Blood of Heirs

by Alicia Wanstall-Burke

  They walked for what felt like forever, though it might have been under an hour, winding through hallways and past storage rooms, never encountering another soul. Their path led through inky darkness and Perce held his torch aloft as they continued into the gloom.

  Had Ran heard those guards correctly? Had they said he used his magic to lead the Woaden to the gates? How could they think such a thing after the weeks he spent preparing to defend the city? Rumour was a poisonous thing. He staggered as the realisation hit him, the truth of what the world above these gloomy tunnels must think of him—and what he’d become—slamming into him. In the space of a day the battle at the city wall had morphed from a glorious victory on his part, into a catastrophic betrayal of the Orthian people by their prince and heir.

  He was a monster now. A cursed thing, fit only for the executioner’s block.

  Yet when he had tried to defend himself in his father’s audience chamber, his magic had failed. The soldiers had no problem defeating and incarcerating him.

  ‘Perce!’ Ran croaked and staggered to a halt. ‘I’m cured! The magic—it’s gone!’

  He searched for the spark he felt on the wall and in the ruined house, but found nothing, and the ghost who had followed him from the house had not shown herself since the day of the battle. Hope and elation dared to lift his heavy heart!

  ‘No, Ranoth, it hasn’t.’ The tutor clasped his arm and led on, down a set of stairs to a rusty gate set in the landing at the bottom. Beyond it a stream of sewage trickled past. ‘I wish it could be cured, my boy, but it cannot.’

  The walls here dripped, coated in a layer of green slime and their single torch threw eerie dancing shadows across the roughly hewn surface. From within his robe Perce retrieved a bunch of keys and rattled through them, muttering as his fingers flicked and turned them in the dim light.

  ‘But I can’t feel it anymore. It’s gone…’

  Perce found the key and jammed it into the lock, opening the creaking steel barricade and shoving Ran through the gap. He locked it again and found another key in his bundle to unlock the manacles around Ran’s wrists. ‘With a few days rest and good food, it will return. That’s how it works. It takes training to keep some in reserve. I don’t know how they do it, but according to the texts, it can be done. Once the magic is awoken, there is nothing in the known world that can halt it.’

  The tutor continued the hurried lesson as they splashed into the water at the base of the tunnel and hurried along with the flow. ‘The Olseta family was cleansed of the curse of magic many generations ago, though I fear your mother’s more foreign blood may have reignited it. Tell me, do you know why Orthia is a duchy, not a kingdom?’

  Ran shook his head. He didn’t have the breath to spare on an answer.

  ‘I wasn’t permitted to teach this version of history, so an abbreviated lecture will have to do.’ They rounded a corner and Perce caught Ran as he slipped on something sludgy that he hoped wasn’t a turd. ‘Orthia was once a kingdom, until the long line of kings was broken by the failure to produce an heir. The Woaden had not long since formed into an united force from the once warring tribes they had been before, but they were powerful and ambitious even then. They agreed to marry one of their minor royal sons to a distant niece of our dying king, thus bringing Orthia under Woaden protection.’

  Ran’s heart pounded harder by the moment and he suddenly felt very ill. He was a descendant of a Woaden prince…?

  ‘Orthia became a Woaden duchy from that moment on,’ Perce puffed between hurried sentences now, his robes dragging heavily in the muck around their ankles. ‘Generations after the alliance, the two split in a dispute over the distribution of resources. Then came the cleansing—the cleansing of families and of our history.’

  They stopped to catch their breath. How far had they come? Ran might have asked but Perce barrelled on with his story despite his heaving chest.

  ‘Your ancestors feared those with magic might be sympathetic to the Congress of Mages in Wodurin. They ordered them executed. Beheaded… Children with the curse were sent away.’

  Ran narrowed his aching eyes and held his side to alleviate a stitch in his chest. ‘Even the children?’

  ‘Even the children…’ The tutor opened a pouch on his belt and held a scroll tube towards Ran. ‘This contains the edicts issued by the duke at the time. It’s the section of the law they will use against you.’ Their eyes met and Ran saw fear in the tutor master’s face unlike any he’d ever witnessed. ‘Ranoth, you are fifteen summers old. You are no longer a child. They can use the full force of the Duke’s Justice against you,’ Perce shoved the tube into Ran’s shaking hand and held it tightly. ‘And trust me when I tell you, they will use it.’

