Forge of Darkness (Kharkanas Trilogy 1) Page 23

  ‘I imagine that those imitators in the Citadel will fail in repeating what you have captured here.’

  ‘I believe you are right, Lord.’

  Urusander grunted. ‘Just as well. Come then, join me in one final meal. I believe you are soon to attend a wedding?’

  Kadaspala rose from the chair. ‘Yes, Lord, my sister.’

  They made their way out of the sitting room.

  ‘Andarist is a good man, Kadaspala.’

  ‘None would deny that,’ he replied, pleased at the ease with which those words flowed from his lips.

  ‘Your sister has become a most beautiful woman, or so I am told.’

  ‘She is that, Lord …’

  * * *

  There were people who feared solitude, but Cryl did not count himself among them. He sat astride his horse, the barren hills stretching out on all sides, a warm wind brushing across the grasses like the breath of a contented god. Near a jumble of half-buried stones there was a scatter of white bones, and set upon one of those boulders was the multi-tined rack of a bull eckalla. Slain by a hunter years past, the perched antlers pronounced the triumph of the kill.

  It seemed a poignantly hollow triumph in Cryl’s eyes. The ancient tradition of hunting had been held aloft as a standard of virtue, emblazoned with the colours of courage, patience and skill. It was also a hand upon the beating heart of the earth, even if that hand was slick with blood. Challenges and contests of wits between Tiste and beast – when the truth was, it was rarely any contest at all. Unquestionably hunting for food was a sure and necessary instinct, but forms were born of pragmatic needs until such endeavours came to mean more than they once did. Now, hunting was seen as a rite of passage, when necessity had long since ceased.

  It was a curiosity to Cryl that so many men and women, well along in their years, still found need to repeat those rites of passages, as if emotionally trapped in the transition from child to adult. He well understood the excitement of the chase, the sweet tension of the stalk, but for him these were not the reasons to hunt, while for many he knew that they had become just that.

  Do we hunt to practise for war? The blood, the dying eyes of the slain … our terrible fascination with suffering? What vile core do we dip into in such moments? Why is the taste not too bitter to bear?

  He had seen no sign of living eckalla, and he had ridden far from House Enes, far from sad Jaen and his excited daughter, far from the world of weddings, hostages and the ever growing tensions among the highborn, and yet even out here, among these hills beneath this vast sky, his kind found him, with trophies of death.

  Years past, when he was still young enough to dream, he imagined setting out to discover a new world, a place without Tiste, without civilization, where he could live alone and unencumbered – no, perhaps not alone: he also saw her at his side, a companion in his great adventure. That world had the feel of the past, but a past no Tiste eye had witnessed, which made it innocent. And he would think of himself as prey, not predator, as if shedding the skin of brazen killer, and with this would come a thrill of fear.

  In his weaker moments, Cryl still longed for that place, where freedom’s risks were plain to understand, and when he rode out from the estate, as he had done this time, vanishing into as much of the wild as remained, he found himself searching – not for eckalla, or their sign; not for wolves on the horizon or in the valleys; not for the hares and the hawks – but for a past he knew was for ever lost. Worse yet, it was a past he and his people did not belong in, and so could never know.

  He had been trained for war just as he had been taught how to hunt and how to slay, and these were deemed necessary skills in preparation for adulthood. How sad was that?

  His horse’s ears flicked and then tilted. Cryl rose to stand in his stirrups, scanned the horizon in the direction of the horse’s sudden attention.

  A troop of riders coming down from the north. Their appearance startled him. He could see that they were Tiste, wearing armour but bareheaded, helms strapped to the saddles.

  The only settlement remotely close was Sedis Hold, at least three days to the northwest, and these riders would have had to cross Young Dorssan Ryl, a difficult task at any time of year, when it would have been simpler to remain on the road on the river’s other side, which would take them down past House Dracons and thence onward to Kharkanas. There was no reason for such a risky crossing when solid bridges beckoned to the south.

  Cryl’s mind raced, trying to recall who was stationed in Sedis Hold. The keep had been raised at the close of the war against the Jheleck. A garrison was ensconced there permanently, ever since the defeated Jheleck had thought to resume their raiding – as if the war had never happened.

