Isadora

by Charlotte McConaghy

  ‘I was never loyal to him, Majesty. I was loyal to the last orders you gave me, which were to serve Jarl Sigurd and so serve him I did.’

  Ambrose smiled. ‘I know, Erik. I’m grateful to you. Go now, and report back of Sigurd’s whereabouts as soon as you’re able.’

  Erik bowed and headed out.

  ‘How do you want to play this?’ I asked my uncle when we were alone.

  He sat on the carved wooden chair, leaning back so he could place his booted feet lazily on the desk. His eyes were very pale in the flickering candlelight. ‘One way or another,’ he said, ‘this ends tonight.’

  Falco

  ‘Keep low,’ I whispered. Ava, Osric and Finn ducked to creep forwards. On the other side of the wall were a host of warder guards. If they heard or sensed us, we were dead.

  The idea had occurred to me as I tossed and turned in bed last night. No matter how tired I felt, I never seemed able to sleep. I thought of Quillane, endlessly, and Isadora, inevitably. I’d also been contemplating how difficult it would be to sneak back into the royal tomb to visit my family. A bad idea, since my desire to be close to them had already nearly seen us killed.

  My thoughts turned to Isadora in the crypt, the fear in her eyes as she’d watched me with the graves. I wondered for the millionth time what had damaged her so badly. My thoughts shifted to something else. Something I’d seen every time I went to the tomb but of which I had taken very little notice. In the corner was a small drainage grate, which no doubt led to the sea. And that was how the idea occurred. If I couldn’t get people out through the tunnel in the palace, then I would make my own tunnel.

  Ava, Osric, Finn and I now made it past the warders and hurried down a street that wound its way around the curve of a rocky hill. We were nearing the cliff’s edge, and the smell of the ocean was heavy with salt and seaweed. An eastern wind rose up, pressing my long hair behind me. It whipped Ava’s face-scarf off and away, and she wasn’t quick enough to catch it.

  ‘How brazen,’ Finn commented, reaching for her belt sash and passing it to the Queen. ‘Cover your shame, woman.’

  It made Ava smile as she wrapped the sash over her cheeks and mouth.

  We descended a steep hill and came to the old fish markets. It was deserted at this time of night, but I imagined it was just as empty during the day since Dren and Galia had banned all fishing boats from embarking.

  ‘What are we looking for?’ Ava asked.

  ‘Any building set into or under the ground,’ I answered. We moved quickly, checking each building – it worked in our favour that most were abandoned.

  I caught sight of Finn watching me. ‘What?’

  ‘Nothing.’ But the worry in her eyes reminded me all too clearly of our conversation the other morning after Isadora and I had fought in the kitchen.

  Finn had followed me into my room, uninvited as usual. ‘What’s going on? And don’t you lie to me, Falco.’

  I sighed, resting my face in my hands. ‘Leave it be, Finn, for once in your life.’

  ‘There’s a whole lot of talk going on about you and Isadora, and that’s my business because she’s my friend, and you’re my friend, and you happen to be extremely important to me, and also because my brother is in love with her.’

  I snorted. ‘He is not.’

  ‘How would you know?’

  ‘He doesn’t know her.’

  ‘Neither do you!’ she exclaimed. Silence reigned as she watched me, bewildered. Finally Finn sighed, sitting beside me and taking my hands. ‘I know how you treat women,’ she told me carefully. ‘Everyone does. If there is something between you and Izzy, you should end it before she gets hurt.’

  ‘Why is everyone so sure it would be her who got hurt?’

  Finn rolled her eyes. ‘Please.’

  Shame heated the back of my neck and I couldn’t look at her. ‘There’s nothing between us,’ I said. ‘She hates me.’

  ‘Good.’

  I couldn’t help smiling, meeting her yellow eyes. ‘Where did you come from?’ I asked her softly. ‘Why did you come to me that night we met?’

  ‘Because the Emperor ordered me to.’

  ‘You didn’t know, did you? You didn’t know for sure.’ I searched her gaze, then pressed her: ‘You thought maybe we’d bond.’

  Her yellow eyes shifted deep lilac. ‘I played with the idea. Teased it between my fingertips. But only as a way to hurt Thorne.’

