29: THE BATTLE BUT NOT THE WAR
His beloved had stopped fighting.
Wolf searched Oakland, worried as the night was still and quiet except for the distant crack of rifles. There were no calls to the Spell Stones. No shields. No flame strikes. Why had she stopped fighting? With all the warrior monks from High Meadow Temple in the city, he couldn’t even pick out her Hand by their shields.
Everyone that he stopped and questioned sung her praises. She had been clever and fierce and unrelenting. Only they couldn’t tell him where she was currently. They finally mentioned that she’d been with one of Forge’s Hands, which let him track her by the unique mix of Wind Clan and Stone Clan shields collected into one tight knot.
Wolf found his beloved wrapped in a wool cloak, tucked into a sheltered entryway, being forced to drink hot tea. Little Horse and Discord were acting as shields as the rest of her people and Forge’s First Hand stood guard as blades.
“They’re getting away,” Tinker was complaining. “Besides, I don’t like hot tea. I only tolerate it as a medium for honey.”
“The oni troops are too scattered for you to be effective,” Little Horse murmured. “And Lemonseed knows how you like your tea. She has put honey in it.”
Discord was more harsh. “You’re about to go face down on the pavement. You still have not fully recovered from breaking your arm, you are dangerously chilled, and you had almost no sleep last night.”
“Pfft, sleep is overrated,” Tinker complained. “I bet the oni don’t sleep.”
“Domou,” Cloudwalker said quietly to alert the others.
“Domou?” Tinker echoed, looking up in confusion. When she spotted Wolf, she gave a wordless cry. Hot tea, entangled cloak, and her own exhaustion forgotten, she tried to fling herself toward him.
Her Hand caught the teacup, the cloak, and their domi before all could end up on the ground.
Wolf swept her up and hugged her tightly, marveling at how small and fragile she felt. She’d taken on multiple horrors and a full army almost single-handedly. How could someone so tiny be so fierce?
“I was so worried!” she cried again and again, hugging him tightly. “I was so worried!”
“I was worried too,” he admitted. “We left you all alone.”
“I wanted to go to you but I needed to stay.”
“You did well,” he said. “I’m proud of you.”
But he was still worried. Her Hand was correct in their assessment. She was soaked to the bone and shivering. Huddling in this damp, cold entryway was dangerous to her health.
“I was so scared,” she whispered. “And angry. Mostly angry. But I was angry because I was scared.”
He had to smile. That was his domi—fiercely protective of even a wounded stranger dropped into her lap. “I have been told by many of my teachers that that is the way of war. To be frightened for the things you hold dear. To be angry at those who threaten them.”
She pressed a tear-stained face against his neck. “I don’t know why I’m crying. I’m so happy that you’re here. Safe. Unhurt. You are unhurt—right?”
“Yes, I am unhurt.”
“I was afraid that I was going to lose you. Lose Oilcan. Lose everyone.”
“It is over. We have weathered the worst of the storm.” At least, he hoped this was the worst. Oakland was safe at the moment but his East Coast holdings might be under attack.
“What’s our plan now?” Tinker asked. “Chase down the oni in the city?”
“No. We need to check the distant voices.” Wolf headed toward a Rolls-Royce that he’d spotted earlier. Tinker must have abandoned it at some point. He was aware that the sekasha had spread out around them, keeping close enough to shield them but far enough out that there was an illusion of privacy. “We must see if there is news of an attack on our East Coast holdings. If not, we need to warn them that an attack is possible. I need to find out how my siblings fared during this, especially Starlight and Charcoal, who are at Aum Renau. Neither one of them is a fighter and the logical move for the oni is to take out the Spell Stones so that even if the queen sends reinforcements, the incoming domana will still be helpless.”
“You’re going to Aum Renau?” Tinker said, worry in her voice.
“As soon as I can. Not tonight, as our forces are scattered and in chaos. Tomorrow afternoon at the latest.”
“Because Oilcan and I can protect the city?” she said quietly.
“I am sorry,” he said. “I never meant it to go this way. I never wanted you to have to fight.”
