Shadow

by Dave Duncan

  And there was warmth.

  Perhaps the bird wanted to thaw his food also?

  No. Shadow was being mothered. NailBiter had apparently done something that no other eagle in history had done--he had decided to make friends. His rider was cold and needed rest, and he was treating him like a fledgling. It was unprecedented and unbelievable, but it was warmth and safety. Indeed it was very comfortable, a living tent and sleeping bag combined. But Shadow had never heard of it being done with an unhooded bird.

  Now he remembered the strange remarks that Vonimor had made: Birds did funny things in Allaban. Nothing could be stranger than this, so it was true, and the effect extended beyond Allaban itself.

  He shivered as the heat seeped through him; the pain in his feet and hands made him want to scream, but in time it must have gone away because he slid easily into sleep.

  Chapter 10

  "Look before you launch."

  --Skyman proverb

  THE walls were paneled in marble, carved in bas-relief. One slab showed a goat being seized by an eagle; King Shadow hit the edge of it with his shoulder and thrust with every atom of his being. It was magnificently balanced, and the bearings were still smooth, even after so great an age, but its sheer mass made it slow to yield. Reluctant as a glacier, it pivoted about its center, and a welcome slit of darkness appeared beside him. He squeezed himself through as soon as it was wide enough. He had forgotten, though, that the opening did not reach to the floor, so he cracked a shin hard against the high lintel and fell forward, striking the opposite wall of the very narrow passage and collapsing sideways on a soft layer of filth.

  Heedless of his pains, he struggled to his feet. Now the panel stood wide. He grabbed it and, with the advantage of leverage against the wall, swung it back on its pivot once more. He caught a last glimpse of Aurolron's body starkly bathed in sunlight; he heard the yells as the rescuers piled up in the doorway, then the slab closed with a gentle thump. He fumbled in the dark to find the massive bolts and slid them into place...one...two.

  He leaned against the slab, gasping and breathless, hearing the thunder of his own heart and an angry twittering of birds overhead. Just for a moment, perhaps, he had won safety.

  "It's very dark!" the queen said, and he choked back a scream.

  It was not quite perfect blackness--he could just see the glimmer of her face and hair. While he had come by one side of the slab, she must have stepped through the gap on the other.

  "Majesty!" he wailed. "What are you doing here?" The stone was quite soundproof; there would be bedlam out in the cabinet, yet he could hear nothing.

  "Hiding from that madman," the queen said in a very normal, conversational tone. "He'd kill us all, you know. He's quite mad. He pulls wings off spiders."

  Great flames of the Ark! He had panicked, yes, but if he had any chance of life left at all, then he must flee at once. He had never intended that the queen should come with him.

  The guards were out there--she would have been completely safe. Right behind him was a blank wall; the passage was barely wide enough for one person, and she was between him and the way out, the way down to the secret tunnels. A lifetime of training held him back from brashly attempting to thrust by her--if he could--and what would she do, anyway? She might well scream. She might reopen the panel and give him away. She might not be strong enough...

  He would have to kill her.

  "What are you doing here?" he demanded again in a low voice.

  "Waiting for Vindax," the queen said calmly, in the sort of voice she might have used to discuss wallpaper or the temperature of soup.

  "He is dead! He had an accident! There was a letter--"

  "Lies!" the queen snapped, but not loudly. "Alvo would never do such a thing. It is a trick."

  Shadow was stopped short. Was that possible? With a schemer like Aurolron, anything was possible. "But the letter?"

  "The letter?" she repeated. As his eyes adjusted to the deep gloom, he could make her out better. "Yes, the letter. Read it to me." She thrust a crackling parchment into his hands.

  She had brought it with her. The implications of that struck him like a lightning bolt. The guards would have found the dead king in an empty room. Jarkadon would now be claiming that he was king, for his father and brother were both dead, but he did not have the letter, and no one but Aurolron had seen it. So they would only have his word for it, and there must be limits to how much credibility would be afforded even a prince in such incriminating circumstances.

