by Anthony Ryan
Shadows shifted on her face as she lowered her head. This time, I knew a prompt to be in order. “He ran,” I said.
“We all did.” She raised her face, letting out a thin, humourless laugh, eyes bright and wet. “All of us scions of the Altvar, the Skard-ryken. We ran.”
“So, it was shame that drove him.”
I heard a mix of awe and fear creep into her voice then, like someone recalling a nightmare. “I think it was the sight of that monster they sent against us, a towering man of steel who tore through the True King’s men as if they were straw and he a whirlwind. His helm bore a red flame that seemed to burn as he fought. I saw stouter hearts than ours flee the monster’s wrath. So why wouldn’t we? Once we were deep in the forest, once the fear had gone, then came the shame. Skeinweld raged at us, at me, blaming us for infecting him with our cowardice. In truth, he was the first to take to his heels, and he knew it. If you and your friends hadn’t come along, he would have found a way to end himself, with a rope if not a blade.”
“You never really know who someone is until the blades start flying,” I murmured. It was a pearl of his wisdom Deckin had shared with me back during my earliest days in the band. Two outlaws had opted to settle a dispute with knives, one suffering a cut to the arm and promptly fleeing into the forest. He returned come the evening, hiding his shame behind forced cheerfulness and an acceptance of an argument properly settled. Deckin welcomed him back with a hearty embrace before shattering his skull with a single blow of his misshapen axe.
All men are cowards of one stripe or another, he told me as I stared at the fellow’s corpse being dragged away. But I’ve no use for a man who runs after just one cut. Two means you’re smart; three means you’re stubborn. He crouched to tap a bloodied fingertip to my nose. Remember that, young Alwyn.
“I am not a warrior,” Berrine said, dispelling the memory. She lowered her gaze to match mine, wiping the tears away with an irritated hand. “I see that now. I have been too weakened by southern ways, made soft by your customs. I must find other means of serving the Altvar. The Sister Queens will return the gods to the Fjord Geld and scour away the pollution of your Covenant. It has been foretold.”
Her eyes gleamed with a sudden, fervent zeal that brought a dismayed groan to my lips. Her honesty had made me like her, but this dogged attachment to her gods stirred a doleful recognition. She was another Hostler, just gabbling out different scripture.
“A true believer, eh?” I sighed, settling back into my blankets. “And who foretold this, pray tell? Some filth-covered hermit who spent years starving himself in a cave to summon visions? It usually is.”
“‘And the ships of the Altvar shall sweep across the sea to bring fire to the defilers. What was stolen will be regained. What was slain will be avenged.’” She raised her head with a triumphant air. “So speaks the Altvar-Rendi, most sacred of all texts.”
“Old words on old paper.” I yawned, closing my eyes. “Didn’t stop you running from a battle. Won’t stop you running from the next one.”
As my mind slipped into sleep she spoke again, the words dull and voiced in Ascarlian, but for some unfathomable reason my memory contrives to retain them even now. The passing years have enabled me to acquire mastery of several languages, Ascarlian among them, so I know the words she spoke were a quote from the Altvar-Rendi, the collection of myth and legend that forms the basis of Ascarlian belief.
“‘Thus spake Ulthnir, Father of the Altvar: Every battle is a forge, and every soul that survives the flames is made stronger.’”
The events of a long and interesting life have forced me to conclude that Ulthnir, like many a god, was full of shit.
CHAPTER FOUR
Berrine and her friends were gone when I awoke. Ever true to his word, Deckin allowed them to rise with the dawn and set off for the coast with no further obstruction, even providing a few sacks of grain to sustain them through the journey. Naturally, Hostler took a dim view of affording any form of assistance to heretic northerners and I was obliged to suffer a diatribe on the subject as we resumed our trek north.
“All who close their hearts to the Martyrs’ example and the Seraphile’s grace will suffer for their perfidy, in this world and the next,” he told me during one of our pauses for rest. “For in their sin they bring us ever closer to the dawn of the Second Scourge.”
We were well into the upper reaches of the Shavine Forest now, where the trees began to open out, creating broad clearings that were best avoided. We had halted at the edge of one glade where a lone apple tree rose from a flower-speckled meadow. Even in late autumn, it was a pleasing sight, not that Hostler seemed to notice.
