Shadowmasque Page 8

  “Tash, we’ll have to stop this. I’ll use Engulf if you…”

  “Wait,” she said. “There’s someone down there with him!”

  In the shifting glimmer of shapes revealed by her magesight, Tashil could make out a tall figure in the pitch blackness behind Ondene who seemed oblivious to this intruder.

  “Void’s name!” Dardan muttered. “Who…”

  He was cut short as a cry went up from one of the torch bearers. Tashil saw Ondene stagger backwards then turn to com face to face with the tall stranger. Who grabbed his shirt front with one hand and made a scribing pass in the air with the other. Nearly all the torches were immediately snuffed out, plunging the yard into a darkness which, to Tashil’s surprise, extended to her own magesight.

  The strange, impenetrable gloom cleared after a moment or two but when all the hunters converged with relit torches on that corner of the yard, Ondene and the stranger had gone. Another pair of torchbearers had been on sentry at the entrance which had been in view the whole time, and there had been no sign of the missing men there. And from the angry exchanges below she knew that all the doors were still locked and barred from within. That left only one explanation — powerful sorcery.

  “Wonder what Calabos’ll say about this,” murmured Dardan with a crooked smile. “Something cryptic, no doubt.”

  * * *

  How swiftly he had gone from captive to fugitive in those moments of confusion back at the Watchers lodge. Then the single-minded exhilaration of becoming an avenger, an instrument of retribution on two leg, moving inexorably towards those who had let his family die.

  But others had intervened, cutting off his approach to what he still thought of as his family estate. A rising panic caused him to hurriedly turn off the road and now he found himself cornered like a rat in the yard of a locked, barred and shuttered coaching inn. As he cowered behind one of the veranda pillars, he almost regretted his impetuous flight from the Watchers’ protection. Were these pursuers, he wondered, anything to do with the soldiers who had ambushed him the previous night? By the light of their brands they seemed like the kind of black-hearted toughs who frequented the more ill-omened wards of the city, louts he could easily dispose of unarmed — if they came at him one by one.

  Then more of them arrived with bright lanterns and he knew that the end was near. The flickering glows came closer and one of the torchbearers shouted on seeing him, and hands brought out long knives and cudgels. Ondene stepped back into the shrinking shadows, thinking in desperation that he might find a pole or some piece of wooden debris to defend himself with…

  And turned to find himself face to face with a tall, gaunt man with long, dishevelled hair and eyes that burned. Ondene gasped and would have recoiled but the man grabbed a fistful of his shirt and held him close.

  “Prepare thyself,” the man said in a deep, resonant voice. “And close thine eye.”

  “Damn you, let me be!....”

  Before he could say any more, his captor whispered something and with his outstretched hand quickly sketched in the empty midair a small, silvery glyph that hung there even as his hand moved away. The strokes of the glyph were like cuts or gashes which started to widen as he stared. Everything else seemed to be slowing down, the approaching toughs moving leisurely, unhurried, while the flickering flames of their torches became languid, undulant tongues of orange and yellow shot through with floating bursts of sparks. All grew strangely distorted, as if seen through a sunglass, then the grey line of the glyph quickly spread apart, drowning everything in ashen silver.

  His stomach lurched and he closed his eyes, believing that this was death, that he would soon awake in the Earthmother’s realm, in the Vale of Unburdening….

  Suddenly he was falling forward to land on hands and knees on something soft, cushioning, cold. Dizzy nausea made his body quiver and his head swim. An involuntary spasm kicked in his vitals and he emptied his stomach onto the ground.

  “I told you to close thine eyes,” said a voice nearby.

  Coughing and shuddering, Ondene turned away from the spew, then realised that he was sitting on snow and that the tall man was standing a few feet away, watching him.

  Then the thought came to him — Snow? In summer?

  Fear began to grow in him along the conviction that he had been kidnapped, rendered unconscious, and spirited off to the mountains. Breathing white clouds, he got unsteadily to his feet.

  “Who are you and why have you brought me here?”

