“No. But I’m not discouraging it either, you know what I mean?”
“Do I need to remind you that we’ve sworn oaths to him?”
“No, I remember it well enough. But surely you can see that if he keeps going along with these sorcerers that eventually…” He let his words trail off meaningfully.
“I don’t want to hear talk like that,” Fen said. “I don’t like where it leads. I’ll get through to him, I swear. You need to trust me on this.”
“Oh, I trust you plenty, Fen. It’s the Ankharans and the Fist I don’t trust.”
“You’d give up your loyalty so easily?” Fen asked him, somewhat shocked.
“Easily?” Cowley replied. “Did you not see the black magic those Ankharans used to kill the Maradi soldiers? Did you miss the part where our king sucked the lives out of those prisoners like he was some kind of dreadbeast or something?” Dreadbeasts were monsters from children’s stories, men who drank the blood of others and from that gained their power.
“He’s not himself,” Fen said stubbornly.
“That’s pretty clear. What’s also clear is that there are a lot of people who are second-guessing themselves now.”
“Promise me you won’t join them,” Fen said. “Promise me you’ll stay loyal.”
Cowley shook his head. “I won’t do that, Fen. I swore an oath, sure, but if the man I swore that oath to isn’t himself anymore, I don’t know that the oath still holds. And I’m not letting him execute you, I don’t care what you say.”
Chapter Four
“We’ll be in Samkara soon,” the wiry man said. He still hadn’t told either of them his name, and it didn’t look like he ever would. Ahead, through the cloud of dust thrown up by the marching feet of the army, the city could be seen sitting on low hills by the sea.
“It’ll be good to get out of this wagon,” Chern said, trying his best to stretch. “I think I forgot how to stand up.” They’d been chained in the wagon non-stop since leaving Marad.
“Don’t be in too much of a hurry to get out. It’s a short walk to the executioner’s block,” the wiry man said.
“You know what your problem is?” Chern said. “You only see the bad side of everything.”
The wiry man looked at him and shook his head disbelievingly. “There a good side to getting your head removed from your shoulders?”
“You don’t know it’s the chopping block. It could be we’ll be hanged instead.”
“I don’t see how that’s necessarily better. Dead is still dead, after all. However it comes about. And hanging’s only for those convicted of soft crimes. Desertion? Killing an officer? Those are hard crimes, make no mistake.”
Fen wasn’t listening to their argument. He was shading his eyes, trying to see through the dust. He could see the masts of the black ship the Ankharans had arrived in. Next to it were the masts of another ship. “When did that get here?”
He said the words mostly to himself, but both the other men turned to look. “Looks like another ship showed up,” Chern said.
“We can all see that,” the wiry man said. “Try saying something useful for once.”
“It must have come while we were gone.”
“There you go again,” the wiry man said. “You sure your crime isn’t stupidity?”
“I don’t want to be in this wagon with you anymore,” Chern replied. “You never have anything nice to say.” He said the same thing at least once a day.
“Do you think more sorcerers came in it?” Fen said. Again, he was more thinking out loud than asking, but the wiry man replied.
“Maybe. But it ain’t black like the first one, so maybe not.”
Fen hoped he was right. Trying to defeat four sorcerers and Lowellin was going to be hard enough. The thought of facing even more sorcerers wasn’t a good one.
They rode for a while in silence while the city loomed ever larger. When the lead elements of the army reached the city gates, they came to a halt. Horns blew, and orders were relayed. The whole army came to a stop.
“Why are we stopping?” Chern asked.
“Maybe so you have another reason to flap your fool gums,” the wiry man grumbled. “Or maybe because of the parade.” Flags waved from the tops of the towers flanking the city gates, and pennants hung on every tall building in the city.
“What parade?” Chern’s brow furrowed as he thought. “There’s no holiday today.”
“The victory parade, idiot. The kind they throw when the army returns after a big victory?”
“Oh, that parade.” Chern brightened. “I like parades.”
