Roger Taylor - Caddoran

The recollection of Thyrn’s strangeness brought calmer thoughts in its wake, reminded her of the certainties in her life. Vashnar had the qualities of a great leader, but even in madness he would not have had the imagination to think of something like this. And his manner now was not, after all, hysterical, still less deranged. Then too, he had said what he had said, knowing what it must sound like, when he could equally well have fabricated some plausible lie to explain what had happened. He had turned to her with the truth, or with what he perceived to be the truth, knowing he could rely on her support absolutely. He needed her.

Her anger vanished. She must be strong for him now. She must be strong for both of them. Looking at him as she reached this conclusion, it came to her, entwined around the image of Thyrn, that her husband was the way he was now not because of some sudden inner failing but because he must be struggling with something he had never known before.

Something had happened which was not only frightening but which he did not begin to understand. His obsessive nature would not respond well to that.

Threads of clarity began to form in the confusion. Obviously, they told her, whatever had occurred had been deeply strange, and Vashnar had misinterpreted it; grievously so, by the sound of it. Exactly what it had been she would have to discover, but that would need a quieter time. For now, it would probably be better for her to focus on the action he had taken, and its likely consequences, and determine how these could best be turned to advantage.

Forcing herself to calmness, she spoke to him like a parent seeking clarification of a serious misdeed from a normally well-behaved child. ‘And you’ve proclaimed the Death Cry against Hyrald and the others as well?’ Vashnar seemed grateful for the tone of the question.

‘No choice, Vellain. No choice. It was a mistake to send them after him in the first place. I realized that almost as soon as I’d done it.’

That was good. He had never been afraid to admit an error to her; he was rational and at least trying to take command of himself.

‘The look on his face, Vellain…’ He shook his head. ‘No, not just the face. More than that. His thoughts. They swept over me in a great rush. I felt them, just as if they were my own, but I could tell they weren’t. Don’t ask me what was happening, but that’s what it was. And he’d seen something he shouldn’t have and he knew it. He even knew I was going to kill him – then and there – at the very instant I was thinking about it.’

He fell silent.

Vellain was staggered by this last revelation. She knew her husband was capable of extreme violence, it had been a necessary part of his job in the early years. Indeed, she found it not unattractive. But even to have contemplated so public an assassination was more startling than the proclamation of the Death Cry itself.

‘But?’ she prompted after a moment, controlling her voice with difficulty.

Vashnar frowned. ‘Something stopped me. I couldn’t move. Couldn’t move! As though part of me were terrified.’

Vellain waited.

‘Then he was gone.’ The events having been forced into words, Vashnar was slowly becoming his normal self. ‘Fortunately there was no one in the outer office, because I don’t think I could have moved if they’d come in. And I don’t know how long I sat there.’

‘So you sent Hyrald and the others after him?’

Vashnar grimaced. ‘Yes. They were the nearest. Handle it quietly, I thought. I don’t know what possessed me. I mustn’t have been thinking properly.’ He straightened up. ‘I wasn’t thinking properly. I knew he was going to blurt out what had happened to anyone he met – Caddoran Oath or not. I knew it. Rhavvan wouldn’t be a problem. He’s just a plodding Warden, he’ll do as he’s told. But Hyrald would have been suspicious at the least, and you know him, he never gives up. Too much of a street Warden. It’s a shame, but we’d have had to deal with him sooner or later – and that sister of his.’ Vellain nodded; it was a matter they had discussed in the past.

‘Hence the Death Cry for all of them.’

‘For all of them,’ Vashnar confirmed. ‘There wasn’t time to have them dealt with discreetly. I’d no one immediately to hand who could’ve done it. The idea of the Death Cry just came to me out of nowhere.’ He gave a bitter grunt. ‘One of the advantages of my assiduous study of our history, my dear. Ideal, I thought. The mob would do the job before Thyrn or the others had a chance to be heard.’

But while none of the fugitives had apparently spoken out, the mob hadn’t done the job, Vellain mused as she sat watching her silent husband staring into the dead grate. Hyrald was not only able, he was popular. Almost certainly someone had warned him, and more than a few would have helped him. The only redeeming factor of his escape was that he was now probably far from both Arvenshelm and help. The latest rumours were that the group was fleeing north. All in all, it was a better conclusion than it had promised to be, not least because it removed Hyrald from any opportunity to oppose Vashnar’s plans. And too, she reflected, the resurrection of this ancient form of justice had brought an uneasiness – a tension – to the streets, which she was sure could be used as an excuse for Vashnar to recruit new Wardens and increase his already considerable power.

It concerned her a little however, that since that day she had been unable to persuade her husband to discuss in more detail what had happened during his encounter with Thyrn. Something told her that it could not be allowed to lie, to fester unseen. Who knew what harm might come of it, mouldering in the darkness? But a range of approaches, from the oblique to the very direct, had failed to elicit anything other than an offhand dismissal.

‘Some other time, my dear.’

In the end, sensing that further effort might serve only to build up resistance, she had resolved to retreat and to watch and wait. Sooner or later, an opportunity would present itself and she must be ready.

Could it be now? she wondered. Vashnar had arrived home unexpectedly and had been unusually silent. Something bad had happened, she could sense it, and though the only outward sign of anything out of the ordinary had been a bloodstained kerchief, she could not shake off the feeling that Thyrn was involved in some way.

‘Trouble with a prisoner?’ she had asked as casually as she could, though she knew that Senior Wardens rarely had anything to do with prisoners. Her concerns were confirmed when she received only a cursory shake of the head by way of reply.

Now, long into his silence, she tried again.

‘Reading the coals?’ she asked with a smile.

Vashnar turned to her blankly.

‘Reading the coals?’ she repeated, still smiling. It was a game they played in the winter months: watching the progress of the flames hissing and spitting through a landscape of glowing coals; wagering which crag would be the first engorged, which valley filled and choked, which sheer face would suddenly spall and crash to fill the black air with bright fleeing sparks. The whole like a distant and terrible battlefield where weapons beyond imagining were being used, and where all led inexorably to a great levelling and a dull grey death.

He glanced back at the dead grate, but did not respond to her irony. It gave her the opportunity she needed. She reached forward and laid a hand on his arm. What’s the matter?’ she said simply.

Vashnar met her gaze. It urged him on. He patted her hand then placed the ends of his fingers against his forehead. ‘Thyrn,’ he replied.

‘Has he been caught?’ Vellain asked urgently, torn between exhilaration and fear that perhaps the errant Caddoran had made public what he had discovered.