by K Dowling
Taking his chance, Alexander ducks down into the nearest alleyway. The Rogue is still struggling within his grasp. He sets her down hard upon the ground, keeping his hand tight about her wrist.
“Let me go,” she snarls.
“If I do, will you run with me?” He is dragging her along the alleyway, ignoring her muttered protests. There is no time to stop—the general will be hot on their heels. He curses himself silently.
What have I done? It was none of my business.
“Fine,” the young woman snaps. “You’re hurting me.”
He releases her arm. She moves in step with him, her breathing falling erratically from between her lips.
“Where next? They’ll find us down here in minutes.”
“In here!” whispers a disembodied voice. To their left, a heavy wooden side door swings ajar. The smell of day old meat leeches out into the alley. “Quickly!”
The young woman catches Alexander’s eye and he proffers a small shrug. They slip through the door into the darkness. It slams shut behind them. They are swallowed in shadow. Panting, they linger before the door while they try to catch their breath. Alexander can hear boots on the street outside—the general. He races by the door, his muffled footfalls fading into silence.
“Wait a few moments, catch your breath,” urges the voice. Alexander keeps his pistol trained upon the darkness as he stares into the shadows. The voice, undeniably male, seems to emanate from all around them. He cannot locate the source.
“The good general’s shift is almost over for the day. He will not continue to give chase once he is off duty, you can count on that.”
“Who are you?” the Rogue demands.
A languid chuckle echoes through the expanse. “I think the question you should be asking is not, who am I, but who is the mysterious savior that plucked you from the square?”
Through the shadows, Alexander can feel those green eyes alight upon his face. He grimaces and says nothing.
“Put your pistol away, Captain. I mean you no harm.”
“Who are you?” the Rogue repeats, more nervously this time.
“I am Nobody,” replies the voice.
CHAPTER 10
Roberts the Valiant
Roberts went to the cathedral at noon, as instructed. He waited upon the steps—his suspicious green gaze scanning the crowd around him—and tried to be patient. Shuffling his feet upon the grey stone of the great staircase, he counted the bells as they chimed the hour. He could feel the reverberations deep within the ground beneath his feet.
And then he heard a voice.
Roberts the Valiant?
It came from behind him, nearly blending into the chatter of the oblivious crowd that mingled upon the steps. He nodded to indicate that he had heard and contined to peer out into the street. Across the way, a donkey was braying loudly. A young woman, her gown stained the color of mud, was perched upon the street beneath the animal. He watched the scene unfold, trying his best to look unremarkable. No one was looking at him.
Follow, came the command.
He turned obediently and found himself walking up the steps after a very ordinary looking man in a brown tunic. The man did not glance back at him. He did not say a word. Roberts followed him through the grand double doors of the building and into the marble foyer.
Now, only moments later, he stands alone—abandoned, it would seem, among a flurry of melting candles. Clumps of hot wax pool upon the floor at his feet. He stares around at shadows. The muttered prayers of Chancians are stifled by the lingering darkness.
He lost the man as soon as they were deep enough inside the cathedral. A cluster of scarlet-robed Elders passed them by, their voices joined in a humble tenor tune.
Confess, the stranger whispered into his ear. And then he was gone. Roberts never even saw his face. The Elders rounded the corner and disappeared out of sight. The echo of their somber hymn trailed eerily behind them.
The multitude of flickering candles makes it hard for him to see. The flames prick at his vision. Beyond the golden aura of light he can only make out indistinct shadows. He moves deeper into the cathedral. His bare feet are silent upon the floor. The Chancians do not take any notice of him as he passes. They kneel upon the checkered stone tiles, their heads bowed and their eyes closed. Lifeless grey statues loom heavily over the praying figures that kneel at their stone feet. Their dead eyes and austere faces appear inhospitable to Roberts. They are holy saints, he knows, and yet he cannot name a single one.
What did the stranger mean, confess?
He wonders if perhaps the man meant for him to kneel at a statue as well. If so, which one? He glances around. All of the saints seem to be taken. He wanders further through the cathedral, trying his best to remain invisible. It is not that he and his kind are not permitted within the walls of the church—far from it, in fact. Rather, it is not common to see a gypsy wandering through a place of prayer. His people do not practice the monotheistic religion of the Westerlies as men of Chancey do. His mere presence beneath the ribbed vaults of the towering arched ceiling will certainly draw unwanted attention. There has been so much secrecy around his meeting with the elusive Cairan king. He is sure he is not meant to cause a scene. Not here—not now.
As he nears the far end of the church’s main building he spots two enclosed booths along the wall. They are constructed from a dark oak, but the latticed panels upon the doorways are gilded. One door has been left open and Roberts notices that it is empty inside. He is thrust, suddenly, back to his childhood, when his Chancian father would come to the church in order to confess his sins to the religious Elder. Roberts would sit in the booth upon his father’s lap and wonder how long it would be until he could go back outside and play.
Forgive me Elder, for I have sinned, his father would begin.
Roberts feels suddenly confident.
Confess, the man said to him. He is sure, now, that this is what was meant. Roberts heads over to the abandoned booth, taking care to stick to the shadows that hover in the cool shade of the low, wooden pews. Taking a seat inside, he pulls the door shut.
