Kingdom of Monsters - Empire of Sand Series

Chapter 3.3

A hot wind gusted across the camp.

The gathered soldiers murmured and shifted.

If she truly knew the General's true name, she would have an unnatural power over him. One that she could use to control him, to bind him to her will the same way that she bound her plants, to pluck his defenses and crack him in half. Or she could shout his true name to the devils, who would use it to harry him to his death and cause the deaths of all who shared his blood, and all whose lives he touched, until the curse ran out of bitterness.

Since that curse had already befallen her family, Lunsa, more than anyone, knew the dangers of speaking aloud a true name.

The smile returned to Arctavian's lips. "This child knows such a thing? And the captain-at-arms brought her here for our general's inspection, in case it might be true? What loyalty."

The soldiers grinned at her, all teeth.

"Let us assist his inspection." He bent to her. "Do you claim the true name by right of motherhood? You are too young to have birthed such a person, even should you claim to have survived it."

"And she's still got her child braids," someone shouted.

"With child braids, you can't possibly bestow adult names in an aging ceremony." His flat smile widened. "Perhaps you exchanged them voluntarily after drinking from the marital cup? Fools do give away such pieces of themselves naively, but I should warn you, the General has lived only in the furthest Frost garrisons, where they receive no clever lambs. Naught but giants and ice to tempt him. Well, then? How do you claim such knowledge?"

"She could have it by witchery," the sergeant said.

The under-general flicked to him, irritated by his nearness and by his overly loud voice, which carried the suggestion beyond the parade ground and into the suddenly quieted camp.

"Let her speak it then!" one of his soldiers shouted. "Won't hurt him none. He's only a beast."

The others laughed again, and the under-general with them.

"Some would say so." Arctavian caught his laugh in one breath and wiped mirth from his suddenly flat eyes. "Yes, then, let her speak it. If she should indeed have such knowledge."

She touched her throbbing cheek and stared up at the cold man who purported to hold her life in his hands.

"No? How disappointing." Arctavian jerked his head at the riverman. "Time to die."

The riverman's whimper rose. "Please, I'll do anything, please, it weren't my idea. I swear it—"

"Oh? It wasn't your fault, you say? " The under-general's eyes started to water. "Make me believe you."

"I don't—I can't—please!" The riverman fell to his knees and prostrated himself. "I'm your servant! I'm your favorite, your man! Please—your graceship—your grace—"

The under-general's smile seemed to split in two directions.

"Please! Oh, your graceship! Oh, your grace . . ." He hiccuped to a whine. Arctavian took a blade, eliciting a fresh round of pleading. Once it abated, he plunged the blade into the riverman's shoulder.

The riverman screamed.

Arctavian removed the blade and studied his sobbing form.

Lunsa tunneled her fingers and toes into the earth like roots and closed her eyes.

Every cry prolonged the riverman's death, and yet, every wound increased his desperation. Her village had never seen such suffering. Demian's punishment, which had lasted longer than the sun, had not painted the dirt with such artful sprays of violence. Here lay the meaning behind the captain-at-arm's warning that she would regret her lies. The captain-at-arms would have killed her cleanly; this man would make her suffer.

Because she had lied. She did not know the demon general's true name.

Fear rooted into her center and knotted around her silent heart.

After a particularly prolonged scream, an older man strode from the elder's house, his uniform more colorful but less polished than the under-general's, and his thin mouth decidedly pinched. "Merciful Eleana, what mischief is this?"

Arctavian didn't look away from the twitching, guttural mass of his broken plaything. "A deserter."

The older man's lip curled. "Can't you dispose of him in a less noisy manner? I can hear his screams clear into my nightmares. Where's General Demian?"

Arctavian wiped his watery eyes.

The sergeant answered. "The front, your strategicalness."

"Hail him for me the moment he arrives. I wish to discuss strategies."

"Yes, your honorable intellectuality."

The strategist pinched the furrowed bridge between his eyes. "Please stop these attempts at flattery and use my name. It will save us all a headache."

"I dare not." The sergeant's voice dropped to an overly loud whisper. "She'll hear your true name in it."

"She?" The older man noticed Lunsa rooted in the dirt for the first time. He made swift cutting motions beside his ears to cut any enchantments before they reached him. "Awful young for a bone-worker."

"She's a woodland witch."

The old strategist stepped back.

Arctavian spit on the ground. "Baseless superstition, Herr Ravot."

The older man flinched to hear his name spoken aloud. He stroked his aged companda and edged away. "Well, anyway. Bring me General Demian. And end this silliness. I need concentration to punch through the Serengai's woody armor."

"For your war-making council, will not I suffice?"

"Demian is still our leader, under-general."

Arctavian eyed the man's retreat with flatness. Then he made a sawing motion at his shoulder. The soldier nearest the riverman slid his blade across the gurgling throat. The riverman hissed to silence.

His companda, which he had sheltered even at the apogee of his suffering, nosed out from his dead body. Blood soaked its fur and it limped. The soldiers let it pass without comment.

So, they still possessed that much humanity. She hugged the absence at her neck. Asnul.

Arctavian let out an unsatisfied sigh. "Always rushing. Where is the unshakeable captain-at-arms?"

"He's gone to the front, your excellent grace, sir."

Arctavian flicked to her again. "Do you know the General's name?"

Her lies lodged behind the dirt she had swallowed. She coughed. Dry, brittle, lonely coughs that disappeared with her breath into the roaring black sky.

The soldiers watched her with the same avidity they had turned on the riverman-ka.

Arctavian's smile rose, hopeful. "Would you instead like to beg for your life?"