The Spider

by Leo Carew

  “And what would Lord Roper say if he knew this was our plan?”

  “He’s not here,” said Salbjorn. “And we have run out of choices. To protect him, we have to capture the assassin. And we only have one thing the assassin wants, so let’s use it.”

  First, however, the guardsmen had to deal with the Black-Cloaks. With as much calm as he was able, Salbjorn went outside and summoned the three tutors he found there up to the interrogation room. They laid eyes on the Master, on the pool of blood in which he lay, and then on Leon’s vengeful face and crimson sword-tip. It was only the immense status invested in the Sacred Guard that prevented the tutors declaring a revolt then and there. They ignored Salbjorn’s increasingly desperate explanations, backing down the stairs in silence, shock and suspicion on each face.

  “Your Master was a coward and a traitor!” Leon bellowed unhelpfully after them.

  The two guardsmen were frozen out. Each tutor who returned to the school was informed of what had happened, and immediately distanced themselves from Salbjorn and Leon. They would not acknowledge the guardsmen, hurrying past when Salbjorn tried to address them. They tried to win back some trust by organising a proper burial for the Master (though Leon growled more than once that the treacherous worm did not deserve such respect) but the Black-Cloaks were indifferent to their efforts.

  And just as Salbjorn was feeling more isolated than ever before, Inger died. Salbjorn was watching over her when it happened, three days after her fall. Salbjorn wept for her, organising a far more heartfelt burial than the last. Even Leon went quiet at the news and briefly left Ormur unattended to drop a handful of earth over Inger’s body. She was laid a little way from the school, head facing east towards the mountains. Salbjorn stayed by her grave for a while after she was buried, curling his fingers into the earth. “Help us, Inquisitor,” he murmured.

  They tried to guard Ormur from a distance and so tempt the assassin close, following the boy out of view as he went through lessons and rituals. But they were not the only ones under pressure, and Ormur’s behaviour had grown steadily more reckless. The guardsmen watched from an upstairs window as he underwent a test of endurance in the freezing waters of Lake Etchachan. A fire was lit by the lake, with blankets and hot sheep’s milk to tempt the boys out. There was enough milk for about three quarters of the cohort, so the longer they stayed in the freezing water, the greater the chance they would go hungry. However, stay until last of all and you were declared victor, and each member of your herd awarded a circlet of hawk-feathers. Ormur’s group won this honour due to the boy’s efforts. He stayed in the still waters until his shivering ceased. His eyes began to flicker and the water slid up to his chin, before a tutor seized him beneath his arms and pulled his limp body from the lake.

  Ormur had shown such suicidal commitment to every challenge laid in front of him, grimly pushing himself further than any other student.

  “I’m going to speak to him,” said Salbjorn, turning away from the window and going for the door.

  “He doesn’t look good,” said Leon.

  The boy had been dragged next to the fire and had a blanket laid upon him. So long had he stayed in the waters that his compatriots had left the fireside to forage. Ormur was left recovering under the gaze of a tutor. “I’ll watch him,” said Salbjorn. The tutor, evidently not wishing to spend any time with the mistrusted guardsman, departed at once. Salbjorn sat next to the boy as the midnight blue left his lips and he roused. He sat up after a time, but kept his eyes down politely, not meeting Salbjorn’s gaze. “Look up at me, boy.”

  Ormur raised his eyes as though they weighed the earth. For a heartbeat, he managed to meet Salbjorn’s gaze. Then his eyes welled with tears, his head dropped and he began to weep wretchedly. Salbjorn put an arm around Ormur, who sobbed into his shoulder. “What’s happening, boy?” he asked softly.

  “I don’t know,” Ormur gasped, voice muffled in Salbjorn’s tunic.

  “Yes you do.” In response, Ormur’s cries redoubled. He wept and wept.

  “I can’t survive this,” he choked.

  “Can’t survive what?”

  “Numa,” gasped the boy. Every word was uttered as a spasm, followed by a hiccough or gasp, as though Ormur were drowning. “My brother is waiting for me on the Winter Road. He would not do it without me. I know he’s waiting and will not make it to the other side unless I am there.” He turned a ravaged face up to Salbjorn. “Release me from my oath. I have one thing left to do.”