He is enveloped in instant darkness. The stippled light that seeps through the gilded panel does not manage to illuminate the rest of the booth. The golden pane glitters peculiarly as the wavering flames outside dance across its uneven surface. Roberts sits in silence and waits.
Nothing happens.
“Hello?” He feels unreasonably foolish, sitting there, whispering at shadows.
There is, as he expected, no response. Agitated, he begins to think that he must have done something wrong. He does not understand why the stranger on the steps could not have been more direct with his orders. No one was paying the slightest bit of attention to the covert exchange that passed between them. He feels sure, in fact, that this whole theatrical show of mystery is entirely superfluous.
He is about to stand up to go when he hears the muted squealing of hinges at his back. There is a rush of air—an icy puff of wind upon the back of his neck. He glances over his shoulder and is instantly surprised by what he sees. There, behind the stiff wooden chair in which he had been seated, is a narrow opening. A flickering torch sits in a sconce upon the wall. Roberts can just make out the outline of a steep staircase winding into the darkness and out of sight.
He glances in front of him at the glittering golden panel upon the door before turning his attention back towards the looming darkness.
Here goes nothing, he thinks wryly. Stepping carefully into the shadows, he begins his descent. The air is cold, here—the steps are steep. As he descends the narrow stars, he realizes that he is heading deep into the catacombs beneath the church. A shiver creeps unbidden down his spine. The lambent aura of the torch at the top of the steps does not reach very far. Before long, he is encapsulated by the pitch-black night that lurks beyond the warm, orange glow.
He uses his toes to feel forward, seeking out the definitive edge of each step before moving forward. Slowly but surely,
he makes his cautious way down the stairs. He can feel the darkness tearing at his skin—or does he just imagine that?
He is not sure how long he has been walking in the dark before he sees a thin strip of flickering light in the inky blackness. As he draws nearer he can see that it is the flicker of a candle spilling out from the bottom of a doorway. He feels the last step with his big toe—steps with relief onto flat ground. His nose is nearly pressed into the wood of the door. He knocks—waits.
A panel is pried open with a squeal. Golden light spills across his face. He blinks rapidly in the sudden radiance, his eyes narrowing. Two blue eyes study him from behind the slot in the door.
“State your name.”
“Roberts the Valiant.” Surely the man behind the door already knows who he is. He doesn’t imagine the Cairan king entertains many social visitors down here in this damp, dark hole.
“What is your purpose here?”
Roberts hesitates, considering the question. “I was invited,” he mutters after a moment. He does not know what else to say. He is not entirely sure what the purpose of this visit is, after all. The panel before his face is pulled shut with a thump. He hears the brassy click of several bolts on the other side of the wood. The door is wrenched open.
“Come inside.” The man that stands before him is portly in size. His doublet—a faded red color—is several sizes too tight. Numerous bronze buttons look as though they might pop free of their grommet at any moment. The man stares down at Roberts from the top of his hooked nose.
“Er, are you the king?” Roberts asks when the man remains silent. This question causes the well-built man to burst into laughter.
“That’s funny,” he says at last, pawing his eye with the back of his hand. “He’ll like that, he will.”
Roberts frowns, his answer received. He glances behind the man to survey the room in which he finds himself. It is small and unassuming, hardly the type of quarters he would expect a king to own. There is but one seat in the room—a beaten green divan over which someone has arbitrarily tossed a violet satin blanket. The rest of the room consists of a number of tables of various shapes and sizes. Upon each of these tables sits curled and crinkling maps. He cannot make out the details from where he stands, cornered before the entrance. His curiosity aroused by the peculiarity of his circumstance, he longs to move about the room and study the maps more closely.
He glances towards the man before him and decides better of it. The guard—if that is indeed what the man is—is still staring him down in unreadable silence, his bulging arms crossed tightly over his chest.
“Will he be returning soon then, the king?” Roberts asks.
“Yes.”
He had hoped to receive a more fulfilling answer than the one he is given. He clears his throat and thinks of another question.
“Where has he gone? If you don’t mind me asking.”
One bushy eyebrow rises upon the man’s head. “I do mind.”
“Oh. Sorry.”
They fall back into silence. Roberts is saved from having to ask any more unwarranted questions when a small door is wrenched open at the far side of the room. A lean, violet clad figure springs into the quarters. His sleek black hair is pulled loosely from a widow’s peak at the center of his forehead. High cheekbones cut across his face, causing sharp shadows to paint the lower half of his face. A golden hoop dangles from one earlobe. He is panting as though he has recently been running. Seeing Roberts standing uselessly at the center of the room, a wide smile cracks across his lips.
“Roberts,” he cries, surging lithely across the space. He takes Roberts’s hand roughly in greeting. “I have been waiting hours for your arrival!”
Roberts thinks it an interesting choice of words, considering the man before him was the one who was late. He opts not to voice this thought aloud.
“Yes, hello,” he replies, surprised at the firmness of the man’s grip.
The Cairan king shoots a sidelong glance at the portly, lopsided man besides Roberts.
