The Icefire Trilogy

by Patty Jansen

  Then the hardest part. He called up a ball of icefire and shaped it into two symmetrical curls floating in the air. The curls descended towards Tandor’s cheeks, one on each side. He closed his eyes and braced himself. Searing pain. The smell of burned flesh. His mouth opened in a scream of pain, of punishment, of lust or satisfaction.

  Panting, he opened his eyes, staring at his sweaty face in the mirror, where symmetrical curls of golden paint marked his cheeks, like the tattoos noble men in the City of Glass received when they became adults.

  The Knights might have dealt him a blow, but he wasn’t defeated. The children were in custody, but they were most likely in the palace, exactly where he wanted them.

  He needed to know if he had enough Imperfects to freeze the guards for long enough to get into the palace.

  By the light of the fire in the hearth, he dug in his luggage and brought a heavy book on his knees. Let’s see, the guard level on the palace gates would be at a minimum because of the Newlight festival. He guessed there would be ten Knights. That meant he needed . . .

  His pen scratched over the paper as he added up the numbers as he had learned from his grandfather’s diary. Body weight by strength. Himself, Ruko, the boy in the city . . . that was not enough. He did have one other Imperfect: Ontane’s daughter Myra. He crossed out the numbers and re-calculated. Yes, that would give him enough power to take out ten guards, and once he was in the palace, he could draw on the fifty Imperfect children.

  Yes, he could do it.

  Chapter 2

  * * *

  ONTANE CROSSED his arms over his chest. He leaned back against the shed door, which he had just closed after dragging the sled out into the yard. “I told you, she’s not for sale. Here in Bordertown we don’t do the women’s things like they do in the City of Glass.”

  “How much do you want then?” Tandor asked, while casually dumping his travel chest on the luggage rack of the sled. The white bear in the harness gave an annoyed snort. Ruko leaned forward over the driver’s seat and patted the animal’s furry rump while giving Tandor an impatient glance. Yes, Ruko wanted to get going. He had been waiting outside the inn at daybreak. That in itself was worrying enough. Ruko should not have been able to break those bonds Tandor had put on him yesterday.

  “You don’ give up, do you?” Ontane growled.

  “No. A hundred silvergulls?”

  “My daughter is not for sale!”

  “I don’t want to buy her. I want her to come with me to the City of Glass. I’ll take her there, and I’ll bring her back. Two hundred silvergulls?”

  Ontane shrugged. He cast a shifty-eyed look at the shed doors, as if wondering if his wife or daughter were listening. “The Knights thought it be too risky to take her a few days ago, why should you take her now? She’ll be needing another mother to be with her when she . . .” He spread his hands.

  “My lady friend is one of the best midwives in the City of Glass. She has delivered hundreds of children and birthed nine of her own. Do you want a more experienced woman?” Or do you want me to take your wife off your hands as well? “Two hundred and fifty silvergulls?”

  Ontane tightened his arms over his chest. “It’s not up to me to agree on something like this. Dara’s gonna kill me if I do anything to the girl.”

  Tandor had only met the girl’s mother once, a dumpy, unattractive woman with a permanent scowl on her face.

  “Your wife will be glad you have the money to buy her a new carpet.”

  “There be nothing wrong with my carpet!” A blush rose to Ontane’s cheeks. He snorted and looked down. “Although it’s not exactly new . . .”

  “Precisely. Women notice these things, take it from me.”

  “Hmph. What do you know about women?”

  “Enough to know that I’m right.”

  Ontane sniffed and raked hair away from his face. “I don’ like it. Why do you want her to come anyway? I thought you were hiding her with us here.”

  “I was, but your stupidity of bringing the Knights down on Bordertown has changed everything—”

  “How many times do I need to tell you: it weren’t my fault.”

  “Whoever’s fault it was, I need to go into the City of Glass to get the children back. Including, I presume, your grandson’s father. Don’t tell me none of the other families in Bordertown question why you got to keep your daughter.”

  Ontane’s face went red. “I told you: the Knights din’ want to take her like this.”

  “I’ve not known the Knights to show such compassion. Maybe there was a bribe involved?”

  “Hmph.” Ontane scuffed his feet in the snow. “I want three hundred silvergulls.”

  “That’s robbery!” But Tandor knew that now Ontane started negotiating, he’d won.

  “It may be, but I’m the one that’s happy with my daughter being where she is.”

  “And with an old carpet on your floor. Two hundred and sixty.”

  “What do you think I am? I want two-ninety.”

  “A man with a nose for business. I could just walk away from this deal and you’d get nothing. In fact, I’m in a hurry, so I best get going.” Tandor picked up another of his packs and set it on top of the chest, then went about lashing both items to the luggage rack.

  Ruko was jiggling his leg and fiddling with the reins.

  “No, no. It’s not as easy as that, mister. Two-eighty.”

  “Da, what’s going on?” The shed door had opened and the girl poked her head out.

  “Go back inside, Myra,” Ontane said.

  “You’re talking about me.”

  “We weren’t.”

  “You can’t fool me, Da. I heard you. What’s it about?”

