Like me, he kept his hair cropped close to the skull. Unlike me, his was still all black. Evanov’s pink skin only showed his few scars now because the pair of them had clearly been working out for a while and they were both hot and sweaty, making his skin pinker.
But it was the sight of Ang Shi that dried my throat. His long hair flowed like black silk. The pale gold of his skin flowed over the movement of muscles that shifted him with the grace of a dancer. He bore the scars of our kind, yet they did not detract from the — what was I thinking?
The boys clashed and Shi kept a critical eye over the match. I tried to as well, but my thoughts were scattering. The boys were doing well. Not perfectly, but they were getting there. Fin had a grip around Lloyd that should take him off the mat, but Lloyd made a move I couldn’t see from where I stood and Fin flinched.
“Break!” Shi shouted.
The two boys moved apart and stood facing each other, ready for the next round. Fin’s back was to me, so I couldn’t see his expression, and I didn’t want to intrude. Lloyd on the other hand looked smug.
“Mister Evanov, that was an illegal move. There will be discipline.”
The grin fell off Lloyd’s face.
Shi was clearly rankled. “Enough for today. Leave.”
Both boys snapped a salute to Shi, then walked off the mats. Lloyd tapped Fin on the arm. Fin looked at him like he’d kill him, until his eyes slipped up to me. At which point Lloyd quickly grabbed his jacket and virtually ran past me.
“All right?” I asked Fin.
“Mostly.” But he turned back to Shi. “Flight Captain, sir?”
Shi stood tall, his hands clasped behind his back. “Yes, Mister Segast.”
“What did you mean about being fourteen?”
Shi sucked in a breath. “You are aware that Supreme Marshal Tiernan is a father?”
Fin looked at me. “The Dragonlord got promoted?”
Tiernan, as Supreme Marshal, was leader of the Riders, the Infantry, and the Tidewardens. The man with more control in all Gultima than anyone outside of the Church of The Nine. There really was no one else. The bastard. And though he had not been the one to pass me the order to relocate to Unkea, I knew he was the source of that command. I nodded. “Yes, we know he has a daughter.”
“He has sent her to a College of Riders already.”
That couldn’t be. “But she’s barely fourteen,” I said. “She won’t survive any rider college.”
Fin turned to me, his face pale. “By the Gods, he really was trying to kill her.”
It was an uncomfortable idea. I jerked my head towards the door and Fin rushed out. My hands were clenched by my sides. The idea sickened me.
“Segast?”
Shi’s voice was quiet, but insistent.
“Which college?” I demanded. Though what I could do about it, I didn’t know. Nothing, obviously.
“Reports vary, and all have been suggested, so I cannot be certain.”
“That bastard,” I grated. “We told the truth and he posted us out here. When all the while—” I caught myself and stopped.
“All the while?” Shi asked, moving to stand in front of me.
I wanted to say. I needed to say. The truth of it had been eating me alive for a long time. “There were rumours that— On the day that—” It was harder to say than I expected. “By the Gods, I don’t know how any parent could do such a thing.” I gulped and tried again. “There are rumours that Tiernan tried to kill his daughter by throwing her off the battlements of Pasaocea Fortress.”
Shi paled under that golden skin.
“She had just turned five.”
His lips parted. The statement hung in the air like the frozen breath of a white. After all these years, I still found the idea incomprehensible. Unsavoury.
