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Eventually, we both drifted off to sleep.
I woke with a start when Harif backed into the yurt carrying a tray of food. Cian still slept soundly behind me, though his breathing was more even than it had been earlier in the day. But Hellion woke and fought to sit up, wincing in pain.
Harif set the tray on the floor in front of me without a word. “I have spoken with the healer and they have agreed to come in one hour to set your bone, Viceroy Hellion.”
“Thank you for your shelter and hospitality,” Hellion said, their tone carefully measured. They had slipped into a role I’d never seen before, the role of a diplomat in a foreign land. “You have Jaida’s gratitude.”
“Jaida’s gratitude is worthless to me,” Harif said, waving his hand. “But perhaps a dance would do. One day. When you are feeling better.”
Hellion gave a stiff nod. “Perhaps.”
I shifted uncomfortably, unsure of what exactly had just happened. It seemed like there was some subtext to their conversation that I didn’t understand. “You said you knew my knife, Harif.”
He nodded. “I did.”
“How?”
He sat down across from me, legs crossed, eying the knife in my belt. “He’s dead, isn’t he? Nisang? It’s the only way he would have parted with Briar and Thorn.”
“Yes.” My voice broke, but I said it aloud, anyway.
“How did you know Nisang?” Hellion asked.
“That story requires a drink,” he said and opened his tunic to reveal a flask and two small drinking bowls. He placed them on the tray and filled both before continuing. “We are… were distant cousins. Sometimes, he would come here to train when he was younger. I gave him a hard time. He was born out here like the rest of us, but Lukesh came and took him to the palace as a playmate for his ha—” He cut himself off, glancing at Cian and then clearing his throat. “For his son. Of course, he wasn’t from this village, but there weren’t many of us. We know each other from the training. It’s common for young ones to rotate from village to village to pick up skills. Anyway, Nisang was famous.” He picked up his drink and tossed it back before cringing and putting it down to refill.
“For being a skilled fighter?” I took a sip of the drink and almost gagged at the sting.
Harif snorted. “No, for beingcivilized. The other Nightmares think we’re backward savages for living out here like this. But Nisang traveled. He learned fancy swordplay and ate fancy meals in a fancy castle. He may have been born one of us, but he didn’t talk like us, or fight like us, so he wasn’t one of us as far as I was concerned.”
“You were jealous,” Hellion observed.
I removed the lid from one bowl and found a clear broth that smelled of savory herbs. Vegetables and small white dumplings floated in the broth. I set the soup aside because that would be easier to spoon into Cian’s mouth and opened another of the containers. The dark brown meat inside smelled delicious, but I passed it to Hellion and opted for the rice instead. They needed to get their strength back.
“All the females liked Nisang because he was charming and lived in a castle,” Harif continued. “I saw him as a potential threat to my mating prospects.” He nodded at my knife. “Do you know the significance of gifting knives?”
“He said it was a symbol of trust after a disagreement. You give them to someone you’ve wronged.” I picked up the bowl of broth, dumping some of it onto the rice and adding some of the vegetables.
“Yes,” Harif said, nodding and refilling my drink and another for Hellion. “I beat him up good one day and he had the audacity not to go home like I expected. I had to give him a knife over it. Since he was such a cultured, fancy man, I decided I’d have some roses and barbs put on it. I thought I was being smart, a backhanded insult. Guess he liked the idea if he had a sword made to match.”
I laughed. “That sounds like something he’d do.”
“I hope that whatever killed him, you’ve killed it back. Nisang was not the sort to go down easy.” He picked up his drinking bowl. “To Nisang.”
Hellion and I lifted ours in agreement. “To Nisang.”
Whatever drink he brought, it was no less painful to swallow the second mouthful than the first. It burned all the way down and sat in my stomach like fire. I had to down a spoonful of broth to keep it from burning through me.
“Why do your people train so hard if you won’t fight in the war?” I asked, picking up the bowl.
“You mean in Cian’s war.” He snorted and shrugged. “It’s not our war.”
Hellion frowned. “But you’re his subjects. Hispeople. How can you say that?”
“Gargoyles are no one’s subjects. We did not bow to Lukesh.”
“Yes, but what do you think will happen if Brenna wins?” I gestured around me. “Do you think she’ll let you keep living like this? Do you think she’ll leave you alone?”
“I think the warlords will negotiate that when the time comes.” He downed another bowlful of his drink.