  “Absolutely not,” said Salbjorn. “I hold you to it, boy. You have sworn not to go after the murderer, and Numa would want you to keep your word. He would want you to endure. Survive, and live for both of you.”

  “I can’t, release me!”

  “No.”

  Ormur’s tears sprang forth once more. He beat twice, feebly, at Salbjorn’s side, and then fell into him once more. Salbjorn held him until the boy was exhausted, his sobs dried and his spasms eased. “We will avenge your brother together, boy. Yours is the more important part. You will survive the assassin, and frustrate him in his goals. And I will kill him in Numa’s memory. Do we have an agreement?” Ormur leaned his forehead against Salbjorn’s chest, silent. “Do we have an agreement, boy?”

  “All right,” Ormur breathed.

  Idleness was deplored at the haskoli, and Ormur had to forage for his supper or go hungry. Leon and Salbjorn, both stiff from waiting, followed him at a distance down to Lake Avon, watching as he checked his fishing lines.

  “Our plan will not work,” said Leon abruptly.

  Salbjorn looked at him sourly. “And why not?”

  “Because the assassin knows we’re here. He will not believe we’ve just left the boy to his own devices. It’s obvious we’re using him as bait.”

  Salbjorn almost said that if Leon was pointing it out, it must indeed be obvious. But he restrained himself and said instead: “Well then. To truly set this trap, we need to be seen leaving.”

  “And just leave the boy to fend for himself?”

  “Obviously not.” Salbjorn paused for a moment. “No. I have an idea,” he said eventually. He explained to Leon, and the next day, with much unreciprocated waving towards the tutors, Leon departed the haskoli. He was dressed in the full armour of the Sacred Guard, a great pack resting on his shoulders and beside him walked another figure in guardsman’s armour. But it was not Salbjorn. Had anyone been observing the departing duo closely, they would have seen the way one of the guardsmen was only able to walk at a shuffle, his shoulders hunched. They might also have noticed Leon steer him a few times with his hand gripped about the back of his neck. And had they truly known the occupants of the haskoli, they might have recognised the face of the second figure as that of Hagen, the disgraced former tutor.

  Salbjorn stayed behind. While he protected Ormur, Leon would take Hagen out of the school and struggle a day through the snows. Over the next two nights, they would then use the darkness to return to the haskoli. To anyone watching the school, it would seem the two guardsmen who had protected Ormur had made a bid to escape via the snow-choked roads, perhaps in response to the assassin’s continued absence. Or maybe to get help after the death of the Master and Inquisitor.

  Salbjorn hoped it might be enough to tempt the assassin to return, though he was starting to wonder whether he was still in the mountains. Perhaps he had grown tired and fought his way out through the snows. Though conscious of his duty to Ormur, he felt himself relax a little.

  The first day, he saw nothing. He followed Ormur from foraging to lessons, trying to keep to undergrowth and shade. At night, he slept as Leon had done, just behind the door to Ormur’s quarters.

  At dawn, he followed Ormur out for his run. It was hard to keep up with the boy on his injured leg, and while keeping to the undergrowth, and he lost sight of him repeatedly. He was finally forced onto the track above Ormur so that he could catch up, and was running through the snow there for some time before he was able to see the boy belo
w him once more. He stopped, panting, and searched the scene for any sign of danger.

  Something he had taken for a shadow beside the path moved. It disappeared behind a large rock. Then emerged again the other side, flickering between the trees: a dark figure, sliding close to the boy’s path and then vanishing behind a bank. Salbjorn’s heart thumped into life and he scrambled down the slope, making a crashing sprint between the trees to reach Ormur before he and the shadow converged.

  Ormur plodded onwards, oblivious to the lethal scramble at his back and the shadow closing in on him. Salbjorn plunged recklessly down the hillside, feet navigating a rush of drops, boulders and trunks. He held the hilt of his sword steady, ignoring the stabbing pains from his weak ankle, and within heartbeats had plummeted to the lakeside, landing on the frozen gravel shore in front of Ormur. The boy started, staring at him. “Lord?” he blurted. “What are you doing?” Salbjorn ignored the question, staring over the boy’s shoulder. Seventy yards further up the lakeside, a black, stocky figure was hurtling away.