  “The sorcerer wants you to come with him.”

  The girl squeaked. “Go with him? Like this?”

  She spread her arms. She was a thin, mousey thing with a fine-featured face, narrow shoulders and slender arms. One of her sleeves flapped empty below the wrist. While there might have been an element of beauty to her, Tandor’s gaze was drawn to her swollen belly. It was hard to believe a female belly could stretch that much and still be part of her.

  Tandor repressed feelings of discomfort. “My lady friend in the City of Glass is a very good midwife. She will look after you. Certainly a country girl like yourself would like to see the marvels of the City of Glass? You would like to buy some nice dresses from the city’s best merchants, and go to the Newlight celebrations?”

  The girl’s eyes widened. “The Newlight celebrations? In the City of Glass? See the games? People competing from all over the land?”

  “That’s what I think I said, yes.”

  “Oh Da, it doesn’t sound so bad. Can I go?”

  Ontane snorted, and then shrugged. “I suppose your mother . . .” He shrugged again and met Tandor’s eyes. “This, uhm, lady friend of yours . . .”

  “Mistress Loriane, one of the city’s midwives.”

  “And what if she . . . if it happens on the way? I’m guessing he doesn’t have any experience.” Ontane nodded at Ruko.

  Tandor repressed a shudder. “Look at it this way: the Knights will be back. If they find her here, you will never see her again. If she comes with us, there will be a good chance that you’ll see your grandchild. Anyway, my lady friend tells me that such . . . women’s things have a habit of happening safely by themselves.” He was groping for words. By the skylights, every word spoken delayed him further, with the chance that this dreaded thing would indeed happen before he got to Loriane’s house. He’d heard a woman’s birth screams once, while he stood, powerless, hidden between stuffy clothing in a dressing room. Oh my love, if I knew I’d do that to you.

 
“It’s all about your daughter’s safety,” he said, pushing away those memories.

  “Hmph safety. I want your guarantee that you’ll bring her back here alive and healthy, not blue and cold like that ghost over there.” Ontane raised a warning finger, the nail chipped and blackened from work.

  Tandor met his piercing eyes. Ontane wasn’t stupid. He knew that Tandor would have to turn Myra into a servitor if she was to be useful to him.

  “She will be back here as you know her.” Once he had control of the City of Glass, all the power of its Heart would be his, and he could return her in the original state. “Are we agreed then?”

  Ontane fixed his gaze on his daughter, who smiled at him. “Please, Da?”

  “Right then,” Ontane muttered.

  “Oh, thank you.” She gave him an awkward hug.

  Over his daughter’s shoulder, Ontane mouthed, two-seventy.

  Two-sixty, Tandor mouthed back.

  Ontane’s face twisted into a snarl, but he didn’t protest. “You’ll be the ruin of me.” He hawked and spat in the snow to seal the deal. “Go get your things then, girl.”

  Tandor put his attention to securing his luggage to the sled.

  Promises, promises. His life hung together with promises. Once he had established himself in the City of Glass, there would be no more promises. He raised his eyes to the sky. Not even to you, Mother.

  Chapter 3

  * * *

  CARRO PICKED UP the cup from the merchant’s table, feigning interest. A mother and a daughter had come to the stall and the mother had asked if the merchant had any good sets of tableware for sale, and she had unwittingly saved Carro from doing what he dreaded.

  While her mother spoke to the merchant, the daughter studied the items on the table, a dusty collection of bric-a-brac, the sort of things that remained after grandmother had died and all her relatives had scavenged her possessions.

  The girl was nervously winding a thin strip of leather with a gull’s tail feather attached around her fingers. One of the newly blooded virgins.

  She let her eyes roam over Carro’s shorthair Knight’s cloak and the straps of his riding harness, which dangled from underneath. Her expression was one of fear or interest; he couldn’t decide which. He knew her vaguely, like he knew most people here, or they knew him. His stomach churned. He did not want to do this, not in the safe haven of his childhood.

  He glanced over his shoulder, between the crowded stalls, the garlands of yellow paper hung from their canopies, and the steady stream of patrons that tottered out of the meltery, faces red from bloodwine. All the signs that the Newlight festival was in full swing.

  The Junior Knight Captain leaned against the wall, the map in his hands. He was looking straight at Carro.

  “Can I assist the dear sir?”

  Carro started. The mother and daughter had left.

  “Uhm . . .” He put down the cup he was still holding.

  The merchant was a middle-aged man, his short-cropped hair and beard more grey than black. Age had lined his face, but his eyes were clear and blue. He wore black. Everyone in the Outer City knew what that meant.

  “Oh, it’s you.” The man smiled. “I had been wondering how you were getting on with the Knights.”

  “Very well, thank you.”

  “You know that all of us in the Outer City are proud of you?”

  * * *

  Carro stands at the stall; the table has suddenly become a lot taller. The cover of the book feels rough under his fingers. He opens it, marvelling at the beautiful print on pages of glossy paper. The book’s scent floats on the breeze, releasing the smell of fifty years of hiding in a musty cupboard.

  I want this one, he says.

