But no one came to the rails to lead the assault on to the dockside. Through the smashed timbers, Lianov thought he could see movement but it might have been a trick of the light. He could hear a scrabbling sound from within. None of it made sense, certainly not the fact that the drum was still beating time and as many oars as could were still moving, apparently trying to keep the ship against the dock.
Something moved on the bow deck. A flash of black. Lianov looked again but it was gone. Smoke billowed into the air. There was a fire below. Some of the guards started cheering but a heartbeat later there was black everywhere, and the cheer faded to nothing. Driven by smoke and flame they came. Thousands of them, scrambling over each other in their desperation to escape. Over the bow rail and boiling from the smashed hull. Rats. Tens, dozens, tumbled into the sea. But for every one that fell, ten more made it to dry land.
This wasn't any accident. This was cargo.
'Kill them!' shouted Lianov, drawing his gladius. 'Kill them all.'
Hopelessly, guards dropped bows and pulled swords and daggers. Two men were carrying a pitch fire down towards the ship. Rats scurried towards them.
'Pour it over the dock,' ordered Lianov. 'I want every one of these little bastards gone.'
But it was already too late. Lianov stamped and slashed as the rodent tide coursed around him and his men. The rats were already scattering towards nearby buildings and the streets that led into the town. He heard screams and cries and saw people running.
Lianov gave up and tried to ignore the hideous feeling of rats running over his boots. He stared back at the ship from which flames and smoke were spiking and clouding. The last few stragglers were coming out now. One of his guards had taken the brave decision to leap on to the broken bow timbers. Below, the oars had stopped moving but the ship was jammed fast. Archers came up in support, other swordsmen with them.
'Get me one of the crew,' said Lianov. 'I don't care who it is just so long as he talks.'
The guard shook his head and jumped back onto the harbour wall.
'It's an inferno in there,' he said.
'Well why aren't they trying to get off?'
The guard shrugged. 'Because they're already all dead, sir.'
Lianov made a move towards the ship but that wasn't his priority despite what he'd just heard. There was only one reason a ship would deliver such a cargo. Instead he turned back to the town and watched his guards chasing a last few rats. Most had already escaped into the town to spread whatever it was they were carrying.
He had to get hold of the Praetor and the Order Speaker to quarantine the whole port. And then he had to send a message to Katrin Mardov. It was just like he'd always suspected. The Tsardon were coming back to finish what they had started ten years ago.
Chapter Eight
859th cycle of God, 6th day of Genasrise
He pitied them even while he respected their diligence and determination. An extraordinary effort backed by undimmed belief. But all misplaced. They had sought the supplication of the masses when all they really needed was time to experiment, to learn and to grow.
He had a little time to think on his way back to his ship out in the sound beyond Estorr's harbour. The boy clutched to his powerful body was so stricken with fear he did not so much as twitch a muscle or utter a word. This was beyond his comprehension. Indeed it was beyond everyone's. Yet it should not be. It was merely the extension of a theory all four Ascendants had known since they were teenagers.
Moulding the elements. They could thin cloud and earth, so they could thicken both too. And the air. With a tiny gale at his back and the molecules pulled into dense form below, he skated across thickened air two hundred feet above the ground. It was exhausting and he'd broken bones developing the ability but to anyone looking from below it would look simply astonishing.
Gorian could fly.
'It'll be over soon, little one,' he said. 'And one day, I will teach you and we will rule the sky as well as the earth together.'
The boy clutched harder but there was only self-preservation in the gesture. Gorian was beyond the harbour now. He lost some height and speed, feeling the lessening drain on his mind and body like a cool healing balm. His ship was already sailing north and east as instructed, benefiting from the prevailing winds blowing up the Tirronean Sea.
Every day was vital now. The Karku already had their suspicions and now his actions in Estorr had inevitably alerted the attentions of the only people who could realistically stop him. But none of them yet had any notion of the scale of his plans. It was an advantage he meant to keep for as long as he could.
