The Icefire Trilogy

by Patty Jansen

  That time seemed like years ago. The man must have been in the audience at the arena for the ritual killing, like most of these people here.

  Isandor bent down and stuck his hand into the window. “Come out.”

  Jevaithi stared at him, looking into the window upside-down.

  “Come. These are good people, from the Outer City. They won’t harm you. They’ll protect you.”

  He could see the whole world go through that frightened expression in her eyes. Did she want to go back to being their queen? She had said she didn’t, but she’d been very quiet the last few days whenever the subject came up. She was scared, and lost, and too groomed for the position to do anything else.

  She came out of the truck, took his hand and let him haul her on top of the roof, where the grey pre-dawn light silvered her face and her no-longer-white bear skin cloak.

  There were gasps, and a stunned silence.

  Then someone cried out, “It’s the Queen!”

  Several voices repeated the cry. “It’s the Queen, it’s the Queen. The Queen lives.”

  Isandor met Milleus’ eyes over the heads of the crowd; his mouth was open. Isandor mouthed, I’m sorry.

  Men climbed up on the truck and lifted both Isandor and Jevaithi onto their shoulders.

  From his position, Isandor glimpsed a whole convoy of Chevakian trucks still coming into the camp through the broken fence, and soldiers trying to turn them around. Fights were again breaking out on the edge of the camp, and the Chevakian soldiers, too few in number, retreated. The southerners were throwing up barricades. Fires burned in some places, sending clouds of smoke through the camp.

  But there was nothing Isandor could do about any of that. The people carried him and Jevaithi into a large tent, where many people sat on the ground. Mothers and children, older people, all huddled under cloaks. In here, it smelled of bodies and damp earth.

  The young Brother Simo yelled, “Listen to me, people. There is good news! We have the Queen. The Queen is back!”

  Chapter 3

  * * *

  SADY GUIDED the southern family in the direction of the main part of the house. He could hear Merni’s voice in the kitchen, much calmer now. She would tell them what to do. Hopefully the bedroom in the guest wing was unaffected, and they could still use that. If they could sleep at all.

  He went to get his dark winter coat and returned to the yard. By that time, Orsan had returned from taking the southern woman Loriane into the bedroom. He had also stocked up on weapons: he carried not just his guard’s gun, but had retrieved his pistol. Sady and Orsan started combing the courtyard by walking in a grid pattern so as not to miss any clues. Farius joined them a bit later, carrying a torch in one hand and a pistol in the other. He was only a young fellow, an apprentice under Serran, twenty at most and with a face that retained some of the angles and bony corners of an adolescent. He would have had little practice with the weapon.

  “Look here,” Orsan said from the darkness.

  Sady and Farius went to where Orsan kneeled on the pavement of the path that led to poor old Eseldus’ statue. Sady had seen the dark trail of spots when he went out here, before he found the woman Loriane in the pavilion. Sady kneeled and reached out, but Orsan said, “Don’t touch it.”

  “What is it? Looks like blood to me.”

  “Could be. Could be poison. We don’t know until we investigate. Best to be safe.”

  Farius followed the trail which went halfway to the pavilion and stopped there.

  Orsan crouched and examined the grass and the path and the small hedge and rockery adjacent to the path.

  “See anything?” Farius asked.

  Orsan shook his head. “It looks like he’s just vanished at this spot.”

  “Didn’t you hear the side gate?” Sady said. The gate was on the other side of the courtyard, with no clear sign of how the killer had crossed that distance.

  Farius went over to the door and tried the handle. “It’s locked.” He hit the wood; it sounded solid. The door was fairly new; Sady remembered it being replaced about five years ago.

  “That’s strange. I swear I heard the door.” Orsan’s bushy eyebrows knitted together. “Any other way out?”

  Farius raised the torch. The wall on the side was too high and there were no trees or features that would allow someone to climb it easily, or at least not without leaving tracks.

  Farius searched the pavilion where Sady had found the southern woman and found nothing except the puddle of blood she had left. The pavilion had only doors into the garden and no access to the street.

  “The only way someone could have escaped without having to go through the house is over that wall,” Orsan said.

  “Look, we’re losing time,” Sady said. “Let’s just assume he got out over the wall without worrying about how he did it. Let’s have a look on the other side.”

  Sady pulled out a key and turned the lock on the side gate. It creaked; the door was only opened when a lot of material needed to be carried into the garden and that hadn’t happened since the end of winter.

  The alley on the other side led past the walls and gates of neighbouring houses. In the past, these alleys were used by servants who, in those days, were not allowed to enter their family’s house through the main door. These days, people used the side entrance only to cart rubbish away.

  A wind gust tore between the buildings and blew all his hair to one side. Mercy, this biting wind didn’t feel like summer at all.

  Orsan and Farius came out as well. By the light of Farius’ torch, they examined the paving and walls, but could see nothing that wasn’t supposed to be there.

  They were wasting time here. The killer would long since have fled. “Let’s assume that he fled into this alley, which way would he have gone?”

