Swords and Salt - the Complete Series Read online

  The fiery ball alighted on the wick of one of several candles squatting on the desk. The singed twine burst into flame. Yanko lifted his ball and moved it toward a pair of candles. He elongated it so he could attempt to light the last two wicks at once.

  A knock sounded at his door. The flame wavered and threatened to go out, but he marshaled his concentration and continued to gather water droplets, cleave molecules, and ignite the fuel source as he called, “Come in.”

  “Yanko,” Arayevo said, stepping into the room. “I have an idea I want to—oh, sorry. I’m disturbing you.”

  Without looking away from the candles, he waved for her to sit down. “I’m almost done.”

  The talking—and a new desire to look good for his audience—distracted him, and the ball closed in on itself, almost disappearing. Grumbling inwardly, he settled for lighting the last two candles one at a time and saving the shape manipulation practice for later. He let the ball run out of fuel and wink out, leaving no evidence that he had used the Science to light the candles. The pleasant smell of melting wax warmed the room.

  “An idea?” Yanko asked, meeting Arayevo’s eyes and hoping he might catch the faintest hint that she was impressed.

  But she had seen him practicing before and merely flopped onto the bed. “I want to get Teesha out of here before the wedding. She can go with me, and we’ll head out of the region for a while. To the coast. In a couple years, once that puppy kicker has forgotten her, she can go home again.”

  Yanko stared at her. He had thought Arayevo might concoct some plan, some way to punish Song perhaps, but this? “I took her to you so you could bandage her wounds, not plot sedition.”

  “How is this sedition? It’s a girl not wanting to marry a tyrannical bastard.”

  Yanko decided not to explain how much rested upon the marriage. Arayevo wouldn’t care. She would only see the injustice and want to fix it.

  “Does she want to leave?” Yanko asked, figuring the girl knew why she was being offered as a sacrifice and might have agreed to it.

  “Yes, of course.” Arayevo spread her hand. “Well, she does now anyway.”

  “You talked her into it?”

  “I showed her the wisdom of leaving before he ends up killing her, yes.” She shrugged. “I thought that’s what you wanted me to do when you brought her to me.”

  “I…” Was it? Had he secretly wanted that? Or had he simply not known what else to do with her?

  “She’s not quite as meek as she looks,” Arayevo said. “She’s thought about poisoning the man, or strangling him in his sleep.”

  Prim and proper, Yanko thought, his uncle’s words sounding in his head.

  “She doesn’t want to go with him,” Arayevo went on. “In the beginning, she was willing to because the regional chief asked it, but that was before she knew how cruel he is. No woman should be asked to make such a sacrifice for politics.”

  “Men and women do every day when they go to war and die,” he said, though he didn’t truly disagree with her. He just didn’t know how he could do anything to stop this without putting his family at risk, especially given his last bit of disobedience. If the regional chief had already turned a baleful eye toward the salt mine…

  Arayevo scowled at him. “That’s different. There’s honor in that. There’s no honor in being beaten every night for the rest of your life.”

  Yanko sighed. “What exactly are you thinking of doing?”

  “I’m planning to leave anyway. I’ll just take her with me.”

  Yanko sank down onto the bed opposite from her. “And when my uncle sends guards after her? And when word gets to the regional chief and the entire countryside is alerted to watch for her? She would be recaptured and back in the same situation if not worse. You would be—I don’t even know. If they think you kidnapped her…”

  “They won’t find us. Once I get over the ridge, we can disappear into the forest and—”

  “You’re good in the forest, yes, but so are other people. They’ll have trackers at their command. And it’s two days to the ridge. All that’s between here and there is a lot of dirt, cactus, and little scrubby tufts that don’t provide much in the way of cover.”

  The Turgonian made it… Maybe she could make it too. But that Turgonian had been some war veteran with a lot of experience. And he’d had a bunch of his people with him, all armed and capable of defending themselves.

  “You can’t do this, Arayevo, not like that.”