He dropped lightly on to the deck just aft of the mast and set the boy down, keeping him close despite the smell of urine that wafted up now they had ceased travel. He understood Kessian's reaction as he did that of the crew. All around them on the ship he could sense unease and fear. It suited him for the most part. They thought him evil, touched by the same gods that they warded against sending them to the bottom of the ocean. They wore charms around their necks and made their symbols and gestures in the air whenever he passed or even so much as looked at them.
Captain Nahran was coming down from the tiller deck. He was a sour-faced man with a shaven head. His powerful frame was scarred from a lifetime at sea and his eyes were hard and cold.
'You have the cargo, I see,' he said.
Gorian prised the terrified boy from him.
'His name is Kessian,' said Gorian, his Tsardon faultless. 'It is a name that speaks greatness and you will treat him as such.' 'As you wish.'
'As you should treat me and address me.'
Nahran raised an eyebrow. 'I have one lord and he is not aboard my ship, Gorian Westfallen. We will make land in Gestern in less than four days if this weather holds. Your boy shares your quarters. See he doesn't get under the feet of my crew.'
Gorian squeezed Kessian's shoulder.
'Go to the rail. See if you can sense dolphins. I'll bet you can if you try. Go on.'
The boy nodded minutely and wandered across the gently rolling deck. His eyes were everywhere, his confusion complete. Gorian turned back to Nahran.
'Remember one thing, Captain. To me, you are transport. A service given to me by your king. And I can always find new transport.'
Nahran chuckled. 'Then do so. Leave whenever you wish.' He gestured at the open sea. 'You are but one man. I have two hundred men and you do not scare me. Fly to the coast if you're able. Otherwise save your threats for those who care to hear them.'
Nahran turned on his heel and stalked back towards the tiller. Gorian watched him go.
'Ocean men. When will you really understand who commands the sea?'
Kessian's knuckles were white on the starboard gunwale. The day was young and the spray ice cold. Dolphins were a remote possibility here.
'What do you see?'
'Nothing.' Kessian shrugged but didn't look around. 'And sense?'
Kessian turned then and Gorian dropped to his haunches, happy to be out of the breeze in the lee of the gunwale timbers. 'Well?'
'Everything.' Kessian stared at him, face and eyes full of uncertainty and dislocation. The stare was long and intense. Gorian began to feel uncomfortable before it was broken. 'You're Gorian.'
'You've heard of me.'
Kessian shrugged. 'They talk about you sometimes. They hate you.' 'They are scared of me,' said Gorian, finding the thought disappointing.
'No. They thought you were dead. They wished you were.' 'Well now they know different.'
Abruptly, Kessian's eyes filled with tears, ‘I don't want to be here. I want to go home now.'
Gorian reached out a hand. Kessian flinched backwards and clung more tightly to the rail.
'You're with me,' said Gorian. 'You are home.'
'No! I want to go home. I want to go back to my mother.'
'But she wanted you to come with me, didn't she tell you?'
'Liar. She hates you.' Kessian's shout had heads turning on deck. '
You're bad. You're what we must not be.'
Gorian felt like he'd been slapped. 'Who told you that?'
'Everyone knows it,' said Kessian, distracted for the moment. 'Mother Naravny teaches us and everyone says the same thing.'
'What do they say?' Gorian wasn't sure he wanted to hear the answer.
'They say you hurt people with your abilities and you shouldn't have. They say you ran from justice and that you are the one who will spoil it for all the rest of us.' Kessian frowned.
'Don't they say how I helped save the Conquord? Don't they tell how I helped us escape Westfallen when the Order would have killed us all?'
Kessian shook his head. 'They say we must control ourselves or become like you. Now take me home. Please.'
Gorian sat with his back to the side of the ship and shook his head. That they would do this to him after all he had meant to them. Still meant to them.
'I want to go home!'
