He almost said ‘not yet, anyway’ but closed his teeth on the heartless phrase before it left his mouth. If Dunrath had degraded as far as this place must have done from Gueynor’s ten-year memory of it he might have cried too. Seghar was old, and that was excusable for Dunrath was also old, but it had no time-mellowed dignity, only the decrepitude of age. Its stonework had crumbled, then been quarried as house-building material or just rubble to pave roads, and the few attempts at repair were haphazard, incomplete and altogether ugly.
More depressing still were the echoes of long-faded grandeur, scattered like discarded rags among the buildings of the fortress proper. A sprawl of overgrown parterres almost covered the gravelled walks of a formal garden, weeds choked its ornamental ponds, and the once-neat trees and bushes that lined its avenues were slowly degenerating into tangles of dying vegetation. Yet not everything was failing. Even at this distance Aldric could detect the heavy scent of roses on the evening air, a cloying perfume he was coming to associate more and more with the name of Seghar, and one he was starting to detest.
“Cowards,” Gueynor whispered. “They didn’t dare destroy what my father had made of Seghar, but they let it fall into this…”
He looked beyond her at Marek Endain, saw the demon-queller frown, and knew the demon-queller was recognising what he had already seen. All this wasn’t because of poverty or apathy but a policy of deliberate neglect, proving the Geruaths capable of far greater subtlety than he had expected. The gardens were all that remained of past overlords, and letting them go to ruin before removing them was someone’s notion of doing the same to the memory and reputation of those who had planted them. Whose idea had it been? Overlord Geruath himself? Or was it Crisen? Now there was a man he had never met, but already disliked as much as the smell of those damned roses.
“Mind what you say about this dump,” he warned. “Compliments will fool nobody, and insults are dangerous.”
A few armed retainers mingled with the travellers as they drew closer to the town – there was a midsummer fair in progress, if their gaudy dress was anything to go by – and attracting attention by strange behaviour or incautious observations would be unwise. The fate of that Tergovan merchant suggested eavesdropping was common in Seghar, with ill-chosen words promptly reported to where they would do most harm. No lord, not even one so bereft of pride as Geruath appeared to be, would care to hear such descriptions of his demesne as took shape inside Aldric’s head. Out on the Jevaiden plateau this fortress might be the centre of affairs; anywhere else it would be a slum or an abandoned derelict.
The inner citadel was primitive, a mere fortified manor house which had sprouted spires and turrets in a jarring, unmatched variety of architectural styles. It was in the same sorry state as the rest of the town, unpainted for the most part and lacking great areas of the plaster which had once smoothed its raw stone. The whole building seemed to cringe into the landscape rather than dominate it as donjons were meant to do.
There was also a solitary wooden tower so incongruously archaic in style that Aldric had never seen one in reality, just pictures in old Books of Years, yet this one was a recent build from clean new timber. He studied it as he rode closer, but was no wiser about its function by the time he reached the gate in the town’s southern wall; the Summergate, it was called. Yet an elusive something, words or a picture, drifted in the inaccessible reaches at the back of his mind, and if he could have just a few more seconds of concentration he would catch—
“You there, stand fast!”
Aldric jerked back to reality at the harsh command and irritation replaced his attempted trawl through memory. Even an eijo was unaccustomed to that tone of voice, more appropriate to addressing servants, and it took half a breath before he recalled that a presumed mercenary swordsman was anybody’s potential servant.
Not that he would have made objection anyway. The two gate-guards in scale and leather armour carried gisarms, cutting-spears as effective as any battleaxe and with a longer reach. Though the weapons were at rest they still warranted wary attention. The kortagor standing between them was a tall man, his spade-shaped grizzled beard jutting pugnaciously from between the cheekplates of his helmet, and the blackthorn baton that was his mark of rank pointed straight at Aldric.
