Barclay, J [2008] Vault of Deeds

by James Barclay

  ‘Busy in here, isn’t it?’ said Grincheux, voice booming from the vaulted roof. Heavy-framed portraits of ancient scribes lowered down.

  It was standing room only. And no one answered him.

  ‘So, er, what’s the score? What’s going on?’ Grincheux pumped his arms in a vague attempt at enthusiasm.

  ‘Three guesses,’ said a reedy voice from next to the fire. ‘No, make that one.’

  Grincheux got goose-bumps. It wasn’t an impromptu scribe convention, then.

  ‘What, all of you?’

  He turned another circle. He wasn’t the most senior scribe in the room, just the most recently de-heroed.

  He pointed at random. ‘Gaston the Invincible?’

  Gaston’s scribe made a noose-tightening gesture.

  ‘Erik Steelfist?’

  Erik’s scribe enacted evisceration.

  ‘Morgan the Mighty?’

  A gripping of testicles was more than any needed to know.

  ‘How many—?’ began Grincheux.

  ‘Forty seven,’ said the same reedy voice.

  ‘This year?’

  A snort of derision. ‘This month.’

  The fire lost all its potency.

  ‘We’ve even had to suspend publication of ‘Scribble Monthly’ because frankly, we haven’t any victory annals to dissect and critique,’ said another voice.

  ‘And you’re all here now doing what, exactly?’ asked Grincheux, finding in himself more than a hint of irritation.

  There was a communal shrug. ‘Waiting to be appointed to new heroes.’

  ‘Or trying to hide from them,’ added a new voice. ‘I mean, have you seen them? The new bunch? Weedy beanpoles who can barely lift a sword and massively overweight rich boys and girls whose daddies have the money to get them in here. And as for the other rumours, well…’

  Grincheux walked towards the source of the voice. It was one he knew. A senior scribe and man who had worked with some of the very best heroes over the last three decades of glory.

  ‘What rumours, Robbo?’

  Pierre van Robinson met his gaze with one riven by doubt and edged with confusion.

  ‘About what now stalks these corridors and who welcomed them in. About the real reason our heroes are dying.’

  Grincheux frowned and a few of Orgascz’s words filtered back to him. It was an unpleasant sensation.

  ‘Care to elucidate?’

  van Robinson shook his head. ‘We cannot.’

  Grincheux was about to protest but became aware that the room had fallen utterly silent. He shivered, his earlier sense of unease rising up and swatting him hard.

  ‘What’s—’

  ‘You don’t know?’ said someone behind him.

  Grincheux turned. ‘Know what? Robbo? What’s going on? What’s happened?’

  ‘Inside the walls of this school, here in our inner sanctum, a scribe has met his death. Has been killed.’

  Grincheux took a pace backwards, feeling as if he had been shoved roughly in the chest. His pulse soared and he felt a little faint. Hands steadied him as he threatened to stagger.

  ‘Who? This can’t be,’ he said. ‘How can this be? Scribes aren’t killed. No one kills scribes. Not even the evil ones. It’s…I don’t understand. Who did it? How did it…?’ He paused and calmed himself just a little. ‘One of you, just bloody tell me what I am bound to want to know, all right?’

  Silence.

  ‘Oh, come on,’ he said and spread his hands. ‘Throw me a scrap here will you? Promise I won’t tell.’

  ‘Exactly,’ said Robbo. ‘That’s exactly what we said. And that’s why we’re all still alive.’

  ‘Oh right,’ said Grincheux, looking round at the scribes, none of whom would look back at him. ‘So I just blunder into something I shouldn’t and become a victim because you lot are too scared to warn me.’

  ‘You can’t blunder into what you don’t know anything about,’ said Robbo. ‘It isn’t like that.’

  ‘Then tell me what it is like.’

  Robbo thought hard and breathed deep. ‘It was Gethen who was killed. Young, naïve, headstrong. He went after the full story. He wanted meat on the bones of the rumours. He never came back. But his book is closed in the Vault of Deeds so we know he is dead. And we’re all barred from going down there now anyway.’

  ‘But it could have been an accident?’ ventured Grincheux.

