Silver trumpets rang joyously. Drums pounded like heartbeats.
Tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of people, soldiers, servants, camp followers, baggage wagons, horses, spread out in confusion over the fields and forests, the army still wrestling itself into any kind of order after the sudden command to march. They lost any trace of Sweet Face. Perhaps, Landra thought, the woman might find her man Acol, be able to share his tent at night.
A great cloud of crows and gulls flew above them. The crows and the gulls knew what following an army meant.
Before them, rising jagged, the high mountains. The Emnelenethkyr. The Empty Peaks. The border of the world of men. Beyond them, the Wastes. The dead place. No man had ever lived there, not since the raising of the world. A place indeed where men should not go. The highest of the mountains were capped with snow, even in full spring. Yet the forest was full of life, Landra saw as they marched. Pale pink windstars bloomed beneath the trees, catkins danced on the branches. Oak and ash put out golden green leaves. Even the dark pines looked young. The kind of place, Landra though painfully, where one should feel filled with hope and happiness. The earth smelled very strongly of growing: rich heavy soil, rotten wood. Bees humming drowsily. The first butterflies. Big black beetles with red flashes to their wings. If she turned her face away from the mountains, she saw sweet running water, flowers, green leaves.
They marched until nightfall, stopped and made camp by the side of a stream. Soldiers and camp followers all mixed up together. Fires lit, food prepared, chatter, laughter; again Landra hoped that Sweet Face had found her friend. Marith’s camp was off somewhere ahead of them, only a few miles, someone whispered in an awed voice. Absurd that it was the same day as the morning they had tried to kill him.
Landra’s body ached. Her mind ached. The shock slowly wearing off, perhaps. Replaced with guilt and pain. She was so tired but she could not sleep. Everything going round and round in her head. Everything changed yet again.
She stared up into the night sky. The flow of the stream made a clear bright sound. A murmur of noise from the next fire, someone still awake. The jangle of metal, the distant sounds of horses, an owl hooted, all the strange human sounds of the night.
She had known him since they were children. Absurd beyond absurd, thinking that he might have been dead, and that she would have killed him.
I hate him, she thought. Yes. But impossible to think of these things.
She tried to think of Ru. Of Ben and Hana and Saem.
Of less shameful things.
There was a splash from the water. Landra sat up.
The night was very dark and very still; the stream was a movement like a shadow, almost visible. She thought: do I see it, or do I only imagine I see it, because I know it is there? Far off in the north she thought that she could see lights moving, in the high mountains on the horizon. Or were they stars moving in the sky?
Tobias was sleeping.
Raeta was gone.
“Tobias.” She shook him. “Tobias. Where’s Raeta?”
“What? Having a piss, I expect. Bugger off. I’m sleeping.”
“Her cloak’s gone.”
“Having a piss. Go to sleep.”
He got up stiffly. Landra heard his knees creak. Scratched himself. “Damn it, Lan, now I need a piss.”
An owl hooted. In the trees ahead, something white moved.
A white shadow. White light.
A sound. An animal smell. Sweet.
There is some kindness in the world. There is. The world is a good place.
Landra stepped forward.
The creature moved towards them.
A deer. White in the light of the stars. Vast antlers reached up into the sky. Vast as trees. Spread and splayed and twisted, a forest of bone branches in which a bird sat and a squirrel ran. Eyes seemed to gaze from the patterns. The deer’s own eyes were human eyes. Its face a human face. Neither male nor female. Not a child’s face, nor an adult’s, nor the face of someone old. But a human face.
It came towards them. Almost looked at them. Its nostrils flared, sniffing. For one moment there was the terrible possibility it might speak. The stars blazed above it. The bird in its antlers fluttered its wings. The deer’s hooves pawed the ground. The human face looked at Landra. Landra almost knew its face. Almost spoke to it. Almost called it by its name. Then it lowered its head, snorted a deer’s snort from its red human mouth, moved away off into the forest.
Gone. Silence. The stars. The stillness of the air.
A gestmet. A god.
