by Ben Galley
And without a further word the mage was off, hobbling down the hill in a limping run, heading towards the dark clouds that were gathering over the city. The dragons watched him leave and Farfallen sighed quietly to himself.
The mood in Krauslung was sombre and down-trodden. Every door was closed every window latched. The taverns and drinking-holes of the city were unusually quiet, and as Farden lurched past them he watched the men in the candle-lit windows, looking at their yellow melancholy faces sipping at cold ale. Farden trudged on. Soon he began to feel the first signs of a rain storm splash on his shoulders and he heard the heavy thwack of several drops landing on his dirty hood. The rain was just the thing to brighten the mood of the city, thought the mage. He snorted. Half of Krauslung was covered by the cloud of smoke and ash that still rose from the nearby hilltop. The city mourned for its deep loss. The mood was taught like a bowstring.
Farden zig-zagged through desolate streets and alleyways with his fists clenched in his pockets and hood pulled low over his fiery eyes. A flash of colours, gold, white, red, and black, suddenly appeared overhead between two rooftops and the mage managed to catch a glimpse of four dragons heading for the great hall. His rib still burned with pain, but he forced himself through it, feeling that vengeance was close at hand. He thought only of Cheska.
The guards at the citadel gates were silent and wary of Farden. With angry eyes they looked at the mage as if he were someone to blame, but they did not challenge him, and so Farden limped on past.
Stairs made his wound protest and scream with fresh agony, and the long hallways seemed endless. As he made his way deeper and deeper into the fortress the white marble and gold trimmings of the Arkathedral disappeared and were gradually replaced by drab granite and gloom. Windows were replaced with stone walls and thick iron doors dotted the corridors. Guards stood quietly on every corner but they didn’t bother Farden. They just stared at him blankly as he hurried past, deeper into the mountain. Like Hjaussfen, the prisons were like a warren, a labyrinth of cells and hallways designed to slow the escape of anyone who would dare. But Farden wasn’t escaping. He knew exactly where he was going.
Soon he came to another thick iron door. At some point in the past someone had painted it a dull blood red, but the colour had long-since flaked away and left the metal brown and rust-coloured. Farden kicked at the door and it swung open, startling a young guard standing on the other side.
‘State your business!’ he demanded and the mage found a shaky spearpoint waving in his face. Farden held up both of his hands. ‘I’m here to see the Arkmage,’ he said.
The young man shook his head resolutely. ‘Nobody’s to go in there, Lord Vice’s orders, under pain of death!’
Farden’s patience was growing dangerously thin. ‘I don’t have ti...’
‘I’m sorry sir, but you’ll have to leave!’ The spearpoint got closer as the man took a careful step forward.
Farden he grabbed the spear shaft and swiftly broke it in two. He pushed the shocked guard backwards until his armour collided with the wall and then he sent him sprawling on the floor with a deft kick. Dazed the young guard cowered on the floor fearfully.
Farden grabbed him by the collar of his breastplate. ‘I said I don’t have time for this! Now where’s Helyard?’ he bellowed, every word making the man jump a little more. The guard pointed a shaky hand to the dark corridor leading off from the little room. ‘Down th... there sir!’
‘Good man,’ muttered Farden. He lifted up a clenched fist and a light spell burned the shadows away and half-blinded the young guard. Anger bubbled inside of him, and even though he had no idea quite what he was about to do somehow he was starting to sense that vengeance and answers were close at hand. Farden tried to calm his breathing. The magick ran like boiling water though his veins. He thought only of Cheska.
Farden found the cell door and gritted his teeth, spreading his palm over the cold steel and oak and letting his fingers creep over the metal. The symbols on his wrist burned white like fire under his vambraces. The mage had no time for subtlety. He could feel the magick pulse through his forearm but he held firm and pushed with all his strength at the door, making the iron buckle and writhe under his hand. The door rippled and shook again with a terrible wrenching sound. Farden clenched his jaw even harder and pushed with every ounce of his strength. Sweat dripped from his forehead.
