by Tim Stead
“Strange man,” Bisalt said. “Started in the ranks, like you.”
“I’ll thank you to hold your tongue, Bisalt,” Jerac scolded him. “I don’t want to be puffed up around the city and have no peace. And tell the men the same.”
“As you wish, sir,” Bisalt said, but by his guilty expression Jerac guessed that it was already far too late.
“Take out ten men and have a look round that Seth Yarra camp,” he said. “See if they’ve left anything we can use. And be careful, there might still be some of them around.”
“Sir.” Bisalt hurried away, glad, for once it seemed, to be elsewhere.
* * * *
The siege was over. It had been a siege, Jerac supposed – a thousand men about a city that was two miles across. It hardly matched the tales. There had been a real danger of the lower city being burned, being looted. Hundreds, perhaps even thousands would have been killed.
Colonel Arbak had fallen on the rear of the enemy just before dawn, and it had been a brief fight. There were prisoners, but given the nature of Seth Yarra there were not that many.
To his surprise Jerac was left in command of the River Gate, told to oversee the repairs to the postern. It was an unexpected pleasure. He picked the men to do the work, and he knew them, of course, though they did not know him. He chose men he had respected. Men who had a good name in the trade, and he talked them through the job. They were surprised, he thought, that a soldier should know so much about their trade, but he told them that Alos Stebbar had been his uncle, and that seemed to please them.
On the second day after the siege a number of people in splendid apparel came to view the gate. By the clothes they must have been from the Castle. At first he didn’t recognise anyone, and simply got on with his work, which was standing around looking alert for the most part.
A horse sidled up to him.
“You look well. Lieutenant now, I hear.”
He looked up, startled that someone from such company should be speaking to him. It was the duchess, the Lady Maryal.
He bowed. “My Lady.”
“You grew bored of being my protector?” she asked, but there was humour in her tone.
“It is much the same here, My Lady,” he said. “And I did not choose this post.”
She laughed, and a couple of noble heads turned at the sound. “Quinnial, what are you going to do with this one now?” she asked. The duke rode over to where he stood.
“Lieutenant Fane,” he said. “What am I going to do with you? It seems that trouble finds you out wherever you are put, but you have a talent for surviving it.”
“I try to do my duty. My Lord,” he replied.
“I confess that I am glad that you do it so well, Lieutenant.”
That was it. Another officer rode over to the duke and resumed their conversation. Jerac was glad to be out of their eyes, and moved away. He watched them mill about in the gate mouth, pointing up at the parapet. It was the major, he realised, telling them what had happened, making a tale of it. He hadn’t recognised the man. He was dressed in considerable finery, red silks and cottons, a blue sash, high black boots that gleamed with polish and bare headed. It certainly didn’t look like a uniform.
Bisalt was, as always, a couple of steps away, ready to be useful. Jerac closed the gap.
“What’s the major up to?” he asked.
Bisalt looked at him, surprised. “You don’t know?” he asked.
“I asked you. I’m not in the habit of asking things I know the answer to,” Jerac said.
“You really don’t know?” Bisalt asked. He was grinning now. Jerac scowled at him. “He’s showing them round – his daughter and son in law – he’s showing them the damage, telling them the battle as it went.”
“His daughter?”
“His daughter.”
Jerac looked at the noble company again. There was only one woman among them. “She’s the major’s daughter?”
“I can’t believe you didn’t know,” Bisalt said.
“Well, how would I? Nobody told me.”
“That’s funny,” Bisalt said.
“No it isn’t.”
“But don’t you see?” the sergeant went on. “It’s the reason we were…” He stopped abruptly. Jerac was glaring at him.
“I’m not stupid, Bisalt,” he said. “You resented me because you thought the major posted me to the guard because I saved his daughter. You thought I wanted that posting?”
Now it was Bisalt’s turn to be taken aback. “You didn’t?” Jerac didn’t answer, just continued to glare. “The guard is the senior regiment. It’s an honour.”
“An honour? We’re lucky we saw any action at all. I wanted to be with Cain Arbak and the Seventh Friend, with Tilian Henn. I’d have chosen no rank at all and to go out and make history with them before an officer sitting on his fat behind over a gate in the city.”
Bisalt stared at him. The sergeant looked shocked. He was struggling to find a reply. Jerac wondered if he should have told the man the truth, but really he could not have done anything to stop the words. They had just come out in an angry rush. Bisalt looked around, but there was nobody nearby that might provide him with a response, so in the end he fell back on the soldier’s standard response to an officer.
“Yes, sir,” he said.
There was a danger here that he might undo all the work he had done with these men. He could see it in Bisalt’s face. The sergeant was proud of his regiment.
