Grasping at Shadows [1/5] (Suikoden II, Jowy and the Highlanders)
I have slaved over this thing for I don't know how long. Intermittently, I admit, since I was somewhat preoccupied with my thesis, but apparently I am telling the long and involved saga of Jowy Atreides's Terrible Life Choices because as much as I hate his stupid face, I also love him.
I am not used to this telling-a-character's-story thing, y'all. Or to writing monsters. I blame Mith. Slightly-unfamiliar ground aside, I'm proud of this one.
Title: Grasping at Shadows [1/5] (AO3)
Author:
puella_nerdii
Fandom: Suikoden II
Characters: Jowy Atreides; Luca Blight, Seed, Culgan, Rowd, Kiba Windamier, eventually the entire Highland cast, and Riou in absentia.
Rating: R (...is "Warning: Luca Blight" sufficient? If not, violence-bordering-on-graphic, war crimes, and shit-gets-real thematic content should cover it.)
Words: ~10.4k in this chapter (I know, I know)
Notes: This fic is unofficially subtitled Jowy Atreides's Terrible Life Choices, by the way. The entire thing, particularly every instance of the word "Silverberg" in it, is Mithrigil's fault, and she knows why.
Summary: "I'll stop this war my own way. No, I'll never let a war like this break out on this soil again. And as you say, I'm prepared to be dishonored, if need be. Nevertheless..." - Suikogaiden 1, Chapter 2
Jowy Atreides wants to slay a monster and bring down a nation. But he has to strike in the right place at the right time, and strike deep while hiding his intent, and the monster is watching -- and laughing.
Chapter One: Assassinating Anabelle may have secured Jowy a place in Highland's ranks, but it hasn't earned him anyone's trust -- least of all Luca Blight's.
Anabelle's blood won't come off his knife.
Jowy wipes it down with a cloth, oils it, even scours it with a handful of sand, but a red sheen still stains the blade, and he can't scrape off the flecks of blood near the hilt. He sheathes the knife, finally, and sets it aside, close enough to his bedroll that he could reach it if he has to. He might have to, from the baleful looks some of the Highland soldiers shot him earlier. Whoever's in charge clearly hasn't put out the reason for his return. They'll probably be slow to trust him even after that, but he'll win them over, somehow. He has to, doesn't he?
He squeezes his eyes shut, but only feels more awake for it. Shifting position on his bedroll doesn't help, either. Resting on his side cramps his shoulder, resting on his stomach twists his neck, and resting on his back makes his heart race hard enough to beat in his throat. Occasionally laughs roar from the rest of the camp, or hammers clang, or fires crackle, and none of those exactly lull him to sleep either.
Is Riou sleeping? Jowy doubts it. He's always been a light sleeper-not as light as Nanami, who used to bolt awake if a cricket scampered across the floor, but light enough. And after what happened in Muse, well.
Someone outside his tent starts to sing. Jowy pushes his pillow around his ears, breathes. Even his breath is loud, rattling in his chest. He glances at the knife again, and for a moment it almost sounds like the blade's humming along to the tune, low and shivering. Stop that, he tells himself. He's too old for that sort of thing. He sits up, draws the knife from its sheath, stares at it in the firelight soaking through the tent's walls. It's only a knife. It's not the cleanest knife, but it's only a knife.
It shouldn't matter whether or not it's clean. He'll get a new one if it rusts or tarnishes. Unless Luca expects to see him wearing it, but it wasn't as though the blade was a gift, was it? Just a loan. His fingers lock around the hilt, throttle it until the blade quivers. Oh, he'll return it, all right. He'll return it with interest.
But not yet.
There's a guard posted outside Jowy's tent-his shadow stretches across the canvas-but otherwise it's Jowy's alone, and the guard's more of a formality than anything else. The guard knows it, too; his shadow shows him seated on the ground, his polearm planted next to him. Jowy might be able to catch him by surprise, overpower him without even calling on his Rune, reach the trees before the guard could cry out to the rest of the camp. But he won't, and they all know it, and so they've left him alone because even if he isn't a Jowston spy he's not a Highland soldier again either.
Damn it, what more does he have to do?
He snorts. Stupid question.
***
Rowd escorts Jowy to Luca Blight's tent the next morning, and Jowy forces himself not to spit in the man's face.
"Don't get cocky, you little punk," Rowd hisses in Jowy's ear, his fingers tightening on the back of Jowy's neck. His breath is as foul as the rest of him, still reeking from last night's celebrations. "And keep your smart mouth shut around His Highness, do you hear? You're lucky he hasn't cut your traitorous throat yet."
You're still sore that a pair of boys got the better of you, aren't you? His Highness must be pleased to have such a brilliant military mind under his command, Jowy doesn't retort. That's exactly the sort of thing Rowd wants to hear from him, and Jowy doesn't have to be stupid just because Rowd is.
That stupid man slaughtered a hundred of his comrades. A hundred children. Jowy's fists tighten at his sides, shaking; slowly, he flattens them out again. Rowd, fortunately, doesn't seem to be watching his hands, but other people will be. "Once a traitor, always a traitor," he goes on, and Jowy stares straight ahead at the line of trees, keeps his spine as straight as their trunks. "And after all this country did for you."
It honestly hasn't occurred to this man that his own actions forced Jowy to flee to the City-State, has it? Of course not. By now, Rowd's probably convinced himself that Jowy and Riou were Jowston spies from the beginning, and that he's to be commended for ferreting them out. Bile rises in the back of his throat-but what Rowd believes must be what nearly everyone else does, too, and it's useful to remind himself of that. He swallows, turns his focus ahead again and tunes Rowd out as best he can.
The walk to Luca Blight's tent isn't long. He doesn't know whether to be thankful for that or not. "Here to see His Highness," Rowd says to the guard, who snaps his head up and shows them in.
Rowd bows immediately, and Jowy doesn't have to be told to do the same. It's not enough for Rowd, though, and he braces his palm between Jowy's shoulderblades, shoves him down further.
Somewhere above him Luca laughs, full and free, and Jowy decides not to raise his head just yet.
"Well, boy?" he says. "No curses for me this time? No snarls? No protests?"
Relax your hands, Jowy reminds himself when his fingers start to twitch. "No, your Highness."
Luca chuckles, and the sound scrapes up Jowy's spine. "Heh. So you think you've learned your place?"
You think. The words set Jowy's hackles on end, and he breathes before he bristles where Luca can see. Unless he's seen already-no, Jowy doesn't have time to second-guess every answer he gives. That'll raise Luca's suspicion faster than anything else, he doesn't doubt. "Not yet, your Highness," he says, but keeps his head down.
The air thickens, and Rowd's knuckles dig into Jowy's back. "Not yet?" Luca says-says, not shouts. The knot at the base of Jowy's spine uncurls itself a hair.
"I haven't received my next assignment," he says, and braces himself for what's to come.
Fortunately it's a laugh and not a blow or worse, though Jowy still struggles not to flinch. Luca's still laughing; Jowy sneaks a glance up and watches him clutch the back of his chair, slam it down the way some men slam down pints of beer after a good joke. "You've got balls," he says. "More than most of this gutless rabble. Come here."
Jowy does before Rowd pushes him forward. He stands as straight as he dares, wills his knees not to tremble.
"Show me your hand," Luca says. Jowy doesn't need to ask which one. He raises his right hand as though he's swearing an oath, and Luca grabs him by the wrist and yanks him closer. Jowy stumbles, bites his cheek before he curses. Luca snorts, rotates Jowy's hand palm-up and palm-down again until he finds what he's looking for or he gets bored, Jowy can't tell which.
"Heh," he says at last. Jowy tries not to look at his teeth. "I haven't seen this since I was a kid. How did a boy like you get his hands on it?"
