Doom-Quest of Ara-Karn 3 The Iron Gate

by Adam Corby

  His eyes closed.

  Something stirred in the airs about him – not a breeze, not wind or what a man would call wind, but a stirring, an unquiet restlessness – a rippling of the fabric of the air. On the stone before the naked man’s shins, the jade dagger turned slightly, the way a well-crafted compass will, obedient to the magic of true North.

  The veins on the man’s arms stood out with tension.

  Strange markings rose to the surface of his sun-darkened flesh. The lean body arched as though with effort or pain. Sweat shone on his brow, his shoulders and back. The sweat gathered among the hairs on his chest, and trickled between the ridges of his abdomen, to the root of his sex and strength.

  A shadow formed between him and the dagger. It seemed the shadow of a seated man. But it lay athwart the stone at the wrong angle to be his own.

  He bent forward. The veins on his brow stood out. His face darkened. The black brows drew down over his closed eyes.

  The shadow stirred. It slid down over the stone. Around the lance-tower it crept, slyly and cunningly down over the foremost battlements, down to the frame of the gate. There it seemed to bend and stretch, and change it shape, until the shadow framed the frame itself, and surrounded the great plates of sea-quenched iron.

  High above, the naked man’s lips moved and uttered words in a tongue not spoken in the lands where men dwell since he himself had used it last; and before him never in a hundred generations of men. The words ran in the form of a riddle and a rhyme of infinite complexity, though their gist was simple enough:

  ‘You will open yourself to no man but me,’ the saying went. ‘You will not bend or break, until I bend and break you. No other man shall win such power over you.’

  And the shadow sank unseen into the blackness of the ancient iron, until the thing was done, and the naked man sprawled half out of life on the roof of the southern lance-tower.

  Slowly below, the barbarians turned and fretted in evil dreams. They began to twitch and stretch. They woke, and their heads ached as though they had all drunk their bellies full of the foulest wine unmixed, even to the bitter lees.

  Across the battlements it was the same with the guardsmen. They struggled to wake, and spat out the foul taste from their mouths; rubbed grains from their eyes and felt their bones benumbed and aching.

  So life and wakefulness came once more to those who guarded and assaulted the Iron Gate. None saw or knew the change that had come over the iron; none but the wisest and blessed might have sensed any change at all.

  ‘Ah! This was a foul sleep and an evil waking,’ growled Berowne. ‘What came over us all? Charan Ennius, ho up there! Did you feel it too?’

  But the lance-tower roof was empty. The Hooded Man had gone.

  * * *

  That waking the Empress emerged from her long confinement and went with her maidens among the Tarendahardilites. Over the black robes of a priestess the Empress wore a long gray cloak, plain and unadorned, such as priestesses wear who are in retirement. Her maidens handed loaves to the people. An awed murmuring followed in the wake of the apparition of the woman robed and masked like one of the Virgins passing among them in silent stateliness, accompanied by a dozen of the most beautiful of women in ivory-colored loras.

  ‘But was it truly her majesty, or only her ka?’ some asked.

  In the court between the gates, the Empress was welcomed by the guardsmen. The men formed a large hollow square four ranks deep around her, and lined the battlements above. They raised their lances and cried three times, ‘Ul Bordakasha!’

  Captain Berowne, with Haspeth at his side, offered her majesty the military salute, to which she responded with the Sign of Goddess. The maidens then distributed wine among the guardsmen, while the Empress walked the battlements.

  A light rain began to fall. She looked down over the city, like a gray statue against the sky. One by one the guardsmen came before her, and she gave them words of gratitude and encouragement.

  Each guardsman, upon hearing her words, pledged her his life. They saluted her only as ‘Your reverence,’ having been instructed by Berowne.

  Haspeth went down on one knee and held out his lance in both fists to her. He remained in this posture for some moments, speaking to the Empress in low, impassioned words. When at length he rose, Haspeth saluted brusquely and descended from the battlements with downcast features.

  Last to stand before her was the Gerso. Berowne himself introduced the Queen to the man who had been responsible for their success.

  Ara-Karn also sank to one knee. ‘Your majesty,’ he said gravely, ‘I am a foreigner here, and do not wear the devices of your majesty’s house; yet even so I wish to assure your majesty that the small deeds I have performed so far are as nothing compared to what I intend to do in the future.’

