The constant, controlled sparring; the fact that he ingested regular meals of fresh, spiced meat; and so much stimulation that Ashok never felt the need to put the dagger to his flesh, made his body stronger than it had ever been.
There was also the nightmare.
A month had passed, and he’d heard nothing from Olra or Uwan with regard to the beast. He walked to the Camborr pens every day, but he never saw the nightmare out in the open again.
Then one day he saw Olra standing near the fence. She motioned him over, but she didn’t look happy.
“Uwan gave permission for you to be trained as a Camborr,” she said without greeting him, “with training the nightmare specifically in mind.”
Ashok felt his heart pounding in his chest, but the look on Olra’s face tempered his excitement. “You don’t want me here,” Ashok said. The unwillingness was plain on her face. Did she resent that Uwan thought Ashok might succeed where she had failed? he wondered.
“You like him too much,” Olra said, “the nightmare. That feeling might turn into trust. If that happens, he’ll kill you the first chance he gets. It’ll be a waste, and I don’t like waste.”
“Neither do I,” Ashok said quietly.
So it wasn’t resentment for taking her place, but something entirely different. Ashok thought they might be able to work together.
“I’ll want to go into the paddock,” he said. “Immediately.”
Olra was quiet for a moment, her scarred face pensive. “One condition,” she said.
“What is it?” Ashok asked.
“Bring your companions,” she said. “You’ll need people to be there, in case something goes wrong.”
Ashok hesitated. “I don’t know if I can,” he said.
He’d never asked Skagi or the others for anything like a favor. Had he asked his brothers in the enclave for such support, he would have been laughed at. He wasn’t sure how the shadar-kai would respond.
Olra shook her head, her forehead creased in exasperation. “You two”-she nodded at the nightmare-“are as hard-headed as they come. Those are my terms,” she said, and turned to walk back to the cave where the pens were. “Find a way.”
At the Tet bell, Ashok climbed the tower stairs to Eveningfeast. Cree stopped him before he picked up a bowl for his stew.
“Come with me,” Cree said, his black eyes sparkling with barely contained excitement. “There’s better fare to be had tonight. We’re celebrating.” He flashed Ashok a grin and moved off without a sound.
Curious, Ashok followed the shadar-kai down the stairs and outside, where Skagi, Chanoch, and Vedoran were waiting.
“Well done, brother,” Skagi said. He lounged against the tower, twirling his falchion. “Did he put up a fight?”
“Brutal,” Cree said. “I had to set him in his place.”
Chanoch snorted. “You’ve lost, let’s see,” he said, pretending to stroke his chin, “four sparring matches with Ashok this tenday. Is that right, Vedoran?”
“It is,” Vedoran said gravely. “And you lost five such against him, little one.”
Skagi bellowed with laughter. “Then we go to celebrate Ashok’s great victory.” He slapped Ashok on the back. “You’re a Camborr now.”
“How did you know?” Ashok asked. He hadn’t told anyone about his conversation with Olra earlier that day.
“You think it’s a secret when any of us go up in rank?” Chanoch said, staring at him incredulously. “Ask Skagi about his tattoos.”
Skagi traced the field of tattoos layered across his flank. “Got these the day I entered Tempus’s service,” he said. “Cost me everything I’d earned doing hard labor in the city, but it was worth every coin. Folk in the trade districts mark me now. They say, ‘There walks Skagi, warrior of Ikemmu.’ Someday it will be Skagi, Sworn of Uwan.”
The absolute conviction in his voice left Ashok with little doubt that Skagi would be successful in his quest. The others nodded in agreement, nursing their own dreams behind their eyes. Only Vedoran seemed subdued.
“You need your own tattoo to mark this day,” Cree said. “You’re a Camborr; you need ink on your skin to show it.”
“I say give him flames, since he’s going into the fire with that nightmare,” Skagi said. “Or maybe the shadow hounds?” He grinned at Ashok.
Ashok looked down at himself. His skin was bland and colorless next to the complex patterns of the tattoos on the others. But he didn’t understand why they would want to celebrate his accomplishment.
“When one of you goes up in rank,” Ashok said, “the others will be left behind. You’re competing for the same honors.” They should be trying to assassinate him in order to take his place, he thought, not congratulating him on his success.
“Whether we succeed or fail depends on our own efforts,” Chanoch said. By the rapture in his eyes, it sounded like he was repeating something he’d heard Uwan say. “It’s our own fault if we’re unworthy.”
“And when we are rewarded for our service”-Skagi threw an arm around Ashok’s shoulder and towed him in the direction of Tower Hevalor-“we drink.”
The tavern was impressive. It occupied three open levels midway up Tower Hevalor and saw mostly shadar-kai patrons, Ashok noticed. There were no signs marking its name, and whenever Ashok heard anyone refer to it, they called it simply Hevalor Tavern.
The tavern’s stone walls were lit with enchanted blue torchlight, and the cloths covering the tables were black. The dark colors created the illusion of privacy in a room with no corners.
There was a circular bar on each level, but no food to be had. How could there be, Ashok thought, when the room was filled to capacity with kegs and bottles of more varieties of drink than he would have thought existed in the world.
Cree went to the bar for drinks while Ashok and the others sought a table on the third level. When they were seated, Ashok took the opportunity to examine his new tattoo. Green-inked flames encircled his right forearm from elbow to wrist. The fire appeared surprisingly fluid and gave the illusion that in the right light the flames might dance like a true blaze. The inker, a human female with a shop in the open market, had done an impressive job.
Ashok liked the design, but he still thought the others were being premature by insisting he mark his status as a Camborr-in-training. He’d done nothing to break the nightmare yet, and it might be that the flame tattoo would end up decorating his corpse if he failed.
Music drifted down to them from a small dais on the third level. Distracted from his thoughts, Ashok looked up and saw the only non-shadar-kai patron in the room. He recognized Darnae at once. She was playing some kind of instrument, her small voice curled around a song in a language Ashok didn’t recognize. It must have been her native tongue, he thought.
Ashok had heard music, sometimes, carried by the wind through the caves of his enclave. He had never known where it came from. Those caves were strange entities that collected sounds from miles across the plains, or perhaps from the world that mirrored the Shadowfell.
But he’d never heard music like Darnae’s, so close and warm and somehow personal. The mournful strains of the song filled the darkened room and made Ashok’s chest ache with unexplainable emotion. Was there a spell in the words, to make him react this way? he wondered.
Skagi snapped his fingers in front of Ashok’s face. “We can’t be losing you already, you’ve tasted no drink!” he said.
Vedoran handed Ashok a tankard of something that smelled like almonds. “Start with that,” he said. “If you prove yourself worthy, we’ll move you up to something finer.”
Ashok found it hard to draw his mind away from the song. He sniffed his drink and risked a swallow. He wrinkled his nose in disgust.
