Bone War (18 page)

They passed a large shop that had completely caved in on itself, and Ranadar found himself thinking how foolish it was to build with dead wood and stiff stone. If such an earthquake had struck Palana, the trees would have swayed a little, but the flexible houses built into them would have gone undamaged.

“Fae!” The word came from a potbellied man in an apron standing outside the shop with two younger, shorter, thinner versions of himself. He pointed a blunt finger at Ranadar. “A stinking elf! Did you cause the earthquake, stinking elf?”

Ranadar halted, taken aback. He had forgotten to raise his hood or throw up a glamour, and his elven heritage was plain as the overhead sun. His thoughts fled back to the market, where the bottler had called him names as well, and he thought of how he always had to hide in this place—hide his heritage, hide his love, hide his grief—and he thought of how he himself had to hide—hide from iron, hide from fear, hide from humans. Bile and acid washed his stomach. He yanked his hood up and turned his head away.

“Funny how he shows up right after it happened,” said a jowl-faced woman.

“Leave him alone,” Other Talfi snapped over Talfi's bundled body. “He didn't cause anything.”

But it was too late. Other people standing nearby had noticed and were whispering and pointing. Some were
talking openly. “Go home!” one of them said suddenly. “We don't want your kind here!”

Others glared along with him. More than one fingered iron knives at their belts with hard looks on their faces. Ranadar stood there with his dead love in the arms of a flesh golem, and his knees buckled under the injustice of it all. He had given everything he had so these people could live. He had helped rid this country of slavers. Now the Fae—his own people—were planning to invade the country, starting with this city, and he was trying to find a way to stop it. And for what? So they could spit on him in his grief.

“Fae filth!” One of the men balled up a fist. “I'll show you how we treat garbage in Balsia!”

The man rushed forward, and anger burned inside Ranadar. The power he had felt before gathered in his mind. If these people thought he was a monster, he would show them what a monster could really do. He would—

Other Talfi leaped between them, bundle and all. The man slammed into him with an
oof.
Startled, Ranadar let the power dissipate. He expected both Talfi and the man to fall to the cobblestones in a tangle of limbs, and he was steeling himself to seeing the dead Talfi spill out of the cloak, but Other Talfi remained rigid as a tree. The man bounced off him and landed flat on his back.

“You won't hurt him,” Other Talfi said in a deadly even voice.

“Vik!” The man scrambled backward while the crowd gaped. “What are you?”

“The real threat to this city, apparently.” Other Talfi shifted the sad, ragged cloak in his arms so it lay over one shoulder and put his free arm around Ranadar. Ranadar noticed the torn fingernail and the way he smelled like Talfi. Ranadar was too upset to push Other Talfi away, and the familiar touch calmed him, even as it reminded him of his recent loss.

And some shame came, too. Had he not just been thinking that someone needed to stop the fighting between Fae and Kin? These people were not angry at
him.
They were angry because they were frightened, and Ranadar was a target. It was hard to remember, but he should try. Someone had to take the first step to make things better, and sometimes the best way to stop a fight was to walk away from one. Even in anger.

“Let's go, friend,” Ranadar said. Other Talfi's arm was still around his shoulder. “Before someone gets hurt.”

“Regi!”
the man on the ground spat. “That's why you're defending him. Pair of
rassregi
! Does the elf drill your hole at night,
regi
?”

A sharp retort automatically came to Ranadar's tongue, but he swallowed it and walked away. Other Talfi, however, didn't feel such constraints.

“You've obviously given it a lot of thought,” he called over his shoulder. “You should ask that manly wife of yours to strap one on for you. Then you won't have to fantasize so much about elves.”

The other people in the crowd looked just as outraged as the man on the ground, and a couple of other men seemed ready to attack again, despite Other Talfi's show of strength. Other Talfi bristled, but Ranadar shook his head.

“
Talash—
my friend,” Ranadar said, “please walk away. For me.”

