The Gates of Tagmeth (Chronicles of the Kencyrath Book 8)

by P. C. Hodgell

  They came in silence, but even so their approach was noted. The Caineron yondri lined the wall, waiting.

  Jame experienced a moment of doubt. Perhaps they meant to help their former colleagues. Perhaps, in fact, the trickster wasn’t Knorth after all.

  Downstream, water swirled. A whirlpool was forming, thin moonlight glinting on the ribbed spiral of its deepening throat.

  The rafts were drawn toward it.

  The ropes attached to the far shore gave way. Yondri grabbed the other ends and tried desperately to reel in the would-be invaders.

  “Pull, pull,” Jame heard herself urge as she beat the parapet with her fist.

  The logs upended, spilling their riders into the watery maw. It closed over them. Timber shot back to the surface, but no bodies.

  Slurp, said the River Snake.

  Tiggeri stood on far shore, watching, his followers behind him. He turned and walked back to his tent through their silent ranks, which closed behind him.

  Jame descended from the battlements to the courtyard. The gate to the oasis stood open. She entered.

  Night lay soft on the garden within. Night birds called sleepily to each other from rustling trees. Bats flitted from palm to palm. The moon had set and the eastern sky held the least hint of dawn. By the lakeshore, Jame started a campfire and settled down beside it, facing the water.

  “Hello!” said Lyra behind her. “What are you doing here?”

  “Thinking.”

  “Couldn’t you do that in bed? It’s late.”

  “Then go back to sleep.”

  “I’m awake now.” She stifled a yawn, sat down, and snuggled up beside Jame, head on her shoulder. “Tell me a story.”

  Jame opened her mouth, then shut it again, considering. She wasn’t much good at storytelling. Just the same. . .

  “Once there was a little girl . . .”

  “Was it me?”

  “No. Be quiet. She lived in a terrible place until one day her father saw her dancing, mistook her for someone else, and threw her out.”

  “It was a mistake, then?”

  “Not really. He meant to do it and never, as far as I know, regretted it. She went to live somewhere else even worse.”

  Lyra yawned. “That was silly of her.”

  “She didn’t have much choice. Did you, when your father sent you to Karkinaroth?”

  “Fathers do things like that. Now he wants to send me to the Ardeth at Omiroth, but I ran away.”

  “So did she, and ran, and ran, until she came to a great city, but again she was driven out. She did meet many good people, though, including good Kendar like the folk who raised her.”

  “I like the Kendar. They pay attention, and don’t make you feel silly.”

  “Sometimes they do, when you are, but they care. Mostly. It was a great shock to her when she discovered that some didn’t care at all. Rather, they listened to their lords and did whatever they were told. That’s called Honor’s Paradox. Trust the Highborn to come up with something so vile.”

  “I don’t think I like your story. It doesn’t have a plot, and where’s the happy ending?”

  “Sorry. That’s just life, which doesn’t have much of a plot either. As for happy endings, well, that remains to be seen.”

  Behind her, sand crunched, the barest furtive whisper of a sound. Jame pulled herself together.

  “The thing is, she . . . I owe the Kendar a debt that I’ll never be able to repay. All Highborn do. They are our moral compass, ignored at our peril. Now a group of them has taken refuge with me, but their lord’s son is at my gate and I can’t guarantee their safety. One of them is just a baby.”

  “A baby!” said a voice behind her.

  Lyra squeaked with surprise, but Jame stopped her from turning around.

  “Don’t. If he doesn’t want to be seen, it would be rude. Hello, Chirp.”

  “Thank you for the bread,” said the Builder, sounding rather breathless.

  “You’re welcome. Have my people been treating you with respect?”

  “Most still do not know that we are here. The rest . . . well, these are Kendar. As you say, they have been discreet and kind.”

  “With your permission, I would like to settle my refugees with you as a permanent colony.”

  The tiny Builder circled around the fire, looking disturbed, causing Lyra to exclaim again.

  “Oh, he’s just like a doll!”

  “This is Lyra Lack-wit, who is not discreet. Lyra, this is Chirpentundrum, who is probably older than all of your ancestors combined, and much wiser. Behave.”

