TWENTY-TWO
And so I found myself down at the river docks about to flee Vermillion by boat with a Viking once again. Same Viking, different boat.
I had argued long and hard that I should at least take a crack squad of troops, by which I meant a small army . . . or, if it were up to me, a large one. Garyus pointed out that any infantry would slow me down and were needed at the walls. The horde of dead men wandering the embers of the outer city still posed a substantial threat and there was no certain knowing that the Dead King would not return his attention to them or send another lichkin or unborn to focus their efforts.
“A fast horse will serve you better than two hundred men, and the queen took what little cavalry remains to us to Slov with her. Any riders we have left in Vermillion are needed as swift reserves to react to possible incursions.”
Garyus had directed that we should begin our journey by following the line of Grandmother’s advance into Slov. The trail of destruction should allow for relatively unhindered passage. He had had no word of his sister and reports of her death appeared to be wishful thinking on Uncle Hertet’s part. With any luck Grandmother would already have levelled the Lady Blue’s stronghold and killed the witch with her bare hands.
This of course led me to suggest that I then deliver the key into the Red Queen’s hands and let her see to its future, whether that lay in the Wheel of Osheim or around her neck. If it were to be the Wheel she would surely do a better job of it than me.
Garyus had contradicted me again. “You have qualities she lacks, Jalan. Necessary ones. You will run away. You will lie and cheat. My sister is more likely to fight and die. The only sure way this key is getting to Osheim is in the hands of someone as flexible and resourceful as you.”
Garyus’s talk of his sister had returned my thoughts to my own. In Hell Marco had revealed that the holiest of items might separate an unborn into the child’s soul and the lichkin that rode it. But Father’s seal was gone, his holy stone too, and a search of the Inner Palace had turned up nothing more holy than a gold cross blessed by the cardinal. I took it anyway. It was made of gold! But truth be told I suspected that being blessed by my father would probably have rendered it less holy rather than more.
All of which left me standing on a cold and misty riverbank thinking that if I really were flexible and resourceful I would have found a way out of this. It also left me clutching the side of my face.
“I think she loosened one of my teeth.” I probed with my tongue. “You look fine to me,” Snorri said, his gaze on the water. I’d had a guard bring Micha to me in one of the palace’s waiting rooms. She had come with Nia bawling in her arms, wearing the wornthrough look of a new parent overlayered with the long horror of the night. “Jalan?” She had been surprised to see me.
“Sit down, Micha.” I nodded to the couch opposite, an overstuffed confection from some Florentine master.
“What is it? It’s Darin! Tell me!” She stood, rooted to her mark, even Nia’s howls fading away to underscore the moment.
The words dried up in my mouth and I desperately wanted to be able to play deaf again. “He was very brave,” I said. I had plenty more I planned to say. I knew how I was going to declaim it, words regarding my brother’s heroism, words of comfort, words of encouragement for the future. But when it came to saying them to her—all I had were those four.
She had crumpled then, folded and gone to the floor, Nia still safe and silent in her arms. I had expected rage, questions, denials, but her grief just reached up and took her voice.
I had Alphons, from my father’s guard, lead her away to the ballroom where a number of soldiers watched over a growing collection of survivors from around the palace. Next I sent for Lisa. She walked in white-faced, cold-eyed, proud, as if I were the invader and she my captive.
I tried to deflect her toward the couch but she kept on coming until we stood almost nose to nose. My instinct has always been to deliver bad news at a distance and be ready to run.
“Two teeth, I think.”
“What?”
I took the fingers out of my mouth and repeated myself more clearly.
“Two teeth, I think.” I should have stuck with my instincts. Being honest and compassionate just gets you slapped so hard your teeth rattle. I didn’t even say Barras was dead, just that I’d lost sight of him in the battle and it didn’t look good . . .
“There’s the boat.” Snorri pointed to a darker patch of mist.
The blur resolved itself as it drew closer to the shore. A flat-bellied riverboat of the sort used to ferry livestock and goods across the Seleen or a short way up or downstream. Currently it held my stallion, Murder, and three other horses chosen for their endurance, the pair not immediately intended for riding laden with provisions and a tent.