  Robbo shook his head. ‘That would be a coincidence too grand for any of us. He was fit and quick. His book snapped shut with a violence that lifted the dust of ages. I can’t tell you any more.’

  ‘You have to,’ said Grincheux. ‘You can’t leave me in the dark like this.’

  ‘Don’t you understand?’ Robbo jumped up and grabbed his lapels. Spittle flew from his lips. ‘They watch us, they monitor us. Do I have to spell out the scribe mind link to the Vault of Deeds? Everything we see that can be formed into a tale of good or evil is recorded in our books, waiting for us to make permanent with our pens. They can read what we see if they want to.’

  ‘They?’ Grincheux didn’t believe it. He wouldn’t. ‘You can’t mean…?’

  If they did, this went high. Very high indeed. Robbo studied his hands. There may have been the minutest of nods.

  ‘Well we have to do something,’ said Grincheux.

  ‘We can’t,’ said Robbo. ‘If we do, we’ll be killed.’

  ‘Whereas sitting here until the forces of evil sweep through Goedterre is the recipe for a long and happy life, I’m sure.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ said a voice from behind.

  Grincheux gaped. ‘What?’ His turn revealed a line of empty faces. ‘Has it not occurred to you what you all sitting here really means? You haven’t, have you?’ He sighed. ‘Give me strength. This is like teaching class four g.’

  ‘You think Goedterre is in danger?’

  ‘Think? Damn right we’re in danger. Forty-seven dead heroes means forty-seven leaderless armies awaiting slaughter. And you lot are hiding from the new heroes who by all accounts have no chance of leading those armies to victory. That means the forces of evil are running here almost unhindered. With the express intention of dividing you from your very valuable writing hands.’

  He saw the light of comprehension begin to dawn.

  ‘We have to do something. We have to stop whatever it is that’s happening before it’s too late and another darkness sweeps our land. We have knowledge. We have to use it.’ He punched the air. ‘Who’s with me!’

  None of them moved so much as a muscle. Grincheux chewed his lip.

  ‘If I die doing this, the last words in my book will be to denounce the lot of you. Here in the HERO academy, they are breeding cowards. Pathetic.’

  He stalked from the common room and slammed the door behind him. Out in the corridor, the academy buzzed with the energy of students learning their trade. Nothing seemed out of place. And yet a sense of dread hung in the air like a sulphurous accident in the chemistry laboratory.

  The corridor stretched away left towards the combat quadrangle and arena; right towards the scribe classrooms. He could hear the hum of teaching and learning and smell the stale sweat of heroes past clinging to the walls. By any standards it had been a dramatic and, he felt, impressive exit. He just hoped no one followed him out. Because standing here in the deserted corridor, he realised he had absolutely no idea what to do next.

  ‘Something’s better than nothing,’ he said to himself and began to stride confidently left towards the combat training area. It was the heroes who were dying in great numbers. Perhaps the first answers lay there.

  Walking the echoing flagstones, Grincheux searched his brain for a plan. Powerful forces would be ranged against him. Those for whom the life of one scribe was a thing easily sacrificed should it suit them. He could not afford them to get even a sniff he was on to them or it would be too late, whoever they were. Yet in the Vault of Deeds, his book was producing draft script picked from the four corners of
his mind. At any moment, the wrong man might choose to have a look at the fresh pages and Grincheux would be undone.

  How would it happen, he wondered. Poison scattered on his pillow for him to inhale that night. A dagger through his ribs to puncture his heart. Or perhaps something less traceable. The waterfall, maybe. Or a tumble down the cliffs of Thoros. Mighty hands might just clamp around his neck. Something quick was most likely.

  On his way past a mirror, Grincheux caught the briefest of glimpses of himself. Enough to reveal he hadn’t brushed his mop of grey and black hair for a while, hadn’t had a shave for a couple of days and had scared-looking blue eyes in a long, weary face that had seen perhaps too many battles these days.

  Grincheux was shivering. He’d almost stopped walking too. His hands were clammy and he could feel a trickle down his spine. What on earth was he thinking? Scribes scribbled. Heroes undertook deeds. Madness. Pure bloody madness. He would make a point of not formalising his draft pages into finished script. He would perform the ritual of deletion right now. No one would ever know.

