The Heir To The North

by Steven Poore

  Every corner and twisted alley led deeper into the heart of the mede. Yet there was open space in the most unexpected places. Here for example, at the far end of a lane so narrow two men could not pass side by side, Cassia knew there was an empty square with an old hay cart abandoned against one wall. The cart’s presence was a mystery, it was much too wide to have ever entered through any of the lanes. Had somebody built it here, in this square? Or was it an accidental relic of a long-forgotten magic? Her imagination leaped upon it. And in another part of the mede, a small, anonymous door set into a long, blank wall had been left open to reveal a vaulted, airy temple, the glazed columns suffused with sunlight. Cassia stared into the space in awe – it far outstripped any of the Hellean temples she had seen – but when she tried to find the place again, she could only trudge in frustrated circles through the mede and nobody seemed to understand what she was looking for.

  And so it was with Malessar’s dhar. It confounded her expectations at the same time as it reinforced everything she thought she knew about the warlock from Norrow’s tales.

  She had thought Malessar would live in an opulent palace, with an army of quiescent servants to cater to his whims. How else would a warlock live, after all? But when the baggage train halted at last before an iron banded door, she thought there must have been some mistake. The alley was a dead-end, and a small group of young men watched her from a doorway further along. The wailing of children echoed faintly through the air, over the muted murmur of the wider streets they had left behind.

  “Where are we?” she had asked. “Are we lost?”

  Yaihl slid the travel chest from his shoulder and laid it on the ground before her. “No, we are here,” he said. He knocked on the door and waited. The porters they had hired to carry Malessar’s other goods had already grounded their own loads and were gathering around Genjis to receive payment. Cassia was too exhausted to do anything but slump down on top of the nearest chest.

  A rattle of bolts drew her attention back to the door. An old man, his lined face hidden beneath a thick beard still flecked with black, scowled out at them. He and Yaihl exchanged a few short sentences and then the man fixed his glare upon her. “Another one, eh?” he said in Hellean. “Gods above and below, another mouth to feed.”

  Cassia coloured, and bit down on her reply. The old man sighed and disappeared, leaving Yaihl and Genjis to haul the chests through the door and down one uneven step to the tiled antechamber beyond. Cassia had to wait until the last one had crossed the threshold before she could follow, acutely aware of how the men watched her. Her sword, she thought, wouldn’t make much difference. It certainly didn’t shield her against their eyes.

  The antechamber had given her pause for thought. The walls were plain, but their ochre sheen was richer than she expected given the house’s weathered exterior, and the candles the old man lit bathed the room with warmth – but then she was ushered across and into a short passage that led . . . into a garden, of all things. She halted, staring around and up at the lush plants and shady trees that grew in enclosed beds, between neat paved paths. At the centre of the garden was a stone fountain where water bubbled pleasantly. Rows of arches created small colonnades on all four sides of the garden, like a miniature version of Hellea’s library, but there was a second set of arches on the floor above as well. Doors and windows indicated rooms on both this side and the far side of the garden, creating two separate wings with the garden enclosed between them. The house had turned its back to the city and created its own world of calm here.

  How fitting, she had realised later on. Malassar had raised walls against the world, disguised himself as a scholar, and turned inwards. How could his house have reflected him in any other way?

  She swung into the alley and took the last turn. The thick sack bumped against her back. She was probably late, but she was certain Narjess wouldn’t mind too much. The old gardener was a grump, but he never stayed in a mood for long.

  The dhar was wide enough to warrant two doors onto the street, with the nearest of the two a narrow, duck-down affair that led straight into Leili’s kitchen. Unlike the main door at the other end of the alley, this one was always open during the day. Leili could be found cooking, baking or salting meat, usually singing or chattering at high speed to one of the women from the neighbouring houses. Cassia slung the sack through first, clasping her blade to her side as she ducked through after it. “Hello, Leili!”

  The short woman barely paused for breath, cursing some poor boy who’d had the ill fortune to short change her in the market. Her companion nodded agreement each time Leili jabbed her filleting knife into the air. Cassia grinned, snatched up the sack again, and headed for the door at the far end of the kitchen. It never ceased to amuse her that, for a man so insular, Malessar had surrounded himself with servants who never stopped talking.

  These doors, at least, were more correctly sized. Curved and ornamented, they opened onto one of the colonnades. Cassia slowed, taking her time through the garden. She had never been ordered not to run here, but it didn’t seem like the sort of place she should hurry.

  Narjess was down by the far wall, nursing a creeping vine towards the upper balcony. He muttered under his breath as if chastising it for not growing faster. He didn’t look around as Cassia approached, but he had clearly heard her come through the kitchen. “Great fates, girl, I could have gone twice myself for the time you’ve taken!”

  “There was a wedding,” she started, and Narjess sighed.

  “If not one thing then another,” he said. “Newborn babies have a greater attention span! Don’t tell me, don’t tell me, there was food, and dancing . . .”

  “And a storyteller for the wedding party,” Cassia said. “I could not stay too long though.”

  Narjess grunted. “Just give me the bag, girl.”

