by Simon Brown
'I have never been in this much water before,' she said.
Jenrosa took her arm and guided her back to the shore. Lasthear thanked her and quickly mounted her horse to put as much distance as possible between her and the water. When Jenrosa mounted, the others took it as a signal to go back to whatever it was they were doing before she entered the harbour. A short while later she and Lasthear were alone. For a while neither spoke; eventually Lasthear let out a gust of air, as if she had been holding her breath ever since being up to her waist in water.
'I knew there was something special about you since the first time we did magik together, but I had no idea…' Her voice trailed off.
'You're not going to go on about the Truespeaker again, are you? Because if you are—'
Lasthear shook her head. 'No.'
Jenrosa shut her mouth.
Lasthear looked at her with uncertainty, as if Jenrosa was no longer the person she thought she was. 'We have a story about a great magiker—'
'Oh no,' Jenrosa interrupted quickly, holding up her hands. She could feel in her bones this was going to be about her in some way. 'I'm not going to listen to this.'
'He died over a thousand years ago,' Lasthear went on.
'Oh,' Jenrosa said, suddenly feeling foolish.
'In his time there were no Chetts, or Kendrans or Amanites or Haxans. There was only one people, and they were new to Theare. This great magiker was a man who was so honoured by his people that they made him their ruler. For a long time the people prospered under his rule, but as he got older he started having visions, terrible visions. At first he told no one about them, but instead wrote them down in great books. One day an acolyte read one of the books and went mad. When the magiker king found the body of the acolyte he knew immediately what had happened, and he realised his own madness was so great that one day it could destroy everything he had helped build. He called to him the greatest among his people and told them what was happening, and what he intended to do about it. He created four great talismans and put into them the four aspects of his power: his generosity, his wisdom, his strength and his hope.'
'Four talismans?' Jenrosa asked suspiciously.
'Yes, you see already. Four talismans that became the four Keys of Power. When he had finished making them he died. Instead of ruling in his name, the great ones he had called together fought among themselves for the talismans. One of them eventually gained control over all four, but by then the one people had divided into all the tribes that exist today.'
'What was the name of this magiker king?'
'Colane Oeser.'
Jenrosa shook her head and laughed lightly. 'Never heard of him.' For some reason she could not explain, she felt relief at that.
Lasthear shrugged. 'It is not important. What is important is that his passing marked the break-up of the one people. The legend goes on to say that the people will be united again when one like him reappears.'
Jenrosa stiffened. 'One like him?'
'It was said he could see all possibilities for any course of action at the same time. He often said that "The past is the same, but the present has no boundary."'
'No!'Jenrosa said loudly. 'No, this I will not believe!'
Lasthear looked sadly at Jenrosa but said nothing.
'No!' Jenrosa cried. She pulled hard on her reins and galloped away from Lasthear and the glistening harbour.
It took longer to garrison the harbour than Ager had thought. Besides organising a mixture of troops—Chett and Haxan—to secure the foreshore and its precincts, he had to set work gangs to put out fires and then clear away wreckage. Over the next few weeks the docks and warehouses would have to be repaired before traders would be able to visit Kolby and unload their goods. Trade was the lifeblood of cities like Kolby, and without it eventually they withered and died. Ager reminded himself to explain this carefully to Lynan, then snorted at his own arrogance. Lynan had been raised in the court of Usharna, and she would have made sure all her children knew how the Kingdom paid for itself.
By the time it was nightfall the worst of the fires were out and most of the bodies collected and taken away. Ager started the rounds then, making sure the new guards were doing their job properly. By the time he had finished, the stars were riding high overhead, and he found himself standing on one of the less damaged clocks. There was a sunken ship on one side, its mast sticking out of the water like a grave-marker. He sat on the edge of the dock, his legs dangling over the side, and said a silent prayer for the sailors inside the ship's belly.
He looked out from the harbour, and down the Oino River that led eventually to the sea north of Theare. He had been on a few merchant ships that in more peaceful times had made the run down the Oino to Kolby. He remembered it being a pretty city. It would be again, he told himself, mostly believing it.
