by Anna Thayer
Eamon staggered in the force of the blast. As he struggled to get his feet, Ladomer erupted through the smoking stones. Eamon blocked the first blow, but then Ladomer stabbed from the right for the inner part of his thigh. Eamon strained every muscle in his body to block it. It was almost more than he had in him. He coughed as smoke from the broken stones clawed at his eyes.
Ladomer brought his vambrace and blade hard against Eamon’s sword, then pushed and twisted it from Eamon’s grip. Eamon forced every tendon and fibre of muscle he possessed against the agonizing downward motion, but he could not stop it.
His sword fell to the ground. Ladomer’s pommel – followed by his blade – struck dangerously near his head. Eamon leapt back. Ladomer swung the pommel after him, almost hooking the blade-point under the edge of his armour. Eamon reeled back, his limbs aching and his armour like a dead weight upon him. His chest heaved with unimaginable exhaustion as he looked at his foe. His dagger was lost and his sword was far out of reach. As the Right Hand advanced on him, desperation filled Eamon’s breast.
Ladomer raised his blade with a slow smile. “Things aren’t looking so good for you just now, are they, Ratbag?”
“No,” Eamon agreed, trying not to sound as terrified as he felt. There was only one thing left that he could do.
With a laugh Ladomer swung at him, driving at his groin and legs. With every ounce of his desperate courage, Eamon stepped forward into the blow, narrowly avoiding it, and took firm hold of Ladomer’s face. He saw the dark eyes filling with rage before they both slipped onto the plain.
CHAPTER XXI
It was dark and the wind howled about them. Eamon felt the blue light near him.
“Please,” he cried to it, “help me!”
The light grew bright and gathered about him.
“Bastard!” Ladomer yelled.
Eamon scarcely heard him. The King’s grace went singing across the plain towards the Right Hand. It dropped and enveloped Ladomer like a cloak of water. With a foul cry he staggered back, clutching his head.
“No!” he roared.
Eamon gasped: though he was not breaching Arlaith, the skies around him were pierced with visions. Eamon saw the throne room, its dire paintings hideously bold in the light of a forgotten day. Arlaith knelt before the throned, shaking.
“Ashway was right, Master,” Arlaith was saying. “The Serpent’s heir was there.”
“And you let him slip from your grasp.” The throned spat thunder. Arlaith cowered. “You let snakes spirit him away from under your very eyes.”
Arlaith’s face was grim, set, pallid. He had failed the Master. His clenched eyes anticipated punishment.
In the agonizing silence, a sliver of a smile spread on the throned’s face.
“Ashway spoke of the traitor’s heir, as well as the Serpent’s.”
Arlaith could barely breathe. “Yes, Master.”
“And so Eben’s son is at Edesfield,” the throned smiled. “Do you not find that poetic, Lord Arlaith?”
Arlaith grimaced. “Yes, Master.”
“This Goodman you have found is little more than a boy. But he will be mine; it is in his blood. Already I know the feel of him.” The throned’s eyes fixed immutably on Arlaith’s own. “You will atone for your failure. You will make him mine. He will finish what his line began for me.”
Scarcely understanding what he saw, Eamon reeled.
“What would you have me do, Master?”
“Go to Edesfield,” Edelred commanded, “and prepare him. Then, when he is ready, bring him to me. The Serpent’s heir may be well hidden, but Eben’s son will lead us to him, in time.”
“I will go under my mother’s name,” Arlaith said. Arlaith’s face changed until it became Ladomer’s. “When you wish to send for me, Master, seek after the name of Kentigern…”
Ladomer hissed and cursed. The memory was torn away. Others took its place.
Eamon now saw wooded hills and valleys. He recognized them as the countryside surrounding Edesfield. Arlaith walked with another Hand, among fallen bodies left by a wayfarer skirmish. Arlaith examined them one by one then cast them aside in disgust.
“They aren’t all here, my lord,” the other Hand told him. “There are only six dead.”
“Who is missing?” Arlaith demanded.
The other Hand paused. “One of the boys,” he said at last. “Perhaps the snakes took him.”
Arlaith snorted. “The Serpent is suffering indeed if he has taken to kidnapping children,” he said. “They will not save him from the Master.”
