The echo of heavy boots became louder, then out of the blackness loomed four warriors of the Thousand, their black and silver armour shining in the light of their torches. They blazed towards her and she drew her sword. She muttered to herself, ‘Bless us, Aduara, goddess of fierce women. Bless your warriors and bathe them in the blood of men.’ She heard the gulon growling in its throat beside her.
The soldiers halted and their leader stepped forward. Although he had his sword unsheathed for battle he opened his helm, a symbol of disrespect to another warrior. She did not know his face.
‘Surrender to us now and you will be honourably treated,’ he told her, then paused as his words echoed off the walls, repeating over and over, diminishing. Then, ‘We have orders to take you alive if possible, but dead will be acceptable.’
Valla looked down at the gulon, then smiled at the leader. ‘Piss on you,’ she said. And attacked.
When she came round the pain in her arm was monstrous. She lifted her head and the world lurched and she was violently sick. The effort of vomiting jarred her arm and the pain climaxed. She passed out again. When she came to a second time, barely rising above unconsciousness, a groan escaped her lips. She prayed for death but, as ever, her prayer went unanswered.
‘Drink this,’ a woman’s voice said from a distance.
Valla opened her eyes. She was seated on a sturdy chair facing a table. On the other side of the table was an old woman. On the table was a cup. Her good arm was free and she picked up the cup and drank. It was not water. She didn’t know what it was. It was both bitter and sweet at the same time. But she felt a little better afterwards as the nausea and pain receded.
She looked around. The room was small and whitewashed and there was a high window through which she could see pale sky. In the distance, strangely, she could hear music, the tender tones of a lute. Her spirits rose. At least she was out of the dungeons. She shifted in her chair and realized her legs were shackled to the floor.
The old woman asked, ‘Where is Rubin Guillaume?’
‘Dead,’ Valla answered bitterly.
The woman waited for her to clarify, but Valla just stared at her. She had long white hair and black eyes and her face was creased with a thousand fine lines. On her breast was a crescent of silver.
‘When and where did he die?’ she asked patiently.
Valla peered at the ceiling in a parody of thought. ‘Four days ago,’ she said. ‘We were attacked by a gang of thugs.’ She shrugged. ‘Five of them,’ she added.
‘Yet you were seen together,’ said the woman mildly, ‘no more than three days ago in Amphitheatre.’
Valla shook her head. ‘Not true,’ she said. ‘I haven’t been in Amphitheatre for—’
‘Don’t play games with me, soldier!’ the woman rasped. The light in the room darkened and thickened as if something awful had passed over the sun. The floor rippled and flexed beneath Valla’s chair like a great animal stretching its muscles. Pain blazed through her arm again, as if her bones were made of liquid fire. Valla moaned and silently begged Aduara for release, but her goddess would not grant her even the gift of unconsciousness.
The old woman spoke, from far in the distance, ‘You are a million leagues out of your depth, girl, and still sinking, and your only way out of this room alive is to please me.’
Valla gathered her scraps of strength and opened her eyes. She said nothing.
‘I see.’ The air lightened and the woman sat back. ‘You are seeking death. Which is why you attacked four armed men. That would have been enough to ensure your swift demise had they not been ordered to take you alive.’
Valla tried to ignore her words, seeking back through her memory, trying to work out what she could tell this woman and what she had to keep silent about for Rubin’s sake. She feared torture but not, she suspected, as others did, for torment was part of her daily life.
The woman nodded to someone behind Valla and a door opened. There was a shuffle of boots, then two men came into Valla’s sight carrying a bloody mess of hair. She looked at it, unsure what she was seeing, until they dumped it on the table in front of her and she saw it was the patchwork gulon. It was in a pitiful state, covered in blood, its legs broken, its head misshapen. Pus and blood oozed from it on to the table, and she guessed it was still alive, but only just. She put out her hand to touch its blood-specked muzzle. One eye opened a slit and, pathetically, it tried to lick her hand.
