“There’ll be no next time. Even if you do walk again. You’re not the only one can learn a lesson.”
“Then why did you come here?”
“’Cause my mother says boys whine about what’s done. Men decide what will be.”
“You always listen to your mother?”
“I complain about it, but yes.” He was no diplomat, after all. Bluntness would win the day, or nothing would. “She’s a very clever woman.”
“Sounds like something my father would say.”
“I hear he’s a very clever man.”
“So he’s always telling me. Let’s look to the future, then,” said Stour. “What do you see there, Young Lion?”
What indeed? Leo took a long breath. “The Bloody-Nine won ten duels in the Circle, but he let most of his opponents live. Rudd Threetrees. Black Dow. Harding Grim.”
“I know the names.”
“He left them bound to serve.”
Stour curled his lip. “You want me to serve you?”
“The Great Wolf for a pet?” He saw Stour’s face twist with anger, made him wait a moment longer before going on. “I don’t need you for a servant. I want you for a friend.”
Stour gave a disbelieving snort, bursting with pride and scorn. Everything he did burst with pride and scorn, even though he lost. “For a what?”
“I reckon we want the same thing, you and I.”
“And what the fuck is that?”
“Glory!” barked Leo, voice clapping off the narrow walls and making Stour flinch. “You want men to whisper your name with fear. With awe. With pride. You want to hear it in the songs, in the same breath as the Bloody-Nine’s, and Whirrun of Bligh’s, and the great warriors of the age! You want fame.” And Leo shook his clenched fist in Stour’s face. “Fame in the Circle and fame on the battlefield! You want to strive against great enemies and put the bastards in the mud. You want to win!” He snapped that word out like a battle cry, and Stour’s face twitched at it, like a miser’s who’s seen the glint of gold. “And you know how I know?” Leo smiled, or at any rate showed his teeth. “’Cause I do, too.”
The room was silent again. Just the rustle as a log shifted in the fireplace. Stour had turned thoughtful, eyes fixed on Leo. Two handsome young heroes at the height of their strength. A lord governor and a king-in-waiting, ready to step out from the long shadows of their parents. A pair of champions, men of action, already with great victories under their belts, set to inherit the world and reforge it the way they saw fit.
“Maybe we understand each other after all,” Stour said softly.
“We have to be neighbours,” said Leo, sitting forward. “We could waste our strength fighting each other. Waste our lives watching for the knife in our backs, like our oh-so-clever parents have. But we’re our own men, I reckon, and we can find our own way. The Circle of the World is wide. No shortage of other enemies. Might do better if we fought the bastards together.”
“It’s a pretty picture,” said the Great Wolf, eyes shining, and Leo wondered if he might trust the thoughtful Stour even less than the furious one. “But do you really reckon a wolf and a lion can share the meat?”
“If there’s enough meat to go around, why not?”
Stour slowly started to smile. “Then let’s shake on it, Young Lion.” And he thrust his hand towards Leo.
Leo wondered if he really was sticking his head in the wolf’s mouth, but he’d come this far. There was no way back. So he winced as he stood, reaching out to take Stour’s hand.
He gave a gasp as the fingers snapped tight around his and he was jerked forward, pain lancing through his wounded side. He found himself bent over Stour with a dagger-blade tickling his neck.
“Trot into the wolf’s lair talking of friendship?” Stour clicked his tongue. “Not very clever.”
“No one’s ever accused me of being clever. But we’ve tried being enemies.” Leo reached around the blade of Stour’s knife to scratch gently at his bandaged face. “Look where it’s got us.”
The Great Wolf bared his teeth and Leo felt the knife’s edge press against his throat, the tension in Stour’s arm as he gripped the handle tight.
“I like you, Brock. Maybe we’re two of a kind after all.” Stour’s snarl became a grin, and he rammed the knife into the wattle wall, much to Leo’s relief. “The Young Lion and the Great Wolf together.” The grin became a smirk as he squeezed Leo’s hand even tighter. “There’s a partnership’ll make the world tremble!”
