Shadowheart (69 page)

“The southern mortals will come down from the hills with the morning’s light,” Saqri said when she returned to Barrick’s tent. “They have numbers and powerful guns, and they fear their master too much to do otherwise. Most of all, they fear what he will do to them if he is victorious below but they have lost everything above.”

Barrick tried to heave himself out of the cot, but the walk down the beach had overwhelmed him. He settled for sitting upright, which made him feel less of an invalid. “What does that mean, Saqri? We fight them again?”

“It means we must not be here. Otherwise, we will be fighting a pointless battle for nothing more important than the honor of the Xixians when the true danger is below. How is your strength?”

“I can walk if I go slowly.” He paused, troubled. “My sister. That was my sister.”

“I saw her, yes.”

He didn’t remember how he had once felt, that was the problem, but he knew he did not have those feelings anymore. “She was unhappy with me. Why?”

“Perhaps because you are no longer the child she remembered and that frightens her. Perhaps because you have found newer and greater responsibilities, or have changed in other ways she cannot understand.” Saqri’s dispassion was so complete it almost looked studied. “Who can say?”

“It bothers me, and I don’t know why. I feel as though I’ve lost something important. Left something behind ...”

The minute downturn of her lips was a frown. “Do not waste your thought on it, Barrick Eddon. We have more than enough to do. The southerners have a long lead on us—in fact, they have almost reached the deepest place, the very Last Hour of the Ancestor.”

He did his best to shake off the mood brought on by seeing his sister. What could it matter now, when the People’s last moments were at hand? “But it seems so hopeless—you told me that the ritual, the spell, whatever foul thing it is that the autarch seeks to do, is meant to happen tomorrow ...”

“One moment after midnight,” Saqri said. “When the year begins to die.”

“How can we possibly stop him before then? He has thousands of men in the caverns. You sent our only allies away, my sister and those Syannese, to fight in the castle against other mortals. Why? What chance will we have now?”

“No chance at all, of course.” Still the impassive mask. “But we have many other important things to concern us. I myself must choose what to do with my death.”

For a moment he thought he had not heard her. When he spoke, his skin was prickling. “Your . . . death?”

“It is hard to explain, but I think there will be no small power in the death of half the Fireflower. Perhaps not enough to change the outcome of such an uneven fight, but perhaps at least enough to thwart the autarch in some way. But if I am not there to employ it, my death will avail nothing.”

He swallowed. “And me . . . ? Do I have this . . . death to give, too?”

She made the gesture
The Book is Closed
, a Qar equivalent of a shrug. “What I speak of has never happened before. Always when one of my ancestors died in battle their heirs were primed to take the Fireflower. Now, who knows? I die with no living issue. As for you . . . ?” Saqri shrugged. “Nothing like you has ever been heard of, not by the Fireflower, not even among those of the Deep Library.” Her smile looked like the bared teeth of a wolf. “Still, I would advise you not to sell your own passing lightly, either.”

He nodded, pushing away the mote of disquiet which meeting his sister had left in him. “So we fight. And we almost certainly die.” It seemed so simple and so final—but also so terrifying. “Not knowing if we have won or lost. Not knowing what happened to Qinnitan.”

“It is possible we will find your southern girl before the end.” Saqri did not quite seem to approve. “As for the rest, we will lose, of course—that is certain. In the whole of our world there is no longer enough Qar . . .
magic
left, as you would call it, to save us. But you and I still have work of our own to do. For better or for worse, my husband chose you to carry the Fireflower of the kings into this final battle. That is why I gave you the armor that once belonged to my son, Janniya. It did not save him. He died here in Southmarch at the hands of your ancestor, but to me he was noble and lovely beyond even the gods themselves.” She put her hand upon his. “Will you fight with me, Barrick Eddon?”

Barrick felt strangely empty, like a pottery vessel cleansed by fire. All the things he had worried about for so long, loved so hopelessly, now seemed to have vanished; he could scarcely remember them.