“They say that the Serpent is old and ailing,” the other Hand answered, and laughed snidely. “Perhaps, my lord, he kidnaps children in the hope of passing one off as his own heir.”
Arlaith fell very still and turned to him. “Who is missing?” he asked again.
The Hand looked at the bodies. “That lanky boy, my lord,” he answered. “The one taken in by the miller just before the culls. Perhaps you’ve seen him?”
“Hughan.” The name came as a dreadful sound from Arlaith’s lips, filled with wrath and fear.
“Are you well, my lord?” the other Hand asked, looking at him with concern. The look swiftly turned to one of horror.
The Hand drew breath but he never spoke again. The next moment he lay dead on the ground, his throat slit by the Right Hand.
The next thing that Eamon saw was Ladomer taking Aeryn’s hand in his own.
“It can’t be true,” Aeryn wept.
“Captain Belaal made me identify his body, Aeryn,” Ladomer told her. “He’s dead.” He dashed false tears from his eyes. “It was terrible, I – I could barely recognize his face…” He shuddered with horror and then looked up. “Aeryn,” he whispered, “where is Eamon?”
“I’ll tell him.” Aeryn drew a shuddering breath and pressed his hand. “I’ll tell him, Ladomer.”
The images changed again. Among them Eamon saw himself. Over and over he saw Ladomer speaking to him and encouraging him, while all along the Right Hand reviled him. He felt Arlaith’s pride and elation as Eamon Goodman was finally convinced to join the Gauntlet and take his oath.
There was a shimmer. Eamon saw the Nightholt resting in Arlaith’s hands. He was in a small room, which Eamon recognized to be the quarters of the Right Hand.
Arlaith rose and crossed his chambers to stand before a small mirror. There, the reflected face morphed into that of Lord Cathair. Arlaith inspected his new face, turning it from jowl to jowl, smoothing the pale skin, adjusting the intensity of the green eyes until he was satisfied with his imitation. Then, clutching the Nightholt beneath his robes – robes which bore the mark of the Raven – he left his eyrie, passing through a maze of dark corridors until he reached a vast hallway.
Cathair approached him from the far side. He too held the Nightholt.
Eamon gaped. How could there be two? And did Cathair not see that Arlaith wore his face? Why did the Raven permit Arlaith to go unchallenged?
Arlaith’s vision focused in on the Master’s tome in Cathair’s hands. “What is that you’ve found in the crypts, Lord Cathair?” he asked.
Cathair’s fingers drummed idly across the cover. “Oh, this?” He shrugged. “Nothing of any importance, my lord. It is merely an old book. I mean to add it to my library.”
Arlaith looked at the Nightholt again. “Very well, Lord Cathair. You will, of course, inform me if you find anything of significance.”
“Of course, my lord. Farewell.”
Arlaith turned away to the left. In the same moment, Cathair turned to the right. The Raven did not bow – and Arlaith made no objection to this slight.
Why would Cathair not bow to the Right Hand? And why would Arlaith not protest?
Something about this memory rang false.
Arlaith returned to his eyrie. As he passed the mirror, his face was again his own. Without ever setting his eyes upon it, he dropped his Nightholt into a satchel and drew the bag shut.
He turned towards the mirror; h
is mirror image turned to meet him. His reflection grinned back at him.
The reflection…
Eamon reeled. Cathair had never held the Nightholt. The entire exchange had been a carefully orchestrated conversation between the Right Hand and his own reflection! Was this how Arlaith had convinced the Master of Cathair’s treachery, and his own innocence? With a parlour trick?
Eamon knew the Master. Edelred would have been so enraged by the image of the Nightholt in Cathair’s hands that he would never have paid heed to the memory’s subtle inconsistencies.
Suddenly, Eamon saw Alessia.
“You will not show him!” Ladomer shrieked at the sapphire skies. “You will not!”
But Eamon saw. Alessia stood in the Hands’ Hall and curtseyed low before Arlaith.
“You will pay court to Lieutenant Goodman.”
