The Spider

by Leo Carew

  “And can’t they stop him?”

  “He… but then it might not be a he… keeps an eye on his own tracks, and those of his Suthern masters. But all you really need to know is that it is not good news that the Ellengaest is involved in this. He has proven very hard to stop so far.”

  Salbjorn felt his respect for Inger increase. Her unassuming style hid insight that was quite alien to him. The two of them sat down by the fire, untended and now just a bank of embers. Salbjorn added a little more wood, blowing to encourage the flames while Inger stared vacantly at his efforts. Leon was nowhere to be seen, and must have been guarding the boy. “But you have his name,” he said. “Someone must know who he is.”

  “Oh, I don’t think Ellengaest is a real name,” she said. “He doesn’t often deal with his agents directly. The tutor downstairs probably has no real idea of who he is, but has been threatened into helping him. We think he operates mostly through blackmail, placing people heavily in his debt and then using that to force them into acting on his behalf. He likes to use prisoners, apparently. Because he liberates them from the prison ships, they owe him everything. Prisoners also don’t have responsibilities they need to fulfil, or loved ones who are expecting to see them, so they’re unusually free to move and act. Sometimes we find escaped prisoners dead, probably because they’ve disobeyed him.

  “But the Kryptea have managed to capture a few of his agents alive, and none have so far had direct contact with him. He keeps them at a distance, and controls them with a few close handlers. Who knows? Maybe Hagen will help us get to the assassin. And maybe the assassin will be one of the few who have dealt directly with the Ellengaest.” She shrugged contentedly.

  Salbjorn sat back from the fire, glancing at Inger’s placid face. “Did you suspect this?”

  “Yes,” said Inger. “I was worried Numa’s death was just the edge of something much bigger. Now maybe stopping the assassin won’t be enough. Ormur probably won’t be safe until Ellengaest is found and his viper’s head has been cut from his shoulders.” She looked up at Salbjorn. “Speaking of which, we should speak to the boy. It’s the Trial tomorrow, and we’ll need to put him on his guard.”

  “I’ll fetch him.”

  Salbjorn found the boy preparing for bed and brought him up to see the Inquisitor. He had the same frayed look as Hagen, and when Inger saw him, her attention began to focus once more.

  “Forgive our decadence up here,” she said, nodding at the flames. “We have been pushing ourselves a little to try and get to the bottom of all this.” Ormur met Salbjorn’s eyes and then quickly turned them to the fire. “Please sit,” Inger said, smiling kindly. “Are you ready for tomorrow?”

  “As ready as I usually am,” said the boy, quietly, dropping onto a goatskin before the fire. Salbjorn did not sit down, leaning on his sheathed sword behind them.

  “How do you feel?”

  “Fine,” said the boy, dully.

  Inger nodded. “You know why we’re here?”

  “Because you think the man who killed my brother wants to kill me next,” said Ormur, his voice resigned.

  “I’m afraid that is what we think.”

  “I hope he tries,” said the boy, terribly cold. “I want to meet him. I don’t care if he kills me, I will hurt him first. I’ll go for his eyes.”

  Salbjorn stiffened a little at this sentiment. This was the first close contact he had had with the boy, and he had not realised how raw Ormur’s grief was.

  Inger looked mildly at the boy. “You must be careful,” she said. “Do not go looking for this man.”

  “I already go looking for him,” interrupted Ormur. “When I’m supposed to be foraging, I go and wait for him where my brother died.”

  “That is exceptionally foolish,” said Inger sternly. “That is our job. We are here to catch him and find out who sent him. One way or another, he will die, but if he gets to you first then he gets exactly what he wants. You’re playing into his hands. Swear to me that you won’t go looking for him.”

  The boy was stubbornly quiet and Salbjorn cuffed the back of his head.

  “Answer the Inquisitor!”

  Inger raised a calming hand to Salbjorn. “Your brother would not want this killer to claim you as well. Swear, boy.”

  Unlike every other student they had spoken to so far, Ormur seemed totally unconcerned by the lofty status of a Maven Inquisitor and a Sacred Guardsman. He was silent a moment, looking sullenly between the two. “I swear.”