  So there would be even more chaos than Shadow had expected, and his tiny, tiny chance of escape might just be a little bit greater because of it.

  The passage was merely a rough-textured gap between double walls, starting where he stood and curving away around the arc of the egg-shaped cabinet itself. In spite of its narrowness, it was very high; small gaps at the top admitted a trickle of light and air. They had also admitted swallows, whose nests encrusted the upper walls and whose litter had piled thick on the floor. The swallows were jabbering angrily at the intruders, darting in and out of the holes.

  "I can't see to read, either, Majesty," Shadow said. "Perhaps in a little while..."

  "Well, we have lots of time," the queen said. She steadied herself with both hands and somehow managed to sit down in her fine, rich dress on the heaped bird droppings on the floor. She leaned her arms on her knees.

  She had gone mad, obviously.

  Aurolron and he had shared one thing: They had both hated the dark and never closed drapes. Yet he knew that the human eye could adapt to darkness for some inexplicable and useless reason. Twenty minutes it took, they said, but already he could see much better. Yes, the document he held was the letter from Ninar Foan, but still not decipherable.

  "It was very stupid of me," the queen sighed. "I should have explained to Vindax and warned him." She sounded as though she were talking to herself.

  "Warned him of what?" Shadow demanded. He ought to be running like hell, yet he had to plan his moves carefully. Was there any possibility that the queen could be of assistance--or of use? A hostage? The uproar and search going on outside must be mind-wrecking.

  "Alvo must have got such a surprise," she said. "How proud he will be of Vindax!"

  Gods! Was the queen about to admit it?

  "They are twins, you know. When I look at Vindax, I see Alvo exactly, as he was. I expect he has aged, but I remember him as he was then, as Vindax is now."

  The passage led to a stairway, and that led down to a cellar. Through such passages and cellars and storerooms, it was theoretically possible to move almost anywhere around the palace complex, if he could remember them all. He had shown many of them to the new Prince Shadow. Aurolon, who had liked to be sure of his backups, had inspected secret doors once in a while. Vindax knew of them. But only those three and himself, he was sure. Two were dead. The fourth might also be dead and was at the far end of the kingdom anyway. He did have time, but not much.

  "A man would not kill himself," the queen said. "That was what Aurolron thought, but he would never."

  A man ought to kill himself--suicide would be much better than a traitor's death. It would have done no good to have stayed and done his duty, denouncing Jarkadon as the assassin, for when the king died, Shadow died. Even if the queen had supported him and he had been believed, he would not have been saved.

  "What?" he said, confused.

  Now he could see the queen's expression as she explained with great patience, "The king thought that Alvo would kill Vindax, of course. He thought that Alvo would think that Vindax was his son and had been sent to him to be put to death because it would be a breach of honor for a man to let his own bastard sit on another's throne."

  Now, that had to be the craziest thing the crazy woman had come out with yet. Honor was not something that Shadow had ever claimed to understand, but he knew that some men had it. Whatever it was, though, no one carried it to those extremes.

  "His own son? Madam, is the d
uke of Foan Prince Vindax's father?"

  "You never asked me that before, dearest," she said reproachfully. The clothes had confused her--now she thought he was Aurolon.

  "But why do they look so alike?" Suddenly he thought he would go happier to his death if he could get this confounded mystery solved.

  "Ah!" The queen sighed blissfully. "Well, you see, I was very much in love with Alvo before I learned to love you. But royalty had obligations, as you told me--you were very patient, my dear. And I gave you what you wanted, didn't I? Two sons? 'An heir and a spare,' you said." She giggled and then sighed. "I should have liked a daughter, but a king likes to have two sons."

  He would need different clothes. Servants' clothes, preferably. There was no way he could escape by air even if he knew how to fly those damned birds. An escape on foot into the town was his only chance. Then--Piatorra? Aurolron had sent the king of Piatorra some sculptures once. That meant carts, so it must be possible to reach Piatorra on foot somehow.

