by Rj Barker
“Oh, Boros,” I said, under my breath.
My first instinct was to climb down. It was a long way, but the wall was pitted and looked easy to climb.
I did not.
I would stand out to anyone watching and as I was dressed as a slave it would likely bring attention. It would only take one guard with a bow to decide I was trying to escape and I would end up joining Boros far below. I stared down at him. Had it been too much, what I had done? He had loathed magic and maybe he would have been able to live with that alone, but together with the memories of his brother’s atrocities had it simply overwhelmed him? Sometimes I remembered things I had done—the door of a blood gibbet clanging shut—and my fists clenched involuntarily, my eyes tight shut while I tried to banish the images. But compared to the things Barin had done my sins were small ones. Or maybe being in his brother’s mind in the cell for those short moments had changed the way he saw him. Certainly, the small glimpse I had seen had changed my opinion of the man. It did not excuse the things he had done, but I felt for the boy he had been.
Or maybe he had not thrown himself from the battlements at all.
I had seen his Heartblade coming down the stairs, and if he was anything like the man I had fought then to pitch an unsuspecting Boros from the battlements would be small work. And that would mean that whatever he had wished to tell me must have been worth hiding.
“Slave, why are you here?” I turned. The same guard who I had waved at had approached me while I was lost in thought. I turned my eyes to the ground, just like a good slave should. Why had I waved? I was a fool. No slave would wave at a guard, it was to invite interest. “Well?” She pushed me with her shield, knocking me back against the parapet. Behind me the void howled and I felt the world spin in sudden vertigo. Was this what Boros had felt in his last moments? “You think you’re my equal, eh? Think a slave can wave at a highguard?”
“Sorry, Blessed,” I stuttered. “Only I were to meets up with Blessed Barin on the wall here and when he was not here and you saw me I thought you were from him, see. It weren’t no disrespect meant.”
The woman glared at me, brown curls had escaped her helmet.
“Be more careful in future, slave,” she said. “And if you’re looking for Barin he ain’t here. Was earlier, but I saw his Heartblade leave a while back. He must have found something more important to do, like feed his dogs.” The woman laughed. “Now be off. I’m sure you have duties.”
I left the battlements. There was a numbness inside me at Boros’s death. I wanted to feel more but was frightened to, what was behind the numbness was too mixed up. Had I caused this? Swapping him over, confusing him, tainting him with magic—as he must have seen it. Had it just been too much for him? But surely that was better than rotting in a dungeon, than burning? Or had I simply tortured him in a more subtle way?
Was this why he had wanted me to come on to the battlements? To find his corpse?
No. I could not let myself believe that. And there was still the question of his Heartblade. I spiralled down the staircase so deep in thought that I was barely paying attention to the world around me. When I ran into Boros’s Heartblade it came as a complete surprise. We stopped, me in my slave’s clothes and him in his enamelled armour and silvered visor. For a second he waited for me to move. As a slave I should go back up the stairs to let him past. I saw myself reflected in his visor and he stiffened in obvious recognition. He went for the blade at his hip but the tightness of the spiral staircase, and the fact it was designed to be defended by a right-handed soldier from above, played in my favour. Before he could draw the weapon I grabbed the sides of his head and twisted, forcing him round. His foot missed the worn step below and he tried to grab the walls to balance himself, but they were too slippery for him to gain a good grip. I let go of his helmet and delivered a short, stiff-fingered punch to his throat and he went over backwards, armour crashing on the stone stairs. I leapt for his body, pulling the eating knife from beneath my tunic and landing on him. As we slid down the steps I stabbed him, again and again, finding any vulnerable point I could: throat, neck, underarms; five, ten stabs before we slid to a halt, wedged in the curve of the steep stairs. I should have run but my knife had cut through the straps of his helmet and curiosity overcame me.
I do not know why I was so curious. Maybe I just wished to see the face of the man I had killed, or maybe the magic within me warned me of something untoward, but I took a moment to remove the helmet. His face was nothing special, scarred and broken from a lifetime’s fighting, but his eyes? His eyes were blood red, as if every vein within them had broken. It could have been the impact of the fall that had caused it, but I thought not. I leant in close, sniffing, but all I could smell was blood and bad teeth. Before I could look deeper into him I was interrupted by a voice from above: the guard.
“What’s that noise? What’s going on down there, eh?”
I could not be found here with this man, not as a slave. Now I ran, down the twisting and turning corridors of Ceadoc, into the darkness. Not knowing what I had found but suspecting something terrible.
When I returned to the Low Tower I put on my motley and make-up and spoke to my master about Barin and his Heartblade.
“Have you ever seen anything like it, Master?”
“No,” she said, smoothing white panstick on my face. “As wounds, yes, but you think that was not the cause?”
“No, I mean he hit his head, many times, I made sure of it. But I do not think it would affect his eyes so quickly.”
“No, it should not, but he was one of these ones you feel is wrong?”
“Yes.” I lifted my face so she could paint black under my chin where I had missed places. “Do you think I should tell Rufra?”
