by Jon Kiln
“One of your sneaky soft city ways, I see.” Vharn shook his head. “You lot will never learn. You think that you’re so civilized because you live in stone buildings and don’t have to fetch clean water – but you’re all breaking your oaths and stabbing each other in the back. Give me a Menaali encampment any day, when an enemy comes straight at you with a knife in his hand.”
He has a point, the wall-captain would have agreed, once.
“His Tower has all of his plans and records. Plans of the city, Plans of what secret places there are here. The Council vaults. The Council treasure houses. Fuldoon’s defenses…” Suriyen said. She had no idea if half of that was true, but she knew that Maaritz was a Councilor, and that he was the one tasked with ‘secret knowledge’.
“So you think that this spies Tower will be the secret to making the Dal rich?”
“Making Vharn rich,” Suriyen added. “And if you two are rich then… Maybe you’ll set me free,” she lied.
“Ha! I knew it! No honor at all in any of you. And here I was thinking that you at least had a bit more backbone than the others.” Vharn started laughing. “But what if this Councilor Maaritz is still alive? What if he’s holed up in this Tower of his with all the Fuldoonian generals, plotting their counter attack?”
I only hope so, Suriyen said. “Then we’ll have to be quiet. Scout it out, take word back to Dal Grehb. He’ll probably still be happy to have the enemy cornered.”
Vharn grunted, scratching his whiskery chin. “You’re probably right at that.” The man glowered and huffed, kicked the dirt for a bit as he thought. “The docks are a long way to the north. It’ll be a major detour of our route.”
Suriyen just shrugged. “That’s where the Councilor’s Tower is.”
“I see.” Vharn went back to musing and thinking. Suriyen hoped that he was dreaming of being the one to discover a secret cache of Fuldoonian gold, or underground maps to the city, or an entire conclave of Fuldoonian resistance, plotting away in the shadows.
“Okay then, Iron Pass girl.” Vharn turned back to her unexpectedly. “You get your wish. We go find this Tower of yours – but you’d better hope to hell that the battle didn’t tear it down, or the resistance burn it down themselves. Because if it is anything less than something glorious…” He started to smile very darkly at her, showing the ex wall-captain his yellowing and horrible teeth. “Do you understand?”
I understand all right. Suriyen nodded. You’ll kill me if I don’t find something worthy of Dal Grehb’s time.
Now, Suriyen was left just hoping that she was indeed right in her suspicions about Councilor Maaritz’s Tower.
31
Their path through the ruined city was circuitous at best – much of the nearer parts of Fuldoon had already been looted, burned, or otherwise damaged by the Menaali trebuchets firing their blocks of masonry. Suriyen would lead Chief Vharn first down one concourse of a street only to find it blocked by a tumble of houses, or else having to clamber over rubble.
“What’s that?” The war chief suddenly froze in his tracks under the hot sun. The pair were nearing the docks, stepping out of the Menaali “controlled” territory and into the more hazardous fallen city beyond.
“Looters?” Suriyen said, clasping her staff a little closer towards her. Several times in their scouting missions they had heard the sound of far off shouts, cries, even laughter. There must be thousands of people left in Fuldoon, the wall-captain thought. Tens of thousands. Not all of them could have fled.
Suriyen remembered how she had stood on the front gate and turned to look back over the city behind her on that last night. It had been dark, and the city had already been burning.
There had been treachery, she remembered. Somehow, someone had managed to crawl into the water tunnels and sewers under Fuldoon’s walls and start fires in the cellars. Entire houses had started to blaze, before collapsing into the basements of tunnels and catacombs below. That had been the beginning of the end, naturally.
I knew it then, the woman thought. Even if I didn’t admit it to myself. Her eyes had been drawn to the brighter conflagration that had once been the Fuldoonian docks. The pride and joy of the world, where it was said that every nation could find a mooring if they had something to trade. Someone – Menaali spies or pirates or both – had set a fire, effectively trapping half of the population of the city here to die.
