Allegiance (River of Souls 3)

CHAPTER ONE

ENDINGS, THE POET Tanja Duhr once wrote, were deceptive things. No story truly came to a final stop, no poem described the last of the last—they could not, not until the world and the gods and time had ceased to exist. An ending was a literary device. In truth, the end of one story, or one life, carried the seeds for the next.

The idea of seeds and new beginnings offered Ilse Zhalina little consolation.

It was late summer, the season tipping over into autumn, and dawn wrapped the skies in murky gray. Six weeks had passed since she had abandoned Raul Kosenmark on Hallau Island. Her last glimpse had been of him fighting off an impossible number of enemy soldiers. Ten days ago, Leos of Károví, once called the immortal king, had died, and she had witnessed Lir’s jewels reunited into a single alien creature, who then disappeared into the magical void. Endings upon endings, to be sure, and some of them she had not yet begun to comprehend. And yet she lived on, she and Valara Baussay.

Ilse crouched over the ashes of their campfire and rubbed her hands together, trying to warm them. The air was chill, stinking of sweat and smoke. In the first few days of their flight, Ilse had been convinced they would never survive. Inadequate clothing, inadequate supplies. She had since acquired a knitted cap and a woolen coat, once the property of a man much taller and heavier than she. He was dead now. A sword slash, ringed with bloodstains, marked where she had killed him. Underneath, she still wore her own cotton shirt from Hallau Island. If she allowed herself, if she let imagination take flight, she might catch the faded scent of days long past, of that brief interlude with Raul Kosenmark.

Raul. My love.

She pressed both hands against her eyes. She was hungry, hungry and cold and consumed by an emptiness that was greater than any physical need. She wished … oh, but to wish for Raul was impossible. She would only start weeping, and she could not grant herself the luxury of grief, not yet. Not until she and Valara Baussay had escaped this hostile land.

Her breath shivering inside her, she wished instead for a scalding hot fire. A perfumed bath, too. At the thought of scented baths in this wilderness, she almost laughed, but it was a breathless, painful laugh, and she had to pause and recover herself before she could continue her list of wants and desires. Clean clothes, strong coffee, a book to read in warmth and quiet. A feast of roasted lamb, fresh melon, and steamed rice mixed with green peppercorn.

Her imagination failed her at the subsequent courses. There could be no fire until daybreak, not unless she wished to signal her presence to any chance patrols from the western garrisons. The skies had lightened with the approaching dawn, but day came as slowly as the night, here in the far north of Károví. It would be another hour before she could risk a fire. She shuddered from the cold and the thought of enemies in pursuit.

Her companion in this madness, Valara Baussay, slept wrapped tightly in a blanket, and as close to the fire as possible. In the dim light, only the darkest and largest of her tattoos, at the outside corner of her left eye, was visible—an elaborate pattern of interlocking squares, drawn in reddish-brown ink, that formed a diamond. A second, simpler pattern under her lower lip was indistinguishable in the shadows. Symbols of nobility or rank, Ilse guessed, though Valara had said nothing of their meaning in the few months of their acquaintanceship. It was difficult to remember, when Valara slept, that she was a queen of Morennioù. Awake, it was impossible to forget.

We have never been true friends, not in any of our lives. But from time to time, we have been good allies.

Not in every life. They had been enemies as well, or if not true enemies, then in conflict with each other. Four hundred years ago, in one of those past lives, Valara had been a prince of Károví. As Andrej Dzavek, he and his brother had stolen Lir’s jewels from the emperor, then fled to their homeland, in those days a princedom of the empire. In that same life, Ilse had been a princess betrothed to Leos Dzavek in a political marriage.

Andrej Dzavek had regretted his treason. He had led the imperial armies against Károví and his brother, only to die on the battlefield. Ilse Zhalina had attempted to negotiate a peace between the kingdoms. Leos Dzavek had executed her, and with the jewels’ magic, lived on for centuries. At some point, Ilse and Valara Baussay would both have to confront all the complications of their past lives.

Her hands were as warm as she could make them. Ilse tugged her knitted cap low over her forehead and drew her hands inside the sleeves of her ill-fitting coat. Moving as quietly as she could manage, she crept up the slope and peered between the two slabs of rock that overshadowed their campsite. From here, she had a clear view of the surrounding plains. They had made camp, such as it was, in a narrow fold of land, its banks strewn with rocks. Pine and spruce once grew here, but now only a few dead trees remained. At the bottom of the fold ran a stream, fed by summer rains and meltwater from the western mountains. A cold uncomfortable site, but for now, she was grateful to have wood for fire, water to drink, and a shelter to hide in.

