The Ragged Man Part 28

Beside Mihn the dog crouched, muscles bunching as it snarled at the angry voices. The guardsman blinked at Mihn and stopped, but he kept his glaive high.

'Not what I think? What I saw ain't possible, and it's d.a.m.n sunny for that to be a ghost!'

'Mihn,' Jachen called warily, 'what's going on?'

'Lower your weapons and back off,' Mihn said firmly. He was unarmed but a steel-capped staff rested against the door just a few yards away. 'Marad, I mean it - back away now, or I will put you down.'

'The f.u.c.k're you t'give me orders?'

Jachen looked at Mihn's expression and grabbed the soldier by his collar. Without a word he dragged Marad back and Ralen followed.

Only then did Mihn relax and push the reluctant dog away towards the cottage.

While Marad still spluttered with anger, Jachen dropped his own sword and yanked the glaives from his soldiers' hands.

'Astonishing,' Morghien murmured, as if oblivious to the confrontation, staring open-mouthed at the cottage.

'His mind remains fragile,' Mihn said in a quiet voice. 'You cannot begin to comprehend the horrors he has endured. You will all compose yourselves, and you will not speak until I permit it, do you understand me?'

The three Farlan exchanged looks. Jachen agreed at once, but Marad, still stunned, remained silent until Jachen glared at him. Eventually both soldiers nodded while the witch, standing beside of the water, watched them impa.s.sively.

'Better,' Mihn said after a while. He collected his staff and gave Marad a warning look before stepping inside the cottage. The Farlan could hear soft murmuring, as if Mihn were coaxing the occupant out as he would a deer.

At first all Jachen saw was a huge stooped figure wearing a cloak made of rags, arms wrapped protectively about its body and head held low. Hulf ran straight to him, dancing around him with obvious delight before taking up a protective position between him and the soldiers.

Jachen could scarcely believe he was looking at a man. He was ma.s.sive; even stooped he towered over Mihn, and he was far wider. One shoulder was dropped low, which reminded Jachen of men he'd known with broken ribs. Even when the man pushed back the hood of his cloak, the scars and the anguish on his face made Jachen the last to recognise him.

'G.o.ds of the dawn,' Ralen breathed, sinking to his knees as though all strength had fled his body.

And in the next moment Jachen felt his heart lurch as the cold hand of terror closed about it.

The man recoiled - his timid movements so different to how he once was, but unmistakable all the same.

'My Lord,' Jachen said hoa.r.s.ely, almost choking on the words as he dropped to one knee.

Isak looked at him and frowned, incomprehension cutting through his distress. 'I don't know you,' he mumbled before wincing and putting his hand to his temple. 'I can't remember you.'

'There are holes in his mind,' Mihn explained, putting a hand on Isak's arm to rea.s.sure him and draw him forward. 'We had to tear out some of his memories.'

'Why?' Jachen found himself asking, fearing the answer he might receive.

'Because there are some things no man should remember,' Morghien said, as though in a trance, 'some things no man could remember and remain a man. Merciful G.o.ds, are you brave or utterly mad?'

He shivered and in unison Isak cringed slightly, s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g his eyes up tight before the moment pa.s.sed.

Jachen didn't even hear the question. He continued to gape, lost in the astonishing sight of a man he knew without question to be dead. Mihn brought Isak a little closer and now Jachen could see the scars on his face and neck, the broken nose and ragged, curled lip, the jagged line of his jaw and a fat band of twisted scarring across his throat.

His lord had once been handsome, for all the white-eye harshness, but no longer. If the signs of torture continued all over his body, Jachen couldn't see how any man could have survived - He felt his breath catch. No man could have survived it; Isak Isak had not survived it. He had died on the field outside Byora, without these scars, or the broken look in his white eyes. had not survived it. He had died on the field outside Byora, without these scars, or the broken look in his white eyes.

'How?' he breathed at last.

'The hard way,' Mihn said grimly, 'and not one taken lightly. The rest can wait for later. Go see to your horses.'

Jachen didn't move. He was still lost in the pattern of pain etched onto a face he once knew. Isak returned the look with difficulty.

'I see you in the hole in my mind,' he whispered, his scarred forehead crumpled with the effort. 'I'm falling, but the war goes on.'

'The war goes on?' Jachen echoed.

Isak seemed to straighten at that, and Jachen thought he caught a glimpse of his former strength showing beneath the lost look on his face.

'The war goes on,' Isak said, 'shadows and lords, the war goes on.'

'Isak, perhaps you should rest?' Mihn urged. He reached out and took Isak by the arm, but the broken white-eye ignored him.

With crooked fingers and awkward movements he pushed Mihn's hand away. 'No rest, not yet,' he said, his face contorted as though every thought caused him pain. 'Lost names and lost faces.'

'You want me to remind you of people?' Mihn asked, looking hopeful.

Isak shook his head and prodded Mihn. 'I want you to tell me what it means,' he said. 'Tell me what it means to lose your memories, to lose who who you are.' you are.'

