Prince of Thorns (19 page)

36

Four years earlier

“It can’t be done,” said the Nuban.

“Few things worth having can be got easily,” I said.

“It can’t be done,” he said. “Not by anyone who expects to live five minutes past the act.”

“If a suicidal assassin were all it took, then the Hundred would be the Dozen by now.” My own father had survived several attempts in which the would-be killer had no interest in escape. “No one with a claim to the empire throne is that easy to bring to an end.”

The Nuban turned in the saddle to frown at me. He’d given up asking how a child knew such things. I wondered how long before he gave up telling me it couldn’t be done.

I nudged my horse on. The towers of the Count’s castle hadn’t seemed to get any closer over the last half hour.

“We need to find the Count’s strongest defence,” I said. “The protection that he most relies upon. The one upon which his faith rests.”

The Nuban frowned again. “Seek out your enemy’s weakness,” he said. “Then take your shot.” He patted the heavy crossbow strapped across his saddlebags.

“But you’ve already told me it can’t be done,” I said. “Repeatedly.” I pulled my cloak tight against the evening wind. The man I had taken it from had been a tall one, and it hung loose about me. “So you’re just planning the most sensible way to lose.”

The Nuban shrugged. He never argued for the sake of being right. I liked that in him.

“The weakest spot in a good defence is designed to fail. It falls, but in falling it summons the next defence and so on. It’s all about layers. At the end of it all you’ll find yourself facing the thing you sought to avoid all along, only now you’re weaker, and it’s forewarned.”

The Nuban said nothing, the blackness of his face impenetrable in the dying light.

“Surprise is our only real weapon here. We sidestep that process of escalation. We cut straight to the heart of the matter.”

And the heart is what we want to cut.

We rode on, and at length the towers grew closer, and taller, and loomed until the castle gates yawned before us. A sprawl of buildings pooled before them like vomit—taverns and tanneries, hovels and whorehouses.

“Renar’s shield is a man named Corion.” The Nuban twitched his nose at the stench as the horses threaded a path to the gates. “A magician from the Horse Coast, they say. Certainly a good councillor. He has the Count guarded by mercenaries from his homeland. Men with no families to threaten, and an honour code that keeps them true.”

“So, what could get us an invitation to see this Corion, I wonder?”

The queue at the gates moved in fits and starts, but never above a snail’s pace. Ten yards ahead of us a peasant with an ox in tow argued with a guard in the Count’s livery.

“Is he really a magician, do you think?” I watched the Nuban for his answer.

“The Horse Coast is the place for them.”

The peasant seemed to have won his case, and moved on with his ox, into the outer yard where the market stalls would still be set out.

By the time we reached the gate a light rain had started to fall. The guard’s plume drooped somewhat in the drizzle, but there was nothing tired about the look he gave us.

“What’s your business in the castle?”

“Supplies.” The Nuban patted his saddlebags.

“Out there.” The guard nodded to the sprawl before the gates. “You’ll find all you want out there.”

The Nuban pursed his lips. The castle market would have the best goods, but that line wasn’t going to carry us far. We’d need a better reason before the Count’s man was going to let a road-worn Nuban mercenary across his master’s threshold.

“Give me your bow,” I said to the Nuban.

He frowned. “You’re going to shoot him?”

The guard laughed, but there wasn’t an ounce of humour in the Nuban. He was getting to know me.

I held out my hand. The Nuban shrugged and hauled his crossbow up from where it hung behind his saddle. The weight of it nearly took me to the ground. I had to grab the bow in both hands and cling to my mount with my legs but I managed the feat without too great a loss of dignity.

I offered it to the guard.

“Take this to Corion,” I said. “Tell him we’re interested in selling.”

Irritation, scorn, amusement, I could see them all fighting to put the next words on his tongue, but he raised a hand for the weapon even so.

I pulled the bow back as the guard reached up. “Be careful, half the weight is enchantments.” That lifted his brow an inch. He took it gingerly, eyeing the iron faces of Nuban gods. Something he saw there seemed to set aside his objections.

“Watch these two,” he said, calling another man from the shadows of the gatehouse. And off he went, holding the Nuban’s crossbow before him as if it might bite given half a chance.

The drizzle thickened into a steady downpour. We sat on our horses, letting it all soak in.

I thought about vengeance. About how it wouldn’t give me back what had been taken. About how I didn’t care. Hold to a thing long enough, a secret, a desire, maybe a lie, and it will shape you. The need lay in me, it could not be set aside. But the Count’s blood might wash it out.

