by Ian Irvine
“Bleddimire’s fallen?” cried Holm. “When?”
“Weeks ago.”
“Then it’s over. He holds the best of Hightspall already and we’re left with the dregs.”
“Be damned!” cried Rix, leaping to his feet and towering over them. “We’re never giving in. Next time we’ll have a bigger victory. And a bigger one after that, until we drive the mongrels back down the rat holes they came from.”
He paced around the room, breathing heavily, then sat down with a thump. He looked up, met Tali’s eye and said with a rueful smile, “Or, more likely, until me and all my rebels are dead.”
“Count me among them,” Tali said impulsively. “The rebels, I mean.”
“Count us!” said Holm. “How dare you leave me out of it?”
Rix’s eyes shone. He wiped them hastily. “Thank you,” he said, embracing Tali and Holm in turn. “That means everything to me.”
“There is one other piece of news,” said Tali. “Two pieces, actually. And perhaps you’ll find them hopeful.”
“Go on.”
“From time to time I’ve been able to spy or eavesdrop on Lyf, via my gift.”
“Yes, yes?” said Rix.
“Lyf’s victory over Caulderon always seemed uncanny to me. Taking such a great and well-defended city within hours seemed too quick, too complete.”
“And to me, too.”
“That’s because it was uncanny.”
“How do you know?”
“I overheard him talking to his ghost ancestor, Errek. After Lyf added Deroe’s ebony pearls to his own, he drew on vast amounts of magery to attack our armies, and defeat them.”
“Why would I find that hopeful?” said Rix.
“Because he took too much. Lyf thought magery was limitless but it isn’t. It’s failing rapidly – his and the chief magian’s. It’s failing everywhere, even mine. So next time he fights a battle, he’ll have to do it without magery.”
“That is good news. I can’t fight magery, but I can fight men.”
They finished their dinner and a servant appeared to usher them to their quarters. Tali was glad to go. All she wanted was a bath and a bed. She followed the servant to the room prepared for her. It was small and spare, with a low ceiling and bare walls, but she liked small rooms and simple surroundings. It reminded her of the little stone chamber she had shared with her mother in Cython.
It did not remind her of the bad things about Cython, but rather the good ones, and the moment she lay down and blew out the candle, Tali fell asleep.
CHAPTER 51
“Was blowing the door off a great destruction?” said Tali.
The smoke was thickening, whirling and tumbling in the updrafts created by the ravine. She could hardly see Tirnan Twil now.
“Did it kill anyone, or destroy something vast or vital?”
“No.”
“Then the answer is no.” He looked down the ravine, then up. “Can you hear them?”
“The people inside?” she whispered, shivering.
“No, the gauntlings.”
It was hard to tell over the roar and crackle of the fire, the wind whistling along the gorge, and the pattering rain.
Kaark! Kaark!
“They’ll come after us, won’t they?”
“Once the smoke clears, they’ll come down to check. With the gusting winds around here, it’d be too dangerous right now.” He glanced at the sky. “Not much daylight left, which is good. Though it means…” He gave her a sympathetic smile.
“What now?” she groaned.
“We’ll have to walk the cliff path out – the really dangerous one – in darkness.”
“What do you mean the really dangerous one? How could it be worse than the one we came in on?”
“It’s worse.” He was smirking.
Tali could not smile. The destruction of Tirnan Twil had burned all humour out of her.
“However I do know a secret way out,” said Holm. “If we can get out of sight we can lose them in the night.”
“Luck isn’t something we’ve had much of, lately.”
“We’re alive, free, and in improving health. I count that as good luck.”
“Just as a matter of interest,” she said as they trudged along, “where are we going?”
“I thought you’d decided that when I was injured and out of it.”
“I was heading in the direction of a place called Garramide. Though I don’t know where it is.”
“It’s a few days east of here, in the middle of the Nandeloch Mountains.”
“Good. I’ve had enough of travel,” said Tali. “About the portrait?”