Sat beside the stream for the rest of the night, watching the stars, two dark shapes against the illusionary movement of the water. Landra thought of Ru, sitting by her fire, spinning wool, weaving golden cloth. Swimming in the sea as a seal. Free. Uncaring. Alone. Mindless.
“A god,” she whispered. “A god.” Wood god. Wood demon. Wild, life power.
“It wasn’t a god,” said Tobias. “It was a … a freak thing. A monster. I’ve seen dragons,” said Tobias. “A dead whale. Lost cities in the forests of Neir. Cetalasophrase blossom luminous under the moon. I once saw a woman spurt beer from her nipples. I once saw Thalia smile at me. I did not just see a god.”
“It was a gestmet. You saw it. You know.” Its image shaped in gold on old shields; wooden carvings painted in bright colours now chipped and faded, displayed sometimes by the harvest fields; dolls of plaited straw that were burned at Sun’s Height. The old unhuman powers of the land, the forests, the wild creatures who lived and died there. Not things to be worshipped. Things to be feared and venerated and left undisturbed, like the wild places and the wild beasts. Unhuman things.
“What did it mean, do you think?”
Tobias was silent for a long time. “A life god. A life power. What the bloody hell do you think it meant, Landra?”
There, again, far off in the mountains, a tiny flicker of light.
Suddenly Raeta was shaking her awake. “He’s gone,” Raeta hissed in her ear.
I … I was sleeping, Landra thought. Dreamed it. I didn’t think I could fall asleep, after seeing it. Her body felt grubby and damp. I didn’t dream it, she thought. The stream rang very clear and loud, swollen with rain. Mist was rising from it. The sky was pale with dawn light.
“He’s gone,” said Raeta.
“Who’s gone?” asked Tobias. He got up slowly, stiffly, from where he was lying huddled beside her. Landra could see and feel every part of him hurting. “Where in all hells have you been?” he asked Raeta.
“The king,” said Raeta. “He’s not with the army any more. He left in the night. I’ve just come from his camp. The place is an anthill, soldiers massing for something, arming. But Marith has gone.”
“He’s left the army?”
Raeta rolled her eyes at Landra. “That’s what I just said, Tobias.”
Tobias looked around as though Marith might appear behind him, sword drawn. “Where is he then?”
“Marith, Thalia—they’ve both left,” said Raeta. “Rumours a small group of horsemen slipped off in the night.”
“Gone back to Tyrenae?”
“I …” Raeta looked up at the mountains before them. Their peaks lost in grey rain clouds. “The horsemen went north,” Raeta said. “They could be doubling back, I suppose …”
Lights in the mountains. Lights in the wild dark night. Gods walking near to the world of men.
“But I think not,” said Raeta. There was fear in her voice.
“One day and we’ve lost the target? That’s a record even for the Free Company at our height.”
“The army’s still here,” said Landra. “It’s just Marith who has left.”
“The army’s not really the bloody concern, is it?”
“No, Tobias.” Gods, the man really was being hopeless. “The army,” said Landra, “the army is not a concern. Not if he’s not with them.”
Long pause.
“Yeah,” said Tobias. Half asleep and confused. Who can ke
ep track of what’s going on? “I see what you mean.”
“So we—”
Broke off. A sound coming towards them. Horses’ hooves.
Loud as heartbeats. Drumming drumming on the earth. Filled Landra’s head. Filled her vision.
Marith, she thought. Marith. Coming to kill me. I saw a god last night, it looked at me, I would have spoken to it. Now Marith is coming to kill me.
Raeta reached over. Took her hand. Squeezed it tight.
Horses’ hooves, thundering towards her. A mass of horsemen came past them, armed and in full armour, the horses armoured and masked. Osen Fiolt was at their head. They rode past like a river flooding. So many of them. And then infantry, marching fast behind. Their faces were hard and set. Eager. Hungry.
A very long time it took, for the columns of the Army of Amrath to march back past. They were going back towards Tyrenae at double speed. The camp followers milled around, wondering, some beginning themselves the march back.
“He’s going back?”
“He’s retreating?”
“He’s giving up?”
“There must be some plan …”
“The White Isles are under attack?”
