“Five men on horseback?” suggested someone, their voice loud and provoking laughter. The official reddened, coughed, rustled his notes and continued in a voice less pompous than before.
“Enemy forces, sirs. As you might expect. The bridge to the island is guarded and a rider may, if he wishes, swim the moat. Any who do so will not be attacked, but note that swimming takes longer than galloping and each course is timed by turn of sandglass. That, sirs, is all.”
That, thought Aldric, is enough. The best way to stop a courier was to shoot the horse from under him, but judge and audience wouldn’t appreciate anything so practical.
He watched as Escuar the Prytenek galloped out to ride the Messenger’s Ride. A target came up on its counterbalanced arm and the young man twisted in his saddle to drive an arrow neatly into it. Even with the awkward great-bow his archery was good, and he took down his two spear-targets as cleanly, but his swordplay was book-schooled and as wooden as the practice taidyo staff-sword in his hand. Though it was enough to dispatch one defender after another, men equally wooden and unimaginative, Aldric saw half a dozen openings for something unexpected.
It happened when the final warrior burst from ambush behind a leaf-strewn net in a clump of trees. As Escuar raised his shield to block the levelled spear, his attacker flung it aside, whipped out his sword instead and left a blue blotch of dye from Escuar’s hip to knee that was visible all over the field.
Something unexpected, just like that. Not far from Aldric someone groaned at money lost, and he wondered if Kyrin was loyally backing him or sensibly doing no such thing.
“Kourgath-eijo,” said a voice at his elbow, “you ride now.” One of the Prefect’s retainers presented him with a small scroll and Aldric was tempted to ‘read’ the thing then destroy it. Instead he played matters straight and tucked it in his gauntlet-cuff, wondering what his odds might be, then dismissed all other concerns and kicked Lyard into a gallop.
Two defenders pounced almost at once, and Aldric made the big Andarran courser sidestep with tug of rein and touch of knee, lunging his red-dyed spearpoint past a shield suddenly in the wrong place. That long reach also ‘killed’ the second kailin before he closed enough to be dangerous. Children’s game or not, it was combat more realistic than anything in Dunrath’s exercise yard. A target reared up, he thrust home—
And his spear broke in half as some unseen flaw gave way.
He swore, threw down the stump, and tugged his bow from its saddle-case. Aldric much preferred the short-bow, half this one’s length, because despite the long and noble history of the Alban great-bow it was a clumsy weapon for horseback. The supposed courier in this supposed story had only used it for lack of better weapons.
Still, it shot arrows longer, heavier and more destructive than anything from the short-bow. Aldric loosed one at close range and despite the noise of galloping in full armour heard a rending crack as the wooden target split from top to bottom. Another target appeared, this time craftily set low on his right, and he bared his teeth in a hard, appreciative grin. Whoever built the course knew no horse-archer could shoot to nearside and had to display skill with mount instead. He did exactly that. Pressure with one knee and a kick from the opposite heel swerved Lyard sharply left, enough to launch a shaft straight back over the courser’s tail. The smack as it drove into timber was as satisfying as the cheers the shot produced.
Three remaining defenders waited at the bridge and Aldric reined back, eyeing them warily. Attacking without a spear for extra reach would be risky, yet he didn’t want to squander time swimming the moat. The sands were running, and a quarter-glass could decide who won or lost. Boldness would be best. He pulled the peak of his helmet down, settled more firmly in the saddle and touched heels to Lyard’s flanks, aware the judge had risen from his canopied seat to get a better view.
But the official wasn’t watching him.
Something reared from the moat in a hiss of displaced water and Aldric’s head jerked round, all plans and strategies forgotten. For an instant he thought the horseman surging at him through the shallows was an elaborate joke, a final trick to challenge the potential winner of The Ride. Then weeds fell from a spear that ended in a long, sharp point. It might indeed be some sort of trick, but it was definitely no joke.
