Chapter 20

The consolation prizes for being denied her duel were several.

Sergeant Mandisa sent a Watch surgeon to stitch the cut on her head and she sat down for a hot meal afterwards. Little more than stew and bread, but both were warm and after days on the run she would have been delighted by even a warm rock. She polished both off and Sergeant Mandisa even offered her a thimble of brandy, which she had not anyone else, before clapping her shoulder.

“There’s a few swords in the armoury,” she said. “Have a look when you’re done.”

A pause as the beautiful sergeant looked her up and down.

“Wen said I should remind you there’s clothes as well, if you want something to take something, but that shirt-and-coat look you went with is pretty ravishing,” Sergeant Mandisa praised.

Angharad went still as a statue, thimble in hand.

“It is shockingly fashionable,” Isabel agreed, eyes smiling. “I could see it taking in salons with the right adjustments – perhaps a silk sash around the waist or an open vest?”

“Coloured breast bindings,” the Malani sergeant suggested. “That way you can make them out through the shirt.”

“Scandalous,” Isabel appreciatively said.

Angharad hunched over and drank her thimble of brandy, as sadly it was impossible for her to disappear down it from sheer mortification. Perhaps a vest was in order, if the Watch kept any. Her coat needed mending again anyhow. Sergeant Mandisa strolled away after clapping her on the back again, leaving her to embarrassment.

“There’s a well for drinking water and another for the washtub,” Brun informed her, perhaps taking pity. “I’ll show you where so you can clean up.”

“That would be a fine thing,” Angharad admitted.

Tristan had done good work getting rid of the blood, but he had not been interested in the filth beyond what might get into her wounds. She was surprised Isabel could stomach to sit across from her given how she must smell.

“I have the first place in line after the Watch is done using it,” Song told her. “As I said before our interlude, you can have it.”

“That is kind of you,” Angharad said, nodding her thanks.

“It the least we owe,” the Tianxi meaningfully said.

Her gaze turned to the end of the table, distracting Angharad from reminding her she owed nothing at all: Song had saved her life on the Bluebell. The silver-eyed woman was staring at the two sitting near the edge, Master Cozme and Remund Cerdan. Both were keeping silent, looking uncomfortable. Now that the heat of the moment had passed, both were wrestling with the reality that they had surrendered Augusto Cerdan to her blade. It was Cozme Aflor who broke first, shaking his head.

“It is as she said,” he admitted. “And you kept your word to the letter: it’s another duel you tried to fight.”

There was a coolness to the way he beheld her now, a wariness. Had he guessed using the precise wording was her intention all along? Remund Cerdan, on the other hand, looked more tired and angry than anything else.

“Would that you were able to end him,” he said. “Cozme would not hear of my seeing to it myself-”

“I have explicit orders otherwise,” the soldier flatly said.

“- else he would not have reached sanctuary alive,” Remund continued, teeth gritted. “He tried to murder us with that shot, to murder me.”

“I would have struck him down if Song had not stopped me,” Brun admitted. “Before we all ran, I mean.”

“The last thing we needed was to start fighting each other,” Song flatly replied. “All it would accomplish was help the cultists.”

Cozme nodded at her gratefully, then hesitated when looking Angharad’s way.

“Augusto Cerdan is no longer under my protection,” he finally told her. “I ensured he reached sanctuary and had the opportunity to withdraw from the trials, I owe nothing more.”

“He will stay, then?” Angharad said, honestly surprised.

Remund laughed unkindly.

“He must,” the younger Cerdan said. “He will be disgraced when Isabel and I return to Sacromonte, perhaps even cast out of our house.”

“Unless Lord Cerdan seeks a feud with House Ruesta, he will most certainly be cast out,” Isabel coldly stated.

“You believe he will try to kill you,” Angharad slowly said. “To prevent word getting back.”

“Not prevent, that would be too difficult. But it is understood between the houses that deaths on the Dominion are to be left on the Dominion,” Isabel explained. “Conflict has occurred before, you understand. He would be stretching the bounds of tolerance, of course, but if he returns and we do not…”

“Any heir is better than none,” Remund said, face pulled tight. “Our father is not a sentimental man.”

