The Winter Road

by Adrian Selby

  One of Seikkerson’s riders coughed, an obvious gesture of derision or disagreement. As I was close to him I squeezed Crogan’s shoulder before he could rise to the insult. I needed to find out about Khiese and I now had the opportunity to spend some time with Seikkerson.

  “Lead us on, Jeife Seikkerson; if you wish I can tell you more of my outposts and plans for my road.”

  “And I expect you’ll wish to hear more of Khiese.” He turned his horse about before I could answer and led us along heathland, the briars and grasses bent east against the years of prevailing westerlies.

  Crimore was the main Seikkerson settlement, a stone longhouse with a stone tower at one end of it on a natural motte with two palisade-walled baileys stretching down the side of a valley. Ours was the only way in, a river cutting through and past us from a waterfall and cliffs at the far end of the valley. Our track was heavy going with mud from what must have been recent flooding. We all got filthy getting the planks down and the wagons over them.

  Here we saw the lie of Jeife Seikkerson, for the banners flying along the stone walls was not those of the owl. The Khiedsen banner was a high ash tree, red on brown. These was black flags, the red ash upside down. As we got closer a murmur went through the van. The outer bailey’s fence of stakes was decorated with naked bodies—blackened skin, distorted and torn, savaged by birds. Some was mostly bones, patchworks of flesh and sinew all that remained.

  A few soldiers come out, while more sentries was at platforms against the fort walls, no doubt on a seeing mix. Men and women took up bows among the smaller longhouses, huts and animal runs.

  Jeife shouted out in their local Abra whatever was needed to reassure them and they stood down.

  Aude was walking alongside me and our horse, the pair of us exhausted and muddied from helping with the wagons. Mosa rode, rocking in the saddle and no doubt himself tired after running with Chalky’s girls around the van. He hadn’t, thankfully, noticed what was on the fort’s walls.

  “You’ve been here before,” said Aude.

  “I have. They don’t hang bodies out like this, not for anything. Or they didn’t. Jeife’s da was chief when I was last here as a girl, same blond hair, but had paid colour hard. He had the shakes far worse than me, a pipe of kannab might as well have been stitched to his mouth. I don’t think he could even have fed himself without it. Last I saw Jeife he was chasing me about, a girl of thirteen years I was, visiting with old Auksen and my da, who was trying to teach me plant and hunting. I say trying because I knew more than he did, out with my ma for years sniffing and snaring game while he was trying to make something of my brother in the dealings with Seikkerson here and the Amersens and Carlessens down south. So one year he brought me along. I think he was aiming to see what my brother would do for the clan while we was away.

  “Back then I had beautiful hair, before the colour, and Jeife kept asking for a strand of it, and though at the time I thought boys was stupid, Jeife was the first I ever thought about kissing.” I give him a dig with my elbow. He shook his head, smiling.

  “He couldn’t tally your ledgers like I can.”

  “No, you always make it right.”

  “I thought Cleark Thornsen did your counting, Ma, not Da.”

  “Well, he doesn’t tally all of them, Mo,” I said. Mo yawned and his eyes drooped.

  “I have to see Jeife’s brother, who’ll be the chief. Thende was always the cleverer. I hope he can help me understand this.”

  “Those banners bother you and all, don’t they?” said Aude. “You’ve not taken your eyes off them.” He’d caught me looking up at the fort as we talked.

  “Not near as bad as the poor Seikkersons on those walls. It makes me sick to see it. The banner’s a Khiedsen banner, disrespected in the way it’s been altered, but to fly it over a clan’s home settlement, well, why aren’t this Khiese’s men here, occupying the fort? How far does his influence extend?”

  He said nothing. He’d followed my line of thought.

  “I’ll need to speak to Crogan. We’ll push on to Auksen lands, I want to know what’s happened to my family.”

  “Of course.”