“You’re not going to see anything but the ass end of this one. No one’s going to stick around to cheer for the prisoners.”
It wasn’t long before the city gates swung open. The Fist rode through the gates first, his fist in the air. The roar of the crowd was like the crashing of the sea.
The roar continued as the high-ranking officers followed the Fist a minute later. It died down somewhat when the carriage carrying the Ankharans rolled in, but then picked up again as the first ranks of mounted soldiers rode in.
“There’s going to be quite a party tonight,” Chern said. He sounded sad. “Too bad we’ll miss it.” The wiry man made an irritated sound but didn’t reply. He was staring at his manacles as if willing them to fall from his wrists.
It took a bell before the last of the infantry and the supply wagons rolled through the gates. The cheering had moved deeper into the city then, following the route to the castle. As their wagon neared the gates, Captain Rouk came riding up, flanked by some soldiers. Following him was a blacksmith. “That one,” Rouk said, pointing at Fen.
The wagon creaked as the blacksmith climbed in. He freed Fen’s chain from the ring bolt set into the bed of the wagon.
“Get out,” Rouk said. He had a nasty glint in his eyes that told Fen whatever he was up to wasn’t going to be pleasant, but Fen climbed out of the wagon without resisting.
“Maybe we’ll see you inside?” Chern said as he climbed down. “Could be we’ll be in the same cell even.” He gave Fen a little wave. The wiry man was staring through the open gates of the city and ignored them both.
The blacksmith handed the end of Fen’s chain to Rouk, who fastened it to his saddle. Without any warning, he wheeled his horse and began trotting toward the gates. Fen had to run to keep from being dragged. His legs were stiff from sitting so long, and he almost fell a couple of times.
At the gates Rouk came to a sudden halt. Fen stopped, breathing hard. He was mostly recovered from Ilsith’s attack, but his strength and stamina had not yet returned.
“Where’s that cart?” Rouk snapped. “He was supposed to wait here for me.” One of the soldiers with him wheeled his horse and took off.
“You know why I hate you so much?” Rouk said while they were waiting. He didn’t wait for Fen to reply before continuing. “It’s because you’re one of those men who rise in the army because of who you know, instead of because of how well you do your duty and how hard you work.” He gave Fen a dark look. “Under the old king the army was full of officers like you, almost all of them in fact. Soft sons of the nobility and fat merchants, pups without a lick of worth in them, ordering hard-working soldiers like me around to puff themselves up. The Fist said those days were gone, that all rank would have to be earned from here on. But then he goes and raises you up.”
He spat on the ground by Fen’s feet and grinned at Fen. “I’ve been waiting a long time to see you humbled, thinking hard the whole way here about how I can make the moment special.” His grin grew wider. “I think you’ll be surprised at what I came up with.”
Fen saw a man coming toward them leading a donkey that was pulling a two-wheeled cart. The man was wearing a food-stained apron and looked to be one of the cook’s staff. The cart was filled with garbage and rotting vegetables. Rouk turned to him. “Hurry up there!” he yelled. “If you move any slower it’ll be tomorrow.”
The man bowed h
is head and pulled harder on the donkey’s lead rope, which made no perceptible difference in the animal’s speed.
The cart reached them, and then passed through the main gates into the barbican. Rouk, leading Fen, fell in behind him. Flanking them were a dozen soldiers, half of them on each side. Fen was starting to get a good idea of what was coming, and he forced himself to stand as straight as he could, to march with his eyes fixed forward and his shoulders back, as if he was on parade with his squad instead of walking toward a painful humiliation.
As they passed through the barbican, Fen could see that the large plaza on the other side of the gates was still mostly full of people, though not as packed as it had been when the army was marching through.
Once he’d passed under the portcullis, Rouk reined his horse to a stop. Slung from his saddle was one of the speaking tubes the town criers used to spread word from the king throughout the city. He raised it to his lips.
“People of Samkara!” he called, then repeated it. People in the crowd began turning toward them. “You have welcomed home your victorious, heroic army with cheers. Now I present to you their opposite, the scum who have defiled the army and the name of Samkara.”
