by Mike Ashley
Nox stepped on to the barge. He paused for a second, glanced down at his bleeding arm, felt the slight shifting of the boat beneath his feet. And here he was, one step closer to freedom.
Several medics glanced up as he went inside, but none of them rose to aid him. He was walking, his wound looked minor, and the pride of a warrior was precious. He found himself a bed – only a few were occupied – and sat down heavily. Closing his eyes, he could not decide whether his queasiness was due to the boat’s movements, or his own blood loss.
“Cut yourself shaving?” a medic asked.
Nox glanced up at her and smiled. “Argument with a foxlion.”
The woman raised her eyebrows, mildly impressed, and held his arm. “How long ago?”
“This morning.”
“Should have stopped bleeding by now. You look pale. I’ll have to flush the foxlion’s poison from the wounds.” She paused and looked Nox in the eye. “It’ll hurt.”
“I didn’t expect anything less.”
As the medic went to gather some equipment, Nox looked around at the few other patients. Most of them sat on their beds or lay propped up, conscious and alert, eager to leave as soon as possible. A few were prone, moaning softly in whatever sleep had taken them. One of them was dead. Blood pooled under their bed, and Nox could see a chipped sword glistening nearby. One more free meal for the sea creatures.
When the medic returned Nox felt a sudden stab of fear and doubt. He began to wonder whether his plan had held any sanity after all, or whether the cold had finally driven him mad.
“Lay down,” she said.
Nox did not move. “Are you sure?”
She smiled, but it held little humour. “Scared, Krote?”
Nox shook his head, lay down and held out his arm.
The medic was right. It hurt.
Later, at night, in the quiet, Nox kept himself awake. The medic had given him a chemicala powder to help him sleep and regain his strength, but he had retained it beneath his tongue and spat it out when she left. Dregs of it had found its way into his system. Shadows of sleep crowded in. But every few minutes he tensed his dressed arm, and the pain brought him back.
His wounds were flushed and had stopped bleeding, but the process had hurt more than putting them there in the first place.
The hospital barge was never completely quiet. There were a few snores from his fellow patients, and one of them moaned in her sleep, haunted by sleep demons. Nox was glad of this. He used a heavy snore as cover for sitting up. When a man cried out in his sleep, Nox stood from his cot. When the nightmaring woman muttered some ancient curse at whatever troubled her, he paced quickly to the windows and moved a curtain aside. The harbour was much quieter than during the day, but there was still movement here and there, torches flaring along the breakwater, shadows slipping through shadows. He had always known that there would be people around, but his plan was brazen enough to have a chance. Or so he thought. If he was wrong, then he would be dead by dawn. Floating in the icy seas. Fodder for the carrion creatures cruising its dark depths.
“Never seen the mages!” someone cried out, and Nox froze. Moonlight cast his shadow back into the barge. Anyone opening their eyes would see him silhouetted against the starlight, but there were no more words. It had sounded like the woman. Perhaps it was the mages that haunted her sleep.
Nox lifted himself slowly on to the windowsill and stepped outside. The edge of the barge was just wide enough to walk around, but any missed footing would send him into the water. That would be the end of him. Night was a time for foxlions. How ironic it would be to fall victim to one now.
He worked his way to the end of the barge and back up on to the breakwater. At its very tip were moored some old fishing sloops. They had been there for years, and their ragged sails and abandoned appearance had planted the seed of his plan. He would steal one, sail it away from Newland and Dana’Man, never trying to hide. If anyone glanced out at the moonlit scene they would see a sailing boat heading confidently out to sea. They would assume that there was nothing wrong and go back to sleep. Or, they would raise the alarm and follow his stolen boat with a hail of arrows and bolts.
The more he thought about his plan, the more Nox realised how crazy he was. But in a way that gave him comfort, because it was that very craziness that would offer his greatest chance of success. No one had ever heard of a Krote escaping the mages’ island. No one had ever heard of anyone even trying. And the simple reason was that it was suicide. Even if they could escape, to truly be free of the mages’ influence they would have to sail a thousand miles south to Noreela.
