Heartland

by Lucy Hounsom

  ‘The Trade Assembly are seeing no one.’

  She felt a flash of irritation at his tone. ‘We’ve come a long way to speak to them,’ she said, attempting to keep a lid on her anger. It always seemed to be boiling over these days. ‘We won’t go until we have.’

  ‘The city is in lockdown. No one enters or leaves without the say-so of the Assembly. I’ve had no orders to expect you.’

  ‘I wouldn’t assume you had. But I will see the Assembly, nevertheless.’

  ‘I don’t know who you think you are, lady, and I’ve never heard of this Naris you say you’re from, but you are not setting foot inside these walls.’

  Brégenne regarded him. ‘Do you really believe you can stop me?’

  ‘Stop you?’ The guard laughed. ‘What do you intend to do – break down the gates?’

  ‘Gareth,’ Brégenne said.

  As Myst and Rain picked their way through the splinters, Gareth gave her a sheepish look. ‘I didn’t think they’d explode like that,’ he said, guiding his horse around a larger chunk of gate. ‘I only meant to set one of them alight.’

  ‘Which hand did you use?’ Brégenne asked him.

  Gareth peered at the gauntlet. ‘Oh.’

  ‘If you’re going to hurl fire around, I think you’d be wiser to use your left hand.’

  ‘Remember, it was your idea.’

  Brégenne grimaced at her own impatience. She and Gareth were now the focus of a host of terrified eyes. Ragged people kept their distance and she was ashamed to see some with minor injuries from the explosion. The lookout tower trembled, as if it might fall at any moment, and both guardsmen were hastily abandoning it. The racket had brought other guards to the scene and blades were quickly levelled at the two of them. Gareth held up his left hand and wreathed it in flame. ‘Don’t even think about it,’ he said pleasantly.

  Everyone except Brégenne stared aghast at the hand. Before Gareth started enjoying the attention a little too much, she said, ‘I will see the Trade Assembly now. You can try to stop us, but I wouldn’t recommend it. As you’ve just witnessed, I have little control over my friend here.’

  Gareth let the fire climb up to his shoulder for emphasis and the crowd drew back amidst frightened mutterings of witchcraft. It reminded Brégenne of Brenwym. ‘Not witches,’ she said slowly and clearly, ‘Wielders.’

  The words made no difference to the apprehensive faces around her, but then the young guard who’d first challenged them stepped forward. ‘Like in the stories?’ he said, a little tremor in his voice.

  Brégenne regarded him in some surprise. ‘Like in the stories,’ she agreed before adding, ‘but Gareth and I aren’t from a story. We’re from Mariar, like you.’

  ‘My grandfather said the Wielders died at the end of the war.’

  ‘That was the rumour we spread,’ Brégenne told him, ‘to protect ourselves. But now we’re here to protect you.’

  The older guardsman grabbed his younger colleague by the shoulder and hauled him back. ‘That’s enough from you.’ He gestured at the hole in the wall where the gates had been. ‘Protect us, is it? You could have killed us.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Brégenne said sincerely. ‘Gareth still has a lot to learn.’ She shot him a dark look and the novice had the grace to look abashed. ‘But I must speak to the Assembly.’ She switched her gaze to the guard. ‘And if I have to use force to gain an audience, I will.’

  The guardsman opened his mouth to respond with what looked like a retort, but the young soldier touched his arm. ‘I know it sounds crazy, Sergeant, but if they really are Wielders, there’s nothing we can do to stop them. My grandfather said—’

  ‘Oh to the pit with your grandfather,’ the sergeant snarled. ‘I’m not letting a pair of witches into the city.’ He eyed Brégenne and Gareth. ‘If that’s even what they are. All of this could be a trick.’

  Brégenne’s fragile hold on her temper began to slip. ‘It was a trick that destroyed your gates, Sergeant?’

  ‘There are powders that can do as much,’ the man said. It hadn’t taken him long to get over his initial fright, she noted sourly.

  ‘But look at his hand.’ The young guard pointed at Gareth. ‘How can that be a trick?’ His face firmed. ‘I think they’re telling the truth.’

  The sergeant rounded on him. ‘If I hear another word out of you—’

  ‘You should listen to him,’ Brégenne interrupted. ‘He’s the only one speaking sense.’

