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Naev never forgets and never forgives—one of the reasons she and Mia get along.
Drusilla—Revered Mother of the Red Church and, despite her apparent old age, one of the deadliest servants of the Black Mother alive. Drusilla failed Mia in her final trial, and it was only after the intercession of Cassius, Lord of Blades, that the girl was inducted.
To put it kindly, she is not Mia’s greatest fan.
Solis—Shahiid of Songs, trainer of Red Church acolytes in the art of steel. Mia cut his face during their first sparring session. Solis hacked off her arm in retaliation.
They get along swimmingly now, as you can imagine.
Spiderkiller—voted “Shahiid Most Likely to Murder Her Own Students” five years running, Spiderkiller is mistress of the Hall of Truth. Mia was one of her most promising acolytes, but after she failed Drusilla’s final test, Spiderkiller’s fondness for the girl has all but evaporated.
Mouser—Shahiid of Pockets and master of thievery. Charming, witty, and as fond of larceny as he is of wearing ladies’ underthings. The Itreyan has no strong enmity toward Mia, which practically makes him the leader of her fan club.
Aalea—Shahiid of Masks and mistress of secrets. It is said there are only two types of folk in this world: those who love Aalea, and those who’ve yet to meet her.
She actually seems quite fond of Mia.
Shocking, aye?
Marielle—one of two albino sorcerii in the service of the Church. Marielle is a master of the ancient Ashkahi magik of flesh weaving, capable of sculpting skin and muscle as if it were clay. However, the toll she pays for her power is a steep one—her own flesh is hideous to behold, and she has no power to change it.
Marielle cares for no one save her brother Adonai, and he, perhaps too much.
Adonai—the second sorcerii who serves the Quiet Mountain. Adonai is a blood speaker, capable of manipulating human vitus. Thanks to his sister’s arts, he is handsome beyond compare.
Though, I do recall a saying about books and covers …
Aelius—the chronicler of the Quiet Mountain, charged with maintaining some semblance of order in the Red Church’s great Athenaeum.
Like everything else in Niah’s library, Aelius is dead.
He seems a little ambivalent about the fact.
Hush—a former acolyte of the Red Church, now a full-fledged Blade. Hush never speaks, instead communicating through a form of sign language known as Tongueless.
The Itreyan boy assisted Mia in her final trials, though he’d insist they are not friends.
Jessamine Gratianus—a Red Church acolyte from Mia’s crop who failed to become a Blade. Jessamine is the daughter of Marcinus, an Itreyan centurion executed for his loyalty to Mia’s father, Darius “the Kingmaker” Corvere. Jess blames Darius, and by extension, Mia herself, for her father’s death—though in truth, the girls have much in common.
The desire to see Consul Julius Scaeva gutted like a pig, for example.
Julius Scaeva—thrice-elected consul of the Itreyan Senate. Scaeva has maintained sole consulship since the Kingmaker Rebellion six years ago. The position is usually shared, and consuls sit only one term, but with Scaeva, the rules seem not to apply.
He presided over the execution of Mia’s father, and sentenced her mother and baby brother to die in the Philosopher’s Stone. He also ordered Mia drowned in a canal.
Yes, he’s something of a cunt.
Francesco Duomo—grand cardinal of the Church of the Light, and the most powerful member of the Everseeing’s ministry. Along with Scaeva and Remus, he was responsible for passing sentence on the Kingmaker rebels.
Duomo is the right hand of Aa upon this earth. The mere sight of a holy relic blessed by a man of his conviction is enough to send Mia writhing in agony.
Stabbing the bleeding fuck out of him may prove problematic as a result.
Justicus Marcus Remus—former justicus of the Luminatii Legion, and leader of the attack on the Quiet Mountain. During his climactic confrontation with Mia, Remus made several cryptic remarks about Mia’s brother, Jonnen.
Mia stabbed the Itreyan to death before he could fully explain himself.
He was not pleased.
Alinne Corvere—Mia’s mother. Though she was born in Liis, Alinne rose to prominence in the halls of Itreyan power. She was a political genius, and a dona of no little esteem and will. Imprisoned in the Philosopher’s Stone with her infant son after her husband’s failed rebellion, she died in madness and misery.
Yes, I quite liked her, too.
Darius “the Kingmaker” Corvere—Mia’s father. Former justicus of the Luminatii Legion, Darius forged an alliance with General Gaius Maxinius Antonius that would have seen Antonius crowned as king. Together, the two Itreyans raised an army and marched on their own capital, but were both captured on the eve of battle. Without leadership, their army shattered. Their troops were crucified, and Darius himself was hung with his would-be king Antonius beside him.
So close they could almost touch.
Jonnen Corvere—Mia’s brother. An infant at the time of his father’s rebellion, Jonnen was imprisoned with his mother in the Stone at the order of Julius Scaeva. He died there before Mia ever had a chance to rescue him.
