CHAPTER 424: 424: THE MIRROR THAT CAN COMMUNICATE PART TWO

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"Good," Mardek said. He felt the itch in his skin ease—just a little—at the thought of not being alone with what he’d seen. "We’ll meet in the Salt Spine Basin. Twenty kilometers northeast of the mountain. Three stone fins. No cover if you stand wrong. Enough if you stand right."

Skall grunted. "I know the place. The ground’s hard there. Good for a wall."

"Bad for a grave," Oru said softly, pleased.

Yavri didn’t smile. "You lost your army. You still have your head. That means he didn’t come himself to finish you. Why?"

"He had a reason," Mardek said. He kept his face still, but he felt the phantom weight of a small body in his hand, the memory of red on white. "He was turning into something else and needed time. His women bought it for him with their blood."

Oru’s eyes narrowed. "So he has women who fight."

"He has women who do more than that," Mardek said. "Keep laughing at him and you’ll learn. Or you won’t. Either way, I’ll be done listening."

Skall’s mouth twitched. "There’s the temper I remember."

Yavri lifted her chin. "Rewards," she said, as if they were talking about the weather and not a mountain and a man with a crown. "Vorak promised more than a drum speech. We don’t walk three routes to lay it on your feet."

Mardek spat again and wiped his hand on the rim. "I don’t want to rank up, or need any upgrade materials," he said. "I don’t want a jewel or a name. I want his face under my feet. I want to break the part of him that makes a sound when he breathes. Give me that, and you can melt his mountain into cups and drink marsh water out of it for all I care."

Skall looked at him for a long, slow breath. "You’ll get a kick like that if there’s a throat left," he said. "The rest splits by count. Three ways. Even."

Oru’s smile sharpened. "Fine by me, as long as I count the shadows."

Yavri’s head moved once. Agreement.

Mardek leaned close. "Listen. If you go at him like you go at sand thieves, he will take your eyes. He has nets lined with iron dust that chew aura. He has traps near the mountain that don’t look like traps. He has a bird woman who falls like a stone and climbs like smoke. He has a knife-girl who moves like a thought and cuts like a plan. He has a shadow who breaks fingers and doesn’t cry. He has... a child who made the desert listen."

Oru stilled, just for a heartbeat. "A child?"

"I took her," Mardek said flatly. "She slipped between the battles. I made it tight and ran like water anyway. He went mad when she cried. He made a sound that scared the wind. If you find her on the road, do not touch her. Not if you want to keep your night sleep."

Skall grunted. "You took a child and lost an army," he said. "There’s a lesson in that. I don’t have time to learn it."

Yavri didn’t scold him. She didn’t pity him. She did what she always did: brought the wall back to the ground.

"We meet at the Salt Spine," she said. "We plan with feet on the same dirt."

Oru lifted the bone ring and flicked it into the air. It landed back on his finger without sound. "I’ll bring a mirror drum," he said. "Three faces talk better when you can feel the others breathe."

Skall’s eyes slid to one side, as if measuring a road only he could see. "I’ll bring mats and spades. Hard ground still breaks if you find its soft."

"Bring nets," Mardek said. "Iron dust woven. The kind that makes aura taste like old salt and mud."

Oru’s antennae angled toward the glass. "You learned a lot in a day."

"I learned I am not enough alone," Mardek said. "You mock me again and I’ll cut your tongue when this is done."

"Promises," Oru murmured, amused, but he didn’t push this time.

Yavri’s gaze cut between them. "Clock," she said. "Dawn plus two at the dune basin. No banners on the march. No cooking fires. No drums. If the bird is above the clouds, we give her nothing to see but cold ground."

"Done," Skall said.

"Done," Oru said.

Mardek didn’t say "done." He said nothing at all. He reached up and tapped the iron ring. The mica went dead, desert and sky again.

He sat back on his heels and closed his eyes. For a moment he let the cold that had run his spine earlier fill him, then he blew it out like a candle.

"Gather the runners," he told his adjutant without turning. "Send them wide. Whistles and thread. Every man who fled goes east by south to the basin. If they do not know the stone fins, tell them to look for the place where the wind sounds like teeth."

The adjutant bowed. "Yes, Vice General."

"And if any of them say they are tired," Mardek added, still without turning, "take their legs and their shoes and ask the question again."

He stood then, because if he sat he’d remember too much. He walked the camp, hand behind his back, the way he did when he wanted his men to feel him near without having to look up. He stopped at the stack of shields and set the best aside. He stopped at a spear-line and broke two that would have broken anyway, better now than when it counted. He paused at the wounded who could not walk and told three of them lies—soft, believable ones about carts and shade and a woman with clean hands in the next camp who would bind them better than any soldier ever would. The lies helped. They always did.

He ended at the edge of the dark where the desert started to look like an ocean again. He stood there with hands open and let the wind try to take his heat. It didn’t.

"White hair," he said to the dark, quietly. "Keep the crown warm. I’m coming back to take it off your head."