Standing at the end of the breakwater, Nox looked out at the dark sea that would be his home for the next few weeks. He planned to fish for food and gather rainwater to drink. A thousand miles . . .
No, he thought, I can do it. It will work! It’s so simple and foolish and impossible, it has to work. He climbed down a rusted ladder on to the deck of one of the boats, untied its mooring ropes, used a paddle to shove it away from the breakwater, hoisted the sail, held the tiller and smiled as a breath of wind seemed to rise from nowhere, helping him on his way to freedom. The breath of fate.
And he was right. Fate breathed down his neck that night.
When he was thirty-five, Nox took part in a raid on a settlement to the north. The Krotes knew of the ice people, bands of rovers that wandered across the snow fields, killed birds for food, eking out a sparse existence. They were undeveloped, wild people, all but cultureless, spending every minute of their waking time embroiled in a battle of survival against the elements. The one talent they did possess was speed. It could have been due to their long legs, grown strong and thin over time to enable them to step through deep snow. Or maybe it was a gift born of the need to flee the many predators that hunted them for food. Whatever the cause, it provided for excellent target practice for Krote crossbows.
The fight was ferocious. The surface of the glacier was left stained red with the blood of the ice people, redder than any blood the Krotes had ever seen, and the few that escaped became an enjoyable distraction for the next couple of hours. Nox and his companions followed the escapees through the snow, using refined skills of tracking and stalking that had been honed through many other such hunts. The ice people knew their territory well; they were adept at hiding, they could blend in with the snow-scape, so pale was their skin. But they were no match for the Krotes, and in truth it was simply sport.
Nox ran down one ice woman, finally bringing her legs from under her with a bolt to the back of the knee. He stood over her, panting, watching her blood seep into the snow and turn it a deep red. She stared up at him, rapid breaths condensing in the air and floating across the glacier like frozen screams. She spoke, but he did not know her language. He decided to slit her stomach open and let her insides out. A slow, cruel way to kill her. But she had led him on a long chase and now he was sore and tired, and his blood was up.
For a second as he bent down, the idea flashed across his mind that this was wrong.
He glanced at the woman’s face and was amazed at the change there. She had gone from terrified to enraged, fearful to ferocious. Shock made him plunge his sword into her chest. She gasped, arched her back, and he pushed harder, twisting the handle and feeling ribs snap under the pressure.
She hissed blood. He did not know the words but their meaning was clear. He could see the hate in her eyes.
Nox withdrew the sword and brought it down on to her neck, severing her head. Then he stood and walked away.
The woman died. Her wraith rose up, colder than the freezing wastes that had been her home. And using a talent that the Krotes would never know, she looked into her killer’s mind and saw his greatest, most secret wish.
And she knew how vengeance could be hers.
Leaving the bloody wreck of her body behind, the ice woman’s wraith drifted south with a message for the mages.
They let him think he had escaped.
He spent
that whole night sat at the tiller, sailing hard, aware of every boat length he put between himself and Dana’Man. His whole life was falling behind, and he felt nothing for it. No loss, no sadness, no sense of the version of himself he was leaving. Ahead, in the dark, the promise of something new loomed like the sun waiting to rise. The weight of all his bad deeds sailed with him, but they were lighter by the second. It was as if putting distance between himself and the mages was also diluting the evils he had performed at their behest.
And then as the sun peered over the horizon, he heard the screech of something diving down from above. Even before Nox had turned to look, the voice came down to slaughter all his hopes and dreams.
“Going somewhere?” Lenora shouted.
He thought to reach for his sword. But how could he fight this flying thing? The hawk was huge, tentacles trailing as it plummeted, wicked curved beak catching the first rays of sunlight. It would crush him.
The creature pulled up short and hovered above his head. The stink of its exhausts thrust down at him, billowing the boat’s sails and forcing him to his knees, retching. When he looked up again he saw who else rode the beast’s back . . . and hope left him forever, purged by the sight of the mage.