“That you killed another man’s servant? Probably, but I would keep his eyes quiet, for now.”
“Nothing makes sense here, Master.”
“No, I was saying as much to Gusteffa. She says all will out, time has a way of bringing clarity.”
“Time is the enemy of life, Master.”
“Oh, aye, and the enemy of you. You are late for a meeting with your king. Go, be off.”
I jogged up the stairs to report to Rufra about Barin. He was disappointed that I had learnt nothing but glad the man he thought was Boros was dead.
“He did not deserve a death so clean,” said Rufra. Behind him stood Aydor, he wiped at his eyes and pretended to cough to cover the sudden tears. “Marrel has been in touch, Girton. You were right about Tinia Speaks-Not. She could not wait to leave Leckan ap Syridd’s employ. Aydor will take you to her.” I nodded, unable to speak as I was annoyed with Rufra, though I should not be. He did not know that Barin was Boros. I should not expect pity from him for the man.
Aydor led me away from the tower.
“You are angry with Rufra. Why?” he said.
“I don’t know.”
“He could not know about Boros.”
“I know.”
“But you are still angry.” I decided not to reply. “I will have his body seen to properly,” said Aydor. “That is the least we can do.”
“We cannot, Aydor. It will raise too many questions.”
“It is not right to leave him there.”
“Nothing here is right. I should not have done what I did with Boros and Barin, Aydor,” I said.
“Nonsense. You think anyone would choose burning over jumping off a wall? Of course not. You did what you could, stop brooding.”
“I’m not brooding.”
“That’d be a first.” He was not looking at me so my glare was wasted. “Anyway, if you want to be angry with someone you should be angry with me.”
“You? Why?”
“Because after we meet your assassin friend we’re going to go and see Neander.”
“Neander? Dead gods, why?”
“He is high priest of Ceadoc, Girton, and you intend to go into the Sepulchres of the Gods. If anyone can warn you about what to expect there
then it is him.”
“Surely there are other priests?”
“Of course there are, Benliu for instance. But he knows next to nothing, and other priests are also more likely to ask inconvenient questions like, ‘Why do you want to go down there?’”
“I am an assassin, Aydor. Sneaking about is my business. I do not need—”
“Merela said you would say that.” I shook my head, not looking at him.
“You spend far too much time with my master.”
“She is teaching me how to correctly read maps.” I snorted at that.
“My master is an assassin, not a miracle worker.” I glanced up at Aydor just as he raised an amused eyebrow and then I felt a presence at my shoulder as Tinia Speaks-Not appeared from the shadows, making Aydor jump.
“Coil’s piss, I do wish you lot wouldn’t do that. Especially in this place. Ceadoc has me enough on edge as it is.”
“Aydor is taking us to Neander, Tinia,” I said, “so we can get some idea of the lie of the sepulchre before we enter.” She nodded. Secretly I had hoped she would tell us she had been before and save me from having to speak to the priest.
“Come on then,” said Aydor and he led us further into the castle. As I walked the floor throbbed beneath my feet in time with the flickering of my torches and I found it hard to walk in a straight line, as if the ground and light were conspiring against the stone flags being where my feet expected them to be. Then it passed, and the floor was once more only floor and the flickering light was only light.
Neander had rooms below the ground, and the air in them smelled damp, as if we stood by a stagnant lake. Inside his rooms was the same mess he had lived in when he was the priest of Heissal at Maniyadoc Castle—books and cups everywhere. To this he had added various robes, mount antlers that were not yet on the wall, trophies of battles he had not fought in, and various other strange and useless knick-knacks.
“Forgive my mess,” he said, brushing a stuffed lizard claw off a chair, which came away in a cloud of dust. “Please, sit. I am still organising after being moved out of my rooms in the sepulchre.” Though his face tried to make light of this, his voice betrayed his annoyance. “There are few more familiar with the resting place of the gods than I,” he said.
“I thought the gods rested in the sea?” I said, taking a seat. Aydor shook his head and rolled his eyes.
“Yes,” said Neander. “I forget you are happy to pretend you do not understand metaphor if you think it will displease others. Maybe we could dispense with that, for today?”
“Of course,” said Aydor before I could find something cutting to say to Neander. “We want information, nothing else. We have been nowhere near the sepulchres—”
“No one has,” snapped Neander. “Not since Darsese died.”
“A strange coincidence,” I said.
“Not really. So many died from the plague that few who knew how to work the machines remained, and none at all who knew how to fix them. It was inevitable that they would break down. They were always breaking down.”
“The machines?” said Aydor.
“Oh, come.” Neander sounded profoundly irritated. “I know you are not quite the fool you pretend to be. Do not say you have forgotten everything I taught you?”
Aydor shrugged.
“I have forgotten quite a lot of it, though I can recite you my lineage to eight generations if you wish?”
Neander shook his head and then ran a hand over his bald scalp, then he opened his desk and took out a piece of parchment and cut a quill, dipping it in ink before drawing a large circle.
