The Right Hand of God (27 page)

luminaries seated to his right and his left. He halted at the correct place, and saw that someone had painted the outline of a pair of boots in the place he was supposed to stand, so he deliberately stood just to the left of the outline. This meant those following had to squeeze past to get to their seats, but he was angry now and didn't care. Finally everyone found their seats. He deliberately waited a few seconds longer than he'd been told - a sidewards glance showed Kurr looking at him with daggers in his eyes - then finally sat in the one remaining seat.

The ceremony began, but Leith was too angry to take any of it in. I'm a child, he thought to himself. Wear this, wear that, stand here, sit there, do this, do that, carry this arrow, save Faltha. They treat me like a child. Lead us, lead us, they said, then, when he made the decision on his own to get the Arkhos of Nemohaim to swear to him, and again when he met with the remnant of the Council of Faltha, everyone had criticised him. They went back to making decisions without even asking him. This will be just the same. Lead us, lead us, the crowd was saying. He could see it in their eyes. Look at them out there, staring at the Jugom Ark! But as soon as I tell them what to do, they'll find reasons to ignore me and do exactly as they please. So what's the point?

'Leith! Leith!' His mother's voice woke him from the depths of his thoughts, and as his attention returned to the moment he noticed the loud murmur of conversation in the hall. He turned in his seat to find that everyone had been forced to move back, away from him, leaving a wide space around where he sat. He glanced down and saw the Arrow blazing like the sun in his hand. The floor below was scorched, and threatened to burst into flame at any moment.

Warily, the Arkhos of Plonya came as close as he dared,

then turned to face the nervous gathering. 'As I was saying, the power of the Jugom Ark cannot be denied. Behold it burning in answer to our need! The former Council of Faltha acknowledges the claim of Leith Mahnumsen and his Company of followers to the leadership of Instruere, and to all of Faltha, in these troubled times. I have spoken to you of treachery, and explained the way in which the Council of Faltha itself was suborned to the will of the Destroyer. I have told you the tale of how the Jugom Ark arrived in our midst. I have faithfully reported how close we of Faltha stand to the brink of ruin. Your own eyes confirm how dire is the predicament we face, for the Jugom Ark would not have returned after two thousand years unless our need was truly great.

'So let us stand now, all united in the presence of each other and of the Jugom Ark itself, as Leith Mahnumsen assumes the Mantle of leadership.' He turned to the northern youth, whose normally pleasant demeanour had for some reason been transformed into something menacing, and said: 'Leith Mahnumsen, will you lead us?'

If the crowd thought the Jugom Ark bright before, it was nothing to the way in which it erupted into flame at these words. With a roar the fire billowed outwards and upwards, and the representatives of the City fell over each other to get off the stage. Leith rose to his feet: fire was in his hand, and all behind him was shadow. He strode forward as though stamping Faltha's enemies under his feet, seemingly unaware he was mantled in flame.

'I will lead you,' he said, each word a flame that roared and shook the hall, so that dust and small fragments of plaster fell from the ceiling.

'And now I place the Mantle on your shoulders,' said the

Arkhos of Plonya bravely. 'Er - ah . . .' He stepped forward, the blood-red garment under his arm, but could obviously get no closer than three paces without being consumed.

'Put it down,' Leith said, and somewhere at the back of the hall a suit of armour collapsed in a crash of dust and rusted metal.

'But I have to - but the ceremony demands. . . yes, lord,' said the Arkhos, placing the Mantle on the wooden floor and stepping hurriedly back to the extreme edge of the platform.

Leith stood erect, and somehow - no one could say how, whether because of some enchantment or because the Arrow in his hand was simply too bright for mortal eye to penetrate - the Mantle lay draped across his shoulders.

'I will lead you,' he repeated, and a chair fell from the dais with a clatter. A few people, their nerves stretched beyond endurance, ran from the hall.

'1 will lead you,' he said for a third time. 'Not because I want to, but because I must. I have no choice in the matter! Our task may be hopeless, and many of you here today will die before it is over. I expect to die. One of my best friends is already dead! Dead!' The hall shook again, and a large chunk of plaster crashed down from above, narrowly missing a section of the crowd.

