Black Dawn

by Peter J Evans

  They moved towards it, treading carefully, stopping when they reached its shadows. That was when Trewpeny heard what Slafot had: voices, flat and dead in the muffling snow. The heavy crunch of boots on snow, the dull clatter of sheathed swords. His heart jolted behind his ribs.

  Marshals, maybe a hundred metres away, maybe less; the snow made it hard to tell. Trewpeny held his breath.

  One of the voices rose momentarily in laughter. A patrol, then. They'd not been discovered, yet, but there was no doubt that the men he could hear were getting closer. They must have come from the Crannock Road watchtower, but that meant that they were not only close to their base, but moving away from it. They'd not be returning any time soon.

  If Trewpeny and Slafot waited where they were, they'd be found. The marshals didn't employ fools.

  He glanced behind him, down the alley. There were no lanterns there, just the barest hint of light flicking from beyond the far end. He tapped Slafot's arm, and pointed. "Come on."

  "What's down there?"

  "How the bloody hell should I know?" As he whispered, he was already moving between the houses, their walls so close together that they scraped both his shoulders at once. Trewpeny was a narrow man, tall and almost unnaturally slender, and even he had to hold his arms in to get out of the far end of the alley. Slafot, with his wide shoulders and deep chest, had to turn sideways.

  Trewpeny paused again as he got out into the open, but there had been no shout from the approaching patrol. The voices were definitely closer, though.

  He thought about lurking here until they passed by, but decided against it. He and Slafot were now in a cramped, unpaved lane, little more than the neglected space between one street of houses and the next. The patrol, if they were worth what the Elect paid them, would at least point a lantern into such an obvious hiding place. It was best to keep moving.

  He beckoned Slafot on, not daring to speak with those other voices so near, and together they began to make their way along the lane, the new snow creaking beneath their soles. The stuff was already a finger's width thick on the ground, and coming down faster with every passing minute. If the wind picked up, anyone caught outside would be in trouble, marshals and fugitives alike.

  Another alley opened up alongside them, and past that yet another street, twisting and ill-cobbled, its remaining lanterns fluttering. Half the houses on its far side were boarded up, the rest left open to the elements and crumbling. Still too close to the patrol, Trewpeny crossed the road, skirting a drain-gutter brimming with frozen filth and ducked between two crumbling shacks and into the lane beyond.

  That was when he realised that he was completely lost.

  Trewpeny felt a solid wad of panic appear behind his sternum. The angles of these narrower lanes and alleys were not regular, and he was no longer quite sure which way he was facing. The snow was falling faster, building up on the frozen ground and making everything looks strange and unreal. If Trewpeny had been unsure of his way before, he had lost it completely now.

  In that moment, all his ambitions withered. He'd failed Daedalus before he had even become a part of it.

  There was no choice but to abandon the quest. If he and Slafot could avoid the patrol, perhaps they could find some open ruin in which to bed down until the angelus bell rang, and it was legal to be about the streets once more.

  It would be a cold and miserable few hours, but it was better than capture. Anyone caught abroad after curfew would be hauled back to the nearest watchtower for a night in the cells. If they were drunk, they'd be fined and released after angelus, so they could get themselves cleaned up in time to pray for forgiveness at matins. Men who were sober would be looked at more closely: the marshals would assume they were up to no good.

  That, of course, was assuming the Endura didn't get involved. They had been more vigilant of late, and there were fresh corpses hanging from the Tabernacle walls. Sure signs of a purge.

  There was every chance that they might take an interest in two young men found in the lower city after curfew, one of them carrying an empty canvas sack rolled up under his cloak...

  That wasn't something Trewpeny wanted to think about. He began to study the houses close by, wondering if they were far enough from the patrol yet, whether any of these broken places would be sheltered enough to keep them alive until angelus.

  But something about the scene was strange. Beyond the saw-tooth outline of roofs, he saw lights in the sky.

