The Ember Blade

by Chris Wooding

  ‘We must go,’ they heard Keel say. ‘It’s time.’

  Garric nodded and turned back to Vika. ‘Farewell, Vika. I’m glad I got to see you safe before I left. Farewell, Cade, Fen … Aren.’ Aren heard the unspoken meaning in the way Garric said his name, a reminder and an acknowledgement of what had passed between them. ‘I go now to take the first step to a free Ossia. Aspects go with me.’

  ‘Aspects go with you,’ Cade and Vika said together. Fen echoed them quietly.

  Garric headed downstairs with Keel, leaving Aren staring at the empty doorway. How different things might have been between them if he’d known the truth about the Hollow Man. When Garric returned, he was determined to begin again, properly this time.

  But Vika had a suspicious look on her face, and he knew she’d noticed something that Aren hadn’t.

  ‘What is it?’ he asked her.

  ‘Nothing,’ she lied.

  79

  There were no moons that night, and racing streaks of cloud obscured the stars as the carriage clattered across the sleeping city, passing through islands of light cast by streetlamps. Where the Uplanes ended in the equally exclusive streets of Consort’s Rise, Clia pulled the horses to a halt. They’d walk from here.

  Hooded and cloaked in the driver’s seat, she waited silently while Garric and Keel climbed out, swords at their hips. There was no point carrying their weapons wrapped up. They clearly had no business in such an exclusive district at this hour, and no passes would spare them if they were seen. Between a fight and an arrest, they’d take their chances on the former. Stealth was the watchword now.

  Clia shook the reins and the carriage rolled away, leaving the two of them in the shadows. In the distance they heard the great bell of Braw Tam began to clang, ringing dolefully across the hills.

  ‘Seventh bell o’ dark,’ said Garric. ‘Let’s be about it, then.’

  They set off into Consort’s Rise, where wide, leafy avenues gave way to winding paths and steps as the land steepened sharply. The houses were narrow but imposingly tall, piled up alongside one another behind stone-walled gardens. Those windows that were lit revealed glittering chandeliers and elaborate plaster cornices, harpsichords and dining tables, pastel walls in the Krodan style.

  They hurried upwards, heading for their rendezvous with Wilham and his men, and the vintner’s yard beyond. Keel had spoken little on the journey and said even less now, for which Garric was thankful. There’d be dark business tonight, and he was eager for it to be over.

  It saddened him that his friend had become a liability, but there was no denying the truth. Keel had been used up in service of the cause, his nerves shredded and his bravery gone. He’d become erratic and indecisive, and he was drinking too much. His decision to go home was no less than suicide, and worse, it would endanger everything they’d worked for. He’d be taken by the Iron Hand, they’d torture him, and he’d give them Mara’s name and address. At the very least, his decision to return to his family would cost the resistance its richest benefactor. She’d be forced to go into hiding and her assets would be seized.

  Garric couldn’t risk that, so there’d be extra men at the rendezvous to seize Keel and keep him safe, in chains if necessary, until his departure was no longer a threat. He wouldn’t be going home tomorrow, or any time soon.

  Garric had made Wilham swear that Keel wouldn’t be harmed, although he wasn’t sure how long his word would hold. Wilham liked the surety of death’s silence a little too much. But Keel had backed them into this corner, and there was more at stake here than one man’s feelings for his family. He’d never understood the need for sacrifice. Not like Garric did.

  ‘You remember old Crackjaw?’ Keel said, rousing him from his thoughts.

  Garric frowned. A strange subject to bring up now; but perhaps this was the moment for reminiscing. It was the last time they’d see each other, after all.

  ‘Course I remember,’ he said. ‘He was a monster whale. Bit Rallen’s launch clean in two and crunched him down. Terrorised the Cut for a year.’

  ‘Remember the day we saw him?’

  ‘Aye, I remember that, too.’ Garric was only half-listening, more concerned with keeping an eye out for soldiers. They could walk right into a patrol in these tight, high-walled lanes.

  ‘There was a storm coming in fast,’ Keel said. ‘The waves were already climbing when Jad sighted him. There he was, some way off to starboard. The torn fluke, the markings on his flank … the size of him!’