Angharad glanced at Cozme, who seemed to be treating this as none of his affair. He avoided her gaze, which was confirmation enough. The Pereduri hid her disgust at the thought that a kinslayer might be welcomed back into one’s family after the deed. It was absurd that Sacromonte might call itself a civilized nation without answering such a foul crime by being throwing the kinslayer down a cliff.

“But such talk can wait until tomorrow,” Isabel said. “Shall I ask Beatris to mend your coat again?”

Her smile as she said that was sly, a joke between only the two of them. Angharad was uncomfortable sharing in it before Remund Cerdan, however, who still seemed to be expecting these trials to end in a marriage.

“Please,” Angharad said, casting a look around.

Where was Beatris, anyhow? She had seen neither hide nor hair of Isabel’s sole remaining handmaid since she reached sanctuary.

“She is resting,” Isabel said, answering an unspoken question.

Song scoffed.

“She is catatonic,” the silver-eyed woman harshly corrected. “She came close to dying too many times for her nerves to keep holding and should not be on this island to begin with.”

Song matched Isabel’s cold look with one of her own. Angharad went still in surprise, for never before had the Tianxi been this bellicose with one of the infanzones – not even Augusto after he murdered Gascon. More surprising still, she gave no sign of backing down even in the face of Isabel’s open displeasure.

“We are all tired,” Angharad said. “And my coat can certainly wait.”

She rose to her feet, almost hastily.

“There was talk of a washtub, I believe?”

The two tore their gazes away from each other. Her request snuffed out the fuse for now, Song and Brun rising to help her as they had promised, but a line had clearly been drawn in her absence.

The washtub was little more than a barrel with a fire underneath, large enough for her to fit her body up to her neck in the water. The water was hot and it felt like being born anew to wash away all the filth and blood. She almost fell asleep inside and did not last long after getting out. The Watch had set out bedrolls in the small chambers made from the stables, so she simply claimed the one by Song’s and closed the curtain before crawling under the covers.

She was out in moments.

—

Angharad woke early, among the first to do so, and shambled out of her bedroll for a meal. Only a few had preceded her, among them Lady Acanthe and the Tianxi veteran called Yong. The two avoided each other and herself, and as the watchman charged with distributing the morning porridge – a horrid slop that tasted vaguely salty – did not feel like conversation either she ate in silence. By the time she was halfway through Song joined her, the two of them soon commiserating together about the fare. Conversation remained light.

“Your braids are coming undone,” Song told her.

She had suspected as much but could not be sure without a mirror.

“And the hair is gone dry,” Angharad sighed. “The rainwater did more damage than the bath, I think.”

At least her stitches did not sting even when she smiled.

“I cannot do anything for that, but I could help you with the braids,” Song offered. “I used to do my little sister’s.”

Angharad started in surprise.

“You have siblings?” she asked.

“I am the third of five,” the silver-eyed woman smiled. “My parents were very orderly: two boys, then three girls.”

“I am an only child myself,” Angharad shared. “I had some cousins from my mother’s younger brother, but I believe them to be dead.”

Uncle Arwel and his two boys had been in the manor when it was set aflame. None had come out.

“Your uncle in the Watch?”

“No, Uncle Osian is the elder of a pair,” Angharad said. “My mother had two younger brothers.”

Unlike Father, who like her had had been without siblings. She had never met her grandparents on that side of the family either, both having passed years before her birth. Talk of their families cast a pall on a conversation, so Angharad accepted the offer of help with her braids to tack on a different wind. Song took a bench and the Pereduri sat before her, finding it soothingly pleasant for someone to play with her hair. Both their moods improved and they sat there as the rest of the fort began to wake around them.

“Ishaan’s still looking sickly,” Song murmured.

Angharad’s eyes found the chubby-cheeked Someshwari in question, who like many among them was looking down at his bowl with a distinct lack of enthusiasm. He did look wan, she thought, and his elegant saffron tunic was touched with old sweat.

“It is not a good time to fall sick,” Angharad said.

