Serpentine (The Beggar's Ride Book 1)

by Tim Stead

  Calitanto’s wife returned leading the boy. Francis was surprised by how young he looked, and how unafraid. Prince Rubel had serious eyes for a ten year old. His dark hair was long, roughly tied back, and his clothes were those of a working family, and did not hint at royalty. The boy stuck out his hand.

  “Prince Rubel Casraes,” he said. “I understand you are here to help us. My thanks for that.”

  Francis had spent most of his life hating the king and the dukes, but in spite of himself he took an immediate liking to the boy. He seemed polite and unassuming despite his recent dire circumstances. He fought down a brief urge to bow. He had never met a member of the royal family. Indeed he had only seen a Casraes once, and that had been a glimpse of the king riding past. Theirs was a name steeped in history, instrumental in the overthrow of King Alaran, the defeat of the Seth Yarra in the first Great War, and they had fought alongside the Wolf in the second.

  “We shall help each other, I hope,” he replied, taking the boy king’s hand. Rubel, despite what he said, was no longer a prince. His father was dead. He was the king for as long as he lived. “You understand that I am a populist? We have no love for kings, but neither do we embrace the unlawful slaughter of men, women and children. We will keep you safe if you will aid us with your name.”

  “He means to take your power, Lord King,” Calitanto said.

  “I have none that has not already been stolen from me,” the boy replied. “I do not think Falini will hand it back.”

  “He means to make you a puppet,” Calitanto insisted.

  The boy looked at his grizzled guardian and smiled. “I know your heart is mine, Captain,” he said. “But have you found another that will preserve me even so?”

  Calitanto looked down. “I have not,” he said.

  “Then our populist here is our best offer – our only offer. Besides, I have heard they have a shadow warrior among them, one who walks unseen through walls, a man who laid a bloody dagger by Falini’s head while he slept, or so my father said.” He turned to Francis, and for the first time there was a twinkle of childhood in his eyes. “Is it so, Sir Populist?”

  So the tale of his exploits had reached the highest in the land. There was some satisfaction in that.

  “There may be some truth in the tale,” he replied.

  “Then I wish that your man had finished the job,” Rubel said, and the bitterness that tinged his voice was anything but childish. Francis tended to agree. If he’d had the same decision to make today he probably would have planted the dagger in the duke’s throat. Too many people had died because he had let the man live.

  “Your protector, Calitanto, will come with you as bodyguard. We have an agreement then, Prince Rubel?”

  The prince glanced at Calitanto. “You will protect me with your life?”

  “I will,” the old man said.

  Rubel looked at Francis. “But you will not swear such an oath, I think.”

  “My life? No. But I will hide you as best I can and none of my people will do you harm. You will be safer than you have been in this house.”

  “It is an agreement, then,” the prince said. “Will you take my hand on it?” They shook hands solemnly, and Francis began to wonder if he had indeed been entirely honest. There were precious few places he had to hide the prince, and many of them could be known to those unfriendly to the prince’s cause. There were even some of his own men who might be tempted to seek a reward for turning Rubel over to one or other of the dukes.

  He needed somewhere new, and he needed it today.

  26 Shadow

  Pascha was unhappy. She was beyond unhappy. Another test and another dead girl, and it was really all her doing. What made her feel worse was the half acknowledged belief that she would have failed her own test. There had been nobody to keep the gate when she had discovered her power, just Pelion, and he had been too timid to stop her, too broken by the power of the Pity Stone.

  As usual when a candidate died she was considering halting the testing, allowing people to develop as they would, but it was a prospect that frightened her. Pelion had explained the causes of the ancient catastrophe that had been the god wars, and the test was her way of trying to prevent the same thing happening again, but the price was becoming too high. Thirteen people dead, and none of them evil, wicked, or dangerous, or not obviously so.

  She had met her Under-Steward, Mordo, on the stairs and he had offered to bring her wine. It was tempting, but she had sworn not to go down that path, to seek oblivion in drink.