  The gray-cloaked figure was still. Then gracefully, the Empress held forth her hand. Ara-Karn took and gently kissed its back.

  ‘Charan Kandi,’ the Empress Allissál said, ‘I thank you for your services on my behalf, and extend to you all the gratitude that a daughter of Elna can offer.’

  Ara-Karn stood, and stepped aside.

  It had been the most natural of exchanges.

  * * *

  After the Empress departed, the two captains stood together on the battlements. The rain had ceased, leaving shiny puddles on the black stones.

  ‘She still blames me that I returned,’ the Rukorian grumbled. ‘What can I offer her to redeem myself?’

  ‘Death and more death,’ Berowne said. ‘What else but kill barbarians?’

  ‘No. We all do that here. If only there were a way out of this place, I could lead my men to Rukor and take command of the forces there.’

  ‘Perhaps there is,’ Berowne said, ‘but even if there were, I could not tell you its secret.’

  ‘It seems there is no one but will hold my past mistakes against me,’ the Rukorian said angrily, and stalked off the battlements.

  Shortly thereafter Narrano Delcarn appeared, bearing the captain a platter filled with bread, cheese, and stew. Berowne laid the platter on his knees and began to eat, while the Rukorian looked over the city.

  ‘Was it truly her majesty, or but a shade?’ Narrano asked.

  ‘What do you think?’

  ‘I do not know what to think. Only this: that a figure of a noblewoman garbed like a priestess thanked me for my efforts, and that I touched her hand, which was cold, and named her reverence.’

  The captain nodded and tore free another bit of bread.

  ‘But was it the Empress?’

  ‘It was herself,’ Berowne answered.

  ‘I looked for – I know not what, but something else. There are so many stories about her… Why did she come among us so obscured? What makes her an Empress? Is there something in her eye, or her manner when she presides over her court?’

  ‘Friend Rukorian, you ask me questions that I cannot answer. You need a seer, and some source of merriment to lift from you this gloomy cloud. Happily enough for you, I see the fulfillment of both your needs in the person of a single man nearing us even now.’

  From the yard an old, gray, stout, balding man climbed unsteadily to the level of the battlements. He wore a shabby, soiled tunic, yet over it a pectoral elaborately wrought of rods of gold fastened with silver chains and pins. He paused upon reaching the summit of the steps, regaining his breath.

  ‘I have seen this man before,’ Narrano said. ‘He often wanders hereabouts, though I have never seen him on the battlements before. Why did the men below let him pass? Who is he, some bankrupted merchant?’

  ‘Here you behold in the person of this diseased old man,’ Berowne answered. ‘no less than Dornan Ural, whose father was a slave, but who himself, as regent, ruled two of the Bordakasha. Are you still curious regarding her majesty, and what makes a woman an Empress? – Ask him, he knows all. Good-waking, my lord.’

  The old man took another step forward. He gave no sign of having heard the captain’s word
s.

  ‘Good-waking, Dornan Ural,’ Berowne repeated.

  ‘What? Does one call me?’

  ‘One does not, but I do.’

  The old man approached them, keeping to the second step, back far enough from the parapet so that the city beyond remained hidden from his gaze. He regarded the two soldiers uncertainly. One eyelid twitched and squinted; the other drooped to one side, drooling a yellowish sap.

  ‘I know you,’ he said.

  ‘I do not understand how,’ Berowne answered. ‘You have seen and spoken with me no more than a score of times.’

  ‘Your name is – Berowne, is it not? How is it that you wear the trappings of the Captain of the Guard?’

  ‘For a small reason, my lord. It seems I am the captain.’

  The former High Regent frowned. ‘What then of the other. A Rukorian, as I trust my memory?’

  ‘Trust in your wife before that, my lord,’ Berowne said blandly. ‘As I have told you, my foregoer fell in the fighting below.’

  ‘Perhaps he still lives, Captain. One can never be certain of these things until all the proper forms are complete – at times not even then. The dead sometimes return. Tell me, captain, do they still abide below?’

  ‘Who, my lord? The rats? Sweet Goddess, they will be there forever. They are our heirs. So we have groomed and fed them, that they may inherit all we leave behind.’