“I do not believe he is, at least not in that sense,” Song told her. “Inyoni’s company arrived an entire day before the rest of us, but they ran into the heliodoran beast on the way. One of them used a contract on it to get away, and now Ishaan Nair looks sickly even though he had a day more to rest than the rest of us.”

It was, she would admit, a detail of significance. They spoke no more of it, however, for something else caught their eye. The old woman Angharad had journeyed with for a few hours, Vanesa, was being helped into a seat by Tristan. He then went to fetch them both porridge.

“Words is that the Watch physician advised they amputate the leg,” Song said. “She refused, but they won’t keep her on pain draughts forever – those are expensive, and if she cannot do the trial what do they care?”

“Did you learn how she was wounded?” Angharad asked. “It does not seem like Xical’s work or a darkling’s.”

She had not wanted to hurt Ferranda yesterday by prodding the fresh wound of Sanale’s death, but surely others of that group must have talked. Song chuckled.

“It’s a story worth hearing and they have not been shy in sharing it.”

Angharad listened intently at the tale, with every word more amazed any of them had lived at all. No doubt the events had been exaggerated, but to use an outwitted monster as a bridge was too livid a detail to have been entirely invented.

“Tristan did this?” she asked.

“And Sarai,” Song reminded her. “Signs are an art of great power.”

That much Angharad would not dispute, but she had a hard time believing that the same man who had beaten a nigh helpless woman for a pistol that had caught his fancy would take such risks for others. Song was nearly done with her braids by the time everyone was awake, and as the conversation ebbed low the noblewoman considered her way forward. Tupoc Xical must be made to pay for his actions, though not through some squalid murder as the sergeant had implied. A trial ought to take place, with crimes laid out and witnesses swearing oaths.

He had made enough enemies that Angharad liked her odds. The only questions was who she should approach first, Lady Inyoni or- her musings were cut short by a sunny Sergeant Mandisa walking out of the makeshift kitchen with a large copper pot, mercilessly beating it with a wooden spoon. She had the closest table, Yaretzi and Ferranda, wincing at the noise.

“Assemble, assemble,” the Malani sergeant called out. “An officer requires your attention.”

Most rose to their feet immediately, a handful inexplicably finishing the rest of their porridge first, but by the time Lieutenant Wen emerged from the barracks even those were standing. The Tianxi already has his gold-rimmed spectacles on and was tearing stripes off what looked like a piece of fresh bread. Once he finished the last, standing in front of everyone, he cleared his throat. The noise did not sound all that apologetic about making everyone wait while he ate.

“Our scouts are back,” Lieutenant Wen announced, “so as promised we will now go over the particulars of the second trial.”

Sergeant Mandisa came to stand by his side, still wielding the fearsome pot and spoon.

“The Trial of Ruins is just as simple as the first one was,” Lieutenant Wen said. “See how someone mislaid a pile of shrines behind me?”

It was hard to miss it, given that the vast majority of the great cavern had been swallowed up by the ruins. There was a general murmur of agreement, though no one committed so far as giving a legible answer. Already everyone had grasped that putting your foot forward with the lieutenant was a lot more likely to result in being made a figure of fun than garnering a reward.

“There are paths in there,” Lieutenant Wen said. “At the end of them lies a gate with a god trapped inside it: get there, cross the gate, and that’s it. That’s the entire trial.”

Someone cleared their throat. Cozme, Angharad recognized after a moment.

“So a maze requiring an offering at the end,” the mustachioed soldier stated. “Full of perils, one assumes?”

The corpulent watchman grinned at the other man, though there was much teeth to it and little amity.

“You’re an infanzon dog, Aflor, let’s not pretend you didn’t read up on everything before setting foot on the ship,” Lieutenant Wen said. “It’s a little like pretending your virginity mysteriously grew back after you set foot in the brothel.”

Master Cozme’s lips thinned and his mustache trembled with anger, but he held himself back from answering. Sergeant Mandisa cleared her throat. The Tianxi turned to glare at her but she just cleared it again, louder. Lieutenant Wen sighed.

“Fine,” he said. “I will be respectful of your delicate maidenhoods and ease you into this adventure with a proper, loving introduction.”

