The Thief's Gamble (Einarinn 1) (43 page)

Islands of the Elietimm,

2nd of For-Winter

The sun rose higher and we saw no sign of our pursuers which was a relief and also something of a puzzle. The village buzzed with activity and luckily it seemed the demands of living in this place outweighed honouring the dead. This close to Solstice and this far north the days were shorter than any I had known. As noon came and went sooner than any of us expected, I began to wonder if we might be able to wait until the early onset of night and scout out to find a boat. We sat and watched teams of men dragging ploughs across the stubborn ground beyond the village and I realised I had seen no sign of any beast larger than the goats anywhere. No wonder the men attacking us back home had had no horses. Groups of women were gathering what I thought was spite nettle, apparently oblivious to the stinging leaves, and dumping it in a long stone trough. Others were emptying a similar trough and I observed they were retting the stuff in the same way we would treat flax to make linen at home. There was something disquieting about seeing such industry devoted to making cloth out of a weed that everyone at home simply ignored or hacked down as a nuisance.

The children, even the very smallest, were busy — cleaning, fetching, carrying. I could see down into the neat yards behind one group of houses and every one had a pen for some sort of furry animals, not coneys but something about the same size with long bushy tails. Cisterns for rainwater were being skimmed for leaves and the like and every dwelling had a small patch of yard where I could just make out older girls and boys tending greenery. These gardens backed on to each other, separated by thick walls with flues running through them, wisps of blue smoke rising into the sheltered air in lazy curls. No wager, but they weren't growing exotic flowers like the fiercely competitive botanists of Vanam. These people weren't spending fuel to flower lace-purples a week earlier than anyone else, this was survival. Thinking about Vanam brought my ever-present worry about Geris charging to the front of my mind and our inactivity began to press still more heavily on me, the more irritating because I knew it was the most sensible thing to do. The sun marched relentlessly across the sky and I began to worry that I might be forced to go back alone after all.

Ryshad must have seen me fidgeting and came to sit by me.

'Busy, aren't they?' he murmured, nodding down at the village.

'There's something odd about this place but I just can't place it,' I said as one aspect of my discomfort came into focus in my mind's eye.

We stared down the slope and now I was looking for it, I saw what was wrong. 'Where are the old people?' While we could see a few bald heads here and there, a couple of grey and white, as busy as everyone else, there was no sign of the oldsters sitting and gossiping on benches that you find in the smallest village at home.

'Come to that, where are the cripples or beggars?' Ryshad was leaning forward now, frowning as he peered at the bustle of people. He passed me his eye-glass and I saw he was right; there were no twisted limbs, no deformities from old illness or accident, no sign of the everyday bad luck that Misaen puts in so many birth runes.

'I'd say they have either very good medicine or very bad.' Activity caught my eye and I swung the glass over to a group busy around a midden. A gleam of white in the muck shone on the sun and, as I looked through the lens, I saw a spread of bones that looked horribly like a little hand. The implications of this were so unpleasant that the appearance of brown-liveried men over the far crest came as a welcome diversion.

'Don't move,' Shiv said unnecessarily. We crouched in the long grass like leverets afraid of a coursing party.

All activity stopped as the hunting party came into the centre of the village. The men with the gorgets snouted something and the villagers gathered without protest but, for all that, there was no fear in their movements, no doffing of caps and tugging of forelocks like you would expect back home. The leaders of the hunt spoke briefly and I was relieved to see shrugs and shaking heads answer them. The pack stood in a moment's tense indecision then, at a word from their handlers, they spread out among the villagers, visibly relaxing as they drank deeply from proffered jugs. I really wished they hadn't done that since I immediately developed a raging thirst.

'Time to leave,' Ryshad murmured. We crawled towards the far side of the circle, bellies flat to the grass.

Shiv was the first to reach the gap facing the coastal road we'd identified earlier, but a flare of white fire suddenly flashed between the stones. The cursed things rang like temple bells, a great hollow sound like Misaen's own hammer blow. Shiv recoiled with an oath, hugging his hands to himself, face screwed up with pain.

'Arseholes!' Aiten ran at the gap full-tilt, like a man charging down a door. He disappeared unexpectedly over the lip of the rise as no resistance halted him.

