SWNOVELS Iceblade: Chapter 4
WE RIDE BACK TO MARATIC in silence, with Lania’s body draped over her horse. Lupine scouts for signs of Rapathians returning to have their revenge for the attack on their hunt.
There has been no sign yet of enemy soldiers approaching but with the overwhelming numbers they have in reserve, we need enough advance warning to give time to escape before they see us. I watch Marin using the keyword plus hand-signs and body language instructions for Lupine as she reports back from scouting and marvel at how they have developed such close communication.
I have almost certainly ruined my chances of learning this skill but right now the wreckage of that hope pales to insignificance compared to the retribution that probably awaits me in Maratic.
After a pause for thought, Marin translates the wolf-news and adds his own conclusion.
“All Lupine found was a cohort of armed men with mules returning to the arena to collect the bodies. I’m guessing that when the hunters were attacked by a single person with Ariel’s fighting skills, they were taken by surprise and could only think about their orders to get the Emperor to safety.”
I try to imagine how it might have felt from the Rapathian point of view. “And then when you four appeared they thought they were facing reinforcements with the same destructive abilities?”
“Probably. What we have to work out now is how they might react to that. They may delay their planned attack on the Northlands and focus on searching for threats closer to Corinium.” He hesitates. “Or they may fear that our military includes fighters with that incredible level of killing power. That would make them even more motivated to wipe out our soldiers by forcing them to invade the Northlands.”
Brac is once more stirred out of his silence. “The Northlands are harsh places to survive. That’s why my people are fierce fighters. The Samarian army would be almost wiped out if there was a battle but so would the Northlanders. It would be a disaster for both sides.”
Marin looks worried. “Bad enough, but there would be worse to come than that. The trust that Tandarion has spent years building between Samaran and the Northland clans is precarious. If that is destroyed, we would lose our last chance of an alliance that might drive out these invaders. We need to gather more information in the city. Find out what the Usurper’s next moves are.”
Nem says quietly, “I can send a message to one of my Annubian contacts there. I’ll tell him to expect us soon.” She turns her horse away to release her hawk and then goes back to her conversation with Brac. They are already piecing together their recollections of people and names from the hunt, both dead and alive.
I can tell that Brac is holding in memory every face he didn’t have time to draw at the time, waiting impatiently for the chance to complete his work as soon as we arrive back at Maratic. I stay out of his way. Stirring up his feelings of anger against me isn’t going to help his concentration on the work he has to do.
THE EMPEROR STARES at the rows of corpses laid out in the palace courtyard, pacing furiously from one end to the other and back again, hoping that some explanation will reveal itself. Half his hunting party cut down in a matter of minutes, from what Akadian has told him so far. But who was responsible for this sudden slaughter?
“Akadian. You say the survivors who saw anything all reported seeing the assassin wearing red, like our military uniforms? Do I have a traitor in the ranks?”
“Yes your Eminence. But it could have been blood. As you may have noticed, there was considerable… damage.”
“And the reinforcements who attacked a few minutes later?”
“At least twenty of them, by all accounts. Possibly in black, but no one who got very close managed to survive the encounter.”
“And the rest of the miserable cowards ran for their lives instead of bringing me a prisoner with some answers!” Purmut kicks the nearest body in a sudden fit of anger.
Akadian hesitates, no doubt hoping that his effort to help the Emperor escape with his life does not automatically include him in the category of miserable coward. They both know what usually happens to anyone designated as traitor or coward.
Purmut uses his unpredictable and irrational judgements deliberately. It creates exactly the kind of nervous apprehension in his subordinates that allows him to maintain control of a cohort of scheming and ambitious aristocrats.
Before the Usurper’s mind can run too far into exploring suitably creative penalties for cowardice, Akadian interrupts with a disturbing piece of distracting evidence.
“There was one significant find, your Eminence. Something very different. Here.” Akadian indicates the corpse at the very end of the back row. Pale, as if frozen, the eyes glassy and open, with no mark on him apart from a small cut on the back of his hand. Purmut resumes his baffled staring, trying to remember where he has seen something like this before. The half-forgotten memory scratches at the back of his mind.
A low hiss cuts across his thoughts as a red-robed figure that Akadian has been studiously trying to ignore, finally steps forward. The shadowy presence brushes silently past the Emperor and stoops to reach out a gnarled hand, touching the victim’s rigid, frozen features slowly, as if holding on to a delicious sensation.
Another soft, drawn out hiss.
“So… The foolish perpetrator of this death is now revealed to us. How extremely… exquisite.”
The general turns his head away from the hissing, red-robed figure and stares at the ground, saying nothing.
The Emperor glares at Akadian, wishing the stupid man would do something, anything, to dispel the uncomfortable tension in the air as the bodyguards stand rigid, desperately trying not to step away from the shadow in fear and revulsion.