  I shook my head. ‘You weren’t sure, when you came to my room. I know you weren’t.’

  ‘What difference does it make?’

  ‘I just need to know that what I felt was real.’

  Finn gazed at me and her eyes shifted yet again to a deep blue. She leant forwards, seeming to understand my fear or my unease or whatever it was that had overcome me. ‘I thought maybe. I wanted you, certainly. I wanted your reputation for being out of control and reckless, because I … well, because I’m me. But do you know the moment I knew you and I weren’t for each other?’

  I swallowed. ‘When?’

  ‘Not when our eyes met, and we didn’t bond. But when our skin touched for the first time. When I felt the true heart of you, and knew it to be very beautiful, but not forged as half of mine.’

  And if it was forged as half of someone who didn’t want it?

  That was when I’d felt a great rush of shock-horror-rage-hurt and looked up to see Isadora watching us. My pulse lurched. ‘Finn and Thorne are bonded,’ I’d blurted. She’d left and I hadn’t seen her in two days and every minute since I’d felt sick.

  ‘Over here,’ Osric now called softly, and we hurried to his side. He was prying open the door of a warehouse. ‘It will have an underground room to store fish in cool temperatures.’

  Inside it was dark, so Finn scrounged around until she found a lamp. We spotted the steps and followed them down into the coolroom, which was full of rank, rotting fish. ‘Holy gods,’ Finn exclaimed, eyes watering. ‘Lucky Thorne isn’t here or he’d keel over dead at such a stench.’

  ‘Look for a small grid in the ground,’ I said, hiding my nose inside my shirt collar.

  ‘Here,’ Ava said a few moments later. I crouched over it, using my blade to jimmy the metal covering off while Finn held the lamp aloft to give me light. It was exactly what I’d hoped to find – a hole disappearing into darkness below.

  ‘What is it?’ Finn asked.

  ‘A drainage system.’

  ‘But the water can just drain over the cliffs. We have gutters and drainpipes for that.’

  ‘The buildings underground need drainage too, or the moisture would seep into the rocks and erode them, eventually crumbling the whole city into the sea. This little tunnel will dip down into the earth and lead to the bottom of the cliff.’

  ‘Which would be great if anything larger than a mouse could fit down it.’

  I flashed her a grin. ‘That’s why we’ll need diggers.’

  They all stared at me. Finn said, ‘I thought you were meant to be useless.’

  Thorne

  I had a very bad feeling about this. Ambrose refused to listen to me. He wanted to deal in words and the power of his reputation. He wanted a different way of things. But if he could not show his strength and punish with his own two hands, it was likely we were walking into a great bloody mess. Two men against gods only knew how many. If he refused to fight, then I’d suggested he at least wait until trusted soldiers were collected from the fortress. But he wouldn’t wait that long.

  Erik had reported Sigurd was taking his pleasure at Iceheart’s Tavern, and he’d warned us that it was not a pretty sight tonight. An auction was being held.

  Ambrose took Erik by the back of the head and held him firm, looking into his face. ‘I have a charge for you, more important than any other. Guard Lady Roselyn and my daughters from harm. If something happens to me, I want you to get them out. Go straight for my fortress and don’t stop, not for anything.’

  Erik bowed his head solemnly. ‘No harm will c
ome to them under my charge, Majesty. That I vow upon my life, and my forefathers before me.’

  ‘Thank you, my friend.’

  Ambrose, Howl and I stole out into the cold night, the coldest it had yet been. We walked in silence to Iceheart’s, our feet soft on the cobblestones, and it was only when we turned a corner and saw the tavern at the end of the street that Ambrose spoke.

  ‘The same goes for you, Thorne. If something happens to me, you go for the girls. You get them out, no matter what. Don’t spare me a thought.’

  ‘If you know how dangerous this is, why do you insist on such haste?’

  Ambrose took my shoulder in his huge hand. ‘Listen to me. You don’t need me to tell you the answer to that. The ice did not change you so much that you no longer see the necessity of stopping this atrocity.’ He leant closer, holding my eyes. ‘There are women being sold in my land. I will not have it. Now are you my prince and my second, or are you not?’