  Lanterns were glowing there, high in the snow-shot darkness. For a moment Trewpeny was so disorientated that he couldn't quite work out why they were set so far above ground. Had he and Slafot gone down some great slope, and not realised it?

  Then it came to him. "Watchtower lights," he whispered. "God's truth, Jon! The Gate!"

  "You found it?" There was a smile in Slafot's voice. "Looks like you knew the way after all!"

  Trewpeny said nothing, but he was grinning as he scurried past the watchtowers and into the ruins.

  If the map had been in his possession for longer, Trewpeny might have learned it more thoroughly and been spared some of his fears. However, it had only been given to him that night, just after the end of compline and the tavern he had been sitting in at the time was hardly the kind of place he would have chosen to study it.

  He'd had little choice in the matter. There had been one opportunity, and one only, to make the connection with Daedalus. Any hesitation on his part, or that of Jon Slafot, and neither of them would ever have seen or heard from it again.

  It had only been by sheer chance, and more than a little stupidity on his own part, that he had come this close. In fact, if it hadn't have been for the ales he had consumed at a much more salubrious tavern the previous nightwinter, there would have been no map, no mission, and no chance of joining the movement that Anton Trewpeny fully believed would save his life.

  The tavern was called the Plough, which was no surprise. Given that almost a third of Igantia's population worked in the fields surrounding the city, or in the distribution of the produce thus gained, there were at least six 'Ploughs' within walking distance of Trewpeny's boarding house. This wasn't the closest, or even the best, but it served a good, cheap ale. In some of the fancier places, neither Trewpeny nor Slafot could have drunk enough to make it worthwhile, not on what they earned at the copyist.

  Even so, both men had been almost at the limit of their finances when the women had walked in. There were two of them, solidly bundled in nightwinter clothes, but pretty enough for Trewpeny to look past the field-dirt on their faces. Slafot, of course, had noticed them as soon as they had walked in, and had nudged Trewpeny hard in the ribs. It could only have been the beer in his gut that made Trewpeny take Slafot's lead that night, and not turn on his friend and tell him not to be so daft.

  Anton Trewpeny was not a man that women found interesting. Truth be told, neither was Jon Slafot, although that never stopped him trying.

  Maybe Trewpeny should have remembered that earlier, but before he knew it he and Jon and the two women were sitting around a table together, with more drinks standing on it than he could really afford. Slafot was doing most of the talking, which was the way of things. Trewpeny didn't have much experience of talking to women, not in the way expected of him now. Most such conversations had consisted largely of him sitting and wondering what to say.

  For a time, this one seemed no different, and the woman sitting close to Trewpeny had been getting visibly bored. That was until Slafot had mentioned Daedalus.

  That certainly got a reaction, although Trewpeny had been rather too addled at the time to make much sense of it. If the women liked to hear about Daedalus then, he thought, so be it.

  If he had been sober, he never would have opened his mouth. Even mentioning Daedalus in earshot of a marshal was grounds for time in a watchtower cell. The movement was proscribed by the Elect, the rulers of the city, and that prohibition was brutally enforced by the Endura. Those bastards were well known to employ torture in th
eir efforts to root out Daedalus and the heresies it espoused, and had Trewpeny been overheard by the wrong people he would have been in very serious trouble indeed.

  Ale, however, has a loud, clear voice, louder than any note of caution that might have sounded in Trewpeny's head at that point. Lucky for him, then, that the women later turned out to be Daedalus sympathisers, and not Endura spies.

  Trewpeny, despite his slender frame, did not readily fall insensible from drink, but he did that night. Slafot too, which was even stranger. Trewpeny realised later that the women had drugged them both, to avoid the dangerous conversation becoming lethal but something in his drunken fervour for Daedalus must have made an impression on them because they came back.

  The pick-up was just where the map showed it would be, and exactly as the man who had given it to them had described. Trewpeny found the package under a pile of fallen roof slates, in the corner of an abandoned hovel.

