The Legacy of Lord Regret: Strange Threads: Book 1

by Sam Bowring

  ‘You do intend to return?’

  ‘We stand a better chance against them united, don’t you agree? That is why I came here in the first place.’

  Forger got an odd look then. ‘Yes.’

  ‘What have you been doing here, anyway?’

  ‘Tallahow’s army is making ready to begin the march to Ander. We leave tomorrow morning … well, once “tomorrow” stops being such a relative term.’

  ‘You intend to conquer afresh?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Well, let me play my part.’

  ‘It is many leagues to Althala.’

  ‘I will make it. And I shall win for us advantage.’

  Forger turned away. ‘Very well. But be as swift as you can manage. While none of us will starve, we will indeed go hungry.’

  Despirrow nodded, and departed quickly lest Forger change his mind.

  THE LONG WAIT

  Even though Yalenna knew that Despirrow could be anywhere in the world, it also felt as if he could be just around any corner. She glanced at Jandryn, decided there was no need to worry for him, and quickened her pace towards Braston’s quarters.

  Maybe Despirrow had come back to finish the job.

  She arrived to find the guards Jandryn had mentioned, one of them reaching to open the door. Waiting patiently to be let through was a healer, carrying what looked like lily water. As for the door itself, it was closed, and there was no way she could presently budge it.

  She bent down to peer through the keyhole. In the room beyond a closed window let in a trickle of unwaning, unwaxing moonlight. Braston himself was a battered lump in the bed, and there was no one else in there, and no sign of any danger.

  She straightened.

  Well.

  Despirrow was probably just up to his old tricks, taking out his ire on a poor girl somewhere, and time would return once he was done.

  She decided to seek Rostigan. She had wanted to speak to him anyway and, with her own bed suddenly as hard as rocks, it may as well be now. Making her way through the castle, she sometimes had to change her path to avoid immovable obstacles. Eventually she emerged into the square, and crossed it to the barracks. It was after dinner, however, and the dining hall doors were closed.

  Sighing at the inconvenience of it all, Yalenna picked her way around the building. It had been a warm night, so many of the bedrooms had their windows open. She checked one after the other, observing soldiers in varying states of consciousness or undress, and more than once felt like a peeking intruder. She hoped Rostigan’s window would be open – if not, he would be trapped just like Braston. It was a disturbing thought, that she might be the only Warden able to move about – but even if it were the case, it wouldn’t be for long.

  At the fiftieth or sixtieth window, she finally discovered Rostigan’s room. It was wide open, thank the Spell, and he lay abed with Tarzi next to him. He was sleeping soundly, ignorant of the fact that time had frozen. Perhaps there was no need to disturb him, she decided.

  With nothing better to do, she sat down under the window to wait out the duration of Despirrow’s spell. Despite the hardness of the ground, she found her own eyes closing, and sleep coming upon her.

  Salarkis had been riding a horse when the freeze snapped in around him.

  He wasn’t quite sure why he rode one. There was no need, not for a man who could travel anywhere he wished in the blink of an eye. Perhaps it was because of that, because he wanted a taste of the man he had been – a man who had loved galloping through fields with the air whistling in his ears. Perhaps he hoped that repeating the experience might put him further in touch with his old self.

  Unfortunately, it had not proven even remotely satisfying. The horse was skittish, as if it sensed the strangeness of its rider. Either that, or he was just too heavy. In annoyance he’d kicked the beast onwards, increasingly desirous of speed, and the frightened horse had done its best. For a moment he’d felt bad – who was he, to torture this creature for the sake of melancholic recollection?

  Then came the freeze. The horse entered the still world with him, for he had been touching it, and stumbled immediately. Blades of grass, he would later think, with little amusement.

  The beast screamed as grass sank into its hooves. Its front legs buckled and it crashed headlong into the sea of waiting stalks. They caught it fast like meat slapped on cactus, and made it a corpse in an instant. Salarkis flew from its back, wondering what had happened as he turned in the air. His first reaction was to blame himself for pushing too hard, and breaking the creature’s back.

