Hinterland Page 5

  He shoved up and searched the ice-choked canal. A dark hummock lay seven steps upriver. He hurried toward it, followed by Kyllan and his guards.

  Beached against the canal wall, lolling on its side, was the watercraft used to transport Rogger here. The tall fin was broken, its keel sundered as if something had shattered out, like a newborn chick from an egg.

  Tylar glanced at the body on the dock. Kreel. It was the pilot, the head of Fyla’s Hunters. Realization iced through him. This was no nest of old ilk-beasts. These were freshly cursed men and women, ilked just now and sent against them.

  Proving this, a screech again rose from the sky. The winged creature had not fled. It attacked once again, diving upon a pair of guards near the shipwright’s shop. But the men were prepared this time. Pikes staved off the beast, slicing through wings.

  More guards closed to do battle, including Eylan, a sword in one hand, an ax in the other.

  Kyllan shouted orders but remained at Tylar’s side. “Stay back, ser. My men can handle the creature.”

  A claw lashed out and razed to bone the side of one guard’s face. He fell back with a scream. The creature moved with the swiftness of the wind.

  Then it struck him.

  With the swiftness of the wind.

  Tylar lunged forward, dragging Kyllan with him.

  “Ser!”

  Tylar hurried, certain of the truth. He ticked off each in his head: the woman’s wings, Kreel’s flowing form, the first beast’s stony armor. Each of the beasts bore one aspect of Grace: Air, Water, and Loam.

  But one was missing.

  Fire.

  As he ran, he heard a new scream, a woman’s cry, muffled from within the shipwright’s shop.

  Delia.

  Tylar had not been the target of the attack. None of the beasts had set upon him directly. They were after the talisman, the cursed god skull. Even now, the winged creature fought at the entrance, struggling to get inside the shipwright’s shop.

  But something was already there.

  Skirting the battle at the front door, Tylar entered through a broken window. Kyllan followed him into what must have once been an old kitchen, judging from the collapsed stone hearth, now a nest to a pack of rats, and the broken pottery underfoot. Though sheltered from the wind, the room was far colder than the outside.

  Tylar knew why.

  The ilk-beast, cursed with fire, must be drawing to itself what little warmth there was in the space. Tylar silently signaled Kyllan. He had already instructed the sergeant on his duty. Though reluctant, Kyllan headed out the back door to the kitchen, aiming for the rear.

  Tylar stepped toward the other door, one that led to the center hallway.

  As he leaned out, a dagger flew past the tip of his nose. He ducked back—but the blade had never been aimed at him. The dagger flew down the hall and struck a black shape crouched at the threshold to the rear workspace. It stood limned against the campfire back there, bathed in its glow.

  The fourth ilk-beast.

  Rogger’s dagger flew true and struck the figure square in the chest, but the hilt instantly burst into flame. No blood flowed; flesh seared instantly. The steel blade dripped in molten rivulets from the wound.

  Tylar retreated to the other end of the hallway, where Rogger guarded Delia.

  Delia moved closer to him, seeking shelter. “It burnt right through the back of the shop and came at us.”

  Drawn by the campfire, Tylar thought.

  The beast growled, flames licking from black lips, its eyes aglow with an inner fire. It stalked toward the trio.

  Tylar raised his sword against it. Though probably as innocent as Kreel, forged unwillingly, the beast had to die. At their back, the screeching battle with the winged beast continued. Any retreat that way was blocked.

  Rogger took up Tylar’s other side. “Ruined four good daggers. I’m not sure any blade can stop it—not even your Godsword.”

  Tylar had no choice but to risk it—but that didn’t mean he couldn’t better his odds.

  He lunged toward the approaching beast and shouted, “Now, Kyllan!”

  Beyond the creature’s shoulder, he spotted the sergeant racing to the campfire in the back room. He flung out a scrap of sailcloth and swept it over the fire.

  Tylar reached the beast as the sergeant smothered the flames and stamped them out. As Tylar had hoped, the beast had been drawing strength from the flames, siphoning heat and power from the pyre. With the sudden interruption of this fiery font, the beast was momentarily lost.

