The Forge in the Forest (5 page)

"I know," said Ils, and sniffed disapprovingly. "A poor place to grow up in, this, with only a few old women to look after him, and his father's squire for a tutor. A wonder he did not turn out odder than he is."

"I think he has few friends as close as we," said Elof. "And this ceremony must mean a lot to him. Will you not witness that, at least? Then you can tell your folk that they have one friend among our rulers, mad and savage though we be…"

"We? Never number yourself among these folk! Nor among your precious northerners!" retorted Ils. "You're another breed entirely, whatever blood flows in your veins. And him also! He is wise to grab hold of his Marchwarden's place while he may, hard and thankless honor though it is. The tide of gratitude that swept him into it neglected to provide wealth to patch even his own roof, let alone sustain the people's. In these parts it seems gratitude's a beggar child, starved into an early grave. What will be left of it after he puts down a few more riots? It'll be back to what drove him out in the first place, his partisans and Bryhon's breaking each other's heads in the streets, and the ordinary citizens damning them both. Ferhas says there are whispers even among his friends… Only this time there's the Ekwesh waiting to sweep up the bits! Well, since you insist on going to the ceremony, so will I also, for all my heart counsels otherwise. I fear, Elof, I fear…"

"You? What could you fear?"

"Anything. Nothing. This great warren of men oppresses me, it dims my wits as the sun does my eyes. I start at shadows, that's all." She tossed a hunk of bread onto his plate. "Eat, and pay no heed."

But as they emerged into the sunny street an hour or so later, Elof could well understand her feelings. The bustle and roar of Kerbryhaine the Great City swept at him and over him like an inrushing wave, carrying with it the sound and scent of men a millionfold. From the clifflike crag of the citadel overhead to the first low slopes of the hazy hills around, all, everywhere, was a great sea of men, walls and houses rising above it like summits of coral along a reef, and writhing coils of smoke. Vast and stately as were the works of the duergar, they stood quieter, emptier by comparison; there was no such sense of fierce vitality barely pent, nor of such bitter unease. Yet he understood it a little better than Ils, and what aroused her contempt awoke in him a measure of pity. The city folk had been terribly shaken, first by the sudden and devastating assault when they had thought themselves so rich and invulnerable, and then by the vast inpouring of northerners fleeing the Ekwesh. The people had looked to their lords for some wise word, some simple gesture that would turn time back to the days of their smug security. But now they were growing impatient, beginning to suspect what might well be true—that there was no such word or gesture, that there was no going back, ever, to what had been. In such a time it was easy to seek scapegoats. They had heard Kermorvan cheered to the echo as he left the house, but now Elof saw heads turn in the crowded street; he heard, or guessed at, the dark mutterings, ribald whispers, sniffs of sternly self-righteous disapproval, sensed fingers pointing in stabbing gestures of distrust and fear. By popular prejudice duergar were regarded as vermin, on a level with beasts of the gutter, and he as some kind of necromancer for walking with one. He swung aside the bag of tools that he was taking to finish some work for Roc, and took her arm. It was tense against his side. Nowhere among all this, not even behind the walls they had just quitted, could she feel even remotely secure.

Fortunately, the way to the Syndicacy was not long.

Kermorvan's ancestral roof, dilapidated as it was, stood tall among the houses of the Old City, against the rocky crags of the citadel's northern flank. Before its gentler eastward face there opened a wide quadrangle all paved with white stone, the square of the citadel, and along one .whole side of that ranged the massive gray frontage of the Syndicacy. High though it stood, it was outwardly stark and plain, its only ornament a line of austere pillars which ran out around the great main doors to support a lofty canopied porch towering on steps above the heads of the throng in the square. Ils flinched nervously at the noisy crush around the steps, but strode beside Elof as if she had no troubles in the world. The crowd parted swiftly to let them pass, as if fearing the contact, and she smiled sardonically. "Even vermin have their privileges, I see."

