Wardtown (Teer & Kard Book 1) Read online

  Stone walls were no better for privacy than wooden planks, it seemed. Not when the building was this small, anyway.

  Teer was grateful for the distraction. He’d been a cursed fool. He’d never been a heavy drinker and he’d let his anger and confusion lead him into making a mistake—that had led to another, far more condemning mistake.

  He knew nothing about the Spehari rider he’d shot at. The man’s name was apparently Karn…and that was all he had. He wasn’t exactly going to ask Komo about the man—he’d messed up badly enough as it was.

  As the sunlight through his narrow window faded toward darkness, he heard a new voice in the office. Hardin’s voice.

  Teer wasn’t sure of the time, but he was sure he hadn’t been unconscious for more than the night. If Hardin was already there, the hands must have seen what happened and ridden through the night to get back to the ranch—and Hardin must have been mounted practically by the time they were done talking.

  Despite everything, the thought that Hardin had dropped everything to come warmed Teer. It wasn’t going to change anything, but at least his mother’s husband was trying.

  “Hardin,” he heard Komo’s voice greet the other man. “I’ve been expecting you. Come into my office; it’s about the only place in this town with any privacy.”

  “Talk quickly, old friend,” Hardin’s voice replied. “I didn’t even tell Alana about this before I started out. She’s going to—”

  It turned out that if both Teer’s cell door and Komo’s office door were closed, Teer couldn’t hear anything from the office. That suggested Komo’s door was better designed than the rest of the doors in the place—there might even be magic to it.

  Teer didn’t know. He only really knew that magic was a thing that existed and how some bits of it worked. He didn’t know if you could cast a spell on a door to make it block out sound.

  If he focused, he could barely make out murmuring through the two doors. Whatever Hardin and Komo were talking about, he couldn’t hear them.

  Even when the shouting started a few moments later, he couldn’t tell what they were saying. He couldn’t make out which of the two men was shouting, though he guessed it was Hardin. If Komo had just told the rancher what he’d told Teer…

  There wasn’t anything Hardin could do. While the Wardkeeper was authorized to handle most minor conflicts and crimes and could do quite a bit for blatant major crimes; anything involving a Spehari had to be judged by the Spehari magistrate.

  And while Hardin was wealthy and influential by the standards of an Eastern Territory wardtown, he had nothing to offer a magistrate.

  Teer’s sense of time was normally extremely precise, but the sameness of his cell was already starting to wear on him. All he was really certain of was that it was nearly dark by the time the Wardwatches opened the cell and let Hardin in.

  “One of us needs to—”

  “Get. Out.” Hardin snapped at Niles. “I’ll shout if I need you.”

  Niles retreated, locking the door behind him and leaving Hardin and Teer alone.

  “I’m sorry,” Teer said quietly.

  Hardin had clearly been sitting and regaining his breath for a bit, but his riding leathers were still marked with fresh sweat. Teer’s guess that he’d mounted up and ridden out immediately on news had obviously been bang on.

  “You should be,” Hardin said. He walked over and took a seat on the bed. “I don’t know if I can fix this, Teer. I fucked up and you’re paying for it.”

  “You didn’t pull a gun on a man who did nothing but have pointed ears,” Teer murmured.

  “You were drunk and you were angry and you were lost and all of that was my fault,” the rancher replied. “Well, maybe not the drunk.”

  He sighed, looking down at the floor.

  “Ohlman wasn’t supposed to surprise you with the job offer,” he said, stating the obvious that still needed to be said. “I don’t know what reason he gave you, but it was probably true enough.”

  “That you were worried about the hands looking to me instead of Alstair,” Teer said.

  “It wouldn’t be fair to either of you, Teer,” the older man told him after a moment. “Alstair wouldn’t have been able to run the ranch, not with the hands used to taking orders from you. But he’d own it and get the money. You’d get nothing but whatever stones I left you in the will.

