Darkburn Book 3: The Gates of Kelvha by Tayin Machrie - HTML preview

Chapter 23

“The boy called him the tiger-killer?” repeated Parthenal. “Well, Rothir, it seems you’ve got yourself a name already.” He sounded amused, and perhaps even, Rothir thought, a touch aggrieved. Rothir sympathised with his sense of slight injustice. Parthenal’s single combat should have been the highlight of the joust.

“It’s a name I don’t want,” he answered, sitting on the wooden settle which was polished to inky darkness not by carefully applied beeswax but by decades of spillages and thousands of backsides. This inn of Leor’s was a drab, unadorned place; but for that reason, Rothir considered that it was as good a meeting-place as any for the Riders to confer. Plenty of mouse-holes, but no spy-holes. No fine mosaics or even pictures on the wall for a spy-hole to lurk in. Groups of Riders were huddled under the low smoke-stained ceiling.

“Don’t worry,” said Yaret, sitting by him. “People’s memories are short. Unless you manage to kill a firedrake in the next week they’ll soon have forgotten all about the tiger.”

“I wish I could forget about it myself,” Rothir said soberly. “It’s always there, lying on the sawdust, dying. Like an after-image of the sun inside my skull. A striped sun.”

“You’re still not quite yourself,” Parthenal advised him. “Looking a bit dazed, I’d say.”

“Or a shadow of the moon. Bars of white and black,” said Yaret meditatively.

Rothir thought about it: that slow, heavy, rippling tide. “Black and silver. Yes. You’re still aware of her?” He did not want to name the subject of his thoughts – not even merely as the huntress – in case she somehow reappeared. But with Yaret he did not need to spell it out.

“Much of the time,” said Yaret, “to some degree or other,” and she glanced over at Veron, who was talking vigorously to Huldarion on the far side of the parlour. Leor, Uld and Solon were with them: Leor looked unhappy, Uld attentive and Solon bored. But boredom was a facade for Solon just as impassivity was for Huldarion. Thoronal stood adrift of the others, staring down at the cold fireplace.

“I don’t know what Veron is made of,” said Yaret, “that he can withstand it.”

“Leather and iron,” said Delgeb.

“He’s lived his life beneath the moon,” said Parthenal, “hunting. Never mind that for now. Why is Huldarion so angry?” Rothir could not see any anger in his chieftain’s face, but Parthenal continued, “What’s been going on inside that temple of Borgun? I don’t understand it properly.”

“I don’t understand it at all,” said Rothir. Yaret had explained about some complex imposture of Leor – or was it of Huldarion? The details had slipped past him, between those bars of black and silver.

Yaret began to explain, again. “It seems that whoever entered the temple in the guise of Huldarion wanted the people of the city to think he was actually Leor.”

There it was again. He still didn’t follow.

“According to Leor the imposter looked exactly like him,” Yaret went on. “Then he changed shape from Leor to Huldarion in front of three gossiping old ladies – who would have heard all about Huldarion’s scars, and were duly amazed. So half the city will have heard about that magic transformation by now. Leor turning himself into Huldarion.”

“They won’t necessarily believe it,” said Shebel.

“But we know it happened,” countered Parthenal, “because we know who it really was.”

“Adon,” said Yaret, who seemed to feel none of the aversion to naming him that the Riders did.

Adon. His very name turns my stomach, thought Rothir; I am even less willing to name him than I am the huntress, although I have only knowingly seen him four times in my life, and always at a distance; in battle, or rather at the edges of it. Adon lets others do his fighting for him, even though he cannot die, supposedly. Any wound will heal itself. I could not even describe him now except to say that he looks young. Or rather, ageless: unlined, handsome, I suppose. A blank canvas of a face. I daresay he can draw on it whatever features he requires.

Yaret was still explaining. “According to Leor, Adon made sure that he was noticed as he walked through the city in Leor’s shape. He made himself conspicuous. And he made sure that he was witnessed when he transformed into Huldarion.”

“He is a despicable creature,” said Parthenal with cold contempt. “To pretend to be Huldarion? A man worth a thousand of him? No, more, infinitely more, because he himself is worthless.”

“Good at deceit, however. If the priest had not been forewarned, he might have accepted him as Huldarion,” said Yaret. “But not for long. Word from outside would have quickly reached the temple. The priest would have soon learnt of the transformation. So Adon was hoping to deceive the priest into thinking he had been visited by Leor in disguise.”

“Convoluted,” commented Tiburé, and Rothir silently agreed. So convoluted that he still did not quite follow it. In fact, he was not sure what he was meant to be following.

“Did he say anything important to the priest while he was inside the temple?” Shebel asked.

