Chapter Sixty
Thalia sat on a low flat rock surrounded by brown and purple heather. The wind was blowing in her face, bringing rain. She could see the high peak, the mountain he had told her was called Calen Mon. Eagles’ Seat. Eagles flew around it, or what she guessed were eagles. They looked like the dragon dancing on the wind. She almost imagined she could hear them calling. What a beautiful thing it would be, to see them close up. Turning with the air, the long soft beating of their wings. He’d climbed right to the top, he’d told her. There were old carvings up at its summit, and little grey stone cairns. You could see all the way to Seneth and Malth Elelane, when the sky was clear. The ground shook again and she started, turned back to look at the flames rising behind her. He’d keep her safe. He’d promised he’d keep her safe. The honey and cream horse cropped at the grass a little way away, unconcerned. The sound of its pink mouth tearing up the grass stems was pleasant. Her cloak was thick and warm.
The ground rocked again, a great crash and a roaring, a vast wild shriek of gulls. A gust of hot wind blew around her. Why does he want to destroy it? she wondered. Because of the boy. Because he’d been hurt there. No, she thought then. Because he’d been happy there. She wondered how long she had been sitting looking away at the peak of the mountain. A long time, she thought. A long time.
What do I know of life? she thought. All I know is death and a dark room that stinks of blood. I vowed to live once. Am I not living? Look! The grass is alive. The sky is alive. Eagles are flying. I have seen a dragon. I have seen the sun rise in the desert. I have seen the sea.
It was getting colder. The sky had cleared in the far west, bringing long golden beams of light. She pulled her cloak more tightly around her. It must be over soon, she thought. But it was good, to sit there with her face to the wind looking at the mountain and the eagles and the sky.
A silence was coming into the air, the screams dying away. A tired weary peace. Thalia stood up slowly, her body stiff. Stretched. She walked over to the horse, still quietly cropping the grass, its head bent. Smelled warm. It pricked up its ears as she approached and she was briefly frightened, but it shook its head and snorted and sniffed at her hand in the hope she might have something for it.
‘Nice horse,’ she said, remembering how Marith had spoken to the mage’s horse in the desert. ‘Nice horse. Good horse.’ She took the reins carefully, tried to remember how to mount it. She couldn’t remember so had to lead it instead, going slowly back towards the fortress over the crest of the hill. The fires still burned, a great plume of smoke blowing on the wind.
They had to cross a stream, clear water running over stones, cutting deep in the turf. It ran very fast and bright, down from the high moor. It sang as it came down. The horse stopped and drank. Thalia drank also, bending her head and cupping her hand. Drops dancing through her fingers. The water was clean and cold, tasting of leaves and stones and earth and rain.
A noise caught her, a snort like the horse’s snort. A rider? Marith? She raised her head.
A deer. A white deer, like the one they had seen in the woods. A stag, crowned with great antlers that stretched up like branches. Like the canopy of a tree, all its leaves dancing. It stared at Thalia with great sad dark eyes. Snorted again, its nostrils flaring. Pawed the earth. Thalia stared back and their eyes held together, woman and animal, and it looked so very sad. Its nostrils flared and trembled, so delicate. It bent and drank, the water dripping from its muzzle, its antlers shivering slightly with the movement of its head. Then it snorted again, rushed away over the moors towards the mountain of Calen Mon. Thalia stared after it.
Run after it. Run off into the wilds. Running water and trees and earth and the sea and the sky. Leave.
She took up the horse’s reins and began to walk on. It trotted behind her patiently, its harness jingling.
After an hour’s walking, she came to Malth Salene. The place where Malth Salene had been. She stopped. An emptiness on the sky in front of her. A gash in the world. A scar. Like her scars. Like Marith’s hand. Ragged and ruined beyond all healing.
But he’s so beautiful, she thought.
A man came up the slope of the moor towards her. He was dressed in battered armour, blood on his face.
‘My Lady.’ He bowed low to her. How many did you kill? she thought.
‘My Lady, My Lord King is looking for you. Awaiting you. If you will follow?’
I should be glad, she thought. We are King and Queen. Crowned in silver. Throned in gold. And they hurt him first. They hurt me. They were cruel. They have brought this upon themselves. Crowned him. Called him Amrath and King. So they deserve it. They could have left us as we were, in the desert outside Sorlost. They did this, not him.