Two boatmen leapt ashore and pulled the craft into the shallows so Snorri and I could board. The plan was to take us downstream beyond any danger from the city’s besiegers and put us on some safe stretch of riverbank so we could follow my grandmother’s trail to Slov. From there our path would take us through Zagre, north into the kingdom of Charland, and eventually back to Osheim.
Strangely, despite all the terror and the hopeless nature of our journey, the actual being on the move part felt pretty good. I’d missed Snorri. Not that I’d ever go as far as showing it. And now he was back and the world was slipping past us, I thought of Kara and the boy again. We’d spent so long travelling together as a four that being a two once more seemed to make their absence more palpable. As if it should be the völva’s hand on the tiller, and Hennan messing about with the ropes.
I joined Snorri in the prow as the boatmen pushed us back out into the current with long poles. “I told you the Wheel draws everyone back in the end.” That was how Nanna Willow had it. The Wheel would pull you in. Quick or slow, but in the end you’d come, thinking it was your idea, full of good reasons for it. And here we were, hundreds of miles away, full of good reasons, and aimed for the Wheel.
“Maybe so.” Snorri nodded. “Some things can’t be avoided.”
He said it lightly but I felt a weight behind it. Perhaps a lesson learned in Hell.
“Osheim has its teeth in you, Snorri. Deep. The old man just had to mention it and you were packing your bags. If it’s got this much of a hold on you across hundreds and hundreds of miles . . . what use will you be when we’re actually there?”
“I will do what needs to be done.”
He looked so grim, so determined, that I let the matter drop. Perhaps he knew something I didn’t. I didn’t ask. Snorri could keep his secrets— I had no appetite for stories from the deadlands—but maybe they waited for me anyway in the days to come, perhaps like the Wheel they stood in my path and could not be avoided.
Snorri still had a strangeness about him, that mixture of death and legend he’d carried with him back from beyond death’s door. We both stood, watching the dark waters of the Seleen escape the mist and vanish beneath our prow, neither of us talking.
The events of the past day unfolded themselves across the blank page offered by the river fog. The whiteness at first the smoke of Father’s pyre, twisting and rising, then the hot clouds billowing over the Appan Gate, thick with the screams of the dead and the dying amid an inferno of my making. I saw Darin’s face, shaped across the mist. Barras appeared too and I realized I couldn’t remember when I saw him last. Had he been with me when I led the charge to save Darin? I didn’t know. I had an image of him, wild-eyed, swinging his bloody sword amid a crowd of dead, but where and when it came from, and what happened after I couldn’t say. Lisa told me I’d let Barras die, abandoned him to his fate because he’d married her. I saw Martus there too, his face raised to me, as he was when I threw him my sword. He hadn’t been the best of brothers, and not the best of men either, but damn it, he was my brother, my mother’s son, and knowing he was gone left me hollow. The sword hung again at my side, the last point of contact between us.
What Snorri saw in the mists I couldn’t say, but neither of us spoke until the autumn sun unravelled the last white thread from the riverbanks. By that time the current had borne us ten miles and we’d seen no trace of the Dead King’s army at any point.
Murder, sensible horse that he was, proved to be terrified of boats and the process of getting him on to dry land without anyone getting kicked to death proved tricky. It wasn’t far off noon by the time all four steeds had been assembled ashore and we’d checked our gear. Garyus had foisted Luntar’s “box of ghosts” on me, saying it might prove useful in Osheim. I suspected he just didn’t want a box of ghosts any more than I did.
“What is that?” Snorri asked as I carried it away.
“That,” I said. “Holds the ghosts of a million Builders. Aslaug’s in there too.”
“I thought you locked her back in the dark place?” He didn’t look as worried as he should be.
“Well, not Aslaug, the woman who became Aslaug. Her ghost. It’s complicated.”
“Aslaug was human once? What about Baraqel? Is he in there too?”
“Probably. Don’t know. Don’t care. The thing gives me the creeps. None of them have anything useful to say anyway.”
I buried the box deep in a saddlebag on my back-up mount, a chestnut mare with the unreasonable name of Squire, and did my very best to forget about it.
