Coldmarch

by Daniel A. Cohen

  Down at the bottom of the steep valley was a stout shack huddling in shadow. Attached to the side was a small wooden stable, a beige snout poking out, dipping into a water trough.

  Is that a hound? I thought, trying to pick out any red eyes through the haze. Did the Vicaress beat us here?

  ‘You see that?’ Shilah asked, nodding down, clarity in her voice returning. ‘I think it’s a camel.’

  ‘It’s alive,’ Cam said. ‘Which means someone must be home.’

  Shilah grabbed my wrist and drew out three more pulls of poison and blood, but I couldn’t feel her lips this time.

  ‘Yrr gong to be okay,’ she said, wiping her mouth.

  My legs began to buckle. I turned to Cam, pointing to the Coldmaker, thinking maybe Ice could help. I was taken aback by the sight of my arm, which was riddled with sweat. Like the boiling bubbles that ran along the top of the Singe.

  Shilah pinched the skin on the back of my neck, jolting me out of the fog. ‘Stop being dramatic. You’re going to be okay. I’m not going to Langria without you. And I’m going to Langria.’

  She was stronger than I thought, or maybe I was stronger, because we made it to the bottom of the valley without me falling over and passing out, the land growing more solid the deeper we traversed. I knew I needed to stay awake, to keep from death’s alleyway, or I’d be gone forever.

  ‘No green mark over the door,’ Cam said as we stepped in front of the shack. ‘You think this is the right shack?’

  ‘Are you kidding me?’ Shilah asked, pounding the door with the palm of her hand. ‘You see any other shacks around?’

  I wasn’t able to peel my eyes away from the stable. The snout poked out further, revealing a beast with kind eyes, accentuated with long, thick eyelashes and knotted tufts of fur awning its forehead. The creature reminded me of a camel, but it was much smaller, the tufts at its neck lumpier. It’s head only reached my chin, and it stuck out a pink tongue playfully, wiggling it in my direction.

  I stuck mine out as well, but I couldn’t get it to wiggle.

  Shilah pounded the door again.

  ‘You ever see one of those before?’ I asked my friends, smiling at the beast. I much preferred this creature to the hounds that were probably still on our trail. ‘I think it wants to be friends.’

  No one answered me.

  The words were only in my head.

  ‘The secret is tears,’ I whispered silently to the camel. ‘Isn’t that funny?’

  ‘That’s not the only secret,’ the camel responded, ruffling its furry neck. ‘I know your name.’

  I laughed, wondering why only I could hear the little camel.

  ‘He doesn’t look so good,’ Cam said, snapping his fingers in my face. ‘Micah, you still with us?’

  Cam’s face was a beige smear.

  Shilah kicked at the door now. ‘Hello! Please, we need your help!’

  The door opened just a crack, enough for us to find a very sharp arrow pointing at Shilah’s forehead.

  ‘No,’ a gruff voice inside the shack said.

  ‘Yes,’ the camel whispered.

  Down at our feet a heavy smoke curled out of the opening of the door. The black cloud was like an old scar. A shameful part of me wanted to drop to my stomach and start huffing, as it would certainly make the journey to my death more pleasant.

  What’s the opposite of penance? I wondered to myself.

  ‘We’re here for the Coldmarch,’ Shilah said, unafraid and standing tall.

  The arrow lowered to point at her mouth.

  A pause from inside, the smoke continuing to escape. ‘No.’

  ‘No what?’ Shilah asked.

  ‘That’s not a real thing. I never heard of no blasted Coldmarch.’

  ‘Mama Jana sent us,’ Shilah said. ‘And my friend here has been bitten by a Sobek. We need your help.’

  The arrow shook. ‘He’ll live. Tell him to suck it up. Least it’s not a sand-viper.’

  Shilah grabbed the severed lizard tail out of her pocket and held it up. ‘It was a baby.’

  ‘Well, you shouldn’t have been out in the sands if you didn’t want to get bit. Go back to your barracks and get medicine there, damned Jadans.’

  Even through my fog of panic I found it interesting that he used the word ‘Jadans’ instead of slaves.

  Cam nudged Shilah out of the way, stepping in front of the arrow and puffing up in the haughty way at which High Nobles tended to excel. I wanted to laugh, as the billowy green flutter-robes wasn’t helping to toughen his image.

