by Anthony Ryan
“Never seen one come that close to a ship and not attack,” the Shield said.
“If you come with me, I promise an interesting tale that might explain it.”
They stood side by side, watching the shark for a while, the Shield’s face unreadable. “Belorath says you blame yourself for not dying,” she said when the shark dived down into the murky depths. “That’s why you’re here. Waiting for the death you were cheated of.”
“I wasn’t cheated of anything. I was punished. Al Sorna knew well leaving me alive was a far worse fate than merely killing me.”
“I know Lord Al Sorna and he is not cruel. He spared a helpless man, that is all.”
Ell-Nestra gave the faintest of laughs. “I saw his eyes, Highness, heard his words. He saw my soul and he knew I deserved death.”
“Come with me and perhaps you’ll find it. Live and I’ll have the South Tower yards craft you the finest vessel you could dream of, the hold filled with bluestone from end to end.”
“Keep the bluestone, and the ship. I’ll trade it.”
“For what?”
He was too fast, grasping her arms and pulling her close, pressing his lips to hers. She shouted, feeling his tongue probing as her lips parted. Fury gripped her and she bit down. He released her, laughing and spitting blood on the stone. Lyrna glared at him, her heart thumping as she wished the throwing knife still hung about her neck. Instead all she could do was rasp at him, “And you said Al Sorna was cruel.”
“Not cruelty, Highness,” he replied, lisping a little as his tongue continued to leak blood. “Curiosity. And not yet satisfied.” He gave a practised and elegant bow. “Allow me to fetch my meagre belongings and I’ll join you forthwith.”
CHAPTER THREE
Frentis
Illian proved a far better archer than she had a cook. Her arms lacked the muscle for a bow so Davoka had given her a crossbow, the camp’s cook-pots soon benefiting from her new-found skill as she returned from the daily hunt with braces of wood pigeon, pheasant or rabbit. The faith-hound bitch had rarely strayed from her side since that first night around the fire and she named her Blacktooth for the permanently discoloured fang she displayed whenever she growled.
“Thin pickings today,” she said, dumping a single pheasant next to the fire. “I think this part of the forest is running out of game.” She turned an imperious eye on Arendil. “Pluck that for me, will you, boy?”
“Pluck it yourself, snotnose.”
“Peasant!”
“Brat!”
Frentis got up and wandered away as they continued to bicker, eyes tracking over the camp as he moved. Janril Norin was teaching the basics of the sword to some younger recruits, mostly boys no more than fifteen. Davoka sparred with Ermund, something she did most days now as the young knight recovered his strength. They fought with quarterstaffs, the clearing echoing with the sound of colliding wood as they whirled and danced around each other. Frentis knew a little of Lonak customs and wondered if she wasn’t auditioning a new husband judging by the intensity of her expression as they sparred.
Grealin sat with Thirty-Four, the torturer carefully enunciating every Realm Tongue phrase the master taught him. “My name is Karvil,” he said in his odd lilting tones, the Realm words barely coloured by an accent. The days following his abandonment of the pain drug had been hard, seeing him shivering and sweating in his shelter, sometimes clamping a stick in his mouth to stop his screams. At night he rarely slept for more than an hour, Frentis remaining at his side as he writhed and whimpered, often convulsing as he voiced desperate pleas in Volarian. Frentis wondered if they were his own or his victims’.
“That’s the name you’ve chosen?” Frentis asked the former slave.
“For now,” he replied. “I am having difficulty in choosing. You may continue to call me Thirty-Four if you wish.”
He moved on, finding Master Rensial with their small but growing stable of horses. He had them tethered in a narrow clearing away from the main camp where he spent all his time now, pausing only to sleep or eat the food Arendil or Illian brought him, proving no more capable of remembering their names than he was Frentis’s.
“Need corn, boy,” he told him, checking the hooves of a mare they had taken a few days before, a tall hunter ridden by a finely dressed Volarian who had unwisely decided to go in search of boar in company with only a handful of guards. Thirty-Four’s questioning had revealed him as the son of some minor Imperial luminary with only one useful morsel of intelligence: Lord Darnel was now in command of Varinshold.
