by Tim Stead
Pain. Pain like a knife. He jerked forwards in the boat, gasping. Not again. Surely not again. But it was so. The pain and the sense of loss almost overwhelmed him. One of his own had died. One of the very few whose lives he had linked to his own had been killed.
The oarsmen had stopped rowing. Hiralo was leaning forwards, watching him.
“Deus, are you well?”
Narak felt the cold descend, the cold white fire of anger.
“Take me to the isle of supplicants,” he said. Even to his own ears his voice sounded flat, stripped back and free of all expression, like a knife.
Hiralo opened his mouth to protest, perhaps, that they were on their way to see the Sei, but he saw the look on Narak’s face. Their eyes met for a moment.
“Do it,” he said to the oarsmen. “Pull hard. Make all speed.”
The stroke rate of the oars doubled, and the boat flew through the water, kicking up a light spray as it cut through the swell. The boat swung towards land. Narak eased his shoulders, feeling the tension in his muscles fade. First Perlaine, and now… It was Narala. He knew without the certainty of the Sirash. The rage that he had locked away at the first death was free again, free and hungry for blood. It was strengthened by this new outrage.
The boat touched the sand, but Narak was already out, one step in the water and then he was running, moving more quickly than a man could run, he ran until he reached the modest hut that had been their place here. He ripped the curtain from the door.
There was blood on the matting. A lot of blood. If someone had died here, and by the amount of blood he was certain that at least one had, then the body had been taken. He checked the hut briefly, finding that the gold was still where he had left it.
Stepping outside he saw a curtain drop in the hut opposite. He drew his blades and with three strokes removed the thin matting wall, revealing a finely dressed man cowering against the bed in the corner. He indicated the bloodstained hut.
“Who did this?” he demanded.
The man shook his head. He was afraid of Narak, but more afraid still to say what he had seen. That was a mistake.
Narak flicked one of his swords, and the man lost an ear. He screamed and clutched at his head, blood running freely through his fingers.
“Who?” Narak said.
“Soldiers,” the man sobbed. “Soldiers from the Sei.”
That was enough. Suspicion became certainty. He walked back down to where he had left the boat and met Hiralo half way.
“Deus, what has happened?” the young commander asked.
“We go to the Isle of War,” Narak said. He walked past Hiralo, and the young man had to run to catch up.
“You should tell me what has happened, Deus,” he said when he drew level.
“If you want to live out the day you will do as I say and stop asking questions,” Narak said. He was in no mood for diplomacy. Hiralo’s eyes widened, and if his dark skin had permitted it he would have paled at the threat. Hiralo had heard all the stories. He knew what Narak could do, what he had done at Afael.
“I will obey you, Deus,” he said.
They returned to the boat without delay, but Narak was no longer in a hurry. He sat silently in the stern and stared at his hands. He did not think. The time for thinking was past. Now there was just that which must be done. His anger must be quenched, its demands satisfied.
The small voyage passed in silence. Hiralo had taken his warning to heart and did not speak. The oarsmen rowed silently with a purposeful rhythm, but now the heat of the sun did not lull Narak. It only fed the fire within. It was as if all reason was burned through, its complications smoothed away like wax before a fire. There was only blood in his heart.
At the island he stepped from the boat onto a pretty, sandy beach. There was nobody there to greet them.
“Show me the way,” he said to Hiralo. The commander nodded and walked through the trees, coming eventually to a high stockade made of stout palm trunks. There were men at the gate, four soldiers with swords. “The Sei is expecting me,” he said to them, and it was true, because the men stepped aside.
As they walked across the enclosed acre within the stockade Narak noted that the men had closed the gate behind him, and dropped a beam into brackets so that it was held shut. A trap, then. The Sei did not intend that he should leave. He glanced around him. There were cook fires, men and women going about their daily routines, and soldiers. There were about thirty soldiers.
At the centre of the stockade stood a building. It was made of the same posts and rush matting as everything else in the isles, but was somewhat larger, perhaps twenty feet to a side, and nine feet high. He stepped through the open door and saw that the Sei was within, waiting. He was seated on a low stool before a table, and he was clearly in the middle of a meal, though Narak noted a sword laid carefully to one side where the Sei might reach it in a moment. There was a low stool set opposite the Sei, and Narak stepped up and sat on it. He said nothing.
The Sei smiled, but it was not a kind smile. “Now you come to me,” he said. Narak did not reply. Hiralo had come in with Narak and now stood behind him to his left.
“Great Sei,” the commander said. “There are things that I must tell you…”
The Sei flashed an irritated glance at the young man, but it was Narak who spoke. “It is too late for that,” he said. “The Sei has summoned me here, but he does not know what it is he has called to his house.”
“I know,” the Sei said. “I have summoned a coward.”