Suddenly there was a crunch and a metallic squeal and splinters exploded from under the metal brackets. Farden didn’t even blink. With another shove the door buckled and flew open in a cloud of white dust. The mage didn’t waste a second. He burst through the haze and stormed into the room, fists clenched and fire trailing around his wrists. His heart pounded and his eyes eagerly roved around the room.
Then the smell hit him, that sickly rotting smell that nobody could ever forget once they had experienced it. Farden saw the body on the floor surrounded by a dark sticky pool of blood and his heart fell in his chest like a cold rock in the colder sea. The mage walked forward slowly and knelt by the corpse’s side. It was Helyard. The old man’s head was twisted at a ridiculous angle and his body lay in an awkward position. A long knife was buried hilt-deep in his chest. The Arkmage’s face was ashen and grey, his eyes were misted over and glazed in death and a horrified expression was frozen on his face. He looked shocked, pained, and Farden stared into his glazed eyes. He wondered what he had seen or what he had been thinking, who he had faced. The mage gingerly lifted Helyard’s chin and moved his head slightly, trying to restore some sense of decorum to the old man’s posture and with a gentle hand he closed his eyes for the final time. A renewed sense of loss washed over Farden like a bucket of ice water. He sighed and looked around at the room, looking at the pockmarks in the walls and the splintered remains of what looked like a cot. The floor was cracked and blistered, like the armour of the unfortunate guards at the Spire. Without a sound Farden stood up and walked out, leaving Helyard in peace. He thought only of Cheska.
Chapter 17
“I am not becoming someone different, I am simply getting to know the person I already am...”
Old saying, origin unknown
For once the Bearded Goat was quiet and still. A few people were scattered around the bar, not bothering anyone except themselves, sipping ale and drowning their thoughts as though there were not going to be a tomorrow. Even the sound of the inn’s creaky sign swinging in the breeze outside was louder than the muffled sound of conversation. The fire crackled quietly by the mage’s side. Someone coughed.
Farden swilled the warm wine around his mouth. After leaving Helyard’s cell he had gone straight to find Vice but the Undermage was nowhere to be found, his rooms had been empty and his servants clueless. He had gone to tell the Arkmage and the council but Åddren had merely slumped deeper into his throne and gone silent, staring blankly into space without any words of wisdom or comfort to offer the mage. Nothing. Farden had been furious.
And, to make matters worse, talk of his daughter’s death had reached Bane the King of Skölgard and he had sent a dozen hawks with news of his imminent arrival to Krauslung. The King wanted an explanation as to why his only daughter and heir to the throne had died whilst in the care of the Arka. Bane had demanded retribution for Cheska and had threatened war on the magick council. They now only had mere days before Bane and his army arrived.
The mage couldn’t help but think that somehow it all rested on his shoulders. He should have been in Albion with the army but he needed time to think. Farden took a thoughtful bite of a lonely piece of bread that sat on his plate. A mixture of anger and grief momentarily flushed through him and he shuddered. Farden tore at the bread with his teeth and sent a shower of crumbs across the table. He narrowed his eyes and tried to think, tried to figure out this mess once and for all.
That evening the city was filled with lights. As night fell the stars battled with the thick cloud for a place in the darkening skies. Torches crept into the streets and candles appeared in
windows. One by one people left their houses carrying candles in glass jars, or tall blazing torches, or little whale oil lamps for the children. The countless lights made their way south towards the sea, wandering through the winding streets of the city like fireflies. They mingled and they gathered, their bearers silent and sombre, and all together they quietly proceeded down towards the shore. An Arkmage had died.
Slowly the lights assembled by the sea and lined the rocky beaches. As the people gathered they did so in complete silence and let other sounds fill the wordlessness. Innumerable shoes crunched on the sand and shingle. A myriad of candles, lamps, and torches sparked and hissed in the cold night breeze. The water lapped gently at the shore and rocked the ships in the port, making their bells shake and toll quietly with low clanging moans.