“What portrait?”
“The one you stuffed in your pocket up on the seventh level. I assume it’s Lyf’s self-portrait. Why did you take it?”
“I suppose, like you, I saw something in it.”
“Do you think it’s the key?”
“Probably not, but self-portraits are always revealing. If it’s cleaned up it could tell us something useful about him.”
That night a wicked blizzard blew in and the few days turned into five, the first two of which they spent in a cave, waiting for the weather to improve.
“Go carefully,” said Holm, on the fifth afternoon. “These are suspicious times, and isolated fortresses are more likely to shoot strangers than welcome them.”
They had spent most of the day labouring up the escarpment through dense forest and heavy snow. They were now standing under the eaves of the forest, studying Fortress Garramide from a quarter of a mile away.
“Better make sure we can’t be mistaken for the enemy, then,” said Tali.
“Take your hat off. There’s never been a Cythonian with golden hair in the history of the world.”
From beneath her broad hat brim, Tali looked nervously at the sky. It was heavily overcast and light snow was drifting before a keen southerly.
“I suppose I could manage it – when we’re outside the gates.”
They headed out of the forest across deep snow, though the surface was hard and it was easy walking, save where a too-hasty step broke through the crust.
“Looks like they’ve been under attack,” said Holm.
“And won.”
There were guards all along the walls and carpenters were repairing the main gates. Several large mounds in the snow suggested a lot of enemy dead, but the fortress stood proud and undefeated, and a hundred chimneys were smoking.
They headed across to the road, where the snow had been beaten down by people coming and going, then slowly along it. Tali went first, nervously. The men on the wall to either side of the gate had their bows trained on her all the way.
“No further,” said Holm. “You’re almost within bowshot. Take off your hat. The scarf too. Let them be in no doubt that you’re a Hightspaller, and no threat.”
Tali took off her hat, unwound her scarf, then braced herself for the sickening panic of agoraphobia, but it did not rise. Perhaps the sky was too gloomy. The wind ruffled her hair. It was icy on her exposed neck and the driven snowflakes settled there, but did not melt.
“State your name and business,” called a tall guard.
“We’ve been hunted halfway across Hightspall, and seek refuge.” Her voice sounded shrill, fearful. “My companion is called Holm and —”
“What is your name?” the guard said curtly.
“I am the Lady Thalalie vi Torgrist.”
Silence. The man had disappeared from the wall. None of the other guards spoke. Neither did they lower their weapons.
“He’s gone to speak to his captain,” Holm said quietly. “We may have a long wait.”
Tali drew her coat around her more tightly. Cold was seeping up through the soles of her boots. She stamped her feet but it did not help.
Five minutes passed. Ten. Fifteen. “Why is it taking so long?” said Tali.
Holm did not answer.
“What if they turn us away? We’ve got no food left.�
�
A huge man appeared on the wall, clad in furs and wearing a hat drawn down over his face against the driving snow. He studied them for a few seconds before turning away.
Tali swallowed. “That doesn’t seem like a good sign.”
“Depends how you look at it,” said Holm.
Shortly a small gate opened beside the main fortress gates. A guard gestured to them.
Tali put on her scarf and hat as she hurried across. The guard held up a square, callused hand, studied their faces as though memorising them, then waved them through.
A tall, weathered man stood waiting in the yard, wearing the insignia of a sergeant. He was quite bald and did not have many teeth. “Sergeant Nuddell,” he said courteously. “Your escort to Lord Deadhand.”
“Does he always interview refugees personally?” said Holm.
“I don’t talk about his business.”
They followed Nuddell along paved paths, freshly cleared of snow. Several leafless trees occupied a left-hand corner of the yard. Ahead was a massive castle built from yellow stone. Towers on the corners each had a green, copper-clad dome.
“Garramide looks all very neat and orderly,” said Tali.
“The late, great dame ran a tight house,” said Nuddell. “Her heir, Lord Deadhand, does things the same way.”
