Ruin

by John Gwynne

  ‘Thank you,’ Fidele said, feeling suddenly weary beyond measure.

  ‘It’s a gut wound,’ Alben said. ‘If it’s pierced his intestines, he will most likely die, in agony.’

  She felt something twist inside her, a cold fist clenching around her heart. No. Not after coming so far.

  ‘If they are not cut then he may still die – fever and the like. I have seen people live, but only a handful out of hundreds. He may wake at any time – there is seed of the poppy for his pain. No food, only water for the next day. Now, let me take a better look at you.’

  ‘I am fine, just scratches.’

  ‘They need to be cleaned. A scratch can still kill.’

  A hand touched Fidele’s shoulder and she spun around. At first she thought it was a patient, a sickly-looking man staring at her, pale with lank hair, his frame gaunt, almost withered.

  ‘My lady,’ he said, his eyes touching her face.

  Ektor, Lamar’s son.

  Without thinking she reached out and hugged him. He was a strange man, reserved and introverted, but Fidele had spent some time with him the previous year, poring over manuscripts in his library buried deep in the tower’s bowels, and she had come to see another side of him.

  ‘It is good to see you, Ektor,’ she said as they separated. He was standing stiff and blinking.

  ‘And you too, my lady,’ he managed. He looked around the room. ‘My father, he is waiting for you in his chambers. You should go, now.’

  ‘Lady Fidele has been injured, Ektor. She will be along as soon as she has been cared for,’ Alben said, his hands guiding Fidele to an empty cot. ‘If you could pass that on to your father, I’d be grateful.’

  ‘Send a messenger, I’m busy,’ Ektor said, retreating.

  ‘We’ll talk, soon,’ Fidele said to Ektor, who nodded as he turned and left the room, disappearing into a corridor.

  ‘That boy is always busy, in his mind,’ Alben remarked.

  ‘A boy?’ Fidele smiled. Ektor was the youngest of Lamar’s sons, around twenty summers.

  ‘When you reach my age, my lady, all whose sleep is not interrupted by the need to empty their bladder are boys.’

  Fidele sat there as Alben checked over her wounds, a myriad of cuts and scratches, washed away some blood.

  ‘Have you had word from your son, my lady?’ Alben asked as he cleansed her wounds.

  ‘No.’ My son. Where are you, Nathair? She felt a knot of worry bloom every time that she thought of Nathair, which was every day. Every night before sleep took her she whispered a prayer to Elyon for his safety. Lykos had hinted at terrible things . . .

  ‘So no news of Veradis either, then,’ Alben said.

  ‘Veradis. No,’ Fidele said. For a moment she had had to concentrate to pull his face into memory. So much has happened since Nathair sailed away. ‘In my last correspondence from Nathair . . .’ The letter that stripped me of my regency, my son replacing me with Lykos . . . ‘Veradis was at Nathair’s side, in Dun Carreg, Ardan. Elyon willing, they are still together. Veradis is the one man I trust with Nathair’s life. He has been most faithful, a true friend to my son.’

  ‘He is a good boy,’ Alben said, a faint smile touching the corners of his mouth. ‘I taught him his weapons.’

  ‘And taught them well.’

  A groan drew Fidele’s attention. Maquin was stirring on his cot. His fingers moved and his eyes flickered. They opened, searching. He made to sit up.

  Alben was there, holding his shoulders. ‘No,’ he said.

  Fidele squeezed Maquin’s hand, leaning over him. Recognition swept his face and he relaxed.

  ‘You’re safe,’ Fidele said. ‘Rest.’

  His lips moved but only a whisper came out.

  She leaned forward, putting her ear to his mouth.

  ‘You are a great deal of trouble, my lady,’ he whispered, then his eyes closed and his breathing steadied.

  She jumped suddenly – a loud bang, a grating sound. She turned, saw a grapnel hooked about the edge of the window’s stone sill. A rope dangled from it, disappearing over the sill’s edge. A hand appeared, then a head, shoulders, and in a heartbeat a Vin Thalun corsair was crouched on the wide sill, breathing hard. He drew a sword. All along the room grapple-hooks appeared in other windows.

  Alben was the first to move, powering forwards, sword appearing in his hand. A flick of his wrist and it was buried in the Vin Thalun’s throat. The warrior fell backwards with a gurgle, spinning into nowhere.

