The Traitor Game

by B. R. Collins

  We say to ourselves, you are all you can trust:

  Be true to yourself, be true, stay true.

  But now I am here, under colder stars,

  And old men and young men and children agree:

  Be enough for yourself. Be enough. Be all.

  (from Mydhen’s Way, trans. MT)

  The smell of smoke is everywhere. It sticks on your skin like grease and wafts out of your clothes when you move. It sits in the back of your throat so that you can taste it on your own breath, as though you’re breathing fire, like a salamandron. It’s as though it’s got into the walls of the castle itself, so that years from now the stone will still smell of burning, secreting the smell of ash like sweat. You can’t get rid of it.

  Most of Arcaster is burnt out, now. The School is still there, and some of the Trade Streets, but the warehouses, and the shops and marketplace where the slave market was have gone. The South-West Quarter, where the poorest people lived, has gone too. If you look in that direction from the castle walls all you can see is a dark grey wasteland. When it snows you can see steam rising from it. But most of the fires have died out. Now, instead of the sound of the flames – the rush of air, the crashes when buildings fell, the screams – there’s a sort of deathly silence. The only noise comes from inside the castle. Even from the castle walls, or the dusty, freezing attic where I’ve been sleeping, you can hear the odd cry of jubilation, or the sound of a scuffle between men who are too weary to shout, or the smash of someone discovering a treasure too large to carry home. And after a while you stop noticing, except that your ears are always open for certain voices, for a particular inflection, a particular turn of phrase. Once or twice, in the last few days, I’ve heard someone speaking Evgard in a low, precise tone, and it made my heart jump. But it was never Columen. And after the first rush of disappointment, I was glad, because they didn’t speak for long before they started screaming.

  When we were little, Ryn and I played wars on the beach in the summer. We built whole countries of sand, towns and fortresses and waterways, and conquered them. I remember besieging London once – before we even knew where London was, or could imagine what it was like. For us it was a huge pile of sand, with hundreds of those knobbly turrets you can make by dribbling sandy water into little towers, and we besieged it for a whole afternoon, before it fell. And then we watched the tide wash over it and we went home for dinner.

  No one but a fool would expect real wars – a real rebellion, a real siege – to be anything like that. But when we read accounts of the Old Country wars at school there was nothing to tell us how boring they are. That first night, after I – after the Company got into the castle, there was fighting; all I can remember of that is a blur of blood and running, the smell of hot metal and sweat, and struggling to keep myself from throwing up. But now . . . Those days on the beach were more of an adventure than this is. I want to find Ryn. I want to search the castle until I find out what’s happened to Columen and Iaspis. They might be alive – they might be . . . But the fear and guilt have worked their way into my bones, paralysing me. Whatever’s happened here is my fault. I opened the gate. I killed that guard. And if Columen’s dead . . .

  So all I do is sit on the castle walls, huddled in the cloak he gave me, not daring to go looking for him, sickened by my own cowardice. It’s been three days, now. All the servants and underlings have fled the castle, so there’s no wood for the fires or food in the kitchens. The White Company are beginning to fight among themselves for bread and fresh water; the wine has long since been drunk or wasted. Sometimes I wonder if there’s anything to wait for. But until I know about Columen, about Iaspis . . . I can’t leave. Not until I know they’re dead.

  Until then, there’s only the snow, blank, mercifully inhuman, and the smell of smoke.

  ‘Argent!’

  I turn to look; I’m aching and stiff with cold. If it weren’t for my cloak I’d probably be dead, or at least deadsleeping. As it is, it hurts to move.

  ‘Argent. I’ve been looking for you for hours.’

  Ryn. But for a moment I don’t recognise her, because I’ve never seen Ryn in anything but grimy wool and linen. I swallow, taking it in. She’s wearing a tunic and trousers of silvery grey silk. The belt that holds her knife is made of shiny dark leather; it’s slightly too big for her, so the hilt of the knife hangs outwards, where it’ll be awkward for her to reach. Her hair is piled up on her head; there’s a filet of silver net holding it in place.

  She grins at my surprise, and gives me a mock Evgard bow. ‘Do you like it?’

  I turn back to look at the snow. I can’t say, Only barbarians loot and pillage, and I’m not going to lie. I stare through the arrow-slit and hope she’ll go away.

