by Kage Baker
“Our people will murmur at these changes, and for that reason we must assert our authority. A child knows nothing, until he is compelled to learn and grow. Now our people must be compelled, for their own benefit.
“This is our opportunity. Here and now we must resolve on a new set of laws by which our people will live. Brothers and sisters, the moment has arrived!”
The trevanion had fallen utterly silent.
The Saint rose to her feet. “No,” she said. “You have offered them false choices.
“We do not stand at a crossroads; there are multiple ways, as many as there are trails in a forest. One may grow without changing one’s nature. One may remain stable without stagnating. You wish to become something new; that’s admirable in you and always has been. But you have no right to force others to walk the path you have chosen for yourself.”
Lendreth rounded on her. “Nor have you, now. Your authority ended when you left us. Lie with your husband and bear his children; but we are no longer your children. A man reverences his mother, and so we will reverence your name, for the Star’s sake; but henceforth we will rule ourselves.”
“You mean you will rule us!” screamed Jish, and the trevanion cried in outrage, and some leaped to their feet.
“No! What he said was just and right!”
“Blasphemer!”
The Saint held up her hand for silence. “I will relinquish authority, if my people wish. But not to you. You would only make them slaves again, to your own ambition.”
Lendreth’s face was dark with rage. “Woman, be silent!”
“How dare you!” shouted Shafwyr.
“Bloody hell, they’re going to have a holy war,” said Arkholoth, shocked, then staggered aside as Gard rushed between the curtains of his pavilion and strode across the meadow to the Saint.
“You smooth-lying bastard,” Gard shouted at Lendreth.
In a blur of green at the edge of the meadow, suddenly they were there: three armed men, running at such speed their cloaks floated out like wings, straight for Gard. The foremost raised a sickle as he ran.
Lendreth, horrified, stepped before them and threw up his arms. “Fools! I told you to stay—” The thrown sickle caught him in the throat, and he fell. One of the Mowers pulled up short in dismay, staggering, seeing what had happened; one ran around and the other ran over Lendreth’s body, still coming for Gard.
“Stop!” the Saint cried, looking into the eyes of the nearest with a wrath that made him clutch his head and stop in his tracks, spinning about in pain. The other one averted his eyes, drawing a machete. Gard stepped back, seizing the Saint and thrusting her behind him. Arkholoth and Stedrakh closed on the Mower from either side and cut him down.
“But we had come to rescue you!” said the Mower who had stopped first, beginning to weep. The Saint ignored him, pushing past Gard to get to where Lendreth lay. She dropped to her knees beside him.
He was staring up at the sky. His eyes swiveled to see her as she knelt beside him; then they rolled back in his head, and the painful rattle of his breath stopped. “You have killed him,” she said to the Mowers, feeling the foundation of the world dropping away.
“No! He was the cause,” said one of the Mowers, pointing at Gard. “This blood is on his hands!”
“And the trevani betrayed us,” said the other, looking bleakly at Lendreth’s body. “I heard the things he said. He deserved his death.”
“You are murderers. Shall I curse you?” said the Saint quietly.
“Kill them,” said Gard to his men, but the Mowers took a single step that brought them within arm’s reach of each other.
The older one looked at the younger and said, “Follow orders.” They drew machetes and buried them, each to the hilt, in the other’s breast. They fell, embracing.
The trevanion had been silent; finally a long gasp came from Jish, who was staring at Lendreth’s body as though her eyes would start from her head. She drew a few strangled breaths. The Saint took her hand.
At last Jish made a sound, a sob and a laugh mixed. “They cut off his voice,” she said, pulling her hand away. “He’d have hated that. How that man loved to talk.”
“I’m sorry,” said Gard to the Saint. The Saint turned to him and held him, tight, and he bent and kissed her.
Now the trevanion all began to talk at once, but even so they were outshouted by voices from below the meadow. “Sir!” Redeye came running with Cheller, bounding up the twisting path, and between them they bore Mr. Bolt. “Sir, messenger! There’s an army coming up the road!”