  In truth she missed Narak. He had stayed in Golt when he should not. He had given his protection to the king of Avilian when she had told him not to interfere, but then he had always been his own man, and that was one of many reasons that she loved him. He was strong, decisive, clever, and almost always right about people. If he was protecting the king then she did not doubt that the king deserved it, but she needed Narak here, to tell her that she was right, that the pain and the death were a price worth paying.

  There was a discreet knocking on her door. It would be Sheyani. Mordo had said he would send her.

  “Come,” she called.

  Sheyani came in. She was carrying her pipes. Pascha was fond of the Durander woman. She had good judgement, had displayed considerable courage and had a spine of steel. Apart from that she was the finest musician Pascha had ever known, and after sixteen centuries of life that was a considerable accolade. Sheyani was a Halith mage, which meant that her music was also coloured by magic. She could sway the mood of an army or a tavern, and had done both in her time with Cain.

  “Will you play for me?” Pascha asked.

  “Of course, Eran. What would you like to hear?” That was just like Sheyani. They had known each other for the better part of a hundred years and she still used Pascha’s formal title.

  “Something soothing, perhaps. Something to make be believe I am not a monster.”

  Sheyani nodded, and Pascha knew that she understood. Guilt was important. Regret was essential, but they could be made to retreat for a while by Sheyani’s magical pipes. The Durander sat quietly for a minute, and they began to play.

  The music was slow and tuneful with a complicated rhythm. It worked its way into Pascha’s head, filling her with images of a world at peace, the comfortable certainty that she was right, that everything she did made the world a better and safer place. After a while she no longer heard the tune. Her mind wandered into the past, to more joyous times, and she began to smile. She remembered the good days in Wolfguard with Narak and Caster when Beloff and Remard visited and they would spend an evening talking around a fine table, drunk on good humour. She had thought then that it might go on forever, but nothing does. Beloff and Remard were dead, Wolfguard was deserted, and everything was tainted by the past – so many years of it.

  The music stopped.

  It was quite abrupt, and Pascha was pulled out of her reverie to the cold terrace and the knowledge of thirteen dead.

  “Someone is at the door, Eran. They are quite loud.”

  The knocking came again – urgent, banging seven times. Nobody could pass the door without her allowing it or whoever it was would have pushed their way in by now.

  “Come,” Pascha said.

  The door flew open and Sithmaree stormed in. She stopped and looked at the two of them. It was plain enough to Pascha that she was considering whether or not she should tell her news in front of Sheyani. It did not take her long to reach a decision.

  “A remarkable thing,” she said. “A miracle, out on the plains.”

  “What?”

  “Shadow. I saw Shadow, and Shadow spoke.”

  “Shadow is a myth,” Pascha said. She knew the stories, of course, but they were no more than that. Shadow was supposed to be some mysterious ghost from an earlier age, but Pascha had never seen hide nor hair of the thing, and neither had Narak.

  “No. I’ve seen it before,” Sithmaree said. “It haunts the plains, it watches, it accepts gifts, b
ut it never speaks.”

  “You said it did.”

  “Never before,” Sithmaree said. She crossed the room and came out onto the terrace, helped herself to a cup of wine without asking and downed it in one. Whatever had happened had certainly made an impression on the Snake.

  “Tell me,” Pascha said. “Tell me everything.”

  Sithmaree took a seat and recounted her tale, the hunting trip with Callista, the twilit grove and the shadow appearing where Callista was gathering wood. “It spoke to her, about her. It was Callista that it came to see.”

  “And what did it say?”

  “It made no sense,” Sithmaree said. She had quite recovered her composure now, and she leaned forwards, filling her cup again. She glanced at Sheyani. “I see her.”

  “That’s all it said?”

  “We were leaving it. It said: ‘wait’. Then it said: ‘I see her’”. That’s all.”