  “All right, then how?” she asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “If you don’t come up with something better, I’m taking her away in the middle of the night tonight. It’s the last chance. Her wedding is tomorrow. After that, she’ll be in a caravan of people heading to the coast and across the sea to whatever desert city-state that buffoon is from.”

  “Sand Palm Oasis.”

  “Oh, that you know. How useful.”

  “What did I do?” Yanko asked, not able to hide the sting he felt. “Why am I the target for your wrath?”

  “Because you’re here.” Arayevo blew out a frustrated breath. “I’m sorry. It’s not your fault that you’re right. It’s just that I don’t know what else to do. She’s in the same situation as I am, or I could be. Stuck marrying some stranger who could be a total ass.”

  “I know, I see that. Let me think.” Yanko crossed his legs, propped his elbows on the insides of his knees, and cradled his chin on his hands. “Tonight’s the last night. They’re doing a dinner and then that little boat ride on the lake. There’ll be music and dancing and…” He rubbed his jaw with his thumb. “Fireworks.”

  “Fireworks? Underground?”

  “It’s a big cavern. I’m sure an expert has deemed it safe. Although… there’s always a potential for something to go wrong when handling explosives.”

  “Potential such as boats exploding and brides being flung into the water and disappearing?” Arayevo asked.

  “If she were presumed dead, there would be no reason for my uncle to send a search party out to find her.”

  Arayevo sat up straighter, her face lightening. “So all we have to do is stage her death and disappear.”

  “All. Hm. There’ll be a lot of people there and making her disappear in front of so many eyes would be a challenge.” In particular, how could he ever fool his uncle? And if things went wrong and their ruse were discovered, what would the repercussions be? What might the delegate demand as punishment? Yanko’s family name might protect him somewhat, but what of Arayevo? She didn’t have such protection.

  “It’s worth the risk,” Arayevo said. “You didn’t see the extent of… I genuinely believe she’ll end up dead if we let her leave with him. Or he’ll end up dead.”

  Yanko closed his eyes. “Very well. I… we may need help for this. I’ll see what I can do.”

  Part 7

  As Yanko walked past his uncle’s office, on his way to the guarded room where explosives were stored, he wondered if he would be taking this risk if one of his male friends had implored him to do so.

  Lakeo grumped along at his side, and he reminded himself that she had even less reason to take this risk. She was doing it because she had stumbled across a crying woman who needed help. True, Yanko had also threatened to withhold a scintillating description of foxglove flowers that she needed for the end of her frieze, but he’d sensed that she would have helped anyway, gruff sarcasm or not.

  They walked up to the bored fellow leaning against the door at the end of the tunnel.

  “Good morning,” Yanko said. “Lakeo needs blasting sticks for her work in the chapel. She’s the sculptor working on new statuary that needs to be completed before the wedding tomorrow.”

  The man blinked slowly. “Blasting? In the chapel?”

  Yanko hoped the man’s tree trunk arms were the reason he’d been chosen for this duty, not any modicum of intelligence. “Not a lot, but there’s a sunken frieze that’s going in by the badger goddess. It’ll be
faster to detonate a small explosion than chisel it out by hand. I’m assisting her since I have experience in that area.” And by experience Yanko meant that he had seen blasting sticks used once or twice in his life.

  The man stared at him. Defiantly? Or without comprehension? Yanko couldn’t be sure.

  “I have the key.” Yanko held up the sliver of copper. “My uncle gave it to me.” Rather, his uncle hadn’t noticed when Yanko had memorized the pattern of notches and ridges on the key hanging by the desk, then later used his thermal science skills to burn the pattern into a door hinge. In retrospect, it would have been much easier to steal the key, but this way, his uncle couldn’t notice it missing at some point during the day and grow suspicious.

  “You asked Controller Mishnal for permission?” the guard asked.

  Lakeo shifted from foot to foot but didn’t say anything to confirm or deny this.

