Blade Of Fire (Book 2)

by Stuart Hill

  Sharley didn’t know if he, a barbarian from the north, would be answered, but a strange sense of peace settled over him, and he lifted his head and gazed on the beauty of the night. Above him the moonless sky swept in a wide, graceful arc of stars, so densely scattered against the night that he could have been staring into the smithy of heaven as the starry sparks of creation flew from the hammer and anvil of the gods. As he walked back to the camp he stopped to watch as the moon rose over the horizon in full glory. Soon the desert was steeped in a subtle silver light that washed like water over the parched land and pooled at the feet of the great dunes like small lakes.

  The next day they began their journey early again, in an attempt to travel as far as possible before the heat became overwhelming. But by nine o’clock temperatures were stifling, and once again Sharley felt as though he was being smothered in the dry furnace of the desert. He’d had to resort to wearing thick woolly socks on his feet and hands to protect them from the sun. He could only hope there’d be plenty of warning if any strangers approached, so at least he’d have some chance of preserving the Royal dignity of the House of Lindenshield. But he still felt dreadful. He was light-headed, and was now suffering from prickly heat, a horrible heat rash of red spots all over his body that itched as though he’d been sitting naked on an ants’ nest. He thought he’d go mad as he scratched and raked at his skin, and felt thoroughly sorry for himself.

  But Maggie was suffering even more. The few bits of the old scholar’s skin that he could see had gone a deep red colour, and he seemed to be having difficulty breathing. Sharley did his best to manoeuvre his camel closer to Maggie’s.

  “It’s a bit warm, isn’t it?” he said with masterly understatement, hoping to make the old man laugh.

  “No,” he answered in short gasping breaths. “It’s a lot hot!”

  “I think we’ll be stopping soon for a meal break. Perhaps you’ll feel better then.”

  Maggie looked at him with a bloodshot eye. “Unless someone’s been thoughtful enough to pack a mobile icehouse, I doubt very much that I’ll feel any different. In fact, I fear I’ve been having hallucinations, a sure sign that the brain is overheating, which is hardly surprising.”

  Sharley looked at him. “What sort of hallucinations?” he asked worriedly.

  “They’re really quite interesting,” the old scholar said, assuming his classroom voice, and taking several gasps for each word. “They take the appearance of young women, modestly dressed in flowing robes and with the most peaceful and calm expressions on their beautiful faces.”

  “Beautiful young women, eh?” Sharley said, and smiled.

  “Young man, at my age, and in my present condition, I can assure you that their attractiveness, or lack thereof, is of little interest to me. Of far more significance is the fact that they appear to be transparent. In fact, as insubstantial as the everpresent heat haze that surrounds us.”

  “Then that’s probably what they are,” said Sharley, relieved to find a rational explanation.

  “Undoubtedly. But the worrying factor is my brain’s insistence in moulding a natural phenomenon into the appearance of young women.”

  Sharley nodded, trying to appear relaxed, but he was extremely worried. Even as he’d been speaking to him, the old scholar’s face had become redder and his gasping worse. Sharley stayed with him for a few minutes making comforting comments, but then he urged his camel forward to catch up with Al-Khatib.

  “My Lord need say nothing. I am aware of Maggiore’s difficulties,” the merchant said as the Prince drew level with him. “I’d hoped that he would be strong enough to cope with the desert conditions, but I’m afraid his great age has made it difficult for him to adapt,” he said quietly.

  “But he should get used to the heat soon, shouldn’t he?” Sharley asked anxiously.

  Al-Khatib shrugged. “Perhaps, but in truth it’s unlikely. I hope that he will not get worse, but even if his condition doesn’t deteriorate, he’s already weak enough for it to be dangerous in the desert.”

  “What can we do?”

  “I’m not entirely sure. We have few options, but those we do have I shall lay before you,” Al-Khatib said with maddening precision and calm. “Firstly, we could turn back and try to reach the town before his condition deteriorates. Secondly, we could travel on and hope for the best. And lastly, we could leave him at the oasis we should reach by this evening. I have a small but comfortable house there and it is staffed by servants well used to treating maladies of the desert.”