I saw the flotilla of escaping vessels heading north over the inner sea, and that was when I realized that Fuldoon had fallen.
So that must mean that there were many, many people still in the city, but where were they all then?
There was another sound, coming from the buildings.
“Go check it out,” Vharn said, stepping back to the edge of one of the cream and white stone buildings. He played out the rope that was attached to her neck collar, giving her the slack to enter the building where the sound had come from.
“At least give me your knife,” Suriyen spat.
“Ha! So, you can cut the rope and run off on me? Ha!” Vharn nodded at the shell of the building again. “Move it, slave.”
Suriyen muttered angrily, picking up her staff and stalking across the littered street to the blackened-out doorway across. She waited by the wall, breathed quietly.
“Please don’t shoot me in the face…” she whispered, ducking as she turned around the doorway and stepped into the empty room.
On the other side there was a simple hallway and living room, with a set of wooden stairs leading up to the wood platform above. The windows and the doors had been smashed in, but other than that, there was still a remarkable amount of furniture and wall hangings still in existence (if torn from the walls).
Suriyen took a step into the room, her old warrior reflexes coming back to her as she was careful to avoid the litter and refuse and not make a noise. Should I call out? If they are Fuldoonians I can warn them… She hoisted her staff across her chest as she scanned for signs of occupation. Nothing.
No – wait… She saw something on the floor by the nearest of the ground floor windows. A few crumbs of something. Stale bread? Someone had been here, crouching by this very window, and watching us, she thought, scuffing the crumbs into the corner of the room.
“Well, good on you for surviving,” she whispered into the dead space, turning back to the door.
A breathy snarl startled her, and she felt movement from behind: a creak on the wooden stairs. Utilizing skills that even she had forgotten that she had, she dropped to the floor and rolled, as something heavy and sharp thudded against the wall.
It was a spear. She kicked out at the legs of the person attacking her, and was rewarded by a grunt of pain as she jumped back up, raising her own staff in response. Only for it to get tangled in the leash rope that was attached to her neck. Dammit! She had to duck under the swing of the spear.
She was being attacked by a large, well-built but not very tall man whose arms, neck and shoulders must have once been impressive, but were now sloughing to fat. He had short dark hair, small eyes in a round face, but he still wore the disheveled, soled and torn tabard of one of the Fuldoonian citizen-guards.
“Traitor!” he hissed, pulling his spear back to run her through.
With a grunt, Suriyen closed the space quickly. She knew that lunging weapons were excellent for dispatching your enemies at longer distances, but near useless at close quarters. That was what was good about staves – they could be used two handed as a quarterstaff, as she did so now.
She hit the guard on the side of the head, just as more figures appeared from the stairs. A man, thin this time but also wearing the Fuldoonian citizen guard’s tabard. And another with a much younger face, and one that Suriyen recognized.
“You!” she hissed in surprise. Her first opponent hit the floor with a grunt, and the second was leveling a short sword in her direction. Suriyen calculated quickly. She could take them. They looked trained, but she doubted that they would be a match for her, even in her curre
nt condition. The boy had a dagger, but with a cold heart she knew that he wouldn’t offer her any problems.
“Wait!” the boy said in a cracked voice. “This is her. The one who saved me.”
“She’s a traitor, Khem,” the taller man was breathing like a bellows. He’s anxious. He never thought to live like this. To see his city overrun with barbarians.
“Listen to your boy,” Suriyen said quickly. “I’m a slave, not a traitor.”
The larger ex-guard on the floor groaned, and shook his head. Blood was trickling from a nasty gash on his forehead where Suriyen had hit him.
“You’re working with them.” The thinner man sneered towards the door and the hot sun outside. “We’ve got you surrounded. We’ve got bows.”
“Then shoot him, and set me free,” Suriyen snapped back defiantly. “But know this. If you do, then you’ll never be free of the Menaali.”
“You see? She defends them!” the man said as his fellow groaned and stumbled to his feet.
