by Paul Kearney
Under his appalled stare, her eyes flooded with yellow light and the pupils became elongated, cat-like slits. He felt her slight body shift and change under his hands. A beast’s growl issued from her throat.
While she is changing. Before it is too late.
He had had the construction of the spell memorized all morning. Now it left him like a swift exhalation of breath and swooped into her.
There was a savage conflict as the birthing beast fought him and the girl writhed, agonized, caught between two forms. But he beat the thing down. It retreated and underneath it he could sense her mind—human, unharmed, but utterly alien. The revelation shocked him. He had never looked into the soul of a shifter before. In the split second before the spell took hold he saw the beast spliced to the girl in an unholy marriage, each feeding off the other. Then she was limp in his arms, breathing easily. He shuddered. The beast had been strong, even in the moment of its birthing. He knew that if it ever became fully formed he would not be able to control it. He would have to destroy it.
Sweat was rolling down into his eyes. He set the girl down, still trembling.
“Prettily done, my friend,” a voice said.
Standing in the room’s doorway was a tall old man who looked as thin as a tinker’s purse. His doublet, though expensive, hung on him like a sack and his broad-brimmed hat was wider than his shoulders. Behind him a frightened-looking young man bobbed up and down, crushing his own hat between his hands.
“Master,” said Bardolin, a swell of relief rushing through him.
Golophin took his arm. “I must apologize for the rowdiness of our entrance. Blame young Pherio here. He does not like me walking the streets in these times, and he sees an Inceptine on every corner. Pherio, the girl.”
The young man stared at Griella as though she were a species of particularly poisonous snake. “Master?”
“Put her on a couch somewhere, Pherio. You need not worry. She will not rip your head off. And hunt up some wine—no, Fimbrian brandy. Bardolin always has a stock in his cellar. Run now.”
The boy staggered off carrying Griella. Golophin helped Bardolin into a chair.
“Well, Bard, what’s this? Consorting with nubile young shifters, eh?”
Bardolin held up a hand. “No jokes if you please, Golophin. It was too close, and it has wearied me.”
“Worth a paper in the Guild’s records, I think. If this is in the nature of research, Bard, then you are certainly on the cutting edge.” He chuckled and swept off his preposterous hat, revealing a scalp as bald as an egg.
“We were expecting soldiers with an Inceptine at their head,” said Bardolin.
“Ah.” Golophin’s bright humour darkened.
“They took Orquil away yesterday. I had thought today they would take me.”
When Pherio came back with the brandy Golophin poured two glasses and he and his one-time apprentice drank together.
“You bring me to the reason for my visit, Bard: these atrocities that the Inceptines practice in the name of piety.”
“What about them? In the name of the Saints, Golophin, they can’t be after you. You’ve been the adviser to three kings. You had Abeleyn sitting on your knee when he was too young to wipe his own arse—”
“Which is why I am the one man the Prelate must bring down. Without me the King has no disinterested advisers—nor any who can tell him what is going on halfway across the world at the drop of a hat, I might add. Abeleyn knows this too, as I hoped he would. With the Prelate on his way to the Synod at Charibon he has a breathing space. Already the burnings have abated, which is why you are here today, my friend. Only the hopelessly heretical are going to the pyre at the moment, but the catacombs are still filling. By the time the Prelate returns there will be thousands there awaiting his pleasure, and if the Synod approves his actions here then there will be nothing Abeleyn can do, unless he wants to be excommunicated. Worse, the Prelate of Abrusio will no doubt try to persuade the other Prelates of the Kingdoms to instigate similar purges in their own vicariates.”
“I have already written to Saffarac in Cartigella, warning him.”
“So have I. He can speak to King Mark. But there is another thing. Macrobius has not reappeared. He must be dead, so they will have to elect a new High Pontiff, a man who shows by his actions that he is not afraid to incur the ill-will of kings in the struggle to fulfill God’s plans, a man who has the good of the Kingdoms at heart, who is willing to purify them with the fire.”
