by Clare London
The voices outside the cave had died away by now, and Eila herself was leaving. I would be left alone again, and I didn’t know whether to believe her promises of food and care. I might be left to die here in another cold night. I struggled to keep my courage firm.
“My men!” I called to her. “Who else is here?”
She paused at the mouth of the cave, her hand on her sword, her back to me. “It’s interesting, soldier, that you should ask so passionately. There’s another one here, another soldier who falls a little short of your discipline and your unyielding loyalty. But then, he’s just a boy. A boy who seemed as concerned about you as you are of him—but a boy who’s already told us plenty that we needed to know, albeit in his fevered dreams. I don’t know which one of you will outlive your usefulness to us first.” She turned to stare back at me, her eyes fierce. “He says his name’s Dax. And perhaps of more significance to you is that he says he’ll become one of us. Willingly, it seems!”
I MUST have passed out then, for I wasn’t aware of hearing her voice anymore, just the memory of its lilt, both melodic and mocking. I was already sure I was dying from the disease, abandoned and unprotected outside the city. I’d wanted to see Dax before I died, but I thought that unlikely now….
“Maen? Maen!” The voice was high and sharp, disturbing my last rest. I shook my head, impatient to be left alone. “Warrior! Here’s food, for freedom’s sake, and ale. Wake up!” Then I was hauled roughly back up, my body sagging like a limp corpse in strong arms, and another pelt was thrown around my shoulders.
Suddenly I could smell fresh bread in the cave, and the air was warmer than before. I recognized Eila’s voice in among many others.
“It’s no good. I think we’ll lose him. He’s too weak. The withdrawal from the Devotions has been too fierce. I’ve never seen the effect on a Gold. Never thought it’d be like this. Con, go fetch Healer Wesley. I’ve no skill to help nurse such a reaction.”
I guessed these people were moving around me, but I could only see dark shadowy shapes and a sharp, painful light at the edges of my vision. My head felt as if it were gripped between the stones of a wall, tight and monstrously hard against my flesh. I was about to vomit.
I did. And it felt good, like poison being expelled from my system. I heard curses around me, though I didn’t understand the references. I thought I heard Dax’s voice, but of course that was hallucination.
I did hear Eila’s laughter again, though not so merry. “That’s good, soldier! Maybe you’re not ready for death just yet, eh?”
I couldn’t have answered, and anyway it was patently untrue. I was dying—of course I was. In my thoughts and dreams, I’d never thought my life would end like this. But then, it had never been mine to determine, had it?
I DIDN’T die that night, although I was very sick for a week or more. I passed in and out of fever and unconsciousness, being fed and given water and generally nursed back to life. It was a strange affair. At the same time as being comforted, I was conscious of bindings on my legs holding me prisoner, though I’d never been fit enough to flee. My knee seemed to be taking a long time to recover from the blow I received during my capture. On some nights I heard myself crying out in pain, not recognizing any words among the anguish. And when awareness returned to me in brief moments, I’d remember all the other dangers in my life, apart from keeping myself alive. I was afraid that I—like Dax—would talk indiscreetly in my troubled sleep and somehow betray the city.
Dax….
I think he was with me some of the time. I’m sure I saw him, but I was so disturbed, it may have been a dream. And when I did finally wake enough to make coherent speech and actually ask, unaided, for water… he wasn’t there.
However, Eila and Takk were.
“Gold Warrior,” the man greeted me sourly, his voice impatient and harsh. He looked tired, and his clothes smelled of days of wear as if he’d been on watch for some time beside my stone bed. “We’ve been waiting for you to wake. To question you.”
Eila made a small sound behind him, as if she were annoyed.
He held up a hand to her, impatiently. “He must tell us, Eila. We don’t have much time. We need the medicines, and the grain. Another bad winter and we’ll have nothing left.” He leaned over me, breathing his strange, musky breath into my face. “Tell us, Maen. We will know the way in through the eastern gate.”
