Brian Ruckley - Winterbirth

Rothe rose as well, but Ame waved him back. ‘The guard dog can stay here, I’d say.’

‘I don’t think so,’ said Rothe.

‘I’ll talk to him,’ Orisian told him. He was surprised at the still calm he felt within. This all felt unimportant, a small detail in the journey to Delyne’s ship; just something that had to be shuffled aside to clear their path. ‘Wait for me here.’

Rothe looked doubtful, but settled back on to the bench.

The First Watchman’s chamber was simple and sparsely furnished. Tomas himself was a wiry, knotted man who sat low in his chair and regarded Orisian with a sharp eye. There was a wolf’s pelt stretched on the wall behind him. Tomas pointed at a stool.

‘Way I hear it, there’s trouble in the mountains,’ Tomas said as Orisian was sitting down. His breathing had an uneven edge to it, the air pushed out from his lungs through bubbling phlegm. ‘White Owl and Fox at each other like stoats. That’s no great surprise, but what I hear is it’s different this time. Humans up there, too. Now the Fox don’t know much about such things, but I’m First Watchman, and I know a thing or two. So when they tell me there’s Huanin out there, with women marching alongside men, I think Black Road to myself. Strange times, that the lords of Kan Dredar are wandering in the Car Criagar, seems to me.’

‘We fled from them,’ said Orisian, unwilling to say any more than he had to. ‘It’s only luck and chance have brought us here. Some Fox Kyrinin guided us. We would have been finished without them.’

He added the last as an afterthought, hoping that it might carry some weight here, where Huanin and Kyrinin lived with only a river between them. The First Watchman ignored it.

‘You’ve the voice of a Lannis boy.’

‘My name is Orisian. I’m from Kolglas.’

Tomas nodded slowly, as if he had already known as much. It was bluff, Orisian decided; a self-important gesture. It seemed very unlikely that Tomas would know the name of Croesan’s nephew.

‘Not just Kyrinin you travel with,’ the First Watchman continued. ‘Yvane, my Watch tells me.’

‘We met her in the mountains,’ Orisian said.

‘Poor company you keep. But I always say the oathbound’re short on judgement.’

Orisian started to reply, but Tomas ignored him and continued.

‘So who else? Fox, na’kyrim ; what about the others? A girl, I heard, and a man big enough to be half bear.’

‘My sister,’ Orisian said. ‘And the man’s a woodcutter. He was working for my father.’ With each passing moment he was less inclined to tell Tomas exactly who he was; the worst of the man’s hostility was kept just out of sight, but Orisian could see more than enough of it to make him cautious.

‘Oh, yes? Well, if you say so. We keep out of other folk’s business here. No one’ll trouble you if you give us no cause.’

He coughed and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

‘Each of your Thanes, when he’s fresh come into his rule, sends messengers trying to persuade us to take his oath. We pay them little heed, and they don’t stay long. One sent gifts a while ago; Tavan, if I remember right. I’ve still got the sword my great-uncle had from his men. Pretty enough on the wall, though I’d have more use for a good bear trap, truth be told. Man who brought it went away with a ringing in his ears. My great-uncle wasn’t a man to play pretty with words.’

Tomas chuckled, then hawked and spat into a battered tin pot at his feet. The mess accumulated there suggested it had never been cleaned.

‘Oaths make men slaves, I reckon,’ said Tomas. ‘No place for ‘em here.’

‘You might find a use for that sword, though, if the Black Road comes this way,’ said Orisian.

Tomas shrugged at that and drummed his fingers on the table-top.

‘We can bend with the wind,’ he said. ‘Black Road or your lot makes little odds to us. It’s the oath, and what comes with it, that takes a man’s freedom. What difference who he’s given it to? You’re all the same deep down. Oaths like yours only lead to killing and the like, one way or the other.’

Orisian bit his lip rather than respond.

‘So it’s war, is it?’ Tomas asked. ‘On the Glas? Must be, if you’ve the Black Road up in the hills.’

‘Fighting, yes. It won’t last.’

‘If you say so,’ said Tomas with a crooked smile. He was missing at least a couple of teeth. ‘Bound to run out of people to kill sooner or later, I suppose. I’d not want your troubles in Koldihrve, though.’

‘There’ll be no trouble,’ Orisian said firmly. ‘We’re taking ship with the Tal Dyreens tomorrow and you’ll not see us again.’

‘Not short of coin, if you’ve tempted that one into carrying you around. You taking the na’kyrim with you?’ His voice was thickening all the time, the words rattling in his throat.

‘Yvane? Yes, she’s coming with us.’

‘Good enough,’ Tomas said. ‘I find you, or her, still here after that boat’s gone and I’ll want to know why, mind. I look after this town, and I’ve plenty men’ll help me do it. We don’t want Lannis folk here any time, but doubly not if the Black Road ‘s rooting around.’

‘We’re gone tomorrow. You won’t have to worry about that.’

Tomas nodded. He was shaken by a liquid-sounding cough even as he waved Orisian away. Orisian retreated, as if the sound itself might carry disease into his own chest. As soon as he was outside, breathing the cold night air, he set to forgetting the conversation. It did not matter that Tomas seemed a fraction more threatening—perhaps even dangerous—than he had expected. Soon, soon they would be away from this town, and Orisian was confident he would never return.

They slept in Hammarn’s hut, all crammed together on the floor with furs and cloth spread over them. The boards were rough on the back, but Orisian slept well. Even when Rothe began to snore—a rumbling, rasping sound vigorous enough to rouse half the town—Orisian woke no more than was needed to prod at his shieldman’s shoulder. Rothe shuffled on to his side with an irritated mutter, and the snoring stopped.

Once or twice more, Orisian brushed against the surface of wakefulness. The sighing of tiny waves on the beach infiltrated his sleep, and later the patter of rain on the roof. He heard boat timbers creak, and he heard the breathing of his companions, and pressed in tight in that small hut he was warm. He rested, and though his dreams were troubled they did not disturb him, and in the morning they sank away and he forgot them.

In that half-hearted dawn, Kanin could see the lights of Koldihrve. They flickered in the grey blur of land, sea and cloud, a feeble and fragile cluster beneath the rain that was starting to fall. The Horin-Gyre Thane glanced upwards. An immense host of fat, dark clouds was massing there. A downpour was coming.

He and five of his Shield had outpaced the rest of his company. They waited here, within sight of the town, for the others to catch them up. They should be here, Kanin thought angrily. It would still take a good two hours to reach Koldihrve. The going had been slower than he hoped, across this sodden, empty landscape. Every moment of delay cut at him, plunging him deeper and deeper into a black mood.

His mount could sense his temper, and shook its mane uneasily. There was a boggy stream a few paces away; Kanin nudged the horse over to it and loosened the reins to allow it to drink. He patted its neck. It was not the same animal he had picked from his stables all those months ago. But then, none of them could be the same, after such a journey: through Anlane, to Anduran, across the Car Criagar. Its coat had lost its lustre, the definition of its muscles had faded. He remembered how it had tossed its head and stamped its feet that morning when he rode out from Hakkan’s gate, with Wain at his side. That magnificent arrogance was all but gone now.