  ‘Sir, I’m Camlish Tavor, first in line for my House, and I’m escorting these Jadans on the Coldmarch.’

  ‘No such thing as a Coldmarch,’ the voice growled. ‘Now take your spoiled, High Noble ass back to your daddy, Tavor.’

  The miniature camel began grunting loudly in its stable, the overhanging tuft of fur on its forehead spilling into its eyes.

  ‘Hush, Picka!’ the man grunted. ‘Thisn’t none of your business.’

  Picka, I thought with a grin as I wandered over to it, looking into its long face. What a fine name for a talking camel. Hello, Picka.

  ‘Hello. Thank you,’ the camel said with a smirk in its eyes. ‘Micah.’

  ‘My friends call me Spout,’ I said with a bow, wondering if the camel was pronouncing my name funnily on purpose, or if it just couldn’t make the sounds with its large, lolling tongue. ‘You can call me Spout. It reminds me of my father.’

  Shilah caught me under the arms as I fell, keeping me upright. I glanced down and saw that my feet were now two large sweat bubbles.

  ‘Look, sir,’ Cam said, giving an arrogant bow. ‘I appreciate your discretionary behaviour, obviously a necessity for such a position as yours, but we know very well that you’re Split the—’

  The arrow released, impaling the bag on Cam’s shoulder. I imagined most of our supplies had just been compromised in one single blow.

  ‘Drat,’ the man said with a menacing tone. ‘Missed.’

  ‘Please, won’t you help us, sir?’ Cam asked with a gulp.

  ‘No such thing as a Coldmarch,’ the voice inside warned, grunting a few times before another arrow appeared. ‘And I’m pretty sure I don’t miss twice.’

  I wanted to reach out and touch the arrow to see if it was actually dripping with honey, or if that was just my imagination.

  ‘You dare threaten someone of House Tavor?’ Cam asked, aghast.

  A silver token hopped out of the crack in the door, landing on the ground with the crest face up. I hadn’t seen a coin like that since the days of endless errands as a Street Jadan, and all of a sudden I was back on my corner, the Vicaress parading around a group of my chained, young, and scared kin.

  ‘You dare bother someone from House Suth?’ the voice inside said in an imitation of Cam’s arrogant tone. ‘You hold no sway here, boy.’

  The camel gave a throaty grumble, broken in frantic brays.

  The arrow pointed down at Shilah’s throat. ‘I’m closing the door now.’

  Cam’s face was all fire. ‘Sir, I demand you lower your weapon and talk to us about the Coldmarch.’

  The smoke at our ankles had stopped drifting out. ‘Scarabs on your shitty demands, Tavor.’

  ‘Please,’ Cam said, breaking into panic. ‘We went through the tunnels beneath her shop, we saw the red alder—’

  ‘Say it, Micah,’ Picka whispered to me. ‘Remember? You should say it now.’

  I heard my father’s voice beneath the words of the camel, which was disconcerting, but didn’t stop me from taking the advice.

  My throat opened just long enough to allow the prayer. ‘Shemma hares lahyim—’

  The arrow swung to me, pointed right between my eyes.

  ‘You don’t finish that sentence, slave!’

  At least the words were real this time, and not just in my mind.

  More importantly I’d struck a chord, his words cracked with emotion down the middle. I had to use my tongue before
it hopped out of my mouth and grew wings.

  ‘Shemma hares lahyim criyah—’

  ‘I mean it!’ The man was at full alarm. ‘Not another word, or I shoot!’

  Shilah reached over and put a hand on my lower back to get me to stop, but I knew what I had to do, even if my vision was slowly narrowing to a pinpoint, and my arm felt as if it had been buried at the bottom of the dunes.

  ‘Shemma hares lahyim criyah Meshua ris yim slochim.’

  ‘DAMN EVERYTHING TO BLEACHED BONES AND SHRIVELLED TONGUES, FINE!’

  The arrow disappeared and the door was flung open by way of a swift boot kick. The man stormed out, revealing a paunchy stomach, thin and wispy hair, and a nose that was craggier than our way back to Paphos. After closer inspection, I realized this man was also another beige smear. Everything was beige now, actually.