  ‘Sense?’ The man’s face began to purple and she came to a conclusion. Words were no more use here.

  ‘Gareth,’ Brégenne said softly. ‘How good are you at human manipulation?’

  The novice’s look was wary. ‘I haven’t practised it much. Why?’

  ‘We’re not getting anywhere here and I don’t have time to mess around. The sergeant’s going to take us to the Trade Assembly, whether he likes it or not.’ She told Gareth what she wanted and then added, ‘Try not to use more force than necessary. We don’t want to come off as the enemy here.’

  The flames around Gareth’s hand died and the crowd gave an audible sigh of relief.

  ‘There,’ the sergeant said, as if the fire had indeed been a trick. He snapped an order. ‘Restrain them.’

  Gareth’s expression turned introspective. He stared fixedly at the guard, tiny beads of sweat popping out on his forehead. The man opened his mouth … but nothing emerged. Instead, his eyes widened as his hand sheathed his drawn blade of its own accord and his feet swivelled to point him in the direction of the city proper.

  ‘Your sergeant’s had a change of heart,’ Brégenne said to the rest of the guardsmen. ‘No harm will come to him as long as he agrees to take us to the Assembly. But should you seek to impede us,’ she spread her hands, ‘I’ve heard there’s a nice deep well in the market district.’

  Slowly the blades lowered and the guards stepped back. When the sergeant again tried and failed to speak, pale fear stole the anger from his face. ‘After you,’ Gareth said politely and the man began a stiff walk like a marionette unused to motion.

  It was safer to lead the horses through the city. Brégenne pulled up the hood of her cloak and the crowd parted for them. As they left the scene of wreckage behind, she glanced back to see the young soldier staring after them, an unreadable expression on his face.

  Prompted by Gareth, the sergeant led them through the city streets. At first he made several attempts to escape, but the novice tightened his mental hold on the man’s body and forced him forward. Brégenne was impressed. After the incident at the gates, she wasn’t sure whether Gareth had the subtlety required for human manipulation. She’d heard some Wielders claim that substantiation was the higher and more difficult method of channelling energy, but Brégenne didn’t agree. After all, conjuring Solar or Lunar fire came under that bracket and any Wielder over Initiated level could do it.

  The sights and smells of the city began to intrude on her thoughts and she found herself staring. Gone were the clean, bustling streets she remembered. Now they were home to hundreds of displaced people, dirty and hopeless-faced. Women sat in the gutter so that their children didn’t have to and men stood over them or sometimes sat beside them, dressed in clothes that might once have been fine.

  She’d put the guard’s claim about there being no room down to exaggeration, but he’d been telling the truth. Every lane and alleyway held its share of the dispossessed. Brégenne looked at the dreadful conditions – the clogged sewers, rubbish left strewn in the streets – and saw a disaster waiting to happen. Summer would breed disease as surely as sunny skies, and without adequate food or shelter these alleys would soon be filled with corpses. What was the Trade Assembly doing? Her anger grew apace as she moved deeper into the city, holding tightly to Myst’s bridle.

  A low rumbling reached them, coming from somewhere up ahead. The sergeant’s face paled further and, after he cast Gareth a few imploring looks, the novice let him speak. ‘We won’t get through,’ he said. �
��When I told you that the Trade Assembly were seeing no one, I meant that they can’t see anyone. They closed the inner circle for safety and now it’s surrounded.’

  The street they followed rounded a bend and Brégenne saw what he meant. A huge crowd was camped outside the white walls of the inner circle, now stained with hurled refuse. Guards patrolled the top, armed with crossbows, shouting at the people who were trying to storm the doors.

  ‘No closer,’ the sergeant begged. ‘If they see my uniform, they’ll tear me apart.’

  ‘A fate you believe you don’t deserve?’ Brégenne replied, narrowing her eyes. ‘How long has this crowd been here?’

  ‘Several days,’ the man answered, sweating freely now, ‘and growing all the time. When the first lot arrived threatening to take food from merchants’ tables, the Assembly had no choice but to lock down the inner circle.’

  ‘No choice? The Assembly could have given them what they wanted.’

  ‘They’d have stormed the place,’ the sergeant protested, ‘and taken everything they could get their hands on.’