  “A permanent colony. . . Permanence, to us, means more than it does to you. Still, a baby. . .”

  “A newborn boy.”

  “Oh! Our kind reproduces so very rarely. I have not held a baby in a dozen worlds. Would you let us help care for him?”

  “You would have to ask his guardian, a Kendar named Girt, but I see no reason why not.”

  “You didn’t say that Girt would agree,” Lyra pointed out as the Builder wandered off in a daze of delight.

  “Sometimes you surprise me. No, I didn’t. We’ll worry about that later.”

  Back in Tagmeth’s courtyard, in the kindling dawn, Jame summoned the Caineron yondri and told her that she and her people were moving into the oasis.

  “They say that it’s nice there,” said Girt wistfully, hitching Benj up on her shoulder and gently burping him. Her fellow yondri hadn’t been part of the troop rotation in and out of the garden. “It’s really too damp underground for a newborn.”

  “You’ll . . . er . . . have some neighbors there—small, gentle folk. Treat them respectfully and, please, listen to any requests they may make.”

  “Such as, lady?”

  “I’ll let them speak for themselves, if they aren’t too shy. You need to move quickly, though. This morning.”

  Brier approached. “There you are,” she said. “Acon is at the bridge, alone. He wants to talk to you.”

  Now what, Jame wondered. After the long night she was both tired and very hungry, but she went to see.

  Acon waited for her, standing stiff and straight. His was a hard face, not given to expression, certainly not betraying his errand, whatever it was. They traded wary salutes.

  “Hard fighting,” said Jame, both as a comment and a compliment. She didn’t add how wasteful she had found it.

  “You’ve given my lord a proper bloody nose. He doesn’t take well to such things.”

  “What’s to be done, then?”

  “Will you give up the child?”

  “No.”

  “I didn’t think so.”

  He glanced off toward the keep, not meeting her eyes. Jame’s eyebrows rose. Whatever he had to say, he didn’t want to say it.

  “We . . . er . . . understand that you have also given your protection to a randon known as Bear.”

  “He lives here, if that’s what you mean, and I am honored to give him shelter. He has never needed my protection.”

  “Well. Scouts have seen his tracks. This morning, Tiggeri set out to hunt him.”

  Oh, schist. Jame had learned that Bear had left the keep when Must had been brought to child-bed in his quarters, but she had hoped that he would at least keep a safe distance. Not far enough, it seemed.

  “What are you doing to do?” she asked Acon.

  “That depends on you.”

  “Then we have to catch up with Tiggeri.”

  Brier’s hand closed on her shoulder. Beware, she might as well have said. While true, this could be a trap to draw you out.

  “That can’t be helped,” she told her marshal, giving the Southron’s fingertips a reassuring touch.

  “Then the rest of your randon will go with you. This is our business too.”

  They passed through the Caineron camp, watched warily by Tiggeri’s Kendar. What did they think? It was all well and good to consider the Kendar in aggregate as noble, but they had to live where they found themselves. Not many,
like Corvine, were able to escape a bad situation, or a bad lord.

  Corvine herself came up behind Jame as she entered the forest above the meadow and overtook her. Acon was already pulling ahead on his long legs through the deeper snow under the trees. Jame floundered in their wake, stumbling over concealed, fallen branches and into hollows. Others passed her—randon officers, sergeants, and cadets, Knorth and Caineron, all intent on what lay ahead. Hounds and horns sounded. Could Bear really have stayed so close to the camp? So it seemed.

  Panting, a stitch tearing at her side, Jame emerged into a clearing. Randon lined its edge with dogs straining at their leashes. Bear stood at bay against a rock face. His massive claws were out, unsheathed.

  “Huh,” he said, and swung them idly as if weighing possibilities.

  Tiggeri stood out before his hunters, a boar spear in his hand.

  “Well?” he said, impatiently, over his shoulder. “What are you waiting for? Take him!”

  No one moved.

  Tiggeri swung around to face them. His eyes were hot, his face blotched with red.

  “You dare?” he snarled. “This is more of Sheth Sharp-tongue’s insolence, isn’t it? Don’t think that he won’t pay. So will his misbegotten brother. So will all of you.”