Half an hour found us riding at a measured pace along the road to Verona, two gentlemen about their business on a day as pleasant as any autumn has to offer. The fields lay empty, the richness of their harvest gathered in, each farmhouse stood undisturbed, quiet in the fastness of the land, the honest folk of Red March about their duties. We passed a charcoal yard, a wagon at its gates filling up with sacks, a yellow dog on the step of the owner’s shack, too lazy to chase us. It seemed amazing that life passed so gently here, undisturbed by the horror at Vermillion. Looking back, I couldn’t even see the smoke of the outer city.
“I could almost feel safe out here.” The road wound past a copse of trees all burning with autumn’s fire, only the oaks held to their green against the distant threat of winter and even they were touched with gold. “Almost safe. At least with a good horse under me.” I slapped Murder’s neck. The night’s terror nibbled around the edges of my imagination but sunshine and open country helped me to do what I do best—lock all the bad stuff away and forget it for the moment. “There’s a good inn along this stretch of the road. I’m sure of it. We should stop and get some lunch. Roast pork and ale would do nicely.” The loss of a night’s sleep started to weigh on me, combining with the day’s warmth, and the thought of a good meal, to make me dozy. I fought to keep my eyes open, yawning wide enough to click my jaw.
The next turn of the road brought a sight so unexpected that every ounce of sleepiness dropped away, along with every trace of the sense of security that had been winding around me.
“A very little man on a very big horse, with a sword that’s too long for him,” Snorri stated the obvious.
“And a lot of friends.” I already had Murder turned most of the way around. Why Count Isen might be sat in our path at the head of a column of several hundred men I couldn’t say. The important thing was that I really didn’t want to know. Our duel might have been behind us, but I’d had extensive carnal knowledge of his wife, the eldest of the DeVeer sisters: no doubt the little bastard would find some new way to twist the fact against me.
Snorri leaned from his saddle and caught my reins. “This is your country, Jal. Aren’t these men yours to command?”
“He’s a count,” I said. “His loyalty is to the queen.” I tugged at Murder’s harness, trying to free us from the Northman’s grip. “He’s also a madman who hates me. So I plan on circumnavigating him with the help of some of the local lanes—cross-country if we need to—trust me, it’s not going to end well otherwise. Present ourselves and at the very best we’re delayed, more likely he murders us both.”
Snorri let go with a shrug. “When you put it like that . . .” He started to turn too, then paused. “Kara?”
I glanced back over my shoulder. There was a blonde woman standing in front of the first rank of foot soldiers, Isen on one side of her, four mounted knights to the other side. It couldn’t be Kara, though. “It’s not her.” I set off back along the way we’d come, Squire following dutifully on her rope.
“Prince Jalan!” Count Isen’s voice carried well on the still air. “I have two northlings here that claim to know you.”
“Hennan?” Snorri called out.
“Ah hell.” I turn Murder back. Making a break for it still seemed like the best idea but I knew I wouldn’t be taking Snorri with me, and I had a long, dangerous path ahead. “What do you want, Isen?”
“Perhaps you could do me the honour of approaching so we don’t have to shout down the road at each other like peasants.”
I had a bad feeling about the whole affair but advanced reluctantly, pulling up five yards shy of him. The infantry lining the road behind the count and his knights wore the Isen livery over light chainmail, their spears making a thicket above hundreds of iron skullcaps. Kara and Hennan stood in the shadow of the knights’ horses, both of them travelstained but in better shape than when I left them. It’s hard to look pleased and worried at the same time but the völva and the boy were doing a fine job of it.
Kara opened her mouth but Isen spoke before she got a word out. “I’ve been east, protecting the queen’s supply lines into Slov.” The little count kept those unforgiving beads he’d been given instead of eyes pointed firmly my way. “But word reached me that the city is under siege. Burning, even? I would have cursed the riders for liars but I could see the glow myself last night as we drew nearer.” A tight little smile flickered across Isen’s lips. “I must have been mistaken though. A prince of Red March would not be riding away from the city in its hour of peril!”
“The steward has sent us on an urgent mission.” I indicated Snorri since Isen had singularly ignored him. Perhaps he felt the very existence of so large a man an insult to the short measure allocated to him despite his high station. “And you have been correctly informed—Vermillion stands besieged and the outer city has been burned.”
“By God!” Count Isen stood up in his stirrups as if the news were too galling to take sitting down. “Who the hell would dare? Rhonish coming down the river is it? No! An Adoran revolt! I told Queen Alica a dozen times to watch her back. Any adventure to the east begs treachery in the west. And how in God’s name did they get to the capital so swiftly? Are our border guard so lightly thrown aside?”