  “Of course.” Yanko smiled. This wouldn’t work for anyone else, but he hoped being a relative of the controller would elevate him above a common worker in the man’s eyes…

  “I should ask him,” the guard said. “He’s the only one allowed to unlock this room.”

  “You can ask him. We’ll wait here.”

  The guard took a step down the tunnel.

  “He’s in the eating hall, I believe,” Yanko said. “Having a late breakfast. He didn’t get any sleep last night, so he’s on the crabby side. I’d keep it short if I were you.”

  “Mm.” The guard looked at him, down the tunnel, and back at him. “If you have his key, I guess it’s all right.”

  “Whatever you say,” Yanko said.

  He slipped the key into the lock and licked his lips, once again wondering if he should have simply filched the original. What if his mind wasn’t as sharp as he liked to think and his copy didn’t work? To have his plan thwarted right here at Step One…

  The lock snicked as the key turned. Yanko pushed the door open as if he had expected nothing less.

  The dark room inside was little more than a closet, a closet filled with kegs of black powder, crates of blasting sticks, and boxes of fireworks, the latter recently delivered if their haphazard placement on the other items was any indication. Yanko created a ball of light, using a trick of channeling illumination from elsewhere to place it where he needed it. Far wiser than burning flames in rooms full of explosives.

  “Tight in here,” he said as Lakeo slipped in behind him. “Let me just…” He closed the door most of the way. He would have liked to close it all the way but thought the guard might find that suspicious.

  “Why didn’t you let him go talk to your uncle?” Lakeo whispered. “It would have gotten us a few minutes of privacy.”

  “And alerted my uncle to the fact that we’re here,” Yanko whispered back. “If we’re caught this early on…” He shook his head. Anything Arayevo did would be expected, and the surprise wouldn’t work. “Watch the door,” he whispered. “This may take a minute.”

  Yanko checked the lids on the closest crates, but none of them had been unfastened. Just as well. If he opened a box in the back, the missing sticks would be less likely to be noticed for a while. He hoped nobody would be detonating explosives on the lower levels that day.

  “What happens if you get caught?” Lakeo whispered.

  “Nothing good, I’m sure. I doubt I’d be hung or quartered, but more than Uncle Mishnal’s good graces are at stake for me.” The first thing that floated to mind was a permanent note on his record that would keep him from attending Stargrind. Ever.

  Grimacing, he climbed across a box of fireworks, trying not to think about the volatility of everything in the room, and slipped one of Lakeo’s chisels into the top of a back crate. He coughed to cover the squeak of nails being pried from wood.

  “These look like they’d take half the wall off the chapel,” Lakeo said in a normal tone of voice. “Isn’t there anything smaller?”

  “I’m not sure,” he said, his voice also raised so the guard would hear. “Look over there.”

  Yanko slid two sticks out of the crate and tucked them into an inside pocket in his robes. He replaced the lid, using a little telekinetic finesse to refasten the nails without banging on them, then gingerly climbed back to the floor. “I’ve got—”

  The door opened, and the guard frowned in at them.

  “—nothing useful,” Yanko continued. “They’re all too large, and I’m not sure how to make smaller explosives with the materials here. I’ll have to ask my uncle what he suggests.”

  “So basically you’ve been wasting my time.” Lakeo scowled at him. It was a convincing bit of acting—or maybe it wasn’t much of an act.

  “Sorry.”

  “I thought you were an expert,” the guard said, his eyes closed to slits.

  “Compared to her, I’m a genius.” Yanko crooked a thumb toward Lakeo.

  Her scowl deepened. Definitely not an act this time. She shoved him toward the door, not a hard shove fortunately—Yanko had heard stories of blasting sticks detonating simply by being jostled, and he was all too aware of the pair nestled against his ribs. He threw his arms out, as if she’d pushed him more vigorously.

  “Can you believe this woman?” he muttered to the guard, then hustled down the tunnel without waiting for an answer.

  The firm clomps of Lakeo’s boots followed him.

