by Ian Irvine
“But today he’s got a thousand men with him.”
Rix’s stomach knotted. He followed Jackery to the top of the hill, from where they could see across the braided streams of the Rinkl all the way to the spiked green towers of Bastion Barr, in the foothills of the northern Crowbung Range.
“Do you think he plans to attack?” Jackery added.
“Grandys is the master of improvisation. Sometimes he doesn’t know what he’s going to do until he’s done it, so how can I possibly anticipate him?”
“He’s changed lately. When he’d never lost, it made him reckless—there was no thrill in battle unless the challenge was enormous and the risk desperate.”
“That’s true,” said Rix, rubbing his jaw, which still ached from time to time. “Something happened after he defeated Lyf’s army, and he hasn’t been the same man since. I wish I knew what it was…”
“He’s lost two strong fortresses and he hasn’t had a chance to retaliate. Grandys will be so hungry for a win that he won’t take so many chances.”
“He couldn’t bear another defeat; he’ll use everything he’s got.”
“In a shattering demonstration of his power,” said Holm. “A warning, and a lesson to everyone in Hightspall who dares oppose him. See what I did to Deadhand’s army, he’ll be saying. I’m going to do worse to you.”
Rix glanced across at the twin white limestone cliffs that formed a rampart below Bastion Barr, half expecting to see an army streaming out between them, but the land was empty.
He dug his knuckles into his belly. It did nothing to ease the pain there, like embedded fish hooks.
“It won’t be long,” Rix said to Glynnie and Holm that evening. “He’s not a patient man.”
“I hope not,” said Glynnie, who was plucking at her collar, over and over, “because once it’s over and we’ve won, I’m holding you to your promise.”
Rix stared at her, blank-faced. How could she blithely assume that it would end well despite all evidence that it would not? “What promise?”
Her eyes flashed. “How can you have forgotten? To help me look for Benn.”
He groaned. “Not again, Glynnie. Not now.”
“He’s my little brother, you heartless bastard!” she snapped. “He’s all I’ve got.”
“Apart from me,” said Rix, tearing at his hair. “Glynnie, I’m facing imminent battle with an enemy I can’t hope to beat, one who’ll gleefully slaughter everyone in this army if I lose. We can’t drink the water, we’re running low on food and all kinds of supplies and I have no idea how I’m going to get more. And Grandys could be cutting the master pearl out of Tali’s head as we speak. So, as much as I care about Benn, right now I can’t even think about doing anything for him… if he’s still alive.”
“You promised!”
“After the war is over, I said. I wouldn’t dare go anywhere near Caulderon right now.”
“Why not?” she said furiously.
“You know why. In an occupied city, anyone asking questions is liable to be taken as a spy, then tortured and executed. Everyone knows my face, I’m far too big to disguise myself and my dead hand would give me away instantly. Besides, I can’t abandon my army with Grandys so close.”
“You’re obsessed with him! You’ve got a death wish.”
“He’s got a death wish on me, and my country. Am I supposed to run away and let him have it?”
“You don’t care about Benn, or me, or anything except playing at your precious war,” Glynnie hissed, and stormed out.
“What the hell am I supposed to do?” said Rix to Holm.
Holm sighed. “Isn’t it obvious?”
“No.”
“Show Glynnie you understand that Benn matters as much to her as anything you’re doing here. More! You’ve still got a manor, wealth and an army—all she has in the world is Benn.”
“And you. And me,” said Rix.
“Don’t persist in misunderstanding me,” said Holm sharply.
“I’m not persisting. I don’t understand her.”
“You expect her to make allowances for all your problems. And she does. But you ignore her problems. She’s in agony, Rix, and you’re the only person who can help her.”
“I’m not ignoring her problems. I just can’t—”
“ ‘Do anything about them at the moment,’ ” Holm chanted as though reciting an overworn excuse.
“That’s right!” Rix said mulishly.