Fury rose in her. ‘Is this a threat of what will happen to me?’ she asked. ‘This poor creature—’
‘This poor creature,’ barked the old woman, ‘almost killed itself attacking my warriors. They had to take it alive, like you, for it is forbidden to kill a gulon.’
My warriors. Valla’s befuddled, pain-racked mind finally allowed her to realize who she was facing. The empress. What have I come to, she asked herself, that I am refusing to answer questions put by the empress? For a moment her loyalty to Rubin wavered.
‘How is it you have a gulon defending you?’ Archange asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Valla admitted, then she added frankly, ‘It has followed me since I returned to the City. I don’t know why.’
‘You returned to the City before the Day of Summoning with your friend Rubin?’
Valla thought of all the people who had seen them in the Red Palace that day. ‘Yes,’ she said.
‘And you had audience with Marcellus?’
This was something Valla could not speak of, so she stared at the woman mutely.
Archange sighed and looked at the gulon with distaste. ‘This creature—’ she began, but Valla interrupted her, careless that she was speaking to her empress.
‘Rubin is my friend and I will not betray him, though your inquisitors reduce me to this, a sack of bones and pain,’ she said, touching the gulon’s ragged ear. The oozing blood had stopped and she wondered if the beast was dead.
The empress’s black eyes glinted. ‘You misunderstand me, Valla. I will not permit torture inside my palace. The City has seen too much of it in the past. On the contrary, I have a great gift to offer you.’
She reached out one thin, wrinkled hand and touched the gulon’s back. The air burned and crackled and a new wave of agony passed through Valla’s arm. She gasped. The gulon writhed, its hairy skin rippling like water. Its mouth opened and it let out a feeble whine. Its front paws scratched convulsively on the tabletop. It scrabbled with its hind legs, trying to get up. It collapsed, then got its legs under it. It looked around fearfully and jumped off the table. It scurried behind Valla’s chair and she stared at it, astonished, as it peered back up at her. Then it sat down on its haunches and started to wash the blood off its paws.
Valla shifted her gaze to the empress, lost for words.
‘It is strong again,’ Archange told her. ‘Perhaps stronger than it was before, for it is an old beast. Now,’ she said. ‘You have a decision to make. I can heal your arm, make it as good as new, now, this very moment. Then we will take a cup of wine together and you will tell me all you know about our friend Rubin Kerr Guillaume.
‘Or,’ she said, ‘you and your arm will live together in agony for the rest of your life deep in my darkest dungeon.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
DAWN WAS A bright splash of coral in a sky of bird’s egg and navy blue, but Dol Salida did not enjoy it. It was a long time since he had last appreciated a sunrise. Once again he had played urquat far into the night until his opponents had staggered, beaten and yawning, to their beds. From then until the first chirrup of the new day he had updated his files in his meticulous, tiny hand, drawing on information gleaned by himself during the day, and by Sully, who roamed the City for him now Dol was marooned on the Shield, far from anywhere.
Time was when the old cavalryman had limped the streets of the City, disregarding the pains in his leg and hip, sucking in the fetid life-force of the alleys and lanes, the canals and culverts, markets, temples, inns and boarding houses, mansions and hovels, e
ach day reclaiming ownership of his City for himself. He had lived and fought for it all his life and he could do no other.
But now he was caught in a two-fold trap. His new, powerful but empty position as the empress’s first counsellor kept him glued to her side, for each day she needed to consult with him, on anything and everything, on troop movements among the remaining regiments, on the new embroidery for the library chairs, or on the precise meaning of a word she believed one of her military chiefs had used in a slovenly way. Archange enjoyed his company; Dol knew that. She often claimed she liked to have young people around her, but Dol didn’t believe it for a heartbeat. In truth she enjoyed sharing the company of someone who understood the pains and frustrations of being old, although, he thought, he understood nothing else about the woman.
