Godless World 2 - Bloodheir

by Brian Ruckley

  Hammarn scrambled to his feet as the guard moved away. He blew a little plume of wood dust from his carving and grinned first at Orisian, then at Anyara.

  "How long have you been sitting out here?" she asked him.

  Hammarn frowned. "A time, yes. Cold out, you know. All sorts of cold out there for the likes of me. Best place to be, I think." He jerked his head at the closed door. "Not very welcoming, though, these days. Bit cold in here, too."

  Orisian rapped on the door.

  "I am resting," Yvane shouted from within.

  "Not true," whispered Hammarn. "She's not been sleeping, not restful at all. I know. She told me."

  "Let us come and talk with you," Orisian said through the thick door. "You'd be doing us a favour. We need a hiding place to avoid a tiresome feast."

  "Who's we?" Yvane asked, each word thick with suspicion.

  "Me and Anyara. And Hammarn. Surely you don't mean to leave him sitting outside this door all night?"

  There was an extended silence. Orisian shrugged at Anyara, noting the frown of irritation that had already settled on his sister's brow. He hoped that she and Yvane could resist the urge to set about one another, but even if they didn't it could hardly be more unpleasant than Aewult nan Haig's company.

  "No one else, then," Yvane called by way of grudging permission.

  Hammarn clapped Orisian roughly on the shoulder.

  "Very persuasive," he grinned. "Always thought you stood most high in the lady's affections. Mind you . . . not sure she has affections, in truth."

  Yvane was sitting in a broad bed, propped up against some voluminous pillows. She looked tired. Her eyes, almost as perfectly grey as a Kyrinin's, were sluggish. Her reddish brown hair had lost some of its former sheen.

  Hammarn went straight to the side of her bed and held out the piece of wood he had been carving. Yvane had to reach clumsily across her body to take it: her nearer arm was still weak, having been skewered by a crossbow bolt during their escape from Koldihrve

  "Made you a woodtwine, dear lady," said Hammarn. "Of Kulkain's first entry into Kolkyre as Thane, you'll see. He has Alban of Ist Norr in chains there, if you look close. Bit crude, perhaps. Not my finest."

  "It's a welcome gift in any case, Hammarn," Yvane said. Orisian often thought she exhibited far more patience and gentleness in her dealings with Hammarn than with anyone else. It was almost as if she expended all her limited stores of those sentiments on the old na'kyrim, leaving none for anyone else.

  "How are you feeling?" Orisian asked.

  "How should I be feeling? I'm stuck at the top of a tower in Kolkyre - where they burned na'kyrim, by the way, before Grey Kulkain came to power. My right arm's all but useless because some madman, or madwoman for all I know, took it into their head to shoot me with a crossbow. And my head feels like it's full of woodpeckers, chipping away at the inside of my skull trying to get out."

  "No better, then?" Anyara asked. Yvane scowled at her.

  Orisian noted a tray of food lying apparently forgotten on a table by the shuttered window. He held a hand over the bowl of soup. It had gone cold.

  "Don't tell me you're refusing food as well?" he said.

  "I've no appetite," Yvane muttered.

  "Nothing's changed?" Orisian asked, seating himself on the end of the bed. "In the Shared, I mean?"

  "No." Yvane started to fold her arms, but winced and thought better of it. "No change."

  "That's true, that's true," said Hammarn. "The taint can't enter this quiet head, can't stir the thoughts in this bucket." He rapped his knuckles against his forehead. "But even Hammarn can smell its stink."

  "There you are, you see," said Yvane as if Hammarn's words explained everything. It took a long questioning look from Orisian to induce her to say anything more. "It's like a never-ending echo. That first night we spent in this town, the . . . the howl that filled the Shared, that woke me; it's the echo of that. Anger, pain, bitterness, all mixed up, all inside my head. And none of it mine."

  "Not good, not good," murmured Hammarn. He was pacing up and down now, his hands clasped behind his back.

  "Couldn't have put it better myself," Yvane said.

  "Not yours," Anyara said. "His, then? Aeglyss?"

  "I've told you: I can't be certain."

  "But you think it's him, don't you?" Anyara persisted. "Anger, pain, bitterness. That's how Inurian talked about what he saw inside Aeglyss."