  The truth of it rocked Ran and his knees buckled. He knew the punishment for harbouring magic, but until now he had hoped, somehow, in some vain way, that his father wouldn’t go through with it. But the pain in Perce’s face told him otherwise. The duke would deploy the full force of the law against him, because he had no choice. He could not allow his son to live if he could not do the same for others.

  ‘What has this got to do with Lackmah?’ he asked suddenly, remembering his father’s blunt response to the name.

  ‘Forget Lackmah! Keep your mind in the present!’ The old man snapped. Before Ran could counter his tutor, Perce hurried off down the tunnel and splashed to a stop at an inconspicuous ladder mounted on the wall. ‘This is where we exit.’

  He clambered up and put his shoulder to a disk of stone recessed into the roof. It shifted and a slice of moonlight cut into the darkness of the tunnel as Perce pushed up. The disc rose high enough for the tutor to slide it onto the surface above, then he carefully peered over the lip of the hole.

  ‘Damn!’ he hissed between his teeth, ducking back into the tunnel. ‘Soldiers everywhere. Come up as quietly as you can.’

  Ranoth followed Perce up the ladder and hauled himself through the hole on arms weakened by battle and beating. They emerged in a laneway cluttered with shadows and old furniture, just off a wide thoroughfare.

  ‘Where are we?’ Ran asked in a painful, nasal whisper.

  ‘A street or two over from the South Gate,’ Perce pointed past a pile of old chairs dusted with snow. ‘We need to get through the soldiers on patrol. I have a horse waiting a few miles down the South Road, hidden though, off the road. You’ll need to search for him. Look for an old shearer’s hut and he’ll be in the copse of trees behind it.’

  ‘How?’ It was all Ran could think of.

  Perce shrugged, ‘I called in a favour. You take the horse and you go south, understand?’ He didn’t wait for an answer, but as he made to hurry down the laneway, Ran grabbed the tutor and pulled him to a stop.

  ‘Why? You signed me out of the dungeon. They’ll know it was you. They might already be searching for us.’

  ‘That is correct. And another reason why we shouldn’t delay—’

  ‘But why?’ Ran pressed.

  Perce threw a glance down the lane, then turned back. In an instant, Ran felt like a child again, under the watchful eye of a man who often came closer to filling the role of father than the duke ever did.

  ‘Because, I don’t believe you did what they say you did. I don’t believe you’re evil. I don’t believe you’re derramentis. But what I believe doesn’t matter. The law is the law and your father is bound by it. You will be tried as a derramentis and executed. Your father will do it with his own hands if he has to!’

  He gripped Ran’s hands, squeezing his fingers around the scroll still held in his palm. ‘This document is the law they will use against you. It links magic with Woaden blood and after what happened in the city, Usmein’s citizens will scream for it to be spilled in penance. Too many people saw what happened on the wall, Ranoth. There is no altering the past. We can only circumvent the future. Do you hear what I am saying to you, boy?’

  Ran nodded stiffly.

  There were tears in the tutor’s eyes; despera
te pools of unshed grief. ‘While I breathe, Ranoth, I will not let them kill you.’

  Before he could reply, Perce hurried to the end of the lane and stole a glance down the street. With a wave, he signalled for Ran to follow and they darted across the thoroughfare into a darkened side street. Beyond another street and the rear of a saddlery yard, a wide space opened near the towering South Gate. If they were lucky, the guard might be thin with most of the soldiers attending the breach repairs to the west.

  They crouched and weaved through the fences of the yard, through an open gateway and paused in the shadows of the workshop’s front entry. The saddler and his family were probably asleep in the apartments above the shop and work sheds. No lights glowed in the front window, so neither Perce nor Ran cast a shadow into the street.