  “Back to the school, fast!” he roared, and he took off after the shadow. Before him, the figure dived up the hillside and out of sight, hidden in a narrow gully. Salbjorn plunged after him and the assassin came back into view, still running.

  This time, Salbjorn knew, he would catch the figure. It was light. The snow would carry his tracks. Salbjorn wore no armour to slow him, could run in his light leather boots, and though in pain, he was a Sacred Guardsman. This was the first time in weeks that he had run in earnest, but he was damned if some common murderer would best him. By sprint or endurance, he would close this bastard down, learn all he had to tell and then cut his head from his shoulders.

  He gripped his sword, and climbed.

  19

  Thingalith

  Spring had brought balmy rain to this part of Suthdal, and the gritty track beneath Bellamus’s boots was under an inch of brown water. It had been three days since he had deliberately exposed himself to Slave-Plague, and he had finally accepted he was healthy, and could resume his usual business. He called on their granary—stocked with food “taxed” from those fleeing to Lincylene—enquired whether they had located a terrier for the rats, was pleased by the response, and passed on to the armoury. It was stuffed with weapons, rough Anakim-bone plates that had yet to be drilled and wired into armour sets, and a growing pile of loot, harvested in the chaos of this latest invasion. The Thingalith would appropriate a portion for themselves, but that did not bother Bellamus. He would have done the same in their position, and they needed compensation for this perilous existence.

  A thin, dark-haired woman, muddy-eyed and grave-faced, hailed Bellamus from the end of the street. “I was coming to find you, Master,” she called, strapping a nose-bag over her horse’s head. “The Anakim have grown tired of stumbling through empty countryside, and finally besieged Lincylene.”

  Bellamus smiled at her. “I’d heard, thank you, Aelfwynn. Do you know how they are doing for water?”

  “Their progress has been exceedingly slow, but somehow they limp on, Master. I cannot imagine what they’re living off.”

  “I fear our enemy are more familiar with surviving in extremes than we are. You’ve done excellently, though. Stop here, take some food and drink, and refresh your horse. You must be careful from here on. Now they have stopped moving, they will keep an exceedingly close eye on their water.”

  Aelfwynn flashed a lean smile, bowed and retreated into the house opposite, which they had transformed into the mess and was kept well stocked with hot stew and bread rolls. Bellamus stayed in the street, eyes on the western hills, vision fogged by the wine that had seen him through his three days’ isolation. A distant figure swarmed closer like an ant over flesh, riding purposefully for Brimstream. The rider laboured and spurred, hair streaming out behind them, their horse stumbling twice with exhaustion. As the rider came near, Bellamus recognised her pale face and long red hair. When she had finally clattered into the street, he seized the bridle of her foaming horse and met her eye as steadily as he was able. “I trust this is important, Marian.”

  She nodded. “Yes, Master. You said to bring word as soon as there were details of the Unhieru weapon shipment.”

  “And?”

  “They’ve been dispatched on a road north of the canal, will cross into Suthdal by the final bridge and travel directly there to the Unhieru king.”

  “When did you hear of this?”

  “They were dispatched yesterday morning, Master. I heard this morning.”

  “Defences—do you know how the shipment is protected?”

  “There was no word on that, Master,” admitted Marian.

  “Never mind, there is not a moment to lose!” declared Bellamus. “You’ve done excellently, forgive me, I must ride. You’ll coordinate things here until my return?”

  He was gone before she could reply, darting into the mess. “Thingalith!” he called. “With me, if you want to save your country and your families! Weapons, armour, food, water: be ready for a four-day ride in a quarter of an hour!” The mess rattled into life, as though he had opened a door to disturb a barnful of rats. Bellamus swept out and back along the street, hammering on each door he passed. “Thingalith! Thingalith! Ride, ride, ride; you have quarter of an hour! Four days of food, weapons and armour, prepare yourselves this instant!”

  Men spilled from the houses, scattering between armoury, larder and stables. “Where is Garrett?” Bellamus demanded of the throng.