“Still,” he said, looking up at the gate. “We made a little history here, did we not?”
“We did, sir,” Bisalt said, and there was a trace of a smile back on his face. “It was the first defence of a gate in Bas Erinor for over a thousand years.”
“I hope it is the last for another thousand,” Jerac said.
* * * *
That evening he was roused from his room at the Seventh Friend by a hammering on the door. It was his habit to sleep through until about eight in the evening when he would rise, have a bath – a luxury that he delighted in – then a hearty breakfast and make his way down to the gate for the start of his guard shift.
The hammering woke him, and he was surprised to see the last traces of daylight still in the sky. It was far too early.
“Go away,” he said.
The door opened, a figure loomed in the doorway, blocking out the light.
“Can’t do that, sir,” a voice said. He recognised it, of course. It was Tane Bargil, the man who ran the inn. He was a big man who walked with a limp, but still big enough to inspire respect, even lopsided.
“Damn it, Tane, I’m trying to sleep,” he muttered, dragging himself upright.
“Sorry, Jerac,” Tane said. “You’ve been summoned. They want you up at the castle.” Tane never called anyone by their rank, even Cain Arbak was just Cain. It was an honour to be called by your first name in The Friend. It meant you were a regular.
Tane put a lamp down on the table in the corner, and a bowl of steaming water and a fresh towel beside it.
“Trouble?” Jerac asked. He appreciated the hot water, but knew it meant there was no time for a bath.
“For you? No. You’ll probably get another horse or a sword or something,” Tane said.
Jerac chuckled. Tane didn’t believe in heroes, which was a good thing working in The Friend. The place seemed to swarm with legends. It was refreshing to be treated with the proper respect due to a man, which was really very little.
“So what’s going on?” he asked.
“I’m an innkeeper, not an oracle,” Tane said. “But they’re all up there. Cain, Tilian, all the lords and ladies. Haven’t seen anything like it since the duke got married.”
“I hate parties,” Jerac said. Not that he knew anything about them. Alos Stebbar had not been to anything that might pass for a party in forty years, not since all his siblings and cousins had been married off. He was a tavern man. He liked to sit about with a few friends and set the world to rights over two bra
ce of ales. Dancing and music were nothing more than distractions, though he had to admit he liked the music in The Friend when Sheyani was playing.
He washed quickly and put on his best clothes, which were actually pretty good. He wasn’t short of a penny after selling the carpentry business, and he had a good coat, pressed trousers, polished boots – enough to make any man think him uncommon. He made sure that his lieutenant’s badge was firmly fixed to the coat, buckled on his fancy sword, and clattered down the stairs to the bar.
It was noisy. The fire blazed on one side and the bar was filled with men for whom work was over for the day. Tane had a kettle hissing away over the flames. Two men in guards’ uniforms waited in chairs by the door, obvious by their sobriety among the revellers: his escort. He took a scalding cup of tea from Tane and sipped it.
“You need something?” he asked the men.
They both shook their heads. Tane, always one step ahead, pressed a hunk of bread wrapped around an Afaeli sausage, or half of one at least, into his hand.
“Eat on the way,” he said.
Outside there were three horses. One of them was Lightfoot, his own mare. So they were going to ride. He mounted, slapped his mount affectionately on the shoulder and they moved off, trotting through the busy streets, people scattering quickly enough to keep clear, though a few unappreciative shouts followed them.
They rode up the Divine Stair. He’d always walked before. It was different riding. The drop on the down side seemed steeper, the view over the city more impressive. Even in the failing light he could see it. It looked better like this, jewelled with lamps and glowing windows, the dirt and damage hidden by the dusk. He could smell wood smoke, and the sea.
They rode through the gate into the high city, nodded through by the men on guard. The same thing happened at the castle gate, and they dismounted in the bailey. Lightfoot was led away and his escort walked with him through the castle.
Jerac had been here once before, and he’d lost himself in the maze of passageways and courtyards. It seemed simpler now. He followed his escort through a series of courtyards and cloisters, down a long stone flagged passageway and up a broad flight of steps. There were other guards here, decked out in full dress uniforms, glittering with polished steel and fake gold.
Here, too, they were waved past. It seemed that all doors were open to Jerac tonight. They reached the end of another corridor, a door was flung open, and he was in the middle of it.
When Jerac thought of parties, he thought of country weddings, tradesmen’s weddings in the low city. There would be tables stacked with food, too much drink, loud music with a solid beat and dancing, endless, pointless, dancing. Alos had been a man who sat close to the food and closer to the ale at such occasions. Perhaps it was the reason he had never married.
This was different.
