The Captain’s eyes narrowed. From his raised vantage point he could see with-out obstruction that a lone figure was approaching from the northwest. A skin of white fur flapped in the breeze like the wing of a ghost-moth, spreading out from the broad shoulders. A longsword was strapped to the man’s back, its edges oddly rippled, the blade itself a colour unlike any metal the Captain knew.
As the figure came closer, as if expecting the massed slaves to simply part be-fore him, the Captain’s sense of scale was jarred. The warrior was enormous, eas-ily half again as tall as the tallest Skathandi-taller even than a Barghast. A face seemingly masked-no, tattooed, in a crazed broken glass or tattered web pattern. Beneath that barbaric visage, the torso was covered in some kind of shell armour, pretty but probably useless.
Well, the fool-huge or not-was about to be trampled or pushed aside. Motion was eternal. Motion was-a sudden spasm clutched at the Captain’s mind, digging fingers into his brain-the spirits, thrashing in terror-shrieking-
A taste of acid on his tongue-
Gasping, the Captain gestured.
A servant, who sat behind him in an upright coffin-shaped box, watching through a slit in the wood, saw the signal and pulled hard on a braided rope. A horn blared, followed by three more.
And, for the first time in seven years, the kingdom of Skathandi ground to a halt.
The giant warrior strode for the head of the slave column. He drew his sword. As he swung down with that savage weapon, the slaves began screaming.
From both flanks, the ground shook as knights charged inward.
More frantic gestures from the Captain. Horns sounded again and the knights shifted en masse, swung out wide to avoid the giant.
‘The sword’s downward stroke had struck the centre spar linking the yoke harnessess. Edge on blunt end, splitting the spar for half its twenty-man length. Bolts scattered, chains rushed through iron loops to coil and slither on to the ground.
The Captain was on his feet, tottering, gripping the bollards of the balcony rail. He could see, as his knights drew up into ranks once more, all heads turned towards him, watching, waiting for the command. But he could not move. Pain lanced up his legs from the misshapen bones of his feet. He held on to the ornate posts with his feeble hands. Ants swarmed in his skull.
The spirits were gone.
Fled.
He was alone. He was empty.
Reeling back, falling into his throne.
He saw one of his sergeants ride out, drawing closer to the giant, who now stood leaning on his sword. The screams of the slaves sank away and those sud-denly free of their bindings staggered to either side, some falling to their knees as if subjecting themselves before a new king, a usurper. The sergeant reined in and, eyes level with the giant’s own, began speaking.
The Captain was too far away. He could not hear, and he needed to-sweat poured from him, soaking his fine silks. He shivered as fever rose through him. He looked down at his hands and saw blood welling from the old wounds-opened once more-and from his feet as well, pooling in the soft padded slippers. He remembered, suddenly, what it was like to think about dying, letting go, sur-rendering. There, yes, beneath the shade of the cottonwoods-
The sergeant collected his reins and rode at the canter for the palace.
He drew up, dismounted in a clatter of armour and reached up to remove his visored helm. Then he ascended the steps.
‘Captain, sir. The fool claims that the slaves are now free.’
Staring into the soldier’s blue eyes, the grizzled expression now widened by dis-belief, by utter amazement, the Captain felt a pang of pity. ‘He is the one, isn’t he?’
‘Sir?’
‘The enemy. The slayer of my subjects. I feel it. The truth I see it, I feel it. I taste it!’
The sergeant said nothing.
‘He wants my throne,’ the Captain whispered, holding up his bleeding hands. ‘Was that all this was for, do you think? All I’ve done, just for him?’
‘Captain,’ the sergeant said in a harsh growl. ‘He has ensorcelled you. We will cut him down.’
‘No. You do not understand.
‘Sir-’
‘Make camp, Sergeant. Tell him-tell him he is to be my guest at dinner. My guest. Tell him… tell him… my guest, yes, just that.’
The sergeant, a fine soldier indeed, saluted and set off.
Another gesture with one stained, dripping, mangled hand. Two maids crept out to help him to his feet. He looked down at one. A Kindaru, round and plump and snouted like a fox-he saw her eyes fix upon the bleeding appendage at the end of the arm she supported, and she licked her lips.
The maids, both wide-eyed with fear now, helped him inside.
And still the ants swarmed.
The horses stood in a circle facing inward, tails flicking at flies, heads lowered as they cropped grass. The oxen stood nearby, still yoked, and watched them. Kede-viss, who leaned with crossed arms against one of the wagon’s wheels, seemed to be watching the grey-haired foreigner with the same placid, empty regard.
Nimander knew just how deceptive that look could be. Of them all-these pal-try few left-she saw the clearest, with acuity so sharp it intimidated almost everyone subject to it. The emptiness-if the one being watched finally turned to meet those eyes-would slowly fade, and something hard, unyielding and im-mune to obfuscation would slowly rise in its place. Unwavering, ever sharpening until it seemed to pierce the victim like nails being hammered into wood. And then she’d casually look away, unmindful of the thumping heart, the pale face and the beads of sweat on the brow, and the one so assailed was left with but one of two choices: to fear this woman, or to love her with such savage, demanding desire that it could crush the heart.
Nimander feared Kedeviss. And loved her as well. He was never good with choices.
If Kallor sensed that regard-and Nimander was certain he did-he was indif-ferent to it, preferring to divide his attention between the empty sky and the empty landscape surrounding them. When he wasn’t sleeping or eating. An un-pleasant guest, peremptory and imperious. He would not cook, nor bother cleans-ing his plate afterwards. He was a man with six servants.
Nenanda was all for banishing the old man, driving him away with stones and pieces of dung, but Nimander found something incongruous in that image, as if it was such an absurd impossibility that it had no place even in his imagination.
‘He’s weakening,’ Desra said at his side.
‘We’re soon there, I think,’ Nimander replied. They were just south of Sarn, which had once been a sizeable city. The road leading to it had been settled all along its length, ribbon farms behind stalls, shops and taverns. The few residents left were an impoverished lot,, skittish as whipped dogs, hacking at hard ground that had been fallow too long-at least until they saw the travellers on the main road, whereupon they dropped their hoes and hurried away.
The supplies left at the T-intersection had been meticulously packed into wooden crates, the entire pile covered in a tarp with its corners staked. Ripe fruits, candied sugar-rock dusted in salt, heavy loads of dark bread, strips of dried eel, watered wine and three kinds of cheese-where, all this had come from, given the wretched state of the forms they’d passed, was a mystery.
‘He would kill us as soon as look at us,’ Desra said, her eyes now on Kallor.
‘Skintick agrees.’
‘What manner of man is he?’
Nimander shrugged. ‘An unhappy one. We should get going.’
‘Wait,’ said Desra. ‘I think we should get Aranatha to look at Clip.’