He led them inside, along a broad entrance hall and up several levels to a door guarded by a compact, hungry looking fellow, scarred across the throat as if someone had tried to cut it. He nodded to Nuddell, opened the door, stood aside to let them pass and pulled the door closed.
Tali went in, anxiety gnawing at her stomach and acid burning a track up the centre of her chest. She passed across an anteroom, her feet making no sound on an ancient patterned rug, then around through a doorway into a large, panelled room lit only by embers in a large fireplace.
The big man still wore a greatcoat. He had his back to her and was standing in the shadow beside the window, looking out. But there was a presence about him, a familiarity, that swelled and grew until, at the moment he turned, she knew him.
“Rix!” It came out as a shriek of joy.
He stretched out a grey right hand, studied it ruefully for a moment and drew it back. “Around here, they call me Deadhand.”
She sprang forwards, thinking to embrace him, for they had been great friends. Then, remembering the manner of their parting, she froze.
Rix frowned. “Am I so very changed? So very ferocious?”
She had to put things right. “I did you wrong, not telling you about Lord and Lady Ricinus’s treason. I’m sorry. I was trying to protect you.”
“It was my right to know,” said Rix coolly.
She could not tell what he was thinking. “I wasn’t trying to protect you, as though you were a child,” she went on. “But if you’d known, you would have been in an impossible situation —”
“A duty to protect my sovereign in a time of war,” said Rix, “utterly in conflict with my duty to honour my parents and safeguard my house. Even so, you should have told me.”
“I’m sorry,” said Tali, “I’ve been worrying —”
“Then worry no more. The high treason was revealed, the traitors condemned, the house crushed. Everything I had and everything I was has been swept away. The slate has not just been erased, it’s been smashed and thrown out. Come here.” He held out his arms.
Tali embraced him, or tried to, though in her heavy coat her arms did not meet around him. He could have enfolded her twice in his arms.
Rix looked over her head towards Holm, then disengaged.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “Rixium of Garramide, though I go by Rix. Or Deadhand, whichever you prefer. I won’t shake hands, if you don’t mind – it rather puts people off.”
“I’m Holm,” said Holm. “I hear you did away with that hyena, Leatherhead. That must have been a sight to see.”
“He might easily have done away with me.”
He ushered them to chairs by the fire and called for food and drink, then gave a brief account of the fight with Leatherhead and his time here, though to Tali’s mind it raised many questions and provided few answers.
But if he wanted to draw a veil over the time since the fall of Caulderon, that was his right. She’d had a number of experiences in the past weeks that she never wanted to think about again. Though, as it happened, Rix did not ask her about her time with the chancellor, how she had escaped, or how she had found him.
Shortly a serving maid came in, bearing a heavy tray.
“Glynnie!” Tali cried.
Glynnie set down the tray and turned to her, smiling, though rather formally. Tali, who had been intending to embrace the girl, shook hands instead.
“You look different,” said Tali.
She seemed taller, and the slender girl’s shape was taking on a woman’s curves.
“I get enough to eat here,” said Glynnie. “Will that be all, ma’am, Lord?”
She shot a glance at Rix, whose jaw tightened. Tali looked from one to the other. There was a tension between them that had not been there back in Caulderon. Rix nodded. Glynnie went out.
“Benn’s dead,” said Rix. “At least, I lost him when we escaped from Caulderon. I don’t see how he can be alive.”
“I’m sorry,” said Tali. “He was a nice boy.”
“Sit down. Eat. And if you have any news, I need to hear it.”
“Wherever we go,” said Holm, “people are desperate for news of the war. Though there’s never any good news.”
“There is here,” said Rix. “We’ve beaten off a besieging force of almost five hundred. Inflicted a heavy defeat, in fact. Though the blizzard helped.”
“A win is a win,” said Tali. “Well done, Rix. Though it doesn’t surprise me. You should be a general.”
