Battle Magic

She fixed her mind on stone in the soles of her feet and on the song of the mountains, and kept going.

By sunrise she reached the canyon where the Yanjingyi war party had captured her. The deep song had called to her from there. She stopped to drink again from the stream. She wanted to sleep, but the mountain song was too loud now. There was no sleeping with that racket going on in her brain. She staggered upright by the water and looked back the way she had come. With horror she saw bloody footprints marked her trail. Panicked, she stumbled forward, wanting to run and unable to. The song was so loud that she did not hear the clatter of hoofbeats in the canyon.

Turning a bend in the stone, she saw an opening in the side of the canyon: a cave. Could she go there? There was plenty of loose rock above it and to the sides. Did she have the strength to close the opening once she was inside, hiding where she had gone?

She halted. The deep song had stopped. In front of the cave she saw the strangest thing. On the dirt was a polished lump of fluorite: deep green, deep purple, and clear crystal. It looked like an eighteen-inch bear sitting on its haunches, one that had been smoothed by years of running water until all of him was rounded. His muzzle was only a gentle point, not a sharp nose. It was the friendliest-looking piece of stone she had ever seen.

It cocked its head knob at her. “Evumeimei Dingzai, welcome to my home,” the living stone said. It spoke with the voice of the deep song, making every bone in Evvy’s body shiver. “Will you enter?”

Evvy stumbled toward it. “Who are you?”

“My name is very long, and I will say it for you at some time, but not now. I am the heart of the mountain that the meat creatures here call Kangri Skad Po.” The stone creature turned and trundled deeper into the cave on very short legs.

Evvy followed, leaning on her stick. Glowing moss on the walls of the cave lit their way. As they walked the tunnel opened up. Normally she would have gasped as it grew larger, but not today. Today she desperately held to the feeling of stone at the bottoms of her bleeding feet as they descended into the earth. So intent was she that she didn’t notice when the cave’s entrance closed behind them.

She did notice a mild grumbling overhead. A few rocks fell and the floor shook slightly, making her stumble.

“What was that?” she cried, steadying herself with her makeshift staff.

“It is nothing,” the crystal bear assured her, his amazingly deep voice making her think of icy underground rivers and hidden hot springs. “Soon you will rest and heal. Then you will tell me what you are. I have never felt anyone like you in all my millennia.”

Normally Evvy would have demanded to know how many millennia the living stone had, and what millennia were. Now she clung to her staff and limped onward, biting her lip until it started to bleed again.

In the world above the mountain roots, Jia Jui led the search party into the long canyon. On the walls of Fort Sambachu, the bodies of Dawei and Musheng hung as a warning to every idiot in the army who did not know the difference between a dead girl and a mage in a deep trance. She had already left sizable offerings to several gods that the emperor would never learn that she, too, had examined Evumeimei’s body and pronounced her to be dead. She would have sworn the girl was dead, and if the emperor’s spies ever learned differently, she would pay very painfully.

She could still save herself. The bloody footprints showed that Evvy could not go much farther. With the girl back in her hands, Jia Jui meant to shackle her to her own wrist and take her to Emperor Weishu herself.

So deep in her plans was Jia Jui that she didn’t notice the quiver in the ground until it was much too late. Driven by the living heart of Kangri Skad Po, the canyon collapsed on soldiers and mage. None of them would be seen again.

THE TEMPLE OF THE TIGERS,

THE DRIMBAKANG LHO, AND

THE TEMPLE OF THE SEALED EYE

Once he had gotten used to the fact that Rosethorn and her horse had simply disappeared, Briar listened to Jimut’s pleadings and turned to help move the refugees into the Temple of the Tigers. He busily sent runaway toddlers, goats, and the odd group of boys across the Tom Sho Bridge and up the rugged hill. It was when he reached the temple fortress at the top of the hill that he saw why the place had the name that it did.

Two giant tiger figures stood on either side of the front gate. One, painted orange with black stripes, snarled realistically at anyone who rode toward it. The other, carved of pure white stone with black stripes, looked as if the sculptor had caught it in midleap, forelegs and claws extended. Briar could even see every hair in the animals’ carved fur. Captain Lango’s Gyongxin people did not care for them. Parahan and Souda’s people only bowed as they passed: Jimut explained that tigers were common, respected animals in the Realms of the Sun. The local villagers, unlike Lango’s fighters, were clearly used to these tigers and even rubbed them on the side or paw. Briar only relaxed once he was well inside the curtain wall. He had half expected the tigers, like the naga queen of the Temple of the Sun Queen’s Husbands, to act unpleasantly alive.

He went with Parahan for a look around when they were settled: The plan seemed to be for the soldiers to patrol a circle around the place while they waited for Rosethorn’s return. They also expected the arrival of more warriors from the west, the southern part of the Drimbakang Zugu mountains and beyond. Knowing that, Briar agreed they ought to familiarize themselves with their newest temporary home.

The place was big, with the stepped outer wall that was common to Gyongxin fortresses. A small village already fit in the lower courtyard as part of the temple, together with barns, stables, mews, chicken coops, fenced gardens, and roaming herds of goats and fowl. In the upper courtyard loomed the main house of worship with its dormitories, side temples, and kitchens.