They rode through the highborn district, with its clean cobbles and ornate gates, its blackwood carriages and healthy horses, its scurrying servants burdened beneath wares they did not own, and of which they would not partake. And the wealthy strolled – fewer than usual – through the dusk, warded by bodyguards, and, as always, contentedly unmindful of the world beyond their ken. She had travelled through the lower quarters of the city; she had seen the destitution and disease breeding in the airs of neglect. But such boldness was rare among her kin.
It would be easy to blame the dwellers for the filth in which they lived, and to see that wreckage as a symptom of moral weakness and spiritual failure; as, indeed, proof of the inequity of blood and the making of privilege a birthright. In the manner of horses, breeding would tell, and if nags struggled before creaking wagons and bore whip marks upon their flanks, and warhorses knew only fields turned muddy with blood and gore, and the upper terraces of the city offered dry even cobbles under well-filed, iron-shod hoofs, then surely this marked a natural order of things?
She had begun to doubt. Too comforting by far these assumptions. Too self-serving the pronouncements. Too inhuman the judgements. The trenches were deepening, and the eyes that looked up and across that gulf were hardening. The privileged had a right to fear these days, just as the dispossessed had a right to their resentment.
But Urusander’s Legion stood nowhere between that divide. They stood apart, wanting only for themselves, and they now gathered into ranks with weapons on hand, to take what the poor did not have and the rich had not earned.
She would be the first to scoff at the notion of hard work among her own kind. Tasks of organization were devoid of value without those being organized; without workers herded together with eyes downcast and the next day no different from this day and this life no different from the next one. She knew that she had been born to her wealth and land, and she knew how that inheritance had skewed her sense of the world, and of people – especially those in their hovels, who huddled in a fug of fear and crime and dissolution. She knew, and was helpless before it.
They approached the bridge and saw before them a large party of highborn, and Hish caught sight of Anomander – the silver hair, the mother’s legacy of his skin.
Gripp Galas rode up beside her on the concourse and said, ‘Milady, I am as unsuited to this company as the tale I bring to my master.’
‘Nevertheless, sir.’
Still he hesitated.
Hish Tulla scowled. ‘Gripp Galas, how long have you served your lord?’
‘Since he was born, milady.’
‘And how do you weigh the words you bring?’
‘An unwelcome burden on this day, milady. They journey to celebration.’
‘Think you your lord not aware of the violence in the countryside? He rides into smoke and ash this evening.’
‘Milady, the Deniers are a feint. The Legion but clears the field in preparation. They intend to march Urusander into the Chamber of Night. They intend, milady, a second throne.’
She studied him, chilled by the raw language of his assertion.
After a moment, Gripp continued, ‘I don’t know my master’s awareness of this situation. Nor do I know if my report will twist pleasure from his brother’s day. We all know a paucity of joyous memories and I wouldn’t assail this one.’
‘Must it always be paucity, Gripp Galas?’ Her question was asked softly and yet it seemed to strike him like a slap to the face.
He looked away, eyes tightening, and Hish Tulla sensed the gulf that stretched between her and him, a gulf he had acknowledged in acquiescing to the child Orfantal’s insistence that he deliver the boy to her first. This was a man who had stood in the highborn shadow: a servant, a bodyguard, his life subservient and dependent upon the very privilege he was avowed to defend. By this measure, one of mutual necessity, all of civilization was defined. The bargain was brutal and implicitly unfair and it sickened her.
Gripp said, ‘Milady, there’s enough to worry about without thinking too much. Too much thinking ain’t never but bred problems. A bird builds a nest, lays her eggs and feeds and defends her chicks, and there’s no thinking to any of it.’
‘Are we birds, Gripp?’
‘No. The nest is never big or pretty enough, and the chicks disappoint at every turn. The trees don’t give enough cover and the days are too short or too long. The food’s short on supply or too stale and your mate looks uglier with every dawn.’