  “I needed a better way. I got started with Atrach and Ohlman back when. I rode with them for six turnings, even running cattle to the armies during the war.” He shook his head. “I was trying to help you get set up on your own, but I…”

  Hardin shook his head.

  “I was a coward and I failed you,” he said. “I needed to talk to you about all of this, but there was always something else I ‘needed’ to do. And then suddenly you were gone, halfway to Alvid with a hundred eighty head of cattle and a job offer waiting for you that was going to come with a kick in the guts.

  “I failed you,” he repeated. “And all of this…all of this is on me.”

  “You didn’t pull a gun on a man,” Teer said. “That’s what I’m here for and that one’s on me.”

  They were silent for a long time.

  “I’ll do what I can,” Hardin murmured. “Komo’s unbribable, even by an old friend. There are options. I will do everything—”

  “No.” Teer cut him off. Everything held too much possibility. There were half a dozen hands on the ranch, every one of them an expert rider and at least a decent shot. It wouldn’t be the first time a rancher had called his hands out to make war—and while six or seven on four wasn’t a fair fight, neither was the Unity against anyone.

  The Sunset Rebellion and the war Teer’s father had died in had proven that.

  “I won’t have anyone else suffer for my actions,” he told Hardin. “You won’t add to the list of crimes, Hardin. Promise me that. No bribes, no…nothing stupid.”

  He couldn’t even say aloud that he didn’t want Hardin to ride out for him. Even whispering, he didn’t trust the walls of his cell for secrecy.

  “I am not going to stand by and watch them hang the son of my wife over a fucking wardstone,” the older man snapped.

  “If you have to, you will,” Teer said numbly. The numbness was back now. That was handy. “Would you rather Ma mourned me or mourned everybody?”

  The jail cell was silent again.

  “I never told you enough how proud I was of you,” the rancher finally said. “That I loved you like a son and every skill you mastered made my heart burst. It shouldn’t have come to this. I owe you better.”

  “If you owe me anything, you owe me your word that you’ll keep everyone safe,” Teer demanded. “Afore anything else, you keep ’em safe, all right?”

  There was another long silence.

  “Your word,” he repeated.

  “You have it,” Hardin ground out. “I’ll do what I can, but you’re right. I won’t risk anyone else, I promise. There’s got to be something I can do.”

  “Ask Komo,” Teer suggested. “For something legal.”

  Instead of trying to bribe the Wardkeeper. Teer wouldn’t have expected that to work—and it sounded like his mother’s husband had already tried that one.

  5

  Stone walls were, Teer guessed, at least more interesting than plain wood. There were patterns to the stone that he wasn’t familiar with, and examining the carved rocks kept him from complete boredom for a candlemark or so.

  After that, boredom started to war with his numb fear. He didn’t really believe that there was anything Hardin could do. He was going to spend the next fifty days or so in this cell, and then he was going to die.

  His mind tried to shy away from that thought, but there was nothing else to think about. He could hear people moving about and talking in the street outside the Wardkeeper’s office, but he didn’t have the urge to listen in on their conversations.

  What was any of it going to matter to him?

  Early in what he
thought was the afternoon, Niles and Atara came into his cell with another tray of bread and soup. Niles was the one stuck with the tray and the replacement bucket for Teer’s “toilet” while the older woman stood by the door with her weapon drawn.

  “Could I get a book or something?” Teer asked plaintively as Niles put the food down. “Staring at the wall is only so much fun.”

  “Not sure how nice we should be to folks who try to kill others,” Atara told him. She glared at him as he wilted, but then nodded sharply. “I’ll ask Komo. See what he says.”

  The two Wardwatches withdrew from the cell and Teer looked at the food. It was the same soup as the last time. It was better than he’d have expected as a prisoner everyone seemed to regard as already condemned.

  He finished the bread and soup and knocked on the door to let the Wardwatches know he was done. He might be guilty of everything they accused him of, but he saw no reason to make Komo’s people’s lives harder.

  They couldn’t change his fate. No point in blaming them—and maybe being a model prisoner might buy him some of Magistrate Lysus’s notoriously lacking mercy.

