by Paul Kearney
“He knows only that he found a manuscript of interest to me. I’ll have a talk with him and secure his discretion.”
“There are more brains in the turnips he raises. I hope he knows the value of the word.”
“I’ll impress it upon him.”
They paused as if by common consent to listen again. Nothing but the soundlessness of the deep earth, the drip of water from ancient bedrock.
“This place predates the faith,” Avila said in an undertone. “The Horned One had a shrine on the site of Charibon until the Fimbrians tore it down, it is said.”
“Time to go,” Albrec told him. “We’ll be missed. You have your penance to finish. We’ll come back some other time, and we’ll have that wall down if I have to scrape it away with a spoon.”
Avila tucked the pentagram dagger into the pocket of his habit without a word. They set off through the dark together towards the stairs beyond, the tall Inceptine and the squat Antillian. In a few short minutes it seemed that their world had become less knowable, full of sudden shadows.
The lightless spaces of the catacombs watched them go in silence.
T WELVE thousand of the Knights Militant had died fighting at Aekir, almost half of their total strength throughout Normannia. Their institution was a strange one; some said a sinister, anachronistic one also. They were the secular arm of the Church, at least in theory, but their senior officers were clerics, Inceptines to a man. The “Ravens’ Beaks” they were sometimes called.
They were feared across the continent by the commoners of every kingdom, their actions sanctioned by the Pontiff, their authority vaguely defined but indisputable. Kings disliked them for what they represented: the all-pervading power and influence of the Church. The nobility saw in them a threat to their own authority, for the word of a Knight Presbyter might not be gainsaid by any man of lower rank than a duke. Across the breadth of the continent, men with their noses in their beer might jocularly lament the fact that Macrobius had gathered only half of the Knights in Aekir before its fall, but they did so with one eye cocked at the door, and in undertones.
Golophin hated them. He loathed the very sight of their sombre cavalcades as they trooped through the streets of Abrusio on their destriers. They wore three-quarter armour, and over it the long sable surcoats with the triangular Saint’s symbol worked in malachite green at breast and back. They bore poniards, longswords and lances, having disdained the new technology of gunpowder. More often than not, folk muttered, the only weapon they needed or utilized was the torch.
The pyres were still ablaze up on the hill. Two hundred today for the Knights were beginning to run short of victims. All the Dweomer-folk of the city and the surrounding districts had fled—those who survived. Most of them were freezing in the snowbound heights of the Hebros. Some Golophin and his friends had procured berths for on outbound ships. The Thaumaturgists’ Guild had been decimated by the purges; most of its members were too prominent, too well known in the city to have had any chance of escaping. But a few, including Golophin, survived, scuttling like vermin in the underbelly of Abrusio, doing what they could for their people.
His face was a blurred shadow under his wide-brimmed hat. Anyone who looked at him would find it strangely difficult to remember any of its features. A simple spell, but one hard to maintain in the bustle of the Lower City. Speech negated it, and anyone who looked long and hard enough might just see through it. So Golophin moved quickly, a tall, incredibly lean figure of economic movements in a long winter mantle with a bag slung over one bony shoulder. He looked like a pilgrim journeying in haste to the site of a shrine.
The Lower City was still virtually off-limits to the Knights Militant, the common people bolstered in their defiance by the stand that General Mercado and Admiral Rovero were making. But already whispers were abroad that a messenger had brought news of the King’s excommunication to the newly established Theocratic Council which technically ruled Abrusio. Abeleyn had been named a heretic, it was said, and his kingship was annulled. The general and the admiral must soon acknowledge the rule of the council or face the same fate themselves. And after that, the pyres would be kept stocked for years as the Knights went through the Lower City cleansing it of all who had defied them.
Admiral’s Tower reared up over the rooftops ahead like a brooding megalith. It housed the headquarters of Hebrion’s navy, the administrative offices of the State Shipyards and the halls of the fleet nobility. Golophin knew the place well, an outdated, labyrinthine fortress which butted on to the waters of the Inner Roads. The masts of the fleet rose like a forest in the docks at its foot and the old walls were whitened by the guano of a hundred generations of seabirds.