The eastern gate, I thought rather dully. So that’s what they wanted. A gate already weakened from the last attack, already vulnerable. Just as Grien had told me, just as Bernos had hinted. The Exiles needed a way into the heart of the city, perhaps to the Queen-Elect herself. The eastern gate. The gate where my men died. “No,” I said, my voice ragged like a thin bubble of air rising into the air. “Never.”
“Kill him!” came a harsh voice from the back of the cave. “He’s weak now, but if he won’t talk, and then he recovers his strength—”
There were murmurs of fear among the other Exiles. I wondered, rather hysterically, why I merited so many visitors.
“Sweet-talk him, Eila!” came another unknown speaker, and several male voices laughed. “Takk won’t mind, and even the city-bred, they’re just men, right? He’ll open up his legs to a teasing hand and a soft mouth and tell you everything you need to know.”
Eila’s voice was sharp in reply. “Sure, he has the same equipment as you, Nonn, though considerably better proportioned.”
Now Nonn was the butt of the jokes, and there were angry shouts among the even louder laughter. Eila’s voice returned, alone, and near to my ear. Almost caressing. “I doubt you’re just a man, Gold Warrior. You’re more precious than that, else there’d not be the threat of a search party coming from the city to find you, would there? And I can see your worth, despite my enmity, despite already having a man I love.” Her laugh was soft and her lips touched my neck. “I’d be more than happy to have you for myself, for a Gold Warrior is a marvelous thing to us. A hero—the type of man we don’t subscribe to here. You’re different—a most glorious specimen of manhood—and you’re a strange, frightening threat to us all!” Now she whispered fiercely at me. “But my man is jealous of me spending more time with you, and I’m expected to abide by his wishes. Can you believe that? That I’d defer to him before taking another lover? You’ll not understand that concept, I know. Fidelity. Love. That’s another of the tales you were told, isn’t it? No personal relationships, no attachments allowed. Coupling only for the relief of bodily urges. No family, no children, no lovers.” She must have felt my body tense beside her, for her laugh was louder and more bitter. “Oh yes, you’ll find I know far more about the city than you could ever imagine.”
Then Takk pushed her aside and grasped the cloth at my throat, almost choking me. It seemed I’d been dressed in some of their own garb, for it wasn’t my own linen vest and trousers anymore. “Tell us what we want to know, Gold Warrior, and perhaps you can have any woman you like.”
“Several!” came another man’s sneering cry. “A final request or two—”
“It’s the boy he came with!” shouted another. “It’s the boy he wants. He’s got love for him. They’re like that in the city, you know? They told me about the military ways, before I left.”
“But the boy’s a Remainder!” cried someone else. “He’s from the same stock as some of us.”
“The boy is just a soldier,” Takk snapped, but his attention wasn’t on the others in the cave, it was on me. “And so are you, Gold Warrior. Though one of the best, else I’d never have considered capturing you instead of killing you outright. You know what position you’re in—you’re isolated, abandoned! And you know the city ways better than us all. No one will mourn you. There’ll be others to take your place, most eagerly. And so we’ll have the information some way. Either you’ll tell us without pain, or we’ll torture you for the same result.”
“No” came Eila’s soft, firm voice beside him. “We’ll torture the boy, Maen. Will you let us do that? How
far will you go to protect a member of your Guard? Or perhaps, for this boy alone, you’ll make those terrible sacrifices.”
I felt a rush of relief, even among my fear. I knew now that Dax was well and these people alone kept him from me. They were cunning and at present a match for me. But they still sought the information they needed. I suspected I hadn’t released any significant secrets about the city while I raved, but that other secrets had been exposed instead.
I looked Eila in the eyes. I saw wariness there, and maybe a hint of compassion. “Let me see him,” I said simply. “Let me see the boy.”
DAX CAME to see me, some time later. It was early in the morning; I could tell from the angle of the sunlight through the cave mouth. He appeared as a silhouette, the sun behind his back, and he walked in swiftly as if he were trying not to run, trying not to appear too eager. He wasn’t restrained in any way, whereas I still had the bindings on my legs, but there were body-shaped shadows behind him, outside the entrance of the cave, reminding us that we were both still prisoners.
