The Realm Rift Saga Box Set

by James T Kelly

  The Erhenni were already wearing the shawls Tom had seen in the Kingdom. Not everyone wore them. And they were still the same tough, practical people he’d seen mere months before. But they were changing. Already they were changing.

  And the elfs walked the streets like they owned them and bestowed their baubles on the humans like they were loyal pets. Tom dropped his hand to where the sword should have been, but he didn’t need it. He could feel the thought in his mind already.

  Fight the enemy.

  But they passed invisible through the crowds, all except Brega. A man, a cloaked and hooded boy, even a dwarf drew no stares. But an Easterner was too rare a sight. Human, elf and dwarf gaped at her as she passed. Soon enough, they were stopped by a pair of watchelfs.

  “Good morrow,” one bade them. He was short and stout for an elf, of a height and build with Tom. The other was tall, skinny, a perfect counter to her partner. Tom might have found it comical if he hadn’t seemed so confused. “What brings you to the Harbour?”

  Tom had expected to be dragged to a rat pit on sight. “Um.” Tom looked at the others, but they all looked at him. “We’re here to see the Proctor.”

  The taller watchelf nodded, as if such a thing were commonplace. “You’ve been sent by your patron, have you?” She seemed almost bored, looking over their heads at passers-by.

  “We don’t have a patron.”

  She was bored. She pointed a finger at a human girl and said, “Please don’t litter, citizen.” The girl started before picking up an apple core. “Directive one-eighty-two.” It took Tom a moment to realise the watchelf was now talking to them. “Every citizen under the rule of King Idris shall be assigned a patron to whom they will report their earnings, pay the taxes applicable thereof, and to whom they can raise concerns, grievances, and suggestions to improve the glory of the Kingdom.”

  The shorter elf smiled an apologetic smile. “Please, seek an audience with your patron.” He bowed his head. “Don’t worry, citizens. We know much is changing. But it’s all for the glory of Tir.” But he looked askance at Brega and added, “How did you come to the Kingdom, citizen? If I might ask?”

  “I came in the company of the Shield of the Eastern Angles, Lord Neirin Tarian, with a scimitar in my hand and an oath in my heart to see an end to Western aggression.” There was laughter and victory in her eyes.

  The bored watchelf narrowed her eyes at Brega. “Where do you hail from?”

  “Cairnabel.”

  The pair of them took a step back. Put a hand on knives at their waist. “State your business with the Proctor.”

  Tom said, “We want to offer him the appropriate gratitude for throwing us in his dungeon a few months ago.” Why let Brega have all the fun?

  “The escapees?” the short elf asked.

  “Possible,” the tall replied. “Not all of them, though.” To them she said, “I’m arresting you on suspicion of being fugitives of the king’s justice.”

  Tom raised his hands and forced a smile. “We’ll come quietly.”

  To Tom’s surprise, they were taken not to the tower but to the Judge’s office. This building bore a burn scar over its white sandstone surface, a bitter reminder of the dragon attack. But even this was being painted over, as if the aggression was but a dream, Men painted the same key symbol Tom had seen on the watch house in Cairnalyst. Tom had expected the inside to be the same, to see Erhenned covered up with the Kingdom. But little had changed. An old man sat at the counter and made the watchelfs sign paperwork before leading Tom and the others to a cell.

  “Don’t cause trouble,” he told them in a gruff murmur. “And trouble won’t come to you.” He said it with the absent-minded air of someone who said it to everyone who came into his care. Did he mean that prisoners suffered under the West? Or was it simply a way of making his own life easier, that he wouldn’t have to deal with troublesome guests?

  The cell was small, longer and taller than it was wide; the ceiling seemed to tower over their heads, with perhaps enough room for Gravinn to sit on Brega’s shoulders. It seemed a waste, and the cell was more oppressive for it. The doors and walls were wood, solid, covered in scratches and carvings and tallies from prior inmates. With no window, the only light came from a small, sputtering torch high above the door.

  “Do any of your plans work?” There was some of the old edge to Brega’s words, some of the same bite. She stood in the corner, unsure what to do with her hands, gaze examining every inch of wall and floor. Perhaps the bite wasn’t out of anger but of fear.