“For the moment, I’ve got my hands full protecting Garramide. What news do you have?”
“The chancellor never stops scheming,” said Tali. “But his schemes don’t come to anything. We can’t rely on him.”
“How big is his army?”
“Not big enough.” She frowned. “It was less than five thousand when I escaped, though it’d be bigger by now.”
“That’s not even enough to hold the south-west,” said Rix. “If Lyf attacks it, now he’s taken Bleddimire —”
“Bleddimire’s fallen?” cried Holm. “When?”
“Weeks ago.”
“Then it’s over. He holds the best of Hightspall already and we’re left with the dregs.”
“Be damned!” cried Rix, leaping to his feet and towering over them. “We’re never giving in. Next time we’ll have a bigger victory. And a bigger one after that, until we drive the mongrels back down the rat holes they came from.”
He paced around the room, breathing heavily, then sat down with a thump. He looked up, met Tali’s eye and said with a rueful smile, “Or, more likely, until me and all my rebels are dead.”
“Count me among them,” Tali said impulsively. “The rebels, I mean.”
“Count us!” said Holm. “How dare you leave me out of it?”
Rix’s eyes shone. He wiped them hastily. “Thank you,” he said, embracing Tali and Holm in turn. “That means everything to me.”
“There is one other piece of news,” said Tali. “Two pieces, actually. And perhaps you’ll find them hopeful.”
“Go on.”
“From time to time I’ve been able to spy or eavesdrop on Lyf, via my gift.”
“Yes, yes?” said Rix.
“Lyf’s victory over Caulderon always seemed uncanny to me. Taking such a great and well-defended city within hours seemed too quick, too complete.”
“And to me, too.”
“That’s because it was uncanny.”
“How do you know?”
“I overheard him talking to his ghost ancestor, Errek. After Lyf added Deroe’s ebony pearls to his own, he drew on vast amounts of magery to attack our armies, and defeat them.”
“W
hy would I find that hopeful?” said Rix.
“Because he took too much. Lyf thought magery was limitless but it isn’t. It’s failing rapidly – his and the chief magian’s. It’s failing everywhere, even mine. So next time he fights a battle, he’ll have to do it without magery.”
“That is good news. I can’t fight magery, but I can fight men.”
They finished their dinner and a servant appeared to usher them to their quarters. Tali was glad to go. All she wanted was a bath and a bed. She followed the servant to the room prepared for her. It was small and spare, with a low ceiling and bare walls, but she liked small rooms and simple surroundings. It reminded her of the little stone chamber she had shared with her mother in Cython.
It did not remind her of the bad things about Cython, but rather the good ones, and the moment she lay down and blew out the candle, Tali fell asleep.
CHAPTER 52
Why did I withhold the news that Tobry was here? Rix wondered after they were gone. Certainly not to injure Tali. Could it have been to injure Tobry, though? He hadn’t stopped talking about Tali since he’d arrived, fretting about her bondage to the chancellor, the dire risk of him finding out that she bore the master pearl and the certainty that Lyf was hunting her.
For Rix, the joy of Tobry’s appearance had faded the night he came, when they had discussed Maloch, Herovianism and Rix’s mural of the opalised Axil Grandys. Another issue he did not want to talk about.
Since the enemy were unlikely to return until the bad weather broke, he had time on his hands. He found himself constantly drawn to the mural, and more so to the man it portrayed.
Grandys had been hard and ruthless, though that was a necessary characteristic of those who forged nations and won wars, and Rix could not blame the man for what he had done. Grandys had a driving purpose and a self-confidence that Rix himself yearned for.
Tobry mocked Rix mercilessly for this ambition, for his admiration of Grandys and almost everything else that gave Rix’s life meaning. Tobry had always poked fun at Rix, but in the past it had been gentle, part of the banter of their relationship. Now Tobry’s criticism had a hard edge, and Rix could tolerate less and less of it. He avoided Tobry most of the time, making excuses where he could.
