They made a human barrier, too, between the King and the mounted lords who followed, many flanked by smaller bands in mail and livery matching the colour of their banners. Some were drunk, others merry and shouting; but Alya was struck by one face in particular, a tall, lean man who rode soberly and alone. His grey hair was foppishly curled, and he was gorgeously robed as any in green and gold over a coat of dark green mail; but he sat straight and firm in the saddle, and the long sword at his side had a well-worn look. His deeply lined face was flint-hard and set, his eyes narrowed with ill-contained anger and impatience, and they seldom left Volmur. The lords who followed him, themselves with only a few followers, were openly laughing and pointing; but the tall lord appeared not to notice.
Behind them the procession tailed off into random ranks of armsmen, sometimes with mounted captains, sometimes with only a sergeant and a few drummers striding at their head, drill and discipline sadly disarranged by drink. The pikemen had relaxed, and Alya exchanged a swift glance with Vansha. ‘Well?’ demanded a muffled voice. ‘What’re you waiting for, a formal invitation on red paper? A fair wind?’
‘Shut up, demon!’ growled Vansha, and together they urged their mounts forward, as the procession wove towards their side of the street. The startled pikemen were thrust aside by the horses, and sent staggering before they could say anything. The horses, evidently used to riding in formation, were eager to join this parade. The two young men fell in quite naturally at the head of a particularly drunken band of soldiery, and their mounts swung with it across the street and away, in the wake of the dissolving procession.
The crowd was already spilling into the street behind them, and cries, if any, were lost in the hubbub. The head of the procession, tumblers, dragon, king and all, had already vanished in the tangle of streets ahead; but Alya saw, not far beyond, the top of a high tower over the rooftops, the tallest one they had made out from the hill. The gables were dragons and demons and other fabulous monsters, all wildly carved and painted, and the roof itself was metal sheet of some kind, probably copper.
Vansha cocked his head. ‘That’d cost a bit, wouldn’t it? Even for city folk!’
‘Most like!’ Alya agreed. ‘A king this rich—’
‘Yes. Surely he’d barely notice the cost of a war party! And look at those gates!’
The gates were even more extravagant than the gables. They were nowhere near as gargantuan as those in the ancient wall must have been, but the arch loomed impressively high over the weaving line of weary revellers, and the gates themselves seemed to be made of glinting greenish metal. The guards did not seem to be stopping anyone, or even looking at them very seriously. The delicious aroma of roasting meats from the courtyard beyond drew all attention, and Alya found his mouth dripping as the gate drew leadenly, slowly nearer.
‘Are they going to let this rabble in at all?’ whispered Vansha thickly. ‘Shouldn’t we move up the line?’
‘Not now! They’d tear us to shreds and dip us in dripping! We’ll need take our chances!’
They held their breath as the archway loomed still closer. Not only from excitement; there was a nastier taint to the air as they passed beneath, overriding even the roasting, and not far to look for its source. Over that massive arch dangled an array of heads, not carven but real and human and decaying, tarred and impaled upon rusting pikestaffs, crowned with squabbling crows and buzzards. The bag stirred, and chuckled softly. ‘As at my door, so at his! Yet who calls him a brigand?’
‘Peace, little chickadee!’ said Alya quietly. ‘Save your huff and puff till it’s wanted!’
They saw now that the imposing gates were only rough logs, like all the other walls; but some effort had been made to cover them in copper sheathing, not mere metal sheets but great plates finely embossed with mythical scenes, and curlicues of foliage, and strange lurking beasts. They looked age-worn and out of place, as if they too were fragments salvaged from some vanished past.
The procession entered the courtyard at last, as the sun dropped behind its walls. In shadow it was a wide place defined by fires and greasy smokes, carcasses crackling on spits over roughly piled embers, turned and basted by scurrying figures like demons in a pit. Behind the smoke the newcomers could see not one single palace, but a mad jumble of smaller buildings clustered around the tower, some with the high-crowned shingle roofs and smooth walls covered in painted figures, others mere flat-roofed log-piles stopped with mud. The ground between them, too, was trodden earth, strewn with dung and litter. Only here and there was there any paving, and that old and cracked and badly laid, by the look of it yet another crude salvage from the past.