It was busy down here. The ships of the fleet required constant overhaul and their crews were kept eternally occupied by vigilant officers. Between eight and ten thousand mariners in all, they were volunteers to a man. Less than half their vessels were in port at the moment, however.
Ships of the Hebrian fleet were continually occupied with guarding the sea lanes which constituted the life’s blood of Abrusio, even in winter. There were squadrons maintained in the Malacar Straits, the Hebrionese, even as far north as the Tulmian Gulf. They kept the trade routes free of the corsairs and the northern Reivers, and often exacted a discreet toll from passing merchantmen in return.
The sentries at the gates of Admiral’s Tower never noticed the man in dun robes and wide-brimmed hat. Momentarily they both found the flight of a gull overhead utterly engrossing, and when they had blinked and looked at each other in mild puzzlement, he was past them, wending his undisturbed way through the darkened passages of the old fortress.
“Y OU came then,” Admiral Jaime Rovero said. “I was not sure if you would, especially in daylight, but then I suppose a man like you has his ways and means.”
Golophin swept off his hat and rubbed an entirely bald scalp that gleamed with perspiration despite the raw coldness of the day.
“I came, Admiral, as I said I would. Is Mercado here yet?”
“He awaits us within. He is not happy, Golophin, and neither am I.” Admiral Rovero was a burly, heavily bearded man whose face spoke of long years of exposure to the elements. His eyes seemed permanently slitted against some contrary wind and when he spoke only one corner of his mouth opened, the lips remaining obstinately shut on the other side. It was as if he were making some sardonic aside to an invisible listener at his elbow. The voice which issued from his lopsided mouth was deep enough to rattle glass.
“Who is happy in these times, Jaime? Come, let’s go in.”
They left the small anteroom and went through a pair of thick double doors which led to the state apartments of the Admiral of the Fleet. The short day was already winding down towards a winter twilight, as grey and cheerless as a northern sea, but there was a fire burning in the vast fireplace which occupied one wall. It made the daylight beyond the balcony screens seem blue and threw the far end of the long room into shadow.
The rams from fourteen Astaran galleys were set in the stone near the ceiling like the trophy heads of a hunter; they testified to the years of naval rivalry with Astarac. The curved scimitars of corsairs and Sea-Merduks crisscrossed the walls in patterns of flickering steel, and immensely detailed models of ships stood on stone pedestals below them. On the walls also, vellum maps of the Hebrian coast, the Malacar Straits and the Levangore hung like pale tapestries between the weapons. The room was a lesson in Hebrian naval history.
Another man stood with his back to the fire so that the flames threw his shadow across the flagged floor like a cape. He turned his head as Admiral Rovero and the old mage entered and Golophin saw the familiar shine of silver from the battered face.
“Good to see you again, General,” he said.
General Mercado bowed. His visage was something of a marvel, created by Golophin himself. As a colonel in the bodyguard of Bleyn the Pious, he had taken a scimitar blow in the face. The blade had slashed away his nose, his cheekbone a
nd part of his temple. Golophin had been on hand to save his sight and his life, and he had grafted a mask of silver on the injury. One half of Mercado’s face was thus the bearded countenance of a veteran soldier, the other was an inhuman façade of glittering metal from which a bloodshot eye glared, lidless and tearless, but sustained by pure theurgy, a spell of permanence whose casting had cost Golophin the last of the scanty hair on his scalp. That had been twenty years ago.
“Have a seat, Golophin,” the General said. The metal half of his face made his voice resound oddly, as though he were speaking from out of a tin cup.
“You’ve heard the rumours, I suppose,” the old mage said, seating himself comfortably not far from the fire and rummaging through his robes for his tobacco pouch.
“Not rumours, not any more. The Papal bull of excommunication arrived two days ago. Rovero and I have been summoned to the palace tomorrow to view it and reconsider our positions.”
“So the pair of you will walk tamely into the palace.”
