The Shadow's Heir

by K J Taylor

  Red lights were flashing in her brain by the time she found the side and dug her fingers into a gap between the bricks.

  They helped her, and she groped her way upward as well as she could, the rough surface bruising her fingers. But her thin fingers were just thin enough to fit in the gaps between the bricks, and her confused mind was full of sudden gratitude. Thank gods I got Northern fingers . . .

  By the time she reached the surface, her head was pounding with pain. She opened her mouth to gasp in air, and the sword instantly fell into the water. She made a grab for it, but started sinking again the instant she let go of the wall.

  The sword vanished into the murky depths. Gone.

  She stared dully after it, chest heaving.

  Once she’d caught her breath, she began to climb out of the canal. She needed both hands for that, but she solved the problem by taking hold of the loose bit of rope still attached to the bundle while she climbed. It was just long enough to keep hold of once she was on land, and she used it to drag the bundle out after her and dump it on the ground.

  Once it was high and dry, she fetched her dress and put it back on before returning to examine her find.

  It was smaller than it had seemed underwater, but still big—nearly as long as she was tall. Whatever it was was entirely wrapped in cloth . . . no, a sack, she realised.

  Feeling sick with apprehension, she turned it over until she found the opening, and fumbled with the trailing rope that held it shut. It came away after a few tries, and she opened the sack and began to pull it away.

  A boot-clad human foot appeared, and she screamed and backed away.

  The bundle didn’t move. She inched back toward it, able now to see the shape of a body inside it. Oh gods, I was right.

  She almost ran away to find a guard but stopped herself. She’d found it, and now she would have to finish it, for better or worse.

  Grim-faced, she knelt and pulled the rest of the sack away, and the body flopped onto the ground.

  It was Arenadd.

  Laela stared at him for a long, long time, not quite able to take in what she was seeing.

  The King had been bound hand and foot. The hilt of a dagger protruded from his chest, and his head was thrown back, the once-neat hair and beard soaking wet. His eyes were closed, and his skin was a sickening blue.

  Very slowly, she leant over and placed two fingers against the side of his neck.

  There was no pulse. As she’d expected.

  A sudden, terrible rage and horror came over her. Furiously, she turned him on his side and undid his bonds. They had been tied so tightly they had cut into his skin. She threw the cords aside and laid him out as gently as she could with his arms by his sides.

  Then she grasped the dagger, and pulled it out. It was long . . . horribly long . . . it came out coated in gore, and she could feel it scraping against bone as it came. She retched, but kept pulling until the blade was in her hand, and then threw it aside.

  The wound it left behind was ghastly.

  She moved the King’s head, tilting it forward so it looked more comfortable, and hesitated.

  Something had been stuffed into his mouth; she could see it poking out. She pulled it out.

  It was a piece of cloth. As she moved to throw it away, she noticed something, and gingerly spread it out on the ground. It looked like an ordinary piece of linen, probably cut from a bedsheet or something similar. But someone had drawn on it with charcoal.

  She shivered involuntarily when she saw that, even though it was a picture she knew well. A circle, with three curling lines that met in the middle spreading out from it. A sunwheel. Gryphus’ symbol.

  She looked at the King’s face again, and a terrible sadness spread through her chest.

  “Oh, gods, what did they do to yeh?” she whispered. “Why? Yeh poor bastard . . .”

  Memories flooded back into her mind. The King, coming into that alleyway on the night they met . . . She’d stumbled into him after the would-be rapist had pushed her . . . He’d felt so thin, but so strong, too, as if nothing could ever knock him down. She remembered the way he’d looked at her, when she had finally realised who he really was—that look she had been too panic-stricken to notice then, but remembered and recognised now—that sad, yearning look. The same look he had given her that night by Skade’s tomb. You remind me of myself . . . Why would you want to be like me?

  She put her hands on his chest, over his silent heart. “Sire . . . Arenadd . . . oh, gods, I’m such an idiot! Yeh did so much for me, an’ all I ever did was treat yeh like rubbish. I was scared . . . didn’t know what was goin’ on, what yeh were interested in me for . . . but I know it now. Yeh just wanted me t’be a friend to yeh, didn’t yeh? That’s all yeh were askin’ for . . . Gods, if I’d only . . . if I knew who’d done this . . .”