The night came, the guards lit lanterns in the gatehouse, and in niches along the wall of the entry way. I could see the teeth of two portcullises waiting to drop if some foe should storm the entrance whilst the gates stood wide. I wondered how many of Father’s soldiers would have died here if he had sent his armies to avenge my mother. Perhaps it was better this way. Better that I come calling. More personal. She was my mother after all. Father’s soldiers had their own mothers to be worrying about.

The rain dripped from my nose, ran cold down my neck, but I felt warm enough, I had a fire inside me.

“He’ll see you.” The guard had returned. He held a lantern up. His plume lay plastered to the back of his helm now, and he looked as tired himself. “Jake, get their horses. Nadar, you can walk these boys in with me.”

And so we entered Count Renar’s castle on foot, as wet as if we’d swum a moat to get there.

Corion had his chambers in the West Tower, adjacent to the main keep where the Count held court. We followed a winding stair, gritty with dirt. The whole place had an air of neglect.

“Should we give up our weapons?” I asked.

I caught the whites of the Nuban’s eyes as he shot me a glance. Our guard just laughed. The man behind me tapped the knife at my hip. “Going to jab Corion with this little pig-sticker are you, boy?”

I didn’t have to answer. Our guard pulled up before a large oak door, studded with iron bolts. Somebody had burned a complex symbol into the wood, a pictogram of sorts. It made my eyes crawl.

The guard rapped on the door, two quick hits.

“Wait here.” He thrust his lantern into my hands. He gave me a brief look, pursed his lips, then pushed past the Nuban to head back down the stairs. “Nadar, with me.”

Both men were out of sight, behind the curve of the stair, before we heard the sound of a latch being raised. Then nothing. The Nuban set his hand to the hilt of his sword. I flicked it away. Shaking my head I knocked again on the door.

“Come.”

I thought I’d faced down all my fears, but here was a voice that could melt my resolve with one word. The Nuban felt it too. I could see it in every line of him, poised to flee.

“Come, Prince of Thorns, come out of your hiding, come out into the storm.”

The door fell away, eaten by darkness. I heard screaming, awful screaming, the sort you get from prey with a broken back as it crawls to escape the hunter’s claws. Maybe it was me, maybe the Nuban.

And then I saw him.

37

The Castle Red left no ruins to gaze upon. All we had were the ruins of the mountain on which it had stood. We beat the most hasty of retreats and made thanks that the wind blew against us, not chasing us to share the smoke and taint of Gelleth. That night we slept cold and none amongst us had an appetite, not even Burlow.

The road from the Castle Red to the Tall Castle is a long one, longer in the coming back than in the going. For one thing, on the way out we rode—on the way back we had to walk. And most of those miles back pointed down. Given the choice I’d rather climb a mountain than come down one. The down-slope puts a different kind of hurting in your legs, and the gradient pulls on you every step, as if it’s steering you, as if it’s calling the shots. Going up you’re fighting the mountain.

“Damn but I miss that horse,” I said.

“A fine piece of horseflesh.” Makin nodded and spat from dusty lips. “Have the King’s stable-master train you another. I’m sure there’s not a paddock in Ancrath without it has at least one of Gerrod’s bastards.”

“He was a lustful one, I’ll give you that.” I hawked and spat. My armour chafed, and the metal held the heat of the late afternoon sun, sweat trickling underneath.

“It doesn’t feel right though,” Makin said. “The most convincing victory in memory and all we have to show for it is a lack of horses.”

“I’ve had more loot from a peasant hut!” Rike called out from back down the line.

“Christ bleeding! Don’t start Little Rikey off,” I said. “We’re rich in the coin that counts the most, my brothers. We return laden in victory.” There indeed was a currency I could spend at court. Everything is for sale at the right price. A king’s favour, a succession, even a father’s respect.

And that’s another thing that made those returning miles longer than the going ones. Not only did I have to carry myself, my armour, my rations, but I had a new burden. It’s hard to carry a weight of news with none to tell and days ahead before you can release it. Good news weighs just as heavy as bad. I could imagine myself back at court, boasting of my victory, rubbing noses in it, a certain stepmother’s nose in particular. What would not paint itself on the canvas of my imagination was my father’s reaction. I tried to see him shake his head in disbelief. I tried to see him smile and stand and put his hand on my shoulder. I tried to hear him thank me, praise me, call me son. But my eyes went blind and the words I heard were too faint and deep for distinction.