“Holy Saints! You’re not telling me that maniac of ours has a chance?”
“More than a chance. The damned fool cannot see further than his own crooked nose. He will bring down the west, Bard, if he has his way.”
“Surely the other Prelates will see this also.”
“Of course they will, but what can they say? They are each striving to outdo one another in zealousness. None of them will dare denounce our Prelate’s actions in common-sense terms. He might face excommunication himself. There is a hysteria abroad with the fall of Aekir. The Church is like an old woman who’s had her purse snatched. She longs to strike out, to convince herself that she is still all of a piece. And do not forget that almost twelve thousand of the Knights Militant went up in smoke along with the Holy City, so the Church’s secular arm is crippled also. These clerics are afraid that their privileges are going to be swept away in the aftermath of the disaster in the east, so they make the first move to remind the monarchies that they are a force to be reckoned with. Oh, the other Prelates will jump at the chance to do something, I assure you.”
“So where does that leave us, the Dweomer-folk?” Bardolin asked.
“In the shit, Bard. But here in Abrusio at least there is a slim ray of hope. I talked with Abeleyn last night. Officially we never see one another these days, but we have our ways and means. He has intimated that there may be an escape route for some of our folk. He is hiring ships to transport a few fortunates away from these shores to a safe place.”
“Where?”
“He would not tell me. I have to trust him, he says, the whelp. But he does not want our sort fleeing wholesale into the hands of the Merduk, as you can imagine.”
“Gabrion?” Bardolin said doubtfully. “Narbosk maybe? Not the Hardian Provinces, surely. Where else is there that is not under the thumb of the Church?”
“I don’t know, I tell you. But I believe him. He is twice the man his father was. What I am saying, Bard, is would you be willing to take ship in one of these vessels?”
Bardolin sipped his brandy. “Have you put this to the Guild?”
“No. The news would be out on the streets in half an hour. I am approaching people I trust, personally.”
“And what about the rest? Is it just we mages who are to be offered this way out, Golophin? What about the humbler of our folk, the herbalists, the oldwives—even shifters like poor Griella there? Have they a choice?”
“I must do what I can, Bard. I will not be going. I stay here to save as many of them as I can. Abeleyn will hide me, if it comes to that, and there are others of the nobility with sons and daughters in training with the Guild who are, naturally, sympathetic to our cause. It may be that we will be able to evacuate a shipload from time to time and sail them out to whatever bucolic utopia you will have carved out of the wilderness. This thing will blow over once the true extent of the Merduk threat is realized.” He paused. “After Ormann Dyke falls there will be less of this nonsense. The clerics will be brushed aside, and the soldiers will come into their own. We have only to ride out the storm.”
“After Ormann Dyke falls? What makes you think it will? Golophin, that would be a disaster to rival the taking of Aekir.”
“There is little hope that it will stand,” Golophin said firmly. “Lejer’s men were overwhelmed this morning, and soon the Searil line will be fatally disorganized by the refugees streaming west. Shahr Baraz’s army will surely move once more.”
“You’re positive?”
Golophin smiled. “You h
ave your imp, I have my gyrfalcon. I can see the earth spread out beneath me. The mobs of fugitives on the western roads, the blackened ruins of Aekir, the lines of Ramusian slaves trekking north under the lash, may God help them. And I can see the columns of Merduk heavy cavalry fanning out from where Lejer’s men fought their last stand. I can see Shahr Baraz, a magnificent old man with the soul of a poet. I would like to talk to him some day. He has served kings as I have.”
Golophin rubbed his eyes. “Abeleyn knows this. It has helped convince him. I will not be going with him to the Conclave of Kings next month, though. I am needed here, and I must be discreet these days. It will be Abeleyn’s job to try and convince the other monarchs of the knife-edge we teeter on. It may be that he will even save the dyke; who knows?”
He stood up and retrieved his hat. “What about it, Bardolin? Will you take ship? Your little shifter can come along if you’ve a mind to continue your research, but I can do nothing for poor Orquil, I’m afraid. He must make his peace with God.”