Visibly taking hold of himself, the fire-cloaked Arrow-bearer continued. 'Like me, in these terrible days to come you will not be able to do what you want. I will take your sons and your daughters from you and feed them to the cruel god of war. 1 will increase your taxes to pay for our defences. 1 will try to be fair, I will favour no one, and my own family will be at the forefront of the battle. But I will have little patience with those who oppose me. Disagree with me if you

must. Tell me to my face that you don't approve of what I am doing. But don't work against me, I beg of you. My task is to save you, not to destroy you. I do not want to be a destroyer.'

Leith stepped back from the front of the stage, and as he did so the Arrow in his hand dimmed, the flame drawing back until it did little more than flicker in his hand. The next part of the ceremony, as it had been explained to him at least, was for the rest of the Company to come forward and receive the keys of office, confirming them as the interim Council until such time as a proper Council could be chosen. But no one moved. A thousand people sat motionless, stunned into silence by the raw power of command in the voice they had just heard.

Finally an old man in the front row of seats rose to his feet, bowed in the direction of the platform - he's bowing to me, Leith realised with a shock - then turned and made his way down the aisle and out of the hall. Another followed suit, then a woman stood and curtsied to him. Within a few moments the whole hall rose to its feet and did obeisance to him, then filed out quietly, without any of the usual chatter.

When the Outer Chamber finally emptied of all save the Company and their servants, the Haufuth climbed on to the dais and strode over to Leith.

'What on earth was that all about, son? That certainly wasn't what we agreed upon. All that threatening talk! We want to encourage them to follow us, not frighten them into it! How was your performance different to that of Deorc's? And we were not confirmed as a Council. We'll have to arrange another ceremony!'

By this time Kurr stood beside the village headman. 'I hardly think that matters, old friend. Do you really think,

after what they've just seen, that anyone will take any notice at all of the Council? By the Fire, boy, the Most High Himself could hardly have been more impressive. I would have done anything you commanded me in that moment.'

'That - that wasn't me. That wasn't me!' Leith said awkwardly, not looking his companions in the eye. 'I know that wasn't what I was supposed to say. I don't know what happened!'

'Don't give us any nonsense about the Arrow taking over your mind,' the Haufuth growled.

'It's an arrow that keeps burning, nothing more.' But he looked askance at Leith's right hand as he said it, then glanced at his own, undoing the intent of his words.

'Whoever it was, whatever happened, I don't think any harm was done.' Phemanderac smiled down at him. 'No one should expect you to be able to control it. It took years of training for the First Men to learn how to control the Fire of Life set within them, and this is the same, it seems to me. But you do need to learn about the Fire, Leith. You need to learn about the Fuirfad, the Way of Fire. I can teach you. It's why I'm here, I'm sure of it.'

'No harm done? No harm?' Mahnum looked angry. 'How much harder is it going to be to get cooperation from the people of Instruere now we've threatened them with the Arrow?'

'Easier, I would have thought,' Kurr shot back. 'Anyway, I'm not sure Leith threatened anyone.

All I recall him saying was that we all have to make sacrifices in the days to come. Is there anyone here who does not agree with that? No, I didn't think so. It's just that he said it very forcefully.' The old farmer glanced down at Leith's right hand. Leith held up the Arrow in response to the old man's unspoken request.

'What kind of weapon is that thing?' he wondered aloud. 'What can it do? What about it do we not yet know?1

He looked Leith in the eye. 'The most important thing you can do in the next few weeks, boy, is to sit and listen to Phemanderac here. You might just have the weapon to save Faltha right there in your hands.'

The Company walked through the Corridor of Appellants as a group. Kurr pushed open the tall wooden door and they emerged into the sunlight - to an enormous cheer beginning at the front of the vast crowd, then swelling even further as people some distance back realised the new Council of Faltha had arrived. Phemanderac waved cheerily, occasioning a renewed roar, and the other members of the Company - the Council, they reminded themselves -followed suit. The crowd made way for them as they walked slowly across the churned-up lawn, quieting down only when they stopped for a moment by an impromptu monument to those who had fallen in the battles of the last three weeks. Looking behind him as they renewed their slow march back to their lodgings, Leith saw the people closing up behind them, eager to get a glimpse, a touch, a word. The whole thing is crazy, he thought. A month ago none of them would have given us a second glance.

