The Forgotten War (70 page)

‘No, Marsh Man, no, get away from me!’ and with that he took a step too far in the wrong direction. His right foot contacted nothing but air and with a womanish shriek he toppled off
the jetty into the river. There was a violent splash and he vanished under its black surface, his heavy clothes pulling him into its invisible depths.

Cygan noticed the soldiers by the inn had been alerted and were coming towards them. He then heard a scream behind him and turned to see Whitey barrelling his way with his knife held high and a
bloody bruise on his forehead. Cygan drew his knife, crouched low, and slashed the man’s chest, letting Whitey’s own momentum carry him onwards until he slammed into the wall of the
trading post. He got up quickly and turned to see Cygan staring at him, knife in hand.

‘Guards!’ he called, almost hysterically. ‘The Marshie is trying to kill me!’

Two of the guards were nearly with them, halberds pointing ahead of them. Whitey, panic-stricken, saw a dark shape rise in the river, quite a distance away from where he was standing.

‘Gorton! Gorton!’ he called as the shape disappeared under the water again. It started to dawn on him how much he was dependent on the big man and how his new-found status in life
was in jeopardy. ‘Gorton!’ He started to run along the bank, giving no thought as to how he was going to affect a rescue.

Then Gorton emerged, his pudgy white face a mask of pure terror. He was at the far bank among the reeds, his arms thrashing desperately. He managed to grasp at a branch of an overhanging
willow.

‘Help me!’ he croaked desperately.

‘Gorton! Just hold on. Just hold on!’ Whitey was close to him by now, suddenly aware that there was a whole river between the two of them. Hearing a noise, he looked back towards the
jetty.

The Marsh Man was in his boat again, coming towards them; the branch on to which Gorton was clinging was bending horribly; Whitey could see it slowly slipping through Gorton’s wet
hands.

‘Hurry up, Marshie; he can’t hold on much longer.’

But the man was there. He positioned his boat so that the current would pull Gorton towards him and with a little difficulty got him to grasp the side of the boat with both hands. The boat
listed dangerously but the Marsh Man knew what he was doing. With deft strokes of his paddle, he cut against the current and steered the little craft towards Whitey. Arriving at the bank, the two
men conspired to haul the sodden mass of the merchant on to the damp grass. Gorton was worryingly still.

Whitey started pressing the man’s chest, imploring him to start breathing. Cygan, though, stood apart from the two of them; the outcome was already obvious to him. He let Whitey carry on
desperately for a little longer, then spoke.

‘He is gone. His heart must have stopped in the water.’

The albino stopped his pummelling of the dead man’s chest. Visions started to swim before his eyes, of his new life vanishing like mist. He saw himself back in the stocks again, or being
flayed raw at the whipping post. He saw his old gang members walking past him, pausing only to spit in his direction, followed by the ladies of the brothel he had only just started to feel
comfortable in, then the local magistrates; they all started to laugh, cold, cruel, mocking. He could hear them saying, ‘The demon pink-eye thought he was human, thought he was like us. How
ridiculous of him! Put a rope around his neck and make him dance, throw him a penny for livening up a boring afternoon.’

Suddenly he felt the wound on his chest smart, and the bump on his head throb. He looked down at the dead man’s face and felt the shadow of the guards fall over him.

‘It was him!’ he cried to them, pointing at Cygan. ‘He killed him, he wounded me – all for no reason at all!’

Cygan looked at the two guards and saw he had no choice. He held out both arms and let them take him without a fight. His fate was with the spirits now.

Or rather, with Magistrate Onkean, who was now sitting in the main room of his house behind his dining table, Cygan standing in front of him flanked by the two guards. Whitey,
who had reason enough to be nervous around officialdom, was cringing in a dark corner. The magistrate drained his ale and took a bite out of a slice of bread before speaking.

‘So a man is dead, you say, drowned in the river after an altercation with this marsh fellow.’

‘Yes, sir,’ said the guard. ‘We saw the three of them at the trading post and the next minute a man was in the water, with this man’ – he indicated Whitey –
‘screaming his lungs out for us to come and help. The Marshie fished him out of the water, but he was already dead. He was a fat man and the shock stopped his heart. After that, though, we
saw the wounds on the pink-eye and realised there must have been a fight of some sort. Then we found this.’ He put the basket on the table. ‘Look inside – there’s enough
stuff there to leave any merchant sitting pretty.’

