The Immortal Throne (2016)

by Stella Gemmell

  ‘It is something which has bothered me for some time. But recently I had a conversation,’ she said, ‘with a former soldier of the Thousand. She was close to someone who knew Marcellus well, and she reminded me of something I had forgotten. She said Marcellus was a schemer, though he was at pains to hide it. He liked to appear spontaneous, impulsive. In fact all his moves were minutely calculated, like a game of urquat.’

  He nodded. ‘But, if that is the case, why,’ he asked, ‘would he stay away if his City was in trouble? And why did you not speak of your concerns before?’

  She shot him an angry look. ‘Why would he stay away all this time? I have no idea. And I did not speak of this before because I do not blurt out everything that is on my mind, Dol Salida. At first I was waiting for Marcellus to make a move against me, to revenge himself for the death of Araeon, and when he did not I thought he had decided to absent himself, as Serafim have done before. Or that I was merely mistaken.’

  ‘And now?’

  ‘Now I think he has made his move.’ She coughed again and struggled to sit up. She reached out and rang the brass bell at her side.

  Dol wondered what she meant for a heartbeat, then the realization was like a blow in the face. ‘You think Marcellus is the reason we have lost contact with the army?’

  Archange spoke to a soft-footed servant then waved him away. ‘His troops love him,’ she said, staring out of the parlour window. ‘He could, if he chose, walk in and take command of the army from Weaver and Marcus. He might even be made emperor by acclamation, in the old way. He might turn the army, abort its mission to help the Petrassi, and return to the City.’ She looked at him. ‘And then what? The City could not stand another war, certainly not a civil war.’

  Privately Dol thought that if Marcellus could seize command of the army from Marcus Rae Khan, which he doubted, then he could also turn the City’s remaining forces against Archange. Not for the first time, he wondered what the relationship was between the empress and Marcellus. He had spent years secretly dogging the footsteps of the First Lord on Archange’s behalf and he still had little idea. But he doubted that Marcellus, who had always been meticulously loyal to Araeon, would be so to the empress who had snatched the throne.

  But his role here this morning was reassurance. ‘You are assuming too much,’ he offered. ‘Firstly, that Marcellus is still alive and wasn’t butchered by some common soldier on his way out of the City.’

  ‘No common soldier could kill him,’ she stated, seemingly forgetting that, for a while at least, that is exactly what she had believed.

  ‘And,’ he went on as if she hadn’t spoken, ‘that he has reappeared hundreds of leagues away near the Petrassi border. And that he is sufficiently disloyal to his empress to act against her.’

  He grunted. ‘Time will tell,’ he added.

  ‘It always does,’ she replied.

  To Dol’s satisfaction, the servant returned with something to break their fast. More tisane for the empress and watered wine for Dol Salida, and a platter full of the pastries which were the only thing Dol had ever seen Archange eat. He had always eyed them furtively but she had never offered him one. Now, however, she gestured to them and he took one. He bit into it, expecting a meat filling, but the taste in his mouth was, for a moment, strange and therefore unwholesome. Then he realized the pastry was filled with sweet fruit and honey, spiced and flavoursome. He ate it quickly then took another.

  As he ate, the granddaughter glided in and spoke softly to Archange. Dol stared at her, schooling his face to show nothing. This Thekla, who had suddenly appeared at the palace ten or so days before, was an unknown quantity. She was said to be a surgeon and if this were true, Dol thought, why was she lingering on the mountain and not working down in the City where she was needed? In all his researches she had only appeared as a footnote to Archange’s life. She had lived most of her years far beyond the City with her mother, for reasons unknown, at least to him. He was deeply suspicious of her and the way she had quickly, since the departure of Broglanh, made a place for herself among Archange’s inner circle. He assumed she had been listening to their conversation. When she left she glanced coolly at him.

  Archange was sitting up now, looking out over the City, sipping from a glass. She looked a little stronger, Dol thought.

  ‘I have a piece of news for you,’ he said, taking another pastry.

  She turned her dark gaze on him, waiting.

  ‘The lady Fiorentina has found sanctuary at the Khan Palace.’