  “On the bones of your brother,” insisted Inger. Ormur gave a jolt, staring up at the Inquisitor, who was unyielding. “Swear it.”

  “I swear on my brother’s bones,” said the boy quietly.

  “Very good.” Inger became suddenly hazy again. “Be alert tomorrow. So far out of the school and with everyone distracted by the Trial, you will be vulnerable. Leon and Salbjorn will guard as much of your route as they are able, but be aware. We know this assassin sprints very well. You will have to navigate the same course as everyone else with one eye on your surroundings. Are you up to that?”

  Ormur nodded.

  “Then good luck,” said Inger. “We’ll be there with you.”

  Salbjorn found he could not wear his armour: he moved too ponderously on his injured ankle to bear the weight. He stood on a glacier, slow and vulnerable, guarding the route of Ormur’s Trial. He kept watchful eyes on the crowd gathering the route: students of all ages and tutors, invited to heckle and cheer the contestants. It was impossible to be certain they were all residents of the haskoli. And even if they were, they had already caught one traitor. There was no guarantee Hagen was the assassin’s only accomplice.

  Suddenly, the spectators began to bay. Ormur and the Master were standing at the start of the course, and the Master had just drenched the boy’s head in ptarmigan blood, holding a hand up in blessing. The spurt of blood was a signal that the Trial had begun, and behind Salbjorn, a jagged black flag had been raised, indicating that Ormur was now in a race against the water clock that would time his effort.

  The boy broke clear of the Master and started to run. He was barefoot, sprinting fifty yards through the snow to his first obstacle: Frystir. This was a long hollow in which four feet of glacial meltwater collected, and into which chunks of glacial ice had been scattered to chill the waters still further. Ormur hurtled in, sending up a great wave and fighting his way through impeding icebergs. He raised his knees high, kicking and splashing hard as he thrashed through the pool and out, stumbling as he emerged, but managing to keep his feet and begin the two-hundred-yard dash to the glacier. Salbjorn had done this many times, and remembered well how numb his extremities had been, so that it had felt like his feet were soft bags of sand for the rock-strewn sprint.

  Ormur had set off fast, but was still able to accelerate slightly for the final twenty yards. The noise from the spectators grew as they responded to this determined effort, roaring him on, and Ormur plunged into the snow on top of the glacier. He was lucky: the fall of the last few days had cushioned its sharp surface, usually exposed by this time of year. His bare feet sunk out of sight and he slowed to a wade. This was where most people failed. Their feet grew too numb and they fell into a decelerating crawl, their misery finally halted by the raising of a second flag as the water clock ran out.

  Ormur stayed on his feet, lifting his knees high over the snow and sprinting up towards Salbjorn. The rage and anguish he was burning to fuel this charge were obvious in his bared teeth and thrusting jaw, and though he slowed, each step more upright and less forward, he stayed on his feet and ploughed beyond the glacier’s cold grasp. Salbjorn felt a lump in his throat and a cheer escaped him as Ormur limped towards the next stage of the trial: a string of stepping stones over a deep, frozen pool. He leapt one, two, three, well balanced, and then slipped suddenly, shattering the thin layer of ice and plunging into the water.

  Salbjorn let out a breath. The boy resurfaced and fought for the edge of the pool, but the Trial was o
ver. The guardsman had quite forgotten that he was supposed to be on the lookout for an assassin and cast around suddenly. He saw nothing, and turned back to Ormur, who had emerged from the water, arms wrapped about his chest, the blood washed from his face. He ran towards a fire burning next to the water clock, where those who had made a satisfactory effort were rewarded with a cloak and cup of warm sheep’s milk.

  Ormur had tried hard, but was barely halfway through the Trial. Nobody, Salbjorn knew, would finish it this day. The snow on the ground made it impossibly cold, and he was astonished that Ormur had made it so far.

  Salbjorn spotted Leon striding over from his post and limped to join him halfway. “What now?” asked Salbjorn, as they drew level.