All was quiet. Rain had fallen in the night, and a cool damp breeze blew from the west, carrying with it the tang of mountain pines, like magic’s sharp green fragrance, and the earthier scents of mud and grass and wildflowers. Even as she watched, a thin ribbon of light unfurled along the eastern horizon, changing the black

expanse into a pale ocean of grass, bowing in wave after wave, like those from the far-off seas. That looming mass of shadow to the west would be the Železny Mountains, which divided the Károvín plains from the kingdom’s westernmost province of Duszranjo. Within a day’s march was where she and Valara were to meet with Duke Miro Karasek.

A flicker of shadow caught her eye—a blurred speck of movement in the grass. Ilse unhooked the buttons of her coat and checked her few weapons—the sword at her belt, the knife in her boot, and the one in her wrist sheath. All were within easy reach. She stared at the point where she had sighted the shadow. Not a patrol, she told herself. It was too small and swift a movement. A solitary rider?

Then the light ticked upward, and she saw what it was—a fox, gliding through the tall grass. A breath of laughter escaped her. She eased back toward the banked fire. Valara stirred and muttered in her own language. Was she dreaming of past lives?

I’ve dreamed. I’ve never stopped dreaming since Leos died.

She rubbed her forehead with the back of her wrist.

… Leos Dzavek’s hand tightened around the ruby jewel, its light spilling through his fingers like blood … Magic burst against magic, and the world exploded. When she could see again, she saw Leos crushed beneath the marble pedestal, his eyes blank and white, like a winter snowfall. He was dying, dying, dying but he would not release his hold upon her, and she felt her soul slipping into the void between worlds …

No! Dzavek was dead, his soul was in flight to its next life, and the jewels had returned as one to the magical plane. She had fulfilled her obligations to the gods. She pulled off the cap and raked her fingers through her knotted hair. The lurid images of her nightmare faded into the pale red light of sunrise.

She drew a sharp breath in surprise.

Valara Baussay was awake and studying Ilse with those brilliant brown eyes. Though Valara’s expression seldom betrayed anything, and even those few clues were often deliberate indirection, Ilse had the impression of being constantly assessed by her companion. In that she was much like Raul.

“You didn’t wake me for my watch,” Valara said.

“No. You were tired and—”

“—and you were afraid of your nightmares. Was it the same one as before?”

Her voice was uncharacteristically gentle.

“The same one, yes.”

“Ah. I have them, too.”

Ilse glanced up, suddenly wary. “You never said so before.”

Valara shrugged. “I don’t like to think about it.”

Ah, well. Ilse could understand that.

“I’ll restart the fire,” she said. “We can eat breakfast and make an early start.”

“Breakfast.” Valara’s mouth softened into a pensive smile. “I’ve dreamed of breakfast, too, from time to time.”

She stood up and stretched. She wore the dead courier’s gloves and his shirt over her own. Valara had rolled up the sleeves and tied a makeshift sash, but her thin frame was almost lost in the folds. Even dressed in such a mismatched costume, she had the air of one about to issue a royal decree—yet another similarity to Raul.

“What is wrong?” Valara asked.

“Nothing,” Ilse said quickly. “Nothing we can change.”

Valara regarded her with narrowed eyes. “As you say,” she murmured.

She headed downstream to the trench Ilse had dug for their latrine. Ilse collected tinder and a few larger branches, and coaxed their fire into life. She set a pan of water to boil and refilled their waterskins. A brief inspection of their supplies was discouraging: a handful of tea leaves, enough smoked beef for a good breakfast but nothing for midday, and a few dried apples. They had eaten the last of the courier’s flatbread the night before. Karasek had provided them with as much gear and provisions as he could spare, but it had all been so haphazard, those final hours at the Mantharah. Hiding all traces of their camp, including their magic. Working out their escape, and how Karasek might lead the search in the opposite direction. What came next, after they were certain they were safe.

Ilse blew out a breath. After. Yes.

If I were wishing, I would wish for Raul. I would wish we were together in Tiralien, without any fear of war between our kingdom and Károví. Without balancing every act against what Markus Khandarr might do against us. We could be Stefan and Anike, two ordinary people, living ordinary lives.

Impossible wishes. Ilse had promised Valara she would sail with her to her island kingdom, a hostage for peace, in return for Valara’s help in recovering the last of Lir’s jewels. She could argue the vows no longer applied. Dzavek was dead. The jewels had departed from the ordinary world. All the variables she and Raul had depended upon had vanished or changed in unpredictable ways.