Bardolin looked around at the rooms which had been his home for twenty years. He missed the breezy exuberance of young Orquil, and it was a shattering blow to realize the boy was beyond saving. The knowledge left him feeling very old, obsolete. But even his battered old nose could sniff the hint of burning flesh that hung on the air. The city would be a long time getting free of it. And Bardolin was sick of it.
He raised his glass.
“To foreign shores,” he said.
SIX
A terrace shaded by a canopy of stickreed stems, the earthen water jars hanging from every corner to add some moisture to the arid air. In the shade the heat was bearable, and Hawkwood had his hands about a flagon of cold beer as though he were warming them.
The quayside tavern was busy both inside and out. It was an up-market sort of place, not a sailor’s haunt, more the kind of place a landsman would imagine a sailor to frequent. Periodically men watered the street in front of the tables so that patrons would not be sullied by the rising dust as the waggons and carts and mules and oxen and peasants and sailors and soldiers sauntered past.
But the beer was good, straight up from a cold subterranean taproom below the street, and there was a fine view of the harbour. Hawkwood could just pick out the tall mainmast of the Osprey, berthed at long last, her hatches open and men hauling on tackles to bring the precious cargo out into the white sunlight. Galliardo had assured him that the Inceptines no longer came down to the wharves to check the ship crews for foreigners. Things had relaxed somewhat, but Hawkwood had still left orders that none of the Osprey’s crew who were not native-born Hebrionese were to be allowed ashore. The men had not protested: news of Julius Albak’s fate had raced through the port like fire. Yawlsmen on the herrin run reported that Abrusio-bound ships were diverting to Cherrieros and even Pontifidad. The madness could not last. If it did, trade would be ruined.
Hawkwood sipped his beer and picked at his bread. He could hardly hear himself think with the noise of the tavern and the wharves surrounding it. He wished the wind would pick up. He felt almost marooned by the unmoving air, though many a time he had cursed the Hebrian trade as it blew in his teeth and he beat up into it, tack upon tack, trying to clear the headland beyond the harbour.
He must promote himself a new first mate, take on more hands. Would Billerand relish promotion?
For some reason he thought of his wife, delicate little Estrella. He had been back five days and still he had not been home. He hated her tears, her hysterics, her protestations of love. She was like some nervous little bird when he was around, forever darting about and cocking one eye to look at him for approval. It drove him mad. He would far rather be clawed and abused by that high-born bitch, Jemilla.
I love Jemilla, a whisper inside him said, but he hunted the thought quickly out of his mind.
A nobleman on a black destrier clove a path down the crowded street like a crag breaking a wave. He was thin to the point of emaciation, and he wore sable riding leathers, even in the heat. His face was long, narrow, marred by a badly puckered scar, and his hair hung in sweaty strings to his shoulders. A basket-hilted rapier was scabbarded by his side. He reined in and dismounted as the keeper of the tavern rushed out, clucking solicitously and brushing the dust from his shoulders. He batted the man from him, caressed the destrier’s muzzle as a liveryman led it away, and then stalked over to Hawkwood’s table, his spurs jingling. Hawkwood rose.
“My lord Murad of Galiapeno. You are late.”
Murad said nothing, but sat and slapped dust from his thighs with a doeskin gauntlet. The tavern keeper set a decanter of wine and two glasses on the table, and bowed as he retreated. Hawkwood chuckled.
“Something amuses you?” Murad asked, pouring the wine. He somehow managed to give an aura of world-weary contempt that immediately set Hawkwood’s teeth on edge.
“You said you wanted this meeting to be discreet.”
“That does not mean we must tryst in some stinking pothouse. Do not worry, Captain; the people I must be discreet for would never come so far down into the city.”
Hawkwood sampled the wine. It was a Gaderian red, one of the finest he had ever tasted, and yet when Murad sipped his he grimaced as though it were vinegar.
“You said in your missive that you might have need of my ships. Do you have a cargo you wish to transport?”
