Crimson Valley

by Hausladen, Blake;

  I managed to get a better sense of it all then, and almost laughed. The crowd alone outnumbered the Havishon three to one. The dancing was a ploy. Their discipline rivaled the Hemari, and any one of the well-armored companies was a match for the full brigade of Havishon horse. They were competing for the crowd’s amusement. The Yud were playing with the Havishon and had been doing it for many days. I’d never seen such a mad rush. Something was driving the Havishon on—something noble and useless if I had to guess.

  The scene was growing old to my eyes when a group of Havishon broke through and charged up the hill. Bits of color in the mix drew my full attention. Men from Aneth were there, and among them a man wearing a blue cap. He was upon and Akal-Tak, spear in hand.

  The cheers rose and the forward edge of the crowd charged them with swords and cups of wine. The wave of death was a wash of darkness and along this sweat swirl the Yud cheered and danced. The hundred horsemen cut deep into the crowd but were swarmed by the thousands. Arilas Kiel was dragged from his horse, and his guts were tied around a pike and raised up for all to see.

  The crowd cheered anew, but it was muted this time. The pennants upon the towers came down until only one remained—the family who’d done the best murder. The last of the Havishon were in full retreat. Pieces of the crowd began to withdraw, as if wanting to be the first down the road home.

  The rest stayed and formed up beneath each tower.

  How many times had the Yud gathered like this that season? Enough that men who butchered meat and cut fruit could rely upon a profit from making the trip up.

  I chuckled at the Havishon. Their way of war had defeated the Hemari but they had not adapted to the sting they’d taken from the spears of the Yentif militia. Their horses could be seen coming across the wash of the valley for many days as they approached Yud and the pikemen were better at war in every way.

  Those that remained gathered in tight groups. It was quiet for a moment as the bloody men swayed together in triumph. Then a song rose and all that heard it stopped and turned. The woman’s voice was accompanied by a slow horn, and her words pricked my ears.

  “I wrote this song,” I said, and eyes studied me.

  Their response to the affront of my foreignness waited while the song rose. Every mouth but mine moved in unison to the words, but only I knew their meaning.

  Spilled blood, Spilled blood

  Sway, sway, sway

  Spilled blood, Spilled blood

  Rise, rise, rise

  Their pronunciation of the old language was a mangled mess, but there it was—a verse I’d written to urge the Shadow to enjoy a blood sacrifice.

  “What have I done,” I said while the Shadow swirled up and painted their souls black.

  “If you’re Roto, I’m a withered tit,” a man said and I turned. It was the meat vendor and he had a long knife and six pikemen at his back. Half the crowd looked on, and they were moving closer, not away.

  I reached out across the soup of darkness, drank it in, and sang.

  Men forget

  The song silenced the vast crowd.

  My ears rang and my teeth ached, but I stayed on my feet. They stumbled away from me, and I decided it was time to move on. I let the uniform cloak fall from my shoulders and started toward the road. The carriage was where I left it, but the road was thick with the traffic of people moving back toward the city. I walked past the carriage and disappeared into the crowd.

  54

  Dia Vesteal

  Ghemma Setaj

  “Finish up. Everyone is gathering outside,” Ghemma said.

  I shoved in the last bit of the sausage, nodded my head, and submerged myself in the wide stone square of the priest’s private bath. The hot spring waters were more soothing than any I’d enjoyed in Enhedu or the Kaaryon.

  I’d woken to the smell of the sizzling meat before the dawn, and Ghemma had me in the water before my first clear though. She’d massaged me while I ate, and recounted the many events since I collapsed asleep the previous evening.

  The prelate’s mercenaries had looted the estate before we arrived and rode off with his first wife and all his horses. His second wife was found dead in a back room some time later, killed Ghemma suspected, trying to fight off the mercenaries. Two of the town’s priests had been found similarly stabbed to death not far from the armory, and several more were missing. I took it all as good news.