  His captor gave an amused snort. “Two questions that require more answers than I have time or inclination to provide. Indeed, the second of them may not yet have an adequate answer…”

  “I will not listen to such games…”

  “In that case you may call me Qothan for now, but it would be more important for you to take more notice of your surrounding, Captain Ondene,” the gaunt man said, pointing over Ondene’s shoulder.

  “What do you mean by my ‘surroundings’?” he said, turning to look.

  Before him were snow-covered fields and a few steadings spaced along the banks of a wide river which narrowed towards a large bay. On the other side was a good-sized town from whose chimneys a thousand smokey trails threaded up into the icy grey air.

  “Behold — mighty Sejeend!” Qothan said.

  “Don’t be absurd —”

  Then he stopped, recognising amid the clutter of buildings opposite the unmistakeable outline of the White Keep from whose battlements fluttered a large, pale blue banner. Beyond it reared a line of cliffs topped by dense forest.

  Dizzyness struck again, along with a nameless fear.

  “How...where is this…”

  “Not ‘where’, good captain, but ‘when’.”

  So saying, he walked past Ondene, downhill towards the river. In a whirl of panic, Ondene stumbled after him.

  “Wait! — what must I do, what can I do here?”

  “This sojourn will not last, ser,” the tall man said over his shoulder. “If we reach the strand of the bay within the hour then all will be well. And if you keep up, you’ll knock some of that cold out of you.”

  Surrounded by strangeness and dark implications, Ondene knew that he had no other choices so he did as he was bid. And hurried to keep up.

  Chapter Six

  Beneath dark and restless waves,

  Below deep waters and the deeper abyss,

  The shout of drowned nations yet rings,

  And their dreamless citizenry stirs.

  —Eshen Caredu, Storm Voyage, Ch 9

  Corlek Ondene followed the mysterious Qothan across snow-covered fields to a wood of skeletal, ice-encrusted trees. He was chilled to the bone and by the time they found a wagon-track snow was falling, a steady scatter of flakes in the white silence as the first shadows of evening began to encroach. But when Qothan continued along the track without so much as breaking step, Ondene protested through chattering teeth, swearing not to move until he had rested. Then he sat down on a boulder by the side of the track, arms wrapped across his chest.

  Qothan stopped and stared at him for a moment before coming over to him and laying a hand on his shoulder. Ondene opened his mouth to utter a cutting remark but hesitated as a peculiar warmth burgeoned within his chest and began to spread across his body. At first he imagined the worst, that this was the onset of some terrible seizure, but as a new vitality swept through him his feelings turned to relief, tinged with frustration.

  “What are those powers that you have?” he said. “And what do you want with me?”

  Qothan only shook his head. “I am not the one to answer such questions —”

  “Then who will?”

  The tall man gave him a stony look. “My own chieftain could give you answers but only if we hasten now to the bay.” Then he turned and began walking again. “Time is not our ally, captain.”

  Ondene cursed under his breath, rose to his feet and set off after him along the frozen, rutted track.

  More fl
urries of snow came and went as they trudged down towards the north bank of the Valewater. A fitful breeze flung snowflakes into their faces, occasionally rising to an icy blast of wind, yet Ondene felt shielded from it all, as if he wore an invisible cloak which let in no coldness while keeping his comfortably warm.

  His thoughts, however, were far from composed, thoughts that whirled around the fearful understanding of where and when he now was. Time is not our ally, Qothan had said yet it was starkly apparent that this grim intruder upon his personal drama had employed some dark magery and hurled them both back down the long aisle of Time, back to an age when Sejeend had been no bigger than a town.

  But the more he dwelt upon this nightmarish predicament, the more his fears began to sharpen and close around him. So he thrust the thoughts aside and instead concentrated on matching Qothan’s gait, stretching his own pace to keep from falling behind. The countryside was half wild, half cultivated with only a few birds disturbing the muffled stillness. Before long, the wagon track widened and was joined by another coming from the north, along which a scattering of folk were travelling, mostly on foot with a couple of horse-drawn carts heaped with boxes, bundles and other possessions wrapped in rugs. A few of those who walked carried sputtering torches to light the way as the day waned, and the carts each had a lantern swinging from a bracket near the driver.