“A lesson you would do well to learn, young ingrate.” Over recent days “ingrate” had gradually replaced “heathen” when he addressed me directly. I assumed it to be a result of my continued resistance to the lessons he imparted as my self-appointed tutor in matters spiritual. I wasn’t sure which I resented more, since I hadn’t asked for an education.
“Allow these teachings into your soul,” he went on. “Follow the example of the Martyrs and know a life of peace and fulfilment.”
“They didn’t,” I muttered back. I had learned it was best to still my tongue when he began to preach, since the alternative would invite hours of tedious argument. But sometimes his blindness to his own absurdities overthrew my reticence.
“What?” he demanded, hands pausing in the act of raising an oat cake to his mouth.
“The Martyrs,” I said. “I mean, the title itself says it all. They died, all of them. Hundreds, maybe thousands of the poor sods put to death because of words scribbled down thousands of years ago. And, as far as I can tell, none got an easy death for their efforts. If that’s the example you want me to follow, my thanks for your concern, but I think I prefer to remain a heathen.”
“The blood of martyrs,” Hostler grated, “washes away the sins of humanity thereby keeping open the Divine Portals of the Eternal Realm, allowing the grace of the Seraphile to flow. Should their grace ever fade from us the Malecite will rise…”
“… and the Seraphile will be forced to scourge the earth once again to cleanse it of their corruption,” I finished with a disparaging roll of my eyes. “Bit strange, don’t you think? All those countless bewinged, magic folk living in a paradise in the sky none of us can see, willing to destroy the world to prove how much they love us. Sounds like a man I knew who took a particular shine to a whore. He loved her so much he used to pay the whoremaster to beat her bloody once a week so no other man would look at her.”
“Do not compare the Seraphile’s boundless love with some faithless, whore-chasing wretch!” He lurched towards me, the oat cake falling from his grip as he grabbed hold of my arm, voice pitched at an unwise volume.
“Best calm yourself,” I advised, staring into his wide, blazing eyes. I placed the knife I had already drawn against his hand as it continued to clutch my sleeve. I had no compunction about severing a vein or two, which Hostler might have understood if I hadn’t stoked his righteous anger to an unreasoning boil. His grip tightened on my arm as mine tightened on my knife, the moment speeding towards violent climax until Deckin’s hand came to rest on Hostler’s shoulder.
He didn’t say anything, nor was his touch particularly heavy, but it was still enough to convince Hostler to remove his hand. The zealot stepped back, face pale with anger and nostrils flaring as he drew in chilled air to cool his rage. “I’m done with this ingrate,” he told Deckin. He was careful not to raise his voice or colour it with any defiance, but his tone was emphatic. “His vile manners and heresy besmirch my soul too much.”
Deckin’s gaze slipped to me and I found I couldn’t help but retreat a step before forcing myself to stillness. He wasn’t happy, and that was never good, but trying to flee this moment would invite worse punishment. So, I stood, bracing myself for the blow. If he was feeling generous it might just be a cuff across the face. If not, I would wake an hour or two later with
a spectacular bruise to my jaw and maybe a loosened tooth.
Therefore, it was with gratified surprise that I saw him jerk his head in dismissal. “Fetch Erchel and see Lorine. It’s time for a new guise. Best learn it well before we reach Castle Ambris.”
“Still too neat,” Lorine decided, lips pursed in appraisal as she looked us over. Flicking her scissors, she snipped stitches and cut rents in the woollen jerkin and soft leather trews I wore. Prior to this, she had me roll around in earth and bracken to dirty it up, then added a liberal dousing of wine and ale to create a convincing pattern of stains. She hadn’t felt the need to alter Erchel’s garb hardly at all since it didn’t take much to make him appear an impoverished, dull-witted churl.
“Why were you cast out of your village?” she asked me, sheathing the scissors.
“Got drunk and tupped the ploughman’s daughter. She was betrothed to the farrier’s son, so I had to run or face the pillory alongside her.”
“And the true reason?”
One of Lorine’s most valuable lessons in deceit was that it was always advisable to layer one’s lies, reserving an embarrassing or criminal secret the sharing of which creates a bond of trust. “I hit the Supplicant ’cause he fondled my balls?” I suggested after a moment’s pondering.
