Ibryen

by Roger Taylor

  Yet it was more than that, surely, and more even than the leaden foreboding that had been weighing on him all day. It wasn’t the awful tension of pending battle – that, he was familiar with. It wasn’t even guilt at the deception he had left behind as an excuse for this strange journey, although this would have to be accounted for soon, and he did not relish the prospect. It occurred to him that in fact he had told no lie. The very abandoning of the old procedures within the village could only lead to a new destiny, a way which none could have imagined. Perhaps what was disturbing him was no more than as Isgyrn had said, a reluctance to accept that all ahead was unknowable.

  But none of these carefully crafted arguments could bring him any peace, and he stood for a long time in the cool darkness, leaning against a tree, pondering the unease that tugged at him. He could not believe the story that Isgyrn had told, yet neither could he casually discount it. Isgyrn clearly believed it and even during the short time he had known him he judged the Dryenwr to be clear-thinking, lucid and logical. And his conclusion had been open and honest – base your actions on the assumption that I’m correct. He couldn’t argue with that. And it was as though his concerns came from beyond himself, as though he were the unknowing focus of events which were moving in ways beyond his control. And too, he was vastly different from the man who had been the Count of Nesdiryn scarcely a week ago. But what value was this change that had come over him?

  He had no answer.

  He had answers for nothing.

  Weary, he let all questions slip away.

  At the edges of his consciousness he could sense the Ways that would lead him into the worlds beyond. For a moment it came to him that he could simply slip from here and search out a place where horrors such as the Gevethen did not exist, where men might look at a sword and think it a farm implement. Was there such a place? He found it hard to imagine. Perhaps that sunlit forest had been one such? But it might simply have been somewhere else in this world. Nothing there had been disturbingly different, not the trees and the vegetation, not even the unusual carvings, and certainly not the fine bridge. And even there, the Gevethen had come. Or worse, he had drawn them there. That brought a coldly awful thought – that he should be the herald of the evil in some untrammelled new world. It laid a dead hand on his brief flight of fancy and carried him to the conclusion that he had known was always there; how could he live any kind of a life elsewhere, knowing what he had left behind?

  There was no escape. There never had been. Whatever was afoot, and whatever his part in it, it could not be resolved by flight. Sooner or later – he corrected the thought – soon, he would have to confront and destroy the Gevethen or die in the attempt.

  Knowing he could not leave, he closed his eyes and slipped into the place of lights and sounds where only his awareness existed. The confusion about him was beyond any describing, but it no longer disturbed him. He could feel Ways all about him that would leave his sleeping form here and carry him to places far beyond this rain-scented forest. And too, he suddenly sensed, there were still other worlds. Worlds that were ill-formed and vague. Ephemera that did not truly exist yet were there for him to enter. Are these dreams? he thought. Other people’s dreams? He had never dreamed.

  A cry stirred within him. He did not want to hear it, but it could not be stilled.

  I should be free to roam these worlds.

  I should not have to die in battle, in fear and pain.

  I should not have this burden to carry.

  LET ME GO!

  * * * *

  The cry echoed into an unknown distance, tailing off slowly into a sigh which became the stirring of the trees about him.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  Briefly he was once more at the door of his quarters in the village, being startled by Marris’s inquiry out of the chilly night. Then he was in the forest, identifying the voice as that of the Traveller.

  ‘Are you all right?’ The question came again, and a slight movement showed him the deeper shadow within shadow that was the inquirer.

  ‘Yes, I’m fine,’ he replied, keeping his voice low to avoid disturbing Rachyl and Isgyrn.

  ‘I thought I heard you calling out,’ the Traveller said. ‘But it was far away.’ He sounded puzzled.

  Ibryen smiled, a faint whiteness greying the gloom. ‘Your hearing goes further than you realize.’ He did not elaborate. ‘Couldn’t you sleep either?’

  ‘I don’t sleep much,’ the Traveller replied. ‘I’ve just been playing with the sounds of the forest. There’s such a richness about us.’

  There were resonances in his last sentence that brought Ibryen almost to tears. ‘Indeed there is,’ he said. Though he did not know why, his mind was clearer. Slowly he drew his sword. Resting it on the palms of his two hands he held it out at arm’s length, as if offering it to the darkness. Stars were reflected faintly in the blade. ‘I pledge myself again to my people,’ he said quietly. The Traveller remained silent.

  * * * *

  Jeyan leaned on the parapet of the balcony. In the distance, stark against the evening sky, like the fingers of a dead, warning hand, she could see the towers in the Ennerhald from which she had spied on the city to see the effects of her murder of Hagen. The train of events that had led her from there to where she now was, passed through her mind many times. There was a grim irony in them which she savoured, together with rich veins of self-justification. She had been right to stay in the Ennerhald for all those years. Had she fled to the Count, she would not now have been in a position to strike such a blow for him. She pressed a hand against the knife beneath her tunic. Or for her slaughtered parents. She pressed the knife harder until the pommel dug into her painfully. Or for herself. Yet, too, another irony was dogging her that day, for she had been unable to find the Gevethen. It did not help that she was quite unfamiliar with the rambling intricacies of the ancient and much added-to Citadel, and that the cold exterior she felt the need to maintain prevented her from flitting quickly about the place and, still less, from asking help of anyone. All she had been able to do was watch and listen. She had however, relished the effect that her presence had wherever she went. Any questioning glances directed her way had been inadvertent and had, without exception, been rapidly lowered as knees had hastily buckled. She had moved through crowds like a scythe through a field of tall corn. It was good. It was fitting that these people who sustained the Gevethen should bend before her.

