Jaud reached towards it. “All you do is pull the pin?”
Yarvi slapped his hand away. “At the right moment! The last moment. The more of Odem’s men have gone to face Gorm the better our chances.”
“Your uncle speaks,” called Nothing from one of the narrow windows.
Yarvi eased open the shutters of another and peered down into the yard. That familiar patch of green amongst the towering gray walls, the cedar spreading its branches at one side. Men were gathered there, many hurriedly arming, many already arrayed for battle. Yarvi’s eyes widened as he took in the number. Three hundred at a guess, and he knew there would be far more making ready outside the citadel. Above them, upon the marble steps of the Godshall, in fur and silvered mail and with the King’s Circle on his brow, stood Yarvi’s uncle Odem.
“Who stands outside the walls of Thorlby now?” he was roaring at the gathered warriors. “Grom-gil-Gorm, the Breaker of Swords!”
The men stamped their feet and let go a storm of curses and contempt. “He who murdered Uthrik, your king, my brother!” Howls of anger at that, and Yarvi had to stop himself making one of his own at the lie.
“But in his arrogance he has brought few men with him!” called Odem. “We have the right, we have the ground, we have the numbers and the quality! Will we let this army of scum stand a moment longer within sight of the howes of my brothers Uthrik and Uthil, the howe of my grandfather Angulf Clovenfoot, hammer of the Vanstermen?”
The warriors clattered weapons on shields and shields on armor and roared that they would not.
Odem reached out, his kneeling blade-bearer offered up his sword, and he drew it and held it high, the steel breaking from the shadows and flashing so brightly for an instant Yarvi had to look away. “Then let us do honor to Mother War, and bring her a red day! Let us leave our walls at our backs and stride out, and before sunset see the heads of Grom-gil-Gorm and his Vanster dogs upon our walls!”
“We’ll see whose head sits on the walls tonight,” said Yarvi, words lost in the answering cheer of the warriors of Gettland. The warriors who should have been cheering for him.
“They go to fight,” said Nothing, as men began to file from the yard, called off in stretches of the shield-wall, each knowing his place, each ready to die for his shoulder-man. “You guessed your uncle’s mind correctly.”
“It was no guess,” said Yarvi.
“Your mother was right.” He saw Nothing’s eyes glint in the darkness of his helmet’s slot. “You have become a deep-cunning man.”
The youngest warriors came first, some younger even than Yarvi, the older and more battle-worn were next. They tramped under the Screaming Gate, the clatter of harness echoing about the chain room, shadows shifting across the pitted faces of Yarvi’s rogues as they peered through the slots in the floor to watch better men pass below. And with each one gone down that passageway Yarvi’s happiness grew, for he knew their odds were so much the better, and his fear grew too, for he knew the moment was almost upon them.
The moment of his vengeance. Or the moment of his death.
“The king’s moving,” said Sumael, pressed into the shadows beside another window. Odem was striding through his veterans towards the gate, shield-bearer, and blade-bearer, and standard-bearers at his back, clapping men on their shoulders as he went.
“The moment is not ripe,” murmured Nothing.
“I see that!” hissed Yarvi. The boots tramped on, men draining from the citadel, but there were far too many yet in the yard.
Had he endured all this, suffered all this, sacrificed all this so Odem could wriggle carefree from the hook at the last moment? He fussed with his stub of finger, the very tips of his thumbs sweating.
“Do I pull the pin?” called Jaud.
“Not yet!” squeaked Yarvi, terrified they would be heard through the slots in the floor. “Not yet!”
Odem strode on, soon to be lost from view below the archway. Yarvi raised his hand to Jaud, ready to bring it down and all the weight of the Screaming Gate with it.
Even if it doomed them all.
“My king!” Yarvi’s mother stood on the steps of the Godshall, Hurik huge at one shoulder, Mother Gundring bent over her staff at the other. “My brother!”
Yarvi’s uncle stopped, frowning, and turned.
“Odem, please, a word!”
Yarvi hardly dared breathe in case it somehow upset the delicate balance of the moment. Time crawled as Odem looked to the gate, then to Yarvi’s mother, then, cursing, strode back towards her, his closest retainers rattling after.