  “The Master refuses to keep the boys in the school any longer,” said Leon. “They’ll be back out, running over the hills and foraging much further afield.”

  “And how are we supposed to guard him then? I can’t even move properly.”

  Leon scowled. “We’ll find a way. The best one would be to catch the bastard who killed his brother.”

  “Inger thinks that might be difficult,” said Salbjorn. “We seem to be gnawing at the edge of something very large. Even if we catch the assassin, he may only be one of many.”

  “She is an Inquisitor,” snapped Leon. “Used to finding those responsible for crimes already committed. But we’re trying to stop a crime from happening in the first place. Meticulously following the clues isn’t good enough. We must be faster than that.”

  Salbjorn turned a little away from Leon, silent for a moment. He tried to remember what week it was, away from these mountains. Svadn, he decided. The week water goes black with tadpoles. “I trust Inger,” he said eventually. “She located that accomplice, and he—”

  “Is now broken,” interrupted Leon. “I heard his whimpering coming out of that room. He is too frightened of whoever controls him to tell you anything. That is a dead end.”

  “I trust her, though,” said Salbjorn. “Do you have a better plan?”

  For a rare moment, Leon hesitated. “We need the assassin. And we have the one thing the assassin wants.”

  Salbjorn stared at his mentor for a long moment, Leon tapping his foot impatiently. “The boy,” said Salbjorn, at last. “You want to use him as a lure.”

  11

  The Hand

  Whenever Inger walked past the dark pine room in which Hagen, the captured accomplice, was held, she felt that soft hand on her shoulder. It made her smile. “Again, my angel? He seems broken, I’m not sure there’s any more progress to be made there.” But the hand was as insistent as she had ever known it, and so she admitted herself once more to the pine-scented darkness.

  Hagen, now chained to the wall in increasingly filthy conditions, no longer looked up when she entered. He had lost any interest in food and as far as she could tell, was not even drinking any more from the water pail next to him. He just sat slumped against the red-stained boards, skin pale and hair matted. As always, she came to sit down in front of him.

  “How are you today, Hagen?”

  There was no response. Inger studied his wretched face for a time. This broken individual would make no reply to threats or pain, as she knew Leon had confirmed. There was nothing they could do to him that equalled the terror already exerted by the Ellengaest. But he was desperate, and desperate people often responded to kindness. She could feel that hand on her shoulder once more and decided to open her mouth and see what emerged.

  “Well, as we’re here, I’d like to speak to you even if you don’t want to speak back. My husband was a Saltcoat. He was away so often training or on the march that I didn’t often get to see him. He was a good man. Not good in the way everyone here in the Black Kingdom is good,” and she smiled hazily at Hagen’s cracked form. “You know. Straightforward, upright, dynamic. He was all that, but he also cared very much. He wasn’t truncated like so many legionaries become. He still had so much heart and I missed him very much when he was away. Forty years ago, he died the death we’re all supposed to be grateful for: on the battlefield with honour and glory…” She raised her eyebrows briefly. “I tried to grieve, for a time, but really it didn’t feel right. I could not accept or believe what had happened. Maybe because I spent so much time without him anyway, just the knowledge that he was dead didn’t change that. It was unbelievable. I used to catch myself feeling normal and have to remind myself that my husband was dead, not just away with his trade or on campaign.

  “But no matter how often I reminded myself, I seemed to feel less lonely than I had. It took me a while to realise, and to listen, but it became obvious to me that I never went anywhere alone any more. I could feel something alongside me, every moment, looking over my shoulder and watching my back. There was a new presence with me, and now I am never without him. I feel him every moment. He has been telling me that you are going to help me.”

  Very slowly, Hagen’s chin lifted from his chest and he turned sunken eyes on Inger. She could feel her own tears building. She smiled and they spilt onto her cheeks. “I have never told anyone that before,” she admitted. “But I trust that presence. And I agree with it, too. I think you’re a good man who’s frightened. I think you’re going to help me.”

  Hagen’s face was wracked with despair. She looked at him hopefully, and he turned his face away. He is responding, she thought.