He nodded slowly. “I’ll fight with you, Saqri, yes. You’re all the family I have, now. And when the time comes, I’ll die with you, too, if the gods grant it.” He did his best to smile, but it had become an unfamiliar exercise. “After all, it will be a better ending than what I’ve always expected.”

—from “A Child’s Book of the Orphan, and His Life and Death and Reward in Heaven”

 

 

 

T
HE FIRES BURNING in the mainland city and the Xixian ships still smoldering on the water made the night almost as bright as dawn. Some of the ships had burned to the waterline, unrecognizable hulks that still hissed steam and spat sparks into the dark sky.

I never dreamed I would come back like this
, Briony thought, watching the mainland recede as Ena plied the oars. All around her boats slid toward the castle like water beetles converging at one end of a pond. Eneas and his men had been loaded onto wherries in twos and threes, the horses onto barges, and now almost twenty score small Skimmer craft were making their way back across the bay to Southmarch.

Neither Briony nor Ena were much interested in conversation; the short journey passed in silence until the first of the boats neared the ruins of the causeway, now nothing more than a short spit of land between the great outer gate and the edge of Midlan’s Mount. Briony let Ena help her out onto the slippery stones.

“But where do we go?” Briony asked. The huge Basilisk Gate looked down on them like a frowning giant. She had never thought about how it felt to come to this place and see such a daunting thing—always before it had been one of the last signs that she was returning home. “How do we get inside?”

“Not the way we Skimmers go, my lady,” said Ena, smiling. “That’s our secret, and in times like these it’ll remain our secret. But you have no need for secrets, Highness! You have come back to your own house!”

“Not everyone here will be so glad to see me,” Briony said, but Ena was already pushing her boat back from the rocks and into safer waters.

“Take care, Queen Briony! We will meet again!” the Skimmer girl called.

She wanted to shout, “I’m only a princess,” but thought better of making so much noise. The other Skimmers swooped in to deliver their passengers to the causeway; then, when all Eneas’ troops were unloaded, they swung back into the open water. A song rose up among them, deep and barely audible above the crash of the ocean against the rocks. It was in no language Briony knew, and she only guessed it was a song because it had a sort of tune that went up and down like the waves themselves. Who were the Skimmers, really? That Saqri creature had said something about them being the kin of the Qar, but that seemed impossible. The water people were part of Southmarch and had been so for centuries, long before and long after the Qar had been driven into exile beyond the Shadowline.

Eneas appeared out of the evening mist, so tall and stern that for a startled moment she thought he was her father. “Princess, are you well?”

“I am, sir, thank you.” Dawn was still hours away; they had no light but the glare of ships burning on the bay and fires on the distant mainland. “This seems a rather uncomfortable spot to make our camp.” She gestured to the mighty walls jutting out above them, the gate itself as tall as a tall tree all carved in the stony coils of its namesake. “Do you have a plan to get us inside?”

“Well, we are a little late to the inn, but perhaps we can wake the porter.” Eneas called to one of his men, and a moment later a trumpeter had taken out his horn. At a second word from the prince, he began to blow a brazen battle call. Startled, Briony could only put her hands over her ears and shrink away.

Moments later a head appeared atop the gate, then three or four more, helmeted guards crouching so low they were scarcely more than bumps above the battlements like a baby’s teeth nudging through its gums.

“Who goes there?” one of them called, so high above them atop the wall that the wind almost tore his words away. “One of the autarch’s men, hoping for a dram of water to put out your fires? We’ll send it down to you, but not in a way you’ll like!”

“No Xixians, we!” cried Eneas. “We are allies! Let us in!”

“Allies! Not likely!” the man shouted back. “Just blew in on the wind and landed in front of the Old Lizard, did you? Think we’ll let you in? Then you’re a madman, that’s what you are.”

“A madman
and
a madwoman!” the prince shouted back. “Here is one who thinks himself the rightful heir of Syan, and another who believes herself mistress of this very castle!”

“For the love of the gods!” Briony told him in a horrified whisper. “Eneas, are you mad? These are Tolly’s men!”