  When he landed, he knew differently. Daggers from below crunched into his scales and, where they found joins, slid through into flesh beneath. Painful as it was, his hard exterior mostly saved him from ruin. There were a few places where agony welled, but nowhere life-threatening.

  He lay as still as he could so as not to make it worse, staring up at the star-prickled sky.

  ‘By desert and storm and sea, when I find you, Despirrow …’

  What to do next? His instinct was to threadwalk, but of course he could not. Maybe if he was careful he could get up and walk on the grass, but he had no idea how far he was from any road, or bare ground, or rock that he might stand upon. Perhaps it was best simply to bide his time, as Despirrow went about whatever mischief had caught his fancy.

  Trying to ignore his hurts, he settled in to wait.

  Mergan had been in a tavern when the freeze had come, at a table to which he had welcomed all and sundry, as he continuously ordered more food from the kitchens. Now his fellow eaters sat glassy-eyed, the spread before them like a sculpted feast. Even the steam rising from the blackened pig was hovering endlessly in the air.

  He waited for what felt like hours, though without day’s passing such measurements had no meaning. He had long ago finished the hunk of meat he’d had in his hand when time had stopped, and grew increasingly impatient for his next serve.

  In the meantime, he had the opportunity to scrutinise his guests. Plainsfolk, for the most part, for he was in the Plains Kingdom. One lass in particular had caught his eye, and he had been charming her in between mouthfuls, maybe. She had laughed a couple of times at his wit, the warmest sound he’d ever heard. She had also looked at him rather oddly once or twice, and he had tried to force the madness back under his brow, so it did not shine so bright in his eyes. He wondered if, after a good feed and a few wines, she might develop a moment or two’s affection for a generous old man. He was not so bad-looking, was he, for his age? Certainly not for my age! he thought, and chuckled. The couple of days spent roaming and eating since escaping internment had certainly done him wonders. Though his hair, he supposed, remained rather wild – perhaps he should have it tended to.

  But I can’t do anything until you release me, damned Despirrow.

  He rose with nowhere to go. The tavern door was closed, the windows open but barred, and even the chimney was clogged up with smoke. There was no way to leave what had briefly been paradise.

  By the Spell, do not leave me trapped here for too long! I could not abide another prison.

  Already his mind was beginning to tick treacherously, bringing him information he did not want.

  Eleven people in the room … sixty mugs behind the bar … how many beams of wood in the floor?

  Was he still there? Did he still lie on the tomb floor, having dreamed himself a brief escape, only to put himself in another cell?

  He rubbed aggressively at his eyes.

  ‘Wind and fire,’ he shouted, ‘I don’t care how many damn mugs!’

  Yalenna awoke with a stiff neck, to the sound of someone at the window. She looked up and saw Rostigan’s face framed by the fall of his dark hair.

  ‘Yalenna?’

  She rubbed her neck. ‘Mmf.’

  ‘How long have you been there?’

  She glanced around. It was still night. She felt rested, and would not have been surprised to discover she’d been asleep for hours.
r />   A quick poke at a pebble on the ground showed that time was still stopped.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  He clambered out and dropped down beside her.

  ‘What is he up to now?’

  ‘I don’t want to guess. Some poor woman still suffers for his attention, somewhere? Or this is his strange way of punishing us – flaunting the fact that he’s still out there, making us float in a suspended world for as long as he deems.’

  Rostigan frowned. ‘How’s Braston?’

  ‘Locked in his room. He was blacked out when I last saw him, and probably still.’

  ‘You don’t think Despirrow might be here – sneaking about, trying to discover a way to have his revenge?’

  ‘It crossed my mind. Maybe we should have a look around?’

  ‘May as well.’

  They rose and set off to search. During a long sweep of the castle and its grounds, they saw nothing move, heard no sound. Eventually they emerged onto the castle roof, to look up at the sky. The fixed stars did not even give the impression of twinkling. They were just dots.