At the heart of this ramshackle complex rose a massive, uneven hall, darker than shadow, with a wide spreading staircase of huge logs and painted pillars leading up to its high-peaked doors; and from one corner of this that tall tower arose. Before the stair the largest patch of paving was spread out, and all across this were strewn rough benches and planks on trestles. On the wide stairs higher tables were set, and on the highest, before a shadowy door, a high seat of black wood gilded and painted. There sat Volmur, surrounded by guards and attendants, and before him men were making obeisances.
‘As well now, as ever!’ muttered Vansha. Instead of dismounting as others did, they trotted their horses forward between the fires, coughing as the sputtering smokes wrapped around them, and through the ranks of benches. Men already filling cups and wooden trenchers glanced at the young men curiously, but they rode on as if they had every right, until they came almost to the foot of the wide stair. Suddenly hard hands seized their bridles, but before spears could be raised they kicked free of their stirrups and slid to the ground, nodding amiably to the guards left holding their horses.
‘Hail, King!’ shouted Alya, and his clear voice cut through the festive hubbub of the court, so loud that most heads turned, and the men on the steps rose and stared. ‘We wish you joy of your feast, Bright Sun! But we come to report a great wrong, and to seek your aid and justice!’
They could not see Volmur’s face as he heaved himself up from his throne, and gestured to one beside him. It was that man who answered them, striding down the stairs flicking his long robes about him, as arrogant as his tone. ‘There is a time and place the King hears grievances, and this is not one! Begone!’
‘I am sorry to offend!’ said Alya stoutly. ‘We know nothing of the court’s ways. But we have come a long way and a hard one to have our hearing, and the matter will not brook delay!’
‘That is for me to judge!’ snapped the courtier, motioning to the guards. But a word from above stopped him in his tracks; and Volmur himself lumbered to the head of the stair.
‘Well, then, peasant?’ he demanded thickly; and his voice held little encouragement. ‘You will have your say! And then, consider that I will have mine! What is this wrong so great that it must spoil a royal feast?’
Vansha swallowed. ‘The raiding of the village known as the Citadel, three nights since; the murder of its chieftain, my father the Seer and many other folk; and the carrying off of young women.’
Neither was prepared for the gust of laughter that went up around them, or the scorn that hissed in Volmur’s voice, like fat upon the embers below. ‘And by whom? By my command? No! But it might have been, indeed. For I had a mind to turn my gaze upon the Citadel one day, when I had the time to spare, and come to claim the dues and fealty it has long denied me, the garrisoning of my troops!’ He snorted, and wiped his beard. ‘Then you curs might well have lost more than lives, and the women you were too cowardly to protect! And you may yet lose more, in your insolence!’
Alya shook his head. ‘King, that is as may be. None denies your power. But the town did stand against the raiders, and slew many – these their horses as our witness! The raiders were our common enemies, the Aikiya’wahsa that men call the Ekwesh, the bloody right hands of the Ice. Shall it be said that you permit them to rampage unchecked across domains you claim, a threat to all alike? Sha
ll we not stand together against them, lest we be taken piece by piece? There is still time to punish their impudence!’
There was an uneasy silence. Volmur broke it with a defiant roar. ‘I stand against the jackals of the Ice wherever they show their painted faces! Eh, lads?’ The court cheered and howled in answer; but when the row died down it was evident that he had been using the diversion to think.
‘But riding out against them, now – that is a costly exercise, and I must be sure it’s worth the lives I venture! Three nights since, you say?’ His voice grew darker suddenly, and more menacing than before; and he came rolling down the stairs to confront them, barging his guards out of the way. ‘But how can that be? Three nights, as you claim, from the Citadel, on the northern borders of my realm?’ He loomed above them, arms akimbo, close enough so Alya could see his narrowed eyes glinting blackly. ‘Say then, and quickly – even on swift mounts, how could you be standing here before me now, so soon?’