“What?” Gard turned and stared. They set Mr. Bolt down before them, and he wheezed as he held up the decorated war ax. Gard took it, turning it in his hands in bewilderment.
Mr. Bolt took it back and worked the trick handle. “Hollow,” he explained. The end cap slid off the haft and revealed a roll of paper inside. He plucked it out and handed it to Gard. “Contact says, Duke Salting’s bringing his troops. They’re going to lay siege to you.”
“Well, that’ll be pointless,” said Arkholoth, grinning. “We’ll just sit up there and pick his men off with rocks.” But Gard’s face had gone pale, as he read.
Sir,
The duke advances on you, planning to arrive at the full of the moon. He will avenge himself for that you raid his shipments. His numbers I have listed below. Beware for he has with him a witch, or it is some puppet worked by magic, and her escort who is called Quickfire, but she is called Pyreeheena. She has no proper flesh and is fearful to see. She boasts she will take you alive, with some device that will break your walls.
Gods lend you strength and be merciful to you. I still wear the amulet.
A list of troops followed: so many infantry, so many archers, so many artillerymen …
Gard looked up from the paper, looked around him at the pavilions, at the trevanion who still stared at Lendreth’s body. The Saint, who had been watching his face closely, said, “What is it?”
“You must send your people away. Send them down the mountain, as quickly as you can. My enemies are coming.”
“Nobody’s going down the mountain,” said Redeye. “They’ll run right into the army, sir.”
“Then I’ll have to bring them into the house,” said the Saint.
“All right,” said Gard distractedly. “Withdraw! Stedrakh, Cheller, lead these people up through the maze.”
“So this is how he does it,” said Duke Salting, peering with interest at the trail up the mountainside.
“It’s wider than it looks,” the scout explained. “Most of the crevices are illusions. You can’t see the real surface until you’re right on top of it. If they aren’t distracted by the illusions, you can get a column ten men wide up there, and quickly.”
“The bastard must have studied stage effects,” said the duke, grinning. “I wonder how many of his other defenses are a sham? Forward!” he shouted over his shoulder. “Standard-bearers to lead! Let all other men keep their eyes on the standard, and don’t look down!”
The army moved forward, ascending the mountain with remarkable ease and speed. At the rear, Quickfire walked beside the sedan-chair bearers carrying the simulacrum. “This may be easier than we thought,” said Quickfire.
“Oh, I hope so,” said the simulacrum. It stared around, admiring the view. “You know, once we’ve broken the spell, I think this might make a perfect home. All the enclosure to which one has been accustomed, but a much nicer climate should one care to venture outside.” It tilted its face to study the fortress above. Though its golden features were expressionless, the sneer was unmistakable. “Of course, one would wish to redecorate. What ghastly taste! But he was never anything but a jumped-up gladiator, really, was he?”
Grattur and Engrattur raced after Gard, attempting to arm him as he made his way to the door in the wall. Behind them, the corridors echoed with shouts as the army mustered. Before them, in the moment Gard threw the door wide, was an eerie peace: the silence of the garden, as remote
and untroubled as the clouds that floated above. The trevanion sat or stood around the reflecting pool, in various attitudes: some weeping, some numb with shock, some few possessed of slightly surreal tranquillity.
The Saint rose to her feet and ran to meet Gard. “How long before they arrive?”
His face was expressionless, like an animal’s in its blank calm. “They’re in sight now. Another hour at most before they get to the Death Zone. Listen to me: there’s an escape route. Grattur and Engrattur will lead you through it. Take the children. Take Eyrdway. Go back with your people and live among them, but let no man know my children’s names. Say they are foundlings you rescued, like the others. Say I kept my boy and he died with me.”
“No!” The Saint looked up at him, horrified. “How can you think you’ll lose? You said no army could take this place!”
“And that may be true, and you and I may live to tell this story to our grandchildren. But I’d be a fool to count on it. Lady Pirihine is with them. My two bitterest enemies on my doorstep, and who wouldn’t guess they’ve got sorcery to break the door down?”