There was a moment's confusion as Ryshad and I both went to grab Shiv's shoulder and then stopped to let the other do it.

'Stuff this, move!' Shiv spat at us and we ran all together, heading down the path to find Aiten dusting himself off after what had evidently been a lengthy tumble. He was upright and conscious which is all I needed to know, so I sped past him and led the way down the coast road. The sounds of alarm and pursuit faded as the land fell away before us but I knew we had scant time before the hounds were on our trail again.

Shiv was muttering to himself as he ran. 'How did that happen? There was no magic, those stones were as dead as the bones they put under them. I know I'm not an earth adept but I can tell that much. What did they do?'

'Does it really matter?' I turned to snap at him, my voice suddenly shrill. 'Just run.'

We turned a curve in the road and I nearly ended up wearing a goat as we met another of those inconvenient herdboys. Aiten drew his sword with a steely rasp.

'It's not worth the time.'

'Forget it. They know our direction anyway.' Ryshad and I spoke in the same instant and Aiten settled for swearing at the lad and pushing him into a thorn bush.

I spared a glance for him and realised that Aiten at least had decided the time to be seriously frightened had arrived. I was hard put to disagree but I saw Shiv was still more concerned about his stinging hands and injured pride, and Ryshad was managing to keep his customary cloak of composure, even if it was a little ragged round the edges. I decided I could wait until panic struck the majority before I cast my lot.

The grass gave up in the face of shingle and sand and we came out on to an open strand where the westering sun gilded the shallows of a broad channel split with sand banks. I realised the tide was out; Dastennin must had decided to send Ryshad or Aiten a lucky throw.

'Wait a minute.' I cast around, looking vainly for any distinctive landmarks in scenery at first glance as varied as a field of corn. Curse it, I had seen a map, hadn't I? I forced myself to slow my breathing, ignore my racing heart and concentrate. In a few breaths, I had it — a line of cairns marching down from the forbidding hills opposite and a massive stone something-or-other in the middle of the channel.

'Spy-glass!' I demanded. I used it to study the stones; I was right, the insignia were different.

'If we can cross this channel, we'll be in another domain,' I said crisply.

Ryshad nodded in rapid comprehension. 'Breaking a boundary won't be something done lightly. Even if they don't turn back, they'll need to send word or get orders, surely?'

We were moving as we spoke and Shiv led the way into the icy sea water, eyes intent on staring below the surface to find us a safe path.

'Arseholes!' Aiten had regained some of his usual poise as he took up the rearguard so I stifled a smile when the others momentarily paused for a deep breath as the bitter water reached groin level.

We pressed on. I fixed my gaze between Shiv's shoulder blades, resolutely ignoring crawling fears about where I was putting my feet on the softness of the unseen seabed and how to avoid the unnerving tug of the current. The water level dropped after a while but this was not much of an improvement as the dusk breeze pressed against our wet clothes and chilled us like muslin-wrapped meat in an ice-house. Still, as soon as we were out on the sandbank, we could run, clumsy in wet boots and clothes, but at least it got our blood moving.

The clatter of boots on the shingle made me look back and realise the runes had just landed for the other hand. Shouts rang out over the water. Chief Gorget and his pal were sending men into the water after us. I hated the triumph on their faces but just as I was wishing to kick in their smirking teeth, the two in the lead disappeared, dragged below the surface without so much as time to scream.

'Shiv!' I looked round but he was not facing my way, his hands were still by his sides. His expression was one of numb horror and as I turned right around, I saw why. A spearhead of men in gleaming black leathers had crested the ridge line above us and a white-haired man with a black mace was standing at the tip. His arms were raised above his head and, as the wind shifted, it brought us a dissonant, ringing chant. Dread sank like a stone in my stomach as I recognised the studded patterns and cut of the livery from our encounter in Inglis.

Any panic in our original hunters evaporated faster than I would have believed possible. Crossbows appeared from nowhere and I flinched as quarrels hissed overhead. Some got through but more bounced uselessly off some invisible canopy. The leather-wearers replied with bows of their own and surprisingly effective slings but as a second volley came in, their reply was scattered as a handful fell to the ground like poleaxed cattle, bleeding from ears and nose.