“I don’t think you really had any choice in the matter,” she said. “Between Vision, Pure Radiance, and my own stubbornness, it’s all kind of beyond your control.”
“Vision?” he said with surprise as the female was nearly mythical, born and vanished prior to the start of the Rebellion.
Tinker explained that the legendary female had been hiding in Pittsburgh, raising wood sprites and planning who knew what. “She gave me this riddle or clue or perhaps just a major distraction in the form of a chessboard set up with a Queen’s Gambit. I think she wants me to do something—but I don’t know what. I don’t even understand what she’s trying to accomplish. If the Skin Clan were hiding out on Earth for a thousand years or more, she probably could have taken them out without them even realizing she was there. And there’s the whole thing about Dufae’s box with the baby dragons inside the magical traps. Why didn’t she find and open it? Why did she let the Skin Clan have it? It’s not because she wants them back in power—she hates them with a passion. I think she’s merely using them as a tool to make some change to the elves. Maybe she just wants to get rid of all the domana—she seems to think they’re just as bad as the Skin Clan. But if it was as simple as all that, then what did she need me for? Why babysit generations of wood sprites and then try to keep me from falling under Pure Radiance’s influence? And the lies she told me all of my life! What’s that all about?” She dropped her head wearily on his shoulder. “It makes my head hurt trying to figure her out.”
He paused to consider the question. He’d had to deal with Pure Radiance’s odd directives his entire life. His parents’ marriage and his nine siblings were all under her orders. She had foreseen that Pittsburgh would arrive deep in the virgin forest of an undefended continent, bringing the Skin Clan. He knew that he’d been born a tool to block the invasion.
Tinker’s father had been the one who created the gate that delivered the city.
Wolf started to walk again. It could not be a coincidence. Vision raised generations of wood sprites until one created a gate to link the worlds. If she truly hated the Skin Clan, then why would she do such a thing? And why would she try to keep Pure Radiance from using Tinker to block the Skin Clan’s attempts to take back the world?
Tinker had undone her father’s work—which was done under Vision’s guidance.
At the end of the first Oni War, Pure Radiance had directed all known gates between Earth and Elfhome be pulled down.
What if what Vision wanted was continuous contact between humans and elves?
All the elves within Pittsburgh were remarkably different from those who lived in his East Coast holdings. They were changed by their constant exposure to humans: Discord with her short blue hair and passion for all things human. Little Horse and Cloudwalker learning to drive the Rolls-Royce automobiles. Rainlily showing up on Discord’s hoverbike, wearing blue jeans. Lightning Strikes had taken a human lover and fathered Blue Sky.
Dozens of elves were living with humans instead of in the enclaves—not that he had been aware of it until Sparrow was killed. From what he’d been able to gather since then, the outliers were elves who didn’t fit into normal elfin society. There was no place for them except among the humans.
“You do not ask a child when he wants to go to bed,” Wolf said.
“Hmm?” Tinker said.
“My mother loved babies but once they started to be able to talk back, she was more than happy for others to step in. In many ways, I’m much more Otter Dance’s son than my mother’s because of all the hours I spent with her, learning to fight. My training started before I could even walk by learning how to tumble without hurting myself. Otter Dance has always been leery of Pure Radiance. It was a caution that she had learned from both her father, Tempered Steel, and her mother, Perfection. By rights, the sekasha should rule us as they are the ones most holy—but they do not trust themselves. They know that the world is filled with shades of gray that they cannot see.”
“They don’t see gray?”
He was explaining this badly. “Morally speaking, no. The sekasha sees that, in every conflict, there is only right or wrong. They understand, however, that the world is more complicated than that. The domana have a better grasp of the grayness of morality. That there is sometimes no right answer and that the best you can do is the lesser of evils.”
“Okay. What does this have to do with bedtimes?”
“There are certain traditions we follow that Tempered Steel has always complained against. One of them was the naming of children. There were others who he thought were wrong, such as the work appropriate for various castes. Some were in place prior to the start of the Rebellion. Others were developed while we were fighting to be free, and never revised. He approached the crown, asking for widespread reform. In the end, he had to choose only one—the banning of spell working—and appealed to his fellow sekasha whom Pure Radiance could not fully control.”