  The riders were drawing closer, but not in any haste; indeed, they seemed to be leading a score of individuals on foot.

  Nudging his horse round to face the newcomers, Cryl hesitated a moment, and then rode towards them. As he approached, he saw that those figures on foot, trailing the riders, were all children, and, even more astonishing, they were Jheleck.

  He could see no chains linking the captives, and each child appeared to be burdened under hide sacks of, presumably, possessions.

  The Tiste riders amounted to a score of regular soldiers, a sergeant and, at the forefront of the troop, a captain. This man’s eyes were intent, studying Cryl as if looking for something in particular. Evidently failing to find it, he visibly relaxed, and then held up a hand to halt those behind him.

  ‘You journey far,’ the captain said. ‘Do you seek to deliver a message to Sedis Hold?’

  Cryl shook his head. ‘No sir. To do that, I would be upon the other side of the river.’

  ‘Then what brings a young highborn out wandering these hills?’

  It seemed, then, that this captain was determined to ignore the matter of their all being on the wrong side of the river. Cryl shrugged. ‘I am Cryl Durav, hostage to—’

  ‘House Enes.’ The captain’s lean, weathered face broke into a smile. ‘Is it a rude guess that you fled the frenzied preparations for marriage?’

  ‘Excuse me?’

  The man laughed. ‘I am Captain Scara Bandaris, Cryl. My journey into the south is twofold.’ He gestured at the Jheleck children. ‘One, to find out what to do with this first gaggle of hostages. And here we thought we’d face another war before the Jheleck ever surrendered a single child of theirs. Imagine our surprise.’

  ‘And the other reason, sir?’

  ‘Why, to attend the ceremony, of course. It so pleases me to know that Andarist is upon the very cusp of wedded bliss. Now, will you escort us to House Enes? I would hear of Jaen’s lovely daughter, whom you have grown alongside all these years.’

  Cryl knew the name of Scara Bandaris, an officer who had fought with distinction in the wars. What he had not known was that he had been posted in Sedis. ‘As hostage to House Enes, sir, it would be my honour to escort you. I have tarried in these wilds long enough, I suppose.’ He brought his mount round as the captain waved his troop forward once more.

  Scara Bandaris rode up alongside him. ‘If I were in your place, Cryl Durav, I might well be seeking an empty cave among the hermits of the north crags. A young woman about to be wed – whom you have known for so long now – well, have I guessed wrong as to your motives?’

  ‘My motives, sir?’

  ‘Out into the wilds, alone and blissfully at peace – you have been gone some days, I wager.’

  Cryl sighed. ‘You see the truth of it, sir.’

  ‘Then we’ll speak no more of wounded hearts. Nor will I torture you with questions about Enesdia. Tell me, have you seen any eckalla?’

  ‘None living, sir,’ Cryl replied. He glanced back at the Jheleck children.

  Scara Bandaris grunted. ‘Better on two feet than four, I tell you.’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Twenty-five whelps, Cryl, that no leash can hold. We shall raise wolves in our midst with these ones.’

  ‘I have heard
, not quite wolves …’

  ‘True enough. Hounds, then. This tradition of hostage taking, so venerated and inviolate, may well come back to bite us.’

  Cryl shot the man a look.

  Scara Bandaris burst out laughing, forcing up a smile from Cryl.

  Perhaps, Cryl reconsidered after a moment, with jests erupting from the soldiers behind them, followed by yet more laughter, his need for solitude was at an end.

  * * *

  ‘Where is he?’

  The cry made the handmaids flinch back, a detail that savagely pleased Enesdia, if only momentarily. ‘How dare he run away? And Father does nothing! Have we ceased to respect the ancient tradition of hostages, to so let him vanish into the wilds like some half-wild dog?’ The array of blank faces regarding her only frustrated Enesdia the more. Hissing under her breath, she marched from the room, leaving the handmaids to scurry after her. A gesture halted them all. ‘Leave me, all of you.’

