Paul Kearney: Ships from the West

'Of course,' Mirren said scornfully. 'This is Barossa.'

'Yes. The Place of Bones, in Old Normannic. It was not always named so. This is the old Western Road, which once ran from Torunn clear to what was Aekir.'

'Aurungabar,' his daughter corrected him.

'Yes, by way of Ormann Dyke . . .'

'Khedi Anwar.'

'The very same. This was the spine of Torunna once upon a time, this old track. The Kingsway runs to the north-west, some twelve leagues, but it's barely fifteen years old. Before Torunna even existed, before this region was known as Barossa, it was the easternmost province of the old empire. The Fimbrians built this road we trot upon, as they built most things that have endured in the world. It's forgotten now, such are men's memories, but once it was the highway of armies, the route of fleeing peoples.'

'You – you came along this way from Aurungabar when you were just a common soldier,' Mirren ventured, with a timidity quite unlike her.

'Yes,' Corfe said. 'Yes, I did. Almost eighteen years ago.' He remembered the mud, the cold rain, and the hordes of broken people, the bodies lying by the hundred at the side of the road.

'The world is different now, thank God. Up along the Kingsway they've cleared the woods and burnt off the heather and planted farms in the very face of the hills. There are towns there where before it was wilderness. And here, where the towns used to be before the war came, the land has been given back to nature, and the wolves roam unmolested. History turns things on their heads. Perhaps it is no bad thing. And there, up ahead – can you see the ruins?'

A long ridgeline rose ahead of them, a dark spatter of trees marking its crest. And at its northern end could be seen broken walls of low stone, like blackened teeth jutting up from the earth. But closer to, there rose up from the flatter land a tumulus, too symmetrical to be of nature. Atop it a stone cairn stood stark against the sky. The birdsong which had been brash and cheery about them all morning had suddenly stilled. 'What is this place?' Mirren asked in a whisper.

Corfe did not answer, but rode on to the very foot of the tall mound. Here he dismounted, and gave Mirren his hand as she followed suit. The marmoset reappeared and swarmed up to her shoulder, its tail curling about her neck like a scarf.

There were stone flags set in the grass, and the pair climbed up them until they stood before the cairn on the summit. It was some five feet high, and a granite slab had been set upon its top. There were words chiselled into the dark stone.

Here lie we, Tormina's dead.

Whose lives once bought a nation liberty.

Mirren's mouth opened. 'Is this-?'

'The ruins you see were once a hamlet named Armagedir,' Corfe said quietly. 'And the mound?'

'A grave barrow. We gathered all those whom we could find, and interred them here. I have many friends in this place, Mirren.'

She took his hand. 'Does anyone else come here any more?'

'Formio and Aras and I, once every year. Apart from that, it is left to the wolves and the kites and the ravens. Since the mound was raised, this world of ours has moved on at a pace I would never once have believed possible. But it exists in its present form only because of the men whose bones moulder underneath our feet. That is something you, as my daughter, must never forget, even if others do.'

Mirren made as if to speak, but Corfe silenced her with a gesture. 'Wait.'

Arrowing out of the west there came a single bird, a falcon or hawk of some kind. It circled their heads once, and then plummeted towards them. The marmoset shrieked, and Mirren soothed it with a caress. The bird, a large gyrfalcon, alighted on the grass mere feet away, and spent a few seconds rearranging its pinion feathers before opening its hooked beak and speaking in the low mellifluous voice of a grown man.

'Your majesty. We are well met.'

'Golophin. What tidings from the west?'

The bird cocked its head to one side to bring one inhuman yellow eye to bear. 'The combined fleet put to sea three days ago. They are cruising in the area of North Cape and have a squadron out keeping watch on the western approaches to the Brenn Isles. Nothing as yet.'

'But you're sure the enemy is at sea.'

'Oh yes. We've had a picket line of galliots cruising beyond the Hebrionese for four months. In the last sennight every one of them has disappeared. And a fair portion of the northern herrin fleet has failed to make it back to port, and yet the weather has been fine and clear. There's something out there, all right.'

'What of your raptor's eyes?'

A pause, as if the bird were distracted or Golophin was considering his words. 'My familiar is based here, in Torunna, for the moment, your majesty, to keep whole the link between east and west.'

'Charibon then. What news?'

'Ah – there I have something a little more tangible. The Himerian armies are breaking up winter quarters as I speak. They will be on the march within a fortnight I would hazard, or as soon as the Torrin Gap is free of the last drifts. The Thurian Line is awash with marching men.'

'It has begun then,' Corfe breathed. 'After all this time, the curtain has risen.'

'I believe so, sire.'

'What of the Fimbrians?'

'No word as yet. They are playing a waiting game. The Pact of Neyr may have broadcast their neutrality to the world, but they will have to climb down from their fence sooner or later.'

'If this yet-unseen fleet manages to make landfall it could well make up their minds for them.'

'And it will also mean a two-front war.'

'Yes of course.'

'I trust, sire, that all your preparations are in hand?'

'The principal field army awaits only my word to march, and General Aras has the northern garrison on alert at Gaderion. You will let me know as soon as anything hap shy;pens?'

'Of course, sire. May I convey to you the compliments and greetings of your Royal cousin Abeleyn of Hebrion? And now I must go.'

The bird's wings exploded into a flurry of feathers and it took off like a loosed clothyard, soaring up into the spring blue. Corfe watched it go, frowning.

'So that was Golophin – or his familiar, at least,' Mirren said, eyes bright. 'The great Hebrian mage. I've heard so much about him.'

'Yes. He's a good man, though his years are beginning to tell on him now. He took it hard, his apprentice going the way he did.'

'Ah, the Presbyter of the Knights. Is it true he is a werewolf as well as a mage?'

Corfe looked at his daughter closely. 'Someone has been listening at keyholes.'

Mirren flushed. 'It is common folklore, no more.'

'Then you will know that our world is threatened by an unholy trinity. Himerius the anti-Pontiff, Aruan the sorcerer, now Vicar-General of the Inceptine Order, and Bardolin, another arch-mage, who is Presbyter of the Knights Militant. And yes, this Bardolin is rumoured to be a shifter. He was Golophin's friend, and brightest pupil. Now he is Aruan's creature, body and soul. And Aruan is the greatest of the three, for all that he has the lesser rank in the eyes of the world.'

'They say that Aruan is an immortal, the last survivor of an ancient race of men who arose in the west, but who destroyed themselves in ages past with dabbling in black sorcery,' Mirren whispered.

'They say a great deal, but for once there is a nubbin of truth under all the tall tales. This Aruan came out of nowhere scarcely six years ago now, landing at Alsten Island with a few followers in strange-looking ships. Himerius at once recognised him as some kind of messianic prodigy and admitted him to the highest circles of power. He claims to be some form of harbinger of a better age of the world. He is immensely old, that we know, but as for the lost race of conjurors – well, that's a myth, I'm sure. In any case, he has the armies of Perigraine and Almark and half a dozen other principalities to call upon, as well as the Orders of the Knights Militant and the mysterious Hounds. The Second Empire, as this unholy combine is known, is a fact of our waking world-'