Winter Be My Shield (32 page)

Isidro tugged at the cord around his neck. He did it without thinking, as he had done hundreds of times over the last few days — so often the cord had rubbed a welt into his skin. The sting of it made him curse under his breath.

On the other side of the chamber the priest looked up from building the fire in the brazier and sighed. ‘I'll find you some salve for that, but it won't get better unless you leave it alone.'

Isidro merely grunted in reply. He'd been trying to do just that, but it irritated like a thorn in his clothes.

As soon as he'd been strong enough to stand and walk a few paces on his own, the High Priestess had demanded that he present himself at the Shrine to be tested for the taint of mage-talent.

Isidro had gone along with the charade. There was nothing to be gained by arguing and once he'd done as they asked the physician, Jorgen, had promised he would not be disturbed further until Mira's escort arrived to take him away. He'd still been very weak — the exertion of walking across the temple grounds to the shrine had left him dizzy and exhausted, so he'd paid no mind to the ritual circle they'd drawn on the floor of the hall in coloured powder or the statues and carvings they'd placed around the perimeter of it under the blank gaze of the statues of the Twin Suns and the altar. He'd seen the ritual before and all he'd wanted was to return to his furs and go back to sleep.

It was only the fierce whisperings of the priests as the ritual reached its peak that made him pay attention to the skin-prickling energy around him. Each of the carved statues placed around the edge of the circle contained an enchantment and if a person carrying the taint of mage-talent stepped into the circle during a ritual those stones would light up like candles. The brightness of the light depended on how strong the
mage had the potential to be — they glowed weakly for someone like him, but would blaze as bright as a star falling to earth for someone in Sierra's league.

Instead of the white light he'd seen at other performances of the ritual, this time the light spilling around his feet was a deep and sullen red wreathed through with darker streaks. It reminded him of nothing so much as Rasten's ruddy flare of power.

It was apparently as much a surprise to the priests as it was to him. Instead of being presented with a new warding-stone then and there as he'd expected, Jorgen had led him back to the hall and his chamber, while the priests gathered around the altar, with its sacred tiger skin, to argue over just what it meant.

Hours later, he'd been woken at the High Priestess's insistence and she'd presented him with the stone he now wore. The enchantment was as powerful as the ones in the bracelets Kell had made for Sierra and the stone itself was carved with the likeness of a tiger's snarling face. The tiger was the Black Sun's consort, just as the bear was the husband of the Bright Sun; and it was said that the tiger was the executioner of the Gods, delivering justice to those who broke the laws the Gods laid down.

If he took it off, the priestess threatened, the Gods themselves would punish him. They'd tied the cord tight enough that he couldn't slip it off over his head. That was probably for the best, he had to admit. If he had been able to take it off he would have done so, if only to be able to sleep without dreaming he was suffocating under the weight of the wretched thing.

The wide oval of stone never grew warm. It was always cold and somehow greasy and where it touched his skin it prickled unpleasantly. Whenever his mind wandered he would catch himself with his fingertips on the amulet ready to wrench on the cord again.

The priest watched him with his hand on his hips and shook his head with a sigh. ‘I hate to think what Lady Mira's going to say when I send you back to her with another wound on top of what you've already suffered.'

Life in the temple must be a fairly sheltered existence, Isidro thought, if a bit of raw skin qualified as a wound.

‘I really don't see why it bothers you so much,' the priest went on as he tidied away a stack of empty bowls. ‘There are plenty of people here
in the temple who wear the blessed amulets and they don't seem to be troubled by them.'

How nice for them,
Isidro thought. ‘A distraction would help,' he said. ‘Perhaps a book, to pass the time?'

‘Ah,' Jorgen said. ‘I did ask, but I'm afraid the High Priestess has forbidden it. She says she cannot risk having the library contaminated. It's probably best for you to be resting, anyway …'

When Cam and the others had left he had been too exhausted and too ill to think of asking them to leave him something to help pass the time. At first he had done nothing but eat and sleep but now he had recovered enough to lie awake for an hour or so at a time, boredom was taking hold.

