The Shadow at the Gate (5 page)

“What in the name of stone and shadow was that?!” said Ronan.

Neither of the two other men said anything. Gor tottered to the dais and sank down on it, his head in his hands.

“What was that thing?” repeated Ronan. His head ached.

“That—that,” said the Silentman. He shrugged helplessly.

“We shouldn’t have taken the job,” said Gor. His voice was low and quiet, ashamed. “It’s too late now, but we shouldn’t have taken the job. The strange little fellow in the cloak came first, a month ago. By himself, understand. We thought there was something odd about him then, but we knew nothing about his master.”

“The gold was good,” said the Silentman. “It was more than should have been paid for a year of jobs and we thought him a fool. We were the fools. But, by the stones of Hearne, the bargain shall be kept. The boy shall be found. You’ll find him, Ronan, if it’s the last thing you do. Every cutpurse and climber and tosser in this Guild will be looking under every stone in this city. I want every door opened, every lock picked, every chimney plunged. If you find the boy, then I’ll reinstate you as the Knife. One last chance, do you understand me?”

“What if—”

“Is that clear?!”

“Yes,” muttered Ronan, not trusting himself to say more.

“I don’t know what either of those two are,” said Dreccan. “I think the small one might be a human of some sort, but the other?” He shuddered. “That was no human.”

“One week,” said the Silentman.

“Stone by stone,” said Ronan. His headache was fading and malice stirred inside of him, viciously glad at the sight of the Silentman terrified on his throne. “How long does it take to destroy a city that’s stood for a thousand years?”

“It’ll stand for another thousand,” growled the Silentman.

“Oh—aye—it will,” said the steward, but he did not sound convinced.

CHAPTER FOUR

THE LIES OF THE WIHHT

Nio hurried down the stairs and across the hall to the front door. It was his plan to go to the university ruins and try his luck again with the scrying mosaic hidden away in the lower level. He grasped the doorknob and then stopped, puzzled. There was a trace of the wihht on the metal, as if the creature had been through the door recently. He concentrated on the doorknob.

Yes—definitely. Only the day before, but he had not sent the creature out then. He had given it no command. Anger flared within him. The wihht was his creation and, as such, was subservient to his will. His word was its law. Everything there was to be known about wihhts he knew, had read, had studied and committed to memory. The writings of Willan Run, Staer Gemyndes’ treatise on the seven orders of fashioned creatures, and the definitive
Endebyrdnes of Gesceaft
, written by the wizard Fynden Fram.

It was unthinkable for a wihht to make a choice of its own will. Unthinkable. Fram clearly said in his chapter on wihhts that “such creatures are physical manifestations of their maker’s will.” He had not willed the wihht to do anything yesterday, but the evidence of the door handle was unmistakable. It was as obvious as a footprint in the mud. Anger pushed hard at him, and he strode to the kitchen, to the stairs down into the basement and what waited there in the darkness. And yet, uneasiness wriggled like a worm in the back of his mind.

“
Lig
,” he said.

A sphere of light bloomed in his hand. The steps creaked underfoot. Moisture gleamed on the stone walls. The wihht stood silently, waiting—easy in its complete stillness as if it had been standing patiently and comfortable in that position for the last twenty-four hours. Nio remembered the final, whimpering cry of the Juggler and the wet, bubbling sounds of the wihht feeding, and the unease in his mind grew.

“You left this cellar last night,” said Nio. The creature said nothing in response, though a slightly puzzled expression crossed its face. The brow wrinkled into momentary furrows and then was once again smooth.

“You left this cellar without my command.” He watched it closely. Something sparked in the dull pupils. Still, it remained silent.

Furious, Nio muttered under his breath.

“
Brond
.”

The sphere of light grew in brilliance and heat. The wihht blinked and stepped backward.

“Where’d you go yesterday?” the man said. “I command you to tell me.”

“I went nowhere,” said the wihht, but its voice seemed stronger and clearer than the last time it had spoken with Nio. The unease inside the man’s mind quivered into something else. Fear. He clamped down on the feeling.

But how could the wihht’s voice have changed unless it had been strengthened somehow? Unless it had fed.

He let his mind drift out toward the wihht, searching for a spark of conscience that he could examine. His consciousness pushed forward, encountering nothing. He pushed a little farther. And felt something that was more than nothing—an absence of being, color, meaning, and form. The emptiness of it pulled at him like a lodestone pulls at iron. A smile drifted across the wihht’s face. Nio wrenched his mind back.

“I know you left the house. Don’t test my patience. I made you, and I can unmake you. Darkness and water woven together make your flesh, and those threads can be plucked apart and dispersed back into the shadows, back into the drains of this city.”

“More than that now,” said the wihht. There was cunning in the hoarse voice. “More than darkness and water in me now. There’s a bit of this and that. Blood and flesh. Not just yours.”

Wordless, Nio stared at the wihht. His hand ached with the remembrance of the blood he had given to the thing.

Given out of his own foolishness.

He backed away, and then quickly walked up the steps. When he reached the kitchen and the door closed behind him, he realized he had been holding his breath. He stared at the shut door. The thought crossed his mind of telling Severan, of confessing his stupidity. Perhaps he knew something about wihhts that he himself did not? No. That would not do.

He wove a binding on the door, working it down through the wood beams into the stone foundation of the house. Three times he sealed the weaving with his own true name. When he was done, he could hardly keep his eyes open, for the binding had been done with all of his will.

He trudged up to his bedchamber. As he fell asleep, a thought crossed his mind.
Not just yours.
That’s what the wihht had said. More than just his blood in the thing. Of course. He had witnessed the thing devour the Juggler and his two thugs. But had the thing meant more than that?

Not just yours to command. . .

