Exile (Bloodforge Book 1) (44 page)

“Now listen here,
Riella. What you have to remember, Riella.”

He laughed, ignoring the
pain in his ribs, and she smiled at him, though he could see it was only a
mask. “If you believe he’s innocent, lass, then go after him.”

She looked down at her
feet and then nodded her head at one of the horses. It was already packed for a
long journey, laden with satchels and a bedroll.

“Ah,” he said.

“Thank you, Beccorban,”
said Riella. “Thank you for everything you’ve done for me.”

He waved a bandaged
hand. “We’ve all had a part to play in this.”

Riella nodded and for a
moment they both enjoyed the comfortable silence between them. “Did Loster
really kill the big one?”

“Yes.”

She laughed. “I never
knew he had it in him.”

“He’s made for great
things, Riella. So are you if you follow your path.”

Riella looked off into
the distance where the mountains of the Heartland Range were a blur on the
horizon. “I’ve made peace with my path. I was never meant to be a priestess. I
know that now.”

“Then what will you do?”
he asked, looking sidelong at her.

She turned her head and
stared back and he realised just how much he was going to miss her. She was one
of the few people he knew who could meet his gaze. “I’ll follow him,” she said
simply. “And get my damned knife back.”

“Gods help him,” said
Beccorban and they both laughed again.

Riella set off before
midday. She said no more goodbyes to anyone and Beccorban watched her go as
Mirril clung to his leg, the small girl’s eyes wet from crying. He had a sense
of loss he had not felt in a long time but he would not let it show on his face
as nakedly as the child beside him. It made him wonder who was the stronger.
Go on lass. Find what you’re looking for
.

Droswain came to him
once she had gone, asking for a private moment.

“I looked at Antler
Helm’s body,” he said straight away, eyes boring into Beccorban as though
searching for some hidden truth.

“Make sure he’s dead,
will you?” said Beccorban lightly.

“I noticed that he had
been stabbed in the throat — a twisted piece of metal had been rammed
into what I would assume was his jugular vein.”

“I don’t know what
you’re trying to say, priest, but I wish you would hurry up and say it.”
Beccorban watched the little man, half-expecting some accusation, though what
it would be he did not know.

“I am saying, Beccorban,
that I am well aware of what you did — for Loster I mean.” He leant in
close. “I know it was you that killed the beast.”

Beccorban shrugged and
swayed away from Droswain. The little man’s breath was too sweet, like overripe
fruit. He pressed a thumb into the bandages wrapped around his wounded hand. It
stung but it gave him an excuse to wear a sour expression. “I did no such
thing, priest. Loster killed Antler Helm. He used Kreyiss. We all saw it.”

Droswain laughed
mirthlessly. “Yes, you’re right, he did. That is not to say, of course, that
the foul creature was not already fatally wounded. I appreciate what you did
today, Beccorban, I really do. I took you for a glory-hound but I admit that I
was mistaken. You have made yourself a firm ally in me, for what that is
worth.”

Beccorban nodded and
watched as the small priest walked away. Though Droswain had come to offer
peace, Beccorban could not help but feel that it was meant as a threat.
Maybe you’re just paranoid
, he told
himself.
You’ve lived too long in the
shadow of betrayal.
Things will be
different now
. He grunted.

“Things are never
different,” he said aloud.

They moved on by early
afternoon, though none of them really wanted to go. True, they had lost friends
here but those friends had been mourned and given proper funeral rites,
consumed by fire like warriors of old. The Dalvossi fortress meant something
else to them now than death. It meant victory. It meant hope. The Echoes could
not touch them here.

Beccorban pushed them on
into the Dalvossi hinterland, leading them ever westwards but careful not to
stray into the Raid to the north. That was a wild land, even more wild than
this one, and three hundred armed men would not be too large a target for some
of the bandit kings that dwelled there. Loster was given a horse to ride and
every man he passed greeted him as if he were an old friend. It was an odd
feeling but he knew he had earned it and it made him proud.