  You’ve done your work well, Hagen, she thought. The very terror of your office strips all protection away from those it was intended to guard.

  But the Gevethen eluded her all that day, though the effects of their presence could be seen vividly all around. The activity she had first encountered as she emerged from the silent corridors into the hallway was as nothing to what developed as the entire administration of the Citadel was marshalled to implement the Gevethen’s order for the committal of every resource to the immediate capture of the Count. Only one senior Army officer, it transpired, had suggested that the proposal was perhaps unwise and that not only would the cost in lives be appalling, but control across the whole of Nesdiryn and its borders might be dangerously loosened. The Gevethen had watched him coldly, then turned away with a casual gesture. The man had collapsed, writhing in pain. It had taken him an hour to die and he had died screaming such that even the hardest of the men around him were to be troubled in their dreams for long after. It had been a considerable time since the Gevethen had demonstrated their own frightening power, and news of it spread through the Citadel and to every army outpost faster than any other message delivered that day. All reservations about what was happening were subsequently spoken with the softest of voices and only in the presence of the most trusted of friends. Better to take your chance in the mountains than face certain death here. Catching the tale in transit, Jeyan stored it away as a reminder that the Gevethen were not without personal resource and that when finally she struck she must strike quickly, for there would be no second
chance.

  The net effect of the Gevethen’s order however, was confusion and disorder, for there were no procedures established for undertaking such a venture. Even those like Helsarn who managed to keep their minds clearly focused on the Gevethen’s intentions spent most of their time explaining to bewildered underlings and civilian officials, confirming messages to exhausted gallopers, and countermanding the orders of his more confused fellow officers. Nevertheless, the Gevethen’s will gradually took shape and soon, albeit raggedly, men and materiel were following in the wake of those who had been sent immediately to establish a base camp.

  Jeyan remained on the balcony for a long time after the Ennerhald towers had faded into the night. Raised voices, the clatter of hooves and the rattle of carts rose in an incessant clamour from the courtyard below, and the city streets were alive with moving lights. As the darkness deepened, she began to see a faint glow in the sky beyond the city as a transit camp for the incoming forces grew ever larger.

  Eventually, the night cold made itself felt and she was shivering when she retreated inside. The gloomy corridors seemed almost welcoming after peering so long into the darkness. Uncertain about what she should do, she decided to return to her room. If the Gevethen wanted her they would presumably look there first. It took a great deal of finding as, even after wandering the Citadel for several hours, she was far from familiar with the place. On her rambling way there, an opportunity presented itself to satisfy a simpler appetite and her Ennerhald habits had her steal some food when she found herself in the kitchens.

  She was still eating when she finally located her room. Nothing had been changed since she left it. What had happened to her ever-watchful servants? she wondered. She stepped back out of the room and looked up and down the corridor. There were several doors each set back in a deep alcove. After a brief hesitation she went to the nearest and boldly seized the handle. The door opened silently to reveal a darkened room. She took a lantern from the corridor and turned up the light. The room was completely empty. She stopped after a couple of paces as her footsteps bounced back hollowly. Moving to the next door she found the same, and so it proved with all the other rooms, though some were furnished and some looked as if they might have been offices at one time.

  After the milling confusion in the rest of the Citadel, the echoing emptiness unnerved her slightly. Then, she thought, it was understandable. Few would wish to be neighbours to the Lord Counsellor.

  But where were the servants?

  She shrugged. It was hardly a matter for great concern. She was glad to be rid of their overwhelming presence. Not least because had they set about preparing her for bed again, they would have discovered the knife and she knew she would have been unable to stop them taking it from her. Worse, the news that she had been carrying one would certainly have reached the Gevethen – with who could say what consequences? She turned over one or two excuses, but none of them felt particularly convincing.

  Tugging the knife from her belt she moved to the bed and slipped it under the pillow. Then, taking off her tunic, she lay down. She wanted to think about everything that had happened since the Gevethen had come for her that morning. Was it only that morning – the sudden awakening in the pre-dawn darkness and the almost hasty dash through the mirrors? The memory brought back the penetrating coldness that marked her passage into that eerie world within, and she clamped her hands to her face, shuddering violently. If only she could be away from here – somewhere safe. Her eyes began to close as she went through again the Gevethen’s frightening, childlike quarrelling – the mysterious whirling tunnel and its collapse – Hagen – Assh and Frey. Then Ibryen in the sunlit forest – a world within a world? And who was the man with him, the one who had torn him free from the Gevethen’s grasp? Strange powerful face, with piercing eyes. And strange clothes too. She had never seen the like of him before.