  Sharley wondered if he should hit him. The choice was glaringly obvious! “Right. Then we settle him at the oasis and go on to the capital without him.”

  Al-Khatib bowed his head. “As My Lord wishes,” he replied smoothly.

  Sharley shifted in his saddle, then asked, “Is it . . . is it usual for somebody suffering from the effects of the heat to hallucinate?”

  Al-Khatib turned to look directly at him. “Sometimes, though only in the more extreme and dangerous cases.”

  “I was afraid you’d say that.”

  “Then am I to infer that Maggiore Totus has experienced such disturbances?”

  Sharley nodded miserably.

  “May I ask what form these hallucinations take?”

  “Young women, dressed in robes, beautiful young women, and he says they’re transparent.” Al-Khatib stayed silent, and Sharley was afraid it was worse than he thought. “Is that bad?”

  “On the contrary, My Lord. Maggiore may have had the great good fortune to have received a visitation from the Blessed Women.”

  “Blessed Women? Who are they?”

  Al-Khatib smiled. “Ah, they are the wealth of the desert and a benison on the land. Without them, no journey would be possible between the few cities and settlements the Desert Kingdom still possesses.”

  “Marvellous,” said Sharley impatiently. “But that doesn’t explain who or what they are.”

  “Forgive me,” said Al-Khatib, bowing in the saddle. “I am forgetting the direct nature of the northern mind. Let me put your curiosity at rest. The Blessed Women are spirits bestowed upon the land by the One. It is their appointed role to protect travellers from danger during their journey through the hot lands.”

  “I see,” said Sharley, perfectly willing to accept the existence of such beings. After all, he came from a land that counted werewolves and Vampires among its allies, not to mention giant talking leopards. “And do they do a good job?”

  “But of course!” Al-Khatib replied, aghast that he should ask such a thing.

  “Then, why do we need an armed escort?”

  Once again the merchant bowed in his saddle. “Please forgive my stupidity, My Lord. It is all too easy to assume one shares common knowledge with a stranger. I was forgetting you would not know that the Blessed Women can only protect certain travellers from the dangers of the desert.” Al-Khatib saw the puzzlement on Sharley’s face and continued smoothly. “Indeed, many people are killed and driven mad by the desert despite the protective presence of the Blessed Women. But exactly why some people are protected by the spirits of good, while others die, must remain one of those mysteries of the One that are beyond our understanding. Some of our greatest theologians and thinkers have questioned such enigmas, but alas, they remain unsolved.”

  Sharley nodded and rode on in silence while he digested this. He was deeply relieved that Maggie wasn’t going mad. After all, what hope would he have of achieving anything without the old scholar’s superior brain to guide him? But now something else bothered him besides his deep concern for his beloved teacher. If Maggie didn’t make a very quick recovery he, Sharley, would have to go to the Sultan’s palace alone, without Maggie’s guiding hand and calming influence. How could he possibly cope? He was bound to make a mess of things, and if he didn’t forge an alliance with the Desert People, the Icemark would fall to Bellorum and his mad sons!

  “Erm . . . will you . . . will you be there when I’m presented to the Sult
an?” he asked Al-Khatib nervously.

  “I have business to attend to in the palace, but if My Lord wishes, I can be your guide and help in your dealings with the Majlis.”

  Sharley nodded and smiled gratefully, a sense of relief flooding through him. Now at least there was still a hope that everything would turn out all right.

  They stopped briefly for a meal, the warrior escort eating in the saddle with their curved swords drawn and resting on their knees. They were now deep in bandit territory where the likelihood of an attack was very real. Sharley sat with Maggie, then helped the caravaneers to set up an awning to provide shade for the old scholar. Once he was settled, Sharley gave him as much water as he could drink and insisted that he ate some bread, even though he wasn’t interested in food at all. After a while Al-Khatib joined them, and the idea of Maggie staying at the oasis was broached.

