No. Baoill had only begun, and Syrah had been relieved to read in the letter that Harond was in a fury fortifying itself in preparation for assault. With the freeze now at their door, Syrah didn’t know what Baoill would do or when he might do it. Would he press immediately east for Harond? Maybe south in an attempt to reach fairer weather, making for the smaller towns of Stullens and Drangstek along the Fissûr Ranges? Maybe he would even make camp for the season, holing himself and his army up to wait out the winter?
Whatever his decision was in the end, the only thing Syrah was convinced of was that Gûlraht Baoill had raised an army for a reason.
Gûlraht Baoill had raised an army for war.
XVI
“I have long admired the council of Azbar for their choice of scribes. Quite apart from a detailed and accurate—if often fraudulent—account of tax revenue, trade, and lawmaking of the period, the men and women selected to attend and record the battles of the Arena during its brief reopening in the 860’s have in particular my deepest admiration for the license and creativity they took in the work. Their descriptions paint well the picture of the time, place, and people. I can almost feel myself there when reading their stories, standing tall in the stands, fists in the air, screaming my encouragements into the pit.”
—THE NORTH: ANCIENT TRADITION AND CULTURE, BY AGOR KEHN
TALO HAD heard it said before that smell was the most potent of methods for drawing up old memories. To inhale the familiar wafts of a person or place, they so told, could bring to mind things one had thought beyond recollection, or simply didn’t know one remembered.
Standing outside the great arched mouth of the Arena entrance, Talo was realizing some things were best left forgotten…
Even beyond the walls he could make out the iron stench in the air. He doubted anyone else in the crowd thronging by on either side of him and Kal noticed it, but to Talo it was as familiar—if not as fond—a memory as the earthen scents of the halls of Cyurgi’ Di. Bits of scattered recollections flashed across his mind with every breath he took, like parts of some great painting shredded and left to the winds. Faces, feelings, sights, sounds. The image of a quivering young man, watching the shifting light of the outside sky through the wooden crossbars of the portcullis as it opened for him for the first time. The same man, older and taller, reddened blades thrust above his head in a twin salute to the roar of the crowd as he turned a slow circle in the mud. The same man again, head bowed and face hidden behind long straight hair, kneeling over the still form of a woman whose life was slipping away like the blood from the great wound across her face.
This time there were no swords. They’d been thrown into the crowd in an attempt to deafen the hateful cheer of victory.
“Talo?”
Talo came to abruptly. The harsh rumbling of the crowd they divided returned in a rush, the memories slinking back into the dark place they’d been hiding. He turned to look at Kal, who was eyeing him in concern.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” the man asked for what had to be the tenth time that day.
“I’m sure,” Talo answered yet again and, leaning heavily on Kal’s offered arm, he took the first step upward, into the maw of the Arena.
They’d been in Azbar for five days now, collecting themselves and gathering what information the Laorin hadn’t been able to provide already. Talo had been more than a little relieved to be proven right in giving Raz i’Syul the benefit of the doubt, but it wasn’t until he heard it from the town itself that the truth sunk in. The atherian seemed to have been in Azbar for some time, yet still the streets were abuzz with little else. Tales of his fights in the pit. Stories of his battles against the Southern criminal rings. Even rumors that he had come to the city to rid it of the Chairman and his council. Talo and Carro had had trouble getting much else out of anyone, in fact, as no one seemed inclined to speak of anything but the Southern legend who had come from nowhere to grace their Arena. Eventually, though, some people opened up, pointing them in the direction of what the Priests were looking for.
What they found was beyond any description Kal or the other residents of the Azbar temple had been able to put into words.