  In that moment of confusion, Tylar stabbed his blade into the neck of the beast. A backwash of feverish heat struck him, along with the gagging reek of brimstone and burnt flesh. Tylar twisted the blade and drove the sword to its hilt.

  He felt no satisfaction from the kill, picturing Kreel.

  The ilk-beast fell from his sword, toppling back with the last sigh of its corrupted Grace. Like Kreel’s, the body that struck the floor seemed smaller, drained of power, mere flesh again.

  Kyllan hurried toward them, his own sword raised.

  Behind them, a small cheer rose from the guards outside the shop, announcing their own victory over the winged ilk-beast.

  Delia stepped to Tylar’s side. “Your blade…”

  As expected, Tylar held only a hilt in his hand. The sword’s blade was gone. Not melted away. Vanished. It was the curse of the Godsword. The blade was allowed only one blessed strike, then it vanished, needing to be whetted back into existence by a rare source: the blood of an unsundered god.

  But for the moment such a rebirth would have to wait.

  Tylar turned to Rogger. “We have to get that skull of yours out of Chrismferry as quickly as possible.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Someone knows you brought it here. The attack was not random.” Tylar explained about Kreel. “They had to be after the skull.”

  Rogger blanched. “But how did they discern my arrival so quickly? I’ve just touched soil for the first time in days.”

  “I don’t know.”

  Tylar glanced at Delia. As a servant to the gods for many years, she had been schooled in all matters of Grace, far better than either of them. But she merely shook her head. This was beyond even her knowledge. Only one place could possibly unravel this mystery.

  “We need to get the skull to Tashijan,” Tylar said. “For study, for answers.”

  Rogger’s brows drew together warily.

  Tashijan, while home to the Order of Shadowknights and the esteemed Council of Masters, remained a place of divided loyalties. The warden, Argent ser Fields, still bore strong animosities toward Tylar’s regency and for the man himself. But they had fierce allies there also: Kathryn ser Vail, the castellan of Tashijan, and Gerrod Rothkild, one of the most learned of the subterranean masters. The skull would be safe in their care, behind the towering walls of Tashijan.

  But how to get it there?

  “I must travel to Tashijan myself in seven days’ time,” Tylar said. “To regain my knighthood and my place among the Order. But I fear waiting so long before investigating the meaning of this cursed skull. It would be well to have answers by the time I reached there.”

  “I can travel overland,” Rogger said. “I still have many friends in shadowed corners. Best I disappear again. Let no one know my path except my own ears. I can send a note by raven once behind those stout walls.”

  Tylar nodded. “And we’ll meet again in seven days.”

  Rogger still hesitated. “My whole story will have to wait ’til then. It is too long to tell as the night wanes. But I must tell you of one other concern.”

  Tylar nodded for him to continue, but Rogger drew him aside first, away from Kyllan, even away from Delia again.

  “What is it?” Tylar asked once they were alone.

  “The skull…I told you I found it in Saysh Mal, but what I didn’t have time to tell was that someone else sought the skull. Someone only a step behind my own.”

  �
��Who was it?”

  “That’s just it. It makes no sense.”

  “Who?”

  “I only saw his face from a distance. At night. A shadowy face painted in ash.”

  “One of the Black Flaggers?” Such was the custom among the pirates and brigands who trafficked in all matters that shunned the light of day. They blackened their faces with ash to hide their features.

  Rogger nodded. “I was able to capture a message, one sent by wing, but it was cursed. Burned in my fingers before I could read it fully. All I had time to discern was to whom it was addressed.”

  Tylar waited.

  “The letter had been intended for Krevan.”

  Tylar was stung by the words. Krevan was one of their closest allies. A former shadowknight—the famous Raven ser Kay of old—he had been fiercely loyal to Tylar and their cause to free Chrismferry. But the knight had vanished after the Battle of Myrrwood, disappearing back into obscurity. Tylar had suspected he had returned to his role as leader of the Black Flaggers. But what new subterfuge was this? Why would Krevan be looking for the skull, too?

  Judging by Rogger’s expression, he had no answers either.

  Tylar ached to hear Rogger’s full story, but such tales would have to wait.

  “How long will it take you to reach Tashijan?” Tylar asked.

