The Lion Soul by Amy Sumida
Chapter Two
After Captain Numaha concluded her negotiations, we headed to the nearest city, Baven. The look the Lion Lord gave me as I left the tent sent shivers down my spine. The hardest thing I've ever done was walk away from him. I wanted to run back into that tent and touch him, convince myself that he was real. Instead, I forced myself to walk away, my expression schooled into blankness . . . after I gave him a searing look to match his.
I haven't had a lot of time for romance, but I'd experimented enough in my youth to know where my passions lay. So, I wasn't surprised by my physical reaction to the warlord, in addition to the spiritual. He was a beautiful man, and I desired him. Despite that attraction and my compelling dreams, I couldn't imagine how we could be together. And that was important because I knew one night with him wouldn't be enough. I'd need much more than that from the Lion Lord. More importantly, I needed to be with him to protect him. The Gods wanted him to live, and they wanted me to save him.
I pondered this problem during the trip to Baven. I even thought about the Lion Lord while the Captain was negotiating with shop owners. I even contemplated asking for an early end to my contract. Yes, it may be rash and unreasonable to risk being stranded on Stalana because of a couple of lusty looks and a dream. It was entirely that I had mistaken coincidence for fate, and he wasn't the lion from my dreams. The Eagle Lord had worn a gem too after all, though his had been green. But I was so certain it was him and just as certain that he was in danger. I had to stay, but my contract was clear; I had another year left with Captain Numaha before she would have to renegotiate terms. If she didn't release me, there was nothing I could do.
By the time we returned to the war camp to deliver the bartered goods, I was in a terrible state of indecision and anxiety, though I allowed nothing to show. My fellow guards and I cleared the Lion Lord's tent, then watched over Captain Numaha as she collected her payment. My stare was drawn back to the Lion Lord over and over again, and he smiled at me every time. I began to relax. We would likely stay the night at this port, and I knew I'd spend it in his bed. Maybe that was what was meant to happen. Maybe tonight was the night he'd be attacked, and sleeping with him would give me the excuse to be at hand when he needed me.
But then a man came bursting into the tent, saying something about an attack. I scowled as it became clear that Farungal ships had been spotted and the camp would soon be called into battle. The Lion Lord advised Captain Numaha to get back to her ship and set sail, and I was horrified when she agreed and started to leave.
“Make haste,” Captain Numaha said crisply to us. “We need to get back to our ship before the Farungal reach shore.”
“We're leaving? We're not going to help them?” I asked, my stomach clenching in denial.
I couldn't leave; this was the moment I'd been waiting for my entire life. With the arrival of the Farungals, my dream had been set into motion. I knew they would try to capture the Lion Lord, and if I wasn't there to stop it, they would succeed, and he would die horribly. Neither the Gods nor I wanted that.
“Why would we help them?” the Captain scowled at me.
“Because honor demands it. Nazakian warriors don't run from a battle unless it's tactical.”
“It is tactical. If we defend these shores and any of the Farungals survive, they might return to their home and tell their kin who helped the Stalanians. Then they might seek retribution on us,” the Captain growled. “Do you want to bring Nazaka to the attention of the Farungal?”
The other guards shifted uneasily.
“We are Nazakian, we can handle any enemy!” I slashed my hand down, desperate to stay. “To flee this battle, simply because it's not ours is shameful. We have the strength and ability to help them, so we should.”
Some of my kin grunted in agreement and set their hands on their swords.
“We're leaving and that's an order!” Captain Numaha snapped.
I ground my teeth together, horrified by her cowardice, then turned to look at the Lion Lord. How could I leave him now, at the very moment he needed me?
“Thank you, but this isn't your fight,” the Lion Lord said to me, as if he had understood our conversation.
I bowed to him, one warrior to another, and then, because I could think of no way around it, followed Captain Numaha out of the tent. The camp was already a flurry of activity, but we marched through it quickly and headed straight for our base camp. Everyone had to help pack up so we could get back to our ship in time, and that meant the Captain too. But even with the extra hands, the Farungal landed, and the battle started before we were finished.
We paused as Farungals swarmed the beach and the army of faeries and humans formed a solid wall to oppose them. It was impressive, especially with the enormous Lions roaring their battle cries and the Unsidhe screeching in glee. Trolls and Red Caps towered over the humans, bashing Farungals with their meaty fists and rustic clubs. Leanan-Sidhe twirled and sliced with nearly the same grace as a Nazakian, and Glastigs bounded through the air to strike down monsters with their strong hooves. And above it all, a few giant birds flew.
“Let's go!” Captain Numaha shouted, and we got back to work.
But a horrible ache was starting to consume me, and I kept half my attention on the battle. This was the time; I knew it. I would be called upon soon. When a lamenting roar came from somewhere nearby, I turned toward it immediately. There, just forty feet away from us, was a group of Lions under attack from a much larger group of Farungals. Lions started to fall under the greater numbers, too far away from the rest of their army to attract the help they needed. And the Lion in the center of it all had a brilliant gold gem hanging below his mane.