“All you have to do is sit down and talk to her. Show you care. Make her understand that you’re determined to help her find Benn, the minute you can.”
“I would, but I’ve got more things to do than I can get done in a twenty-four-hour day.”
“It would only take fifteen minutes. You’ve just wasted twice that time denying Glynnie’s right to be worried about Benn. You’d better sort this out, Rix, or you’ll lose her.”
If I can’t sort Grandys out we’ll all be dead, Rix thought, and I’ll be blamed for it.
“I can’t sleep!” he cried. “My bowels are running like tap water and on the rare occasions when I do doze off, I wake drenched in sweat, dreaming about the wyverin. And you know what that means.”
“What does it mean?” said Holm, rather coolly.
“The same as it meant for my father—betrayal and an ignominious death.”
“I don’t—”
“It’s a monstrous omen of our defeat, and the fall of Hightspall. I’m cracking, Holm. How much more am I expected to take?”
“Not much, by the look of you. But if you were with your friends rather than against us, you’d find the stress easier to bear.”
“I’ll talk to her in the morning,” said Rix.
But before dawn he was woken to the news that Grandys’ army was streaming out of Bastion Barr, heading for the ford. Rix mobilised his troops in a panic, issued his orders and made sure his formations were organised for defence, and in the tumult there was no time to talk to Glynnie.
Later that morning, when Grandys’ troops were about to cross the ford, they turned as one, marched east along the Rinkl River and disappeared over a rise.
“What the hell is he doing?” said Rix.
“Taunting us,” said Jackery.
“He’s not going to fight you on your battlefield,” said Holm. “Let him go.”
“And be called a coward again?” said Rix. “A traitor secretly in Grandys’ thrall?”
“He wants you to follow him.”
“I know.”
“You’ll be walking into his trap.”
“I know there’s going to be a trap. I won’t be walking into it.”
“You’re doing exactly—”
“Not exactly. He doesn’t know what I’m going to do, and neither do you.”
“I’ve got a pretty good idea,” Holm muttered, “and I don’t like it one bit.”
CHAPTER 27
Rix doesn’t care about me or Benn, thought Glynnie. All he cares about is war.
She was tossing in her sweat-damp bedroll, having been woken soon after she went to sleep by another skin-crawling premonition of doom about Benn. She couldn’t bear to go back to sleep—she couldn’t take any more.
After pulling on her boots, she went out into the still camp. It was silent and dark save for a handful of down-lanterns illuminating the benches at the cooks’ wagons, where they were making stew and preparing the dough for tomorrow morning’s bread. Rix required that his troops begin the day with a hot meal, the best available.
Glynnie avoided the activity at the kitchen wagons and walked south, out of the camp. She skirted a small lake, not much bigger than a pond, and headed down to the edge of a low crag, where she sat a safe distance from the edge and looked out across the lowlands. It was a clear night with no wind, the landscape lit slantingly by a waxing moon.
The false war, between the two armies several miles apart, had been going on for days now. Grandys had marched east along the north side of the Rinkl River,
then crossed through Lakeland into the south of Fennery, a soggy lowland with a scattering of flattopped hills standing out above large areas of marsh and mire. And Rix had continued to shadow Grandys…
Conveniently forgetting his promise. Glynnie’s pulse rose at the thought. Damn him!
On the third day of the false war Grandys had captured the small manor of Flume, on the border between southern Fennery and Gordion. Rix had camped four miles north, on a long hill called Bolstir, where they were now. The little lake on its dish-shaped crest was blissfully free of the volcanic ash that had befouled every water supply further west, while low crags on the east, north and south sides made it easy to defend.
A few miles to Glynnie’s right the moon reflected off a large triangular bay, several miles on one side, surrounded by the high, pale cliffs that formed most of the northern shore of Lake Fumerous. Further south, only ten miles away in a straight line, was the smoky smudge of the city of Caulderon.