  “Who? Who did it see?”

  “Callista. I’m sure of it.”

  “And what does that mean?”

  The Snake shrugged. “I have no idea, but I do not doubt that it is important.”

  Important or not it was quite incomprehensible. More to the point, it led to nothing. There was no action that suggested itself to Pascha. There was no point in going out on the plains and seeking the thing. She would never find it. Men had spent their lives looking for Shadow and failed. Admittedly, she would have more chance than most, being a god mage, but even if she did find it the chances of it speaking to her were almost zero, and judging by what it had said to Sithmaree and Callista she would be unlikely to understand it anyway.

  But it might be worth getting Callista’s side of the tale.

  “Well, it is a revelation indeed,” she said. “But I don’t know what to do, or what to make of it. Does anything suggest itself to you?” The question was thrown open to Sheyani who had listened with quiet attentiveness to all that passed.

  “Callista is special,” Sithmaree said. “That is all. I do not know why or how.”

  “Is that good or bad?” Sheyani asked. “For all we know Shadow may have been pointing out a danger.”

  “Everything tells me otherwise,” Sithmaree said. “You have not met the girl.”

  “Perhaps that would be a good idea. Sheyani, you can read the music in people. Make a point of seeing Callista and tell me what you find. I have spoken to her at length and there is nothing that suggests she is a threat. Narak has met her and saw nothing evil about her, but just in case I want you to read her, to see what she might be.”

  Sheyani frowned. “I will do what I can, Eran, but you know better than any that Durander magic is not carpentry. The music will show some things, but may not reveal others. It is only with long acquaintance that I can be certain of anything.”

  “Do what you can,” Pascha said. “Tell me what you find.”

  *

  After they had gone Pascha sat on her terrace alone and looked out over the Great Plain. The talent was exploding all over Terras. There was no doubt in her mind that something had changed since Pelion had released her back into the world. The talent had been quiescent in the centuries that the Benetheon had ruled in the beast realms. There had hardly been a single incident. Now it was breaking out everywhere.

  Thirteen had failed her test, and she did not doubt that there were many more that did not come to take it. All over the world there would be men and women with strange abilities, and each of them was potentially a disaster. There had to be a better way to deal with it.

  She thought it must have something to do with the Sirash. Pelion had ended the Sirash when he released her, and that had effectively ended the Benetheon, but Pascha suspected that the secret place had somehow consumed the latent talent of the population. It had suppressed it.

  Whatever the cause, she found herself facing a problem that she had failed to solve. The test could not go on. If it did she would be killing hundreds, perhaps thousands, and it would lead to everything she was trying to avoid – war, mage war.

  If she were Narak she would turn to Cain. Cain had a mind that solved problems, but Cain knew nothing of magic and the Duranders, even Sheyani, were so limited compared to Pascha. She understood them completely, even if she had not yet mastered all their skills. They, on the other hand, knew very little. They wallowed in rote skills and half forgotten lore that degraded with each passing generation.

  Pascha needed another god mage. She needed someone to pass the test.

  27 Doorways

  “You know that your life is forfeit?” Narak asked. He had taken Drammen from the dragon’s pavilion out into the woods. Now that Drammen knew who he was, there was no need of Kelcotel.

  “I know it,” the man said. “But I regret my actions. I was misled, and thought that I served a higher cause.”

  Narak knew that this was true, and he had no intention of killing the man, but he wanted to be sure of him. Drammen’s shame and despair were quite genuine. He could sense it.

  “Do you want an opportunity to redeem yourself?”

  Drammen looked up. “Aye,” he said, with some enthusiasm. “Anything. I am yours to command.”

  “Then you will help me to find this false Wolf who wishes the king of Avilian dead, and we shall see how he fares.”

  “I will kill him myself,” Drammen declared.

  “That will not be necessary,” Narak assured him. “Besides, I may wish to speak with him first.”