  He examined the table legs – three, hand-turned in the artisans’ district and bound together to keep them from damaging each other on the journey – and shook his head, his muttered words never quite audible. He seemed to do a lot of that when she was around. That, and sighing. There was plenty of that too.

  “I suppose I can sand out these knocks before I paint them,” he said at last. “But great fates, girl, do try to be careful.”

  “I’ll try,” she said. “Narjess, is the master in his rooms?”

  “No. Still not back.”

  She glanced up at the balcony, at the shuttered windows sheltered behind it. That whole half of the dhar was private and out of bounds, she had been told early on. There were layers of privacy beyond anything she could penetrate. Even when Malessar was within and the windows were unshuttered, the doors were firmly closed. Leili was the only person to enter there, and even then only at the warlock’s bidding. If Cassia saw him at all, it was here in the garden, or on the terraces that enclosed it, or when he decided she needed to learn something.

  Secretive as he was, he had already disappeared from the house at least twice without telling anyone of his intentions. The first time, Cassia had panicked, thinking she had been abandoned already. But Leili dismissed her alarm with a brisk clucking. “The master’s life revolves around the master, not around you,” she said. “I certainly don’t want to know what he’s doing, and neither should you. Now, if you don’t want to help, get out from underfoot. This meat won’t spice itself.”

  It hadn’t been much comfort, which was part of why she still felt happier away from the dhar than within it. Out in the mede she was not surrounded by proof of who her patron truly was. She didn’t have to pretend the walls of the Galliarcan house were not decorated with scripts, hangings and other objects that were all unmistakably of the North. Or, more, that some of the scripts didn’t actually name the towns that Baum had mentioned to her. Gethista. Aelior. Kennetta. The memory of riding through the cold grasses towards the ancient ruins of Gethista was still clear in her mind, and thoughts of the curse upon Caenthell and Baum’s centuries-long search for vengeance inevitably followed close
behind.

  On some nights she lay awake, listening to the sounds of the mede echoing through her small window and wondered what sort of mischief and subterfuge Malessar was about now. There had to be something. After all, hadn’t he been in Kebria, working ill magics in the queen’s palace there, before the sudden arrival of Guhl and Arca’s squad of soldiers caused him to disappear overnight? He’d be plotting something now, Cassia was certain. Everything Baum had told her of the warlock pointed to it.

  And neither Leili nor Narjess appeared concerned. Cassia was convinced they had to know the truth of his identity, yet they referred to him, and addressed him, only as their master. She had been careful not to let slip the extent of her own knowledge for fear she would find herself ejected onto the streets once more. Or worse.

  I assume they know. Perhaps they assume that I know. And Malessar – what does he assume? What does he know? There was danger in everything she said, she had quickly realised, a terrible danger that she would betray either herself, or Baum and Meredith.

  She crossed back to the shaded table at the other end of the garden and poured a measure of the minted drink that Leili always maintained there. The Galliarcan staple was an acquired taste, but it refreshed her more than water alone, clearing her palate of the fine, dry sand that seemed to hang in the air. There was time enough to doze and regain her energy before the market stalls were broken down in the Fahrian Square and the crowds began to gather for the night’s festivities.

  And tonight she would wear her storyteller’s gear, the gown repaired and repatched, the colours fresher and less Northern, embroidered designs flowing in a fashion that Norrow’s never had. Her cap was brand new, hemmed with thread that sparkled in the lamplight. Tonight she would try her own tales in the Square.

  She’d spent enough time listening to others, hearing the rhythms they used and the ways they drew their audiences into their stories, and she had tried out some of those techniques on the children who infested the top end of the alleyway. Whether they had listened because of her skill, or because of the sheer novelty was debatable, but the point was that they had listened. When she lowered her voice and brought the tale to a slow build-up of tension, they leaned in closer, ballgames and playfights forgotten; then with bold jests and heroic deeds she whipped fire into them. And, the following day, they wanted more.

  In one wild moment, buoyed by their excitement, she even wondered if she might have been inspired by a spirit that still watched over Pelicos’s sword, or perhaps even by Pelicos himself. As unlikely as that seemed, she realised she was far more ready to believe in such things now she had seen sorcery for herself.

  I’ll tell my tales just as he fought, she decided. Lightfooted, daring, the breeze that licks the darkened corners of a room. Swords and words – the two aren’t so far apart, are they?

  q

  Leili and Narjess slept in the long room between the kitchen and the entrance hall, a room they had clearly occupied for a number of years to judge by the possessions they had accumulated, which stood as a bulwark against the Northern-styled furnishings that prevailed in the rest of the house. Malessar had offered Cassia the room above that, but she spent no more than half an hour in it, marvelling at the thought that she should merit so much space, before she began to feel uncomfortable.

  The waifs and strays Malessar had taken in before haunted the room. Every step Cassia took echoed through the air and against the walls before seeming to disappear up into the dark ceiling panels. There were hundreds of other sounds up there, she thought, left by its previous occupants. She felt them looking down at her. She could not lie on the bed without feeling exposed and vulnerable.