For a start it was quiet. The men and women in the room were dancing or standing or talking in hushed tones. If he’d dropped a glass everyone in the room would have heard it break. There was music, but the music was thin, gentle, and melodic. It danced the same way the people danced, quiet and complicated. It made him nervous. It made him feel clumsy just to see it. And if that was not enough the clothes they wore were also like nothing he had ever seen. His own best coat, probably the finest garment he had ever owned, looked dull and workmanlike in such exuberant company. A rainbow would have blushed to see it.
To top it all it seemed that every man and woman was arrayed in enough gold, silver and gemstones to buy half the city.
A man appeared at his elbow.
“Lieutenant Fane, will you follow me please?”
He nodded. He followed. The man was small, thin, dressed more like a servant and walked with his toes turned out. His shoes clicked rhythmically on the stone floor as he wove a sinuous path along the edge of the room. Every now and then he paused, waiting while some unheeding aristocrat stepped into his path. Jerac was impressed that he was able to cross the room without colliding with any of them. It was a real skill.
They came to a small, modest door, and the servant opened it, ushered Jerac through, and closed it behind him.
This room was quite different again.
It was well lit but quiet. Jerac would have named it a study, but for the fact that it was half the size of the public bar in The Friend. There were six people here. He recognised Duke Quinnial, Lady Maryal, the major, and Sheyani, and there was another man, a young man who looked familiar, but Jerac couldn’t place him. They were scattered about the room close to a vast oak desk, and had apparently been discussing something before he had been pushed through the door.
“Lieutenant,” the duke said. “Sit down. Will you take a glass of wine?”
Jerac nodded, having difficulty finding his voice in such exalted company. He perched on the edge of a chair and took a glass from the duke’s own hand. The chair, a monstrously comfortable contrivance of velvet softness, should have been insulted by the way he used it, had it a mind.
He sipped the wine. They were all looking at him, and that made him even less comfortable. He clutched the glass, afraid to put it down because his hand would shake and he might spill it.
“You’ve done well,” the duke said, leaning back and sipping from his own glass. “You have performed better than was expected of you, better, indeed, that we expect of anyone. You saved the duchess from certain death, you protected the Eagle, who might have died if not for you, and your timely warning saved the low city, if I’m any judge of it.” His tone suggested that he thought he was.
“I really don’t know how we can reward you, Fane. Especially after you held the River Gate with just five men. Impressive.”
The familiar young man spoke. “And there are stories,” he said. “It’s not just that you held the gate, but the way you held it.” He glanced across at the major, and it was the way he turned his head, the timbre of his voice. Jerac’s eyes widened.
“Cain Arbak!” he said.
Cain smiled. It was him for sure. Jerac should have known at once. He was sitting next to Sheyani, his hand resting on her arm in just the way that Cain always sat, but he was young. He was young like Jerac.
“Yes,” he said. “And the stories?”
Jerac didn’t know what to say. Stories were one thing. Hearing a confession from his own mouth was quite another. Yet there sat Cain Arbak, a man he’d known well enough when he was working on the refurbishment of The Seventh Friend, and Cain Arbak looked half the age Jerac knew him to be. If anybody would understand it must be Cain. But he was afraid. Even looking at Cain’s younger-than-it-should-be face he was afraid to be different, to confess to it.
“Just stories,” he said.
He saw Sheyani look down at the floor.
“You walk with the Wolf,” Cain said.
It was true. He could hardly deny at having told Bisalt that it was so. He nodded.
Cain sat back in his chair. “You went through a change, then, some weeks ago, two months perhaps. It would have been night or late in the evening here.”
What could he say? If he denied it, it would seem as though he lied. If he admitted it, then his secret was laid bare. It was a simple trap.
“Aye,” he said. Honesty was a better fault, he decided.
“And you are stronger, quicker, better than you were before? Be honest, Fane, there is nothing that you need hide from us.” Cain’s eyes were on him, and Jerac felt a reckless spirit take him. Why not say? This was Cain Arbak, a man who he admired, and more to the point, trusted. Cain had always treated him fairly, spoken fairly, acted with charity.
“I am,” he said. “And younger, too.”
Cain and Sheyani smiled. The duke frowned.
“How much younger?” the duke demanded.
Jerac swallowed. There was an answer that was better than a number. “I changed my name,” he told them. “I used to be Alos Stebbar.”
“Alos who?” It meant nothing to the duke, but Cain studied his face.
�
�Yes,” he said. “I see it. Do you see it, Sheyani?”
“I did not know him as well as you, Sheshay.”
“Will someone tell me the answer to my question?” the duke said, his tone a little peevish. “You know this man, colonel?”
“I do, My Lord,” Cain said. “Alos was the master carpenter who fitted the bar at The Friend. At a guess I would say he was between sixty and seventy years old.”