Other Talfi gave him a peculiar look, but obeyed. Dark looks from the people followed in their wake, but Ranadar ignored them. Other Talfi continued to carry the red-wrapped bundle over one shoulder and kept his free arm around Ranadar.

“Assholes,” Other Talfi muttered. “Vik-sucking assholes. Don't they know who we are? What we did?”

Ranadar wanted to react to this, he truly did, but it was overwhelming to watch a living copy of Talfi call his attackers names while carrying the cooling corpse of Talfi himself. His throat thickened, and he forced a wan smile to his face.

“Thank you for the help,” he said, coming out from under Other Talfi's arm. “I am fine now.”

A flicker of disappointment crossed Other Talfi's face, but Ranadar was too unsettled to do more than register its presence. “Just as long as you don't use that mind-smashing thing again,” he said. “I could tell you were getting ready.”

Ranadar nodded and concentrated on moving forward. That was Danr's philosophy, correct? Just keep moving forward, always forward. He tried it now.

They passed more people and heard more rumors and stories. The Gold Keep had fallen. No, it was barely damaged. No, it had not been damaged at all. A tidal wave was moving toward the city. No, it had already struck, but the spit of land that protected the harbor had stopped it. No, the coast to the west had been flooded. No, everyone should move to higher ground to avoid the tidal wave. No, the priests of Bosha had said there would be no tidal wave.

Through it all, Other Talfi kept Talfi's body close against his chest and followed Ranadar without further comment. Ranadar was sweating now, both with effort and with grief. With every step, it became clearer and clearer that Talfi was really gone. Grief gave way to more anger. Death had promised! She had taken half his life away and given it to Talfi, but Talfi was dead. What kind of universe allowed—

A chill came over Ranadar, and he halted so quickly that Other Talfi nearly bumped into him from behind. What if the reason Talfi had failed to come back was that Ranadar's days were over? Death had not actually said how many days Ranadar had left. Today might be the end. Today Ranadar must be fated to die as well. It made perfect sense. He certainly did not wish to live.

“What is it?” Other Talfi asked.

Ranadar silently took Talfi's body from him and pressed his face into the ragged cloak. Before the sun set, they would be together in Vik's realm—and he would pause at Death's door to tell her what he thought.

“My
Talashka
,” he whispered in a choked voice. “We will always be together, one way or another.”

He wondered how it would happen. Another earthquake, perhaps. Sorrow might overcome him and he might simply end it himself. Or he could just fall down dead. He wondered how Mother would react when she learned of it. A strange calm came over him. Soon it would be over, and he would no longer have to worry about dying Talfis or his mother's machinations or rescuing the Great Tree.

“What's wrong?” Other Talfi said. They were only two streets away from Mrs. Farley's house. This part of the city was showing little damage, though the streets were still filled with uncertain, worried people.

“I have realized something important,” Ranadar said. “Something that should have occurred to me earlier.”

“Uh . . . can it wait until we get to Mrs. Farley's?”

“Probably not,” Ranadar replied with a grim smile. “At any moment I will—”

The bundle in his arms squirmed hard and gave a loud gasp. Ranadar's heart jerked. With a cry, he set the bundle on the filthy cobblestones and pulled the cloak away. Talfi blinked up at him, his head healed and his hair crusted with blood. His sky blue eyes were confused, and he worked his jaw back and forth. Ranadar gave an unprincely shout as his heart soared.

“You are alive!” Ranadar shouted. “The Nine! You are alive!” He yanked Talfi into an embrace of wild delight and disbelief as tears sprang to his eyes.

Talfi, for his part, seemed a little bewildered. He hugged Ranadar in return and patted his back. “I'm all right. I always am. What's the big problem?”

“You've been dead a long time.” Other Talfi leaned laconically against a wall with a few fresh cracks in it, though there was tension in him. “We were beginning to wonder.”

“Wonder?” Ranadar backed up a moment and held Talfi at arm's length. “
Talashka
, we thought you were truly dead.”

