes for us all.”

“Death is normal,” she agreed. “Murder is not.”

Valyn forced himself to shrug. “Lots of ways to die—gangrene, old age, a knife in the back—it all lands you in the same place.”





10





The demolitions shed was just that: a shed tacked up from scrap lumber with a roof that looked like it wouldn’t keep out a decent rain. There wasn’t much point in building something more substantial, considering the place was blown up or burned down about every other year. Valyn approached with some trepidation. He’d spent a training rotation here, learning to craft and deploy the powerful munitions—starshatters, flickwicks, moles, lances—to which only the Kettral had access, but the place made most people a little uneasy. The low basin in which it was set looked like some sort of shattered desert, or the floor of a parched lake: a few charred remnants of plants stuck up from the broken soil, limestone chunks blasted from their bed bleached silently in the baking sun, while the sharp smell of nitre hung over everything. Aside from those cadets and Kettral whose training focused on demolitions, most people tended to avoid the entire area.

Valyn glanced over at Ha Lin, shrugged, then pushed open the rickety door. It groaned on its hinges as he stepped inside. The interior was dim but not dark. Daylight poured through cracks in the walls in a dozen places, and the thin sailcloth covering the windows admitted even more illumination. A row of battered workbenches ran down the center of the room, cleared off in some places, piled high with tools and instruments in others: alembics, retorts, vials, and tightly stoppered jars. As usual with the Kettral, nothing was standardized; the demolitions master for each Wing crafted his or her own munitions to fit his or her own needs and desires. There were basic recipes, of course, but most of them preferred to improvise, innovate, tinker. Valyn had seen starshatters that exploded in violet flame and moles that could rip a hole the size of a barn foundation out of the rock. Of course, such experimentation was not without risk.