  “I’ll take that,” Atara said, opening the door just enough to grab the tray. “Here.”

  She passed him a heavy-looking tome.

  “Komo said it would be educational,” she said drily. “Enjoy.”

  “Thank you,” Teer replied—to a closed door. He looked down at the book and chuckled.

  A History of the Spehari Unification, Volume I: Landings and the Merik.

  A few of the books he’d read for his limited formal education had referenced A History but he’d never seen a copy of one of the actual books himself. It was not known as an easy read…but he had fifty days. Something that took effort and time to get through was actually appealing.

  Teer settled down on the cot and opened the book. He didn’t have anything else to do, after all.

  “I will speak with your Wardkeeper.”

  Something about the voice cut through Teer’s focus on the book like a knife. He looked up, trying to place it. There was a lilt to the tone he’d never heard, and a formality he was unfamiliar with to the words.

  “Of course, Lord Karn,” Atara’s voice replied and he realized who had entered the building. “I will get him.”

  Teer’s focus was entirely on the conversation outside his cell now.

  “I am capable of walking down a hallway, Wardwatch,” the Spehari stated. “Which office is his?”

  “The first on the right, Lord,” Atara replied, her voice quailing. Teer could barely imagine the hard-bitten veteran Wardwatch showing fear, but it was clear in her voice.

  Who would not be afraid of a Spehari? They were the magic-wielding demigods who’d brought machines and gunpowder to the continent of Aran. The few chapters of A History Teer had stumbled through made it clear that the Merik tribes had barely mastered forging iron spearheads when the Spehari had arrived on their shores in entire ships built of iron.

  This was the being that Teer had drawn a gun on. No wonder the stranger had been barely fazed by the bullets.

  He heard the thumping of a fist landing heavily on a door.

  “Lord Karn!” Komo greeted the Spehari. “This is an unexpected surprise. How may I serve you?”

  “We must speak, Wardkeeper,” Karn growled back. “I have declined the Right of Retribution, and yet I am told you still intend to execute the boy.”

  There was a long silence.

  “If you do not claim your rights, Lord Karn, then his fate falls to the law and the law requires Magistrate Lysus to judge him,” Komo finally replied. “I do not know what the Magistrate will decide, but the Unity sees little value in those who attack your kin, my lord.”

  There was a thunk as the door closed behind Karn, and the rest of the conversation was lost to Teer. He stretched his focus, trying to hear anything through the two closed doors, but he couldn’t pick up anything.

  Sighing, he turned back to his book—and then Karn shouted.

  Hardin shouting had been inaudible, but either Karn was louder or Teer was paying that much more attention.

  “I did not lay aside my rights so that you could execute the idiot regardless,” Karn bellowed. “He should be flogged for what happened, not hanged!”

  Whatever Komo said in reply was inaudible to Teer, but it calmed the Spehari enough that Teer couldn’t hear the next exchange.

  Was the Spehari trying to save Teer’s life? Why? Teer had no illusions about what he’d done. He’d pulled a gun on a man who had committed no crime except being a member of his species. While the nation created by that species had betrayed Teer’s father, this Lord Karn certainly hadn’t!

  Teer’s current state certainly wasn’t making him any happier with the Spehari or the Unity, but he had to admit that none of this was Karn’s fault.

  So, why was the Spehari trying to spare him?

  “I will speak to the boy,” Karn’s voice echoed down the corridor again. He’d clearly at least opened the door from Komo’s office.

  “I’m not sure that’s wise,” the Wardkeeper told him. “He did try to shoot you.”

  “The only weapons in that cell will be the ones I bring with me,” the Spehari replied. “Unless you are utterly incompetent at your job, Wardkeeper Komo?”

  “He is not armed. Not even a spoon,” Komo admitted.

  “I have no fear that a boy of nineteen turnings will disarm me and turn my weapons against me before I disable him with magic,” Karn stated. “I will speak to him.”

