Michael Sullivan: The Crown Tower

Hadrian had bent himself upright as well. Pale and gray as the day, they both appeared as risen cadavers bewildered and surprised to find themselves still tethered to the world.

“What do we have for food?” Now that his stomach had settled, Royce was famished.

Hadrian looked about the slope. “Some of these look like berry bushes.”

“I meant, what did you get from the tavern?”

“I didn’t get anything. I never had time to ask Dougan for any.”

“Ask?” Royce was in the treacherous process of hoisting himself out of his tiny lake when he paused. “Why didn’t you just grab something? I thought that’s what you were doing behind the bar.”

“I was grabbing our clothes. I had them drying there.”

Royce looked down at himself. “Thank Maribor you dried the clothes.”

“What did you want me to do, steal from Dougan?”

Royce nodded dramatically.

“I’m not a thief.”

“Yes, you are, and you’d better get used to it.”

“You have to steal something to be a thief. I put the book back.”

“Tell them that when they catch us. I’m sure it will help.”

Royce flinched and winced his way to higher ground. Muscles stiff and sore, his abdomen burned, and he suffered bolts of pain when moving. He felt worse than before, not surprising after spending the night soaked in a cold puddle. Shaking with the chill and his waterlogged skin, just lifting his arms was exhausting.

“Do you hear bells?” Hadrian asked.

“Yes.”

“Those can’t be the ones from Ervanon still.”

“They aren’t.”

“You think it might be a religious holiday?”

“Nope.”

“This is bad.” Hadrian turned his head left and right, peering out through the rain.

His hair plastered to his head, his face pasty white, he looked beaten. Royce knew that stare; he knew those eyes. He’d seen them every day on the streets where he grew up. They were like the windows along Herald Street after the Sickness.

The fevers came every year to the city of Ratibor where Royce grew up, usually in winter, but once when Royce was young the Sickness invaded the city in midsummer. Unprecedented, they called it an ill omen. Everyone knew that was bad-it turned out to be worse than bad. Herald Street was one of the nice neighborhoods, one of the few in Ratibor. Royce liked to walk there when he was troubled, just to look at the pretty homes. It was how he dreamed, when he couldn’t anymore. That summer the houses looked different. It was hot and dry. The windows should all have been open trying to catch any breeze, but they were all shut, the curtains drawn. Pale lace that behind the dirty glass took on a particular color of gray-the washed-out hue of hopelessness, a sort of pallid vacancy that came with having time to dwell on tragedy. Hadrian’s eyes looked like the windows of Herald Street. They had the same color, the same closed-off emptiness, the same look of surrender.

“How’s your side?” There was hesitancy in Hadrian’s voice, a tinge of fear.

“A little better than yesterday,” Royce lied. He wasn’t sure why. What difference did it make? “So are those berries edible?”

Hadrian hesitated a moment, then turned to the bushes as if it had taken that long for the words to reach him. He stood up, slow like an old man, and Royce heard a sharp intake of breath when he put weight on his left leg. Walking over to the bushes, Hadrian stood there as if he’d forgotten what he was doing.

Royce watched. If it was going to happen, it would happen now.

Having lived through worse, Royce knew it could be done. He had never felt the gods had singled him out for punishment. That would presume he was important enough to be noticed. He was just one more overlooked life that should have ended early. He was just too stubborn to lie still and over the years had grown too mean to give in. But he knew nothing about Hadrian. He was a soldier, but what did that mean? Had he spent his few adult years riding on a fine horse with plenty of food, slaughtering unarmored footmen while he remained safe in a steel suit? Had he ever been alone, abandoned, and facing death?

If he was going to break, this would be the time. Few ever lost it in the heat of the moment. It was always afterward, once they had time to think. Then the windows were shut and the lace curtains drawn. Royce watched silently. The day before he might have taunted him, tried to push Hadrian over the edge. Instead, he just waited. He felt no sympathy-no one ever had for him. The moment stretched as Hadrian stood in the rain, looking out across the valley, not seeing, just staring.

Then he bent over and plucked a berry.

In a few minutes he returned with a cupped hand. “Blueberries,” he said, sitting down beside him. Royce tried one. Tart. He realized that while his stomach was better it wasn’t perfect.

“So what’s your story?” Hadrian asked.

“My what?”

“Your story-your history.”

“I don’t have one.”

“Do you know who your parents were?”

“No. My earliest memory”-Royce paused to recall-“was fighting a dog for food.”

“How old?”

He shrugged. “I don’t even know how old I am now. I was at a workhouse-a place for orphans. I escaped. I was five or maybe six by then. Stole my food after that, ate a lot better as a result. Got in trouble pretty quick.”

“City watch?”

“Wolves.”

Hadrian stared at him, confused. “What is this about wolves?”

Royce tried a second berry. Sweeter. “A kids’ gang. Finest group of pickpockets under the age of twelve. There are a lot of orphans in Ratibor. Competition is fierce. Must have been fifteen rival groups fighting for hunting rights. And there I was going it alone-oblivious. I didn’t stand a chance. Still, I was better at stealing. The Wolves saw me. I was in their area and they didn’t like it, so they offered me a deal. I could be drowned in the cistern, leave the city entirely-which was a death sentence at my age-or join them.”

“How were they?”

“Like anyone-only more so. Nice until you have something they want. They kept me alive.” He plucked another berry from Hadrian’s palm. “How about you? How’d you learn to fight like that?”

“My father. He started training me almost from the day I was born. Day and night, no days off, not even Wintertide. Not that there was much else to do in Hintindar, but he was fanatical. Combat was like a religion to him. I figured there was a purpose, a reason behind it. I expected he was grooming me for military service, thought he would send me to the manor to start as a guardsman, thinking I would work my way up to sergeant at arms maybe. If I was lucky, Lord Baldwin would be called to service and I’d go along. If I was really lucky, I’d do something heroic on the field and King Urith would knight me. That’s what I thought my father was thinking anyway.”

“What was he thinking?”

Hadrian shook his head slowly as he looked out at the lake far below. “I don’t know. But when I was fifteen, I asked when I would apply to the manor. Most boys started as pages much younger-fifteen was the age to sign up to be a squire if you were noble, or man-at-arms if you weren’t. My father said I wasn’t ever going to the manor. I wasn’t going to Aquesta either. I wasn’t going anywhere. He wanted me to replace him as the town blacksmith when he got too old to swing the hammer.”

“Then why’d he train you like that?”

“He never told me.” Hadrian popped the last of the berries into his mouth and chewed.

“So that’s when you left.”

“No. I was in love with a girl in the village-maybe not love, but as close as I’ve ever been, I suppose. I was going to marry her.”