Harshini dct-3

by Jennifer Fallon

  As that thought occurred to him, he experienced a moment of blind panic. A fugitive was exactly what he was and he knew that R'shiel would not rest until he had been found. He had to get out of here, out of this room, out of the Citadel.

  Loclon tried lifting his head and was appalled to find the task almost beyond him. His body had lain dormant for months and the muscles had wasted almost to the point of atrophy. He had no strength, no control, not even the ability to push himself off the bed.

  It had never occurred to Loclon that his body might be wasting away in his absence. He knew it was alive - and as long as his body lived, so did he. Mathen had assured him the priests were taking care of it, but he had never been permitted to view the body himself, the priests claiming such a confrontation would undo whatever magic they had worked to transfer his mind into Joyhinia's body. To awaken, in this thin, emaciated body, with barely enough strength to lift his head from the pillow, seemed the ultimate irony.

  R'shiel could not have planned it better if she tried.

  A sense of urgency overwhelmed him, for a moment swamping even his despair at finding his body so useless. R'shiel was looking for him. She would not rest until she had him in her power.

  Anger warred with fear as he thought of R'shiel. She had no right to come back, he decided, even though, as Joyhinia, he had done everything in his power to ensure that she would. If the Kariens had done as they promised she would have been dead by now - burned at the stake in Yarnarrow for the Harshini sorcerer she was. But not even the Karien god could hold her, and Loclon was not so foolish as to think that if she possessed the strength of purpose to face down a god that he could escape her wrath.

  That thought finally spurred him to action. With a panic-driven burst of strength, he threw himself off the bed, landing heavily on the floor. He lay panting, exhausted by even that small effort. He could see the door, a mere five paces from where he had fallen. The distance stretched before him like a vast canyon.

  For a long time, he simply lay there, gathering what little strength he had to cross the gap. He did not think of anything but the urgency of his mission. He had died once already today. He did not intend to let it happen again.

  Loclon pushed himself up onto his elbows and began the painstaking task of dragging his useless body towards the door. He had barely moved a pace across the floor when he heard footsteps in the hall outside. Terror lent him another burst of strength. He slithered painfully over the polished floorboards, filled with an unnamed dread. His arm slipped out from under him and he banged his chin, making black lights dance before his eyes. The door loomed in the distance, seemingly no closer, despite his desperate efforts. The footsteps drew closer, louder. Sweat beaded his brow and left clammy handprints on the floor as he clawed his way painstakingly forward.

  He collapsed in exhaustion, his breathing ragged. Tears of fear and frustration blurred his vision. The door might as well be on the other side of Medalon. He would never make it. Any moment now it would open and R'shiel would be standing there, ready to even the score for every insult, real or imagined, that he had inflicted on her. He sobbed with terror and stared at the panelled door; watched it open with a feeling akin to having hot lead poured into his stomach. The door slammed against the wall. Loclon let out an unintelligible cry for mercy; tasted the acrid smell of urine as his bladder let go.

  “Oh, for the gods' sake, stop blubbering!” Mistress Heaner declared impatiently. “Pick him up, Lork.”

  The old woman looked down on him, staring at the spreading stain on the front of his loincloth in disgust. As usual, she was dressed in black, clutching an expensive cape around her shoulders. Her small eyes set amid the folds of her thin, leathery face were filled with distaste. Lork stepped forward and scooped Loclon up from the floor. Even he screwed up his nose.

  “You should be grateful, Captain. They're turning the Citadel inside out looking for you.”

  Loclon did not reply. He was too relieved by his rescue and too frightened by its source. Owing Mistress Heaner anything was dangerous in the extreme. She demanded a finger for an unpaid gambling debt. Loclon was afraid to think of what she would charge for his life.

  * * *

  Bathed and fed, Loclon began to feel better now he knew he was safely within the walls of Mistress Heaner's house. His only care was to hide until he could escape the Citadel.

  Later that evening, Mistress Heaner came to his room. When she opened the door Loclon noted, with some alarm, that Lork was on guard outside, standing there with that implacable, witless expression that seemed to respond only to Mistress Heaner. There was a boy of about twelve with her, with sandy hair and a sly, but beautifully innocent face. Loclon remembered him as one of Mistress Heaner's more exotic playthings. Lork closed the door behind them and the boy carried the tray he was holding to the small table beside the bed. The tempting smell of roasted meat escaped from under the domed cover on the plate.

  “The Defenders have control of the Citadel,” she told him as she lit the lamp. “They've imposed a curfew until tomorrow at sunrise. You can go now, Alladan.”

  “Who's the new First Sister?” he asked with a twinge of professional jealousy as the boy slipped silently from the room.

  “There isn't one,” the old woman shrugged. “Nor will there be, if you believe the rumours.”

  “You mean the Defenders have taken over the Citadel? Without the Sisterhood?”

  “So it would seem. I hear Garet Warner masterminded the whole thing. That's not surprising. He's a slimy little bastard. Jenga's dead though,” she added, with no more emotion than she might tell him of a change in the weather.

  Loclon felt no remorse over the loss of the Lord Defender. “So Warner's in charge?”