  After a lengthy, increasingly irritating search, she found her father out behind the stables, observing the breaking of a horse in the corral. ‘Father, are we to lead the way in the rejection of all valued traditions among our people?’

  Jaen regarded her with raised brows. ‘That strikes me as somewhat … ambitious, daughter. Best I leave such things to the next generation, yes?’

  ‘Then why have we abandoned our responsibilities with respect to our hostage?’

  ‘I was unaware that we had, Enesdia.’

  ‘Cryl has vanished – for days! For all you know he could be lying at the bottom of a well, legs shattered and dying of thirst.’

  ‘Dying of thirst in a well?’

  She glared at him until he relented and said, ‘I sent him in search of eckalla in the hills.’

  ‘A hopeless quest!’

  ‘No doubt, but I imagine he is familiar with those.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Jaen shrugged, eyes once more on the horse as it fast-trotted round its handler, hoofs kicking up dust. ‘This is your time, not his. In fact, his sojourn with our family is coming to an end. It well suits him to stretch his lead, as it does every young man at his age.’

  She disliked hearing such things. Cryl was her companion, a brother in every way but blood. She struggled to imagine life without him at her side, and she felt a tremor of rising shock as it suddenly struck her that, once she was married, her time with Cryl would be truly at an end. After all, had she really been expecting him to join them in the new house? Absurd.

  So much had been happening, devouring her every thought; only now was she thinking things through. ‘But I miss him,’ she said. Hearing the weakness of her own voice misted her eyes.

  Her father faced her. ‘Darling,’ he said, taking her arm and leading her away from the railing. ‘A changing world is a most frightening thing—’

  ‘I’m not frightened.’

  ‘Well, perhaps “bewildering” is a better description.’

  ‘He’s just … grown past me. That’s all.’

  ‘I doubt he sees it that way. You have made your choice, Enesdia, and the path before you is now certain, and the man who will walk at your side awaits you. It is time for Cryl to find his own future.’

  ‘What will he do? Has he spoken to you? He’s said nothing to me – he doesn’t say anything to me any more. It’s as if he doesn’t even like me.’

  They were returning to the Great House, Jaen electing to use a side entrance, a narrow passageway leading into an enclosed garden. ‘His feelings for you are unchanged, but just as you set off into your new direction – away from this house – so too must Cryl. He will return to his own family, and it is there that his future will be decided.’

  ‘The Duravs – they are all soldiers. Cryl has only one brother left alive. The wars almost destroyed that family. He’ll take up the sword. He’ll follow in Spinnock’s footsteps. Such a waste!’

  ‘We are no longer at war, Enesdia. The risks are not what they once were, and for that we can all be thankful. In any case, the youngest born among the nobility have few recourses these days.’

  They stood in the garden, in still air made cool by the raised pond commanding the centre. The fruit trees trained up two of the inner walls were laden with heavy, lush fruit, the purple globes looking like dusty glass. She thought, if one should fall in the next moment, it might shatter. ‘I have been unmindful, Father. Selfish. We are parting, and it will be difficult for both of us.’

  ‘Indeed.’

  She looked up at him. ‘And even worse for you – is not Cryl the son you never had? This house will seem so … empty.’

  Jaen smiled. ‘An old man treasures his peace and quiet.’

  ‘Oh? So you cannot wait to be rid of us?’

  ‘Now you have the truth of it.’

  ‘Well, then I’ll not spare your feelings another thought.’

  ‘Better. Now, return to your maids, lest they make mischief.’

  ‘They can wait a while longer – I wish to stay here for a time. I need to think.’

  Still smiling, her father departed the garden.

  I could ask Andarist to offer Cryl a commission. In the Citadel Wards. Somewhere safe. It will be my gift to Cryl. A gift that he will never know about. He will have Andarist as his commander – or will it be Anomander? No matter. He could advance far.

  She walked to the nearest tree, reached out and took hold of a globe of fruit. Soft, ripe. She twisted it loose. See? No risk of shattering. Nothing like that at all. She felt something wet trickling down her hand. Gentle as she had been, the skin had split.