She walked slowly following the soldier across the burned grass, looking and trying not to look at the ruins. Impossible to tell what was flesh and what was stone. All bound together, formless filth and rubble. Like Ausa’s bones had been, ragged and snapped. Crows and seabirds crouched everywhere, glaring at her as she walked. As she passed they flew up, calling out their lonely pained cries. The most beautiful sound in the world, Marith had told her. Fierce bright burning joy, like the fire in the dragon’s eyes as it lighted on the ground. The terrible, beautiful pain of being alive.
Marith came out to meet her, standing at the edge of the ruin. It made her think of the mer woman’s house, looking bleakly out to the sea, bound around with charms against death.
‘Thalia!’ Marith’s face leapt when he saw her. His eyes were so wide and laughing. ‘Oh, Thalia! Do you see? Do you see? What I’ve done! And this is nothing to what I’ll do!’ He clasped her hands. ‘I love you so much! I swore I’d be avenged on them for harming you! I swore I’d make them all kneel at your feet! King and Queen!’
The soldier with her bowed down to him. ‘King Marith! King Marith! Ansikanderakesis Amrakane! Amrath returned to us! Amrath come again!’
Marith beamed at her. Radiant with happiness. ‘You see?’ he said again. ‘You see? Isn’t it wonderful? What I’ve done? What I’ll do?’
‘I see,’ she said. She smiled back at him.
The men danced in the ruins. Beat their swords on their shields. ‘King Marith! King Marith! Victory to the King!’ They sang the songs they had sung at his crowning. Stamped their feet, leapt the fires, leapt and danced over the bodies of the dead. Stamped out the war dance, treading patterns of glory. Singing the paean, the praise song. The bronze rang out in triumph. Swords and shields crashing. Armour crashing as they danced. The clear blue sky shone above them. The golden light of the evening sun.
Marith smiled at them in wonder. His face looked as he had looked in the desert. Amazed and frightened. Alive with hope.
‘King and Queen,’ Thalia said. It made her breathless.
Marith said, ‘We’ll go to Malth Elelane. Marry there. Be properly crowned. You’ll stand in the chapel of Amrath my ancestor where I will place the crown of Eltheia on your head. I told you we’d be there by Sunreturn! We’ll have a great banquet, with sledging and skating and bonfires on the ice.’
‘You did tell me.’
The boy’s grin. ‘I knew it would happen, you see? It’s too beautiful for us not to be there by then. We’ll have pavilions built, gold and silver. Three days of feasting. Horse races, dances in the snow.’ He caught her up in his arms. ‘Come riding with me now! Let’s look over everything. Our kingdom. The hills, the marshes, the trees. The air stinks here. We’ll ride away into the wind until it’s clean. There’s still so much I need to show you. So much in the world that’s mine.’
‘I’m tired,’ she said. ‘You must be tired. I don’t want to ride anywhere. I want to sleep.’
I should be killing a man, she thought then. Somewhere far to the west Demerele will be killing a man.
It always comes back to death and dying. Always. Everything. In Sorlost a man is dying in the dark so that the dead may die and the living may live.
Death is terrible, she thou
ght. Terrible and to be feared.
But he’s so beautiful, she thought.
Marith smiled at her grave face. ‘But all you did was sit and watch it! And it’s still only just evening … Come a little way? Please?’ His eyes glittered with life. ‘Please?’ Then he paused, looked at her. ‘I’m sorry. You’re cold and tired. And I’ll probably collapse from exhaustion in a moment. Battle joy wears off worse than drink, and I’ll realize I hurt and my head aches.’ Looked around at the ruins of Malth Salene, and a realization seemed to come to him. ‘And we’ll need to find somewhere to sleep, I suppose …’ He laughed. ‘All those beautiful things, that beautiful place. All gone.’
A horse was brought up, a warhorse, roan-coloured, harnessed and plumed in silver, snorting and tossing its head. It lashed out, tried to bite at the man leading it. Its flanks were cut and bloodied. Burn marks on its strange thin legs.
‘Father’s horse,’ said Marith. He came towards it, stroked its nose. The horse snorted, stamped its feet, then calmed at his touch. ‘There, that’s it,’ Marith said, stroking its nose. ‘Good horse. Good horse.’
