The Proof House Part 8

The man stood and stared for a full heartbeat, then groped for the hilt of the cavalry scimitar that dangled incongruously from his shoulder on an excessively long belt. d.a.m.n, Bardas thought; his legs were too cramped for sudden, energetic movement, else he'd have run away; but that option wasn't available. The man had found his sword-hilt (round, jowly, hara.s.sed face; used to know a man who looked quite like him, had a stall selling candles in the Chandlers' quarter) and was struggling to draw it, hampered by the long belt and his own extreme terror. The knife was in Bardas' hand (here we go again), its pommel finding its own place in the hollow of his palm, his thumb pressing down on the middle of the handle, feeling for the slight groove that marked the right spot, the fingertips resting lightly on the quillons; arm back behind the ear, c.o.c.k the wrist back and flick as the arm comes forward, to keep the knife upright as it leaves the hand, so that the shifting weight of the hilt guides it and powers it - you have to do this instinctively, if you think about it you'll miss, or the knife'll hit side-on. It's second nature or it's impossible (it had always come naturally to him in the mines, throwing his knife at a noise in the dark, knowing where to find it again).

A good solid hit; not the ten, but cutting the edge of the nine, slicing into the adam's apple and severing the windpipe, so that there wasn't any air available for the curse or the famous last words or whatever it was the man was about to say; but his mouth opened and closed and nothing came out, and then his feet slipped from under him and he went crashing down on to a crate (marked fragile, inevitably) which burst dramatically open, drenching Bardas in the scent of dawn-plucked roses. A moment later, the dead man's boot skidded past his ear.

'Dad?' No time for anything now; Bardas reached awkwardly over the body with his left hand and fished out the cavalry sword (horrible, evilly balanced things, the pommel nips your wrist and you'd have to be a triple-jointed contortionist to thrust effectively), then used his left hand to push himself up on to his feet - left foot still numb, pins and needles in the right, what a stupid reason for getting killed . . .

'Dad!' There was an edge of panic in the young voice. 'Ba.s.sa, what's happened to Dad?'

'Hang on.' A head popped up over the rampart of luggage - a girl, about nine years old, squat pudding face (obvious family resemblance). 'Dad?' Now she was staring at him, and at the dead body lying face down in the ruins of the crate. 'Gylus! He's killed-'

The knife was in his hand again, but he was a bit too late; the head bobbed down again before he could throw. I wish I wasn't here, he thought, as he tried to shuffle along the ledge of exposed crate he was standing on; but his knees still weren't working properly, he lost his footing and stumbled, bashing the side of his head against a sharp wooden corner. Ouch, that hurt, he noted, trying to get the knee working so he could get up. Someone was swearing at him; he looked up and saw a boy, twelve or thirteen, resting a clumsy and crude-looking crossbow on the edge of the crate rampart. He could only see the eyes, the forehead, the clump of scruffy ginger hair, over the arched steel bow and the sun glinting on the honed edge of the arrow-blade. Instinct, he thought, as his wrist flipped over; and then, since instinct was running the show, he said, 'Thank you,' aloud, as the head snapped back and disappeared, taking his knife with it.

He heard the girl scream as he shifted the scimitar across to his right hand. If she picks up the bow I'm still not out of this, he thought, wincing at the pain as he put his weight on his left foot. Come on, leg, this is no time for hissy fits. Maybe that's all there were, father, son and daughter; or maybe there's the rest of the G.o.ds-d.a.m.ned extended family crouched up there in the rocks - brothers, sisters, uncles, aunts, nephews, nieces, fifteen different degrees of cousin, grandpa and grandma and a picnic lunch in a hamper. What I'd really like is to be somewhere else; but I'd settle for my knife back.