When they entered the portico the Syndicacy's air of austerity vanished, for all around its inner walls were rich mosaics, male and female figures depicted in swirls of vibrant color. Elof guessed by their size and their heroic aspect and distinctive attributes that they must represent the Powers most revered by the folk of Bryhaine: there was Niarad with his nets, succoring mariners, and Ilmarinen, as it seemed, releasing lava to shape the citadel rock, and many others he did not know. He looked in vain for a figure in black armor or blue mantle, till Ils pointed to the summit of the great doors ahead. Above their wide arch rose a great sun in gold, pouring down gilt radiance, and across its disc, flying with open beak, a vast raven. To Ilmarinen Ils bowed as they passed, but at the Raven Elof glared.

The doors beneath were blackened wood, of great height and thickness, and width enough to span almost the whole floor of the chamber within. At most times they stood shut tight, shielding the deliberations of the Syndicacy from common eyes, but upon rare days such as this they were flung wide to vouchsafe the crowd a glimpse of its solemn ceremonial. Ferhas, Kermorvan's squire and steward, awaited them there, white mane bobbing nervously: he ushered them swiftly up a marble stair to places kept for them at the front of the crowded public gallery, overlooking both chamber and doors, but himself chose to stand some way behind. Elof smiled wryly. Even wise old Fer-has was as much a city man as the worthies on either side who edged discreetly away; much as he valued these proven friends of his master's, he had long held the city view of northerners as bumpkins at best, at worst barbarians, and still less could he shake off the violent prejudice against duergar. The conflict left him perpetually ill at ease in their presence. It was chiefly more traveled men, Northland traders such as Kathel Kataihan, who held broader views; there were not so many of these in the city now, and among the four hundred-odd syndics fewer than a score. And even of those how many could Kermorvan rely upon to side with the refugees, if the majority would not?

Elof scanned the wide empty chamber below, the banked rows of seats carved from fine stone and gilded wood, set about with signs and blazons where the place was held by ancestral right as well as wealth. The many-colored windows flecked the chamber with glowing warmth. All in all a noble sight, yet to his eyes it looked cold and hard, entrenched, unyielding. So also too many of the syndics seemed as they filed in, proud in the sweeping splendor of their robes. Too many faces reminded him of the Headman and elders of Asenby. Strong and even capable men those had been, but blind to all of the world that did not concern their immediate interests; so also these seemed, and from all he had heard, in defense of those interests they could be selfish and quarrelsome as children.

Green robes marked the landowners and men of property, gray the scholars and officials, brown the merchants and tradesmen, but they varied wildly in shade and pattern and ornament, sometimes as a mark of faction, more often as a display of wealth. The two great factions, once nobles and commoners, now old nobility against new, generally wore darker or lighter shades of their particular color, but still they vied in ornament. Some of the gray robes were most richly and garishly adorned of all, while many of the scarlet robes of the warrior order, worn over armor and the weapons they alone might bear in the assembly, seemed positively old and threadbare. Not so one that was borne by a dark man of great height, taller even than Kermorvan. Light red it was, and marked at the breast with a device of a claw and broken chain. Its discreet border of worked gold and baldric of golden mail bore out his air of prosperous ease, as did the smooth joviality with which, pausing by the doors, he acknowledged the loud acclaim of a good part of the crowd.

At last men of the City Guard called for silence, and a wide door at the rear boomed open. Syndics and spectators alike rose to their feet, and the crowd surged forward to see. In came the two elderly Marshals of the city in gray robes, their faces uneasy, and behind them in scarlet and armor the Wardens of the Eastern and Southern Marches, flanking Kermorvan as Warden-elect of the North. But at sight of him a swelling cheer from without faltered and dwindled to a great babble of astonishment, for the robes he wore were not scarlet but black, trimmed and collared with heavy gold, and over his heart in gold was traced the emblem of the Raven and Sun. The guardsmen hammered their staves on the marble floor for silence as the procession swept toward the center of the assembly, leading Kermorvan to a tall seat one place to the right of the Marshals' chairs. But ere they could reach it there was a rustle of robes, and the dark man was on his feet, his gangling frame towering over the Marshals and blocking their path.