“It’s the Dead King who attacks us,” I said. “The troops didn’t cross our borders—they’re the dead of Vermillion, risen from their graves, or from where they were slaughtered yesterday.” Isen opened his mouth, his expression telling me that it would be to object to what would have sounded like nonsense to me as well a year previously. I forestalled him with a raised hand. “Just believe it, Isen, I’m really too tired to argue. Or if you can’t believe then reserve your judgment until you get there—either way, you’ve seen the fire for yourself, so believe that your help is needed and get these men there as quickly as possible.” I drew a deep breath and redirected the conversation by pointing at Kara and Hennan. “So tell me: why is so high a man keeping such low company?”
“Come down off your horse, Prince Jalan, and we’ll discuss the matter.”
“Perhaps I didn’t stress the urgency of—”
Isen started to dismount as if I were just flapping my lips to pass the time.
“—urgency of my mission. I didn’t leave a city in the middle of an assault, a city I should add of which I happen to be marshal, so I could pass the time of day with every acquaintance—”
“Get off your horse, Prince Jalan, this won’t take long.” Count Isen beckoned Hennan forward, and finding him reluctant, went to the boy and set a hand to his shoulder. Hennan appeared to have grown a foot taller since I last set eyes on him and now stood a couple of inches taller than the count. “This young man seems to think rather well of you, my prince. You wouldn’t want to disappoint him, would you?” Isen steered those mad black insect’s eyes of his my way. Unlike his men he went unarmoured, his fur-trimmed cloak too warm for the weather. Leather gauntlets lay one across the other over the pommel of his saddle.
With a sigh I dismounted. Murder could surely outrun Isen’s knights but there’s something about being stared at by people who expect more of you . . . it’s rather like an anchor, a damned inconvenient anchor. Ignoring Isen, I strode across to Kara, looking rather fine in a plain linen road-dress, her hair in braids as it had been when we first met. The sun had finally darkened her skin and it suited her. “Kara.” I offered her my best smile.
“Thief!” Her slap caught me off guard.
“Ow! For godsake, Kara!” I reeled back, clutching my face. I could feel her handprint burning there in red, thankfully on the opposite side to the one Lisa had chosen. “Jesus!” Isen whacked me around the “Lisa’s side” of my face, swinging one of his heavy gauntlets—he had to stretch to reach but he put enough power in it to snap my head around, sending out a spray of spit and surprise. “Oh come on!” I bellowed, staggering away, hands raised in defence. “What the hell was that for?”
By way of answer Isen held up his thumb and forefinger, pinched together as if presenting something for my inspection. Through the tears in my eyes I could see something tiny and golden.
“What is it?” I wiped my mouth, finding my fingers bloody.
“A reason,” Isen said.
“It’s a fucking small reason!” I shouted.
“It looks like a sharp little piece of gold,” Snorri offered. I’d rather he just divided Isen into two even smaller pieces.
“It’s a splinter,” Isen said, speaking through gritted teeth. “I had it gold plated. Care to guess where I found it?”
“I’m thinking . . . when they stuck that stick up your arse.” The pain in my face made me temporarily forget that he had several hundred men lined up behind him—though I was gratified to see quite a few of them battling to keep a smile from their lips.
“I discovered it under my scalp a month after you hit me from behind with a tree branch. Finding it returned the memory of the incident to me. And now, sir, we shall conclude the matter that should have been settled at the roadside many months ago.” He drew the gleaming length of his sword. Seeing him there with that same mad look in his eye, his lips pressed in a thin and murderous line beneath his grey moustache, made me remember just how fast he was with a blade and how much I didn’t want to face him again.
I drew myself to my full height, keeping my hand well clear of my sword hilt, and tried for haughty dignity. “I’ll grant you that some blow has scrambled your wits, Isen, but it was none of mine. I’ve no time for your games and no intention of being side-tracked from such urgent business.”
“Speechify all you like, Prince Jalan, but by God you will not leave this spot until I have had my satisfaction.”
By which the lunatic clearly meant, dead and slung over a horse. I racked my brains, while stepping backward.
“If he tries to run ride him down, Sir Thant!” The little count knew me too well.
