by Rj Barker
“Dark Ungar’s breath,” I said, to myself. “You think this is a game.” I left the boy’s body on the grass and walked toward the fires that marked out Festival. There were none of the usual miles of small fences, used to pen animals as Festival was not at Ceadoc to trade but to show its support for Rufra. Guards in gold and red stood around the edges and as I passed one of the fires I threw the parchment into it. It angered me that whoever had sent it had killed needlessly, as if to taunt me. Was it because of the way the boy spoke of me, “The greatest assassin of our age?” Had this other assassin heard that and taken exception to it? Was this common talk of me? Did it make others feel like they had something to prove?
If so, good. That would mean whoever this assassin was they wanted to face me. Less likely I would get a knife in the back or be ambushed by soldiers in a tiny room now.
Unless, of course, they only intended to mislead. I walked the rest of the way to Festival, more wary than ever.
Festival was in the mid of setting up. Braziers burned and the air was filled with happy voices and the percussive thudding of hammers on wood as stalls and stages were built. Many here knew me—I had visited with Rufra often enough in the first years of Maniyadoc’s peace, and on my own in later years when events had kept Rufra too busy to attend. Even if I was not recognised, the motley and make-up of Death’s Jester carried weight at Festival, where older ways were followed and the rigid rules of Tired Lands society were set aside.
I approached the wooden walls of Festival, gaily painted with scenes of Adallada, Dallad and the hedge spirits who served them capering around their feet. Work on the walls had stopped and one was sitting at a crazy angle, suspended by a tangle of ropes and scaffolds. The workers putting up the walls had drawn away to one side while two groups of soldiers stood, facing off in the firelight. One group wore the shiny silver of highguard and the other the red on black of Festival.
“The walls are unneeded. It is a mark of distrust!” shouted the captain of the highguard.
“It is a matter of tradition,” said the captain of the Festival troops. She sounded calm.
“If anyone moves to erect more walls,” said the man, “we will arrest them.”
“If anyone tries to arrest those of Festival,” said the woman, “we will protect them.” Violence was in the air. It would only take one overzealous trooper to set a confrontation in motion and I knew Rufra would not welcome more blood. Not so soon after Boros and definitely not involving his allies.
“What is the problem,” I stepped between them, “could I help?” I took up the posture of reconciliation. The highguard captain looked me up and down.
“You’re not in Maniyadoc now, Jester. You should know your place and stay silent before your betters.” I stared at him, just long enough for it to be clearly insolent, then dropped my pose, standing relaxed with my hand on my blade hilt.
“You are right, Captain, I forget myself. If you will not speak to a jester maybe you will speak to the Heartblade of King Rufra, forerunner among those to be high king?” That wrong-footed the man. I had seen his type before: officious men with a little power who let it go to their heads.
“I hardly think this ragged-arsed bunch will respect your authority, Heartblade.” He made the title into a sneer. I am not sure he respected my authority either.
“On the contrary, Captain,” said the leader of the Festival guard with a small nod of her head toward me. “Girton Club-Foot is known to us and we will abide by any decision he makes.”
“Girton Club-Foot,” said the captain, “the assassin?” He took an unconscious step back as he said my name. Many did that. “Very well,” he said. “If they’ll listen to you so will I.”
“What is your name, Captain?”
“Gallida,” he said.
“And I am Venia, of Festival,” said the woman.
“The problem is, Girton Club-Foot,” said Gallida, “that this woman will not listen to reason. I have been sent to make sure Festival do not insult the high king’s hospitality by putting up walls and implying they may be attacked, here of all places, at Ceadoc.” I turned to the Festival captain as she spoke.
“I have explained the walls are not about defence but tradition and, to some degree, to keep out thieves.”
I nodded. I could see that Gallida was desperate to say more and wondered if this was more about him being unwilling to back down before a woman than anything else.
“Captain Gallida, may we speak alone?” Fear passed over his face, then he straightened his shoulders and nodded. I led him a few paces away and all the while he watched my hands. The man was sure he went to his death but he did not waver in his duty. “May I ask, Captain, who gave you this order?”
“It came down from Gamelon.”
I nodded.
“He is not high king.”
“But he keeps the laws.”
“It seems to me, that to end up in a fight with Festival is worse for the high king’s hospitality than letting them put up the walls.”
“The thing is,” he leaned forward, “I reckon Gamelon suspects treachery from ’em, see. That’s why he don’t want the walls up.”
I nodded, as if thinking over his words.
“Look at the walls, Gallida.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Do you really think they would hold against a determined army?” He stared at them for quite a long time, assessing them and the scaffolding which held them up, then shook his head. “And they may have a point about thieves. I have seen the people of Ceadoc, they look hungry and desperate. Let them have their walls, Captain Gallida. Tell Gamelon you thought it a better way to keep the peace.”
“He’ll likely have me out on my arse for not following his orders.”