Kessian's voice was rising to a shout. Gorian glared at him.
'Calm down, Kessian. You know you aren't going home. You're with me now. Father and son on an adventure.'
Kessian froze and his face reddened with an anger Gorian well recognised. 'You aren't my father,' he screamed, voice carrying clear through the ship and across the water. 'You aren't anything. I don't want to be on this ship. I don't know what I'm doing here! Take me home. Take me home.'
Gorian's look made the boy flinch backwards. In his mind's eye he had seen Kessian running into his embrace, desperate to be with the one who had given him life. Instead he got this ... this screeching abuse. He grabbed Kessian's left arm above the elbow and hauled him to his feet.
'You need to learn your destiny,' he said. 'Come with me.' 'I don't want to—'
Gorian let it happen. He pulsed cold down his arm and let it flow into Kessian's arm through the break he made in the boy's energy map. Kessian yelped and tried to pull away. He was strong in Gorian's image but he did not yet have Gorian's build.
'You have pushed me far enough.'
He pulled the boy towards the fore hatch and thrust him down the steep stair. Kessian half-fell and sprawled at the bottom, looking up and trying to back away. Gorian jumped down after him, grabbed him to his feet again and marched him to the quarters they were going to share. Behind a rough curtain, two narrow cots were crammed into the tiny space. Gorian's few belongings were strewn across his bed. He threw Kessian onto the other cot.
'Does it hurt?' he asked, indicating the boy's upper arm where it was being clutched.
There were tears in his eyes when he nodded. The fury had gone, replaced by new fear.
'I didn't mean to hurt you,' said Gorian quietly, feeling a stab of guilt. 'I had to make you quiet.' He sat on the bed next to him. 'You have to understand that I cannot be undermined in front of the crew like that. I will not stand for it. You must respect me as they must, do you see?'
'I don't know what I'm doing here,' whined Kessian. 'I just want to go home.'
Gorian sucked his lip and breathed in slowly, desperate to calm himself. The thoughts chased themselves around his head. Overwhelming the rest was a sense of deep disappointment. The boy was not what he expected at all. Weak. More like Ossacer than himself. He pushed his forefingers into the corners of his eyes and cleared his throat.
'Look, Kessian, I know this must be hard for you to accept but your life has changed.' An idea struck him. 'Did Mirron, your mother, ever tell you how her life changed very suddenly one day?'
' 'Father Kessian Day,' said Kessian quietly. 'We remember him and the day every year.'
Gorian smiled and with it came the sense of loss that he experienced every time he dwelt too long on memories of Westfallen and all those he had loved and who had abandoned him.
'It's right he is remembered,' said Gorian. 'It's a tragedy you could never know him. But at least, the others won't sully his memory, will they?'
'They loved him.'
'As did I.'
'Why did you bring me here?'
'To fulfil your promise. To achieve that which the Academy and all who run it would deny you with their teaching.'
Kessian stared at him, face blank and confused. There were tears in his eyes and he was kneading the thin blankets rhythmically.
'I don't know what to say to you,' said Gorian. 'Your mother had to leave Westfallen to find the strength within herself. So did I and Ossacer and Arducius. We were all unhappy about it at the time but we can all see what it did for us now. That's what is happening to you.'
'But I didn't ask for it to happen,' said Kessian. 'Do you think I did?' Gorian shot to his feet. 'Do you think I chose to see Father Kessian murdered before my eyes and be chased from my own home? Do you? Stupid child. At least you are in a safe place. We were cast adrift without friends or sanctuary. No one asks for things like this to happen. They just do. And the mark of who you are is how you rise to meet the problems you face. Your mother did, I did. You must.'
Kessian stared up at him. His chin was wobbling as he fought to contain his tears.
'But I can't do anything. You had to stop a war. You've just taken me from my home. Isn't that my only problem?'
Gorian sat back down. 'No. Your problem is facing up to who you are. And welcoming your destiny. And that is to sit with me while I rule this world of ours.'