  ‘Argent!’ She grabs my elbow and pulls me back. ‘What’s the matter?’ She wrinkles her nose. ‘You look like someone chopped your balls off and pissed in the hole.’ She sees my face, and adds, ‘It’s only a phrase, Argenshya. I just mean . . .’

  ‘I know what you mean. Where did you get them? The clothes?’

  ‘There’s a whole room of them. Above the kitchens.’ She squeezes on to the sill of the window next to me and peers over my shoulder at the snow. ‘You should have a look. I bet most of it would fit you. There’s loads of girls’ stuff, too, all these fancy dresses in weird colours, but I like the boys’ stuff better.’

  ‘Of course. It’s easier to fight in trousers.’

  There must be something funny in my voice, because she turns and frowns at me. ‘What’s the matter?’ She smoothes her hands over the tunic. ‘You don’t think I should have gone for a dress?’

  ‘No.’ She’s still staring at me. ‘What was wrong with your old clothes? Your own clothes?’

  ‘Well, for a start, they’re falling apart. And they don’t keep the cold out.’ She squints at me mulishly. ‘Anyway, you’ve got Evgard clothes. Look at that cloak.’

  ‘Columen gave me mine! I didn’t steal them,’ I say, before I can stop myself.

  She sits back slowly. I can’t hold her gaze. ‘Columen . . . ? As in, the Duke’s son?’

  I bite my lip. I shouldn’t have told her. I promised myself – I was so careful not to tell her . . . But I can’t, I won’t take it back. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Gave you clothes? Personally?’ When I don’t answer she gives a harsh little whistle. ‘What were you – his slave? His catamite?’

  ‘His friend.’ I can’t help myself, but as soon as I’ve said it I know I should have lied. Her face freezes. She turns her head so that she’s watching me sidelong. A moment ago she was looking at me the way she used to when we were kids and quarrelled about whose turn it was to carry the seaweed-basket to the beach; now she looks like someone different, older, someone who’s killed people.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I mean –’ Go on, for fargtt’s sake, Argent! But that look in her eyes – calculating, suspicious. ‘I only meant . . . He was kind to me.’

  ‘Kind to you? You mean, he kept you alive?’

  It’s true, in a way. ‘Yes . . .’

  ‘He gave you a few of his old clothes.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Is that all? Did he do anything else?’

  Oh, lyshe . . . He stopped me jumping from the Ghist Tower. He saved me from his father. He treated me like I was human, like I was his equal – or almost . . . I look down, away from her eyes, which are silver, like mine, cold as a winter sea. ‘No. Not really.’

  ‘He treated you like a pet. That’s all.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Varesh meither, Argent, tell me you haven’t said that to anyone else! That you were friends with the Duke’s son –’

  ‘No, I haven’t.’ Who would I say it to?

  Ryn sighs out a long breath; it hangs in the air like smoke. She shakes her head. ‘You shouldn’t say things like that. People won’t know which side you’re on. It was hard enough before – after you opened the gate –’

  ‘What? I let you in. If I ha
dn’t –’

  She puts her hands on mine, pressing them down. ‘Yes, I know, I know. But not everyone understood what you’d done. They wanted to know how come you were wandering about the castle like that, when all the other Mereish slaves were in the dungeons. But if they heard you say . . .’ She leans close to me, so close I could touch her lips with my tongue, if I wanted to. ‘Promise me you won’t ever say that again. That he was your friend. Promise me.’

  ‘All right.’

  ‘We’re Mereish, Argent. We have to stick together. The Evgarders – they’re different from us. They’ll always treat us like shit. That won’t ever change. We’ve got to fight –’ She searches my face with her eyes.

  ‘Yes.’ I’m too tired to argue. I imagine my father, leaning forward, shaking his head. He’d say, Ryn, lass, that’s not the way, that’s not enough. He’d say, Whenever you fight there’s someone who loses. And whoever loses fights harder the next time. For a second I can see his face, every line of it, his eyes looking into mine; and I’m glad he’s not here, that he can’t see me like this, that he doesn’t know what I did. Then suddenly I have to swallow again and again, pushing the misery back, because he isn’t here. He didn’t come for me. He didn’t join the raid, hoping against hope that I was still alive; he’s not here, leaving the others to loot and drink while he searches, not resting until he’s found me, or my body. He thinks I’m dead . . . I say again, ‘Yes.’

