Rebel Elements (Seals of the Duelists) (33 page)

“Are you sure you want to leave him back there?” Bayan looked over his shoulder at the nobleman. Kiwani’s father stood bereft and slump-shouldered in his rumpled jacket, amidst Kiwani’s grassy anger.

She lowered her voice to a teary whisper. “I don’t owe him anything. Kiwani t’Eshkin died a long time ago, if she ever existed at all. I am just one more nameless duelist in service to the emperor.”

~~~

“Are you both entirely off your nut?” Calder yelled as he stood with his back to the hearth circle.

“Hardly. We were doing quite well with our skill duel rules until someone tried to murder me. And since then, I have glimpsed Bayan’s true character, and I can admit that I misjudged him. He’s proven his worth and friendship to me, more clearly than I ever could to him.”

Still confused, Calder shook his head, looking to Tarin and Eward. Their blank looks told him they didn’t know how to react either. “What aren’t you telling us? I’ve heard some strange things in the barracks’ hallways. Jealous rages? Sint-inspired near-death experiences? Bayan stabbing Kiwani in revenge for past grievances? Which is it?”

Bayan and Kiwani shared a look, and Calder could tell they were trying to decide how much to say. He ground his teeth.

Bayan told the rest of the story, explaining to the hex about the mysterious attacker and how he, Bayan, had rushed Kiwani down the mountain to Doc Theo’s. “The last I heard, the search teams never found the would-be assassin, only the bloodstain on the rock where Kiwani was shot, and some bits of melting ice. The only proof I have that he ever existed is this.”

Bayan lifted up a broken metal chain, from which dangled a small, black, featureless pendant.

“Not really an identifying item,” Tarin said.

Calder squatted down to stare directly at the plain black pendant. Frowning, he glanced to Kiwani, who also regarded it with concern. “I’m glad you dinna get killed.”

“I don’t know who that man was, or why he decided to attack me. But if it hadn’t been for Bayan, I would be dead.”

Bayan shrugged and grinned. “Hexmates.” But Calder read tension in his smile.

On the way back to the barracks, Calder nudged Bayan. “You were being nice to Kiwani tonight.”

“She’s had a rough time.”

“Aye, but there’s more to this than just saving a hexmate. You’re still worried about her. Is she still in danger?”

“Master witten Oost says no.”

“Then what changed?”

“A lot. A lot changed.”

~~~

The next day, Bayan was just exiting the dining hall after a long, quiet lunch with Kiwani when Calder jogged up with a look of concern.

“I was just feeding Bituin for Gerrolt, and, well… You should come look at her, Bayan. I don’t know what’s going on, but she doesn’t look good.”

Now what?
Bayan wondered, as he hurried to the glasshouse with Calder
.
He stepped into the narrow glasshouse and looked around at the eight dark red pitchers Bituin had grown in the year he’d lived on the campus. Normally, they were slender and open, but now, the pitchers sagged under their own weight, their lid leaves barely able to shut properly.

Bayan stared in surprise. “She’s stuffed.”

He held up the lowest pitcher and peeled up a corner of its leaf lid. Something dark and soggy filled the pitcher. “Did you pull any of this muck out?”

“Not yet.”

“Well, we’ll need to fish it all out. This much of anything could overwhelm her. I hope it’s not dirt; this soil isn’t healthy for her without the right additives.” He left the greenhouse and found a thick Y-shaped twig on a dormant, leafless shrub and snapped it off. Back inside the glassed structure, Bayan slid the stick along the inner edge of the pitcher and hooked a stringy fragment of its contents. Both he and Calder stared in fascinated disgust at what he lifted from Bituin’s pitcher.

Bayan tipped his head, examining the stringy substance. “That’s meat.”

Calder glanced at all the overstuffed pitchers. “That’s a lot of meat. Someone doing a good deed and feeding the plant for us?”

Bayan pursed his lips in doubt. “Most students know how much to feed her by now. Something else is going on.”