Angharad wondered whether politely requesting him to abandon that line of metaphor would make things better or worse. Worse, she decided. Almost certainly worse.

“Welcome to Trial of Ruins,” Lieutenant Wen said with caustic cheer. “We do not know who put those shrines in there and can’t be sure why, but we do one thing: they’re full of dead and dying gods.”

Spirits, he meant. Angharad was uncertain why a dead spirit’s existence should matter much – perhaps traces of power would remain, but surely no more than that? – yet such a creature trapped and dying was certainly to be nothing to trifle with.

“Now that may sound like a bad thing,” Lieutenant Wen said, allowing a pause.

“Because it is!” Sergeant Mandisa helpfully provided.

“But it’s also how you’ll get through,” the Tianxi said, sliding his thumbs into his belt. “See, our friends out in the ruins can only get so far eating each other – diminishing returns, you know how it goes. Eating people, though? Now that’ll stave off extinction a decade or two. So they’ll let you into their shrines.”

“So they can eat you,” the Malani added, in case anyone had forgot.

“Not all shrines will open,” Lieutenant Wen warned them. “Some gods are sated, or too close to death or gone so mad they don’t remember how. In practice, that means you’ll be navigating a maze to get to the gate at the other end of the cavern.”

“Seems like a lot of gods to kill,” Shalini Goel skeptically said. “Could watchmen even do it?”

“We can’t,” Lieutenant Wen approvingly said. “But not for the reasons you think. If any of you are idiots or blind, you might have missed the giant spinning gold sky.”

To Angharad’s lack of surprise, no one stepped forward to name themselves a blind idiot by admitting that they had. Not that even the most unobservant of men could miss it: the only reason the cavern was not a pitch-black pit broken up only by the occasional lantern was the soft glow given off by the great machine hanging from the ceiling.

“We haven’t been able to get up there and confirm it’s Antediluvian work, but it seems likely,” Lieutenant Wen said. “Which is probably why it’s not just a very vain lantern: it’s also an aether machine placing restrictions on all gods within its area of influence.”

Angharad breathed in sharply and she was not the only one. It was one thing to walk the ruins of the First Empire, the worn and broken works of stone, another to walk in the light of one of their miraculous devices. No one had tamed Vesper the way the Antediluvians had, not even Liergan at its height.

“We have observed two restrictions,” Lieutenant Wen told them. “First, no god can do violence on anything but another god directly. Second, gods are bound to their shrine or seat of power. As a consequence of these, the Watch developed a method.”

“We’re going to make you bind your souls to boxes and bet them,” Sergeant Mandisa enthusiastically announced.

Angharad choked at the words, not quite believing what she’d just heard. She was not the only one. The bespectacled Tianxi glared at his sergeant.

“I was building up to that,” he reproached.

Notably, he did not contradict Sergeant Mandisa. The expression on Lieutenant Wen’s face might have passed for a pout if not for his inborn amount of spite making any application of the word unsuitable.

“Fine, the fun’s gone now anyway,” he sighed. “See, so long as terms are agreed on between mortal and god beforehand – and observed during – the aether machine does not consider what follows violence. So everyone has a chance at getting what they want: the god gives you a test, a game with rules, and if you fail or die during they get to eat your soul. If you win they let you through their territory, sometimes even throw in a prize.”

“Only the nice ones do that,” Sergeant Mandisa said. “There’s not a lot of those left, those that aren’t nice tend to eat them.”

“Should we have brought our own soul boxes, or will they be provided?” Shalini sarcastically asked.

“You can use ours,” Lieutenant Wen smiled. “It’s nothing all that sinister, Goel – a forged iron lantern splashed with your blood to serve as a mark on your presence in the aether. You’re technically gambling the marker, not your soul. It’s just so happens the marker’s enough for it to get at you.”

“You use aether seals?” Tupoc Xical asked, sounding genuinely surprised.

And pleased, for some reason. That did not bode well.

“Keep it in your pants, Leopard Society,” Lieutenant Wen replied, rolling his eyes. “It’s just a temporary mark. We’re not exactly burning souls to keep our candles lit, so don’t you start looking for a village or two to abduct.”