“That’ll work,” she said, nodding in satisfaction. “But make it a full beating rather than a single blow. Soldiers like a bloody tale.” She arched an eyebrow at Erchel, raising a hand to still his tongue when he began to offer up his own concoction of lies. For all his cunning, Erchel was a poor liar and his tales were either absurdly convoluted or gruesomely off-putting.
“You’re a simpleton who stole a pig,” she said. “Keep your eyes wide, mouth agape and leave the talking to Alwyn. You two met on the road. You heard there might be work in Ambriside, or at least some free ale on account of the duke’s trial. Where do you find soldiers most likely to talk?”
“The cheapest alehouse or inn,” I said.
“That’s right.” Lorine inclined her head in satisfaction at a lesson well learned. “Remember, avoid Crown Company at all costs. They’re too sharp of wit and have no need of recruits. It’s duchy men-at-arms you want, the drunker and greedier the better.”
Her eyes took on a flinty aspect as she shifted her gaze from me to Erchel. “Deckin wants information, not blood, not loot,” she said, speaking with hard precision. “You glean what you can then you get out, hopefully without anyone even recalling you were there. Understand?”
I had rarely seen Lorine afford Erchel such close attention. Ever since his uncle had led him into Deckin’s camp five years before, Lorine had regarded him with mostly bland disdain. She taught him, as she taught all the whelps, but it was clear she wouldn’t have cared a jot if he disappeared one night. For his part, Erchel was always assiduous in affording her the respect due to Deckin’s chief lieutenant. Even in his less guarded moments when he thought no one was looking, his expression when looking upon Lorine was one of suppressed fear rather than the ugly hunger that I would have expected. It is in the nature of predators to fear the more dangerous beast, after all.
“’Course,” he muttered now, bobbing his head and avoiding her flinty gaze.
Lorine gave a soft grunt and stepped back. “Names?”
“Ash,” I said. “Short and easy to remember. My da’ was a charcoal burner, see?” I nodded at Erchel. “I call this one Gabbler, since he hardly ever talks.”
“That’ll do.” Tapped her chin as she gave us a final looking-over. “Both a tad too well fed for my liking, so it’ll be half rations until we reach Castle Ambris. Don’t grumble; it’s only two days.”
“He didn’t beg, y’know.”
The old drover’s many-wrinkled brow formed into something I took to be an expression of admiration as he followed my gaze to the top of the castle’s south-facing wall. The outer defences were at their lowest point here and the moat at its narrowest: a carefully chosen spot for it afforded a clear view of the grisly objects arrayed atop the wall. The light was fading but it was a clear sky for once and I could make out the features clearly enough. I had only ever seen Duke Rouphon once, a brief, distant glimpse two years before when I’d followed Deckin to a glade in the western woods. We’d crouched in dense bushes and watched this man ride past on a tall horse, a falcon on his wrist and a pack of hounds and huntsmen hurrying in his wake. I recalled how Deckin’s hard, unmoving features were an uncanny mirror of the noble on the fine horse. I also recalled the hatred I saw shining in his eyes and wondered how badly Deckin would have wanted to be here to savour this man’s end.
Despite the depredations of torture and the sagging quality that comes with death, I was still able to confirm that the head impaled atop the spike was indeed that of Duke Rouphon Ambris, until recently a knight of Albermaine and Overlord of the Shavine Marches. The other heads were rendered anonymous by bloating or wounds, but I took them to be those captured alongside the duke – family retainers or bondsmen obliged to share his treason and his fate.
“Did you see the trial?” I asked the drover, receiving a disparaging tongue-click in response.
“That I did, just this morning, not that there was much of a trial to see. They stood the duke on the scaffold alongside the other traitors. The lord constable read out the charges and asked if any would come forth to bear arms in their defence, like they do. Of course, no one did. Not with the King’s Champion standing up there and the full number of Crown Company lined up alongside. Ascendant Durehl came forward to hear the duke’s testament and when he was done Sir Ehlbert took his head off with one swipe of that big sword of his. Just the duke’s head, mind. As soon as it was done, the big fellow walked off and left those others to the headsman.”