We gazed at each other. He looked me up and down and his eyes widened. Perhaps I still bore the signs of my illness. I certainly felt less than my best. I looked him over the same way, almost hungry for the sight of him. He too wore their strange clothes, but he seemed more at home in them. His hair was loose—that astonishing hair that looked all the more striking surrounded by the dark-haired Exiles—and he looked very young, but he still held his shoulders at attention, and his body in readiness for orders. I tried to struggle to an upright position, keen to appear well before him. “Are you hurt?” I asked in a low voice that I hoped wouldn’t carry. “Why did they take you as well as me?”
“I’m fine,” he said, his voice a little shaky. “Sir. My arm was strained badly, I think, but they strapped it up for a few days, and it seems much better now. I’m so glad to see…. Maen… sir!” His voice faltered. “I thought you were dead, the way you fell in front of me.”
Those deep blue eyes were as intense as ever, and I felt my head swim when he turned them on me. I blamed the fact that I was in much worse health than he was.
“They took you down with an arrow to your neck, and they cut away at your legs. I-I tried to get to you, to stop them taking you, and they had to take me as well, for I was hindering their escape from the Household.” He looked again at me, as if afraid he’d be punished for his ridiculous bravery, and then he smiled, full of a youth’s natural charm. “I was a fool, sir, right?”
“Right.” I smiled back. “Trying to be a Gold Warrior before you’ve passed a year as a Bronzeman. It’s not a path I’d recommend a man to take.”
He sat down on the shelf beside me, eyes softening with pleasure at my gentle teasing. The simple furs fell away from my legs and his hip pressed lightly against mine, the warmth of his young body at my side. Everything seemed so disoriented here in this alien world. I could forget we were soldiers with such distant rank between us. I could imagine we were men together who’d share this experience, support each other, be nothing more than comrades.
I wondered whether this wildness came from missing Devotions or whether I had a disease, after all. My concern for Dax was renewed. “You’re well enough for missing your Devotions, Dax? They wouldn’t tell me if you were ill.”
He flushed. “I’m well. Sir…. Maen, I must tell you I haven’t always taken my Devotions. Not as a Remainder, and even sometimes as a Bronzeman. It distracted me sometimes, from feeling as I ought.” He hung his head. “I’d take the tablets from the dispensary but hide them, then dispose of them later. The loss of them now hasn’t been a trouble to me.”
I stared in amazement. But of course it would explain a lot about his erratic behavior. I wondered why I wasn’t more appalled, why I felt some sneaking sympathy for his feelings. Had I felt the same myself? Wondered at the tremors of resistance I sometimes felt, as I took my own Devotions? No, that was false memory! Besides, there were other things to discuss now, of more importance. I lowered my voice further and drew nearer to his ear. “I will ask you this, Dax, and you must answer truthfully. They say you told them details of the Household, of the city, when you were in fever. And that now you want to join them as an Exile.”
“It’s true. I can’t lie.” He looked wretched, yet sharp-eyed at the same time. Was he afraid I’d punish him here and now? “I rambled a lot of nonsense, but in among it was some sense, it seems. I don’t think it’s been enough for them, for I know very little of the Household plans. The only benefit is that they see me in a more sympathetic light. They allow me the freedom of the Place, which is what they call this camp. As for joining them, it seemed to calm them when I suggested it, so I kept up the pretense.” He turned back to me, a sudden passion in his eyes. “But why not? What do I have to go back to in the city? Especially after this disaster. Even if I get out of here alive and can go back, I’ll never be accepted as a Bronzeman again. I’ll never be trusted. And I’ll disgust people, for I’ll have been without Devotions, won’t I? They’ll think I might carry the disease, and my unusual behavior will be tolerated even less.”
“You’ve been forcibly taken,” I protested. “No one will blame you for the Exiles’ hostile attack on the Household—”
He made a noise of frustration, stopping me. “Forcibly, you say? Would you really describe it as such a thing? Even though our men were killed, that’s only because we were so ill prepared, not because of the superior skill of the Exiles. You’ve seen the men here. There’s no training like in the city, no military leaders like you and the other Gold Warriors. We can defeat them easily, and they know it. But they still risk the attacks, and now I understand it’s because they need things from the city that the Queen won’t give them.”