“Oh.” Talfi patted himself as if making sure everything
was in the right place. He pulled a spoon from his pocket and looked at in confusion. “I always come back, Ran. Death promised.”

Ranadar floundered, not sure how to respond. Just a moment ago, he had been ready to die,
sure
he was going to die, and now his reason to die was alive again, and the world was a fantastic place. He felt as if he might fly to pieces or shout or leap into the air and punch the sun, all because the world had returned to normal.

Talfi slipped the spoon back into his pocket, and it struck Ranadar as such a mundane gesture that he nearly laughed with giddiness.

“How did I get out from under the . . .” Talfi's handsome face paled a little, and he swallowed a little. “That is, I remember the chimney falling and . . . then I was here.”

“Ranadar dug you out with his bare hands,” Other Talfi said lightly.

“Did you?” Talfi sighed. “Gods, Ran. Thank you. That was a bad one.”

Ranadar snatched him into a long embrace again and privately wondered if he would ever manage to let go. It was the most wondrous thing simply to hold Talfi in his arms, feel Talfi's cheek against his own, touch his hair. But eventually he did let go.

“We'll call that your second favor,” Talfi said with a shaky laugh. “Fing!”

“Oh!” Ranadar laughed himself. “I had almost forgotten. That should not be a favor.”

“It's mine to use,” Talfi replied. “Shut up and let me use it.”

“Took you long enough to come back,” Other Talfi said lightly. But Ranadar heard a hint of strain in the voice he knew too well. “We thought Death had reneged.”

Talfi stretched his arms wide and grimaced slightly as his joints popped. “When Kalessa's father chopped my head off, I didn't come back for several hours. I don't know why you're so surprised.”

Ranadar grinned and caught him in a third embrace. “I
am just thrilled to have you back,
Talashka.
Hurry! We should check on Mrs. Farley. We will tell you everything else on the way.”

Mrs. Farley's house had ridden out the earthquake with minimal damage, though the lady herself was sitting on a bench outside the front door, clearly reluctant to reenter the house. She started off it with a small cry when she saw them. “Good Grick! You're covered in blood, Master Talfi!”

“It looks worse than it is,” Talfi said. “I'm all right. Just need to wash.”

“The well water's all cloudy, but it'll do for a rinsing,” Mrs. Farley said uncertainly. “I don't dare go back inside for any brandy if you've cut yourself. What if there's another quake?”

“I doubt there will be another, Mrs. Farley,” Ranadar said, feeling suddenly tired now. It had been a horrifically long day. “Though I suppose a great many people will be sleeping in the streets tonight. It will be a sporting day for thieves.”

“That's why I have my courtyard,” Mrs. Farley said. “I'm glad to see you boys are all right. Did you bring back my kitchen things?”

“Damn. I think they were lost in the earthquake.” Talfi showed her the spoon from his pocket, then put it away again when Ranadar drew back. “That is all that survived. We'll replace everything, we promise.”

“It'll make eating difficult until then, Master Talfi,” Mrs. Farley sighed. “I—oh! You must be Master Talfi's . . . brother?”

This last she directed at Other Talfi. He stepped forward and took Mrs. Farley's hand. “Sure am. Arrived just now and wham! The quake hit.”

“I see.” Even during a crisis, Mrs. Farley played the good landlady. “Will you be staying long? Your brother has rented the entire place with his friends, and there's plenty of—”

A sprite flickered through the sky. It shot down the street and struck Mrs. Farley full in the chest. She made a soft sound of surprise, and then standing in her place before the house was the grand and beautiful form of Queen Gwylph of the Fae.

J
ust as Danr remembered, the tunnel abruptly widened into a cavern so great and wide and tall, a hawk could have flown across it and not realized it was underground. Mushrooms of sizes ranging from thumbnail to oak tree grew everywhere, and many of them glowed with a soft green luminescence that provided Danr's troll eyes with more than enough light, but were dim and gloomy to Aisa and Kalessa, though perhaps Kalessa's new serpentine vision was more sensitive.