  “I want to help you,” he whispered.

  “Then I will help you,” she said. “How is Ellengaest threatening you?”

  But saying the name was a mistake. Hagen’s face dropped and he shook his head once more. Inger repressed a sigh, getting to her feet. “You are a good man, Hagen. I can see that.” She left him in that room, hoping those words would act in her absence. She climbed to her favourite spot on the cliffs overlooking the school and sat once more with her legs dangling over the edge.

  There is a way in there, she thought. He will help us.

  She stared out over the jagged, indifferent universe, steeped in snow and seamed with rock. “There is something sacred here, my love. You feel closer than ever.” Her instinct that this trail might lead directly to Ellengaest solidified in the rarefied air. They might not only avenge Numa’s murder, but find that villain as well. She kicked her legs, sending little stones skittering down the cliff-face, and decided that she found the degree of Hagen’s fear hard to comprehend. Was a member of his family held by Ellengaest? What did he think would happen if he agreed to assist them?

  The snows were coming down hard again: unseasonably so. The passes were already clogged, and now would not clear for some time. At this thought, she became aware of muffled footsteps at her back. She looked, expecting to find Salbjorn or Leon, but was confronted instead with the stiff, aged form of the Master limping towards her. “Master,” she said, making half an effort to stand. “I hope you haven’t come all the way up here on my account.”

  He smiled wearily at her, waving her back to her seat. “Not at all, my lady. This has been a favourite place to think for many years.”

  “I shall leave you to it,” said Inger, but the Master waved her down again.

  “We can enjoy it together, Inquisitor.” He sat next to her, grunting a little as he arranged his stiff limbs and draped his legs over the drop. “I find the exposure clarifies things a little, don’t you?”

  “I do,” she agreed.

  “And is it helping with your task here?”

  “I believe so. We have reached some dead ends and it seems there is only one path to the assassin. But I am hopeful. I believe the tutor we have imprisoned might one day help us. Perhaps we can persuade him to signal to the assassin, as he did on our first night here, and lure the killer into the school. Then the guardsmen can take care of him. I believe that if we have patience, Hagen will realise he has no choice but to help. And if we catch this assassin… he may yet lead us to an even greater prize.”

  The Master cleared his throat with a crack. “Poor Hagen. He arrived so f
ull of confidence and pride. I’ve watched him crumble to pieces.”

  What now, my love? “When did that start?” asked Inger, distracted by that hand on her shoulder again.

  “It was quite sudden. A few months after he arrived. His head dropped, his shoulders hunched and he fell almost completely quiet. I’ve never seen someone succumb to stress so completely.”

  “And did it coincide with anything that you remember? A messenger coming to the school? The arrival of a new tutor here?” She brushed her shoulder gently.

  The Master frowned. “Not that I recall. But give me some time to think, more may come back to me.”

  “Let me know if you remember anything.”

  “And who is this greater prize, at the end of all this?”

  “Perhaps you’ve heard of the Ellengaest?” Inger suggested, still distracted.

  The Master stiffened. “You believe that villain is involved here?”

  “I do. That is who Hagen is in fear of, truly.”

  There came a pause. “I have heard much about that man,” said the Master, quietly. “His stench even reaches up here, to the mountains.” His voice grew fierce. “A rabid dog. A man with unlimited fear and ambition but no reason. If that is where your trail leads, perhaps you should not follow it. It cannot end well.”

  Inger laughed. “Oh no, I intend to find that maniac. He must stand before the Ephors and answer for everything he’s done.”

  “The Almighty is not mocked,” said the Master. “Ramnea will have him eventually, and she always exacts a fitting punishment.”

  “But after he’s done how much damage to our kingdom?” asked Inger mildly. “After the boy Ormur is dead? I do not just sit back and wait for the Almighty to act.” She clutched the dog-headed angel on her tunic. “I work with his angels. I will pursue this to the end.”

  The Master was silent for a long while. He seemed to be sitting very close. Inger shifted a little on her perch, suddenly uncomfortable.

  And that hand was on her shoulder, begging that she realise before it was too late.