The Priory of the Orange Tree (The Roots of Chaos)

They had taken the rising jewel. It was the first thing she knew when she woke: the empty feeling of its absence. She was lying in a room of salmon-colored stone, and her hands were tied behind her back.

A woman with a shaved head and warm brown skin stood in the doorway.

“Who are you?”

She spoke in Ersyri. Tané knew a little of the language, but said nothing.

The woman watched her. “You were carrying a ring belonging to Queen Sabran of Inys,” she said. “I would like to know if she sent you here.” When Tané only looked away, her lips tightened. “You were also carrying a blue jewel. Where did you find it?”

She knew how to withstand interrogation. Pirates would do all manner of things to their enemies to bleed them of their secrets. To prepare for the worst, all apprentices had to prove that they could suffer a beating from a soldier without revealing their name.

Tané had not made a sound in hers.

When no reply was forthcoming, the woman changed her tone. “You and your sea beast injured one of our sisters and slew another,” she said. “If you cannot give some justification for your crime, we will have no choice but to execute you. Even if you had not spilled our blood, consorting with a wyrm is punishable by death.”

She could not reveal the truth. They would never yield a fruit from their sacred tree to a dragonrider.

“At least tell me who you are,” the woman said, softer. “Save yourself, child.”

“I will speak to Chassar uq-Ispad,” Tané said. “No one else.”

With a small frown, the woman left.

Tané tried to clear her head. From the light, it would not be long until sunset. She fought to stay awake, but she found herself drifting as her body chased the rest she had denied it.

Nayimathun would get away. She could swim downriver faster than any human could run.

A man entered her prison, jolting her from a doze. A knife was tucked into a crimson sash around his middle. A robe of purple brocade, embellished with silverwork, crossed over his massive chest.

“I am Chassar uq-Ispad,” he said. His voice was deep and gentle. “I am told you speak Ersyri.”

Tané watched him sit in front of her.

“I have come here for a fruit of the orange tree,” she said, “to take to Eadaz uq-Nāra.”

“Eadaz.” Surprise jumped into his eyes, then pain. “Child, I do not know what you have heard of Eadaz, or how you know her name, but the fruit cannot bring back the dead.”

“She is not dead. Poisoned, but alive. With the fruit, I can save her.”

He froze as if she had struck him.

“Who told you about me?” he asked hoarsely. “About the Priory?”

“Lord Arteloth Beck.”

At this, Chassar uq-Ispad looked very tired.

“I see.” He knuckled his temple. “I suppose you also meant to take the blue jewel to Eadaz. The Prioress has it now, and she intends to execute you.”

“Why?”

“Because you murdered a sister. And because you rode here on the back of a sea wyrm. And lastly,” Chassar said, “because killing you would allow her to control the rising jewel.”

“You could help me escape.”

“Eadaz was able to steal the waning jewel from Mita Yedanya, the Prioress. She will not let its twin be taken,” Chassar said heavily. “I would have to take her life first. And that, I cannot do.”

Tané waited as he sat in silence.

“I trust that you will think of something, Ambassador uq-Ispad,” she said, “or Eadaz will die.” He looked at her. “Let me go, and she may not. The choice belongs to you.”

Chassar uq-Ispad did not return. He must have chosen loyalty to the Prioress.

All was lost.

Two women came at twilight. Their cloaks were pale brocade. Tané allowed them to lead her over tiled floors, through corridors that must never have seen sunlight. In every nook and alcove, there were cast-bronze figures of a woman holding an orb.

Tané knew she needed to fight, but suddenly she felt too weak to so much as bend a blade of grass. Her captors escorted her through an archway, on to a slim ledge of rock. A waterfall formed a veil on her right. The roar was so loud, she could no longer discern her own footsteps.

At least she would hear water at the end. The thunder of the falls reminded her of Seiiki.

“Sisters.”

Tané looked up. Chassar uq-Ispad was walking toward them.

“The Prioress has asked that I interrogate this one again,” he called in Ersyri. “I will not be long.”

The two women exchanged glances before letting Tané go. Chassar waited until they were out of sight, then took Tané by the arm and marched her back along the ledge.

“We have not long,” he said against her ear. “Do what you must, then leave and do not look back. All that awaits you here is a noose.”

“Will they not know you helped me?”

“That need not concern you.” Chassar showed her a stair carved into the rock. “That will take you to the valley. Only the tree can decide if you are worthy of a fruit.” He reached into his robe and withdrew her lacquer case. “This is yours. The coronation ring and the letter are still inside.” Next he produced a length of silk. “Carry the fruit in this.”

With his help, Tané knotted it around her body. “How will I get to Inys?” she asked him. “My dragon is gone.”