“This,” he pointed at the circle with his pen, spattering drops of ink across the page, “is the main sepulchre where the statues of Adallada and Dallad reside and the book of kings is kept. Or was, if it is still there.” He drew four lines on the circle, each opposite another. “There are four entrances and exits: these arches are large enough to drive a cart through.”
“Gates? Portcullis?” said Aydor.
“Some doors here.” He pointed at his drawing. “It is not a place for war, Aydor. Around the main sepulchre runs a corridor and off that are all the minor chapels, forty in all.”
“They’ll be a hedging to clear,” I said. “Are they big?”
“Big enough to comfortably hide ten or twenty men.” He looked from Aydor to me. “Is Rufra seriously considering storming the sepulchre?”
“It depends what we find down there,” I said.
Neander nodded as if I had just told him I liked the particular shade of make-up around his eyes.
“Well, he cannot. I do not know what you think is happening down there, but it cannot be.”
“Why?”
He drew a line from the sepulchre to the edge of the paper and then drew another circle, adding a second where the line met the sepulchre.
“These are the pools of return,” he said, pointing at the circles.
“Pools,” said Aydor. “From what Benliu told us they may be tactically problematic.”
“It is problematic full-stop,” said Neander. “The layman sees a pool full of water when he approaches for the morning service. Before his eyes the pool empties, and he can walk through the tunnel. At the other end he watches as the pool fills again behind him. It is symbolic.”
“You don’t say,” said Aydor. “And this is where the machines come in?”
“Yes, pumps, utterly silent, and I have no idea how they are driven. They are from the times of plenty, but they are broken so the sepulchre cannot be accessed.”
“How long is the tunnel?” I said.
“It takes three minutes to walk.” Tinia Speaks-Not grinned at me as Neander spoke. “I know that may be no problem for you, Master Assassin, but it would neatly stop an army.”
“What happens if the machine breaks when you’re in there?” said Aydor. “There must be another way out.”
“Maybe once,” said Neander. “Not now. If the machine breaks when you are in there and there is no one to fix it I am afraid you will die. There are probably corpses in there from when the machine did break. The Tired Lands are cruel, eh?” He did not look particularly upset by this. I presumed whoever he thought was dead had been a rival.
“Are there gates on the tunnel?”
“No,” said Neander. “Why would there be?”
Tinia tapped her hand on Neander’s desk, then her hands flickered out signs at me.
“Numbers?” said Neander, then he smiled at me. “Your hand language is one of many things I picked up on my journey to being high priest.” He gave me a smug grin that I would have enjoyed cutting from his face. “If you are right and the Landsmen are hiding something down there then Fureth has an inner circle, Mistress Assassin. About thirty men, ten of them his elite guard. And he spends a lot of time with Vondire, who is high priest of the Children now Danfoth is dead. So if they are together add another twenty to that. The Children have many soldiers too. That Vondire—and before him, Danfoth—have been bringing them in has not escaped my attention.”
Tinia’s hands flickered again, but this time it was clearly meant for me.
“What does she say?” said Aydor.
“That with the blessed that have gone over to Fureth, the Children of Arnst, the Landsmen and the highguard, we are heavily outnumbered if we have to fight.”
“That all depends on what—”
“If,” said Aydor.
“It depends on what,” I said, “is going on in the sepulchre. Where are the machines, Neander?” He added a couple of rooms to his map, off the pools of return.
“Here,” he said, spattering more ink over the page with his pen, “but because of the danger caused by the flooding, Landsmen guard both the machines and the pools.”
“Nothing is ever easy,” I said.
“We should go then,” said Aydor. I nodded but as we left Neander’s room I turned back to him.
“Berisa Marrel,” I said. “Was she one of your girls at Maniyadoc?” He stared
at me, a sneer on his craggy face.
“She did not call herself Berisa then,” he said. He started to ask a question, but it was too late, I had already left his room.
Chapter 27
The smell of stagnant water became stronger as we approached the sepulchre, the stink as still and enveloping as the pool it emanated from.
“I’m glad I don’t have to swim in that,” whispered Aydor. “Smells like Blue Watta’s arse.”
We crouched at the edge of a room behind a low, damp wall. Everything had a thin coating of green slime except for a path that went through the centre of the room to split in two before the pool. At the end of each path stood a bored-looking Landsman.
“We don’t want to kill them,” I said. “We just want to look, for now. Aydor, can you distract them, talk to them, then Tinia and I can get into the pool.”
“Easy enough,” he said, starting to stand. I grabbed his arm.
“One moment.” Tinia slipped past me, down to the farthest end of the low wall. “Right. Now.”
He stood and wandered forward so the Landsmen could see him. They shifted slightly to allow them easier access to their weapons.
“What’s this place then?” said Aydor. He stared up at the ceiling, patterned with concentric circles of coloured glass.
“Dangerous is what it is,” said the Landsman on the left, “and somewhere you shouldn’t be.”
“Is it a bathhouse?” Aydor took another step forward, pointing at the water. “’Cos I reckon I’d stink worse after going in that than I would before.”
The Landsmen looked to one another and then both advanced to meet Aydor: sensible, given his size—even though he seemed like little more than an amiable buffoon.