Assail (5 page)

She almost wavered then. The option remained to travel half the path. Voice mere concerns. Play the worried subordinate.

Yet they would see through that and know her failure of nerve here, now, on the cliff’s edge. She would lose any remaining shreds of their respect: not only disloyal, but a coward as well. Imagining such a loss stung her to draw breath, but she caught sight of a fifth, uninvited, figure entering the clearing and clamped her lips shut.

It was Cowl in his tattered finery. He came swaggering up with his maddening knowing grin. The scars across his throat – put there by Dancer himself – seemed to glow in the darkness. His unkempt black hair fell across his face like deeper shadows of night. He offered his manic grin to each.

‘You have no part in this conclave,’ Shimmer ground out. ‘Be gone.’

The High Mage and master assassin of the Guard appeared not to hear. He continued to cast his gaze about the meadow as if he were out for a mid-night stroll.

‘There is poetry here,’ he suddenly announced, seemingly apropos of nothing.

The sensation of
things
crawling upon her skin that always accompanied this man’s presence returned to Shimmer. ‘What do you want?’ she growled. She was emboldened – and encouraged – to see even Tarkhan shift uneasily and rub his arms in discomfort in the presence of his old master.

‘It was not so far from here that other masks were removed,’ the man said airily, as if this fully answered her demand.

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean, dearest Shimmer, that this is not far from the spot where Skinner and I abandoned the pretence of searching for K’azz and he stepped forward to claim command of the Guard.’

Shimmer’s throat clenched far too tight for words. Bastard! What was he trying to do? Might as well stick the knife in and be done with it!

‘I don’t believe Shimmer here means to try anything that radical,’ Blues ground out, an unspoken warning in his voice. He turned his narrowed gaze upon her. ‘’Least not the Shimmer I knew.’

‘No,’ she agreed. ‘But I cannot stand silently by either. Duty and loyalty drive me to call attention to K’azz’s neglect of his responsibilities.’

Cowl brayed a mocking laugh and Shimmer fought down an urge to yank her whipsword free and add to the scars across the man’s neck.

‘Quiet,’ Blues growled. To Shimmer: ‘I share your concern. What of you, Tarkhan?’

The Wickan inclined his head in agreement. ‘I, too, am concerned. We are an army yet we pursue no contracts. We are idle. What, then, are we?’

‘And you Petal?’ Shimmer asked.

The giant was pulling thoughtfully on his fat lower lip. He blushed beneath their attention and dipped his head, murmuring, ‘I am come merely as an observer – I have no standing to vote on any of this.’

‘We ain’t voting on anything,’ Blues was quick to answer. ‘’Least not yet, anyways.’ His gaze fixed upon Shimmer. ‘What do you propose?’

The weaponmaster’s gaze flayed her to the bone and she drew a steadying breath. It was as if the man were waiting poised for one misstep from her, one wrong word, and she would feel his blade in her heart before she sensed his move. She found her throat had gone quite dry, and licked her lips to wet them. Even though she felt as if she were declaring her own death sentence, she began: ‘I must formally question K’azz’s fitness to command.’

Blues’ hands did not rise from where they rested close to the sticks thrust through his belt. Tarkhan’s dark eyes, like glistening obsidian, shifted from her to Blues while he brushed his fingertips across his belt. Petal had stopped pulling at his lip and now stood motionless with it pinched between his fingers.

A long slow mocking laugh echoed through the clearing and Shimmer, as did the rest, shifted her gaze to Cowl, High Mage of the Guard.

‘Quiet from you,’ Blues warned again.

The man bowed. ‘My apologies. Please, do continue, dear Shimmer. Do go on. You now propose yourself as acting commander given K’azz’s, ah,
desertion
of his duties. Yes?’

‘I propose no such thing.’

The man’s acid smile slipped away and he tilted his head in puzzlement. ‘Oh? You do not?’

‘No. I propose Blues as acting commander.’

The Napan swordsman’s brows shot up. ‘Now wait a Trake-damned minute.’