Along the markets they found groups of begging orphans the locals had dubbed “the Arena’s children.” Dirty, shivering wretches, they huddled together against the cold, their parents long dragged off and never returned. Around one of the wells in the eastern parts of the city, a man had approached them, trying to sell off any of a dozen empty properties in the area whose families weren’t alive to need them anymore. He’d been desperate, unable to shake the fearful waver in his voice as he followed them around the square, dropping price again and again in what became clear was a hard-fought effort to keep himself—and perhaps his own family—afloat. Along the western edge of the outer wall, the burned frames of a half-dozen homes still stood, swallowed up in a blaze set by a crazed and desperate woman who had preferred to end her family’s lives on her own terms than that of the Arena’s.
Trinkets and coins littered these ruins, leaving the wooden skeletons glittering in the sun, one for every other within Azbar’s walls who had preferred to take their own life than lose it at the end of a stranger’s sword.
“Is this what it was like, then?” Carro had asked in quiet shock when they’d found out what the tributes were for, standing in the road along the morbid remains of the buildings. “Is this how it was, when it was open before?”
Talo hadn’t had the heart to answer him truthfully, to tell him that, in so many ways, it had been far, far worse.
And now, climbing the last steps into the Hall of Heroes, he faced the proof that he had played his fair part in creating that broken world.
Both he and Kal were dressed in common clothes today, not wanting to draw more attention than was necessary. Patched cloth tunics with thick overcoats were covered with heavy brown mantles, wide hoods lined with fur to beat the snow that hadn’t seen fit to fall just yet. The winds were brutal, though, ripping through the Hall so that everyone bowed their heads against it, yelling to be heard by their companions. No one seemed much bothered to pause and take in the life-sized statues that flanked the long chamber on either side, warriors frozen in metal, their names engraved in plates below their figures. There were some Talo would have liked to pay his respects to but—in the interest of staying inconspicuous—he and Kal moved with the crowd, if a little slower. It didn’t seem word had reached Tern of his and Carro’s stealing into the city, and giving the Chairman any cause to find out just didn’t seem like a good idea.
Despite this, though, Talo couldn’t help but stop when he reached the final pedestal, the only new addition to the Hall since he’d last seen it nearly thirty years prior.
The base was of unadorned marble, like all the rest, but the nameplate had been torn away. The hollow iron molds of paired feet mounting a pile of human skulls were all that remained of the statue itself. Even had he not seen the title illicitly carved into the top of the stone, Talo knew whom it meant to represent.
Lifetaker.
“They tore it down nearly as quick as it went up,” Kal said with a frown, looking down at what remained of the statue. “Markus Tern had it put in a few years after you left, once it became clear you weren’t coming back. Six months later word reached Azbar that you were trying to ban the fights across the North.” The man laughed unexpectedly. “The mob was so mad, I wouldn’t be surprised if they ripped it apart with nothing but their bare hands.”
“A shame,” Talo said quietly, reaching out with the hand that wasn’t wrapped around Kal’s arm to trace the carved name with a finger. “I may have deflated my ego somewhat since my youth, but I admit I would have liked to see it.”
“I doubt it,” Kal said with a snort, smiling slyly. “It was naked.”
At that, Talo straightened bolt upright.
“It was what?”
“Naked,” Kal repeated, chuckling now at the look of abject horror on Talo’s face. �
��Stark, stripped, and stitchless. Raz i’Syul may be a living and breathing Southern myth, but we have some of our own. There were tales that said the Lifetaker could take on an army of fighters with nothing but his swords. The sculptor”—Kal waved at what remained of the statue—“apparently took the stories a little literally.”
Talo mouthed at the air like a fish, lacking any fitting response to this unpleasant imagery.
“Naked,” he finally managed to gulp, looking back at the desecrated pedestal. “For years all I dreamed of was a place in this Hall, and when I finally get it, I’m naked.”
“There’s a lesson in there , I’m sure,” Kal said with a smile, turning to start leading Talo back towards the stadium stairs, “but for now we’d best find seats. We don’t want to be among the unfortunate left to stand.”
Talo allowed himself to be guided away, but kept his eyes on the statue for another few moments even as he walked. He would have liked a minute to reminisce, but Kal spoke true enough. His knee wouldn’t do well to stand for through the fight they had come to see.