  A change of career, that was what was called for. Curious. He felt the sudden desire to conduct missionary work in a very far off country.

  ‘Not that I’m scared,’ he told himself. ‘Missionary work can be dangerous. Plenty of unknowns out there in the wild after all.’

  Grincheux was staring at a notice board. He couldn’t focus on it. Perhaps missionary work wasn’t the thing after all. Being a hermit in a cave somewhere. Now there was a role befitting a scribe who’d lost… He spun on his heel and collided with the breast plate of a finely polished suit of armour.

  He clutched his nose and sat down hard on his backside, feeling the blood start to flow.

  ‘Ow, GOD!’ he shouted, sounding bunged up. ‘Why don’t you look where you’re going.’

  ‘Me?’ said a voice from within the armour. Rather tinny, it was, and muffled. And a little high pitched, if not downright effeminate. ‘I was just standing here. It was you who was going, so to speak.’

  Grincheux, his hands pressed hard on his throbbing nose, looked up and over his fingers. Across greaves, skirts, breast plate and full helmet. The visor was down and gauntlets picked ineffectually at the hinges, trying to move it. Through the grill, he could see pasty white skin.

  ‘Where in this great land did you come from all of a sudden? Is this some new kind of stealth plate armour I’m not familiar with or are you one of those weird magicky spelly type fighters? Not sure I agree with that, you know. Doesn’t seem like playing fair to me.’

  ‘Could you help me with this thing?’ A gauntlet tapped on the visor.

  Grincheux shook his head and stood up. He wiped bloody hands down his jacket, grabbed the hinges and turned sharply up. He was met with a broad smile from a small round freckled face. Good gods, the boy looked about twelve.

  ‘Are you on stilts in there or something?’

  ‘No,’ said the boy, whining slightly. ‘But I am stuck. Could you…you know?’

  It took an age. Or it felt like it. A few people wandered past and one or two offered a little advice but largely they pointed and laughed or ignored what was going on completely. But, in the fullness of time, a pile of plate armour sat on the floor and Grincheux looked up at the tall young ma-

  ‘Err…’ he burbled and pointed vaguely at some rather beautiful long hair followed by what was undeniably a pair of breasts.

  ‘What?’ she said. ‘Got a problem?’

  ‘Well no,’ blustered Grincheux. ‘I just, well, you know.’

  ‘I’ve been looking for you ever since I left jousting class.’

  ‘You have? I mean. Have you? Oh, well, I’ve been around.’ Grincheux gestured vaguely towards the common room. A place he would give his quill hand to be in right now.

  ‘I’m your new hero. My name’s Cassandra. Cassandra the Swiftblade.’

  Grincheux chuckled and ignored the proffered hand. ‘Oh, my dear I don’t think so. I do senior heroes only.’

  He buffed his lapels.

  ‘There’s no mistake,’ said Cassandra. ‘I’ve got the parchment.’

  ‘That’s as maybe,’ said Grincheux. ‘But I didn’t get to be a senior scribe by entrusting my life to a whelp barely out of—’

  Grincheux didn’t remember taking the decision to lie flat on his back in the corridor but it was impossible to keep track of everything. A face swam into focus above him. It was very close and looked to be wearing a deep frown.

  ‘Why? Think I might not be able to protect you because I’m a girl?’

  ‘The thought never entered my he—’

  ‘Or perhaps you think I’d be too slow.’

  Grincheux didn’t see her move but he could certainly feel the blade point at his neck. He decided not to comment on her speed at this juncture. The sword moved and she grabbed him by the neck and hauled him to his feet. So, quite strong for a delicate little thing, then. Or perhaps he’d lost weight recently. He was feeling pretty trim right now.

  Cassandra’s face speared into his vision once more.

  ‘The point is, in case it has escaped your attention, that there are no senior heroes. They are all lying dead in far flung fields. And indeed not so far flung. That’s why poor little me is being pressed into service early and why big bold scribe you has been appointed to me, get it?’

  ‘Well, since you put it so eloquently—’

  Cassandra crushed the parchment into his chest. ‘Eloquence is your department, pal…although I was top of my heroic utterance class. Mine is fighting evil. And, since I have no intention of dying young, I anticipate our relationship will be a long and fruitful one.’