  In the guard house on the opposite side of the road, a couple of soldiers played cards by the light of an oil lamp. It had to be close to midnight, a half-moon high above the city, hiding behind thin wisps of cloud. It gave them enough light to see the small door in the gate, held shut by a heavy iron latch. Getting through without being seen or heard would be close to impossible. Ran swallowed and made to grab Perce, but the tutor slipped out from his grasp and wandered casually up to the men in the guard house.

  ‘Evening fellows!’ He sketched a bow and leaned against the door frame. His body blocked most of the light spilling from the guard house, and importantly, obscured the view the guards had of the saddlery and the small door in the gate. ‘I wondered if I could bother you for a minute of your time…’

  Ran noticed Perce clasp his hands behind his back, and one of them waved hastily at the gate. The hammer of his pumping blood filled Ran’s ears and he didn’t hear the rest of the nonsense Perce delivered for the benefit of the guards. It was likely they would count him as a drunkard and send him on his way.

  In a few quick steps, Ran was at the gate with his hand on the door latch, the thick iron giving way slowly to the pressure he forced down on it. When it finally released its grip, he let go of a breath that was screaming in his lungs and swung the timber door panel outwards.

  ‘Oi!’ A shout shot across the night and bounced off the cold walls of the buildings at either side of the road. ‘Halt!’

  Ranoth paused, his heart thumping wildly in his chest. He turned, one foot through the doorway, the other still inside the city. Perce began to talk louder, quicker, laughing, but it was farce to distract the gate guards. It did nothing to divert the soldier astride a horse in the centre of the street, moonlight glinting off his dented armour and greying hair.

  Gregon was unmistakeable, even in a saddle, and Ran knew his jig was up. Recognition furrowed Marshal Gregon’s brow and he leaned forward. ‘Ranoth?’

  ‘Damn it—’ came a curse from his left, and Perce spun away from the guard house, abandoning his ruse. He shoved Ran in the chest and through the open doorway. ‘Go! Get out of here!’

  Ran tumbled into the night on the far side of the gate and scrambled to his feet. Shouts went up and the men at the gate launched into action. They tackled Perce into the timber barricade and the old man went down bellowing. Voices rose in anger, someone somewhere barked an order, something about a Black Prince, and Ran barrelled headlong into the woodland beyond the gate.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Hummel, Tolak Range, the South Lands

  Moons waxed and waned over the Tolak range, and the dry season showed no sign of breaking to bring relief from the cold, parched air. The atmosphere vibrated with tension: Sellan watched Erlon; Lidan studied them both; and the clan silently eyed all three. Lidan stayed clear of her parents as best she could, keeping her thoughts to herself and her presence discreet. The less they noticed her, the less likely they were to use her as a pawn in their games.

  Restricted by his injury, Erlon remained in the village and busied himself in the forge or the stables. Usually, at this time of year, the clan saw neither hide nor hair of the daari; his time spent hunting game and ranging the borders. Hummel always felt smaller with Erlon in it, as if he took up more space than the average man, and the place became almost claustrophobic the longer he lingered with his simmering anger. He paced like a caged animal, tense and careworn, his brow furrowed with deep lines and his temper quick to break. Lidan wished her father’s malcontent was due solely to the conflict with his wife, but the trail of blood from the bush to Hummel’s gate spoke of deadlier woes.

  Since the first ill-fated hunt, four parties had returned beaten and scarred, while another failed to return at all. Grent worked to save the wounded, packing poultices into the deep gashes in their flesh and wrapping them in clean linen. For a lucky few, his ministrations dragged them back from the brink. For too many, he could do nothing but delay the inevitable slow descent into agony and death. None of them recalled who or what attacked them. They spoke of being ambushed by shadows, or refused to speak at all.

  Lidan stood at her workbench in the bonesetter’s treating rooms, a clean bandage hanging idle in her fingers and little bone needles waiting to be sharpened and cleaned on a nearby table.

  ‘First Daughter?’ Grent called without looking up. Lidan started and tore her eyes away from the wounded man sweating and grinding his teeth on the bonesetter’s table. ‘Have we any black-stump left?’