  Ondene saw the weary misery in their faces and immediately knew that they were refugees, fleeing some unknown calamity to the north. This was a sight he knew well from his years as a sellsword, fighting for the princelings and holdsmen of the Dalbari coasts, and it never failed to make him feel sick at heart. As he walked alongside them he noticed that hardly anyone was talking. Everyone seemed locked within themselves by tiredness and suffering, except for a knot of children chattering to each other in one of the carts. To his ear he could make out a word here and there, realising that they were speaking an old form of Mantinoran, probably with a dialect.

  If I open my mouth, he thought, they won’t be able to understand me and might get unfriendly…

  So he trudged on in Qothan’s wake, saying nothing.

  The road passed through a thick copse of black, leafless trees, emerged at the bank of the Valewater and led onto a heavy stone bridge. The appearance of the lights of Sejeend spurred on the refugees and Ondene heard a few of the refugees raise a ragged cheer while others offered up thanks to the Fathertree, their voices ringing with gratitude and sorrow…

  On the other side, the road sloped up towards the gates of Sejeend but Qothan stepped off it, heading north along the shore. With a sad backward look at the refugees, Ondene hurried after him across snowy, uneven ground broken by hollows and icy pools that were almost invisible in the descending gloom. And Qothan had quickened his pace and was striding through the snow, heedless of obstacles like bushes which he just barge through. Ondene hastened to reach the man and snatched at his arm, thinking to slow him but instead found himself seized by his own arm and dragged along.

  “Wait!….damn you — hold! Why this...mad flight….”

  “I told you, captain — time is against us in this,” Qothan said, releasing him and slowing a little. “Soon we shall be swept back to the year and the day and the hour from whence we departed, thus we must be in a safe place.”

  “And you know of such a place,” Ondene said.

  “I do, and we must reach it very soon.” He glanced at Ondene. “If your strength is waning I can carry you over my shoulder — it would not delay me.”

  “I think I can manage.”

  “Very well,” and so saying the tall man leaped forward into a long-legged run. Ondene stared in astonishment for the merest moment before dashing after him with all the speed he could muster.

  Several wooden piers marched on wooden posts from the shore out to deeper water, and Qothan led the way under them, feet crunching on frost-webbed shingle. Ondene’s memory told him that this part of the bay was — would be — a continuous stretch of massively-built wharfs and quays, so Qothan’s urgency seemed inexplicable. Then they emerged from the weedy shadows beneath another jetty and Qothan grunted.

  “There!” he said. “We will be in time…”

  Then he increased his gait and sprang ahead. Ondene, gasping for breath, could only see a huge stony outcrop, some ancient spur of bedrock, jutting out beyond the waterline, partly exposed with the low tide. But there was no-one else to ask and no-one else to trust so he snarled and put on a further burst of speed.

  “Do not forget to close your eyes this time, captain,” Qothan cried over his shoulder. “The sweep is about to take hold….”

  Sure enough Ondene could feel nausea uncoiling in his stomach then a ripple of dizzyness. His sense of balance went awry, he stumbled and tripped, arms outstretched as he fell. Sand and pebbles flew as he came down on an elbow, rolled then struggled to regain his feet. But his chest felt hollow and echoing while his hearing came and went in waves and pale webs were invading his sight…

  He said to close my eyes, came the desperate thought. Close my eyes….

  As he did so, the nausea and imbalance lessened, then he felt someone lift him bodily and carry him along the beach.

  “Prepare yourself,” said Qothan’s voice from beyond a veil of whispers and watery purling….