Her face was faultlessly expressionless. “Yes, my lord…”
A hundred other moments flashed by; Eamon saw himself at the Crown, saw Arlaith leaning towards him and whispering: “Whatever its guise, Lord Goodman, treachery is a terrible thing. And those who betray those whom they claim to love?” The Right Hand shook his head before looking across the dark box to fix his eyes on Alessia’s. “That, Lord Goodman, is most treacherous of all…”
He saw Alessia again, this time brought and cast to her knees before the Right Hand. Eamon gaped in horror.
“I was very clear with you, Lady Turnholt,” Arlaith spat. “Very clear indeed, and yet you dared to go against me. Have no fear, you will be answered for your disobedience.” Alessia was very still before him. “Where is the maid?” Arlaith demanded.
“Lillabeth?” Alessia whispered. Though her face was wracked with fear she shook her head. “Lillabeth? Please, my lord, she has no part in this –”
“Do you have an earnest desire to be breached again?” Arlaith snarled.
Alessia trembled. “No, my lord –”
“Then answer me,” Arlaith hissed. “Where is your maid?”
Alessia shook her head again. “Please, my lord, I do not know. She was not at the house, I… she was not –”
“Do not lie to me!” Arlaith cried, striking her brutally across the face.
“Alessia!” Eamon cried.
Alessia had scarcely been thrown to the ground before the Right Hand snatched her throat and drove his hand viciously against her face.
“Please, my lord!” Alessia screamed. As red light grew about the Right Hand’s fingers, she convulsed with anguish. “Eamon!” She sobbed his name as though it might bring him to her. Eamon recoiled. “Eamon!”
“He will not save you,” Arlaith sneered. Alessia writhed beneath his burning fingers. “You were only ever his whore.”
“No!”
Suddenly Arlaith stopped. With a livid roar he hurled the woman aside.
“Goodman.” The word poured like a curse from his lip. “Summon Lord Cathair!” he yelled. Another Hand ran from the room. Arlaith rounded on Alessia. “Do not think that I have finished with you, Turnholt,” he seethed. “I have not.”
Arlaith stormed from the room, leaving the tormented woman in his wake.
“Alessia!” Eamon wept. He started forward, but he could not comfort her. The vision slipped away.
In its place came the Right Hand’s eyrie. Arlaith paced it. Ashway stood before him.
“I tell you, Lord Arlaith, that I cannot make him read it. Nor can I prolong his life much longer. Cathair will execute the Master’s command.”
“He must not!” Arlaith stormed. “Fool! I need that boy alive. Everything depends on it! I must know how to change it.”
“If we keep him alive much longer, Cathair will get suspicious,” Ashway retorted. “His suspicions will reveal us. Is that what you want?”
Arlaith swore violently, then spun and seized Ashway by the throat. “You will find a way,” he growled. “You will make him read it. Understood? You will do whatever is necessary.”
Ashway’s gagging face swirled away. Arlaith was now moving swiftly through the city streets towards the Brand, carrying a heavy satchel over his shoulder. As he hurried up the steps into the West Quarter College, Captain Waite stepped aside and bowed.
“Good evening, Lord Cathair,” the captain said. “Forgive me; we did not expect your return so soon.”
Arlaith waved his words away. “I wanted something to read on the road to Ravensill,” he said. “One should never be without a good book, captain.”
“Of course, Lord Cathair. By your leave, my lord.”
“Do go about your business, captain.”
Waite bowed again and returned to his office. Arlaith made his way through the college to the Raven’s library. No dogs ran to greet him as he entered.
He strode purposefully to the case where Cathair’s safe was hidden. A red light appeared in his hand, the shelves shimmered, and the safe opened. Arlaith lifted the satchel and drew out the Nightholt. He placed it into the alcove.
Cathair’s library faded and became the East’s Handquarter office. Tramist was there.
“His healing of the singer proves nothing,” Tramist said. “Has not his house always carried both marks? Besides which, the Master is his keeper; does it truly matter whether he is a snake?”
“That the Master is blind to it suits me well enough, but this snivelling Goodman bastard is a thorn to me, Tramist, and one that I have endured too long,” Arlaith retorted. “I mean to rid myself of him, and if you wish to be a friend to me you will do exactly as I say.”
“I have always been a friend to you, my lord,” Tramist answered.
“Ashway claimed the same,” Arlaith snapped. “Do not make his mistakes.”
Tramist looked pale. “Yes, my lord.”