  “He is difficult to meet,” Drammen said. “But I have a way of contacting him. There is a place where a paper can be put that he says he will always receive.”

  “Then we shall compose a letter. What will he expect to hear from you?”

  “I was tasked with seeking Aran Telio, he that you were meeting in The Loyal Blade.”

  “So he would expect you to report that Telio is dead?”

  “Aye, or escaped, but that would be a shame. We were eight going in.”

  “Will he know that Telio escaped?”

  “No. We can say that he is dead.”

  “Then a new assassin might be called for.”

  “Aye,” Drammen agreed. “And who better than the true Wolf.”

  It was the beginnings of a plan, and after an hour spent with pen and paper they had concocted a report that tried to explain how Telio had been killed and so many of Drammen’s men. Drammen seemed able to accept the deaths of his men – they had not been friends perhaps – and managed to be quite inventive in his fabrication.

  “Now you can show me where the letter must go,” Narak said. He thought that the letter might not be needed. If he knew the place he could simply wait until someone came to collect the paper, and then he would have them.

  Drammen led him back into the city.

  Narak was curious. Letters were not a common thing in Avilian, and written messages of any kind tended to be sealed and delivered by messengers whose duty it was to put the missive into the hand of its intended recipient. This, he did not doubt, would be different.

  Drammen walked in the direction of the Green Hill, and for a while Narak thought it would be there, but he turned off down a side street, an alley more or less, and about half way down he stopped and, looking around to make sure they were not observed, he pulled a brick out from a dilapidated wall and dropped the letter through the hole.

  Narak took the brick off him before he could replace it and looked into the hole. He did not know what to expect, but he was certainly surprised by what he saw – nothing. It was simply a cavity in the wall, and the letter had dropped from sight. He reached in and tried to lay his hand on the paper, but it had dropped out of reach.

  “How does he retrieve it?” he muttered.

  The obvious, stupid answer was from the other side of the wall, but Narak was prepared to bet that this was not the case. He walked a few paces up the street and knocked on the door. After a short interval it was opened by a tall, thin woman of middle years. She was dressed passably well, as one mi
ght expect in Golt.

  “May I help you?” she enquired.

  Narak held up a glittering coin. “A gold guinea if you let me look at the inner wall of your house,” he said. She looked confused and uncertain. Narak produced a second coin. “Two,” he said.

  The woman nodded. Gold always worked in Golt. It was the golden city. Gold and power. “Come in, my lord,” she said.

  Inside the house he found things in good order. The place was quite small but clean and tidy. He took a few paces along the wall until he was on the other side from Drammen’s loose brick.

  There was nothing, not a mark on the wall, not a loose floorboard, not a sign of any access.

  “Does the house have a basement?” he asked.

  The woman, who was standing by the door with arms folded, shook her head. Narak glanced at Drammen and with a movement of his head suggested that he should take the woman out of the room on some pretext. Drammen was quick enough to pick up the sign and began asking her questions about other rooms. They left Narak alone.

  He assumed his aspect, felt the massive strength flood his body, saw his fingers become talons and his hands sprout steel hard scales. He struck one blow at the floor, cracking three boards. He quickly plucked the broken wood away and exposed what lay beneath.

  Nothing. Again there was nothing, just hard earth, so there was no natural way to retrieve the letter that they had just posted into a hole in the wall outside. That alone told Narak what he needed to know.

  He released his aspect.

  “Time we were going, Drammen,” he called out. Drammen came back with the woman. “Sorry for the damage,” he said. The two gold guineas would pay for the whole house to be re-floored twice over, so he felt no guilt. He led the way outside.

  “It seems we will have to rely on the letter,” he said. “Tell me, did the false Wolf have an accent?”

  “He did,” Drammen said. “He spoke Avilian and Berashi well enough, but he was no native of either, though if I had to guess I’d say he learned both tongues in the north. He had that broadness to his speech.”

  “So what then? Telan? Durander?”