  He turned, leveled his spear, and charged at Bear. Bear batted the spearhead aside and grabbed the shaft. Tiggeri refused to let go. They wrestled for a moment, scuffing up snow, then Bear gave a mighty shove and Tiggeri went down on his back. With a grunt, Bear sat on him. The shaft was between them, gripped by both. Slowly, implacably, Bear bore down on it until it pressed across the Caineron’s throat. Tiggeri began to gag.

  Jame left the margin and went to Bear’s side.

  “Enough,” she said, touching his shoulder.

  Bear glanced up at her, grunted again, and rose. After a moment, so did Tiggeri, one hand on his bruised throat. He looked enraged enough to gibber, but with a great effort controlled himself.

  Jame stood between the two.

  “Enough?” she said again, this time making it a question.

  “I didn’t know that he was your pet,” said Tiggeri hoarsely, with a lopsided smile that was half a baring of teeth.

  “And I didn’t think you had the courage to tackle him alone. That was impressive.”

  “Well. Now what?”

  “I invite you and your randon to join me for breakfast, provided you take my word for it that the boy is no longer at Tagmeth.”

  “Oh? Just like that?”

  “He was in danger, so I sent him away; and no, I won’t tell you where. Have you any other good reason to attack us?”

  “We Caineron still claim the keep.”

  “I said, a good reason. Be sensible. You’ve seen that we can’t easily be taken by assault.”

  His chin jutted. “I can still starve you out.”

  “Come judge that by the table we set.”

  He eyed her. “You’re a strange girl, quite possibly mad. All right. I’ll come. We all will.”

  V

  IT WAS A PECULIAR PROCESSION that returned to Tagmeth, wondered at both by the camp and the garrison, although Jame had sent word ahead to the latter what to expect and how to prepare for it.

  In the island’s meadow, she pointed out the site of Must’s pyre. Tiggeri looked stricken.

  “How many days ago?”

  “Eight.”

  “So recently. And I missed her by only that much.”

  Then he saw the larger bare patch caused by the haunts’ pyre and cheered up.

  “I see that you have had other deaths. Many of them. Not easy, is it, to establish a keep in such a wilderness?”

  Jame didn’t correct him.

  They found the courtyard swept clear of snow with tables and benches set out surrounding the well. A purposeful clatter arose from the kitchen. Helpers ran in and out. Breakfast was usually a casual meal, but Marc and Master Rackny were preparing for a feast, a week’s cookery gone in one burst from whatever could be prepared quickly or had been started the night before.

  Jame saw Tiggeri glance around. The gates were there, of course, closed and looking innocent—unless one asked where they led. Otherwise the courtyard appeared neat and well maintained, also its people, who arrived looking trim and fit, but understandably wary.

  While most of the regular garrison would eat outside, tables had been prepared in the mess hall for Tagmeth’s guests and its randon. The doors stood open, billowing fragrant steam into the chill outer air. The fireplaces at either end of the hall roared. Jame showed Tiggeri to a seat at the high table and gestured for wine, a precious bottle of which had been broken out of storage. Master Rackny’s current assistants ran out of the kitchen bearing platters of spiced toast with almond sauce and luce wafers.

  Tiggeri drank without pausing to savor the vintage which, Jame supposed, was just as well. At least the stuff was strong.

  “You’re up to something,” he said. “I know it.”

  “What, if not to heal the breach between our houses?”

  “That you will never do. Our enmity goes back too far and runs too deep. My son . . .”

  “Is gone.” Trinity, she hoped that that was true. Girt and the Caineron yondri at least were nowhere in sight, and she had told them to hurry.

  “Do you doubt her word?” asked Acon, from her other side.

  “Oh, to call a randon a liar—you would love that, wouldn’t you?”

  “No, my lord. Lies befit no Kencyr.”

  Platters of smoked pike salad in pastry, baked lamprey, and brie tarts were set down before them. Tiggeri glowered at the bounty, ashes to his mouth, no doubt. If nothing else, this repast should convince him that Tagmeth was not readily to be starved out. Still, he couldn’t resist. As he truculently tucked in to the feast, Jame bent toward Acon.