Jowy's throat closes; his breath shudders to a halt. The strange blue light in that cave, and the shadows that had no right to be on Pilika's face but lined it anyway, and Riou smiling at him from a field of blinding white-
Luca continues on, and if he's noticed Jowy's silence he doesn't comment on it. Maybe he likes to hear himself talk. Jowy's dealt with enough of those sorts of men at his father's house, but polite smiles and attentive noises won't appease Luca. "Do you think you can kill me with this?" he asks, and tightens his grip on Jowy's wrist until the grooves in his gauntlet snag on Jowy's skin.
Jowy sucks in a breath through his teeth and says nothing.
Apparently the question wasn't rhetorical, because Luca wrenches Jowy's hand up, high enough that his shoulder cracks in protest. "You couldn't even kill a pack of common soldiers with this. How the hell could you kill me?"
The back of Jowy's neck heats and some of that heat creeps into his cheeks, but he can't look down. He can't. There's no surer admission of guilt. "I couldn't," he says, and the words sting his tongue.
"Damned right." Luca huffs out something that's almost a laugh, and Jowy hears his fingerbone snap a second before he feels it.
Pain explodes behind his eyes, sears his arm to the bone, jangling and harsh and hard enough to drive him to his knees except Luca's holding him up like a rag and if he kneels he'll rip his arm out of its socket, too. Gods. His throat burns from the scream trapped inside it, and when Luca bends that finger back further he shouts loud enough to shake from it.
"You couldn't, and you can't, and you won't," Luca goes on, his smile glimmering in the thick red haze creeping over Jowy's sight. "So don't try."
Whatever answer Jowy has to that scrapes and sticks somewhere in his throat-and then Luca snaps another finger and the tent wavers and Jowy doesn't realize he's started screaming again until he runs out of breath.
Luca's laughing. Of course he's laughing. Hate curls through Jowy's veins, red and insistent as the pain. He gives Jowy's arm a shake and Jowy's head lolls to the side and he wonders, dizzied, how any man-even this man-can call on so much strength. It shouldn't be human. The world blackens around the edges of his vision.
"Go ahead, call on your Rune!" Luca's shoulders shake too, but not from pain. "Ask it to kill me where I stand!"
"Can't-" Jowy chokes.
Crack. Oh gods. He'd faint now if every nerve in his body weren't burning, jangling. Well, he can't hold a knife now. Or a sword. Or a sword Rune. That isn't funny and he's not going to laugh, the Mad Prince can't have already destroyed his wits that much.
"What is it, boy? What can't you do?"
He searches for the pulse of his Rune beneath the throbbing in his hand, but there's nothing, not even the tiniest hum of power.
"Can't-" He forces the words past his teeth. "I can't kill you-"
"And now you won't forget that," Luca says, and wrenches back the last unbroken finger on Jowy's hand.
I can't throw up in front of the Prince of Highland, Jowy thinks, and prays his stomach listens after the wave of nausea hits. He squeezes his eyes shut; they're damp at the corners, and how could they not be?
It takes Jowy a moment to realize Luca's let go of his hand. Once he does, his arm sags at his side, useless. "Get one of the healers to fix that," Luca says, and strides to the tent flap. "Report to me when you're done. We're setting up headquarters in Muse, and you're riding with my company." He looks over his shoulder, his smile steadier than anything else in Jowy's line of sight. "Tell me how you killed that cunt on the way there. I hope she squealed when you stuck her."
He leaves, and Jowy collapses to his knees, knows better than to try and break his fall. He expects Rowd to haul him to his feet again, but Rowd is as silent as he's been since the beginning, and doesn't pull Jowy upright until Jowy asks.
***
The healer calls on his Water Rune, the pain ebbs away, and Jowy thinks he's going to faint from its absence. To be safe, the healer puts Jowy's hand in a splint while his bones reset themselves, but at least it'll take hours instead of weeks for them to do that. He doesn't dare flex his fingers yet, though, no matter how much the magic itches under his skin.
The tent flap flies open as the healer finishes bandaging the splints into place, and a man with wild red hair saunters in, flashes Jowy a grin. "Well look who's here," he says. "The kid who killed Mayor Anabelle."
"And my patient," the healer says, with the kind of irritable edge in his voice that all healers seem to develop sooner or later. "So if you'll excuse me, General Seed-"
General Seed waves his hand in the air. "Done. You're excused. I just want a few words with him, all right?"
The healer purses his mouth. "As you wish," he says, and sweeps out after admonishing Jowy to use his hand as little as possible.
"Healers." Seed shakes his head. "They're useful, don't get me wrong, but they're giant pains in the ass."
Jowy inclines his head, but remains silent.
"Looks like His Highness took a shine to you."
This time, Jowy can't keep himself from snorting.
"I'm serious," Seed says, though his grin is anything but. "If he didn't like you, he'd just have killed you straight off. Wouldn't bother with that first." He indicates Jowy's hand, and Jowy fights to keep it from twitching in response. "Maybe likes is going a little too far, I don't think he actually likes anybody-except Her Highness sometimes, but that's a sometimes, I'm pretty sure."
Jowy remembers the kind of face his father used to adopt at court and before petitioners: neither smiling nor frowning, his gaze level and straight, no new wrinkles creasing his face. He slips that expression on now; the more practice he can get in before he has to face Luca Blight again, the better. "I hope I don't give His Highness cause to dislike me further, then."
"Heh. Well, you never know." Seed thumps him on the back, and if it was meant to be reassuring, Jowy will eat his boots. "Sometimes you don't even need to give His Highness cause at all," he adds, dropping his voice, and pushes his hair from his neck. "See this scar?"
"Yes."
"It's from when he nearly scalped me," Seed says. "Grabbed me by the hair and hacked it off at the root. I thought he was going to shave my head with his sword-and shave clean through my skull while he was at it. He said my hair already looked like blood, so who could tell the difference?"
Jowy's hand stiffens, runs colder than the Water Rune alone could have made it. The chill creeps up the rest of his arm, sinks deeper under his skin, and he digs his heels into the ground to keep from flinching. Seed expects him to flinch, so he can't. "Why?" he asks, and hates how audible the dryness in his throat is.
Seed shrugs and plants himself on the edge of one of the beds, stretches his limbs until they crack. "Who knows? I think something must've pissed him off before I got there, and then I was there, and well. He had to take it out on someone."
He didn't have to do anything, Jowy nearly retorts, but pain lances through his hand again, stabs at all the places that haven't mended yet, and he's too busy trying not to yelp to say anything. He looks down at his hand. It's curled into a fist, and he closes his eyes, commands each finger to uncurl. The Rune throbs under his skin, tries to shove its energy out of his fingertips, but he resists that too.
"Careful with your hand there," Seed says. He must have noticed. "You don't want it to heal out of alignment. Believe me, I know."
He spares a glance at Seed's hands. Seed's gloves might be concealing scars or discolorations, but nothing about the shape of his hands strikes Jowy as odd. "You do?"
"Yeah. Not my hands, but pretty close." Seed beckons Jowy closer, and Jowy is tempted to ask him which one of them is the patient, but it's not as though his hand keeps him from walking. "Check this out," he says, and lines his wrists up next to each other. One of them looks normal, but the other-Jowy winces. The bone juts out to the side like someone shoved it out of place and never bothered to put it back.
"His Highness wanted to test out his new plate." Seed's smile stretches into a grimace. "Told me to put a dent in it or break myself against it trying, and you can guess how that turned out. He wouldn't let me stop until I couldn't hold the sword anymore, and even after all that I barely scratched the enamel."
Jowy remembers trying to lock blades with Luca, how he thought every bone in his body would snap from the force bearing down on him and Riou. How could an ordinary sword hope to cut that? Even the fire that destroyed the rest of the fort rolled off Luca's back, and his eyes burned brighter than the flames.
"And you know, I don't think he ended up liking that armor much, anyway," Seed continues. He looks at Jowy with what could be mistaken for nonchalance, but his eyes are too sharp for it to really be that.
"I thought you said he didn't like anything," Jowy says. It feels like the safest response.