The human part of Mercado’s face quirked upwards in a smile. “Not tamely, no. I intend to take an honour guard of two hundred arquebusiers, and Rovero will have a hundred marines. It will be public, no chance of a dagger in the back.”
Golophin thumbed leaf into the bowl of his long-stemmed pipe. “It is not my place to preach to you about security,” he conceded. “What will you do if you are satisfied the bull is genuine?”
Mercado paused. He and Rovero looked at one another. “First tell us what you have to say on the matter.”
“Then your minds are not made up?”
“Damn it, Golophin, stop playing games!” Admiral Rovero burst out. “What of Abeleyn? Where is he and how does he fare?”
The old wizard lit his pipe with a spill caught from the flames of the fire. He puffed in silence for a few seconds, filling the room with the scents of Calmar and Ridawan.
“Abeleyn has just fought a battle,” he said calmly at last.
“What?” Mercado cried, horrified. “Where? With whom?”
“Two squadrons of corsairs ambushed his ships as they were sailing south through the Fimbrian Gulf. He beat them off, but lost three-quarters of his men and two of his own vessels. He had to beach his remaining ship on the coast of Imerdon. He is intending to march overland the rest of the way to Hebrion.”
Rovero was grinding one fist into a palm, striding back and forth restlessly and spitting words out of the corner of his mouth as though he were unwilling to let them go.
“Corsairs that far north. In the gulf! Two squadrons, you say. Now there’s a happy chance, a synchronicity of fate. Someone tried to take the King, that’s clear. But who? Who hired them?”
“Why Admiral,” Golophin said with mild surprise, “you almost sound as though you care about the fate of our heretical ex-monarch.”
Rovero stopped his pacing and glared at Golophin. “Beat them off, eh? Then at least he hasn’t forgotten all I’ve taught him. Ex-monarch, my arse! Assault the person of the King, would they, the Goddamned heathen piratical dastards . . .”
“He sank three of them,” Golophin went on. “They were in galleasses, the older sort with no broadsides, only chasers.”
“How were the King’s vessels armed?” Rovero demanded, his face alight with professional interest.
“Culverins, sakers. But that was only on the carrack. The two nefs had falcons alone. The corsairs sank one and burned the other to the waterline.”
“Abeleyn’s bodyguard?” Mercado asked abruptly.
“Almost all lost. Most were in the nefs. They gave a good account of themselves, though. Abeleyn has barely a hundred men left to him.”
“They were good men,” Mercado murmured. “The best of the Abrusio garrison.”
“Where has he beached? How long will he take to get here?” Admiral Rovero asked, his eyes as narrow as the edge of a blade.
“That I don’t know for sure, alas, and neither did the King when . . . when I communicated with him last. He is in the coastal marshes, close to the border with Imerdon, south-west of the mouth of the Habrir river. That is all I know.”
The admiral and the general were silent, conflicting emotions flitting across their faces. “Is Abeleyn still your liege-lord, gentlemen?” Golophin asked. “He needs you now as he never has before.”
Rovero grimaced as though he had bitten into a lemon. “God forgive me if I do wrong, but I am the King’s man, Golophin. The lad is a fighter, always has been. He is a worthy successor to his father, whatever the Ravens might say.”
Only someone watching Golophin with particular care could have seen the tiny whistle of breath that escaped his lips, the imperceptible sag of relief which relaxed his hitherto rigid shoulder blades.
“General,” he said quietly to Mercado, “it would seem that Admiral Rovero still has a king. What say you in this matter?”
Mercado turned his face from Golophin so that the mage could see only the expressionless metal side.
“Abeleyn is my king too, Golophin, God knows. But can a king rule if his soul is damned? Who would gainsay the word of the Pontiff, the successor to Ramusio? Maybe the Inceptines are right. The Merduk War is God’s punishment. We all have a penance to do before the world can be set to rights.”
“The innocent are burning, Albio,” Golophin said, using the general’s first name. “A heretic sits on the throne of the Pontiff whilst its true occupant is in the east. Macrobius lives, and he is aiding the Torunnans in their battles to maintain the frontier. He helped them save Ormann Dyke when the world thought it irredeemably lost. The faith is with him. He is our spiritual head, not this usurper who sits in Charibon.”
