The Sword Saint

by C. F. Iggulden

  He said the last word without especial emphasis, though it caused confusion in Xi-Hue.

  ‘To Shiang?’ the man said.

  Hondo shook his head, hearing the rightness as he’d said it.

  ‘No, ambassador. To Darien.’

  Tellius looked at the young man lying helpless, wrapped in bandages. Prince Louis had suffered terrible wounds in the attack. Tellius could only blame himself for not anticipating it. He should have guessed there would be some in the city who regarded the deal with the kingdom of Féal as an insult, or an invasion. By the Goddess, that was exactly how he had felt himself. Instead, he had done nothing as the prince and his Lord Harkness had set up restaurants, gambling houses and trading ventures across the city. They’d lavished astonishing sums on the new establishments – all legally. In response, Tellius had spent more days sulking on the Sallet estate than he had in two years, feeling old.

  He’d mourned a royal title he’d never truly had, as well as a council of Twelve Families that had chosen gold over dignity and freedom. It had hurt – and as a result, he’d missed the danger that he was not the only one who resented the prince and his people. The result was what he saw. One of the prince’s arms had been broken, his fingers hacked away. One of his eyes had been ruined, with a gash down his cheek. It was ugly work and Tellius recalled the prince’s youth and arrogance with something like regret. He would never again stand unaware of pain or loss. That was the terrible thing about serious injury. It stole more than just an eye or a hand. It took innocence.

  The prince stirred and Tellius rose from his seat to cross to the bed. The royal physician, Master Burroughs, was down the corridor of the little hospital. Tellius stepped outside to the guard on the door.

  ‘Send someone to fetch Master Burroughs. I think the prince is waking up.’

  That done, Tellius leaned over the young man. It did not make him proud to feel a twinge of spiteful vindication as he did so. Tellius had wanted vengeance for the death of Lord Canis. He’d even kept an eye on the Canis boy for weeks, in case he tried some wild scheme, or used his family money to hire men. Could that …? No, Tellius shook his head. The boy was not yet subtle enough to escape the watchers Tellius had placed around him. There had not been one Canis meeting in the weeks since his father’s death without ears to report the details back to Tellius. Yet it had not saved Prince Louis.

  Tellius saw the eyelids flickering and the young man hissed to himself, drawing in a breath as he became conscious enough to feel pain. There was a brass bracelet on his wrist. Tellius rotated it as he had been shown, hearing it click. Burroughs had said it wasn’t magic, that it dripped some numbing milk or other into a vein. However it was done, it seemed to work. Tellius saw Prince Louis’ face relax. He thought the prince might go back to sleep, but without warning, the good eye opened, red-rimmed and sore as it focused on Tellius.

  ‘Relax, son. You’ve been badly hurt. You’ll live. Master Burroughs says the wounds were clean enough. He had to open you up last night to stop some bleeding inside. Can you understand me?’ Tellius remembered what Burroughs had told him to say. ‘Do you know who I am?’

  ‘Speaker Tellius,’ Prince Louis whispered.

  He sounded hoarse and Tellius passed him a glass of water. To sip it, Louis had to struggle up and Tellius could see the young man’s confusion at the mass of bandages that had replaced his left hand.

  ‘No …’ Prince Louis said, shaking his head as memories flooded back.

  Tellius decided to get it over with. He knew he might have been more patient with a friend or family member, but the truth was he had other concerns than coddling a young fool who seemed to walk with trouble wherever he went.

  ‘You’ve lost your right eye and left hand. You were stabbed in the side. Master Burroughs says you are lucky to be alive. If you hadn’t been found so quickly and brought here, you would be dead. The young woman with you was not as fortunate.’

  Tellius paused to see how much the young man was taking in. Prince Louis seemed stunned, though it might have been the pain or the drugs in his system.

  ‘You will live. Do you understand that? As long as you rest, you have every chance of returning to full health.’

  It seemed like a cruel thing to say to a man who had lost an eye and four fingers, but Prince Louis nodded. They both looked up as Burroughs entered. He smiled to see his patient awake and alert. With Tellius looking on, the doctor made a show of inspecting the bandages, though what he could possibly discern beneath all that white cloth, Tellius had no idea. Still, Burroughs looked satisfied.