"No, I said he didn't like anyone. There's plenty of things he likes, and things he likes doing." Seed's teeth aren't as sharp as Luca's but they're whiter, stark against the red of his hair and uniform. "You know, you're just about the right age-nah, relax, I'm kidding," he says when Jowy jerks back and nearly falls off the edge of the bed. "He doesn't do that. He doesn't do that with anyone at all, as far as we know. Practically lives like a monk-well, sort of." His laugh's fuller this time, but it's nothing compared to Luca's. "It might be the only thing you're safe from with him, but hey, it's something."
"It's something, all right," a dry voice says from somewhere behind Jowy, and a man strides into view, tall and solid and pale. He led a unit of mounted archers during the assault on the mercenary fort, Jowy remembers, and Solon Jhee called him Culgan. General Culgan looks down at both of them, his eyebrows raised. "Did he tell you about the scar?"
"Yes," Jowy says, and Seed scoffs.
"He got it from a griffin."
Seed spreads his hands wide. "How the fuck would I get a scar from a griffin?"
"You were sixteen, and you tried to steal its egg." Is Culgan smirking? It's hard to tell, but Jowy suspects he is. "It's not that unexpected, when you think about it."
Seed rolls his eyes.
"Don't mind him, Jowy. He tells that story to all the soldiers entering His Highness's personal service."
"I hadn't even gotten to the one about the tent peg yet," Seed says, and sighs dramatically. "You ruin all my fun."
It's an invitation to ask, but Jowy knows better than to accept it. "Then none of it was true?"
"Some of it was. He's not going to rape you, if that's what you're worried about."
Jowy nods once, short and sharp. "How did you really dislocate your wrist?"
"Bashing my sword against His Highness's armor, like I said."
Culgan looks away, stays silent.
"Well, all right, fine, technically I fell on it when I tried to charge him down and he swatted me out of the way. Damn stupid way to break a fall. I probably should've landed on my ass instead." This time, Seed's smile doesn't stretch far enough. "But hell, I can still hold a sword, and you'll be able to too, and that's what matters, right?"
"I don't use a sword," Jowy says, and out of the corner of his eye, watches the glances Seed and Culgan exchange.
"You don't," Culgan asks, "or you can't?"
"Don't." It sounds stupid the moment he says it; what's the difference between a sword and a staff and a knife, at heart? They're different weapons, but they're weapons all the same, and if a sword is what he needs he'd be a fool to turn it down.
"Once your hand heals, we'll see what you can do." Another signal passes between Seed and Culgan, and Seed wrings a crack out of his neck, pushes himself off the bed.
"Good luck, kid," Seed says, and claps his hand on Jowy's shoulder, leans in and lowers his voice. "And be careful. Even the shit I made up isn't as bad as half the stuff you're gonna hear. And most of that's true."
***
General Kiba rides up to the gates of Muse to greet Luca and his escort, most of whom he seems to know. He frowns when he sees Jowy, though, and asks, "Who's this, your Highness?"
"My new adjutant," Luca says, which at least gives Jowy a title. He decides not to ask anyone how many adjutants Luca's gone through. "Where are they keeping the pigs?"
"Your Highness?"
"Don't play stupid, you can smell them as well as I can." Luca winds his horse's reins tighter around his hands, and ignores his whinny of protest. "Stinking swine, every last one of them. Whatever idiot I left in charge must be letting them walk around free."
"Their soldiers are confined, your Highness, and the city is secured and occupied. All citizens of Muse are under curfew, and-"
"It's a waste of our men," Luca mutters, his lip curling. "Occupations always are."
General Kiba reddens behind his mustache. "Your Highness, surely you're not suggesting we withdraw?"
"No," Luca says, and looks up at the city gates. His eyes gleam. Jowy doesn't want to know why, but the spark in them brightens and dances and Jowy stares, wonders what it signifies. "Not yet."
Jowy's right hand throbs.
"Open the gates!" Luca hollers, and the guards in front almost trip over themselves in their scramble to obey. He waves the rest of his party ahead, but when Jowy kicks his horse forward, Luca grabs the reins away from him.
"I have a job for you," Luca says, and Jowy's skin prickles.
"What is it, your Highness?" he asks, and fights to keep his breathing even, his hands steady. For gods' sakes, Luca hasn't even told him what he wants him to do yet. There has to be some way to keep his guard up without twitching like a rabbit every time Luca addresses him. And Luca's going to be addressing him often, if his new title's any indication.
"You're counting pigs," he says. "We sectioned Muse up. Go to the captains in charge of each section and get their daily headcounts for their areas. Make sure the numbers haven't fallen or risen-I don't want anyone being smuggled in or out of this city. Then find out how many Muse soldiers we've rounded up, and if that number's changed, my captains better have a damned good reason why."
It could be worse. Jowy breathes more freely. "Yes, your Highness."
"One more thing," Luca says before Jowy rides ahead, and Jowy curses himself for jinxing that.
***
The Highland soldiers rap smartly on each door on the block, first with their fists, then with the butts of their spears if there's no answer, and finally with their hatchets if nobody comes to the door after that. They've only used their hatchets once. Most people open their doors before the soldiers finish knocking and file quietly into the street. Older children clutch the younger ones by the hand and lead them along, and younger men and women offer their arms and shoulders for the elderly to lean on.
There's no reason Jowy has to be here. He's only collecting the final count. That's all. That's all he has to do. He turns around to face the other end of the street; there's a small garden at the end of it that the soldiers haven't trampled, and a tree blossoms in the middle. It's pretty, for a tree. He can't say he usually gives much thought to trees, but maybe he should start to.
One last door slams, and the shuffling sounds behind him taper off.
The tree doesn't look like any of the ones that grow in Kyaro. Most of the other plants around here haven't looked much different than the ones in Kyaro, though. Maybe this tree was a gift from another city, an offering of friendship. Its budding leaves-
"Twenty on this block, sir."
"Thirty-two on this block, sir."
Its leaves aren't that interesting, truth be told. He digs his thumbnail into his palm. A bird lands on one of the branches near the top and starts to chirp, and Jowy strains to listen to it, block all the other sounds out. Its call is high and trilling, almost like a reed pipe, sliding from high to low to high again. He wonders if it's showing off, or if it's trying to attract a mate, or both.
"Twenty-six on this block, sir."
"That's seven missing since last count. You say you checked every house?"
"Yes, sir."
"Any houses where everyone was missing?"
"No, sir."
The bird's warbles trail off. No, Jowy thinks, keep chirping. But the bird tucks its head under its wing and grooms itself, oblivious to everything else. Jowy sighs, presses his thumbnail in even deeper. Isn't the bird traveling with a flock? Where's the rest of it?
"Search all the houses on that stretch," the man who must be the captain says. "Don't let anyone go back inside until you've finished."
"Understood, sir," the soldier says, and Jowy stares at the sky, tries to pick out patterns in the clouds, but they're not much more than threads of white today.
"Sir?" the captain says, his voice closer, and it takes Jowy a moment to realize the captain's referring to him. He turns around, keeps his focus squarely on the captain's face and his thick moustache and ruddy cheeks.
"Yes?" Jowy says.
"My apologies, sir, but we won't have the final count ready for you for another hour, at least." He cringes before he's finished speaking, and turns his face to the side as though he's bracing himself for a slap.
"It's fine," Jowy says, "I'll come back later," and turns around before the captain finishes saluting.
He walks towards the tree. A voice in the back of his head screams Coward. He doesn't answer it.
***
Straw pallets are scattered across the floors of the clinic to create more beds. There still aren't enough: some of the pallets hold two people, curled in tightly on themselves to leave space for a possible third. Jowy steps around the pallets as best he can, but that means he has to watch where he puts his feet, and when he does that he can't avoid looking at the blood staining the straw, the bile caked on the floor.
"What are you doing here?"
A man straightens, rises from the side of a soldier with more bandages showing than skin. He peers at Jowy over the rim of his spectacles, and his lips thin.