The brothers had little to say on the return journey, feeling the holes left in our ranks, haunted by the space where the Nuban should be. Gog on the other hand bubbled over with energy, running ahead, chasing rabbits, asking question after question.

“Why is the roof blue, Brother Jorg?” he asked. He seemed to think the outside world was just a bigger cave. Some philosophers agree with him.

There were other changes too. The red marks on Gog’s hide had shaded to a fiercer red, and the nightly campfires fascinated him. He would stare into the flames, entranced, edging closer moment by moment. Gorgoth discouraged the interest, flicking the child into the shadows, as if the attraction worried him.

The roads became more familiar, the inclines gentle, the fields rich. I walked the paths of my childhood, a golden time, easy days without care, scored by my mother’s music and her song, with no sour note until my sixth year. My father had taught me the first of the hard lessons then, lessons in pain and loss and sacrifice. Gelleth had been the sum of that teaching. Victory without compromise, without mercy or hesitation. I would thank King Olidan for his instruction and tell him how his enemies had fared at my hands. And he would approve.

I thought of Katherine too, as we drew nearer. My idle moments filled with her image, with the moments I had spent close enough to touch her. I saw again how the light caught her, how it found the bones of her face, the softness of her lips.

We came footsore and road-weary to the heartlands of Ancrath, too deep in our own thoughts even to steal the horses that would ease the last of our journey. I had but to close my eyes and I would see the new sun rise over Gelleth, rise through Gelleth, and hear the screams of her ghosts.

We saw the Tall Castle’s battlements from the Osten Ridge, with seven miles still before us to the gates. The sun descended in the west, crimson, racing us to the city.

“We’ll be heroeth, Jorth?” Elban asked. He sounded uncertain as if all his years had yet to teach him that the end justifies the means.

“Heroes?” I shrugged. “We will be victors. And that’s what counts.”

We walked the last mile in dusk. The guards at the gates of the Low City had no questions for me. Perhaps they recognized their prince, or perhaps they read my look and some instinct for self preservation kicked in. We walked through unopposed.

“Brother Kent, why don’t you lead the way to the Low Town and find the lads somewhere to drink? The Falling Angel, maybe.” Sir Makin and I would go to court. The remainder of my brothers would find no welcome in the Tall Castle.

With Makin at my side I set off for the High City and at last we came to the castle itself. I put fatigue aside when we entered by the Triple Gate. We crossed the Lectern Courtyard in the deepest shadows, thrown by a failing sun.

By the time we passed the table knights at Father’s doors I had a spring in my step. I looked first for Sageous, seeking him at the King’s side, then amongst the glitter of the crowd. I let the herald finish our introduction, and still I sought the heathen. I found Katherine beside the Queen, one hand on her sister’s shoulder, hard eyes for poor Jorg. I let the silence stretch a moment longer.

“Where have you hidden your painted savage, Father-dear? I did so want to meet the old poisoner of dreams again.”

I slid my gaze across the sea of faces one more time.

“Sageous’s services to the Crown have taken him from our borders.” Father held his face impassive, but I saw the quick glance exchanged between his queen and her sister.

“I’ll be sure to look for his return.” So, the heathen had run before me . . .

“I’m told that you limped back without the Forest Watch.” Queen Sareth spoke from Father’s side, her hands upon the greatness of her belly. “Are we to assume your losses were total?” A smile escaped the tight line of her mouth. An exceptionally pretty mouth, it has to be noted.

I spared her a small bow. A bow for my half-brother, struggling to claw his way from her womb. “Lady, there were losses among the Forest Watch, I cannot deny it.”

Father inclined his head, as if the crown weighed heavy upon him. Pale eyes watched me from the shadow of his brow. “We will have an account of this rout.”

“Lord Vincent de Gren . . .” I counted him off on my index finger.

An intake of breath hissed through the aristocracy.

“Even the Watch Master!” Queen Sareth struggled to her feet. “He has even lost the Watch Master! And this boy seeks our throne?”

“Lord Vincent de Gren,” I resumed my count. “I had to push him over the Temus Falls. He vexed me. Coddin is the Watch Master now, low born but a sound fellow.”

“Jed Willox.” I counted a second finger. “Killed in a knife fight over a game of cards, two days’ march past the Gelleth border.”