  ‘Well,’ said Grincheux. ‘That’s encouraging.’

  ‘I’m glad you think so,’ said Cassandra. ‘Because we’re starting tomorrow. Leading the forces of the Lord of Light and Love to battle in the Kasterian Mountains.’

  ‘That’s excellent,’ said Grincheux, smoothing out the parchment. ‘Really it is. And I will of course prepare myself with the same professional attitude as ever. But there is something I was rather hoping to sort out this afternoon and I thought perhaps, seeing as you’re my new hero, that you might, you know, help.’

  Cassandra stepped back. ‘Heroes stride the battlefields, slaying evil. When they are at the academy, they meditate, pray and spar, bringing themselves to the peak of their powers for the trials ahead.’

  ‘Well, there could be some slaying of, er, evil involved as it happens.’

  ‘Where?’

  Grincheux shrugged. ‘Here, actually.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘If you could delay your meditation for a couple of minutes and deign to take tea with me, I’ll fill you in. Might help you enjoy that long career you say you want.’

  Cassandra looked at him askance. ‘All right. But if you’re wasting my time, Kettifer will hear about it.’

  ‘Doubtless he will,’ said Grincheux. ‘Come on, this way.’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Kettifer hurried along the corridor from his office, below a hastily drawn banner stating ‘Principal Only’ and down a flight of stairs where the heat began to rise. He was a happy man. Gletterforst had approved the books and reinforced his support. The both of them would retire in just a few short months, their pension pots comfortably full, their reputations untarnished. All in all, a plan of some genius and managed impeccably. Just a few loose ends to tie up. Travel plans, guarantees, that sort of thing.

  He bustled down the stairs and turned a sharp right at the bottom, fetching up sharply. The sound of saws and hammering drifted towards him from the great pit ahead, dimmed by the great bulk occupying much of the corridor. He frowned and took a pace backwards before gathering himself.

  ‘What,’ he said. ‘Are you doing here?’

  The bells chimed and students poured into the halls and corridors of the HERO Academy. It was time to eat. The smells of cooking permeated every stone. Grincheux wrinkled his nose. Cabbage boiled to a pulp
. Indeterminate meat in carvable gravy. Potatoes with more eyes than a dozen spiders. He shook his head and yearned for the days of trail rations and his hero walking into camp with a deer over his shoulder. So distant now.

  ‘Didn’t used to smell like that when I was first here, what, twenty years ago. Of course the school was smaller then. The trouble is, there hasn’t been investment over the last decade or so. All this stinks of cost-cutting to me,’ said Grincheux.

  ‘If you ask me, it smells of sh—’

  ‘Well, never mind. We aren’t eating today.’

  ‘Aren’t we?’ asked Cassandra. ‘I thought we were having tea.’

  Grincheux stopped and looked at Cassandra. There was something close to shock in her eyes.

  ‘Heroes need food,’ she explained.

  ‘Yes but you just said—’

  ‘We must take sustenance where we can. Strength must be maintained. Evil eats. We must eat.’

  ‘All right,’ said Grincheux slowly. ‘You’re being a little scary now.’

  They were standing in the middle of a corridor leading from a set of scribe classrooms to the dining hall which lay adjacent to the gymnasium and combat quadrangle. There was nothing like stale sweat odours to help the digestion. Pupils flowed around them. High-pitched voices bounced from the walls, irritating the ears.

  ‘Only those who wish to die will refuse sustenance before battle.’

  ‘But we aren’t going into battle.’

  Cassandra’s face cleared abruptly. She focused on him, frowning.

  ‘You don’t know that,’ she said.

  ‘Just a quick cup of tea. We haven’t got time to eat.’

  ‘How can you possibly say that? We don’t even know what we’re looking for. You haven’t told me anything.’

  Grincheux sighed and made to set off up the corridor. Cassandra’s hand on his shoulder was surprisingly strong.

  ‘We will eat.’

  ‘Doesn’t feel like you need to.’

  ‘Nevertheless.’

  Grincheux took quick stock of the determination in Cassandra’s face and the tightening grip on his shoulder. He patted his stomach.

  ‘Now you mention it, I am a little peckish.’