  ‘No, no, not rats – how oddly you speak! Have you been careful to wear your helmet at all times? It was a saying of my father’s that the late summer sun will act upon a man’s brains as on a pond, leaving only brack.’

  ‘Your seasons move backward, my lord,’ Narrano said gently. ‘It is late autumn now.’

  ‘Ah.’ The old man sighed. ‘If only the seasons would go that way! How cheap would wise counsel be then!’

  Berowne looked at the bright horizon. ‘Would you like a helmet, my lord?’ he asked.

  ‘Why? Do they gather to attack? I had heard talk of a treaty, and peace.’

  ‘Come and be your own herald, my lord,’ the captain invited. ‘Behold the happy truth yourself.’

  ‘No, please, captain, look beyond the parapet and tell me what you see. Tell me of my Tarendahardil. Will you?’

  ‘Of course, my lord,’ Berowne said gravely, stepping to the parapet.

  ‘I see a fair city,’ he said. He began gently, but his voice gathered power as he went on. ‘The fairest, greatest city in the round world. I see towers of alabaster and domes of brass and porphyry. I see the Brown Temple of Goddess, the Hall of Kings, the stone barges of the Emperors; I see theaters and the Courses, and the marketplaces – oh, it is busy there, my lord! All the merchants have laid out their wares. Broad-beamed ships row into the harbor, laden with goods. Can there be another such city known to time, or must I name her for you?’

  A sigh heaved itself from the deeps of the old man’s chest. He straightened his back. ‘Yes, that is Tarendahardil. What have they told me? I must behold my city for myself!’

  He stumbled past them to the parapet, and looked down. There he stood frozen. As the clouds slowly reformed brightward, obscuring Goddess, a gray tear slid from the squinting eye upon the wrinkles of the old man’s cheek.

  ‘Now I remember,’ he whispered. ‘Ara-Karn destroyed Tarendahardil, after my sons were slain at Egland Downs. No, what do I say? My sons died in the pleasure-gardens of Arstomenes in Vapio along with Chara Ilal and all the rest of the highborn. But it was Egland Downs that ruined us. I worked so hard, and it went to nothing. Ampeánor was not there to lead the armies, so we were defeated. I achieved my part, but he failed us. This I lay at his doorstep.’

  ‘Do you speak their tongue, my lord?’ Berowne asked. Dornan Ural shook his head, at which the captain responded, ‘Then it is as well you do not know what that one shouted just now.’

  ‘Why? What did he say?’

  Sadly, the captain shook his head. ‘He called out, sure as I am a man, “Look! Is that not the High Regent of whom we have heard so much? Some of you join me and take bows, that we may shoot him down and take his head to Ara-Karn!” See how they hold their bows and eye you, my lord?’

  Dornan Ural’s eyes grew big. ‘I think I should go, Captain. There is business for me, seeing to the supplies of water and meat.’

  ‘My lord, dare we hope to look for your presence again? It heartens my men to behold so brave a figure for our leader.’

  The old man shook his head, mouthing some apology. Narrano caught the old man’s grimy sleeve and asked, ‘My lord, will you not stay a bit longer, and tell us of the Empress? I have heard that none knows her majesty better than you. What sets her so far above us?’

  The old man stared over his shoulder at the Rukorian, his eyes and mouth ghastly. He pulled free and stumbled back down the steps.

  A rumble of laughter burst from the captain’s chest. ‘Now,’ he uttered in laughter, ‘I am delivered at last from sorrow. Yet alas, lieutenant, our good Regent seemed to take an ill liking to you.’

  ‘What was it? Did you know he would take it so?’

  ‘In truth, there have been rumors that affairs between the Empress and her High Regent were not always of the best. Still, you needn’t worry: he has no power over our preferment. And did you not see his face!’

  ‘Were you not cruel with that poor old man, Captain?’

  ‘Why? He is no better born than I am. Now at least we will no longer be annoyed by his hauntings.’

  The Rukorian shook his head. ‘I am not yet used to the ways of the court and the city, it seems,’ he said, and walked back toward the steps.

  * * *

  Nam-Rog sat again, heavily, wearily, in his seat before the black tent of Ara-Karn.

  Another man approached him from the ways between the tents. Erion Sedeg wore long dark robes and two streaks of paint on the sides of his eyes, in the manner of the fighters of the Desert. The Southron knelt below the old Durbar’s chair; grudgingly Nam-Rog acknowledged him.

