Page 45 of Four Ruined Realms (The Broken Blades #2)
Mikail
City of Loptra, Khitan
Gambria’s apartment smells of lumber and lilacs and overlooks the city of Loptra. Somewhere down there is her wife, whom she sent out for goat cheese when I knocked on their door. Gam served me tea and custard buns out of custom and politeness, but she’d rather I not be here. Not because I’m a Yusanian spy but because that’s how she generally feels about me.
I lean on the wall by the picture windows and glance down at the street, but really, I’m studying Gambria in the reflection of the glass. She sits with her legs crossed in a green armchair. Her pink pants are perfectly tailored to her small frame. She’s a touch over five feet tall and barely a hundred pounds, but she’s as formidable as a mountain.
“Tell me about the Marnans,” I say.
“Hello, it’s nice to see you as well, Mikail,” she drawls.
My lips quirk. There’s always been a certain tension with Gambria. She likes me, I think, but she’s protective of Fallador, and she believes I’m trouble. She and Fallador survived together, the last of their family, hiding in the cargo ship that took them from Gaya to Khitan during the Festival of Blood.
Gam has dark curls and light eyes, but aside from those features, she doesn’t bear much of a resemblance to her cousin. I knew her on the island, too, so her poor opinion of me is entirely personal.
“What do you want to know?” she asks, too inquisitive to not take the bait. “The Marnans live in the ice caves two days west of here, but you know that already, so what are you really asking?”
I smile. “How many are they?”
“Eight thousand, maybe ten at this point. It’s hard to say with how they live underground. Even their own people don’t have an exact number. When they need more room, they tunnel to another location. They have no need for a census.”
I have the same intel. I grimace internally. I was hoping for a far lower number, but without infiltrating their caves, it’s impossible to say for certain. Gambria’s wife, Lyria, is Marnan. Her mother left the caves and came to the city before Lyria was born. I assume in some kind of disgrace, but it’s hard to say.
“Where do they bury their dead?” I ask.
Gambria’s tea is nearly to her lips, but she puts her cup down, clanging it in the saucer. “No.”
I face her. “No, what?”
“To what you’re thinking,” she says. “Absolutely not. It’s suicide.”
I arch an eyebrow. “I didn’t know you’d miss me so much. I’m touched, Gam.”
She inhales and stares in the middle distance like she’s suffering, but amusement shines in her eyes. They are sky blue and wide set.
“I can take or leave you,” she says, “but someone else doesn’t feel quite the same.”
I grin despite myself.
“Then help me survive—where is their burial ground?” I ask. “I doubt they keep their bodies where they live. Frozen or not, that’s fairly grisly.”
She sighs. “Staraheli is in a glass coffin inside a mausoleum at the cave entrance. Both the mausoleum and the cave mouth are guarded day and night.”
Well, that’s not ideal.
“My darling, there is a reason Staraheli still has his head,” Gambria says, turning serious. “Khitan, and Loptra in particular, would love nothing more than to display it. It can’t be done.”
It’s a good thing can’t and won’t are different things.
“Not with that attitude,” I say.
She rolls her eyes, but the ghost of a smile lights her face. She has a quiet beauty. Fallador’s whole family did. Past tense. The royal family of Gaya was slaughtered and thrown into the sea after Joon declared they had broken the colonial treaty. As if that paper wasn’t signed at the point of a sword.
I stare out the window, thinking about how to get to Staraheli’s corpse. Mausoleums are typically sealed, but if the body is in a glass coffin and guarded, then perhaps not. Sora and Euyn can take care of something as simple as a few guards as I smash the glass and cut off his head.
We can do this. One step closer to Quilimar. Another closer to freeing Gaya.
I watch the snow fall on the sleek buildings. There’s less gilding here than in Vashney or Quu, but it’s still foreign. Thoughts of Gaya, of the fields and the black woods return. It never snows on the island. Our houses are stucco and black timbers, not this.
“This place couldn’t be less familiar, could it?” I ask.
She shrugs. “It’s home.”
I whip around. “Gaya is home.”
“Oh, Mikail, it is not.” She looks truly sorry for me. “We have changed.”
“What do you mean?”
“You and me and Fallador—we are now from but not of Gaya. We are both the lands that adopted us and Gayan, but that is not the same as Gaya being our home.”
I stare at her in disbelief. As much as I have pretended to be Yusanian, I have always known that I am not. I am not a part of Yusan now, nor will I ever be.
“That’s ridiculous,” I snap. “I am Gayan. As are you. Your cousin is the rightful ruler of the realm!”
“The former realm.” She shakes her head, her curls bouncing as she stands and walks closer to me.
My eyebrows rise as she gently rests a hand on my shoulder. It’s very strange, since she is not a gentle person.
“We have not been there since we were children,” she says softly. “Even you haven’t been back. I am certain it is much changed in nearly twenty years. We love the Gaya of our past, as we should. But that Gaya is gone. It disappeared when our boats set sail.”
I try to let her words slide off me, but the barbs sink in. “I hope you’re wrong.”
“But that’s so rarely the case.” She smiles a full-lipped grin.
I’m shaken, so I change the subject. She can’t be right. She just can’t be.
“You know, you’ve never told me why you settled here and not in Quu near Fallador,” I say.
“Because you can love someone and want to make your mark separate from them. I am my own person here.” She drops her hands and folds them. She’s both telling the truth and lying, because that’s not why she really left the capital. “I hope there’s a place of peace for you, my friend.”
I nod. “Maybe one day.”
She sighs. “You couldn’t sound less sincere if you tried.”
I smile. “Don’t be silly, Gam. I can always be less sincere.”