Azes. There'd been another kid, called Azes; a boy's name, presumably. Now what would a good boy do, in the circ.u.mstances? Would he scoop up his kid sister and get the h.e.l.l out? That's what I'd do (only it's not what I did) or would he come after the monster, the destroyer of his family and his home and his life - Oh I hope not. I really, really- In the mines, you knew when someone was behind you. As the boy jumped down, Bardas was already twisting around, trying to get some sort of balance so he could use his feet. It would have been nice to side-step, hop lightly out of the way while bringing the sword up in a universal backhand parry - that's what he'd have done if he wasn't stumbling about in a narrow s.p.a.ce between crates of perfume and biscuits in the back of a coach, with two clumsy, painful feet and the sun in his eyes as he looked up. As it was, he saw a blur and he hit it as hard as he could, relying on instinct (again) and basic timing. The boy's blood hit him in the face, suggesting he'd slashed through the jugular vein. A ten, and wrong-footed.

A good ten; he'd nearly cut the boy's head off. I hope you were Azes, he thought, turning round again. I'd really hate it if there were more of you. There was still the crossbow, spanned and c.o.c.ked and with an arrow in the nut, somewhere up above his head on top of the luggage. Just as well Azes was as thick as a brick, trying to jump him from behind with a little wood-cutter's hatchet when there was a perfectly good crossbow lying about; not that intelligence seemed to run in this family, or they wouldn't have chosen this particular method of earning a living.

I've had enough of this. Let's get out of here. A gap where the roped-down crates had shifted was just enough of a toehold to allow him to scramble up on top of the luggage, past the crossbow, past the dead boy with the knife between his eyes, and down on to the box. If there'd been a third cousin twice removed up among the rocks with another crossbow he'd have been in trouble; but there wasn't, so that was all right. He grabbed the reins and the whip, trying to remember how you went about driving coaches - can't be all that different from a hay-wagon, though I haven't driven one of them since I was - oh, Gylus' age. n.o.body shot at him, or tried to cut his throat from behind, or rolled rocks down on top of him, so that was all right.

'You're not the usual courier,' said the man at Melrun station, as he reached up to take the reins.

'The courier's dead,' Bardas explained. 'Someone tried to rob the coach.'

The man looked shocked. 'You're kidding.'

'Straight up. Jump up and count the bodies if you don't believe me.'

'You fought them off?' the man asked. 'On your own?'

Bardas shook his head. 'It's all right,' he said, 'I'm a hero. And besides, most of them were just kids.'

CHAPTER FIVE.

The battle was effectively over. It had been short, one-sided and rather b.l.o.o.d.y, mostly because of the rebels' distressing reluctance to call it a day, even when it was obvious that they'd lost. Fighting to the last drop of blood sounds all very well in theory, but it's really only ever worth the effort when you're winning.

Temrai's handling of the battle had been textbook perfect, from the initial skirmisher attacks that had drawn the main rebel force out of position and into the killing zone, through the flawless enveloping manoeuvres of the main cavalry wings down to the perfectly conceived and executed pursuit and mopping-up of the enemy survivors. It was a pity, General Kurrai remarked afterwards, that such a masterly battle should be wasted on a bunch of malcontents and losers who'd never stood a chance anyway. A few volleys of arrows and a simple charge would have done the trick in a matter of minutes, and the cavalry could simply have ridden them down as they ran. Simple, efficient and there wouldn't have been that embarra.s.sing business at the end . . .

At the death, when the encircling horns of horse-archers and lancers had met up to complete the ring around the zone and it was all over bar the actual killing, one of the enemy ringleaders had caught sight of the pennants of Temrai's bodyguard and committed what was left of his forces to a suicide attack against that part of the line. Needless to say, only a handful of rebels actually made it through the shield-wall as far as the edge of the guard cordon, and nearly all of them ended up spitted on the pikes and halberds of the guards. No more than four men out of a whole double company came within striking range of Temrai himself; and of those four, just the one man actually managed to land a blow on the king's person. A thumbnail's width to the left, and all that effort would have been entirely justified.

