the kitchen servant at the Residence. Whole families had perished. Mothers, fathers and children. Young women and men she had grown up with. The frail and weak along with the robust and strong. None of them any threat to Takado, but all a source of a little more magic.
Tiken walked toward one corner of the field. She followed him. As she had expected and dreaded, two of the planks of wood were carved with her parents’ names.
“Nothing was done to them beforehand,” the boy told her.
She looked up at him, puzzled by his comment. His expression was grave and his eyes haunted. He looked twice as old as she knew him to be. She shuddered.
“Probably ’cause they were old,” he told her. “And maybe... maybe because your father helped the slave.”
She heard Jayan curse again, but ignored him. In her mind she saw Hanara’s thin face and frightened eyes. She looked at the other graves. “Is he...”
“No. He’s not here.” The boy’s expression darkened. “Never found him.”
She frowned, feeling suspicion like some parasite hatching inside her.
“What did they do to the others?” Jayan asked quietly behind her.
The boy hesitated. “What Sachakans do,” he answered evasively.
Jayan asked again. She moved away, closer to her parents’ grave, hoping to get far enough away to not hear. Kneeling in the dirt, she placed a hand on the soil over her father’s body and let grief come and drown out their voices.
I
Nothing had worked out quite as he’d expected, or as he’d feared. After leaving the stables, the former slave had run across fields and along roads, searching and searching. The signal light had disappeared, but he explored the area it must have shone from... and found nothing. He’d circled the village, looking in all the places he’d seen the signal flash from before, but in vain.
When he finally found Takado, the magician was sitting on a tree stump beside a path, at an intersection Hanara had passed several times in his search. Takado had laughed when Hanara threw himself at his feet. He’d laughed, then read Hanara’s mind. Then he’d laughed again.
Hanara had thought of Tessia, then. Unexpectedly. Was that why Takado had attacked the village? Had he been angry that Hanara thought another – a Kyralian – might be worthy of his loyalty? But Hanara had only thought of her briefly – and not convincingly. All he had done was realise that it was possible he might feel loyalty to her...in another life...if Takado hadn’t already been his master.
When Takado had attacked the village Hanara had been shocked and puzzled. But his master never did anything without a reason. So why had he done it?
Hanara looked up at the men sitting around the fire and felt his empty stomach sour.
A faint whistle nearby brought all heads up, eyes searching the darkness. Footsteps told where to look. Then magical globes of light weaved into the clearing close to the ground, casting an eerie glow on the undersides of the faces of the men approaching.
Hanara would have assumed Takado had not killed him because he needed a source slave, if his master hadn’t returned to Kyralia with a new source slave. He looked back at the thin young man waiting by Takado’s tent. Jochara hadn’t said a word to Hanara, but his unfriendly stares made it clear he had not expected to be sharing his role with his predecessor.
As Takado and his two companions joined the ichani, Hanara hurried forward and placed the low wooden stool he’d been holding on the ground. His master sat down, not sparing him a glance.
The Sachakans who had left with Takado to see the ruins of Mandryn were unfamiliar. Like the ichani, they wore knives in jewel-encrusted sheaths on their belt to indicate they were magicians. Their own slaves brought stools for their masters to sit on.
“Well?” Rokino, one of the outcasts, asked. “What did you think, Dachido?”
“Looks like it was an easy target,” the newcomer replied. Kochavo, his companion, nodded in agreement.
All turned to look at Takado, who smiled. “They’re all easy targets. Some easier than others. We could take a quarter of the country for ourselves with no real resistance. No immediate resistance, that is.”
“Could we hold it?” Dachido asked.
“To do so permanently we will have to take the whole country, which I believe we can do, with careful planning.”
Kochavo looked thoughtful. “The whole country. Reconquer Kyralia. If the emperor wished this, he would have done it already.”
Takado nodded. “The emperor believes it is not possible. He is wrong.”
Dachido frowned. “How can you be so sure?”
“I have examined Kyralia’s defences for myself,” Takado told him. “They have perhaps a hundred magicians, many of whom have never been trained to fight – except in some silly game they play. Most of the time they bicker with each other, never agreeing on anything. Those who live in the city despise those who live in the leys, who distrust them in return. Their king is young and inexperienced with about as much authority over his people as our emperor has over us. The commoners hate the ruling class and are uncooperative and defiant. Their magicians are only allowed, by law, to take strength from apprentices – and many do not even have those.” He smiled. “They are foolish and weak.”
“Some would say much the same of us,” Dachido said, chuckling. Then he sobered. “You are asking us to defy the emperor’s wishes. He has made it clear he will punish anyone who threatens the peace between Sachaka and its neighbours.”
Takado said nothing. He rose and paced around the fire, frowning, then he stopped before the two newcomers.
“The emperor knows that Sachaka may face civil war. Better the landless and disinherited unite to gain new land than fight over the old. If we win enough support, and demonstrate that victory is possible, Emperor Vochira will be forced to endorse a conquest of Kyralia. He may even join us.”
“More likely he’ll send someone to kill us,” Dachido said darkly.
“Only if there are too few of us. The more of us he has to kill, the more allies he has to apologise to and compensate, and the weaker he will appear.” Takado’s teeth flashed in the light of the fire. “Some will join us without much urging, because they have nothing better to do, or love a good fight. Others will join us once they hear how much support we have gained. Even more will come when we have a few victories to our name. Still more will want some of the prizes – land, wealth, fame, power.”
Dachido frowned. He was older than the other outcasts, Hanara saw. His eyes were not afire with excitement