  Keel’s words conjured the memory and a faint smile touched his lips. ‘That was old Crackjaw, no doubt,’ said Garric. ‘Right till that moment we were going to head for port, but you turned us into the storm instead.’

  ‘Godspit, I was a madman back then,’ said Keel. ‘I hungered for Sarla’s embrace. Went up against the worst the sea could throw at me. Anything to feel free. Anything rather than going home.’

  ‘We all knew it, too,’ said Garric, warming to the tale. ‘Only the wildest sailed with you. We were all reckless, scornful of living. There was kinship in that.’

  ‘The storm came upon us, howling like the thwarted dead.’ Keel had a fierce grin on his face. ‘Rain like needles of ice, thunder fit to burst your ears! And we saw old Crackjaw again, and again after that, always before us, always just out of reach. Like he was leading us into the heart of the tempest.’

  ‘Keb went over, taken by a wave,’ said Garric, excited now, caught up in the memory. ‘The boat heeled and tipped till we weren’t sure she’d stay afloat. We couldn’t have dropped a launch if we tried, but we didn’t care. You had us stand ready to harpoon that monster from the gunwales. You said it was only a matter of time before it turned and came at us.’ He stopped then, and the fire in him waned. ‘But then you changed your mind. You told us to turn around, give up the chase and return to port with our lives. So we did, and old Crackjaw swam on, and this tale comes to nothing.’

  Keel drew back suddenly, holding up a hand. He peered round a corner, then motioned for Garric to come and see. In the lane beyond, some way distant, four Krodan soldiers loitered, talking quietly among themselves.

  Garric cursed under his breath. Wilham had only a narrow window of opportunity and they’d agreed to be there shortly after seventh bell. The patrol was blocking their route to the vintner’s yard and showed no sign of moving.

  Keel pulled his shoulder and pointed at the mouth of an alleyway a little further up the hill. ‘Reckon we can go around them that way.’

  Garric grunted in agreement. With a last glance at the soldiers, they slipped into the alley and found themselves on a winding path between high-walled gardens, so narrow they had to go single file.

  ‘Not nothing,’ said Keel, from behind him.

  ‘What’s not nothing?’

  ‘You said my tale comes to nothing. It doesn’t. We never caught Crackjaw, but we lived instead, and we forged many new tales together that would not have been told elsewise.’

  Garric was having trouble seeing his point, and was beginning to find the conversation irritating. The sight of the Krodan patrol had reminded him that there were more important things to do tonight than indulge in nostalgia.

  ‘You know why I turned us around that day?’ Keel asked.

  Garric didn’t care, but it seemed easier to hear him out. ‘Tell me.’

  ‘Because it hit me, all in a flash,’ Keel said. ‘We’d already lost Keb. I thought of Halger’s sons, and Caffey’s wife, and all the men on that ship. Thought of you, too. You didn’t all deserve to die just because I wanted to. I was ready to take you all down with me, just to get that whale.’ His voice became hard. ‘The cause wasn’t worth the cost. Reckon that’s a lesson you never learned.’

  Garric’s mood darkened. So that’s what this was about. One last argument, before they were done. ‘I’d see every man, woman and child in this land dead before I’d see them live as slaves,’ he growled, ‘and I’ll give my life to stop it happening. Freedom has no price.�
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  The alleyway came to a crossroads ahead. Garric guessed that a right turn would bring them back to their path, with only a little delay.

  ‘Every man, woman and child might disagree with you,’ said Keel. ‘Is it really their freedom you’re after? Or is it atonement? Still making amends for that day thirty years past when you failed in your duty? You say you’re doing this for Ossia, Garric; but maybe you were just doing it for you, all along.’

  Garric quelled a surge of anger. They were only words. Let the coward talk; he’d not be moralising when Wilham’s men got hold of him. ‘Some things are worth any cost,’ he said as he reached the junction.

  ‘Not to me,’ said Keel, and he pulled Garric’s sword from its sheath with a ring of steel.

  Too late, Garric saw the armoured men hidden to either side of the junction. They lunged, seizing his arms, driving him against the wall and cracking his head against the bricks hard enough to split the skin. He roared in rage and disbelief, kicked away from the wall to dislodge them; but now the gates of the surrounding gardens burst open and Iron Guardsmen flooded out, swords at the ready.