“Mattus of Lee.” I counted a third finger. “Apparently he urinated on a bear by mistake. It seems that the legendary woodcraft of the Forest Watch may be somewhat overstated. And . . . that’s it.”

I held the three fingers at arm’s length above my head and turned left, then right, to survey my audience.

“The losses among my own picked men were similarly grievous, but in our defence you must consider that the razing of a castle defended by nine hundred Gellethian veterans is a dangerous undertaking. With two hundred and fifty lightly-armed forest rangers, there is a limit to what can be achieved without casualties.”

“The coward never reached Castle Red!” The Queen pointed at me—as if anyone would mistake her target—and her voice became a shriek.

I smiled and held my peace. Women are apt to lose perspective when fat with child. I saw Katherine try to press Sareth back into her throne.

“I ordered you to assault the Castle Red.” Father’s words held no hint of anger, and carried all the more threat for it.

“Indeed.” I advanced on the throne, leaving Sir Makin in my wake. “Bring me Gelleth, you said.”

A yard separated us, no more, before the first palace guard thought to raise his crossbow. Father lifted a finger, and we paused, me and the guard sweating in his hauberk.

“Bring me Gelleth, you said. And you were good enough to grant me the Forest Watch to do it with.”

I reached into the road-sack at my hip, ignoring the crossbows held on me, and the fingers ever tighter on their triggers.

“Here is Merl Gellethar, Lord of Gelleth, master of the Castle Red.” I opened my hand and dust trickled through my fingers. “And here,” I drew out a chunk of rock no bigger than a walnut. “Here is the largest stone that remains of the Castle Red.”

I let the stone fall, dropped into silence. Neither dust nor stone were what I purported, of course, but the truth lay there on the throne-room floor. Merl Gellethar was dust on the wind, and his castle rubble.

“We killed them all. Every man in that fortress is dead.” I looked to the Queen. “Every woman. Lady, scullion, drudge, and whore.” My eyes fell to her belly. “Every child, every babe in cradle.” I raised my voice. “Every horse and dog, every hawk and every dove. Each rat, and down to the last flea. Nothing lives there. Victory does not come in half measures.”

Father lurched to his feet.

In one pace I stood almost nose to nose with him. I couldn’t read what his eyes held, but the old fear had left me, as if it too had trickled from my hands.

“Give me my birthright.” I kept all colour from the words, though my jaw ached from the strain of it. “Let me lead our armies, and I will take the Empire, and make it whole once more. Set aside the heathen. And his plans.” I glanced toward the new queen at that.

I should have kept my eyes on him, should have remembered where I got my mean streak.

I felt a sharp pain under my heart. It made me bite off my sentence, nearly my tongue too. I tasted blood, hot and copper. One step back, two, staggering now. I saw the blade, exposed in Father’s hand when I slipped from it.

Is this a dagger I see before me?
The quotation bubbled up, and laughter too, breaking out of me, crimson with spittle. I wanted to speak, but for once words escaped me, leaking away with my life’s blood.

The throne-room swam before me, its architecture no longer certain in the face of such betrayal. Every eye watched my retreat toward the great doors. Their stares lanced me, lords and ladies, Princess, Queen, and King. The legs that had borne me league upon league from Gelleth now turned traitor, as if each mile from the ruin of the Castle Red settled upon my shoulders and left me drunk with weariness.

He stabbed me!

There was a time when I loved my father. A time remembered, in dreams, or in rare waking moments, like the shadow of a high cloud crossing my mind. There’s a laughing face from a year I no longer own, from a season when I was too young to see the distance between us. The face is bearded, fierce, but without threat.

Is this a dagger I see before me?
My mouth wouldn’t frame the joke. The laugh burst from me, and I fell, as if the knife had cut my strings.

For an eternity I lay before them, my cheek to the cold marble. I heard Makin roar. I heard the clatter as he went down beneath too many guards. The slow thud of a heartbeat filled me.

When I fell I saw the blackness of my father’s hair, darker than night, with the faintest sheen of emerald like a magpie’s wing.

“Take this away.” He sounded weary. The slightest hint of human weakness at the last.

“Will he lie by his mother’s tomb?” A new voice. The words drew out to fill an age, but somewhere in me they echoed and I saw their owner, Old Lord Nossar who bore us on his shoulders, Will and I, a lifetime ago. Old Nossar, come to carry me one last time. I heard the answer, too faint and deep for distinction. My eyes went blind. I felt the floor scrape against my cheek, and then no more.