Twice on the way here, bands of Grandys’ raiders had attacked Rix’s camp, shooting burning arrows into the tents then vanishing into the night. On another night Grandys’ agents had silently killed all Rix’s outer guards and outriders, and disappeared. No one had known of it until the guards’ signals had not come in.
Holm had been right all along. Grandys was playing a mind game with Rix, baiting the trap, and Rix was too proud and stubborn to see it. Glynnie did not like the way war was hardening Rix—he seemed to see his soldiers’ deaths in these endless skirmishes and sorties as necessary, even strategic. But the war was out of his control. One day soon he would be killed in battle, or tortured to death by Grandys, and there was nothing she could do to protect him.
She couldn’t bear it. And since there was nothing she could do for Rix, she had to look after the only person she could do anything for—Benn.
The moonlight was just good enough for her knife-throwing practice. Glynnie picked out a target, an inch-wide knot in the trunk of a small tree. If she was going it alone, she had to be ready to defend herself.
She had been practising with her knives for weeks now and could hit her target eight times out of ten, though it would be a different matter in real life. She had also trained with Holm, using a rapier-like blade, though her small size and light weight meant she would always be at a disadvantage in swordplay.
Her knife throwing would help to even the imbalance, though whenever she picked up a knife it reminded her of the sentry she had killed. Murdered! She shivered and dropped her knife. At the time she had thought it fortunate that she had never seen the sentry’s face, though lately his faceless shadow had come to haunt her dreams almost as often as the wyverin did Rix’s.
And her victim always had the killer’s knife embedded in his back.
Her knife.
She tried to reason that she’d had no choice; that he had been a bad man and by killing him she had saved a good man’s life, but it still felt as though she was a cowardly murderer. Well, if that’s what she was, it could not be changed. And if she had to do it again to save Benn, she would! And pay the price afterwards.
Glynnie picked up the knife and hurled it true. Thunk, a few inches to the left of the knot. Good, but not good enough. She had to kill any attacker before he came within reach. If she could not, she would die and Benn would be lost.
Thunk, three inches right of the knot this time. Just as bad. Glynnie tried to aim but her throwing arm had developed a tremor. She stood still, her arms hanging down, imagining some tall brute of a soldier advancing on her, flushed with battle rage and swinging back a broadsword the length of her body. Her only chance was to kill him first. She raised the knife but her arm shook violently and now there was a weakness in her elbow.
Pull yourself together, girl. This is your life.
The lecture didn’t work. No matter how she envisaged the threat to her, or to Rix, she could not steady her arm. And she knew why. Rix had his true purpose in life—fighting and, if necessary, dying for his country; opposing Hightspall’s enemies in every way he could. But it was not her true purpose. Her promise that she would look after Benn overrode everything else, even her love for Rix. Even her fear for him.
Glynnie’s throwing arm was rock-steady now. She aimed with her heart, not her eyes, and threw her remaining knives, one, two, three: thunk, thunk, thunk. They embedded themselves side by side in the centre of the knot.
She retrieved the five knives, cleaned the sap off the blades and sheathed them. Glynnie turned and Holm was standing a few yards away. She started, guiltily.
“You look like a woman who’s just come to the decision of her life,” said Holm.
She headed back. He fell in beside her.
“I have,” said Glynnie.
“Are you sure it’s the right decision?”
“I dream about Benn every night. I can see his face as though he’s standing right in front of me. Every night he’s in greater danger and more pain.”
Holm frowned. “You’ve dreamed about him every single night? For how long?”
She shrugged. “A week or so. What does it matter?”
“A dream repeated so regularly, so vividly, could have a dark origin.”
She missed a step, stumbled. He caught her arm.
“You mean it’s being sent to me?”
“Got any enemies, Glynnie?”
There was no need to answer. She moved on, her heart fluttering.
“I don’t believe it,” said Glynnie.
“You don’t want to believe it.”