  The merchant reaches across the table. He wears a short beard, black, the same colour as his clothes. It’s the colour of the Brotherhood of the Light.

  The merchant says, I don’t think your couple of foxes of pocket money would pay for that. He eases the book out of Carro’s hands. Besides, I don’t think you want to be seen with this. Your father would whip you if he knew you had it.

  Carro shivers. His father would, too. His father doesn’t like the Brothers. It’s illegal to possess anything that belonged to families who supported the old king. But he promised his friend Isandor. And the book is so beautiful.

  Carro puts his hand in his pocket and closes his fingers on the gold eagle, the metal warm and heavy against his leg. It’s not his money, well, some of it is, but most of it is his friend’s. He takes it out and puts it on the table.

  He says, I want the book.

  * * *

  “You’ll be flying in the race today?”

  Carro gasped. The words of the past were still on his lips. I want the book. He blinked at the merchant, who was waiting for a reply.

  “Oh—uhm—the race. Yes, I will.” His heart thudded. He hated how he had these spells where he drifted off into his memories.

  “So you’re here to visit your parents?”

  Carro glanced over his shoulder again, where the Junior Knight Captain was still looking at him, drumming his fingers on the side of the sled. No way to get out of this. He closed his eyes and sighed.

  “No. I’m afraid I’m on patrol. Do you have any illegal items?”

  The merchant took in a sharp breath. His eyes widened. No, he hadn’t expected that either, after Carro’s history.

  Carro ploughed on, speaking rehearsed words with a tongue that felt like tanned hide. “You can give illegal items to me now, and there will be no fuss. If I have to call my Captain . . .” He shivered. The merchant might tell the Captain that he had sold Carro some of those illegal items.

  “No, no, you needn’t do that.” The man rummaged in the space under the bench and retrieved a box with a dusty assortment of bric-a-brac. There were some forks, silver, richly stamped with the crests of the old families, the Thilleian house. There were metal stands for lights—the silver globes gone of course—a couple of sheets in neat print. Carro ran his finger over the paper, feeling the raised profile of the ink. Familiar. His books were like that. The old people used to have machines that melted ink onto the paper. The books that were still under his bed in his father’s house, the books Carro hoped no one would find.

  Carro took the box, meeting the merchant’s eyes. He cringed with the anger in the man’s expression. “I’m sorry, but I’m asking every merchant.”

  “Sure,” the man said, his voice stiff. “You know this sort of stuff turns up every now and then.”

  “You should hand in any illegal material as soon as you get it.” Carro hated his own words.

  “I hadn’t gotten around to doing that.”

  All lies. Carro wanted to hear no more, lest the merchant dig up uncomfortable truths from Carro’s past. This was enough warning, for both of them.

  * * *

  Seated on a mound of snow, with his peg leg sticking out awkwardly into the narrow alley, Isandor opens the book on his knees. His skinny fingers trace the writing. He whispers, Wow. A lock of glossy hair falls over his shoulders.

  A real diary from the time of the old king, Carro boasts. The best he had. You should have seen his face when I showed him the money.

  You’re a real hero, Carro.

  Carro smiles. No one else calls him a hero.

  Who wrote this? Isandor has a dreamy look on his face.

  The king’s court historian. Carro bends forward and flicks the pages, trying to ignore his numb and cold fingers. Heroes are not cold.

  Wait. Isandor stops Carro’s hand. There is a drawing on the page with many lines leading from one box to another. Look at this. It’s a map of the city with this thing
they call the Heart.

  The Heart? There is no such thing. Carro feels uncomfortable. His father has spoken of this thing once and he’d seen it when he flicked through the book.

  It is the Heart, Isandor says. It says so in the book. It’s a machine under the palace. They say it’s the source of icefire. Isandor raises his head. His eyes are distant. You know this book sings?

  Sings? Carro shivers.

  Yes, can’t you hear it?

  Carro shakes his head. What song?

  There isn’t a song. It’s like the band in the meltery. The music just plays on and on, but no one takes any notice of it until it stops. That’s what it’s like.

  Carro shrugs. It’s strange. Then again, Isandor has Thilleian blood, Carro is sure about that.

  The old king only needed to reach into the air and icefire would spark from his fingers. He would kill people with it. Old people still tell the stories.

  * * *

  Carro carried the box across the marketplace to the sled, repressing memories unlocked by the musty smell. Other merchants, all people he knew, followed his every move. Stone-hard looks on stone-hard faces. He wanted to scream that it wasn’t his choice to do this job, that he’d been told to do it, that the Knights with him were all older and hated him, that . . .

  He dumped the box on the luggage tray of the sled. The Knight Captain strolled to the sled and rummaged through the contents in a bored fashion.

  “Another load of old junk,” he drawled. “You know, we’ve collected so many light stands over the past few days, one wonders where the lights are.”

  Carro didn’t meet his gaze. The silver light globes were always gone by the time these items came to the market. Even if the lights had been complete when the merchant obtained the items, he would know better than take the globes to market. They were worth a fortune, those bulbs that needed only icefire to glow.