  It was a small thing, maybe the size of a man's hands held together in prayer, and wrapped tightly in what looked like oiled linen. Whoever had brought it into the city had tied the linen around it with twine, and then secreted it in the rubble. Its location was passed on in code through operative after operative, until it finally led to the man who looked like a farmer but certainly wasn't one. He had handed Trewpeny a folded map and told him to be careful.

  It couldn't have been an important item. It must have been something trivial, even to Daedalus, maybe an item very much like one that had been found before. It might even be a fake, a slab of timber dressed in cloth and hidden to test him. He wasn't about to unwrap it and find out.

  That was part of the test. Daedalus was based on a desire to know, but sometimes knowledge was the most dangerous thing of all.

  Trewpeny pulled the package free and turned it over in his hands, the frozen cloth crunching faintly. "God's truth, Jon. This is it."

  Slafot was at the doorway, looking out into the night. "What is it?"

  "How should I know?"

  "Oh, right." The bigger man nodded and then chuckled nervously. "Never thought it would come to this, Anton. Before God, until now I never really believed Daedalus existed."

  Trewpeny straightened up, placing the package carefully into his canvas bag. The bag was fastened with a leather thong, which he drew tight and tied to his belt, moving the loop around so the bag hung at his back, under the cloak. "Well, it exists all right and we're in it up to our necks, for good or ill."

  "Aye." Slafot glanced back outside. "We should be away."

  "Maybe we should wait. The snow..."

  "It's stopped falling. Anyway, we wouldn't want to be caught here, of all places. They might need this spot again."

  Or, thought Trewpeny, it might already be known to the Endura. He was damned just for picking the package up, his soul forfeit for even touching the thing, and if he was caught with it he'd be tortured and hanged without mercy. Slafot's chances of escaping the Elect's wrath would be fractionally higher if they weren't caught hanging around a known pick-up point.

  "You're right. Let's get home."

  There was no one in the street outside, and the sounds of the patrol had long since faded. Trewpeny stepped past Slafot and out into the snow.

  It was bitingly cold and there was a breeze, weak and thin, but still enough to cut into the skin. Trewpeny had been sheltered from it inside the ruined house, but now it was almost blinding. He dipped his head, drew the coat tighter around his shoulders and set off, shivering.

  He found it difficult to judge how long he had been out. He hadn't heard the hourbell ring for ages, not so far away from the centre of the city and with the snow muffling every sound. It might be an hour before angelus, or only two or three after compline. The flat, unchanging sky gave him no clues.

  Trewpeny didn't try to retrace his steps exactly. Instead he led Slafot through a series of alleyways and lanes that ran vaguely at right-angles to the city wall. If he could keep heading west, he reasoned, before long he would find a place he recognised.

  Igantia was a big city, but he could still walk it, wall to wall, in an hour; two in the snow, three while staying quiet enough to avoid patrols. There was still a chance he could be back through his front door before the angelus bell sounded.

  That was the thought in his mind when he ran into the patrol.

  The marshals had been waiting for them, hiding at either end of a lane between two streets of dilapidated hovels. If Trewpeny hadn't had his head down to avoid the freezing wind he might have spotted them earlier. As it was, he was within a dozen paces of them before he saw them step out to block his path.

  Behind him, Slafot cursed. Two more marshals had moved into view at the other end of the lane.

  Marshals travelled in groups of five when on patrol. There were three in front of him. None had their swords drawn, but their visors were down.

  One of them, shorter than Trewpeny but broader, with an ornate mask for a visor, stepped ahead of the others. "Yield, lad," he said quietly. "There's nowhere to go."

  Trewpeny took a step back, shaking his head. "How?" he managed.

  The marshal didn't speak, just tilted his mask at the ground. Trewpeny looked down, and then back, to see the line of footprints in the snow behind him. He groaned.

  God's blood, how could he have been so stupid? As soon as the snow started to fall, he'd been leaving a clear trail. From the markets all the way to the pick-up point.

  The marshal raised a hand and held it palm up. "I'll lighten your load, son."