  Yvane sighed and looked down at Hammarn's woodtwine where it lay in her lap.

  "I don't know," she said wearily. "I only glimpsed the edges of whatever it was that Inurian saw. But yes, it might be him. If it is . . . well, if he's still in league with the Black Road I think they might be in for a nasty surprise. It's frightening to think what it must be like inside his head now, if his is the sickness that's afflicting the Shared."

  Hammarn had paused by the window, and pulled back one of the shutters.

  "Look," he murmured. "Little fires."

  Orisian joined him and looked down onto the dark gardens beneath them. A few torches were burning there, their bearers arrayed in a circle. In their orange light, two men, naked to the waist, were wrestling on the grass. Orisian could hear shouts of encouragement from the onlookers, made soft and faint by distance and the breeze.

  It was probably Aewult's men, absenting themselves from the feast, hot with drink and the prospect of battle. They had an angry, arrogant hunger for revelry, the thousands of warriors the Bloodheir had brought north with him. They were barred from leaving their great camps outside the city except in small groups, but Orisian had already heard, from Rothe, rumours of thievery and drunkenness within Kolkyre. They took their mood from Aewult, perhaps, and there seemed to be nothing gentle in him.

  "Lovely friends we have," Anyara said, looking over Orisian's shoulder.

  "We can only hope our enemies justify our allies," Orisian murmured. He turned thoughtfully back towards Yvane.

  "You can find out whether it's Aeglyss, can't you?" he asked her.

  The na'kyrim winced. He could see that she knew what he meant, and that her reluctance was instinctive. Her hand rose defensively, unconsciously towards her injured shoulder.

  "You've said that whatever's happening in the Shared is . . . dangerous," he persisted. "You've said it might be Aeglyss. Don't we need to know? He hounded Inurian to his death. He helped the Inkallim take Kolglas. He's our enemy. One of them, at least."

  "You wouldn't ask that if you understood," Yvane said. "No reason why you should, of course. Last time I reached out through the Shared to Aeglyss, he drove me off. It . . . hurt."

  "I know. But . . ." Orisian reached for words, finding nothing to quite express what he felt. "Something's changed. You've said it yourself. We - no - you might be the only person here who can say what it is."

  "It's like an ocean, the Shared," Yvane said. She was unusually passive. Distant. "What's in it now is . . . poison. You're asking me to swim out into a poisoned sea; breathe its waters."

  "Only to arm ourselves against our enemies. To know what we face. Aewult and his thousands of warriors: they think they're the answer to every question. They think nothing else matters. Maybe they're wrong."

  "If I do it," muttered Yvane, recovering a touch of her customary bristle, "it'll be for me. It'll be because Inurian was a wise man who probably didn't deserve to die, and because he saw threat in Aeglyss. Not for Thanes or Bloodheirs or armies; not to help you Huanin kill each other in ever greater numbers."

  "You will do it, then?" Anyara said, with a soft smile.

  The three of them watched in silence while Yvane willed herself into slumber: Hammarn sitting nervously on the end of the bed, Orisian and Anyara leaning against the frame of the window. There was nothing obviously amiss with the sleep into which Yvane fell. Her face slackened, her eyelids trembled minutely. She looked gentle in her repose, as she never quite did when awake.

  Orisian watched intently, aware that for all the apparent mundanity of
the scene he was witnessing something remarkable. Yvane was right, of course, when she said he did not understand this. No human could. The Shared was the sole preserve of na'kyrim. He did not envy them that. Few of the mighty na'kyrim of legend, who wielded great powers drawn from the Shared, had profited by it in the end. While they lived, though, they had done enough harm to make those of his own time outcasts, feared and loathed as much for the mystery they embodied as for the mixed blood that ran in their veins. If the Shared was a gift, it came at a heavy price.

  Yvane made soft sounds. Hammarn was growing nervous, fidgeting. The muffled noise of laughter and cheering rose up from outside. Neither Orisian nor Anyara looked round. Yvane held their attention.

  Her head rolled slowly to one side. One of her hands opened, splaying itself out on the bed sheet. Hammarn stood up and edged closer to the window, though never taking his eyes off Yvane.

  "Not sure," he whispered. "Not sure."