  Ryn narrows her eyes. Then she relaxes. She’s rubbing one hand absent-mindedly against her leg, over and over; she sees me looking and grimaces. ‘I can’t get clean. It’s like it all gets under your skin – all the ash and mess and blood.’ There’s a track of rusty dark under each nail. She spreads her fingers and looks critically at her hand, the silvery nails, the skin so white it looks like quartz. ‘I need some gloves, really.’

  ‘Take mine.’ I tug at the fingers of my gloves and offer them to her. They’ll be too big for her, but they’re black leather and sable. They were Columen’s fourth-best pair.

  She looks up with a little questioning smile. Then she tries them on and laughs with pleasure. ‘Thank you.’

  I don’t say anything else. My own hands have already started to ache with cold. I don’t know why I gave them to her. Not out of generosity, certainly; maybe something about those white, white hands, that set my teeth on edge. Pisciculi albus . . . I know what they meant, now.

  ‘Anyway. Come on.’ She stands up suddenly and turns, pulling at my sleeve.

  ‘What? Where?’

  ‘Mathon wants to see you. Didn’t I say? He wants someone who speaks Evgard.’

  ‘Why?’ They’ve been here for three days; why do they need to start talking Evgard now? I push away the jab of hope that says, They’re negotiating. It’s just as likely that they want someone to interrogate the prisoners, or just taunt them as they’re being tortured. What if it’s Columen –? I grit my teeth.

  ‘How would I know? But you’d better come. Show everyone what side you’re on.’ She says it so casually.

  ‘I opened the gate! I betrayed –’ I hit at the stonework with my fist, feeling the cold jar right down to the bones. I killed that guard – with Columen’s dagger . . . ‘Varesh meither, Ryn – what else do they need?’

  She rolls her eyes. ‘Yes, I know that, Argesha.’ She hooks her gloved hands into her belt. ‘But not everyone knows you as well as I do. Come on. Don’t sulk. Please.’ When I don’t answer she shrugs and starts to walk along the wall, back towards the North Tower.

  I follow her, dragging my feet in the icy, ashy sludge. I say to her back, ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘I told you. To Mathon –’

  ‘No, where?’

  ‘Oh.’ She turns to look at me, brushing snow out of her eyes. ‘The Square Gallery. Why?’

  ‘Not this way. If we go down the Narrow Stairs, then there’s a back way –’ I shouldn’t have said anything. Her face stiffens, suddenly hostile, and I know why: because there’s a kind of ownership in my voice. I can’t help it. In the last few weeks I’ve been everywhere in the castle, without let or hindrance, following at Columen’s heels. He showed me all the secret ways, too, the doors and levers and code-keys, the walls that yield under the right pressure, the garderobe that’s always kept locked, because it isn’t really a garderobe at all . . . I know Arcaster Castle as well as any Evgard courtsnipe, and I’m proud of it.

  She jerks her head; it’s almost a nod. When I turn towards the south again, and the Narrow Stairs, she’s there, at my shoulder, silently following me. It’s only because we grew up together – because we’ve been friends all my life – that I can see the change in her, the slowly hardening core of distrust when she looks at me. But it’s too late. There’s nothing I can do about it now.

  The Square Gallery is dark, and crowded, and smells of dirt and stale breath and blood. There’s loot all over the floor; people have used chests and bales of cloth to block off areas of the room, so that it’s hard to get to the other side. Mathon has a makeshift desk at one end, but he’s hemmed in by odd pieces of furniture and smoke hangs above his head like a pall. A couple of people look up as we walk past, but no one challenges us. I can’t help thinking, This is a shambles . . . and then, in spite of myself, Columen would have done better.

  Mathon sees us. He stands up and comes out from behind his desk. A couple of the men slumped against the wall follow his example, hauling themselves gracelessly to their feet. Ryn sketches a salute and pushes me forward. ‘Here he is, Captain. This is Argent. He opened the gate for us.’

  Mathon looks down at me. There’s something about him that makes my hackles rise. The way he stood up before we got to him, perhaps, as though he wanted to make a point of his huge bulk, the fact that I only come up to his shoulder. Or maybe it’s that he looks like a parody of my father, except that where my father is wiry and weather-darkened, Mathon is heavy and ruddy from too much drink. He has very small eyes, as though poring over battle campaigns has made them retreat nervously back into his skull.

  He looks me up and down. ‘This is the Evgard boy?’