IT FEELS STRANGE TO be riding back up the twisting, circling trail to Maratic, the familiar gnarled trees and irregular-shaped rocks welcoming and yet at the same time threatening, every time I start to consider whatever unknown fate might await me here.
Trengar stands with his friends in the outer courtyard ready to take our horses. He takes a step forward, scanning faces anxiously as everyone dismounts. His eyes go to the shrouded bundle draped over Lania’s horse. I can see the sorrow on his face as the news that Marin’s hawk has already delivered finally connects with reality.
Brac walks over and lays an arm around Trengar’s shoulders, a wordless gesture of comfort telling me that the Northerner was not the only one among the Eldrin who had a deeper, more personal relationship with Lania.
I wish there was something to take the weight of guilt from me. I’m going to need all my focus to get through whatever retribution Jantian has in store. The scraping, scratching dissonance of Maratic’s power is back in force, tearing at my body and mind like a thousand red hot needles as it conflicts with the savage energy I stole from my victim. The jagged inner pain gets worse as Marin leads me into the training cavern to find Jantian.
The Eldrin we pass on the way avert their eyes. I’m guessing they have all heard Marin’s message describing what happened in the arena. They are all probably under orders not to interfere.
Jantian is standing on the far side of the training cave. He doesn’t wait for us to reach him and strides forward with a curt nod to Marin.
“Bring Lania in here.” He watches Marin leave before turning his attention to me, his dark eyes searching my face. I dread to think what he sees, while at the same time I am desperately hoping he will take away the horrible buzzing and prickling that overwhelms every part of me.
At last he lays his hands either side of my face and the dissonance fades enough to focus a little. I wish he didn’t look so worried about what he is picking up from me. And there is something else behind the concern, a kind of quiet fury that I don’t understand but find terrifying.
“Ariel. Tell me what happened. I know the sequence of events but I want your reasons, your feelings.”
The last thing I really want to do is to go over it again. The look on his face makes it clear I have no choice. So I tell him everything, every detail I can recall. When I get to the end, I try to look him in the eye without flinching.
“I’ve messed up again, haven’t I?”
I thought he would simply be angry but his response is calm and calculated.
“The mistake was mine and Marin’s as well as yours. Now we see whether we can correct it.” He steers me to the side and waves me to sit down as Marin and Trengar carry in the bier with Lania’s body and lay it in the middle of the floor. Looks like I will have to look at the result of my disaster for the whole time I am trying to survive whatever Jantian is going to throw at me.
Someone starts blowing into the fissure in the cave wall and the humming frequency of Maratic’s power fills the cave, blending with the green-gold light rippling in from the afternoon sun. Blissful relief floods through me as the jarring dissonance fades, but I know Jantian has not brought me here for a holiday. His eyes focus on me once again.
“Now, Ariel. Tell me in even more detail what happened in the arena.”
By the time we have gone through it another dozen times the missing pieces of memory are almost all back in place. I watch myself killing Rapathian army commanders and aristocrats over and over again, examine every flash of bloodlust, and notice how the flood of vicious stolen power blots out the last flicker of rational thought that had survived my initial outburst of uncontrolled anger. And all the time I am repeating this I am watching the Eldrin filing silently in and out, paying their last respects to their dead comrade in arms.
Finally Jantian allows me to stop. “You get a break to make your contribution to Brac’s notes. Then you come back and we go over it again.”
I groan inwardly but I am painfully aware that this is my only route to another reprieve. I scramble to my feet and stumble outside to find Brac sitting at the end of the terrace, still working at one of his drawings. Nem is arranging the finished ones on the ground and adding her own notes, her slender fingers darting back and forth with uncanny precision.
Marin walks over and steers me to the sea of faces staring up from sheets of paper.
“Ariel, you look terrible.”
I try to manage a grin but I can tell it looks as false as it feels.
“I’m beginning to think the fabled tortures of hell aren’t about having red-hot spears stuck through you like they show in the old pictures. It’s more like being forced to go over your bad deeds again and again forever. I’m just hoping the next session will be a bit easier. What do I have to do out here?”
Marin points to the display of portraits. “We put live ones this side, dead ones on the other, and added extra notes from everything we can recall. Then we have to work out how to use what we have now, to disrupt the Usurper’s plans as much as we can. You need to add whatever you remember into the notes.”
I stare at the sketched faces. Brac has an incredible eye for detail. I’m surprised at how much more I can contribute after the session with Jantian than I could have managed when I first arrived back here. At least all the pain has produced something useful. I add notes where I can and reassign a few more faces to the side of the dead that the others have missed.
Then something occurs to me.
“Does anyone remember the designs of Rapathian aristocratic house liveries?”
Brac looks up from his notes. “Mostly. Why?”