“Little brother, hold still,” said Grattur, weeping as he tried to fasten a pair of vambraces on Gard’s arms.
“Then come with us,” cried the Saint.
Gard was vanishing, piece by piece, under his black armor, becoming the Dark Lord. He shook his head. “You have a duty to your people; I have a duty to mine.”
“They can’t get through the Death Zone. I won’t go unless they get through,” she said, desperate.
He shook his head again. “If they can get through, it’ll be too late.”
“No! You’re a mage! You’re more powerful than she is! You can fight!”
“Little brother, she speaks the truth,” said Engrattur.
“Oh, I intend to fight,” said Gard. “Maybe I’ll even win. But if I lose, I’ll die rather than go back in chains. It’ll be all right, whatever happens. You see?”
“No,” she said, wondering if he had gone mad. “I don’t see.”
He leaned down and kissed her, then murmured in her ear, “The Dark Lord always comes back. That part of the story never changes. Give me a name.”
“What?”
“Name me. You are my wife and my heart. Give me a name, and it will be my true name.”
She looked up at him, feeling the tears welling in her eyes. Then she stood on tiptoe and whispered a name in his ear.
He grinned. “There! Keep it safe in your heart. Tell no one. Only call me to you and I’ll find you again, if I have to make myself flesh out of leaves and dust.”
He kissed her and strode away. The trevani Shafwyr, who had been sitting by the pool staring at them, rose and turned to the Saint. “I see, now,” he said. “The Mowers took your garden and made it a fortress. This man has made his fortress into your garden.”
“Yes,” said Kdwyr, as though that were the most obvious thing in the world. “He did not capture her. She captured him.”
“Is this an illusion too?” Duke Salting asked his scout. They stood before the black boulders of the Death Zone.
“Unfortunately it is not, my lord. This was where my associate died. At least, I assume he died; he went into the maze and never came out. The rocks are sharp as broken glass.”
“They won’t trouble us.” The duke turned and strode back through the ranks, to where Quickfire was just helping the simulacrum from its sedan chair. “Madam witch! We’ve arrived. See the maze, there? I want a path cut across it. Shall I have the device uncrated for you?”
“Not yet.” The simulacrum turned its face toward the maze. “We must save power for his walls. The model will burn through this part easily enough. Fetch it, Quickfire.”
Quickfire ran to the baggage train and returned a moment later carrying the model. The simulacrum took his arm and they walked to the edge of the Death Zone. The assembled troops watched as the simulacrum bowed its head and seemed, for a moment, to sag, as though the will that held its limbs together had directed its focus elsewhere.
This time there was a jangling sound, like the strings of a harp being cut through with a saw, as the spells of the Death Zone broke. The black stones melted into glittering sand and drifted away on the wind.
Quickfire walked forward with the simulacrum and trained the model on the next rank of stones, burning through them also; and so to the next, and the next, until at last a path had been cut through wide enough for three men to walk abreast. Duke Salting, following them closely, smiled up at the open space before Gard’s high wall. “Well done! Now let’s bring the whole pile down around his ears.”
“I beg your indulgence, sir,” said the simulacrum in a faint voice. “Let me retire to my chair first. I am only a woman, and do not wish to see so much blood shed.”
“Of course, madam,” said the Duke. “But have the device sent up from the carts. I’ll fire it myself; my revenge will be the sweeter. I have only to turn the switch, am I right?”
“Yes,” said Quickfire. “The big red switch. Pardon me while I help the lady to her chair, won’t you?”
Quickfire hurried to the back lines, supporting the drooping simulacrum. Once she had returned to her chair, he shouted, “Some of you, help me with the device!” Uneasy men obeyed, hauling out the trunk. The black tube was hauled forth and proved to be monstrous heavy; it creaked as it settled on its red-and-gold-painted wheels. Quickfire pointed to the great red switch on the back of the mechanism.
“Listen to me! Keep your hands away from that switch! No one must touch it but my lord the duke! If any man is fool enough to meddle with it, I can’t be answerable for the consequences, do you understand?”