The Lion Lord.
I would have recognized him even without that stone. I would have recognized the scene. It was the very one from my dream, with the addition of a few Lions and the subtraction of the bleak landscape. Other than that, it was a near replica of what I had seen every night for the past thirty years; the Farungals closing in around the Lion, him snarling and snapping, slicing out with his vicious claws as they readied an evil looking net. Several of the Lions around the Lion Lord had already been subdued with other nets and shifted back to their prime forms. They tore at the nets but couldn't get free. My jaw clenched as a Farungal gleefully stabbed one of them through the heart, and the Lion Lord roared in fury and agony. It was the heartbreak in his roar, the pain over his fallen comrade, that jolted me out of my daze and compelled me forward.
“Rieyu!” the Captain shouted.
I kept running.
“If you disobey this order, you are in breach of your contract! I will see to it that you are cast out! Do you hear me? You will be dead to your clan!”
Well, that was one way of getting out of my contract. I couldn't have turned back if I wanted to; the Gods had sent me on this mission, and I wouldn't fail them.
“Traitor!” she shouted after me. “You are Nazakian no more! Don't try to find your way home; you have no home to return to!”
Then my fellow Nazakians rowed out to sea, even my kin, leaving me to fight alone. I didn't have the time to process it; I was too focused on the Lion Lord. My swords slid free of their sheaths silently, and my body flowed into the motions that were as natural to it as breathing. I'm the only one of the Captain's guards who fights with two blades; the only one who spent an extra five years training with Master Kushara to learn the intricacies and advantages of using two swords at once. I knew I was a great asset to my people, but that didn't stop the Captain from abandoning me. It did, however, mean that even outnumbered, my addition to the group of overpowered faeries gave them a chance.
I knew what to avoid and strike at first on a Farungal. Most Nazakians wouldn't, but once I'd learned that the monsters in my dreams were Farungals, I read every book I could find on them and listened to every story told on foreign shores. They had poison in the barbs on their tails and venom in their fangs. So, the first thing I did was make a quick circuit of the monsters, spinning beneath their deadly claws and around their blades to lop off the tips of their tails. Farungals screamed as the Lions froze, watching me in shock before launching into action and making good use of the impediments I'd imposed on our enemies. A few went to help those who labored under the nets, freeing them so they could return to their lion forms.
My training came instinctively to me, sending me off the ground in graceful leaps to slice monster throats, spinning to kill several with one movement. I didn't have to bother with punching or kicking. My blades, both made of the finest Nazakian steel, were all I needed. Extensions of myself. With deft maneuvers, I worked them around my bending body like a windmill, the soft whir of their passage through the air comforting me. And where they went, blood followed.
It took us five minutes to kill the Farungals. Five. And by the time we were finished, my kin and captain were gone. I stared off toward the sea, where their rowboats were just nearing our ship, then sighed and flicked the blood from my blades with a sharp, simultaneous movement of both hands. Around me laid the bodies of too many Farungal to count and two faeries. My kills were easily distinguished from the rest by the precise cuts. Clean. Quick. Perfect. Master Kushara would have been proud. At least, he would have been proud of my skills. Maybe not so much of my disobedience and the dishonor it would bring my clan.
“Holy fucking shit,” one of the Lions exclaimed. “Did that just happen? Who the fuck is this guy?”
The Lion Lord stepped up to me, noble even among the gore that stained his paws, and bowed his massive head. “Thank you,” he said in Nazakian. “You just saved me from capture.”
“You speak Nazakian?” I asked in surprise as I sheathed my swords, both on my left hip.
“Your country has always fascinated me. I learned your language a long time ago. I'm a bit rusty, though.” He looked back over his shoulder; the battle was already winding down, and the Farungals were fleeing. “They were after me, in particular. It appears that the new Farungal Queen wants a Lion warlord to experiment on.” He swiveled that great head back to face me, his sapphire eyes so strange in that leonine face. “I was trying to protect my soldiers by leaving the battlefield, but I only played into their hands.”
“It was my honor to assist you, Lion Lord.” I bowed to him. And so it was done; my obligation to the Gods complete and the lion saved. The anxiety that had been plaguing me all day vanished.
“Do you have time to get to your ship?” the Lion Lord asked. “I don't see your people.”
“They have abandoned me,” I admitted. “I am stranded.”
“For helping me?”
I nodded crisply.
“I see. Then I am able to repay my debt.”
“You owe me nothing. I know the local language and have an able body; I will be fine.”
The Lion Lord chuckled. “Is my life so worthless to you?”
I flushed. “No, of course not.”
He nudged me with his nose. “I'm teasing you.” Then he regarded me somberly. “What's your name?”
“I am Rieyu Takahansi.” I bowed to him again. This time I used a bow more suited to an introduction.
“Thank you for your help, Rieyu. I am Kaelen Brimara,” he said. “Now, come with me. Such valor requires a reward.”
Fate settled her shivering hands on my shoulders as I let the Great Lion lead me through the battlefield and into his war camp. Reward. So, the Gods weren't finished with me yet.