“Ith has been invaded?”
“Lord Fiolt has betrayed him?”
“What does it mean?”
“What does it mean?”
The baggage, all the food stores, the army servants, were reported to have been left where they were camped, with guards around. A woman who had spent the night with one of the officers swore the order to march had been given by the king himself.
“Should we follow them?” Landra asked. Such a terrible fear in her, that Raeta would say yes.
“We’re looking for Marith,” said Raeta. She looked suddenly very tired. “Not … whatever this is.”
I know what this is, Landra thought then. I know what they’re going to do. Oh gods.
Raeta looked strained, sick. Raeta knew, also. Her face was grey, her body bent and hunched with pain. She looked like a tree battered down in storm. Looking at her, Landra heard the creak of breaking wood. The sound of stones shattering against the earth.
“We must go on,” said Raeta. “Into the mountains. Find him. Kill him. There is nothing we can do here.” Her face was like an animal’s face, wounded, suffering. Her mouth moved awkwardly. “I said that he would be vulnerable in the mountains.”
Destroy him like a rabid dog.
Landra nodded.
Tobias sighed. Spat in the dust. “I can’t let you go to Ith, boy,” he said quietly, half to himself. “You know that. Can’t let you have power and command. I know what you are. What you’d do.” He pulled his pack onto his shoulders. “Gods. How much more guilt can any one man bear? If we’d done as you wanted, Landra. Paid the weaponsmith more.”
They went on along the road through the forest. Slowly, as though bowed down by a great weight. The forest was green and rich with life. I saw a god, thought Landra. A god of life.
The next morning, great palls of black smoke could be seen on the horizon, coming from the direction of Tyrenae.
Chapter Forty-Five
“Go back to the city,” He tells His army. “Destroy it. Every stone. Every life.”
“Tyrenae surrendered.” One of His lieutenants. A sensible, clever man. “Tyrenae is Your city, My Lord King. You are King of Ith.”
“Destroy it,” He says. “Every stone. Every life. Everything.”
“As My Lord King wills,” the man says.
In Tyrenae, Undyl Silver Eyes tamed the dragon Aesthel by feeding it on the flesh of his own children. In Tyrenae, Ysleta White Hands slew both man and dragon with the sword Goldlight. Sons betrayed their fathers. Fathers betrayed their sons. Children starved while their parents killed each other. Blind children and madmen go begging in the streets there. The wealthy look at them and turn away and do not care. The rich feed on the suffering of paupers. The poor fight each other for food scraps. Terrible things were done there. Torture and pain and hunger and neglect. Tyrenae is not a good place. Three people plotted to destroy King Marith here, and perhaps if they had acted sooner they might have managed to do it, and perhaps things would not be as they are.
Every stone, the Army of Amrath destroys. Every life, they take with their pitiless sharp bronze. They pile the bodies in the rubble. Pile them into towers of dying. The ground is churned to mud with the river of bloodshed. The ground is slippery with human fat. The city of Tyrenae is wiped from the face of the earth. Everything is dead.
Chapter Forty-Six
“Why?” said Landra.
“Because he could,” said Tobias.
“Half the army … half the army were from Ith. From Tyrenae. He forced them to do it,” said Landra. “He made them. He’d have killed them if they didn’t, maybe …”
Malth Salene falling in ruins. Marith shrieking, “Destroy it!” Following him, cheering him, breaking it down with their swords and their bare hands.
I followed him, Tobias thought. Cheered him. This shouldn’t be a surprise either, not to anyone. “Every soldier’s wet dream,” said Tobias, “a rich city, open gates, undefended. Your commander yelling at you to attaaaaccckkkk!!!!! Don’t suppose they cared, most of them, whose city it was. Easier, in fact, for the Ithish guys. Knew their way around. Knew where that girl who’d always spurned them was living. Knew where the people in their families keep the secret money stash.”
For three nights, the sky over Tyrenae was lit by red fire. For three days, the sky over Tyrenae was black with smoke. On the fourth night, the sky was dark.