“The evil lies with us, not the magic.” Tinker paraphrased Tempered Steel’s famous argument.
“Yes. When he first approached the crown, Pure Radiance blocked his reform proposal, saying that ‘You do not ask a child when he wants to go to bed.’ He was not swayed by this, saying that you teach a child wisely but in the end, step away and let it be guided by its training and its own heart. This is why the sekasha are by blood and sword. Yes, they were set upon their path by birth, but they must show that they understand what it is to be a sekasha and the desire to continue that path.”
“They win their sword at a hundred,” Tinker said.
“Yes, if they chose to fight in order to continue being one of the holy. If they decide not to try for their sword, then they are allowed to walk away from the path of the holy. I thought that Discord had always felt pressured to take the path of one of her parents. At first, she was sure that she needed to train as one of her mother’s caste. Later, she chose her father’s path. But was it truly right for her?
“In the Easternlands, there was no other road for her to follow. It did not exist. Within the cities, laedin are responsible for most duties that require knowledge of combat. No one would employ a sekasha. Those of the blood but not of the sword are considered flawed. They could live within the temples but always be looked down upon by the warrior monks. They end up in isolated areas, filling in where there is a need. Patrolling remote roads. Guiding pilgrims to mountain temples. Herding livestock to high summer pastures. It is an aimless life, drifting at the edge of society, one step away from being hermits. In Pittsburgh, there are no traditions that would lock Discord into one path. There was the freedom to make a road where there hadn’t been one before. I urged her to explore different lifestyles. For a decade, she did.”
“So Vision might be trying to dismantle the traditions that tie people into preordained paths?”
“I cannot say for certain but it seems to me there are vast changes to our people that Pure Radiance has not been willing to allow. I think I understand the problem because unlike other domana, I’ve always been given multiple paths to choose from. Will I be Wind Clan or Fire Clan? Do I chase the grandeur of my name? Even the choice of who I would take as my domi was never clear cut. I had freedom to choose anyone.”
“I’m still amazed you chose me.”
“You are the most extraordinary person I have ever met.” He pressed his forehead to hers. “Time and time again you have done the utterly impossible. You amaze me constantly. I could not imagine anyone better suited for my life than you.”
“Hmm, flattery will get you everywhere,” she murmured and kissed him. “Why does it feel so comforting to be held by you? It’s like you’re emitting this wonderful drug that makes me feel so relaxed and peaceful.”
“I think that is love,” he said. “Because I feel it too. It is very nice after being so afraid of losing everything.”
* * *
There were messages from all his East Coast holdings at Poppymeadows. All his siblings had dropped unconscious, triggering frantic queries to him and to the other holdings, which were automatically copied to him. No one on the East Coast knew of the spells to revive someone in the deep sleep after transformation. All his siblings were still asleep.
“Oh, this sucks,” Tinker whispered, reading the messages with him.
“No word yet of an attack.” Wolf tried to stay positive. “You should prepare yourself for tomorrow—it promises to be grueling. Take a hot bath. Eat. Sleep.”
“Bath? Sleep?” Tinker complained. “Okay, a hot bath would be lovely but it doesn’t seem right to sleep.”
“There’s nothing you can do now,” Wolf said. “The trains are still tied up rescuing the royal marines and the Wyverns that stayed to support them. True Flame is awake but barely able to stand. All our people are exhausted, soaked to the bone, and scattered across the city. We cannot rush off either—not without food, water, and supplies. That way is insanity. It will take time to organize. If you push yourself to collapse, you will not be able to function tomorrow. The first rule of warfare as a domana is to stay alive.”
She seemed to shrink smaller, as if she’d been held up by sheer anger and determination. “Being a domana sucks sometimes.”
He felt a stab of guilt as he was the one who’d made her domana.
She kissed him and then let her Hand carry her off to the bathhouse.
“That applies to you too,” Wraith Arrow murmured once they were alone.
“I’ll eat and change to dry clothes,” Wolf stated. “After that, I need to do what I can to make sure that Oakland is safe.”