As they managed the last of the final stairs, stepping out from under the arching ceiling into the Arena proper, Talo’s first impression was that not a thing had changed about the place. The great stadium looped ahead of them in either direction, ancient stone worn by time and weather, but no less impressive in the meticulous deliberation with which it was carved and placed. The stands stretched upwards for five full floors of seats, capping along a flat ring where the unfortunate latecomers could stand for as long as the fights would last. Thick decorative arches crowned this topmost level, some standing tall despite their years, others crumbling into various states of ruin. Worn gray banners depicting the crossed antlers and swords of Azbar hung from these stone loops, like cloth doors to the sky. If one was brave—or inebriated—enough, they had only to step over a narrow chain barrier and push the banners aside to witness the city in all its splendor from one of the highest vantages in town.
Despite this, though, what truly drew the eye of every man and woman in the Arena was at its center. There, perfectly circular and gaping like a hungry mouth, was the pit itself.
It was not a pretty thing, as one might assume if judging by the rest of the Arena’s carefully manicured architecture. The pit, instead, had been built to serve a purpose which had nothing to do with aesthetic pleasantries, and everything to do with brute and simple violence. The walls were of plain stone and mortar, mottled in color and texture and scarred by old gouges and blows that marked where steel had missed flesh. Fifteen feet high, they had a slight incline to them that allowed all spectators except for those in the topmost seats a fair view of everything that was going on even when the fight was happening right below them. The muddy floor itself was not smoothed or prepped, and old footprints could even be made out in the frozen ground, lightly covered in a thin blanket of morning frost. Fifty paces across, it was small enough to keep even duels interesting, but large enough to host an all-out melee of ten to twelve if desired.
To the spectators around them, the pit spoke of excitement and the promise of entertainment. To Talo, it whispered only of death.
“This way,” Kal said, pressing Talo to the right. Ordinarily, men and women of the city guard would bar them from leaving the Hall of Heroes without paying the entrance fee to the stands. When the fights started, a few lucky street urchins might be allowed to watch from the top of the stairs leading back down into the Hall, peering over the heavy chain barrier into the pit, but otherwise the chamber would be cleared until the end of the matches.
Today, though, the council had seen fit to offer free entry to any and all who wished to come.
Today, after all, was opening day.
Two days prior, Quin Tern had made himself a popular man indeed when heralds appeared in each of Azbar’s main squares, announcing what they had dubbed “the Chairman’s Tourney.” Talo, Carro, and Kal had been together to witness one such proclamation, and the enthusiasm it had been received with was disheartening to say they least. The promise of true violence, of blood and gore and death, had certainly dredged up a crowd, but it was the declaration that the first day of the tournament would be free to all, the stands of the Arena filled until they were at capacity, that had stirred most into a frenzy.
“A gift from the Chairman to the great citizens of Azbar,” the herald had boomed in closing over the excited heads around him, standing on his wide stool as guards flanked him on three sides, “in thanks for their patience and patronage as he has prepared the Arena for this grand spectacle of might and madness.”
“Madness is right,” Carro had muttered in disgust. Initially, Talo had only agreed with him, nodding along as he considered the announcement. Now, though, as Kal led him through the crowd around the inner ring of the Arena, he was realizing something else.
Tern is gambling it all on success, Talo thought, considering the coin they hadn’t had to fork over to be there. He assumes he’ll make up the loss, in the end.
“Kal”—Talo had to almost shout over the excited buzz of thousands of spectators already in their seats despite the fact that the fights wouldn’t start for nearly an hour—“is he that good? i’Syul? It seems to me your Chairman has a lot riding on these games of his, and to be convinced to stop poaching from the prisons and town… I would think it took a lot.”