  Trewpeny began to reach back under his cloak, and as he did so he saw the marshal flinch. Just a fraction, but unmistakeable.

  The man was afraid of him.

  No, not of him, of what he held. Trewpeny snatched the bag from his belt and held it aloft. "Get back!" he yelled.

  After so long keeping his voice to a whisper, the volume of the shout surprised even him. One of the marshals took a step away, hand dropping to his sword, and the others started.

  "Christ, boy, don't be a bloody fool!" That was the leader, his voice a hiss from behind his visor, unsure though. Trewpeny held the bag higher, waving it at him.

  "What, do you think they'd entrust it to the likes of me if it was safe? Now get back, before I drop this bag and we all die!"

  The leader's sword was out, the edge of it catching lantern-light. Trewpeny hadn't even seen it drawn, but now its tip was wandering the air in front of him. Not as steady as it should have been, though.

  He shook his head. "No, marshal," he said. "I've got no quarrel with you or your men, but stand away or you'll find out why the Elect fear us so much." He brought the bag around, until it hung between him and the blade.

  "Lad-"

  "I said stand away. Your men, too." He gave the bag an experimental shake. "Marshal, you're sworn to protect the people of this city so let us be. I can make this device safe once I'm away, but if it fulfils its purpose in these streets the fires will burn until daysummer, I swear before God."

  There was a moment, a very long moment indeed, when everything in the lane remained exactly as it was; unmoving, time itself frozen. Trewpeny could feel it shiver in the air around him, as though the whole world was in balance, and the slightest tap would send it tilting one way or another. A breath in this direction, and the marshals would scatter; a nudge in that, and the leader would step forwards and slice the hand from his wrist. In yet another, the device really would explode, sending him straight to hell for having touched it in the first place, let along swearing before God what he knew to be a lie.

  Whatever caused the final nudge took the moment in a different direction to all of these. The marshals didn't scatter, but at a nod from their leader the two behind Trewpeny moved aside. He heard their boots on the snow, and Slafot's murmur of disbelief. A glance over his shoulder confirmed that his way was now clear.

  "Slowly, Jon," he breathed. "Keep your head."

  Slafot said nothing, but started to walk carefully back between the two mar
shals. Trewpeny listened to the squeak of his boots in the snow, still cursing himself for not thinking about footprints, and then began to follow him. Even if he survived this encounter, he thought despairingly, it would be more than likely that Daedalus would have him slaughtered in his sleep, for such stupidity.

  All the marshals were ahead of him now, regrouping at the end of the lane. All had their swords drawn. Trewpeny continued to walk backwards, the bag still held high, the muscles in his arm beginning to quiver. Whatever he had found among the roof slates, it was heavy. He wasn't sure how long he could keep it aloft.

  "Jon?" he muttered, from the corner of his mouth. "You ready?"

  "For what?"

  "Shit, I don't know! Give me a minute..." Trewpeny's heart was hammering behind his ribs, pulses in his head throbbing in sympathetic rhythm. He'd always hoped that in moments like these his mind would start to race and his thoughts would achieve a pure, crystalline clarity. Instead, all he felt was cold, sluggish and terrified.

  He forced himself to think. In a few paces he and Slafot would be at the end of the lane and, once he was out of sight, the marshals would have no choice but to pursue. They were five fit, trained men, armed and armoured, and sworn to protect the city from heresies just like the one he was holding before them. At the first opportunity, they would be after him.

  There was no way he could outrun or outfight them. God's truth, he couldn't even think straight!

  He looked behind him, past Slafot to the houses lined up to block his way. Almost all of them were completely dilapidated, their walls sagging in the darkness, glistening with frozen rot. Several had no roofs at all, just heaps of tile and broken timber. With enough of a push, any one of them might-

  Trewpeny stopped dead in his tracks. "Jon?"

  "Aye?"

  "I reckon we've got one chance at this. Just do what I do - either this will get us away, or we're caught and dead. You trust me?"