by Bruce Blake
Khirro slipped past Athryn, back pressed to the wall as he crept up to the battered and scarred door; the rusted bars of an iron gate lay on the ground nearby, chunks of stone torn from the wall still attached to its hinges. He peered through the crack of the open door and saw an alley running away into darkness but nothing else. He crept back across the opening and pulled the magician a step away.
“No one,” he whispered directly into Athryn’s ear. “An alley. No room for guards.”
“But ideal for an ambush.”
He looked into his companion’s eyes and nodded once. They didn’t know when they might find another town and, with winter’s approach, game was scarce. If they didn’t resupply here, they wouldn’t make it back to Erechania; they had no choice but to enter the city.
“I’ll go,” Khirro said. “Give me a few minutes. If you don’t hear me come to my death, then follow.”
“They may have seen our approach and will wait until we are both trapped.”
“Then be ready to fight.”
Athryn put a hand on Khirro’s shoulder like he might speak, but didn’t. Khirro wanted to say more, perhaps to thank his companion for all he’d done, but though their lives might end here, he didn’t know what to say to the man whose assistance had allowed him to come this far. The heat of embarrassment touched his cheeks. Instead of speaking, he turned away and forced himself through the space between broken door and chipped wall into the dark alley.
The stench of refuse, rotted food and Gods knew what else slammed against him like he’d run into a wall. He covered his nose and mouth with his arm and breathed shallowly. His eyes watered. He waited. After a minute with no noise or movement from the lane ahead, he sucked a breath through the sleeve of his tunic and took a step. His boot sunk into something soft and he pulled back.
It’s only garbage.
Khirro shuddered and swallowed hard around a knot in his throat. When his boot sank again, he pushed on. His second step found hard ground and he paused again, looked up at the tops of the buildings on either side. The sky above remained dark, leaving him unable to determine if he saw silhouettes against the dark gray of impending dawn or not. He crouched to make himself a smaller target and held the Mourning Sword out in front of him. The glow of the runes faded, as though the sword knew not to give him away. A minute passed. Another. Sweat ran down Khirro’s brow despite the chill in the autumn air. Gathering himself, he moved forward.
After a dozen steps, the alley widened into a narrow courtyard. Windowless walls looked down onto bare ground and Khirro stood at the mouth of the alley, wishing for light. A heap lay in the middle of the courtyard, lumpy and angular and indistinguishable. He crouched again, straining to hear past the rush of blood in his ears, the rasp of breath in his throat. Swallowing, he stopped his breathing, tried to calm his thumping heart.
A noise.
The sound of cloth scraping against cloth from the heap lying in the middle of the yard. Khirro dropped his arm from his face and grasped the hilt of the Mourning Sword with both hands, the muscles in his arms bunching. Another sound, louder this time. The clink of steel? A thought sprang to Khirro’s mind.
What would Ghaul do?
The name brought a bad taste to his mouth, but he couldn’t deny the soldier—enemy or not—would have known how handle this, as he would have known how to handle any dangerous situation. Would he rush in and hope to catch the enemy off guard? Sneak up and surprise them? The lack of visible movement suggested the person must be resting or unconscious.
Ghaul would sneak up and slit their throats while they slept.
Disgusted at the thought, Khirro rose and inched forward. Each step brought the shape before him into clearer view until he saw it was more than one person lying on the ground. He stepped gingerly, closing the distance, silent like the tyger burning within him until his boot struck a stone. The rock skittered across the ground.
A flurry of movement froze him in his spot. The dark shape of some devil or monster rose into the air and he dove to the ground before recognizing the angry caw of the crow he’d disturbed. He rolled to his back and saw its dark shape outlined briefly against the sky before it disappeared beyond the top of the wall. It hollered at him from a distance, but he neither saw nor heard any other signs of life. Khirro climbed to his feet.
“Khirro?”
He whirled at the voice, blade flashing before him. Wisely, Athryn had halted several paces away. Khirro blinked and allowed the sword’s tip to dip toward the ground, embarrassed by his nervousness.
That’s not me anymore. I’m no longer the fearful dirt farmer.
“Are you all right?”
“Yes,” Khirro whispered as the magician came to his side. “You startled me. You and that crow.”
“It seems our entrance is unguarded and unnoticed.”
“Perhaps.” Khirro gestured over his shoulder. “Look at this.”
Five corpses in total lay in the street—four men and one woman. The woman’s rough spun dress was in tatters; two of the men wore no breeches. Athryn knelt and inspected the bodies, touching bare flesh with the back of his hand, lifting one man’s arm. Khirro watched.
“They have been dead for a couple of hours.” Athryn nodded toward the bodies arrayed on the ground before him. “They have no weapons. They did not kill each other. Someone else did and brought them here.”
“But why? What happened?”
Athryn glanced up at Khirro. “This is Poltghasa.”
***
They crept through the city, stealing from shadow to receding shadow as dawn inched into the sky. The only people they saw were asleep or passed out—or perhaps dead—and they didn’t stop to determine which. Khirro wondered at the lack of people in the streets. Was Poltghasa such a terrible place that even those who lived in it wouldn’t venture out in the dark?