  I hid it from him, but seeing banners where they shouldn’t be, thinking of my family’s own colours deposed, burned me up inside, and it was upsetting me because I wasn’t expecting to feel like that about a place I hadn’t been for eight years. With Ma and Da gone there was nothing, or so I thought. But there’s a knot, must be in all of us, mustn’t it, a protectiveness when we think of the fields, faces and songs that rise in our memories on our thinking of home. I know I said what I said about my ancestors, that rope of elder, da and son, but nobody wants their name to just vanish from the world.

  We come to the outer bailey. Jeife dismounted and give the reins to one of the men—must have been a guard, though he had no colour.

  I stood with Crogan, Eirin and Chalky. Chalky nudged me and pointed up to the tower. There was a bowman up there and alongside him another, a figure bone-white as though caked in chalk, skin and head; bare-chested, eyes painted black. He dwarfed the bowman. As Jeife began speaking he left the lookout, descending out of sight inside.

  “You shall feast with my brother, he is aware of your coming.”

  “That would be your ghost, I guess,” I said, pointing to the tower where the man stood.

  “Who, the sentry? No, I sent a rider here before we rode up to your van. Bring the wagons inside. I will find our quarter, he will arrange where your retinue will sleep. Master Amondsen, I would be honoured if you would sing your Family creed after we have eaten. You sang it so beautifully as a girl.” He held out an arm for me to take. Patronising shit. I took his arm and we strode ahead of the others along the wide track sloping up through Crimore to the fort. It was an insult to Crogan of course and I was fine with it.

  “Your keep, the skinny one?”

  “Aude, yes.”

  “Looks tame. Did it take long?”

  “Do you think he should have bigger muscles? Some colour?”

  “Can’t be much to get your juices going when his woollens come off.”

  “I can see why your brother’s the chief, Jeife. If you had any wit you’d be able to answer those questions on your own, as well as understand that they’re too stupid to get my hackles up.”

  “That your boy, with him?”

  “What do you think?”

  He shrugged. “I didn’t hear of a fightbrew didn’t take a woman’s womb.”

  “He calls me Ma, it’s good enough for me.”

  I kept looking for a sign of the man painted white, but there was nothing. The van had brought most of the Seikkerson family out of their huts, the workshops and off the runs. The children was quiet.

  We was nearing the inner bailey and the chief’s longhouse itself. The arched doors split open, grand enough but diminished against the memory I had of them as a girl. Thende would be out to greet us.

  “You’re flying a banner I don’t recognise. It insults the Khiedsens.”

  “It is Khiese’s banner. He is lord of these lands, though once was exiled from his own. My clever brother Thende did not lose many of our family before he realised Khiese’s might. Khiese is a man of his word. Always. Obey him and all is well. Cross him and he is savage, without mercy.” He gestured to where we had seen the dead on the outer fence.

  “This is Citadel Hillfast, Jeife. The Circle is still part of the lands of the citadel.”

  “No, Teyr, it isn’t.”

  Thende walked out of the longhouse and down the steps cut into the motte. His colours were pale, a faint yellowy green. He must have paid out many years ago, no doubt when he was made chief. He was taller than Jeife, towering over his guards as though they was children, though rangier than an infantryman, a strong runner. He wore the long, intricately carved gold beard ring of the Seikkerson chief but was almost bald.

  “Lord Crogan Othbutter of Hillfast. Masters Amondsen and Knossen. My hall is yours.”

 
The others had caught up to me and Jeife as we waited for Thende.

  “Elder Seikkerson,” said Crogan, “may Haluim keep us safe. We bring gifts, among them a new recipe for your book that our chief wishes to share with all the clans.”

  They clasped arms. Crogan would have also said “we bring justice,” but he was clever enough to leave that out, though all about would be aware it was unsaid. Now, in front of a gathering, wasn’t a time for questioning fealty. That would come later.

  I lingered a moment as Thende gestured for us all to join him inside the longhouse. Looking back down the hill, I saw how beautiful this valley was, the faint hiss of the waterfall to our right behind the chatter and churning songs, snow on the high ridges and now only in patches as this fertile land come to life again. The settlement’s children should have been happier than they were. Mosa was up on Aude’s shoulders as they too looked across the valley and the cold clear river to the hills beyond. At home he’d drag me out at this time of year to harvest moss, shiel and any other plant we could find, always hoping for that rare pea-sized budding flower of the blueheart. I told him he’d get a silver piece for each one, all of which he kept in a small bag in a secret hole in the floor of our bedroom. But these children seemed listless in their doorways or on the skirts of their mas. I’d seen it before many times, always after a slaughter or some other horror.