"You'll address His Highness's adjutant with respect," one of the Highland soldiers growls, but Jowy holds up his hand before the soldier finishes drawing his sword. There's enough blood here. More would almost be superfluous, wouldn't it?
"Are you the healer in charge of this clinic?" he asks.
The man jerks his chin up, says nothing. It seems that's as much answer as he'll give, but it's answer enough. The bandaged soldier groans, louder than the wounded around him, and the healer kneels to wring out a cloth and press it to his forehead, but his eyes stay sharp on Jowy's.
"I have orders from His Highness," Jowy says. He'd breathe in to settle the pounding in his ears, the churning in his stomach, but who knows what this air's infected with? Some of the Highland soldiers escorting him clap cloths over their mouths to stifle their coughs, but Jowy didn't bring a cloth with him. All he has are his orders, stamped and sealed, and when he squares his shoulders the paper crinkles inside his jacket.
The healer sucks his breath through his teeth, and Jowy thinks he'd spit on the floor if he weren't trying to keep it from getting any dirtier. "What orders?"
"What orders, sir," the Highland soldier who spoke before corrects, and again Jowy holds up his hand. At least they'll obey that much from him. His Rune throbs under his glove, pulses in time with the shallow breaths and ragged moans around him. He closes his eyes-no. No, he can't do that.
He snatches the paper from his jacket, tightens his jaw. "These orders."
The healer steps forward to receive them, thank the gods; he probably doesn't want Jowy and the soldiers advancing any further into this clinic. How much more of the clinic is there? He hasn't seen any proper beds yet, and they must have some in the back-
Jowy's pulse drums in his temples, hard enough that red seeps into his vision. He's not here to find that out. He's here to deliver the orders. That's all. That's all.
"Are you going to give them to me or not?" the healer snaps, and Jowy uncurls his fingers from the paper, one by one. His fingers ache, but it's a different feel than the kind his Rune gives him, cramped and stiff.
Before the healer breaks the seal, Jowy turns around and motions for the soldiers to follow him. There's a small window set in the door; he looks through that at the sky beyond until they're out in the open air again.
"Wait," the healer calls, his voice carried on the breeze the closing door shoves out, but the door clatters shut before Jowy has to hear the rest. He still can't close his eyes, but when he opens his mouth to tell the soldiers to return to their previous stations, his voice stutters and stalls in his throat. He waves them ahead the way he's seen Luca do more than once by now, and apparently they remember what it means, too.
Now Jowy closes his eyes, and the orders inscribe themselves on the backs of his eyelids, each letter burning red.
Draw up two lists: the patients well enough to recover on their own, and the patients who need further care. Deliver those lists to the captain of this section before dawn tomorrow. If you fail to do so, everyone in your care and everyone employed by your clinic will be put to the sword.
I won't waste magic and medicine on this trash, Luca said. If they're too weak to live, then why should they? Better to kill them fast and save ourselves the trouble.
Jowy ducks into the first alleyway he sees so he won't double over in the middle of the street.
***
"Lower," Culgan says, and Jowy strains to comply, bring the hilt of his sword to his temple instead of holding it overhead. It's heavier than he remembered, like a staff with a lead core but not as evenly weighted.
"The point's too high."
Jowy grits his teeth, lifts his back shoulder, and the line of his blade dips and straightens. It straightens too much, and at least he twists the short edge back towards himself when Culgan calls him on it.
"Thumb under the blade."
Damn. He swears he used to know all this. Versions of it, at least. The stances Culgan's having him run through aren't quite the same as the ones Genkaku taught, or even the same as the ones he drilled in the Unicorn Brigade. Culgan circles him, and Jowy keeps his knees bent and trunk straight no matter how hard he needs to breathe.
"Not bad," Culgan says at last. "Your hand's too close to the guard, but not bad."
It's always something, isn't it?
Culgan taps his shoulder, motions for him to lower his blade, and Jowy tries not to sigh with relief. "Your hands are spaced like this on a staff." He demonstrates, holds his hands about an arm's length apart. "On a sword, it's like this." He moves his hands closer, barely as wide as his face. "You have less of a base of support, and you're holding the end instead of the center. It's harder to control the whole blade."
"That's what I was taught," Jowy says, but this is a more forceful reminder than most he's had.
Culgan nods once and gestures up, and Jowy shifts into plow stance, his hilt by his hipbone and his blade angled towards an imaginary opponent's throat. It's the most familiar to him after wielding a staff for so long. He tests out a few quick slices and upward thrusts: a swipe at where his opponent's knees would be, a fast jab at the throat.
"You're ready, then?" Culgan asks, and even if the answer is no it's better to match himself against someone real.
He nods. Culgan draws his sword wordlessly-and whips towards Jowy with a two-handed cut, one he barely dodges in time. "It's not live steel," Culgan says, but that's all the pause Jowy gets before Culgan bears down on him again. He brings his sword up to parry but Culgan knocks his blade aside and raps Jowy on the shoulder. Blunted edge or not, that smarts. Jowy arcs his blade down to cut behind Culgan's knees, but as he lifts his arm Culgan chops him under it and the shock rings down, forces Jowy's fingers open. His grip on the hilt slips; he fumbles and steadies himself in time to flip his blade up and turn Culgan's thrust. There's an opening now and Jowy takes it, follows through and extends that strike to smack Culgan's ribs. The impact shudders down his arm again-there was never this much recoil with his staff, even when he struck bone.
No time to think about that. Culgan lunges and slashes down Jowy's chest, etching a line of fire down his ribs and stomach, and if that blade were sharp Jowy's guts would have spilled across the ground. As it is he has to clutch his stomach, will that throbbing burn to fade.
"Keep both hands on your sword," Culgan chides him, and proves his point when he reverses his grip and brings his hilt down on Jowy's wrist. The bones in his hand flare up with fresh pain and echoes of an older one, his fingers snapping in Luca Blight's grasp, and Jowy hisses and cradles his palm to his chest, drops the sword. It thumps to the dirt and the point of Culgan's blade hovers at Jowy's throat, steady and shining.
So soon. Damn. His jaw tightens.
"That was better than I expected." Culgan sheathes his sword, motions to Jowy to pick his own up. That'll have to wait a few moments, until pain isn't jangling so harshly through his wrist.
"You know how to do this," Culgan says. "You need to break your staff habits, that's all."
"Like fighting defensively."
That voice is unmistakably Luca's. Jowy whips around. Luca's sliding his gauntlets into place; they look lighter than the ones he usually wears. He's armored more lightly, too, in leather instead of plate, but it makes a certain amount of sense. Jowy can't imagine sparring in full plate, though if anyone could do it, Luca could.
"A sword's no good for blocking," Luca continues, striding closer. "All you'll do is ruin the blade." He draws his own, and from the way it rings from its sheath Jowy knows it's live steel. "Swords strike. Swords kill. You learn forms because you can kill your enemies faster from them."
In a flash, Luca raises his sword over his head and sweeps it down towards Jowy's neck and Jowy hits the ground, ignores the latest ache in his hand and snatches his own sword up and brings it up to guard-
"Wrong," Luca barks, and the edge of his sword rests against Jowy's throat, right where his sweat is beading the most. His pulse pounds against the blade's edge, hard and uneven. Is this still a lesson? He'd ask Culgan, but Culgan's clearing his throat, glancing aside. Luca smirks. Better that than laughing. Maybe.
"Don't try to stop my sword," Luca says, and bares his neck, his teeth. "Go for my throat."
Jowy swallows, his skin straining against the blade. "What if you hit me first, your Highness?"
"Heh. Then who cares?" Luca withdraws his sword, finally, and Jowy tries not to make his desperate gulp for air too obvious. "You'd never have been able to beat me. But it's better to die fighting."
His cheekbone stings where Anabelle scored him across it with the shards of that bottle. She would have sliced his throat open with it if he hadn't rammed the knife into her side-
Jowy closes his eyes.
