by Ben Blake
*
Irrian dozed for a time, but full sleep wouldn’t quite come to him. Memories churned through his mind, mixed with images of countless soldiers swarming through Sarténe with flaming brands in their fists, and in the end he woke. At some point Jayan must have come back, because a blanket had been placed around Irrian and tucked in at the sides. That made him smile. He might live to be ninety, and still Jayan would think he needed to be cared for like a child.
When he stirred went back to the window, wincing once more at a stab of pain in his troublesome hip. None of the chiropractors could tell him why arthritis had struck at one joint and left the others alone, even a decade later, but he supposed he should be glad of the mercy. Antanus the Hierarch was crippled in both hands and knees, so that every day he was martyred by his suffering from the moment he woke. Irrian could at least still hold a quill. His lips quirked in an ironic smile. Perhaps God was telling him he had chosen the right path.
Outside night was falling. Irrian watched it and let his mind run on a familiar track, calculating risks and possible gains. He wished it was Sarul who suffered crippling pains in his hands, or else Elizur Mandain. Someone who deserved them. It was unkind of him, but Irrian hoped both men would be struck down by agonies before they could join the Crusade. He didn’t really expect they would be, though. It was strange that the cruel and self-serving always seemed to escape while the pious went through torment.
But Irrian had done what he could. Jayan would pass his message to a Notary in the outer city, if he hadn’t already. The coin-counter would encrypt it in a secret cipher and send it by pigeon to someone in Mayence: Irrian had never known who. From there it would rapidly reach the Hidden House, and the Lady. Irrian had been sending her messages that way for thirty years.
Three months ago he’d sent a message to someone else for the very first time, a hastily-scrawled missive meant for Calesh Saissan, far away in the deserts of Tura d’Madai. Everything that followed now would be partly because of him: the lives lost, the lives saved, all the joys and griefs. When he thought too much about that it brought a chill to his skin.
The Lady of the Hidden House must be well into her seventies by now. Twenty years older than he was. He supposed if she could bear her burdens, he could shoulder his own.
He hoped he might be allowed to see her again, before it ended.
Twelve
Departures
A frayed-looking man with sawdust in his hair balanced a wooden board over a broad window, trying to hold it in place with his knees while he twisted to hammer in nails. Half a dozen stuck out at unruly angles, and he hadn’t fixed the board when he struck his own thumb so hard that blood spattered in bright, sparkling drops. He yowled and dropped the board.
Strong hands caught it before it moved more than an inch.
“Hasty hands make for sloppy work, friend,” Luthien said. “Calm yourself. Your life is not in peril today.”
The grounds keeper saw his green Elite’s robe, and broke off in the midst of another ripe curse. His face went red.
“Er,” he managed.
Luthien looked over his shoulder, to where Academy students were streaming past along the gravel path, heading for the manor house. “I’d appreciate a little help, if someone could spare a moment.”
It was gratifying, really, to see the number of youths who detached themselves from the tide and moved towards him. Most saw that others were ahead of them and veered back to the path, but three came over and lifted the far end of the board into position. He didn’t know any of them. Presumably they came out of respect for the green robe.
“Perhaps you could hammer those nails straight now,” he said to the grounds keeper. “And don’t worry about your swearing. Really, I heard far worse oaths in the Hand of the Lord.”
He wished he had the words back as soon as he spoke them. Luthien could actually see the man wondering whether to ask when he was going to fetch his weapons and prepare for the coming battles. Several of the students glanced over too, though they hastily looked away again if they thought he might notice them. One or two of the more percipient flicked eyes from the path to the window and back, visibly calculating the distance Luthien must have moved to catch the board as it began to slide. Which wasn’t the point, of course. Nobody would have had the time to cover the five yards or so from where Luthien had been, walking calmly in the gravel, to where he needed to be.
The trick was in knowing where you had to be before you needed to be there. He’d always found it rather simple.
“The nails?” Luthien said after a moment. The grounds keeper gave a start and picked up his hammer, pausing to suck blood off his wounded thumb before he began to work.
It was only a clumsy hammer stroke, but Luthien had seen other signs of panic already. Students loading bags onto a hired donkey until the animal’s back was bent under the weight, then adding more. People at the quayside in Parrien trying to buy passage on a ship heading out, heading anywhere, at extortionate prices that only got worse as the day wore on. Other townsfolk had formed impromptu caravans and trudged away westward, towards Mayence. So far the exodus was slow, the roads uncrowded, but behaviour like that was contagious, just as fear was.
