Valista (The Valista Trilogy Book 1) Read online

  Copyright @ 2021 by B. Lynn Harris

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by an information storage and retrieval system-except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review to be printed in a magazine, newspaper, or on the Web without permission in writing from the publisher.

  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Cover Artist: Leslie Ray, 2021

  Dedication

  To my husband, Ed, who never blinks at my nutty ideas, even when I said I wanted to write a novel.

  And to the best critique group a writer ever had—Writer2Writer, without whom this book wouldn’t be more than a Word file on my computer. Thanks, ladies, for the support, encouragement, and technical expertise.

  ONE

  Why wasn’t it you?

  Her father’s words were a well-honed blade through her heart.

  Kneeling beside his pallet on the floor, Adanya blotted his feverish brow with a damp cloth. His body shuddered as he coughed, a wet sound, and blood spattered on his lower lip. She washed the red droplets away, something she’d done for weeks since he couldn’t, and rinsed the rag in a bowl of red-tinged water.

  Why wasn’t it you?

  She swiped her sleeve over her own sweaty brow, despising the shadow that haunted her. Father had only said it once, on the day chosen to celebrate her birth, staring at her with eyes blurry from cactus wine. It was eleven years ago, when she’d been barely five, but she remembered his voice, thick with alcohol and torment. He hadn’t accepted life as it was—a wretched daughter but no wife, his beloved lost to childbirth.

  She’d mended his clothes. Cooked his favorite meals. Sheared their sheep and traded their wool while he’d blunted his pain in drink. It had never been enough. He’d never wanted her.

  Yet she did all she could to hold on to him.

  Staccato raps sounded on their door. She closed her eyes and whispered a silent prayer of gratitude. The village healer. She’d seen fit to come.

  Adanya hurried across the packed-dirt floor and opened the door. The healer’s dark hair was streaked with gray and pulled into a ponytail wrapped with leather twine, leaving her lined face in clear view. Her expression was aloof, but her emotions tripped through Adanya’s body as if they were her own and left a bitter taste on her tongue. Disdain. Scorn.

  Keeping her own face composed, Adanya stepped from the threshold. “Please come in.”

  The healer entered, her satchel slung over her shoulder. She glanced around their mud hut with a grimace, and Adanya’s gaze followed hers. A single room. Thread-bare rugs. Sleeping pallets on the floor. The stench of sickness. No majestic desert scenes painted on their walls. No finely woven linens to soften their sleep. Nothing like the lavish quarters of a healer.

  Adanya’s lips tightened—she knew it was sparse. She didn’t need the healer to remind her.

  Her guest knelt by Father and rested a hand on his forehead. The faint flicker of their fire illuminated the goddess tattoo at the pulse point on her neck. A promise of fidelity to their deity and to their people. A tattoo Adanya had never gotten.

  Opening her satchel, the healer retrieved a poppet crafted from coarse fabric with a simple painted face and placed the doll on Father’s chest. She slid a necklace from inside her shirt, kissed the dark, jadeite stone lashed to its leather tie, and set it on the doll.

  Adanya wrapped her fingers around her own necklace. The Honani carried them, these green minerals found in the mountains far to the north. They kept them close for comfort and small healings, but the healer used a large one, one free of imperfections. From across the room, its pulsing energy thumped against Adanya’s skin, dwarfing the gentle throb of her own stone.

  The healer rested a hand on her gem, another on Father’s chest. She chanted in the ancient language of their people, using the stone as a conduit to remove the sickness from Father and transfer it to the poppet.

  The stone’s pulsating rhythm escalated with her words, and what it sucked from Father had a dark, malevolent tang to it. Adanya didn’t want to taste it, to experience everything Father and the healer did. This was a gift from the goddess she would gladly return.

  Father twitched on his pallet and, with more energy than he’d displayed in weeks, pushed at the healer’s hand on the doll. “No,” he muttered.