Whoever he was, this one man out of so many, he must have been very angry. By the time he barged his way past the inner ring of guards, he'd already taken enough damage to stop a normal human being - two pike-thrusts puncturing his stomach, a glancing blow across the right side of his head that sprayed blood everywhere, as deep scalp wounds tend to do, a cut on the point of his left shoulder that lost him the use of that arm. But he was still on his feet and right-handed; and the backhand scimitar-cut he managed to loose, in the half-second or so before someone split his skull from behind, slammed into Temrai's neck on the very edge of his gorget, where the lip of the metal had been curled up and back. As it was, the shock of the blow sent Temrai sprawling, the impact enough to crush his windpipe and stop him breathing for long enough to make him believe it was all over. He dropped suddenly to his knees, in time for his head to get in the way of another guard's backswing which clattered across the front of his helmet like a blow from a smith's hammer. He landed at a hopelessly contorted angle down among the forest of legs and ankles, and lay curled and choking to death for a very long time, until a couple of guardsmen found out where he'd disappeared to and hauled him back on to his feet before anybody else could tread on him.

By the time he was up and breathing normally again, the meaningful part of the battle was already over, leaving only abattoir ch.o.r.es. Some guardsmen hustled Temrai out of the crowd and back to the calm and quiet of the tents, where an armourer had to cut through the straps of the dented and misshapen gorget before he could get the thing off. A surgeon examined the ugly swollen bruise, dabbed it with witch hazel and a.s.sured Temrai that there was no permanent harm done.

'Just as well you were wearing the thing,' Tilden said later. She was holding the twisted, mutilated gorget and looking at it thoughtfully. 'If it wasn't for that little raised bit round the edge, you'd be dead. I suppose the raised bit's there for precisely that reason.'

General Kurrai shook his head. 'Actually, no,' he said. 'It's just to stop the edge rubbing against your neck and cutting you to pieces.'

'Oh,' Tilden replied. 'Well, in that case it was definitely a slice of luck.' She put the gorget down with a little squeamish shiver, as if it had been covered in blood. 'Do you really need to do this?' she asked. 'Go to all the battles, I mean. Can't you stay near the back or something and let someone else do the actual charging about? After all, you're the King, heaven only knows what'd happen if you got yourself killed. And it's not as if you're a mighty warrior or a crack shot or anything.'

'Thank you,' Temrai said gravely. 'I'll bear that in mind.'

Tilden frowned. 'Well, you're not,' she said. 'And don't look at me like that. You know I'm right really.'

'Of course you are,' Temrai replied with a sad little smile. 'You could also point out that every time I get myself into trouble in a battle, it means other people have to risk their lives getting me out again, which is dangerously irresponsible behaviour by any standards. Unfortunately, there's nothing I can do about it.'

'Isn't there?' Tilden stood up, her arms filled with the heavy wool blanket she'd been darning. 'I'm terribly sorry, I mistook you for the King. My mistake.'

Temrai sighed. 'Yes, I'm the King,' he said, 'that's why I haven't got any choice in the matter. The people need to see me in there with them, fighting beside them, sharing the same dangers . . .'

'But you aren't,' Tilden pointed out, the middle of the blanket tucked under her chin as she stretched it out to fold it up. 'You're surrounded by bodyguards. You're dressed head to foot in expensive imported armour. And besides, what makes you think that everybody's got their eyes glued to you all the time? If I were a soldier, I'd be watching the enemy, not peering over my shoulder to see if I can just make out the top of the King's head over the crowd. I don't suppose for a moment that anybody except you gives it a moment's thought.'

'That's not really the-'

'And anyway,' Tilden went on, 'if I were a soldier I wouldn't want my King and commander-in-chief stuck down in the front line, where he might easily get himself killed and where he hasn't got a clue what's going on. I'd want him to be standing on top of a hill somewhere, where he can see the whole of the battle and give the army its orders.'

'All right,' Temrai said. 'Point taken. It's not a very sensible way of doing things. But it's the way I do things, and I can't stop now without giving everybody the wrong message. You think I enjoy being the mark for every suicidal lunatic in the enemy army who wants to be a hero and end the war at a stroke?'

