True Power

by Gary Meehan

  Afreyda was sat at the far end of the stuffy cabin, having a gash in her arm sewn up by Willas. Megan wanted to throw her arms around her but held back and offered nothing more than a supportive smile. In return, Afreyda gave her a wave with her good arm.

  Megan leaned in to examine her wound. Clean but nasty. “Does it hurt?”

  “Yes.” Afreyda winced. “Especially if you prod it.”

  “Sorry.”

  Willas passed Afreyda a bottle of clear liquid Megan suspected wasn’t water. Afreyda uncorked it and downed a hefty slug. Her head lolled. She passed out.

  “You’re meant to rub it in,” said Willas, peering over her sprawled form. “Keep the cut from getting infected.” Afreyda failed to respond. Failed to do anything in fact.

  Willas turned to Megan. “So, queen, huh?”

  Megan nodded distractedly. She pointed at Afreyda. “Shouldn’t we . . . ?”

  “She’ll be all right in a minute.”

  “How do you know if you’re meant to rub the stuff in?”

  “Let’s just say she’s not the first to make that mistake,” said Willas. “Or even consider it a mistake.”

  Spasms racked Afreyda’s body then she went rigid. Her eyes snapped open. “What . . . ?” she croaked.

  “How’re you feeling?” asked Megan.

  “I am not.”

  Megan looked to Willas. “Is that normal?”

  “Possibly . . .”

  “Something tells me you’re not a real doctor.”

  “I only do the basics,” said Willas. “Stitches, setting broken bones, hangover cures . . .”

  Megan sat on the edge of the bed and stroked Afreyda’s hair. She seemed peaceful enough. “What happened out there?”

  “A few scuffles. Nothing serious.”

  “Nothing serious?” Megan pointed at Afreyda’s arm. “What caused that? A dirty look?”

  “No one’s a corpse who shouldn’t be,” said Willas. “Though I don’t hold out much hope for your weird little stalker over there.”

  “My . . . ?”

  Megan looked across to the bed opposite, where a sheet was drawn up to the chin of a still figure. Scarlet bloomed across the linen, beginning to brown at the edges. She crept over, knowing what to expect but praying she was wrong, that it had nothing to do with her.

  As Megan’s shadow fell over her face, Clover’s eyes fluttered. Megan let out a little gasp. “She’s not . . .”

  Willas frowned and shook his head. He pointed to a wooden bowl beside Clover’s bed. A crossbow bolt sat in it, its point and shaft smeared with blood as if a child had made a half-hearted attempt to paint it.

  Clover’s eyelids fluttered. “Mother?” she said, her voice struggling to rise above a whisper.

  “Hey,” said Megan, equally softly.

  “Is the . . . ? Is the Savior safe?”

  “Yes.” She always was. What happened to you was completely pointless. I should have sent you away, but instead I used you.

  “Can I . . . ?” Clover coughed. Blood dribbled from the corner of her mouth and down her chin. “Can I see her?”

  “I . . .”

  Clover tried to push herself up. She barely managed a couple of inches before she slumped back down again. “Please, Mother.”

  Megan had spent so long denying the witches’ fantasy it seemed hypocritical to indulge it now, but could she deny the last wish of a dying girl? Seeing Cate would give her some comfort, even if it was the comfort of a lie.

  “I’ll go get her,” she said. “If she gets cranky because I woke her up, it’s your fault.”

  Clover managed a faint smile. Megan hastened back to the mansion, plucked Cate from the arms of a bemused Synne, and ran back to the infirmary as fast as she thought Cate could tolerate.

  It was too late. Clover was gone; her head slumped to the side, death already leaching the color from her skin. Megan buried her face into the warmth of her daughter’s body and murmured the all-too-familiar words of the funeral prayer.

  The celebration of the peace that night was an ill-tempered affair. Hilites and Faithful split into two distinct clumps, glaring at each other across the no-man’s-land between them, soured rather than cheered by the beer that flowed. Missiles arced between them—cups; food scraps; once, rather enterprisingly, a whole bench—until Fordel deployed a contingent of newly returned border guards to keep order.