  The healer hastened her chant, louder, more insistent. Father flailed his hand once more before it dropped to his side. His head lashed back and forth, seeming to reiterate his disapproval before that, too, stopped.

  Father’s emotions slammed into Adanya, and she shrank away until her back hit the wall of their hut. Oh, blessed goddess, he didn’t want healing. He wanted to die.

  Her breath came in ragged gasps. He couldn’t leave her alone, with no one, no family. He just couldn’t.

  The healer’s chant fell silent. She lifted her necklace from Father and placed it around her neck. She picked up the poppet and drew the blanket over Father’s thin chest.

  Turning to Adanya, she held out the doll. “I’ve transferred what sickness I could.”

  Adanya’s eyes were glazed over, not wanting to see what was so obvious. She didn’t move, her fists tight to her thighs.

  “Adanya,” the healer called, her tone harsh.

  Adanya. She didn’t hear her name often. It was ironic she carried it. It meant ‘Her father’s daughter.’ Her aunt’s choice when Father had rebuffed his newborn.

  Father never used it. He called her Girl.

  “Adanya,” the healer repeated, stepping into her line of site. A deep frown creased her face. “It is not good,” she said. She forced the poppet into Adanya’s hand. “Burn this to cleanse your hut.”

  Adanya managed to nod. Sensing the healer’s eagerness to be done with this business, Adanya retrieved a bag of wool for payment she’d placed beside the door. The healer hurried away as all villagers did when forced to visit them. Father’s angry outbursts and erratic behavior had driven them away years ago.

  Clutching the doll in her hand, Adanya took the few steps to the fire and tossed the poppet into the flames. It crackled and hissed when it ignited. Its smoke turned a bright green and formed a tornadic vapor that swirled out the smoke hole in the ceiling. The poppet disintegrated into ash.

  When she returned to her father, his dark eyes were open. She dampened the cloth in the bowl and mopped his face and chest. His gaze, glassy with fever, locked onto hers, and he muttered, “Farai.”

  She froze at the use of her mother’s name. Before his illness, he’d often lamented how much she resembled her—the same almond-shaped eyes, the same thick ebony hair—his anguish seeping from every pore.

  His emotion was different now. He stroked her hair, hand trembling. “My Farai. So beautiful. I’m coming, kochanie. I’m coming.”

  Sweetness exploded on her tongue, a sweetness she’d tasted only from those savoring the truest love. She squeezed her fingers around the cloth. This emotion was not for her.

  Why wasn’t it you?

  Father’s chest constricted, and blood spewed from his lips. She blotted the mess, but it kept coming, more than ever before, until he lay back on the pallet. He looked at her with a brilliant smile, and his eyes closed. He released a long, gurgling exhale. His chest didn’t rise again.

  She pressed her fingers against his goddess tattoo at the pulse point on his neck. There was no answering thump
against them.

  ∞∞∞

  Adanya slipped out their open door into the desert sunshine. Leaning against their hut, she closed her eyes and sucked in the fresh air, the dry heat as familiar as her own skin. The sounds of their village drifted to her ears. Women bargaining at the market. The rhythm of small feet at play. An occasional old man’s laugh. Sounds so normal they made her chest ache.

  Life went on.

  A hint of a breeze brought the familiar smell of hay and dung from their barn. Keeping their sheep close by guarded against predators. Their neglected flock needed her attention. She had a pregnant ewe to watch.

  The weight of Father’s death kept her still.

  A rare sound of hoof beats pried her eyes open. Two warriors rode the village’s allotted horses not far from her hut. Goats crying in distress were tied across the mounts in front of the riders and bulging burlap bags dangled from the horses’ flanks.

  This was happening more often. Drought and crop failure had forced people from outlying areas into their village. Hunger was driving raids on enemy Andvari farms. The Honani leader, The First, allowed the village’s two warriors to do this task. The rest of their young men trained with her deep in the desert, leaving those along the border—old men, women, and children—defenseless against Andvari reprisals.