Kessian's eyes widened in surprise but at the same time, a smile tugged at the corners of his mouth.
'The Advocate is the ruler. She won't let you do that.'
'No?' Gorian shrugged. 'I can see you don't believe me but one day soon, you'll stop laughing. You see, I know more about you than you think. You're a very special boy. The only male child born of the original Ascendants.'
'I'm still too young,' said Kessian. 'I can't do much.'
'Really?' Gorian's voice dropped low and he felt pride through his veins when he spoke. 'I have felt you ever since you were born though I was thousands of miles away. It is how I knew the time was right to come for you, to free you.'
'I don't—'
'Shh.' Gorian held a finger to his lips. 'I'm speaking. Listen to me. You can do so much more than any other Ascendant of your age, can't you?'
'No,' said Kessian sharply. 'Everyone knows that I won't fully emerge until I'm thirteen or fourteen.'
'Everyone but you and I,' said Gorian. 'Your mother doesn't look so she doesn't see. But I have. I felt it happen across the endless miles but it was so brief a thing that even those closest to you missed it. You emerged, didn't you? Over the course of a few hours not days like everyone expected. And early. Years early. I have touched your life energies and I know. Don't deny it, Kessian. You have the power at your fingertips now, today.'
Kessian's head dropped and he scratched the top of his head. Gorian put a hand under his chin and tilted his face back up.
'What's wrong?'
'Everything!' shouted Kessian. 'It shouldn't have happened. It means I'm not like the others. Not normal. It means something is wrong with me.'
Gorian drew in a sharp breath. 'You're ashamed?'
Kessian nodded. 'I have to hide it until I'm ready.'
'No, no,' whispered Gorian, happy to accept the gift he had been given. He stroked Kessian's beautiful blond hair and for the first time the boy didn't recoil from the gentle touch. 'Don't be ashamed, be proud. Can't you see why I was right to liberate you from the Academy? From your mother just for now? You felt you had to hide what you were because you think they won't understand. And you're right, they won't. They'd want to study you, hold you back until they thought you were safe to be taught again.
'With me, that won't happen. You are far ahead of any other Ascendant. Far ahead of where I was at your age. But I'm not scared by that, I'm excited by it. Because it means your potential for shaping your abilities in the right way is that much bigger.'
Kessian's face had cleared a little and Gorian felt that for the first time, he actually had his son's attention.
'I will teach you to understand wha
t you are feeling and how to tap the well of your power. I'll teach you the things you would never have been taught at the Academy. The things they think are dangerous but are the birthright of every Ascendant. You want to learn, don't you?'
Kessian nodded.
'Well, I will help you and in return, you will help me. I won't ask you to do anything you don't want to do. You won't harm anyone, I promise. And neither will I harm anyone who believes in me. In us. And one other thing I promise is that you will see your mother again. I can't say when but you will. One day, we will all stand together. A proper family.
'So, what do you say? Do you want to try?'
The confusion was back on Kessian's face. Gorian could understand it readily enough. He smiled and ruffled the boy's hair before standing up.
'All right, look, this is all too much to take in, isn't it. I'm sorry to have to do it to you, all right?'
Kessian nodded and the tiniest smile appeared.
'You're scared, you don't know me and you don't know where you are or where you're going. Hey, are you hungry?' 'A bit.'
'All right then, here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to leave you to think about all that we have spoken about. And then I'll bring you some food and see what you think. And Kessian. Let me promise you one thing more. I will never let anyone harm you. While you are with me, you are safe and secure. You're my son, whatever you think about that right now and that makes you precious beyond measure.'
Gorian pulled the curtain across the opening and walked back to the stair and up to the deck. Whether he had turned Kessian at all, he was unsure. But one thing was certain. He had been right about the enormous capacity for his power. And it could be tapped and used. It would make Gorian ten times the man. More.
A Shout for the Dead Page 8