Empty Chests
The wind gusted up strong, whipping brown leaves from the trees and sending them chasing across the hillside, whipping Rikke’s hair in her face as she stood, watching Leo limp towards her with Jurand and Glaward in tow, silently seething.
She’d been seething ever since the duel, and not always silently, either. Three times she’d gone to the house where he was lying wounded. Three times she’d prowled around outside. Three times she’d stalked away without going in. Wanting to see him, refusing to see him. She’d been hoping her silence would speak in thunder, but some men are wilfully deaf.
Leo bared his teeth as he walked, leaning hard on a stick. That sprinkled some guilt on her anger. He’d fought for them, after all. Risked his life for them on nothing more than her word he’d win. He stumbled, and she almost started forward to help him. But he glanced up, and saw her, and it was then he really started to look pained. As if he expected harsher treatment from her than his enemies. In that, if nothing else, he was wise.
“I’ll give you pained,” she muttered under her breath.
Didn’t help her mood at all that, ever since the duel, she could still see ghosts. Misty figures haunting the corners of her vision. Misty after-images that followed faces. Folk preparing the Circle. Folk fighting and dying in the battle. One time a fellow taking a shit in the bushes. No pattern to any of it that she could see. Her left eye still felt hot, her nerves raw and smarting, her stomach squelching and bubbling. That morning she’d got out of bed and given a shriek as, looking back, she caught a glimpse of herself asleep. Now and again, she’d flinch at the thought of that crack in the sky. Shudder at the memory of the black pit beyond, that held the knowing of everything.
Maybe you can force the Long Eye open after all. But closing it again might be another matter.
“Rikke.” As he came close, Leo tried a guilty smile which helped neither of them. “It’s good to—”
“Antaup tells me you’ve been off chatting with Stour Nightfall.”
Leo winced. “He wasn’t supposed to say anything.”
“So the problem’s not that you did it, but that he admitted you did it? Tell me you killed the winking bastard this time!”
Leo sighed, as if talking to her was quite the trying task. “I think there’s been enough killing, don’t you?”
“I could stand one more grave for the right man.”
Glaward was already edging away, no bones at all for such a big fellow. “I think I’d better… in fact, I definitely need to…”
Jurand loitered, frowning at Rikke, one hand out as if to catch Leo if he fell. “Do you want me to stay?”
“No,” said Leo, as if he actually did. “I’ll catch up with you.”
Jurand backed reluctantly away. The looks he gave her, anyone would’ve thought it was him and Leo who were the couple. Rikke had meant to be firm but fair, the way her father always told her to be, but well before Jurand was out of earshot she ended up scolding.
“What did you and that murdering bastard have to talk about?”
Leo sighed. “The future. Like it or not, he’ll be King of the Northmen. Better we talk than fight—”
“Is it?” snapped Rikke. “I’m surprised you didn’t stay there. Hold hands while he heals, share a few laughs over how he burned my father’s hall and chased me through the woods and killed my friends and yours!”
Leo winced like he was stepping out into a storm. “I’m not changing sides, Rikke, I’m just trying to build
a bridge from one side to the other.”
“No doubt. A bridge those evil fuckers can march straight across!”
“To kill an enemy is cause for relief,” he trotted out pompously. “To make a friend of him is cause for celebration—”
“You make friends with your enemies when you see the mud heaped on top o’ the bastards! You think Black Calder will just let this go? He wants all the North and he won’t be happy till he has it. All you did was sharpen his appetite.”
Leo had that sulky-child look he got around his mother. Rikke was feeling more sympathy with her by the day. “The heir to the North owes me his life now. He’s bound to me. That’s a valuable thing—”
“By the dead,” she sneered. “You think the likes o’ Stour Nightfall care a shit for debts or bindings? He’ll turn on you quick as a snake. You promised me you’d kill him, Leo. You promised me.”
“It’s not that easy to kill a man! Not when he’s just lying there, at your mercy.”
“I’d have thought that’s the perfect bloody time!”