  Shadow peered at the letter and saw that the words were becoming distinguishable. Astonishing! It had been quite dark when he first came into this smelly stone slot. The twittering of the birds was dying down. He would need money...

  "I only thought of it a few days ago," the queen said. "All these kilodays it has puzzled me, and I only thought of it now, too late!" She began to weep softly.

  "Thought of what?" He had no money of his own. When he had been Baron Haunder, he had owned an estate somewhere a long way rightward on the Range. He had never been there--the rents had come in regularly, and he had relied on the manager.

  "Why Vindax looks so like Alvo."

  Great Ark of God! "Majesty," he said, "whydoesyour son look so like the duke of Foan?"

  "Because I was so in love," the queen sobbed. "All the time I was carrying the king's son I was thinking of Alvo, Alvo my love. I made a baby that looked just like him."

  Balls! Shadow thought. It wasn't love that made babies, it was balls.

  "Er...did the king know this?"

  "Yes!" she sobbed. "I just told you I just told him because I just thought of it--too late. After he had sent Vindax away to die. And he said of course that was why it was and not to worry about it."

  Even King Shadow did not get to hear all the private conversations within the family itself.

  "That was why he sent a letter to call Vindax back," the queen explained, wiping her eyes with a lace handkerchief that had appeared from nowhere.

  No, it wasn't. It was because of Jarkadon.

  The former Baron Haunder dragged himself back from his planning. Was it possible that Aurolron had been sending Vindax to his death? He had claimed as much to Jarkadon. Or had he been leading Jarkadon on to see how much infamy the young man was capable of suggesting? Did it matter at all now, especially to a fleeing traitor? He held up the parchment, and some of the words could be made out, some guessed at.

  "No, I still can't see well enough," he said. He lowered the letter and looked down at the queen.

  "Lies!" she snapped, and reached up to rip it from his hands. She tore it in half. "It was WindStriker! She wanted revenge. She has never forgiven me for escaping from Allaban. The eagles have never forgiven me." She ripped the document in four.

  Shadow leaned back wearily against the end wall. He could think of no way he could use this madwoman--she would merely be a ball and chain on him.

  Money? The queen wore jewels; he could take those, and if he could get into town, he could cash them in. But what in hell did he do with her? He shivered. He would have to kill her. She was the only one who had always smiled to him.

  Now she had stopped ripping the whole letter and was working on it one fragment at a time.

  He needed clothes first, obviously. But from where? Perhaps down in the kitchen cellars he might find some discarded rags. He might club down some servant from behind. The trouble was, most of them would be hulking lunks who could turn right around and break him in half. Then he'd have to head out into the city.

  Then?

  Then nothing. Even if he knew where his former estate was, he could never get to it, and it would not be a safe place anyway. When Baron Haunder had become King Shadow, his estate had been put under royal wardship--which meant that the crown had plundered it, of course. The men there would never have heard of Haunder and would have no interest in him anyway.

  "Clever eagles!" the queen muttered, reducing sixteenths to thirty-seconds.

  And who was king now? If the queen recovered her wits and both of them testified against Jarkadon, then who was next in line? He had no idea--one of the decrepit royal dukes probably, if he did do the honorable thing--return the queen and testify against Jarkadon--would the successor be grateful enough to pardon him? Somehow the chances did not seem very encouraging.

  He would have to hide out. Now he recalled the bolt hole under the royal quarters. It had been built for just such a purpose. It was never used, and he had not even shown it to Prince Shadow; he had not even seen it since his first day on the job, five kilos ago. Perhaps even Aurolron had forgotten it. But it was furnished with two cots and a chair, water, and even books. It had three entrances, one of which led into the larders of the royal kitchens, so a fugitive could hope to sneak in there during third watch and steal food. It had spy holes. Perfect! It would be a prison, but a comfortable one, and he could vanish for ages, until long after he had been forgotten. Then he could make his escape to Piatorra.

