Grim Company 02 - Sword Of The North (50 page)

As the wizard finished speaking the crowd erupted into cheers. Cole saw determination in the eyes of many. An Indebted whose name he didn’t know took a step forward. It was one of Floater’s friends, he realized. ‘I lost a good friend back there. I haven’t got a family of my own, but Floater did. I owe it to him to get revenge on that bitch.’

That won a fresh round of cheers. Another Thelassan stepped forward. ‘Floater was my friend too. The White Lady’s got to pay for what she’s done. She’s got to pay!’

More cheers roared across the dock. A consensus was beginning to form, the anger of the crowd turning it towards a singular purpose, a singular path of action.

Suddenly, Smokes stepped forward. ‘I’ll burn this fucking city to the ground!’ he snarled. ‘And every man, woman and child in it!’

The sound of someone clearing their throat was the only noise to break the silence that followed. ‘For what she done!’ Smokes added belatedly. He looked around, desperate for someone to back him up.

‘That seems a little… extreme,’ Cole said slowly. ‘Besides, the city is constructed from marble. It’ll never catch fire. Especially not in this weather.’

Smokes sagged and a moment later shuffled shamefacedly back into the crowd, which now looked rather deflated.

Cole took a deep breath. It was up to him to salvage things. ‘I know all too well the depths of the White Lady’s evil,’ he began hesitantly. ‘I served her faithfully. But after she was done with me, she tried to have me murdered. She almost succeeded. Almost, but not quite. I survived. Thanks to this man, I survived.’ Cole gestured at Thanates. ‘I owe it to him to stand with him now. As do you! Months ago the people of the Trine toppled one tyrant. Today we can topple another.’

Much to his surprise the crowd reacted to his words with fresh cheers. He’d half expected peals of laughter. He couldn’t imagine why any man would pay attention to him, a common bastard. Perhaps they were simply intimidated by his mastery of the dead. There was a time when being feared would have gratified his ego, but of late he had come to realize that anyone who inspired loyalty through terror was probably not a very good person.

Smiler melted out of the crowd and approached him. ‘You’re a hero, Ghost.’

Cole shook his head. ‘I’m no hero. I just do the best I can with what I have.’

‘You’ve certainly changed your tune. You were the cock of the walk that night at the tavern.’

‘I was a fool,’ Cole said sombrely.

Smiler jerked a thumb behind him towards the harbour. ‘I wish you luck in any case. I’m sailing back to the Grey City once this weather lets up. My cousin Moryk’s there somewhere, I know he is.’

Cole nodded. ‘You’ve been a good friend to me. What does your cousin do?’

Smiler gave a gap-toothed grin. ‘Moryk? You might say he’s a miner too, of sorts. He’ll force himself through any hole.’

Something about that sounded odd to Cole’s ears, but he let it pass. ‘Well, I hope you find him. Look out for Sasha while you’re in Dorminia. She has long brown hair and eyes a man could lose himself in. If you see her, tell her… tell her I’m coming home as soon as I can.’

‘It’ll be my pleasure,’ Smiler replied. Cole exchanged a companionable nod with the fellow. Despite all that had happened, it was reassuring to know there were still decent men like Smiler around. He reminded Cole of his erstwhile henchman Three-Finger, before the cruel truth of the world had broken his spirit.

The survivors of Newharvest said their farewells. Those who lacked the stomach for a fight sloped off into the rain while those who remained looked expectantly to Thanates. The wizard nodded at Cole and then pointed to the ship. ‘It is time. Call your minions from the hold.’

Cole shifted uneasily. ‘I don’t want any innocents to get hurt.’

Thanates clenched his fists angrily and dark fire danced around his knuckles. ‘It is vital that we as create as much chaos as possible on the streets! I need the Whitecloaks and the Unborn drawn away from the palace. But first you will take me to the Hall of Annals. I understand it lies somewhere in the ruins of Sanctuary.’

‘I don’t know the way.’

The sinister glow that shone through Thanates’ rag flared dangerously. ‘You told me you were familiar with those ruins,’ he hissed. Despite the fact he had Magebane tucked safely at his belt, Cole couldn’t help but shrink back in the face of the wizard’s ire.

‘The pale women escorted me there! They used some kind of device to conceal the path from me. All I remember are shadows and mist, and children crying.’