  Screams echoed through the hospice as more Vin Thalun appeared, leaping into the room, stabbing at healers and wounded alike.

  ‘Out of here,’ Alben snapped at Fidele. Even as he said it another figure was appearing in the window behind him. Before Alben could turn the Vin Thalun was leaping forwards, crashing into the old swordsmaster, both of them tumbling to the ground. They came to a stop, the Vin Thalun on top of Alben, a knife in his hand.

  Fidele grabbed one of the iron bars heating in the fire-bowl and rammed it into the corsair’s face. He screamed, flesh sizzling as he rolled away from Fidele, from the pain, clutching at his face. Alben rose, sword flashing, and the Vin Thalun stopped screaming.

  ‘Come on,’ Alben said as he gripped Fidele’s shoulder, steering her to the door.

  ‘Maquin,’ she breathed, pulling free and staggering back into the room.

  Vin Thalun were everywhere, slaughtering those about them like wolves in a sheep pen. Maquin was still lying on his cot, though he had pushed himself up onto one elbow, sweat and pain staining his features. She reached him and wrapped an arm about his torso, helping him to stand.

  He grunted with pain but got his feet under him.

  ‘Thought you’d—’ His face twisted in a grimace. ‘Gone.’

  Then Alben was there and they both had him, half-dragging him into the corridor. The sunlight failed to reach here, torches illuminating the hall in a sequence of light and shadow. Screams drifted down the corridor, echoing from other rooms. A figure crashed into them, sending them smashing into a wall. Alben’s sword was at the man’s chest before his panicked cries told them it was Ektor. A handful of Vin Thalun were just behind him.

  ‘Run,’ Alben said as he stepped into the corridor. Ektor ran on, calling for them to follow. Fidele grunted under Maquin’s weight as Alben stepped away on light feet, his arm straightening to skewer the first Vin Thalun. He kicked him back into his comrades, slashed across the eyes of one that avoided the dead man, and then the corridor was momentarily jammed with the dead.

  ‘Alben,’ Fidele cried as she struggled down the corridor with Maquin’s arm about her shoulders. Alben glanced back at her, hovered, clearly on the brink of decision, then sprinted after them.

  They reached a staircase that spiralled both up and down. Alben began to lead them up but Ektor grabbed him.

  ‘No, they are loose on the floors above us; listen.’

  The sound of combat, screams drifted down the stairwell.

  ‘The Vin Thalun behind us will head up, to the gates,’ Ektor said. ‘We should go down, to my chambers. They won’t go that way.’

  Alben nodded sharply and they were running downwards, feet slapping on stone, sconced torches sending their shadows flickering on damp stone walls. Fidele and Alben stopped Maquin from tumbling down the stairwell. Even so he was drenched with sweat and breathing hard when they reached Ektor’s chamber.

  ‘Torch,’ Ektor said to Alben, who reached up and took one from a wall sconce. Ektor rattled a key in a lock, threw the door open and ushered them in, closing it hastily and locking it again. The only light was from Alben’s torch, but Ektor quickly used it to light a few lanterns, then he doused the torch in a bucket.

  ‘Can’t be too careful,’ he said, gesturing into his chamber. Fidele remembered his fear of naked flame and the thousands of scrolls that were kept in this room.

  It didn’t seem to have changed from when Fidele had seen it last. The first half looked as if battle had raged through i
t: chairs over-turned, bed sheets strewn on the floor, half-eaten trenchers of food left to rot. Beyond this wreckage was the library, a great curved stone wall with a thousand alcoves carved into it.

  She helped Maquin into the chamber and he collapsed onto a long table, rolling onto his back with a moan.

  Ektor shrieked at Maquin and none too gently started pulling him upright.

  ‘Ektor, he is injured,’ Fidele said, something in her tone giving Ektor pause. He looked at Maquin, saw the wound low in his belly. ‘My maps,’ he said. ‘He’s crushing my maps. And he’ll be more comfortable on my bed.’

  Fidele and Alben helped Maquin to a huge bed on one side of the chamber. Alben went back to the door and put his ear to it, listening for any sound of the Vin Thalun.