He had no company other than the priest who tended to him. Earlier a few of the temple servants had found excuses to come into his chamber and ask breathless questions about Sierra, or Kell and Rasten, or about the men who had died when Mira set them on Sierra's trail. Isidro had refused to discuss any of it. Thanks to Brekan, he gathered, stories were spreading thick and fast.

Jorgen was shifting an empty tea-bowl from the shelf near Isidro's head when he hesitated and held up a tiny slip of parchment. ‘Do you want to keep this, or shall I toss it on the coals?'

‘I'll keep it,' Isidro said and took the note from his fingers. The ink from Lakua's childish scrawl had run and blurred on the old hide and her signature was blotted with tears. She and Eloba had left while he was sleeping, riding to Ruhavera with Mira's messenger to her clan. He held the note up to the lamplight to read it one more time.

Issey
, the note read,
I'm sorry to bid you farewell in this way, but we cannot delay Lady Mira's messenger any longer. Eloba and me have severed the knot with Brekan. We're going to start a new life.

I know I wouldn't be here if it weren't for you. I'll never forget what you did for us and for my poor Markhan, and I'll pray that the Gods watch over you always.

Both the sisters had signed it, though the words were Lakua's.

Isidro tucked the scrap of leather into the front of his jacket. He was keeping it only for sentiment's sake, but as long as he was here alone he couldn't bear the thought of throwing away anything that connected him to his old life. Markhan was gone, Garzen was gone, and now Cam
and Sierra had ridden off and left him behind. It seemed that everything was slipping away from him. ‘Is Brekan still here?' he asked the priest.

‘Who? Oh, that fellow. He left a few days ago. I think he went east? Or maybe it was south …' Jorgen dismissed the matter with a shrug and perched on the bench beside him. ‘Let's have a look at that arm of yours. Has the swelling come down yet?'

With an effort Isidro lifted himself out of the fugue that was settling around him and gingerly moved his splinted arm into Jorgen's reach. ‘It's getting there,' he said while the priest peered and prodded at the bandages wrapped over his hand.

‘So it is. Tomorrow, perhaps, I'll re-wrap it. Once it's bound more firmly and with a few more days of rest I think you'll be well enough to travel.' The priest stood and gathered up his basket of dirty dishes and clothing to be laundered. ‘Well, I've measured out your next dose,' he said, nodding to the little ceramic bowl he'd set on the shelf near Isidro's head. ‘Don't take it until you've eaten — and don't let the meal get cold this time, will you? If you need anything else, ring the bell and someone will fetch me.'

Isidro nodded and then remembered a question that had been bothering him vaguely the last few times he had awoken. ‘Can you tell me what time it is?'

Jorgen paused in the doorway with the curtain half drawn back. ‘Evening. You slept through the dinner hour.'

As much as he was tempted to down the dose of poppy and escape into sleep, Isidro took only a few sips from the bowl Jorgen had left for him. The priest wasn't as careful of the stuff as Rhia had been and, unlike her, these folk didn't seem to care if he took so much that he began craving it. He'd seen where that path led. Valeria had plied her elder son with wine, drugs and women once he grew old enough to rebel against her meddling and control. Isidro had seen the effects of it himself back when his father was still alive and had brought his son and foster-son to court in Lathayan. Isidro was vulnerable enough as it was, without giving an enemy something else that could be used against him. As the heavy somnolence crept over him, Isidro tucked a fold of blanket under the cursed stone around his neck and waited for the refuge of sleep to settle over him again.

 

A bell rang somewhere in the night, an incessant jangling that echoed around Isidro's skull. Hanging near the head of his bed was a cord that rang a bell in the physician's chamber so he could call for assistance during the night. That was a tiny contraption, though, unable to produce the swelling sound that filled the temple — it could only come from the one attached to the bell-pull outside the temple door, to allow late travellers to gain entry to the shelter of the hall.