‘I have no objection,’ Tarkhan put in quickly, and he smiled evilly as if taking enormous pleasure in Blues’ discomfort.

‘Well
I
do,’ Blues growled. ‘I decline. And anyway, it makes no difference either way.’

Shimmer frowned, not certain what he meant, but sensing the truth of the man’s words. They carried an echo of something out of Jacuruku. ‘What do you mean?’ she said slowly, almost in dread.

He waved to Cowl. ‘What this jackal’s laughin’ about. You’re not a mage, Shimmer. You don’t understand. Makes no difference who we put forward to take over. Can’t be done.’

‘As I now have come to see,’ Cowl whispered, and his toothy white smile broadened once again. ‘The Vow is binding.’

What of the Vow? she wondered. Whatever did the man— Damn! We swore to K’azz! He commands … until we are all gone? No escape? We are … helpless? A strange dizziness assaulted her and her vision darkened. A hand steadied her – Blues – and she nodded her thanks. ‘Then there is nothing we can do,’ she barely said aloud. The words sounded desolate to her ears. There was no hope for them.

‘Make the arrangements, Shimmer,’ Blues said gently. ‘Just go ahead. We will go to Assail.’

‘Who should come?’

‘I must,’ Cowl said, and his manic smile returned.

‘Then I will,’ Blues answered, glaring at the mage.

‘And myself,’ Shimmer answered. She cast an invitation to Petal.

He raised his brows, quite surprised. ‘I would – if I may. And I suggest Gwynn.’

‘Bars must come, of course,’ Blues added. ‘What of you, Tarkhan?’

The plainsman shifted his broad stance, uncomfortable. ‘If you lot are going then I am certain K’azz will once more leave command of Stratem to me.’ He smoothed his moustache and scowled his disgust. ‘There you are. Neither Shimmer nor you get command. It comes to me, unwanted and unasked for.’

‘I am sorry, Tarkhan,’ Shimmer offered. ‘But I am also relieved.’

The man snorted.

‘We must go in force,’ Blues continued. ‘At least ten more swords.’

Shimmer nodded her assent. ‘Two Blades, then. You take one, I the other.’

‘Very good.’

‘And K’azz?’ Petal asked, his hand at his lip.

Blues waved the question aside. ‘He can come or not. His choice. We aren’t leaving Cal to rot.’

* * *

The south coastal people called her the Ghost Woman, the Stranger, or She-Who-Speaks-to-the-Wind. All anyone knew was that she appeared just a few seasons ago here on this stretch of their coast and that that day there had been a terrible battle in which the dead rose to fight all the day and all the night. Since that time this length of seashore was avoided by all and was cursed with the name the Dead Coast.

And over the seasons the clash and clamour of battle had returned to rage from that coastline. At those times, day or night, the locals would huddle in their huts, throw themselves down before their altars, and beg that the gods and demons pass them by.

Sumaran, son of Jirel, was one of those inhabitants. A fisherman by trade. Once, when the winds pushed his outrigger too far up the coast, he spotted the woman herself. She was out walking the dunes all alone, just as others had reported seeing her – reports he’d doubted himself. Yet that day there she appeared, a lonely figure, her long hair blowing in the shoreward winds, her ragged clothes snapping and flicking as well. Then she had stilled, and it seemed to him that her face turned to him, and he thought he saw her mouth moving as if she were speaking though no one was there. Or she was casting a spell upon him. He had made the sign against evil at his heart and rowed on as fast as he could.

Now, this morning, the winds had taken hold of his outrigger once more and were determined to toss him upon the Dead Coast. He’d lowered his mast and paddled furiously but still the rising winds pushed him in towards the submerged rocks that guarded this stretch of beach. It was, he decided, as if some malevolent god or demon was working to make this day his last. He wondered what he had done to earn such wrath and realized that it could have been anything. He was no stranger to the capriciousness of the gods, and the demons and spirits of the coast were even worse. If occurred to him then, briefly, that perhaps this was the curse of the Ghost Woman herself for that single forbidden glimpse.

