The Patron sat back in his chair. He had never dealt with these self-styled Terrechar before, but this was childish, nobody handled a serious contract like this.
That know-all Shadder had told him that the fee - it was always the same - was simply left with the priests at the Sulis temple along with a sealed letter bearing the target’s name. If the money was still there a week later, the contract had been refused. Such a casual arrangement for a huge sum of money had proved impossible for Rezzawa to accept. It was so unprofessional. He had instead delivered a sealed message to the temple, insisting on a preliminary meeting and saying that there was more than one target, a whole list of them in fact. Shadder had bet heavily against him receiving a reply, and when it came, the fool’s surprise had been as satisfying as taking his money. Rezzawa had not told him that it had named this infested flea-pit as the meeting place.
“The alternative is to pay half in advance, half afterwards.”
So despite what Shadder believed the implacable Terrechar could be bargained with! Savouring this first small triumph he glanced at his men and was pleased to see both of them were poised for action, totally concentrated on the stranger.
“But for such an arrangement the price is doubled.”
Rezzawa’s calm splintered and flew away. The monkey was laughing at him.
“Take off that mask, you insulting buffoon. This is an important negotiation and I like to see who I’m dealing with.”
“Are you sure?” The question was plain and uninflected, as if the speaker would accept equally whatever answer he received. “It will increase the cost for you.”
The simple statement tipped the Patron further off balance. “Was that a threat or a bad joke? We’re not children. Fancy dress doesn’t frighten us. Get that mask off or we’ll do it for you.”
Birost moved unbidden to stand close behind the stranger’s chair. The bladesman was known and feared for his speed; he was quick as a snake and Rezzawa knew he could condemn the man opposite to death in the blink of an eye. But the tension in the room eased as the stranger simply reached up and peeled off the mask. He revealed a middle-aged face, good-looking, unremarkable except for its stillness. Even the dark eyes were flat and motionless as a reptile’s.
“Do you have the list?” If the man was aware of sudden death hovering behind his right shoulder, he gave no sign of it.
The Patron took an envelope from his pocket and laid it on the table and kept his hand on it. “This string of contracts is worth a great deal of money and they’re being routed through me because this is my territory.” He leaned forward. “Belugor is mine. You understand that? You want to operate here, then I have to know about you, who you are, who your principals are, why you’re using the Terrechar name, everything.” He slapped his hand on the table. “Everything, you understand. What’s….”
The Terrechar shifted slightly in his chair, Birost bent forward as if to watch him more closely and carried on bending, folding slowly to the floor. At the same moment a terrible soft choking behind him told him Tchalit was dying. The Patron had no idea what had happened, or rather how it had happened. It was said the old Terrechar had magic: how else could the man have taken out two of the best fighting men in the whole country? And from a chair! He sat absolutely still as sweat broke out all over his body. It stung his eyes and rolled down his face to drip from his chin onto the envelope in front of him. His eyes dropped to the table. The list.
“This is blank. The real list’s at my house.”
He was ashamed of the quaver in his voice, but he could not help himself. He wanted to call his men from downstairs, he wanted to reach for his knife, he wanted to be cool and defiant; but his belly had turned to water and he could barely speak.
He raised his eyes and jerked back in his chair with shock. The killer had gone without a sound. Hope was just flaring through him, when a hand was laid gently on his head from behind.
“We have our own list,” the Terrechar’s voice said, “and your name is the first. The death price has been paid.”
Moments later the assassin retrieved his tiny throwing star from Tchalit’s throat, dipped his finger in the bodyguard’s blood and with practiced bold strokes drew the infamous Char, the symbol of the notched sword, on Rezzawa’s forehead. After the long years of secrecy the time had come to let the world know of them and fear them again.
Chapter 4
And Harrikan drove the Borgoy into the mountains and would fain have pursued them thither, but the people of Hem stood forth upon the heights and said, "Son of Gemnar, return to your house in peace. Your enemies are no more. From this day forth we shall permit no man to pass through the mountains, neither from the east nor the north. Inasmuch as ye set not your foot in the land of our people, we will be as a wall and a shield about you that ye may live without fear."