  ‘Fine. The Coldmarch is real,’ the smudge said. ‘I’m Split the Pedlar. Is that what you want to hear, you little brats? Years of peace you just upended. Now get your friend inside and—’

  Beige went black.

  Chapter Six

  ‘In your opinion,’ I said, putting the vial marked ‘Gales breath’ back in its potion slot, ‘what are the most important ones to know?’

  Leroi crossed his arms, something the Head Tinkerer did quite often. ‘All of them.’

  ‘No, I know that,’ I said, turning away from the cabinet full of solutions and giving him a smile. ‘But I mean the most important specifically for inventing.’

  Leroi gave me an incredulous look, raising an eyebrow.

  I selected the next vial, marked ‘Crushed Marjoram’, and tapped at the bright green powder, a colour I’d only ever seen in Noble eyes. ‘I know it’s important to recognize them all, but we can’t really use everything for inventing. So what I meant is, what are the things in this cabinet to focus on for our line of work?’

  Leroi sat back on his chair and crossed one leg over the other, giving a ponderous scratching of his goatee, looking around the Tavor tinkershop. ‘What is it that you think we do, Spout?’

  ‘Make things,’ I said with a shrug. ‘With metal, and gears, and Cold Charges.’

  ‘And that’s it?’

  I shrugged. ‘Obviously not, but you know what I mean.’

  ‘Course I do. But just because you’re Jadan don’t think I’m going to take it easy on you.’

  I laughed. ‘I don’t think that’s ever been the case.’

  Leroi spread his rough facial hair down at the corners of his moustache. I expected him at least to smile at my joke, but his eyes had become distant and heavy. ‘I imagine that’s true.’

  I nodded, taking out the next vial, with was filled with preserved newtworms from the Hotland Delta. I shook the glass, wondering how much better Jadankind would be if, like these slimy creatures, we didn’t need Cold to survive. I wondered how much Leroi had already experimented with these life forms, trying to discover their secrets.

  ‘What you have to remember,’ Leroi said, ‘is that you will never be finished learning. You will never have only certain things to focus on.’

  I put the newtworm vial back. ‘What do you mean?’

  Leroi sighed, taking his hand away from his face and wiggling his fingers. ‘Art. Inventing is art. The hands of Creation itself. Sometimes you work for the hand of the Crier, sometimes for—’ He stopped himself, shaking his head. ‘Sorry, you don’t need to hear that nonsense. What I mean is, your life isn’t going to be like the Builders or the Patch Jadans or even the Domestics, with certain quotas to fill or tasks to be completed. Inventing is not like other lines of work. There’s no cap, no finishing. Inventors don’t get to specialize in paint, or words, or music, or clay, we work with all of reality itself. Creation to destruction. You need to know everything, and you can never know everything. You need to know that Golemstone reacts violently with Milk of the Dunai. You need to know at what pressure Glassland Black will shatter, and at what temperature it will melt. You need to know how many ounces of Halia’s elixir will dissolve diamonds, or how many drops will make a grown man scream. You need to know your metals and poisons and your powders and your mathematics and your poems, dammit, you need to know what the world needs, Micah, what Jadans need, and Nobles, too, and what this desecrated, Sun-damned, piece of—’

  Cool water splashed my face, snapping me awake. My mouth instinctively gaped, collecting all the water it could. I sputtered and choked as it washed down my throat, but it felt wonderful against my burning tongue. Everything was still out of focus, and I blinked wildly, trying to figure out where I was.

  ‘There. He’s alive,’ a voice announced. ‘Now we get this over with.’

  ‘Give him some time, man.’

  A throaty grumble.

  ‘Spout.’

  A snap of fingers in my ears, then pressure on my chest, rubbing back and forth.

  ‘We can have him ride Picka. She’s small, but strong enough for your little friend. If the Khat’s hounds are on the scent, we need to move.’ Another grumble. ‘Can’t believe you got me into this.’

  I finally heard Shilah’s voice: ‘Spout.’

  ‘Do you know if the baby Sobek bites can have lasting effects?’ Cam asked.

  ‘How should I know?’ the gruff voice asked. ‘If you’re smart, you avoid the damned things.’