He sensed rather than heard someone move behind him, and as he looked over his shoulder he placed one hand over the hilt of his sword. When he saw Morfast he relaxed and smiled ruefully. 'You'll never do any good as an assassin.'
'I wanted to watch you without you knowing I was there,' she said, and came to sit beside him.
'I could think of more entertaining ways to spend my time.'
'I like watching you,' she said plainly. 'I try to imagine what it is you're thinking.'
'And what did you imagine I was thinking just now?'
'Something about the water. I know you used to work on merchanters.' She studied his face carefully. 'There is a glint in your one eye, Ager. Do you miss those times?'
'No, not really. Not the work anyway. But the sea. Yes, I miss the sea sometimes.' He laughed softly. 'It wasn't something I missed on the Oceans of Grass. That was like being at sea. The plains are well named.'
'I would like to go to sea one day,' Morfast said. 'I have always been curious to know what it is like.'
'I will take you to sea one day,' Ager said.
Morfast leaned over to kiss his cheek. 'You will be too busy working for the king to take anyone to sea.'
For a moment Ager did not know who she was talking about, then understood that by the king she meant Lynan. It made him feel odd, as if he was out of his true time and place.
'Yes, I suppose that's true,' he said vaguely.
'And when you're not doing the king's business, you'll be looking after your clan.'
Ager smiled suddenly. It still amazed him that he was chief of a Chett clan. The clan's previous head had tried to ambush him one night, because Ager had wounded his honour in single combat. Having slain the chief and his immediate family, Ager had inherited the clan. He had grown to be as proud of his Chetts as they seemed to be of him, and they had proven their worth as warriors in three great battles. In fact, members of the Ocean Clan regarded themselves as the equals of the Red Hands, Lynan's personal bodyguard.
'That would be no duty,' he said softly, then looked at Morfast. 'Where are we camped?'
'We are billeted!' she said. 'His Majesty has placed the two of us in the palace so we may be near him while we are here.'
'Ah.' He tried not to sound disappointed.
The palace was dark. No one was around to light braziers and fires. Some moonlight filtered through lancet windows set high in the outer wall, adding an eerie silvery sheen to marble columns and pavers. Lynan's footsteps clinked hollowly in the hallways as he explored. With his acute eyesight he recognised a painting done by a Kendran artist Usharna had sent to Salokan years ago as part of some trade agreement. Now it belonged to Grenda Lear again.
For I have conquered it, he told himself, and Grenda Lear will belong to me.
He studied the painting more closely. A stream of blood whipped across the bottom like a decorative sash. His feet squelched and he looked down. There were still great puddles of blood on the floor. The bodies had been removed hours ago, but no one had yet bothered to clean up properly. He wiped his feet on a dry part of the floor and went on. He could hear voices ahead and followed them. Eventually he found himself
in a wide and relatively narrow hall. Someone had lit the braziers: the room was criss-crossed with shadows. There was a large stone seat against the centre of one of the walls.
Lynan realised this was the throne room. It was smaller than he had imagined. But then he was used to the throne room in Kendra, which by itself must have been a quarter the size of this whole palace.
Korigan was sitting on one of the arms of the throne and giving instructions to a banner leader.
'You should be sitting in that,' Lynan told her. The banner leader bowed low to Lynan and Korigan and hurried from the room. 'After all, your Chetts won it.' Korigan smiled easily, and he expected her to come back by saying it was his throne.
'It is below me,' she said simply.
'Below you?' He could not help the surprise in his voice.
'Haxus is now nothing more than a province. This is a governor's chair, not a throne. I would not deign it with my backside.' She was still smiling. 'And nor should you.'
'I am tired,' he countered. 'Bone dead. I will sit on it until I find someone else to fill it.'
'And who will you find?' she asked.
'You speak as if I'd already made up my mind.'
'And haven't you?'
Now Lynan smiled. 'Yes.'
'Salokan?'
'It was his Kingdom. He knows it better than anyone.'
'How do you know he won't rebel against you once you leave Haxus?'
'Is he nearby?'