'Why?'

Isak prodded Mihn again, pushing him a few steps backwards, and this time Mihn glanced behind him to check how close he was to the water.

'The war must go on. Someone told me once to use what I have inside me,' Isak said.

'I don't understand, Isak.'

Isak's face became a ghastly smile. 'What I have inside are holes - and they'll be my weapons now.'

King Emin walked stiffly up the stairs, a jug of wine in one hand and a pair of goblets in the other, a slender cigar jammed in the corner of his mouth.

'Another long day,' he commented to Legana who was ascending silently behind him, her progress slow and careful. She steadied herself with a hand on the tower wall and her silver-headed cane in the other.

'It appears even a king must feel his age one of these days.'

Legana inclined her head and walked past as Emin respectfully held open the door to his breakfast room. It was a small room, and as spa.r.s.ely furnished as the rest of Camatayl Castle, but it served the king's needs. This was not a place for luxuries: almost every room now contained food stores or cramped bunks for soldiers.

There was a fire alight and chairs set for them on either side of it. Emin poured drinks once Legana was settled. Over the past few weeks the pair, both strong-willed and impatient with others, had found an accommodation that suited them both. Their common understanding of their extraordinary positions had turned into a cautious friendship.

'Have the priestesses accepted your authority?' Emin asked, tossing his hat aside and easing down in his chair. He idly brushed dirt from his boot while Legana wrote on her slate.

- They ask many questions. They ask many questions.

'Questions you cannot yet answer?' Emin nodded sadly. 'As do my generals. They believe absolutely in the might of Narkang's armies; defeat in battle has been a rare thing in my life, so they cannot understand my tactics now.'

- The priestesses ask what the rest do not dare. The priestesses ask what the rest do not dare.

'What the substance of your promises might be? It's the nature of people. Offer them a brighter future and they will cheer and shout your name, but sooner or later they want to know the details. How did you think I ended up in this mess?' Emin said wryly.

- I promised only that a better future was possible. I promised only that a better future was possible.

'But you don't have a form in mind? I hadn't taken you for a woman of faith.'

- Of instinct Of instinct, she corrected, even before I was joined to the Lady. I sense a future will come. I hope it will come before a G.o.d tries to subsume me. even before I was joined to the Lady. I sense a future will come. I hope it will come before a G.o.d tries to subsume me.

Emin looked startled. 'Is that even a possibility, G.o.ds fighting each other for supremacy? I know it used to happen in the Age of Myths, but now? p.i.s.s and daemons; could a G.o.d like Larat decide there is enough of the divine within you to take you as an Aspect?'

- I don't wish to find out. I don't wish to find out.

Emin gave a snort. 'I can imagine. So we both may be running out of time.'

- You don't believe in your armies too? You don't believe in your armies too?

'Hah! I know my strength well enough, and I also know my enemy. I've studied his campaign thus far; Lord Styrax is inventive and bold, but he's lacking the arrogance one might hope for. His armies are battle-hardened and replenished by the states he's conquered; mine are untested in ten years. He has made no significant mistakes, and only committed himself to vulnerability when he is certain of victory. This is not what one hopes for in an enemy. '

He grimaced and took a swig of wine, staring into the distance a moment before continuing, 'No - that's not correct; he has made one mistake. His allegiance is no longer to Lord Karkarn, it appears, or any of the G.o.ds, it's to himself. However much they fear to walk the Land and risk death, the G.o.ds do not favour the greatest of their creations.'

- Can you exploit it? Can you exploit it?

'Would that I could,' he said. 'It's a mistake I've also made. Even it were possible, I don't know how . . .' He tailed off, then asked, 'Is that what Larat meant?' There was a pause and the king straightened in his chair a moment, then relaxed back down. 'No, it doesn't fit.'

- What? What?

Emin looked at her, unable to discern anything from the expression on her face. Curiously, it was one of the reasons why he liked the fierce Mortal-Aspect; she was beyond his abilities, both as a man and a king. Not even the intellectuals he welcomed to the Brotherhood-protected private club in Narkang could hide their thoughts from his scrutiny. He enjoyed feeling in the presence of an equal.

'Did you not sense it, a week or so after you first arrived?'

She hesitated, then scribbled quickly on the slate. - Once I dreamed of laughter, and a face that shifted, yours to a young woman's. Once I dreamed of laughter, and a face that shifted, yours to a young woman's.

Emin nodded. 'Larat came to speak to me that morning, he warned me to heed the lessons of the Great War.'

- One favours you then. One favours you then.

'True, but direct action is not his way - and having lost Death's favour, none of the rest will intervene. What do you know of the Crystal Skulls?'

Legana gestured to the blackened handprint on her throat and the cane she now walked with. - I know one did this. I know one did this.

'But the nature of them? I've read a number of Verliq's works - the great man mentions the Skulls several times, but he never studied them directly. Larat mentioned something, and I wonder about the significance.'