He threw aside his useless wooden weapons, wrenched Lyard around and galloped with desperate haste towards the judge’s escort, the only men on the field wearing real blades. They broke and scattered as he approached, running not from him but from what came after him. Aldric snarled, rode one of them down and was out of his saddle before Lyard had skidded to a halt, wrenching the dazed man’s sword from its scabbard. Though it was no named-blade taiken, it was steel and better than nothing.
The bronze rider was on him before he could mount up again. Aldric twisted away from the spear, hacked at its shaft and almost dropped the sword from stinging fingers as it bounced off solid metal. He tensed to sidestep another charge, but the scale-armoured horseman dismounted instead, landing with a hollow reverberation as if there was nothing inside his reptilian mail.
“I am Esel, O enemy of my master.” It was the High Speech of religion and ritual, in a metallic, inhumanly-deep voice that confirmed Aldric’s fears. Duergar had caught up with him at last. “Return to me that which ye stole, or shall I take it from thee? Speak thy choice.”
“I think…” Aldric cleared his throat to still the tremor lurking there and managed a mirthless smile. “I think you’ll have to take it.”
“As ye will.” The monstrous figure turned towards his horse, and when he swung back he held a sheathed sword as long as Aldric was tall. “My master desires ye brought before him, that he may chastise thee at his pleasure. This shall be. Prepare thyself.”
*
A whistle rang out through the deathly stillness of the crowd and Lyard swung his head around, ears pricked and nostrils flaring. The black Andarran recognised his master’s signal, but his master hadn’t given it and Kyrin had to repeat the summons twice before the horse obeyed.
As she made for the spot where the big animal waited, Kyrin had to barge past spectators who stood as if spellbound. For all she knew, they were. Aware how dangerous a warhorse could be, she approached with as much caution as haste could spare while Lyard snorted and put his ears back. When she set foot to stirrup and vaulted into the saddle he reared, pawing the air and shrilling his anger and excitement, but did nothing worse. The woman on his back was a companion, someone who had treated him kindly, and a familiar comfort in the midst of this frightening strangeness. Relieved she wasn’t about to be bucked off and stamped flat, Kyrin dug in her heels and rode full-tilt for Aldric’s tent - and for Widowmaker.
*
Aldric tore off the white overrobe before it tangled his legs, and backed away from Esel’s inexorable advance. He glanced around, hoping for help and getting none. Whether through fear, horror or some more sinister reason, nobody moved. When the bronze katafrakt whipped his sword through the air and sent its scabbard spinning at Aldric’s face, he ducked aside from a long-train familiar ruse – but no tuition by Joren or Gemmel could have prepared him for the weapon Esel gripped in one scaled fist.
It wasn’t steel, it wasn’t even bronze to match the rest of him. Instead a shimmering translucent material drew Aldric’s eyes and held them. His vision blurred and he gulped as sourness rose in his throat, then wrenched his gaze away as the sweat under his armour and combat leathers went icy cold. The world had begun to slither out of focus, and one more second would have left him helpless. Before it happened again he lashed out with his own stolen sword, and guided by luck or judgement the clumsy blade struck hard against Esel’s helm.
One of the bronze goat-horns broke off and spun away, but Esel ignored what should have been a stunning, brain-rattling impact. There had been neither an attempt to dodge, nor a block with the shield strapped useless and forgotten on his arm, nor any warding movement with the great sword. It was as if he didn’t
understand what to do with either of them, because he gripped his sword like a blacksmith’s hammer. Or a bronze-founder’s maul.
Quick footsteps came from Aldric’s left as one of his former opponents charged in, a battle-axe raised in both his hands. Why this man moved when no one else did he didn’t know, and it served no purpose. Esel’s sword came up to parry with a piercing sweet chime unlike any true clash of steel, and the nacreous shimmer vanished from his blade, leaving it as clear as ice.
Then it chopped home.
The kailin dropped his axe and froze in his tracks. There was no visible wound, nor any blood on the white overrobe covering his armour, but the cloth went rigid and it crackled. Aldric had heard that sound before, the sound of frost-crisped leaves in autumn. The warrior fell over, his face a pallid mask of shock, and even before the wave of icy air billowed over him Aldric realised what Esel’s sword had done. The fallen man had frozen in very truth, his body, clothing, mail and plate all frosted over within half a heartbeat on a hot spring day. Aldric felt sure he was still alive, because this was too much like a way to transport meat from one place to another.