Murad smiled. His lips were as thin as blood-starved leeches. “A cargo. Yes, I suppose so. I wish to commission you, Captain, and both your vessels, to undertake a voyage with myself and several others as passengers.”
“To where?”
“West.”
“The Hebrionese, the Brenn Isles?” Hawkwood was puzzled. Hebrion was the westernmost kingdom in the world.
“No.” Murad’s voice lowered suddenly, became almost conspiratorial.
“I mean to sail across the Western Ocean, to a continent that exists on the other side.”
Hawkwood blinked for a moment, and finally found his voice. “There is no such continent.”
“And if I were to tell you that you are mistaken, and that I know where it lies and how to get there?”
Hawkwood hesitated. His first impulse was to tell this nobleman that he was either a liar or a fool—or both—but something in the man’s manner stopped him.
“I would need convincing.”
Murad leaned back, satisfied. “Of course you would. No sane captain would risk his ships on a foolhardy venture without some manner of surety.” He leaned forward again until Hawkwood could smell the wine and garlic on his breath.
“I have the rutter of a ship which accomplished the voyage to the west and returned safely. I can tell you, Captain, that the crossing of the Western Ocean took this vessel some two and a half months, with favourable winds, and that it was bound out of this very port. One has but to keep on a certain latitude for some twelve hundred leagues, and the same landfall can be made.”
“I have never heard of this ship, or this voyage,” said Hawkwood, “and my family has been at sea for five generations. Why is this discovery not better known?”
“The master died soon after the return voyage, and the voyage itself took place a century ago. The Hebrian crown has kept the information to itself until now, for reasons of state, you understand. But the time is ripe at last for this information to be exploited.”
“The crown, you say. Then the King himself is behind this?”
“I am the King’s kinsman. I speak for him in this also.”
A crown-sponsored voyage. Hawkwood experienced mixed feelings. The Hebrian crown had sponsored several expeditions down the years, and the captains of some had become rich, even ennobled as a result. But many others had lost their ships, their lives and their reputations.
“How do I know you come from the King?” he asked at last.
Wordlessly, Murad reached into his belt pouch and produced two rolls of parchment weighed down with heavy seals. Hawkwood unrolled them with sweating hands. One was a
Royal letter of credit for the hiring and provisioning of two ships of between eighty and two hundred tons, and the other was a letter of authorization conferring upon Lord Murad of Galiapeno the governorship of the new colony to be founded in the west with the powers of viceroy. A list of conditions followed. Hawkwood let the parchments spring back in on themselves.
“They seem genuine enough.” In truth, he was shocked. He felt as though he were cruising in through shoaling water without a leadsman in the bows.
“Why me?” he asked. “There are many captains in Abrusio, and the crown owns many ships. Why hire a small independent who is not even Hebrionese?”
“You fulfill certain . . . conditions. I want two ships owned by the same man; that way it is easier to keep a track of things. You are a skilled seaman, not afraid to sail the lonelier sea lanes beyond sight of land. It is amazing, the number of so-called sea captains who do not feel comfortable unless they have a coastline within spitting distance of their hull.”
“And?”
“And, I have something you want.”
“What?”
“Your crew, Hawkwood, those men of yours currently interned in the catacombs. Take on this commission and they will be returned to you the same day.”
Hawkwood met the cold eyes and scimitar smile, and knew he was being manipulated by the same forces which governed kingdoms.
“What if I refuse the commission?”
Murad’s smile did not waver. “Six of them are marked down for the pyre tomorrow. I would be sorry to see such worthy men go to the flames.”
“It may be that I value my own skin over theirs,” Hawkwood blustered.
“There is that, of course. But there is also the fact that certain captains with a large proportion of foreigners and heretics in their crew are open to investigation themselves, especially since some of those captains are not even Hebrionese to begin with.”
So there it was: the sword hanging over his head. He had expected something like this from the moment he had seen the Royal letters. He uncurled his fist from around the wine glass lest it break.