Kal nodded, but didn’t reply immediately. Taking a set of narrow steps between sections of the seats, he helped Talo climb a few levels and carefully circumvent a wide basin-like trough from which great leaping flames spewed heat in all directions. There were dozens of these massive sconces throughout the stadium, even along the upper floor, each burning hot and steady on the careful supply of oil and wood fed to them by attendants over the course of the day. Aside from life-giving warmth, the fires provided a certain edge to the atmosphere, adding to the simmering excitement that bubbled in the air
It wasn’t before he’d led them both towards a couple open spaces, tucked away along the fourth row up from the bottom of the stands, that Kal finally answered.
“I haven’t watched him fight myself, obviously,” he said, helping Talo ease himself onto the plain stone, “but ask anyone who has and they’ll swear the man is practically some old god of war.”
“Have you ever seen him?” Talo asked. He’d intended to question Kal about the atherian at some point, but priority of the mission at hand always claimed dominance. Most of their time had been spent discussing the legislature and public reaction, identifying what could realistically be done about the Arena in the moment, and what would have to wait.
They hadn’t come up with a lot of options on either end.
“Once,” Kal said, then snorted. “And I’m quite sure I made a fool of myself.”
“How so?”
“He’s… Well, he’s big, Talo. Very big. Oh, you and your man are sizable specimens yourselves, I know, but not like i’Syul. I was at the markets when I saw him, and I’m almost ashamed to say I stared. Completely forgot myself, taking him in. The way he moved…”
Kal paused, sitting back to lean on his hands, considering his words.
“I’ve heard people talk of him as though he’s a mountain among men,” he continued eventually, “but I don’t think that’s the most appropriate comparison. He doesn’t lumber or plod along like some giant. He’s more… I don’t know… elegant, maybe? No, that’s not the word. Graceful? Maybe he’s—”
“In the world of mercenaries and fighters,” Talo said loudly as a group of fat men swinging about tankards of some frothing drink erupted into laughter below them, “the term is ‘conservative.’”
Kal blinked, then looked around at Talo again.
“Yes,” he hissed, as though making some great realization. “Conservative. Exactly. Smooth, clean, quiet. For a man built like a tower, it was astounding. The way he eased through the crowd, as though he were barely there. I don’t think i’Syul saw me himself, but I must have seemed a real idiot to the r
est of the market, what with me standing with my mouth hanging open like some buffoon.”
Beside him, Talo couldn’t help but chuckle.
“What’s so funny?” Kal asked, frowning at the man.
“Syrah once told me a very similar story.” Talo was still laughing to himself, watching the restless crowd around them. “And I wouldn’t worry about the crowd. If i’Syul is anything like you and Syrah describe him, I’m sure you weren’t the only one staring.”
Kal seemed about to respond, but paused, considering.
“… I suppose,” he said after a moment, looking back down into the pit thoughtfully. “I don’t know. If you or Carro had been there, I doubt you’d have been caught frozen in place.”
“You obviously don’t know Carro yet,” Talo said with another laugh. “As for me, well… I’ve seen a great many interesting things out in the world, Kal. I’ve seen a great many interesting things in this very Arena, in fact.” He waved a hand to indicate the stadium around them. “But in truth, coming across a seven-foot-tall lizard-man while shopping for my morning bread might top most of the surprising experiences even I can think of.”
Kal snorted, then grew quiet. For a time the two High Priests sat in silence, looking about as the throng thickened with every passing minute.
After a while, though, Kal spoke again.
“Talo… You say you’ve seen things in this place. Tell me then… Why are we here?”
Talo turned to look at him, eyebrow raised curiously.
“I thought it fairly obvious,” he said with half a smile. “We’re here to see the fights.”
“Yes but—but why?” It was Kal’s turn to wave a gloved hand at the pit below them. “This place. The things you must have witnessed. ‘Interesting’ things, you said, but I don’t think that’s what you mean… As long as I’ve known you, as many letters as we have exchanged over the years, you’ve never been keen to revisit this part of your past. So I ask again: Why are we here?”
The Warring Son (The Wings of War Book 2) Page 15