“They infiltrated the city defenses. They killed soldiers!” I was suddenly angry at his naivety. “They’re our enemies.”
“They only want supplies!” he cried in reply, his face alight with a new cause. “They just need to live. They need food, linens, tools, medicines. That’s why they attacked the House of Physic the other month. And our Household was targeted for money because they need to trade with the merchants, with the other cities.”
“That’s impossible!” I almost shouted. “They’re outcasts to all.”
But Dax was shaking his head. “Not so, Maen. The other cities aren’t as hostile to Exiles. They see them as another community—with different ideals, of course—but they’re tolerant toward them, even deal with them in some commodities, as long as they don’t disturb the life and trade of the city itself.” His voice trailed off. He saw the furious horror in my expression and realized he’d gone too far.
There was a sudden, shocked silence between us, while I fought to regain my composure. My chest hurt, and from more than my enforced invalidity.
“I… forgot,” he said faintly at last. “I should call you sir… but I forget it sometimes.”
I took a deep breath. “I know,” I said wryly. I tried to regain my anger, to be appalled at his behavior. It was apparent he’d abandoned far too swiftly the discipline he’d learned since he joined the barracks. But it was difficult to maintain my righteousness when I was so confused, and his eyes shone with such passion, even if it were misguided. I liked to watch those eyes turn to me; I liked his look of trust and admiration. I scorned my own foolishness. I’d always prided myself that I spurned the need for personal attention, that I never felt the lack of my own ambitions and needs. And yet here I was, savoring every word of a callow, impressionable young man.
Fool! I told myself. And you’re doing Dax a disservice with such a dismissive description. He’s more of a man than that—or will be, one day.
I wanted to see that. I wanted to guide him there. I wanted to contribute to his life in any way I could. I was both thrilled and terrified at these shocking new feelings, at the escape of things I’d thought held so safely within me.
I gentled my voice. “You forget a lot of things, boy, especially your respect towar
d me as your commanding officer. But then, it’s never been one of your stronger points. I think that you’d better call me Maen here.”
“Maen,” he said, as if trying it out in his mouth. “Thank you, sir. Maen.” He couldn’t know I’d been painfully aware of every time he’d called me Maen unintentionally. I probably remembered the occasions far more than he did. My name sounded young and fresh in his voice, as if it amused and pleased his mouth to say it.
“We must talk,” I began. “This camp—I don’t know where we are.”
“It’s the Place, it’s where they live. Outside the cave and down the rockface there are settlements, corrals for horses, crops grown in the fields—”
“It’s a ghetto, Dax,” I said harshly. “A place for people who have nothing else. People who can’t live as they should, who’ve been expelled for whatever reason.”
“No! Look around you, Maen. They’re pleased with their life here, many of them. It’s very different, but it’s a proper life for them. They’ve thrown off so many of the conventions of the city, though. There are children here, living with their birth parents! Men and women live as couples. Men aren’t segregated, aren’t in servitude, aren’t at the beck and call of Ladies. The women are rougher, I know, but they’re as clever as our Mistress and her like. Just different, that’s all.”
He continued to use that word—different. I could see he’d been drawn into their tales already, but then, he was still so young and suggestible. “They’re Exiles, Dax,” I said softly. “They’re people who’ve failed at life in the city.”
“At first that may have been the case.” His eyes glinted with determination. He wanted me to understand. “We spoke about it before, didn’t we? I hadn’t even thought about what their Place might be like then. But there are many here who joined voluntarily, as the rumors told me back in the Remainder community. There are many who’ve been born here and never known anything else. They have the refugees and the criminals, I know, but don’t you find those everywhere? Here they have their own society, Maen, their own agriculture, their own defense and settlement rules, their own masters, and religion of sorts—” He saw my wince of horror but rushed on regardless. “They aren’t controlled by Mistresses, not even by women alone! All the people share the organization of the Place, men and women, together or apart, depending on whether they have the skills and the taste for a job. The people in charge are chosen by merit—by the choice of all of the Exiles.”