Tilden arched an eyebrow at him. 'Just because you don't enjoy it doesn't necessarily mean you have to do it,' she said. 'Look, if you're so worried about what people think, why don't you get one of the generals to make a public appeal to you, in front of the whole army so everybody can hear, and implore you not to take unnecessary risks? Then you'd say something like it's terribly sweet of everybody to be concerned, but you feel it's your duty and all that nonsense; then they'll all turn round and say, No, the general's right, you ought to take better care of yourself. And then you'd be off the hook and doing what your people want you to at the same time. Simple.'

Simple, Temrai reflected as he lay awake in bed that night. Simple; and the truth is, I'm so terrified these days that it's all I can do to keep myself from running away as soon as I set eyes on the enemy. Ever since - well, ever since the burning of Perimadeia, when I was on the wrong end of Bardas Loredan's sword.

He closed his eyes, and there was the image again; Colonel Bardas Loredan staring at him down the length of a sword blade, his eyes reflected in the brightly polished metal. All that was a long time ago now, and the last he'd heard was that Colonel Loredan was a sergeant in the army of the provincial office, on his way to some administrator's desk deep inside the Empire. Out of my life for good, he tried to tell himself, but he knew he was wasting his time. I burned Perimadeia just because I was terrified of one man, and he's still out there, and here I am, waiting for him to come and get me. Temrai couldn't help smiling at that; rebellions at home, the Empire pressing on the borders of his territory, the sort of threats that were worth losing sleep over, and he was so preoccupied with the phantom of Bardas Loredan that he scarcely had the time or the energy to be frightened of anything else. The silly part of it is, I won; I destroyed the biggest city in the world, and I'm the one who's too scared to close his eyes. I don't suppose he's lying awake obsessing about me - 'Gannadius,' the boy whispered, loud enough to be heard in the next valley. 'Are you awake?'

Gannadius rolled over and opened his eyes. 'No,' he said.

The boy glared at him. 'How are you feeling?' he asked.

'Awful,' Gannadius replied. 'How's yourself?'

He looks annoyed, Gannadius thought. I expect I'd have been the same at his age. Flippancy really aggravated me when I was young. The boy's scowl deepened.

'You do realise, don't you?' he said. 'These people are plains, they're the enemy. Just our luck, to be rescued by them.' He winced and pulled a face, as if a wasp had just stung him. 'What are we going to do now?'

Gannadius rolled his eyes. 'Speaking purely for myself, ' he replied, 'I'm going to lie here till I'm better. You can do what you like.'

'Gannadius!'

'I'm sorry, Theudas.' Gannadius lifted himself awkwardly on to one elbow. 'But the fact is, there's not a lot we can do. I'm in no fit state to get out of this bed. You can try to get home if you like, on your own, but don't ask me how you'd go about it, because I haven't a clue. Besides,' he added, 'I like it here. Nice women bring me food and ask me if I'm feeling better, and I don't have to do any work.'

Theudas Morosin turned away sharply; too well brought up to be rude to his elders and betters. Where did he learn such good manners? Gannadius wondered; probably not from Bardas Loredan, so presumably from Athli Zeuxis, on the Island.

'All right,' Theudas said, 'if that's your att.i.tude. I just hope you still find it all so wonderfully amusing when they realise who we are and stick our heads up on poles in the middle of the camp.'

Gannadius sighed. 'Right,' he said. 'So who are we, exactly? What are these dreadfully secret ident.i.ties we've got to hide from them at all costs?'

Theudas winced. 'We're Perimadeian,' he hissed. 'Or had you forgotten?'

Gannadius shook his head. 'You may be,' he said, 'I'm not. I'm a citizen of the United Maritime Republic, more usually referred to as the Island, just like you. And last time I heard, relations between the Island and King Temrai have never been better. That's the lovely thing about belonging to a neutral country, people tend not to kill you just for where you live.'

Theudas opened his mouth and then closed it again; Gannadius could almost see the thought crossing his mind, like a big flock of rooks going home to roost. 'Actually,' he said, 'that's not right. You're a Shastel citizen, aren't you? Not that that matters in this instance,' he added.