The city’s architecture contrasted with the plain wall surrounding it. Pillars carved with heroic scenes supported arches over the main boulevard; buildings built not just for shelter but also for art lined the streets. Stretching above them all, a spire two hundred or more feet tall in the center square presided over the city. But all the buildings and statues showed disrepair and neglect, the city’s beauty muted by centuries of dirt, grime and damage. Statues of ancient kings, with missing limbs or broken heads, stood guard outside shattered buildings. Once proud gargoyles lay smashed in the streets, thrown off their perches by the hands of attacking warriors or drunken wretches. They passed by it all, awed as much by the neglect of the city’s residents as they were by the incredible workmanship.
What should I expect of banished criminals?
They stole along garbage strewn streets, drawn toward the spire. Chipped cobblestones passed beneath their feet as the sky lightened and in the distance a rooster heralded dawn, followed quickly by someone telling the bird to shut up. Athryn took Khirro by the elbow, hurrying him along.
A hundred yards from the tower, they stopped. Athryn raised a finger and pointed at the rough flight of stairs climbing alongside the spire.
“The Killing Stairs.”
Khirro stared. Hundreds, maybe thousands of people’s lives had ended on those stairs, thrown off the top of the tower in the days before anarchy ruled Poltghasa. Gods alone knew how many more in the days since.
They moved forward quickly, as life began to stir around them. A woman threw her gray water out of a second story window; a cat raced across the avenue chasing a mouse; the sound of voices embroiled in an argument spilled out through the broken door of a building.
They stopped at the first step of the granite stairs and saw each edge was chipped and worn by a thousand years of sandals and boots thumping against their surface. Instruments of death. Part way up, spread over twenty of the steps, Khirro saw a dark stain on the light colored stone.
That’s where they died.
Athryn nodded, confirming Khirro’s thought, then gestured toward the door at the base of the tower.
&nb
sp; “In there,” he said and moved toward the door.
A layer of verdigris covered the bronze door, muting the intricate pattern carved across its surface. Despite the neglect, the door hung straight on its hinges. Khirro grabbed the handle and pushed, expecting it not to budge, but it swung open easily, like a portal well used and oiled, though the odor of dust and mold wafting through the open doorway suggested otherwise. Athryn crept through; Khirro followed.
The air within seemed like it might have been undisturbed for centuries, existing to be breathed by spiders and vermin scuttling about in the dark and no one else. Khirro pulled the Mourning Sword from his hip; the red runes glowed dimly but it was enough for them to discern shapes in the chamber as Athryn closed the door. The room was empty of furnishings or decoration except for a staircase carved into the wall winding its way up and up and up into the darkness above. Khirro extended the sword over his head, hoping to see the ceiling, but saw darkness and nothing more beyond the glow of his blade.
“The ceiling is two hundred feet above our heads. Maybe more.” Athryn’s voice echoed away in the heights. Somewhere above a bat squeaked and fluttered.
“What?”
“There are no floors, only this one and the roof from which Shyctem cast his enemies. Those and the stairs in between.”
“It seems like no one’s been in here for a long time.”
“I do not think they bother to take the condemned all the way to the top before killing them anymore.”
Khirro thought about the men and woman they’d found and wondered how many people in this so-called ‘free city’ found their deaths innocently. He suspected it could happen anytime if you made the wrong man angry. But the same could be said of any city, couldn’t it?
“We will rest here until nightfall,” Athryn said clearing cobwebs, dust and loose pebbles from a place on the floor with his boot. “After dark, when we can move with less chance of notice, we will find supplies and be out of this place before the sun rises.”
Khirro nodded, his chest tight. “I’ll take first watch.”
“As you like. You have but one door to watch.”
Athryn settled onto the floor, his breathing soon settling into the deep, easy pattern of sleep. Khirro wandered the round chamber, examining walls and testing the stairs. He rested his foot on the bottom step and dread filled him as he felt what it must have been like for the condemned mounting the stairs on the final march to their deaths. The only choices before them were complete the climb and die on the Killing Stairs, leap from these steps and die a death unseen by the crowds gathered in the square or be killed for refusing to climb. Any of the three yielded the same result.
Khirro looked back over his shoulder at Athryn sleeping on the floor and the closed door beyond him. It looked like no one had entered this place in a very long time; he doubted there was any chance anyone would do so today.
No one saw us come in. We’re safe here.
Khirro turned his attention back to the stair and stepped up onto the first step. Beneath his boot, it felt like any other step. It could easily belong to any one of the sets of stairs leading to the top of the wall at the Isthmus Fortress, would have only felt out of place leading to the hay loft in his father’s barn because it was stone rather than wood. The sense of dread he’d felt disappeared, no feeling of impending doom shivered up his leg and into his heart.
They’re only stairs.
He stepped up onto the next stair, then the next, his shoulder brushing the wall his only guide to keep him from going over the edge. Step after step he climbed, fingers trailing along the stone wall beside him. After several dozen steps had passed under his feet, he stopped, listening. He still heard Athryn’s gentle breathing on the floor below, but there was nothing else; no bats or birds flitted overhead chasing bugs, no sounds from outside the tower penetrated its thick wall.