  “He'll probably name himself Lord Defender in the morning.”

  “I have to get out of the Citadel.”

  Mistress Heaner nodded. “Squire Mathen left instructions in case something like this happened. You're to be taken to Karien.”

  Loclon's eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Why?”

  “Because you were the First Sister. You have information the Kariens will need to take back the Citadel.”

  “There's a hundred thousand men outside the walls. They don't need me.”

  “The Defenders are holding all the dukes hostage. There is an army out there, certainly, but no one to lead them.”

  She spoke matter-of-factly; as if she were repeating some idle gossip about a neighbour, not telling him that his entire world was falling apart.

  “Then she's still here?”

  “Who? R'shiel? Oh yes, she's still in the Citadel.”

  “She wants to kill me.”

  “So would every Defender in the Corps, if he knew what you'd done,” Mistress Heaner pointed out with infuriating smugness. “Fortunately for you, your brothers-in-arms don't believe in magic, therefore they're not likely to seek vengeance for an act they cannot conceive.”

  “Can you get me out of here?”

  She smiled. It was a cold, calculating smile. It made him shudder.

  “For a price.”

  “How much?”

  “It's bad manners to discuss such things over a meal,” she replied, glancing around to ensure everything was to her satisfaction. She had put him in the Blue Room. The hint was not lost on Loclon. This was where he had killed that whore... what was her name? Peny? This was the room where Mistress Heaner found the leverage she needed to turn him into a traitor. “We'll talk about it later.”

  “How am I going to get out of the Citadel?” he asked, lifting the cover off the platter and nodding appreciatively. He was starving.

  “Through the gate, how else?”

  “But isn't it closed against the Kariens?”

  “For the moment. They're opening it in the morning to let the Kariens go.”

  Loclon looked up from the plate with astonishment. “They're letting them go?”

  “They seem to think we're going to be under siege for quite so
me time,” Mistress Heaner shrugged. “They've told the Kariens they can leave and anyone else who would prefer to go with them. I doubt they're planning on releasing the dukes, but they want to be rid of the rest of the Kariens. Clever thing to do, actually. A lot less mouths to feed.”

  “R'shiel will be there,” Loclon predicted with dread certainty.

  “Probably.”

  “She'll recognise me.”

  “Don't worry, Captain, we'll give the demon child something else to think about.” She walked back to the door and knocked on it twice. Lork opened it with a key. He was a prisoner, he realised with despair, but a prisoner with some value at least.

  The question was: how much was Mistress Heaner going to charge?

  CHAPTER 45

  Tarja assigned a squad of Defenders to aid R'shiel in her search for Loclon. He even made a point of picking men who knew Loclon on sight. It was a thoughtful gesture, but not enough for R'shiel to forgive him for opening the gate. Particularly when she learnt he had ordered the men to look for Loclon, but not hinder the Karien exodus. R'shiel wanted to stop every man leaving the Citadel. She wanted to examine each soldier and knight closely, search every wagon, every sack, and every woman's purse, to ensure that Loclon did not get past her. When the officer in charge of the squad repeated his orders, R'shiel turned on her heel furiously and made her way straight to the First Sister's office.

  Tarja met her rage with silent fortitude. He was wearing a new red jacket bearing the sword and shield insignia of the Lord Defender. Despite the fact that it was before sunrise, the First Sister's office was full of Defenders. They cleared a path for her warily and avoided her gaze. None of the Defenders in the office appeared concerned that Tarja had been promoted over them to the Lord Defender. They acted like men who were glad that the ultimate responsibility for their fates had been shifted to someone else. A small part of her understood how they felt. This coup was still very new, and although they controlled the Citadel, Medalon was a long way from being secure. If it fell apart on them, Tarja would bear the brunt of any reprisals.

  “Garet said we could check everyone leaving the Citadel!”

  “Actually, he said that we'd post extra men on the gate to see that Loclon doesn't slip past. There was never any suggestion that we would allow you to stop and search every single person trying to get through the gate.”

  “There are thousands of people down there! We'll never find him!”

  “Then I'm sorry, R'shiel. I've given you all the men I can spare.” His tone was implacable. It was as if he had assumed some of Jenga's dignified gravity along with his rank.

  “And if I find Loclon? Your men do have orders to arrest him, don't they, my Lord Defender? Or did you want me to just give him a friendly pat on the back and wish him a safe journey?”

  He frowned, impatient with her sarcasm. “Take the men I gave you, or not, R'shiel. I've neither the time nor the inclination to argue about it.”

  “Is this your idea of helping me?”

  “Would you care to discover what not helping you feels like?”

  They glared at each other for a tense moment.

  “If he gets away from me, I'll never forgive you, you know that, don't you?”

  “It's getting light out there,” he said, turning his attention to his men. “If you want to be at the main gate when it opens, I suggest you get a move on.”