‘By riding through the Forest of Birds, my lord,’ said Alya calmly, and his face did not change in the storm of laughter that followed. Even Volmur laughed; but there was no merriment in his face, only scorn and wrath, more of thunder than of sun.
‘You look remarkably well for that! Well, mere overbold bumpkins I thought you. I might even have found you a place in my guards, after your floggings! But now you have over-reached yourselves. Through the dark Forest, indeed! You seek to draw my men out into some snare or trickery, or to distract from some other assault, I doubt not. Perhaps you are even fingers of that icy hand yourselves! But whatever, we shall find out – eventually!’
He snapped fat fingers to his guards.
‘King Volmur!’ shouted Alya. ‘I do not blame your doubt! Yet pass we did. And brought you a token there is no disputing!’
He threw open the bag from his saddle, and reaching within seized the squalling Nightingale by the scruff of his neck and drew him out. He dangled the childlike figure high, one-handed, effortless. Ignoring the sudden clamour around him, he grinned at Nightingale. ‘Now, demon, show them who you are! Whistle up a good blow!’
Nightingale kicked his legs delightedly, stuck his grubby fingers in his gape of a mouth and took a deep breath. Even Alya, braced against the sound that came, shuddered at its impact; and yet he could scarcely hear it.
He felt it, as one feels the scrape of a knife over rough earthenware or the screech of chalk upon slate, up and down his spine, with shrivelling force. Vansha clapped his hands over his ears and winced; the guards dropped their spears and did likewise. Volmur’s courtier, standing straight in its path, rolled up his eyes till only the whites showed, and fell in a fit upon the stair. Volmur himself staggered back, hands on ears, face screwed up in anguish. Nightingale screeched with malevolent pleasure. And then the air seemed to gather itself in stifling folds about them, and unleash.
The torches were extinguished with snapping force. The cooking fires lifted in great swathes of flame, and went out. An icy roar swirled through the courtyard, spinning weathercocks, rattling doors and rooftiles, plucking at robes, lifting tabletops from their trestles and heaving benches over and over. The roasting carcasses toppled with a crash and hissed in the embers. Around Vansha and Alya the air was still, while all about them men stumbled, leaning into the gust to keep their footing, waving their arms as if swimming.
Still it grew, plucking fur hats from wealthy heads, rags from serfs, helms from the guards, sending them bowling madly together across the yard. At the stairhead above, the high seat tilted and toppled back with a crash. The doors and shutters that had rattled burst open now, and the screaming from within mingled with the howling air. Jugs, chairs, anything loose was plucked up and hurled. Men fell flat and scrabbled to the earth for a handhold, or caught at pillars as their legs were plucked from under them by the rushing air. They hung there by their hands among wreathing smoke, as if the world had turned upon its side.
On the stairs Volmur was not borne away, but on his hands and knees he struggled forward, grabbing at his sword. And off to the side Alya saw one man who still stood upright, bow in hand, struggling to aim an arrow. He loosed, and the blast blew it straight back at him, over his shoulder. It was the unhappy lord of the parade, looking like a tall grey feather the blast should pluck away. But, far from that, he hurled his bow from him, drew his sword; and he too began to inch forward against the wind, step by leaden step.
‘Enough, little bird!’ cried Alya then, and as suddenly the air was deadly still, like the hush before a storm. The grey lord staggered with the sudden release, and the men who had been holding on slumped down exhausted.
In the silence Nightingale’s snigger was all too audible. Hastily Alya bowed his head to Volmur, picking himself up, and forced the Nightingale to bow also, though the creature was still giggling to himself.
‘Your pardon for the damage, great lord!’ said Alya deferentially. ‘But it is not too hard to set aright – and there was no other way to convince you what we have conquered, and what power we hold. A power against which only your mighty self could still stand – and in some measure this other gentleman here. Say, is my good faith now proven?’