"Get over here, Culgan," Luca shouts over his shoulder. "I'm tired of cutting down worms. Give me a real fight."
***
on to part two
.
I am not used to this telling-a-character's-story thing, y'all. Or to writing monsters. I blame Mith. Slightly-unfamiliar ground aside, I'm proud of this one.
Title: Grasping at Shadows [1/5] (AO3)
Author:
puella_nerdii
Fandom: Suikoden II
Characters: Jowy Atreides; Luca Blight, Seed, Culgan, Rowd, Kiba Windamier, eventually the entire Highland cast, and Riou in absentia.
Rating: R (...is "Warning: Luca Blight" sufficient? If not, violence-bordering-on-graphic, war crimes, and shit-gets-real thematic content should cover it.)
Words: ~10.4k in this chapter (I know, I know)
Notes: This fic is unofficially subtitled Jowy Atreides's Terrible Life Choices, by the way. The entire thing, particularly every instance of the word "Silverberg" in it, is Mithrigil's fault, and she knows why.
Summary: "I'll stop this war my own way. No, I'll never let a war like this break out on this soil again. And as you say, I'm prepared to be dishonored, if need be. Nevertheless..." - Suikogaiden 1, Chapter 2
Jowy Atreides wants to slay a monster and bring down a nation. But he has to strike in the right place at the right time, and strike deep while hiding his intent, and the monster is watching -- and laughing.
Chapter One: Assassinating Anabelle may have secured Jowy a place in Highland's ranks, but it hasn't earned him anyone's trust -- least of all Luca Blight's.
Anabelle's blood won't come off his knife.
Jowy wipes it down with a cloth, oils it, even scours it with a handful of sand, but a red sheen still stains the blade, and he can't scrape off the flecks of blood near the hilt. He sheathes the knife, finally, and sets it aside, close enough to his bedroll that he could reach it if he has to. He might have to, from the baleful looks some of the Highland soldiers shot him earlier. Whoever's in charge clearly hasn't put out the reason for his return. They'll probably be slow to trust him even after that, but he'll win them over, somehow. He has to, doesn't he?
He squeezes his eyes shut, but only feels more awake for it. Shifting position on his bedroll doesn't help, either. Resting on his side cramps his shoulder, resting on his stomach twists his neck, and resting on his back makes his heart race hard enough to beat in his throat. Occasionally laughs roar from the rest of the camp, or hammers clang, or fires crackle, and none of those exactly lull him to sleep either.
Is Riou sleeping? Jowy doubts it. He's always been a light sleeper-not as light as Nanami, who used to bolt awake if a cricket scampered across the floor, but light enough. And after what happened in Muse, well.
Someone outside his tent starts to sing. Jowy pushes his pillow around his ears, breathes. Even his breath is loud, rattling in his chest. He glances at the knife again, and for a moment it almost sounds like the blade's humming along to the tune, low and shivering. Stop that, he tells himself. He's too old for that sort of thing. He sits up, draws the knife from its sheath, stares at it in the firelight soaking through the tent's walls. It's only a knife. It's not the cleanest knife, but it's only a knife.
It shouldn't matter whether or not it's clean. He'll get a new one if it rusts or tarnishes. Unless Luca expects to see him wearing it, but it wasn't as though the blade was a gift, was it? Just a loan. His fingers lock around the hilt, throttle it until the blade quivers. Oh, he'll return it, all right. He'll return it with interest.
But not yet.
There's a guard posted outside Jowy's tent-his shadow stretches across the canvas-but otherwise it's Jowy's alone, and the guard's more of a formality than anything else. The guard knows it, too; his shadow shows him seated on the ground, his polearm planted next to him. Jowy might be able to catch him by surprise, overpower him without even calling on his Rune, reach the trees before the guard could cry out to the rest of the camp. But he won't, and they all know it, and so they've left him alone because even if he isn't a Jowston spy he's not a Highland soldier again either.
Damn it, what more does he have to do?
He snorts. Stupid question.
***
Rowd escorts Jowy to Luca Blight's tent the next morning, and Jowy forces himself not to spit in the man's face.
"Don't get cocky, you little punk," Rowd hisses in Jowy's ear, his fingers tightening on the back of Jowy's neck. His breath is as foul as the rest of him, still reeking from last night's celebrations. "And keep your smart mouth shut around His Highness, do you hear? You're lucky he hasn't cut your traitorous throat yet."
You're still sore that a pair of boys got the better of you, aren't you? His Highness must be pleased to have such a brilliant military mind under his command, Jowy doesn't retort. That's exactly the sort of thing Rowd wants to hear from him, and Jowy doesn't have to be stupid just because Rowd is.
That stupid man slaughtered a hundred of his comrades. A hundred children. Jowy's fists tighten at his sides, shaking; slowly, he flattens them out again. Rowd, fortunately, doesn't seem to be watching his hands, but other people will be. "Once a traitor, always a traitor," he goes on, and Jowy stares straight ahead at the line of trees, keeps his spine as straight as their trunks. "And after all this country did for you."
It honestly hasn't occurred to this man that his own actions forced Jowy to flee to the City-State, has it? Of course not. By now, Rowd's probably convinced himself that Jowy and Riou were Jowston spies from the beginning, and that he's to be commended for ferreting them out. Bile rises in the back of his throat-but what Rowd believes must be what nearly everyone else does, too, and it's useful to remind himself of that. He swallows, turns his focus ahead again and tunes Rowd out as best he can.
The walk to Luca Blight's tent isn't long. He doesn't know whether to be thankful for that or not. "Here to see His Highness," Rowd says to the guard, who snaps his head up and shows them in.
Rowd bows immediately, and Jowy doesn't have to be told to do the same. It's not enough for Rowd, though, and he braces his palm between Jowy's shoulderblades, shoves him down further.
Somewhere above him Luca laughs, full and free, and Jowy decides not to raise his head just yet.
"Well, boy?" he says. "No curses for me this time? No snarls? No protests?"
Relax your hands, Jowy reminds himself when his fingers start to twitch. "No, your Highness."
Luca chuckles, and the sound scrapes up Jowy's spine. "Heh. So you think you've learned your place?"
You think. The words set Jowy's hackles on end, and he breathes before he bristles where Luca can see. Unless he's seen already-no, Jowy doesn't have time to second-guess every answer he gives. That'll raise Luca's suspicion faster than anything else, he doesn't doubt. "Not yet, your Highness," he says, but keeps his head down.
The air thickens, and Rowd's knuckles dig into Jowy's back. "Not yet?" Luca says-says, not shouts. The knot at the base of Jowy's spine uncurls itself a hair.
"I haven't received my next assignment," he says, and braces himself for what's to come.
Fortunately it's a laugh and not a blow or worse, though Jowy still struggles not to flinch. Luca's still laughing; Jowy sneaks a glance up and watches him clutch the back of his chair, slam it down the way some men slam down pints of beer after a good joke. "You've got balls," he says. "More than most of this gutless rabble. Come here."
Jowy does before Rowd pushes him forward. He stands as straight as he dares, wills his knees not to tremble.
"Show me your hand," Luca says. Jowy doesn't need to ask which one. He raises his right hand as though he's swearing an oath, and Luca grabs him by the wrist and yanks him closer. Jowy stumbles, bites his cheek before he curses. Luca snorts, rotates Jowy's hand palm-up and palm-down again until he finds what he's looking for or he gets bored, Jowy can't tell which.
"Heh," he says at last. Jowy tries not to look at his teeth. "I haven't seen this since I was a kid. How did a boy like you get his hands on it?"
Jowy's throat closes; his breath shudders to a halt. The strange blue light in that cave, and the shadows that had no right to be on Pilika's face but lined it anyway, and Riou smiling at him from a field of blinding white-
Luca continues on, and if he's noticed Jowy's silence he doesn't comment on it. Maybe he likes to hear himself talk. Jowy's dealt with enough of those sorts of men at his father's house, but polite smiles and attentive noises won't appease Luca. "Do you think you can kill me with this?" he asks, and tightens his grip on Jowy's wrist until the grooves in his gauntlet snag on Jowy's skin.