“This could play to our advantage,” Master Grealin had said. “The Fief Lord is not famed for his intelligence.”
“Best not to underestimate him, brother,” Ermund responded. “A wild cat can’t argue philosophy but it’ll kill you just the same.”
Frentis gave Rensial the same answer he had given several times before. “Corn is in short supply, master.”
“Corn builds muscle,” the mad master went on blithely, moving to the next horse, a veteran stallion taken from the Free Cavalry. It had a greying muzzle but retained considerable power in its muscle-thick limbs and neck. “Warhorse needs corn. Grass is too thin.”
“I’ll make every effort to secure some, master,” Frentis said, as he usually did. “Is there anything else you need?”
“Ask Master Jestin if he can see his way to forging more shoes. Three of these have thrown them already. When you’ve done that the tack needs cleaning.”
Frentis watched him brush the stallion’s coat, seeing the blank devotion in his eyes. “Yes, master.”
◆ ◆ ◆
He toured the pickets next, pausing to converse with the former City Guard corporal who had charge of the south-facing watch. “No sign?”
“None brother. Been at least half a day now.”
Draker and Ratter had gone on a reconnaissance that morning, at their own insistence which was unusual. Frentis suspected they had gone to retrieve some long-buried loot concealed close to the city and surmised they had little intention of returning. It was a source of considerable surprise that they had lingered so long already, as was their failure to shirk danger when brought on a raid.
Good luck to them, he decided, having waited until dusk with no sign of the thieves’ return. Be halfway to Nilsael by now.
“We’ve some brandy left from last week’s raid,” he told the corporal, rising from the concealed watch-post. “Come get your share when your shift’s done.”
A short whistle sounded, signalling possible danger and he immediately sank down again, eyes peering into the dim tree-line. After a few seconds the sound of laboured breathing could be heard, Draker stumbling into view shortly after. The weeks of meagre rations and hard living had denuded much of the outlaw’s weight but he still had difficulty maintaining a decent lick of speed for any distance. He duly collapsed on seeing Frentis emerge from hiding, falling to all fours and gasping for breath.
“Ambush,” he breathed as Frentis held out a canteen. The big man took it and poured the water over his face before taking several large gulps. “We got took. Those slave-soldier bastards and a couple of Renfaelins, hunters to trade by the look of them.”
“Where’s the rat?” the corporal asked.
“Killed him didn’t they? Took their time about it too. They left me to stew over it but I got free.”
“Got free how?” asked Frentis.
“Worked me bonds loose didn’t I? Every outlaw knows that trick.”
“Bonds? They didn’t chain you?”
Draker shook his head dumbly.
Frentis raised his head, ears alive to the song of the forest, straining for the faintest sign . . . There, faint but clear, barking. Renfaelin wolfhounds, not slave-hounds.
“Back to the camp!” he ordered, pulling Draker to his feet. “Form up on the southern flank. We’ve no time
to run.”
“You fucking dullard!” the corporal snarled at Draker as he stumbled in their wake. “Led them right to us.”
Frentis ran through the camp, shouting orders, calling the fighting groups to their positions. He had rehearsed this but never fully expected it to happen, always hoping they would have sufficient warning to flee before the storm descended. The fighters moved quickly after the initial shock, gathering weapons and running to form their uneven ranks.
“Arendil! Lady Illian!” They came running, Arendil with his long sword drawn, Illian with her crossbow and quiver. “There will be skilled fighters amongst them,” Frentis told her. “Men who fight well but show no rage or fear. Get yourself in a tree and kill as many as you can. Arendil, keep her safe.”
The boy lingered a second to argue but was forced to follow when Illian instantly scampered off.
“Best if you linger in the rear, Master,” Frentis told Grealin as the bulky brother strode to his side, sword drawn. “Provide a rally point if they break through.”
Grealin just raised an amused eyebrow and stayed where he was, soon joined by Ermund and Davoka. “The children?” she asked.