  ‘You need to stop saving my skin,’ Maquin said to her through gritted teeth. ‘This way I’m never going to be out of your debt.’

  You saved me from something far worse than death. From a living hell. No matter how many times I save you from a knife through the heart you will never be in my debt.

  ‘You need to learn how to keep out of the way of sharp iron, then.’

  He started to grin at that, but it shifted into a pained grimace.

  ‘Quiet,’ Alben hissed and they all froze.

  A hundred heartbeats went by; eventually Alben turned back to them.

  ‘There were footsteps on the stairwell, but they have not come this way.’

  ‘How did they scale your walls?’ Fidele asked.

  Alben shrugged. ‘It has never been done before. We are a long way up from the bay.’

  ‘And what now?’ Fidele asked.

  ‘We wait,’ Ektor said.

  ‘For what, the Vin Thalun to overwhelm the tower?’ Fidele said.

  ‘What would you suggest we do?’ Ektor snapped. ‘You, no offence intended, are not exactly warrior-born. Your friend, on the other hand, looks as if he could carve his way to the Otherworld if he had a mind to.’ It did not sound like a compliment the way Ektor sneered as he said it. ‘But he is clearly injured and unable to stand unaided, let alone fight. And the oldest swordsmaster in the Banished Lands.’ Alben scowled at that. ‘And me.’ He smiled ruefully. ‘Not the greatest band of heroes ever mustered.’

  ‘He’s got a point,’ Maquin grunted.

  Fidele thought about it. To go charging into the unknown would be foolish. The thought of Vin Thalun out there, though, possibly taking the tower, opening its gates to Lykos. It was terrifying, all the more so for the not knowing.

  I will cut my own throat before I let him touch me again. She found herself pacing about the chamber, searching for a distraction. Ektor was tidying his table, a worried frown on his face. He seems more worried about his maps than the fact we’re possibly being overrun by invaders.

  I remember studying them with Ektor – how long ago was that? A year? Two?

  She had spent a long day in this chamber with Ektor, listening to his wealth of knowledge on the history of the Banished Lands, trying to unravel clues in the ancient writings of the giants. She had been unsettled by what they had discovered, rumours about the Ben-Elim and Kadoshim walking the earth clothed in bodies of flesh and blood. There was reference to the high king’s counsellor being Kadoshim, a servant of Asroth. The question had been which high king? Aquilus or Nathair? Meical or Calidus? I think I know now, if Lykos’ association with Calidus is anything to go by.

  ‘Did you ever find the answer?’ Fidele asked Ektor.

  ‘Not exactly,’ he said quietly, as if guarding some great secret. ‘But I narrowed it down to two conclusions.’

  ‘So did I,’ Fidele whispered.

  Ektor nodded at her, smiling. ‘You really show a great deal of potential, you know.’

  ‘Thank you,’ she murmured.

  ‘Footsteps,’ Alben hissed, drawing his sword. Fidele pulled her knife from its sheath. The latch lifted, rattled as someone tried to open the door. A fist pounded on the thick oak, dust puffing from the hinges. Fidele felt a knot of fear squirm inside her. She gripped her knife tightly.

  ‘Ektor,’ a voice shouted, ‘are you in there, you pasty-faced bookworm?’

  Fidele’s fear melted away. Only close kin can be so personal and insulting.

  Alben unbolted and opened the door, revealing the bulk of Krelis standing in the doorway, a dozen warriors filling the corridor behind him.

  Ektor came forward and glowered at his brother. ‘You took your time.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CAMLIN

  Camlin stood in the shadows, leaning against a wall. They had rowed into the lake to a tower that protruded from the dark waters like a spear, disembarked and entered a huge round chamber, ivy growing up its walls and birds nesting in its eaves. Edana sat in one of many chairs around a long table, Baird stood a step behind. Pendathran was there, and Drust, the warrior who had brought them here, as well as Roisin and Lorcan.

  News of Edana’s arrival had spread through the camp like sunlight in a dark room, people thronging to see her. She had happily wandered amongst them for a time, Baird and Vonn keeping a watchful eye over her.

  She was not the only one to cause a stir. Roisin seemed to have made a big impression, if the way Pendathran’s eye kept settling upon her was anything to go by.

  ‘An unusual place for a meeting,’ Edana said, looking around the room.