The Ode of Harrikan - Traditional (Easterleng)
Esparan
Hamdrim got the boys up at first light. It was chilly in the yard with a low mist, so they were glad to find the kitchen already warm, with no trace of the enormous stacks of dishes they had seen the night before. Several of the farmhands were in having breakfast as well, but no one was talking.
"It’s that Firebrew they were boasting about last night," Berin whispered in Caldar's ear and received a wan smile from the man across the table.
Hamdrim gave them no time to linger. When the boys asked him about thanking Kirpar, he said it had already been taken care of and went outside to put Randy's harness on. In no time the panniers were hitched and they were off, striding towards the riverbank.
For the first hour the mist hung and drifted soundlessly around them, while they walked along the wide towpath by the main river, crossing bridge after bridge over channels of dark water that led off into Kirpar’s invisible fields. A couple of boats drifted downstream, half-seen in mid-river; but no one hailed them and they walked on surrounded by silence, each immersed in his own thoughts.
Gradually light began to pool and shimmer overhead, as the fog thinned. Hedgerows appeared and fruit trees which smoked as if on fire, until before long the trio were walking in bright sunshine. Looking over to his left Caldar could see a pattern of fields and woods still interspersed with streamers of low-lying mist which gathered in the distance into a continuous white wall. Emerging like an isolated island was a hill capped with dark crags. Was that where he had gone with Berin yesterday? He could recall climbing up the path and then something strange happening; but whatever it was, he could not grasp it. Try as he might, his memories frayed like smoke in the wind and blew away.
Caldar’s thoughts turned away to the Sarpil. He realised now that he should have thanked Kirpar for that gift as well as for his hospitality. And Tikka! What a surprise that had been. The boy who had turned out to be a girl and 'so beautiful' - Berin's words. Feeling a curious sense of loss that he had not been there to hear Tariska’s future, he decided it was time to catch up with Hamdrim and ask him about the Telling.
"Well now,” Hamdrim started slowly. “I don't know much about Jedorje, other than she's a Teller. Her people are Hamna, somewhere up in the Eastern Mountains, but there are stories of her travelling all over the world - probably riding on a pink cloud if you listen to some of them. People are scared of her. What else? She knows a lot about herbs and cures. And she sings - that was her you heard last night, singing the Song of Welcome.
A true Telling's a rare thing now. That was the first I've come across since I was your age. It's serious, true prophecy if you like, not something to chat about.”
He looked back at Caldar's face and laughed. "All right. Just remember I didn’t hear it either, I was outside in the garden with you. I'll tell you what Kirpar told me, which wasn’t much. Jedorje said Tikka’s going to travel a long way, far beyond the Lake from the sound of it. She's going to meet a lot of danger and to have great sorrows and great love in her life. There's nothing very unusual about any of it as far as I can see, except that it seemed everyth
ing’s going to be more …" Hamdrim groped for the right word "well, more intense than normal. Jedorje seemed to think Tikka's going to be someone very special; very important too. And she's also bothered about you."
He glanced at Caldar again. "Seems to think for some reason you're liable to get into trouble if I don't keep a close eye on you. Didn’t really need a Teller for that, did I? So, Berin, what d’you think? Cheese-making? That should keep him out of harm's way. I’m sure you’ll enjoy it, Caldar. What's the matter? Don't you like …."
Caldar was looking right past him, with an expression of amazement. Both the others followed his gaze and stopped walking.
Low clouds had clung to the hills ahead of them all morning, so that the flat riverlands seemed to fade into the endless murky distance. Now the clouds were breaking up, and as they swirled and parted around the bold black outlines of the lower peaks, shapely snow summits appeared and disappeared, floating in distant sunshine immeasurably high and remote above. The little party stood silent, watching the slow dance of cloud and light on the distant heights. Then Hamdrim turned to study the two rapt faces beside him.