  ‘I don’t doubt it,’ Brégenne said. ‘But if the Assembly had acted with some humanity when the refugees began arriving in the city, all this –’ she swept a hand at the angry crowd – ‘could have been avoided.’

  ‘I don’t like the thought of going through them,’ Gareth said to her in a low voice. ‘I can’t fight that many … and I’m not sure I’d want to.’

  Brégenne shook her head. ‘I wouldn’t ask you to.’ More people were arriving to swell the crowd and it was in danger of spilling down the side street where the three of them stood. She looked at the sergeant. ‘Is there another way in?’

  He shifted his feet, said nothing.

  Brégenne went to stand in front of him, forcing him to meet her gaze. ‘You have a choice. You can get us inside or we’ll leave you out here with the mob.’ She had to raise her voice over the volume of the crowd. ‘At this stage, I’d say we’re the better option.’

  ‘It’s a strict secret,’ the sergeant protested. ‘If anyone found out I’d shown you, it’d be more than my life’s—’

  ‘How much is your life worth to them?’ Brégenne asked, gesturing at the angry group who had just rounded the corner and were coming their way. Every hand held a weapon.

  The sergeant took one frightened look at them. ‘In there,’ he said, nodding at a dingy alley. It was little more than a gutter and they would have trouble getting the horses through it.

  ‘Let him go, Gareth,’ Brégenne said and all three of them hurried to the mouth of the alleyway, squeezing the horses in just in time to escape notice. The sergeant didn’t pause but led them further into the narrow space where shadows lingered even under the late afternoon sun. The horses flattened their ears, skittish in the enclosed space, and Brégenne muttered soothing words to them.

  ‘Urgh,’ she said a moment later, having stepped in something that gave off a reek like rotting fish and excrement. Thankful for the high boots she wore, she covered her face with one hand. The gutter was wet despite the dry weather, the walls on either side pale-slicked with lichen and darker spots of mould.

  Gareth kept close behind the sergeant, his bulky presence both an encouragement and a threat. Finally, they emerged into a street where the sounds of the mob were muted. The sergeant led them north-north-west until Brégenne found herself looking at the curve of the inner wall. A wide drain ran alongside it like a moat and the sergeant jumped in without preamble. ‘This is the only way,’ he said, not sounding especially sorry about it.

  Brégenne jumped down after him. Her feet splashed into shallow water that smelled almost as bad as the alley and she chided herself for her squeamishness. She’d spent far too long surrounded by the comfort and wealth of Naris.

  Once both horses had been coaxed into the water, they set off, following the curve of the wall. At a place where the stone joined a thicker section, the sergeant came to a stop. He snatched a glance over his shoulder to ensure they hadn’t been followed and then knocked twice on what appeared to be solid stone. It sounded distinctly hollow. A few moments passed before the outline of a door appeared, opening towards them. Brégenne saw Gareth’s eyes widen – the portal was wood, but cunningly disguised to blend with the dappled stone of the wall. A woman’s helmet-framed face looked out at them, darkening when it saw the sergeant who stood there stiff and subdued.

  Before Brégenne could speak, he blurted, ‘Captain, get reinforcements. These two destroyed—’ The rest of his sentence was muffled by Gareth, who slapped his gauntleted hand over the man’s mouth. The sergeant’s eyes rolled up in his head and he dropped.

  Shocked, Gareth caught him, but Brégenne was already moving. Before the captain could reach for her short sword, Brégenne’s knife was at her throat. ‘Inside,’ Brégenne hissed and the woman slowly backed up. ‘Bring him, Gareth,’ she said without looking around.

  ‘Who are you?’

  The woman’s words were vibrations in the metal of the blade. ‘I am Brégenne of Naris,’ Brégenne said. ‘And I will speak to the Trade Assembly if I have to hold every guard in this city at knifepoint to do it.’

  Once both guards were trussed up, Brégenne and Gareth coaxed the horses into the high-ceilinged passage beyond. It led to a small courtyard with a well at its centre and from there into the streets of the inner circle. Brégenne was glad it hadn’t come to actual blows because holding a blade to someone’s throat was about all she could do with one. She’d picked the knife up in Jarra after her conversation with the barman. It was mostly for show – she had no idea how to use it in a fight and had even contemplated asking Gareth to demonstrate the basics. The novice wore a much nastier blade, which she was fairly sure wasn’t for show. Gareth called it his only memento of home – his mother had thrown it at him along with her curses. ‘I don’t think she meant to hit me with it,’ he’d said with a distance in his brown eyes. ‘I’m pretty sure she meant for me to keep it … to use it. Although with my mother, you never know.’

