SWNOVELS Iceblade: Chapter 1
THE SUN INCHES ABOVE the crest of the mountain range, warming chill morning air as it lights the trees around the camp in shades of gold. For the first time since taking the Shadowblade’s deadly gift I am starting to feel optimistic when I think of the future. It may take weeks or even months, but I finally think I can learn to control the fighting power my strange bargain has granted me. Now at last I have some hope of maintaining my role with Marin and his team of Eldrin. I still need their help to free my sister from the Rapathian invaders.
On the other side of the clearing, Marin is checking the wound on Lania’s shoulder and I can hear her protestations from where I stand.
“Marin! I’m fine. It started feeling better as soon as you dug the arrow out. Let me finish packing my gear.” She flicks her long sandy braid in defiance and he ducks just in time to avoid it hitting him in the eye. He may be her commanding officer but I’m starting to understand how the easy-going camaraderie of the Eldrin reflects the way they share a complete confidence and loyalty when working together in dangerous situations. Something I long to share with them, once I can fully earn their trust. When I can prove I’m reliable and will guard their backs as surely as they watch out for each other.
Marin checks the angle of the sun and looks round.
“Ariel, get Sahan saddled. We need to leave soon. Best if we ride slowly on the road back to Maratic.”
I know he has delayed the departure for the five of us because he doesn’t think I have fully recovered from yesterday’s fight. I need to work even harder than Lania does to convince him I’m fine and that the slash on my arm is almost healed already. Another effect of the new power running through me. I avoid thinking about where that power might lead, or what kind of creature I will become at the end of all this.
Right now, I don’t want the Eldrin to think I’m weak. My role as deadly weapon still makes me feel uneasy, but I know it is the only reason they are willing to risk working with someone as unreliable as I proved to be on that mission in the city only a few days ago.
Their hope that my fighting ability could help defeat the invaders is the only thing securing my place here. Without it, I would be dead, executed as all other dangerous Blade adepts have been in the past. Even now, my existence is precarious. My survival depends on learning to overcome the wild anger that still sometimes takes control in the heat of battle. My training is due to start again as soon as we reach the Eldrin base at Maratic by the end of today.
Marin signals Allantis and his team of fifty archers to move out. The young patrol lieutenant walks across to us, buckling on his quiver as he approaches. He addresses Marin with the standard formality of the regular military.
“Sir. My archers are almost ready to leave. We should be back at Longford Manor by sunset tomorrow. I will deliver your letter to the Eldrin captain in charge of protecting the king. If we succeed in getting Tandarion away from Lord Farang’s control as you instructed, I will dispatch a messenger directly to Maratic with the news.”
Marin’s hand instinctively moves to stroke the feathers of his own message-hawk. “Did you learn anything from your captured spies?”
“Not much.” The archer glances back at his team as they start to file out of the clearing. “Except… it seems that only one of them was knowingly in league with the traitor Farang. The others had been duped into believing that you were the traitor and they had orders to report everything you said back to him, in order to save the king from your evil plans.”
Marin frowns. “Are you sure the others are still loyal to Tandarion? It would be a great risk to set your prisoners free too soon. We think Lord Farang has his own agenda. Plans that he is even keeping secret from his Rapathian allies, which makes it difficult to know what he will do next and who his real co-conspirators are.”
Allantis shakes his head. “No. I can’t be entirely sure. Not yet. I’m taking all the spies back with us as prisoners, together with my own spy masquerading as the sixth captive. I’ll wait to see if he can overhear any further gossip while they plan their escape before suffering the painful death we have promised them.”
Marin gives a wry smile. “If they stay loyal to their king in the face of that, they’ll be among your most trusted archers when they finally get their reprieve.”
“That is what I’m hoping for.” Allantis hesitates. “There was one other small thing we learned, although it has nothing to do with military plans. The Rapathian Emperor ordered a lion hunt tomorrow, only two hours from here at the cliff-circle. Apparently he goes on these hunts as often as possible, whether he is at home in Rapathia or wherever he happens to be overseeing a military campaign.”
Marin’s face registers his distaste for the whole idea.
“The king once told me the Usurper has a liking for this so-called sport. The Rapathian aristocrats consider it essential to demonstrate the strength and prestige of the ruling class. But from what I’ve heard, the way they do it is far from heroic. A mere artificial show.”