Mercado twisted to meet Golophin’s eyes. “Are you so sure?”
Golophin raised an eyebrow. “I have my ways. How else do you think I stay abreast of Abeleyn’s adventures?”
The fire cracked and spat. A gun began to boom out the evening salute somewhere on the battlements beyond. They would be lighting the ship beacons along the harbours of the city. The men of the ships would be changing watch, half of them trooping into the messes for the evening meal.
Faint and far-off amid the nearer noises, Golophin thought he could hear the cathedral bells tolling Vespers up on Abrusio Hill, nearly two miles away. He knew that if he stepped outside and looked that way he would be able to make out the dying glow of the pyres, finally fading. The dwindling reminder of another day’s genocide. He stifled the bitter fury which always arose when he thought of it.
“We must play for time,” Mercado said at last. “Rovero and I must not see this bull of theirs. We must hold them off as long as we are able, and get Abeleyn into the city safely. Once he is back in Abrusio, the task is simpler.”
Golophin rose and gripped the general’s hand. “Thank you, Albio. You have done the right thing. With you and Rovero behind him, Abeleyn can retake Abrusio with ease.”
Mercado did not seem to share Golophin’s happiness.
“There is something else,” he said. He sounded troubled, almost embarrassed.
“What?”
“I cannot be sure of all my men.”
Golophin was shocked. “What do you mean?”
“I mean that my adjutant, Colonel Jochen Freiss, has been conducting secret negotiations with a member of the council, Sastro di Carrera. I believe he has suborned a significant number of the garrison.”
“Can you not relieve him of his post?” Golophin demanded.
“That would be tipping our hand too soon. I have yet to plumb the depths of his support, but I believe some of the junior officers may have joined him in conspiracy.”
“It will mean war,” Admiral Rovero said ominously. His voice sounded like the rumble of surf on a far-off strand.
“How can you sound out the loyalty of your men?” Golophin asked sharply.
“I have my ways and means, even as you have, Mage,” Mercado retorted. “But I need time. For now we will continue to hold the Lower City. Some of the les
ser guilds are on our side, though the Merchants’ Guild is waiting to see which way the wind blows before committing itself.”
“Merchants,” Rovero said with all the contempt of the nobility for those in trade.
“We need the merchants on our side,” Golophin told them. “The council is sitting on the treasury. If we are to finance a war then the merchants are our best source of money. Abeleyn will grant them any concessions they wish, within reason, in return for a regular flow of gold.”
“No doubt the council will be putting the same proposition to them,” Mercado said.
“Then we must be sure it is our proposition they accept!” Golophin snapped. He stared into the ashen bowl of his pipe. “My apologies, gentlemen. I am a little tired.”
“No matter,” Rovero assured him. “My ships may tip the scales. If the worst comes to the worst I can threaten them with a naval blockade of the city. That’ll soon loosen their purse-strings.”
Golophin nodded. He tucked his pipe back into a pocket which was scorched from similar use. “I must be going. I have some people to see.”
“Tell the King, when next you speak to him, that we are his men—that we always have been, Golophin,” Mercado said haltingly.
“I will, though he has always known it,” the wizard replied with a smile.
SIX
T HE chamber was small and circular. Its roof was domed and in the dome was a bewildering array of small beams, too slender to provide any architectural support. Corfe could not guess at their purpose, unless it were mere ornamentation. They were hung with cobwebs.
Large windows covered half the circumference of the walls, some of stained glass, predominantly Torunnan scarlet which lent a rosy hue to the place despite the greyness of the weather outside. Inside, the furnishings were rich and comfortable. Velvet-upholstered divans whose lines curved with the walls. Intricately embroidered cushions. A miniature library, the shelves untidy with added scrolls and papers. A tiny desk with a quill springing out of an inkwell. A bronze figurine of a young woman, nude, the face laughing exquisitely. An embroidery stand with rolls of thread tumbled about its foot. The room of an educated, affluent woman.
