The Crow (10 page)

Hem said nothing: there was nothing to say.

"Why should I live?" said Zelika. "I have nothing to live for. I will fight them, and kill as many as I can."

"You need a better knife," said Hem.

They walked the rest of the way in silence.

At the buttery, Soron gave Hem a plum and a small bowl of cold dohl without any questions, although he stared curiously at the girl. They sat at one end of the long table in the eating hall, and Hem watched as she ate.

"You should not eat so quickly," he said. "You will be sick." He mimed vomiting. Zelika said nothing, but slowed down; she had been wolfing her food ravenously. When she had finished the bowl of dohl, she looked at Hem inquiringly. She obviously wanted more, but did not ask.

"How long since you ate?" he asked.

"I think... two, three days," said Zelika.

"No more now," Hem said sternly. "More, in a little while."

To his surprise, she did not argue with him. "I tried to take some bread from the market, but the man saw me and chased me. I ran and ran; that's why I ran into you."

"There are no crowds, and it makes stealing hard," said Hem.

"I never stole before," she said, with a disarming simplicity. "I don't know how."

Hem looked at Zelika more closely. He had taken her for an urchin, like the orphans he had known in his childhood, but it now occurred to him that she might be more gently born. He remembered her announcement of her name. Perhaps she was from one of the important families of Baladh. She fought well for a noble, he thought, remembering their scrap; in his short time at the School, Hem had quickly worked out that students from wealthier families were much softer in a fight than those who came from poorer houses.

"I should heal your cut," he said, with a trace of self-importance. He had dealt with many minor injuries at the Healing Houses. "Come with me."

Zelika followed him with a gratifying meekness to Saliman's house, and he took her first to the bathing room. "You should get clean, first," he said. "I'll get clothes for you. Wait here." He ran to his chamber and emptied his chest, and returned with a tunic and trews.

Zelika was sitting on the bench in the bathing room, looking suddenly lost and exhausted.

"Do you want a wash?" Hem asked.

She nodded dumbly, but did not move. Hem wondered for a moment if she expected him to wash her; he did not feel up to that responsibility.

"I'll wait for you, there," he said firmly, pointing to the hallway, and went out of the room, closing the door behind him.

There was a short silence, and then he heard the splash of running water. Hem sat cross-legged on the floor and composed himself to wait.

It wasn't long before Zelika emerged. She was wearing the clothes Hem had given her; they were slightly too big. Her hair had been washed and combed and hung in glossy ringlets down her back. Hem blinked, taken aback; she was much prettier than he had first realized.

He led her back to his chamber and dealt with the cuts on her face. They were not very serious, apart from the infection. He cleaned out the pus scrupulously and applied the healing balm, muttering healing charms in the Speech. Despite how much it must have hurt, Zelika did not make a sound.

As he finished his work, Hem heard the street doors open and close with a bang. Telling Zelika to wait in his chamber, he ran to see if it was Saliman: it was almost time for the noon bell, and he counted on the Bard returning home for the midday meal. It was Saliman, and before he had a chance to open his mouth in greeting, Hem breathlessly told him about Zelika.

"Is it all right that I brought her back here?" he asked anxiously. "I didn't know where else to take her. She wasn't hurt so badly that she needed the healers, and I cleaned her cuts myself..." Saliman's eyebrows were drawn into a frown, and Hem trailed off into silence.

"Turbansk is no place for a child," said Saliman shortly. "She should not be here."

"I'm a child," said Hem, suddenly feeling angry. "And I'm here. And anyway, it's too late now. All the wagons have gone."

There was a silence, and Saliman sighed. "We'll eat in my rooms. Everyone else is out," he said. "You may as well go and get her."

Zelika had come reluctantly to meet Saliman, and had at first sat silently, refusing to answer any questions, and concentrating on eating. Saliman had covertly studied her as she ate, as if turning over the little Hem had told him about her. When they had finished their meal, Saliman had said that she should leave for Car Amdridh that day; although all the wagons had left, a messenger was preparing to ride that afternoon, and Zelika could ride with him.