  “In the stables, Master,” reported one man.

  “Make sure he’s ready,” Bellamus ordered. He saw the shock on the man’s face; his hesitation as he decided whether he feared Bellamus’s or Garrett’s wrath more. “Go,” said Bellamus, and the man fled. “Stepan?”

  “Here, Captain,” said the knight, ducking beneath a door lintel.

  “We’ll need you, my friend.”

  Stepan let out a breath, glancing at the distant hills. “Where are we going?” he asked, hesitantly.

  Bellamus pushed through the scattering Thingalith and into the dark space behind Stepan, beckoning the knight in after him. He turned in the shadow to face his friend. “The Unhieru armour and weapons shipment is on the road. We have this one chance to disrupt it and delay the Unhieru from joining this war. Who knows, we may even stop them altogether.”

  “It will be heavily defended,” said Stepan.

  “Of course it will. That’s why we need you.” Stepan twisted his head slightly, grimacing, and Bellamus reached a hand up to his shoulder. “I know you don’t want to be here, Stepan.”

  “No, Captain—” Stepan began to protest but Bellamus overrode him.

  “No, it’s fine,” he said. “I understand, and you are here as a friend. But I need you now, and Suthdal needs you. Will you ride with us, one more time?”

  Stepan took a deep breath. “Of course, my captain.”

  Bellamus nodded. “Quarter of an hour.” Then he stepped out into the grey light of the street. He had near six hundred men in total and thought a little over two hundred might be available to him now, in this village. He hoped it would do. He hoped the Anakim would think the Sutherners were focused on the unfolding invasion, and that this shipment was not at particular risk, and therefore only lightly protect it to deter brigands. He hoped he could catch them before they crossed into Unhierea. He hoped they were not too late.

  Bellamus found chain mail and a short-sword in his quarters and donned both. He stuffed a saddlebag with cheese, smoked pork, several loaves of stale rye, and burst back outside. Horses were clustering at the edge of Brimstream, some warriors already mounted and holding the riderless mounts steady.

  Garrett was there. The huge, fever-eyed hybrid was already armoured in clattering bone plates and holding his long-bladed spear, tip sheathed in Anakim skin. Stepan mounted next to him, glittering in chain mail, saddlebags bulging with Anakim-bone plates. Bone-armoured Thingalith rose on all sides, and there was a cheer as Bellamus strode
out to them. He banished the lingering nausea of the wine and beamed at them all. “Ready, my warriors?” he called. “There is no force as fast as you! No force this light and this powerful, who would be ready at such short notice. Great God, but I’m proud to be your captain!” He strapped his saddlebags to a horse Stepan held for him and mounted, spurring forward at once. “Move out! We are all there is! Ride, my Thingalith, ride!”

  20

  Under Siege

  Lincylene was surrounded.

  Nothing passed through the walls in either direction, though the rams and ladders under construction would remedy this. The local trees were felled (Roper taking satisfaction in imagining the more vigorous Anakim lineages that would replace them) and shaped into clunky siege weapons, thicker than normal as they were made of greenwood.

  “But there doesn’t seem to be anything else to do,” he complained to Gray. He and the captain sat on the hill where they had first laid eyes on the city. The morning was in its adolescence, and a quilted grey sky hung above them. By Roper’s right hand was a scatter of uprooted grass, which he fed absently.

  “It is strange to hear you talk like this,” said Gray, leaning back on his hands and staring down at the city. “You burst upon every hearth with such a sense of momentum, and understand so well how to motivate the legionaries, that I forget how new to you this is. War is mostly about waiting. Brief flurries of extreme activity, bordered by long stretches of nothing.”

  “Nothing is bad,” said Roper.

  “At war,” agreed Gray. “It is important at home, as my wife reminds me, but nobody wants time to reflect before a battle. You need a little time after, but nobody wants it before.”

  “Surely nothing, either at war or at home, is time wasted.”

  “You should speak to Sigrid about it,” said Gray. “Or the Chief Historian, if she will answer your questions. That’s who Sigrid took her example from. I do not understand it as well as she does, but nobody values pauses and silence more than my wife.”