A great stone staircase descended into the cavern ahead of them—the tunnel came out some distance above the cavern floor—and the tall risers were difficult to descend, built for trolls and giants as they were. Though now that Danr thought about it, the dwarfs, who were much shorter than even humans, had to have some way of getting out. There must be a different staircase somewhere else.

In the distance flickered more lights, an entire cityful of fireflies. Danr inhaled the damp, mushroom-scented air and remembered the last time he had visited Glumenhame, the kindgom under the Iron Mountains. Here he met Kech, his father, and Bund, his grandmother and a powerful trollwife. Danr had liked Bund a great deal, and her death still caused him sorrow. His father, Kech, on the other
hand, was someone Danr had little respect for. Kech had fallen in love with Danr's mother, Halldora, and she with him, but when Halldora had become pregnant, Kech had been too weak to acknowledge his half-blood child, and he had turned his back. Years later, Danr had threatened to reveal their blood ties, and Kech had begged him to stay silent. In the end, Danr had agreed, though many people, including Kech's wife, Pyk, and their son, Torth—Danr's half brother—knew Danr's origin.

Also in the know was Bund's sister Vesha, queen of the Stane. She had seen the value of having a nephew who could move freely between the sunlit upper world and the gloomy underworld and had appointed him temporary ambassador to Skyford and the Kin in general. Vesha, however, had also been instrumental in chaining Death and using her power to break the Fae spells that had kept the Stane trapped and starving underground for centuries. For this Vesha had paid a price. Death had escaped and laid a terrible curse on her: Vesha would be immortal—until she set foot aboveground. Then Death would come for her personally. Danr hadn't seen or heard from Vesha since then, and he still didn't know whether to live in awe of her accomplishments or in horror of her foolishness.

Danr paused at the top of the great staircase for a moment, remembering all this, until Kalessa nudged him with her nose. “Are we standing here all day? We have a sword to find.”

They trooped down the stairs. The two wyrms had less trouble than Danr had expected, but the risers were difficult for human-sized legs, and Aisa finally clambered onto Slynd's back. At the bottom, a great wooden bridge trundled across a noisome, eye-watering pool of bat droppings that slithered with multilegged insects. When Danr had last been here, the bridge was creaky and more than a little nerve-racking, but someone had rebuilt it firm and strong. At the front of the new bridge, a troll stood guard. It—he—was more than a head taller than Danr, and his massive
body was thick as a pile of boulders beneath a rough-and-tumble suit of dwarf-built armor. Thick black hair stuck out from the huge helmet that covered his head, and he carried a bronze-shod club with spikes in it. His jaw jutted pugnaciously forward, pushing his small nose back into his face and letting long white fangs poke upward. Trolls would find him handsome, Danr was certain, even if humans did not. The troll looked to be about eighteen, though Danr hadn't spent a great deal of time among his father's people and wasn't very good at estimating the ages of other Stane. The troll guard raised his great club at them as they reached the bottom of the stairs. Kalessa, Slynd, and Aisa drew back from the troll with literal hisses, but at this distance, Danr was able to recognize him.

“Torth!” he said. “I haven't seen you in some time!”

The troll stared down at Danr uncertainly. “Do I know you, human?”

“I'm Stane,” Danr said blandly. “I visited our—your—father just before Grandmother Bund died. Aisa here came along. Remember?”

Recognition stole over Torth's face. It warred with fear and more than a little anger. “I remember. It was because of you my grandmother died.”

Another pang went through Danr, and a weight settled on his shoulders. He remembered with pain Bund casting the spell that opened the Twist to send him, Talfi, and Aisa to Xaron so they could look for the Iron Axe and persuade the orcs to join in the fight against the Fae. The spell had cost Bund the last of her fading strength and killed her. It had also cost Talfi his leg and his life, though that situation had ultimately improved.

“None of us knew she was going to kill herself when she sent us to Xaron,” Danr said quietly. “If I had known, I wouldn't have let her do it.”