  I waved down to Aude before turning to enter the longhouse. Little had changed, barracks to the right, the chief’s feasting hall ahead and the forges and workshops to the left. Still no sign of the painted man.

  Inside the feasting hall a second firepit was being prepared for the evening, the main pit giving off a welcome warmth. On the far side of the hall an open archway led through to Thende’s just, where he would sit over disputes, and beyond that was his own room.

  “See that Lord Crogan’s retinue and I aren’t disturbed,” Thende told a guard. Jeife was stood with Crogan, Chalky and me.

  “Jeife, could you see Lord Crogan’s soldiers and the mercenaries have spots to lie tonight.”

  I give Jeife enough of a hint of a grin to sting him, and the guard closed the door to Thende’s room. I was glad to see he still slept on straw, though in a wooden frame well worked with carvings of hunting and beautiful depictions of the plant we made so much use of in these parts. There was an equally ornate desk set sideways on to a huge hearth and fire, though on it was folded robes and woollens that must have been washed for him. Shutters was open high on the walls, but they did nothing to lift a weak and sorry light.

  “Your father, your entire rope, must wish you severed for flying whatever that banner is over Crimore,” said Crogan, the moment the door had shut.

  Thende looked hesitant, nodded, struggling with Crogan’s openly hostile way of speaking.

  “Khiese came, brought with him forty-two boys, all of them were twelve to twenty summers at most, six from each of our Families. He had twice as many as we could have mustered, painted white, well armed. Looked like the dead risen and put a fright among my people”

  “Whiteboys, there was one at the top of this tower as we walked into Crimore,” I said.

  “No, there couldn’t have been.”

  “What happened?” said Chalky before I could press him on it.

  “Well, Khiese stood at the gates, out of bowshot. One of his painted men, huge man, not of these parts, shouted out that if we didn’t allow him to make his case for ruling over the Circle he would slaughter us all. We stayed quiet. The first instinct, the first thought any of us had I’m sure, was defiance, for the insult would be hard to wear on the High Family of a clan. But Khiese’s flag flies above us and so you have an answer.

  “I said I would hear Khiese. Taking boys of my clan, from our Families about, with no word reaching me was a shock to me. I needed to understand him better, whether he was a mouthpiece for some other power. He spoke softly, standing where you four are stood now, not even the size of Teyr, though he had a rich green web—as the veins are sometimes called—and a dark yellow colour such as you would see on wildmen. Hard to see at first what men or women would fear in him. He told me he had the Khiedsens, Triggsens and salt-trading Eeghersens swearing fealty to him. I laughed at him, Triggsens and Eeghersens being big proud clans. He was calm, understood in a strange way why I might have laughed, told me what I was thinking, reminded me the Khiedsens were the most feared clan north of the Circle. He is a Khiedsen, or was. Took the name Khiese instead of Khiedsen to dishonour them. Said he was chief of the Khiedsens and all those clans and now, he said to me, yours.” Thende looked at me at this point.

  “I was about to tell him what a problem that would be for both of us when he told me himself. My Families had already sworn him fealty, they would not raise a sword for me. I would not get our tithe, nor men and women to manage our borders and farmlands, and here of course he meant plant rights. He told me we were under siege if I did not fly his banner. He told me Jeife was ready to take my place if I wished to die with honour.”

  “That is a serious dishonour upon him. It would get Jeife killed among the Amondsens,” I said.

  “Why aren’t you dead? What do your people think of you?” said Crogan.

  “They’re alive to think it. The dead you see on the walls were those that went against him.”

  “Every one of you alive has betrayed the clan. They’ve betrayed Hillfast.”