“If Grandys had sent my dream, it’d be darker. It’d be tinged with rage, violence, blood and pain, because that’s his signature.”
“He might have had someone else send it. Someone kinder. Yulia, for instance.”
“Do you think I don’t know my own brother?”
Holm did not reply. They were approaching her tent now, a small outline in the darkness.
“In my dreams it doesn’t feel like an imitation of Benn,” said Glynnie. “It’s just Benn, as only I know him.”
Holm let out a heavy sigh. “And you have to go?”
“What would you do if it was your little brother or sister, or your own child?”
“I failed the test with my own child,” he said quietly.
“You won’t try to stop me, will you?”
“I should,” said Holm. “You’re only seventeen, not officially an adult… No, I’ll worry about you, but I won’t stop you… but—”
“What?” said Glynnie, when he did not continue.
“Are you going to say goodbye?”
“Goodbye, Holm.”
“You’re wilfully misunderstanding me. I meant goodbye to Rix.”
“Why would I?” she said bitterly. “He doesn’t care about me or Benn.”
“You know that’s not true.”
“And you can’t tell him I’m going!”
“I have to tell him. He’s our commander; he’s got to know.”
“Not yet!” she cried. “After I’ve made my final choice.”
“I thought you had.”
“I’m still wavering,” she lied.
“All right,” he said reluctantly, “but the moment you choose, you’ve got to tell Rix. If you don’t, I will.”
“He doesn’t care what I do,” she muttered.
“Emotional blackmail won’t work on me, Glynnie. Of course he cares—it’s just that the oaf finds it hard to say so. Besides, Rix relies on you. He needs you, and if you leave he’ll be devastated and undermined at a time when he has to focus everything on defeating Grandys. On saving this army and all of us.”
It was painful for Glynnie to accept, though she had to concede Holm’s point. If she left now, the chance of Rix beating Grandys must be lower than if she stayed. The chance of Rix’s survival must be lower, too. If she left now, there was a good chance she would never see him again.
“You’re trying to change my mind.”
“No, I’m just making your choice cle
ar.”
“It is clear. I have to choose between Rix, the man I love, and Benn, my little brother.”
“He’s been lost for months,” said Holm. “Surely a few more days don’t matter?”
“I’m afraid that the next few days matter more than ever. Besides… if I stay here there’s a good chance I’m going to die, and that would leave Benn all alone. If I go to Caulderon, how am I taking more of a risk? I’m just exchanging one danger for another.”
“I wonder what Rix would do in this situation?”
“I already know,” she said bitterly.
“And your choice?” Holm said wearily.
“Rix is a big, powerful man who has a whole army. Benn’s a little, lost boy and he’s got no one but me.”
“Sleep on it, please. If you still feel the same way in the morning…”
“All right!”
CHAPTER 28
In all Glynnie’s life, even in the dreadful days after she had been captured by Grandys and treated barbarously in his cells, she had never felt so alone as she did now.
She had given Holm the impression that she would sleep on her decision, though her mind had already been made up. She regretted lying to him but there was no choice. If she’d told him the truth he would have told Rix, and Rix would have prevented her from going.
She had lain in her bedroll for another sleepless hour, until the camp was quiet. Then she rose at midnight, made her way between the tents, bypassed the guards, and slipped away.
Now she was shivering in impenetrable blackness at the bottom of the hill, half a mile from the camp, heading for Caulderon. She had planned her route carefully last night, but the moon had since set and it was too dark to see any of the tracks through the mires. She had a lantern but dared not use it here—any light, however fleeting, would attract both enemies and allies.
The little hairs lifted on the back of her neck. Glynnie had an unnerving feeling that there was someone behind her. But how could there be? She could not see the tip of her nose.
She drew the knife on her hip, more for security than anything else, but as it came free of the sheath she took a hard, glancing blow to the top of the head. She struck out instinctively, slamming the knife backwards, and felt it pass through soft flesh before hitting bone. Liquid gurgled.