Day after day of weariness had stretched Leith far beyond anything he had known before.

Even the days in the Vale of Neume, the struggles in the Joram Basin when the Sentinels came to life, had not been like this. There he had needed to deal with only one thing at a time, and in most cases his path had been clear. Here there were so many people to see, advisers to listen to and things to read, with a multitude of choices to be made for each. But finally the bulk of their quest was over; they had turned the focus of Instruere, and much of Faltha, towards the Bhrudwan threat. Leith longed for an afternoon's rest, and decided that one last afternoon at their lodgings, where he could spend some time thinking - sleeping, more likely -

was something he desperately needed. .

At that moment a guardsman burst through the crowd and threw himself down at their feet, gasping for air as though he'd just run to save his life.

'There's an - an army, a great army outside the gates -coming across Longbridge! Strange men from far away, horses and terrible beasts! We must summon the guards!' The man knelt on the grass, trying to recover.

'Ring the alarm!' cried the Captain of the Guard. Instantly two men sprang forward, and set off at a dead run towards The Pinion, a few hundred yards away. The crowd scattered, but not quickly enough to prevent one or two being knocked off their feet.

An army outside the gate. The thought seemed to hover somewhere outside Leith's mind, as though unable to find a way in. The only thought that went through his head was: after all this, we are too late.

The captain dispatched a company of guardsmen to check the Struere Gate, and they ran off down the Vitulian Way, knowing they might discover their own deaths there. Others were sent to prepare horses, though it may already be too late to organise a sortie or to cast down Longbridge. Nevertheless, the captain set as many plans running as he could think of. With a frown he glanced across at The Pinion: the alarm ought to have been sounded by now.

The journey east from Instruere, the journey south to Kantara. Leith recounted the deaths in his mind: Wira,

Parlevaag, Illyon, Stella. All to no purpose. There's an army outside the gate, and we're trapped here.

Now the crowd, alerted that something was wrong, scattered in every direction. Leith had no idea what they knew, and spared no thought for their fate, so paralysed had he become by the news. Someone - Phemanderac - grabbed his arm and pulled him along the street to the north, towards the Inna Gate. He couldn't hear what the tall philosopher said to him: everyone was shouting, and there was a roaring in his ears. He had enough strength left to curse the voice that had led them to this place, then sat on the cobbled street and rested his weary head in his hands.

'Leith!' It was his mother's voice, but it was muffled, as though she was wrapped in blankets.

'It's all right. Everything's all right!'

His eyes snapped open. Immediately to his right stood the Inna Gate, firmly closed and bolted. The members of the Company were ranged around him, some of them with concerned looks on their faces.

Embarrassed, he sat up. 'What happened?'

'Come with me, Leith,' said Phemanderac in a tender voice. 'There's something you should see.'

The youth struggled to his feet, trying to make his rubbery legs work, and followed his tall friend with difficulty as he strode to the nearest stair and climbed to the top of the wall. Leith shook his head to clear the fuzziness, and looked out over the Great River Aleinus to the plains of Deuverre.

There, indeed, spread out on the far side of the river, stood a large army. But what attracted his attention lay directly below him: four small figures, jumping up and down and calling his name, two of them with their arms around the

shoulders of a seemingly drunk Farr Storrsen. Beside Leith, Phemanderac laughed out loud in sheer delight, pointing out the young man's shocked face to the others of the Company now joining them on the wall.

'Wha - what?' Leith got out.

'The losian Army of the North!' announced the Dhaurian Philosopher in ringing tones. Leith looked more closely, and saw the aurochs, the furs, the multitude of colours that spoke of Fodhram, Fenni and Widuz, and knew he beheld a miracle. Phemanderac drew close, and said in a much quieter aside: 'Though that's not what they call themselves. Arrived just in time to join our march eastwards. And what's most magical of all, they were led here by our losian-hater!' He laughed again, a carefree sound.