Stephen Deas - Warlock's shadow

Water shimmered at the end of the passage. The great river, bright in the midsummer sun. A moment later he rounded the corner of Hammersmiths’ and the Emperor’s Docks were right in front of him. They were so small! He’d never seen them before, but he’d always assumed they were at least a bit like the other docks, huge and sprawling. But no, they were small and cramped, a thin cobbled strip squeezed in between the rocky shore of the river and the steep slope up to The Peak. There was one ship tied up alongside, towering over everything. Wooden steps ran down from the ship to the dockside. At the bottom of the steps, a handful of soldiers stood about, bored. Berren stared at them. He’d never seen soldiers like this — they were dressed in bright breastplates, and around their waists they wore long skirts made of overlapping strips of thick hard leather, coloured a deep green. Instead of swords they carried pole-arms, strange things with spikes and curved blades on both ends. Berren walked closer but the soldiers paid no attention to him. They weren’t drinking, not like the Emperor’s men he’d passed on the way here. They were tense.

Apart from the soldiers, the dock was quiet. A few people walked back and forth along the waterfront, but the festival was further down the river. There was no one here juggling torches, no one selling hot fish strips or roasted roaches.

He moved to a quiet corner, out of the way but in clear sight of the ship, and sat down in the sun. Out on the river, little boats sailed to and fro across the estuary. If he strained his eyes, he could just make out the line of Siltside across the water, the gleaming mud and the patchwork of little huts on stilts.

He hadn’t been there for long, eyes half closed, when a shadow loomed over him.

‘Berren.’

He blinked. ‘Tasahre?’ She sat down beside him. He shook his head, trying to work out whether he was really awake or whether he’d fallen asleep and this was a dream. ‘What are you doing here?’

She smiled at him. ‘A glorious day, is it not? It never rains on the Festival of Flames. Not for a hundred years. Did you know that? Almost every day in the summer, the rains come in the afternoon, yet never on the Day of the Dead. Not once.’

He touched her lightly on the shoulder to make himself believe she was real. ‘But what are you doing here?’

‘Radek of Kalda is on that ship. So I knew you would be here.’

‘But still, why?’ He didn’t understand. ‘Are you all here? What about the others?’ The other monks! If Master Sy saw sword-monks, he’d never come! He’d turn back and slip away and wait for another day!

‘Only me, Berren. If your master comes to kill this man, this Radek, do you think he will listen to you?’

‘I don’t know.’ Berren shivered. ‘I thought … I thought after the Sunbright … maybe there would be some other way. I came to go with him, one way or the other.’

She took his hand. ‘I know.’ Out in the water, one of the little boats was sailing towards the docks. ‘And I found I was not content to let you go when I could share your company one last time.’ She took his hand and squeezed it gently. ‘I did not ask any others to come. Together we will be enough, I think.’ She laughed. ‘Perhaps I am here to protect you from the press gangs! I am told more men become sailors after the Day of the Dead than over the rest of the year!’

Berren wasn’t so sure of that and he wasn’t so sure about them swaying Master Sy from killing Radek either, but to have some company through the afternoon, waiting for the night when Master Sy would come, that was a pleasure he couldn’t deny. He smiled back at her. The warmth of the sun on his face was a delight. Maybe she was right. Maybe when the thief-taker came slinking through the shadows later, the sight of his apprentice and a sword-monk would be enough to make him pause. For a moment, he felt himself at peace.

A band of players came out of Hammersmiths’. They walked slowly along the docks, men and women with painted faces and bright clothes, juggling balls and dancing and playing pipes. Three of them were dressed as knights, with jerkins decked like armour and swords and long brightly painted lances made of wood. They walked past where Berren and Tasahre sat and smiled at them. Berren smiled back.

‘May the festival bring you joy!’ one of them cried and waved. Berren blinked. That voice — he’d heard it before!

Beside him, he felt Tasahre tense. ‘That is odd,’ she said.

The players wandered on towards the ship. As they did, their music grew louder. They started to dance and sing. On the river, the little boat with the sail drew closer. Berren scrunched up his face, trying to work out why the man had sounded familiar. ‘What’s odd?’ he asked after a bit. Tasahre was staring out at the water.

‘Those men. Their swords. They were real.’ She stood up. The players had reached the soldiers with the leather skirts. They were dancing around them, teasing them. The men played their pipes while the women offered up skins of wine and then snatched them away again. Abruptly Tasahre stood up. ‘He’s here! Your master! He’s here!’

Berren looked up and down the docks, searching. ‘What?’

The old harbour watchtower. The day he and Master Sy had climbed it to look at the ships and they’d seen the Headsman’s flag. That was where he’d heard the voice before!

‘There.’ She pointed out to the water, to the little boat with the sail.

It had turned. It was heading straight in for the docks.

Tasahre was up and running. A shout came from somewhere up on the ship. The soldiers by the steps turned, confused, and then several of the players, the men who’d been singing and dancing and making music just a moment ago, drew swords and attacked. The soldiers fell, caught by surprise, the swordsmen too close for the soldiers to use their long axe-spears. Three of the players, the ones with swords, ran up the steps; the rest bolted for the far end of the docks and vanished into the alleys there. Out on the river, Berren couldn’t see the little boat with the sail any more. It had vanished behind the bulk of Radek’s ship.

He leapt up and raced after Tasahre. More shouts rang out from the ship. He saw her ahead of him, bounding up the narrow rope-and-wood steps and disappearing onto the deck. She made him feel slow even though he knew he wasn’t, molasses to her lightning. He didn’t even have a sword. Just his stupid waster. They certainly weren’t going to stop the thief-taker, that much was already clear.

He pushed himself faster, jumping over the dead soldiers sprawled at the bottom of the steps. If they’d had swords then he might have stopped to take one, but he hadn’t the first idea what to do with their stupid pole-arms so he let them be and raced up the steps. The deck of the ship had become a swirling melee. There might have been a dozen men fighting on each side, more of Radek’s soldiers pouring up from inside the ship only to be met by men climbing over the side from ropes thrown from the little ship with the sail. There were already bodies, a few of them, some lying still, others crawling, hauling themselves to some semblance of shelter and leaving thick dark streaks of blood on the deck behind them. There was an air of desperation. As Berren watched, one man fell, another reeled away with half his arm missing, screaming. Berren’s eyes sought Tasahre.

Master Sy! Even in the chaos, Berren knew the thief-taker from the way he moved. He cut down one of Radek’s men and moved straight at another, howling curses all around him. ‘Tethis! For Tethis!’

The rest of the men fighting with him could have been anyone. City snuffers, maybe, although they fought with a grim determination and hardly any of them had swords; they had clubs and boat-hooks and knives. At the top of the steps, on the edge of the deck, Berren stood, frozen, wondering what to do.