“Perhaps,” he said cheerfully. “But perhaps not. Let us find out.”

“What foolery are you at, man?” demanded the fellow on the wall. “Mistress? Your mistress is likely a slattern and you are certainly a drunk fool, fisherman. Get back in your boat and go away before we feather you and your lady properly!”

One of the Syannese soldiers already had an arrow on his string and was preparing to dispatch the guard when Eneas held out his hand. “Leave him be,” he said quietly.

“But, Highness . . . !” the soldier protested. “Did you hear . . . ?”

“I heard.” Eneas raised his voice. “It is you who is feeling the breath of Old Knot on the back of his neck, fellow. I am Prince Eneas of Syan. Open the gate! We are allies of your true king!” He turned and said quietly to Briony, “That should start some interesting conversations!”

More heads popped up along the top of the massive gate, and several men held up torches, peering down into the darkness below for a look at the visitors. Briony could only hold her breath and pray for Zoria’s continued protection. The gatehouse above it, and the monstrous towers on either side probably housed a pentecount of men or more. Eneas might have far more men than that, but they had no protection and nowhere to go if the archers began firing on them. The Skimmers were gone and there was no other way off the narrow piece of land in front of the gate.

“That
is
the Syannese prince!” one man atop the gate shouted. “I’ve seen his banner! That’s him!”

“Liar!” another screamed. “Or traitor!”

“Open the gates!” someone called. “Let them in! They sank them Otarch ships!”

“I’ll kill the first man who goes near that windlass . . . !” a man cried, and then many voices began shouting at once, and even the figures lined up atop the gate suddenly dissolved into chaos. To Briony’s horror, a figure came flying off the top of the gatehouse, ten times a man’s height in the air, and hit the ground in front of Eneas and his men with a horrible moist thump.

Flames rippled across the top of the gate and in the narrow slits in the towers on either side as men with torches ran in and out. One of the Basilisk Gate’s huge bells began to ring out an alarm, then fell silent again almost immediately, as though the bell ringer had met a sudden, violent end. Torches began appearing along nearby sections of the wall as the struggle at the main gate caught the attention of the other guard posts.

“Form up!” Eneas told his men. “Shields up—the arrows may begin flying any moment!”

Briony was only too happy to lift her shield over her head, although it was not long before her arms were aching so badly she would almost have preferred being shot. A few arrows did come sailing down, but more or less randomly, and not from atop the gate itself, as though a few scared soldiers on the walls were merely firing out into the darkness.

At last silence fell, then the great gate creaked open; Eneas held his men back when they would have surged through. The portcullis shuddered and rose, and a handful of figures with torches stepped into the cobbled opening, a space wide enough for a dozen men to ride through.

“Is it truly you, Prince Eneas?” one of the torchbearers asked, taking a limping step forward and holding up his torch, which rippled as the breeze from the bay whipped through the open gate.

“It is. Do I know you?” Eneas strode forward. Briony hurried to stay with him—his confidence, at that moment, seemed better protection than any Syannese shield.

“No, sire. You wouldn’t. But we true Southmarchers are happy to see you. Was it you burned the Xixy ships?”

A crowd of guardsmen quickly surrounded Eneas and his men, but to Briony’s relief the mood was more festive than combative. Several dozen were climbing down from the nearest guardhouses to see what was happening, but most of the fighting was already over. At least a dozen men sat sullenly on the ground with their backs to the wall, being guarded by men with spears. Half a dozen more lay nearby and did not need to be watched, as their contorted limbs and the blood on their tabards made clear.

The soldier who had spoken saw Eneas and his men looking at the dead. “They were Tolly’s men, those scum. One of them tried to ring the bells. The rest would have been off to warn the Protector and his bullyboys—they’ve all gone to ground in the royal residence. What is happening, Sire? Have you come to chase the damned Summerfielders out? May the gods bless you if you have, Highness.” He peered out past Eneas and the others, squinting as if he could make out what was happening on the far shore. “What about that autarch? What happened to his ships?”