  I drew myself up, frost encrusting my heart. ‘I am.’

  ‘Then set free the beast.’

  A thrill trembled down my spine: he needed no freeing, he’d been free since the day I became King of the Ice. He was me and I him.

  ‘Good lad,’ my father told me from within the shadows. ‘Your King is right – a threat is met without hesitation, only fury. Find yours now or die.’ His teeth flashed as he smiled, and it was the smile of the wildest wolf in all the world. It was the smile of the King of the Underworld as he draped himself in the skins of the dead. It was the smile of a berserker.

  Together we followed Ambrose into Iceheart’s. Howl stayed close to my side, on the ready. The tavern was full to bursting and loud. The din was created by at least a hundred men, all crowded onto tables and against the bar, filling the staircases on either side of the room and draped over the top floor railings. Within a small circle was a row of women, manacled to each other at ankles. And watching over, perched lazily on the bar, was a delighted Jarl Sigurd.

  That was when it found me, my fury. It erupted through my veins, cold like the ice mountain itself. I wanted blood and the feel of bones breaking beneath my fists; I wanted to kill.

  The women were young, battered and bruised and hollow-eyed with fear. Ambrose’s urgency became mine – this needed to end now. No one had noticed us yet so we stood by the door, surveying the proceedings to understand what was going on. Sigurd called for a girl to be brought forwards. The prisoner on the end was unlocked from the line and tugged into the ring.

  I watched her face crumple with fear, but then she looked back at the girls she’d been chained to, at one in particular, the youngest. This young one wore such an expression of defiance as she nodded at her companion that the girl straightened, her face calmed and she turned to meet her judgment with pure, simple courage. It humbled me, reminded me once more of what beauty could be hidden within the ugliest of all things.

  Bidding began with men shouting numbers. The highest price was reached and the winner entered the ring to claim his purchase. He didn’t take her far, choosing to sit and watch the rest of the auction with his prize on his lap.

  Instead of choosing the next girl in line, Sigurd pointed at the youngest, the most defiant. ‘Her,’ he said softly. ‘I’ll take her for myself.’

  The second she was unchained the girl struck out at the soldier holding her, taking him in the eye and then smashing her knee into his groin. He doubled over in pain and she spat on him before she was overcome by another two soldiers.

  Sigurd smiled at her spirit; I could see in his eyes the desire to break it.

  ‘I think I’ve seen enough,’ said a deep voice. The King of Pirenti stepped into the ring. There was an awkward hush as most recognised him and whispered to those who didn’t.

  Jarl Sigurd didn’t climb down from the bar. Instead his smile simply widened and he spread his hands. ‘Welcome, King Ambrose! It’s been too long since your last visit! Come, enjoy the nightlife of Vjort with us.’

  Ambrose didn’t waste a single moment in play. His voice was flat as he said, ‘Jarl Sigurd, for crimes against humanity, you are stripped of your rank, title and honour, and will spend the remainder of your days in prison on the Isle. Enter into our custody by your own will, or be forced into it. Each and every person you have illegally stolen and sold will be freed and anyone guilty of purchasing will also be put in prison. I’m sickened by the lot of you, and ashamed to name you men of mine. This vileness ends now.’

  A rustle of sound moved through the soldiers. I listened closely and took a deep breath to gauge how they felt about this; a mix of fear, anger and resentment. The girls were warily elated.

  Sigurd gazed at Ambrose, no surprise evident on his face. He was a handsome man, with blond hair and beard, finer in build than most in this room. No doubt more dangerous than all.

  ‘Here’s the problem with that, Majesty,’ he said delicately. ‘In your absence – during which we can only imagine you’ve enjoyed playing host to your Kayan whores and piss-whelps, inviting them into our lands and groveling at their feet like the good little cocksucker you are – we here in the north have been taking what is rightfully ours. That being: whatever we want. As Pirenti men have done and will do for all the days of this world.’

  A cheer went up in the tavern and I knew then that we were dead. Unless I curbed it now and challenged this scum before –

  ‘Do you know what they whisper of you, Ambrose?’ Sigurd addressed him insultingly without title. ‘That you are immortal. Impossible to kill, like one of the gods themselves. But I’m no man to be frightened of myth or superstition. I was born to kill gods.’