'Wrong. I became an Island citizen the moment I started owning property there. So long as I've got a credit balance at Athli's bank, I'm a genuine, solid-gold citizen. Besides, you don't think foreign trash like me are allowed to join the Order just like that, do you?'

Theudas shrugged. 'Anyway,' he said, 'that's beside the point. And yes, I suppose you're right. I was panicking. Sorry. It's just,' he added, grimacing as if he'd just burned himself, 'I hate these people. I don't think anything'll ever change that, not after what I saw when I was a kid. You weren't there, Gannadius, you didn't see . . .'

'True,' Gannadius replied firmly, 'for which I am duly thankful. And I'm not saying don't hate them; but as long as we're their guests, do it quietly. All right? That way, we stand a fair chance of getting put on a ship and sent home.'

Theudas hung his head. 'I'm sorry,' he said. 'And I know, I'm not fit to be out on my own.' He lifted his head and smiled. 'Just as well I've got you to look after me, really.'

'Works both ways,' Gannadius replied, lying back and closing his eyes. 'I don't know how far I'd have got after the wreck without you, but you could probably have measured the distance with a very short piece of string.' He breathed out, making himself relax. 'If you want to make yourself useful,' he went on, 'go and look for that nice lady doctor, see if you can get her to send a message to the coast, find out if any of our ships are expected, and if so, when. Try to be nice, will you? Don't call her a blood-soaked murderer or anything like that; you know the drill.'

'Yes, Uncle.'

When the boy had gone, Gannadius closed his eyes and tried to go to sleep. Instead, he found himself back in the awkward part of the scenario, the bit where the plains warrior was climbing in through the window of his room, marking the sill with blood.

'What the h.e.l.l are you doing here?' the warrior said.

'I don't know,' Gannadius replied. 'I don't want to be here.'

'Tough.' He was squeezing his broad shoulders against the window-frame, trying to force it away from the wall so he could get through. He looked strong enough to be able to do it. 'You belong here,' he added with a grin.

'No I don't.'

'I beg to differ. You should have been here. And now, here you are. Better late than never.'

Gannadius tried to get out of bed, but his legs weren't working. 'I'm not really here,' he protested. 'This is just a dream.'

'We'll soon see,' said the warrior, and grunted with the effort. There was a sound of wood cracking. 'The way I see it, this is where you are, and where you'll always be. Properly speaking.'

Reaching behind him, Gannadius caught hold of the headboard and tried to pull himself backwards. 'I'm just making you say that,' he said, 'because I feel guilty. You don't even exist.'

'You watch your mouth,' the soldier replied. 'I exist all right. Give me a minute and I'll prove it to you.'

With an extreme effort, Gannadius pulled himself up into a sitting position and tried to swing his legs out of the bed, but they were completely numb.

'And besides,' the soldier went on, 'I'm telling you the truth, aren't I? Here you are, back on Perimadeian soil, where you belong. The truth is you never really left. And you know it.'

'Go away. I don't believe in you.'

The soldier laughed. 'Your prerogative,' he said. 'But you're wrong, and you can't kid yourself. You know too much about it. Agrianes' On Shadow and Substance, book three, chapter six, sections four to seven; I only know about it because it's right here in your mind for anybody to see.' He heaved and the central pillar of the window-frame tore loose. 'In which Agrianes postulates that whenever there's a serious dichotomy between perceived reality and the course of events that best accommodates the workings of the Principle, the latter interpretation is to be preferred in the absence of positive evidence to the contrary. In other words, proof. You prove you're not here and I might just let you go. Otherwise-'

'All right,' Gannadius whispered. 'What kind of proof do you need?'

'Proof-' the soldier repeated; and became Doctor Felden, the nice lady he'd just sent Theudas to find. She had a worried frown on her face.

'Are you all right?' she said.

Gannadius looked her in the eyes. 'Where am I?' he asked.

'It never rains,' said the courier sadly, awkwardly holding a sack over his head with one hand while grasping the reins in the other. 'Well, once or twice a year, and then it rains, if you see what I mean. Not like this.'

Bardas, who had no sack, pulled his collar round his neck. 'I'd say this is rain all right,' he said.