“Tophurn, you can go.”
Roberts watches as the man called Tophurn turns away without a second glance. He stalks wordlessly across the sparse room and disappears through the narrow doorway at the far end of the expanse.
“I hope Tophurn wasn’t too threatening.” The Cairan king continues to vigorously shake Roberts’s outstretched hand. “He isn’t the friendliest of men, but he gets the job done.”
“I can see that.” Roberts watches the door slide back into place in its frame, lifting his palm out of the man’s firm grasp.
“You must be wondering why I’ve called you here.”
Roberts proffers a shrug, venturing a guess. “I assume because of the fire at Toyler’s yesterday.”
The lanky man laughs at that, and the sound spills easily away from him. His blue eyes, so deep they are almost violet, twinkle in the hazy golden candlelight. “Quite right,” he says. “I’m sure I don’t have to tell you, friend, that times are changing.”
Roberts thinks of the recent arsons in the city—of the occasional unexplained disappearances—all at the hands of the guardians. He thinks also of his family, killed in cold blood all those years ago. Furrowing his brow, he wonders if in fact things have not simply always been this way. He is about to mention this when the man changes topics abruptly.
“Do you know Harrane the Hostile?” He paces away from Roberts, a strand of sleek, black hair draping across his face. His left hand twists a thick golden ring round and round upon the thumb of his right hand. “Or, I should say, did you?”
Roberts pauses, caught off guard by the question. “I do, yes,” he admits. “Although not well.” He takes silent note of the man’s careful word choice. Did, he thinks. Has he died?
“He kept to himself,” the man explains, rounding upon Roberts with glittering eyes. “He was one of mine, you see.”
“One of yours?” Roberts repeats, feeling confusion flickering across his brow.
“Yes.” One corner of the man’s lip twitches slightly as he studies Roberts’s perplexed expression. “They call themselves my Listeners. I have recruited a handful of men to help me to infiltrate the city—to be my eyes and my ears upon the streets of Chancey. Tophurn is one of them, in fact.”
“Oh.” Roberts finds himself suddenly wondering what any of this has to do with him, or his presence at the fire the previous day. The man does not wait for Roberts to add anything valuable to the conversation before continuing on without him. He drops down upon the green divan, a cloud of fluttering dust motes dispersing about his narrow frame.
“My Listeners were at present Toyler’s when it burned. We had received word long before General Byron and his men even visited poor Manfred Toyler—rest his soul—that they were planning on torching the place. I called together some of our strongest to spark an insurgence against the guardians. We wanted to create enough of a distraction to allow the Mames and their maidens to clear out the wounded.”
Roberts recalls the way that the Cairans had rushed the golden guard as the flames licked at the sky. He had thought it was an act of passion—an angry response to the evil that had been done that morning. Who was to know that it had been premeditated?
“I, of course, was responsible for the act,” the man continues. “Harrane was against it from the beginning. He believed that the guardians would simply execute us on the spot for our actions. He went along easily enough, however. He always did. It’s his duty to agree with me.” He laughs at that, although his indigo gaze is laced with naked grief.
“He is dead—Harrane. My Listeners inform me that he was executed at the usurper’s feet before breakfast.” He swallows thickly, clearing his throat. “It is tragic and unnecessary. He died for me— protecting my identity from my enemies.”
Roberts considers this. “How can you be so sure that he was killed?” Surely the Listeners, as skilled as this man might believe them to be, have not been so adept as to be able to infiltrate the palace walls
. It is more likely that Harrane the Hostile was taken into custody in prison. “King Rowland prefers public executions. He likes a show.”
The man is nodding his agreement, the movement causing a stray lock of hair to spring out from his sleek pompadour and fall across his brow. His lips have settled into a solemn grimace. “Indeed he does. That is why, earlier this morning, Harrane’s corpse was strung up in the square to be picked apart by crows.”
Roberts freezes. His hands clench into fists at his side.
“It’s a reminder to me,” the man says, leaning back against the violet throw. “It’s a message from my enemy. The usurper doesn’t like to be crossed. He thinks that this will frighten me back into the shadows.”
“What do we do?”
A small flicker of a smile teases at the king’s lips.
“We?” he asks.
“Yes,” Roberts asserts, feeling more than a little annoyed. “I may not be one of your Listeners, but I’m a Cairan. This affects me, too.”
“Indeed it does,” is all the man says, lapsing into a long silence as he studies Roberts through narrow, glittering eyes. Just when Roberts begins to fidget uneasily beneath his gaze, the man resumes speaking.
“All that can be done for now has already been accomplished. That is why I was late to our little meeting today. I went to the square myself. Harrane didn’t deserve such a degrading funeral. He has a mother, and his body should have been with her, the dear old woman. I meant to cut him down myself—I owed him that.”
“Meant to? You mean you didn’t?”
“No, I didn’t. The body had already been cut away by the time I arrived. You may know the young woman responsible for the act. I believe she is your sister.”
“Emerala?” Roberts feels his blood run cold. She had been gone when he woke up this morning. He had given little thought to her absence, so distracted had he been by his looming meeting with the Cairan king. “Where is she?”