Then the outrigger ground up against the rocks and he was heaved over the side. Waves tossed him rolling until he knew not which way was up. Rocks gouged his shoulder; his chest flamed. The clear bright sky suddenly glared upon him and he gasped one breath before the waves pushed him under once more. His arm struck the sandy bottom and he stood, coughing, squeezing his shoulder.

He staggered to shore even though he knew he was no better off. This was the Dead Coast where the dead ruled. He had to flee. He ran, panting, the wet sands pulling on his feet, his shoulder blazing its pain and his hand slick with blood.

He ran mouthing prayers and entreaties to all the gods and spirits of the coast: please allow him to escape! Please look away! He would sacrifice half his catch from this day forth should he live to see tomorrow’s dawn!

Pleading gave way to tears and curses as his feet became heavy and he tripped, falling again and again. His breath burned in his throat and his vision blurred. He rose one more time to stumble on. A dark figure suddenly appeared before him as if swirling out of the night itself and he threw himself aside shrieking his terror. There, peering down at him, was the ravaged face of death itself, and Sumaran knew nothing more.

He awoke to the cawing of seabirds. The sun was just rising. He lay upon the open sands, the remains of a fire before him. Something held him tight and he felt at his chest. Some sort of cloth was tied tightly over his shoulder. He peered about, terrified. Where was death? He thought he’d come for him. Perhaps it had been nothing more than a nightmare.

A figure approached from over the dunes. Sumaran tensed to run but his legs would not move: he was frozen in dread. It was the Ghost Woman. The wind tossed her long tangled hair. She wore a hide shirt and trousers and over this a tattered fur cloak that flapped and snapped. She was old, he saw, as wrinkled as any elder. Strings of polished green and blue stones hung about her neck. She stood peering down at him and it seemed to him that there was no sympathy in her hard black eyes.

‘You are well?’ she asked in an odd accent, using very archaic phrasing.

Remembering whom he dealt with he quickly lowered his gaze. ‘What do you wish of me?’ he stammered.

‘I wish nothing of you. You need not fear me. I will not harm you.’

He did not know what to say. What could one say? ‘I – I am grateful for my life,’ he murmured, his eyes still downcast.

‘It was nothing. If your strength has returned you may go. You are from the villages to the east, I believe?’

He swallowed to wet his throat. ‘Yes.’

‘And what is it they name me there?’

He dared not reveal that. He searched for some possible answer until the Ghost Woman chuckled and murmured, ‘That bad, is it?’ He ducked his head, even more petrified. ‘Never mind,’ she continued, ‘I understand. It is not important. You should go now before—’ and a catch came to her voice, almost as if she was pained.

Suraman dared a glance. The Ghost Woman was studying the horizon and for a moment it seemed as if she was far more terrified than he. He almost spoke then, to ask what it was she saw, but he feared her anger far too much to dare such a thing.

He used his good arm to raise himself up, all the while keeping his gaze downcast. ‘I – I will go, then. My thanks again.’

‘Certainly.’

He dared another glance: the witch was still peering aside, squinting, something like unease tightening her mouth. For a moment the strange impression struck Suraman that instead of haunting the coast, this entity was in fact guarding it. He headed off, limping slightly. Yet that startling image drove him to turn back. Glancing up, he asked: ‘How, then, are you known – I may ask?’

The woman was still staring off towards the sea. Her old patched furs lashed and snapped about her. She answered, ‘You may call me Silverfox.’

When he was far enough away he risked one final glance back. The woman was still where he’d last seen her. All alone, staring off towards the surging ocean waves, hands clasped behind her back. She appeared even more alone and sad to him then. Something about her pulled at his heart. He was about to turn away when suddenly she was no longer alone there among the dunes. Other figures stood with her. Dark they were, ragged and worn in outline. Bulky furs draped their odd figures, and long tatters of hides blew about them. The head of one carried gnarled antlers.

This sight drove icy atavistic shivers down his spine and he backed away, horrified once again. The dead. She is the sad Queen of the Dead. To think if he had drowned in the surf he, too, could now be standing among them!

He spun and ran. He must warn everyone! No one need doubt no longer. This was the Dead Coast in truth!