Another step. Another. Khirro climbed the staircase following the curve of the tower wall, each step forward taking him higher and deeper into darkness. He moved slowly, cautiously, silently counting each stair as his foot set upon it without knowing why he was climbing.
When his count reached two hundred, he stopped again, listened to the silence. The only sounds now came from within him: the beat of his heart, the whisper of breath in his throat, the creak of his armor each time his chest expanded. He saw nothing ahead and above him but darkness; behind and below was the same.
A wave of vertigo overtook Khirro, spinning his head in the dark. He leaned toward the wall and felt as though it would surely be gone; it startled him when his back touched it. The dark spun around him, shortening his breath and bringing nausea from his gut to his throat. He flattened himself against the wall, arms spread, and closed his eyes to stop the world from spinning. After a minute that felt as though it stretched on for an hour, his head steadied, his stomach settled, and Khirro opened his eyes to the same darkness they’d observed before.
He looked down and saw nothing. If he hadn’t counted two hundred stairs passing under his feet, he might have thought he could step off right onto the floor, but he knew that would be the death of him, the end of hope for the kingdom. He looked up and thought he saw a sliver of light. It invigorated him and he began moving up the stairs, keeping as close to the wall as he could.
As he climbed, the sliver of light grew brighter, and with it his mood lifted. He moved faster, driven to get out of the dark and into the light. His thighs ached from climbing, sweat ran from his temple, but the light got closer until he recognized it as the sun shining through the narrow crack beneath a door.
Khirro made his way cautiously up the last few stairs, suddenly aware again of the fall awaiting him if he misstepped. Finally, his eyes drew even with the crack under the door and he could see the last few stairs dimly lit, and the landing at the top of them.
He rested a moment as he reached the top, sucking deep breaths into his lungs in an attempt to recover from the climb. How horrible it must have been to be a condemned man making such an ascent, having so much time to contemplate your coming demise. Khirro shivered at the thought but put it aside as he reached for the door.
It wasn’t locked, of course. At such a height, there was nothing to keep out, and who in their right mind would climb the steps to the door.
Only me, I suppose.
The city stretched away in all directions from the spire, its broken down buildings bathed in the golden glow of early morning sun. Beyond the far city wall, yellow-brown steppe led to forest and the ground rose to hills. Khirro didn’t know if he looked toward Kanos or Lakesh, but either way, the view was breathtaking.
As was the sheer height of the spire.
Khirro stepped gingerly onto the ledge outside the door. It was big enough for a few men to stand on at once—perhaps ten feet wide and extending out five feet from the tower—but the lack of any handhold or railing to separate platform from empty air made it a poor idea to crowd it with too many. One was probably enough.
The soles of Khirro’s boots scuffed the rough stone as he shuffled away from the doorway , curious to peer over the edge. He leaned forward, dragged his feet ahead another few inches, then leaned again.
The stairs two hundred feet below were tinted pink, painted that color by the lives they’d taken over the centuries. After the climb to get here and now standing on the platform, Khirro realized that the death at the end of the fall might have been a relief to the condemned who took the plunge. The dread anticipation and exertion of climbing the stairs, the opportunity to contemplate the value of life while standing on the platform looking over the city and the land beyond, the fearful descent to the stairs so far below all must have been tortures heaped upon tortures that hitting the stairs would finally relieve.
Tortures heaped upon tortures.
Like having the life you were raised for torn from you against your will. Like being cursed to carry out a task you didn’t want. Like watching friends and companions die in the name of helping you. Like n
ever having the chance to love the woman you truly loved.
Khirro moved closer to the edge, his toes less than an inch from open air. A bird flew by close to the tower but beneath the level of the platform; cold wind touched his cheeks, drying the sweat on his temples and making him shiver. He looked down at the pink stone stairs and drew a long breath in through his nose.
One death could save so many: Athryn, the child in my dreams, my family. If only it could bring back those already lost.
The wind rose again, flapping his breeches against his legs, tugging at him. He crossed his arms, hugged himself against the cold, but he knew it wasn’t only the cold that made him shiver. It was also where he stood, and it was temptation.
But how many more would die along with that one death?
The thoughts were like words in his head that didn’t feel as though they belonged to him. He swayed slightly forward and back again, forward and back. His legs ached, tired of holding him upright, tired of holding the burden.
Smoke curled from chimneys of many of the decrepit houses below and Khirro caught a whiff of pork frying, bread baking. He saw people moving through the streets. These weren’t his people, but they made him think of his own home, of people like the widow Breadmaker who liked to entertain foreign merchants, and of Maree who showed him her lady flower when they were but children. Did they deserve to die because Khirro didn’t want to go on any longer?
Do they?
The voice again that didn’t belong to him. He knew whose voice it was: the tyger's.
“No,” he said aloud. “They don’t.”
Khirro turned his shoulders to move away from the edge, but his feet wouldn’t do as they were told. The world tilted and he stumbled, arms pinwheeling, desperately seeking balance without finding it. Khirro threw his weight backward, away from the edge, felt air rush around him and the sensation of falling. Saliva flooded his mouth with the coppery taste of panic.