  * * *

  The wind was biting when she emerged into the light on the broad ledge that circled the towering white walls of the Citadel. R'shiel had not been up here since she was a child, when Tarja had brought her to the walls to show her the rare spectacle of the high plains covered in snow. She was only five or six years old at the time and snow on the plains, while not unheard of, was unusual enough that she had cried out with delight at the sight of it. That Joyhinia had beaten her afterwards for sneaking out with Tarja had not lessened the thrill, and she had held on to the memory as she sobbed in her room, hungry and cold, her legs throbbing from the cane. She could remember thinking that it had all been worth every savage blow. It didn't matter that she had been sent to bed without dinner. She didn't even care when Joyhinia had declared that as she seemed to like the cold so much, she could get a taste of what it really felt like in the snow and had the fire in her room extinguished and the blankets removed. It didn't matter that her legs were black and blue. She had stood on the wall-walk in the still, cold air and looked out over the countryside blanketed in white, the shallow Saran River frozen with a thin coating of ice, and thought she was standing on top of the world.

  A trace of the same feeling came back to her as she looked down, but this time no peaceful layer of snow softened the view. The plain crawled with humanity as far as the eye could see, even as far away as the small village of Kordale, whose smoking chimneys R'shiel could just make out in the distance. From this high up it was impossible to make out individual details, rather the ground below rippled like some strange, poisonous ocean that lapped at the walls of the Citadel.

  “Are you all right?” Brak asked with concern.

  “Why wouldn't I be?”

  He did not answer for a moment. He was sitting with his back to the wall with his booted feet stretched out in front of him on the ledge, cleaning his fingernails with the tip of his dagger. Scattered clouds left over from the rain during the night hung motionlessly in a sky tinted the colour of washed-out blood.

  “If you happen to find Loclon, just be careful, will you?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that if you're planning to use your power to restrain him, try to do it as quickly as possible. You'll be drawing on the same power as Korandellan. He'll have to fight you for his share of it.”

  Brak did not need to add that if she drew too much, Korandellan's ability to hold Sanctuary safely out of time would be compromised. She had seen his weary face in the Seeing Stone in Greenharbour. R'shiel knew how close to exhaustion he was.

  “You make it sound as if I actually have control over it.” She closed her eyes, letting the chill air clear her mind then looked down from the wall-walk over the mass of humanity swarming to be let out of the Citadel. “This is hopeless!”

  “You knew that before you came here,” Brak pointed out.

  “Aren't you going to help?”

  “What do you want me to do?”

  She muttered something unintelligible and looked back over the crowd. The Defenders were pushing the people back to clear a path for the gates to open. On the other side of the wall, the plain was littered with the Karien army. There was a sizeable gathering outside the gate, waiting for their comrades inside the Citadel to be released.

  A truce had been arranged the previous day, although with their leaders now hostages in the Citadel, it had taken some time to sort out the Karien chain of command and find someone capable of making a decision. The wall-walk was lined with archers to discourage the Kariens from attempting to break the truce. The Defenders could not hope to fend off a well co-ordinated attack, but they were enough to deter the disorganised and bewildered Kariens from trying anything stupid. They seemed incapable of understanding that the Citadel was lost to them, or that their leaders had been taken prisoner. The Overlord would not allow such a thing.

  “Isn't there something magic we can do?” she asked, turning her back to the Kariens.

  He raised a brow at her. “Something magic?”

  “You know what I mean.”

  Brak sighed with long-suffering patience. “You still have no idea what you're dealing with, do you?”

  “I don't want a lecture, Brak. I just want to know if there is anything we can do to find Loclon more easily.”

  “You could make every person leaving tell the truth then ask their names as they pass through the gate,” he suggested.

  “That won't work. Tarja won't let us stop them.” She was scanning the crowd and did not see Brak's smile.

  “I was joking, R'shiel.”

  “I'm besi
de myself with mirth. Do you have any other brilliant suggestions?”

  “No.”

  “Good.”

  Brak sheathed his dagger then climbed to his feet and came to stand beside her. The gates swung open ponderously as the Defenders shouted orders to the crowd. The first to leave were the troopers that had been posted around the city, and they made up the bulk of the occupation force. They looked cold and miserable, having spent a night in the damp weather confined to the amphitheatre. Most of them were simple peasants dragged into this war because their masters owed a fealty to the Karien King. They were at the mercy of their god, their King and their dukes.

  “They don't look very happy, do they?” Brak remarked.

  “Can you blame them?”

  “You're not feeling sorry for them, are you?”

  “A little bit. Most of them would much rather be at home getting ready for the spring planting, I think. Not stranded here in a foreign country fighting a war they probably don't even understand.”

  “Well, if you think the peasants are unhappy, imagine what that lot must be feeling.” Brak pointed up the street.

  The next group waiting to be let through was the knights. Tarja had permitted them their mounts, but other than that, they were leaving empty handed. Their faces were cold and haughty, as if they were leaving of their own free will, not being forced out like beggars who couldn't pay the rent. Sir Andony sat at the head of the small column. R'shiel could not make out the others from this height. She watched them curiously, wondering what they were thinking. Were they plotting revenge? Were they already planning to return?

  “My Lady! My Lady R'shiel!”

  R'shiel glanced down at the street and discovered an urchin waving up at her. She did not know the child, but he was panting heavily, as if he had run all the way to the gate.

  “What is it?” she called.

  “That man you're looking for? The one with the scars? I saw him!”