  ‘I don’t know why you would call it sanctuary,’ she argued, frowning. ‘Are you implying she has something to fear from me?’

  ‘Not at all,’ Dol said hastily. ‘But she has kept her whereabouts concealed since the Day of Summoning, as have the Khans. Perhaps she feels it is necessary.’

  ‘I had assumed she died in the fall of the Red Palace, if I thought about her at all. Have your agents seen her, spoken to her?’

  ‘No, and the Khan servants are fiercely loyal. But one of her former maids has been indiscreet. These people have their own network of contacts.’

  She coughed. ‘Scarcely conclusive. And the Khan servants may be fiercely loyal – they are probably too frightened of Giulia to be anything else – but I am sure the threat of interrogation will put a crack in that loyalty.’

  ‘Perhaps. I am not sure it is that important.’

  ‘Then why bring it to me? What do I care where the whore’s sister has fetched up?’

  ‘Just a morsel of gossip on a sunny morning,’ Dol said lightly, wishing he’d never mentioned it. Any allusion to Petalina, Marcellus’ ‘whore’ for nigh on thirty years, however indirect, always provoked the empress.

  She sat back. ‘Perhaps I will call on Giulia,’ she mused, ‘and renew our relationship. I have not seen her since she returned from her voyage and I should express my gratitude for the foreign gold she brought to our coffers. I can mention Fiorentina and see what her face gives away. It will be informative.’

  The morning passed, the sun ascended in glory, and Dol Salida found no inclination to leave the parlour. He had a full belly and his pains had died to the merest whisper.

  They discussed many things, some important, many trivial. There was the matter of the Gulons, the emperor’s own century of the Thousand. They had been far from the City on the Day of Summoning and had never returned. Dol had assumed the empress had ordered them rounded up and quietly despatched, like the Leopards before them. Yet apparently not, for she seemed concerned about their whereabouts and the Gulons, an elite force with, perhaps, a grudge against the empress, were a worrying loose end.

  The Nighthawks were a problem for another reason. Though they had fought for the empress on the day the Red Palace fell, and she kept them close by her in the White Palace, the other centuries, and Dol himself, saw them as traitors and regicides. Like a good dog turned bad, he said of them to his friend Sully, you can never trust it again. Get rid of them, was Dol’s opinion. Send them off on some hopeless mission against the Fkeni. Or split them up and mix them in with the common soldiery. Or send them north to join Marcus. Good men had died in recent clashes between the centuries and he believed Archange was reluctantly coming round to his opinion.

  As the sun reached its zenith Dol realized he must leave; it would not do for the empress to think he had nothing to occupy him. He pushed himself to his feet.

  ‘Thank you, Dol Salida,’ she said as he stood, grasping his silver-topped stick. ‘You have been a good servant to me.’

  This sounded worryingly like a farewell and Dol was momentarily nonplussed. As if she knew what he was thinking, she added, ‘And I trust you will be for many more years to come.’

  ‘If the gods save us,’ he answered gruffly.

  Unexpectedly she held out her hand, something she had never done before, and Dol Salida took it awkwardly. It felt like random bones loosely wrapped in thin velvet.

  ‘This role is not one you enjoy, is it?’ she asked, looking
up at him.

  ‘It is an honour—’ he started.

  ‘Yes, yes. I know it is an honour. But?’

  He thought quickly. ‘I miss my wife,’ he confessed, ‘and my girls.’ He had not made his way down the mountain since the beginning of summer so his answer was true, if incomplete.

  ‘Then go and see them today.’ She was still holding his hand and he felt a sudden warmth pass through it into him. In a heartbeat he felt his old limbs grown stronger, his brain clearer, felt blood flowing through his veins.

  ‘I will,’ he said, and he realized how much he wanted to. He left the parlour with a light heart.