A twitch of Lyard’s reins stopped the big Andarran courser an easy spear’s-length from where the man stood, neither too far away nor too close. It was always best, whether playing a part or not, to avoid annoying those with the power to make life unpleasant. That was why, instead of snarling one of the several irascible responses which would have been in character, Aldric gave the man a crisp, neutral salute before dismounting. He gave another after his feet hit the ground and, a calculated interval after his salute, he bowed as well. It wasn’t the low sweeping insolence he’d used to tease Gueynor, but low enough, gauged to convey respect without servility with the finely tuned politeness at which Albans excelled.
He stayed quite still as the officer strolled closer, inspecting him as he would a soldier on parade. Given his chosen role that was close enough to the truth. The man was unsure of what he saw and confused by the mixture of signals he was reading, which sometimes agreed and sometimes contradicted. Whether that confusion would be helpful, hindrance or threat was something Aldric was likely to find out before too long.
*
Kortagor Jervan had become a good judge of men during twenty years with the Imperial military, and it wasn’t chance which had brought him to this particular gate. He made it his business to inspect every stranger who stayed in Seghar for more than his own arbitrary limit of two days, and on certain occasions advance warning meant the inspection took place at once. This was one such occasion. Jervan’s assessments were so seldom wrong that he didn’t like uncertainty, least of all where it concerned a man who carried a small private arsenal of lethal weapons.
As if conscious of his gaze, the horseman’s hand came up to tug at the patch he wore. Jervan had seen such a movement before. Men were often embarrassed by disfigurement, especially when they were like this one, younger than the usual run of mercenaries. Armed so heavily, he could be little else. There was a hard set to the features, no doubt an act meant to impress, but there was something else about him which didn’t fit. It was as if he was more used to giving orders than getting them. As if he was accustomed to respect.
“You’re Alban.” Jervan used the baton to point out a dirk and shortsword worn in loops through the rider’s belt, and a longsword hilt rising like a scorpion’s tail above his right shoulder. Both times he stopped before contact to avoid the risk of insult, then grounded the blackthorn’s metal-shod tip with a hard, bright clank on the paving stones between his feet.
“Once,” the young man said. “But not any more.” Even though no question had been asked about them, his hand mirrored Jervan’s gesture towards the longsword and the short, but bypassed the black dirk. “Now I rent these and my expertise. In case you were wondering.”
Jervan examined him thoughtfully. There was no insult in the soft-spoken words, or if there was it had been so veiled that the kortagor chose not to waste time searching. He was a strict man, as required by his rank, but as fair-minded as decency dictated. If One-eye wanted to enter the Overlord’s service, it was the Overlord who would command him to go or stay. Interference from his garrison commander wasn’t needed until after that decision was made.
“He calls himself Kourgath,” said Marek. “And he answers to it readily enough.”
Jervan’s head snapped round and his beard seemed to bristle with annoyance at the interruption, but the fat man sitting on a fat pony just smiled at him.
“Who might you be?”
“Marek Endain, demon-queller.” Jervan blinked and his eyebrows went up, but the fat man continued talking with a fat man’s affable unconcern. “Kourgath here is my hired bodyguard. What with bandits and wolves and who knows what else, this province can be a dangerous place, Kortagor…?”
�
��Jervan. Garrison commander of Seghar.”
“Then Jervan, garrison commander, I wish you well this fine evening.” Marek made an expansive gesture more like a benediction than any greeting or salute Jervan had ever seen. He stared for a moment, debating whether more questions were required, then decided to direct them where they would do more good.
“What about the woman?” he said and took an ominous step closer to her. “Do you also speak for her, or can she talk?”
*
“Don’t call her ‘the woman’,” said Aldric. “Her name is Aline.” He pitched his voice loud enough for Gueynor to hear and hoped she would take the hint, because he had seen shock and horror cross her face when she saw Jervan. Although he didn’t know the cause, something distracting needed said before the soldier noticed too and wondered why. Jervan’s head swivelled back towards him like the turret of a battleram warship, and for an instant he regretted saying anything to draw this man’s attention. There was a half-humorous glint in the kortagor’s eyes, a toleration of insolence up to a point, and that point had just been reached. This time when the blackthorn stick jabbed out it didn’t stop short. The impact on his chest was no heavier than that of a pointing finger, but it carried a deal more emphasis than any finger ever could.
