The Dark Defiles (26 page)

She made a noise that felt like collapsing. The Dragonbane heard it and crossed the room to her. She could see he wanted to embrace her, would have liked it herself, but could not rid herself of some stubborn, refusing fiber at her core. She held up a single arm instead. He slapped her hand, palm to palm, and they made the clasp, two hands, then four, tight. He hauled her close over the grip anyway, put his forehead to hers.

“Go to bed, Archidi,” he said gruffly. “Get some rest. And for Urann’s sake, stop feeling fucking guilty about everything for a change.”

G
ET SOME REST.

Ha.

She lay in the huge bed, staring across the darkened expanse of the bedchamber at the windows and the clouded night sky beyond. Bandlight filtered in, but there wasn’t much of it. Krinzanz need pounded in her veins like the ocean. Her mind churned the events of the day—near death hanging upside down, hunger and cold and a meager fire on a beach, fresh hope rising with the news, An-Kirilnar growing closer along the causeway, the species portcullis, the death of Sogren. Now the Warhelm’s guided tour of the ancient past, the sword and Cormorion Ilusilin Mayne, the truth about the Illwrack Changeling, the shattering revelations about her father and the mission.

Or had it been lying about that bit … ?

You know the truth when you hear it, Archidi.

Really? We came north because you thought you’d heard the truth, and look what happened there. Look where we could have been otherwise.

Oh, give it a fucking rest. You heard the Dragonbane.

Yeah, the wisdom of buffalo herders turned mercenary captains. Precious beyond the price of pearls. Maybe he can recommend you some whores as well.

She tried masturbating to thoughts of Ishgrim, her pale honey limbs and curves, her hooded eyes and undone mouth, but despite her best efforts, climax was as out of reach as the girl herself. She gave it up, flopped back hot and irritable in the covers.

What would Ishgrim do when the sky turned black?

What was she doing now, come to that, with tremors shaking the city, and the tramp of hot-eyed religious morons through the streets, fired up by fear and Citadel cant, on their way to glorious martyrdom somewhere in the north, but happy,
more
than happy, to start trouble right here, right now, at the faintest hint of anything they could take righteous offense at, above all if it was committed by a woman … 

You have to get back. You have to stop this from happening.

You have to get some rest.

She felt as if someone had hammered her into very small pieces that somehow still retained all their links with each other. The enormity of what her father had done to the Warhelms towered in her head, the enormity of the crime they’d planned to commit if Flaradnam had left them empowered. The enormity of the power they’d had.

What she wouldn’t give for that power now.

For a fraction of that power.

To have just one intact Warhelm at her back. Never mind the luxury half dozen that her father’s generation had apparently summoned from the void to fight the dwenda the last time—she’d settle for a single one and count herself well-armed.

Would that have been so fucking much to ask?
That just one of those colossally empowered creatures could have come up with a better fix for the problem than
extermination,
that it could have come to some kind of agreement with Flaradnam and preserved its strength for later days. Anakhanaladras in the south or Ingharnana—

Wait a minute
… 

She snapped bolt upright in the bed.

Ingharn
… 
anasharal?

What kind of coincidence would that have to—

She leaned back on her elbows, dug back through the messy whirl of her thoughts, sifting for Tharalanangharst’s words.
Up in endless circuit between the world and the band
… 

That’s no fucking coincidence, Archidi.

She sat up again, got herself cross-legged under the covers. Noticed absently that her ruined clothes were gone from where she’d stepped out of them beside the bed.

“Warhelm?”

“I hear you, daughter of
kir
-Flaradnam. What is your will?”

hen
Dragon’s Demise
stood about half a league out of Ornley for what looked to be—
thank Firfirdar’s flaming cunt for that
—the very last time, he went up on deck to watch the sun set and have a quiet word with Nyanar. The noble captain was still somewhat shaken by his captivity at the hands of the privateers—all thirty-odd hours of it—and wasn’t much in the mood for conversation. He was also, Ringil discovered, nursing a deep resentment that Klithren had chosen to leave him imprisoned in Ornley and take Senger Hald back to Trelayne instead. It reflected badly on the Nyanar clan that he hadn’t been considered worthy of immediate ransom and the marine commander had. Didn’t this League pirate scum know who he
was
?

“Klithren of Hinerion is a commoner,” Ringil consoled him. “Recently and rapidly promoted with the war. He’s a pragmatic man, knows nothing of nobility. Doubtless, he saw only commander Hald’s military value for interrogation. And the risk of leaving him behind with his men. Ornley jail is not what one would call secure holding for soldiers of marine temper.”

“That’s as may be,” snapped Nyanar. “But it is a gross breach of wartime etiquette to privilege such crass pragmatism above recognition of rank. And bad form to assign a knight’s command to a
commoner
in the first place. This is not the same League that my father went to war with in the twenties. That was a war between gentlemen.”

“Indeed,” said Ringil absently, watching the dun cluster of sails on
Sea Eagle’s Daughter
and the League vessel
Mayne’s Moor Blooded
off to stern and starboard. Beyond them, the sun declined into torn cloud the color of bruises, stained the sky bloody enough for omens to please the most exacting of black mages. He gazed west into it all, soaking up the rich and violent colors while he could.