“As safe as I could make them,” he replied. “Look for the Kuritai and stay close to me. We need to even the odds.”
Draker came huffing up, his heavy cudgel in hand, deep contrition etched into his face. “Sorry brother . . .” he began.
“Had to happen sometime,” Frentis told him. “Did you find your loot?”
Draker gave a rueful shrug. “That’s how they caught us. They’d staked out our stash. Ten full skins of redflower juice. We thought the healers could use it.”
Frentis saw no trace of a lie on the thief’s face. Not a thief now, he realised. A soldier. “Watch my back, will you?” he said.
Draker raised his cudgel in a salute. “An honour, brother.”
Frentis unlimbered his bow and notched an arrow as a thick silence fell on the camp, all eyes fixed on the wall of trees. “Maybe they missed us,” Draker whispered.
Frentis suppressed a laugh and kept his eyes on the trees. They weren’t long in coming, moving forward at a steady run, no bugles or war cries, just a hundred or so silent expressionless men running to battle with a sword in each hand. Expensive, Frentis thought. Gathering so many just for us.
“Archers up!” he shouted and the bowmen rose from their hiding places to loose their volley. The Kuritai rolled, dodged and leapt as the shafts flew, no more than half a dozen falling before they closed on the fighters. Frentis managed to bring down two before tossing his bow aside and charging forward with sword drawn.
He saw a Kuritai hack his way into a knot of fighters, swords blurring as they tried vainly to fend him off. He leapt a fallen fighter, parried the Kuritai’s left-hand sword and jabbed his longer blade into his eye, too fast for the counter. Another came for him, swords coming together like scissor blades as he attempted a decapitating blow, then doubling over as Davoka’s spear took him in the side, Ermund stepping forward to finish him with a two-handed sword stroke.
A shout drew his gaze to the rear, finding Draker swinging his cudgel at a Kuritai who ducked and lunged forward, short sword jabbing. Master Grealin moved faster than Frentis thought possible, the Order blade taking the slave in the thigh, sending him to the ground. Draker yelled in fury and fell on the man, cudgel rising and falling in a cloud of blood.
Frentis surveyed the battle, seeing far too many bodies on the ground and too many Kuritai still standing. He looked for the hardest-pressed group, finding a dense knot of men and women near the centre of the camp, assailed on all sides.
“With me!” he shouted to Davoka, palming a throwing knife and casting it at the nearest enemy. The man staggered as the knife sank into his bare upper arm, reaching to retrieve it with a hand that was hacked off before his eyes. Frentis killed two more in quick succession, his sword like a steel whip as he parried and slashed his way through their line. The fighters rallied to him, screaming and hacking with their mismatched weapons, Davoka and Ermund joining the fray, fighting back-to-back, spear and sword stabbing and slashing in a tireless frenzy.
Not enough, Frentis realised as the fighters closed in around him, Kuritai moving in on all sides. Didn’t free enough for a real army.
The thunder of hooves dragged his attention to the rear of the camp and he saw Master Rensial charging through the trees on the veteran stallion, leaning low in the saddle, sword extended. He speared a Kuritai through the back, pulling the blade clear as he galloped past the falling corpse, killing another with a slash through the shoulder and riding down one more, the stallion stamping and voicing a shrill whinny as the Kuritai rolled beneath its hooves.
A Kuritai ran forward to kneel in front of the rearing horse, another running and planting both feet on his back, vaulting towards the mad horse-master, both swords raised above his head. Rensial’s face remained as blank as always as he danced the horse to the side, the Kuritai flying past, his slashing swords missing by inches. He landed, rolling and turning to renew his attack, then falling dead as a crossbow bolt flew from above to spear him through the neck, Davoka and Ermund charging in to cut down his companion in a coordinated dance of spear and sword.
Master Rensial’s empty gaze found Frentis for a moment, then he was off again, charging towards the densest knot of Kuritai, his sword moving in the kind of perfect silver arcs Frentis had never quite managed to match on the practice ground. He saw three more Kuritai fall before the master disappeared from view.