Damn, Suriyen thought. Three against one. She was still sure that she could win – but then again, in her weakened state – she might not.
“I’m not defending them. I’m trying to lure them into a trap, you idiot!” Suriyen hissed at them. “I was the wall-captain for Fuldoon. Didn’t you hear of the northern girl who rose to be wall-captain?”
“The Dawn Menace,” the boy whispered in awe.
The what? Suriyen would have laughed, if she didn’t currently have a sword pointed at her. “Is that what they called me?”
The boy, owlishly, shook his head. “Because you sallied forth from the gates in the morning, to hold the bridge.”
“How do you know it’s her?” said the shortsword wielding ex-guard.
“Her hair, Rumpole,” said the heavy set injured guard, now leaning against the nearest wall. “She was called the Dawn because of her golden hair, see? How many soft-haired northerners are there around here?” He looked at her with a shy (and pained) expression. “Sorry for trying to kill you, ma’am.”
“It’s alright. I would have done the same,” Suriyen muttered. Well, I probably would have succeeded, which is the difference, she thought dryly. She didn’t apologize for thumping him on the side of the head.
“C’mon, Rumpole, blades down. She’s a slave,” the larger man said, and Suriyen watched warily as the thin man gradually lowered his sword, but did not sheath it at his belt.
“You talked about a trap?” he said cautiously.
“Maaritz’s Tower,” Suriyen nodded up the street.
“You mean the Tower of Art?” the boy nodded. “No one can get into it. It’s locked every which way from tomorrow.”
“I’m leading him there, and I’m hoping to bring the Dal there too, if I can.”
“When?” the thinner, suspicious man squinted.
“I don’t know. As soon as I can. I need it to be something important enough to lure him into the city.”
“Well, you’ll find something in the Tower of Art, for sure,” the injured man said. “They say the Councilor was cooking up some defensive weapon or something before he died.”
“He’s dead?” Suriyen staggered on the spot. She hadn’t known him well, but had a passing friendship with him over the years. He had also trained under Mother Aldameda, after all.
“He was found dead, torn apart in the streets. He was the one who raised the alarm about the fires under the city,” the boy whispered.
“Slave!” Vharn’s voice cut through their whispers. Getting closer. “What have you found in there?”
“Dammit!” Suriyen whispered. “You lot, hide, now!” she hissed as they started to scatter back up the stairs. “Just get your people in place around the Tower of Art. We’ll surprise them!”
She was rewarded by a brief nod from the man she had injured, before they disappeared onto the roof platform and were gone. Suriyen waited, then started kicking at the broken furniture in the room as Vharn poked his head around the door.
“What’s taking you so long? You found anyone, or what?”
“I was searching for some food,” Suriyen lied.
“Water?” Vharn cursed, pulling on the rope to her collar cruelly, and bringing her to her knees. “There’s a bleeding fountain every other street, it looks like. How lazy are you?”
That’s right, let him think I’m just a good for nothing, lazy slave. Suriyen shrugged sullenly, earning another one of the chief’s backhanded slaps.
She spat out blood this time onto the floor and hoped that Vharn wouldn’t notice the scuff marks from her previous fight.
“Huh,” Vharn was scowling around the room, scratching his whiskery chin. Just when she was sure that he was going to notice something amiss, he shrugged. “Come on, then. How far have we got to go yet?”
“We’ll be there before evening.” Suriyen got to her feet. She wondered how much more of this abuse she could put up with.
As much as I need to, she thought grimly, stepping back into the harsh daylight of an occupied city.
32
The Tower of Art, as it was stylistically named, stood near the far end of the harbor, a few streets back from the blackened warehouses. It stood in a curl of streets with high walls and no windows. Just like Maaritz, Suriyen thought glumly, as her eyes wandered to the rooftops above them. He would do everything that he could to make it seem more sinister than it really is.
“Come on! We’re almost there!” Vharn barked. He appeared to be getting jittery too, although perhaps for entirely different reasons. His eyes strayed to the top of the buildings often and beyond, looking at the glooming sky.