  ‘Excellent,’ he said. ‘Young dogs do heal well. I have salved the wounds in honey, sir. You’ll need to have your dressings changed every second day for the first month. I’m happy to do it, if you remain in the city. Now, I’ve cleaned you up as best I could, but much depends on the fevers that will surely enter. Still, you are young and obviously fit. You should survive. Good. Must get on.’

  The doctor nodded to Tellius once more and left the room. Prince Louis sagged back against the pillows, looking utterly defeated.

  ‘I …’ Tellius began. He hesitated, but he needed to ask before Prince Louis drifted back to sleep. ‘I am aware that pigeons flew from the roof of the Darien Lion shortly after you were found and taken here. I assume your father will have been told of your injuries?’

  Tellius waited. An age seemed to pass before Prince Louis nodded.

  ‘I’m told you were attacked by men of this city. I assure you there was nothing official about any of this. If it is confirmed that men of Darien waylaid and maimed you, I will have them taken and prosecuted. As speaker for the council, I offer our formal apology that such a thing could happen. I am only pleased you survived, unlike poor Lord Canis.’

  The single eye turned to watch him. Tellius thought he could see a terrible anger there. He could hardly blame the young prince.

  ‘Do you remember the attack?’ Tellius asked.

  He knew his chief witness lay on the bed before him, though he was not certain what answer he wanted. Slowly, Prince Louis dipped his head once more.

  ‘I’ll need descriptions. Anything you can recall. One of them seems to have run foul of the guards and been killed on his way out, but there were at least two more, that we know of.’

  Tellius took a deep breath before going on. There was no help for it.

  ‘And to the best of your knowledge, were they men of Darien?’

  After an even longer wait, the prince nodded again. Tellius felt himself deflate, though he had known what he would hear. He’d spoken to a dozen patrons of the Darien Lion that evening. The violent thugs who’d attacked a foreign prince on Darien soil had been triumphant and jeering as they’d left. One of them had even boasted about it in a tavern down the road, vanishing before city guards arrived to arrest him. The whole story was infuriating and yet Tellius had to press the prince further, for all he dreaded the answers.

  ‘Tell me. How will your father react? Will he accept such things happen in a city? That violence on the street is not unheard of? Will he give us time to respond?’

  The young man on the bed tried to lurch up and catch him by the arm. Instead, the bulbous lump of bandages on his left hand just knocked against Tellius and fell away.

  ‘My father will go to war,’ Louis said. His remaining eye blurred with tears.

  13

  Hunter

  The village of Wyburn was a one-street sort of place, with a tavern and a smithy and a few houses dotted around. A day of hard riding from the city, Tellius felt as out of place as he once had entering Darien. After forty years or so, he knew the city well, but the outlying villages, where farmers … farmed, were a different world again. He thought people were probably still people, wherever they lived. Yet he’d heard rumours about village folk and their dark superstitions. He saw a few boys had gathered at the base of an apple tree nearby to stand and stare. He and his guards were probably the most exciting thing to happen in Wyburn since t
hey’d been born.

  When they came to the right house, Tellius nodded to Captain Galen and stood back. The door opened as Galen raised his fist, before he could knock. Tellius swallowed.

  The man who came out to stand on the step looked as if he’d been dried on a stove. Elias was stringy and hard, like old wood. He wore leather trousers and a ragged old black smock, ripped open at the neck as if he hadn’t cared enough to sew a seam. His beard was half white and half black, just about, with deep lines on his cheeks and around his eyes that spoke of years outdoors. There was no front garden, as the house opened right onto the cobbled road. Two small plum trees had been placed in pots on either side of the door – a touch that did not seem like something the man facing them would have done. Tellius could smell meat drying on the air that wafted out. It was a rich, sweet smell, not unpleasant. He cleared his throat, but the man spoke before he could begin.

  ‘No to whatever you want. I don’t have any business in Darien, not now.’