  ‘This is ridiculous,’ Yalenna said. ‘There has never been a freeze this long. What’s he playing at?’

  ‘It can’t be good.’

  The ghosts of hours must have become days at some point, but it was hard to be exact in the eternal night. The best method Despirrow had to keep track of his progress was noting the settlements he passed. He moved through one now, a grey place with lanterns that made it seem more jolly that it actually was, built in the same uniform manner of so many places close to Tallahow.

  Close to Tallahow – that was depressing.

  Despirrow tried to recall the names of these places, to see a map in his mind’s eye – come on man, you have looked on Aorn so many times, so many maps on castle walls, and taverns, and tapestries – and though he felt the knowledge was there, it flitted out of grasp. If only he’d brought an actual map … but even a small thaw in the long freeze, all the time necessary to pick up a map from a table, would be long enough for the distant door to open, and let Braston out of his cell.

  A map and a horse, that would be ideal … but no, a horse would need to eat, drink and rest, unlike him. Of course he felt hungry, but he knew he would not starve. He was thirsty too, but he’d had practice at that, for he was always thirsty. Sleep was but an unnecessary comfort. As he kept on, his body went through cycles of wearying and recovering, and the recovering part was actually quite pleasant. If ever he became truly tired, he could always lie down in the middle of the road for a bit. He had to stay on the road, for the grasslands were deadly, and the woods a maze.

  If only he had realised he would be making this journey before fleeing all the way to Tallahow. Saphura was so much closer to Althala.

  He kept a lookout for places where maps might hang in plain sight. He spotted a tavern with an open door, and ducked inside. A quick glance about showed that he was out of luck, though his eyes lingered over a buxom barmaid. There were others too – nice girls in this place.

  Stay on, he told himself, turning away. Keep on.

  Whenever he found his focus waning, or desirous thoughts queuing up to be had, he pictured Braston’s hateful face, and it pushed all else away. So unforgiving the man had become after the change. So quick to dismiss the years of service Despirrow had given the court of Althala, just because he’d developed a few little quirks. All those evenings spent together as young men, sipping wine and discussing the kingdom, had meant nothing in the end. After helping rid the world of Regret, Despirrow should have been allowed to do anything he wanted, and yet his old friend had made it a personal mission to kill him off.

  Thus Despirrow moved past barmaids, and farmhouses likely full of innocent young daughters, and roadside campfires, and whores standing outside whorehouses with a moonlit shine on their naked chests … and he stayed on, kept on.

  Braston had not used a fast-acting poison on Despirrow, oh no. He had wanted, Despirrow was certain, for Despirrow to know what had been done to him. With cloudy vision and swimming mind, he had fallen out of the whorehouse bed, not able to summon the concentration necessary to threadwalk to Althala, where Braston had probably been laughing at him.

  No, not laughing. Staring sternly with that righteous expression, satisfied that justice had been done.

  Satisfied. That was worse than laughing.

  In those last moments, before Despirrow could do nothing at all, he had killed every whore he could lay his eyes on – punishment for drugging him, for doing Braston’s will.

  Was that justice, you endless fool? So happy you were to spend the lives of others, if it but cost me mine.

  No, he didn’t need to sleep, not yet. Imagining Braston meeting the same end as he had gave him renewed energy. That would be true justice. He didn’t care as much about stealing the magic, as he did about seeing Braston’s face, once he realised what had happened to him.

  So he kept on, stayed on.

  ‘It must be weeks now,’ said Yalenna.

  ‘Aye,’ said Rostigan. ‘Longer, maybe.’

  They arrived at Braston’s quarters, and she crouched to look through the keyhole.

  ‘Are you all right, Braston?’

  There was a moment’s silence, followed by a groan. The lump in the bed sat up.

  ‘Piss and fire,’ she heard him mumble. ‘What is taking so long?’

  ‘We don’t know.’

  ‘Has he died? Has he stopped time, then somehow got himself killed, and consigned us all to limbo forever?’