  "Come, madam," he said. "We must go." The guards might start taking sledges to the walls of the cabinet soon, seeking the secret passage.

  "Where to, dearest?" she said, holding up a hand. Now he was the king again.

  "Let us go and find Vindax." He helped her up.

  "Good idea!" she said, and walked obediently along in front of him. He guided her down the stairs, fearful she would stumble in her long dress. At the bottom the passage ended, but there was an opening in the wall, with a massive metal door. He slid this into place and shot the bolts. Pursuers would have to break through that from a space almost too narrow to move in--the long-ago genius had planned well. He found flint and steel and ancient dried-out candles.

  This way was long and complicated, and he would have to take care not to get lost or sidetracked, but his first problem, obviously, was the queen. He was not man enough just to strangle her.

  The solution proved surprisingly easy. They were stumbling along a dusty underground passage, and he found a massive door standing open. Flickering candlelight showed a small empty cellar, apparently carved out of the rock itself. A dungeon, perhaps? He did not know.

  "In here, Madam," he said.

  She smiled thanks, thinking he was following, and then stopped in surprise. He pushed. He heaved the door closed and shot the bolts as the echoes rolled away. Then he shivered uncontrollably. Hunger would kill her? No, thirst. He would come back for the jewels--after a long time, hectodays. Poor woman! But it was her fault that he was in this mess. He stumbled away down the corridor, expected to hear screaming or banging behind him, but there was only silence.

  Passages and trapdoors and concealed panels...he detoured through cellars and once through shrubbery, scuttling along like a hunted rat. But no one saw him or heard him, and all he saw of the search was once when he looked out through another spy hole and saw a band of men running. The whole palace must be in turmoil, and even the cellar areas and kitchens were stripped of people, which made his journey easier. It was the middle of third watch, too--those who had not heard the news would be in bed.

  At last he reached the royal quarters and began to advance more carefully than ever. One entrance to the bolt hole was from the king's bedroom--he could forget that one. Another was from the larders, and a third from a cloakroom off a public corridor. The larders were the best bet.

  He had to leave the secret ways and enter a wine cellar through the back of a cluttered and apparently useless closet. He tiptoed in the dark around great fragrant barrels, wondering
if he was leaving marks in the dust. He crept up steps and peered around the corner. He scurried through a deserted kitchen and down more stairs.

  The larders were pitch-dark. Wearily he went back up and found another candle and lit it. Then he descended again and picked his way cautiously between the racks and bins to the far corner. Damn! A great stack of boxes stood in the way. Sweating with fear and exhaustion and effort, he moved the whole pile forward one row, leaving a narrow space behind. With luck, no one would notice and the pile would conceal the door, for he would be coming back this way many times in the future.

  At last the job was done and he could slide behind the pile and find the panel. It creaked like a clap of thunder, at least to his ears. Then he was through it, had closed it. There were no bolts or fastenings; on this side it looked like a boarded-up passage, and perhaps once that was all it had been.

  The candle's glimmer showed more stairs, but this was a wide and passable corridor compared to most he had used. The steps were thick with dust. He plodded up them, wishing he had thought to grab some food while he was in the larders. At the top he reached the door to the room, but the corridor continued, running on to the cloakroom entrance. He had better make sure that that was sealed, and then he would attend to the royal bedroom exit, which was off the far side of the hideaway. Then he could go to sleep for a few days.

  The cloakroom entrance was already bolted on the inside. That surprised him. Indeed, that was astonishing and quite beyond understanding. Perhaps if he were not so exhausted and emotionally battered, he could figure it out, but he was very glad he had not tried to come in that way.

  He followed his flickering candle flame back to the bolt-hole door and threw it open.

  The first thing to strike him was the light--the place blazed with lamps. The next thing was the heat, from the lamps and from the people. The walls were lined with mirrors or draped with scarlet cloths. The simple furniture he remembered had gone, replaced only by thick rugs and piles of cushions.