  He paused and Tellius had the uncomfortable sensation that the man was listening to a conversation only he could hear. If everything Tellius had heard was true, that was exactly what he was doing.

  ‘My name is …’ Tellius began.

  ‘Androvanus Yuan-Tellius, yes. Seems you know who I am as well. I don’t know how you found me, but if you know anything, you’ll know you won’t be taking me from my home, not today.’

  ‘Meneer,’ Tellius tried again, as the people of those parts said. ‘If you know my name …’

  ‘I know your name because you just told me. Then I told it to you, so you didn’t. How did I learn it, if I stopped you speaking? Yes, exactly.’

  To Tellius’ surprise, the man stepped out further onto the step, pulling his own door closed behind him.

  ‘Hold on. Just listen for a moment,’ Tellius struggled on. ‘You are Elias Post. That’s clear. It took me long enough to find you.’

  ‘How did you … Oh, I see.’

  Tellius blinked. It was hard carrying on a conversation with a man casting for answers Tellius had not given.

  ‘Meneer, you’ll have to slow down. I am too old for games.’

  ‘That I understand,’ Elias replied, with a shrug. ‘All right. If I ask how you found me, you’ll say something about witnesses, the last time I was in the city. I had other concerns that night, beyond hiding. So I suppose I was seen.’

  Tellius considered his next words carefully. The last time Elias had entered Darien, he’d ended up so covered in the blood of others that he’d been described as a red horror. No good description of the man had been possible in those circumstances – except that he had carried two small girls away from the fighting. It had taken all the resources Tellius had in Darien, dozens of men masquerading as tax inspectors, over many months. Some of them had even collected taxes as they’d visited every home, farm and village within a hundred miles of the city.

  A hundred and eight families had two small daughters in that number. They’d all merited a second visit, this time by the women in his employ. As a rule, those families had been trusting enough when a sweet young lady asked their daughters if they’d ever been to the city.

  Tellius’ people had been thorough and whittled the numbers down to a dozen possibles. He’d set watchers on each of those – and one of them had reported a widower in Wyburn, living on his own with two children. Shortly after that, the watcher had vanished, disappearing as if he’d never lived. Which brought Tellius to the door of the man he privately considered to be the most dangerous individual alive.

  ‘So. You confirm you are the man who killed the last king?’ Tellius said.

  ‘No,’ Elias said. ‘I was there, yes. I did not fire the shots that killed him. Now listen to me: I regret that day, every day. I went into Darien because a man had taken my daughters. I didn’t want to kill anyone – and I ended up red with innocent blood. Have you any idea what that is like?’

  Tellius nodded, slightly unnerved by his intensity.

  ‘I believe I have,’ Tellius replied. ‘I fought that same night, sir. I fought against the Aeris legion as they came in. I held the line, standing in the road with the people of the city. I heard your part in it much later. If you say you didn’t kill the old king, who did?’

  It was not what Tellius had come to ask, but he could not let the moment pass without seeing if Elias would confirm what he had heard. To his frustration, Elias Post just frowned and waved his hand.

  ‘Some young fool. I imagine he’s long dead by now.’

  ‘Perhaps I should thank you for what you did,’ Tellius went on. ‘You stood against the Immortals of the Aeris legion. You helped defend the city.’

  ‘For a while. Yet it was your Lord Hart who killed their general, not me. You know, I wish it had been me. He was the one who took my daughters. He was the one who gave the order to kill the king and throw the Twelve Families and the whole city into chaos. He told us to cut the head from the snake. He needed killing.’

  A whisper of an old rage began to gleam in the man’s eyes and Tellius had to struggle not to edge away. Elias looked fit and brown from a life outdoors, but there was no obvious sense of danger from him. Yet he had survived traps of gunfire and sword. He had withstood a cavalry charge. This was a man who had walked into a royal palace and then out again, leaving a host of dead behind. Tellius chose each word carefully, sensing Elias was still hearing them before they had been spoken.

  ‘Why have you come here?’ Elias said.

  He seemed to listen to a response and Tellius felt he had to reply quickly to get a word in with his future selves. It was the oddest sensation.