  So he said, “I’m sure this is temporary,” in a soothing tone. “Once Gerwyn hears we’ve come back, I’m sure he’ll send for us.” Though if he was being honest, he was pleased to have delayed a return to the rat pits. The very thought of being locked in one of them again made him feel short of breath. Hadn’t he once thought he’d prefer a pit to this cell? He’d been a fool.

  “So we wait?” Gravinn was sat on the floor, already scratching something into the wood between her feet.

  “We wait.”

  There wasn’t much room to lie down but Dank did his best, curling into a corner and dropping into a light doze which saw him twitch and mutter. Brega remained standing, ready. “You can sleep if you want,” she said, as if she didn’t care. But it was an offer. Tom nodded his head in thanks and sat. He was tired. Already he’d grown used to sleeping by day and travelling by night. So he let his head drop and he dozed.

  He dreamt of another cell, older, darker, wetter. He was alone, wrapped in rough cloth, cold and hungry and thirsty. He felt he’d been waiting a long time and expected to wait longer. But there were footsteps and a voice in the dark said, “So. You came back.”

  He was in Faerie, trying to keep Emyr on his feet. The old man was heavy and hurting. And Melwas said, “You will love us, little Tom. We will make sure of that.”

  He was hot, his limbs heavy, a great weight over his shoulders. His world was dark, vision limited to a slit of light. “Do you think that will protect you?” someone said.

  And Ambrose, still walking across Tir, plodding through heavy rain that slicked his hair to his face and drenched his old robes. “You and I, Tom. You and I,” he muttered. “We do what we have to do.”

  Tom woke with a start, expecting to feel cold rain on his face. But he was warm and dry. Inside. In a cell.

  Brega gave him only a glance. She was tired. He could see it in her eyes and in her shoulders.

  “Your turn.” He stood, forcing life into his limbs, forcing his mind awake. “Sleep.” When she shook her head, he said with more force, “Sleep.” He waited for her to meet his eye before adding, “You’re no good to Neirin if you’re dead on your feet.”

  “Don’t use my Shield against me,” she said. But there was no venom. No bite. She took his place and he took hers, squeezing past each other in the narrow cell. She sat, rested her forehead on folded knees, and fell asleep in moments.

  “What if he doesn’t send for us?” Gravinn stared up at him, her voice soft. Brega and Dank slept on.

  “Gerwyn?” No. Gerwyn would want to see them. They’d escaped his cells, taken him hostage, made a fool of him. “He’d want to see us.”

  “But what if he doesn’t?”

  He shrugged. “The fay can break us out.”

  “But they don’t know where we are.”

  “Don’t worry. Dank knows,” he told her. “What one fay knows, all fay know.”

  “Really?” she stared at Dank. “Everything?”

  “I think so.”

  “You have some sort of power over them.”

  Tom almost snorted. “Not at all.”

  “But they obey you.”

  “They help us,” he corrected her. “Because it suits them to do so. As soon as it suits them to do otherwise, they’ll abandon us.”

  “Do you really think that?”

  “I must do,” he said with a rueful smile. “I can’t lie.”

  “Can’t?” She peered at him,
as if suspicious of a cruel joke.

  “A Faerie gift.”

  “Prove it.”

  Ah. That old game. How many people had asked him to prove he couldn’t lie? “How?” he would always ask.

  And they would always say, “Tell me a lie.” Gravinn was no exception.

  And he would say, “I can’t. I can’t tell you the sky is green, or that rats can fly, or that you have a thousand gold coins in your hand. But that won’t satisfy you, because you won’t know if I can’t say it or won’t say it. So you’ll ask me questions you think I wouldn’t answer truthfully. And when I do, you’ll realise it could be a ploy to make you believe me.” He shrugged. “There’s no way to prove I can’t lie.”

  “So everyone just believes you?”

  “Some don’t.” Some visitors had ridden away and refused him coin. And when he went to Regent’s court, some had called him a charlatan and a con artist. “Some take it on faith. I think most people only believe it when they see one of my foresights come to pass.”

  “Storrstenn told me about them,” she said, with the tone of someone who believed the person she was speaking to was simple or mad. “Have you had any foresights of this?” She pointed a finger at their four walls.