“Follow the River Minara until it forks and turn right. That way will take you north. I will send help, but you must not stop. The sisters will be on the hunt the moment they realize you are gone.” He squeezed her shoulder. “I will do what I can to delay them.”

“I cannot leave here without the rising jewel,” she bit out. “It answers only to me.”

Chassar looked grim.

“If I can get it from her, I will send someone after you with it,” he said, “but you must leave.”

He was gone before she could thank him.

There was no handhold on the stair. She cleaved to the stone on her left, watching the steps, mindful of the placement of her feet. Then the stair wound around the cliff side, and she saw it.

When Loth had spoken of an orange tree, she had imagined it as one of those that grew on Seiiki, small and unassuming. This was as tall as a cedar, and the scent of it made her mouth water. A living sister of the mulberry tree on Komoridu.

White flowers peppered its branches. Its leaves were polished green. Gnarled roots fanned around its trunk, snaking over the floor of the valley like patterning on silk. The Minara flowed around and beneath them.

There was no time to marvel. A shadow winged past, so close it ruffled her hair. Tané pressed her back against the rock face, watching the sky, still as prey in the eye of a hunter.

For a long time, there was silence. Then, out of the night, a firestorm.

Her body reacted before her mind could. She threw herself out of the way, but the stair was narrow and precarious, and suddenly she was tumbling, out of control, and the steps were a hammer on her back. Half-blind with panic, she grappled for something to break her fall as her body rolled toward a sheer drop.

At the last, she threw out a hand and caught the stair. She hung there, breathless.

She imagined herself on Mount Tego again. Steadying her nerves, she turned to see what had happened.

Fire-breathers. They were everywhere. Not pausing to question where they had come from, Tané dared look down. She was closer to the valley floor than she had thought, and time was running out. She let go of the stair, slithered on her back down the rock, and hit the grass with knee-jarring force.

The roots. The roots were thick and dense enough to protect her. As she delved into them, a fire-breather shrieked and crashed into the river, so close to Tané that she felt the spray of water from the impact. An arrow, fletched with a pale feather, was buried in its throat.

Chaos was unfolding in the valley. The trees around it were already on fire. Tané crawled on her belly, tensing whenever a hot wind blistered overhead. When she found an opening in the roots, she clambered back on to the grass and staggered to the foot of the tree.

Somehow, she knew what to do. She sank to her knees and turned her palms upward.

Cinders fell like snow on to her hair. She thought she had failed until a gentle snap came from above, and an orb, round and golden, dropped from on high. It missed her hands and tumbled into the tangle of giant roots. Cursing under her breath, she chased it.

The fruit rolled toward the rushing waters of the Minara. Tané threw herself forward and stopped it with one hand.

A flicker caught her eye. Between the roots, she saw a bird land, and as she watched, entranced, it turned into a naked woman.

Feather stretched to limb. The beak became a pair of red lips. Copper hair poured to the small of a slim back.

A shape-shifter. Everyone in Seiiki knew that dragons had once been able to change their forms, but it had been a long time since anyone had seen proof of it with their own eyes.

Another woman was approaching across the valley. A dark braid snaked over her shoulder. She wore a gold necklace and a scarlet robe with long sleeves, darker and more richly embroidered than those of the other women. When a fire-breather dived for her, she swept its flame aside as if it were a fly. Around her neck, on a chain, was the rising jewel.

“Kalyba,” she said.

“Mita,” the redhead answered.

They bandied words for a time, circling each other. Even if Tané could have understood their exchange, its content was of little consequence. All that mattered was which of them triumphed.

The Prioress moved toward the other woman. Her face was taut with hatred. The sun glinted off her sword as she swung it. Kalyba turned back into a hawk and swooped over her head. A heartbeat later, she wore a human shape again. Her laugh chilled Tané to the core. With a shout of frustration, the Prioress hurled a fistful of red fire.

Their battle brought them nearer and nearer to the roots. Tané withdrew into the shadows.

The women fought with fire and wind. They fought for an eternity. And when it seemed as if neither of them would ever best the other, Kalyba disappeared, as if she had never been there at all. The Prioress was so close now, Tané could hear her breathing.

It was then that the witch rose silently from the deep grass. She must have taken the form of something too small to see—an insect, perhaps. The Prioress turned a moment too late.

A sound like a foot crunching a shell, and she folded at the knees. Kalyba placed a hand on her head, as one might comfort a child. Mita Yedanya collapsed on to the grass.

Kalyba held up the heart of her enemy. Blood seeped from between her fingers. When she spoke, it was in a language Tané had never heard. Her voice rang through the valley.

Tané pulled her hand from her mouth. The body was close enough to touch. One last risk, and she could leave this madness behind her. She shifted back onto her belly and crawled toward the dead Prioress.