Allantis shrugs gloomily. “Show or not, I suppose the rush to hold a hunt here in Samaran is to demonstrate to the defeated citizens how powerful their conquerors are?”
Marin gives a derisive snort. “Citizens won’t be allowed anywhere near it. Only the aristocracy and a few extremely wealthy merchants are invited to participate in these things, together with large numbers of bodyguards and servants to protect their masters. More likely the purpose is to impress Farang’s cronies and secure further alliances with other Samarians who have also turned traitor to their country.”
I notice how tired Allantis is looking as he takes in the discouraging news of more aristocrats turning traitor to Samaran. He probably spent most of the night interrogating those spies. As usual, Marin is ahead of me when it comes to bringing new hope and resolve to those under his command. He clumps a reassuring hand on the archer’s shoulder.
“Allantis, you’ve done a great job, extracting this information at short notice. When you get back to Longford Manor, make sure you report very quietly to the Eldrin in the kingsguard, because the cohorts of the Samarian army stationed there are still under the control of Farang and his two traitor generals. If you can do that, I have every confidence you can avoid a confrontation with the army and get Tandarion out of there by stealth. You have the advantage that Farang is currently distracted by trying to discover the location of Maratic.”
It looks as if Marin’s confident leadership has once more sparked the kind of loyalty and courage we are going to need to win this war. I watch Allantis walk back to his crew with his head held high. Not for the first time, I wish the Blade’s gift had given me that ability to inspire others. It is as if Marin was born to lead, dealing with difficult decisions and coordinating so many different people. Yet he is barely two years older than my inexperienced eighteen winters.
Marin signals Brac to join us. The big red-haired Northerner strides across the open space, glancing questioningly at the departing archer patrol.
“Marin? Any news from t’ captured spies?” His face says he expects it to be bad.
“Allantis learned that Purmut is planning a lion hunt two hours’ ride from here. Tomorrow.”
“So we could take advantage of that somehow..?” Brac is looking interested.
“We might be lucky and get a chance to kill the Emperor while he is away from the palace and the capital. It could be worth making the detour instead of going directly back to Maratic. If we succeed, it would create a diversion that would help Allantis to rescue the king.”
Now I’m getting interested as well.
“Would killing the Usurper get rid of the invaders permanently? Do you think their whole army might leave Samaran if their Emperor is dead?” It seems too much to hope that a massive and bloody final battle might be avoided so simply.
Marin is cautiously optimistic.
“It would cause a power struggle among the Rapathian elite––if their recent history is anything to go by. An Empire that grows by bloody conquest tends to have its internal succession decided in the same way. So yes. Ambition-driven conflict among the Rapathian aristocracy might cause enough disruption to drive the invaders back to their own capital.”
Marin’s understanding of international politics reminds me that I am still the uneducated villager by comparison. Now the Blade’s gift has sharpened my ability to calculate as well as my enhancing my physical fighting skills, I’m determined to catch up. Fast.
“So how do we go about this?”
Marin is already focused on details. “Brac, did you complete your drawings and notes yesterday?”
“Yes. I laid everything out for you, as soon as there was enough light t’ see by.”
Marin releases his hawk to go hunting and walks over to where Brac has laid out small sheets of paper on the ground, weighted down with pebbles at the corners. I marvel at how Brac manages to make such detailed drawings in between riding, fighting, keeping watch––and maybe even finding time to eat and sleep.
Marin kneels to examine the images more closely, with a brief explanation for me. “Brac is a talented artist with a particular skill at capturing faces.”
Each page contains a carefully-drawn face with a few neatly-written notes inscribed on one side.
Brac points to a separate set of pages. “These were done by our resident artist in t’ city. I only got to spy directly on these five when I was there.” He points to five faces set on one side.
The style of these is a little different from that of the city artist, but there is the same precision marking every facial feature. I would know these people the instant I met them. But it is the last image that holds my attention. Brac’s notes say simply, General Akadian. Commander in Chief of the Rapathian Legions.
I can hear Akadian’s voice in my head as I stare at the image. Guttural, heavy, with an imperious tone to it that says he expects to be obeyed immediately. Expects to be given everything he demands. Immediately. I try to blank out his association with my captive sister. I don’t want to think about the two of them in the same moment, but those fragments of Akadian’s conversation with Alina still haunt me.
I force my eyes away to the pages drawn by the city artist.
“Brac? This is what you went to collect in Corinium when Deris and I went in to free the slaves?”
