The Black Knife

by Christopher Nuttall

  Hind laughed and started to explain.

  ***

  An hour later, they were all seated in a small meeting room, drinking warm milk and eating a small repast. Hind hadn’t realised how hungry she was until the servants had produced a plate of food and ordered them to eat, but then, the healing trance and the pool would have banished hunger from her mind for a long time. Her old tutors would have lectured her on the dangers of using the trance too often, yet it wasn’t as if she’d had a choice. The old bastards had never spent much time out in the field.

  “I will not breathe a word about your existence to anyone,” Eric was saying to the Mother, ignoring the mischievous attempts at flirting from the Maiden. “If I win the coming war, I will be Emperor of Touched. I will not mention you to anyone, but do you not want to take up your rightful seat in the House of Lords?”

  “We have no Lords,” the Mother explained. “All of us are elected by the community. We would not, I think, be welcome in your House of Lords.”

  Eric chuckled. “Perhaps not,” he said. He cleared his throat as he finished the slice of bread and meat he’d been given. “What do you intend to do with us?”

  The Three glanced at each other, silently communicating. “We understand that you intend to head down into Lawless,” the Maiden said. “It is a hellish trip. Even if you hadn’t been chased and ambushed, you would almost certainly have died at the hands of some of the creatures living up in the mountains, or been lost in the snow.”

  “They were being escorted by Bran of Pittenweem,” the Mother pointed out. “They might have made it.”

  “But Bran is dead,” the Crone said. Her elderly face darkened suddenly. “The father of one of our children is dead. One of our allies in the outside world is dead.”

  “We can escort you through tunnels that will keep you out of the worst of the weather,” the Maiden said. Her voice brooked no compromise. “In exchange, we will ask of you a favour.”

  Eric leaned forward, assuming what Hind recognised as his negotiating pose. “That is understood,” he said, formally. “What favour would you wish of us?”

  The Maiden smiled. “We wish for you to lie with some of our women and add your seed to their wombs,” she said. Hind felt her mouth open with shock. No words came out. “You have powerful and unique magic running through your bloodline, even if in your case you have barely developed it beyond the basics. We want it.”

  Hind would have cheerfully turned her into a frog – or worse – if it hadn’t been for the wards protecting them. A very deep and primal anger was bubbling up inside her. How dare the Maiden ask her husband to get her – or anyone else – pregnant? Didn’t she understand that she’d just offered a terrible insult? No woman in her right mind would want her man to be dividing his attentions between two women, or even two sets of children. Cold logic suggested that perhaps the Maiden didn’t understand – the children would be raised in Harmonious Repose, without any involvement from their father – but she wasn't listening to cold logic, not today.

  “No,” Eric said, flatly. “I will not sire children I cannot love and nurture.”

  “They will want for nothing,” the Maiden assured him. “I think…”

  She broke off as the door opened and Branet ran into the room, running over to Hind and giving her a tight hug. Hind held the child tightly, as if she was a talisman against evil, even though she still wanted to hurt the Maiden badly. Branet chatted happily about how she’d survived – no one had told her about her parents yet, Hind realised – and how much she was looking forward to learning new potions. Hind felt tears trickling down her cheeks as she put the child down and motioned for her to eat.

  “I think that you will not get what you want,” the Mother said. She gave Eric and Hind a long considering look. “Do you wish to disturb their happiness?”

  The Maiden looked as if she was going to protest further, but the other two stared at her until she bowed her head in submission. “That was one thing we wanted from you, but not entirely a…important thing,” the Mother said. Hind wasn't sure if she should be relieved or angry. “The other thing we want from you is more complex. You are aware, of course, that Branet is currently without a guardian.”

  Hind winced, wondering if the child had heard, but Branet showed no sign of hearing. The Mother had used the wards to keep the discussion from her ears. “Yes,” she said, flatly. Eric had filled her in on the deaths and his battle with the assassin. “We are aware of that.”

  “We wish you to assume her guardianship, at least until she turns thirteen,” the Crone said, bluntly. “While she is of our blood, she is not one of us and will not react well to being confined to Harmonious Repose. Her parents, had they remained alive, would have provided a link to the outside world for her. We can no longer do that for her, nor could we permit her to leave if she became one of our trainees. In the end, she would either rebel against us or lose all that makes her unique.”

  Hind looked at her sharply, and then down at Branet. “You may speak freely,” the Crone assured her. “She will not hear you.”

  “She’s a child,” Hind said, icily. “Why can you not take her in?”

  “Because she has spent time in the outside world and will not adapt well to spending the rest of her life in the caves,” the Mother said, grimly. Her eyes were sad, leaving Hind to realise that the Mother was a real mother. She had had children and brought them up, watching as they grew to adulthood, making mistakes and learning along the way. “We would be unable to allow her to leave, not as long as she is…unsure of her true place in the world. If she grows to maturity in your company, she will either choose to remain in the outside world or return to join us, secure in her conviction that it will be the right choice.”