  She looked down at his white face. Gods, to spend all those years alone, with no-one there who loved him, no-one to talk to except his griffin . . . an’ knowin’ the woman he loved was dead. No wonder he took to drink.

  When she was younger, she’d seen her foster father drink, too. He’d stay sober for a few days, but in the end the wine or the beer would come out, and he’d drink until he was asleep. Sometimes he’d get angry, but he’d never hit her . . . Most of the time he was silent, and sometimes he even cried. One day she’d asked him why he did it, and she’d never forgotten the answer.

  It’s yeh mother, girl. I miss her, an’ I can’t stand it.

  She wanted to laugh. “It’s just the same, ain’t it?” she said aloud. “Just the same.”

  Then she did laugh—but it was a broken, ugly kind of laugh, and when she laughed again, it broke again, and before she knew it, she was crying.

  The tears were for her father, but they were for Arenadd, too. Poor, drunken Arenadd, who frightened her so much but only wanted her friendship, and who had come to such a pitiful end in this dank place, all alone.

  He wasn’t no Dark Lord, she thought as she sobbed. He was just a man.

  14

  Destiny

  Laela was too exhausted to cry for long.

  Common sense told her she should leave, and soon—if someone found her with the King’s dead body, she would be in unimaginable trouble. But she couldn’t bear the thought of leaving him there, so cold and vulnerable. She lifted him into her arms and held him, cradling him against her chest.

  “Night God, help him,” she prayed. “Please, help him. Yeh helped me. Now help him. Please . . .”

  She sighed and bowed her head.

  As if that were a signal, an instant later Arenadd’s body twitched. Laela gasped and nearly dropped it, searching urgently for any sign of movement. For a moment it looked like she’d imagined it, but then he twitched again, then gave a violent jerk. His mouth gaped wide open, and horrible wheezing sounds came from his throat. Then he jerked again and started to cough.

  Laela let go of him and pulled on his shoulders, moving him into a sitting position. He gagged suddenly, making an awful gurgling sound, and then vomited blood and water.

  Once the last of it had escaped, he slumped back onto Laela’s lap and was still.

  Laela patted his face. “Sire! Sire—Arenadd! Arenadd, are yeh . . . all right? Breathe! For gods’ sakes, breathe in!” She thumped on his chest. “Breathe, damn it!”

  His mouth opened, and he gasped in a breath and coughed. More water came up, and he coughed again, but then he breathed, deeply and shakily, and again and again until it had steadied and the colour began to come back into his face.

  Laela sobbed. “Oh, thank gods. Thank gods. Thank . . . thank the Night God.” She looked skyward, and cringed when the sun hit her eyes. “Thank the Night God,” she said again, more loudly, looking back at Arenadd’s face.

  He was breathing much more strongly now, and the blue had left his face. Laela could scarcely believe it.

  She touched his face. “Arenadd. Arenadd, can yeh hear me?”

  He stirred and moaned, and
his eyes flickered open. They had a glazed look, and didn’t focus on her face.

  Laela waved a hand in front of them. “Arenadd,” she said again. “Arenadd, please, wake up. Say somethin’.”

  He coughed weakly. “Skade . . .”

  “I ain’t Skade,” said Laela. “Arenadd, yer hurt. I dunno how bad . . . Can yeh hear me?”

  His eyes slid shut. “Skade, he’s killed me. I’m sorry. I should have listened to you. He had the . . . the sword . . . Gryphus gave it to him . . . I can still feel it in me . . . Skade . . . please, don’t cry. I was . . . I was already . . . already dead.”

  Laela hugged him to her. “I ain’t Skade. I’m Laela. Arenadd, listen—I gotta get yeh back to the Eyrie, so they can help yeh.”

  He stirred. “Skade, I can’t feel my legs.”

  “I can carry yeh, then,” Laela said sternly. “Just wait a moment.” She laid him down and went to fetch her boots—he reached weakly after her and made a sound that might have been a sob.