  “Two days—if I follow the most circumspect route.”

  “I will send a raven to Kathryn to tell her to expect you then.”

  “Maybe it would be best if I just surprise her,” Rogger said with a raised brow. “Ravens have a way of being lured astray.”

  Tylar quickly gathered everyone outside the shop. He turned to Rogger for one last word, but the thief was already gone, vanished into the Blight without even a farewell.

  Tylar shook his head as Delia slipped to his side.

  “Will he be safe?” Delia asked, worried for their friend.

  Tylar took her hand. Once again he had no answer. And a greater fear loomed in his heart. Would Rogger be any safer once he reached Tashijan?

  Would any of them?

  3

  A GIRL WITH A WOODEN SWORD

  DART HURRIED DOWN THE SPIRALING FLIGHT OF STAIRS. THE fourth morning bell had already rung, echoing through the throat of Stormwatch Tower. As she ran, she hiked the edge of her cloak to keep from tripping.

  Mustn’t be late…not again.

  Pupp kept pace with her. Her ghostly companion trotted and bounded ahead down the steps, his fiery tongue lolling in the excitement of it all. His form passed through legs and cloaks, unimpeded and unsensed. Nobody could see Pupp, and only stone was solid enough to block his passage.

  Dart was not so lucky.

  At this hour, the central stair was crowded, thwarting her progress. Messengers dashed about in blue livery, burdened with clutched scrolls or shouldered satchels, as frantic to climb as Dart was to descend. The occasional Masters, their bald and tattooed heads bowed together, moved more sedately, rocks in the flowing stream of activity.

  But most of those who shared the stairs were of Dart’s own caste: pages in their half cloaks, squires in their hoods, and towering over all, a jumbling crowd of full-blessed shadowknights. Dart’s brethren marched the stairs in all manner of moods. Some were cloaked and buried in matters that weighted their shoulders; others wore bits of bright colors, enjoying the freedom here. Only in Tashijan could knights walk bare-faced, free of their black cloaks and muffling masklins.

  Here was their home.

  And it had been Dart’s for going on a full turn of seasons.

  Laughter and whispers, shouts and curses, accompanied Dart down the tower toward the practice yard. With the retinue from Chrismferry due in another four days and the festivities to follow, knights had been gathering back home, packing the place full. Even the outlying sections of the sprawling Citadel, long abandoned, had been reoccupied, swelling the ranks.

  Along with the bustle came a thousand requests, suggestions, complaints, threats, and bribes, all rising like smoke to the castellan’s private hermitage at the top of the tower. And since Dart served as page to Castellan Vail, her duties had also multiplied, leaving little time for routine.

  Like her training practice.

  She carried a wooden sword tied to her waist. It was a far cry from the handsome swords of the truly knighted, those rare blades adorned with the black diamonds on their pommels. Still, hers was long enough to bump against her side and threaten to trip her at every step.

  At last she reached the bottom of the wide stairs and broke into the cavernous hall beyond. She kept near the wall, skirting the milling crowds in the center.

  “Hothbrin!”

  She almost didn’t recognize the barked name, not even after a full year here. Then again, it was not really her name. Born an orphan, she had no surname. Only Dart, after the yellow and thorny dartweed that grew stubbornly between stones. Filling the void, Dart had borrowed her friend Laurelle’s family name, taking it on as a mark of their deep bond—though Laurelle was far away, back at Chrismferry, continuing to serve as the Hand of tears for the new regent, Tylar ser Noche.

  “Hothbrin!”

  Dart turned and spotted one of her fellow knights-in-training, a bristle-headed squire named Pyllor, aide to the swordmaster of the school. Though only two years older than Dart, he stood as tall as any knight, and taller than many. He strode toward her.

  Pupp appeared from the throng and stepped between Pyllor and Dart. His molten form grew fiercer, reflecting Dart’s own mood. His mane of spikes bristled at Pyllor’s stormy approach.

  “There you are!” Pyllor strode straight through Pupp and grabbed Dart by the shoulder. “Late again! Swordmaster Yuril ordered me to fetch you. By your heels or hair, she said.”

