The tiny ferry port of Jump Off lay just to their east, the familiar sight bringing a hearty whoop and a broad smile to Cloak’s face. Most of the houses sat close to the water’s edge, some clinging tenaciously to the low sea wall whilst others sat on stilts, the low waves lapping and splashing against the barnacled timbers. To both the east and west the long narrow jetties used by the fisher folk pressed through the bank side sedges, the thin structures stretching out for many yards into the channel beyond. The tide was ebbing, the delta’s numerous green isles appearing to float on a sea of shimmering blue black mud.
‘Well Cloak,’ said Needle, ‘you know my council. I still think we should stay away from Jump Off. I advise we follow the shore east and make for Rains.’
Cloak shook his head. ‘With respect Master Needle, we don’t have to go to Rains. The flats are my home, I’ve sailed the waters and know my way around the islets and channels of the delta. If we can barter the mules for a half decent skiff we could sail it north east, bypass Rains and head for the low lock on the Red Silk Canal. It will take us half the time, and, it will keep us out of sight.’
Needle stopped at the crossroads just short of the village edge and dismounted. Cloak followed, rolling off the mule’s back, careful not to stand on his swollen ankle. ‘It’s not that I don’t trust you Cloak, it’s more my vain hope that Master Smoke will catch us up. It won’t take him long to guess we’re headed for Thankless and when he does he’ll likely bear hard east towards Rains before seeking a berth on a barge plying into the plains.’
‘True, but as you say yourself Master Cliff, if he manages to follow us this far he’ll know where we are heading and might even arrive there ahead of us.’
Defeated, Needle smiled. ‘You have a persuasive logic Cloak or perhaps it’s just that you engender people’s faith. So much so that I’m sure that if Master Smoke was here himself he would listen to your advice as well.’
Helping Cloak back into his saddle, Needle led the mules down into the village. The Keeper of the Wharf was a hearty gent, helpfully directing them to a small shore side yard. The owner had two old vessels for sale, Cloak choosing to view a small skiff that lay moored to a jetty upstream of the village. As they left the village and headed east, the old wish walker fell into step with the boat owner, exchanging meaningless chatter about the weather while dexterously avoiding any talk about boats, sales and cleats. Cloak rode behind on his mule silently hoping to himself that the skiff was as sound as the man claimed and that Needle was not persuaded to strike a rash deal before he had a chance to inspect the craft. All going well and with a fair wind and a rising tide they would make it safely across the delta in a day. His yearning to return to Delta Crossing had lessoned, replaced now by a growing desire to study under Master Needle. The old man’s belief that the buried temple would in some way trigger his own lost talent was strong. Perhaps his own crest talent could be triggered in the same way, perhaps his own talent could be made latent as well, perhaps then he could wish walk the crested lands and search out the dastard Echo Grave, rescue his guardian mother and kill the shitty dastard. One day, thought Cloak, I will wish walk the world at will.
TWENTY ONE: Escape from Cold Choke
Star Light Willow watched as Smoke’s body tumbled down the slope towards the lip of the cirque, the Weaver applauding as his attempts to slow his descent failed and he disappeared over the edge. There was no need to confirm the man’s death, his limbs were twisted and broken long before the final fall……………….he was no longer a threat
Smoke’s body tumbled backwards through the air disappearing from sight over the sharp lip of the cirque. His fall was short but not short enough to stop him landing with a sickening crunch on a small outcrop of bare rock. Bleeding and Smoke fell into unconsciousness. Had Needle been there to witness his fall he would have surely claimed that fate had intervened. A fall from the lip just six feet to left or right would have doomed the king’s assassin and left his corpse lying in pieces at the foot of the cirque.
Laid out on a slim finger of rock like a corpse at a wake, Smoke survived thought himself dead. The platform that he had landed on was inaccessible from above and invisible from below, too insignificant to catch the eye of even the most vigilant guard. Smoke was beyond consciousness, the assassin deep in a black place and close to death. For now, the abyss where his mind lay remained his only sanctuary from pain, a shadowless place, a place without hope of succour.