Jowy sucks in a breath through his teeth and says nothing.
Apparently the question wasn't rhetorical, because Luca wrenches Jowy's hand up, high enough that his shoulder cracks in protest. "You couldn't even kill a pack of common soldiers with this. How the hell could you kill me?"
The back of Jowy's neck heats and some of that heat creeps into his cheeks, but he can't look down. He can't. There's no surer admission of guilt. "I couldn't," he says, and the words sting his tongue.
"Damned right." Luca huffs out something that's almost a laugh, and Jowy hears his fingerbone snap a second before he feels it.
Pain explodes behind his eyes, sears his arm to the bone, jangling and harsh and hard enough to drive him to his knees except Luca's holding him up like a rag and if he kneels he'll rip his arm out of its socket, too. Gods. His throat burns from the scream trapped inside it, and when Luca bends that finger back further he shouts loud enough to shake from it.
"You couldn't, and you can't, and you won't," Luca goes on, his smile glimmering in the thick red haze creeping over Jowy's sight. "So don't try."
Whatever answer Jowy has to that scrapes and sticks somewhere in his throat-and then Luca snaps another finger and the tent wavers and Jowy doesn't realize he's started screaming again until he runs out of breath.
Luca's laughing. Of course he's laughing. Hate curls through Jowy's veins, red and insistent as the pain. He gives Jowy's arm a shake and Jowy's head lolls to the side and he wonders, dizzied, how any man-even this man-can call on so much strength. It shouldn't be human. The world blackens around the edges of his vision.
"Go ahead, call on your Rune!" Luca's shoulders shake too, but not from pain. "Ask it to kill me where I stand!"
"Can't-" Jowy chokes.
Crack. Oh gods. He'd faint now if every nerve in his body weren't burning, jangling. Well, he can't hold a knife now. Or a sword. Or a sword Rune. That isn't funny and he's not going to laugh, the Mad Prince can't have already destroyed his wits that much.
"What is it, boy? What can't you do?"
He searches for the pulse of his Rune beneath the throbbing in his hand, but there's nothing, not even the tiniest hum of power.
"Can't-" He forces the words past his teeth. "I can't kill you-"
"And now you won't forget that," Luca says, and wrenches back the last unbroken finger on Jowy's hand.
I can't throw up in front of the Prince of Highland, Jowy thinks, and prays his stomach listens after the wave of nausea hits. He squeezes his eyes shut; they're damp at the corners, and how could they not be?
It takes Jowy a moment to realize Luca's let go of his hand. Once he does, his arm sags at his side, useless. "Get one of the healers to fix that," Luca says, and strides to the tent flap. "Report to me when you're done. We're setting up headquarters in Muse, and you're riding with my company." He looks over his shoulder, his smile steadier than anything else in Jowy's line of sight. "Tell me how you killed that cunt on the way there. I hope she squealed when you stuck her."
He leaves, and Jowy collapses to his knees, knows better than to try and break his fall. He expects Rowd to haul him to his feet again, but Rowd is as silent as he's been since the beginning, and doesn't pull Jowy upright until Jowy asks.
***
The healer calls on his Water Rune, the pain ebbs away, and Jowy thinks he's going to faint from its absence. To be safe, the healer puts Jowy's hand in a splint while his bones reset themselves, but at least it'll take hours instead of weeks for them to do that. He doesn't dare flex his fingers yet, though, no matter how much the magic itches under his skin.
The tent flap flies open as the healer finishes bandaging the splints into place, and a man with wild red hair saunters in, flashes Jowy a grin. "Well look who's here," he says. "The kid who killed Mayor Anabelle."
"And my patient," the healer says, with the kind of irritable edge in his voice that all healers seem to develop sooner or later. "So if you'll excuse me, General Seed-"
General Seed waves his hand in the air. "Done. You're excused. I just want a few words with him, all right?"
The healer purses his mouth. "As you wish," he says, and sweeps out after admonishing Jowy to use his hand as little as possible.
"Healers." Seed shakes his head. "They're useful, don't get me wrong, but they're giant pains in the ass."
Jowy inclines his head, but remains silent.
"Looks like His Highness took a shine to you."
This time, Jowy can't keep himself from snorting.
"I'm serious," Seed says, though his grin is anything but. "If he didn't like you, he'd just have killed you straight off. Wouldn't bother with that first." He indicates Jowy's hand, and Jowy fights to keep it from twitching in response. "Maybe likes is going a little too far, I don't think he actually likes anybody-except Her Highness sometimes, but that's a sometimes, I'm pretty sure."
Jowy remembers the kind of face his father used to adopt at court and before petitioners: neither smiling nor frowning, his gaze level and straight, no new wrinkles creasing his face. He slips that expression on now; the more practice he can get in before he has to face Luca Blight again, the better. "I hope I don't give His Highness cause to dislike me further, then."
"Heh. Well, you never know." Seed thumps him on the back, and if it was meant to be reassuring, Jowy will eat his boots. "Sometimes you don't even need to give His Highness cause at all," he adds, dropping his voice, and pushes his hair from his neck. "See this scar?"
"Yes."
"It's from when he nearly scalped me," Seed says. "Grabbed me by the hair and hacked it off at the root. I thought he was going to shave my head with his sword-and shave clean through my skull while he was at it. He said my hair already looked like blood, so who could tell the difference?"
Jowy's hand stiffens, runs colder than the Water Rune alone could have made it. The chill creeps up the rest of his arm, sinks deeper under his skin, and he digs his heels into the ground to keep from flinching. Seed expects him to flinch, so he can't. "Why?" he asks, and hates how audible the dryness in his throat is.
Seed shrugs and plants himself on the edge of one of the beds, stretches his limbs until they crack. "Who knows? I think something must've pissed him off before I got there, and then I was there, and well. He had to take it out on someone."
He didn't have to do anything, Jowy nearly retorts, but pain lances through his hand again, stabs at all the places that haven't mended yet, and he's too busy trying not to yelp to say anything. He looks down at his hand. It's curled into a fist, and he closes his eyes, commands each finger to uncurl. The Rune throbs under his skin, tries to shove its energy out of his fingertips, but he resists that too.
"Careful with your hand there," Seed says. He must have noticed. "You don't want it to heal out of alignment. Believe me, I know."
He spares a glance at Seed's hands. Seed's gloves might be concealing scars or discolorations, but nothing about the shape of his hands strikes Jowy as odd. "You do?"
"Yeah. Not my hands, but pretty close." Seed beckons Jowy closer, and Jowy is tempted to ask him which one of them is the patient, but it's not as though his hand keeps him from walking. "Check this out," he says, and lines his wrists up next to each other. One of them looks normal, but the other-Jowy winces. The bone juts out to the side like someone shoved it out of place and never bothered to put it back.
"His Highness wanted to test out his new plate." Seed's smile stretches into a grimace. "Told me to put a dent in it or break myself against it trying, and you can guess how that turned out. He wouldn't let me stop until I couldn't hold the sword anymore, and even after all that I barely scratched the enamel."
Jowy remembers trying to lock blades with Luca, how he thought every bone in his body would snap from the force bearing down on him and Riou. How could an ordinary sword hope to cut that? Even the fire that destroyed the rest of the fort rolled off Luca's back, and his eyes burned brighter than the flames.
"And you know, I don't think he ended up liking that armor much, anyway," Seed continues. He looks at Jowy with what could be mistaken for nonchalance, but his eyes are too sharp for it to really be that.
"I thought you said he didn't like anything," Jowy says. It feels like the safest response.