The messy work began. The pile of half-digested meat next to Bituin’s stalk grew bigger as the pair emptied out her pitchers with slotted spoons borrowed from the kitchens. But as Calder fished for meat chunks in Bituin’s uppermost pitcher, with one foot braced on the wall and one on Bayan’s shoulder, he found an unexpected item. He drew it out and let it dangle for Bayan to see.

“The missing attacker… did he wear a braided leather belt?”

Doc Theo nudged the partially digested meat on his desk with the end of his quill. “You say Bituin’s pitchers were all stuffed with this?”

Bayan nodded. “That’s right. We pulled about half a man’s weight out of her.”

Doc Theo frowned at the reference.

Calder stepped forward and handed Doc a worn length of braided leather. “We also found that.”

The chanter picked it up and examined it. “A belt?”

Bayan cleared his throat and perched on the edge of Doc Theo’s desk. “We were wondering, Doc. Could you test this and see if it’s—if it used to be—a person?”

The chanter studied Bayan with a sober look, then observed the scrap of meat again. “You think this is the missing attacker?”

“The man I fought wore a braided belt like this one. Then he vanished. Somewhere during that night, he died. Maybe someone thought feeding pieces of his remains to Bituin would be a good way to get rid of the body.”

“Did you get a good look at the man?”

“He was a blond Akrestoi villager. I’ve seen him sitting in on our training classes.”

“Blond Akrestoi narrows it nicely.” He selected his Northern Common crystal. “Now,” he continued, holding the crystal over the strip of meat, “I hain’t tried anything like this before, so I cain’t say it’ll work. This meat’s been stewing in Bituin’s digestive sap for at least a day.”

He began to chant. For a moment, nothing happened. Then the meat began to subtly freshen.

“Bhattara,” Bayan breathed, gulping. His stomach rebelled against the idea that people were acceptable seerwine pitcher food.

Calder stepped back from the desk and turned his head. “That’s the nastiest thing I’ve seen all year.”

“Worse than Eward’s stinky smallclothes after Bean Stew Night?” Bayan asked.

“Well, maybe not quite that bad.”

“Is there any way to tell who this used to be?” Bayan asked Doc Theo.

The man shook his head. “Not even if you brought all the meat from Bituin’s pitchers. Where did you put it?”

“In a rubbish barrel we borrowed from the kitchens.”

“Take it to the headmaster. No dawdling. I’ll show him this healed bit, too. And I’ll check with the Village, see if they’re missin’ any villagers.”

“Thank you.”

Calder and Bayan left the Chantery and headed back through the big tunnel toward the dining center and kitchens. When they arrived back at the glasshouse, however, they couldn’t find the barrel they’d filled with partially-digested human flesh. They checked with the cooks, but none of them had seen it, either. They searched for it in several unlikely places, but eventually gave up and returned to the glasshouse.

“I don’t believe it. We lost a dead man.”

Calder swore under his breath. “That’s the second time he’s gotten away. The dead shouldna be allowed to cheat like that.”

Bayan had a worrisome thought. He tugged Calder’s arm, drawing him close as he walked away from the glasshouse.

“Someone is hiding something.”

“You mean besides a mostly digested body?”

“Someone probably killed him on the mountain, and now they’ve noticed that we discovered their method of disposing of the body, so they’ve stolen that evidence, too. We still have no way to prove that he ever existed.”

“Well, you’ve got that pendant of surpassing boringness. But don’t forget what Doc—”

“Hsst. Not here.” Bayan glanced around in suspicion.

Soon, the pair met up with their hexmates at the Wood Arena, but Kiwani had not come.

“She said she wasn’t feeling right,” Tarin explained.

“After this morning, I canna blame her. She could barely summon a spark at all in Shock class, like how Bayan was when he hadna figured things out yet.” Calder grinned.

“Thank you. It’s good to know I can serve as a bad example, if nothing else,” Bayan said.