“Then come to Rufra,” I said. “He values a good fighter, and he values a warrior intelligent enough to avoid a needless fight even more.”
He looked me up and down, then glanced back at the Festival guards.
“You’d better be right about this.” He stumped over to his men and addressed Venia. “Have your walls, I’ll not have my boys dragged into a fight on your turf, ’specially when there’s so few of us.”
I almost felt the wave of relief go through his little band. The highguard had a fierce reputation but so did Festival’s troops, and Gallida’s men were outnumbered here.
I watched them leave, and Venia came over to stand at my shoulder.
“That was well done. I am glad you came when you did.”
“He did not want to back down in front of a woman.”
“No, and it happens more and more outside of Maniyadoc.” She shrugged. “Torelc brings change however unwelcome, eh? You are here to see the Festival Lords?” I nodded. “I was here to watch for you and accompany you to them. Come with me.”
I followed Venia through the centre of Festival. People were already hard at work stacking wood for the massive central bonfire. To burn so much wood was as much a show of wealth as it was a Festival tradition.
Venia stopped by those building the fire and pointed the way.
“Go. They said to let you approach alone.”
I thanked her and headed on.
At the two-storey caravans of the Festival Lords I was met by a figure who made my heart skip a beat and my skin crawl as if kissed by icy dew. For a moment I thought the god of death himself, Xus the unseen, had come to meet me and like all men I fear death. But it was not a god, only one of his priests.
When I was very young the black-robed hermit priests of Xus, with their porcelain masks stuck between mania and hilarity, were a common sight on the roads of the Tired Lands. They were a rare sight now, and even rarer since the Children of Arnst had taken Xus’s mantle for themselves—though I recognised nothing of the god who had touched my life in the god that cult spoke of. They worshipped a fierce figure where my experience was of a gentle, even sad one.
“Girton Club-Foot,” said the priest, his voice little more than a whisper. “We know of you, and you are w
elcome here.” His mask had been white once, but now it was yellowed with age, the colour of old bone and cracks ran along a porcelain expression, forever frozen.
“I have never seen you here before,” I said.
“And yet I am everywhere,” replied the priest with a bob of his head.
“What is your name?”
“I need no name, I am the last.”
“Last?”
“A fiercer god has taken the priests of Xus.” He barely seemed to care.
“That is not right, they are not right.”
The priest shrugged.
“Everything dies, Girton Club-Foot, even beliefs,” he leaned in close, “but still, tell no one I am here.”
“I won’t.”
“I know.” And he turned, his robes flapping like the wings of the black birds of Xus as the wind caught them.
He led me up the stairs of the caravan and through the small door. Inside it was oppressively warm, like walking through soup. The wooden walls of the caravan had trapped hot air and with no way to escape it had intensified the heat.
Down a narrow corridor, walls almost touching my shoulders as I followed the priest of Xus. I touched a wall: it was warm, as if heated from outside. I could barely breathe in the enclosed space. Then, as a sudden need to escape the confines mounted and just as it was becoming too much, the corridor opened up into a small room, comfortable for no more than three or four but welcome after the narrow space of the tunnel. Braziers burned in each corner of the room, filling the air with fragrant smoke that made my head swim.
“Will you abide by our ways, Girton Club-Foot?” said the priest, his mask quivering and moving as if it were flesh. “No harm will come to you. You have my promise.”
“I will abide,” I said. The words took on form, like mist around my head, and the life of the land throbbed beneath me. I could feel the Festival Lords. They were in a room above me, sat apart, one at each point of the compass but, curiously, I could feel nothing from the priest before me and memories—moments when I had met priests of Xus only later to feel sure I had encountered something more, so much more—came flooding back.
“Xus,” I said, starting to go to my knees, but he held me by my arms.
“No.” He lifted the mask, showing me the unremarkable-looking old man beneath. “Just another human, just like you.” He pulled down the neck of his robe so I could see his skin—see the same scars writhing across his flesh that writhed across mine—and it turned my stomach: the Landsman’s Leash used to cut sorcerers off from their power. “I am just a man, Girton Club-Foot, just a man.” He put his robe back and pulled down his mask. “Now, follow me.”
He led me up a tight spiral stair. His robe was ragged and ripped into tails that brushed against every step. I saw them as snakes attempting to take great chunks from the wood and failing: a bite, a bite, a bite.
The heat, overwhelming.
Sweat ran down my face.
The priest stopped at an arched door.
“Are you ready?” he asked. I nodded. I had seen the Festival Lords once long ago at a feast, then glimpsed through a torn tapestry. “Whatever happens in here, let it happen.” He opened the door and pushed me forward into a dark room without windows. The only illumination came from four braziers, one in each corner, and their light was meagre, little more than the faint glow of embers.