"No, I said he didn't like anyone. There's plenty of things he likes, and things he likes doing." Seed's teeth aren't as sharp as Luca's but they're whiter, stark against the red of his hair and uniform. "You know, you're just about the right age-nah, relax, I'm kidding," he says when Jowy jerks back and nearly falls off the edge of the bed. "He doesn't do that. He doesn't do that with anyone at all, as far as we know. Practically lives like a monk-well, sort of." His laugh's fuller this time, but it's nothing compared to Luca's. "It might be the only thing you're safe from with him, but hey, it's something."
"It's something, all right," a dry voice says from somewhere behind Jowy, and a man strides into view, tall and solid and pale. He led a unit of mounted archers during the assault on the mercenary fort, Jowy remembers, and Solon Jhee called him Culgan. General Culgan looks down at both of them, his eyebrows raised. "Did he tell you about the scar?"
"Yes," Jowy says, and Seed scoffs.
"He got it from a griffin."
Seed spreads his hands wide. "How the fuck would I get a scar from a griffin?"
"You were sixteen, and you tried to steal its egg." Is Culgan smirking? It's hard to tell, but Jowy suspects he is. "It's not that unexpected, when you think about it."
Seed rolls his eyes.
"Don't mind him, Jowy. He tells that story to all the soldiers entering His Highness's personal service."
"I hadn't even gotten to the one about the tent peg yet," Seed says, and sighs dramatically. "You ruin all my fun."
It's an invitation to ask, but Jowy knows better than to accept it. "Then none of it was true?"
"Some of it was. He's not going to rape you, if that's what you're worried about."
Jowy nods once, short and sharp. "How did you really dislocate your wrist?"
"Bashing my sword against His Highness's armor, like I said."
Culgan looks away, stays silent.
"Well, all right, fine, technically I fell on it when I tried to charge him down and he swatted me out of the way. Damn stupid way to break a fall. I probably should've landed on my ass instead." This time, Seed's smile doesn't stretch far enough. "But hell, I can still hold a sword, and you'll be able to too, and that's what matters, right?"
"I don't use a sword," Jowy says, and out of the corner of his eye, watches the glances Seed and Culgan exchange.
"You don't," Culgan asks, "or you can't?"
"Don't." It sounds stupid the moment he says it; what's the difference between a sword and a staff and a knife, at heart? They're different weapons, but they're weapons all the same, and if a sword is what he needs he'd be a fool to turn it down.
"Once your hand heals, we'll see what you can do." Another signal passes between Seed and Culgan, and Seed wrings a crack out of his neck, pushes himself off the bed.
"Good luck, kid," Seed says, and claps his hand on Jowy's shoulder, leans in and lowers his voice. "And be careful. Even the shit I made up isn't as bad as half the stuff you're gonna hear. And most of that's true."
***
General Kiba rides up to the gates of Muse to greet Luca and his escort, most of whom he seems to know. He frowns when he sees Jowy, though, and asks, "Who's this, your Highness?"
"My new adjutant," Luca says, which at least gives Jowy a title. He decides not to ask anyone how many adjutants Luca's gone through. "Where are they keeping the pigs?"
"Your Highness?"
"Don't play stupid, you can smell them as well as I can." Luca winds his horse's reins tighter around his hands, and ignores his whinny of protest. "Stinking swine, every last one of them. Whatever idiot I left in charge must be letting them walk around free."
"Their soldiers are confined, your Highness, and the city is secured and occupied. All citizens of Muse are under curfew, and-"
"It's a waste of our men," Luca mutters, his lip curling. "Occupations always are."
General Kiba reddens behind his mustache. "Your Highness, surely you're not suggesting we withdraw?"
"No," Luca says, and looks up at the city gates. His eyes gleam. Jowy doesn't want to know why, but the spark in them brightens and dances and Jowy stares, wonders what it signifies. "Not yet."
Jowy's right hand throbs.
"Open the gates!" Luca hollers, and the guards in front almost trip over themselves in their scramble to obey. He waves the rest of his party ahead, but when Jowy kicks his horse forward, Luca grabs the reins away from him.
"I have a job for you," Luca says, and Jowy's skin prickles.
"What is it, your Highness?" he asks, and fights to keep his breathing even, his hands steady. For gods' sakes, Luca hasn't even told him what he wants him to do yet. There has to be some way to keep his guard up without twitching like a rabbit every time Luca addresses him. And Luca's going to be addressing him often, if his new title's any indication.
"You're counting pigs," he says. "We sectioned Muse up. Go to the captains in charge of each section and get their daily headcounts for their areas. Make sure the numbers haven't fallen or risen-I don't want anyone being smuggled in or out of this city. Then find out how many Muse soldiers we've rounded up, and if that number's changed, my captains better have a damned good reason why."
It could be worse. Jowy breathes more freely. "Yes, your Highness."
"One more thing," Luca says before Jowy rides ahead, and Jowy curses himself for jinxing that.
***
The Highland soldiers rap smartly on each door on the block, first with their fists, then with the butts of their spears if there's no answer, and finally with their hatchets if nobody comes to the door after that. They've only used their hatchets once. Most people open their doors before the soldiers finish knocking and file quietly into the street. Older children clutch the younger ones by the hand and lead them along, and younger men and women offer their arms and shoulders for the elderly to lean on.
There's no reason Jowy has to be here. He's only collecting the final count. That's all. That's all he has to do. He turns around to face the other end of the street; there's a small garden at the end of it that the soldiers haven't trampled, and a tree blossoms in the middle. It's pretty, for a tree. He can't say he usually gives much thought to trees, but maybe he should start to.
One last door slams, and the shuffling sounds behind him taper off.
The tree doesn't look like any of the ones that grow in Kyaro. Most of the other plants around here haven't looked much different than the ones in Kyaro, though. Maybe this tree was a gift from another city, an offering of friendship. Its budding leaves-
"Twenty on this block, sir."
"Thirty-two on this block, sir."
Its leaves aren't that interesting, truth be told. He digs his thumbnail into his palm. A bird lands on one of the branches near the top and starts to chirp, and Jowy strains to listen to it, block all the other sounds out. Its call is high and trilling, almost like a reed pipe, sliding from high to low to high again. He wonders if it's showing off, or if it's trying to attract a mate, or both.
"Twenty-six on this block, sir."
"That's seven missing since last count. You say you checked every house?"
"Yes, sir."
"Any houses where everyone was missing?"
"No, sir."
The bird's warbles trail off. No, Jowy thinks, keep chirping. But the bird tucks its head under its wing and grooms itself, oblivious to everything else. Jowy sighs, presses his thumbnail in even deeper. Isn't the bird traveling with a flock? Where's the rest of it?
"Search all the houses on that stretch," the man who must be the captain says. "Don't let anyone go back inside until you've finished."
"Understood, sir," the soldier says, and Jowy stares at the sky, tries to pick out patterns in the clouds, but they're not much more than threads of white today.
"Sir?" the captain says, his voice closer, and it takes Jowy a moment to realize the captain's referring to him. He turns around, keeps his focus squarely on the captain's face and his thick moustache and ruddy cheeks.
"Yes?" Jowy says.
"My apologies, sir, but we won't have the final count ready for you for another hour, at least." He cringes before he's finished speaking, and turns his face to the side as though he's bracing himself for a slap.
"It's fine," Jowy says, "I'll come back later," and turns around before the captain finishes saluting.
He walks towards the tree. A voice in the back of his head screams Coward. He doesn't answer it.
***
Straw pallets are scattered across the floors of the clinic to create more beds. There still aren't enough: some of the pallets hold two people, curled in tightly on themselves to leave space for a possible third. Jowy steps around the pallets as best he can, but that means he has to watch where he puts his feet, and when he does that he can't avoid looking at the blood staining the straw, the bile caked on the floor.
"What are you doing here?"
A man straightens, rises from the side of a soldier with more bandages showing than skin. He peers at Jowy over the rim of his spectacles, and his lips thin.
"You'll address His Highness's adjutant with respect," one of the Highland soldiers growls, but Jowy holds up his hand before the soldier finishes drawing his sword. There's enough blood here. More would almost be superfluous, wouldn't it?