Saliman's statement pulled Zelika out of her blank passivity. She refused flatly to go. When Saliman pressed her, she stood up, screaming curses, and threw her plate at him. Hem, greatly embarrassed, tried to calm her down, and finally she just sat mulishly, her lips pressed tightly together, and would not speak at all.

Saliman watched her tantrum in silence with his arms crossed. When she was finally quiet, he asked her if she really knew what it was she was facing, and how little hope there was of victory.

Zelika glared at him mutinously. "I know," she said.

"I doubt you understand fully," said Saliman, with a hard edge to his voice. "I shall explain."

All through the Great Silence, Saliman said, Turbansk had been assailed by forces from Den Raven, but it had never been taken. Neither, as loomed large in the thoughts of everyone in the city, had Baladh fallen, nor the ancient fortified city of Jerr-Niken. But now Baladh lay in ruins, and the Black Army marched on territories it had never before invaded. Jerr-Niken had been sacked seven years before by Imank, the sorcerer-captain of Den Raven. It was then that fears arose in the Suderain that the return of Sharma, the Nameless One, long prophesied, was now a reality.

During the Great Silence, Imank had been the Nameless One's chief captain. A powerful Hull, a bard who had traded his True Name for the secret of deathlessness, Imank had fled far to the south after the collapse of the Dark. It had not been heard of for centuries. The people of Den Raven, freed from tyranny and enslavement, made treaties with the Suderain and Annar, and for some hundreds of years even used the Bardic system of dual government. For centuries all had seemed well, and little disturbed the peace.

But three hundred years before, in a sudden coup of unprecedented savagery, the Bards of Den Raven, accused of spying by the then King, had been slaughtered or banished. Those few Bards who managed to escape to the Schools of the Suderain brought evil news with them: Imank had returned to Den Raven. Adopting the guise of a wise and trusted counsellor, the Hull had ingratiated itself with the King, poisoning his mind and encouraging his greed and lust for domination; and when its power over the King was total, the Hull had sprung a trap on the Bards. Thereafter, for two centuries, Den Raven had been ruled by a series of petty kings and despots controlled by Imank and a cohort of Hulls, who returned out of exile from the unmapped areas south of the Agaban Desert.

Since Imank's return, very few outsiders had managed to penetrate Den Raven, and the few who had brought grim reports. The entire realm had been transformed into a fortress, and the people of Den Raven into a massive army. From birth to death every action of every person was overseen by the Eyes, Hulls who controlled the different regions and dispensed work and punishment. No rebellion, in word or thought or deed, was too small to be crushed mercilessly: merely to mutter a complaint was enough to merit torture in the dungeons of the Hulls, and to speak openly against the rulers was a death sentence.

"I have been there myself," said Saliman, and both Zelika and Hem looked up at him with wonder. "Merely to attempt to enter Den Raven is to risk death and worse." He was silent for a time, his face overcast by dark memories. "I hope never to return there. It is little more than a huge prison. The Eyes of Sharma are powerful sorcerers, and they are greatly feared; they have ways of watching, perversions of Barding, which are an evil even to think of. Much of the land is poisoned: there are places where nothing will grow, and strange forests that glow red at night. There are beasts running wild who do not understand the Speech but are grown dumb and strange; they have something wrong with their minds, and their forms are misshapen. The Nameless is ingenious in all his devices; I don't doubt these also serve his purposes."

As Saliman spoke, Hem could see in his mind the landscapes he was describing, and the boy shuddered.

"The armies are fed by great farms, all tilled by slaves," continued Saliman. "The Eyes control all supplies; they live well enough, but the people fare poorly, and are given only enough to ensure they live. Those who win favor with the Hulls, of course, can do much better; some, the Grin, live in an obscene luxury and are themselves petty tyrants. They are useful to the Nameless One, and so he suffers them to flourish. But nothing there is grown or made for pleasure or beauty, and even the leisures of the Grin are stamped with foulness and cruelty."

Saliman paused, and Hem swallowed, the queasy fear of his nightmares rising within him. The two children had listened in silence as Saliman spoke, Zelika frowning as she tried to keep up with Saliman's Annaren. They watched as Saliman poured himself a goblet of water and drank before he continued.