As day passed into night Smoke’s life hung in the balance as he lay unmoving beneath a sky peppered with stars. For the next two days his torn flesh lay exposed to the elements, his weeping wounds providing fodder for feasting flies. As the sun rose to herald the third dawn, sunlight raked the walls of the corrie, the spears piercing Smokes eyelids, drawing him close enough to consciousness that his pains surfaced.
Smoke had experienced pain before………..many times. Torture and suffering, broken limbs and cuts to the bone. He sensed he was broken, each heart beat a stab wound, each breath he drew a torment. He knew was not ready to move and doubted he could hold on to consciousness long enough to pray for relief, yet, Smoke forced himself to try. Assembling the prayer word by word, Smoke accepted the pain, knowing from experience that it would not last but had to be suffered. Reaching for the shadows was a sore temptation but prayer did not work in shadow. Prayer had no colour, drawing its power from the sun and the moon. He would not succumb, he would gauge his hurt and heal what he could with words of power. The charms carved on his bones could be drawn on to speed the healing process but in doing so he risked his broken bones knitting crook, safer to suffer, take a single step at a time and heal whole.
The sun arced across the sky, dawn became dusk and dusk starlit night. Smoke tried hard to stay awake, he fought with the pain, smothering it with prayer. Smoke knew how to fight, how to defeat an opponent………….pain would not triumph but despite his efforts, the king’s assassin repeatedly fell into unconsciousness. Slowly ever slowly, the unconsciousness brought on by pain became sleep brought on by healing. By the dawn of the next morning, Smoke felt ready to touch shadow.
Painlessness was bliss, the sharp shadows of the early morning instantly soothing his hurts. His form flowed smoothly from rocky shadow to rocky shadow, following the shade downwards, careful to avoid the bare areas of sunlit shale. The several hundred foot fall became a glide, his passage down to the edge of the tarn taking mere minutes. His emergence from shadow back into sunlight brought with it such searing pain that he tumbled quickly back into another black sleep.
With its outer edge dipping into the black waters, the flat stone that he chose for his bed was no bigger than a morthouse slab. The water of the tarn was cold and bitter but to Smoke, the acidic lake was as nectar, the meagre amount cupped in his left hand tasting like the wine of god, moistening his cracked lips, bathing his swollen tongue and easing his parched throat. Whilst his first cry for help was lost below the sound of the wind and lapping waves, his second hail brought a challenge from above and an order to hold fast. Rescue came quickly as did the initial inquisition as the guards lifted him none too gently from the slab.
Dropped into the well of the boat the agony from his grinding bones sent Smoke once more into unconsciousness. What time passed he did not know or care. When he awoke next his eyes were greeted by absolute darkness, a black space, the air humid and heavy with the scent of blood. He lay on a thin mattress, naked bar his small cloth, his ribs had been bandaged, and his pains subdued. His unbending right arm and leg had been placed in splints, his bones set straight. Drawing on his own healing powers, Smoke focussed his thoughts, enlivening his blood with majic to accelerate the healing. His efforts weakened him as much as they healed him, sending him into a peaceful dreamless sleep.
In the pitch black, time became meaningless, whether it was dawn or dusk immaterial. When the door opened Smoke was asleep and slow to wake, his eyes temporarily blinded by the lamp carried by the guard. As his eyes adjusted to
the glare, the small featureless cell he lay in came into focus. Its walls, floor and ceiling were cut from coal black granite and whilst not visible to his eye, Smoke knew they would be etched with wards.......he had seen such rooms before.
Four folk entered the cell, two men both clan guards and a woman, a high clan sergeant of the guard, the right side of her face marred with a deep diagonal scar. Whilst both men bore short swords at their waist, the sergeant gripped only a steel tipped fighting staff, an unusual weapon of choice, but nonetheless lethal in the right hands. The forth figure was a rotund little man with three chins and piggy eyes, his crest marking him as high clan, possibly even a low royal. Whilst Smoke did not know who he was, he recognised immediately for what he was, a High Inquisitor, a Questor, a finder of hidden truths, with a talent for sensing lies.
