A Blackbird In Silver (Book 1) (32 page)

‘Our optimism is wearing thin,’ Ayla put in. ‘I fear most for the children. But my husband, bless him, still thinks a miracle will save us.’

Setrel laughed. ‘It’s true, if foolish. Still, I don’t let such speculation interfere with the practical work that must be done.’

‘So,’ Ashurek said after a pause, ‘Gastada will graciously let you know when he decides to destroy you? Much in character.’

‘You speak as if you know him.’

‘Regrettably, I do. He held me prisoner in his castle only a few years since.’

‘You are Prince Ashurek of Gorethria… are you not?’ Setrel’s eyes narrowed in speculation.

‘Your guess is correct,’ the Prince replied evenly.

‘By the gods… of all the strange things that have happened, this is the most unbelievable. You, appearing on my very doorstep! You must know that you have become a legend of the worst kind in Tearn. However, I hold that the reality behind any myth is always something quite unexpected, so I am not about to sit in judgment on you, nor flee for my life.’

‘I am gratified,’ said Ashurek with a wry grin.

‘Tell me, how did you escape from Gastada? If we could only find some vulnerability, some weakness in him…’

‘He has none, as far as I know. As you say, demons and fell creatures of the Serpent provide his power. I escaped only by a sorcerous raid made on the place.’ He explained Silvren’s bright enchanted rescue of him, but was unprepared for Setrel’s reaction to the account.

The man leapt to his feet, eyes shining and his black robe flapping. ‘It’s true then! Ayla – did you hear?’ Estarinel and Medrian stared at him, but his wife just smiled and nodded in her down-to-earth way. ‘Sorcery exists! I knew! All my life – every moment of my spare time has been devoted to proving that there is a power other than the Serpent in the world. There is magic!’

‘Setrel, don’t raise your hopes. Silvren was a sorceress, the world’s first and only one. Her power was foreign to this world, and to use it caused her great pain. And now the Serpent’s creatures have imprisoned her, afraid of her magic,’ Ashurek said with acute sorrow. ‘Perhaps you have made a few small spells work?’

‘Yes I have, in my workshop – that’s just it,’ Setrel said with less enthusiasm.

‘But there can be no more sorcery on this Earth unless the Serpent should perish. Until then, demon-summoning is the only force, and no one in his right mind would resort to that.’

Setrel sat down and said, ‘But my discoveries were not wrong. Sorcery can exist – if the Serpent were to die.’

‘If the Serpent were to die, Gastada would trouble you no longer either. And talking of that: in spite of your own problems, we would appreciate assistance in continuing our journey.’

Setrel looked intently at the three. And he saw not, as others had, three very unlikely travelling companions, but three people of single-minded, sound purpose. Excitement and hope glowed warmly within him. Perhaps there was a way from the path of blood and death and darkness that threatened them.

He took a long draught of beer and stood up to replenish the fire with logs.

‘As supper is finished, let us go in and see how the boy is.’

In the bedroom, the Elder gently woke Skord. He came round slowly, seeming dazed. Estarinel propped him up and Setrel fed him a bowl of broth mixed with healing herbs. To their surprise he drank it all without protest. It must have been the first time he had eaten in over a week. He coughed a little, and after a few minutes fell asleep again, breathing slowly now. For the first time in days he seemed at peace. They stood about the oak bed, a single candle spreading their shadows on the circular wall of the room.

‘We’ll let him sleep until he wakes of his own accord,’ Setrel said. ‘As I said, he’ll be safe here for now – though what will happen with the war, I don’t know.’

‘Ashurek,’ said Estarinel, ‘isn’t there something we should tell Setrel?’

‘Tell him then,’ the Gorethrian replied shortly.

‘It’s that–’ he began hesitantly. ‘Skord’s demon can appear to him at any time. I don’t think it’s fair that you should have such a thing in your house…’

Setrel smiled at this. ‘Ah, there you are wrong. No demon can cross my threshold. You poured scorn, Ashurek, upon my few small spells, but I have taught myself enough to keep a demon at bay.’