So are we going … somewhere now? Thalia thought. The men still danced around the ruins, shrieking as they danced. The evening was coming in now and they looked like monsters, bronze and silver and all stained with smoke and blood. The drums and the clash of swords and shields grew louder and louder. The fires rose. They were starting to burn the dead. They would soon begin again to kill each other, she thought. Kill and kill and kill! They leapt the fires, singing the paean. Their feet drummed out war chants on the ruined ground.
‘Amrath! Amrath! Amrath!’
A voice shouted, ‘Trained and trained for it! And that was a battle! What all battles should be! I trained!’ The sound caught her, a young voice, raw, madly on edge. She turned towards it, saw a young man’s face. ‘A battle!’ he shouted again. His face strained with disgust. Another man, older, clapped a hand to the boy’s shoulder. ‘It’s all right, lad. You know that.’ She thought, confusedly, that she saw Tobias with them. Behind them. Helping the older man lead the younger man away. It can’t be Tobias, she thought. The three all shouted together, ‘King Marith! Hail King Marith!’ She wasn’t sure, it did look like Tobias. But …
If it is him, she thought, this is a good punishment for him. Fighting and dying in Marith’s army. It did look so much like Tobias. But the face was so shining with happiness. Lit up like a candle with love for the king.
‘Thalia!’ Marith was waiting for her. He led the horse to the very centre of the ruins. The blackened, melted ground where the Great Hall of Malth Salene had been. Where they had crowned him king. Marith drew his sword. Killed the horse. Blood spurted out all over him. Covering the human blood. The soldiers went down on their knees before him shouting ‘Victory!’. She was sure she saw Tobias, kneeling between the older man and the boy.
Marith hacked off the horse’s head. Raised it aloft.
‘Victory!’ Marith shouted. The evening sky rang with it. Shadows in the sky shrieked and danced.
He turned to Thalia. His eyes were silver with tears. Grief and joy together to break his heart.
‘It’s done, then,’ he said.
Chapter Sixty-One
We ride down to Toreth together. The soldiers march behind us, still singing and clashing their swords. At the gates of the town we stop. The gates are closed. Marith frowns. Then a great cry, a cheer, ‘The King! The King! Amrath returned to us! Open for the King!’ The gates swing open, the townspeople flood out, shouting, singing, holding out their hands in greeting, filled with happiness.
‘King Marith! King Marith! Hail to the King!’
The wealthy men of the town argue among themselves for who should have the privilege of giving up their home to us. Marith chooses a fine tall house near the harbour, windows looking out over the sea. Inside, more people bustle and shout and fall over themselves crying out ‘King Marith! The King! The King!’. Hot baths hastily prepared, sweet with lavender and dried mint. Hot food. Wine. Clean clothes dragged from some rich merchant’s wardrobe, a grey silk gown for me, even a necklace, gold flowers set with pale green stones. Everywhere people kneeling, eyes cast downwards, calling me ‘My Lady’, ‘My Queen’. More cheering. More singing. Dancing. Happiness. ‘The King! The King!’ It seemed to last forever. This moment burning in my heart. Marith drinks it in, stares with eyes wide as the sea. His triumph. Truly, now, he is King.
Until at last even he is exhausted, admitting he wants to sleep a while. The candles burning low. The first scent of dawn in the air. He aches, he says. His head hurting. Battle joy wearing off. The last dregs of it. Wants to go to bed.
So finally I am alone with him. The bedroom door is closed and guarded, shutters bolted against the world. Yellow candles burning. The room blazing with light. Red cloth hanging around the bed.
‘Here we are, then,’ he says. Smiles a sad smile. Things crawl behind his eyes, in the darkness beyond the dark. Things that beat like wings, clamouring to get out. Maggots and scars and the sound of a knife. I cannot tell, now, looking at him, whether he is happy or so grief-stricken his heart will break. He sits down on the bed, stares at his hands. ‘It’s done,’ he says.
A crown of silver. A throne of gold.
A sound of weeping. A scent of blood in the air.
King Ruin. King of Dust. King of Shadows. Amrath returned.
It’s done.