“Did you hear the duke’s testament?” I asked, aware that Deckin would wish to know.
“Too far away, and I doubt he had much’ve a voice left after the torments he’d suffered. But, like I said, it was plain he didn’t beg.” The drover looked back at the head on the wall and clicked his tongue again. “He wasn’t the worse sort, for a noble. Fair, for the most part. Generous with alms too when the harvests were poor. But, by all accounts, you wouldn’t have wanted to let him near your daughter, and he wasn’t a man to cross if you wanted to keep your skin.”
The drover gave a final tongue-click and tugged on the reins of his ox, the animal obediently hauling the cart along the moat-side track. “I’d stay out of the town tonight, lads,” he advised us over his shoulder. “Lessen you’re keen on marching under the banners. Awful lot of soldiers about.”
I raised a hand in thanks, turning my attention to the sprawl of buildings rising from the flat ground to the east of the castle’s main gate, following the shore of the Leevin River that fed the moat. Years of comparative peace had enabled the town of Ambriside to grow into a large if untidy collection of houses, inns, workshops and stables. Despite having spent my infancy in a similar but smaller clutch of hovels, I found the scent of woodsmoke and dung stirred dislike rather than nostalgia. I much preferred the woods; for all the danger, things were simpler among the trees.
“I know what it was,” Erchel said.
“What?”
“His testament.” He nodded at the head on the wall, face tilted at an inquisitive angle. As before, any enmity towards me had apparently vanished, even though he surely sported a nasty bruise somewhere from the stone I threw at him.
“I, Duke Rouphon Ambris, seek the Seraphile’s pardon for my many sins,” he went on in a parody of noble speech. “For years I have sat my fat arse upon horses I didn’t raise, eating food I didn’t grow and meat I didn’t butcher. All the while I fucked any churlish maid I took a fancy to while helping myself to coin and goods not my own in the name of Crown taxes. Every now and then I’d piss off somewhere and slaughter some poor unfortunate sods ’cause the king told me to. Then I turned on him like an ungrateful dog for not making me richer than I already am, so here we are. Now cleanse my soul, you p
ious bastard, so I get to live in paradise for ever.”
He turned to me with a grin. “Tell Deckin that’s he what he said. He’d like that.”
“No.” I recalled Deckin’s face the day we spied on the duke’s hunting party and spared the grisly parade on the wall a last glance before turning and starting for the town. “He wouldn’t. Come on, Gabbler, let’s be about it.”
In accordance with Lorine’s tutelage, we made for the most ill-favoured-looking tavern, reasoning only those soldiers with the deepest thirst would congregate at the place with the cheapest ale. Securing ourselves a table at the rear of the dingy establishment required some judicious intimidation of the two churls already in residence. Both older men with ragged beards and the lean but tired features of those born to the plough or the hoe, the pair stared up at us with wary eyes but didn’t consent to rise. One seemed about to sneer a warning but fell silent when Erchel leaned down, taking hold of the fellow’s clay tankard and drawing it clear of his hand.
“Fuck off, eh?” he said with a bland smile and a wink. To emphasise the point, he put a twitch on his face and a flare to his nostrils that told of contained violence, evidently with sufficient clarity for both churls to surrender possession of their table and swiftly depart the tavern.
“Sure this is the best place?” Erchel said, sinking onto a stool and setting the tankard down with a disdainful scowl. “Even a drunkard wouldn’t soil his tongue with this piss-water.”
“A true drunkard comes in search of spirits, not ale.” I gestured to the brandy casks visible beyond the bulky form of the tavern-keeper. “The cheaper the better. Don’t fret; they’ll be along. And still your tongue. You’re a simpleton, remember?”
True to my prediction, a half-dozen soldiers from the duchy levies arrived not long after. They entered with none of the boisterous swagger common to those new to their profession, creased and weathered faces uniform in their dourness. A grim morning’s work apparently made for a grim mood and a desire to drink it away. War, as I would learn in time, does much to strip youth from the youthful. They had shorn themselves of their armour but kept daggers and swords sheathed at their belts, most more than one. They were all decently washed and trimmed of hair but their clothing – mostly leather jerkins and trews and shirts of wool – had the patched, slightly ragged look common to garments in a permanent state of disrepair.