  Ghemma had a warm towel ready for me, new clothes laid out, and I found my sealskin coat well cleaned. I’d never had anyone attend to me as masterfully, and as I began to carefully think my way through the many coming challenges, I recalled the countless perfect mornings I had given Barok. No wonder he had done so well.

  I suspected how he was getting on without me.

  It might have been possible for the chief prelate to be more upset at how that particular day was going, but only the two of us could hear him pounding on the door of the closet Ghemma had locked him in. The determined little thumps in the corner were music to my ears.

  Ghemma had learned a great deal in the service of a man she despised. Fear didn’t explain how hard she worked.

  “Do you know how many have decided to come with us?” I asked while I dressed.

  “Too many, I think. There are not that many singers in Verd, and I’m not sure why you would want all of Harmond’s men.”

  “They are abandoning the harvest?”

  She shrugged. “Those with talent hope you will bless them as you did Harmond. The rest know that Master Aden is coming down from the Bunda-Hith. Half wish to please him, half wish to be as far away as possible. They all are taking advantage of you.”

  “How many words do you know?” I asked.

  “Just the three words of the healing song,” she said, and blushed crimson. She hid her embarrassment by hurrying to get Clea ready. She handed her to me with the care of a dame.

  “You have had children of your own?”

  “No,” she said, and her softer emotions were strangled by a bloom of rage that colored her cheeks. “His first and second wife each gave him sons. I helped raise them before he shipped them off to tutors in Korkorath. He’d bought a fourth wife from Dagoda to make more little brats for him, but she died in a fire. He’s been crawling on me twice as often since.”

  “Had he gone impotent?” I asked.

  She chuckled. “If only I was so lucky. His second wife added a dose of the women’s medicine to my soup the night of my wedding. She told me about it after and threatened to tell him I was barren if I didn’t see to her sons.”

  She reached her hands through the pockets of my coat and undergarments and began to rub my back and sides. She found soreness I’d not know I had. Her kindness was designed to end the conversation, and I couldn’t rightly remember what I’d meant to ask next.

  She tapped on the top of my belly and took hold of my arm. “You won’t make it far before the baby comes.”

  “I have no choice.”

  “Are all masters cruel?” she asked.

  “It is best to be your own master,” I replied, and squeezed her hands in thanks.

  She gave me a strange look, and I turned the topic. “Did you ever meet Burhn?”

  She blushed at the questions and I asked, “You know him well?”

  “He would lead a group of acolytes down the glacier after each hunt to trade their healing magic for gold and supplies. He would stay here and dine with my husband. They discussed much. It shook things up here when he fled. You knew him, too?”

  She fancied him. I wanted to hear more about those dinner meetings, but Ghemma would not have been included in the discussions. Instead of telling her I’d tried to kill Burhn, I choose to be kind.

  “He’s one of the bravest man I’ve ever known. He has gone his own way, and I wish him well.”

  “He was a different from the rest, that’s for sure. He called himself Bermish, but he was born far away—Heneur, I’d heard him say once after too much wine. Best for all of us to b
e away, perhaps.”

  “There are not many routes out of here. Perhaps we’ll meet him again on the way.”

  She smiled to hear it and carried my pack for me as we moved out into the flower-choked garden that separated the estate from its stables. The crowd gathered there was large, mixed, and anxious to be moving. The flowers had been picked apart, and several of the stones along the edges of the manicured path had been kicked free. Harmond and one of the priests stood in the center of the gathering and were arguing at volume. The group noticed my arrival and both men started toward me.

  “I do not like problems,” I said to them.

  “We disagree on the best route to Pashwarmuth,” Harmond said.

  “Do we need to decide it now? I would prefer to be moving as soon as possible.”

  “No,” the priest said. “We—”

  “Yes, we do,” Harmond said. “We must decide it before we leave the city. The best route is west across the lakes. The only place to find boats enough is here in Verd.”