'As you requested, he was assigned one of the rooms in the palace.'
'Not his original quarters, I trust.'
'Something much less grand.'
'Would you bring him to me?'
When Korigan had gone Lynan walked up to the throne. He was about to sit in it when he changed his mind. He was not sure what it was, but he knew that this was not his to have. He would sit in a throne one day, but not this one and not this day. He ran his hand along its polished stone. It was beautifully crafted, with a battle scene carved on its three closed sides. He wondered absently if they depicted a battle during the Slaver War. Unlikely, he told himself. Haxus won no great battles in that war. Lost a few, though. He noticed there was blood on the floor here, too. Puddles of it. He wondered how many had died to defend this empty throne.
'You wanted to see me?' asked a voice behind him.
Lynan turned to face Salokan. The once king stood slung-shouldered, but there was something about the way he held his head and the way his arms set straight against his sides that spoke defiance, not submission. Korigan and one of the Red Hands stood behind Salokan. Lynan asked them to leave. The Red Hand turned on his heel and left immediately; Korigan seemed reluctant, but nodded to Lynan and left too.
'Are you happy to be back in your palace?' Lynan asked Salokan light-heartedly, going to him.
Salokan blinked but did not answer. Lynan took him by the arm. Salokan tried to resist, but gasped in pain as Lynan tightened his grip.
'Let me show you around,' Lynan said. He pointed to the throne. 'Here is where you used to lord it over Haxus. And here is where your cousin's soldiers died defending it.' He forced Salokan to accompany him on a walk around the entire room, making sure they stepped in every pool of blood. When they returned to the throne he forced Salokan to sit in it.
'Now you are back, ready to lord it again.' Lynan smiled thinly. 'As governor of my province of Haxus.'
Still Salokan did not answer. Lynan sighed, then with one quick motion drew his dagger. Salokan flinched, but did not cry out. Lynan flipped the dagger in the air, caught it by its blade and offered the grip to him. Salokan looked up warily.
'Go on,' Lynan urged. 'Take it.'
'You are going to kill me, aren't you?' Salokan said. 'Now that you have my Kingdom you don't need me alive any more.'
Lynan seemed to consider the words. 'There's a certain logic in that,' he conceded.
'I will take the dagger and you will strike me down, claiming I attacked you.'
'You forget one thing. I don't need an excuse to kill you. In the eyes of the world you are nothing. A king without a throne is less than a peasant.'
'Then what does that make you?' Salokan spat back.
'Your conqueror,' Lynan said easily, and offered the dagger again. Salokan took it reluctantly. 'Now strike me.' Salokan gaped at him. 'Go on.'
Salokan shook his head and dropped the dagger to the floor. The hall echoed with a metallic clang. Lynan looked disappointed. He picked up the dagger, grabbed Salokan's right hand and forced his fingers around the grip. Then, the horrified Salokan powerless to stop him, Lynan drove the dagger through his left forearm. A spray of blood spurted between them. Salokan used all his strength to pull away, to release the weapon, but Lynan held him in place with extraordinary ease.
'More sacrifice for your throne,' Lynan said, grinning now, and pulled the dagger out. He let go of Salokan and stepped back, watching his bleeding wound with keen interest. Salokan tried to stand up, but Lynan used his gory right hand to push him back. He thrust his forearm into Salokan's face. 'Look at it!' he commanded, and Salokan had no choice but to look, and as he did so he saw the flow of blood ease to a trickle and then stop altogether.
'That's not possible,' Salokan said hoarsely.
Lynan reached out and grabbed Salokan's shirt, used it to wipe his forearm clean and presented it again for inspection. There was no wound. Not even a scratch. Bile flooded up Salokan's throat, and he grabbed his mouth with his hands to stop vomiting. Lynan leaned forward and whispered in his ear: 'You will rule Haxus in my name because I say you will. If you disobey me in anything, if you rebel or join cause with my enemies, I will come back to this palace and eat you alive in front of your people.'