Between each brazier sat a Festival Lord. I knew that there were always two male and two female, though their identities were hidden by their clothes. They wore thick woollen blankets covered in strange geometric designs that turned each Lord into a living cone of colour. The only place their clothing was open was at the face, but their features were concealed by a lattice made of cornstalks, the ripe ears of corn poking out of either side of their heads. In the half-light and under the influence of the strange herbs burning in the braziers they were eerie figures. I tried to concentrate, to do the exercise of the False Lantern and bring some light into the room, but whatever connected me with the magic in the land was not in here. It was not like a souring, or like when my master had cut the Leash into me all those years ago. There was nothing harsh or cruel about what kept me from the land in this place; this was a soft and malleable barrier. When I reached for the magic I was slowed and stopped, as if being gently guided toward a better path by a well-meaning friend. In the darkness my eyes darted around the room, looking for something familiar to settle on. Little by little the darkness seemed to ebb, not by a lot, but enough that I could make out paintings of hedging lords on the walls, black spare figures outlined in faintly glowing lines, red eyes staring out as they herded frightened people across landscapes—or maybe they helped them. I could not tell.
“Kneel, Girton Club-Foot,” came a voice. It was the priest, but it was not him at the same time. In this room he was a huge presence, crowding me against the walls, and though I never moved from the centre of the room it seemed I was pushed from my body by him. His voice filled my world, my mind. It was a fight to make my limbs obey me while my thoughts were buffeted by the strength of the man’s voice—but I did what he said, falling to my knees on the hard floor of the room, fighting for every breath in the suddenly unbearable heat. I felt a lurch, as if the caravan moved, but it affected no one else in the room. I heard the happy jingle of the bell on the end of my hood as it was taken down. Sweat ran from the hair on my head and down the back of my ears, the hood’s removal brought no respite from the heat. I felt the priest lift my hair, worn long and plaited to keep it out of my way, and my scalp prickled as he took hold of the thick rope of hair.
“Make the old salute, Girton Club-Foot,” he said, standing close enough behind me that I could feel the contours of his body against my back. I did, knowing that the priest stood exactly where I would stand if I intended to cut a throat. I lifted my head to bare my throat and felt the cold of a blade against it, but only for a moment. Then my hair appeared in my vision, held in the hand of the priest. His nails were caked with filth. His other hand came round. In it he held a pair of shears. “So the wheat is cut,” he said, and the shears took a hand’s length of my hair from the plait and the pressure of his body against my back vanished. I heard the crackle of something going into the brazier and the room filled with the choking stink of burning hair.
I felt wrong. I felt right. I stayed still. The world spun. Then the Festival Lords began to speak.
“I am Fitchgrass of the Fields
I am Coil the Yellower
I am Blue Watta
I am Dark Ungar.”
I could not tell who spoke. The voices came from all around me and from each of the Lords at the same time. Terror was my overwhelming emotion. When each spoke, I felt the weight of their names. In Fitchgrass I felt the binding coils of knotgrass around my feet, heard the mournful howl of hauntgrass on the wind. When Coil spoke, I could smell the souring: feel my stomach turning over at the overwhelming emptiness beneath me. In Blue Watta was the struggle to breathe as I fought against drowning, weeds wrapped around my body. And when Dark Ungar spoke I felt only fear. Fear of what was to come. Fear of what I was—of the magic that lived inside me which I thought I had learned to control, but now it leapt and crackled inside like a fire suddenly finding fuel.
“What do you want from me?” The words were a cry, as if pulled from me, and they were not the words I had wanted to say.
“Girton Club-Foot
we seldom intervene
we watch from the outside,
in hope.”
My head spun: four voices that all seemed to come from the same place—inside my head and at the same time surrounding me. I looked to the left, to the right, and saw only figures still as statues. I felt like my scalp was on fire. My eyes streamed.
“You should speak to Rufra,” I said. “He is king. You—”
“We speak of a king,
of his misfortune
cursed
of his life.”
will not listen.
“you will listen”
“Rufra does not listen to me, not any more. You hold a vote for high king, that has more power over Rufra than I do.”
“We speak of
older
and gone
ways”
“Tell him, not me!” My words were a cry. Lost in a world twisting around me.
“We cannot go
in Ceadoc
the place
in torture.
danger waits
in every shadow
we are the land and the land is us
there betrayal
remains.”
I felt like I stumbled forwards. These jumbled words contained obvious meaning, but just like the half-seen figures on the wall I felt sure there was more to them than I perceived. The air hummed with magic, but it was not of the kind I was used to, not the kind I knew.
“We speak
with Rufra
the hope of the land
an older way
a dark way
he cannot be allowed to fail
must not fail”
“I intend to do everything I can to ensure Rufra’s success.”
“You will do your best
we know
you think to help
we see beyond
do not see clearly
of a king’s death
Jester
“we saw the end
we remember the story of King Roun
the twice souled
poor luck,
served by two
jesters
from ill-starred”
“You suggest I leave him?”
“then
trickery”
“I should remove my motley? Become only a Heartblade? And then …”
“Remain?
Girton Club-Foot
changing
how you look will not change