“This is vile calumny, lieutenant,” Tupoc replied with a friendly smile. “The Leopard Society’s purpose is the pursuit of criminals who flee beyond Izcalli borders, nothing more.”

The pair from the Someshwar loudly scoffed and Yong’s face might as well have been carved out of stone.

“Of course, of course,” Lieutenant Wen agreed.

A second later he gave the Aztlan the most exaggerated wink Angharad had ever seen.

“And the gate at the end?” Lady Inyoni called out. “Nothing else is simple, I will not believe that is.”

“Simple enough,” the bespectacled lieutenant said. “The god at the gate will not open unless ten or more of what it calls ‘victors’ – that is to say, those who bet their soul and won – are standing in front of it.”

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Angharad bit the inside of her cheek. And there the nature of the trial changed again, Lieutenant Wen ripping the carpet out from under their feet. There were only twenty-five of them left, and of these several were no longer fighting fit. The Pereduri could not simply bet her soul ten times and gain victory enough to open the gate on her own, others needed to triumph as well. And if they lose even once, then or afterwards, that is the end of the line. That was why Tupoc was so certain he would get away with it: killing him was good as throwing away a victor. And he’ll kill some of us before we execute him, further slimming our odds.

Angharad considered her chances of simply killing him, without trial or verdict, the moment they stepped out of sanctuary. Alone she gave herself better than even odds, but it would not be quick and that meant complications. Ocotlan seemed likely to side with him in a fight, Augusto for certain and perhaps even Acanthe Phos. Angharad was not without allies of her own and Tupoc had certainly made enemies enough to be buried, but it would be a skirmish and not a duel. In that chaos, how many would be wounded or slain?

The costs would be too high.

Even if she gathered enough vengeful souls to strike with her, others would object: more afraid of the deaths ahead than angered by the deaths left behind. The moment Tupoc gathered someone to stand with him, showed it would be a fight and not an execution, her support would turn to mist. The trial she had wanted to arrange was good as buried. Angharad breathed in, let the indignation and the surge of rage – he’d been right, the smiling monster, he was going to get away with it – sink deep into her bones and let them simmer there as she calmed the surface of her.

Throwing a fit would serve no purpose but making her look unstable, unfit for alliance. Already she had attempted to kill Augusto yesterday, if she now had a tantrum because she would not be allowed to preside over the hanging of another trial-taker she would look like a bloodthirsty lunatic. For now her reputation was solid and Tupoc’s was as a full chamber pot: too foul for others to want to get close enough to throw it out, but that did not mean anyone was fond of the smell. She could not, would not set aside the demands of honour but Angharad was capable of biding her time. She would win oaths and allies, then get the last word. The dead were ever patient and she would not give any less than they.

By the time she had fully mastered herself, the conversation had moved on and the bespectacled watchman was speaking again.

“You’re a lucky bunch,” Lieutenant Wen jovially announced. “Three of the first row of shrines are open this year, so you’ve got plenty of paths to choose from.”

Lan raised her hand.

“Yes,” the lieutenant invited.

“Is that good?” she asked.

“That’s good,” Lieutenant Wen agreed. “It means dead ends are a lot less likely to force you through a shrine whose test will kill half of you.”

“It’s never the ones you expect either,” Sergeant Mandisa mused. “The Riddler-Teller’s usually such a sweetheart.”

Angharad made a firm and immediate decision to avoid any shrine whose spirit was named thus. When it became evident Lieutenant Wen would no longer speak unless prompted, the crowd began to disperse. Some of them had known of what was to come, at least part of it, but most would need time to digest the trial laying ahead. It was a man she believed part of the former that made his way towards her as others moved out of the way, making room. Space spread around them, out of either fear or manners. Angharad breathed in, back straight, and faced her enemy.

Tupoc Xical had come out of the Trial of Lines with nary a scuff on him.

There was a small rip in the long white skirts going to his ankles, already mended, but his collared green shirt and the dull breastplate he wore over it did not have so much as a stain. Angharad, who had only bathed once in several days and whose braids were not in the proper style, could only envy the way his long hair shone. Even the round earrings hanging from his ear had been freshly polished, flashing copper-gold whenever they caught the light. Her gaze must have lingered there, for Tupoc flicked one with a finger and gave her a smile.