‘I can show you,’ piped up a small voice.

Cole and Thanates turned. Gazing up at them with his watery eyes was Derkin. ‘Ma and I spent years living in the ruins,’ he added. ‘I’ll guide you there.’

The western section of the ruins of Sanctuary was much the same as the other parts Cole remembered. Ancient walls constructed of sandstone and other weak materials had begun to collapse long ago, resulting in leaning buildings that were supported only by the weight of their neighbours. Rubble and rotting timber covered the abandoned streets. The storm had penetrated even here; water rained down from hundreds of feet above, percolating through cracks in the artificial foundations that separated the City of Towers from the corpse of the dead city beneath. There was little in the way of natural light, but the torch Derkin carried provided sufficient illumination for the three of them to navigate the ruins. Derkin’s ma waited back at the docks, still too weak from her recent brush with death to risk venturing down into the undercity.

‘The White Lady was once the high priestess of the Mother,’ Thanates said as they made their way deeper into the skeleton of the holy city. ‘Politically and magically she was perhaps the most significant figure of our time. That much I learned from my research in Dorminia.’

For a second Cole thought he glimpsed something moving just beyond the edges of the light. He stared at the darkness but saw nothing. He decided it was probably just his imagination. ‘There’s something I’ve been wondering about,’ he said. ‘Does the White Lady have a name? She can’t have always been the White Lady. She must have had a real name at one time.’

Thanates shook his head. ‘If she did no one remembers it, least of all me. Until recently I could not even recall my own.’

Cole’s eyebrows rose in surprise. ‘You couldn’t remember your own name?’

‘For close to five hundred years I lived as a crow, my consciousness lost in the mind of my familiar. I came to the Grey City searching for clues as to my true identity.’

‘What did you discover?’

‘My real name, among other things. With the help of another I began to piece together my fractured mind. My memories are still incomplete. I trust I will find the answers I seek in the Hall of Annals.’

‘The person that helped you rediscover yourself. What was his name?’

‘Isaac.’

Cole stopped dead. ‘I knew an Isaac!’ he exclaimed. ‘He was about my age, maybe a little older. He was…’ Cole paused. He couldn’t remember what Isaac had looked like. All he recalled was a face of devastating blandness. Absolutely nothing about the Halfmage’s manservant had stuck in his mind, other than the fact he had seemed intent on ingratiating himself with the old barbarian Kayne and the rest of the group of rebels. ‘I don’t remember,’ he admitted, feeling stupid.

Thanates cocked his head in that peculiar manner of his. ‘You cannot describe his appearance either? Strange. This Isaac was an enigma. In return for his help he had me perform various favours that made little sense at the time. I now believe he was planning something. Preparing a strategy. He was brilliant, a man of endless talents.’

‘I thought he was an ass,’ Cole mumbled. Something occurred to him then. ‘Why did you save me? When you found me dying, I mean.’

‘I believed I could use you.’

‘Use me?’ Cole said warily. He had an unpleasant feeling he knew where this was heading.

‘You killed Salazar. You toppled a Magelord. As such, you are a beacon of hope that I will light when the time is right. And you have strange powers of your own. You are a potent tool, child.’

‘I’m not a tool!’ Cole snapped back. ‘And I’m not a child. I’m sick of people trying to control me. Trying to use me. It’s almost got me killed on countless occasions. I just want to be left alone.’

There was a hint of amusement in the wizard’s voice. ‘For a boy who wants to be left alone you have an uncanny knack of finding yourself at the heart of events.’

‘Not any more. After this is over, I’m settling for the quiet life.’

‘You carry a god’s essence within you, Davarus Cole. The quiet life is no longer yours to choose.’

An uncomfortable silence followed. Cole looked down at his hands. They were beginning to lose their colour again, the vitality he had stolen from Corvac fading away. What was it Thanates had said to him?

Death itself resides in you. Feed it and you will grow stronger. Resist… and it will feed on
you
.

He shook his head angrily. He was determined not to feed
anything
. He would refuse to become a killer like the Reaver’s essence seemed to want him to be. He hadn’t asked for this.

Suddenly, Derkin gasped and raised his torch as high as his stunted arms would allow him. ‘The Abandoned are coming,’ he whispered.