“No one could stop Grandmother Bund from doing anything she decided to do,” Torth grumbled in the dim cavern.

“That is certain,” Aisa put in. “I think of her often, and remember her strength and power. You must be proud to be her grandson.”

Torth seemed a little mollified at that, and he shifted his club with a clank of armor. “So, why are you here? Have you come to see . . . my family?”

“In a way,” Danr said, and on impulse added, “Look, Torth—you're my brother. My only brother. I know we aren't supposed to talk about it because Father's a prince who fathered a bastard child with a human. But everyone knows what happened. Everywhere else in the world, people toss me gifts and throw me parades. Down here, can't you and I at least be friends?” He put out a hand and held his breath.

Torth hesitated, then brought up his own hand. Abruptly, he pulled back. “You're after the queen.”

That caught Danr flat. He dropped his hand. “What?”

“You're right—everyone knows who you are. You wielded the Iron Axe and saved all of us. I was there, too, remember?”

“You were at Palana?” Danr gasped. “I didn't see you.”

“We were all somewhat occupied,” Kalessa said.

“I had put on my armor—this very suit of it,” Torth said. His voice was deep and rumbling, though the cavern was too big for an echo. “And I was put in command of a regiment of trolls, dwarfs, and giants, just like Father. The horns sounded to announce sunset, and we marched out the Great Door. Except something went terribly wrong. A Twist wrenched us across the continent, made us all dizzy and sick and scattered our soldiers. The Fae fell on us then and we couldn't stop the slaughter. Only a few of us had iron armor and weapons, and even those of us who did were too unsettled to use them well. I saw my friends cut in half and their blood ran in black rivers.”

“I'm sorry,” Danr said softly. “I tried—”

“Then you showed up with that Axe,” Torth continued as if he hadn't spoken. “You called fire and stone from the sky and made the earth shake and cut the Fae to ribbons. I
had thought I couldn't be more afraid when the Fae Twisted us to Alfhame, but I was wrong. You were the most terrifying, fearsome thing I'd seen in my life. Vik himself would have hidden in his bucket of souls when he saw you coming. I pissed myself in my armor.

“You faced down the Queen of the Elves, and she fled like a coward. The queen!” Torth thumped his club on the cave floor, and the sound rang hard. “And then we were suddenly back in Glumenhame, as if none of it had ever happened. Except a great many of us were dead, and our own queen is cursed. And all the doors are open and we are free to come and go. We have food and we have trade with the Kin now. The sacrifice of our people was painful, but not in vain.”

“Er . . . good?” Danr hazarded.

“And now you've returned,” Torth said. “You're the hero of the Stane. Everyone celebrates who you are and what you did, and they call you a prince. Father could publicly acknowledge you now, and it would make him an even bigger Stane than he is now. But it would shame Mother.”

“Hmm!” Kalessa put in. “He is celebrated and she is shamed, even though he is the one who strayed outside his marriage. You Stane live underground because everything about you is backward.”

“Hey, look,” Danr said, “we don't need to—”

“You want the crown!” Torth burst out.

This silenced everyone. Water dripped, and Slynd's scales scraped against stone as he shifted position. Finally, Danr said, “The crown?”

“You're my brother, which makes you a prince,” Torth spat. “Aunt Vesha has no children, which puts Father in line to be king after she dies—if Death ever takes her—and me in line after him. But now you're here. You saved us all. The moment you arrive in the city, they'll throw a great celebration that'll last for nights. And then Aunt
Vesha will have no choice but to put you in line for the throne. First in line. Half-blood or not.” He spat again.

“I thought the Stane disliked like half-bloods,” Aisa said.

“It's more complicated than that,” Torth said. “Some half-bloods are better than others.”

“To become a full-blood, all you must do is save the world?” Aisa said.

“I don't want to fight,” Danr interrupted. “And I don't want the crown.”

Here, Torth paused warily. “You don't?”