The man with the mace shouted and some sort of acolyte joined his chanting. Suddenly a squad of his men disappeared and yells of outrage pulled me round to see them now somehow on the other side of the water, hacking into the bodyguard around Junior Gorget. Several of them fell back, faces exploding in showers of blood but Junior Gorget was forced to do his own aetheric leap a good way back up the hill. Now he was exposed, the mace-wielder sent blasts of power directly at him. Earth and stones flew into the air and one unfortunate soldier was ripped quite literally limb from limb. White-hair seemed oblivious to the fate of his squad, who were suddenly held motionless and cut to pieces where they stood. Once he'd dealt with them, Chief Gorget tried to hit back directly at his enemy with shafts of blue-white fire. These flared wildly in all directions as they hit some kind of shield around the mace-holder, but a few men took minor wounds from this and, as I watched, surface cuts ripped themselves open into ragged gashes and grazes disintegrated into open sores. Another acolyte stepped forward and redoubled the chant, the tone harsh and bloody.

'Move.' Sword drawn and ready, Ryshad made to lead the way off the sandbank as troops were advancing from either side. I hoped forlornly that they would be more interested in killing each other than us. Perhaps moving was a mistake; we were certainly noticed.

I screamed in sudden shock as irresistible, invisible hands began to pull me upwards. Ryshad seized my thigh as my feet left the ground and I grabbed wildly for his shoulders and curly head. Blue-white sparks crackled in my hair until an icy blast of wind knocked me back to the ground. Strange angular beams of light darted from side to side but were foiled on each pass by the brilliant blue fire shooting from Shiv's hands. Green gleams around us shoved at the advancing soldiers; wherever they stepped, the sand turned liquid and treacherous under their boots.

'Try your old book-magic then,' I heard Shiv mutter savagely. 'I'm in my element.'

Unaccountably dizzy, I clung to Ryshad. We huddled together as Shiv wove a shimmering net of power around us and Aiten drew his sword with an awkward gesture of defiance. Men in brown and black were advancing from both directions now and Shiv began to throw spears of lightning at them, sending them reeling back blackened and hissing as their charred flesh landed in the water pooling on the sands. Now I heard a sob of frustration in his voice as he cursed them; for every one he blasted to Saedrin, the aetheric enchanters were simply lifting two more over the channel, abandoning attacks on each other in favour of the real prize. As I realised this, I wondered if this was the time for abject terror but somehow, it didn't seem worth it.

We stepped back, shoulder to shoulder, facing oncoming death, swords drawn and hands steady. My bowels were turning to water inside me and a scream was trying to rip its way out of my chest without bothering with my throat, but I felt a mad surge of pride.

Shiv let his assault falter for an instant and, in that breath, an invisible hand knocked him backwards, clean off his feet. As a massive purpling bruise erupted across his forehead, he landed, boneless as a rag-doll, on a scatter of rocks hidden in the shallows. Blood stained the water behind his head and I took a futile step towards him.

My feet slipped and stuck under me. I twisted wildly and was held in an impossible position, hanging in the empty air, pinned like a fish gutted and racked for smoking. I waved my arms helplessly but felt like I was struggling in thick honey; I soon lost any ability to move at all. With the last of my strength, I twisted my head to an agonising angle and was just able to catch sight of Ryshad and Aiten. They were caught like me, held motionless halfway through a step and a fall. In Aiten's case, his head was only a hand's breadth above the water; I could see the ripples of his breath on the surface.

Battle cries screamed around us as the real fight was joined, now we were immobilised. The sands blushed red and the charnel smell of slaughter mingled with the salt scent of the sea and the sweaty reek of fighting men. High above I could hear the seabirds crying, attracted to this sudden unexpected bounty. Whatever magic had numbed my feet was creeping up my body; I was feeling increasingly remote from the mayhem all around me. My mother had once dosed me with an Aldabreshi pain-syrup after the surgeon had cut an abscess from my back. I had woken fleetingly in the depths of the night to see her by my bed, face drawn tight as she watched every breath I took, but I had been as far away from her anguish then as I was now from the men dying all around me.