“We’ll never get back all the way before nightfall,” he muttered to himself. “So, you’d best hope that this place of yours has got some food and a bed in it.”
“I can’t promise a bed,” Suriyen said, as she thought of her old colleague. She had never been in his domain of the Tower, even on the few occasions that she had stayed in Fuldoon with Mother Aldameda. It was Maaritz’s realm, one dedicated to the arts of subterfuge and science, an as such held no interest to her warlike heart.
What will he have in there? she wondered, desperately wishing that she had chosen some other easy lie all of a sudden. Maybe the Council’s Treasuries, or hidden bank houses? Neither of them would have been of any use to her though. She did not know where those places where, or how one would even get into them.
No. Maaritz, it will have to be you, she thought as she turned down the final double-bend in the high brick walls and emerged straight into a small plaza with a cobbled floor. There, standing in its exact center was a hexagonal tower which was squat at the base, and narrower near the pointed roof. It was made out of a different sort of brick than the rest of Fuldoon was, Suriyen saw. Black bricks that Maaritz must have ghoulishly loved.
It looks like some sorcerer’s tower. Even the windows didn’t start until halfway up, meaning that the only way in was the small, dark mahogany door on the other side of the iron gate. If Suriyen had been better traveled, or had paid more attention to Vekal when she had been traveling with him, she might have noted a similarity between Maaritz the Councilor’s tower and the Tower of Records of the Morshanti Order – otherwise known as the Sin Eaters.
But Suriyen had never set foot inside the City of Gods, and never seen the place that had once been Vekal Morson’s home.
“Looks cursed,” Vharn scowled at it. “That bloody witch that Dal Grehb keeps around him will probably love it.”
Another piece of information I might be able to use, Suriyen thought. Vharn hates Aisa Desai.
“Here,” Suriyen nodded to the iron gate, reaching up to grab the top railings to pull herself over.
“Easy now…” Vharn watched, easing the rope out so that she had just enough to get to the other side and thump to her feet, before he attempted the same. Suriyen managed to maintain a stony face as he huffed and puffed over the side and thumped to the small and cramped enclosure on the far side next to her. If
I only had a knife… She thought of all of the many countless times that she could have killed him by now.
Oh well, never mind. Keep your eyes on the prize. Dal Grehb. She moved to the door to study the locks – of which there were many.
The small door would be barely big enough for her to step through, and it was fitted with three iron locks, one under the other.
“And it’s too much to hope that you’ve got the keys waiting around, right?” Vharn groaned.
Suriyen shook her head.
“Fine. Give me your staff,” Vharn said, and Suriyen, reluctantly handed it over. “Now go stand over there.” He pointed back to the fence.
She watched as he pulled his war axe from his back – it was larger than a hatchet, but not as large as a full double-bladed battle axe. He neatly chopped the end of Suriyen’s staff into a crude point, before chopping at the hinged edge of the doorframe until he had a wedge-side space, which he jammed the spear into.
“This is one of those things you soft city-dwellers never learn,” Vharn growled. “Put all your weight on this,” he patted the outstretched ‘arm’ that had once been her quarterstaff, now wedged into the doorframe.
“The weak point of any door isn’t the lock. Or the wood,” Vharn muttered, taking careful aim with the axe against the wood. “It’s the bloody hinges.”
He hit the door solidly – not in the middle, but near the hinge. But the wood was old and well-seasoned, and aside from a deep gouge, it didn’t give. At first Suriyen thought that the barbarian was going to be angry, but in fact he didn’t seem to mind as he took another careful aim, this time at the hinge below.
“Lean all your weight against it!” Vharn snapped, and took another swing.
On about the fifth blow, alternating from the top to the bottom hinge, there came an almighty crack, and Suriyen looked up just as a break appeared running up the wood. She suddenly felt the tension in her wooden spear-staff give, and the door suddenly fell outward.