Aa—the Father of Light, also known as the Everseeing. The three suns, known as Saan (the Seer), Saai (the Knower), and Shiih (the Watcher), are said to be his eyes, and one or more is usually present in the heavens, with the result that actual nighttime, or truedark, occurs for only one week every two and a half years.
Aa is a beneficent god, kind to his subjects and merciful to his enemies. And if you believe that one, gentlefriends, I’ve a bridge in Godsgrave to sell you.
Tsana—Lady of Fire, She Who Burns Our Sin, the Pure, Patron of Women and Warriors, and firstborn daughter of Aa and Niah.
Keph—Lady of Earth, She Who Ever Slumbers, the Hearth, Patron of Dreamers and Fools, and secondborn of Aa and Niah.
Trelene—Lady of Oceans, She Who Will Drink the World, the Fate, Patron of Sailors and Scoundrels, thirdborn daughter of Aa and Niah, and twin to Nalipse.
Nalipse—Lady of Storms, She Who Remembers, the Merciful, Patron of Healers and Leaders, fourthborn of Aa and Niah, and twin to Trelene.
Niah—the Mother of Night, Our Lady of Blessed Murder, also known as the Maw. Sisterwife of Aa, Niah rules a lightless region of the hereafter known as the Abyss. She and Aa initially shared the rule of the sky equally. Commanded to bear her husband only daughters, Niah eventually disobeyed Aa’s edict and bore him a son. In punishment, she was banished from the skies by her beloved, allowed to return only for a brief spell every few years.
And as for what became of their son?
As I said last time, gentlefriends, that would be spoiling things.
Epigraph (#ulink_1f8adca6-eefd-5331-811d-de9830da760f)
The wolf does not pity the lamb,
And the storm begs no forgiveness of the drowned.
—RED CHURCH MANTRA
CHAPTER 1 (#ulink_b7061e7f-51ab-5bc8-8389-42dda614408d)
PERFUME (#ulink_b7061e7f-51ab-5bc8-8389-42dda614408d)
Nothing stinks quite like a corpse.
It takes a while for them to really start reeking. O, chances are good if you don’t soil your britches before you die, you’ll soil them soon afterward—your human bodies simply work that way, I’m afraid. But I don’t mean the pedestrian stink of shit, gentlefriends. I speak of the eye-watering perfume of simple mortality. It takes a turn or two to really warm up, but once the gala gets into full swing, it’s one not soon forgot.
Before the skin starts to black and the eyes turn to white and the belly bloats like some horrid balloon, it begins. There’s a sweetness to it, creeping down your throat and rolling your belly like a butter churn. In truth, I think it speaks to something primal in you. The same part of you mortals that dreads the dark. That knows, without a shadow of a doubt, that no matter who you are and what you do, even worms shall have their feasts, and that one turn, you and everything you love will die.
But still, it takes a while for bodies to get so bad you can smell them from miles away. And so when Teardrinker caught a whiff of the high, sweet stink of decay on the Ashkahi whisperwinds, she knew the corpses had to be at least two turns dead.
And that there had to be an awful lot of them.
The woman pulled on her reins, bringing her camel to a stop as she raised her fist to her crew. The driver in the train behind her saw her signal, the long, winding chain of wagons and beasts slowing down, all spit and growls and stomping feet. The heat was brutal—two suns burning the sky a blinding blue and all the desert around them to rippling red. Teardrinker reached for the waterskin on her saddle, took a lukewarm swig as her second pulled up alongside her.
“Trouble?” Cesare asked.
Teardrinker nodded south along the road. “Smells like.”
Like all her people, the Dweymeri woman was tall—six foot seven if she was an inch, and every inch of that was muscle. Her skin was deep brown, her features adorned with the intricate facial tattoos worn by all folk of the Dweymeri Isles. A long scar bisected her brow, running over a milk-white left eye and down her cheek. She was dressed like a seafarer: a tricorn hat and some old captain’s frock coat. But the oceans she sailed were made of sand now, the only decks she walked were those of her wagon train. After a wreck that killed her entire crew and all her cargo years ago, Teardrinker had decided that the Mother of Oceans hated her guts, arse, and the ship she sailed in on.
So, deserts it was.
The captain shielded her eye against the glare, squinting into the distance. The whisperwinds scratched and clawed about her, the hair on back of her neck tingling. They were still seven turns out of the Hanging Gardens, and it wasn’t uncommon for slavers to work this road even in summersdeep. Still, two of three suns were high in the sky, and this close to truelight, she was hoping it’d be too hot for drama.
But the stench was unmistakable.
“Dogger,” she hollered. “Graccus, Luka, bring your arms and come with me. Dustwalker, you keep up that ironsong. If a sand kraken ends up chewing on my cunny, I’ll be back from the ’byss to chew on you.”