Even if Snorri cut one knight down he couldn’t get them all. Plus he expected me to fight Isen. He probably thought my reluctance was on account of the man’s stature.
“Since I’m challenged I get to choose the weapons.” An extensive knowledge of duelling might save me yet.
“Swords!” Isen replied, both eyebrows elevating to quite a remarkable degree. “What else is there? No gentlemen would have at each other with peasants’ weapons like the axe or scythe!”
Snorri growled, but made no move. I rubbed at my aching jaw a moment. Isen would refuse any weapon beneath his station and be within his rights. I could feel the imprint of his gauntlet on my cheek, and it gave me an idea. “Fisticuffs!” I said, balling both hands and raising them.
“What?” Isen leaned forward, craning his neck as if he thought he’d misheard.
“Fisticuffs! The sport of kings,” I said. “No gouging, no biting, no blows below the belt.” I knew from painful experience that they taught the art to young princes, and I imagined young countlings were not excused the rigours of such an education either.
“I’m not going to brawl on Her Majesty’s road like some drunken commoner—”
“Have a care, Isen. My grandmother encourages the pugilistic art in the very highest of circles—I trust you aren’t going to criticize her judgment any more than you would deny the challenged party the age-old right of choosing his weapons.” I brandished both fists. “And here they are!” I didn’t exactly relish the prospect but I’d beaten a few opponents into the dust in my time, and Isen fulfilled one of my acceptance criteria, standing no taller than your average twelve-year-old boy.
Isen scowled. “If I must beat you to death with my bare hands, Prince Jalan, then that is exactly what I will do.” He passed his sword up to Sir Thant, of whom I could see little but a beard bristling below his pot helm and fierce eyes glinting in the shadows behind a visor.
“Well and good.” He had big balls, I gave him that. I’d expected him to bluster and call the whole thing off.
I passed my sword to Snorri in its scabbard. “Your dagger too.” Snorri motioned with his eyes to my other hip. “I’ve seen men stab each other in brawls without meaning to—once the blood gets up instincts take over.”
I clenched my teeth and managed to thank him through them whilst handing over my knife.
The knights rode into position so as to mark out the four corners of a fighting ground and the front ranks of Isen’s command filed around to watch, completing the square. Snorri loomed over the soldiers on one side, frowning.
“Well . . . all right then,” I said, squaring up to my opponent and feeling slightly embarrassed. Somewhere in the sea of faces Kara and the boy would be watching. I wasn’t sure that flattening a half-crazed midget would raise me in their estimation.
Isen came at me, fists raised, ducking and bobbing like some enraged chicken. Somewhat embarrassed for both of us, I took a swing at him, knowing I had at least a foot more reach, not to mention two or three decades and seventy pounds. The little maniac ducked under my arm and surged up to loose a flurry of blows at my stomach and ribs. It felt rather like being struck by small iron mallets. Iron mallets, small or large, are incredibly painful. Yelping, I leapt away, only to find him bearing down on me immediately.
“Steady on . . . I don’t want to hurt you.” The jab I threw his way had everything I could muster behind it. Isen blocked the punch on both his fists, just before his face, then hit me in the wrist with a vicious uppercut before I could pull my arm back. It hurt like fuck and left my wrist aching.
I glanced at Snorri for inspiration. He mimed a punch, and I turned back to find Isen doing exactly that. At nearly full stretch he struck me on the jaw. It felt as if my head had exploded: I saw lights flash, the world spin, and a bone-rattling reunion with the ground allowed me to deduce that some falling had been involved too. Lifting my head and squinting I could make out two smaller figures advancing on me. Was I really going to end my illustrious career by being beaten to death by midgets?
A shake of my head reunited the two images of Count Isen as he closed on me. All the parts of me hurt and I lay still while he paced around me.
“Confess your crimes, Prince Jalan!” he roared. “You pressed your unwanted and degenerate attentions on my sweet Sharal!”
I stared up at the sky, hoping his theatrics would let me get some much-needed air into my lungs. Around the periphery of my vision I could see Isen continue to stalk around me as if I were some trophy kill, an eighteen point stag he’d brought down on some hunt perhaps.
“Confess your crimes! You forced yourself on my innocent—”
I swept my arm out taking Isen’s feet from under him. He fell backwards, landing heavily as I sat up.