  The riders stopped in front of the village chief’s home and dismounted. Adanya’s neighbors congregated around the men, their voices loud and animated, congratulating the warriors on their success. A young woman her age, Zandela, pushed through the throng and pulled the warrior Jai’s head down for a kiss.

  The other warrior, Nikhil, eyed the pair and shook his head with a smile. A braid in his long hair displayed several colorful beads, indicating an accomplished warrior. A jagged scar from his eye to his jaw blazed crimson in the heat. Though it marred his handsome face, he wore the scar with pride. He’d earned it fighting the Andvari.

  He slapped Jai on the back and entered the chief’s hut with the bags. Jai broke the kiss and stroked Zandela’s face.

  The couple’s passion thrummed in Adanya’s chest like a tribal drum, like Father’s toward her mother just moments before. The sweet flavor on her tongue was the same as when the pair bonded the week before, a ritual that sealed their energies together for a lifetime. Though it hurt to watch this love that was not hers, she couldn’t take her eyes from them until he stepped out of Zandela’s embrace, untied the goats, and led them toward the community barn where they kept the food they shared.

  As they dispersed, her neighbors chattered about how much better their food rations would be with the fruitful raid. An older woman congratulated Zandela on her new mate.

  Adanya retreated toward their hut, exhausted from the onslaught of other people’s emotions, but the sound of multiple horses at a gallop whipped her attention toward the village outskirts. The animals raced forward, raising a cloud of dust.

  These were not Honani riders.

  Oh goddess. The Andvari had avoided their desert in the four generations since they’d isolated the Honani here, only entering to exact what they called ‘justice.’

  They’d followed the warriors, and now they would all pay.

  The ambient noise of the village turned to screams and shouts—mothers to their children, husbands to their wives. Run. Hide. A glance at Father’s dead body locked her in place. She couldn’t leave him, not even now.

  Andvari soldiers, at least a dozen, thundered past her on massive horses, forcing her against the wall of her hut. She covered her face and coughed against the dirt they kicked up. The horses stopped in the village square, and the soldiers dismounted and drew their swords, the ring of metal loud even in the chaos. They turned to a curly-haired, blond man still astride his mount, and he barked orders and gestured toward the village huts.

  The soldiers disbursed, and a man with the bright red hair found only in Andvar charged toward her. He seized her by the arm and jerked her up against his sweaty chest, his pungent body stench curling her nose. He wrenched her arms behind her and locked her wrists in his hand. She stumbled as he dragged her into her hut. His hatred tasted rancid on her tongue.

  Pulling her with him, he crossed to Father’s pallet and whipped the blanket from him.

  “No scar,” the man muttered.

  Goddess preserve us. Father has no scar, but Nikhil does.

  The man’s disgust erupted like an entity in the room. “Don’t you bury your dead?”

  Still holding her arms, he stomped from her hut, and she tripped along with him. Screams rocked the village, and the same scene played out across the square. The soldiers hauled old men, women, and children from their homes, some with daggers held at their necks. Their fear prickled along her skin, matching her own, and her heart thrashed against her ribs.

  The red-haired soldier yanked her toward the village chief’s hut where the other Andvari men and their captives were converging. The village chief joined them in the plaza, her face impassive.

  Their leader slid from his mount. He put his hand on his sword, the hilt glinting precious silver in the sunlight, and marched to their chief. “Where are they?”

  She stared at him and said nothing.

  The Andvari leader wiped a sleeve over his sweat-dotted brow, his face flushed. He glanced among the hostages and nodded to the soldiers. The grip on her wrists tightened, and a blade nicked her neck.

  She gritted her teeth, unwilling to cry out. Oh, Father, hold a place for me with the goddess.

  The Andvari leader turned to the village chief. “How many of you must die before you tell me? Where are they?”

  The leader scanned the group. She would easily sacrifice Adanya to save the warriors, but the other captives were in danger, too. Her eyes hardened, but her shoulders dropped. “One in the barn and one in here.”