"One moment!" he cried, his deep voice echoing through the chamber. "One moment, my lords! By what authority do you admit this man to the Syndicacy, and lead him to a place? And by what authority is he permitted to bear those robes?"

The astonished Marshals gaped at him, while through chamber and square alike a buzz of dispute arose. Many of the crowd, and even some in the gallery, howled abuse at the tall man till across the floor another man rose, in brown robes trimmed with fine furs that only emphasized his stoutness, and his rich mellow voice rode over the uproar. "By the unopposed vote of this assembly under the rule of war, these six months past—that would be how, my lord Bryhon! And in recognition and reward for great deeds done. Which is more than I recall you were ever voted!"

"And those remarkable robes, my lord Kathel?"

"M'm, as to them…" The merchant's voice was honeyed as ever, but it had lost something of its first certainty. "Well, they are of his choosing, and I know of no law that prevents him."

Kermorvan raised his head calmly. "My lords Marshal, they are the robes my great-grandfather last wore in this assembly, as was the ancient and unquestioned privilege of our line. By what authority has that been changed? And by what authority are these questions asked?"

"By the urgent need to question a decision forced through in haste and folly," said Bryhon with equal calm. "And consequently, perhaps, to impose some grave penalty." Sharp whispers, astonished and aghast, ran across the chamber, echoes rustling like dead leaves in the domed roof, and outside the crowd rumbled contention and discontent.

"But—but he has not yet taken his seat in the assembly!" blustered the leading Marshal, a stout, red-faced old man with bristling white moustaches; his blue-gray eyes were not penetrating like Kermorvan's, but bulging and opaque.

"Looks like a dead fish," muttered Ils, "only with fewer wits."

"Let him stand, then," said Bryhon quietly, "as must all brought here to our judgment." A wild chorus of dispute broke out, and Elof could hear that neither in chamber nor in crowd was it all on Kermorvan's side; scuffles were breaking out, and files of guardsmen went hurrying down to deal with them ere they spread. The harassed Marshal conferred with his colleague, a younger edition of himself; they shook their heads at Bryhon and Kermor-

van alike, and when the guards had eventually enforced silence they announced that all should take their seats for now, but without ceremonial, and Bryhon should have the right to speak. He smiled and bowed graciously, and stepped to the middle of the floor.

"My lords Marshal, fellow syndics, for any discourtesy I crave your pardon. But it seemed to me the only way to forestall what might not easily be undone. Master Kathel, in justifying this strange act of the Syndicacy you mentioned the matter of some great deeds done by this man. But the people of this city are driven to ask, were such deeds ever done?"

"W-what foolishness is this?" stammered the Marshal, into a shocked silence.

"Yours, I fear," said the dark man coolly. He rounded on the other syndics, "What do those deeds amount to? A skillful claim, aided, it shames me to say, by some within this city, to have compassed the defeat of that whole savage army which besieged us. How?" He shook his head in apparent wonder. "By the slaying of one of their leaders! And by the shattering of some savage totem, which he claims they relied upon. But I ask you, look again without panic and credulity at the events of that sorry time. That we were beaten back by the first attacks, that is little wonder, for they came upon us without the least warning and we a people at peace, unprepared. But given a day or so to muster our full force, to plan our strategy, we sallied out, and we drove them back into the sea. As you would expect! For how could such savages stand against the forces of this city? Ask of yourselves, must we really hare after miracles to explain their defeat? Are we ourselves grown so savage, are we sunk to the level of simple northerners that believe in magical mutterings over metal?" His cool eyes swept the chamber with mild scorn. "It seems we are. For from a sideline of the battle a man stages a clever show with the corpse of a slain chieftain and a broken weapon—were there not enough of both, that day?— and with some small encouragement we fall at his feet. Some encouragement, no doubt, from those who would gladly turn aside the people's allegiance, that they might more easily be oppressed. Turn it aside from their chosen leaders. From
us. "
The word was spoken no less quietly, but with the spitting intensity of water on hot steel.