And secondly, he was trapped daily, hourly, every moment, by the pains in his leg. It had been injured fifty years before when, as a young trooper, he had been thrown from his mount during a battle, now long forgotten, against the Odrysians at the eastern frontier town of Markusia. With an old soldier’s nostalgia, and flexing his new-found power in the palace, he had earlier in the year sent a troop of soldiers to investigate the town. Just dust and ruins, had been their curt report. And a few goats. Goats mean people, he had thought angrily. The townsfolk were just hiding, understandably. He was tempted to send the soldiers back, then, in a rush of common sense, had decided against it. What was the point of terrifying a handful of peasants just to satisfy a passing whim?
He had been thrown off the horse, a black mare called Darkest, but his foot had caught in the stirrup and the fool animal had dragged him half a league before stopping. The hip and knee joints had been entirely disconnected and he had spent more than ten days in misery until they healed sufficiently for him to walk again. But he never walked properly, without pain. And he had not sat a horse since.
His early-morning routine was always the same, as are, he thought to himself scrupulously, most routines. He woke, if he slept at all, in his old leather chair, an instrument of torture these days. He dragged himself to his feet, sweating and cursing, and eased out some of the agony by limping back and forth for as long as it took. His servants had learned to stay out of his sight or hearing during that time. Archange never seemed to summon him then. If she had he would have ignored her, empress or not. In truth, he would have ignored the gods of ice and fire if they had summoned him. Once his pains had settled to their regular, familiar torment, he called his servants and his day began.
But this day was different. He had levered himself from his chair, and was hanging on to the arm, feeling sluggish blood making its agonizing way through his mangled limb.
‘The empress summons you, lord.’ It was a soldier, one of the Nighthawks, his least favourite century.
Through gritted teeth he said, ‘Tell her I am indisposed. She must wait.’
But they both knew Archange would wait for nothing and the soldier, implacable, said, ‘We have brought a chair, lord.’
So it has come to this, he thought, and a flush of shame rose to his face. I am to be carted around the palace like a pile of laundry. But he had no choice. He suffered himself to be helped into the padded chair – old fool – and carried in humiliation to Archange’s pretty parlour. He was surprised out of his self-absorption to see the empress was not seated in her usual place but lay on a day-bed by the window, propped up on many pillows. She looked gaunt and her eyes were dull.
She watched him without speaking as he was helped from the dratted chair and into another. A fine pair we are, he thought, to be responsible for this great City. The soldiers departed, leaving a single armed man at the door.
‘Good morning, Dol Salida.’
‘Morning, lady. I hope this urgent summons is worth my embarrassment?’ Let her have his head on a platter, it would be a kindness.
She sighed and blinked slowly. ‘We have had no word from Marcus in five days.’
‘They will have engaged the enemy by now,’ he replied sharply, still irritated. ‘And Marcus and his chiefs have better things to do than write letters.’
He knew this was inadequate, a product of his discomfort. Messengers were sent daily from the City to the army and back. Marcus Rae Khan’s first priority, after the execution of his mission, was to keep the empress informed.
She said with some of her former sharpness, ‘Perhaps I should have left you in the torment of your own chair if that is the best you have to offer me.’
Mindful suddenly of her variable moods, he adopted a more politic tone. ‘If you thought Marcus and Hayden Weaver had suffered such a setback that they could not communicate, then you would have summoned all your chiefs, not just me and my game leg.’
She smiled thinly and coughed. ‘That meeting will be held later. I have called the chiefs but some will take a few hours to return.’ She gazed at the ornate golden timepiece on her wall, a gift from Weaver. ‘I am merely,’ she sighed, ‘seeking the immediate reaction of my old friend. Reassurance, if you will.’
‘I have no reassurance to offer,’ he said, honestly. ‘There is nothing the City can do to help them if they have been overwhelmed. We do not have a few thousand spare troops to send. They are on their own.’
He had argued long and loud against sending the Khan army north to aid Weaver’s forces. A third of the City’s remaining troops on a fool’s errand to help a man who was once, not long ago, the enemy. Vindication trumped loud in his ear, but he could take no pleasure from it.
Sharply, the empress ordered the single guard from the room. Dol looked at her enquiringly.