  “That way.” Orsan gestured to the east, where low hills rose over the surrounding houses. “Any criminal would probably flee out of the city, rather than into it.” He came out of the side gate, and shut the door behind him. Sady registered the noise, and tried to remember if he’d heard it earlier that night, when he’d been sitting in the kitchen. He didn’t think so.

  They walked through the alley. Farius with the light, Orsan clutching his pistol and Sady between them, his hand on the grip of his hunting rifle.

  It was dark. The wind howled around corners and blew sand and leaves through the street. Farius’ torch made long eerie shadows on walls. There was no sign of life anywhere on this night. Even the ground squirrels hid in their infernal burrows. The wind carried distorted sounds of the bell tower’s hour chime. Then a single strike of the bell, the continued warning for Tiverians to stay indoors.

  Sady remembered that before he left his office, he had been keen to look at the sonorics measurements for tomorrow morning. All things going well, the contamination should be going down now that the southerners and the trains had been cleaned.

  Somehow, the world of the office and the doga seemed incredibly far away.

  They continued through the deserted streets, seeing nothing and no one. A feeling of darkness grew inside Sady’s heart. The killer had obviously long since fled, and walking around here was useless; they would not find him tonight. He was just about to suggest that they turn back—he was feeling guilty about not being at home at a time he could probably be more useful there—when there was a sound of footsteps in a nearby yard, and a bolt being shoved back.

  Orsan held up his hand.

  Farius slammed the dimmer over his torch and ducked into a shaded alcove. Sady followed, pressing himself against cold stone. Orsan hid in a corresponding alcove on the other side of the alley. Sady heard the click-click of the cocking of Orsan’s gun.

  A bit further down the alley, a door op
ened. Two men came out, talking in relaxed voices just outside Sady’s hearing. They wore long cloaks such as commonly worn by men from Tiverius’ well-off families. Sady could only catch the occasional snatch of conversation. Have to have a meeting . . . and . . . says it should be ready for review soon . . . One man pulled the door shut behind them and they walked off, away from Sady, Orsan and Farius, all the while in oblivious conversation.

  When they had gone, Orsan gave the sign to keep moving again.

  “Who were they?” whispered Farius.

  Orsan said, “People are allowed to use these alleys.”

  “But, there is a level one sonorics alarm active. People should avoid going outside.”

  “We are outside.”

  Point made. And Farius was right, too. It was strange.

  They walked past the gate where the men had come out. Lights blazed in the yard and lit those parts of the house visible over the wall. The wind also carried the sound of many voices talking and laughing. Who would have a party on a night like this?

  “Wait—isn’t this the Lady Armaine’s house?” Sady asked.

  “Yes, it is.”

  Hadn’t Orsan been turned back at the Lady Armaine’s house because she was away? He stopped, studying the wall. The gate where the two men had come out was a double door, wide enough for a cart, but made from solid wood. “Any way we can look into the yard?”

  “You’d have to climb the wall and we can’t do that without a warrant,” Orsan said.

  “And who signs warrants?”

  Orsan’s eyes met his. Everything about his stance with his hands at his sides, the muscle moving in his jutting jaw and his heavy brow screamed defensiveness. “Aren’t we here to find a killer?”

  “Do you think we’ll find anyone? Wherever he is, he’s long gone.”

  “The city guards won’t like if you go over their heads.”

  The city guards were the ones who normally applied for warrants, and the proctor approved them, not the other way around

  “You are a member of the guard. You have a warrant as of now. If you want an official one, I’ll write and sign it in the morning. Get me up on that wall. Over there, near the tree.”

  It was Farius who helped Sady climb up. Orsan stood back and watched. It was too dark for Sady to see his expression, but his silence probably meant that he didn’t like it.

  Dear Orsan was way too fond of the rules. These people had become so reliant on their inflexible bureaucracy.

  Once he could see over the wall, Sady recognised the house with the large garden room where he’d met the Lady seated at her huge desk.

  The room was brightly lit, and the doors wide open as they had been during Sady’s visit. All the furniture had been moved to the sides to make place for rows and rows of chairs. There were a lot of people on these chairs, talking to each other, all of them wearing warm clothing as if prepared for the cold. They obviously knew of the Lady’s propensity to have all doors and windows open. Sady recognised many people. Merchants, the doga’s chief accountant and some of his staff. Destran, Alius, and a couple of young people who were probably students. Many in their work clothes, some dressed in dark clothing. So as to sneak in and out of the house through the back entrance without attracting attention?

  Something happened at the back of the room that made people cheer and clap. A thin figure in a powder blue robe walked along the aisle between the seats, her hair piled in an enormous bun on top of her head. While she walked, Lady Armaine spread her hands, and many people reached out to touch them. She smiled and talked to them.

  She reached the front of the room, faced the seated people and bowed. A man Sady didn’t recognise wheeled a small table towards her. He was a young fellow, dressed in a black robe. He wore his hair tied back at the nape of his neck. His thin beard hung halfway down his chest. Sady couldn’t see what was on the table he had brought, because two people at the side of the crowd blocked his view. They stood watching the proceedings, hands clasped behind their backs. The lady’s guards, he guessed. They also had beards.