  “Not of this cell.” But, now he thought of it, this was where they had left Judge Hullworth. Jago. And he’d had a foresight of Jago. It would be a stroke of luck if he were to come to them. They had formed a bond. He would help them. “But I have foreseen a Judge. A boy named Jago.”

  “What did you see?”

  It felt like a lifetime ago. What had he seen? Not much, he seemed to remember. Jago said something. Maybe, “The law is the law?”

  Gravinn seemed unimpressed.

  Dank took a deep breath. “Are we still here?” he mumbled.

  “We’re still here,” Tom told him.

  “Feels like it’s been hours.”

  Dank sat up and rubbed his eyes. Brega stirred but didn’t wake. “It’s getting dark outside.” The fay had told him that. There was no way to know that from inside the cell.

  “I wonder what the holdup is?” Tom said.

  “Should we send someone to the tower?”

  They could. Fenoderee could slip unseen into Gerwyn’s rooms, find out what was going on. Maybe even subtly encourage the elf to fetch for his returned prisoners?

  But there was noise outside. A jangling of keys. This was it. Gerwyn wanted them in rat pits. Tom tried to quell the icy knot of fear in his gut.

  “Stand back in there!” Everyone climbed to their feet and shuffled against the far wall. Brega was alert, ready. It was incredible how quickly she awoke.

  The door swung open and three figures stood in the doorway. One was the same old man, keys in one hand, torch in the other. The others were elfs, garbed in white. The man lifted his torch higher and the elfs peered from beneath white hoods.

  “That’s them,” one said. Emyr’s black bones. The guard from the dungeon. The cruel one. Him. Tom felt his fists clench and his heart flutter, fear and fury rolling over him in waves. His fingers itched to close around that elf’s throat. “They’re the ones who escaped.”

  The other elf nodded. “It’s them.”

  “Very good,” the man said.

  This was it. They would be moved. But was there something they could do to these elfs on the way? Tom was loathe to leave this island without making them pay a price for how they’d treated them. Could they hurt them somehow? Kill them? Tom wished he had Caledyr. He could do something if he had Caledyr.

  He was so busy wishing for the sword he hadn’t noticed the door was being closed. “Wait,” he said, but the door was shut with a bang and a click. The lock was turned. He could hear faint footsteps receding.

  This wasn’t the plan. He rushed to the door. “Give me Gerwyn!” He hammered his fists against the wood, but it was so thick it didn’t even rattle. And there was no response. Nothing.

  “I don’t think your plan has worked,” Brega said.

  Tom persuaded them all to wait a few more hours. If Gerwyn hadn’t come for them by then, Fenoderee and Mester Stoorworm could engineer their escape. “But we have to give it a little more time,” he told them.

  “Why?” Brega was blunt as ever. “Is it worth this much effort? We could have hit half a dozen targets in the time we’ve spent on this one.”

  Because I want to put Gerwyn where he put me, he wanted to say. I want to see him in a rat pit. And I want Katharine’s maps. “It’s worth a few more hours,” he said.

  But no-one came. No Proctor, no elfs, not even their jailor. No sound or sign came to them through the thick walls. They had only Dank to reassure them that time was passing in the world outside.

  “The sun has set,” he told them, then, “The moon rises. It’s a clear night. Lots of stars. Puck is bored.”

  “He’s always bored,” Tom replied.

  “He wants to hunt mortals.”

  “Tell him he can’t.”

  Dank grinned. “Fenoderee already made that clear.”

  Fenoderee. That fay was an odd one. Supposedly he was the dark face to Glastyn. But though he was foul of face, he seemed to hold to a sense of morality and decency that was foreign to Glastyn. Glastyn was fey and flighty. But Fenoderee seemed decent and loyal.

  Tom sighed. This had been a bad idea. They hadn’t achieved anything. No Ambrose. No Gerwyn. No maps. He took a breath to put an end to it, but paused. Was that a noise outside? Yes. It was. Gerwyn. He’d left them stewing but he could wait no longer. He’d finally come to claim his prize.

  “Get back!” A deeper voice, bored and mean for it. They shuffled back against the wall. The lock clicked and the door swung open.