“Let the, the lady say her piece, Alban. If I want your contribution, I’ll ask for it. Until then, hold your tongue. Now, my dear young lady…” Jervan turned his attention back to Gueynor, and Aldric would have felt far happier if the approach hadn’t smacked so much of Dewan ar Korentin at his most suave and devious. “Tell me a little about yourself.” Gueynor’s response to such a question should have been to freeze like a rabbit confronted by a stoat. Instead she collected her wits and gave the officer a shy little smile.
“My name is Aline Havarel, sir, and my husband Berek used to have a shop in Ternon. We sold such pretty things there, silks and fine lace, velvets—”
“I might know it.” That was the usual opening for a man about to ask a maze of questions which ended by confirming there was no such place, but Aldric also regarded him with another emotion than mere wary distrust. He wouldn’t have admitted feeling jealousy, even to himself, but it was there all the same. Gueynor recovered well and covered better than he expected, proving what he already knew, that there was more to her than met the eye. Just like her uncle.
“I don’t think you would, commander,” she replied, becoming a little sad. “Not this two years past, anyway. I married young, you see—”
“You’re still young,” said Jervan. His gallantry might even have been genuine, but Gueynor ignored it and continued without heeding his interruption.
“—And I was widowed young. There was an accident. My husband had gone for bolts of cloth from the weaver…” She took a breath and spoke fast, like someone repeating a story told too many times already. “Our horse took fright. It bolted. The cart rolled over. Berek was, was under it. And he… Died.” She made a sound like a sob and lowered her head as if controlling tears, turning back with a tired expression and a little sigh that conveyed more than many words. “The town guild wouldn’t let me run the shop alone, or buy anything to sell. By the end I couldn’t even afford rent and food at the same time. So I left, and now I travel with anyone who… Who pays for my company.” The performance was masterful and understated, it imitated reality to perfection and provoked sympathy rather than suspicion.
“We have no such accidents in this town, lady,” Jervan assured her with a look that held only pity. “Horses aren’t permitted beyond the inner walls.” Aldric wasn’t prepared to let him take credit for that.
“An Alban custom, Kortagor?” he asked, daring the soldier to deny it. Jervan didn’t.
“I also travel, Kourgath-eijo, though less than I would like. That custom struck me as sound. So did others.” What those were he didn’t say, but it was clear he knew the significance of Aldric’s short-cropped hair. “Marek Endain, a word with you. In private.”
The Cernuan dismounted, following Jervan under the shadows of the gate-house and out of earshot. Aldric could guess what that private word involved. Himself, and as much of his history as Marek knew, and whatever other details the garrison commander of Seghar might find interesting. He had told the usual story about fighting on the wrong side in Alba that spring and being forced to leave, but hadn’t embellished it with surplus detail. Simplicity was safer, and easier to remember.
When Jervan said ‘in private’ he meant it, because neither of the lord’s-men went with him. Aldric had hoped they might, but when they made no move to obstruct his first couple of steps he walked rapidly to where Gueynor sat astride his pack-pony, face sweaty and ashen like someone about to be sick. Anyone who had heard her story would have attributed that reaction to recalling unpleasant memories, but Aldric knew otherwise. The girl was sick indeed, sick with fright. Her hand trembled so much that he could feel it flutter like a little bird through the leather of his glove, and when he helped her down the skin of her cheek was cold with more than the onset of evening.
“What’s the matter?” he murmured into her ear, trying to appear as if he was comforting her. “What scared you?”
“J – Jervan…”
“Jervan? Light of Heaven, why? He’s the nearest thing to a human being I’ve ever met in Imperial armour.” That wasn’t as impressive as it sounded. Aldric’s limited sampling didn’t entitle him to such sweeping statements. So far he had encountered only two Imperial officers, a battleram commander and an eldheisart of the Bodyguard cavalry, though Dewan ar Korentin’s desertion should have disqualified him from inclusion.
“I know him, Aldric—”
“Shush! Call me Kourgath!” It shouldn’t have been possible to shout in a whisper, but he managed.