“Mistress Angel wants your help!” Lenora shouted down.
Nox could only stare, hands limp by his side, unable to tear his gaze away from this sorceress. Though bereft of magic for a century still she exuded malevolence, a sense of dread like sweat seeping from her pores. She was beautiful, but awful to behold. She looked down on him without expression. Lifeless. And he wished for all the world that she would speak, because her silence was most terrifying of all.
“Will you help?” Lenora said.
“You’re toying,” Nox said. “Just kill me and get it over with.”
“Kill you?” Lenora said. “Of course not, Nox. What a waste!”
Nox could not begin to imagine the punishment he would receive.
He reached quickly for his sword. He would drag the keen blade across his own throat and gasp one last bloody laugh at this mage. Perhaps a century ago she would have been able to torture his departed soul, but now in a magic-less world dead was dead.
Goodbye, he thought.
The crossbow bolt passed clean through his palm. He dropped the sword and it fell into the ocean with hardly a splash.
“No,” Angel said, her voice like a rumble in the ocean depths.
Lenora whistled and the hawk came down, its claws outstretched, and grabbed Nox from the boat. Its talons passed through his thigh and shoulder and he screamed, the mage’s laughter a ghastly accompaniment.
“Mistress Angel demands your help!” Lenora shouted. The hawk rose swiftly, and Nox saw his own blood spattering the deck of the boat. Part of him may find freedom, at least.
The hawk rose high and flew fast, and Nox’s petty attempt to flee was belittled by the short time it took them to reach Newland.
He hung from the creature’s talons trying not to scream, weathering the pain, certain that there would be far worse to come. Pain is imaginary, he had been told. Control it as you control your imagination. But the feel of the thick talons scraping against his bones was real enough, and each change in direction brought a screech from his throat. Above him, out of sight on the hawk’s back, Angel’s Lieutenant laughed every time.
“Where are we going?” Nox asked. There was no answer, and he was not surprised. The mage would not deign talk to him unless she so desired. And when she did, it would doubtless be to tell him of some awful fate.
From high up, Nox saw that Newland was deserted. The usually bustling harbour had been left to the bobbing boats and scavenging sea birds, and the only movement in the barrack fields was the flutter of flags. Where has everyone gone? he thought. And why?
As if passing from above sea to land was a signal, one of the hawk’s huge tentacles suddenly whipped around his waist. Its claws uncurled and Nox screamed as he was tugged from them. He struggled and tried to fall, but the tentacle held him tight, crushing his stomach and lifting him up, depositing him in the saddle on its back. The hawk let go, but Nox could not move. Before him, Lenora held the reins and guided the creature inland. And behind him, her breath hot on his neck, her presence like a hole that could swallow him up, Angel.
“I’ve known for years that you would flee,” Angel whispered. Her voice was a shard of ice penetrating his skull. “My brother and I have been watching, waiting. We decided a long time ago that we’d make an example of you.”
“Why?” Nox said, having to shout into the air disturbed by the hawk’s flight. Angel’s voice did not sound raised at all, and yet he heard her words clear and heavy.
“Because we wished it,” Angel said. She rested her hand on his wounded shoulder and squeezed gently. “You have no friends, Nox. They’ve betrayed you. You have no comrades or lovers on your side. No one. You’re quite unique. The others that try to escape we simply kill. Cut up. Eat. But time is moving on, things change. I want everyone to see what happens to you.”
Nox pressed his hands flat against the saddle and pushed hard. He would tumble to the side and fall away, and for every second of his descent he would relish those last few moments of freedom. But Angel’s hand pressed him down, she whispered, “No,” and Lenora whistled to the hawk to begin its descent.
“We’re not warriors!” Nox shouted, directing his words at Lenora. To address the mage was too terrifying. “We’re slaves! No better than the fodder we eat, the slaves we capture and kill. Lenora! What will this gain you?”
Lenora did not answer, but Angel did.
“You’re right,” she said. “The slaves we control with chemicala, you Krotes with promises and fear. You’re all slaves to us.”