  It could only have been a handful of months since Tom had seen Judge Jago Hullworth, but he looked a decade older. Whatever had eaten the youthful flesh from his face had given him the beard he’d hoped for, thick and dark but unable to grow around the scarring on the left side of his face. He still clutched his withered left arm to his chest, but now he wore a glove on that twisted hand, and his clothes were both richer and more austere than before. He scowled into their cell and Tom felt himself quail.

  “Jago?” he said.

  “Judge Hullworth,” he corrected. His left eye was cloudy too. It seemed a cruel twist of fate that he had been further crippled. “I’m surprised you’d show your face here again.”

  Jago, it seemed, was no longer a friend. “You survived the attack.” They were empty words. But what else could he say?

  “Most of me.” Hullworth cast his good eye over them. “There were more of you.”

  “They aren’t here.”

  “I know. We searched the forest.” He took a breath and for a moment he looked pained. The scarring ran down beneath his neckline. How badly had he been burned? But he turned his pain into a fragile smirk. “You’re guilty of fleeing from justice.”

  “We fight for the duchies,” Tom told him. “We want to end this war. Topple Idris, free Erhenned.”

  “War’s over.” Hullworth’s voice grew gruff and hard. “We lost.”

  Over? Had Idris conquered the rest of Tir? No. No, he would know.

  “There’s fighting in the south.” Dank was backed into a corner. He peered at Hullworth with fear and fascination. “Raids carried out by small bands of Erhenni. There are rumours that Ria rules from a hidden fortress.”

  “There’s no truth to them stories.” There was a gruff mix of hope and resentment in Hullworth’s tone. “Ria is gone. And there’s no resistance can stand up to a dragon.”

  That much felt true. Tom had been face-to-face with that dragon. Seen how strong it was, how quick. Seen the devastation it wrought. Hullworth had seen worse, of course. But Tom understood that fear. Why try to fight if your enemy can draw on so much strength?

  He could almost hear the sword. The sense of duty. The sense of righteousness.

  “The West isn’t unstoppable,” Tom said. He took a careful step forward, ext
ended a hand. “We’ve bloodied them. We kidnap officials, burn records, steal weapons, spoil rations. Every night, we ruin Idris’ ability to wage this war. Erhenned’s cause is our own.”

  “No.” Hullworth’s expression closed and he glared at them. His face was a mask. But was there hesitation? Despite his grizzled exterior he was still young. A boy at heart. Did he want to help them? But he said, “The law is the law,” with such finality that it crushed Tom’s hopes.

  Gravinn let out a little gasp.

  “The sentence for fleeing justice is death,” Hullworth told them. “Death by arena.” He stepped back and armoured Erhenni, Judge’s Hands, stepped past him and began to drag them from the cell.

  “Wait,” Tom called over the ruckus. “What about Gerwyn?”

  “Proctor Gerwyn?” Hullworth frowned. “He ain’t here. He was summoned to Cairnagwyn a few days after you escaped.”

  Cairnagwyn. They’d sat in this cell for hours and Gerwyn wasn’t even on the island. “Are you sure?” It was a stupid question. Why had he asked it?

  “Sure as tides.”

  They had wasted a day and a night. Maybe more. Iron nails. He had been so sure. He had almost felt his hands on Gerwyn’s throat, almost seen the terror in his eyes. Seen him wailing and flailing at a grate as the tide rose around him. Tom felt cold and sick. All he wanted was justice. Why couldn’t he get it? Why did Gerwyn deserve to escape?

  They were dragged into the streets. The night air was thick and close, a storm rolling in from the sea. “We need to leave,” Tom said. “Dank, it’s time to leave.”

  An Erhenni shook him but Tom was twisting in his grip, finding Dank with his eyes. The boy was pale, weak. His captors lifted him under his arms and his feet stumbled and dragged behind him.

  “Dank?”

  The boy lifted a slack-jawed gaze but said nothing.

  Iron. The Hands were wearing iron armour. Thick. Heavy. It wasn’t their style at all.

  “Don’t think your Faerie friends will be coming.” Hullworth grinned, his scarred face twisting. “I wasn’t one for Faerie tales and magic, truth be told. But once you’ve seen a dragon, well, you’ll believe most things, I reckon. I told Proctor Gerwyn we needed some iron armour, in case you came back. He told me I could have a dragon of my own if I put you back in a cell.”