Narak was sure that he heard the young man swallow, could almost hear the quickening of his pulse, the shortening of his breath. The Sei bent down from his seat and lifted something from the floor, put it on the table next to his plate.
It was a head. It was Narala’s head. The neck was roughly severed, the dark skin spattered with darker blood. Her eyes were open. The Sei picked up a piece of food from his plate and put it in his mouth.
Narak sat quite still for a few moments, then reached out and closed her eyes, pulling the lids down one at a time, first the right, then the left.
“You would not want to see this, old friend,” he said. He turned to Hiralo. “Go,” he said. The young man stood for a moment, perhaps waiting for the Sei to dismiss him, too. Narak leaned closer to him, looked up at his eyes. “Run.”
Hiralo turned and was gone.
“Now you will fight me,” the Sei said.
Narak looked around the inside of the building. There were two guards by the door, but apart from that they were alone.
“No,” he said.
“No?” The Sei’s tone was disbelieving, scornful.
“You will die by my hand,” Narak said. “But I will not fight you.”
The Sei reached for his convenient sword, but Narak moved quickly, as quickly as only a god can move. He leaned forwards and struck the Sei on the side of his head with a fist. It was not enough of a blow to kill the man, but enough to break his jaw, to drop him senseless to the floor.
The guards rushed forwards to their lord’s aid, but Narak drew his blades and killed them both. He put the blades away and lifted Narala’s head gently from the table, setting it carefully on the carpet. He lifted the table, scattering the food and drink across the floor, raised it over his head and brought it down on the Sei’s legs. He heard bones break. The man was jerked back to consciousness by the pain. He cried out.
“You thought to kill me,” Narak said. “You did not know that she was the one protecting you.” He took a fistful of the Sei’s hair and dragged him across the floor, pulling him outside into the sunlight. Perhaps the soldiers did not believe their eyes, perhaps they were too shocked by what they saw, but he had dragged their lord half way to the gate before they acted. Narak stepped clear of the Sei and drew his blades. He did not hesitate, but began to kill them at once, moving like a storm of smoke among them, never where they swung their blades, and always cutting, cutting, until twenty-five men lay dead and the others stood back, k
nowing that they were overmatched; afraid.
Narak picked up two spears from among the dead. He weighed one in his hand, and then threw it, the point driving through the beam that held the gate and deep into the gate behind, locking it in place. He threw the second one, pinning the beam in a different place. Now they were all trapped together.
He dragged the Sei the rest of the way to the palisade wall and propped him up against it. He knelt on one knee beside the whimpering king.
“I want you to see,” he said. “You are not merely a murderer. You have killed one of the Wolf’s chosen, one who walked with the Wolf, and the account must be settled. You owe me eight hundred years, Sei.”
He stood again, a blade in each hand. There were perhaps fifty people still alive within the palisade. He closed his eyes and brought Narala’s image before him, as he remembered her best, how she looked on the day they had given her sister back to her. She had been happy, joyous, overcome with unadulterated emotion. It is the promise of the wolf; your death will not pass unmarked. There will be blood.
It took less than twenty minutes. Narak chased down and killed every living thing within the palisade. Men, women and children; even the dogs died. He threw the bodies into the matting house, then broke the posts and collapsed it, setting fire to the huge pyre that he had made. He walked back to where the crippled Sei sat by the gate. The King of Fire and Blood was weeping openly.
“Now you share my pain, Sei,” Narak said.
“Why?” the Sei asked. “Why the children, the women?”
“A lesson I learned long ago,” Narak said. “Some men are happy to die, but few will sacrifice their kin, their town, their city. Now even the most powerful in the Green Isles will know what happens when you kill one who walks with the wolf. Besides,” he added. “I loved her dearly.”
He reached down and broke the Sei’s neck with a twist of his hand, dragged the body away from the wall and cut off the man’s head. He wrapped the bloody lump in a torn piece of cloth that he picked off the floor and tied it to his belt, then reached out and ripped the beam free, shattering the spears that had held it shut. He walked back down the path he had walked up just half an hour ago.
At the dock he found Hiralo waiting with his boat and oarsmen. He got into the boat without speaking and took his place at the rear. He saw that Hiralo was looking at the column of smoke rising above the trees. The screams of the dying would probably have carried this far, and the sweet smell of burning flesh was apparent in the air.
“Where do you wish to go, Sei Feras Tiar?” Hiralo asked.
“The Isle of Kings,” Narak replied. “The Hall of Decision.”
19. Pascha in Wolfguard
Pascha leaped backwards, twisting as she jumped, using all her speed and strength, but her sword passed through air, and yet again she felt the smack of Caster’s blade as it struck her hip. She cursed.
“Balance,” Caster said. “Balance, balance, balance. You rely too much on speed and strength, just like Narak used to.”