The sun made an appearance,
bursting through the clouds that had plagued them since Fend and shining its
warmth down upon them. Loster basked in the rays. He felt at peace with
himself, as though the gods themselves were congratulating him.

“
Don’t believe in everything you’re told,
” warned Barde. The
familiar voice in his head had been more quiet since the battle, only
concerning itself with weak insults that held no lasting rancour. With every
passing minute, every pat on the back, every person who cheered his name,
Loster was finding it easier to ignore his phantom brother.

The land began to rise
again as they pushed inland. Beccorban allowed them ten minutes of rest every
two hours but they marched long into the night and then on again before it was
light. After a solid day of travelling, they came to the great Dalvossi steppe,
the vast area of flat, stony land that had once trembled with the sound of the
mighty overmarches and their huge armies. It was one of the most carefree times
in Loster’s life. No longer did they have to worry about the Echoes hunting
them down. This was an empty land in which they could hide forever if need be.

On the dawn of the
second day, Loster left behind Droswain who rode on the wagon and trotted his
horse forward to find Beccorban marching alongside his men at the front of the
column. As the leader of their force, Beccorban had been offered a horse of his
own. He was still recovering from his injuries and both his chest and his left
hand were swathed in bandages, but the grizzled old warrior would not hear of
it. “I’ve lived through and with worse than this, lad,” he had said. “A little
walking will help get the breath back in me.”

Now Loster reined in his
mount to keep pace and grinned down at Beccorban who smiled back. A part of him
warned that he should feel guilty riding one of their few horses while others
walked, but nobody seemed to begrudge him the privilege and he thought it was
about time that he spoiled himself a little. “Hail, Helhammer!” he said.

“Hail Echo-killer,”
replied Beccorban, and a few men cheered.

Loster beamed. “Where
are you leading us?”

Beccorban grunted. “For
the moment, I intend to get as far from the coast as possible. Once we are
clear of the Echoes’ reach we will find somewhere defensible.”

“So it’s like Droswain
said, then. We are exiles.”

Beccorban sighed. “For
the moment, but we will go back. First we must rally. Once the tale of your
victory spreads then others will come. There will be some who escaped the
Echoes’ nets and we need as many men as possible.”

“And women!” shouted an
anonymous voice and there was much laughter. These men were happy, untroubled.
I will make them the core of my army
,
thought Loster. He was surprised at his own ambition, but then scolded himself.
You are the Hammer’s Son. Sooner or later
you’re going to have to start believing it.

“And then we take back
Veria?” he asked Beccorban, knowing what the answer would be.

“Yes. When we are
strong, we will carry the fight to the enemy.”

Loster remembered how he
had felt when fighting. Though the thought of more fighting scared him, it also
made him excited. He reached down to his saddle and touched the hilts of the
two curved swords that he had taken from dead Echoes. The task before them was
huge but on that day nothing seemed impossible. With men like Beccorban on
their side, how could they fail?

Loster lowered his voice
and steered his mount closer to the old warrior, suddenly less comfortable with
broadcasting his thoughts than he had been. “When you took Veria back from the
Respini, how did you start?”

Beccorban looked at him
and his eyes were seeking something. Whatever it was, they must have found it
because he looked away again. “With a single step, Loster. Then one at a time.”

Loster smiled. One step
at a time. He could do that.

Beccorban turned them
south again, angling back towards the borders of Respin. In the distance,
little more than a jagged blur on the horizon, Loster could make out the
Heartland Mountains with the towering pinnacle of the Widowpeak at the western
limit of the range. His soul fell silent at the sight and he slowed his horse,
letting the soldiers pass him by. Some looked at him curiously but he ignored
them, trapped in his own inner thoughts. Up on his horse, he suddenly felt very
exposed.

There, at the foot of
the largest mountain in Daegermund, lay his home. There was the lair of the
Guardian, the place where all of this had begun with the spilling of his
brother’s blood.