His charge bought a brief respite as the Kuritai regrouped, the surviving fighters running to Frentis’s side. So few, he thought as they clustered around him, eyeing the neatly ordered troops of Kuritai now moving to encircle them once more. I shouldn’t have waited so long. He put his fingers in his mouth and whistled, loud and shrill. The answer was almost immediate, the snarling, roaring barks of the faith-hounds filling the forest as their handlers let them loose, hurtling through the trees towards the Kuritai. They saw the danger and fell into a defensive formation, forming into a single company with their impossible precision, one rank kneeling in front and the other standing behind, short swords held at full extension. A formidable, perhaps unassailable fortress of flesh and steel.
Slasher bounded towards them and leapt, turning in midair as he sailed over their heads and landed in the centre of the circle. A gap appeared in their ranks barely a second later, the hound tearing through flesh and bone as his pack raced towards the hole he had carved. Frentis raised his sword and charged in their wake, the fighters following as the Kuritai’s cohesion shattered. He hacked a man’s legs from under him, reversed the blade and stabbed down through his chest, the fighters racing past to join in the slaughter. The Kuritai fought to the end of course, no sign of panic or fear as they were hacked down or torn apart by fang and claw, claiming ever more fighters and hounds before the last finally disappeared under a dozen slashing blades.
Frentis did a count as the fighters staggered around in the aftermath of the carnage. No more than fifty left, he surmised. At least a third of those wounded.
Janril was still amongst the living, hacking at something concealed beneath the ferns with slow methodical strokes of his sword. He stopped and bent down to retrieve his prize, holding it up as blood gushed from the stump of its neck. The former minstrel laughed as he shook the head up and down, the mouth opening and closing in a grotesque parody of speech. Frentis found himself shamed by the realisation he had hoped Janril would have found his end today. There will never be peace for one such as him.
A high-pitched yell came from the rear, Davoka instantly hefting her spear and running towards it. Illian.
Frentis followed, seeing Master Grealin up ahead, the big man moving with surprising speed once more as he raced through the undergrowth. Beyond him Frentis could see Arendil battling two Kuritai, his long sword moving in fluid arcs as he
turned aside their short swords, twisting and ducking as they tried to close. He could see Illian standing amidst the branches of an oak above the fight, hands spread helplessly. No more bolts.
Arendil was forced to back away at speed as the Kuritai redoubled their efforts, one slashing low the other high. The boy’s feet found a tree root and he stumbled, falling flat on his back, the Kuritai closing, swords raised.
Master Grealin stopped twenty yards short, lowering his sword and raising his free hand, fingers spread wide . . . And the Kuritai flew.
It was as if some great invisible fist swept down to batter them from their feet. One colliding with the trunk of the oak, wrapping around it with enough force to shatter his spine. The other glanced off the branch where Illian was perched, the girl uttering a yelp as he spun from the impact to land some ten yards away.
Davoka paused to stare at Grealin for an instant, a palpable fear and distaste on her face. “Rova kha ertah Mahlessa,” she said in a low voice before running on to check on the young folk.
Frentis walked to Grealin’s side, seeing an expression of sombre regret on his face, his skin clammy and pale, as if he had suffered a great pain. “I thought I had imagined it,” Frentis said. “The Volarian impaled on the branch. A feverish vision. Any other surprises for me, Master?”
Grealin gave a slight smile. “Actually, my correct title is Aspect.”
◆ ◆ ◆
He sent Janril after the Renfaelin hunters along with ten of their most capable remaining fighters. As instructed they killed the dogs to erase the memory of their scent and kept one of the hunters alive for questioning. His defiance didn’t last long, a few moments in Thirty-Four’s company proving sufficient persuasion to fully loosen his tongue.
“Our lord is convinced his son resides in this forest,” the man said, a lean fellow of middling years with the weathered look of a professional tracker. The fingers of his left hand dripped blood continually from where Thirty-Four had thrust rose thorns under his nails. “We were promised ten golds to bring him back, twenty if he was still alive. He paid for the slaves out of his own pocket, bought them from the Volarian general.”