An arrow whistled from somewhere in the clearing, just missing Kalyba. Tané flinched back. Sweat ran down her cheek as she reached for the corpse, but her fingers were too clumsy. Hardly daring to breathe, she bent over the body, the crater where a heart had been. Her fingers shook as she pulled at the chain, passed it over her own head, and tucked the jewel underneath her tunic.

When Kalyba looked back, both she and Tané froze. Recognition sparked in her eyes.

“Neporo.”

Tané watched her expression flicker. Kalyba began to laugh.

“Neporo,” she exclaimed. “I wondered— all these centuries, I wondered so often if you had survived, my sister. How wonderfully strange that it should be here that I find my answer.” A smile twisted her mouth, beautiful and terrible. “Look upon my work. All this destruction is because of you. And now you come on your hands and knees to beg the orange tree for mercy.”

Tané scrambled back, boots sliding through mud. She had never been afraid to fight in her life, but this woman, this creature, made something ring in her blood like a sword out of a sheath.

“You’re too late. The Nameless One will rise, and no starfall will weaken him. He would welcome you, Neporo.” Kalyba walked toward her, blood dripping from the heart in her palm. “Flesh Queen of Komoridu.”

“I am not Neporo,” Tané found her voice in a dark hollow. “My name is Tané.”

Kalyba stopped.

She was wrong. Like a cockroach wrapped in amber, preserved in the wrong time.

Yet Tané felt irresistibly drawn to her. Her blood called to this woman even as her flesh recoiled.

“I almost forgot that she had a child,” Kalyba said. “How could it be possible that her descendants have not only lasted this long without my knowledge, but that you are here on the very same day as I am?” This little quirk of fate seemed to amuse her. “Know this, blood of the mulberry tree. Your ancestor is responsible for this. You are born of wicked seed.”

The rush of the river was closer now. Kalyba watched her go deeper into the roots.

“You look . . . so much like her.” The witch softened her voice. “A ghost of her.”

An arrow sailed across the clearing then and struck Kalyba in the back of her shoulder, making her turn in fury. A woman with golden eyes had emerged from the caves, a second arrow already nocked. She looked straight at Tané, and her gaze was a command.

Run.

Tané wavered. Honor told her to stand and fight, but instinct pulled harder. All that mattered now was that she reached Inys, and that Kalyba stayed ignorant of what she carried there.

She threw herself into the river, and the river took her back into its arms.

For a long time, all she knew was the fight to keep her head above water. As the river carried her from the valley, she crossed one arm over the fruit and used the other to swim. Smoke followed her all the way to the fork, where she hauled herself, dripping, from the rush, so bruised and tired and footsore that she could only lie and shudder.

Twilight turned to dusk, and dusk to moonless night.

Tané stood, her legs shaking, and walked.

Instinct made her take the jewel from its case, and it lit her way. Between the boughs of the canopy, she found the right star and followed its glimmer. Once, she saw the eyes of an animal watching her from the trees, but it kept its distance. Everything did.

At some point, her boots found a path of hard-packed earth, and she walked until the trees began to thin. When she was out of the forest, under the sky, she fell at last.

Her own hair was her pillow. She breathed through the clenched fist of her throat, and she wished on everything she loved that she was home in Seiiki, where the trees grew sweet.

An earth-shaking thump made her open her eyes. Wind unsettled her hair, and Tané looked up to see a bird looming over her. White as moonshine, with wings of bronze.

Ascalon Palace glistened in the first glow of sunrise. A ring of high towers at the crook of a river. Tané limped toward it, past the city-dwellers who had risen from their beds.

The great white bird had found a gap in the coastal defenses and taken her to a forest north of Ascalon. From there, she followed a well-trodden road until the horizon birthed a city.

The gates of the palace were threaded with flowers. When she got close, a throng of guards in silver plate blocked her way.

“Hold.” Spears pointed at her chest. “No farther, mistress. State your business here.”

She raised her head so they could see her face. The spears flinched higher as the guards stared at her.

“By the Saint,” one of them murmured. “An Easterner.”

“Who are you?” another asked her.

Tané tried to form words, but her mouth was dry, and her legs quaked.

Frowning, the second man loosened his grip on his sword. “Get the Resident Ambassador to Mentendon,” he said to the woman beside him.

Her armor rattled as she left. The others kept their spears trained on the stranger.

It was some time before another woman approached the gates. Her braided hair was a deep red, and she wore a black garment that flattened her breasts and waist, with skirts that belled out from her hips. Lace covered her brown skin to the throat.

“Who are you, honorable stranger?” she said in perfect Seiikinese. “Why have you come to Ascalon?”

Tané did not give her name. Instead, she held the ruby ring into the light.

“Take me to Lady Nurtha,” she said.