Where he was going next, there’d be none of this.

“Do you know, I was not permitted water to wash in
for the entire day
? And they only fed me from the tavern’s leavings at nightfall?”

Well, at least they didn’t roast and eat you.

“Can you manage with this crew?” Gil asked him bluntly. He thought if Nyanar whined on much longer about his ordeal, he might end up putting him over the side.

“In this weather? Oh, yes.” The captain pulled a sour face. “But if we have to deal with storms such as we met coming north …”

“There’ll be no storms.” Ringil was not honestly sure he could deliver on that just yet, but he handed out the cheap reassurance anyway, for what it was worth. Hoped the Dark Court would take the hint.

Nyanar sniffed. “Well, let’s hope you’re right. With this few reliable hands to count on, we’re spread very thin.”

He had a point. It had been a tricky balancing act—how many of Klithren’s men to leave behind in Ornley, how many to co-opt for the voyage south. In the end, Ringil decided to take both remaining Empire vessels home, mainly because he couldn’t be bothered moving Anasharal from
Sea Eagle’s Daughter
to
Dragon’s Demise,
but also because he might need to split his forces once they reached the Gergis coast. And then, for appearances, they needed at least one League warship to play the role of conquering escort.
Mayne’s Moor Blooded
was there for the taking—rather than adrift somewhere up the coast, decks soaked with blood and littered with the akyia-butchered remnants of crew—so that was that. Three vessels to crew with the sailing complement of one, plus the sparse crop of imperial marines, sailors, and Throne Eternal they’d liberated from holding in Ornley. Even as supervisors of co-opted privateer manpower, that left them stretched.

Ringil longed silently for Mahmal Shanta’s supremely competent hand on the tiller, but, well, nothing to be done about that for the time being. Nyanar was what he had.

He glanced sternward, where Ornley and the whole Hironish coastline were shrinking and sinking into the early evening gloom. If the Illwrack Changeling was still back there somewhere, still buried someplace long twisted out of memory by the elaborations of lazy chroniclers or epic storytellers chasing something more dramatic and sonorous than true—well, then, his bones could rest in peace. Gil was done digging holes. He’d told Archeth back in Yhelteth that the whole quest was likely a waste of time, a wild ride after phantom fancies, and now he had Firfirdar’s word for it that he’d been right all along.

“I’m going to my cabin,” he told Nyanar. “I’m locking the door and taking out the key. I may be some time. You or any of the men hear anything scratching at that door and asking to be let out, even it sounds like me, you don’t listen and you don’t open. Got that?”

The captain looked queasy. Like everyone else, by now he’d have heard the story the marines told about Klithren’s interrogation—how Ringil, a recalcitrant Klithren and the torture table itself had all disappeared for the solid count of sixty, left nothing behind but wisps of smoke and flickers of blue light and a scorch mark on the deck where they’d stood. And how they’d come back—Klithren uncuffed from the table and apparently unharmed, but cringing like a dog in a thunderstorm, the iron cuffs on the manacle rail sliced open and bent back as if they were nothing more than stiff leather, a faint scent of burning in the air. And how the air around that burn mark on the deck had seemed to emanate faintly heard moans and wailing right through until dawn … 

“But … will you be gone long?” Nyanar’s voice was almost plaintive.

“Quite possibly.” He thought about it. They had a good few weeks at sea ahead of them for sure. “Look—at worst, I’ll be back by the time you raise the Gergis coast or I’ll be dead and not coming back at all. In which case, you run west for the cape and head home under full sail. And don’t let Klithren of Hinerion across onto this ship at any point—I don’t think he’s going to be any trouble; we’ve struck a gentlemen’s agreement and he seems to be holding to it, but—”

A mannered snort, presumably at the epithet
gentleman
attached to someone like Klithren. Gil ignored it, pressed on.

“—but I have been wrong once or twice in my illustrious career, so best not to take any unnecessary chances. He stays aboard
Mayne’s Moor Blooded,
where Hald can keep an eye on him.” Scratching around, hoping he’d thought of everything that could … “Oh yeah, and if you’ve raised Gergis, I haven’t shown, and there’s something
else
in that cabin, scratching to get out, then you get everyone across to
Sea Eagle’s Daughter
and you scuttle this fucking ship. That clear?”

Nyanar swallowed. “And if … if something … untoward … occurs before that, during the voyage? If we
need
you? What then?”

Gil clapped him cheerfully on the shoulder. “Then I’ll know, and I’ll be back,” he lied. “But I’ll come back through the door myself; I won’t need any help. Tell the men that, make sure it’s clear. Can’t answer for your safety if you don’t.”

He was probably laying it on a bit thick, but better that than leave this pampered noble idiot any latitude for error. Better to cover all the angles as best he could, and hope the ramshackle makeshift command structure he was leaving would hold.

Time to go.

Down in his cabin, he locked the door as promised, took the reclaimed Kiriath steel carpenter’s bradawl he’d blagged from Shanta back in the shipyards at Yhelteth, and scratched wards into lock plate, door hinges, and jamb. He made himself go slow, make sure of each stroke. He’d nearly burned down a waterfront tavern in the upriver districts of the city last year, pissing about with fire wards for practice and getting the cross strokes out of true.