They were in the practice room. It was a hall, ten feet high, and twenty paces each way. Swords were fixed to the walls, benches stood against them, the floor was polished wood and the walls and ceiling white painted plaster. It was a plain room in every way, and quite traditional but that it had no windows and was entirely lit by lamps that were bracketed every two paces along the walls. This was the place that Narak had built for Caster, the place Pascha had watched him perfect his killing art.
“That’s balance, Deus, to you,” she said. Caster grinned. He knew that she was not serious, that she was merely piqued to have been beaten yet again by a mere mortal. But Caster was more than that. His skill was exquisite. Compared to her he fought in slow motion, but he always managed to step out of her way, block her thrusts and cuts. It was as though he could read her mind.
“Are you sure you’re not using magic?” she asked.
His grin became a laugh. “I told you, it’s all in the eyes, the balance. You try to fight with your body, not your blade. You tell me where you’re going to attack long before your blade moves. You need to be still. The sword is sharp and you treat it like a club. You don’t need to bludgeon your opponent to death with it. Just a touch will do, a cut, a thrust. The blade will do all the work if you let it. Your body, and especially your feet, are there to move you into position so that the blade can attack, and of course to run away if you are over matched.”
She put the sword down. “Enough,” she said. “I will never be any good at this.”
“That’s what Narak said.”
“No.”
“I swear on my lord’s favour, Deus. He said those same words to me. It took him weeks to get past strength and speed.”
Now it was Pascha’s turn to laugh. “You only say these things to make me feel better, Caster,” she said. She liked Caster. He had an easy charm, manners better than any lord, and he always tried. He tried to be what people wanted him to be – a good teacher, a charming companion, a spark of light in a dark time. “I’ve missed you,” she said.
“Certainly not as much as I have missed you,” Caster replied.
“And that is quite enough flattery,” she said. “Will you teach me again? Tomorrow?”
“I am at your service, Deus,” he replied, racking his practice blade and hers together. “The same time?”
“The same time. Yes.”
She left him and walked back along one of the spiralling passageways that led down into the heart of Wolfguard. She was not tired. They had been sparring for the best part of two hours, and she had been impressed that Caster had lasted so long, but she had seen that his limbs were slowing, his breath growing more uneven. She did not want to wear him out, game as he was.
To tell the truth she had asked him for lessons because she was bored. Fear of the assassin had closeted them all together. Anyone who wandered outside the haven of Wolfguard was a target for the creature that had killed the others of the Benetheon, and risked a blood silver arrow in the back. She had learned that truth well enough.
Narak, of course, would not be so confined. Part of Pascha wanted the assassin to try his luck against the Wolf. She was sure that Narak would prevail, but not quite certain enough to want it with all her heart. Narak was the best of them. He was quicker, stronger, more skilled. Jidian was the better archer, but not by more than an arrow in ten, and Beloff had been stronger, but again the margin was not a large one, and the Bear was dead, one of many who had died at the battle of Finchbeak Road.
She entered her room. It was the same room that she had lived in centuries ago, and she thought that it was more or less as she had left it. She thought that she recognised the tapestry that hung opposite the door, but that was absurd. It would have rotted and faded in five hundred years. She supposed that Narak had replaced it with a similar work, and perhaps more than once. It struck her as an odd thing to do.
She picked up her true blade, her sharp sword. It was the one that she had taken from the assassin who had tried to kill her in Benafelas. She had thought more than once that she should get rid of the thing, edged and tipped with blood silver as it was, and replace it with a clean blade from Wolfguard’s armoury, but she liked its balance, and had come to think of it as a lucky blade. After all, it had been with her in the forest when the metal headed god killer had shot at her, and was she not still alive?
She took a position, sword held out before her, arm comfortably bent, both knees bent, too. She concentrated on balance. Even with a blade like this, heavier than a fencing sword, she was able to control it with her wrist. She swept it left and right, up and down, keeping her arm still. She imagined a blade before her, beat it to one side and lunged, stepped back, parried, thrust to the left, a feint, then more firmly to the right. It all looked very good when she was on her own, but with Caster in front of her the moves fell apart and she resorted to slashing the air in an attempt to knock his elusive blade away.
She threw the sword down on the bed. Th
ere was wine on the table, and she poured herself a glass. Like all the Benetheon she was not prey to the intoxicating wiles of the drink, but she did like the taste, and it went well with the cheeses and fruits that she favoured. There was a tray of food as well. Some thoughtful servant had placed it there while she was fencing with Caster. Probably Poor had done it. She liked the steward as much as she liked Caster. In fact she found it impossible to fault any of Narak’s choices in the make up of his household. The Wolf had a true eye for character.
She ate the food and drank wine. There was a small stack of books and papers by her bed, things that Narak had sent to her, accounts of the first Seth Yarra war. She had glanced at them the previous night, and they were dull stuff, but she knew that Narak had read them all several times, and duty was duty, dull or no.