Isidro rolled over with a groan as he heard someone shuffle past his chamber. ‘Alright, alright,' a woman grumbled beyond the lattice. ‘Fires Below! Are you trying to wake the whole temple?'

The ringing continued, a cacophony of discordant noise. Something about it made Isidro kick his blankets off and sit up and he was reaching for his outer clothes before he even knew what he was doing. There was urgency in that frantic sound. Something was wrong.

In the act of reaching for his boots, Isidro froze. What use would he be in an emergency? What could he contribute, as weak as he was and with his sword arm ruined beyond repair?

The bell kept up its frenzied peal as the priestess hauled the door open with a scrape of wood over stone. Then she shrieked, calling for help, and Isidro heard a boy's voice babbling something unintelligible. He swept the curtain aside and saw a woman helping a boy of about twelve or thirteen into the common room. He wore only indoor clothes and was pale and shivering with cold. Blood was sheeting down his face from a wound to his scalp.

Her scream brought people running from their beds and chambers, rousing enough of a crowd that Isidro hung back to stay out of the way. There were more than enough able hands to help her as a pad of rags was pressed to the bleeding wound and a blanket wrapped around the boy's shoulders.

The boy's wound bothered him. The Gods knew that awful injuries could happen by accident, but that gash had cursed near scalped the lad — as though someone had swung a blade at him and he'd ducked, but not quite quickly enough.

His first thought was of the vision he'd seen on the journey, of the Akharian soldiers ambushing the Duke and his men. Isidro shook his head and tried to dismiss it. It could be a raid. Charzic had never led his men this far east before, but the king's army and the Akharian forces
might have driven him to seek out new hunting grounds. That made more sense than the idea that a legion had slipped past the king's men, leaving their supply line vulnerable and their rear open to attack. Trying to convince himself it was only a handful of ragged outlaws, Isidro ducked back into his chamber for his coat and headed for the doorway while wrapping it around his shoulders.

The priests and temple servants ignored him as he edged past the crowd to the entrance, but there he met more people from the village, pale and shivering as they pushed past him into the warmth of the hall.

‘What's going on?' he tried to ask one of them, a man, but he took one look at Isidro's face and must have realised who this stranger was, because he recoiled and blundered past, leaving Isidro staggering to keep his feet.

From the foyer, Isidro pushed through the heavy draught curtain. The outer door had been hauled open until it jammed on a drift of snow. Treading cautiously for fear his feet would slip out from beneath him, Isidro went out onto the landing to look over the temple wall and down towards the village.

More people were streaming in through the gates, stumbling in the soft snow, and down in the village there was a ruddy flare of light amid the houses. It gleamed like a beacon, illuminating a few scurrying forms before the gloom swallowed them again.

Someone grabbed his arm from behind. Isidro whirled, turning too quickly for his frail state, and would have fallen if Jorgen hadn't had a grip on his arm. ‘I thought I saw you come this way,' the physician said. ‘You're the only one in the temple with any experience of fighting. They say there's a raid on the village. What should we do?'

‘Get your weapons and mount a defence,' Isidro said. ‘There's a good wall around the temple grounds. Your village should have enough men to hold the gates.'

‘We don't
have
any weapons,' Jorgen said. ‘This is a
temple.
'

‘What about the village militia?'

‘Most of them are away at the Wolf Clan's muster. There's a handful of them left but they're mostly boys and greybeards …'

‘We need to know what we're facing,' Isidro said. While some of the folk streaming through the gates were heading to the hall, others milled around below with spears and shields. Isidro headed down towards them
with Jorgen at his heels. ‘Outlaws will be interested in food and women and not much else. They'll take what they can and torch the rest, but they don't have enough men to face an organised defence. Get everyone into the temple grounds and block up the gates any way you can. Put the women and boys there with shields and spears or axes and send any archers you've got there, too.'

‘But the houses!' Jorgen said. ‘If they put them to the torch we'll lose the stock and the winter stores —'

‘You don't have the numbers to defend them. The stock will run and the houses are too laden with snow to burn to the ground. Save the people now; salvage what you can later.'