knollback turtle. The sailors had heard of them in old maritime tales and legends. They were supposed to have been mistaken for islands by land-hungry mariners far from home. The crew made the Sign of the Saint at their breasts, and the next day Brother Ortelius’ sermon was better attended than it had ever been before, affording the Inceptine a grim kind of pleasure. He called the voyage a flight in the face of God, and with Murad looking on declared that God’s servants could not be muzzled by threats or fear. God’s will would be done, in the end.
The same evening Hawkwood had two men flogged for questioning the orders of the ship’s officers.
The men in the boats rowed on through the humid nights, watch on watch, their oars struggling through the stinking, matted weed with its population of crabs and mites. And on the gundeck the talk was turned to Pernicus’ death and its possible author. Wild theories were hatched and did the rounds and it was all Bardolin could do to keep the Dweomer-folk calm. As it was, there were more manifestations of magic now. Some of the oldwives were able to purify small amounts of salt water whilst others worked to heal the salt sores everyone bore, and still more ignited white were-lights and left them burning through the night for fear of what would creep about the decks in the dark hours.
And then, eight tense, airless, back-breaking days after Pernicus had met his end, a wind came ruffling over the surface of the undisturbed sea. A north-easter that gathered in strength through the morning watch until the carrack’s sails were drawing full again and the white foam broke beneath her bow. The ship’s company drew a collective sigh of relief as the wake began to extend ever further behind her and she set her bowsprit squarely towards the west once more.
It was then that the killing began.
V OL Ephrir, capital of Perigraine. A city considered by many to be the most beautiful in the world.
It sat on an island in the midst of the mighty Ephron river. Here, three hundred miles from its headwaters, the Ephron was a glittering blue expanse of water over a mile wide. Ephrir island was a long, low piece of land that curved with the meanders of the Ephron for almost three leagues. Centuries ago the Fimbrians had walled it in against the constant flooding of the river water and they had reared up an artificial hill a hundred feet high in its midst so that a citadel might be built there. The city had grown around the fortress, fisher villages coalescing into towns, merchant wharves taking up more and more of the riverfront, fine houses and towers springing up in the island’s interior—until one day the entire island had been built over, a sprawl of houses and villas and warehouses and taverns and shops and markets with no discipline, no order. A long-ago king of Perigraine had decreed that the city must be better regulated. The fisher slums were demolished, the streets widened and paved, the harbours rebuilt and dredged out to accommodate the deep-bellied grain lighters that came upriver from Candelaria.
The city had been reconstructed along the lines of an architectural ideal, and had become a marvel for most of the western world: the perfect city. And Vol Ephrir had never known war or been besieged, unlike many of the other Ramusian capitals.
There was something peculiarly innocent about the place, Abeleyn mused as he rode along its wide streets and inhaled the fragrance of its gardens. Perhaps it was the balminess of the climate. Although a man might look east and see the Cimbrics thirty leagues away, white with early snow, here in the Vale of Perigraine the air was neither warm nor cold. It could be bitter in the winter, but this slow slide into autumn suited the city, as did the millions of red and yellow leaves that floated in the city’s ponds and upon the surface of the mighty Ephron, having fallen from the birch and maple woods that were flaming everywhere. The drifting leaves heightened the impression of quietude, for though Vol Ephrir was a busy, thriving place, it was nonetheless sedate, dignified. Somehow ornamental. The population of the place, at a quarter of a million, was almost as great as that of Abrusio, but there was something about Abeleyn’s home city that was more frantic. Its teeming colour, perhaps, its vibrant cheek-by-jowl disorder. If Vol Ephrir was a dignified lady who welcomed guests with regal stateliness, then Abrusio was a bawdy old whore who opened her legs for the world.
King Abeleyn of Hebrion had been two days in the Perigrainian capital. Already he had been feasted by young King Cadamost and had tried his hand at hunting vareg, the vicious, tusked herbivore which haunted the riverside forests. Now he was impatient for the conclave to convene. The major rulers had arrived: himself and Mark of Astarac, their alliance a secret between the pair of them; white-haired, irascible Haukir of Almark, Inceptine advisers flapping around him like vultures eyeing a lame old warhorse; Skarpathin of Finnmark, a young man who had assumed his throne in rather murky, murderous circumstances; Duke Adamir of Gabrion, the very picture of a grizzled sea-dog; and Lofantyr of Torunna, looking harried and older than his thirty-two years.