  Three soldiers released their hostages and walked toward the barn. Two more followed her into her hut. Furniture crashed as the soldiers threw it aside.

  Her root cellar. She’d hidden Nikhil there.

  Crockery broke, and there was a string of Andvari curses. The man holding her tightened his grip on her wrists, and her hands numbed. The soldiers dragged a struggling Nikhil from the hut, the village chief following close behind. Her face was stern, and she whispered to the warrior. The soldiers shoved Nikhil to his knees, and one yanked a leather rope from his belt and pulled Nikhil’s hands behind him, lashing them together.

  The three soldiers returned from behind the hut with Jai and the two goats. When Jai saw Nikhil on the ground, he flailed against the soldiers. His terror ripped through her, leaving an acrid bite on her tongue. A soldier clubbed him with the handle of his sword, and she flinched as Jai dropped to the dirt, unconscious.

  Zandela cried out and tried to go to him, but her neighbors held her. The chief raised her hand to signal quiet. The soldier tied Jai, hands and feet.

  The Andvari flung the warriors on their bellies over the village’s only horses. Nikhil’s pouch, the one that held his stone, dropped to the ground, and Adanya gasped. A soldier retrieved it. “A souvenir from a successful mission,” he said with a grin and slid it into his pocket.

  The Andvari leader glanced at his men. “Release the hostages. We have what we came for.”

  The red-haired soldier freed her hands and joined the others at their mounts. She rubbed her bruised wrists and dabbed at the blood on her neck with her sleeve.

  A baby cried, and the mother shushed it, her fear slicing into Adanya, whipping her already over-sensitive emotions, and her heart rent. Nikhil needed a stone now more than ever. Shoving aside her neighbors, she rushed through the soldiers toward him, sliding her cherished necklace from her neck. But before she reached him, a strong hand grabbed her arm and jerked her to a stop.

  Energy pulsed from that hand, tripping up her arm, and she shuddered. She looked at the man holding her, their leader. A sweat-soaked curl lay on his brow above bright blue eyes that didn’t leave hers. He grabbed her other hand
, the one with the necklace, and said, “No.”

  His face was hard, and his look cut through her resolve, and yet it was her own emotions that threw her into tumult. The sweetest taste she’d ever experienced erupted on her tongue. The shock almost brought her to her knees. It was a flavor she knew was hers and not a reflection of someone else’s devotion.

  No, no, no. She loathed this man for what he and his soldiers were doing. He was taking their warriors, relegating them to starve. He was the enemy.

  But instead of a hard knot of hatred, her heart was melting, opening, reaching for him.

  His eyes widened as if he too felt something, but he shoved her back, stealing her necklace as he did. She lunged for it, but the red-haired soldier cut between her and the leader. He backhanded her, causing her head to snap, and lights spark behind her eyes.

  She rubbed her jaw and unwanted tears rolled down her cheeks, but she locked eyes with their leader. He didn’t move, and he wiped the emotion from his face, but she felt it. From the others, there was fiery hatred and contempt. From him, the emotion was different—he was distressed by her assault.

  He broke from her stare and mounted his horse, her necklace still clutched in his fist, and the other soldiers followed. The goats were secured in front of two men. The last soldier exited the chief’s hut with the bulging bags in one hand and a lit torch held high in the other. He gave the sacks to another man and mounted his horse.

  The Andvari leader addressed the crowd. “Heed this warning. Your raids into Andvar stop today. You are in violation of your expulsion. We are confiscating these horses and arresting these criminals. We will return for any who trespass on Andvari land.”

  A wail rose from Zandela, and she fell to her knees. They would never see these warriors again.

  The leader kicked his horse, and, as a unit, they turned to go, forcing Adanya to step away. Quickening to a trot, they scattered the villagers. But before the horses had taken many steps, the soldier holding the torch circled back. He hurled the fire on the chief’s thatched roof, and it burst into flames. An uproar rose from the crowd, and people rushed for buckets.