  "Not sure of what?" Anyara asked.

  The old na'kyrim shook his head sharply. "Feels . . . Not sure."

  There was a tremor in Yvane's shoulders. Her breaths were coming faster and faster, turning into a faint panting.

  "Is something wrong?" Orisian asked, pushing himself away from the wall. "Hammarn, is something wrong?" If Yvane came to harm in this endeavour, he knew that much of the blame would be his to bear.

  Hammarn did not seem to have heard him.

  "No," breathed Yvane. Her eyes were still closed, but her head was lifting now, coming away from the pillow. "That is not my name. I am not her."

  "We should wake her," said Anyara, stepping towards the bed.

  "No," snapped Yvane, much louder this time. Orisian could see the muscles in her pale neck, strung taut as a bowstring. Her hands were bunching into fists. A shiver ran down Orisian's spine.

  Hammarn was sinking down to the floor, shaking. A faint moan escaped his lips.

  Yvane pressed her head and shoulders back against the wall. Her eyes snapped open. Orisian saw alarm in them. He moved to go to her side, but before he had taken more than a couple of strides Hammarn was yelping and scrambling towards the corner of the room.

  "He's here!" Hammarn cried. He twisted his head violently round and down, as if averting his eyes from some horrifying sight.

  "Go," Yvane rasped. "Go." She was staring fixedly towards the door. Orisian and Anyara, standing side by side, looked that way. There was nothing: the plain wood of the door, the grey stonework of the walls. Nothing.

  "I am not the one you seek," Yvane said.

  Orisian's skin was crawling. The air was suddenly thick in his throat, the light fading around the edges of his vision. He put a hand on Anyara's arm, as much to stave off the dizzying sense of disorientation that beset him as anything. Shadows seemed to be . . . moving, shifting. He believed, in that moment, that there was something in the room with them. Something he could not see, or hear, but something that nevertheless had a weight, a presence.

  "Leave me. Leave us." Yvane spat the words out. Fear and anger and insistence swelled her voice.

  Anyara swayed against Orisian. He glanced at her, and saw beads of sweat on her brow, her eyelids sagging. He put an arm around her. Something unseen, intangible, was constricting his chest.

  Then, without warning, it was gone. He breathed again, deeply. Anyara stiffened and straightened at his side. The tension ran out of Yvane's frame. Her shoulders sagged and she put her good hand to the side of her head, pressing briefly against her skull as if fighting off an ache.

  "I will be listening to your suggestions with much less sympathy in future," the na'kyrim murmured.

  "What happened?" Orisian asked.

  "I turned stupid. That's what happened."

  Hammarn unfolded himself out of the corner and hurried to Yvane's side. He regarded her with acute concern.

  "Gone, though?" he whispered. "Gone? And you safe, lady? Safe and well."

  Yvane smiled at him. Orisian noted the fragility of that smile; its weary, almost sad tone.

  "He's gone, my friend," Yvane said, and turned to Orisian. "The Shared's a seething pit, and Aeglyss is the snake in its depths. I should have turned away, but . . . I was so close. I looked upon him. It might have been . . . I can't be sure. Perhaps there were Kyrinin there. He might be amongst the White Owls."

  She closed her eyes, wrinkled her brow. The rawness of the memory was plain in her face.

  "Whatever he's become, it's far beyond me. He had hold of me at once. But didn't know me." She grunted. "Thought I was someone else. And when I pulled away, came rushing back to myself, he followed. He couldn't do that before." She stared at Orisian. "He's learning new tricks."

  "He didn't harm you, though," Orisian said quietly. "Did he?"

  Yvane shook her head just once. "He's got ten - a hundred - times my strength in the Shared, but he doesn't know how to use it. Not yet. He's wild, half-mad. Still, I'll not be trying it again. Next time, I wouldn't get back; not unless he's the slowest learner the world has ever seen."

  "At least we know it's him now," Anyara said. She spoke much more gently than was her wont, almost hesitant. "For sure, I mean. We - you - learned that much."

  "That much, and a little more. He thought I was someone else, and when that thought was in him, I felt such . . . need. Such longing. There's someone he's searching for, someone he longs for, and her name is K'rina."