  Oh, now I am stained!

  Annoyed, Enesdia flung the fruit into the pond, the splash loud as a retort.

  A commission for Cryl. She would have to work hard at hiding her intentions – he seemed to see right through her.

  It’s good that he’s gone away.

  * * *

  The estate road joined the track leading east, and it was there that Orfantal waited, standing beside a slope-backed nag purchased in Abara Delack, at his side the stable boy, Wreneck, a sour dog-faced boy with greasy hair and a constellation of acne on his broad, flat brow. There had been a time, not so long ago, when Wreneck played with Orfantal, and for those few months – shortly after the fire when the responsibilities of a stable boy more or less ceased to exist – Orfantal had discovered the pleasures of friendship, and in the shambling stable boy an agreeable companion in his imagined wars and battles. But then something had happened and Wreneck grew taciturn and, on occasion, cruel.

  Now the boy stood stroking the nag’s neck, impatient with the wait as the day’s heat built and the sun’s glare sharpened. There was no shade to be found barring that cast by the horse. They had stood in this place since shortly after dawn, circled by three feral dogs from town drawn by the smell of the fresh bread and egg pie the servants had made up for Orfantal’s lunch, which filled the small hessian bag he clutched in one hand.

  There had been no conversation. At ten years, Wreneck was twice Orfantal’s age and it seemed that this span of years had become vast, over which no bridge of words could cross. Orfantal thought long and hard on what he might have done to offend Wreneck, but he could think of no way to broach the subject. The stable boy’s expression was closed, almost hostile, all his interest seemingly consumed by the somnolent horse at his side.

  His legs growing tired, Orfantal went to sit down on the travel trunk containing his clothes, wooden swords and the dozen lead toy soldiers he owned – four Tiste and three Jheleck and five Forulkan, none painted, as his grandmother had concluded that if given paints he would make a mess of the tabletop. He had been astonished to discover that all of his possessions fit into the single, small trunk that had once held his grandfather’s war gear – with room to spare. Indeed, he thought he could fit himself into that trunk, and make of his entire life a thing to be carried about, passed from hand to hand, or flung into the ditch and left behind and forgotten by the whole world.

&
nbsp; Wreneck wouldn’t mind. His mother wouldn’t mind; and his grandmother, who was sending him away, might well be pleased to see the last of him. He wasn’t sure, in truth, where he was going, only that it was away, to a place where he would be taught things and be made into a grown-up. Eyeing Wreneck askance, he tried to imagine himself as old as the stable boy, finding the year that unhappiness came to every boy’s life, and feeling his own features sag into that angry, helpless expression. And ten years later, his face would find a new set, to match the sadness of his mother.

  Hundreds of years after that, he saw himself with his grandmother’s face, bearing the look that always reminded him of a hawk eyeing a field mouse speared to the ground by its talons. This was the path to adulthood, he supposed, and Grandmother was sending him off to learn how to live with what everyone had to live with, the steps of growing up, all the faces to find in his own.

  A rumble in the road lifted him to his feet, looking west to see a troop of riders and two heavily burdened wagons appear from the dusty haze. The wagons were stacked high in sheep and goat skins, from the culled herds outside Abara Delack, destined for somewhere to the south. This was to be his escort.

  Wreneck spoke behind him. ‘That’s them.’

  Orfantal nodded. He fought the urge to take Wreneck’s hand, knowing the boy would sneer and bat his away. When he’d left the Great House this morning, his grandmother’s only touch had been a bony hand upon his back, pushing him forward and into Wreneck’s care.

  ‘You can go,’ Orfantal said as the stable boy came round to stand beside him.

  But Wreneck shook his head. ‘I’m to make sure you’re on the horse, and that the trunk’s properly loaded. And that they know where to leave you.’

  ‘But didn’t Grandmother arrange all that?’

  Wreneck nodded. ‘Still, I’m to make sure.’

  ‘All right.’ Though he would not say it, Orfantal was glad of the company. He did not recognize any of the riders, after all; they looked dusty and in bad moods as they rode up and reined in, their hooded gazes fixed upon Orfantal.