The Awakened City by Victoria Strauss

Author:Victoria Strauss
Language: ara, eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: Open Road Media Sci-Fi & Fantasy
Published: 2014-12-22T17:48:40+00:00

16

Gyalo

GYALO DREAMED THAT night of Teispas. The captain was unwounded; he wore the dress uniform of the Exile Army and his black hair was smoothly combed and braided. Gyalo stood beside him in the moonlight, on the second-floor balcony of the dwelling of Thuxra City’s military administrator, where he and the exploration party had stopped before their departure into the Burning Land. Did you remember? Teispas said, staring out at the shadows of the administrator’s garden, and Gyalo, puzzled, asked, Remember what? And Teispas replied, angry: You don’t ask the proper questions, then turned and walked away and would not pause, no matter how Gyalo called after him. His red coat shredded as he went, revealing the lash marks on his back.

Gyalo woke uneasy in the first gray light of dawn, his scars aching. Just a dream, he reassured himself. He had not forgotten anything. Everything had been said.

That afternoon a palanquin arrived to fetch Sundit to the King. She remained for several hours. Since she did not summon Gyalo afterward to tell him what had transpired, he sought out Reanu, who had accompanied her.

“He asked questions,” the big Tapati said. “About the pretender. Also about you. He’s very interested in you.”

“What did he want to know?”

“What do you think? About your shaping.”

“What did she say?”

“She told him about the cave. About the bandits. He questioned me, too.

“And what did you say?”

“What she did. More or less.”

“I see.”

Reanu regarded Gyalo. With his gravity and bulk he gave the impression of an older man, but Gyalo guessed he was probably no more than twenty-five. He was handsome beneath his tattoos, with a well-shaped mouth and large, heavy-lidded eyes. At his throat he wore the amulet of the Aspect Skambys, the soldiers’ Aspect, Patron of war and weather; it and the thong that tied it were the exact blue-black of his tattoos, and it had been some time before Gyalo realized they were not a permanent part of his anatomy.

“It took some grit to do what you did yesterday.”

Gyalo shrugged.

“Was it true about the sword? Were you really not sure you could shatter it?”

“It was true.”

Reanu nodded, thoughtfully.

Two more days passed. There was no reason, really, to remain, and Gyalo urgently desired to be on his way. Yet he could not bring himself to leave without being certain that he and Sundit had been successful. “I’m sorry,” he whispered to Axane, at night before he slept. “Just a little longer.”

On the fourth day another palanquin arrived, with a summons not for Sundit but for Gyalo. Word was brought to him in the garden; he sent the servant away, then spent some minutes considering what to do. Did the King simply wish to question him, as he had Sundit and Reanu? Was this something more? A dozen scenarios chased through his mind, from an arrest with manita to something more permanent. Yet if he refused to go, what impact would that have on his and Sundit’s embassy? At last he rose and went

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