‘Who are you?’ said the Questor
‘My name is Smoke Silverfly. I am the high messenger to the king.’ Smoke’s voice was small and croaky, his throat burnt dry.
‘What brings the king’s messenger to Cold Choke?’
‘The king’s own business………’
The pointed steel tip of the sergeant’s staff pressed hard against Smoke’s throat.
‘If you try to slide away from my questions the door will be locked and you will be left dry and hungry to lie in your own filth until you change your mind……………however long that takes,’ drawled the Questor. ‘In Cold Choke, a moon’s cycle means nothing, time here is measured in years and decades.’
‘Questor, I am on a mission for the king. I arrived at Flick’s Pier on the ferry some three or more days ago. I do not know the passage of time exactly. I was travelling on the high trail over the ridge the Holdfast. I fell and tumbled, landing on a slab of rock high on the cirque. I tried to slide down the scree but tumbled again.’
‘You’re more than economical with the truth Master Silverfly. Indeed, I’d go as far as to say you’re a lying little dastard. Travellers to Flick’s Pier are not rare, but, two high crest travellers pursued by a Low Royal Weaver and a squad of fighting talents draw eyes. Do you think high majic is allowed to pass the walls of Cold Choke undetected?……………I ask again.’
‘What I’ve told you is true, but, you are right, I was indeed being pursued. A Weaver, three inner guards and a squad of skirmishers, enemies of the king who wished to delay me and prevent me from completing my mission. In my haste to evade them, I slipped and fell.’
This time the point of the sergeant’s staff broke the skin, the point pressing against his voice box.
‘You little shit, you lie here with your body broken, you’re confined within his majesties most secure hold and yet you still think you can whistle me a tune and blow soot up my arse at the same time? The last man who did that found himself impaled arse to eyeball on the sergeant’s staff.’
The Questor’s search for answers escalated. Obvious questions leading to deep seeking questions, the interrogation methodical, questions repeated and rephrased. It was his talent and incrementally he was calling on it. The faintest of colours tinged the light around the lamp, a deep burnt yellow almost hidden by the natural colour of the whale oil. Smoke suspected that the strong smell of fish that filled the room was a mask, the pungent odour a means to cover the smell of his majic, a sugary smell, barely discernible but there none the less.
Time did indeed mean little inside Cold Choke. After the first interrogation Smoke lay undisturbed for a long time. From a hatch at the foot of the door, food and water were slid across the floor; hard bread, dried strips of salt pork and a small skin of water. Despite his hunger, Smoke ate frugally, not sure when his next meal would arrive. His best guess was that a full day had passed before the hatch reopened, then again, he strongly suspected that time was indeed being tampered with to suit the Questor’s purpose. Left alone in the dark the king’s assassin used his time wisely, focussing on his healing, the set bones knitting quickly under the power of the blood fed charm carved onto his shoulder blade.
His movement was at first limited, sliding himself across the floor on his bottom to reach his food and use the pot. A further day, possibly three passed before he felt well enough to stand, stretching his cold stiff muscles, breathing deep to test the soundness of his cracked ribs. The opening of the door was signalled by the sudden appearance of its outline, time enough for Smoke to shade his eyes and protect them against the harsh light that flooded in from the corridor beyond. No one entered. At the doorway two large guards flanked a third figure, a small elderly man with pale skin, his high crest silhouetted against the light behind. The man was clearly high scripture but against the light his face remained hidden.
‘Is that him, yes or no?’ said a gruff voice
‘I think so.……..’ The guard slapped the man hard across the cheek.
‘I think so is not what I asked. Yes or no?’ replied the guard.