“Wait!” hissed Yarvi, and with wide eyes Jaud eased his fingers from the pin.
Yarvi strained towards the window, cool breeze kissing his sweat-sheened face, but could not hear what was said on the steps of the Godshall. His mother knelt at Odem’s feet, pressed hands to her chest, humbly bowed her head. Perhaps she made abject apologies for her stubbornness, her ingratitude to her brother and the High King. Perhaps she swore obedience and begged forgiveness. Then she took Odem’s hand in both of hers, and pressed her lips to it, and Yarvi’s skin crawled.
His uncle looked at Mother Gundring, and gave the slightest nod. His minister looked back, and gave the slightest shrug. Then Odem touched Yarvi’s mother on the cheek and strode away, back towards the gate, his servants and closest guards about him in an eager gaggle.
The last trickle of warriors were following their brothers out of the citadel, no more than three dozen left in the yard. Yarvi’s mother clasped her hands, and looked up towards the gatehouse, and Yarvi fancied she might even have met his eye.
“Thank you, Mother,” he whispered. Once again he lifted his withered hand to Jaud. Once again he watched Odem approach the gate. But this time, instead of seeing the gods pull all his plans apart, he saw them offer him his chance.
“Wait,” he whispered, the hot breath of the word tickling at his lips.
“Wait.” Here was the day. Here the hour.
“Wait.” Here the moment. “Now.”
He chopped down his crippled hand and, weak though it was, thanks to the ingenuity of six ministers of old, it fell with the weight of mountains. Jaud snatched free the pin, gears whirred, a chain snapped taut, and the reason for the name was suddenly made clear. With a shrieking like all the dead in hell and a blast of wind that tore Yarvi’s helmet off and slammed him against the wall, the Screaming Gate plunged through the floor.
It struck the ground below with a crash that shook the citadel to its elf-tunnelled roots, sealing the entrance with a weight of metal Father Earth himself would have strained to lift.
The floor reeled, tipped, and Yarvi wondered for a moment if the very gatehouse was collapsing at that shattering impact.
He stumbled to a slot in the floor, trying to shake the dizziness from his head, the ringing from his ears. The passageway below was full of Odem’s closest. Some were tottering with hands clasped to their heads. Some were fumbling out their weapons. Some clustered at the gate, silently shouting, silently, stupidly, uselessly beating against the screaming faces. The false king himself stood in their midst, staring up. His eyes met Yarvi’s, and his face paled as though he saw a demon that had clawed its way back through the Last Door.
And Yarvi smiled.
Then he felt himself seized by the shoulder.
Nothing was dragging at him, shouting in his face, he could see his mouth moving in the slot in his helmet, but could hear only a vague burble.
He scrambled after, the floor settling to level, down a winding stair, bouncing from the walls, jostled by men behind. Nothing flung a door wide, a bright archway in the dark, and they burst into the open air.
36.
THE LAST DOOR
In the yard of the citadel, chaos ruled.
Weapons swung and splinters flew, steel clashed and faces snarled, arrows flitted and bodies dropped, all in dream-like silence.
Just as Yarvi had planned his mother’s hirelings had spilled from hidden doorways
and taken Odem’s veterans in their backs, hacked them down where they stood, driven them witless about the yard, left their scattered bodies bleeding.
But those that survived the first shock were fighting back fiercely, the battle broken up into ugly little struggles to the death. In blinking silence Yarvi watched one of the Shend women stabbing at a man while he opened gashes down her face with the rim of his shield.
Just as he had planned, Yarvi saw Rulf and his archers send a flight of arrows from the roofs. Silently they went up, silently rattled down, prickling the shields of Odem’s closest guards, formed into a knot about their king. One man caught a shaft in the face and seemed hardly to notice, still pointing towards the Godshall with his sword, still bellowing silent words. Another went down, clutching at an arrow in his side, clutching at the leg of the man beside him who kicked his hand away and shuffled on. Yarvi knew them both, honoured men who once stood guard at the entrance to the king’s chamber.