  I turned to the priest. “And you would take the tithe road north?”

  “Of course. The road is much faster.”

  Harmond said, “If we were going to Korkorath, fine, but from there we need to move down the Lira River and across Goad Lake. It is a mean river during the spring thaw, and Korkorath will not have boats enough to take us. It is best to get boats here, from men we trust and portage across the lakes. It is a well-travelled route, safe, and faster than their meandering road.”

  I’d hoped our course would take us straight north. From Korkorath, I could make it to Alsonbrey. From there the rest was a trip I’d made before through the back woods and field of the Kaaryon and Trace. It had felt like the right plan, but as the group stared at me, I could not help but imagine Hessier on horseback racing down the road after us.

  “Burhn went west,” Ghemma whispered to me.

  “Boats it is,” I said.

  The priest was not pleased. “To Pashwarmuth? All of us, for the sake of the armor? What use is it? I wish to receive Aden’s blessing, as promised. I see no reason to portage worthless armor halfway across Berm and back on the say of a woman.”

  “As you wish, sir,” I said. “It is best, I think, for you to stay here and explain to Aden why you and the prelate failed to deliver the armor he paid for. When the rest of us return with it, I look forward to seeing what has become of you.”

  “Well, now, hold on a moment. I don’t think any of us want to anger Master Aden.”

  When no one else had anything to say I led them out. Harmond had a line of wagons ready, and we rode west from the collection of estates and up a wide road toward the market that occupied the hill in the center of the town. I got a better sense of the place as the wagons carried us up the slow slope. The estates were built as far away from the slaughterhouses as possible. To the west the city hugged the bottom of the long lake the river fed. Docks crowded the river’s mouth, and each was thick with boats and rafts. Every space between the markets and docks was crammed with shacks that I guessed were only occupied during the harvest.

  I began to feel the rumble of the herd again as we crossed the plaza and I from the center of it I got a fresh look at the monstrous flow. At that distance they looked like a line of angry ants racing down the trunk of a felled birch tree. Behind them rose the teeth of the Bunda-Hith and the slope of the long white curve of glacier. It was clear enough that morning that I could see all the way up to where the ice curved northwest toward the Priests’ Home. I could not believe I’d traveled down it and caught the sideways glances of those around me.

  “You walked all the way down?” Ghemma asked. Hearing the question did not make it any easier to believe.

  “My daughter did all the hard work,” I said, and they laughed. It was the happiest sound I’d heard since Enhedu. Harmond seemed not to have heard us and his expression was off. I followed his gaze back toward the glacier.

  “Someone else is coming down,” he said.

  “Where?” several asked at the same time and everyone searched the wide white ribbon.

  “There,” he said. “Just coming off the ridge.”

  The dust thrown up by the herd obscured them, but they were there—Geart and his Ashmari had reached the spot upon the ridge where I’d met the herd.

  My advantage was spent.

  “That’s not Aden and his acolytes,” Harmond said. “Who else could be coming down the glacier?”

  All eyes turned to me. I was ready for the question. “It is worse that Aden feared. His enemies have come.”

  “What enemies?” the priest demanded. “Are those Hessier?”

  “From Bessradi. A war between them has been festering for centuries. For these creatures to be here, the Priests’ Home has fallen. They will kill us all. We must get moving.”

  We felt the sick tingle then and the sky darkened. Every person in Verd came to a halt and turned toward the glacier.

  A flash blinded me, and a long moment later a clap of thunder slapped my ears and shook the ground. A child began to cry somewhere in town, and shapes began to appear in the sky—the black dots of diving birds they seemed. I blinked at them as they got bigger, and then like a rain, charred hunks of caribou began to rain from the sky. Everyone screamed.

  “Get us moving!” I yelled.