  “What did he mean,” she asked under the mess room’s growing clamor, “about the Commandant’s insolence? That doesn’t sound like Sheth Sharp-tongue at all.”

  “Nor is it.” Acon also spoke quietly, almost as if not addressing her at all. “Sheth is still at Restormir, largely because Lord Caineron can’t decide what to do with him. He doesn’t say much, but his very presence, I fear, is a reproach.”

  “Are things so bad there?”

  Acon applied himself to a fig stuffed with cinnamon eggs. Jame suppressed a grimace. She had told the kitchen not to serve anything exotic, such as fresh figs, for fear that Tiggeri would ask where they had come from. However, he didn’t seem to have noticed the lapse.

  “Restormir is . . . on edge. The Caineron Matriarch is dying, and Lady Kallystine seeks to take her place. I confess, we did not realize what a check on our lord his great-grandmother was. Is. I mean, who credits Highborn women with such power?”

  Only fools, thought Jame, but that was hardly fair. The Randon weren’t aware of the interplay between Highborn men and women. For that matter, she was the first Highborn female in at least a millennium to undergo randon training. Curious how, despite her connection to That-Which-Destroys, the links she made between people, ideas, and powers kept ringing true. Who was it who had said that a potential Tyr-ridan would be close to all three faces of their god until he or she came to maturity? In that case, so far so good. Ancestors help her, though, with whatever came next.

  God-born. God-cursed. Was there a difference?

  She became aware that at a neighboring table Killy was speaking rather loudly.

  “You wouldn’t credit it,” he was saying, “that doors could lead out of this world, or maybe into it. Rathillien is amazing. Think about it—people moving from here to the other side of the world just by walking across a threshold!”

  Jame stiffened. Tiggeri wasn’t paying attention yet, but Damson was. She shot the cadet a look. Damson wrinkled her forehead and Killy began to choke. Char hit him on the back, without result. Then he followed Damson’s gaze, raised an eyebrow at Jame, and put a hand under Killy’s elbow to raise him.

  “Excu
se us,” he said.

  That caught Tiggeri’s notice.

  “Early in the day for a drunken garrison, isn’t it?” he asked as Killy stumbled toward the door between his two escorts. In the doorway stood Lyra. She recoiled as Killy was led past, then raised her eyes to meet those of her half-brother.

  Trust the girl to nose out a feast, Jame thought despairingly, and then not have the sense to use the back door.

  “Well,” said Tiggeri, putting down his cup. “That’s one mystery solved. We wondered where you had gone. Greetings, little sister.”

  Lyra looked ready to bolt, as well she might, but where? Any serious search of the keep would no doubt betray the gates. Would Lyra think of that? Would she care?

  “Your great-grandmother needs you,” said Tiggeri. “Darling Kallystine has scared off most of her attendants, even if she can’t entirely strip Cattila of power. She’s dying, you know, although she is fighting it every inch of the way. How not? A tough old bird, our Gran. Also, our father has had a falling out with Dari of the Ardeth, so you needn’t fear being made his consort. Will you come back?”

  It was a surprisingly tactful plea. Jame wondered if he actually cared about Cattila and Lyra, or just the credit he would gain by returning his runagate sister, especially after failing so abysmally to reclaim either Tagmeth or his own son.

  Lyra wavered, a fawn about to bolt. She gulped and looked at Jame as if for guidance, but this must be her own choice.

  I can’t help you, Jame wanted to tell her, but, oh, think of the damage you might do!

  “All right,” said Lyra. “I’ll go back with you. Maybe I’m not very clever, but I can try to be responsible.”

  For her, that was a surprising concession.

  Soon afterward Tiggeri and his randon left, with Lyra at his side trying to assume a dignified pose. Jame wondered what her position would be when Cattila was gone, also if Lyra had thought about that. But it was no answer for her to hide anymore. One eventually had to face one’s life.

  At the bridge, Tiggeri suddenly turned and enveloped Jame in a bear hug that was virtually an assault.

  “Don’t think you’ve won,” he hissed, hot breath in her ear as spear points clashed down around them on both sides. “I will have my son, and I will have Tagmeth. Just wait.”