‘I wish to discuss with you an important matter I cannot bring to the attention of my other counsellors,’ she told him. As was always the case, he felt pride in the fact that she had chosen him as her foremost confidant. He regarded her closely. She seemed anxious, not an emotion he normally connected with the empress.
‘Marcellus,’ she said, watching his face. ‘I believe he lives.’
This wasn’t what Dol expected. When crossed Archange could make comments which were impulsive, outrageous even. But she was gazing at him calmly, sipping a tisane, awaiting his reaction. If it were anyone else he would have scoffed. But the empress would not have confided this concern to him unless she had good reason. He thought it through, remembering the gossip and rumour which had spread through the tortured City after the Day of Summoning. Marcellus still lives, people said. He will return to rescue the City. Superstition and nonsense, he thought. He shook his head firmly.
‘We have Fell Aron Lee’s testament that he executed him, severed his head and threw it from a tower of the Red Palace. We have no reason to think he was lying.’
‘I do not think Fell was lying,’ the empress snapped. ‘When I questioned him – you were there, Dol Salida – I believe he told me the truth as he saw it. I have thought this over and over,’ she sighed. ‘Fell told us he killed Marcellus then made his way down to the Hall of Emperors. What did he say about that?’
Dol searched his memory. ‘He said he got lost in the maze of stairs and tunnels. It took him some time to find his way back.’
‘Exactly!’ she cried triumphantly. ‘He took some time. Yet he arrived there shortly after the death of Rafael. You verified this.’
In a moment of revelation, Dol saw what she was thinking.
‘Rafael was not a mortal man,’ he said.
‘Indeed. He was merely a reflection of Marcellus. A remarkable one, ancient and unique, but just a reflection.’
‘And a reflection cannot survive once his—?’
‘Sire.’
‘Once his sire is dead. Therefore, if Marcellus was indeed killed, up on the observatory tower, Rafael should have died on the instant in the Hall of Emperors.’
‘Exactly so. But he didn’t. You saw Rafael die.’
‘I did. He was disabled by Shuskara, then executed by Indaro. The gods curse her name. Fell arrived in the Hall of Emperors shortly after. I remember wondering wh
o he was, this tall warrior walking among the corpses.’
‘Which can mean only one thing. The man Fell killed was not Marcellus.’
She sighed and set off a fit of coughing. ‘It was obvious, but I could not see it, because Marcellus only created one reflection in his life, and that was his brother Rafael. He said it often and I repeated it myself and believed it, and it blinded me to the more obvious fact. That Marcellus must have made another one, perhaps more than one, in secret – he was always a secretive man – ready for just this eventuality. Araeon created any number of reflections over the years, to misguide his enemies, to guard his back. Why would Marcellus not also?’
Dol thought it through. ‘Perhaps not,’ he argued. ‘The same facts would also apply if Rafe were not a reflection at all. Perhaps he was not. His death seemed like that of a mortal man.’
She shook her head. ‘Rafael was a reflection,’ she rapped. ‘I know them well. I know everything about them. Marcellus was an only child, an orphan, and remained so until he was well into middle years. Then this friend, this brother appeared, whom Marcellus named Rafael Vincerus. Only the oldest of us knew he was no such thing. Most of the reflections that peopled the palace – there was something of a fashion for them for a century or more – were copies of their sires. They were made by Serafim using the power of the Gulon Veil. Only Araeon, who had powers far beyond the rest of us, could create reflections which were quite unlike him, at times not even human. At least, that is what we all believed.’ She shuddered.
Dol sat back. He was only half listening. Marcellus alive, he thought. The possibility made any worries about the fate of Marcus’ army fade into insignificance. If Marcellus still lived, if he had ambitions to gain the throne – and how could he not? – then all their futures looked uncertain.
‘Why,’ he asked, ‘have you come to this conclusion now? The evidence, such as it is, has always been there for both of us. Why now?’ This came perilously close to criticism, and Archange scowled.
The Immortal Throne (2016) Page 33