Kiwani didn’t attend classes the rest of the day. Bayan and the other boys in his hex waited on the lawn in front of the girls’ barracks while Tarin tried to coax Kiwani down for supper. A few girls leaned from their windows and taunted him.

“Come to beat the poor girl down some more, have you?” Anneke called. “Bad enough she’s too scared of you to come out of her room. Why you’re still allowed on campus, I’m sure I couldn’t guess.”

“Someone ought to file a formal complaint against you, you little muckling deviant,” a dark-haired girl yelled.

“Let it pass,” Calder warned Bayan, but Bayan’s anger was already moving his feet.

He planted himself in front of the broad side of the building. “Kiwani is my hexmate. I would die for her—”

“Try harder!”

“You ask her yourself,” Bayan shot back. “She’ll tell you exactly the same story I’ve been telling everyone!”

“She won’t contradict you because she’s completely terrified! We’ve seen the way she stares into nothing, like her soul’s gone to the sints before the rest of her. That’s your doing!”

“It is not. The Kiwani I know isn’t afraid of anything, least of all me. But you go to the headmaster and tell him your version of events you didn’t witness. Then you can sit there like a foolish, ignorant child while he tells you that he’s already talked with both of us, and he knows far more about the situation than any of you. Now why don’t you take all that hot air you’re wasting out the windows and aim it at each other? It’s still winter!”

The girls in the windows grumbled. A few catcalled, while others slammed their windows shut. Meanwhile, Bayan heard Eward and Calder stifling hoots of laughter behind him.

Bayan turned to them with an exasperated sigh. “I still don’t follow the Waarden rules for humor. I was just—”

“Telling the truth,” Calder and Eward chorused.

Tarin walked over from the barracks doorway a few moments later. Her sober expression told the boys what they didn’t want to hear.

“We can fix her a plate, though,” Tarin said. “I hope she eats some. She’s just shutting down.”

A stab of alarm went through Bayan. “If she shuts down too much further, I’m not sure they’ll let her stay with us.”

“What a shame that would be,” Eward said, as they all turned toward the dining center. “After her turnaround with Bayan.”

A shame indeed, Bayan agreed silently. If our duel hadn’t directly brought about the discovery of her blood secret, we’d all be getting along fine now. With Elemental exams looming closer by the day, we can’t lose another hexmate now.

The next day, Bayan and his hex walked to the dining center for lunch. Kiwani had not joined them for morning classes. When the hexmates were close enough to the dining hall door to smell the appetizing menu items within, a young newnik girl approached them with a note. “It’s from the Chantery.” Bayan and Calder exchanged glances. Bayan took the note and thanked the trainee, who scampered off. The others clustered around.

“Is this about Bituin?” Eward asked.

“Let’s find out. ‘Have found what you lost. Drop by when free.’”

“Are we free now?” Tarin asked.

“We’re hungry now, is what we are,” Calder answered.

“Let’s run over. We’ll be back in plenty of time to eat before Instructor Mikellen lets us try to destroy the Earth Arena with Rising Mountain spells,” Bayan said.

Together, they jogged through tunnels and along wooden walkways, down stone staircases and onto the stone platform that fronted the Chantery, below its second story of living rock. As they approached the front door, however, they heard raised voices inside.

“That’s Master witten Oost and Doc Theo,” Calder whispered.

Try as he might, Bayan could not make out the specific words in the heated debate.

“We shouldna be listening to this,” Tarin warned. “He’s a Master. I dinna know he still argued over anything.”

“Bah. We canna hear a thing. But we shouldna be caught trying to listen to this, either.” Calder backed up, looking up the stone façade of the Chantery. Most of the windows were shuttered against the chilly air, but one was open. Before anyone could advise him not to, he invoked Wood and cast Briarflame. Long, thin brown vines shot from his fingers toward the open window.

“Up you go, mates.”

The others grabbed onto the vines and began scaling the wall. Bayan looked over his shoulder as he ascended, wary of others entering the small valley of the Chantery and spotting them at their mischief. But he and his hexmates were alone.