by RJ Baker
I had put a stop to that.
I would put a stop to this.
Chapter 14
The journey back was miserable. A light rain fell, the type that is only seen as a succession of puddles seeping out of the earth and only felt as a gradual dampening of the rough wool beneath your armour, making it chafe against your flesh, leaving it raw and red. We met Boros half an hour after we left the site of the battle. He stared at Aydor and Rufra as they passed, then chose to ride with me. It seemed, for the day and a half it took us to journey back, we did nothing but stare resentfully at the head of the column. Boros was angry because he had been denied the chance to face his brother and I dropped further into a dark place each time Rufra and Aydor laughed together, like they were old friends.
And I had used magic before the battle. It had not even occurred to me I was doing it, listening to Aydor’s voice from a distance on the battleground, but that was the way of magic – it was insidious. It had been weeks since my master had cut me with the Landsman’s Leash, and the scars on my skin felt as if they had come alive – incandescent trackways of binding symbols oh so gradually migrating across my flesh to create new patterns, new ways, subtly altering themselves to channel the power of the land rather than deny it. The thought terrified me and it thrilled me. As long as there was life in the land the power of a sorcerer was limitless, so if Rufra chose to ally himself with Aydor I could wipe them both from Maniyadoc with a thought, and all that would be left of them was a souring, a yellow mark upon the land that I would call Rufra’s Folly, and …
“Girton?” I turned. Rufra rode beside me and I was staring at my hands as if they belonged to another. A shiver ran through me. Was this how the Black Sorcerer had thought before he almost destroyed Maniyadoc? “Are you cold, Girton?” said Rufra. I nodded, putting both my shaking hands on the saddle horn. “It is the rain, but at least I am free of Aydor now. He has gone to join his troops so he can enter the camp at their head. It is a relief, if I am honest. He would not stop talking about how well we had fought together. I thought I would never get away.”
“You looked to be enjoying yourself.” I tried my best not to sound like a sulking child but from his expression I did not do very well.
“Well, it is fun to be around a drunk for a while, but it quickly becomes wearing and, dead gods protect me, a king must meet a lot of drunks.”
“He’s not just a drunk, he’s dangerous, Rufra. Don’t be taken in.”
He shrugged. Rufra had been a remarkably plain boy and had grown into a plain-looking adult, his face only coming alive at the thought of battle, but when he was puzzled or sad he became downright ugly.
“I am a king now, Girton.” He gave me a crooked smile. “It seems everyone I meet is dangerous and few can be trusted, really trusted.” He locked eyes with me. “Nywulf told you about Arnlath.” For a moment I thought he was about to be overwhelmed by the weight of his grief, then he added, “My son.”
“Yes,” I said simply. There was nothing I could add. I had no balm for his grief.
“I am sorry. It should have been me that told you, but it is—”
“It is all right, Rufra.” I reached across and put my hand on his shoulder, and for once Xus decided against trying to bite Balance. “You do not need to say any more, if it is difficult.” He reached up, giving my hand a brief touch of thanks. What could have become uncomfortable was ended by Xus snapping at Balance, having tolerated enough closeness between them, and I had to pull hard on his reins while Rufra laughed at me.
“I am afraid Xus will never make a true cavalry mount, he will always be one to ride alone.”
“Yes,” I said and patted Xus on his neck. “It is the way he is.”
“We will be entering the camp with ceremony, Girton,” said Rufra, “and it will take us at least an hour to get ready, if not longer.” He sounded and looked tired, but something passed between us, a resetting of the past two days, and I knew that, though our friendship could not be as it had been when we were young, it survived. Rufra would let the mask of kingship fall in front of very few people but I had been allowed to see the pain behind it, if only for a moment. “You do not need to ride in with us, though you are welcome to,” he added quickly, “but I thought you may wish to ride ahead and see how your master fares.”
“I would like that.”
“Good. Go then. I must return and let Crast polish my best armour until it will give any onlooker a headache to look at.”
“It is hard to be a king,” I said solemnly. “I know how much I would miss having to polish my own armour with old kitchen fat.”
“It is my burden, Girton –” he smiled “– and I must bear it.”
I left Rufra behind me, angling Xus towards the twisting columns of smoke that marked the fires of the camp. The dampening rain of the past days had subsided and now the sun burned and the fields and hedges were alive with the small movements of animals. The black birds of Xus wheeled high in the sky, dipping, falling and playing like scraps of ash caught in the wind. Flying lizards zipped through the air, some with wings beating so fast they were a blur, others gliding on wide wings of translucent skin. I could hear the grunting of pigs, which had always been a homely sound – most in the Tired Lands kept a pig if they could – but the thought of those vast predatory herds lent a darker edge to the brightness of the day. When I glanced behind me the clouds of the Birthstorm towered on the horizon as if about to fall over Maniyadoc. Sometimes figures danced on the edges of my vision, some of bone, some of grass or wood or water, but most often they were clad in black and simply standing and watching. I had seen shades of Xus before and they always preceded death, so the nearer I got to the camp the more worried about my master I became. She had been awake when I left, but only just. What if she had died while I was away? What if she had died and I had not been there for her?