The courier shook his head. 'No way,' he said. 'Well, yes, obviously it's rain; but it's not the sort of rain you get here when it's raining. Comes down in sheets, it does; before you know it, the coach is full of water. Can't see ten yards in front of your nose. This is just - well, ordinary rain, like we used to have in Colleon.'

Bardas shivered. The ordinary rain was running down his forehead into his eyes. 'Well,' he said, 'this is rain like we used to get it in the Mesoge; about a third of the year, all spring and a bit of the late autumn. b.l.o.o.d.y good weather for staying indoors in.'

'We're here,' the courier said. 'Ap' Calick. Where you're headed, remember?'

'What? Oh, yes. Sorry.' Bardas blinked rain out of his eyes, but all he could see was the vague, rain-blurred shape of a big, square, grey building in the valley below the hill they'd just come round. 'So that's Ap' Calick?' he said, for no real reason.

'That?' The courier laughed. 'G.o.ds, no. Ap' Calick proper's another half-day on up the road. That's Ap' Calick armoury. Quite different.'

'Ah.' Bardas let go of his collar just long enough to draw a sodden cuff across his eyes. It didn't make much difference to the way it looked; a dim grey block, precisely square. 'That's all right, then,' he said.

'Dismal b.l.o.o.d.y place,' the courier went on. 'Mate of mine was posted there once; nothing there, he told me. Nothing to do; miserable little canteen where they water the booze. No women except for the G.o.dawful specimens who make the chain-mail, they've got hands like farriers' rasps, and talk about strong-' He shuddered, tilting rain out of a fold in his sack on to Bardas' knee. 'And the dust,' he went on, 'the dust's the real killer. A month in there, you'll be spitting up enough grit to polish a breastplate. No wonder they all die.'

'You don't say,' Bardas replied.

'That's if the noise doesn't drive you crazy first,' the courier went on. 'Three shifts a day, see, clack, clack, clack all the d.a.m.n time. If you're really lucky, you'll go deaf. The heat's another killer,' the courier continued. 'I mean to say, typical provincial office, builds the biggest forge in the west in the middle of a b.l.o.o.d.y desert. You get blokes going crazy because they drink the brine.'

'The what?'

'Brine,' the courier repeated. 'Salt water, for tempering in. They get so thirsty in there on a hot day, they drink the salt water out of the tempering vats and go crazy and die. Three or four of them, every year. They know it'll kill them, but after a bit they just don't care.'

Bardas decided it was time to change the subject. 'I didn't know that,' he said. 'About tempering in salt water.'

The courier shook his head. 'Temper in all sorts of things,' he said, 'depending on what they're making. Salt water, oil, lard, plain water; molten lead they use for some things; or is that annealing? Can't remember. My mate didn't talk about it much. Made him depressed even thinking about the place.'

'Is that so?' Bardas said.

A few hundred yards further on, Bardas could hear the noise. It was just as the courier had said, the clack-clacking of countless hammers, all out of sync, like ma.s.sive raindrops on a slate roof. 'Worse inside,' the courier informed him. 'Big rooms, see; the sound bounces off the walls and the ceiling. You can always tell a man who's worked in one of these places, he doesn't talk, he shouts.'

Bardas shrugged. 'I don't mind a bit of noise,' he said. 'Where I was before, it was always a bit too quiet for my liking.'

The courier was quiet for a while. Then, 'Another thing that happens to them,' he went on, 'they lose the use of their left hands - the hand you hold the work in, right? All that constant shock and jarring, it kills the nerves. It gets so you can't hold anything. Once that happens, they ship 'em out to the desert forts. Be kinder to knock 'em on the head, really.'

The courier dropped him off at the gate (there was only one; high, nail-studded double oak doors, strong enough for a city), turned round and vanished into the rain. Bardas banged on the door with his fist and waited, until he could feel rainwater seeping down the insides of his boots.

'Name.' A panel had opened in the door while he'd been looking the other way. 'Yes, you. Name.'

'Bardas Loredan. You should be . . .'