  She glanced worriedly at Rostigan – it was something they had discussed, but neither really knew what would happen if Despirrow died while the world was frozen.

  ‘We don’t think so,’ she said. ‘Surely his death would start things again. Besides, how would he die?’

  ‘Who cares?’ said Braston, and collapsed back into bed.

  ‘Are you healing?’

  ‘Taking a while. Fighting infections too, now. Would be better if I could eat, or drink!’

  Yalenna glanced at the frozen healer, still poised to enter the room. At least Braston would get a drink as soon as time came back, but she didn’t think it was worth telling him that now. It might torment him, knowing it was on the threshold, so close and yet unreachable.

  ‘We will check on you later,’ she called.

  They walked away, though without anywhere in particular to be, it was a rather aimless meander. They had wandered the castle many times already – where they could get to, anyway – and the city itself as well. They had even climbed the platforms of water that issued up from fountains in the throne room.

  At least Rostigan and Braston had soft beds, as both of them had been in them at the time of the freeze. Yalenna had suggested that she might borrow Rostigan’s, but he was too worried about what would happen if time started and Tarzi woke up to find her there in his place. His counter-offer had been to stay in the room and watch over them both as they slept, so he could wake her if the world unfroze, but she had been uncomfortable with the notion somehow. Not that there was much need to sleep, beyond a way to break the boredom. They were hardly burning energy, and were both, in fact, growing extremely restless.

  ‘Perhaps we should have a race,’ she had suggested at one stage, ‘around the square? Or from castle top to bottom?’

  He had given her a rueful look. Not much one for frivolous fun, it seemed, even in the face of such monotony.

  They’d had many conversations, about many things. About what was happening to the Spell, about the damage Despirrow was surely doing with this prolonged use of power, about what should be done with Loppolo.

  ‘It is only a potential danger,’ Yalenna had said, gazing out across a tableau of courtiers from her perch on the top of a water font. ‘We don’t know for sure that Loppolo will act.’

  ‘No reason for us not to,’ Rostigan replied from further down, kicking at colourful fish below the water’s surface.

  ‘I don’t
know that we should tell Braston about it. He will demand retribution.’

  ‘Retribution for retribution?’

  ‘He is blind to justice when it concerns himself. He refuses to think that he’s part of the problem. Who knows – perhaps Loppolo is even being driven by some need of the Spell’s, to restore things to rights?’

  ‘Braston did raise an army, which we will need should Forger march, or the Unwoven. Surely the Spell does not object to that.’

  ‘He could have raised it anyway. He did not need to be king.’

  ‘Well then, what do you suggest?’

  ‘I will talk to Loppolo. Try to … I don’t know. Smooth things over.’

  ‘It’s a big bump to smooth,’ Rostigan had said glumly.

  Now they reached the castle roof, and instantly Yalenna could tell something had changed. Her eyes went to the sky, and what she saw made her miss a breath.

  Rostigan followed her gaze.

  ‘Huh,’ he said.

  From star to star in a great line, light crept, like a fissure opening between pressure points. Meanwhile the moon, which had been brightly fixed in place, now seemed duller, almost as if it were fading from existence.

  ‘The world is straining in place,’ she said softly, with a heart full of dread. ‘It knows the night should have passed.’

  Rostigan sighed. ‘For so long I held my power close.’

  The look he shot her made clear it was not only Despirrow’s presence he begrudged.

  ‘You aren’t the gatekeeper,’ she said in annoyance. ‘This is not Rostigan’s Aorn, you know.’

  ‘No,’ he said, turning away. ‘It isn’t.’

  Seventeen.

  It was flames in the fireplace now, the number of distinct tips reaching up the chimney.

  Mergan slumped back on someone’s lap. It was so unfair – he’d only had a few days, a tantalising taste on the end of his tongue, of life after his long winter. This was worse than the tomb, sometimes, maybe … to have these listless companions with him, to see food on the table he could not touch.