Afterwards, I lie awake in the darkness, listening to his breath. The wind has risen. I can hear the sea, the waves breaking on the shingle, the gulls. Faint noises outside the window, a woman’s voice calling, drunken singing and a shriek and a crash. A woman’s laugh.
I have seen a dragon dancing on the wind. I have seen the sea. The sky. The cold of frost. The beauty of the world.
I have felt the sun on my face as it rises over the desert. I have felt clear water running beneath my feet.
I have known sorrow, and pain, and happiness, and love.
Love.
I bring one of the candles to burning. Marith stirs at it, claws roughly at his face. Mutters something. Pain in his voice. I smooth my hand over his forehead and he sighs and relaxes back deeper into sleep.
King Ruin. King of Death.
I go over to the wall where his sword hangs, take it up, walk back over to the bed.
The gulls scream at the window. Shadows crawl on the walls.
I raise the sword over his heart.
Look down at him.
A kindness. That was what Tobias said.
A kindness. To him and to me.
I put the sword down. Curl back beside him.
Sleep.
Chapter Sixty-Two
Two young men, boys really, sit side by side against a large grey boulder on the moorlands north of Malth Salene. Marith leans his head on Carin’s shoulder, Carin’s arm rests lightly around Marith’s waist. They sit on the edge of a low cliff, looking out over a tumble of rocks to the sea. Still and calm weather, gulls bobbing on the water. A seal head watches them. Far above a kestrel hovers. In the distance the sound of goats being called in to milk. They pass a bottle leisurely between them, warm and comfortable in a summer evening. Their horses graze contentedly a little way off, tethered to a hawthorn tree still bearing the last of its blossom.
‘We should get back,’ Carin says.
‘Why?’
‘Well … I don’t know. Maybe we just should.’
‘No.’
‘Fair enough.’ Carin kisses Marith’s hair. ‘You’re hogging the bottle again.’
‘Of course I am.’ Marith passes it over to him, curls himself more comfortably into Carin’s body.
They watch the gulls soaring on the wind, a fishing boat out in the bay.
Carin says, ‘You’ll be king, one day.’
‘Just realized that, have you?’
‘No, but, I mean … When you are …’ Carin shakes his head. ‘Never mind. I’m just being maudlin.’
�
�Don’t be.’ Marith sits up a little, looks at Carin. ‘What?’
‘You as king … I don’t know … It can’t be like this when you are, I suppose.’
‘I’ll have to stop sleeping in gutters, you mean?’
‘Ha, yes. But more than that. All of this. You’ll have to do things. Rule.’
‘You’ll be Lord Relast of Third. You’ll have to do things, too. The same things, really. Only smaller.’
‘Oh, thank you.’
‘Now you’re making me maudlin.’ Marith rests himself back against Carin. ‘So stop it. We’ll find time for this. I’ll order it.’
‘And we’ll be old and boring by then anyway.’
‘We will. You’re hogging the bottle now.’
‘I’m not.’ Carin kisses Marith’s forehead. ‘Just not letting you hog it.’
‘That comes to the same thing.’ Marith sighs, runs his hand idly down Carin’s arm. ‘Do you want to be Lord Relast of Third? Really want to be, I mean?’
‘Really want to be how? I will be. I can’t want it or not want it.’ Carin kisses Marith’s forehead again. Can tell Marith’s becoming troubled again. The happiness lasts so briefly, now. He shouldn’t have started this conversation. But it bothers him. The thought of Marith being king. ‘It’s probably all much less interesting than it looks anyway,’ he says. ‘Signing papers. Listening to people boring on. Having people executed. A lifetime of tedium, I should think.’
‘Should you?’ Marith smiles sadly. ‘Perhaps tedium would be good for me. A long and tedious reign in which nothing happens and about which the historians have nothing to say.’
‘King Marith the Eminently Forgettable.’
‘Indeed.’
They look at each other and something passes between them and Carin turns away and squeezes his eyes shut for a moment like he’s in pain. ‘I suppose we could always run away,’ he says. ‘Become travelling minstrels.’
Gratitude in Marith’s face for the things unspoken. The things they both know but never say. He smiles again his sad smile. ‘Bandits. We’d have to be bandits. Because you can’t sing.’
The Court of Broken Knives Page 45