  Ryn grabs my elbow in a quick protective clench. ‘No, Captain, he’s Mereish. He’s one of ours. From Skyph. He got captured. Before the Sundark.’

  ‘Argent . . . That’s an Evgard name, isn’t it?’

  I stare back at him. As though it matters. It’s only a name . . . ‘My mother was from Petra Caeca.’

  His nose twitches. There are tiny bristles on the end of it, growing out of the pores. ‘So you’re half Evgard?’

  I start to say, ‘I let you into the castle, didn’t I?’ but Ryn has already pulled me back and stepped in front of me.

  ‘No, Captain – he’s as Mereish as we are. He never knew her, his mother, I mean. She just went off when he was a baby. Selfish Evgard bitch.’ She takes a step closer to Mathon. ‘Honest, Captain, he hates Evgard more than any of us.’

  I catch my breath. But the look Ryn shoots over her shoulder is so pleading, so apologetic, that I make myself bite my tongue. Please, Argent, it says. Let me save your life.

  And Mathon nods, slowly. ‘All right.’ He looks down at me, chewing the side of his cheek. ‘But one false move . . .’ He stares at me, as though he’s trying to read my mind. ‘We know you’re not above a little bit of treachery. So no funny business – or it’ll be you begging for mercy on the Salamandron’s Tail, and not your Evgard friends.’

  I don’t believe it. In a moment he’ll relax, grin, slap me on the back, say, ‘Ha! Thought I was serious, didn’t you, sonny? Well . . . so it was you that let us through the gate? Well done, boy, well done. I’m glad to meet you.’ But he doesn’t. He clears his throat and spits into the rushes at my feet.

  I gaze at him, incredulous. In my head the noise of the battering ram is surfacing again, the horrible sweaty stickiness of blood on my hands, the smell of rust hitting the back of my throat. All that, for this. You’re not above a little bit of treachery . . . I blink, forcing it
away. Don’t think about it.

  Mathon says, ‘And if you think you’re getting a share of the spoils you can think again. Keep your thieving little hands off, you understand?’

  I want to say, You bastard, I opened the gate for you. I killed that guard. I betrayed Columen, the only person I . . . You shudfargtte, you meidburuchtts . . . but I can’t speak.

  ‘Hurry up, then, boy. Don’t stand there like an idiot.’ He glances at Ryn. ‘He isn’t an idiot, I take it?’

  Ryn doesn’t laugh or catch my eye. ‘No, sir.’

  ‘Hmm.’ It’s hard to tell from his tone whether he’s pleased or disappointed. ‘Come on, then.’ He picks up his axe from the wall where it’s been leaning and makes a few mock passes with it before slinging it over his shoulder. ‘Chop chop.’ He laughs, showing a rotten back tooth.

  No one tells me where we’re going, or why. After a while I begin to suspect we’re taking a roundabout way to the Treasury. Everywhere we pass is deserted, with doors hanging off their hinges or kicked into piles of firewood. The reeds on the floor have been trodden into brown decaying wads. Most of the pictures have gone; a couple are still in place, defaced by obscene scrawls or crude drawings of skulls or phalluses. We go past the picture of the Lady Ilex that Columen showed me, and someone’s written WHORE above her head. Mathon follows my gaze. ‘Like it, do you, boy? Or don’t you know what it means?’ He makes a gurgling noise in his throat; it takes me a few seconds to realise he’s laughing. ‘Sounds like you ought to know. Sounds like your mother was –’

  My dagger is in the small of my back. I know it’s there. I don’t need to think before my hand goes to it, and it slides up out of its sheath, fitting into my hand so neatly it’s as if it’s part of me. I don’t even wonder what I’m about to do.

  But Mathon has stopped dead, catching Ryn off guard, so she almost walks into him. ‘Oh, shudfargtt.’ He’s not talking to me.

  The corridor’s been blocked. There’s a long, massive table, set on its side, with pale splintered pockmarks where someone’s reclaimed arrows, and bolsters slumped round the edges like dead children. There’s even a huge pewter dinner-dish, with one edge curled up as though it bounced off the wall before it fell. A barricade. From the way it’s been built – strong, logical, the table too heavy to be moved without a team of men – I’d say it was Evgard soldiers, making a last-ditch stand. I’m glad we can’t see the other side, where the bodies would be. Not that it’s important, really, who built it; the only thing that matters now is whether we can get past it. And we can’t.