  Megan was on her own. Afreyda was still sleeping off the drink Willas had given her; Cate was back at the mansion with Synne. Initially stilted conversations with the refugees became more raucous and one-sided as the evening wore on. Congratulations became pre-emptive blame. Tentative questions about the food situation, how long the cabins would take to complete and when those south of the Kartiks would be let through became shrill demands she personally achieve everything. The refugees accepted she had by some trick averted potential disaster, but it was just that: potential. It was an abstract concept, hard to grasp and, anyway, in the past. Their gratitude evaporated under the pressure of more concrete concerns. If Megan couldn’t deal with them, what was the point in her being queen?

  The muggy heat in the great hall coupled with the alcohol made Megan tired and irritable, slowed her brain down. Her attempts at regal concern dissolved into schoolgirl snappishness. Someone jostled her—probably by accident. She found herself reaching for a knife, only the wide eyes of those around her staying her hand. She muttered an apology and stumbled out of the hall.

  Out in the streets the cold air pinched her cheeks, sobering her or at least giving the illusion of doing so. She wove through the fringes of the party, refusing requests to celebrate she suspected might not be mutually enjoyable. No one pushed too hard. Her reputation preceded her, protected her. For the moment at least.

  Megan hadn’t realized where she’d been heading until she found herself there: Eleanor’s grave. It had been on the edge of town when originally dug; now half-completed cabins stood sentinel. She sat on the icy ground and brushed off the headstone dust that had drifted in from the building site.

  “Is this why you were so eager to sacrifice yourself?” she said. “So you wouldn’t have all this grief?” There was no reply, but even the silence of the night seemed wiser than Megan. “You could have warned me what you were planning. Given me a chance to prepare myself. Or tell you to sod right off.”

  She sighed, ran her fingers through her hair. “I’m not you. I’m not sure if I can keep doing this. I’ve been lucky so far, but how long can I stay lucky? I’ve not had to think beyond the next day. Now I’ve got thousands of people looking to me, demanding everything, and I’ve no idea where to even start to start.”

  “Haranguing the dead?”

  Megan twisted her head. It was Fordel. “It’s the only way I can win an argument with her,” she said. “Did you follow me?”

  “I was concerned. Don’t want to lose a queen before the day’s out. It would look careless.”

  “Funny how things worked out how you wanted them.”

  “We’re all victims of events.”

  “Some of us are keen to make ourselves victims,” said Megan.

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Willas just happened to be in position to get Cate to safety? Rekka’s children just happened to be hundreds of miles away in Downín? The city guard just happened to surrender without putting up a fight? There just happened to be a thousand Tiptunite soldiers on the doorstep?”

  “When you put it like that . . .”

  “Father Broose’s acolytes—they’re working for you, aren’t they? What did you offer them?”

  “They are Hilites,” said Fordel. “They know where their loyalties lie. But in the spirit of religious reconciliation, the bar on followers of the Faith being electors of Hil is being lifted.”

  Bribing them with their own rights: an easy bargain. “What if I hadn’t been able to get the Faithful to step down?” asked Megan.

  Fordel looked at her knowingly. Mega
n’s veins couldn’t have run colder if she had opened them up to the night air. “That was never part of the plan, was it?” she said. “You didn’t expect me to survive and claim the throne, did you?”

  Moonlight gleamed off Fordel’s eyes. “It was an unexpected bonus.”

  “You wanted the priests dead, me a martyr and Cate queen. Saviors, you’re as bad as the witches. You manipulated everyone: me, the refugees, the people of Hil, Vegar—”

  “I did not manipulate the Lord Defender,” said Fordel.

  “Really?”

  “I let his wife do it. She’s had much more experience.”

  Fordel wandered around Eleanor’s grave. “What do you think is better for Hil, for the rest of the Snow Cities? A religious zealot or someone who recognizes other people have a right to exist? We need each other. And with the priests taken care of, there’s nothing to stop us.”

  ten

  The old man had soiled himself all three ways and was only standing because he was being held up by two burly menservants. Beside the trio, a man in the rich clothes of a merchant was rubbing his hands. Damon felt despair wash over him. The merchant was trying to wash away the guilt, he realized. Or maybe Damon was projecting his own.