After an hour the entire city had gathered at the water’s edge and every single one of them was deathly quiet. The People stood in their thousands anywhere they could find the space to do so. They crowded on the dark shoreline and filled the empty jetties and walkways. Peasants and shopkeepers rubbed shoulders with aristocrats and fine ladies stood with battle-scarred soldiers. Sailors stood at the railings of their ships. Even in their thousands nobody made even the faintest sound. The silence, broken only by the gentle swish of the waves and the quiet tolling of the bells, ached.
Åddren stood alone on a rock near the front of the crowds and looked out over the calm waves that rippled across the bay of Rós and out towards the Bern sea. The dark waters seemed glasslike, mottled like obsidian, and every now and again the frothy tip of a wave caught the bright torchlight and shone orange. He let a slow sad sigh escape from his pursed lips. The night breeze made him shiver.
At that moment a lone horn rang out from somewhere in the port and nine small boats emerged from the mouth of the harbour walls. Another horn cried then, a long high-pitched wail that floated across the cold air. Everyone just watched and waited.
The boats bobbed leisurely on the waves and thudded against each other with dull knocking sounds. Another smaller boat, a skiff, made its way out to them. There was a man leaning far out from the bow holding a long pole with rags wrapped around the end of it. Slowly, and with a great deal of reverence and ceremony, the man lit the pole with flint and tinder and touched each boat with the crackling flames. One by one the boats, their sad cargoes liberally doused with a special oil, burst into flame. The man in the skiff pushed the vessels out to sea and let the waves do the rest.
The thousands gathered on the beaches and ships bowed their heads and slowly, saying their wishes and prayers to their gods, snuffed out their torches and candles. The beaches were gradually plunged into darkness until the only lights were those of the nine burning boats drifting towards the dark horizon and the islands of Skap.
Far away on the Manesmark hillside a hooded figure sat watching the ceremony with his arms resting on knees and as silent as the surrounding grass. Farden’s keen eyes had long since adjusted to the darkness, and now he stared raptly at the tiny twinkling lights in the distance. He let the breeze tug at his hood, breathing slowly and listening to his mind wander through dark thoughts.
Farden twiddled something between his fingers absentmindedly. It was Cheska’s fjortla. He had toyed with it for hours but the red metal was still cold to the touch. The fact that she could have died during the Ritual and not in the fire was no comfort. He looked at it a hundred different ways but the outcome was always the same: Cheska was gone.
The night was cold but the mage was already numb and felt as lost as ever. More than once he had contemplated throwing himself onto the rocks below the hill but he knew the fall wouldn’t have taken his problems away. Farden shook his head and his morbid thoughts were interrupted once again by that annoying sense of duty that seemed to incessantly poke at him. Maybe it was responsibility or maybe it was a craving for revenge, he didn’t know, but something was definitely trying to keep him going and stoking the angry fires deep in his heart. But at the same time an overwhelming desire to give up and wallow in grief tugged at him from the opposite direction, and he was caught in the middle of both feelings, undecided and confused. The conviction with which he had fought everything up to this point was slowly dimming and getting lost amidst the stress and the pain. Farden was tired. As the very last of the lights disappeared on the horizon in the darkness of the bay he got to his feet with a grunt and strode off into the darkness.
The walk back into the city only took a few hours, and as Farden walked past the huge city gates it started to snow. The flakes were few and lazy at first, gently drifting down from the black sky, but Farden could feel that a blizzard was fast approaching. As he descended into the streets of Krauslung he looked up at the dark clouds between the buildings. In the orange light of the torches the snowflakes looked like grey flies floating on the growing breeze, swarming around the windows and rooftops. Farden pulled his cloak about him and coughed, watching the hot breath escape from his lips as steam. The cold was doing wonders for his arrow wound.