  Harmond’s men shoved and shouted, and our gentle pace became a rumbling dash down the far side of the hill. The stubborn horses protested as much as the squeaky wheels and brakes of the wagons. We reached the docks, and half the town was yelling while Harmond led us toward the boats. They were flat-bottomed and wide, and there was more than enough to carry us all away.

  A second, third, and fourth flash tore open the sky.

  “Everyone in,” I shouted as the black rain began again. Verd screamed again and the singers and priest flocked to the boats. Soon the whole town was pouring down the hill behind us.

  “Run for your lives,” I screamed with all my breath and body. “You must flee the city or you will perish.”

  Harmond pulled me down onto a seat as the men prepared to cast off. Ghemma was right behind me, sheltering Clea from the horrible rain.

  “We must take or ruin every boat,” I said to Harmond. “They cannot be allowed to have even one.”

  He wanted to argue but did not. He led several of his men down the dock while the sky flashed and spit blood and bone upon us. The desperate crowd from town filled more boats, and Harmond and his men stood in the center of the long wharf yelling people toward empty craft. There was enough for almost everyone and the many hundreds of boats were underway when they hurried back to us.

  The explosions ceased, and the bizarre calm that followed filled with the splash of oars and shushing of mothers.

  Ours was the last boat to cast off, and the men had the oar working hard when a set of dark figures appeared upon the market hill. They came to a halt, and before I could call out a warning their dark grip reached out and strangled us. The men stopped rowing and all the chatter cursed.

  I wanted to yell, kick, or slap them back into motion. None of us could manage so much as a whimper. Geart had us.

  But we kept moving. It made no sense until I managed a look to my right at the river. We’d moved out into the swift current that pushed across the top of the docks and it was carrying us steadily away from the town. The black grip upon us weakened.

  Geart and his minions began to run down after us, and I lost sight of them in the twisted streets.

  The men began to move and needed no urging to get back to the oars. The hundreds of boats all began surging through the water, and the dark chill upon us faded further.

  “The air is getting colder,” I said, and searched for Geart along the wharfs.

  “We are getting farther from the springs that heat the river,” Harmond said. “I will get as cold as it was upon the glacier soon enough.”

  I wished I’d not bathed. My clean skin would take the chill hard, the air did not feel rig
ht.

  “No, damn it. I know cold. This is something else. Not natural. Row, damn you. Row!”

  The surface of the lake between us and the town stopped rippling and slowly turned white.

  “They are freezing the lake,” Ghemma said. “Can any of you hear their song?”

  No one replied, and the forward edge of the sheet engulfed us and began to creep out toward the rest of the boats. The six men at our oars had to bash the blades through the thin sheet of ice to keep us moving. The others in our boat, nine of them perhaps, were all singers—the best of them, if you could trust a place like Verd to sort out the weak from the strong. One of them was a priest.

  “We have to keep away their magic,” I said. An idea turned my stomach, but I choked it down. Clea’s blood could not be my first weapon for every battle.

  “What do we do?” the priest asked. He looked ready to swim for it.

  Behind us, Geart and his Hessier appeared upon the docks. The air around them was shrouded in a gray fog and the lake froze solid along the shore. They started out toward us.

  “I need a knife,” I said, and unwrapped Clea’s bundle. “I want you all to share the nouns you know. We are going to sing them, just the nouns.”

  “Nonsense,” the priest said. “I’m not giving up my family’s words. This whole thing is a trick to get us to cough them up.”

  “Then you can find yourself another boat,” I said, and took the knife that Harmond offered.

  “What do you intend?” Ghemma asked and wrapped her arms protectively around Clea.

  It stung my heart, but the desire to survive smashed the feeling aside. “I’m going to bless you all with the blood of my daughter like I did Harmond, and you are going to sing a song that will hold away the cold. Now get hold out one of her feet so I do not hurt her more than is necessary.”

  Ghemma held Clea close and looked ready to knock me overboard.

  “I love you for protecting my daughter, but the evil marching toward us will tear her apart if we do not escape. Do as I say.”