  “I think he’s suspicious,” she whispered, coming up to walk beside him.

  “Maybe,” Yanko murmured, “but my uncle’s known for being grouchy and not hesitating to dole out punishments, so I doubt the workers go out of their way to start up conversations with him. He’s—”

  They rounded the corner at the intersection and almost crashed into Uncle Mishnal, who had his hand on the doorknob of his office and was about to enter.

  Yanko halted, a flush heating his face. He had been speaking quietly, but the tunnel was quiet. Had his uncle heard that last sentence?

  With deliberate slowness, Mishnal removed a pocket watch and studied the face. “You’re supposed to be working the screw right now,” he told Yanko, “and you—” his gaze shifted to Lakeo, “—should be in the chapel. You haven’t much time to finish your assigned task.”

  “I know,” Yanko said. “We know,” he added when Lakeo didn’t say anything.

  “What were you doing?” Mishnal’s focus shifted toward the intersection and the tunnel they’d walked out of. Aside from the explosives room, there wasn’t much down there. A few storage closets and spare rooms.

  “We were…” Yanko gave Lakeo a pleading look for help, his mind a blank.

  “What?” She propped her fists on her hips. “You’re too embarrassed to admit to spending time in a closet with a lowly worker girl?”

  By the fox’s wicked humor, that was her solution? “Er,” he said. “Yes. I mean, no. I just… nobody was supposed to find out.”

  Uncle Mishnal’s eyes narrowed. “This is the wrong girl, isn’t it?”

  Yanko clamped down on his lips before another “er” came out, but the idea that his uncle might know about his feelings for Arayevo mortified him. Did his father know too? Did everyone?

  Not her…

  Fists still on her hips, Lakeo shrugged. “He said he needed practice.”

  “I—” It was all Yanko managed to get out before Lakeo shoved him past Uncle Mishnal.

  “We’ve delayed too long though, you’re right,” she said, waving over her shoulder.

  Yanko let himself be hustled toward the lift, but he slapped a hand over his face as soon as it started descending. “We couldn’t have been more suspicious if he’d caught us with our hands in the explosives boxes.”

  “Why? Young people wander off to satisfy carnal urges all the time.”

  “Not with random members of the opposite sex.”

  “Some people do.”

  “Not me. My uncle will know that was a lie.” Yanko rubbed the back of his neck. “Urg, he’s probably talking to the security guard right now.�
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  “No, he’s not. He’s busy. Relax.”

  “I’m glad to know you’re such an expert on his personality,” Yanko snapped, then forced himself to calm down. He had talked her into helping with this scheme; he shouldn’t be the one to lose his way in the mine. “Never mind. Let’s hope you’re right. Are you going to be able to finish your frieze in time to help Arayevo set up tonight?”

  “For an opportunity to club that snotty delegate in the head, I’ll make sure to finish.”

  The lift rattled to a stop, but Yanko waited to open the gate. “Just to be clear, when you say clubbing him in the head, what you mean is knocking him from the boat in such a way and in such a time that he believes he was thrown clear in an explosion, right?”

  Lakeo smirked. “Of course.”

  “Do you need any more help from me in the chapel?”

  “No, I’ve got the picture roughed in; it won’t take long to finish the fine details. You just worry about your part of this charade.”

  “I will.” His time at the screw would be well spent today. While his body labored, his mind would be mulling over the intricate layers of illusion he would have to weave to fool everyone attending the fireworks display, including people who might be sensitive to the presence of a practitioner.

  “You’ll have to use a light touch,” Lakeo said.

  “I assure you my touch will be lighter than yours,” Yanko said, miffed that she would question him on this matter. He immediately regretted snapping again—and hinting at something he hadn’t meant to reveal that he knew.

  Her face froze. “What does that mean?”

  “Nothing.” He waved in dismissal and reached for the gate. “Here are the blasting sticks. Let’s get to our tasks before someone comes along and we’re required to pretend we were kissing in the lift as well as random closets.”