  Teer laid A History aside on the bed as he straightened to look at the door. That wasn’t what he’d been expecting. He had no idea what was going on now or how to handle it.

  Teer had to agree with Komo, in principle at least, but the door swung open and the Spehari strode in regardless.

  He was no shorter or darker-skinned now that Teer was sober, though the strange fuzziness that had hung around him in the bar was gone now. He looked down at where Teer sat on the bed and scoffed.

  “Are you going to try to kill me again, boy?” he asked. “With your bare hands, perhaps?”

  “I wouldn’t know where to begin,” Teer admitted.

  “See?” Karn turned back to Komo. “Leave us, Wardkeeper.”

  “The laws say—”

  “I am Spehari,” Karn ground out. “Leave us.”

  “I will lock the door,” Komo said. “Call when you need us.”

  The Wardkeeper bowed his way out of the cell, closing the door behind Karn and locking it. The Spehari continued to look down at Teer silently, then turned to look at the door. Orange light flickered around his hands for a moment, then flitted across the room to coat the door in a thin sheen.

  “We cannot be heard now,” he told Teer. “It will not last, but it will buy us some much-needed privacy.”

  Teer could see the spell. He didn’t know much about Spehari or magic, but he was pretty sure that was strange.

  “What do you want?” Teer asked bluntly.

  “My name is Karn of House Morias,” the Spehari told him. “I am the man you tried to kill. More successfully than most, which is fascinating to me. Older and far superior fighters than you have tried, and few have managed as much as you did.”

  “I am sorry,” Teer half-whispered, looking at the floor. “I was a drunken fool.”

  “Yes. Not generally considered an excuse, though usually a mitigating factor,” Karn agreed.

  Teer…mostly followed what the Spehari was saying. He thought.

  “Why are you even here?” he asked.

  “Two reasons,” Karn told him, holding up a pair of fingers on his right hand. Now that they were this close, Teer saw that those hands were far from the delicate and clean hands he would have expected from a Spehari. Karn’s hands were worn and callused, with multiple small burn scars along his fingers.

  “Firstly, I do not believe your death is necessary,” the Spehari said bluntly. “You seem discouraged enough that I woul
d not expect you to go hunting the Spehari in the streets, and I doubt there are enough other Spehari-haters out here for your death to be a useful example.”

  He folded a finger down and grinned, the expression carving turnings off his face.

  “There are other ironies inherent to the situation that you are not aware of.”

  Teer stared at the other man blankly. He’d only understood about half of that last sentence. Karn realized that and chuckled.

  “You and I have more in common than you think, but I can’t explain that here,” he told Teer. “My second reason for wanting to know more about you is that you intrigue me, boy. You saw me. Everyone else in that bar saw a Merik bounty hunter. Even another Spehari wouldn’t have seen through that illusion or even realized it was there. But you…you saw me.”

  That made no sense to Teer, but it triggered a thought.

  “Like I can see the magic you did on the door?” he asked.

  Karn looked at him like he’d grown a second head and glanced behind him. The door continued to gleam a faint orange color to Teer but the Spehari studied it like it was entirely new to him.

  “Most Spehari can’t see other people’s magic,” he said slowly. “You are more intriguing by the moment, boy, and I hesitate to condemn you without knowing more. So.”

  “So what?” Teer demanded. “I’m a curiosity? What does it matter?”

  “It matters for a lot of reasons,” Karn replied. “Why did you try to kill me?”

  “Because I was drunk and angry and you were Spehari,” the youth admitted. “Did you miss that?”

  Karn chuckled again, still looking down at Teer on the bed.

  “I got all that, yeah,” he agreed, his tone slipping into a very different register for a moment. “But that doesn’t actually tell me anything,” he continued. “Most people don’t hate the Spehari that much. We’re more of an unpleasant distant problem than something that immediate.”

  “What, you want to know why people hate your species?” Teer gestured to the book on the bed. “Try reading that. The author likes the Unity and she can’t brush over the horrors your people inflicted on mine when you arrived.”