  ‘No!’ he shouted in wild denial as the reality of Keel’s betrayal set in. ‘No! No! No!’

  He thrashed in their grip, but there were too many hands on him, and his dagger was pulled from his belt. Through the blood that ran into his eyes, he caught a glimpse of Keel beyond the melee. He was backing down the alley, Garric’s sword in his hand, an expression on his face like a little boy aghast at a prank gone wrong.

  ‘Keel!’ he screamed, spittle flying. ‘You son of a whore! Traitor! Traitor!’

  Stars exploded behind his eyes as someone smashed the pommel of a dagger hard on his crown. His legs turned to water and the soldiers bore him to the ground. Someone knelt on his neck and his arms were wrenched up behind him. Before he could struggle free, there was a click of manacles and a soldier booted him in the belly, hard enough to drive the wind from him. When his attackers drew back, they left him gasping on the floor like a fish.

  The blow to his head had him seeing double, and the man who approached him was little more than a dizzy blur. As he neared, the two images slowly merged. He was small and balding, with weak eyes and a wide, wet mouth, wearing the black coat of the Iron Hand. He hunkered down before Garric. A soldier yanked his head up by the hair.

  ‘Cadrac of Darkwater,’ he said. ‘My name is Overwatchman Klyssen. I’ve been looking forward to meeting you for some time.’

  80

  Most nights Fen dreamed of falling, and tonight was no exception. She jerked awake in bed, heart lurching in her chest. Panic gave way to sweet relief as she found herself in a guest bedroom in Mara’s house, in a bed softer than she’d ever slept in before. She lay there a moment, breathing hard, her head thick with wine and a faint ache in her knees and shins, more remembered than real.

  There were urgent voices downstairs. Men’s voices. Doors banging, hurrying feet.

  She sprang up, pulling on her clothes, a new panic driving her. Someone was barking orders below, the words muffled through the floor.

  They’ve found us!

  She snatched up her bow and arrows, her only thought to escape. Someone ran past in the corridor outside. Not that way, then. The window! She struggled with the catch, pushed it wide and leaned out. It wasn’t a long drop to the garden. She’d be over the back wall before anyone could stop her.

  Go. Run. Survive.

  She hesitated with one foot up on the sill. Aren and Cade were still in the house, and if the Krodans hadn’t found her yet, maybe they hadn’t found them, either.

  The need to flee was an almost physical pull. She heard her father’s voice: Don’t lean on anyone or anything, Fen. Not no place or person. Elsewise, when they fall, you’ll fall with ’em.

  She had to cut them all loose. She should have done it a long time ago, but Aren and Cade held her back. They were the first people near her own age she’d ever grown close to. There had been others at Salt Fork, like Otten and Dox, but they hadn’t liked her and she hadn’t liked them. Aren and Cade were her friends; perhaps the first real friends she’d ever had.

  Beyond the window was a wide, wild world, empty and frightening. Beyond the window, she’d be alone. She didn’t want to go back to that.

  With an exasperated curse, she climbed down and darted to the door. She heard nobody nearby, only a clamour of rough voices below. Cracking the door open, she peeped out. The lamplit corridor was deserted.

  She could make it to their bedrooms, if she was quick. Maybe they hadn’t woken yet; they’d all been drunk, after all.

  She opened the door and hurried down the corridor, an arrow nocked to her bow, heart thumping. A short way along, she reached a landing overlooking the foyer. She pressed herself to the wall and peered down. The front door was wide open, letting in the night air.

  Movement below. She sucked in her breath as a man in a cowled cloak strode into view from another room. Fright made her draw and aim. If he should look up, if he should see her …

  ‘Fen! No!’

  Aren’s voice made her start and she almost let fly. The man below whirled, showing a black-bearded face she didn’t know.

  ‘They’re with us,’ said Aren, stepping onto the landing from the other direction. ‘Listen.’

  Fen lowered her bow. Of course: they were speaking Ossian. She’d been frightened, muddled with sleep, and their voices had been muffled by the floor, but still she should have realised. The two languages sounded nothing alike.

  The man she’d almost shot gave her a baleful glare, then hurried on.