She stared at him in shock, and then burst out laughing.
Her reaction startled him and a moment later he shook his head. ‘I do not expect my master to do my thinking for me, milady. We must each of us do that for ourselves, and that’s the only bargain worth respecting.’
‘Yet you will take his orders and do his bidding.’
He shrugged. ‘Most people don’t like to think too hard. It’s easier that way. But I’m content enough with the bargain I’ve made.’
‘Then he would know your thoughts, Gripp Galas.’
‘I know, milady. I simply rue what he will lose in the telling.’
‘Would he rather you said nothing? That you wait until after the marriage?’
‘He would,’ Gripp acknowledged, ‘but will face what he must and voice no complaint, nor blame.’
‘You are indeed content with your bargain.’
‘I am.’
‘You remind me of my castellan.’
‘Rancept, milady? A wise man.’
‘Wise?’
‘Never thinks too hard, does Rancept.’
She sighed, eyeing the retinue once more. ‘I wish to be back in my estate, arguing with my castellan over his cruelty to his favoured dog. I wish I could just hide away and discuss nothing more significant than a dog’s wretched tapeworms.’
‘We would mourn your absence, milady, and envy the castellan your regard.’
‘Will you seduce me now, Gripp Galas?’
His brows lifted and his face coloured. ‘Milady, forgive me! I am always honourable in my compliments.’
‘I fear I mistrust men who make such claims.’
‘And so wound yourself.’
She fell abruptly silent, studying the man’s eyes, seeing for the first time the softness in them, the genuine affection and the pain he clearly felt for her. These notions only deepened her sorrow. ‘It is my fate to lose the men for whom I care, Gripp Galas.’
His eyes widened slightly and then he looked down, fidgeting with the reins.
‘In what comes,’ she said then, ‘take care of yourself.’
There was a shout from the party, and at once riders and carriages were crossing the bridge.
Gripp squinted at the group and then drew a deep breath. ‘It is time, milady. I thank you for the clean clothes. I will of course recompense you.’
She thought back to the torn, bloodstained garments he had been wearing on the night of his appearance at her door, and felt tears in her eyes. ‘I did not sell them to you, Gripp. Nor loan them.’
He glanced at her and managed an awkward nod, and then urged his mount towards the party.
Hish Tulla guided her warhorse into his wake. When he drew nearer, she would angle her mount to one side, seeking to join the procession at the rear. With luck, Anomander would not notice her arrival and so be spared embarrassment.
Instead, he caught sight of them both while still on the bridge, and as suddenly as the procession had begun moving it was stopped by a gesture from Anomander. She saw him turn to his brother Silchas. They spoke, but she and Galas – both now reined in – were too distant to make out the exchange of words. Then Anomander was riding towards them, with the attention of all the others now fixed upon the two interlopers.
Lord Anomander halted his horse and dropped down from the saddle. He strode to stand before Hish Tulla.
‘Sister of Night,’ he said, ‘our Mother’s blessing well suits you.’
‘In the absence of fair hues my age is made a
mystery, you mean.’
Her comment silenced him and he frowned.
And so wound yourself. She evaded his eyes, regretting that she had made him stumble.
Gripp Galas spoke, ‘Forgive me, master—’
But Anomander raised a hand. Eyes still on Hish, he said, ‘I see the gravity your tale wears, Gripp, and would not discount it. I beg you, another moment.’
‘Of course, master.’ He clucked and guided his horse away, towards the head of the train.
Hish stared after him, feeling abandoned.
‘Will you dismount, Lady Hish?’
Startled, she did so and stood beside her horse’s head, the reins in her hand.
‘You gave no reply to my invitation, Lady. I admit to feeling shame at my presumption. It was long ago, after all, and the years have stretched a distance between us. But I still feel a child in your eyes.’
‘You were never that,’ she said. ‘And the shame was mine. See me here, yielding to the pity of your gesture.’
He stared at her, as if shocked.