“What would you know about it?” he snapped. “There’s a brotherhood between two men in the Circle. A bond. You wouldn’t understand!”
“Because I’ve got a quim or because I’ve got a brain?”
“My mother might treat me like a child but at least I bloody am her child. I’m lord governor now!” Half-angry and half-wheedling, like he was trying to convince himself as much as her. “I have to make the decisions.”
“And your first one is to break your fucking word?”
He looked taken aback by how savage she sounded. Truthfully, she was a little taken aback by it, too. “I’d no idea you could be so… ruthless.”
“Oh, aye, Ruthless Rikke, terror of the North. Seems none of the men in my life know me as well as they think. The fact is, being nice gets nothing done. You have to make of your heart a stone, Leo. You should’ve killed him.”
“Maybe I should have.” Leo lifted his chin. “But I won. It was my choice what to do with him.”
By the dead, how had it come to this between the two of them? From a lot of bliss and a few niggles to all niggle and no bliss at all. She guessed you can only ride so far on a fine stomach. She felt a flurry of twitches chase up her cheek and the fact she couldn’t get her own face to obey only made her angrier than ever.
“You arrogant fuck!” she snarled. “You were reckless, and stupid, and by some margin the second-best fighter out of two! You won because Stour was even more of a puffed-up fool than you and couldn’t help showing off! You won because my Long Eye saw what he’d do and I bloody screamed it at you!”
Leo’s bruised, bandaged face barely moved while she spoke. Once she ran out of things to hurt him with and petered off into silence, he took a small step towards her. Not angry. Not sad.
“What did you say to me? No one remembers how the fight was won. I won. No one cares how.”
He brushed her shoulder as he stepped past, not quite barging her out of the way, but nearly.
Was only a day or two ago, he’d said he loved her. Seemed he shrugged his loves off as easily as his promises.
He left her on the hillside, in the wind. Silently seething.
“Leo dan bloody Brock,” she snarled, and in case someone had somehow missed the point, added, “that preening dunce!”
Isern thoughtfully fiddled with the finger bones on her necklace. “I sense something hath come betwixt the young lovers.”
“You’ve an uncanny feeling for these things,” mused Rikke’s father.
“He’s a bloody bladder o’ vanity!” snapped Rikke, rubbing at her eye. Still sore. Still hot.
“You know your problem?” Her father had that calming look that was always certain to enrage her more.
“It’s Leo dan lying Brock, the faithless fucker!”
“You’re prone to set folk up so high, all they can do is let you down…”
“It’s a constant worry o’ mine,” said Isern, nodding away, “the way the girl worships me.”
“… and when they do, it’s a high peak to topple from.”
“That’s not true!” snapped Rikke. Then she wondered if it was, and quickly lost all patience with the exercise. “That’s shit!”
“You’ve said all along he’s prone to think of himself first, second, third and last,” said Isern.
“And you’re saying that’s all right?”
“I’m saying it’s a bastard of a shortcoming in a lover, but one your eyes were wide open to. If you build your boat from cheese, d’you see, you can’t wail at the heavens when it sinks, for cheese is known to be a poor material for boat-building.”
“You should only ask for promises you know are going to be kept,” said her father. “And we’re talking of the Circle.” He gave a helpless shrug. “Things happen. You’ve got to try to look on the sunny side or you’ll spend your life in darkness.”
Rikke ground her teeth. The two of them had, as usual, many fair points. But it was unfair points she wanted right then. “So when someone kicks me up my arse, I need to thank ’em for not kicking me in the teeth, do I?”
“We got our land back, Rikke. Our city. Our hall. Our garden…” His mouth curled up in a faraway smile. “No doubt it’ll all need some putting right, but—”
“How long for, d’you think?” sneered Rikke, not much comforted by thoughts of training a rose or two. “Will Black Calder just toss his father’s dreams on the rubbish heap now, dump his ambitions with the fish skins? That greedy fucker’s going nowhere. Moment we look away, he’ll be back!”