The city was quiet again. Now that the funeral was over the citizens had gone back to their homes and had locked their doors for the night. Snow quickly covered the streets and blushed orange and yellow in the torchlight and made the alleyways and buildings glow oddly. Farden could barely see ten yards in front of him but he could make out a few people wandering through the cold streets ahead of him. The figures looked odd and misshapen through the thick snow. They passed without a sound, like him their hoods pulled low and hands deep in their pockets. They made a strange sight, with their heads and shoulders covered in a thick layer of white snow, huffing and puffing steam like a chimney as they hurried home. Somewhere to the left a mother shushed a whining child. There was a sudden peal of boyish laughter and two more children wrapped in a dozen scarves bounded through the whiteness. A few seconds later another fatter child raced after them, carrying two sizeable lumps of snow in each chubby hand. Farden shook his head with a hint of a smile, even though the expression felt strangely foreign in his current mood. They were so oblivious to their surroundings, so innocent and carefree. The mage felt a little pang of jealousy and wished he could go running into the snow and forget everything.
Soon he came to a familiar corner and heard the muffled squeak of a familiar sign. Farden sighed with relief: all he wanted to do was sleep. The mage made his way to the brightly lit doorway and stamped his feet hard on the steps to shake off the snow. The Bearded Goat was quiet once again, subdued and half-empty. Thick tobacco smoke filled the air. Farden wandered in and nodded to the innkeeper, who went to pour him another glass of the sweet red wine he was starting to like. It wasn’t like him to be so habitual but it was the only thing that seemed to keep him from thinking too much. Melting snow from his leather boots dripped onto the floor and made little puddles. With a sigh he cast a few looks around the place. A few men leaned against the end of the bar, swapping words in low murmurs and nods. Farden watched them for a moment, trying to listen, but he soon gave up. Another man, a soldier by the look of him, sipped ale by the hearth. His eyes were glazed in deep thought and he absently swirled his ale in his glass.
The warm wine came in a wooden cup. The smell of spices and nutmeg in the wine smelled good. Farden sipped the hot liquid carefully and savoured the hot steam on his face. Seeing as he had left most of his supplies at the Arkabbey he decided he would order some food later. The only things in his pockets were the Weight, the fjortla, and the daemonstone. He found himself chuckling grimly as he thought how pointless the present was. Farden sighed.
The mage looked to the other figure sat in the corner at the back of the inn and met a pair of beady eyes looking back at him, a pair of very familiar rodent eyes. The old beggar tugged on his hair and nodded slowly. Farden hesitated by the bar, and just looked at the old man. He wore the same patchwork getup as before, his dirty wet cloak was pulled tightly around him like a filthy blanket. Bits of snow clung to his long greasy hair He looked even more haggard than he r
emembered, like a drowned rat. A yellow smile curled at the corner of his lip. Farden looked away and tasted the hot wine again. He waited patiently by the bar and thought about the sudden strange excitement that stirred in his chest. Farden hadn’t even thought of nevermar since that night in the forest with Elessi. But now it was all he could think of. He made his way past the warm fire and the men at the bar and meandered through a copse of stools and tables. He sat down beside the old man without a word.
A moment passed. ‘It’s a cold night,’ said the beggar with a cough.
Farden nodded, keeping his eyes on the fireplace ahead. ‘Mm it is, storm’s coming.’
‘A storm ‘e says, hmm.’ He clacked the mouthpiece of the pipe against his teeth thoughtfully and then began to chuckle. ‘Keep and eye on the weather it’ll be comin’ sooner than ye think, fine mage, sooner than ye think,’ His laugh was a weird hissing sound. The grimy man grinned, flashing blackened gums. Smoke streamed from his nostrils. It made him look like an old dragon, Farden thought.
The mage merely nodded once more and sat in silence, sipping his wine again. The beggar stared at him with a glint in his eye. ‘What brings yew t’ my table tonight then?’
Farden shrugged. ‘Nothing in particular, familiar face and all that.’ The excuse sounded stupid. The beggar tapped his nose with a mucky finger. ‘Strange that, ‘aven’t seen yew in a couple o’ weeks, mage.’