“They’ll be heading back this way soon,” said Tobias. “Back towards Illyr. Suggest we possibly think about getting out of their way.” He turned away from them. Not going to let them see him cry.
They met a woodsman on the road. He knew nothing about what had happened to Tyrenae. Knew nothing about fighting, or a new King of Ith. But he had seen a party of riders, some days past, riding fast into the mountains, hooded and cloaked, richly dressed like great men.
“What in all hells is Marith doing? Where’s he going? He can’t be planning to conquer Illyr on his own?” Not expecting an answer.
Landra looked blank and puzzled. Raeta shrugged. “Making himself vulnerable.”
“Very considerate of him …” He just didn’t want to face it, maybe. Face seeing Tyrenae sacked and slaughtered. “It was nothing to do with me, I was miles away, I was drunk, I didn’t want it to happen, someone must have misunderstood.”
The forest grew darker. Thicker, less alive. Cutting out the light. The road went sharply upwards, into the mountains, there was no human life visible but they passed sometimes old marks where mine workings had been. The earth was dark and heavy, slimy underfoot. All poisoned, Raeta said, by the mine workings. Quicksilver was once mined here. And then the mountains themselves, their slopes forested with black pine trees, the track leading through high passes where the air was thin and cold. In dark sheltered places there were still patches of snow.
They came to the river Elenanen, that cut through the mountains. It had once flowed all the way across Caltath, the greatest river in Irlast. Flowed past the palaces of the Godkings There was a bridge over the river, the road running along its northern bank. The stones of the bridge were pale yellow, dry and crumbling. They did not look like the stones of the mountain. They did not quite feel like stone under Tobias’s hand.
Still no sign of Marith. No trace of a group of horsemen. They were walking through a landscape bigger than the whole of the bloody White Isles. He could have turned off the road. He could be anywhere. Doing anything.
Raeta, Tobias realized, was beginning to look afraid. Staring around her at the trees. She flinched and trembled, as they crossed the bridge.
“Elenanen,” Landra said, “means—”
“Quiet!” Tobias held up his hand. “Stop. Get down.”
Voices. Coming towards them.
“… not my fault …”
&nbs
p; “… bloody stupid … tell him … tried … not …”
“… kill us …”
Not happy bunnies.
Three men came out of the trees. Armed. Dark cloaks. Dark red badges on their armour. Shapeless formless pool of colour, like a scab over where their hearts would be.
“He’s near,” Raeta whispered in Tobias’s ear.
Tobias nodded. “What do you think?”
Raeta sighed. “Yes. Do it.”
The three men came up to them. Hostile and curious. But swords not yet fully out. A man and two women lost in the mountains, what harm could they be?
About to find out, guys. Sorry. Bad luck. Nothing personal.
Music of iron and bronze! Hadn’t drawn his sword for a long time. Hack and smash. Smash and hack. Kill two. Take one alive. Easy. Yeah? Gods, this was tiring, his leg ached, his sides ached. Swung his sword aiming for one of the men’s chest, and felt his ribs scream. Sword in his face, stabbing, hacking, warded it off, drove his opponent back a few steps, the sword back in his face again. Driven back himself. Ward it off. Just ward it off. Hit and smashed and hit and missed and his ribs were killing him, and so was his arm, and gods he really didn’t want to mean that literally.
I used to be a good swordsman, me.
Hack and smash. Artless. Bloody hard. Just ward it off. Kill the bloke before he kills me. Taste of blood in his mouth.
This was a mistake. Should just have chatted to them nice. Asked leading questions. Never mind taking one alive. Just try to stay alive myself. My ribs fucking fucking fucking hurt.
Tobias only got his one down because the bloke stumbled on a rock. Landra was bloody useless, stood there staring with her sword in her hands like she was waiting for someone to be good and helpful and fall on it. Looked terrified. Raeta finally killed her one with a swing of her sword that took his head off. Rolled away, got up some momentum, went over the riverbank. Plop. The body lay there bleeding. Sword still in his hand. Looked really surprised by it, even despite not having a head.
Strong woman, Raeta. Possibly hadn’t realized quite how strong.
The Tower of Living and Dying Page 30