"Thanks for doing that for me, I know it wasn't easy."
Samora shrugged. "He just wanted a grope. I've had worse."
"You'd better go," Amber said. "In fact, we'd better not speak again until tomorrow night."
"I understand." Samora nodded. The Halrana woman squeezed Amber's shoulder, and then left the tent.
When she was alone, Amber waited for the space of twenty breaths, and then lifted up her sleeping pallet to reveal a place where the dirt had been recently stirred. With her wooden plate she scooped at the loose dirt, digging deep and forming a pile at the side of the hollow. Finally she hit something hard, and with her breath running hard, she dropped the plate and felt in the hole with her hands. She withdrew the big glass bowl, and then a moment later Amber withdrew the tiny flask of essence and the scrill that just a few days ago Lina had brought her.
In the time since Amber's son had been taken from her, the unlikely friendship between the two women had grown. Lina was a tall, stern Halrana, with an unforgiving manner and the lines of a hard life written across her face. In contrast, Amber was young and had often been told she was pretty, with dimples when she smiled and gentle eyes. Yet here in the prison camp, both women were determined, more than any of the rest, and both shared the loss of a child. Lina had seen her babe trampled to death at the battle at the Bridge of Sutanesta, but still the woman hadn't given up. Amber knew she, too, would never just fall down and die, like so many others in this terrible place.
Lina had taken care of Amber after the baby's delivery, and they began to take walks around the camp together, ostensibly to help Amber regain her strength, but in reality so the two could talk together and deliver instructions to the other prisoners. With the lean diet and regular exercise, Amber's clothes began to fit her again, and her belt was now as tight as it had been many months before.
The guards again took an interest in her, something Amber took full advantage of, but they knew Moragon had laid claim to her, and she could flirt with them and earn small indulgences without having to compromise her safety.
Then Lina had shown up with the essence and the scrill. Lina knew Amber was an enchantress and that they needed a way to signal their liberators. She didn't tell Amber how she'd managed to get the essence, and Amber never found out more.
Amber sent a message to Rogan Jarvish to say that she would signal the way with a green light. She'd then set about enchanting some flashbombs and a few other tricks. But she knew the light would have to be bright, and with one night remaining, Amber still hadn't finished.
With a sigh, Amber set to work. She knew it was dangerous beyond belief to use essence without gloves — a single spilled drop and she was dead — but there was nothing for it. Amber sat the glass bowl, as large as her head, on her knees, and dipped the scrill into the mouth of the vial of essence, holding it there for the barest instant before withdrawing it and setting to work on the glass.
Smoke rose from the glass, and Amber turned her head to prevent it going into her nostrils. Her hand moved with slow, careful movements, as she struggled to remember her classes at the Academy of Enchanters. She was only trying to enchant a nightlamp, she reminded herself. Well, perhaps a very powerful nightlamp, but a nightlamp nonetheless.
It would serve a double purpose. As bright as she knew how to make, it would shock the guards, and hopefully some would be blinded. It would also be a rally call to the Alturans and Halrana both inside the camp and out. The many thousands of prisoners would be certain to know what was happening, and hopefully they would fight.
Amber knew she was taking a terrible risk. If a guard came to her tent — and they often did — she would need to move quickly indeed to hide what she was doing. With no gloves, fast movements were more than just risky. Amber could only pray to the Lord of the Sky and continue what she was doing.
Suddenly she heard movement outside. Amber's eyes grew wide with fear as she panicked. Fingers were fumbling at the knots at the tent — she'd tied them intentionally tight, but they would only hold a man for so long — and Amber heard breathing.
Everyone in the prison camp knew better than to disturb her unsought. She had made it very clear that any disturbance would compromise their whole plan.
Which meant it could only be a guard.