Mutters passed over the crowd and dark looks fell on Fen. They couldn’t yet see the other wagons carrying prisoners.
“Foremost among them is the vermin I have here, a traitor whose name I will not utter, a man who betrayed his king and country. A man who betrayed all of you!”
At this the mutters turned into angry shouts and shaking fists. Rouk turned a triumphant look on Fen, then raised the horn to his lips once more.
“Ahead of me you see a cart filled with garbage. Help yourself to it, citizens of Samkara. Let the traitor feel the full depth of your hatred toward him.”
People began to crowd around the cart, pulling out garbage. Rouk spurred his horse forward, jerking on Fen’s chain to follow him.
They don’t know the truth, Fen told himself as he walked out into the plaza, and the first debris began to fly. They don’t know what they’re doing.
But even so it hurt. A moldy potato struck him on the chin, thrown hard enough to rock Fen’s head back. A blackened turnip hit him in the shoulder. But those weren’t the true source of the pain, and neither was any of the other garbage which struck him.
What hurt was knowing he had devoted his life to protecting these people, that he would, without hesitation, sacrifice himself to keep the least of them safe, and they responded by heaping hatred and scorn upon him. He knew it shouldn’t matter to him. He knew that they were being fed lies. But it hurt all the same, though he tried not to let it show on his face.
A rotted cabbage hit him in the chest, breaking open and spattering his whole torso with muck. Bugs crawled in the wreckage. Other garbage followed as the crowd pressed closer around Fen, screaming and throwing at him whatever they could get their hands on. Someone threw a tea cup that barely missed Fen’s head. That was followed by a rock that hit him in the temple and made him see stars.
Fen began to wonder if he would actually survive this walk of shame. The crowd had become a mob, and as it forced its way closer, the soldiers accompanying them were hard pressed to hold them back. A woman managed to slip through the cordon. She spat in Fen’s face and slapped him before she was hauled back by one of the soldiers.
Evidently, Rouk had come to the same conclusion, because he shouted orders at the soldiers and began laying about him with the flat of his sword, driving people back and cursing at them. He’d been ordered to keep Fen alive for his trial, and now he could see that maybe he’d gone too far in his zeal to humiliate him.
The cart was empty of garbage before they’d made it halfway across the plaza. Which reduced the things the mob could throw at Fen, but only seemed to intensify their rage. The soldiers tasked with keeping the crowd back had been pushed back nearly to Fen. They were swinging their weapons wildly, and though Fen could tell that they were trying not to hit people with the cutting edge of their blades, he also saw more than one person stumble back or fall down, bleeding.
Rouk shouted something at the soldiers guarding Fen. His words were lost in the roar of the mob, but a moment later he wheeled his horse, and they changed direction, veering off at an angle. Now they were heading for one of the smaller streets that emptied onto the plaza, rather than the main boulevard that was the official parade route.
A man wearing the canvas pants and hemp shirt of a dockworker burst through the cordon suddenly and punched Fen in the stomach hard. Fen doubled over, and the man struck him in the face, splitting his lip and filling his mouth with blood. He drew his fist back to strike again, but one of the soldiers hit him over the head with the flat of his blade, and the man collapsed on the ground. Fen spit out blood as the mob roared its approval.
The soldiers fell back another step. They were shoulder to shoulder now, sweat flying from them as they matched their finite strength against the irresistible force of the mob. An elderly woman managed to get her cane through them, rapping Fen hard on top of the head before she was thrust back.
Just when Fen was sure the mob would overwhelm them, they reached the small street and forced their way into it. Instantly the press of bodies lessened as most of the people were left behind. Several of the soldiers fell back and blocked the entrance to the street. Fen heard cries of pain and looked over his shoulder to see two people already down, bleeding badly. It looked like the soldiers were no longer using non-lethal force.