  I blinked again, wiping the water off my face, and three bodies came into focus above. Shilah and Cam were pressed against each other, vying for the spot closest to my side. Cam smiled, giving me a rather sheepish wave. He still hadn’t changed out of the loose fluttering robe and blouse and looked like a green cloud. Shilah was straight-faced and standing tall, but her hand was resting gently on my ankle.

  My arm was now covered in a waxy cotton, soaked red all the way through. I imagined Split the Pedlar wasn’t nearly as proficient with needle and gut as my father, whose stitches almost never leaked.

  I felt a wave of nausea, and my body spasmed under the weight of falling memories. I whimpered once, but disguised the next sound by sitting up and coughing, keeping my eyes averted. I pressed down hard over the cloth on my wrist and doubled the pain shooting up my arm. This flushed my mind of anything other than pure physical agony.

  ‘Don’t do that, kid!’ Split demanded. ‘You’ll ruin the stitches! You think this house is made of needle and gut?’

  I didn’t listen, pressing even harder, digging my fingernails through the cloth. It was working. After a few more fake coughs my composure returned.

  The first thing that I noticed was that the shack was rather dull for a Pedlar. The bare walls were decorated with splinters and flecked paint, and the empty shelves were stocked only with dust. The bed was a simple boilweed mattress, with no sleeping sheet. This was unlike the lavish silk accommodations I imagined all High Nobles slept on. A healing box sat open on the counter – recently rifled through – but I couldn’t see any food in the kitchen.

  The one oddity that struck me was the wooden Khatclock in the corner, smaller than Mama Jana’s, but equipped with the same time-locked hands hanging over the Closed Eye face.

  Hands that pointed North.

  I gave the broken clock a nod, as it told me we were at least in the right place. ‘Are you still a Pedlar?’

  Split grunted. ‘Hmm? What’s that?’

  ‘It’s pretty empty in here.’ I worked my jaw and lifted my face enough finally to get a good look at the man. ‘Did you sell everything you own?’

  He crossed his hairy arms, tapping his thumbs against his soft chest. The stout man had the look of someone who could have once picked up his camel, but was now more likely to pick up a plate of cheese. Fair and flabby skin hung loose around his neck, and his belly protruded over his waist. A receding hairline tugged back the top of his head, which was bald and burned red from exposure. Beady eyes were sunken in beside his crooked nose, and his waxen face was chiselled with a deep frown. He wore a hollow sort of sadness I’d seen only once before.

  ‘I pe
ddle big piles of “you’re alive thanks to me”,’ Split grumbled. ‘So stop asking dumb questions that don’t matter, and get off your ass and let’s get going.’

  I had a feeling my friends had yet to show him the Coldmaker.

  Cam scowled. ‘Spout is alive because Shilah got so much of the venom out. You even said so yourself.’

  Shilah’s cheeks flushed just a little bit darker.

  Split waved a dismissive hand. ‘I said she helped. Your sweaty friend here would be a blathering pile of useless meat if not for me. Now let’s cut the chat and get my section of the March over with, before the hounds eat all of our faces off.’

  ‘Lovely,’ Cam said. ‘Now hold still, Spout, let me check that burn.’

  He leaned in and wrapped a hand around the back of my neck. Forehead to forehead, he whispered so low that only I could hear. ‘Don’t use your real name.’

  I pondered for an instant and then nodded, deciding it was probably wise. ‘It’s fine,’ I said at normal volume. ‘It doesn’t hurt any more.’

  Cam stood up and gave Shilah a secretive wink.

  ‘I thought you said there was no such thing as the Coldmarch,’ I said to Split, testing the waters.

  Split went red. ‘Listen, kid. I don’t know what you think you know, but you basically just left the womb. Maybe you were a really good errand boy in the city, finding colourful parasols on sale in the Market Quarters for ungrateful Nobles’ – he did a fancy twiddle with his fingers and then pointed to Cam – ‘or rushing towels to his bare-butt relatives in their baths, but you’ve never been outside Paphos. This is the Drylands, boy, this is where stupid young Jadans step on baby Sobek lizards, and then they die.’

  Cam looked as if he was about to melt under the heat of his own fury, but I found myself drawn to Split, especially after seeing the Droughtweed pit cut into the middle of his floor. The ashes within the charred grey leaves were still smouldering. A small part of me wished just a bit of the smoke would waft my way and help ease both the burning in my throat and the stabbing in my wrist.