Battle makes all men animals, Yarvi’s father used to tell him. He saw a snarling thug with sheep thief written on his cheek cut down an unarmed slave, water jug flying from his hands and shattering against a wall.
Could this be what he had planned? What he had prayed for?
He had flung wide the door, and begged Mother War to be his guest. He could not stop this. No one could. Surviving it would be challenge enough.
He saw Nothing hack the legs from under one man, slash another across the back as he turned to run, shove another by the shield so he tottered into the low wall of the well and over, vanishing from sight into the depths.
In a deafened stupor he dragged Shadikshirram’s sword from its sheath. That was what a man did in battle, wasn’t it? Gods, it felt heavy of a sudden. Men jostled him as they ran past to join the madness, but he was rooted to the earth.
He saw the doors of the Godshall standing open, Odem’s guards crouching behind arrow-bristled shields around the archway, shepherding the false king into the shadows.
Yarvi pointed his sword towards them, shouted, “There!” The deafness was fading. Enough that he heard thudding footsteps in time to spin around.
But not to do much more.
Steel clashed on steel and the sword was wrenched in his fist, almost out of his hand. He caught a glimpse of Hurik’s scarred face, heard a snatch of his low growl before his shield crashed into Yarvi’s chest, lifted him from his feet and dumped him groaning on his back two strides away.
Hurik’s eyes slid sideways and he twisted to catch an ax on his shield, splinters spinning from the force of the blow. Jaud, charging in with a roar, hacking away like a mad woodsman at a stump. Hurik gave ground, blocked the second blow, but the third was clumsy and he caught it in a ready crouch, steering it wide, the heavy blade missing his shoulder by a hand’s breadth and thudding into the turf. He clubbed Jaud in the head with the rim of his shield as he stumbled past, knocking him off balance, then with a short chop of his sword ripped the ax from Jaud’s hand.
It seemed a baker was no match for a queen’s Chosen Shield, however good a man he was.
Hurik’s bared teeth showed white in his black beard, his sword flashed as he stabbed, blade sinking into Jaud’s ribs to the hilt.
“No,” croaked Yarvi, struggling to get up, but wanting a thing is not always enough.
Jaud dropped to his knees, face crushed up with pain, and Hurik planted one great boot on his shoulder, ripped his sword free, then kicked Jaud onto his back. He turned to Yarvi.
“Let us finish what we started in Amwend.”
He stepped forward, red sword raised. Yarvi would have liked to face Death smiling, but few have courage when the Last Door yawns before them, even kings. Kings least of all, perhaps. He slithered back, holding up his withered hand as though that might ward off the blade.
Hurik’s lip twisted. “What a king you would have made—”
“We shall see.”
Hurik’s chin was jerked back and there was steel under his white-streaked beard. A dagger, polished to an icy gleam. The face of Yarvi’s mother, eyes narrowed and jaw clenched, appeared beside his.
“Drop your sword, Hurik.”
He hesitated for a moment and she leaned closer and murmured in his ear. “You know me. Few better. Can it really be …” and she twisted the blade until a line of blood ran down his thick neck, “that you doubt my will?”
Hurik swallowed, wincing as the knobble on his stubbled throat squirmed against the steel, then let his blade clatter to the dirt. Yarvi scrambled up, clutching Shadikshirram’s sword, levelling the point at Hurik’s chest.
“Wait,” said his mother. “First answer me this. For nineteen years you have been my Chosen Shield. Why break your oath?”
Hurik’s eyes shifted to Yarvi. Sad they looked, now, and broken. “Odem told me the boy must die, or you must.”
“And why not kill Odem where he stood?”
“Because the High King had decreed it!” Hurik hissed out. “And the High King would not be denied. My oath was to protect you, Laithlin.” He pushed his shoulders back, and slowly closed his eyes. “Not your crippled son.”
“Then consider your oath discharged.”
The smallest movement of the knife and Yarvi stumbled back as blood spotted his cheek. Hurik fell, and keeled on his face, and Yarvi stood with his sword slack in his hand, blinking down at the dark pool creeping through the grass.
His skin was flushed and prickling. The breath tore at his throat. Lights danced in his eyes, his limbs heavy, bruised chest throbbing. He wanted only to sit down. To sit in the darkness and cry.