  Laela put her boots back on as quickly as she could, and tied her money-bag to her belt. She paused briefly over the now-empty scabbard, and then sighed and threw it into the canal. No point in keeping it.

  Then she returned to Arenadd’s side and touched his forehead to reassure him. “It’s all right, I’m here. I’ve got yeh.”

  He grabbed at her hand. “Take me out of here, Skade. I don’t want to die in Gryphus’ temple.”

  “Don’t worry; I’ll take yeh back,” Laela soothed. She slid her hands underneath him, and awkwardly lifted him. He was heavier than she’d thought, but she slung one of his arms over her shoulders and straightened up. His legs dragged uselessly, and his head lolled forward.

  Laela gritted her teeth and set out back toward the Eyrie, following the canal.

  They made slow progress. Eventually, Arenadd revived somewhat and tried to help her by using his free arm to support himself on the walls of the buildings they passed. But he showed no sign of trying to walk under his own power.

  The path beside the canal was completely deserted, and they got almost all the way back to the Eyrie before a heap of garbage forced Laela to turn away into an alley and back onto the main street. There were plenty of people there, of course, but none of them paid too much attention to the girl and her soaking-wet and apparently crippled companion.

  Laela’s shoulders were aching horribly. She wanted to lie down and sleep for a year, but she gritted her teeth and forced herself on over the last stretch.

  There were guards posted at the gate. “Oi!” one of them shouted when she was close enough. “What’re ye doing back here? Who’s that?”

  Laela raised her head. “I’ve got the King!” she shouted back. “I found him!”

  After that, it was as if the entire world went mad. The guards came running, saw the King’s face, and went white. One of them sprinted back through the gate to alert the rest of the Eyrie, while the other stayed with Laela and asked a rapid succession of angry questions.

  “Where did ye find him? What happened to him? Why is he all wet? Is he hurt?”

  Laela did her best to keep up. “Found him in the canal. Someone tied him up an’ threw him in. That’s why he’s all wet. Yeah, he’s hurt, but I dunno how bad.”

  “What d’ye mean, someone threw him in the canal?” the guard growled. “Who? How did ye find—”

  Laela didn’t have to answer that because people were already running out of the gates toward her. She braced herself and opened her mouth to begin her explanation, but nobody was interested in hearing it. The King was torn out of her grasp so fast and eagerly it almost knocked her over, and before she knew what was happening, someone had taken her by the arm and pulled her through the gate and back to the Eyrie.

  There was no point in trying to argue. She did her best to keep up and stood as tall as she could, trying to see where the King had gone. She caught a brief glimpse of him being lifted onto a stretcher and rushed inside, and then he was gone, and she had her own predicament to deal with.

  The guard who had seized her seemed at a loss as to what to do with her, but an authoritative-looking middle-aged burly man Laela didn’t recognise stepped in and said, “I’ll take her. Come with me, girl.”

  She followed him, grateful that at least he didn’t decide to drag her after him. He took her into what looked like a storeroom, which was at least out of the way of the crowd.

  “Right,” he said. “Who are yer?”

  “Laela Redguard,” said Laela. “I’m the King’s companion.”

  “The half-breed who was thrown out of the Eyrie on suspicion of havin’ somethin’ t’do with the King’s disappearance,” he summarised.

  “Yeah,” Laela gritted out. “That’d be me.”

  “An’ now yer come back with him, badly hurt.”

  “Yeah.” Laela paused. “Who are yeh, an’ why should I tell yeh anything anyway?”

  “I’d be Garnoc, Commander of the City Guard,” he said. “An’ you’ll tell me the truth, or I’ll make the world a painful place for yer.”

  “Then listen,” said Laela. “I didn’t have nothin’ to do with the King vanishin’, got that? He was a good friend to me. Saved my life, gave me a home—he was kinder to me than I deserved. Then he vanishes an’ everyone’s sayin’ I did it. Well, I ain’t done nothin’ wrong. They threw me out, so I went lookin’ for him myself, an’ found him. Then I brought him back here where he’d be safe.”