Brac nods, running calloused fingers absently through his cropped russet beard as he studies the images.
“I made copies of everything while we were at Maratic for the others to study. We need t’ know the enemy, especially the commanders and aristocrats.”
Now Brac’s habitual silences make more sense. Every moment that he isn’t preoccupied with fighting for his life, he is focusing on everything around him, committing faces and locations to memory until he can get them onto paper for others to use.
I look round as Nem appears from the direction of the stream, leading a very wet, clean and rather disconsolate Lupine. The Annubian’s clothes are soaked, suggesting that her efforts to give the wolf a cold bath were met with lively resistance. Still, she has managed to get most of the blood out of Lupine’s fur although the silver still looks a bit pink in places. At least the courageous but reckless animal is no longer limping and that front leg looks almost healed. I may have caused problems with my erratic dedication to duty but I can feel some sense of achievement in my healing abilities.
Marin waves Lupine away to go and lie down in a patch of sunlight to dry off.
Nem walks over, her boots leaving wet prints on the rock underfoot. She glances at the drawings in a way that tells me she has already seen most of them.
“Why are we studying these now? I thought we were heading back to Maratic.”
Marin looks up. “New information. There will be almost two hundred people involved in the lion hunt tomorrow. Maybe two score of them will be generals and aristocrats, leaders of the invasion. If we can overhear anything they say, we report it to Brac and he will add details to his notes.”
This sounds totally different to the plan I heard just now.
“But I thought we were going in there to kill the Emperor!”
Marin is no longer surprised by my outbursts. “That is the other objective, but there are constraints we need to discuss, to agree upon now we are all here together. I know the area they are planning to use. It has the attributes the Emperor likes for his so-called hunts.” He draws a circle in the sandy ground. “It is quite flat, easy for the horses, surrounded by a ring of tall rocks, like this. The beaters will go out early and drive the lions into the circle, then guard the exits to prevent them escaping from the hunters.”
A wave of disgust floods through me at this idea. “That’s not a hunt, it’s a slaughter! And what’s the purpose? Lions aren’t even good to eat.”
Marin hunches his shoulders and I can tell he feels the same way but is determined not to get sidetracked by emotions.
“They do it to give themselves a false sense of being powerful. All they want is the skin to take back as trophies to wear or to hang on their walls.” He glares at me, no doubt hoping I’ll shut up and let him get on with plans for what we have to do.
“Sorry Marin. Go on.”
He makes a few more marks in the sand with a stick.
“The main gaps in the circle of cliffs are here and here, with a few narrower ones in between. We can slip past the beaters on a steep path straight over the top of the rock, here. Within the arena the trees are close together and the hunters will be moving fast. It will be difficult to get a clear shot at the Emperor.”
He pauses and regards each of us in turn. “The instant we attack, they will turn on us and we will be outnumbered, as well as trapped inside the rock circle. We may be strong and skilled but we can’t win against two hundred armed fighters. Some of the Emperor’s toughest warriors and bodyguards will be on protection detail for the Emperor and his wealthiest aristocrats.
He pauses for a few moments to let us take it in.
“That isn’t a sacrifice worth making to remove anyone but the Emperor. Generals and aristocrats get replaced fairly frequently in the Rapathian way of doing things. But if we take out the Emperor himself we have a good chance of causing enough of a power struggle to force them back to their own country. If that avoids a final confrontation with our own military, we will save thousands of lives, soldiers and civilians. That is a sacrifice I’m prepared to make, but I can’t order any of you to do the same. It has to be your decision.”
We sit for a moment in silence while the implications sink in. Then Nem speaks.
“If you’re going, I’m going with you. I trust you not to reveal our presence unless you get a clear sighting on the Usurper.”
The others nod agreement. Marin looks at me and I remember with a wave of regret that it was less than an hour ago when he finally revealed his feelings for me. Neither of us had known at the time that it had been a precious, fleeting moment, perhaps our last chance to be together. Ever. Tears are prickling behind my eyes as I take in the fine lines of his face, the strength and skill in his body, the sharp intelligence behind his seemingly careless informality. Life would be desolate and empty and not worth living if he were killed on this mission.
“Yes. Of course I’ll go with you.”
I know my skill has developed to the point where I have a better chance of killing the Usurper than any of them.
Increasing our chances of success.
And in the process, increasing our chances of being dead before tomorrow night.