“Up there”—Danr pointed at the ceiling—“I've been made a knight and a baron and, when I wasn't paying attention, a priest. I've also been crapped on, spat at, and hit with big sticks. All I really want is to be left alone on a farm somewhere. The last thing I want is to rule over a bunch of people who half love me and half hate me for the way I was born.”

Torth chewed his tongue. Danr felt a strange pain at his hesitation. He'd barely thought of Torth until this moment, but now that he was facing him, he wanted to feel a greater connection. Everyone else he'd grown up with had siblings, but never Danr. Being an only child had accentuated how different he was to the humans around him. Now that he had a brother, he wanted to
have
a brother. For real. But Torth saw him as a rival, not to be trusted, not to be—

“All right.” Torth held out his hand.

Danr stared down at it stupidly. “What?”

“You're my brother,” Torth said, still holding out his hand. “It shouldn't matter, I guess, whether you want the crown or not. Blood is blood. I'm more worried about Mother, but—”

“Brother!” Danr shook Torth's much larger hand in his own. It was strange to shake hands with someone bigger and stronger than he was, but this was his brother. He had a brother. A small bit of elation feathered through him.

“Just hug him,” Kalessa said, flicking her tongue. “Truly!”

Torth and Danr embraced, a little gingerly because of Torth's size and armor, but fully. For the first time in his life, Danr was hugging his brother, and he wanted the moment to go on for a while, even though he had to surreptitiously wipe at his eyes.

“Well,” Torth said, and his voice was a little thick, “I suppose I should bring you into the city. Get the parade started.”

“If it's all the same to you,” Danr said, “I think we'd rather skip all that. We're a little pressed for time, and we need to see Aunt Vesha. Can you arrange it?”

“Yeah, course.” Torth cocked a thumb. “There's a back way into her caverns. I can take you. Brother.”

“Brother,” Danr echoed with a grin.

“Oh, brother,” said Aisa, but Danr caught the soft note in her voice.

*   *   *

Danr had not visited the royal caverns the last time he had come under the mountain. They were a series of tunnels dug through the rock that wormed in a thousand directions. Each was polished smooth and overlaid with marble and granite, often shot with veins of gold or silver. Mosaics of precious stones showed scenes from ancient stories—Bosha and Kalina warring with the Fae, trickster Tikk in the shape of a fly landing on Grick's vulva as Brinna and Fell were born and adding himself to the Nine, Urko being split in half as a punishment and living partially in Glumenhame and partially in Lumenhame. The stones refracted the luminescent light of the ever-present mushrooms, amplifying it and brightening the caves without hurting sensitive trollish eyes. They passed sumptuous rooms with intricately carved stone furniture and even some of precious wood. A great kitchen bustled with a dozen trolls and gave off strange smells that nevertheless made Danr's mouth water. Torth led them past this room before the huge cooks noticed them and left them in a
small side chamber, though
small
was a relative term—the room would have housed three human families comfortably.

Torth said, “Wait here. Brother.” He left.

“How long does he intend to do that?” Aisa asked.

“Oh, leave it alone. Sister,” Kalessa put in while Slynd explored the room.

“I am only teasing.” Aisa put her hand into the crook of Danr's arm. “I am glad the two of you have decided to get along. And it will make one part of the Garden that much less of a tangle.”

A moment later, Queen Vesha strode into the room. She towered over everyone there, including the wyrms, but she wore an elaborate dress of night blue velvet embroidered with gold thread. Like with all trolls, her jaw jutted forward, showing plenty of teeth, and she wore her dark hair in a long, thick series of braids wrapped around her head. Torth came behind her, wearing a more straightforward tunic and thick trousers. Both trolls were barefoot—Danr had never met a Stane who went shod except into battle. Vesha went straight to Danr and hoisted him off the floor in a tight embrace. Danr's breath rushed out of him and his ribs creaked.

“Nephew!” she grumbled in his ear. “It's been too long! And Aisa!”

Aisa stepped back out of hugging range. “I would rather not be crushed,” she said, “pleased as I am to see you, Highness.”