  “It’s too large,” was all she said to Malessar. For once the warlock actually looked surprised.

  She had spent that first night on a mat in one of the garden colonnades. It was much colder than she had expected, but she was too exhausted to care. In the morning, after some negotiation with Narjess and Leili, she appropriated a small room just off the entrance hall. It had been used as a storage room, but once it was cleared and swept and Cassia had dragged in an old, lumpy pallet, it was a lot more comfortable than the empty room on the floor above.

  There were other considerations too. Here, she was closer to the dhar’s front door. If she had to leave, she could do so quickly, and without having to let the warlock’s servants know. Malessar might have promised she would be safe in his house, but there was a nagging uncertainty, as that promise came from the man who had destroyed the North.

  She dropped onto her pallet and felt beneath it for the stone charm. It was virtually the only thing she still owned from her time in Hellea and the North. Peculiarly, it always seemed to retain some warmth, even when left in here, in the cool. She ran the tips of her fingers over the worn contours of the figure. It was easy to imagine she was touching Meredith’s skin, caressing his cheek or his lips. From there her memories of his touch, of his body so close to her own that an inhalation would have pressed them together, would lull her to sleep every night.

  There was no time for that right now. She shoved those thoughts to the back of her mind, the warmth she felt not entirely caused by her journey through the streets. Ceresel, be merciful tonight. And Movalli, patron of storytellers, please look down in favour. She hesitated then, and looked at the carved figure once more. And Pyraete, should it please you, I am your servant.

  If any of the gods heard her, they did not answer.

  q

  Fahrian Square was a cacophony of noise and motion. Polyrhythmic drumming echoed between the buildings, the beats chasing themselves through the air like playful spirits. Young boys shinned up studded posts to light the braziers, baiting each other with catcalls. Below them the stalls in the square moved like a tide, collapsed and lifted aside by expert teams who had performed the same task every day for their whole adult lives. Behind them came the carts that held the open-air ovens, the rickety benches, the spice traders . . . and the storytellers.

  They were there all through the day, but the best storytellers came out in the evening. That was where Cassia wanted to be: among the very best.

  She threw out her elbows as she entered the square, her cloak billowing out behind her. The silvered thread flickered around the edges of the patches she had sewn onto the cloak, catching both the light of the braziers and the eyes of the nearest onlookers in equal measure. She felt the corners of her mouth twist upwards into a grin. This is what my father must feel when he does this.

  All the prime positions were already taken. There was an established pecking order amongst the city’s storytellers, it seemed, and Cassia had not found her own place yet. Some of the stares turned in her direction were speculative, others less friendly. A few were cold and openly hostile. She threaded through the gathering crowds, making sure to step in time to the dominant beat. When she looked back over her shoulder after her first circuit of the Square, she was delighted to realise a couple of men had begun to follow her. A handful of young boys, including one or two she thought she recognised from Malessar’s street, were gathering just behind them.

  An audience. In Fahrian Square. My father would bite his own tongue out.

  She cast about for a space to set up, and spied a pitch to her left that a stallholder had just vacated. There was no sign that another vendor would take his place. So I’ll go there. At least until they try to move me on. She swatted the thought away. One problem at a time, girl. One at a time.

  The boys flooded in to the space before her, around the ankles of the few men who had come to hear the Square’s newest storyteller. The canopy flickered with the reflected light of the nearest braziers, and the air was filled with smoke from the cookfires and the burning tang of spices and stewing lamb.

  She reached up to adjust her cap, making sure her hair was tucked safely underneath it, using the moment to examine her audience more closely. The boys would want something thrilling, a tale of heroics and treasure. Dragons were always appreciated
, she had discovered. She was less certain of the men. Would they look for old-fashioned epics, or more modern tales? Something that matched the rhythm of the Square, perhaps?

  “Who remembers the days of old?” she asked aloud, falling into the cadence of the introduction as though she had recited it every night of her life. “Who remembers the great and the good? Their deeds and their trials? Who remembers the battles of times long passed, when the heroes and generals are blown to the sands? Who will remember our times, when we too are gone from the world, when our lives are done and our last breaths escape to rise past the tallest peaks of the mountains?”

  There was something that might suit. Her father had told it as a bawdy story in taverns, while Cassia huddled below the window outside, close against the wall to keep the night winds from chilling her bones. She could shorten it by stripping out some of the less palatable jokes, but there would still be enough humour in the tale to please her audience.

  I hope.

  “So thought Pelicos, Pelicos the Brave, Pelicos Bedstealer with his sheets to the wind – the wind that had borne him away from the shores, into the seas that took him to wife . . .”

  q

  With the final words, she swept off her cap and flung it to the ground, and raised her arms into the air to show the gods she was done. Her mouth was dry, and it felt as though there was no air in her lungs. Her eyes itched from the smoke that drifted across from the next stall. Throughout her tale she had focused on the front rows of her audience, switching her attention from one set of eyes to another as she paced the small space she had claimed. It was a little wider now; she had decided to illustrate one of the tale’s fights with her staff, marrying the rhythm to Meredith’s training, and the boys had scrambled backwards with excited cries.