He was the meat, his destination was Dunrath, and Esel was to fetch him.
Another great sweep of the ice-bladed sword left a trail of chilly white vapour like exhaled breath swirling in its wake. Aldric ducked under it, straightened up fast and smashed the iron-bound rim of his shield against the bridge of Esel’s nose. It should have broken bone or even dislocated the spine, it would at least have left a real man blind with pain, but the only blindness here was a war-mask buckled beyond recovery. Esel made a grinding, impatient noise and tore the mask aside, and the lack of any face beneath it was worse than any wound.
Aldric lost his own sword in the next exchange. Brittle from appalling cold, its blade abruptly flew into a score of tinkling shards, and perspiration on his sodden glove almost froze the useless hilt to his hand.
As he backed out of reach the bronze katafrakt followed without haste, walking with the calm assurance of an executioner.
Esel moved as he had always done, no slower, no faster, stride after patient measured stride, but exhaustion was making Aldric unsteady on his feet and even Gemmel’s marvellously-light armour had become a dragging weight. That was when he realised he couldn’t outlast Duergar’s sending. Resignation joined fatigue, combining with the despair of vast weariness until he almost knelt and waited for the inevitable.
Almost; not quite. He was Alban, kailin-eir Talvalin, and he could still finish this thing on his own terms with the tsepan at his belt. Then hoofbeats and shouting cut through his daze and his eyes focused on the fast-approaching black horse and the woman astride it whose blonde hair flew behind her like a banner. He forced himself into a shaky run.
Kyrin breathed a soft apology to Isileth Widowmaker and felt not the least bit foolish doing so. She slid the taiken from its scabbard and threw it as hard and straight as she was able, then broke away to the right out of Esel’s reach. The weapon cartwheeled down and quivered in the turf for less than a second before Aldric’s fingers closed around its hilt and wrenched it free. There was no surge of renewed strength, just reassurance that with his own sword in hand he had a better chance of…
Of dying well, if nothing else.
He swung around to face his tormentor and flinched instantly, avoiding a cut across the eyes by less than a finger’s-breadth, so close that the frigid wind of its passage left frost on eyebrows and lashes. Aldric had no illusions about crossing swords, not even with Widowmaker, and concentrated on spotting the opening he needed. It wasn’t an opening in Esel’s battle harness, he was certain none of the pommel-strikes or cunning stabs to weak points could hurt what was inside it. But bronze was brittle. That helmet-horn hadn’t cut, it had broken like a dry stick. So given the chance – Aldric threw his shield away and poised Isileth Widowmaker in the Falcon’s Guard behind his head – he would test his theory on the bronze man’s armour.
And his arm.
Esel’s blow was a huge clumsy sweep. Despite his weariness Aldric evaded it with ease and there was nothing weary about his return stroke, a vertical double-handed cut aimed between wrist and elbow. Armour and limb gave way together with a hard bright clank, and Esel’s hand with the sword still in it went spinning to the ground. He clutched the stump with his remaining hand and uttered a shrill noise, a screech like the corroded iron hinges of some ancient gate working against decades of rust. Instead of blood he leaked a bluish fluid with a sharp acidic stench, and instead of flesh an oily pulp bulged from the ruptured metal, pulsing with the irregular flutter of a moth in a cobweb.
Aldric fought a matching flutter in his stomach as he dropped Isileth to the ground, lifted the amputated hand and twisted Esel’s sword from its slack, bronze-scaled grip. He kept his own hand well clear of the icy crystalline blade as he took a step forward, stiff-legged as an angry cat.
“Esel,” he said. There was no longer any quaver in his voice, only a harshness fired and tempered by the memory of how this creature had frightened him almost onto the point of his own dirk. “Your master wants something from me. When the time comes, he’ll get this.”