  Now Gareth placed his hand on the blade’s worn scabbard. ‘What’re you planning?’ he asked in a low voice as they attempted to blend in with the people strolling through the leafy avenues. Their lack of silk and fancy headwear was attracting a few stares. ‘Sunset’s coming on so don’t spring any more manipulation on me.’ Gareth huffed. ‘Moving people is exhausting. Give me another go with the gates.’

  ‘Not likely.’ Brégenne slowed their pace a little and patted Myst’s neck. ‘When we get in there, let me do the talking. No surprises.’ Brégenne nodded at his arm. ‘Watch what you do with that gauntlet.’

  Gareth tilted his hand. ‘I didn’t mean to knock the sergeant unconscious.’

  ‘Just be careful.’

  The contrast between the inner circle and the rest of the city was appalling. Sunset bathed the white buildings in a rosy glow; they seemed better suited to a town along the archipelagic coast where hot winds blew from the desert. There were no hopeless people in the gutters, no piles of rubble littering the streets. The more obvious effects of the Breaking had long since been cleared away while the rest of Market Primus rotted outside these pristine walls. The shops here all had grand awnings and signs that swung gently in the breeze. Although it wasn’t dark yet, lights were being lit in lamps propped high on posts. They marched in neat formation down either side of the wide street, the middle of which was reserved for the elegant carriages of the merchant class.

  The road branched off to the right where it wound up a small rise to a neighbourhood of pale stone mansions, glass windows sparkling in the last of the light. Gareth whistled. ‘Nice place.’

  ‘Yes,’ Brégenne said darkly, glaring at their destination: a round building domed and palisaded with gates under guard. ‘The Trade Assembly are very good at making money, but less so at spending it wisely.’

  ‘The Assembly’s in session,’ one of the two guards said as they approached.

  ‘Perfect,’ Brégenne rep
lied.

  Unlike the more serviceable city guard, this pair wore decorative armour that suggested it would crumple at a blow. Their lances looked as if they’d never been intended for anything other than ceremony. The guards’ eyes ranged over Brégenne and Gareth, their clothes, packs, the sewer-muck caking their boots and the legs of their horses. ‘Who are you?’ one asked. ‘How did you get in here?’

  ‘Oh, so you know about the mob at your gates?’ Brégenne said coolly.

  The guard’s hold on his spear tightened. ‘Answer the question.’

  ‘My answer will likely make little difference.’

  ‘You’ll not sound so flippant after a night in the cells,’ the other guard said. He was watching Gareth, his eyes on the sword sheathed at the novice’s hip.

  Brégenne glanced at the sky and smiled. ‘At this moment in time, gentlemen, there is no power on Mariar that can stop me walking through those doors.’

  Perhaps the guard who’d first spoken heard the warning in her words, or perhaps her smile unnerved him, for he didn’t join in when his companion laughed. ‘You going to take us both on with that little knife? At least your friend has a blade that might scratch my armour.’ The grin he gave Gareth was more of a sneer.

  Gareth shook his head. ‘I’d stop talking now, if I were you.’

  ‘Or what?’

  The novice folded his arms and shrugged. ‘Can’t say I didn’t warn you.’

  Brégenne’s hands began to glow. It was only a weak glow, being early in the evening, but it was enough to make the mouthy guard drop his spear in shock. ‘Pick it up,’ she said, crooking a finger and, his face blanching, the guard did as she commanded. The other man simply stared at her.

  ‘What are you?’

  ‘For the last time,’ she replied, ‘I am Brégenne, Wielder of Naris, and you are taking me to the Trade Assembly.’ She mentally seized control of one guard’s body and spun him around to face the building. ‘You,’ she snapped at the other man, ‘will watch our horses.’ White-faced, he nodded frantically and Brégenne turned her attention to his companion. ‘Now walk,’ she commanded and the mouthy guard stumbled forward, already flinching away from her.