“Like them?” the Izcalli asked. “They were a gift from my teacher when I declared my intention to enter the Watch.”

“So you are not a deserter, at least,” Angharad coolly replied.

The man clicked his tongue disapprovingly.

“I was offered help in that endeavour, Angharad Tredegar, not censure,” Tupoc informed her. “We hold the rooks in high esteem: they, too, understand the lessons of the Fifth Loss.”

It was a concession to manners and not the man that Angharad did not roll her eyes. She was in no mood to indulge the famous Aztlan superstitions, which the Kingdom of Izcalli had enshrined as dogma tacked on to the teachings of the Orthodoxy – the myth of some ancient lost war against the sky, ending in defeat and an exile that could only be turned back by triumphing over the Circle Perpetual. That the way to this triumph involved the Kingdom of Izcalli invading its neighbours at every opportunity had not endeared the preaching of Izcalli priesthood to anyone.

“And what would that be, Tupoc?” she said. “By the account of your deeds, I would suppose selling us out to cultists.”

“That the lights are fading,” Tupoc seriously replied. “That there can be no evil in any act undertaken to keep them on even a breath longer. What do you think the Watch is, Lady Tredegar?”

“The watchmen of Vesper,” she replied. “The keepers of the Iscariot Accords.”

“They are the lid on a very deep well,” Tupoc Xical said, shaking his head. “Only when they succeed in that duty can they spare the breath to be anything more.”

The too-perfect Aztlan smiled, utterly convinced of his words. Angharad might have spared some pity for him, for the way he must believe this to be able to look at himself in the mirror, were he not one of the vilest men she had ever met. No amount of paper-thin charm would make her forget the scream of terror that had ripped itself out of Briceida’s throat. Tiring of this playacting, of having to offer the monster manners, she sought his gaze and held it.

“What do you want?” she bluntly asked.

“I will be leading warriors down a path,” Tupoc said. “Be one of them and I will deliver to you the man whose death you seek.”

She bared her teeth.

“Only one of them,” Angharad told him.

“Greedy,” the Aztlan chided, more amused than offended. “But it seems you are not yet ready to bargain.”

“Nor will I ever be,” she replied.

After a curt nod she turned her back on him. In the wake of Lieutenant Wen’s oration most of the trial-takers had dispersed but there was nowhere to go save the great courtyard: none had gone all that far, beyond the distance courtesy dictated she be given for a private conversation. People clustered in pairs and small group, eyeing their fellows, but before Angharad could consider what she ought to do about this she found Isabel approaching her. The infanzona offered her soft smile and her arm with it.

“Walk with me,” Isabel Ruesta asked.

Who was Angharad to deny her? There was little to do but go around in circles in the courtyard if they did not want to leave the safety of the fort, so it was that they settled on.

“The second trial,” the dark-haired beauty told her, “is where most people are said to die. My family knows little about the Trial of Weeds, save that it ends in a port on the other side of the island, but it does not seem as dangerous.”

“Spirits are never to be trifled with,” Angharad agreed.

“We must make allies, then, else we will be at the mercy of others,” Isabel said, then paused.

The infanzona snuck a shy glance.

“That is, if you still want my company,” she said. “I would not presume, now that I have no guard left and only a single maid that-”

“Of course,” Angharad hurried to answer her. “You must know I would not abandon you now, Isabel, not when peril has reached its height and you are all but alone.”

“Thank you,” Isabel feelingly said. “Remund and Master Cozme are worthy friends, of course, but I cannot rely on them as I do you.”

“Cozme has his duty,” she conceded.

And it was Cerdan lives he was sworn to protect, not anyone from the House of Ruesta.

“The four of us – five, when Beatris recovers – make a respectable backbone for an expedition,” Isabel said.

“Five will not be enough,” Angharad replied.

Not when neither Isabel nor Beatris were any good at fighting.

“Then recruitment is in order,” the other woman agreed. “It would be best, I think, for you to take the lead in this.”

Angharad cocked an eyebrow.