  Gwyneth looked up from the Unifier’s throne, which she had taken to treating as her own personal armchair. “We’re not taking in unwanted grandparents,” she said. “Drop him in the Rustway with the rest of the trash.”

  The merchant smiled unctuously. “If it pleases my lady, I’ve brought you a priest to, well . . .”

  The soldiers in the throne room snapped to attention, though what threat the old man posed Damon couldn’t say.

  “This is a priest?”

  The old man shook his head frantically. “No, no, no. I’m just a . . . I’m just a pilgrim eager to learn the teachings of the Saviors.”

  Gwyneth looked around. Tobrytan and the other officers were off officer-ing. Her gaze fell on Damon. “Question him.”

  “Me?”

  “Determine if he’s a priest.”

  “How do I—?”

  “Do it,” said Gwyneth, “or I’ll have you strangled with each other’s intestines.” Damon wondered what types of books she’d been reading to get those kinds of ideas, then remembered some of the grimmer parts of the Book of Faith, the bits they didn’t get the kids to act out on Saviors’ Day.

  He approached the old man, as close as olfactory considerations would allow. Could he condemn this pathetic thing to the witches? He’d seen what they’d done to the priests they’d captured. Pre-mortem cremation was the favorite. But how could he prove a negative?

  Damon examined the man, looking for clues. He had a shiny pate, which could be simply aging—the priests had introduced the tonsure to excuse male-pattern baldness. No sign of the priests’ usual obesity, but a few months of rations did wonders for the figure. The clothes, underneath the stains, were rough wool. Easy enough to come by for a few pennies. Nothing conclusive.

  Damon gave him a small wave. “Hello,” he said. “Drink?”

  “Some water”—hacking coughs gripped the man—“some water would be most kind.”

  Damon threw his hands up in the air. “He’s innocent,” he said to Gwyneth. “No priest would ask for water.”

  “I’m not convinced.”

  Damon grimaced and turned back to the man. “You said you were a pilgrim. What did you do before that?”

  “Silversmith, sir.”

  “Silver, huh?”

  Damon looked around. He plucked Gwyneth’s ever-present goblet from her hands, chucked the dregs of wine on to the flagstones to an indignant cry from Gwyneth and handed it to the would-be silversmith. “Tell me what the hallmarks mean.” Please.

  “Certainly.” The man examined the base. “Eight hundred fine silver. Made in Janik in the year 270. Not a very good piece. One of hundreds knocked out for Edwyn the Fourth’s many parties, I’m guessing.”

  Thank the Saviors for that, thought Damon. The soldiers around the throne room relaxed. He and the man shared a mutual nod of relief. Damon made to take the goblet back. He then noticed the man’s fingers. Stained with decades’ worth of ink. He hadn’t spent his life smithing silver—he’d spent it writing. And there’d only be one reason he would be keen to hide that.

  Damon swallowed his suspicion. “No priest knows about practical matters,” he said to Gwyneth, trying to affect a casual shrug. The old man had probably picked up the knowledge from a father or an uncle in the trade. “Let him go. He’s harmless.”

  “Release him,” Gwyneth said to the merchant’s men-servants.

  The old man dropped to his knees, either voluntarily or involuntarily. “Thank you, my lady, oh thank you.”

  Gwyneth preened a little. “Can I go now?” Damon asked her.

  Her eyes flicked to the witches lining the room. She cocked her head. One strode forward. Damon’s mouth started to form an objection. An ax swung through the air. Hot blood splattered on to Damon’s face. The old man’s torso toppled forward. His head rolled away, his expression still one of gratitude.

  “What?” said Damon. “He wasn’t . . . I’d . . .”

  “I realized I didn’t care,” said Gwyneth. She beckoned Damon to her. “Now do what I told you to do,” she whispered into his ear, “or I’ll realize I don’t care about you.”