“I know him! He’s the man who let me leave. With Evthan. When the soldiers came to Seghar. It’s the same man, I tell you! Tall, with a black beard…”
“Are you sure?”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m certain! I know him!”
“So you keep saying. But does he know you?” One open hand pressed to her lips created welcome silence. “Because I don’t think so. Listen, Gueynor! Listen to me! He was a grown man then and can’t have changed much since, except for his beard going grey. That’s why you still recognise him. But you were a child and now you’re a woman, so calm down and don’t worry about it.” Aldric wished he could feel as confident as he sounded. Whether she was right or not, she had convinced herself and now risked renewed curiosity just from that.
Jervan’s private word with Marek had developed into a full-scale private conversation, so it was a nerve-racking twenty minutes before the two dark outlines re-emerged from the Summergate. It was more night than evening now, with the sun well set, but its fading afterglow meant lamps were still useless. The delay gave Gueynor time to get herself under control, while the poor light hid where colour hadn’t quite returned to her face. She still looked unhappy, but no more so than when she had spun her tale for Jervan.
“You’ll stay where I can find you,” the kortagor told Marek, “at The Crossed Pikes. Nowhere else. One of my men will escort you there.”
“Why nowhere else?” Aldric wanted to know. “So you don’t waste time if you decide to arrest us?”
“Hold your tongue, man!” Marek sounded like every irritable employer rolled into one. “Unless you think you can find another job before the night’s out?” Aldric subsided and Marek muttered a few words to Jervan that made the officer laugh before turning on his ‘bodyguard’ again. “As you would have found out with patience not insolence, it’s because the Overlord may want to speak to me. To me. Not to you.”
It was the most reassuring rebuke that Aldric had ever heard.
*
To Aldric’s slight surprise and considerable relief, the inn where Jervan had sent them was just as reassuring. From the name of their destination he had half-expected a blocky fortified building with iron grilles over the w
indows and a garrison of spearmen. Instead, the only pikes in sight were a pair of fierce toothy fish painted on the sign above the door.
As they walked through the streets after stabling the horses – and sneaking things out of his saddlebags that were no-one else’s business – he had seen several other taverns and eating-houses, so they were being sent to The Crossed Pikes for a reason beyond being easy to find. One would be to make it easy for observers under each tavern’s roof who watched and listened for careless opinions expressed after too much to drink, though Jervan might have learned more if he hadn’t been so obvious. This would be an evening for careful best behaviour.
Aldric had taken more comfortable walks. One of the kortagor’s soldiers led the way, the other followed close behind, and even though neither did or said anything threatening, their gisarms were threat enough. He felt far more at ease when they left the busy tavern and took their weapons with them. Its patrons had the prosperous look of successful merchants, dressed to impress those who knew what to see, yet soberly enough that speculation about robbing them was more of a gamble on whether they were worth it.
Just because the soldiers had gone didn’t mean there were no weapons or people able to use them, and Aldric’s eyepatch and Three Blades were a good match for the other hard-faced men and women in the tap-room. These bodyguards played their own part in discouraging theft, capable of breaking bodies as easily as guarding them. If they thought it unusual that the one-eyed new arrival dined with his plump master and a young woman of uncertain status, rather than drinking with the other servants, nobody voiced a comment. A few raised cups in salute, the rest registered his arrival with a nod or a thoughtful stare, but none of them ignored him. The message was clear: ‘We see you, but this is our time off. Don’t cause trouble and neither will we.’
There would be no trouble. There had already been no trouble, since Jervan’s men had made getting stalls at the livery stable and rooms here a simple matter. Maybe it implied that Aldric’s small party was important enough for an escort and should be treated accordingly, maybe it hinted at something more ominous. But until those hints and implications became clearer, they were ignored in favour of more pleasant concerns, and the air of the tavern was full of them. It smelt of roasting and grilling, the skilled ways of cooking meat and fish that Aldric had missed most. Fish charred by the unruly flames of an open fire or leathery dried sausage toasted awkwardly over embers were not the same at all.
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