  Hind didn’t hesitate. “Then, as far as I am concerned, she has a new set of parents,” she said. Eric nodded in agreement. “Is that all that you want from us?”

  “Unless you decide to change your mind about the children,” the Mother said, dryly. “There is very little else that you can offer us. I suggest that you and your husband and your new child retire to your rooms. It would be best” – she looked at Eric firmly – “if he was to remain within the rooms until the time came for you to leave. Not everyone here is keen to sample the delights of being with a man. Some came to us to escape from men.”

  “I understand,” Eric said, bowing his head. “As long as there’s somewhere to sleep, I don’t mind.”

  “You two have a destiny,” the Crone said, suddenly. “What binds you together held up under pain and suffering and vast temptation – don’t lie to me, young man, I know that you were tempted. Take care of yourselves and your daughter. One day, she will reshape the world.”

  Hind gave her a sharp look. She only knew one other person who spoke like that; Kuralla, the Oracle of the Golden City. The Crone couldn’t be an Oracle, could she? There was only ever one at a time…could that be why Kuralla had pointed them towards the mountains? Was Branet a Child of Prophecy?

  “Thank you,” Eric said. She would have to discuss it later with him, once they were alone. Children of Prophecy were dangerous, for the future could resolve around them. If Herod knew that one had been born – if one had been born – he would stop at nothing to kill her before she grew into maturity. “And if there is ever anything we can do for you, just ask.”

  “You will have to tell her about her parents,” the Crone said. Hind winced. That wasn't going to be easy. “She knows very little about her father’s relationship with us. I would suggest leaving it that way.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  “That lousy stinking son of a motherless whore,” Eleanor burst out, angrily. “How dare he think that he can take me for his wife?”

  She raged on for several minutes, trying to make it look – and sound – good. Her father had once advised her – after unaccountably failing to be swayed by her first and last tantrum as a growing woman – that if one had to lose one’s temper, it was better to
pretend to lose it first and maintain at least a shred of self-control. It was hard to remain focused, but Eleanor managed it, cursing Herod with language she’d learned from some of the servants while thinking hard about ways out of the situation. If there was one thing she was determined upon, she was not going to end up the wife of the man who had murdered her father, even though she knew that it had happened to other Princesses and Ladies in the past.

  “Bastard,” she said finally, and threw herself onto a sofa. It had been an old sofa when it had been given to her – she’d loved it over newer furniture at the time – and it broke under the sudden impact. Eleanor felt her magic burning through her and the remains of the sofa disintegrated in a burst of light, leaving nothing, but charred ashes behind. “He’s a filthy motherless bastard!”

  “I think that you will find that that is a contradiction in terms,” Kuralla said, flatly. The Oracle looked much better now that some of her visions had come burning out, even though the person who had seen them was the last person who should have seen them. Eleanor had touched Kuralla before and she hadn't seen any visions, which made her wonder if Herod had drawn them out of her or perhaps he’d seen them because they were visions featuring him. “There’s no such thing as a motherless child.”

  Eleanor surprised herself by laughing, before she looked down at the remains of the sofa and scowled. Her father would have taken her to task for destroying Royal property, even if it was just an old sofa. She still hadn't forgotten the lecture she’d received back when she’d destroyed hours of Eric’s work back when she had been six years old and wanted her brother to play with her. Some of her tutors would have taken a much sterner view, even though – as a Royal Princess – they were forbidden to touch her by law.

  “You know what I mean,” she said, calling on the Control she’d been taught at the Academy. She didn't want to ask the next question, but it had to be asked. “Is Eric really dead?”

  Kuralla’s eyes were guileless, unaffected by Eleanor’s raging emotions. “I do not know,” she said, finally. She seemed more willing to talk about her visions now, although Eleanor realised that it was only because Herod had seen some of them for himself. “I have not had any visions since your future husband” – her voice was lightly teasing, but Eleanor tensed anyway, clenching her fists – “stormed out of her, laughing his head off.”

  “But you have seen him in the future?” Eleanor asked, or pleaded. “He can't be dead.”

  “It doesn’t work that way,” Kuralla said. “Every vision I had of him in the future might have been invalidated by his death, if he really did die. If I have a vision of him in the future, I will know that he is still alive, but even if I don't...”

  Her voice trailed off. “He might not be dead,” Eleanor finished. Kuralla nodded, flatly. “We can't stay here, not when that motherless murderer means to take me for his wife. I’m not even of age to marry!”

  “You’re of age to get engaged, just not old enough to share blood and consummate the marriage,” Kuralla pointed out. “You might even be able to consummate, even if you cannot exchange blood rings just yet. I think it would be wise not to suggest to Herod that you don’t intend to accept your fate.”

  Eleanor nodded, feeling a chill tickling down the back of her spine. Kuralla was right; if Herod realised that she was thinking about bolting, that she could bolt, he would take swift steps to ensure that she remained in the castle. It wouldn't be hard; for all of her protections, there were spells that could keep her trapped, or hopelessly obedient, if he saw fit to use them. She had to keep her voice low and concentrate on working out a way out of the Golden Palace. Her first idea was clearly not going to work in time.