“We hear you,” said the captain among the rear guard, looking sullen. “Not going to explode on my boys as we push, is it?”
“Not if you’re careful. Go slowly, and don’t jostle it, but go. Now!”
When they had moved away, trundling the device uphill with infinite care, the simulacrum jerked erect and hopped from its chair. “There. Now, let’s waste no time.”
“You men come with us,” Quickfire told the chair-bearers. “We have a secret mission, at his lordship’s express orders.” He picked the model up again. The simulacrum led and he followed, with the chair-bearers coming close after them.
“Sir!” Dalbeck turned from the parapet. “They’ve done it!”
Gard came to the edge and looked out. He saw the swath cut through the Death Zone, and the column of armed men moving slowly through.
He felt a black calm, a serenity like ice. He turned and saw Thrang, wringing his hands. “Inform my lady wife, please,” he told him. “And bid her remember.”
Thrang turned and ran. Gard looked at the demons assembled there, at Redeye and Balnshik and the others, all those he had called to him and given flesh. “D’you think my armor’s black enough?”
“You’re perfectly horrifying, darling,” said Balnshik.
“I won’t be taken alive,” he said.
She smiled. “It would be an honor.”
“Thank you. Sergeant, take your division down to the postern gate. If they turn that thing on the walls, break out and do your best to take it. We’ll cover you.”
“Sir!” Redeye saluted and ran.
Gard looked around. “Have we a flag for parley?” Hallock found one and brought it to him. Gard went to the parapet and leaned down, waving the flag.
The simulacrum led the little party along the edge of the Death Zone, until they were well out of sight of the army. It turned its mask this way and that, as though sniffing the air. At last it stopped and clambered down the hillside. It pointed at one particular spot on the steep slope and said, “There.”
Quickfire scrambled down. He took aim with the model and bored a passage into the mountain, tall enough to stand in, ten paces deep. “Inside! And again,” the simulacrum ordered. “Follow him, soldiers.”
They obeyed, half-willingly, watching the hectic sparkle as the back of the passage op
ened out, and opened out, and led them into the mountain’s heart.
Thrang raced weaving between the running troops, threading his way along the corridors to the door in the garden wall. He emerged, panting and whimpering, and came across the quiet lawn and knelt at the Saint’s feet. They are through! Madam must fly.
Her heart lurched. Grattur and Engrattur howled. They drew knives to cut themselves.
“Stop that,” said the Saint, amazed at the steadiness of her own voice. “Jish! You must lead the trevanion. That is a practical instruction, not a mandate for authority. Follow this blue gentleman.” She reached out and took Grattur firmly by the hand. “Grattur, take them to the escape route. Engrattur, you will go with us to the nursery. We’ll get the children and then you’ll show us how to follow the others.”
“Yes, Lady.”
“Yes, Lady.”
“Kdwyr, disciples, anyone strong enough to run while carrying a child, come with us.” Engrattur turned and ran and she followed him, heavy, slow, until Kdwyr took her arm and assisted her.
“Trespasser,” Gard called in the voice he had used on the stage. “Who dares set foot in my dark domain?”
Duke Salting glared up at him. “I, Skalkin Salting! Duke of Silverhaven, Deliantiba, and Port Blackrock! Liberator of Konen Feyy! Owner and operator of Salting Freight Lines! I come for just and bloody revenge and payment in full for all damages, you thief!”
“Be warned and begone, foolish mortal,” Gard called back. “For I have sorceries too terrible to name that I shall unleash, to drive you into the dust!”
“Oh, you have, have you?” Salting heard the device being brought up behind him. He turned to glance at it, then turned back, smirking. “Well, you aren’t the only one with sorcerous weapons. Behold! Lady Pirihine Porlilon sends it with her compliments. Did you see how we cut through your black maze? That was nothing to what this thing can do!”
Gard stared down at the device, the gleaming darkness on its bright-painted wheels. A diffuse crackle of magic was hanging in the air all around, wafting up like smoke. Some spell was working, grinding away the hours of his life … and somewhere his wife and child were racing to safety. How much time might he buy them?