Volmur was breathing heavily, and his glowering eye burned with wrath, but he contained it sensibly enough. ‘It is, though I could wish it less forcible. Very well, boy, you have shown you are no man to gainsay! And you have rid that bloody woodland of its worst menace among many, which is no small service to me. For that alone I must forgive you the damage and more. But now, you will cause me the keenest of delight by striking the head from that stinking abomination there …’
Vansha looked deeply relieved, but Alya again bowed, and returned Nightingale struggling feebly to the bag. ‘Your pardon, King, but I took a pledge that I would spare him, for his surrender and service. And such power as his we may yet have need of, when we set out after the savages of the Ice.’
Volmur scowled. ‘Well, I suppose that is true enough; and if the Powers have given you might enough to subdue that thing, then there is little to be gained from pursuing the matter. You shall join us, and welcome!’
Nightingale put his head out of the bag and waggled a long pale tongue at him, but the King ignored it. ‘Serfs! Shift! Get off your lazy scuts and renew the feast at once! Set all this mess aright, and lay two more trenchers on my table, for—’ He paused.
Alya bowed yet again. It always seemed to be the right thing to do. ‘I thank you, my lord. My friend is Vansha, son of Ushaya-awale, late Seer of the Citadel; and I am Alya, son of Alyatan-kawayi’wale Atar, late Seer of the town of Teoquhan.’
‘Teoquhan!’ The grim man, leaning languidly against a pillar, stood suddenly erect. ‘You are old Alya’s son? It must be thirty years since he left us. Whatever became of him?’
Alya, dismounting, stared. ‘I am his son. He chose to become an outliver, with his young wife and household; and with them he was slain, three years since, by the raiders. He died in saving me. How came you to know him?’
The grey man drew himself up. ‘Because I am the Lord Asquan, son of Atiya, inheritor of Teoquhan domain, last of the ancient lands, and it was my father he served.’ Volmur snorted loudly, but the grey man ignored him. Suddenly he looked by far the more regal of the two. ‘My father it was whom Alya sought to warn after his fashion. My father, whom he left, and went into the wilderness. And thus, some five years after, he escaped the sack and destruction of Teoquhan, town and lands, by the Ice. Few enough of us did.’
Asquan rubbed his cheek with beringed fingers, and Alya saw there a white line scored across it from brow to throat, a terrible jagged scar. ‘I have often thought we should have listened to him, harsh and impatient as he was. Yet it seems that in the end the all-seeing Alya could not save himself from just the same fate!’ His smile was more crooked and mirthless than a sneer, and it stung Alya fiercely.
‘A Seer cannot predict everything!’ he snapped. ‘Often what concerns himself, least of all. The realm beyond the Wall is n
ot mapped or tracked.’
Volmur had been listening with keen interest. ‘You speak of what you know. So you yourself are a Seer?’
‘I was, though my schooling was not completed. But, as you say, the Powers have chosen to give me a greater strength.’
Volmur shook his head dubiously. ‘I often wonder if there can be any greater might than a Seer’s. A king may command the strength of giants in his armies, but if he lacks the foresight and the knowledge to wield it, then it is as nothing. But come, eat and take your ease, and we will ponder what way your service can best be rewarded.’
Alya caught Vansha’s eye, and they were wise enough to content themselves with that, for then. They were eager for the meat that still caressed their nostrils, as the fires were relit. The courtier who had sought to dismiss them now came to invite them to the King’s tables upon the stairs, and his bleak face revealed no more than his courteous bow. Alya found himself and Vansha in a place of honour among the lords, and they deferred to him in all things. There was boiled grain in plenty to timber the belly, and deep bowls of fine herbs and sauces to flavour it, and a huge pinch of white salt for every man; and if ash or earth still clung upon the carcasses restored to their spits, on the joints that reached the King’s table none remained.
The young men ate like wolves, while Nightingale in his bag crouched beneath the table and crunched and cracked bones that Alya passed down to him, sucking out their marrow. But as time passed and their bellies filled, Alya became aware that the Lord Asquan had moved unobtrusively down the table to sit near him, though he only inclined his head gravely, and did not speak. Only when Volmur’s attention was wholly elsewhere did he speak, looking straight ahead, not moving his lips, and too softly for any other to hear.
‘Alya’s son, I should not look to Volmur for too much help, if I were you.’
Shadow of the Seer Page 15