  “Out of the question! I’ll be needed at the Majlis; Prince Charlemagne has no experience of such matters of diplomacy and negotiation,” was Maggie’s immediate and irritable answer, even though it took a laboured breath after each word to say it.

  “That is undoubtedly true,” Al-Khatib answered courteously. “But it is equally true to say that either you take refuge in my humble home in the comfort of the oasis, or you will die in a matter of days – a week at the very most. The Prince will have to conduct his meetings with the Sultan without your guiding hand, and it would be far better if your absence was due to your convalescence rather than to your death.”

  This bold statement shocked them into silence. Al-Khatib normally took three carefully polite sentences even to express an opinion about the heat of the desert. The seriousness of Maggie’s condition finally had to be accepted.

  “That settles it – you’re staying at the oasis. The Icemark can’t survive without you,” said Sharley firmly. “I want you with me when we go home, and I’d prefer it if you were sitting on a horse next to me, not ashes in a jar en route to your burial mound.”

  Maggie stared at Sharley. There were times when King Redrought, his plain-speaking grandfather, could be clearly heard in his rough youthful voice. “I really only need a day or two to recover. May I suggest a compromise? I can convalesce at the oasis, then we travel on to the Court of the Sultan together.”

  “No! It’s going to be hard enough getting you back to the coast from the oasis in one piece, what with bandits and the heat to worry about. And who knows whether the Blessed Women will look after you, even if you have been lucky enough to have been visited by them already.”

  “Blessed Women! Who are they?”

  “Maggie! For a scholar you can be pretty dense at times. You weren’t having hallucinations earlier, you were visited by the good spirits of the desert.”

  “Firstly, I would say that as a scholar my expertise lies in the field of the rational, the scientific, and the generally quantifiable. That said, your news about these ‘Blessed Women’ is most welcome. If you’re right, then I’m not going mad, I have been visited by spirits! What a relief! When one’s livelihood depends upon one’s intellectual clarity, the thought of insanity is quite disconcerting.”

  “Yeah, of course,” said Sharley dismissively. “But, to get back to my earlier point, you are not coming any further with me. You’re as frail and doddery as an old man’s granddad, and I’ll need your brain working for me on the journey back to the Icemark. Just accept it, Maggie, you’re ready for the knacker’s yard and it’s up to me to get you home before you pop your clogs!”

  The old scholar looked at him in annoyed amazement, then he broke into wheezy laughter, as Sharley had known he would. “I hope you’re a little more diplomatic than that when you meet the Sultan!”

  “Tell it like it is, that’s my motto!” Sharley answered with a wicked grin. Now he reminded Maggie of Oskan.

  “You are the sum total of all your influences,” the old scholar said fondly.

  “Without question,” Sharley agreed, a little surprised at the sudden change in Maggie’s mood. “But there’s also a large helping of me in here too.”

  “I have never doubted it.”

  Listening to these strange blunt-speaking people, Al-Khatib realised an agreement had been reached. Maggie would stay at the oasis. He was relieved, but the manner in which the Prince and his Royal Adviser had come to their decision left him feeling almost breathless! Barbarian honesty and plain speech was sometimes refreshing, but the supreme courtesy and formality of the Sultan’s Court was beginning to look very attractive indeed.

  CHAPTER 16

  Scipio Bellorum rode at the head of his army, his false hand of gold resting arrogantly on his hip. It was engraved with battle scenes and studded with precious stones which flashed and sparkled in the sun. This glorious contraption was a result of his single combat with Queen Thirrin during his last invasion of the Icemark. Their long and vicious fight had ended when she hacked his swordhand off at the wrist, and Bellorum would have been killed if his entire cavalry hadn’t intervened. But this time there’d be no theatrical duels between the two leaders: Bellorum intended to use precision and calculation to defeat the barbarian queen and her little country. To some extent the General regretted that he’d be denying the world the usual spectacle of a Polypontian war, but he’d been forced to acknowledge that Thirrin and her alliance of monsters were so formidable that they allowed no room for anything but total ruthlessness. The war would be a straight competition between the forces of science and those of abomination – between witchcraft and the modern world.