“I fucked her!” I got to my feet as Isen rolled to his front. “But she wasn’t an innocent.” I stooped down and grabbed the back of Isen’s belt in one hand, the back of his collar in the other. “And she liked it!” The last with a roar as I hoisted him above my head, holding him firm despite his struggles.
Isen bucked like a fish on deck but I held him. “Yield!”
“It’s to the death, you fool!”
He might have been a small fellow but already it was starting to feel as though I had a full-grown man held above my head.
“Death is a permissible outcome but either party may still choose to accept if the other party yields.” I quoted from my extensive knowledge of duelling regulation.
“Well I don’t yield!” Isen shouted. I could imagine the froth around his moustache.
“I can drop you on my knee and break your back. You realize that?”
“Do your worst, despoiler!”
I was sure someone must have swapped Isen for Snorri: it was the only way to explain how heavy he had become. I had to rest some of his weight on my head to relieve my arms. “Two of the DeVeer sisters have been widowed since the last sunset,” I said, through teeth gritted with effort. “I’m loathe to widow the third.” Then, too quietly for the crowd to hear, I hissed, “And if you don’t yield I’m going to put you over my knee and spank you before your troops.”
A deathly silence followed, during which I barely managed to keep him aloft. If he’d struggled he would have broken free and I would have been too weakened to fend him off—but in the end it was the threat to his dignity rather than his life that scared him.
“I yield.”
I did my best not to drop him but the effect was pretty similar. “Isen yields!” I shouted it loud enough for everyone to hear and stepped away sharply while two of his captains hurried forward to help him up. I would have lifted my arms in victory but right then even reaching up to scratch my nose would have been a labour of Hercules.
Isen shook off his knights and came striding toward me. I tried not to flinch or beg him not to hit me again. Instead I played on the role of bold, brave, bluff Jalan, hoping that a sufficiently convincing performance would erase the memory of me being flattened by a single punch and lying at the count’s mercy.
“Honour is settled, Isen, and at least one of the DeVeer sisters still has a husband. Count your blessings, and remember that Sharal is the greatest of them.”
Count Isen’s mouth twisted with all the harsh words he wanted to let loose in my direction, but like old nobility he bit down on it and followed protocol. “Settled.”
Lowering my voice for just his ears. “Do your duty. Vermillion needs you. Play your cards right and you could come out of this a hero. You might find the dead wandering close to the city—in small numbers it would be a chance to let your men adjust to the idea and to develop your tactics. Spears are not the best weapon.”
“The dead are truly risen?” Isen chewed at his lip, staring into the distance over the heads of his men.
“You need to get messengers into the city to coordinate with the new marshal. Send them in by river—watch out for mire-ghouls, they swim and use envenomed darts. Your men will be more useful inside the walls so getting them in will be the first task . . .”
Isen favoured me with a hard stare, perhaps reevaluating me, though from his expression it could be in either direction. He raised his hand and shouted, “Move out!” He walked briskly to the roadside and men hurried out of his path. From the embankment he beckoned the Norse to him then waved his knights on. Snorri, Kara and Hennan came to stand beside us as the spearmen started to march past. Sir Thant led the count’s steed over, Murder immediately snorting a challenge at the larger horse.
“I’ll leave these foreigners in your care, Prince Jalan. My agents found them on the Roma Road heading north and since they were the only link I had to finding you after your remarkable disappearing act.” He shot me a dark look. “I extended the hospitality of my house to them. The woman mumbles a lot of heathen gibberish.” He nodded toward Kara as if she were incapable of understanding Empire tongue. “Claimed you and the other had descended into the underworld!” Isen managed to combine disgust and amusement in a single snort. “But she knows some tricks and said she would be able to find you when you got closer . . . and she did! In any event, they’re your responsibility now. Release them, have them incarcerated as spies, or turn them over to the inquisition—whatever you choose.”
Isen turned and mounted his monstrous horse, a feat that required several more steps than is traditional. He turned in his saddle and regarded us all from on high. “We won’t speak of this again.”
A shake of reins and the count left us, Sir Thant trotting after him toward the head of the column. We watched him go, silent for a long moment.
“So.” I turned back to Kara and Hennan. “Did you miss me?”