  The lady lifted a gold-coloured cloth off the table. The object underneath radiated such a bright glow that washed colour from the surrounding furniture and people. What was that thing?

  People cheered and clapped.

  The guards shifted, and Sady saw that the table held a brightly glowing sphere on a stand about waist high.

  He had seen these types of light in the houses of the rich in the City of Glass.

  They were, his guides had explained to him, remnants of old technology that had been common under the reign of king Caldor. His guide had said these words with much disapproval on her face.

  One by one, the people in the room came forward to touch the globe, bow, kiss their hand and return to their seat.

  What was this strange group? Why would all these people care? They were Chevakians. Half the important senators were here.

  Sady watched, but the queue was long and it didn’t look like anything else would happen soon. He was getting cold, Orsan and Farius were waiting, and they had a killer to find, so he let himself down, his head reeling.

  It seemed the Lady Armaine had her fingers everywhere in Tiverian politics.

  “Anything interesting?” Farius asked.

  “Puzzling,” Sady said.

  “Not the murderer,” Orsan said.

  Sady met Orsan’s eyes, emotionless. Orsan had tried to dissuade him from looking in the yard. He had a discomforting thought: did Orsan know this party was going on? Did Orsan know why these people met here?

  Sady’s heart pounded. Doga guards worked for the doga, and not for individual senators. They swore to secrecy to protect the privacy of the senator they served. If that senator was preparing to challenge, his guard could not go to the rival senators and talk about any of the senator’s recent meetings. Guards knew a lot, and never said anything, unless presented with a summons to a formal interview. And Sady was going to have to order such an interview. It troubled him especially that Destran was there, because that would make any investigation political in nature.

  An uncomfortable silence lingered.

  Farius said, oblivious to the tension, “I don’t think we’re going to find a trace of the killer tonight. It’s much too dark, and he’s been gone a long time. Maybe even went into the other direction.”

  “I agree,” Orsan said.

  “Yes, let’s go.” Sady’s heart pounded. Interrogations were not his favourite. Orsan had been with him for a long time. He should be trustworthy.

  “Home?” Farius asked.

  “Yes. Lead the way,” Sady said.

  Farius uncovered the light and he and Orsan started walking.

  At that moment, there was a muffled shout that came not from Lady Armaine’s yard, but from the other side of the alley.

  Sady stopped and whispered, “Orsan!” as loudly as he dared, and gestured for them to come back.

  But Orsan and Farius had walked down the alley and didn’t hear him.

  They’d just passed a gate into the yard, this one a lacework of metal. Sady remembered glancing in, but had noticed anything out of the ordinary. Just the standard courtyard with central statue and clipped hedges.

  Sady ran back, and was followed a moment later by Orsan. “In there,” he whispered, and tried the gate. I was open.

  “No, I go first,” Orsan whispered and he gestured to Farius, who came with the torch.

  Both men went into the yard, and Sady followed. There were no sounds other than the burbling of a fountain.

  Then another snort, a cough and a sniff.

  “Who’s there?” Orsan lifted his gun.

  Farius held the torch higher.
r />   Long shadows trailed over the yard’s walls. Clipped bushes made eerie shapes on the stuccoed walls.

  “There,” Orsan said, pointing to the far corner.

  Behind the backs of both men, Sady saw little, but he could feel the tension in Orsan’s voice. Farius raised his gun. Someone tried to run away, judging by the sound of shoes slipping on stone.

  “Don’t move,” Orsan said.

  Farius ran forward, and held his torch higher. “Here he is!”

  In the corner of the yard stood a man who resembled a walking skeleton. Half his hair was missing, his skull a mess of weeping scabs. His only remaining hair, a patch around his right ear, hung in dirty dreadlocks down the side of his head. His face, deathly pale, had deep scratches from which blood flowed freely. His shirt may once have been white, but now it was grey in parts that were not soaked in blood. In his hand he clutched a knife. In place of his other hand, he had a golden claw.

  He stared into the light with wide eyes, his chest moving quickly in shallow breaths.

  When Orsan came closer, he turned around with a panicked whimper, and tried to clamber up the wall. It was far too high and smooth for a healthy person to climb, let alone one as crazy and injured as this.

  Orsan and Farius closed in. The man lunged at Orsan with the knife, but the attack was jerky and clumsy. Orsan avoided and deflected the slashing knife with ease. One hit with the butt of Orsan’s gun and the knife clattered onto the paving. Sady bent to pick it up, but the hilt was slick with blood, so he pushed it with his foot, well out of the man’s reach.

  After a short struggle, the two guards had him tied up with the sleeves of his own shirt pinning his arms to his sides. The prisoner made no effort to fight or talk. His eyes were expressionless, the pupils tiny, and whites showing on all sides.

  His ghost-like face made Sady shiver.