  “What would you do, Crogan?” he said. “You might call him a savage when you look at our walls, but that is merely the price of defiance. Better soldiers, better equipped than the handful I’ve got here, no way of getting a bird to Hillfast and, besides, what would be the use when we see nothing of the Othbutters, no justice, no arms. Would you have me burn this whole Family for pride? For a flag?”

  “Yes, Crogan, what would you do?” I added. Fuck him. Not the wit to see Thende was neutered, nor yet that a struggle would have taken place if Khiese had been alone in this room with Thende. Crogan stepped to me, his face inches from mine, his jowls and neck quivering as he spoke.

  “What could you know, Amondsen, of honour, multiplying your coin while playing at mother? You took purses wherever they were fattest, left your family before you could even begin to repay them for raising you.” He turned back to Thende. “I wouldn’t have believed him, Thende. I would have had him killed. I would have killed him myself.” Thende saw me ball my fist and put out a hand to stay me from doing something stupid.

  “I drew my sword, for I saw he had none,” he said. “I thrust, he spun on one leg, back bent and palmed the blade away. He moved in and winded me, his elbow, his fist in my face. I was on my knees and I’d lost two teeth in a breath. Before I could flinch he had his thumbs on my eyes. ‘I understand,’ he said. ‘You had no choice, me alone, unarmed.’ So he stood back, looked at me like he was my da all disappointed in me, said, ‘You can try again, once more, first move, but I’ll kill you if you don’t kill me, and I hope you’d put your clan over your own honour, as hard as that must be.’” Thende was silent for a moment. The confidence he had put out when he greeted us at the gates was gone. He was broken, I could see it now, shoulders curved in, drooping at the neck like he had an anvil on a necklace.

  “What shall we do now then, Crogan?” I asked. It was that or beat him to the ground. He knew fuck all about why I’d left home. Besides that, we really had a problem. Khiese’s hold on the Circle was worse than we could have thought.

  Thende looked at me then.

  “Khiese said the Auksen clan are falling into line, all their families. He could be lying.”

  “We’ll go after him,” said Crogan. “It seems he’s ambushed a great many Families unready or unable to cope with his crew of whiteboys. We’ve brought our own crew, Hillfast’s best. You’ll give us his whereabouts.”

  “You should have taken more interest in the Circle these last few years, and this might not have happened, Khiese might not have gained so much ground,” said Thende. “Your collectors used to co
me for your tithes and return with our tidings, our requests for justice, which went always unanswered. Little wonder vans like yours need so many soldiers when Hillfast guards are a distant memory on the Sedgeway. I’ll give you his whereabouts. He’s gone east, I expect, for that side of the Circle is still free and the way east still open.”

  Crogan was bubbling up like a lid on a boiling pan, so I applied the finish.

  “You wouldn’t even be here now if it wasn’t for my own coin and my interest in bringing the Circle into the new world.”

  “Fuck you, you bald bitch,” spat Crogan. “Your insolence will find its way to my brother. He’ll tax you until your arse squeaks if he doesn’t tear you open as a traitor. Thende, we’ll have a speech prepared for the feast. You will renew your fealty to Hillfast. Your people will see some pride restored.”

  Thende’s smile was belied by his eyes. Crogan turned and left, slamming the door behind him.

  “I’ll head down to the van and do the night checks with Eirin,” said Chalky.

  The wood’s whistling and cracking filled the silence now we was alone. A tear slid from Thende’s eye. I was close enough to reach out. He let me press it away with my thumb.

  “We’ll see Khiese and we’ll deal with him. We’ve got a good crew, good drudhas.”

  “You’ll need to apologise to Crogan later. I appreciate your words, Teyr, but I don’t swear fealty to Othbutter and Hillfast. Crogan’s not as stupid as you think he is, Teyr. He knows I must refuse him tonight and so damn myself before my people, who have seen you all arrive as a sign that they might be free of this Khiese, that you’re here to rescue us.”

  “Crogan’s not Circle, he’s not made here like you or me. Amondsens and Auksens have parley and arrangements with Crimore for generations. Our ropes are woven.”

  “You haven’t been here since you were a girl, remember?”