He fell silent again, and Legana waited patiently. Allies they had become, but neither expected undying loyalty of the other, and asking too much would invite questions in return.

At last he went on, 'He told me that the twelve Skulls corresponded to the G.o.ds of the Upper Circle, and the bearer of a Skull had the right to ask a question of that G.o.d.'

Legana didn't move for a long while, her porcelain features crinkled in thought until her emerald eyes flashed and she opened her mouth to speak before remembering herself and writing on the slate.

- Why ask? Why ask?

'Why ask?' Emin echoed, realising she was prompting him just as he had done so often with his pet intellectuals in Narkang, nudging their thoughts down new paths, harnessing their knowledge to a particular need.

'Why ask? You ask to secure an answer - expecting an answer. Larat said that some knowledge should not be shared, that there were some questions that might upset the balance of the Land.'

- He is a G.o.d. He is a G.o.d.

'And a tricky one at that,' Emin added, feeling a spark of insight; he was getting close. 'What he told me was no doubt correct, but not the entire story. One asks a question to get an answer, to be so foolish as to do that with a G.o.d of the Upper Circle - well, you would have to be certain that an answer would be forthcoming. To have a G.o.d smite you for impertinence is the outcome one would expect for idle pestering, or seeking knowledge the G.o.ds would not wish to share.

'So perhaps it isn't just a right, but a compulsion; something binding the G.o.d to answer truthfully - perhaps even something stopping them from simply reaching out and crushing the head of whoever has presumed to question them.'

He took a long draw on his cigar and c.o.c.ked his head at Legana. 'Covenant theory: the idea that a contract of sorts must exist in magical actions - no spell so powerful it does not have a flaw; no great incantation that cannot be undone by something innocuous - and no dealing with G.o.ds or daemons that does not have rules to frame it.'

Legana nodded encouragingly, and Emin, looking calmer, continued his exploration. 'This right to ask a question of a G.o.d, it confers a right to get an answer too. Perhaps that means there is a contract of sorts, and they're creatures of magic so they must be bound by the rules - and if they're bound in whatever way, that implies there's some power of compulsion over the G.o.d.'

Emin took a slow breath, ordering his thoughts as he extended the principle further. 'If Larat is willing to admit that much, no doubt the truth is something deeper, something more fundamental to their relationship with the Skulls - perhaps even the existence of the G.o.ds themselves. The Skulls are stores of power; the G.o.ds are power incarnate. Could they be the flip-side of the same coin?'

- How does this help? How does this help?

Emin topped up her goblet with a smile. 'Lord Styrax is not collecting them to secure his rule or aid his conquest, those are just by-products. He wants that power over each of the G.o.ds of the Upper Circle, not to ask questions but make demands.' He shook his head. 'As great and long-lived as he is, the man is only mortal. One day he will die, unless . . .'

King Emin puffed on his cigar and looked at the icons hanging on the wall. The empty cowl of Death occupied the centre; on His left was Kitar, G.o.ddess of Fertility, on His right, Karkarn, G.o.d of War.

He said slowly, 'He will die unless he becomes a G.o.d. Unless this peerless warrior asks something of the G.o.ds they cannot refuse.'

CHAPTER 21.

Captain Hain looked around at the army and felt a strange surge of exhilaration. 'd.a.m.n but it's a sight,' he said, nudging Sergeant Deebek with his elbow. 'Shame the major's missing it.'

Behind his helm Deebek grinned as best he could, his mangled top lip lifting on one side to reveal the ruined gums underneath.

'Reckon 'e'd agree, sir. I 'eard 'e were sent to play spies in Byora 'til 'e's fit for duty. Can't see 'im takin' that over an honest fight.'

The entire Cheme Third Legion was lined up in tight ranks, as though on the parade ground. Ahead was the Second, and the other side of a copse, the lighter-armed troops of the First. Lord Styrax's favoured shock troops, his minotaur clans, were a few hundred yards north, alongside a division of light cavalry. On their other flank was a legion of Chetse, what was left of the Crocodile Guard bolstered by fresh recruits from the now-quiescent Chetse cities.

Hain had lingered on the sight more than once; he'd never believed he would see the day a legion of the Ten Thousand marched under Menin banners. Once each of the commanding tachrenn had kneeled to Lord Styrax, the enlisted had started to see him as something other than a conqueror: they saw a peerless warrior, a Chosen of the G.o.ds who truly deserved the t.i.tle.

'Don't hope for much of a fight today, Sergeant,' Hain warned. 'I doubt they'll dare.'

They had skirted the Byoran marshes and gone up through the Evemist Hills and just crossed the Narkang border. Now they stood less than a mile from the fortress town of Merritays, Narkang's first line of defence against aggression from the Circle City that had never materialised until now. Four square stone towers were connected by defensive earthworks and enclosed a small garrison town, accessible only by drawbridges attached to each tower. Some two miles behind Merritays stood a market town that had grown up in its protective lee.