CHAPTER FIVE

THE APPARENT BOREDOM OF DUTY

Ever since Arodilac could remember, his uncle had been telling him duty was honorable. Duty is the pursuit of the nobility. Nothing better than duty, my boy.

Duty, however, was boring.

He yawned.

By rights, he should have been allowed to go with Owain Gawinn. He had watched the troop clatter out the gate and canter away, down through the long, green reaches of the Rennet valley. He was seventeen—practically a man—and just as good a swordsman as any of Owain’s men. When he had complained to Bordeall, the old man had just handed him a spear and told him to patrol the wall. Tramp the length, up around to the northern tower, all the way down to the southern tower, and then back to the main gate tower.

That had diverted him for a while. The city crowded up to the wall with its labyrinth of stone and brick and shadows drawn by the morning sunlight angling down. On the other side of the wall was the rest of Tormay. The land stretched east for miles and miles through the cradle of the Rennet valley. On either side, the land rose up sharply. To the north, it rose up to the Scarpe plain. It was said that the Scarpe was the inland sea, for when the wind blew, the grasses billowed and rolled like waves of water, and the birds skimmed over the green as if they were gulls over the sea. South of the valley, the land climbed up into the rough, broken hills of the duchy of Vo.

Arodilac gazed out across the wall and imagined an army attacking up the valley. The corn and hay would be trampled underfoot and the green of the grasses blotted out by the silver and gray of armor. Flags waving in the wind. Horns bugling above the neigh of horses and the shouts of men. He would lead a last, desperate charge of cavalry from the gate, spears already dark with blood.

Smiling, he tripped over the spear he was carrying. Shadows, but the thing was heavy. He sighed and limped on. His feet were getting sore. He was bored.

So much for duty, he mumbled to himself. I wouldn’t mind it so much if it meant fighting someone. But not with this spear. Give me a good sword and I’m happy enough. I wonder if uncle would give me gold enough to buy a new sword? He’s been in a nasty mood lately. Perhaps I’d better try my hand at the Queen’s Head and win some gold there.

I wonder how Liss is doing?

With that melancholy thought in mind, he trudged along. The tower at the main gate was near enough. He’d kick off his boots and have some ale in the shade.

“Off to Gawinn’s house,” rumbled Bordeall.

“I went just yesterday. Besides, I’m tired.”

“Get going.”

“I fail to see what some little girl having nightmares has to do with being a member of the Guard. I’m a soldier, not a nanny.”

“Go. Now.”

“Oh, all right,” said Arodilac.

He did manage to sneak a tankard of ale in the guardhouse before leaving. The sergeant on watch took the spear and locked it in the armory. The man grinned at him. Oh, they had been polite when he had first joined the Guard. After all, he was the regent’s nephew. But that had worn off fast enough.

“Off to take care of babies?”

“Shut up,” said Arodilac.

It was a long walk from the main gate to the house of Owain Gawinn. The crowded streets didn’t make matters easier, and by the time he reached the garden wall behind the house, he was sweating and feeling sorry for himself.

A wooden gate opened through the stone wall and into a garden. The air smelled of herbs and the honeysuckle massed along the wall. Bees hummed as they darted from flower to flower. Three small boys were chasing each other around a patch of grass. The sun was high and the garden brimmed with light.

Not even a ward, thought Arodilac crossly to himself. You’d think the Lord Captain of Hearne would have more sense that that. Particularly if I’m supposed to waste my time looking after his houseguests.

“Hullo,” said the eldest of the boys. He barely came up to Arodilac’s knee.

“Hullo,” said Arodilac. “Is your mother home?”

“Hullo,” said the middle of the boys.

“Do you like bees?” said the eldest boy.

“I’ll just let myself in,” said Arodilac.

“We have lots an’ lots, but they never sting us. Just never.”

“Just never,” echoed the smallest of the three boys. He smiled shyly.

“But they’ll probably sting you,” said the eldest boy generously.

Arodilac knocked on the back door and then stuck his head in. It was dark and cool inside.

“Hello? Mistress Gawinn? Hello?”

The three little boys pushed past his legs.

“We’ll find Mother,” said the eldest boy. They disappeared down the passage.

Soon, he heard the sound of skirts and footsteps and then Sibb Gawinn appeared. She wore an apron and her hands were white with flour.

“Arodilac,” she said, smiling, “you needn’t hover about the stoop like a stranger. Come in.”

He ducked his head in embarrassment. Not that she compared to Liss, but he thought Sibb Gawinn one of the most beautiful women he had ever seen, almost as beautiful as the duke of Dolan’s niece—Levor-something or another. He’d caught a glimpse of her in the courtyard when the duke’s party had arrived.

“Just dropping by to check on the
 
girl, ma’am,’ he said.

“Come in, then. She’s in the kitchen with Loy and my Magret. We’re baking bread.”

The big Hullman scowled at him when he walked into the kitchen, as if to say that he had things in hand, could watch over the foundling himself, thank you. Arodilac was in complete agreement, but that didn’t prevent him from scowling back.

Magret was perched on top of a stool next to the table, barely visible behind an apron many years too big for her. Flour rose around her in clouds as she pummeled a mountain of dough with her sharp little fists. Bread baked on the stone hearth. Arodilac’s stomach growled as he inhaled the warm scent. Magret giggled.

“I’ll have to speak to my husband about your rations,” said Sibb. “Here.” She sawed off a generous portion of a loaf and then sliced up a tomato to pile on top of the bread.

The foundling girl sat on top of the counter beside the hearth, knees drawn up to her chin and slender hands laced about her ankles. Her eyes shifted from Sibb to Loy and then back. Her face was expressionless.

“Hello,” said Arodilac, stepping in front of the girl. Her eyes focused momentarily on his. She frowned and then looked past him.