  Dol Salida had not lived for long on the mountain before he realized why its palaces had been largely abandoned, except for those Families either rich enough or secretive enough to endure its many inconveniences. There was only one road up the Shield, built at the cost of many lives, and it was variously narrow and steep, and frequently both. Everything – food, water, supplies of every kind – had to be hauled up by donkey or on the narrow carts specially built for the purpose. To keep the palaces, if they were all tenanted, supplied with water alone would have been an impossible task. As it was there was an endless train of beasts up and down the pathway, a permanent nuisance to anyone who wanted to descend the Shell Path by carriage. Dol was told that at one time there was a pumping system which delivered water to the top of the mountain, though he found that hard to believe.

  So his journey down the path, in the late afternoon as the sun cooled in the west, was a frustrating and long drawn out business. Frustrating, that was, for the driver of his narrow carriage. Dol, basking in his pain-free condition, enjoyed the journey, slow though it was, looking kindly on the placid donkeys which plodded past them as they paused at each of many turnouts to let them by.

  The afternoon meeting with the military chiefs had been frustrating, as they often were. They could not know what had happened to the Khan army, any more than Dol did, yet it was his experience that the less people knew the more vigorous they were in their opinions. There was a deal of shouting before Archange arrived, on her own two feet. It was Dol’s view, and that of others, that the problem was not with the army, but the messengers. The riders must pass through Fkeni lands and once a band of tribesmen had spotted this regular daily movement through their territory it would be a simple matter to pick the lone riders off for torture or death or both. The meeting decided, predictably, that they would wait another day, until dawn, then, if no messenger returned from the north, a group of Darius’ riders would set out.

  When his carriage arrived at the base of the Shield, Dol was surprised and disturbed to see how much it had changed. There had always been a barracks here, for the Emperor’s Rangers had guarded the mountain for time out of mind. Now, though, a new barracks had sprung up, as had myriad shacks and tents housing pedlars, sellers of foodstuffs and whores to service the soldiery, plus beggars, hangers-on and the other ne’er-do-wells such places attract. It was a small town now, stiff with soldiers but with the ragged feel of a frontier outpost. Dol resolved to speak to the empress about it when he returned.

  He had chosen to walk the half league to Gerta’s cottage, which nestled in the crook of the river meandering past the Shield. The day before he would not have considered such a thing, but his leg felt better than it had in years. He had heard the empress had healing hands, and gossip had it that she had recently healed a gravely injured prisoner for some reason of her own. Dol thought this improbable, for why would she choose to help a criminal before her closest adviser? But, whatever the reason, for the first time in an age he felt like taking a gentle stroll. Having shaken off the beggars who clustered when they saw his fine carriage, he set off. To the north storm clouds were gathering and a patter of light rain darkened the shoulders of his jacket.

  He soon spotted the cottage and saw a thin plume of smoke arising from its fat chimney. He smiled. His wife, warned he was coming, would have been baking all afternoon, piling up the sweetmeats he loved, rich with herbs and spices. His mouth watered at the prospect.

  He noticed the front door was ajar, for the late afternoon was sultry. Then he halted, his heart seeming to stop in his chest. The metallic scent of blood, unmistakable, drifted to him on the warm air. He hastened, faltering, to the door, a low moan rising in his throat. Old warrior though he was, he was terrified of what he might see.

  Inside the front door he found the body of his daughter Eudice. An ex-soldier of the City, she had been caught unweaponed, and her breast had been stabbed, her heart pierced. He stumbled past her and found his other daughter, Fierro, dead in the parlour, throat slashed. Sobbing, he walked heavily to the kitchen. He knew that was where he would find her.

  Gerta lay huddled in the corner in a pool of blood. Dol stood in the doorway. He knew she was dead. A knife stuck out of her throat. In his grief, he didn’t see it as significant that it was still there. There was a movement; hope rose in him, and he saw his grandchild, one of them, Eudice’s son. His fair head was peering out from behind Gerta’s bulky body. She had protected the child to her death. Dol choked back his tears. They would not help her now.

  He limped forward and picked up the child, who was white-faced and blood-covered, silent in shock. Dol pressed the boy to his chest. He had little experience of children, but he murmured, ‘There, there, boy. I’ll find someone to care for you.’