“Aye, Cap’n!” the big Dweymeri called. Turning to the contraption of iron piping bolted to the rearmost wagon in the train, Dustwalker hefted a large pipe and began beating it like a disobedient hound. The discordant tune of ironsong joined the maddening whispers blowing in off the northern wastes.
“What about me?” Cesare asked.
Teardrinker smirked at her right-hand man. “You’re too pretty to risk. Stay here. Keep an eye on the stock.”
“They’re not doing well in this heat.”
The woman nodded. “Water them while you wait. Let them stretch their legs a little. Not too far, though. This is bad country.”
“Aye, Cap’n.”
Cesare doffed his hat as Dogger, Graccus, and Luka rode up on their camels to join Teardrinker at the front of the line. Each man was dressed in a thick leather jerkin despite the scorch, and Dogger and Graccus were packing heavy crossbows. Luka wielded his slingblades as always, cigarillo hanging from his mouth. The Liisian thought arrows were for cowards, and he was good enough with his slings that she never argued. But how he could stand to smoke in this heat was beyond her.
“Eyes open, mouths shut,” Teardrinker ordered. “Let’s about it.”
The quartet headed down through rocky badlands, the stench growing stronger by the second. Teardrinker’s men were as hard a pack of bastards as you’d find under the suns, but even the hardest were born with a sense of smell. Dogger pressed a finger to his nose, blasting a stream of snot from each nostril, cursing by Aa and all four of his daughters. Luka lit another cigarillo, and Teardrinker was tempted to ask him for a puff to rid herself of the taste, accursed heat or no.
They found the wreck about two miles down the road.
It was a short wagon train: two trailers and four camels, all bloating in the sunslight. Teardrinker nodded to her men and they dismounted, wandering through the wreckage with weapons ready. The air was thick with the hymn of tiny wings.
A slaughter, by the look. Arrows littered on the sand and studding the wagon hulls. Teardrinker saw a fallen sword. A broken shield. A long slick of dried blood like a madman’s scrawl, and a frantic dance of footprints around a cold cooking pit.
“Slavers,” she murmured. “A few turns back.”
“Aye,” Luka nodded, drawing on his cigarillo. “Looks like.”
“Cap’n, I could use a hand over here,” Dogger called.
Teardrinker made her way around the fallen beasts, Luka beside her, brushing away the soup of flies. She saw Dogger, crossbow drawn but not raised, his other hand up in supplication. And though he was the kind of fellow whose biggest worry when slitting a man’s throat was not getting any on his shoes, the man was speaking gently, as if to a frightened mare.
“Woah, there,” he cooed. “Easy, girl …”
More blood here, sprayed across the sand, dark brown on deep red. Teardrinker saw the telltale mounds of a dozen freshly dug graves nearby. And looking past Dogger, she saw who it was he spoke at so sweetly.
“Aa’s burning cock,” she murmured. “Now there’s a sight.”
A girl. Eighteen at most. Pale skin, burned a little red from the sunslight. Long black hair cut into sharp bangs over dark eyes, her face smudged with dust and dried blood. But Teardrinker could see she was a beauty beneath the mess, high cheekbones and full lips. She held a double-edged gladius, notched from recent use. Her thigh and ribs were wrapped in rags, stained with a different vintage than the blood on her tunic.
“You’re a pretty flower,” Teardrinker said.
“S-stay away from me,” the girl warned.
“Easy,” Teardrinker murmured. “You’ve no need of steel anymore, lass.”
“I’ll be the judge of that, if it please you,” she said, voice shaking.
Luka drifted to the girl’s flank, reaching out with a swift hand. But she turned quick as silver, kicked his knee and sent him to the sand. With a gasp, the Liisian found the lass behind him, her gladius poised above the join between his shoulder and neck. His cigarillo dangled from suddenly dust-dry lips.
She’s fast.
The girl’s eyes flashed as she snarled at Teardrinker.
“Stay away from me, or Four Daughters, I swear I’ll end him.”
“Dogger, ease off, there’s a lad,” Teardrinker commanded. “Graccus, put up your crossbow. Give the young dona some room.”
Teardrinker watched as her men obeyed, drifting back to let the girl exhale her panic. The woman took a slow step forward, empty hands up and out.
“We’ve no wish to hurt you, flower. I’m just a trader, and these are just my men. We’re traveling to the Hanging Gardens, we smelled the bodies, we came for a look-see. And that’s the truth of it. By Mother Trelene, I swear it.”
The girl watched the captain with wary eyes. Luka winced as her blade nicked his neck, blood beading on the steel.
“What happened here?” Teardrinker asked, already knowing the answer.
The girl shook her head, tears welling in her lashes.
“Slavers?” Teardrinker asked. “This is bad country for it.”
The girl’s lip trembled, she tightened her grip on her blade.
“Were you traveling with your family?”