“I think we need to put them in. Just a strip of blue, red, or whatever around the neck would be enough. Then rearrange the images within the great houses.”
Brac picks up a paintbrush. It looks tiny and ineffective in his beefy hand.
“Come back after your next session with more detail for the notes. I’ll have it ready by then.” He seems to have buried his grief in his work and I am relieved that we can at least talk together without other difficulties getting in the way.
The next session with Jantian turns out to be just as tough as the first. Red-hot spears are a fairly good allegory for what this foretaste of hell feels like. The Eldrin have finished filing past Lania. Only Trengar remains, sitting silently beside the bier, his back to me.
Jantian follows my gaze in his direction.
“Trengar and Lania were lovers.” He speaks so quietly I can only just hear him above the thrumming of Maratic’s frequency. I try to imagine how much blame Trengar has laid on me for what happened. Then I abandon that line of thought. This kind of speculation is futile. The only way to make this right is to become the reliable weapon they want me to be. The thing that will drive the invaders out of our land. I still have no idea if I can do it.
I lose track of time, aware only that these endless repetitions are more exhausting than fighting off a dozen Rapathian warriors. At last Jantian stands and leads me back outside. Brac’s portraits are now laid out in groups designated by the sigils and livery of each great house.
I sit with the others, scanning the array, frowning. There is a pattern here but I can’t see what it is. I make a couple of corrections, still surprised at how sharp my memory has become after all the repeats with Jantian.
Maybe that is how the power of Maratic works. Whatever you practice while the sound-frequency is running through you gets learned much faster than normal. Which would explain why Jantian makes sure all training sessions are disciplined to follow a path of skill and collaboration instead of the wild and uncontrolled way I have been using the Blade’s gift on my own. And for my own purposes.
When I look round Jantian has laid out a Tican board on the paved floor of the terrace. The jade pieces lie neatly packed in their carved box at the side.
“You play Tican?” He gives the ghost of a smile. Perhaps he knows I have almost lost the will to live after several hours in hell. But playing Tican isn’t really what I have energy or enthusiasm for right now.
I try to sound polite and respectful, acutely aware of how precarious my situation is after what I’ve done.
“I was never much good at it. Not much of a strategic thinker.”
“It seems that might be changing. Marin just informed me that it was your idea to group the enemy according to the noble houses of their hierarchy.”
“Yes. It was. But I’m still not really sure why. There is a pattern here but I can’t read it.” I wave a hand vaguely at the portrait display.
“Tican is used to practice strategy.” Jantian points to the elegant jade game pieces in the carved box. “There are four power places.” He lays them out, one at each corner of the board, then sets down the other pieces as he names them. “Two kings, one for each army. Two queens. Four knights on each side. Two assassins. Five spies. Ten peasants conscripted as infantry.” He turns to me and drops the rest of the pieces into my hands.
“You know these other roles can be exchanged at will. Which would you choose? And which pieces will you take out of the confrontation in exchange for them?”
I stare at the beautifully carved figurines. For all my lack of interest in the game I know the roles well. Three courtesans. Two peasants who will become warlords after seven moves. Two priests with the power of rhetoric to sway people’s hearts. Four wealthy merchants with money for bribes. Five jealous aristocrats––
“That’s what I was missing!” I drop the figurines back in the box. “The pattern of the dead.” I point to Brac’s portraits laid out beyond the Tican board. “Three of the houses took nearly all the hits and two of the houses were completely unscathed.” I look round at Marin for reassurance. He frowns, staring at the spread of images.
“That isn’t so surprising. The nobility were keeping their clans together with their own servants around them to make sure they were well protected from the lions. You just carved a way straight through the ones nearest to you, trying to reach Akadian and the Emperor.”
I point back at the Tican board. “Yes, but if you look at it like a Tican strategy game with assassins and jealous aristocrats, it might look like a plot. An inside job. You said earlier that you thought they were taken by surprise and ran for safety. Each house was looking after its own instead of working together to fight off a common enemy. Maybe because they thought it might be an inside plot instead of a Samarian attack? Too confusing to know who might be after them? Marin, you said yourself that even with the enhanced strength and skill of the five of us together, you were sure they would kill us all if we attacked. But the Emperor and half the hunt simply ran for their lives.”
Marin stares at the board. “All our spies have reported a lot of jealousy among the Rapathian elite, partly due to their insecurity after all the Emperor’s purges. In turn, the Emperor himself is insecure, hence the purges to ensure none of the aristocrats lasts long enough to become too powerful and challenge him. So it is possible.” He looks up. “Jantian? You have the most experience of what politics is like in Rapathia.”
“Most of which I would rather forget.” Jantian fingers a long scar running down the side of his face and neck as he goes over the images. “But I think we may have the beginnings of an idea here.”
He turns to me. “Ariel, do you know the story of the Five Warriors?”