  Dol didn’t see the dark shape appear behind him in the doorway, or hear the assassin step forward on noiseless boots. But for the briefest moment he felt the hot blade of the dagger as it drove through his back and into his heart.

  PART FIVE

  The Lone Army

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  BROGLANH SAT WITH his back against a dead horse, sharpening his blades by moonlight. The landscape was bright as day and there was no need for a fire, not that any of the weary, bloodied soldiers had the will to gather tinder. He could smell the enemy’s campfires in the distance, the faint musk of burning peat, the tantalizing odour of roasting meat. They had been well prepared.

  Good for them, Broglanh thought. They’ll still die on our swords.

  Everything he could see was either black or silvery grey, the shadows sharp with crisp edges. He imagined it was how the deathworld would be, the place warriors of the City called the Gardens of Stone. Archange had once told him there was no such thing, and when you died your soul died too while your carcass mouldered into dust. Only simple folk believed in an afterworld, she said, and there was nothing more simple than a soldier. Eat, sleep, fight – and one day die.

  Broglanh was content with that. He knew he was skilled, but he also appreciated he was lucky. He had beaten the odds an unreasonable number of times. With each warrior he came up against, be it in a momentary scrap or a gruelling contest of swords, it was kill or be killed. And each time he had killed.

  And it would be the same this day. That they faced greater numbers meant nothing. That they had their backs to the wall, in a manner of speaking, meant nothing. Each fight would be a new one against a new adversary, and each would be a fight to the death.

  He rolled his right shoulder, which he had wrenched sometime the previous day. It was painful but it would not hamper him. He had fought on with far worse injuries. He was hungry, but then he had been hungry since this journey started. He took a long drink from his water skin to ease the cramp in his belly. The water was vile and he spat it on the ground, trying to dislodge the taste. He used the rest to rinse his hands and face, rubbing off the sticky remnants of blood. He looked to the east. He guessed it was still long before dawn and he wondered if he could sleep for a while. Around him the Pigstickers were mostly sleeping, snoring and scratching, although some lay awake staring at the sky. Given the choice of fighting from horseback with the riders or on foot with the Pigstickers, he’d chosen to stand with the infantry. He knew them better, he knew their strengths and weaknesses – and he felt he owed them for protecting Emly from the Fkeni. Besides, too m
any things could go wrong on a horse; they were unreliable beasts in battle, as he’d long ago found to his cost. He had given his mount to the girl, so she could make a dash for it if everything went to ratshit.

  He thought of Emly as he had last glimpsed her, holding the great warhorse’s rein, ready to flee the coming battle. Her face was ashen, her eyes bright with fear. Not for herself, but for him. Broglanh felt no guilt, though he had brought her into this. He had done what he thought right at the time, right for Em and for the City. He hoped she would be safe.

  He’d finished with the blades. He slipped the short one into the groove in his boot, the two long ones in the scabbard on his baldric, and he sheathed the sword. It was a good blade, taken from a gut-skewered soldier. Some thought it bad luck to take a weapon from a dying man’s hand, as if some of the ill fate could be transferred from grip to grip. Broglanh scoffed at the idea. This sword had been lucky for him; it had lasted all day without breaking or noticeably blunting. He placed the sword-belt within hand’s reach, leaned back against the still-warm horse and closed his eyes.

  ‘Have you taken lorassium?’

  ‘No,’ he lied.

  ‘Look at me.’

  It seemed a lot to ask, but he raised sluggish eyelids. It was Thekla, in a gown of midnight silk. On her breast was a crescent moon. Her blue-black hair coiled and curled, slithered and slid.

  ‘Only the Gaetas,’ she said, ‘know the true power of the veil.’

  He was riding in a cart again, in comfort, though it was only a rough wooden wagon with old blood-stains on the floor. It seemed to glide along as if floating in the sky. Suddenly anxious, he looked about him, but the cart was not flying. It was rolling smoothly, silently through the dark streets of the City. He saw buildings he knew well from his childhood: the trainees’ barracks, the temple of Paraclites where he’d had his first real fight with some drunken roughs, the brick mausoleum of the Sarkoys. He was in Paradise.