Lenora laughed, her shoulders shook, and Nox looked down.
They were descending rapidly, and now he could see long columns of people marching up through the snow. There were thousands down there, all of Newland making its way into the mountains. A few Krote pennants waved shadows on to the snow. He wondered where his own troop would be, and whether any of them would care.
Nox suddenly felt his fear transmuting into something else. Not hope, nothing so limitless. But peace. He realised that Angel was helping him on his way. However terrible his manner of death, once gone he would be beyond the mages’ reach.
“I’ll still escape,” he said, and Angel’s hand left his shoulder.
“I’m sure you’re right,” she said, and Nox felt her smiling. “Even I can’t see forever.”
They landed on the glacier. It was a bright morning, no snow showers, and the cold air was sharp and clear. There were already a thousand Krotes and slaves there, huddled around hastily lit fires, cooking fish, drinking, already entering into something of a festival atmosphere. And why not? Nox thought. They’re here to see a killing, and killing is what they love.
Lenora slipped down the side of the hawk. The assembled throng grew silent, watching her. She looked up at Nox and motioned him down.
“Don’t make me come up there and get you,” she said quietly.
Nox considered the weapons he carried. His sword was gone, but he still had throwing spikes, the slide-shock on his belt, maces strung along both legs. He could surely reach them before Lenora made it back on to the hawk, but Angel still sat behind him. And even if the mage did nothing to prevent him – he guessed she may enjoy the sport of seeing Lenora and him enter into combat – Lenora herself was more than his match.
At least it would be an honourable death.
He fell sideways, right hand reaching to his belt for a throwing spike, left held out to roll himself across the hard packed snow. He saw Lenora tense, and then smile, and then he felt a hand close around his ankle.
Angel stood on the hawk’s back and held him high. He drew back his own hand, throwing spike ready.
He heard the familiar whistle before the slide-shock snapped off three of his fingers at the second knuckle. The crowd cheered and Lenora gr
inned. Nox screamed, instantly ashamed at his pain.
“Here he is,” Angel said. “The escapee! He didn’t get far. Noreela is that way, Krote!” She swung him southward and jerked him back, blood from his fingers spattering a line across the glacier.
“We’re all slaves!” Nox shouted, but the crowed cheered and jeered, and he wondered where he had ever found hope.
“My brother and I are slaves also,” Angel said, and the shouting suddenly ceased. She dropped Nox to the ice and jumped down, feet landing either side of his head. He could see her mottled skin, smell her age, sense the power she still possessed. “Slaves to the magic that tore itself from us. Slaves to this place, our banishment. Slaves to revenge.”
“Kill him!” someone shouted. Other voices rose in support. Nox turned and scanned the assembled crowd of Krotes for a familiar face, but they were all strangers to him now. He had left them less than a day before but already he no longer belonged. He had changed.
“Bless you,” Angel said, as if talking to a thousand children. “Death is all you know.” She reached down and gathered Nox to her chest, lifting him as easily as she would a baby.
Nox stared up at her face. Was she growing? Was he shrinking? He should be able to move, to struggle and fight. But each message he sent his limbs was translated into another pathetic whimper from his mouth. Just let it end, he thought. Please, just kill me. The mage glanced down, smiling as if hearing his thoughts.
“Lenora!” Angel shouted. “You know what to do.”
Nox did not see, but he heard. The hawk shifted on the ice, clumsy out of the air. Its great feet crashed down, once, twice, three times. And then came a blast of heat, a gasp from the crowd, and clouds of steam formed an unnatural mist around them.
“All ready, Mistress.”
“All ready,” Angel echoed, looking down at Nox. “Betrayer,” she whispered. She looked up again at the ever-growing crowd.
“This is a warning,” she said, her voice carrying across the slope. “Anyone who tries to flee my brother and I will suffer a similar fate, or something worse. We may not have magic, but we still have knowledge. Ways and means. And chemicala. This is Nox! See him alive now! And see him live forever.”