There were only a few dozen people around them now, and the soldiers were able to force them back. Gradually they gave up and fell behind, their curses still ringing in Fen’s ears. In the sudden calm, Fen could hear the soldiers breathing hard. There were muttered curses from several of them as they nursed various wounds inflicted by the mob. Rouk looked subdued, his earlier triumph quashed by how close he’d steered to disaster.
Breaking the calm was the sound of catcalls. Fen looked up to see a small gang of street urchins standing partway up a sagging wooden staircase that climbed the outside of one of the buildings facing the street. They hooted at him and made rude gestures. He saw one of them swinging something that looked like a clump of black fur. A moment later a dead cat sailed toward him.
Fen ducked. The cat hit one of the soldiers, who cursed and ran toward the boys, his sword upraised. The boys scurried upwards, still raining derision on them all, and disappeared through an open window.
With a heavy heart Fen followed Rouk down the street. He was stunned by the intensity of the mob’s hatred. They knew nothing about him. How could they hate him so much? Was this really what he had dedicated himself to protecting? He felt like he’d wasted his whole life up to this point. He’d been an idealistic fool, so caught up in his belief in the nobility of his oath that he’d failed to see the ugliness in those he’d sworn to protect.
He wiped some of the muck from his face and neck and threw it on the ground. If the only reward for his dedication was hatred, then why did he bother? Why not simply take what he could and leave others to face the consequences of their poor behavior?
Unsure which way to go to reach the prison, Rouk came to a halt at an intersection. Fen stumbled to a halt and looked around, wanting to be prepared for the next person who threw something at him or hurled insults at him.
His eyes fell on a young woman who was standing on the steps of a tenement building on the corner. Beside her, holding her hand, was a young girl. His eyes started to pass over her, but something about her looked familiar, and he gave her another look. All at once he knew who it was.
It was the young woman he’d saved from the thugs who’d broken into her home looking for her husband. There was no scorn or hatred on her face, only sadness. She looked into Fen’s eyes and Fen knew then that she remembered him too. She raised one hand, then let it fall by her side.
Rouk chose a direction and jerked Fen into motion once again. Fen watched the woman and her child over his shoulder until he could no longe
r see her.
The blackness lifted, and Fen silently berated himself for how easily he had given up his oath. Who cared if the entire city turned on him? Had he become a soldier because he wanted public acclaim, or had he done it out of a pure desire to protect people? By some miracle of coincidence, fate or the gods or whatever had placed that woman and her daughter in his path today in a simple rebuke to his own weakness.
He was who he was. He could not let others’ treatment of him change that. In that moment he renewed his vow to the people of Samkara and even to the Fist himself.
Fen straightened his shoulders and lifted his feet. No matter what trials beset him from this point forward, he would not again betray his principles. For if he did so, then all those who had turned out against him would be right, because he would be a traitor to something even higher than his king and his country. He would be a traitor to himself.
Chapter Five
In the years since Fen and the rest of his squad witnessed the wholesale slaughter of Samkara’s nobility, he’d never again looked at the Gulach, as Samkara’s prison was known. He’d been through the plaza in front of the prison a number of times, but always he’d kept his eyes averted.
Now, as Rouk led him across the plaza, he found his eyes drawn to the front wall of the prison where the nobility had bowed their heads to die, and he could not look away. The memory of that day was still so clear in his mind, the long row of men, women and children forced to their knees, the flash of steel, the spurting blood, the stench, the horribleness of it. It sickened him then, and it sickened him now. He had never been able to truly justify the Fist’s decision to slaughter all those people, even though the Fist had explained his reasoning to Fen, and it had made sense in an awful kind of way.
He wondered if the poisoning of the Fist had already been going on then, years before the Ankharans ever showed up. Probably he had been poisoned the first moment Fen saw him, when Lowellin’s hands appeared out of the shadow and blackness poured from them into the Fist’s eyes and mouth. It had taken years for the effects of the poison to fully appear—years and the appearance of the foreign sorcerers—but they’d been there all along.
Chaos Trapped Page 6