‘I do not scorn the power. I know it could be strong. But nothing can come of it until the path is cleared.’

‘Do you believe in fate – precognition?’ the Elder asked suddenly. ‘Follow me.’ He led the three into the central room of the cottage, his workshop. There was a fireplace, but no windows. It was an almost sinister place, with strange alchemical equipment set up on two long tables, and papers and scrolls and books scattered everywhere.

‘There is so much knowledge to be had of this world,’ Setrel began. ‘I believe everything that is to be known has been written down – history, everything about the Planes and their inhabitants, even all that is known of the Serpent – everything. Yet the ignorance of people amazes me. They know nothing, only superstition and hearsay. They never bother to search for knowledge, or read. Many do not even believe the Serpent exists – I did not myself, thinking it only a symbol of evil that was used as a scapegoat for inexcusable acts.

‘Then – many years ago now – I visited Eldor. He taught me that not only must I learn all I can from books, but that I must make discoveries of my own. Now all my spare time is spent researching, and everything I find out, or think I’ve found out, I write down.’

‘How can you do it all?’ Medrian said, her first words that evening. ‘Learn and discover everything, and fight a war at the same time?’

‘Because I believe in fate,’ the man answered with a smile. ‘Everything falls into place. And my theory is proved by your arrival here – I believe you three are part of the greatest, most vast design the Earth has seen since its creation.’

Estarinel shook his head in denial of this awful thought, but Setrel continued, eyes glittering with anxious enthusiasm.

‘Look – I am going to show you a prophecy. Think me an old fool if you will–’ he was rummaging among piles of books on table and floor. At last he found the one he sought, a small volume hand-bound in brown leather, worn with much use. He opened it at a certain page and set it on the table before them, so they could read the sprawling calligraphy:

When the three come from the gorge

Respite from evil shall there be:

The dead shall not walk in torment

But find peace in the cold ground.

Darkness for darkness shall be bargained

And a half-year’s light issue therefrom.

They shall come from the gorge

And by dark birds be taken.

‘Who wrote it?’ Ashurek asked.

‘My grandfather,’ Setrel replied. ‘He was a mystic and a poet. His family thought him half-mad, though we loved him dearly. This poem of his has always preyed on my mind, ever since I was a child, and especially since our present troubles began.’

‘What do you think it means?’ Estarinel asked, with the sinking feeling that it held some kind of truth.

‘Well, you say you came from a gorge… and though there were four of you, I don’t believe Skord is truly one of your party. And corpses do walk about, bringing us evil. I think the poem is saying that you can find a way to help us.’ He stroked his long beard, looking at the faces of the three.

‘But what about the rest of it – what’s the “half-year’s light”?’ Estarinel said.

Medrian answered, her voice cold and quiet. ‘It means that if we do save Excarith from Gastada, there is still only six months left before the Serpent has full power over Earth.’

Setrel himself looked shocked at this. ‘I, ah – never followed the line about the dark birds, either…’

Medrian was silent.

‘Setrel, do not delude yourself,’ Ashurek said, the firelight catching green glints in his eyes. ‘It’s only a poem. A miracle will not save you; only your own bravery can. We cannot stay to help. We have to leave as soon as possible, for our journey becomes ever more urgent.’

Setrel sighed and sat down, his face lined with worry and premature age. ‘I have to go to the Long Table at Mardrathern tomorrow. I am supposed to report everything, but I won’t mention you. Oh Ashurek, what’s to be done? You know that the Dead Army consists in the main of Gorethrians, killed in the battles across in East Sel-Hadra.’ He drew a weary breath. ‘It was a terrible thing you did when you invaded Tearn – terrible. How are you ever going to make amends?’

#

Someone else had once asked Ashurek that question, five years before, and he could not forget the tragedy that had preceded the words. It had been in Drish, that forest-covered country on Tearn’s east coast. The Gorethrian army had invaded from Elegar and from the sea, pouring over the hills in their bronze and black and gold hordes, eyes burning like emeralds and teeth gleaming in cool smiles as they cut down the Drishian soldiers before them. Led by Ashurek, they seemed infected by the electric force that moved him.