  Ammen Lyre dar Kilkry-Haig had learned many things from his father, Ochan. He had learned that a clever man need not be subject to the same rules and restrictions as others; that the weak made themselves victims by virtue of their shortcomings; that a father might love daughters easily but would only love a son who fought for, and earned, that affection.

  A year ago, not long after Ammen's thirteenth birthday, he had been cornered in a Kolkyre alleyway by two youths. They had good cause. While out that night carrying messages for Ochan, Ammen had found a man sprawled in the middle of a narrow, dark street. The reek of drink was as strong as he had ever smelled. Groping through the man's clothes, Ammen was disappointed to find not a single coin, but the sot did wear a fine little knife on his belt, a blade with a horn handle and a decorated scabbard of good leather. Ammen unbuckled the belt and slid the knife off, complete with sheath. As he straightened, glancing up and down the silent street, the drunken man suddenly cried out and grabbed at Ammen's sleeve.

  Surprised rather than alarmed, Ammen tried to pull away, but the man's grip was much stronger than seemed reasonable. He rolled onto his side, shouting incoherently, pulling so hard at Ammen's arm that the boy almost fell to his knees. Ammen kicked him as hard as he could in the face. The man wailed and relinquished his hold. Ammen wasted another moment in stamping ineffectually on his hand and then walked away. This was one of the many small pieces of advice - all of it seeming the greatest, fiercest wisdom to Ammen - that his father had imparted: a running man is more obvious than a painted dancing girl in a room full of fishwives. So if you want to avoid notice, walk.

  On that night a year ago, the advice had failed. Ammen had covered less than two dozen paces before he'd heard angry shouts behind him. Two young men had come out from one of the shabby houses that lined the street, leaving its door open to spill feeble lamplight into the night. One crouched by the drunken, groaning figure on the ground; the other was staring after Ammen. The two youths exchanged a few curt words - enough to tell Ammen that the man he had robbed was their father - and then the chase was on.

  Ammen knew the streets around Kolkyre's harbour as well as anyone. It was his father's territory, and thus his. But his pursuers had longer legs, and they were driven by powerful indignation. They ran him down in no time, and he turned at bay in a tight, lightless alley that stank of fish guts. Afterwards, turning the treasured memory of those moments over and over in his mind, he was proud that even then, with the two burly youths bearing down on him and shouting their fury in his face, he had not felt fear. Their anger made them careless: in the deep da
rkness of that alleyway they did not see Ammen draw their own father's knife from its scabbard. He slashed the first one across the face and was rewarded with a piercing howl of shock and the sight of his assailant reeling away. There was no time to savour the victory, for the second closed and Ammen took a stunning blow to his head. The crunching sound and the splash of blood over his lips told him that his nose was broken, but he was so dazed by the impact that he felt only a numbness that spread across his cheeks. He fell, and his attacker threw himself down on top of him, fumbling for the hand that held the knife. Ammen never could remember exactly what happened then, but he knew that he stabbed the young man more than once. He might not have killed him, for the blade was short and his strength faltering. It was enough, though. Ammen staggered to his feet and ran, rather unsteadily, for home.

  Ochan's pleasure on hearing of the incident lit a glow of pride and joy in Ammen's heart.

  "Keep that blade close by you," his father had laughed. "It'd be wrong to sell something that's served you so well. We'll call you Ammen Sharp now, shall we? The little boy who grew a tooth."

  So Ammen became Ammen Sharp, and treasured the name. Having borne it for a year now, it felt as much his true name as any other. Only Ochan called him by it; his mother and sisters remained ignorant of its origins. Being a secret shared only by Ammen and his father, it had become that much more precious to the boy.

  He was with Ochan, watching as his father sorted through a pile of trinkets, when his cousin Malachoir - one of the numerous distant relatives who served Ochan as thieves, runners, watchers, guards - poked his head nervously around the door. Ochan was engrossed, minutely examining each bauble and bracelet for any sign that it might have some true value.

  Ammen had no idea where this little hoard had come from, and the question had not occurred to him. From his earliest years he had understood and accepted that goods and materials of every imaginable kind appeared in his father's possession and then, just as abruptly and inexplicably, disappeared once more.

  Malachoir cleared his throat.