  ‘The past is the past, meneer. I have not come for vengeance …’

  ‘If you had, I would make you regret it,’ Elias said, interrupting.

  Tellius hurried on, rather than challenge something he believed to be the truth.

  ‘This is no small thing, meneer. Darien could fall, be in no doubt about that – I would not have come otherwise. I do not yet know the full strength of the forces that will come against us. Only that it is the result of a personal event. A king’s son was maimed in Darien. His father’s armies are marching south.’

  Tellius found he was gabbling to stay ahead of his alternate selves. He had no idea of the extent of the ‘knack’ Elias Post was said to have. The man could see just a little way into the future, which made him almost impossible to hit and fearsome in a way no other warrior could be. The Aeris general who had taken his daughters had done so as a way to control him. That had not ended well.

  ‘Listen to me now,’ Elias said. ‘I have not invited you into my home because I did not want to consider you my guest. I have no interest in the politics of your city. If Wyburn is attacked, I will fight to defend my home. Nothing else …’

  ‘We need you. And you owe us a debt,’ Tellius interrupted. ‘I am the Speaker for the Council of the Twelve Families, consort to Lady Sallet. Do you think I’d be here if it wasn’t absolutely necessary? I …’

  Elias broke his stubborn stare, turning to look left, along the street. Tellius had seen small gates between some of the houses, with alleys leading to the rear of the terrace. One of those opened and a girl stepped out. She wore a dark smock dress that reached her knees, slender as a willow wand and about as pale, twelve or fourteen at the most. Tellius knew he was no great judge of such things. The resemblance to her father was clear, however, as was the man’s instant concern and irritation.

  ‘Not now, Jenny. Whatever it is, I will deal with it when these … gentlemen have gone.’

  ‘I was listening,’ the girl said. ‘I think you should help the city if you can.’

  ‘And I have told you before not to listen to conversations that are no business of yours,’ Elias retorted.

  ‘You said the city saved my life, though – and Alice’s life,’ the girl said. ‘You said they tried to save mum as well. That’s a debt, isn’t it?’

  Her voice was clear and although she seemed
aware of the soldiers and Tellius watching her, she didn’t look at them. It was as if Elias and his daughter were having a private conversation on the open street.

  ‘It sounds like a debt,’ Tellius murmured to her.

  She looked up at him, clear-eyed and fresh-faced as she raised one eyebrow. Elias snorted.

  ‘There was a plague a few years back. The girls and I were given some foul muck by a legion doctor, outside the city. They offered it to secure my service, then held my daughters prisoner so I would do whatever they wanted. It has nothing to do …’

  ‘The Aeris legion is funded by the Twelve Families,’ Tellius interrupted. ‘It was then, and it is today. It remains a cornerstone of the city defences, though we have militias and gun regiments now.’ He raised a hand as Elias began to colour. ‘They are commanded by a younger Aeris brother, nothing to do with the one you knew.’

  As Elias digested that information, Tellius nodded to the girl.

  ‘Jenny Post, is it? So, you and your sister were saved by Darien. I’m sorry to hear we could not save your mother as well. I remember that plague, though I lived a different life then. Darien allows change, miss. And forgiveness, sometimes. I have come to ask for your father’s help in an emergency, that is all. Perhaps to wipe clean some of the blood on him as well.’

  He waited then for Elias to respond. The man was trembling, though it did not look like fear, but rather one who was barely holding himself under control. Tellius dared not risk a glance at Captain Galen, nor at the closest thing to a Mazer master he had left, now Hondo and Bosin had gone. Micahel was the best or second-best swordsman in Darien at that moment, but if Elias attacked them, Tellius suddenly realised he would sacrifice himself to get Micahel away. It had been quite unconscious, but Tellius had edged between them while the girl spoke, when he saw Elias growing angry and cornered.

  Micahel’s job was to keep him alive, to move so fast, perhaps not even Elias could stop him. Yet instead, Tellius’ instinct had placed himself in the way. The realisation made Tellius smile in wry disbelief. The girl stared quizzically at him.