Cole glimpsed dark shapes at the edges of the torchlight. He concentrated and thought he could hear heartbeats. Dozens of them, faint and highly irregular. ‘The Abandoned?’ he whispered.

‘They rarely venture into this part of the ruins,’ Derkin explained. ‘Something must have drawn them here.’

Cole placed a hand on Magebane’s jewelled hilt. ‘Are they dangerous?’

‘They feed on waste from the city above and normally avoid people. But they can be dangerous if they haven’t fed in a while.’

The misshapen figures inched nearer, drawn to the three intruders like moths to a flame, though they seemed reluctant to step inside the circle of light. Cole became aware of a faint rasping sound, like a dying man gasping for breath. A tense moment passed. Then the first of the Abandoned stepped into view.

Cole recoiled in horror. The
thing
that emerged from the shadows was the size of a large child. It was entirely naked, its pale flesh so thin that it was nearly translucent, revealing the dark shape of vital organs beneath. Oversized eyes the colour of soured milk stared from a face the features of which were poorly defined, as if the creature were somehow incomplete. Every breath seemed a tortured rattle in its underdeveloped lungs.

The Abandoned raised a hand, its webbed fingers reaching towards Cole, who drew Magebane and held it protectively before him. ‘Back!’ he shouted. ‘I don’t want to hurt you.’ Surprisingly, he found that he meant it. Something about this apparition brought to mind a lost child. A twisted mockery of a child, but a child nonetheless.

The horror inched closer. It opened its mouth, a simple hole in its face that contained no teeth, only a tongue that flopped out, drooling thick white mucus. In a broken voice it rasped a single word.

‘
FaaAAAther…?
’

A moment later there was a blinding flash. Cole reeled away, clutching his face. When his vision cleared, he turned back to see the creature smouldering on the ground, one smoking arm extended in the act of reaching for Cole before it died. The rest of the Abandoned were nowhere to be seen.

‘They’ve fled,’ Thanates said. ‘At least for the moment. I fear not these wretches, but I can ill afford to expend my magic chasing them off.’

Cole was still staring at the corpse. Something was troubling him ‘Did… did that thing call me
father
?’

The wizard shrugged. ‘There are many mysteries in this city yet to be solved. Perhaps the godly essence you carry within you is in some way related to these creatures.’

Cole couldn’t help but sigh at that. ‘Great,’ he muttered.

‘Don’t let it concern you now. We must hurry to the Hall of Annals.’

‘It’s just ahead,’ Derkin said. He hesitated a moment. ‘The Hall is forbidden. The White Lady’s handmaidens hunt down anyone that dares go near it. A whole community of us disappeared three years ago after someone trespassed there.’

‘Then my instincts prove sound,’ Thanates replied grimly. ‘If there still exists a place where the truth of what happened to Sanctuary all those centuries ago might be found, it is the Hall of Annals. The White Lady wanted to erase history… and yet I suspect she could not bring herself to destroy everything. A tiny part of her clings to the memory of that which she once cherished. In this she is not unlike other women.’

‘How do you know that?’ Cole asked.

When Thanates eventually answered, Cole thought he heard something like uncertainty in the wizard’s voice. ‘The White Lady and I once were lovers. This I remember.’

The shelves stretched out as far as he could see, disappearing into the darkness at the far reaches of the cavernous chamber. Cole stared at the towering bookcases in wonder as Thanates led him and Derkin deeper into the Hall of Annals. They had found the great doors unlocked, but the thick carpet of dust coating the floor suggested no one had seen the inside of the great domed building for many years. In contrast to the rest of the crumbling ruins, the Hall of Annals was in a near perfect state of repair.

‘A holding spell,’ Thanates announced, sniffing the dry air. ‘The walls of this place are kept in perpetual stasis by the White Lady’s magic. They will not falter until she does.’

‘Stasis?’ Cole repeated. ‘Salazar had something he called a Stasiseum in the Obelisk. There was a giant egg suspended over a fire frozen in time. And a big green savage imprisoned behind glass. He was unmoving, like a statue. But he looked real enough.’

‘I dare say he
was
real,’ Thanates replied. ‘I wonder what became of this creature. Orcs once ruled the north. I had believed them long extinct.’

‘Orcs? I thought they lived in the Frozen Sea beyond the High Fangs. They’re a kind of whale. I read about them in a book once.’