“Anderas knows something,” Arlaith continued. “I am sending him to you with papers tonight. Find out what he knows – and then take care of him.”
Tramist bowed. “Yes, Lord Arlaith,” he answered.
As Eamon stared, Arlaith went to the throned. But now as Arlaith came striding before the Master, he bore the standard captured from the southern flank of the wayfarer line in one hand, and Eben’s dagger in the other. The throned’s face was full of wrath.
In rage, Arlaith hurled down the standard before the throned’s feet. “Your precious project has gone awry,” he yelled, “as I always told you it would.”
“Do you dare to gainsay me?” the throned answered. Red light fretted his hands, but Arlaith disdained it.
“Ashway spoke too true, Master, and you were blind to it. Now Eben’s bloody bastard son brings the Serpent into the city!”
“Why such fear, Left Hand?” the throned answered with a smile. “You know that I always meant for him to come.” Suddenly his face turned bitter and angry, and he struck forward with his palm, sending cracking light all about Arlaith’s form.
Suddenly the light ceased. Shuddering, Arlaith met the throned’s gaze.
“If you want to live out this day,” Edelred told him, “you will honour the oath that binds you, and you will stand with me.”
The red light ran again from the throned’s hands to Arlaith’s. The Right Hand’s face turned in pain as the light showed forth on his hands and brow.
“Yes, Master,” Arlaith hissed. Though obedient, he was not cowed.
Ladomer screamed.
Eamon’s eyes opened. The plain was gone – the Right Hand’s face, lashed with red light, changed horribly between Arlaith’s and Ladomer’s.
After an ear-piercing cry, the Right Hand’s knees buckled and he fell.
“Ladomer!” Eamon gasped.
“You blue bastard!” Ladomer yelled, and lashed at Eamon’s face. Rather than touching flesh as he intended, Ladomer’s hand caught hold of the broken strap of Eamon’s helmet. He wrenched the helm from Eamon’s head, blinding Eamon for a second.
As the helmet clattered away onto the ground, Eamon felt a rush of cold air creep beneath his sweat-drenched hair. Ladomer straightened up. Sudden
ly the Right Hand turned and drove his rising pauldrons deep in Eamon’s waistline, just below the breastplate of his armour.
Eamon felt the crushing force of the blow. His breath was torn from him as the shoulder plate impacted; the stomach-churning judder ran up and down his whole body.
He lost his grip on Ladomer’s face. Ladomer staggered to his feet. Not a second later, Ladomer hurled Eamon over his back.
As Eamon fell down over Ladomer, he rolled into the fall. His gut ached and no amount of armour articulation could have spared him from the pain in every limb. His body slammed into the ground. He turned on to his back and for a second he lay stunned, seeing nothing but smoke and fire.
He heard Ladomer rise; Ladomer’s feet appeared by his dazed head and Eamon saw him stooping for his blade.
Eamon flung out his left hand, grabbed his sword, and brought it over himself just in time to block the killing blow. The Right Hand tried to slip his blade over Eamon’s sword.
With strength he had thought spent, Eamon rolled deftly out of the way. Using his left arm like a pivot, he brought himself up to his feet before casting a low lunge at Ladomer’s lower legs.
They were both slow and tired, but Ladomer still managed to block the attack. Eamon’s grip on the sword was weak. His arm pulsed with the wounds of Cathair’s dog.
For a moment Eamon and Ladomer stared at each other and gasped for breath.
“Surrender,” Eamon panted desperately.
“Who?” Ladomer asked sarcastically. “You or I?”
“You!” Eamon raged.
Ladomer looked wryly at him. “You know, I never understood why we adopted these clumsy, uncivilized things,” he said, flexing his fingers about the hilt of Eamon’s blade. “But you can be sure, Goodman, that I will wield it better than you.”
Eamon recoiled with fatigue as Ladomer raised the blade and swung at him again. He had not the time to pass his sword into his strong hand. He twisted awkwardly round to take the blow. His right hand was free. He reached towards Ladomer. A huge spark of blue light left his palm and struck his foe.
The Right Hand yelled a vile curse as it touched him. He recoiled. Eamon turned Ladomer’s sword back in his hands, and drew it up firmly across Ladomer’s ribs and chest from right to left.