‘I have been speaking with Gripp Galas,’ she said. ‘He is blunt in his ways, but I grew to appreciate his honesty.’
‘Lady,’ said Anomander, ‘Gripp is the least blunt man I know.’
‘Then I am played.’
‘No, never that. If he is made to guard his feelings, Lady Hish, he is known to grow discomforted. There is a tale, I expect, in his riding to you before me. The last I knew of him, he was on the road down from House Korlas, safeguarding a young hostage. It is not like him to disregard such a charge.’
‘Of course it isn’t,’ and she heard a faint snap to her retort. ‘The child is in my keeping for now, and yes, there is a tale, but it belongs to Gripp.’
‘Very well.’
‘I am not one for unbridgeable divides, Lord Anomander.’
He considered that and seemed to relax. ‘If you imagine him to view you as would a father, you have stepped wrongly.’
‘I begin to comprehend that,’ she replied, ‘and now all footing is uncertain beneath me.’
‘That said,’ Anomander continued, ‘I am confident in believing Gripp Galas to be generous of spirit, and so he would not burn to see you upon my arm at my brother’s wedding.’
‘Will he have a place to stand in witness to the ceremony?’
‘Always.’
She nodded. ‘Then, Lord, I am here to take your arm.’
He flashed a smile. ‘And girded for war, no less. I did not think me so formidable.’ Then, instead of waiting for her to draw near, he stepped forward, and his eyes met hers, and he said, ‘Lady, your beauty leaves me breathless as ever, and once again I feel a wonder at the privilege of your regard, now and all those years past.’ I fear Gripp might not be so pleased with my words here, but I speak only in admiration.’
All words left her, spun beyond reach.
‘Pity, Lady Hish Tulla? I only pity those who know you not.’ He offered his arm. ‘Will you honour me by accepting my invitation?’
She nodded.
His wrist was solid as iron, as if it could bear not only the weight of an entire realm, but also her every regret.
* * *
When Anomander dismounted before Hish Tulla, Silchas Ruin twisted in his saddle and waved Kellaras closer. Leaving the company of Dathenar and Prazek, the captain rode up to the white-skinned warrior.
Silchas was smiling. ‘For a beautiful woman, your lord will make even a groom wait.’
‘There was an invitation, sir,’ Kellaras replied.
‘We did not think that she would accept, else I would have attempted the same and set myself as my brother’s rival. We might have come to blows. Crossed swords, even. Scores of dead, estates in flames, the sky itself a storm of lightning and fire. All for a woman.’
‘A thousand poets would bless the drama and the tragedy,’ Kellaras observed.
‘They’ll sift the dust and ashes,’ Silchas said, nodding, ‘for all the treasures they can only imagine, and in vicarious ecstasy they’ll invite wailing mourners into their audience, and make of every tear the most precious pearl. In this manner, captain, do poets adorn themselves in a world’s grief.’ He shrugged. ‘But the feast of two brothers warring over a woman is one too many poets have attended already. ’Tis easy to grow obese on folly.’
Kellaras shook his head. ‘Even poets must eat, sir.’
‘And folly is a most pernicious wine, always within reach with sweet promises, with no thoughts of tomorrow’s aching skull. Alas, it is not only poets who attend the feast of our condition.’
‘True, sir, but they chew longer.’
Silchas laughed. And then, when Anomander stepped forward to take Hish Tulla’s hand on his arm, the Lord’s brother grunted and said, ‘What think you of that old gristle waiting in the wings?’
‘His presence disturbs me,’ Kellaras admitted. ‘Gripp Galas had other tasks and I fear his presence here marks failure.’
‘Let us hope not,’ Silchas said in a mutter.
Kellaras lifted his gaze, considered the northern sky. ‘I also fear for the estates upon the edge of the forest, sir. Too many fires and no rain in many days. Bogs are known to swallow flames but not kill them. Should the wind veer …’
‘The river god battles those flames, captain. It will only fail when dies the last Denier in the forest.’