  ‘What’s happening?’ Fen asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Aren said as he reached her. ‘But I think we have to leave. Go wake Cade and Grub and Vika; I’ll find out what I can. Meet me in the parlour. That’s where they’ve gathered, by the sound of it.’

  Cade was bleary and slow to rouse, though his eyes lit up when he saw Fen at his bedside, at least until he heard why she’d come. Vika was already heading out by the time they got there, Ruck at her heel. Together they went to Grub’s room and found it empty. It was only when they called his name that he emerged from behind the door, holding up two daggers with an apologetic look on his face.

  The parlour was crowded with strangers, the atmosphere tense. Fen pushed inside to join Aren. Mara was in the centre of the room, deep in conversation with a small, baby-faced man with hair a fierce shade of ginger. He was pacing angrily back and forth.

  ‘That’s Wilham the Smiler,’ Aren told her, though he wasn’t smiling now. ‘He’s the leader of the rebels in Morgenholme. Garric and Keel were supposed to meet them, but they didn’t show up. Wilham smuggled the cart in without them and then came here.’

  ‘Why smuggle it in without Garric?’ asked Fen.

  ‘They only had one chance to get it inside,’ said Aren. ‘Garric might be able to slip in later – easier to sneak in one man than a whole cart.’

  ‘So it’s sitting in the yard with a secret compartment and no one inside it? What happened to Garric and Keel?’

  ‘Wilham’s men are trying to find out. Tapping all their contacts in the area. We know they were dropped off by Clia, and they didn’t have far to go after that.’

  ‘If they don’t find them soon, we have to leave,’ Cade interjected. He’d squeezed through the crowd to join them, along with Grub. ‘If they were captured—’

  ‘Garric would never talk,’ Aren said firmly.

  ‘Reckon Keel would, though. Ain’t like he’s at the peak of mental stability these days, is it? Feller looks like he’d have a breakdown if you slammed the door too loud.’

  ‘We ought to go now,’ said Fen. She was feeling edgy, and this uncertainty troubled her.

  ‘Freckles say something smart, for once,’ said Grub. ‘Hollow Man gone. Bitterbracker, too. Krodans on the way, Grub thinks.’

  ‘They might have been delayed,’ said Aren, with forced optim­ism. ‘Chased off by a patrol. Maybe
they’re lying low till it’s safe.’

  Grub snorted sceptically. ‘And maybe Grub have the gateway to a magic kingdom hidden in the crack of his arse.’

  There was a commotion at the door of the parlour and a young man elbowed his way in, cheeks flushed. ‘Wilham! I have news!’

  They crowded in closer to listen as he spoke with Wilham and Mara. Only Ruck was disinterested, occupied as she was with sniffing everyone in the room.

  ‘We found someone who saw it all from their window,’ he panted. ‘The Iron Hand were waiting in ambush and they’ve taken Garric.’

  A murmur of shock went round the room. Aren blanched.

  The man held up a sword. ‘We found this nearby.’

  Mara inspected it. ‘It is his,’ she said at length, her voice dull.

  ‘And Keel?’ Wilham asked.

  ‘They let him go. It seems … It seems he was in league with the enemy.’

  There was uproar at that. Fen felt as if she hadn’t quite woken from her dream of falling. Garric had given her direction when she had none. Even after the rout at Salt Fork, he’d made her believe. Now he was gone, betrayed by his own, and his grand plan lay in ruins.

  When they fall, you’ll fall with ’em.

  Vika looked stricken. ‘He is taken?’ she said in disbelief.

  ‘This house is no longer safe!’ Wilham shouted over the hubbub, silencing them all. ‘Gather the guests, take them to the safehouse in Riverside. Go in small groups and use different routes. Mara, you have carriages?’

  ‘Two. Clia can drive one. The servants must come, too – I’ll not leave them to the Iron Hand.’

  ‘Well enough. The rest go by horse.’ Wilham’s soft face was screwed up in anger as he addressed the room. ‘Gather anything the enemy could use against us. Burn what you can’t take. Leave no trace. Move!’

  81

  The mood was bleak as the carriage jolted and bounced through city streets. They were packed in close: Aren, Cade, Fen, Vika and Grub, with Ruck at their feet. Passing streetlamps showed glimpses of drawn faces. Nobody spoke. Even Cade had the sense not to attempt one of his uplifting monologues.