He felt cold and a sharp
pain started at the back of his neck.

“
Oh, if only they knew, Los. If only they knew the truth.
”

“
Slipskins can’t bear children,
”
the pretend Illis said as he cut into it.
“
You killed your own son.
”

Callistan shook his head
and screwed his eyes shut. He could feel the pain welling up inside him again,
the memory of that cherubic face as he had thundered down upon it and stole the
life from its small body.

“
Please, Papa! Let me go!
”

A whimper escaped his
lips and the man next to him shoved him roughly. “Are you alright?” the
stranger asked.

Callistan nodded and
looked down at his boots. It was dark and he was wearing a hooded cloak so the
man wouldn’t have been able to make out his features anyway, but it made no
sense to be recognised. Not here.

“It’s okay to be
afraid,” the man continued. He was in late middle-age — around fifty
summers — and Callistan had chosen to stand next to him for this exact
reason, and because he had a kindly face. He always put himself amongst the
older ones. They were less likely to cause trouble, less likely to shout
something out and so be taken.

It was the fourth time
he had stood in the main square in Temple, and tonight it was raining fat
droplets of icy water that soaked through every stitch of clothing until your
bones were cold and brittle. Temple had changed little since his last visit,
but it was emptier now. Some people chose to stay in their homes at night, but
that often led to trouble. The Echoes were watching everyone all the time. If
you missed too many of the nightly addresses it got noticed and then they sent
the Knockers to your door. The Echoes had not sacked Temple like Kressel.
Instead the city had opened its gates to the enemy and had been granted its
peoples’ lives in return.

For a time.

Already there were
stories of disappearances, people going out and never coming back. Every
drunkard in every tavern had a theory of where the missing ones were going but
Callistan knew the truth of it.
An army
marches on its stomach
, he thought,
and Temple is more than a plateful
.

He had no plans to stay,
of course. This city was a lost cause, it had been before it was captured. He
was only here for one reason and that reason had brought him south, through the
icy passes of the Heartland Range where Beccorban had led his beleaguered
forces almost thirty years before, and up over the walls of the capital of
Veria. Though it had taken months to get here, entry into the city itself had
not been difficult. The Echoes did not give much thought to defence. They had
no need of it. They had taken the entire nation in less than a year, and with the
Dremon still absent the nearest formidable force was less than a rumour.

Part of him wondered how
the others had fared in their battle but he quickly suppressed those thoughts.
You left them for a reason. Don’t carry them
with you
. He fingered the hilt of Riella’s knife, strapped to his belt. She
had called it something but the name slipped his mind. It wasn’t important.
Weapons should not have names. A stab of guilt hit him and he bit his lower
lip. Every time he thought of her, of how she tasted, he thought of his wife,
skinned and worn as a cloak by the foul servants of the Echoes.
No, that’s not how they do it.
He shook
his head again and cleared it of haunting memories.

“Look there, who’s this
all primped up?” the man nudged Callistan’s shoulder. “He’s not the one they
usually send.” The man shrugged. “When he’s done we can go home. You should
come to the Five Fillies, I’ll buy you a jug of ale.”

Callistan looked up and
saw himself. The Doppelganger. It still wore his face. Three nights of failure
and finally he had found his tormentor. He slid his hand down to the blade of
the knife and it bit into the ball of his thumb, drawing blood. He gritted his
teeth.

“No announcements
tonight, good people. Be sure to get home safely,” the Doppelganger’s face was
split into a wide grin and under his hood Callistan grinned back, though there
was no warmth in his smile. He was not as good an actor as his double.

The Doppelganger stepped
down off the stage and into an entourage of robed Echoes and the crowd began to
disperse.

“So,” said the old man.
“How about that drink?”

Callistan shook his
head. “Not tonight.” He began to follow the Doppelganger, watching as it fled
into the twisting alleys that led from the square. “I have business elsewhere.”