  ‘Aye. Dun Crin is an unusual place altogether,’ Pendathran replied. ‘A giant’s fortress that stood in a valley, is my guess. The histories tell of the world changing shape after Elyon’s Scourging.’ He shrugged, a rippling that made his chair creak. ‘We’ll never know how it came to be like this. But it is hidden well, and if discovered is defendable. Towers like this one are linked by old battlements that are easily defended by only a handful. And there is little chance of surprise out here when the only way across is swimming or a boat.’

  ‘You have chosen admirably,’ Roisin said, ‘A better-defensible place I could not imagine.’

  ‘Thank you, my lady,’ Pendathran said gruffly.

  Is he blushing?

  Camlin glanced out of the window he was standing beside. A good spot to defend, Roisin’s right. But not much of a line of retreat. Or escape. Something sinuous rippled in the waters close by and Camlin pulled a face.

  Don’t much care for the wildlife, either.

  A movement in the shadows near his feet drew his eye and he saw Meg sitting there, knees hunched up to her chest.

  She’s as quiet as a wraith.

  ‘So, I think there’s a need for us to swap tales,’ Pendathran said, smiling at Edana.

  Edana nodded and told them of the flight from Dun Carreg to Domhain. Pendathran and the others about him listened with surprise creeping across their features as Edana told of the battles fought as they clawed their way through Cambren and into the mountains of Domhain.

  ‘Wolven and giants,’ Pendathran muttered, ‘and you fought them all off.’ Camlin saw something kindle in Pendathran’s eyes – respect?

  ‘Not without loss,’ Edana acknowledged sadly.

  The old battlechief lowered his head when Edana spoke of Heb’s death. He had been well known and well liked amongst those who dwelt in Dun Carreg. Many of them nodded and grunted as she spoke of Eremon’s support and first the elation and then the despair of the following battles. Finally Edana told of the flight to the coast and their journey by ship to Ardan. Pendathran growled when he heard of Conall slaying Marrock.

  ‘Ach, how many of my kin will fall in this war? Is there no end to the hurt our family must bear?’ He wrung his hands as if he was squeezing on someone’s neck.

  I forgot, Marrock was Pendathran’s nephew.

  ‘And then we sailed here,’ Edana said. ‘With the help of Roisin and a score of Eremon’s finest shieldmen.’

  ‘Aye, and I’m grateful for that. Both for your presence and that of the extra swords.’

  ‘We are glad and grateful to be here,’ Roisin said, managing to lo
ok both sad and happy at the same time.

  She has more talents than I realized.

  ‘And you, Uncle?’ Edana said. ‘I thought you slain in the feasthall of Dun Carreg.’

  ‘It was a close thing,’ Pendathran said. He shifted a dirty scarf tied around his neck to reveal a white scar. ‘I must have come close to bleeding out in the hall. Don’t know how I didn’t. All I can tell you is that I woke up in a stinking hole – turned out to be Evnis’ cellars.’ He could not stop his eyes flickering to Vonn, who stared fiercely back.

  Just the mention of his da seems to set a cold flame burning in the young warrior.

  Pendathran explained how Evnis had tortured him, and then how he had been rescued by Cywen. After escaping through the tunnels below the fortress he had travelled south from Dun Carreg, ended up wandering around the marshes for over a moon before he had been found by the fledgling resistance.

  ‘Turned out I wasn’t the only one who fled here – there were men from my son’s warband . . .’ He paused, a shadow crossing his face at the mention of his son.

  I remember watching from the walls of Dun Carreg as Dalgar led his warband against Owain’s host. They were sorely outnumbered. Pendathran had led a force out of Dun Carreg’s gates, but the bridge to the mainland had been blocked by Owain’s men. The battle was hard fought, but eventually Pendathran’s relief force had been turned back and Dalgar’s warband routed. Dalgar’s corpse had been delivered to Dun Carreg’s walls. Camlin could still see Pendathran carrying his son’s broken body across the bridge.

  Pendathran rubbed a hand across his eyes and carried on. ‘Warriors who survived the defeat of my son’s warband fled here, many bringing their families with them. Even some of Owain’s have come here.’ He nodded at Drust. It turned out that he had been telling the truth when he claimed that he was a shieldman of Owain.