‘Yes, I’ve seen him in attendance around the inner court……..………his name is Silverfly. He delivers the king’s declarations and such.’ The guards pulled the man roughly away, the door closing with a bang, its outline disappearing as the majic locked it fast. The darkness in the cell was complete, no shades of grey, just black. Alone, Smoke’s sense of the passage of time vanished, day and night meaning nothing, the cycle of the moon of no consequence. Whilst passing the hours in sleep would have been an easy option, Smoke knew it was also the path to a lingering death. Succumbing to torpor would atrophy his muscles and waste him away, slow his mind and dull his reactions. To fill his time a pattern and purpose had to be rigidly adhered too, he needed to limit his sleep, concentrate on prayer and contemplation and importantly, maintain as far as he could his mental and physical strength. Smoke rose from his pallet, carefully stretching his muscles before commencing a series of well practiced combat moves, the king’s assassin fighting invisible enemies in readiness for his escape.......and he would escape.
His next interrogation was a trial, draining his waning stamina with hour after hour of probing questions. Talents were being exercised; the sticky scent of the Questor’s majic now thick in the air. He was now also sure the tip of the sergeant’s staff was imbued, its touch multiplying the pain he felt when pressed to his temple or throat. As the interrogation wore on the Questor’s dissatisfaction with his answers grew, the sergeant stepping forward on his command to administer her staff time and time again.
Satisfied that matters were progressing well, the Questor pressed on. He did not take any pleasure in having to inflict pain but when faced with a trophy such as Master Silverfly it served an important purpose. His sergeant did not know it but the use of her potent staff was nothing more than a crude diversion. A cruel woman and enjoyed inflicting pain on men she was careful to ensure that they saw how much she enjoyed the task as she slowly lowered the tip of her staff towards their head, throat or genitals. She would grin as they flinched away or closed their eyes tight shut in anticipation of the blow, and then, when the blow was struck and the majic multiplied the pain several times over, laugh out loud as they screamed. The pain she inflicted seldom if ever brought new answers, nevertheless, the striking of the blow served its purpose, distracting even the most resistant minds and momentarily dropping their mental shields. In that second, his majic would flow, honeying the air, majic so persuasive and compelling that it could draw out truths buried deep or long forgotten.
Smoke had always taken care not to pointlessly aggravate the Questor, remaining calm, never raising his voice and avoiding the temptation to make idle threats of retribution. He did not feel any sudden change in himself, did not sense his resistance wane, his lies grow fewer or his truths grow fuller. The interrogation over, the king’s assassin lay down passively on his mouldering mattress. Exhausted, Smoke fought to stay awake. His senses shrieked at him that something was wrong, very wrong but the more he fought off slumber, the quicker it enveloped him.
---
Time passed, a week a month, perhaps more. Smoke had no idea.
His secrets were many, dark and dangerous. His missions for the king had shaped the kingdom. Some were national secrets know and sanctioned by the High Lords of the Inner Council but many were culls, men women and children, high, good and great, accidents, tragedies and outrages, their assassinations sanctioned personally by his liege and the finger of blame always pointing in the direction of his choosing. Wherever these secrets now lay, whoever’s lips had spoken them and whoever’s ears had heard them, he would seek them out and ‘recover’ them. His king would expect nothing less.
Smoke could only presume that the knowledge obtained from his interrogation had by now been passed to others. The king’s missions were history, secrets from the past and as such immutable but his knowledge about Cloak and his pledge to find and keep the boy safe were a different matter. Burying the secrets of the past would not be easy, but protecting the boy from what lay ahead was another issue, something he could do nothing about as long as he remained a prisoner.
Whatever majics were being employed were very potent, much more so than just the Questor’s talent for compulsion or the sergeant’s brutal staff. Despite the strong smell of fish oil the lamp brought in to light the cell was clearly charmed. He had guessed so the first time he had seen the unwavering shadowless light, the hidden flame too steady to be fuelled by wick and oil. He already suspected the cell was warded, the lines invisible to the eye but as for the passage of time, Smoke was now certain this too was being tampered with in some way. He had healed too quickly; wounds and breaks that should have taken weeks to mend now whole, all tenderness gone, the scars fading...............yet, unless his bladder and bowels played tricks on him, barely a bucket had been passed.
CLOAK - Lost Son of the Crested Folk Page 34