In my worry I barely noticed the camp when I got there. As soon as it had started to take form on the horizon I had pushed Xus from an easy lope into a gallop. I had to slow him when I entered the camp, and eventually the press of people forced me to drop from his back and lead him through the crowds, all the time talking to him in a calming voice to stop him lashing out. When I reached our tent I tethered him and gave a child half a bit to go to the stables and get the mountmaster. There was no sign of Neliu, who was meant to be guarding my master, and I feared the worst. Taking a deep breath, I entered.
To be met with laughter.
The laughter of a man and the laughter of a woman.
In the gloom I could not make out who they were, and I was ready to be angry. Was Neliu in here when she should be guarding the door? Or – a fear unreal – was my master dead and the tent given to someone else?
My eyes slowly became more accustomed to the low light, and I saw Mastal, the healer, sat on a chair by my master’s bed. She was propped up on cushions and a small candle burned on a little table beside her.
“Girton,” she said. She still looked tired and ill but she was talking. There was a light in her eye I had not seen since I was very young and had learned some new trick that pleased her. And though I had heard her laugh before, of course I had, it had always been a quick there-and-gone-again laugh, not the throaty chuckle heard when I entered.
“Master, you are well?”
“She is not truly well,” said Mastal, a smile on his face, “but she is better, much better.”
“I …” I did not know what to say. There was something wrong here, something too close in the way Mastal sat with her, something too light in the way he spoke.
“Girton, did you know that Mastal is from the Sighing Mountains, just like I was, once,” she said.
“No. I have never heard of the Sighing Mountains.”
“That is because it is our people’s name for them,” said Mastal, “not yours.”
“You would call them the Slight Hills,” my master said gently.
“That wounds me every time I hear it said.” Mastal laugh
ed. He mimed a dagger being thrust into his heart. I did not laugh, and Mastal’s laughter slowly died away. He looked from my master to me. “You two must have much you wish to speak about,” he said and rose. “I will leave you to talk.” He brushed past me, stopping to give me a short bow and quick smile.
“That was rude of you, Girton,” said my master. “Without him I would be dead.”
“It was I who fought off the rest of the Glynti and dragged you here, not him,” I said, sitting.
“Of course,” she said, putting her hand on my forearm. “You got us to Rufra’s camp, and for that I am thankful.” She took a sip of water. Her hand shook slightly, and I noticed she made no attempt to move the arm that had been poisoned from where it lay on the bed.
“You do not need to thank me,” I said. “Besides, I had Aydor’s help.”
“Aydor?” She raised an eyebrow.
I leaned in close. “You must not trust Mastal. He is one of Aydor’s men and has secrets.”
“We all have secrets, Girton.”
“We are not all sent by Aydor though, Master.”
“And yet we are here and not dead. Maybe life is not as simple as you wish it to be?”
Rather than be angry with her for being unwilling to listen, I put her replies down to her illness and told her what had happened while she had been asleep. Told her how Aydor had ingratiated himself with Rufra after sowing dissent in his camp by saying there was a spy, and how I had been attacked.
“And do his council seem suspicious?”
“Some, for different reasons, though I have not talked to them all yet. But Rufra trusts them.”
We talked some more. She quizzed me about our ride and my attacker, but all the time I felt she was filling the air with words rather than saying what really mattered. Eventually, after a lengthy silence, she said quietly,
“Girton, how long was I asleep for?”
“Surely Mastal has told you that.”
“But you do not seem to trust him, so I ask you. How long?”
It felt as if a frost was working its way through the tent, seeping out of the heavy felt sides and from under the groundsheet to coil around and up my legs. She had no real interest in how long she had been away from the world. What interested her was magic and sharp blades that scored symbols which squirmed and bit into my skin. This was about cutting something into me that would sever me from the world, deaden taste, turn music into noise, emotion into numbness and the colours of spring into mud.
“Too long,” I said. She nodded, and another long silence between us followed. “There has to be another way.”
“I know you don’t like the knives, I know it hurts, but—”
“No!” The word shot from my mouth, my body shuddering. “It is not the pain. It is not that.” And I was standing over her, my hands bunched into fists. I had to force myself to unclench them and sit back down. My master watched impassively. “Master, I have to learn to control it, not simply stamp it down.”
“That is the magic talking, Girton,” she whispered.
“No, it is not, what if you had died?” I leaned in close and whispered, “What if you had died? I would be alone and what then?”
She stared at me. For too long. She was tired – I could see it in her eyes – tired and disappointed in me. She was always disappointed in me.
“Very well, Girton. See how it is. Clamp down hard if you feel it move and promise me at the first sign of you losing control you will let me cut the leash into you again.”
I nodded. “Thank you, Master.”
“But you must return to the path, Girton. Without discipline there is no control. You must put that aside –” she pointed at the warhammer but would not look at it “– and take up your blades again. Practise the iterations, and if Rufra needs it you must be ready to put on my motley.”