Her father, as ever, refused to be goaded into anger and stuck with quiet resignation. “Nothing’s for ever, Rikke. No peace and no war. All you can do is the best you can in the time you’ve got.”
“Well, there’s our answer then. Best you can! Wisdom to be proud of.”
All that dug from him was a wistful wince. “Wish I had some wisdom to give you. Wish I had the answers.”
Rikke felt guilty, then. She seemed to lately, whenever she wasn’t angry. Lurching from one to the other like a bloody children’s see-saw. The kind that smacks you hard in the arse. “I’m sorry,” she grumbled. “You’ve given me plenty of wisdom. More answers than any child’s got a right to. Ignore me.” She couldn’t resist adding, “Everyone bloody does,” in a mumble at the end.
“Well, your faithless but finely proportioned lord governor problem is solving itself.” Isern leaned back and put one boot up on the table, rolling a chagga pellet between finger and thumb. “Since he’s off to the Union where the bloated fools who wouldn’t lift a finger to help will call him the greatest warrior since Euz, and puff his head up with farts until he can’t fit through a bloody door sideways.”
“Huh.” Rikke neatly swiped the chagga pellet as Isern lifted it to her mouth and stuck it up behind her own lip. “Some solution.”
“Thought you hated him?”
“I do.”
“But you don’t want him to go anywhere?” asked Isern, rolling a new pellet for herself.
Rikke planted her elbows on the table and her chin on her hands and sagged unhappily into them. “Exactly.”
Her father swiped the second pellet from Isern’s fingers and stuck it down behind his own lip. “Just as well you’re going with him, then.”
Rikke looked up. “I’m going where now?”
“Adua.”
“I need to go back to Uffrith, with you. Tend to the garden, and whatever.” Though she’d never had much patience for it, and less than ever these days.
“Isern and Shivers’ll go with you, make sure you don’t get into mischief.”
“Or that you do?” muttered Isern, eyeing them both carefully as she rolled a third pellet.
“You can pour a drink on my old friend Grim’s grave.” He gave a little smile. “No need for words over it. He never liked ’em. But there’ll be deals done in Adua, and we need to be represented. After the battle at Osrung, we were promised six chairs
on the Open Council. Never happened.”
“Promises are like flowers,” said Isern, stretching her arms wide. “Often given, rarely kept.”
“Well, if Leo sticks by us, maybe it’ll be kept now.”
Rikke pushed her pellet sourly from one side of her lip to the other. “I haven’t proved myself too good at making Leo stick to things.”
“Try again. You might improve. And it’ll do you good to see the world. There’s more to it than forests, believe it or not.”
“Adua,” muttered Rikke. “The City of White Towers.” She’d heard a lot about it but never thought to go herself. A year in Ostenhorm had been hard enough work.
“Just promise me one thing.”
“Anything.”
“Let go of it.”
“Of what?”
“The feuds,” said her father, and of a sudden, he looked so tired. “The grudges. The enemies. Take it from a man with a wealth o’ bitter experience. Vengeance is just an empty chest you choose to carry. One you have to go bent under the weight of all your days. One score settled only plants the seeds of two more.”
“So you’re telling me I should just forget what they said? Forget what they did?”
“There’s no forgetting. I’m hemmed in by the memories.” And he flapped an arm about as though the shadows were full of an invisible crowd. “Besieged by the bastards. The hurts and the regrets. The friends and the enemies and those who were a bit o’ both. Too long a lifetime of ’em. You can’t choose what you remember. But you can choose what you do about it. Time comes… you got to let it all go.” He smiled sadly down at the tabletop. “So you can go back to the mud without the baggage.”
“Don’t talk that way,” said Rikke, putting her hand down on the back of his. She felt like she was on stormy seas and he was the one star she had to sail by. “You’re a long way from the mud.”
“We’re all of us only a hair away, girl, all the time. At my age, you have to be ready.”
Rikke realised she’d got swept away in her bitterness then, and she leaned forward and hugged her father tight, and propped her chin on his balding head.
A Little Hatred Page 45