  And, above all, what had the Gevethen seen, or learned, in the brief scuffle with Ibryen?

  ‘He has the gift!’they had screamed at one another in the midst of their rage. What gift? Had they not said to Hagen’s spirit that she had the gift? No, she remembered, they had said that she was kin, whatever that meant.

  She started awake. She mustn’t doze off. She must remain awake and alert, ready to move as circumstances dictated. They might suddenly be in her room again. Then she rolled on to one side. Her hand slipped under the pillow and touched the knife as once she might have touched a cherished toy replete with the love of her parents.

  What was Ibryen’s gift? The question returned. What had the Gevethen seen that had led to this frantic activity, this overturning of every meticulously ordered procedure in their administration? For though she knew little of the detailed workings of the Gevethen’s regime, she recognized well enough the near-panic that was pervading the Citadel and that it was markedly at odds with all that had gone before. And too, from remarks that she had overheard, she was beginning to realize the political implications of withdrawing the army from all the major towns and cities. The Gevethen were risking losing their grip on the entire country. And moving forces from the borders could well embolden neighbours who, peaceful in Ibryen’s time, had become increasingly alarmed by the Gevethen’s growing army.

  What could possibly be so important to them?

  What was Ibryen’s gift?

  She forced her heavy eyes open.

  What was Ibryen’s gift? What was so precious?

  She fell asleep, her hand still touching the knife.

  * * * *

  As ever, she woke abruptly and lay motionless. The lanterns were still lit, but there was more light in the room than they were making. She swung off the bed and went to the window. Daylight was seeping around the edges of the curtain. She returned to the bed and took the knife from under the pillow. A few deft cuts severed the stitching holding the curtains together and the morning light flooded in like fresh air. The sky was overcast though quite bright, but the distant mountains were lost under a lowering sky that reached right down to the ground. Though she could not see the sun, she judged that it was quite late in the morning. Her stomach confirmed the conclusion. This was unusual, for she did not normally sleep much after dawn. She looked around the room. It looked peculiarly small and dingy in the daylight. And it was unchanged from the previous night. Still the servants were missing.

  Good, she thought, quickly throwing on her tunic and sticking the knife back in her belt. A little more familiar with the Citadel now and the authority that her uniform carried, she would spend as much of the day as she could learning more about what was happening. Then she would seek them out.

  Rested, armed again, and free of the cloying presence of the servants, Jeyan felt more her old self. The disorder that the Gevethen had left in their wake renewed and fed her long hatred. Whatever their reasons, whatever their intentions, they were of no concern to her now. It was sufficient that events were swirling in disorder and that opportunities would arise that might never come again. She must strike the Gevethen at the first chance she had. For a fleeting moment, her elation plummeted into awful fear, then sprang back again.

  ‘No choice,’ she said to the silent room, and the words echoed over and over through her mind.

  No choice.

  She preened herself for some time in front of the tall, black-edged mirror. The Lord Counsellor’s uniform must be without flaw; it was both her sword and her shield. Her reflection stared back at her disdainfully.

  Checking that her knife was held securely and secretly in her belt, she opened the door. Helsarn was framed in it, his hand raised.

  Chapter 31

  ‘My… apologies, Lord Counsellor,’ Helsarn stammered, lowering his hand awkwardly and bowing as he stepped back. ‘I was about to knock. Their Excellencies ask that you attend on them in the Watching Hall.’

  Helsarn’s momentary confusion prevented him from noticing Jeyan’s.

  Her stomach became leaden. What did they want? Had they been searching for her
yesterday?

  ‘There are no servants to carry such errands, Commander?’ she asked sharply, forcing herself to remain at least outwardly calm.

  Helsarn misunderstood the question at first, but provided the answer to one she was reluctant to ask. ‘Your body servants have been called to the mirrors, Lord Counsellor,’ he said hurriedly. ‘And it was not fitting that a lesser person carry such a message.’

  Jeyan nodded and motioned him to lead the way. She noticed that he was dressed for travel, and was carrying a helmet under his arm. ‘The mobilization goes well?’ she asked as they walked along.

  ‘It does, Lord Counsellor. It has gathered pace through the night and new units are arriving by the hour. Such a Levying will enter Nesdiryn history as a truly great military achievement. A force is being gathered that will crush the outlaw Ibryen’s rag-tag followers once and for all, and bring him back to Dirynhald in chains.’ He took the opportunity to associate his own name with this glory. ‘It’s been a great honour for me to play my small part in such a venture.’

  ‘Indeed,’ Jeyan said coldly. The news added to the darkness growing within her. It wasn’t possible that Ibryen could stand against the forces being marshalled. More and more it was becoming apparent that she was the only one who could put an end to the Gevethen. ‘Ibryen will prove no easy prey,’ she said. ‘What is the condition of the men?’

  Helsarn half-turned towards her. The question was unexpected and he started answering without thinking. ‘Those from the city and nearby are fresh. Others…’ He hesitated, realizing that he was on the verge of casting doubts on what was happening. This creature was beginning to unsettle him as much as Hagen had.