  “Right,” said Garnoc. “So how did yer find him, when my men’ve been lookin’ for two gods-damned days and found nothin’?”

  Laela thought quickly. “’Cause I knew where he’d have gone, that’s why.”

  “How did yer know?”

  Laela explained.

  Garnoc’s eyes were narrow. “I see.”

  “Look,” Laela added in desperation, “if I did that to him, why in the gods’ names would I have brought him back here where there’s all these guards what hate my guts an’ think I did it? I ain’t as stupid as I look.”

  He looked at her for another long moment. “We’ll get to the bottom of this later. Go back up to yer room an’ stay there. I’ll send someone up with yer t’make sure yer don’t go anywhere.”

  She nodded resignedly. “Fine.”

  Garnoc summoned a guard, who took her back up to her old quarters. They hadn’t changed in her absence. The guard ushered her inside and locked the door behind her.

  Laela didn’t particularly care about being locked in. It was still better than being in the dungeons, and she needed her bed, and badly.

  She stripped off her wet clothes and hung them in front of the fire, dried herself off with a handy towel, and climbed under the blankets very gratefully indeed. In virtually no time at all, she had slid away into peaceful, dreamless sleep.

  • • •

  She slept for a long time, and when she woke up she found a tray of food waiting for her. She put on a clean set of clothes, and then ate everything on the tray. It tasted delicious.

  Outside, the sun was beginning to sink. She’d slept most of the day. Everything that had happened that morning felt hazy and unreal.

  She found a comb and sat down to try and do something about her hair, which was full of dried mud and other bits and pieces it’d picked up in the canal.

  As she was untangling a particularly stubborn knot, she heard the door open and looked up to see a young woman peering in at her.

  “Laela?”

  She stood up hastily. “What’s goin’ on?”

  The woman coughed. “The King is awake and asking for you.”

  Laela threw the comb aside. “I’m comin’.”

  The guard was still outside, but he let them pass without comment. Laela walked beside her new companion. “How is he?”

  “Better,” the woman said shortly.

  She was walking too fast. Laela sped up. “Don’t think I’ve seen yeh before—what’s yer name?”

  The woman glanced at her. “Arddryn Ta
ranisäii.”

  “Taranisäii?” Laela repeated, unable to hide her surprise. “Related to the King, are yeh?”

  “His cousin Lady Saeddryn is my mother,” said Arddryn.

  Laela scratched her head. “Didn’t know she had children. Are yeh the heir to the throne, then?”

  Arddryn’s lips pursed. “My brother Caedmon should be the next in line.”

  Should be, Laela noted. She thought of asking more, but Arddryn’s manner was distinctly unfriendly, and she decided not to push her luck.

  Arenadd was in a different tower, in a part of the Eyrie Yorath had shown her and said was the infirmary. There were several different rooms in it, and Arddryn led her into the largest. There were guards stationed outside, both grim-faced.

  As Arddryn opened the door, Laela caught a snatch of conversation from within.

  “—getting too damned over-confident by half.” The King’s voice.

  “I had a duty t’do somethin’—what would ye have preferred me t’do?”

  “Not throwing an innocent girl into prison would have been an excellent place to start!”

  “All the evidence—”

  Arddryn coughed politely, and the voices stopped. A moment later, Laela heard a muffled curse, and she and Arddryn had to stand aside as a very-angry-looking Saeddryn strode out of the room. Laela watched her leave the infirmary and felt very slightly smug.

  “Laela?” Arddryn was beckoning to her. “Go on, go in.”

  Laela walked past her and into the room, and heard the King’s voice call her name.

  He was tucked up in bed, looking pale and tired, but alert. “Laela,” he said again.

  She went to his side and tried to smile. “Hullo, Sire.”

  He frowned. “Call me Arenadd. I think you’ve earned the right by now. Please, sit down.”

  There was a chair by the bed. She took it. “How are yeh feelin’, Arenadd?”

  “Better. And you?”

  “Pretty tired,” Laela admitted. “It’s been a long day.”

  “You can say that again.” He smiled at her with his eyes.

  “I thought yeh were dead,” said Laela.