The Burning White (Lightbringer #5) - Brent Weeks Page 0,331

live, too.”

His weird, uncontrolled shimmering pulsed in the darkness, and she saw him illuminated for an instant, raising the sap high his hand, and then he swung it sharply into her temple.

Chapter 96

It had been a long night, and Karris’s initial elation at being alive to greet the dawn had long since faded to fear.

King Ironfist had stayed on his feet for only a few moments after he’d been brought into the audience chamber, clearly conscious through heroic effort of will alone. He’d ordered a stop to Karris’s execution and ordered the deployment of all his troops under High General Danavis’s leadership. Then he’d searched the crowd as if looking for some face, while begging Karris to come aside to hear something private. She went to him instantly, but he’d finally succumbed to his wounds.

He hadn’t stirred since.

Naturally, the Chromeria’s best physickers were with him, and his own Tafok Amagez, and Blackguards. There had been some chaos at the lift, apparently a Blackguard had attempted to assassinate him? The Tafok Amagez didn’t trust the Blackguards (understandably enough, Karris thought, though of course the Blackguards were in full denial mode) or the physickers, and the Blackguards didn’t trust the Tafok Amagez or the physickers, and the physickers wanted everyone to get the hell away from their patient.

Karris had no idea what the private thing Ironfist had hoped to tell her had to do with, and now there was no getting Ironfist away from the Tafok Amagez. After an attempt on their king’s life, they weren’t going to allow anyone near him until he was conscious and safe.

It was a fight she wished she had time for. She didn’t.

Sun Day Eve dawned with thousands of Corvan Danavis’s and King Ironfist’s warriors disembarking and carrying supplies to their respective stations. High General Danavis was in his element, orchestrating a million details with ease and efficiency. There were a thousand logjams and bottlenecks that could happen with deploying so many troops and supplies, and with Danavis in charge, people simply were given orders and went, and when they arrived, they found the supplies they needed arriving at the same time, or already there, or arriving immediately after them.

It was a level of technical virtuosity that people didn’t even see: of course black powder, wadding, flints or match cord, bullets, and ramrods will arrive in the same place as a thousand muskets, they thought. Of course that place would be centrally located to where the men who were trained in their use and needed them could get them in an orderly and timely fashion. But with what Karris and her luxiats had been doing in the last month to prepare the islands’ defenses, she knew now how hard all of this was, and she simply stood back in awe.

But not in rest. She had her own details to oversee.

Not least of which was the fleet visible with the morning sun. At first everyone had assumed they were seeing the vanguard of the White King’s fleet, coming in from the west.

But this fleet was alone, and small, not followed by an armada—and flying the flags of Ruthgar and the Malargos clan.

Karris took a skimmer out to them to divine their intentions: Eirene Malargos hadn’t come herself (smart, in case we all die, Karris thought), but Karris learned that her luxiats had prevailed upon Eirene to send everyone they could spare.

And by ‘her luxiats’ they meant Karris’s luxiats, Karris soon realized, for three of the young men who’d been so convincing to Eirene Malargos had been part of Karris’s little group of faithful scholars.

‘Everyone they could send’ seemed an exaggeration, because Malargos had only sent five thousand men. But the five thousand were Ruthgar’s best, and they were outfitted better than any of the other contingents. In addition, Eirene had sent desperately needed supplies. Not only black powder (most precious since Atash had fallen), but also good muskets and, most valuable of all, ten thousand sets of mirror armor.

Ten thousand!

Karris had thought all her entreaties to Eirene Malargos had fallen on deaf ears, but all the while the woman had been stockpiling and commissioning gear whose cost must have bankrupted even her. And Eirene had done it all silently, so that it might be kept secret from the White King.

The rest of Sun Day Eve passed in a blur of preparation: Kip was frantic with his Mirror preparations, too distracted to even talk to her; Andross was entirely absent except for when he popped in and demanded