  ‘Y-yes,’ she let the unrolled bandage fall to the table and reached for a small, stoppered urn. It held no more than a cup full, but Grent only needed a few drops on the man’s tongue to calm him. The mouthful Grent administered to the man would knock him out completely, his senses dulled and his mind closed. The shivering and sweating eased a few moments later but the broad shoulders of the bonesetter hunched in defeat, the back of his bloodied hand rubbing the bridge of his nose.

  ‘I’ll need you to go out and get more of that, Liddy… I can’t leave…’ The morning was still young and already Grent’s voice was an exhausted croak.

  ‘Yes, Master Grent…’ She gave him the title after endless weeks assisting in the treatment rooms, her fingers deft at the finer tasks Grent struggled to complete, or simply hadn’t the time for. Another group of rangers, equally injured and desperate for help, followed each one they healed; the search for food quickly turning into a fruitless pursuit of the mysterious attackers. The folk of the clan spared what they could to help, but Lidan devoted all her time to helping the wounded, glad for the distraction and an excuse to remain well clear of the hall.

  A boy, one of Grent’s helpers, stuck his head around a screen shielding their work from the others resting in the rooms.

  ‘He’s here, sir,’ he murmured and disappeared, replaced by Daari Erlon’s wide frame. Erlon gave Lidan a nod and folded his arms, stern eyes on Grent.

  Grent sighed. ‘He’s calm but he won’t last more than a few days.’

  ‘You’re sure?’

  ‘We’ve done all we can.’ Grent lifted a dressing of linens covering a wound in the man’s chest and the daari swore.

  While the top layers of cloth remained clean and white, the undersides were soaked with dark blood and a slick discharge that smelled of rotting fish. The wound was a haggard mess, packed with honey, healing leaves and ground bark, its edges puffy and the skin worrisome shades of red, purple and black. Swelling pulled the glossy flesh tight and the whole thing looked fit to burst at any moment. Early on, Lidan lost her lunch into the nearest bucket at the sight of badly infected wounds, but she’d seen so many they were now as common as piles of horse shit—still foul but frighteningly ordinary. The lines of anguish around her father’s eyes struck a chord in her heart and she swallowed a lump of despair.

  ‘Burns me to say it, but if you think it’s best…’ Erlon muttered.

  With a nod Grent returned the dressing to the wound. ‘Liddy, best you get back to those bandages, eh?’

  She slipped back into the shadows at the rear of the room without glancing at her father. The request was simple enough, but she knew what it meant. This wasn’t the first man Grent had seen go b
eyond the reach of his aid.

  The first few he’d fought hard to save but they’d gone eventually, some of them screaming at demons hidden in the shadows, others sucking hard for breath as unseen hands squeezed their throats shut. Since then, she watched for the signs; the sweating and shivering, the same discoloured skin, and saw Grent’s shoulders drop in defeat. She knew then her father would be called by one of the boys—Grent never sent her on the errand—and Erlon would come. She would retreat to her bench and pretend to roll bandages until…

  Snap.

  Her fingernails bit the tabletop and her teeth drew blood from the back of her lip. Her chin quivered, but she straightened and swallowed the bile in her throat. This was not the first time her father visited a final mercy on one of his suffering rangers and a wave of dread told her it wouldn’t be the last.

  *

  Her meal at midday tasted of ash, her appetite stripped away by the sight and smell of death earlier that morning. Lidan felt hollow, in her heart and her head. Fatigue weighed her down and she wondered if it showed on her face. Her days were spent tending the wounded, but by night the daari’s long and loud meetings with his rangers kept her wide awake. At first, she tried to sleep through the overhead conversations, until the muttered words drew her from her bed to listen through the screen of reeds, hidden like a mouse in the cracks of a wall. She scratched notes in a bound bundle of parchment, rudimentary symbols and drawings of the things and places they argued about.

  Apart from the constant discussion of the attacks on the rangers, anyone with a few moments to spare whispered of the dana’s comings and goings. Lidan caught snatches of rumour here and there, when the women helping Grent thought she was too far off to hear or when the dana again failed to appear in the hall for the evening meal. While she pretended not to notice, Lidan devoured every word, filtering fact from exaggeration and laying the pieces of the puzzle out so she might understand them.