The huge sword stabbed into the bronze katafrakt’s body as easily as into a scabbard, far enough to come out again at the back. Instead what went inside became part of inside until the hilt-guard slammed against Esel’s chest and stuck fast. A convulsion wrenched it from Aldric’s grip, and Duergar’s failed sending staggered towards his horse.
The bronze warrior crawled laboriously back to his saddle and sat there, plucking at the sword-hilt protruding from a torso already caked with ice. His horse raised one foreleg and stopped. Esel leaned back, stump raised as if to hold his missing war-mask in a hand no longer there, and gazed into the distance. If Aldric had ever visited a certain bronze-foundry in Erdhaven, he would have recognised the pose at once. The equestrian statue once so admired slowly overbalanced, fell with a vast splash into the moat and vanished beneath a surface that froze solid between one breath and the next.
There were long seconds of shocked silence before the cheers began.
Aldric heard more footsteps, many more, as armed and armoured men came running up now everything was safe. His face curdled with disgust, his stomach heaved, and he got his helmet off just before the vomiting began. Kyrin stroked his head, murmuring soft comforting sounds until he was done and spat the last foulness from his mouth, then glared as soldiers surrounded them with levelled spears. Their officer surveyed her with a cold eye, but when he did the same to Aldric he was met by an expression that made him back away.
“Somebody get his sword!” the man shouted to cover being startled by a sickly frightened boy in armour.
The sickness and fright were almost gone by now, Aldric had been much more than a boy for years, and after a sorcery-created monstrosity like Esel, a mere officer of guards didn’t count for much. It took several deep breaths to control his anger or at least push it out of sight, and he straightened his back as he glanced at the soldiers.
“What’s going on here?” His voice was as haughty and menacing as any offended clan-lord, and though the officer tried to ignore its tacit threat, Kyrin noticed he kept well clear. Instead he levelled one gloved finger at her.
“You,” the officer said, “help him to walk. Guards, watch them. Especially the eijo. I wouldn’t think of escaping, an-kourgath,” he finished, bolder once his soldiers had closed in.
“I asked you a question,” Aldric said. There were no more threats. He was too weary for play-acting an unconvincing role and no longer cared about an answer. He got one all the same.
“My commander wants you,” the officer replied, happy to dump his responsibility on someone else. “Both of you. Now. At once.”
CHAPTER SIX
Aldric and Kyrin had no idea where they were going, and it became clear they weren’t meant to know. The closely-escorted walk from the competition field brought them to a carriage of impressive luxur
y, though every curtain was lowered and fastened and two armed guards who climbed in and locked the doors were there to keep them that way.
Aldric nodded at Kyrin, glanced at the guards and slowly, so as not to alarm them, he stretched to confirm the three small blades under his clothes were still in place. For all his bluster the arresting officer – an arrest, or an abduction? – seemed remarkably ignorant about how to handle dangerous prisoners, yet apparent ignorance could be a test to see what those prisoners might do. He forced himself to relax and see what happened next.
The carriage stopped after only twenty minutes of slow travel through the Festival-busy streets, not long enough to take them beyond the walls of Erdhaven Port. Another brief walk from the coach-yard went past where cooking smells and general bustle suggested a kitchen, then up narrow back stairs to a plain door, and the view inside told them everything had changed again.
“Quite a cage,” said Kyrin. “A gilded one.”
To call this room gilded understated the truth. Gold-plated was more like it. Ornamental panels of maple and walnut covered its walls, and rugs deep as snowdrifts lay on the floor. The lamps, burning scented oil, filled the air with fragrance and struck myriad reflections from gems and precious metals. So much ostentation should have been coarse and garish. Instead it was tasteful, restrained, and elegant enough that Kyrin stood near the door considering her next move in case it unbalanced the room’s sense of graceful order.
“A cage is a cage,” said Aldric as he studied the windows. Scrollwork half a finger thick writhed across them, and like much else their dull yellow gleam was not mere brass. But they were as secure as any brutish lattice of iron strips. “And this has bars like any other.”
The Horse Lord (The Book of Years Series 1) Page 14