  Now, I had to do it now before he got any further. I pushed forwards but the throng was heavy and –

  He was already booming, ‘I, Jarl Sigurd of the ancient barracks of Vjort, son of Jarl Seth, formally challenge you, King Ambrose of Pirenti, son of a disgraced traitor, brother of a slaughtered slaughterman, husband of a boy-bitch enemy, for your throne.’

  I would kill him. Tear his limbs from his body and listen to his screams. I pushed through the men before me, scattering them; they were small and weak, all cowards, the lot of them. ‘You will die for such insults,’ I snarled, and at my side Howl let out a ferocious snarl.

  Sigurd smiled again, looking me up and down. ‘Well, if it isn’t the princeling of the ice. Too cowardly to train here at Vjort with us, like all hard men. Too cowardly to leave the care of his addled mother, too cowardly to go anywhere but south into the sunny ease of enemy lands and marry a girl whose vile warder magic is more powerful than he.’

  Was he trying to get himself killed? The insults were spewing forth as though he thought they made him stronger, when they only made him small.

  ‘You don’t stop, do you?’ Ambrose asked calmly. How was he so calm? My fury filled the whole tavern, a living breathing roaring thing that made the walls swell and threaten to burst. Ambrose put a hand on my shoulder and I tethered myself to it, breathing deeply.

  To Sigurd he said, ‘I don’t accept your challenge.’

  Confusion rippled through the crowd, and for the first time Sigurd looked thrown. ‘You have to,’ he argued. ‘It’s law.’

  ‘No longer. I’ve seen enough proof in the last ten minutes to warrant your death, but I’m shaping a new country, where killing is not the answer to everything.’

  ‘I’ve challenged you – if you wish to defend your throne then fight me, or give it up like the coward you are.’

  ‘Whether or not you can beat me in a fight does not mean you have earned my throne. I have earned my throne, by creating more peace and prosperity in this land than any ruler before me. I have earned it by working for it, by respecting it, and by giving my life to this nation. I will not fight you for something that is beyond your petty power to obtain.’

  There was an intake of breath. Ambrose looked so strong, standing without fear, only conviction, passion, disdain. He was a giant.

  But Sigurd’s words were insidious and dec
eptive; he had the power of swaying weak minds. ‘Your so-called King thinks so little of his people and his land that he spits in the face of tradition. A god indeed. He is the lowest form of coward. Kill him.’

  ‘Don’t move!’ I roared. ‘His Majesty is a greater man than any here, but I am not. I will fight you, Sigurd, if it’s violence you seek.’

  ‘I didn’t challenge you, Princeling.’

  ‘I am berserker King of the Ice Mountain,’ I told him softly. ‘My enemies will use my title before they die.’

  Sigurd bristled and I saw a flash of fear in his eyes. The tavern was abuzz with excitement. I’d lost their scents – there were too many and they’d blurred into a heavy rank odour.

  ‘No one is dying tonight,’ Ambrose’s voice cut through the noise. ‘Anyone who uses violence in this room is a criminal and a traitor to his nation. Do not fall below your honour for such a weak man.’

  Confusion again, I could smell confusion. Disbelief. And rage. These were men of Vjort, after all. They knew violence. They knew strength of a very different kind to the one Ambrose was displaying. And they didn’t like his undermining of what they knew in their hearts to be true: that men fought for power with the strength they possessed, and that only the strong survived.

  ‘Kill him!’ Sigurd screamed, and this time they came at us.

  A hundred men, at least. Brutal, bloodthirsty men. Most of them trained if not by Ambrose himself then by my father, who could not be beaten. We would die here.

  I thought of Finn as I drew my axe and swung it straight through the skull of a man running at me. I thought of Finn with every blow and strike and slash and block I executed, killing the soldiers one after another. Howl was beside me, tearing savagely into throats and thighs, spilling blood with wild courage. But we could not keep it up – there were too many and they crowded too close, hindering my range of movement.

  ‘Thorne!’ a voice shouted over the din, and that was when I looked up to see that Ambrose was not fighting. He was amid a sea of attackers, with Sigurd at their head, enduring blow after blow as they beat him to death.