  “I—I—I had to attend—”

  “I—I—I.” Pyllor mocked her, silencing her. “It’s always about you. Just because you serve the castellan you think you can walk with your nose high and come and go as you please.”

  Pyllor’s words could not be further from the truth. Dart’s service to the castellan offered her little freedom of movement or time. And she surely held herself in no higher regard because of it. In fact, the contrary was true. She always felt set apart from her peers, less prepared, always struggling to catch up with her studies and training.

  But most importantly, Dart felt herself to be an impostor. She had not earned her place here at Tashijan. Her position was all a ruse to hide her behind the tall walls of the Citadel, to keep her safe and near at hand. Only a year ago, Dart had learned her true heritage, that she was a child born of two rogue gods. And while her humours flowed with none of the rich Graces of the gods, her blood carried a single blessing: the ability to whet Rivenscryr, the Godsword of Myrillia, into existence. Thus, she had been sent here, away from Chrismferry, away from the sword itself, to make it harder for both to be stolen at once.

  Otherwise, she was no different from any other girl.

  Only perhaps more lost and alone.

  “Swordmaster Yuril has everyone laboring with drudges as punishment for your tardiness.”

  “But why should the others pay—?”

  “‘A knight is only as strong as the Order itself,’” Pyllor quoted with a disdainful smirk.

  Dart had heard the same throughout her training. The true strength of the Order lay not in a single knight but in the breadth of the Order itself. As one failed, all suffered.

  Such was the lesson being taught this morning.

  Courtesy of Dart’s tardiness.

  She needed no further prodding to hurry out of the tower and toward the tiers of training fields beyond. The pages apprenticed to the Order held the grounds farthest afield. Dart passed a group of squires practicing lunges on horseback, kicking up clods of mud, earning jeers and accolades from their peers. She sensed the deep brotherhood among them all. What would it be like to be so accepted?

  Dart hurried on, eventually spotting her fellow knights-in-training. They were
yoked like oxen to wooden and iron drudges, dragging the sleds across the frozen mud and yellow grass, a hard exercise to strengthen back and legs.

  Overseeing their labor, Swordmaster Yuril stood with her arms crossed, a pipe of blackleaf clenched between her teeth. Though the woman’s dark hair was streaked with gray, she remained whip-thin and hard of countenance. She heard Dart’s approach and turned to face the late pupil.

  “Ah, Hothbrin, good of you to join us.”

  Dart dropped to one knee, bowed her head, then regained her feet. “My duties—”

  “—are here,” Yuril said. “Not up in the castellan’s hermitage. Castellan Vail knows this as well as I. And you can tell her that from me.”

  “Yes, mistress.”

  Yuril whistled around the edge of her pipe. “Enough with the drudges! Gather round!”

  With grateful groans, Dart’s peers slipped yokes from sore shoulders and hobbled across the field. Dart shied from their hard-eyed glares. All knew whom to blame for their sore morning, but they all also knew better than to complain aloud. That would come later. When they were out from under the baleful eye of Swordmaster Yuril.

  “We’ll start today with basic form and position, then proceed with a few sparring matches.”

  They lined up in rows of four. Dart wanted to slink toward the back, but the swordmaster would not let her so easily shirk away. She was made to stand at the front of one row. For a full ring of the bell, they ran through the basic forms of defense and offense: Swayback Feint, Dogtoed Parry, Cusp-to-Cusp, Trailing Hilt, Thrusted Lash, and a blur of others.

  Dart tried her best, but her lack of practice showed in the dropped point of her blade during Jackman’s Tie and the tremble in her wrist as she moved from Honeynest to Sweeper’s Row. Swordmaster Yuril corrected each mistake. She snapped out with a cane, striking Dart’s wooden sword, stinging her fingers, making her repeat the form.

  At these moments, all eyes were on her. Dart felt the weight of their attention, sensed the ill will, the bitter amusement. Tears threatened to rise, but she refused to relent.

  Finally she reached the last form, a complicated dance of wrist and steel named Naethryn’s Folly. It was a feint used to disarm an opponent. It was a risky maneuver. If not performed flawlessly, the dance would end with your own sword on the ground. Still, if you could lure your opponent into the dance and not fail, it was almost impossible to counter.