  The miniature crossbow was exquisite. Varnished hickory stock, gold-plated limb, silver trigger, the targeting sight a pearl with a notch carefully filed into it. Its reduced size limited its range, of course, but at this distance its target wouldn’t stand a chance. Unfortunately for Damon, its target was his head.

  “I’ve come to buy, honest,” said Damon through his held-up hands, thinking there was no surer way to flag your untrustworthiness than appending your sentences with “honest.”

  “I don’t serve witches here,” said the apothecary at the other end of the crossbow.

  Damon glanced down at the uniform the witches had provided him with. “It’s not what it looks like,” he said. “Honest.”

  “Get out!”

  “I have money.”

  “Show me.”

  Damon slowly lowered his hands to his belt. He fished out the pouch Gwyneth had provided and tipped its contents on a nearby table. Sovereigns gleamed in the light of the scores of candles lining the perimeter of the shop. The apothecary’s eyes gleamed in turn. Damon pushed one of the gold coins toward him.

  “How about we call that a pre-service tip?”

  The apothecary’s crossbow vanished along with his hostility. He crossed the room and pocketed the sovereign with a speed and dexterity that appealed to Damon’s sense of professionalism.

  “What does sir require? Something for the lady in your life?”

  “You could say that.”

  “Got her into trouble?”

  “More the other way round,” muttered Damon. “I’m looking for—I don’t know what you’d call it—an anti-aging product.”

  “Anti-aging? As in . . . ?”

  “Stop it altogether. Yes.”

  The apothecary kept his face straight, but his eyes couldn’t help flicking to the pile of gold on the table. Damon scooped them back into the pouch one by one, pausing each time to give the apothecary time to count them. He cocked his head. The apothecary pursed his lips then disappeared through a beaded curtain.

  Damon followed him into a dimly lit back room. Tapestries stitched with occult-looking symbols hung on the walls. A skull grinned from the top shelf of a bookcase, looking decidedly cheerful for someone who had died and had the flesh boiled from his bones. Coils of incense wafted through the air with the artificial sweetness favored by those who wished to mask a hobby that involved evisceration.

  He noticed the light source. “Black candles? Really?”

  “Too much?”

  “At least you don’t have a stuffed . . . oh, you do.” A crow stared at Damon with glassy eyes, its malignancy forever perpetuated.

&nb
sp; “My customers find it reassuring,” said the apothecary. “Now, what kind of solution are we looking for, sir?”

  “The kind of solution that makes everything look completely natural.”

  The apothecary pursed his lips. “That could be hard. Young women don’t suddenly drop dead, sir. As a rule.”

  “It’s not for her. It’s for her.”

  “Ah. I understood it was your girlfriend you were looking to . . . preserve.”

  “She’s not my . . .” Saviors, after the events of a few nights previous, maybe she thought she was. Damon tried to swallow but found his throat too scared to move. The last man she’d been involved with had been brutally killed. This was not a woman who broke off relationships with an “it’s not you, it’s me.”

  “It’s for a man,” said Damon. “An old man.”

  “That makes things a lot easier, sir.”

  The apothecary selected a key from a ring and unlocked a drawer. He took out a jar of crushed herbs and measured a small quantity into a scale pan, which he then poured into a pouch made of dried skin. Damon thought it best not to ask what kind of skin.

  “That should accomplish what you’re looking for,” said the apothecary, handing the pouch over.

  “And it’ll look natural?”

  “As if his heart had given out.”

  Damon noticed a door behind the apothecary. A back exit? For a moment he thought about asking if he could use it—evade the escort waiting for him outside. But that still left the middle and outer cities to sneak out of and if the True caught him, well . . . They had hung, drawn and quartered a city guard who had tried to instigate a rebellion, a punishment not seen since before Unification. Damon preferred his internal organs to stay, well, internal.

  He handed over payment for the herbs. “Would sir be wanting a receipt?” asked the apothecary.

  “I’m not entirely convinced we should be leaving a paper trail,” said Damon.

  “As you wish, sir. Some customers need one. For tax purposes.”

  “Poison’s deductible?”

  “No”—the apothecary grinned in what was definitely not an advertisement for his dentist—“but health care is.”