Amber's hands shook as she tried to put the scrill into the small bottle's opening. A single drop flew out, and her eyes watched it as with terrifying slowness the droplet fell through the air, landing on the sandal on Amber's left foot. She held back a scream and kicked the sandal off with her other foot, waiting for the pain to hit her. When the tent opened and a head poked in, Amber still had the vial on the floor in front of her, the glass bowl on her lap, and tears of terror trickling from the corners of her eyes.
The pain didn't come, and the head was Lina's.
"I'm sorry," Lina said. "I know…"
"Scratch you," Amber whispered. "I almost died, just now. Do you realise that? You almost killed me."
Lina came in and closed the tent flap behind her. "Is it that bad?"
"That bad?" Amber whimpered. "It's essence, Lina. You might not realise, but I know. I'm an enchantress. I've seen what this does to people. Lord of the Sky, you nearly killed me!"
"I said I'm sorry," Lina said, "and I wouldn't have come if it wasn't important. Rayna is about to break."
Amber gathered herself, checking that the vial, scrill, and half-constructed nightlamp were safe, before Lina's words registered.
"About to break? What do you mean?"
"Rayna's scared about tomorrow night. The woman is crazed. She's going to tell the guards. I mean it. Samora has her, and for the moment she's keeping her calm, but in moments the woman will be screaming our plans to the world."
"Can't you take care of it?"
"No, Amber, I can't. Rayna's a friend of Samora. I need you."
"All right. Help me put this back under the pallet. Then let's go and see them."
~
RAYNA was just as Lina had described. The woman was rocking back and forth, mumbling words that no one could understand, repeating them over and over. Samora was speaking to her friend with low, soothing tones, but how long Rayna would stay so quiet was a mystery.
Amber and Lina sat down next to the two women, looking at Rayna with consternation. Amber looked around. The sight of four women huddled together was a common one. Amber met Lina's gaze and the tall Halrana woman shook her head.
"What does she know?" Amber asked Samora under her breath.
"Everything," Samora whispered back.
"Can't do it. Can't do it," Rayna's words suddenly became clear, and her volume increased.
"Shhhh," Samora soothed, but to no effect.
"Dead outside. Dead inside. We're all dead anyway. Should I die tomorrow? Why not wait? Why not die right now? Get it over with. That's right. End it in an instant. Dead already. Dead-dead-dead-dead-dead-dead…"
"We have to do something about this," Amber said.
"I know," Samora said. "She was fine, but then she just… snapped."
"I'm sorry," Lina said. "But you know what has to be done."
"Wait," Amber said. "Do we have rope, and something we can make a gag out of?"
Lina looked at Amber scornfully. "You know that won't work. We tie her and gag her, and then what? And no, we don't have rope."
Samora was looking from one woman to the other. "No," she said. Tears began to slide down her face.
"I'm so sorry," Amber said. "I know she was your friend."
"Was? What do you mean? She's right here!" Samora cried.
"And in a few minutes she's going to start screaming," Lina said.
Amber exchanged glances with Lina, and then shuffled along the ground until she was close by Samora. She put her arms around the Halrana woman while Lina went over to Rayna.
Samora began to sob in Amber's arms.
"Shhhh," Lina said to Rayna, whose mumbling rose in intensity, and then quieted, before rising again.
As Amber looked on, holding Samora to her breast, Lina reached her arm around Rayna's neck, until the woman's chin was in the crook of her elbow. With both arms, Lina began to squeeze, and Rayna's ranting was suddenly cut off.
Lina must have been stronger than she looked, or Rayna must have been ready to go. With barely a gasp, a red-faced Rayna kicked once, and suddenly went limp. Samora's sobbing intensified. Finally Lina laid Rayna gently down, closing her eyes and placing the woman's hands together on her breast.
"It's over now," Amber said to Samora. "I'm so sorry."
Amber stood and walked away. There was little light left in the day, and she would need to finish the nightlamp before nightfall.
Amber struggled to maintain her composure.
She wondered what had happened to the little girl from Sarostar.
38
ON THE third Gathering of autumn, a day usually reserved for the harvest, when child, parent and grandparent would head out into the fields to reap the rewards of their sunny land, plans were put into action in Ralanast.