Faint flicker of blue, etching the door’s dimensions, fading out.

Done.

He took the key out of the lock, etched glyphs down its shaft, and put it under the pillow in his bunk. He put on his cloak, took the Ravensfriend, scabbard, and harness, lay back on the bunk with his sword hand draped over the side to the floor, boots up on the foot bar and crossed at the ankles. He put his free hand behind his head and stared up at the ceiling.

Began to recite the slow, unwinding cadences Hjel taught him. Described the glyphs to the ceiling with the fingers of his left hand.

Anticipation prickled through him.

He wasn’t sure if it was the slow seep of blood into his prick at thoughts of Hjel, the siren song of the white
ikinri ‘ska
cliffs, waiting in endless glyphed mystery, or simply the thought of what he and the Ravensfriend would need to do once he reached Trelayne.

Then, as the trance state Hjel had taught him came steadily on, he saw that, really, there might not be much difference or distance between any of those three things.

The cabin ceiling grew less significant overhead, the bunk seemed to drift like an unmoored boat. He felt himself slipping toward the Grey Places. Compared to the raw force it had taken to punch himself and Klithren through last time, this was almost languid.
Lesson one, grim scar-faced swordsman sorcerer—some places in the Margins are easier to reach than others.
Hjel smiles as he says it, pillowed only inches away, and traces the scar on Gil’s cheek with one gentle fingertip.
The reason so few aspiring witches and warlocks make it through is because they’re so bloody single-minded. They aim for the heart of the
ikinri ‘ska
every time—which is a bit like trying to swim up a waterfall in spring spate. Trick is, look for kinder waters. If you’ve got any natural aptitude, the Margins want you here anyway. Use that. Loosen up, float and swim wide. Relax and let the currents bring you. You can always walk the rest of the way in, once you’re here.

He opens his eyes.

Red sparks escaping skyward over his head to mingle with the cold white pinprick scatter of stars. He’s on hard-packed earth beside a roaring fire.

A boot comes down, right next to his head. Someone yelps in shock, he hears liquid spilled into the fire with a billowing hiss. Gets a confused impression of a figure towering over him, pinwheeling its arms to stay upright. His grip on the Ravensfriend tightens. The figure sits down with a hard bump, narrowly misses landing on Gil’s legs.

Fuck, man! Where’d he come from?

Uproarious laughter, a burst of it, but dying off fast into queries of concern. The man who went over on his arse waves it away. Bounces to his feet and winks at Gil in the firelight. His Naomic has an outlandish lilt and phrasing to it, but Ringil’s been here enough times now for it to seem comfortingly familiar.

Nice entrance, mate. You were nearly wearing my soup for a waistcoat there.

Ringil mumbles an apology, props himself up and looks around. Sees faces beyond the leaping flames, easy grins. Behind that, the cold white rise of ruins into the dark; slumped walls and truncated white pillars, holding the night air up.

A handsome, middle-aged woman comes forward, bends, and offers her hand to help him up. Dark hair bound back, shot through with a lightning bolt streak of white from one temple—he knows her vaguely, has seen her around camp a few times on previous visits. He lets go his sword and makes the grasp. Her hand is warm and calloused. She smiles at him.

Hjel’s apprentice,
she says.
Welcome back. You’re getting pretty good at this, you come in closer every visit. Try not to land in the fire next time.

More laughter. She pulls, strong and firm, lands him on his feet. He nods acknowledement, gathers up the Ravensfriend, scabbard, and harness from where it’s lying in the dust. Feels a little self-conscious clutching it—outside of the usual knives and bows for hunting, the odd ax for chopping wood, these people aren’t much for weapons.

Thanks, uh—

Daelfi.
She sketches a casual reverence, hand to breast and brow, head briefly inclined. The motions have a dancer’s easy grace.
Acting skipper, while Hjel’s away.

Daelfi, yeah. I’m Ringil.

Oh, I know.
She grins crookedly, gestures around.
You might not think it from all these cackling idiots, but you’re a bit of a favored guest these days. The way Hjel mopes about between visits, we’re all pretty glad when you finally show up and put a smile back on his face.

Yeah,
someone calls out.
Poke the fire, get it going. So to speak.

The laughter again. He’s forgotten how much he misses that sound, the rounded, open ring of ribald amusement with no sour edge, no hidden blade of hate or distancing mockery in it. He feels it tug a soft unwilling smirk onto his lips.

He’s not around, then? Hjel?

Headed out into the deep range this morning. To look for you, actually.
For the first time, a frown chases the good humor off Daelfi’s face.
We had a visit from your wraith guard yesterday, back at the beach camp. Flickering about on the edge of the fire like candles in a gale. Poor, cursed creatures. They were frantic about something. Hjel figures it has to be you, you’re in some kind of trouble, so he has us up stakes and move into the Margins. Told us to camp out here at the ruins and wait for him. So here we are, waiting. And
—a sharp clap of those warm, calloused hands—
pashatazam! You show up here instead. Magic, eh—what are you going to do?