  “Yes,” she said, and stood up, trying to look cheerful. “Perhaps we should have another game of Guesswork?”

  Several hours passed while they exchanged cards and generally acted like a pair of friends, rather than a pair of acquaintances plotting an escape. Guesswork was partly a game of bluff and bluster – and forward planning – rather than just another game of chance, although Kuralla was uncannily good at it. She was so good at playing that Eleanor even asked her if her gift allowed her to see what cards were in Eleanor’s hand, although she denied it. Even without her Oracle gift, Kuralla had a talent for observation and reading faces, something that came from trying to please supplicants to her temple.

  “I hated the temple while I was in it,” Kuralla had said, in an unguarded moment. “And now all I want is to go back and shut out the outside world.”

  Eleanor smiled as she laid down her final cards, watching as Kuralla ruefully surrendered her hand. There was no point in either of them placing bids, although back at the Academy, some of the betting had become pretty daring during the more complex games. The ones that had included boys had included forfeits and punishments for the losers, although they had never been allowed to get out of hand. The tutors would not have been happy.

  “You won, as I saw,” Kuralla said, with a grin. One of the servants had come inside, presented them with a tray of food and departed, as silently as he had come. Eleanor had considered trying to find a way of winning the servants over to her side, but the jewels in their foreheads made that impossible. Whatever they wanted, wherever their sympathies lay, they were Herod’s creatures, in body if not in soul. “And now I suggest that we go to bed.”

  Thirty minutes later, Eleanor slipped out of her bed, stepped through the weakened ward – if Herod had sensed that Reginald had weakened the ward, he hadn't bothered to repair the damage – and out into the corridor. Carefully, listening for any sign of movement, she walked down to the secret passageway and stepped into the hidden entrance, before heading down to the dungeons. Herod’s guards had been running random patrols through the Golden Palace and she'd had a couple of lucky escapes, even though she was sure that she could have taken them with magic. It wouldn't have mattered. The second she started killing his people within his wards, Herod would know that she had escaped and was roaming his new castle.

  She took several minutes to check the dungeons for intruders before opening the cell, jumping back quickly as an enlarged rat ran past her, something she didn't want to think about in its jaws. The rat population of the Golden Palace hadn't been enhanced deliberately, but like many other creatures exposed to magic, they’d been evolving and growing warped by the magical field. The young Eleanor had heard rumours of entire rat civilisations down in the catacombs, but the older Eleanor merely regarded them as an amusing nuisance. The various Emperors had brought in armies of cats the hope they could kill the rats, yet the rats seemed to have a grasp of tactics and – more often than not – killed the cats instead.

  “Your Highness,” Sir Pellaeon said, as Eleanor entered the cell. It stank, if it were possible, even worse than it had when she had first visited. Sir Pellaeon wasn't getting ill – the healers had engineered all kinds of immunities into his body – but he was clearly growing weaker. Eleanor had been on the verge of offering to try to clean the room when he’d pointed out that that would inform his gaolers that someone had been visiting him in the night. “I trust that you are keeping well?”

  Eleanor eyed him crossly. Sir Pellaeon had not only been one of her father’s trusted confidents, but one of Eric’s tutors, charged with beating some sense into her elder brother’s head. The position had given him some right to take liberties with the Royal Children, yet that was a step too far...no, she corrected herself; he had no way of knowing what threatened to happen to her.

  “I am, it seems, engaged,” Eleanor said, savagely. If Herod had been listening in to the two girls, he had no illusions about what she thought of him. “The bastard wants me for his wife.”

  “Not an unreasonable position on his part,” Sir Pellaeon observed, coolly. “If he were to be married to you, his claim on the Throne would be strengthened beyond any challenge, unless Eric returns home to claim his Throne.”

  “I see,” Eleanor snapped. “How can you be so calm about it? Do
you know what he intends to do to me?”

  Her voice began to shake as she started to lose control. Despite having spent two years at the Academy, she was still a little shaky on what consummating the marriage actually meant. The more worldly girls in her year had been happy to share tales with the less experienced girls, yet Eleanor suspected that most of those tales were lies, or exaggerations. They had all been...vague and imprecise, while the healers and dorm mothers refused to discuss the issue with children until they grew old enough to understand. Even so, even if it was the most pleasant thing in the universe, Eleanor had no intention of sharing it with Herod. She would sooner have married a swineherd and spent the rest of her life helping him with the kids.

  “I am calm because there is nothing I can do about it,” Sir Pellaeon said, and there was a certain resigned nobility in his voice that made Eleanor sit up and listen. “I suggest that remaining here isn't exactly in your best interests.”

  “I had already worked that out, thank you,” Eleanor said, petulantly. “I crept down the passages to the secret exit and the bastard” – she used the word with a certain glee, even though Sir Pellaeon winced every time she spoke it – “has sealed it with stronger wards. I can open the door, but if I tried to step outside...”