"Are you the healer in charge of this clinic?" he asks.
The man jerks his chin up, says nothing. It seems that's as much answer as he'll give, but it's answer enough. The bandaged soldier groans, louder than the wounded around him, and the healer kneels to wring out a cloth and press it to his forehead, but his eyes stay sharp on Jowy's.
"I have orders from His Highness," Jowy says. He'd breathe in to settle the pounding in his ears, the churning in his stomach, but who knows what this air's infected with? Some of the Highland soldiers escorting him clap cloths over their mouths to stifle their coughs, but Jowy didn't bring a cloth with him. All he has are his orders, stamped and sealed, and when he squares his shoulders the paper crinkles inside his jacket.
The healer sucks his breath through his teeth, and Jowy thinks he'd spit on the floor if he weren't trying to keep it from getting any dirtier. "What orders?"
"What orders, sir," the Highland soldier who spoke before corrects, and again Jowy holds up his hand. At least they'll obey that much from him. His Rune throbs under his glove, pulses in time with the shallow breaths and ragged moans around him. He closes his eyes-no. No, he can't do that.
He snatches the paper from his jacket, tightens his jaw. "These orders."
The healer steps forward to receive them, thank the gods; he probably doesn't want Jowy and the soldiers advancing any further into this clinic. How much more of the clinic is there? He hasn't seen any proper beds yet, and they must have some in the back-
Jowy's pulse drums in his temples, hard enough that red seeps into his vision. He's not here to find that out. He's here to deliver the orders. That's all. That's all.
"Are you going to give them to me or not?" the healer snaps, and Jowy uncurls his fingers from the paper, one by one. His fingers ache, but it's a different feel than the kind his Rune gives him, cramped and stiff.
Before the healer breaks the seal, Jowy turns around and motions for the soldiers to follow him. There's a small window set in the door; he looks through that at the sky beyond until they're out in the open air again.
"Wait," the healer calls, his voice carried on the breeze the closing door shoves out, but the door clatters shut before Jowy has to hear the rest. He still can't close his eyes, but when he opens his mouth to tell the soldiers to return to their previous stations, his voice stutters and stalls in his throat. He waves them ahead the way he's seen Luca do more than once by now, and apparently they remember what it means, too.
Now Jowy closes his eyes, and the orders inscribe themselves on the backs of his eyelids, each letter burning red.
Draw up two lists: the patients well enough to recover on their own, and the patients who need further care. Deliver those lists to the captain of this section before dawn tomorrow. If you fail to do so, everyone in your care and everyone employed by your clinic will be put to the sword.
I won't waste magic and medicine on this trash, Luca said. If they're too weak to live, then why should they? Better to kill them fast and save ourselves the trouble.
Jowy ducks into the first alleyway he sees so he won't double over in the middle of the street.
***
"Lower," Culgan says, and Jowy strains to comply, bring the hilt of his sword to his temple instead of holding it overhead. It's heavier than he remembered, like a staff with a lead core but not as evenly weighted.
"The point's too high."
Jowy grits his teeth, lifts his back shoulder, and the line of his blade dips and straightens. It straightens too much, and at least he twists the short edge back towards himself when Culgan calls him on it.
"Thumb under the blade."
Damn. He swears he used to know all this. Versions of it, at least. The stances Culgan's having him run through aren't quite the same as the ones Genkaku taught, or even the same as the ones he drilled in the Unicorn Brigade. Culgan circles him, and Jowy keeps his knees bent and trunk straight no matter how hard he needs to breathe.
"Not bad," Culgan says at last. "Your hand's too close to the guard, but not bad."
It's always something, isn't it?
Culgan taps his shoulder, motions for him to lower his blade, and Jowy tries not to sigh with relief. "Your hands are spaced like this on a staff." He demonstrates, holds his hands about an arm's length apart. "On a sword, it's like this." He moves his hands closer, barely as wide as his face. "You have less of a base of support, and you're holding the end instead of the center. It's harder to control the whole blade."
"That's what I was taught," Jowy says, but this is a more forceful reminder than most he's had.
Culgan nods once and gestures up, and Jowy shifts into plow stance, his hilt by his hipbone and his blade angled towards an imaginary opponent's throat. It's the most familiar to him after wielding a staff for so long. He tests out a few quick slices and upward thrusts: a swipe at where his opponent's knees would be, a fast jab at the throat.
"You're ready, then?" Culgan asks, and even if the answer is no it's better to match himself against someone real.
He nods. Culgan draws his sword wordlessly-and whips towards Jowy with a two-handed cut, one he barely dodges in time. "It's not live steel," Culgan says, but that's all the pause Jowy gets before Culgan bears down on him again. He brings his sword up to parry but Culgan knocks his blade aside and raps Jowy on the shoulder. Blunted edge or not, that smarts. Jowy arcs his blade down to cut behind Culgan's knees, but as he lifts his arm Culgan chops him under it and the shock rings down, forces Jowy's fingers open. His grip on the hilt slips; he fumbles and steadies himself in time to flip his blade up and turn Culgan's thrust. There's an opening now and Jowy takes it, follows through and extends that strike to smack Culgan's ribs. The impact shudders down his arm again-there was never this much recoil with his staff, even when he struck bone.
No time to think about that. Culgan lunges and slashes down Jowy's chest, etching a line of fire down his ribs and stomach, and if that blade were sharp Jowy's guts would have spilled across the ground. As it is he has to clutch his stomach, will that throbbing burn to fade.
"Keep both hands on your sword," Culgan chides him, and proves his point when he reverses his grip and brings his hilt down on Jowy's wrist. The bones in his hand flare up with fresh pain and echoes of an older one, his fingers snapping in Luca Blight's grasp, and Jowy hisses and cradles his palm to his chest, drops the sword. It thumps to the dirt and the point of Culgan's blade hovers at Jowy's throat, steady and shining.
So soon. Damn. His jaw tightens.
"That was better than I expected." Culgan sheathes his sword, motions to Jowy to pick his own up. That'll have to wait a few moments, until pain isn't jangling so harshly through his wrist.
"You know how to do this," Culgan says. "You need to break your staff habits, that's all."
"Like fighting defensively."
That voice is unmistakably Luca's. Jowy whips around. Luca's sliding his gauntlets into place; they look lighter than the ones he usually wears. He's armored more lightly, too, in leather instead of plate, but it makes a certain amount of sense. Jowy can't imagine sparring in full plate, though if anyone could do it, Luca could.
"A sword's no good for blocking," Luca continues, striding closer. "All you'll do is ruin the blade." He draws his own, and from the way it rings from its sheath Jowy knows it's live steel. "Swords strike. Swords kill. You learn forms because you can kill your enemies faster from them."
In a flash, Luca raises his sword over his head and sweeps it down towards Jowy's neck and Jowy hits the ground, ignores the latest ache in his hand and snatches his own sword up and brings it up to guard-
"Wrong," Luca barks, and the edge of his sword rests against Jowy's throat, right where his sweat is beading the most. His pulse pounds against the blade's edge, hard and uneven. Is this still a lesson? He'd ask Culgan, but Culgan's clearing his throat, glancing aside. Luca smirks. Better that than laughing. Maybe.
"Don't try to stop my sword," Luca says, and bares his neck, his teeth. "Go for my throat."
Jowy swallows, his skin straining against the blade. "What if you hit me first, your Highness?"
"Heh. Then who cares?" Luca withdraws his sword, finally, and Jowy tries not to make his desperate gulp for air too obvious. "You'd never have been able to beat me. But it's better to die fighting."
His cheekbone stings where Anabelle scored him across it with the shards of that bottle. She would have sliced his throat open with it if he hadn't rammed the knife into her side-
Jowy closes his eyes.
"Get over here, Culgan," Luca shouts over his shoulder. "I'm tired of cutting down worms. Give me a real fight."
***
on to part two
.