The dead and wounded were scattered blade-slashed and arrow prickled across the grass where Yarvi had played as a child. Cherished swords and shields, heirlooms of noble houses, had fallen from lifeless fingers and lay shattered, filthy with blood. The doors of the Godshall were sealed, those of Yarvi’s men still standing gathered about them, Rulf’s face red streaked from a cut in his hair. The two big Inglings were pounding away with their axes but the heavy wood stayed firm.
And against the trunk of the spreading cedar, that Yarvi’s brother used to mock him for being too scared to climb, Jaud sat still with head tipped back and hands limp in his bloody lap. Sumael knelt beside him, her head hanging and her lips curled from her teeth, clutching at one bloody fistful of his shirt, as though she might lift him up. As though she might carry him to safety, as he once carried her. But there was nowhere to take him, even had she had the strength.
Nowhere but through the Last Door.
And Yarvi realized then that Death does not bow to each person who passes her, does not sweep out her arm respectfully to show the way, speaks no profound words, unlocks no bolts. The key upon her chest is never needed, for the Last Door stands always open. She herds the dead through impatiently, heedless of rank or fame or quality. She has an ever-lengthening queue to get through. A blind procession, inexhaustible.
“What have I done?” whispered Yarvi, taking a halting step towards Jaud and Sumael.
“What you had to.” His mother’s grip on his arm was iron. “There is no time to mourn, now, my son. My king.” One side of her face was pale, the other dotted red, and she looked at that moment like Mother War indeed. “Follow Odem.” She squeezed harder. “Kill him, and take back the Black Chair.”
Yarvi clenched his jaw then, and nodded. There could be no going back.
“Stop that!” he called at the Inglings. “There are better ways.” They lowered their axes to stare darkly at him. “Mother, stay with them and watch the door. Make sure no one leaves.”
“Not until Odem is dead,” she said.
“Nothing, Rulf, gather a dozen men and follow me.”
Rulf stared at the carnage in the yard of the citadel, breathing hard. The wounded and the dying, the hobbling and the bleeding. And Jaud, brave Jaud, who had stood by his oarmate, sitting with his back to the trunk of the cedar, no oar to pull, no load to lift, no encouragement to give any longer.
�
��Will I find a dozen still able?” he whispered.
Yarvi turned away. “Get what there is.”
37.
A LONELY SEAT
“Ready?” whispered Yarvi.
“Always,” said Nothing.
Rulf worked his head one way then the other, the blood that streaked his face black in the shadows. “Don’t see that I’ll get any readier.”
Yarvi heaved in a great breath, and as he pushed it out drove the heel of his twisted hand into the catch, barged the hidden door open with his shoulder, and burst into the sacred vastness of the Godshall.
Empty at the top of its dais the Black Chair stood, in the sight of the Tall Gods, their jewelled eyes agleam. Above them, about the dome, the amber statues of the Small Gods observed the petty doings of humanity without comment, emotion or even much interest.
Odem had only ten men left and those in a sorry state, clustered about the doors as they shook faintly from blows outside. Two were trying to shore them up with spears. Two others had swept the holy offerings from a table shiny with age and were dragging it towards the entrance as a barricade. The rest sat bewildered or stood stunned, not knowing how their king could have been taken unawares by a company of rogues in the heart of his own citadel. Mother Gundring hunched beside Odem, tending to his standard-bearer’s bleeding arm.
“To the king!” he shrieked as he saw Yarvi burst in, and Odem’s men clustered about their master, raising their shields before him, weapons ready. The man with the arrow in his face had snapped it off, the bloody shaft poking from his cheek. He had been leaning groggily on his sword but now he pointed it, wobbling, towards Yarvi.
Nothing rushed up at his left shoulder, Rulf at his right, and those slaves and mercenaries who could still fight spread out about them, bristling with sharpened metal.
They edged around the Black Chair, down the steps of the dais, spitting and rasping curses in half a dozen languages. Odem urged his men forward, the space between them ten strides of stone, then eight, then six, the coming violence hanging heavy as a stormcloud in the still air of the Godshall.
Half a King Page 22
