Page 40 of Heir

12

Sirsha

Sirsha lay atop a tree branch, gazing at the wide blue sky through the canopy. Her mother stared down, stern as ever. But her face held none of the hatred Sirsha remembered from the day she was cast out of her Kin.

Come back to me, little one, her mother whispered.I miss you.

Sirsha tried to move her mouth. Tried to sayI miss you too, Ma.But a rushing filled her ears, like an immense cataract, only distorted somehow. She grasped her head, staring dully as her mother waited for her response. “Sirsha,” her mother said. “Wake up.”

Sirsha opened her eyes to a sky set aflame. Her ears rang with the screams of injured people, and her clothes were stained with blood—her own, she realized with a wince. A glass shard the size of her thumb was embedded into the soft flesh above her hip. Shaking, she tore off a strip of her cloak and yanked out the glass, not bothering to muffle her scream.

She bound the wound quickly and rolled to her side, growling as the debris that littered the street cut into her arm, gawping at the catastrophe before her.

Navium collapsed before her eyes. The docks were a solid wall of flame. If the wind hadn’t warned Sirsha when it did, she’d have been roasting on a mass funeral pyre with hundreds of others.

All those families. Joyful only a minute ago.

Something heavy and dark swooped overhead, illuminated for a moment. A Kegari Sail. She’d seen one before, long ago, when she was still tracking for her Kin.Magic keeps them aloft, her mother had told her.Wind magic.

She’d later puzzle over why the Kegari were dropping bombs on an empire thousands of miles from their homeland. The knowledge of what that thing above her was, of what it could do, brought her staggering to her feet. She stumbled through streets carved in new, deadly ways by Kegari missiles, stepping over dolls and dancing shoes, food that would never be eaten, skin that would never be warm.

She ran until the merchant harbor was well behind her. A telltale whoosh of a Sail flying overhead, the buzz of a missile falling, and Sirsha knew she had to get out of Navium—out of the Empire. Whenever and wherever the Kegari attacked, they left only death in their wake.

Think!An overland path out of here would leave her in a countryside swarming with refugees and Kegari troops within days if not hours. Besides which, the killer’s trail led to the sea. Going overland would delay her mission by months if the Kegari seized the nearby ports.

Even considering an impediment to her mission made her oath coin itch. She had to follow the killer.

She needed a ship small and fast enough that it wouldn’t be noticed by Kegari air patrols, but strong enough to handle a sea voyage.

Of course, those thieving bastards had bombed the military and merchant docks first. They weren’t stupid. Judging from the flames rising in the south, the Kegari had destroyed the docks where the pleasure boats were moored too.

They couldn’t have gotten every vessel in the port. There were too many docks. Fishing boats, smuggling ships, a moldering log. There had to besomethingshe could steal.

A memory surfaced: the city of Sadh more than a year ago. Shut down, just like Navium was, because the Martial Empress was visiting. Sirsha had wanted to go to her favorite fishy, but the Masks at the dock sent everyone packing. The ship they were guarding had no flag. No markings at all, other than a screaming bird as its figurehead.

Now that Sirsha considered, she realized what that boat must havebeen. A safeguard. An exit in case the Empress needed to scarper and couldn’t get out by land.

If she had a boat in Sadh, she’d have one here. Probably in an unusual place. A smaller but well-guarded dock.

Like the one she’d seen near her inn, where a couple of Masks had been loitering.

The wind shoved her south, as if to say:Finally, you figured it out. Halfwit.

Of course, she still had to steal the damned thing. From a pair of Masks, no less. And that’s if the boat was still there.

Ah well, she’d figure it out as she went. Like usual. At least she’d grabbed her pack.

The pitted cobbles smoothed out, and warehouses gave way to fountains and wide boulevards, still intact.

“Run!” Sirsha shouted as residents tumbled from their homes, bleary-eyed and confused. “Flee the city! It’s under attack!”

The fire at the cothon was so enormous that despite the cold, sweat poured down Sirsha’s back. Finally, when she thought her lungs would burst, she caught the glimmer of ocean ahead. It glowed like lava, reflecting the massive fire at the pleasure boat docks. The smoke was so thick that Sirsha had to crouch beneath the fug to keep from choking to death.

She really did pick the most skies-forsaken jobs.

When she broke free of Navium’s buildings, she headed for the small dock she’d seen earlier. Both Masks guarding it were dead, their faces torn to shreds. The air around felt strange and warped, but Sirsha ignored it; she hadn’t been hired to avenge the Masks. She raced up the dock, heedless of anything but getting to the vessel, cursing in relief when the two-sailed shabka came into view.EF IIwas emblazoned on the side.

The captain appeared too, a broad-shouldered man who looked likehe could knock Sirsha over with one swipe of his massive paw. He lumbered to the edge of the gangplank, eyes wild, a scim in one hand and a wet handkerchief in the other to protect him from the billowing smoke.

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