Page 29 of Queen Demon
She bared her teeth, clearly embarrassed at the slip and trying to cover it with anger. Without the veil, he could see she was young,light-skinned and with a narrow face. Her hair was a washed-out brown, braids loose from struggling. He hadn’t taken enough of her life to shorten it, just enough to weaken her for the next day or so, but she might not realize that. She said in understandable Arike, “I have nothing to speak about to an expositor’s pet demon.”
Kai said, “The only expositor here is dead.” She glared, not understanding. Which was odd, as she seemed to know what demons were. Or she thought she did, at least. “What is your name?”
She huffed a noise of pure contempt. “As if I would give you that power over me.”
Kai found himself exchanging a baffled look with Ziede. Ibel flicked her fingers to get their attention and signed,It’s a superstition in the north, I’ve heard. The dustwitch faced the other way and didn’t see Ibel’s comment.
Ziede’s expression turned thoughtful. “I’ll give you our names, and if you think you can do anything with them, you’re welcome to try. I’m Ziede Daiyahah and that is Kaiisteron.” She paced to the opposite side of the tent from Kai. As she passed Baram, they made the Witchspeak gesture of respect to her that meantwelcome to an elder’s wisdom,and Ziede’s hand moved in a polite acknowledgment. The dustwitch took this in with a suspicious glare.As if she doesn’t know what it means,Kai thought. This was very strange.She’s young but she’s not a child.
Ziede folded her arms and faced their prisoner again. “Why would dustwitches attack an Arike troop who had made no gesture, no word, no action of hostility toward them? An attack by stealth, stealing lives like thieves.”
The dustwitch’s face turned scornful. “Are you from past the middle mountains, too?” she asked. “The Witchlands?”
“I’m from the Khalin Islands,” Ziede said, watching the dustwitch carefully. “You haven’t heard of it.”
“Why should I? It means nothing to my family.” She grinned at Ziede, clearly trying to provoke her.
“Why did you try to steal our people?” Kai asked. He needed to stay on track, ask things that they needed to know. Because Ziede wasn’t the one who was easy to provoke. “What did you mean to do with them?”
Her expression shifted and she lifted her chin. “When will you kill me?”
“She has no idea,” Ziede said, managing to sound almost bored. “Her education seems severely lacking. Her elders probably don’t tell her their plans.” Baram and Ibel both signed agreement.
“I don’t need to know anything,” the dustwitch sneered. Cerala, standing back against the tent wall behind Ibel, had been stone-faced up to this point but that remark apparently caught her by surprise. The sound outside had fallen away a little as the camp calmed and her involuntary snort of laughter was loud in the quiet. That seemed to set the dustwitch off the way nothing else had. “Mortals are like cattle to us,” she spat. “We do with them as we want. Our blood is superior! And the Witches who are slaves to them, who scrape and bow and let themselves be taken as familiars, they are nothing to us!”
She sounded like a shitting expositor and up until this moment Kai had thought Ziede was wrong, that he wasn’t so angry that he was in danger of losing control. Ziede had been right, as she often was.
It wasn’t just the vanguarders the dustwitches had killed, and Kai’s fear for Amabel and the others here. This attack was a violation of everything the Saredi ever were, the war they had fought that brought the underearth together in harmony with the mortal world. His jaw was starting to hurt and he realized he had been gritting his teeth since he stepped into the tent. He said, “There is a treaty with the underearth. You do not use its gift in your blood to war with each other. You do not war with mortals unless you are first attacked. You do not—”
“The treaty is as dead as the Saredi!” the dustwitch shouted over him. “Hierarchs sealed the underearth, the Witchlands areempty. Their treaty is nothing to us, there is no one to force us to bend to the will of the dead and gone—”
Her words cut off with a strangled gurgle as Kai’s hand curled around her throat. He hadn’t been aware of moving, of pulling her up off the ground until he felt her life pulse under his hand. He said, “I am Kaiisteron late Enna of the tent of the Kentdessa Saredi and Prince of the Fourth House of the underearth. You will hold the treaty as a sacred bond or bend to my will. And I don’t take familiars, I take lives.”
Her eyes were blown wide. Talamines’ blood pounded in Kai’s temples and his skin felt like it was on fire.
Then someone touched his arm lightly, and Bashasa’s voice said, “Kaiisteron’s grandmother negotiated that treaty. So you see, it is very much a factor in our relations. Whoever has told you that it is not is much mistaken. Let us speak about that.”
Kai managed to uncoil his fingers and the dustwitch stumbled backward, clutching her throat. She dropped to the ground, shaking.
Bashasa squeezed Kai’s biceps, a light reassurance, and continued, “Perhaps our guest would like some water? Yes, Trenal, set it down beside her. Do not think of hurting Trenal, or any others of our people. Fourth Prince would not like it and neither would I.”
The dustwitch huddled unmoving as Trenal set down the water flask and retreated. They all waited a long moment, until she snaked out an arm and picked up the flask. Her hand trembled as she drank. She kept her gaze on Bashasa, who was as disheveled as the rest of them, his curly hair loose and his beard stubble pronounced, though he had managed to throw a coat on.
Bashasa waited until she set the flask down, then said, “There is no need to be offensive, and try to anger anyone. If you want to die, you need only ask. But I would prefer you answer our questions so I can decide whether to send you back to your people or not.”
The dustwitch took that in, and wet her lips.
Bashasa asked, “Who is it who told you that the treaty is not in force?”
She seemed puzzled by the question, and Kai realized Bashasa was starting with information that would seem unimportant to her, to get her used to talking to them. Kai and Ziede had tried that, sort of, badly, but it hadn’t worked for them. She answered, “Our Doyen.”
Kai didn’t react but saw Ziede’s brows lift in surprise. He hadn’t heard a Witch use a title like that before, either.
Taking the cue from Ziede, Bashasa frowned a little, as if the answer surprised him too. “Why does your Doyen think this?”
“Because the west and the Witchlands are all…” She threw a wary look at Kai. “She said they were all dead.”
Bashasa shrugged and gestured to indicate Kai and Ziede. “Demonstrably they are not. And even if they were, why should you throw your world and culture and way of life away, just because the Hierarchs came to destroy you? Is this not a way of surrendering to them?”
