Stephen Deas - The King's assassin

Now what?

Another soldier hurried out of the house. Berren followed him with his eyes into a barn and then out again, a wine bottle in each hand, then back to the house. When he was inside again, Berren peeked into the barn. It was packed full of soldiers sheltering from the rain, but in among them were horses and mules. One of the horses wore an elegant harness in fine rich colours. The king’s colours. He slipped out again and found himself a place to stand without being seen, between the barn and the house, out in the rain and away from the sheltering soldiers. He took the crossbow off his back, cleaned it up as best he could and settled to waiting along the path the king must take to his horse. Water ran in steady rivers over his face, trickles of it creeping down his spine, into his breeches, filling up his boots. He was soaked through to his skin and the cold had settled into his bones. Yet he waited, still and silent.

He almost missed them. Out of nowhere, three soldiers in gaudy cloaks and crested helmets walked swiftly towards the barn. They weren’t muddy at all. An older man was with them, dressed in fine metal plates. He was carrying his helm under his arm, and he’d already walked past when Berren saw the golden crown set into it.

Meridian. It had to be. He didn’t know what the king even looked like, but the crown was enough. As they passed, barely a dozen paces from where he stood, Berren lifted the crossbow. He took a moment to aim. Blood pounded inside him, urging him to hurry, but he it fought back, picking his spot with deliberate care. The string was wet, the crossbow would be weak, the man wore metal plate, but from this range none of that would matter.

The bolt hit the king square in the back of the head. Berren didn’t see Meridian fall; by then, he was already gone, out of sight between the houses. He hurled the crossbow away, drew his sword and then gave in to the tautness inside him and ran, as far and as fast has he could. He had no idea where he was going. Away, as though there were a dozen men hard on his heel, maybe more. At first, he didn’t even dare to look back over his shoulder.

And then he realised that no one was following him, no one at all. If anyone had even seen him go, they hadn’t given chase. Behind him in the rain the hamlet was already nothing more than hazy shapes. He kept running anyway, until he couldn’t see it any more, and then he ran further, in a different direction this time, until he was sure that no one who was looking for him could find him. Finally he stopped and caught his breath. Every part of him was shaking, trembling uncontrollably. He could hardly feel his fingers. They’d already been numb when he’d pulled the trigger.

I killed a man. He never saw me coming .

He saw Tasahre again, Master Sy cutting her down, face twisted with rage. And Radek, paralysed by Saffran Kuy’s shadow around his neck as Berren smashed in his skull. The sailor, Klaas, the woman who’d earned him his name and the nameless soldier Syannis had killed beneath Meridian’s castle.

After a bit he found a tree that gave him a vestige of shelter. He huddled under it, cold and wet and shivering. The rain finally began to ease away as the early winter darkness fell. He could see the farmhouses again by then, or rather he could see the fires being kindled beside them. He could soon hear the men around them too, their rowdy singing and shouting. For a time he thought these must still be Meridian’s men, camping for the night. But the fires grew more numerous, spreading out into the fields all around until Berren understood. This was Talon’s army, not Meridian’s. Talon had won.

He tried to run again then, to get back among them and back where there was warmth and friendship, but the best he could do was a stumbling lurch. He collapsed in their midst, sitting himself down beside one of the fires, rocking slowly back and forth, shivering. Someone passed him a bottle of something strong. He took a swig and stared into the spiralling flames. He could see his sodden clothes steaming, but he still felt cold and the shivering got steadily worse. Hunched under his cloak he watched the sparks from the fire rising up into the sky, mingling with the stars. A strange music started to fill his head. He looked around to see where it was coming from and everything began to blur together. He thought he saw Tarn grinning at him, and then the grin fading and a strange look in Tarn’s eye. Someone passed him another drink, one that burned his throat. A soldier wrapped a blanket over his shoulders, and then another and another, layers and layers like sheets on an emperor’s bed, but he was still achingly cold. The words and the conversations around him twisted into a blur of noise. He closed his eyes.

A smell of smoke and incense and fish and some giant was looming over him with hands that were neither kind nor gentle. He felt them touch his face . .

Dragons for one of you. Queens for both! An empress!

Daylight. He staggered along in line. They were going somewhere. He saw Tethis. He remembered the place where he and Hain had buried their swords.

Gasping, watching a reflection of himself. The golden knife clasped in both hands. It rose and fell but there was no pain, no blood. In its swirling patterns he could see his other self, clutching and clawing, his face contorted with agony . .

He remembered shouts. He wasn’t sure what they meant, but afterwards there was a warm place to lie down, and far off he heard men cry, The king is dead! Long live the king!

You have to keep it closed. Otherwise something will come through. He’s making us ready. To let it in when the Ice Witch makes the Black Moon fall .

Someone whispering in his ear in the dead of night. A terrible smell of dead fish. A true master makes a few tiny cracks in the stone just so, and then leaves time and wind and rain to finish his work . And he saw them again, the faces of the dead — of Tasahre and of all the men he’d killed — and in his fever he was gazing through a tiny window out over the sea from the stern of a ship, watching Tethis as it receded into the distance, savouring a dull pang of regret. Not for anything he’d done, but simply to be leaving, and for what he knew would await him. He held a handful of sand and slowly let it trickle through his fingers to the floor.

See , whispered the voice of the warlock. This is what happens to us all in the end .

Berren woke with a start. The last thing he remembered, the last thing that didn’t feel like a dream, was sitting on sodden earth, staring into the flames of a campfire with half an army around him. Now he was alone in a big room, maybe a barn, but the roof was too low, lying on a hard pile of old straw. It was uncomfortable and scratched his skin. The room stank of sweat. When he tried to stand, his legs had no strength. He threw off his blankets and looked to see if he had some injury he didn’t remember, but no. No blood, no bandages.

For a few seconds he couldn’t think where he was. He’d killed a king, or what passed for one anyway. He’d run away and hidden shivering in the rain, getting colder and colder until he could barely feel his skin. Then he’d found the Hawks and their camp, the delicious warmth of their fires, and that was where his memories began to fray.

What came after that were fragments. Marching and marching and feeling tired enough to die. ‘You’ve gone grey,’ someone had said to him. There might have been another battle, but if there was then he didn’t remember any of it. If there was, he was surprised he was still alive, because his arm barely had the strength to lift a sword, never mind wield it. But they must have won because the next things he remembered were more songs and drinking and more delicious fire. At some point he’d crawled away from the rest of them, stolen as many blankets as he could find and found a place to sleep, struggling to be warm.