The magistrate did so, his expression grave.

‘You! Pink-eye, did you fight over his merchandise? And don’t lie to me or I’ll have your ears nailed to the stocks.’

Whitey feigned a low bow and wiped the sweat off his face.

‘There was a misunderstanding, sir. We offered the man a fair price for his goods but he wasn’t interested. Called the stuff we had to barter with rubbish and pulled a knife on us,
he did. Poor Gorton was so afeard he fell overboard and I got slashed by him. Them Marshies have their own rules, they do; they just don’t know how to behave in civilised lands, sir, so they
don’t.’

‘I see,’ the magistrate growled.

‘It is not as this man said.’ Cygan decided to speak. He had no idea of the protocols involved here but obviously this man passed as important.

‘So, Marsh Man, you speak our tongue. Then tell me why, within five minutes of your arrival, a countryman of mine is lying cold on a table in the inn. Coincidence, maybe?’

‘No. I came here with a message from the Elder of my tribe for your baron. The goods I brought with me were to be used as a gesture of goodwill and to ensure that our words were heard. The
dead man and his ... ally’ – he nodded towards Whitey – ‘saw an opportunity to enrich themselves to the endangerment of us all. They attacked me and in the fight one of them
fell into the river. I tried to rescue him but was too late.’

‘How is it that this man is wounded and you are unscathed?’

‘Actually, he did catch me a blow. Ten years ago he wouldn’t have got near me.’ He showed the magistrate the hole in his tunic and the strip of dried blood underneath.

Another mouthful of bread later and the magistrate spoke again.

‘We have a classic case here. Two witnesses whose accounts differ and no one else around to corroborate either story. What am I to do? Eburg town is but less than ten miles away and a man
is dead. A report has to go up there and any judgement I make the Baron will hear of. The last thing I want is for him to come down here with a load of his men undermining my authority. So,
punishment has to be meted out.’ He brushed some crumbs off his sleeve and gazed steadily at Cygan.

‘I am sorry, Marsh Man, but a merchant is dead. Though I am far more inclined to believe you over the snivelling little shit in the corner, the villagers here, and the people at Eburg,
will never accept the innocence of a non-Artoran barbarian against one raised under the Divine Pantheon. Take him out and hang him.’

Cygan’s eyes blazed; his mind raced as to how he might attempt a desperate breakout when his guard spoke.

‘If I may be so bold, sir, the people here rely on the Marshies and the trade and people they bring in. To execute one of them here, well, it could threaten the trading post. The Marshies
could go further upriver instead, to Eburg, or further on.’

‘I cannot let him go, my man. Do you have a suggestion?’

‘Yes, sir. Send him to Eburg for judgement. They will probably decide the same as you, but, at least to the Marshies, it isn’t us that has made the judgement. Besides, if the Marshy
has a message for the Baron, at least he’ll be closer to him. He just has to hope the Baron visits the dungeons from time to time.’ The guard laughed at his joke.

‘You have a point. I will prepare a written deputation and you two can shackle this man and take him to Eburg on the wagon. You can leave within the hour.’

‘You are a fool,’ said Cygan. ‘You have to listen to what I have to say or you are all going to die. My people first, yours second.’

The magistrate gave him an icy stare. ‘I will put your request in my deputation. If you are genuine, then pray to your gods that the Baron reads it. Take him away.’

The two men led Cygan away, out of the manor house towards the smithy. He didn’t struggle; it was the Baron he wanted to see, after all, and to resist here would be a futile gesture.

The magistrate and Whitey were left alone in the room.

Onkean started scribbling, writing his deputation. Only the sound of the quill scratching the parchment could be heard. After a couple of minutes Whitey plucked up the courage to speak.

‘Sir, I was ... er ... wondering as to who had the rights to the goods on the table. I was wondering if I could take some for ... um ... Gorton’s widow, seeing as she will need
providing for now her husband has gone. Any proceeds I make will go to her, I swear.’