"That’s the beginning of the Eastern Mountains, the Bharaga Fellim. It's a fine sight, isn’t it? Better from here than further on; we'll be too close under them tomorrow. That's Thunder Mountain showing through to the left and Somelkist, the big one over there. Of course the really big stuff’s way back out of sight. It’s said there’s a hundred leagues of mountains and thousands of peaks between us and the grasslands. It's not surprising we feel safe in Easterleng when we’ve got this lot to guard us." He pointed upward, wondering even as he did so, how much longer it would protect them.
"I've seen them sometimes from the hills round home," Caldar put in. "They're just little white lumps along the horizon. I’d no idea they’d be like this. I can’t believe we're going up there."
"We're not," Hamdrim commented drily, "Those snow summits will be far above us. You see that dark rocky peak like three figures sticking up? The Rails are just below it. Come on, we've stopped long enough. They'll be eating early in camp, and Randy and I both want to be there for supper."
For the rest of the morning it was as well for Caldar that the path was wide and easy. He was fascinated by the majesty of the ever-changing display high above and rarely watched where he was putting his feet.
The sun was still bright in the west behind them when they reached the campsite on a tree-covered rise near the river. They could see the smoke of the fire rising straight up in the still air an hour before they arrived to cheerful greetings from the five drivers. Faradan reported that Kulkin had disappeared without waiting to be dismissed and good riddance: he’d known all along he was a bad one. They ate supper together overlooking the quiet river. It was one of those lovely spring evenings, no wind, no midges, with the slanting sunshine turning golden as the shadows lengthened.
"I can't really believe all that's happened in the last few days." Caldar's words were addressed to a beetle that was trying to crawl into his blankets. He blew on it gently, until it turned away discouraged.
"Well the Sarpil were real enough," replied Berin from the next mound of bedclothes: his voice dropped to a whisper. "Hey, have you got them safe?"
"It's alright," Caldar reassured him. He patted his pack. "They're right here in my pillow."
"Remember, Ham said he knew something about them," Berin went on, "just before the feast. We never asked him."
'I will tomorrow,' thought Caldar. And with muffled 'goodnights' the boys settled down to sleep.
They woke to a misty morning and were soon following the dark trail the mules had left across the dew-silvered meadows to the main track. This broad highway led them easily along between rich meadows, crop-fields and orchards, as the valley gradually narrowed towards a forbidding gap in the mountains ahead.
They entered the defile at midday. From this point the road climbed and clung where it could, sometimes hanging precariously on a cliff edge, sometimes winding away up the tree-clad slopes to bridge some side torrent, while far below the main river swirled and roared deep between its confining walls.
It was a steady uphill pull all the way that soon slowed the mule train. The boys bounced on ahead, full of exuberance, until the unrelenting slopes bored and eventually tired them. Bit by bit they fell to the back as the main train plodded inexorably away from them; only the old driver Faradan stayed behind with two mules to keep them company.
"How many times’ve you been up here, Faradan?" Caldar asked. None of the muleteers on this trip worked for Taccen and he didn't know the driver well.
"Let's see. 'undred. Mebbe 'undred 'n' fifty. Reckon me and t' Nipper 'ere," he gestured at the gaunt mournful-looking mule on the inside of the track, "we could find t' way up 'ere blindfold. Not that I'd do it, mind, blindfold I mean. I’d not risk me bum anywhere near 'im, if I couldn' see. Didn' get called Nipper for nowt. 'E earned 'is name proper. 'Ad 'is gnashers into 'alf t' men in t' Rimber valley, 'e 'as."
Later in the afternoon the whole valley ahead was blocked by dark crags, riven by one great black slit where the invisible river thundered. Caldar was getting tired now and the looming barrier made him feel even more weary. But the road zig-zagged unhurriedly up to the left and brought them out on the lip of a gentle green bowl ringed by sunlit hills with the camp a bare hundred paces ahead.