The officers of the Black Army were the first to play a part, although for them it was nothing far from the ordinary. An hour after dawn the guards stationed at Ralanast's eastern gate were relieved; those finishing their tour would return to Tingara, while the new soldiers settled in for a long spell and wondered if the rumours they'd heard about Halrana women were true.
As the sun climbed in the sky, farmers brought drudge-pulled wagons carrying loads of grains, fruits, and vegetables into the city. The new guards examined several carts for weapons, but couldn't see much reason to be meticulous, and eventually waved the rest through.
To the south of Ralanast, an army of grim-faced men in green and brown looked down from a sloped hill, maintaining a rigid formation as they gazed at the indomitable southern gate. They had been here for days, and with little in the way of siege weapons, the Black Army's officers were starting to believe they wouldn't attack after all — they hadn't even encircled the city in an attempt at siege! If this was out of sentiment to the Halrana who would be the first to starve, well then perhaps the Alturan commander didn't have the stomach for what it took to win in a war like this. Reinforcements would arrive from Tingara soon. The allied army would be crushed, the same way they had been crushed at the last Battle for Ralanast.
The heat started to leave the day as the sun crossed the centre of the sky and began to fall towards the horizon. In the cool autumn evening the farmers and workers left the city to return home to their quarries, mills and fields. The soldiers at the gates and outposts remarked that they seemed a reticent, sober-faced bunch, but then their speculation dried up as they, too, felt the import of the day, without quite realising why.
At the prison camp, the soldiers in black sensed that their prisoners were stirring. Their captain warned his men to be especially vigilant, although there was nothing specific he could point to — no rebellious behaviour that could be punished with whipping, hanging, or a brief and educational visit to the vats.
In Ralanast itself, a man in the attire of a Halrana High Lord stood at the vortex of a constant stream of activity, issuing orders and receiving messages from his command centre in one of the four great storehouses in Ralanast's cargo district. There was a whisper, a hum that was impossible to suppress, as the number of men under Prince Tiesto swelled at the last minute, with every young Halrana wanting to play a part and join their fellows in this moment. The newly created officers — recruits whose only credentials lay in the fact they'd been with the resistance since the beginning — tried to keep the murmurs of anticipation quiet, but the Halrana could not be silenced. By nightfall, the storehouses were filled to bursting, and still they came. Prince Tiesto would not turn any away.
Expectancy hung in the air.
~
AMBER looked around her, nodding in satisfaction. To all outward appearances, the density of the clustered groups of prisoners was the same as it always was, but she and Lina had coordinated a shifting, so that the most able-bodied prisoners were clustered near the gate.
Their task was made infinitely more difficult by the various personalities of the prisoners. Some were willing and ready to fight — desperate to, even — while others were terrified, their spirit crushed by the constant fear and merciless beatings. Amber often felt that more of their efforts had gone into handling the other prisoners than anything else.
There were many more prisoners than there were guards, but the guards had sharp swords and long pikes, steel armour and prismatic orbs. The tough warriors of the Black Army would cut through the weak and unarmed prisoners with ease.
Amber sat with Lina and Samora, wondering if she looked as nervous as the other two women. "What if they noticed the food was tainted?" Amber asked Samora.
"Then it's over before it starts," Samora said.
Amber looked at the guards, men who were on duty and wouldn't be eating with the others, knowing that no matter what, they would need to take these men out. At best, the poisoning would reduce the numbers of their reinforcements. "Are you sure she used enough?"
"How would I know?" Samora said. "I'd never even heard of celemar three days ago. It's not like I was there to watch her."
The off-duty guards always took an evening meal at their own encampment. There were three shifts in a day, which meant that at any time two-thirds of the total complement of soldiers would be resting, ready to come to the prison camp at a moment's notice in the event of trouble, while those on guard duty cursed their luck and would take their meal later, passing the time making sport with the prisoners.