Onkean was dismissive. ‘This is all going to the Baron, as it is evidence in this case. You should go, too, as you are a witness, or would you rather I wrote down your evidence here rather
than have you face the Baron yourself?’

‘No sir, I am happy for you to write on my behalf.’

‘Good. Now as you have no further business here, I suggest you settle your account at the inn and leave our village behind. You have the merchant’s widow to speak to and his business
interests to settle. I imagine you will be a busy man for a few weeks, will you not?’

‘Of course, sir, as you command.’ Whitey bowed and beat a hasty retreat from the room. He had the money from the transactions earlier in the week, so the trip had not been a total
loss. Gorton was unmarried, of course, and Whitey knew nothing of his business interests other than the work he had put Whitey’s way. So it was a case of take the money and run. Today had
been a disaster but there were things that could be salvaged from it. He would decide what to do next when he was back in his room in Sketta.

Behind him Onkean continued writing. He looked up at the guard.

‘That albino.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Make sure he leaves promptly. A man like that around brings bad luck to us all. Beat him out of town if you have to; his sort makes my flesh crawl.’

The man left and Onkean was alone. He finished his deputation with a sense of satisfaction. After sealing it, he sat back in his chair, smiled, and lifted the covering off Cygan’s
basket.

Morgan had slept well. The bed was one of the softest he had known and the gentle warmth of the glowstones suffusing the room had left him feeling more relaxed than perhaps he
had ever been. For a while he had heard Itheya in the next room talking softly with someone in her own language, before she, too, had fallen silent and he had been left with the sounds of the wind
gusting over the lake, the snapping of the banners outside his window and the soft lament of the trees as they shed their leaves in the face of the oncoming winter.

When he awoke, he saw that someone had been in his room leaving some bread and fruit and a large vessel containing water for him to wash with. Itheya had told him he could not leave his room,
unless she was with him, so he accepted his benevolent incarceration and remained where he was.

He was not to remain alone for long. He had just devoured the last of the food when a shadowy figure appeared at the doorway.

‘Good morning, Dramalliel. I take it you wish to be my escort for an hour or two?’

‘Indeed,’ the elf said with a smirk. ‘Your fellow human and Terath are already on the shore waiting for us.’

And so they were. Morgan acknowledged Cedric who was swathed in a dark-green elven cloak that Terath had obviously given him. He leaned on his stick and was presumably feeling the drop in
temperature. A small but curious crowd dressed in similar cloaks had gathered to watch them. Morgan, too, felt the late-autumnal nip in the air, pinching his nose and cheeks.

‘Hello, my boy. I have some interesting news. Terath is going to attempt a scrying ritual using information gleaned from the tooth. It may give us the location of some of the dragon
stones. Granted, none of that is of any practical use to us at the moment, but to the people here it is significant. It strengthens the ties between me and you and our hosts, and what with their
gathering taking place a few days from now it can only be helpful.’

‘Good,’ said Morgan. ‘Now if I can only get through the next hour unscathed, it will make for a perfect day.’

‘Don’t worry; Terath and I will keep an eye on him. The young elf is quite the hothead, or so I’ve been told.’

Dramalliel was joined by Tiavon and a couple of other elves, all carrying spears. He looked at Morgan, excitement in his violet eyes.

‘It is this way. Follow, please.’

He led them along a narrow but well-defined track leading in a southerly direction away from the tented lawn. Morgan could hear the waters of the lake lapping at the shore to his left, barely
fifty yards away; apart from that he was surrounded by the ancient woodland – trees sporting beards of lichen, overhanging banks of lime-coloured grass, and clumps of bracken. After a few
short minutes the trees opened out on to a broad green sward that was actually sunken into the earth; it was bowl shaped and surrounded on all sides by high banks of trees. As Morgan looked around,
he could see it was some sort of a training area; he saw some archery targets made of wicker, racks of spears, some hurdles, dummies and other unknown contraptions partially hidden under thick
cloth covers.

‘This is where the foot warriors train,’ Dramalliel explained. ‘With Armentele happening tomorrow no one is training today. However, I thought maybe I could show you how an
elven warrior fights. Do you wish to test yourself here?’