CHAPTER 7
Amemun looked down from the dune rise to wide green plains and could not help breathing a sigh of relief. After travelling for so long in the deserts of the Saranah, he longed to walk in a land that actually had grass and trees instead of the stunted bushes and spiky weeds that passed for vegetation in the south of the continent. Dekelon raised himself on his elbows to get a better view of the land that spread northwards.
'The Oceans of Grass,' he said, and could not hide the excitement in his voice. He turned to Amemun. 'My people have dreamed of returning here for generations to exact our revenge on the Chetts and take back our land. And now it is possible.'
Amemun smiled sympathetically. I would have the same dream had I come from your home, old man, he thought.
'What now?' he asked.
'We wait until night before moving. On these plains we would stick out like trees in the desert.'
Amemun glanced behind him at the small army Dekelon had gathered. There were four thousand warriors, all young and all male, all wearing sheepskin lapcloths tied around their waists with long strands of dyed and twisted wool, and all were armed with a simple bow, javelin and hunting knife. He still found it hard to believe just how quickly the Saranah had organised once he and Dekelon had come to an agreement about the level of Grenda Lear support for their invasion. In the end it was the temptation of new land, especially the richer pasture on the Oceans of Grass, that convinced the Saranah to take up arms. Financial support was not as important as the news that the Chetts had mobilised as never before and gone east with their army, leaving their southern border more vulnerable than it had been in living memory.
'My great-great-grandfather grew up here,' Dekelon said, now gazing out over the plains again. 'We were once the strongest and biggest clan on all the Oceans of Grass.'
Amemun had heard the story before, not only from Dekelon but from every other Saranah who had bothered talking to him. You were also the most aggressive, Amemun wanted to add, but there was no benefit in needling new friends.
'When this is over we will again be a clan. All our tribes can come together for the first time in over a hundred years.'
'First you have to win your land back,' Amemun reminded him.
Dekelon grinned. His bald pate shone in t
he sun, and he patted it. 'My skull will lie in this good earth, not the desert behind us.'
The pair eased their way down the dune. The army was camped in a deep gully that hid a small creek of fresh water and afforded shade during most of the day. Dekelon stretched himself out on the ground and almost immediately fell asleep. Amemun, native to the cool mountainsides of Aman, found it almost impossible to sleep during the day: the heat and the flies made him more uncomfortable than he could ever remember being before. He reminded himself that from now on they would be marching at night and so would not be able to sleep then either. Cursing under his breath, he closed his eyes and tried to rest.
Savero of the Horse Clan, nephew of great Eynon, swelled his chest in pride as he watched his clan's mighty herd make its way along the narrow valley called the Solstice Way. Four thousand head. No larger among the Chetts, except for possibly the White Wolf herd, and everyone knew they got that by reaving cattle from other clans. Savero fidgeted with his sword belt. Every time he swelled his chest the belt would slip a little. Well, he would grow into it. He was already tall for his thirteen years. Eynon—the great Eynon—had said so himself. And he was already working as one of the clan's outriders. He could not help it, his chest swelled with pride again.
True, if Eynon had not gone to help out poor Prince Lynan, that strange albino creature from the east, and with him taken a good portion of the clan's warriors, Savero might still be among the young riders assigned to guard the clan's wagons. Whatever the reason, here he was, outriding for the mighty Horse Clan—
He smelled something in the wind. He reined in and looked around. He sniffed the air. There it was again. Not animal. Not vegetable. Nothing he knew. Curious, he kneed his horse away from the lip of the valley and started criss-crossing the high ground, homing in on the scent.
There was something vaguely odd about it. Something that did not belong to the Oceans of Grass.
He reined in a second time and looked around him. He could see nothing unusual. He could hear the low calling of the cattle rising from the valley, but not much else. Maybe he should get old Colden; he would know what the smell was. Colden knew everything there was to know about the Oceans of Grass; at least, that's what he told everyone around the camp fires at night. According to him, he had even taught Eynon how to ride and fight. Savero snorted. No one had taught Eynon how to ride and fight; he was born with a sabre in his hand and stirrups around his feet. Now Savero sniggered, thinking how uncomfortable that must have been for his mother.