  He was, however, allowing himself one small indulgence, which just might pay off handsomely and end the war before it had even properly begun. Here, right at the beginning of his campaign, he was laying a trap and baiting it with the citizens whose protection Queen Thirrin so misguidedly placed higher than even her own safety.

  He’d allowed a refugee column to escape from the last town that had fallen in the South Riding, then he’d waited for it to walk right into his trap. Oh, how gullible are the desperate! thought Bellorum. They had no idea that their escape was essential to his plan to kill their Queen and crush their little country. He would draw her out of her stronghold by threatening these verminous refugees; she was bound to come riding out to the rescue. If he was right – and he was rarely wrong – Queen Thirrin would march straight into the steel jaws of his army and sacrifice herself in an attempt to save them. Such was the folly of compassion!

  Behind him, the Polypontian army marched in stony silence. If commanded to do so, they would sing the martial songs of the Empire, but the General was in a pensive mood, so they stared rigidly ahead with only their boots tramping out the rhythm of conquest. Soon, Bellorum would exchange his golden hand for the steel construction he used for combat. Imperial engineers had designed it so that each finger could move separately and might be locked around the hilt of a sword or the haft of a mace. But even without weapon, the steel war-hand was deadly in itself. Bellorum had insisted that the cleverly jointed fingers should have elongated nails as sharp as razors, and in battle he’d been seen to slice open throats and puncture eyeballs with a casual flick of his wrist.

  Strangely, his false hand actually itched, and when it was cold, as it always was in this frigid little land, it would ache just like the real one. Bellorum concluded that it was possessed by his living spirit and had, in effect, become a true part of himself. And as for the itching, he was sure a little bathing in fresh warm blood would soon solve that problem. Though, for that, he might have to wait until the barbarian queen arrived. If he himself took part in the fight against the column’s rearguard they’d probably break and run, then there’d be no excuses left for not overtaking the refugees and slaughtering them. That would be the end of his plan. With no live bait he would have no trap, and he felt it was important that Octavius and Sulla both experienced action against Thirrin herself as early as possible in the campaign.

  He turned in his saddle and beckoned to his sons, who’d been riding several pace
s behind him.

  “My Lord?” they enquired as they drew level.

  “You know your dispositions for the coming battle?”

  “Of course, Sir,” said Sulla. “I have command of the artillery. We’ll use grapeshot. Not only is it effective against both cavalry and infantry, but broken and rusty metal is a fitting weapon to use against the barbarian alliance. Rubbish against filth, so to speak.”

  Bellorum nodded, satisfied. “And yourself, Octavius?”

  “I’m commanding the cavalry on the right wing, though my main target will be the enemy centre and Thirrin Lindenshield herself. It’ll be interesting to pit my troop against the cavalry of the Icesheets. A stuffed leopard’s head will make an interesting banner, don’t you think?”

  His father smiled coldly. “I do indeed. And have you a particular leopard in mind for this honour?”

  “Of course! None other than the so-called ‘Thar’ will do. He is a magnificent specimen, it has to be said, and his Tharina’s skin will make a wonderful saddle blanket.”

  Bellorum gave a single bark of laughter. “It will at that! Let’s see if we can furnish the entire cavalry with leopard-skin trappings.”

  Medea walked the moonlit corridors like a ghost, her face deathly white and her eyes as deeply shadowed as caves in a chalk cliff. Since she and Oskan had returned home this was her favourite time of the day, when the palace was asleep. Only the guards saw her pass, though the human soldiers avoided her with a shudder once they realised who she was. And the werewolves curled their muzzles as her faint but strangely unpleasant scent – like a fresh corpse, newly washed and perfumed – reached their sensitive nostrils. She particularly liked to visit the haunted parts of the palace, and told herself she had a special link with the phantoms that walked the night. But in truth, even the ghosts avoided her, and chose to watch her pass from the safety of their invisibility before manifesting in agitation once she’d finally gone.