By the time they had finished supper, the last pale light had left the tops around them and the stars were out. A chill little wind blew intermittently from the east, bringing them all close to the fire. The men yarned for a while about fishing and hunting, until one of the younger men, a roaming worker from South Lake who had never been to the Rails before, asked "Who lives in these mountains then?"
"A few outlaws, round the fringes like this," Hamdrim replied. "You won't see them: they'd not dare touch a mule train. And further in, the Hamna. You won't see them either."
"Hamna?" the young driver queried.
"Nomads. They run goats and wild cattle, shaggy brutes with huge horns. This road was the only way through the mountains, used to carry a lot of travellers. Then the Borogoi horde that attacked the Easterleng in the Great War came right through here from the grasslands, burning and killing along the way. When we beat them and drove them back into the mountains, the Hamna cut them off.” He paused for effect. “They say not one of that horde ever got home. Since those times the Hamna have pulled further back into the mountains. We never see them now."
“Don’t mind not seein’ ‘em,” Faradan put in. “An’ they keep our back door shut to them Borog devils, that’ll do fer me.”
"What about other travellers, then?" Berin asked from the shadows. "We haven't met anyone all day."
"The road was closed by the Hamna after the war. I've never heard of them letting anyone through. Everyone goes down through Suntoren now."
The talk went on for a long time, so the boys unrolled their blankets and settled down right where they were on the edge of the firelight. Morning was distinctly cold. The camp was in cloud and a small searching wind played around every corner of the damp boulders. The drivers tied the mules together in strings of four and formed up in a long line before Hamdrim started them moving with a shout.
For the first hour they kept up a good pace with little to see except the line of ghostly figures ahead. Then the track swung sharply back on itself and started steeply up the first of what proved to be an interminable series of zigzags with the click of hoof on stone and the occasional clink of a bridle sounding in the cloud above.
By the time they topped the long slope the sky was clearing. They had left the woods of beech and oak below them on the last few turns, and apart from stray rowan and birch the hillside around was covered now with low thorny bushes whose leaves seemed to be a favourite delicacy for the mules. The whole train came to a stop. The drivers accepted the pause with a good grace, knowing from experience that when four mules are of the same mind, one man is in no position to change it
. There were worse things than a rest and food in the strengthening sunshine.
When the mules started to move again, the boys joined Fillitin, the young muleteer at the front, working their way steeply to and fro up through the pine forest. It was cool in the trees and the path was soft and springy under a carpet of needles.
"Are we anywhere near the Rails yet?" Caldar asked eventually.
The muleteer shook his head in mock despair, "So impatient, you lads. Here we are. We've only just had lunch and you expect us to be arriving next minute. Why don't you just think about girls like I do? All the girls who’ll be panting to dance the Square with me on Independence Day. Course you two’ll be up here. Not much to look forward to at the Rails, I doubt there's ten women in the whole valley. Me, I'm off down to Easterleng again in a couple of days." He started to hum the tune to a well-known love song.
"You're going down straight away?" Caldar asked in surprise.
"Course. Supplies up, cheese and butter down." He noticed Caldar's surprise. "You don't know how it works, do you? Rimber lad? There’s thousands of cattle up at the Rails, hundreds of ‘em milk cows - that’s a lot of cheese and butter gets made every day. Ends up all over the Lake, Suntoren, Norleng, everywhere. Thanks to the mule-drivers." He turned his head to look at the boys. "Hmm. I can see you're not impressed. You should be. It's us that hold the whole Lake together." He started to hum his favourite tune again.
An hour later they came out suddenly onto a grassy coll overlooking the valley beyond. The Rails. Grassland, forest, and a string of lakes faded away towards an indistinct tangle of peaks and grumbling thunderclouds.
"It's huge." After the confinement of the woods Caldar was thrilled at the impression of space.
"Thirty mile end to end and more than three wide." Fillitin was happy to be displaying the valley to a newcomer. "The main farm's at this end, just down near that first lake. Come on, let's get there before it rains."
The Tears of Sisme Page 7