"We always feared that Imank merely prepared for the return of the Nameless One," said Saliman. "For fifty years we have been certain that the Nameless was in Den Raven, but no one in Annar would believe us. Wishful thinking clouded the judgment of most Bards, but I fear that was the least of it. A subtle corruption has wormed its way into the heart of many Annaren Schools, although I did not know what it was until I saw Enkir, the First Bard of Annar.

"Perhaps if we had marched on Den Raven before it had become strong, when Imank was merely harrying small settlements south of Jerr-Niken, it might be a different story now. But when Jerr-Niken was sacked seven years ago it was already, I fear, too late. What is about to happen is the culmination of long planning by the Dark, and the Light is weaker than it has ever been. I fear all goes the Dark's way; the best we can do here is measure our retreat. The Nameless seeks to be sure this time: if the Dark conquers, then all Edil-Amarandh will be like Den Raven, a place of tyranny and fear, and Song and Knowing and Light will vanish from this world, beyond our reckoning."

Hem thought of the bony hands and chill eyes of the Hulls who had taken him out of the orphanage, and wriggled uncomfortably. A vivid image of Maerad as he remembered her in Norloch, laughing at one of Saliman's absurd stories, crossed his inner eye. Maerad wasn't much taller than Zelika, and she was only a few years older than Hem himself. And she was supposed to cause the downfall of all this terror and might? For the first time Hem's absolute faith in Maerad faltered: if even the strength of Turbansk did not suffice to hold back the Black Army, what could his sister do? He almost asked how Maerad was going to save them, but bit his tongue; he feared Saliman's answer would be comfortless.

"So this is what you choose to face, both of you," said Saliman, this time in Suderain and looking straightly at Zelika. "The main part of Imank's army now marches on Turbansk. I do not believe, though we fight to the last soldier, that the city will stand. Do you see why I say this is no place for children?"

Zelika leaned forward, spitting out her words. "The worst they can do is kill me," she said. "I'm not afraid."

"Zelika, there are worse things than death," Saliman said. His voice was calm, but it had a curious intensity.

"I know there are," said Zelika. For the briefest of moments, her eyes filled with a terrible, almost uncomprehending grief, before it was overwhelmed by blazing hatred. She jerked her thumb at Hem. "You let him stay; why not me?"

Saliman looked at both his young charges impatiently. "I have not time for this wrangling," he said. "And precious little energy. Not an hour since, I had word that the Black Army has reached the II Dara Wall, and already we are hard pressed." Hem suddenly understood, with a lurch in his stomach, Saliman's uncharacteristic curtness when he had returned home. "But you have won one point, Zelika: I will not burden any messenger with you."

"Good," said Zelika, her eyes snapping.

"Then tell me: what do you think you will do here?"

"I will fight. I will do anything," she answered. "I will kill the Black Ones. What will
he
do?" She pointed derisively at Hem, who was now deeply regretting he had brought her home.

Saliman stifled a sigh. "Hem is a certain case – " he began.

"And so am I. Anyway, what makes you think Car Amdridh will be any safer?"

Zelika crossed her arms and leaned back in her chair, seeming to think the argument was settled. Hem glanced at Saliman with alarm. To his surprise, Saliman gave him an amused look.

"I like this Zelika, for all her wildness," he said in the Speech. "She has been ill-used, and is in great pain, and for those and other reasons I mislike greatly her staying here; but within her there beats a brave heart. And she is right; it is likely she will be little safer in Car Amdridh, if Turbansk falls. The Dark reaches for its full power, and its arm is strong. I have not the will to gainsay her desire to stay here. Not now, anyway. How many more strays are you planning on bringing home?"

Zelika, suspecting that Saliman was talking about her, looked from one to the other mistrustfully. Hem answered in his bad Suderain.

"No more," he said fervently.

Saliman answered in the same language, so Zelika could understand. "Then while we await our doom, she can teach you how to speak Suderain. Yes, Zelika? That can be the price of your meals." He smiled at her, and Zelika, uncertain at first whether he was mocking her, looked back blankly.

"So you will not send me away?" she said.

"It seems I cannot. So you might as well be useful." He held out his hand.

She stood up and clasped his hand solemnly, as if they were closing a bargain. "I'll teach him well," she said, with what Hem thought was an ominous determination.