  He kept his eyes tightly shut through it all but that did not prevent strangeness from intruding upon him. Abstract visions played across the inside of his eyelids, rainbow threads and diamond flickers which coalesced into curious eyelike shapes then drifted apart, momentarily seeming to depict a great array of weapons, arrow, shields, spears, daggers, and amongst them a vaguely familiar man’s face...then a crack split the vision in two, bisecting the face and widening into a fissure down which he fell —

  He was shocked into awareness by a sudden cold which enveloped him from the chest down, cold and a heavy dragging sensation in his legs as he tried to move. In the next instant sight and sound rushed in upon him with a suddenness that made him gasp and almost lose his footing. But another’s supporting arm kept him from pitching face-first into the waters.

  “Calm yourself, captain. We have returned from the pit of Time.”

  They seemed hemmed in by darkness and the surging slosh of waves. Feeling sand and shingle slip beneath his feet, Ondene looked up and could just make out a horizontal edge to the blackness, illumined by yellow torchlight. He laughed hoarsely, realising that they were wading about near the foot of one of the lesser quays on the south coast of the bay.

  “How did….you know where to go?” he said, following Qothan through the choppy waters towards the sheer side of the quay.

  “Observation,” the big man said. “Of unchanging landmarks.”

  Ondene frowned. Surely this entire section of coastline was utterly changed from those earlier times, the banks having been completely reshaped and the coastal seabed dredge to allow the berthing of larger vessels. But he said nothing for the raw chill of the sea was seeping into his body and a shivering was taking hold. They were now deep in shadows so perfect he could barely discern Qothan’s shape. Then his hands were grabbed and led forward a few yards to touch something cold, wet and metallic.

  “Climb, captain. We are not far from deliverance.”

  It was an iron ladder, corroded and flaking. He could feel the crumbling rust and the slippery tendrils of seaweed as he climbed the rungs. The exertion was warming his body yet also putting a strain on his dwindling stamina so that the last few rungs demanded the greatest effort. At the top he slumped forward and crawled a few feet onto the rough, wide planks of the wharf then just lay there, gasping. A moment later Qothan was at his side, hauling him to his feet.

  “Just a little further along, captain, to one of the deepwater berths.”

  “A...ship?” Ondene said groggily.

  “Yes, the Stormclaw,” Qothan said, supporting him with one arm. “Aboard is my chieftain, who may have answers for you.”

  Heading along the dockside the
y made an odd sight, two bedraggled men of mismatched heights, both soaked through and streaked with rust. Qothan explained to passers-by that his companion was drunk as a lord and Ondene felt no inclination to contradict him. His thoughts were returning to the matter of the usurping dor-Galyn family and his yearning for retribution, and in retrospect he conceded that he could have chosen a stealthier, more certain means of exacting revenge. If he had been carrying out such an assassination for someone else he would have been a shadow within the shadows, the cold, unseen blade of death. But now, becalmed in weariness, he could see that his careless pursuit was really just an urge to self-destruction which had shut out all caution and guile.

  My mother and brother are dead, he thought. I must grieve for them, I must find a way to say last words to them, offer up prayers for them and bid them farewell. After that, vengeance.

  Out of the smells of brine-soaked wood and rope, and the flickering glow of pole-torches, Ondene grew aware that they were passing before the jutting prows of berthed ships. Even at such a late hour there were longshoremen at work, offloading a huge cargo barge, their backs curved beneath sacks, canister, bolts of cloth and a hundred other items of trade. Elsewhere he saw sentries up on the vessels themselves, and port watchmen patrolling in pairs, stavelamps slanted over their shoulders.

  “Ah — at last,” said Qothan.

  By now Ondene was just capable of standing on his feet unaided and so followed the tall man up a gantry to a lit opening in the flank of a massive, dark shape. Climbing the gantry, however, sapped the last dregs of his vitality and when he stumbled at the top only the helping hand of a waiting crewman kept him upright. Then a rough woollen blanket was wrapped about his shoulder as Qothan stepped into the entry passage.

  “Prince Agasklin awaits you in the auracle, Outrider,” said the crewman, another tall, gaunt man.

  Qothan only nodded then turned to Ondene.

  “I can see that you are weary, captain, but my chieftain wishes to speak to you now, if you are able.”