There were others, of course. The dukes of the Border Fiefs were here: Gardiac, Tarber, and even isolated Kardikia had sent an envoy, though Duke Comorin could not come in person. Since the fall of Aekir, Kardikia was cut off from the rest of the Ramusian world; the only links it had with the other western powers now were by sea.
The Duke of Touron and the self-styled Prince of Fulk were present also, and in Abeleyn’s own entourage, but not seated at the council table, was a representative of Narbukir, that Fimbrian electorate which had broken away from its fellows almost eighty years ago. The Narbukan envoy was to be revealed at the proper time. From the Fimbrian Electorates proper Abeleyn had had no news, no response to his overtures. He had expected as much, for all Golophin’s optimism.
The rulers of the Ramusian kingdoms of the world were young men in the main. It seemed that a generation of older kings had relinquished their hold on power within a few years of each other, and the sons had taken their father’s thrones whilst in their twenties or early thirties.
There were three Prelates present in the city also, newly arrived from the recent Synod at Charibon. Escriban of Perigraine, who was Prelate of the kingdom itself, Heyn of Torunna, who had spent hours closeted with King Lofantyr, and Merion of Astarac, who had spent the time likewise with Mark. Old Marat, the Prelate of Almark, had taken the quickest route home, but his monarch, Haukir, was so hemmed in by clerical advisers that he had probably deduced his presence unnecessary; so Abeleyn thought sourly.
The first meeting of the conclave was convened amid a buzz of rumour and speculation. There were reports that the first assaults on Ormann Dyke had taken place, and though part of the fortress complex had fallen the rest was standing, defying a Merduk horde half a million strong. Thanks to Golophin’s gyrfalcon, Abeleyn was more accurately informed. Though it had taken place only days ago, and was almost a month’s travel away, he knew of the failed river assault and the current enemy lethargy. He was at a loss to account for it, however.
But the miracle had been granted: the dyke still stood. It might be possible to reinforce it now. Five thousand Knights Militant were purportedly riding to the relief of the fortress from Charibon even as the kings took council in Vol Ephrir.
But there was another item of news which only Abeleyn and a few others were privy to. It had been confirmed that Macrobius was alive and well at the dyke, blinded but in possession of his senses. Himerius’ elevation to the Pontiffship was therefore null and void. It was the best news Abeleyn had heard in weeks. He settled back in his leather-padded chair at the council table in the King’s Hall of Vol Ephrir in a better mood than might otherwise be expected.
King Cadamost of Perigraine, as befitted his status as host, called the meeting to order.
The most powerful men in the western world were in a circular chamber in the highest tower of the palace. The floor upon which their chairs scraped was exquisitely mosaicked with the arms and flags of the Royal houses of Normannia. Tall windows of coloured glass tinted the flooding sunlight twenty feet above the heads of the assembled kings, and Perigrainian war banners hung limp from the rafters. There were no guards in the great chamber; they were posted on the staircases below. The round table at which everyone sat was littered with quills and papers. Those who disdained to read or write themselves had brought scribes along with them.
Courtesies were exchanged, greetings bandied about, protocol satisfied with an interminable series of speeches expressing the gratitude of the visiting kings to their host. As a matter of fact, hosting the conclave was no mean feat, even for the spacious city of Vol Ephrir. Every ruler present had brought several hundred retainers with him, and these had to be accommodated in a certain style, as did the monarchs themselves. Entertainments had to be laid on, banquets and tourneys to keep the crowned heads diverted when they were not in the council chamber, delicacies to whet their appetites, beer and wine and other liqueurs to help them relax. All in all, Abeleyn thought petulantly, Cadamost could have raised and equipped a sizeable army with the money he had spent playing the gracious host to his fellow monarchs. But that was the way the world worked.