One of the prisoners, a fifteen year old girl named Merri, had been drafted to serve the guards. A stick-thin waif of a girl, some officer obviously thought she was harmless enough that she could be trusted to serve out bowls of meat stew, scrub the dishes after, and clean out the latrines once a day under supervision.
When they'd first shown Merri the celemar she had refused outright to have anything to do with slipping it into the guards' food. A brown knob of root the size and colour of a large mushroom, the celemar looked far from appetising, and Merri said she had no involvement with the preparation of the food anyway.
After the conspirators gave it some thought, Amber was tasked with obtaining a canister of salt. This time she used a man's typical reluctance to think too hard about anything womanly. Amber told the guard that she needed salt to mix with water to prevent infection. What infection? The guard asked. Amber had simply looked down. Embarrassed, the guard had lived up to expectations and soon he'd provided her with a canister of salt from his meal table, fear of Moragon written across his face.
The three women then spent hours with stones, grinding up the celemar until it was a fine, light-brown powder. Amber and Lina remembered to wash their hands afterwards, but Samora forgot, and even now she was still sick in her bowels.
They poured the celemar powder into the salt canister, mixing it with actual salt, and regarded their handiwork. The colour was definitely off; would the guards notice?
Merri finally agreed to the plan. She would smuggle the canister in with her, and place it on the bench next to the steaming pot of stew she served the soldiers. Many would automatically season their monotonous fare, and if the chance came, Merri herself would try to sneak some of the powder into the pot.
"How long until sunset?" Samora asked.
"Less than an hour, I make it," Lina said, the tall Halrana woman frowning and looking up at the sun. "It gets dark late this time of year."
"The guards are going to wonder why some of the bowls are missing. They'll notice some prisoners aren't returning with their bowls," Amber said worriedly.
"No they won't," Lina said. "The guards will just count their blessings that mealtime has finished early today."
"Look." Samora nudged Amber.
Merri was returning to the camp. In her hands the thin girl held a tray, and from where they sat the three women could see steam rising from t
he tray.
With a shaky smile on her lips, Merri took the tray to a pair of guards, who greedily took a plate each. Merri then moved on to some more guards, a soldier pinching her on the rear as she departed, causing her to squeal.
"Lord of the Earth, bless that girl," Lina said. "She's done more than we ever asked of her. I'm naming my next child after her."
Amber smiled, suddenly feeling a surge of hope to hear Lina, a woman who had been given her fair share of life's painful moments, talk about again having a child.
"It's nearly time," Samora said.
"Give it a big longer," Lina said. "Everyone knows to wait for nightfall."
The prisoners who'd kept their wooden bowls were those who sat closest to the three women. Amber looked down at the sack at her feet, where the glass globe of the nightlamp had been covered from prying eyes, trying to slow the racing of her heart as the sun steadily dropped towards the horizon.
"The man who commands the allied army," Amber said suddenly.
"What about him?" Lina asked.
"He's the man I love."
"You're in love with the Lord Marshal?" Samora said quizzically.
"I suppose I am," Amber said.
"I pray you'll soon be reunited," Lina said, squeezing Amber's knee. "Come on. It's time. They're here." Lina looked up.
Against the afterglow that remained after sunset, six men carrying a makeshift litter were silhouetted against the sky as they wended their way through the camp, carrying a seventh man, immobile and groaning in pain, through the camp to where the three women sat waiting.
This part of the plan was a calculated risk. The guards generally left the prisoners to their own devices, particularly when it came to injuries. When a prisoner was hurt or sick there were no visits from healers; it was left to the prisoners to tend to their own kind. The litter had been made from Amber's wooden sleeping pallet, modified by some of the men who were good with their hands to form a platform of planks. The six men who bore the litter were the strongest of the prisoners, and the prone figure they carried was neither injured nor unwell. All seven men had been soldiers in the allied army, and all had a debt to repay to their enemy.
The Hidden Relic (The Evermen Saga, Book Two) Page 27