I was about to reply like an angry child, telling her that I had survived alone and she could no longer tell me what to do, when we were interrupted.
“Girton? Girton Club-Foot?”
I turned. It was Areth, Rufra’s wife, and she was as utterly captivating as the first time I had seen her. It was like looking over the side of a boat through clear water to the floor of the ocean deep below: fascinating and for ever beyond my reach.
“Yes,” I said eventually. I was dizzied by her, though she did not seem to notice. Maybe she had this effect on all men and was simply used to it. “This is Areth, Master, Rufra’s queen.”
“Welcome to my tent, Queen Areth,” said my master.
“You are awake, Merela Karn. I am glad of it. Rufra has told me much of you, but you have been gravely ill and must rest. I do not want to bother you but I would speak to your charge if I may?” She nodded. “Outside, please.”
“Go,” said my master. “I need to sleep.” I followed Areth out of the tent.
“I had hoped we would meet in better circumstances,” she said, “but I am afraid time does not allow for niceties. You left with Rufra?” As she spoke I noticed Xus was still there. It annoyed me that the child had taken my money and not done his job.
“Yes, I did.”
“But you have come back alone …” She left it hanging, and it was only then that I saw how worried she was.
“Rufra is well. We met Aydor, and Rufra is getting ready to enter the camp in triumph; he sent me on ahead.”
“Good,” she said. “Good, but he must not enter in triumph; he must come back now. He is needed.”
“Why?”
“Arnst is dead.”
“The priest?”
“Murdered, and the camp is ready to tear itself apart over it. I have held the peace as well as I am able, but Rufra needs to return now or he will come back to a riot.”
Now I was glad Xus remained.
“I will go and get him.”
“Thank you,” she said. I crossed to Xus and pulled myself up into the saddle. As I prepared to leave I leaned over to speak quietly to her:
“I heard about your child and I am sorry.”
For a second I thought she would cry, but then her face hardened – not in an unpleasant or cruel fashion, she was touched by my concern, though she also knew she did not have time for it.
“Children die here, Girton,” she said. “Princes, living and thankful alike. The Tired Lands are a hard place to be a mother, but we must move on from death. And more will die if Rufra does not end the war. We cannot afford to sit and brood or blame.”
“Have you told Rufra this?”
“I have tried, he is not ready to talk, not yet. Has he spoken of Arnlath to you?”
“A little, not much. He seemed sore hurt by it.”
“It is good that he has spoken to you, Girton.” She reached up and placed a hand on my sleeve. “Be a friend to him, for me. It is harder for a man to take, I think, the death of a child.”
It cut me to see her shouldering such pain.
“But you bore the child …”
“And I am heartsick at the thought of him still. But blessed men? They teach you to win and to fight where they tell women to expect pain and grief – we are prepared for it all our lives. Rufra feels he failed Arnlath, like he lost the fight and he blames himself.”
“He is wrong.”
“I know,” she said quietly, and then as the silence grew between us she added, “Look after him, Girton, because he will not let me, not yet.” She removed her hand from my arm and I trotted Xus out of the camp. Soon his great legs were stretching out in a gallop that ate up the land, but it was not the speed that made me dizzy, it was the thought of Areth ap Vthyr.
Chapter 15
As I approached the column, Nywulf rode out to meet me. He listened as I explained that Arnst had been killed and then he swore, running off a list of the worst of the hedge spirits and the unlikely things they did to each other in the bedchamber, before telling me to wait while he gave Rufra the news. Five minutes later Rufra rode past me on Balance, his head down as he pushed his animal as f
ast as it would go. Behind him came Crast, Boros, Cearis and finally Nywulf, who signalled me to join them.
We did not speak.
The crowd that had slowed me when I arrived at the camp parted for Rufra to pass. He pulled Balance to a halt in front of the tent that served as a meeting place for his council and slid off the animal, storming through the flaps of the tent and ignoring the salutes of his guards.
Nywulf grabbed my arm as I tried to follow. “He will want to speak to you later. Now he needs to speak to his council. Do not go too far away.”
I nodded and found a bench where I could wait and let the sun warm my leg where my club foot ached. I wondered how I had missed the difference in the camp when I entered it earlier. There was a quietness about the people that had been lacking before. The camp had the air of a castle under siege, and people stood about in small groups whispering to each other. Children who had previously run around getting underfoot were now being herded by groups of adults, and when I tried to talk to a little girl all I received from her guardian was a suspicious look.
Mastal joined me. The healer smelled of herbs and dust and when he sat, his thick brown robes rubbed against my armour. I shuffled along so he was not touching me.
“Girton, I must speak to you about your master.”
“You have done well, Mastal. Thank you,” I said, but the words were ashes in my mouth. I could not bring myself to like him.
“It is not I, it is these.” He opened his robe so I could see the hand he was shielding from those around us. In it were some dried leaves about the size of my palm.
“Doxy leaves?”
“They are not doxy leaves.” He smiled. “I wish that they were, Girton. Doxy leaves are common as pigs and these are far from that.”