So they came down through Drish, taking its capital, the City of the Eleven Spires. These spires gleamed pale gold and white in the sun, and it was beautiful, as if the Drishians had put all their art and imagination into building this one city. It reminded Ashurek of Shalekahh.

And now Gorethrians walked its streets, and the hillside below was infested with the colourful hide tents of their encampment, like many poisonous beetles lying in wait.

The Drishian army, with its tall, swarthy soldiers, had withdrawn. They were re-grouping, Ashurek knew, and there would be at least one more battle to subdue them.

He sat in his tent, writing swiftly upon parchment. A lamp shone with hazy luminescence upon the rugs and furs, luxuries always provided for the High Commander.

Ashurek felt no pleasure or pride in the conquest; but around his neck, in a small leather pouch on a chain, hung a tiny blue stone. This motivated him, so that he could form plans and perfect strategies without thinking; whereas any attempt to resist the Egg-Stone’s whims caused him agony.

He finished the letter and rolled it up, sealing it with wax. He handed it to the thin Gorethrian at his side, saying, ‘Send a messenger to deliver this up to Battalion XII in Elegar. It reports the present situation.’

General Karadrek, his second-in-command, obeyed the order. When he returned, there was a look of irritated amusement on his thin, hawk-like face.

‘Sir, there’s a Drishian outside. He says he wants to speak to you. Shall I have him killed?’ Karadrek asked.

‘No,’ said Ashurek, not even looking up. ‘Send him in.’

Ashurek’s lieutenants brought the man in. He was tall, stockily built, with tangled brown hair and beard. His face was weather-darkened and he wore a knee-length brown tunic belted at the waist, sandals laced up his shins. He seemed nervous but held his head high.

‘Sir–’ he began, but the General pushed him to his knees. ‘Address the High Commander as Your Imperial Highness,’ Karadrek said softly.

‘Your Imperial Highness,’ the man tried again. ‘I come to throw myself upon your mercy.’

Ashurek looked hard at him. ‘I have little. What do you want?’

‘There – there will be a battle soon. We most humbly request that all children, with their mothers and all those lame or otherwise unfit to fight may seek refuge over the hills in Dasheb.’

‘Very well. I have been called child-slayer, but it is not true. Be ready to move your refugees out at dawn, and come to me with their numbers and details,’ Ashurek answered without hesitating.

‘My thanks, Your Imperial Highness,’ the man gasped in relief. He had expected to be dead by now; certainly he had not expected the request to be granted. The lieutenants led him out, returning him to his own camp as Ashurek ordered.

Ashurek continued looking over maps. At his shoulder, the thin General cleared his throat and said in a tone of soft amusement, ‘Forgive me, sir, but you obviously do not know your Drishian history.’

‘Why, what of it, Karadrek?’

‘Three centuries ago, Drish was invaded by Elegar. They made a similar request, and it was agreed that all the sick and crippled should go into Dasheb. The next morning, every single Drishian had maimed or injured himself, or pretended the same, and every single one of the cowards limped over the hills into Dasheb.

‘Elegar was left with a deserted country, made complete fools. So they dithered a while, then followed the Drishians, and were massacred by a large force mustered in Dasheb. For Dasheb, as you should know, has always been Drish’s ally.’

‘I know this, but you’re wrong, Karadrek. They’ll not dishonour the agreement,’ was all Ashurek had to say.

General Karadrek looked sourly at his Commander, then stooped under the tent flap, and left.

Later, in the night, he returned. Ashurek was sleeping soundly, for Karadrek himself had slipped a powerful narcotic into his wine. Trembling slightly, he reached down to Ashurek’s neck and felt for the tiny leather pouch on its chain.

Loosening the top of the pouch, Karadrek peeped inside and saw the little blue stone, egg-shaped, smooth and gleaming. It felt almost gelatinous – and then he felt its power.