Kellaras glanced across at Silchas. ‘The Houseblades but await the command, sir.’
Silchas met his eyes. ‘Will you risk your life defending non-believers, captain?’
‘If so commanded, sir, yes.’
‘And if Mother Dark deems the Deniers her enemy?’
‘She does not.’
‘No, she does not. But still I ask.’
Kellaras hesitated, and then said, ‘Sir, to that I cannot speak for anyone else. But I will not follow any deity who demands murder.’
‘Why?’
‘Because we know murder to be wrong.’
‘Is it as simple as that, captain? Are there not exceptions? Do we not draw circles in the sand and claim all outside them to be less than us, and by this distinction do we not absolve ourselves of the crime of murder?’
‘Sophistry, sir.’
‘Yet, as a warrior, captain, you have committed murder in the name of our people, and in the name of your lord.’
‘I have, but in the taking of life I appease no god’s command. The crime is mine and upon no other shoulders do I set it. If I did – if we all did – then no god could withstand the burden of those crimes. But more than that: we have not the right.’
‘Urusander’s Legion disagrees with you, captain.’
‘With sword I stand ready to make argument, sir.’
Lord Anomander and Lady Hish Tulla were on their horses now, and Kellaras saw Gripp Galas join them. A moment later the procession lurched into motion once more. The captain wondered if Andarist, ensconced in the lead carriage, had chafed at the delay, or sought explanation from his servant. His eyes then fixed on the sword now strapped at his master’s hip, encased in a lacquered blackwood scabbard. A weapon blessed by a goddess, forged to take life. But she refuses to tell him which life. Who will die in her name?
But the blade was un-named, and so it would remain until after Andarist’s ceremony. There would be no omens attending this marriage scene. If perfection were possible, Anomander would seek it for his brother and Enesdia. Or die in the attempt.
Beside him, Silchas said, ‘Andarist is the best among us.’
Kellaras understood the meaning of that ‘us’. Silchas was referring to his brothers, as if his thoughts had followed parallel tracks to the captain’s own.
‘For him,’ the white-skinned Andii continued, ‘we will bring peace to the realm. By all that follows, captain, you may measure the fullness of a brother’s love. Like you, Kellaras, Anomander will not murder in her name.’
It is well then that the sword has no voice.
As they rode out from Khar
kanas and on to the north road, Captain Scara Bandaris arrived with his troop. Greetings were called out and jests followed. The sun was low in the western sky and the night promised to be warm.
* * *
Long before they came within sight of the estate the dog began to cower, casting glances back at Grizzin Farl, as if to question their chosen course down the road. By this sign, the Azathanai’s steps slowed, and it was with deep trepidation that he continued on.
He had no words with which to ease the dog’s growing distress, since he could find none for himself. The title of Protector was not an honorific, and not one he willingly chose for himself. The things he guarded against none could withstand, but he would be first to stand in their path, first to weather their storm, and first to bleed. He knew that few understood him, even among the Azathanai. And among the Jaghut, the Lord of Hate was the only one to turn away, avoiding his gaze.
The dog halted at a new track that led from the road, where brush had been cleared and stones left in piles to either side. When Grizzin Farl joined it, he reached down and settled a hand upon its sloped head. ‘I am sorry,’ he murmured, ‘but this is my path. My every desire is a conceit, and where the road ends is where it begins again. Providence, forgive me.’
He set off down the track. The morning air smelled of blood and putrefying meat, but the rot held that sweetness that told him that it was still relatively fresh. A day or two, no more. The dog stayed at his side as he came out upon the clearing. He studied the carriage with its open door, and then the bodies sprawled in the grasses. A fox stood over one, frozen in fear at the sight of the dog. An instant later it bolted, vanishing into the wood. The dog gave no sign of wanting to chase, instead pressing against the side of Grizzin’s leg.
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