  ‘Lord Nam-Rog,’ the Southron said, ‘I ask leave to take men so that I may build a thing which will win for Ara-Karn this stronghold.’

  ‘We do not need the tricks of Southrons to conquer, but only the strength of our own arms,’ Nam-Rog said. He did not like this man, did not trust him. Something about the Southron raised the hackles on the back of Nam-Rog’s neck. It was an evil thing, and each time he beheld him, Nam-Rog felt he should make the Sign of Goddess.

  The renegade stood to his feet. ‘This you will regret,’ he said softly. ‘I made my offer not for your sake, but for the King’s.’

  ‘Begone, slave,’ Nam-Rog grumbled. The Southron departed silently, leaving the old chief of the Durbars alone.

  Behind Nam-Rog, the great black tent of Ara-Karn stood at the very center of the camp, as it had stood at every campsite since the conquest of Carftain in the North. Empty of men yet filled with chests of treasure and the finest weapons, the tent had been raised over winter snow, desert sand, and the rain-pools around Bollakarvil, mutely awaiting the return of its owner. Gundoen had begun the practice; since Gundoen had been taken prisoner Nam-Rog had continued the practice, though whether out of habit or hope, he could not have said.

  He turned his face away from the ominous tent. He for one looked with no pleasure to the return of Ara-Karn.

  He had never understood the stranger. An outlander who scorned gold, had no use for women or laughter, ate whatever came to hand, even if it was the meanest of stuff, and seemed to take no joy even in the killing of enemies. He, a foreigner and a civilized man, had assumed the dream of Gen-Karn and led the tribes through the Pass of Gerso, to begin at last their long-awaited vengeance. Then, when but a handful of cities had fallen, the man had left them. Whither he had gone, none knew except for Gundoen.

  And Gundoen was a prisoner in that fastness.

  Nam-Rog shook his head and bared his teeth. He stood, and slowly made his way back to his own tents.

  Bern-Dak of the Harvols, who had been set to
watch the Iron Gate that waking, awaited him. There was something doubtful in Bern-Dak’s movements.

  ‘What now?’ Nam-Rog asked.

  ‘There was something on the Iron Gate.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘We saw it. We all saw it.’

  ‘What did you see?’

  Bern-Dak drew up his great scarred fist, and held it out before his throat as if he crushed something in his grip. He swallowed, and his throat worked oddly. ‘We saw the Gray Priestess,’ he said.

  Nam-Rog stared at him.

  The Gray Priestess was legend among the warriors. It had been in Gerso, on that bloody waking when the city burned like Goddess, that Ara-Karn confronted an old virgin Priestess who flung her curses at his head. Calmly – or so the rumor went – the Warlord ordered her bound between two pillars, and cut her in two with several strokes of his sword. And now, though not ten living men had beheld her in the life, ten thousand of them swore they had seen the Gray Priestess pass among the tents of every camp the army made, to enter the dreams of men like an accusing slayer. It was said that any man who dreamed of her would die in the next battle.

  ‘What did you see?’ Nam-Rog asked.

  ‘Her! I tell you, chieftain, my eyes are not so bad – I’m a bowman. She wore the black of sacrifice, and over it the same gray cloak they tell of. She stood atop the Iron Gate, she passed out rewards to all the guardsmen! She is with them, don’t you see?’

  ‘You saw a Priestess, nothing more. There were many of them here, long before we broke the Gates of Gerso.’

  ‘I saw what I saw, and the men with me saw the same.’

  ‘Then if you are afraid, Bern-Dak, go sit in your tents until the fear leaves you. But do not ask the rest of us to hold your hand and chant for you each time you cannot sleep.’

  The Harvol’s face darkened like blood, and the dark bristles of his beard stood straight out from his face. He pushed past Nam-Rog and burst out of the tent.

  ‘This place is unlucky,’ Bern-Dak shouted. ‘And when word of this crosses the camp, there will be no tent with a man at peace in it this sleep.’

  Nam-Rog swore to himself. From the inner chambers of the tent women appeared. They were women with hair the color of straw in High Summer, small breasts, slim hips, and dark green eyes. They were the women Nam-Rog had taken as his portion of the fall of cities.