Word that the All-Church army was crossing the Rielle had spread through Parrien during the morning. It had reached the Academy too, passing through the halls in a ripple of whispers, like a pagan god flying on winged feet. Parrien could at least shelter behind its walls and ramparts, poorly maintained though they were, but the Academy was exposed, a rambling sprawl of buildings set in woodland and orchards. It would last only for as long as it took horsemen to ride through and toss burning brands inside the doors. Parrien wasn’t much better: anyone still there when the army came would likely be trapped until the fighting was done, and no matter if his father was a Duke in Boromil or a Baron in Rheven. Sieges were ugly things, drawn-out torments in which the innocent starved right alongside the guilty, and died with them as well. The realisation of that truth was in every one of the passing faces of the students. They were heading for the main hall – if they could all still fit inside – to hear the Dean tell them what the faculty intended to do.
Luthien would quite like to know that, as well.
“You know,” he said in a low voice to the grounds keeper, “a sheet of wood won’t keep soldiers out of the lecture halls.”
With nails held in his mouth, the hammerer shifted them deftly to one side of his lips before he answered. “Might slow them down.”
Not much, it wouldn’t.
The man was dreaming, but at least he hadn’t already begun to throw belongings into bags and flee for the hills. Plenty of people had done so the moment they heard the army was coming. Luthien supposed he couldn’t blame them: the size of that force appalled him too. It was one thing to see tens of thousands of men unleashed on infidels in a faraway land, but the likes of Gallene and Rheven hadn’t seen an army like that since the days of the Empire, half a millennium ago. Not even the wealthiest kings could afford to pay for it. But the All-Church could, and it went where they ordered.
And the soldiers? Some would fight for money: there were always enough like that to keep wars raging until God made an end of the world, or else the last human lay dying with a spear in his belly. Others would believe whatever the All-Church priests told them, however horrible or unlikely, about the Dualism. There were always plenty of those men too, willing to accept the vilest slanders as truth if the speaker wore the cassock of a man of God. Still more would harbour doubts but follow orders, held to the purpose by bonds of brotherhood and trust, forged in battle and almost impossible to break. Luthien knew a little about such ties, and he couldn’t blame people for them either.
A few might defy the priests. Not enough, Luthien thought; a thousand would not be enough. Only a very small number of men had the clearness of mind to recognise a lie through several disguises, and the moral courage to act upon the knowledge. And there would be lies, he was su
re. The All-Church would make outrageous claims of their enemies; that they defiled the Cross, murdered children for use of their blood in unspeakable rites, and practised bizarre sexual acts upon each other. The same sort of things that had been said of the Madai before the first Crusade was launched, and of the Jaidi before then, when the Basilica was gathering men to retake Alinaur from the desert folk. It was outright mendacity and Churchmen ought to be above such things, but it worked, and it didn’t help that the Margrave of Mayence so patently preferred men in his bed. That was the well-known fleck of truth which would gild the lies, and make them seem true.
The army would go where the All-Church aimed it. That was obvious, but it would need days to cross the Rielle, and perhaps another week to reach Parrien. Still, many of the townsfolk had decided not to wait. There was no such thing as leaving too early, but a person could certainly leave it too late, though too much haste might lead to mistakes. One knot of refugees had actually fled east, straight down the road the All-Church army would shortly march up. The soldiers would steal the food they brought and take the women for their own amusement, most likely. The thought made Luthien grimace.
He should not be thinking about armies anyway. That part of his life was over. He turned his attention back to the grounds keeper, and lowered his voice still further. “If you have family, it might not be a bad time to pay them a visit. Especially if they live outside Sarténe.”
Nails moved back across the man’s mouth. “All my people are here.” He shrugged. “All my life is.”
He was not a garrulous man, it seemed. Luthien didn’t press him further. With the board nailed up he stepped away and nodded thanks to the three students who had helped. The boys rejoined the stream of youths heading for the manor, which was thinner now that most had already gone by. Luthien dusted his hands, pleased with a job well done, and that was when he noticed five men in uniform watching him from twenty feet away.
They were Hand of the Lord, he saw immediately, their black and white coats dusty from travel. Soldiers of the Hand always kept their uniforms clean and mended, which meant these men hadn’t had time for such niceties. That made them newcomers to Mayence, and that meant they almost certainly belonged to the companies Calesh had brought back from Tura d’Madai. It was simple logic – simple, but even that much was usually beyond most people, which always frustrated Luthien. He knew he shouldn’t pity those who were less clever than he was, but it was a weakness he couldn’t seem to shake.
The men weren’t wearing armour, so Luthien didn’t think they meant trouble. Still, the cadaverous-looking man at the front was gazing quite openly at him. Luthien walked over and raised an eyebrow.
“My name is Amand,” the gaunt man said, not at all perturbed. His uniform bore the remnants of well-ironed creases, underneath the dust. “I’m here on the orders of Commander Saissan, and you’re Luthien Bourrel, of course.”