Yaret shook her head. “Not according to Veron, who has been acting as our emissary to the priest. The man pretending to be Huldarion stayed only for a few moments. He knelt before the statues of Borgun, and spoke three sentences. Then he left by the main door. A little later the priest left by the back, and reported to Veron.”

“And what were those three sentences?” asked Parthenal.

“Firstly, I greet you in the name of all the Vonn.”

“Ah,” said Parthenal. “No wonder Huldarion looks so angry.”

“And then when the priest spoke to him, the impostor stared at the statue and said, Borgun should have a ruby on his forehead, a jewel made of blood.”

“Very poetic,” commented Delgeb. “And the third thing he said?”

“Shall the statue come to life and rise up for the people?”

“Whoa,” said Delgeb. “Ominous.”

“However,” said Yaret, “he knew the priest would soon discover that he had not been talking to Huldarion at all.”

“Then the purpose of the visit was… what? ” asked Rothir, doubtful that he had actually understood this tale correctly.

“Simply to implicate Leor, it would seem.”

“And to make Huldarion distrust Leor,” added Delgeb.

“To sow discord and disharmony,” said Parthenal. “He wants us fighting amongst ourselves.” He stood with his head bowed, not in humility but as a necessity; for he almost touched the ceiling in this gloomy low-beamed parlour.

“But Adon was clumsy,” said Yaret.

“He is not known for being clumsy,” Tiburé said drily.

“Oh, I should think Adon is very clever,” she replied, “and that he knows it. And that he imagines everyone else to be stupid in comparison. That’s why he didn’t expect Leor to be there. He assumed he would know if Leor was anywhere near him. But the whole business of transforming in front of the old ladies was clumsy. Theatrical.”

“He likes theatre,” said Tiburé thoughtfully.

“I daresay. I expect he likes to be looked at. But it sounds very ostentatious. And Adon was trying to be too clever. He made a mistake.”

“He is not known for making mistakes either,” said Parthenal. “What do you mean?”

Yaret shook her head. Huldarion was walking over to them with his group.

They all stood up. As he did the same, it occurred to Rothir that this was something new. Huldarion would not have wanted such a gesture before he came to Kelvha: nor did he ask for it now – yet it seemed to be required. Things were changing.

Although three years younger, Rothir had always loved Huldarion as a friend. But since he had displeased Huldarion by allowing the capture of the darkburn, the relationship had seemed more one of master and unworthy bondsman. No, liegeman; for he was bound to Huldarion by fidelity and not by any law. And he did not consider himself unworthy. Yet he did not know if he was fully back in favour. The tiger’s death had helped, perhaps.

The silver bars again intruded on his thoughts... He tried to make his way between them and was aware of Yaret looking over at him with knit brows.

“What Yaret means is this,” said Huldarion calmly. “When the priest spoke to the impostor, he asked him for a password which had come from me, a word known only to the Vonn. But I had named a false password within the castle walls, in the chart room where I knew there was a spyhole. Ruby was the false word. And that is the word that the impostor gave back to the priest.”

Rothir nodded. To his relief, he understood that. “So he has spies within the castle.”

“What password?” asked Thoronal, now speaking for the first time. “We have never had such a thing.”

Huldarion looked at him gravely. “It was for this occasion only. But I will not say it here.” That made Rothir wonder why not. Did Huldarion not trust even his own Riders? Did he not consider them all bound to him by equal fidelity? That troubled him, in case it was Rothir himself whom Huldarion did not trust.

“So that is the mistake you meant,” said Parthenal to Yaret.

She shook her head again. “Not quite. Look: Adon was pretending to be Leor. But how could Leor know a password that was a secret known only to the Vonn?”

They all turned and looked at Leor.

“I have never known any such secret word,” said the wizard, “and although I would be flattered to be entrusted with it, I would not expect it.”

“There has never been any such secret word,” Huldarion said, “until now.”

“Maybe it is something that we should adopt,” suggested Solon.

But Parthenal was ruminating on Adon. “The ignoble one might have thought that Leor could have guessed the word. The king’s crown at Caervonn bears a single ruby – no other jewel.”

“It’s not a pretty thing,” explained Huldarion to Yaret. “But it is of great significance, and fame, having been won in battle six hundred years ago.”

Rothir was glad to see Huldarion addressing her with such consideration, as if he respected her judgement. My protégé, he thought. It was Veron who called her that. I don’t know why. She is more a protégé of Veron’s. One of the hunters now, like that man Zan.

“I see,” said Yaret. “But it was still clumsy of Adon.”

“I like to think of him as being clumsy,” Delgeb said.

“However, his clumsiness is not something that we can rely on,” said Huldarion. “The next question is: who is the spy? Who listened to our conversation – or set a listener at the spyhole – and then gave the secret password to Adon?”

“My money’s on Nerogun,” said Veron.

Rothir immediately felt that he did not agree, yet he could not pin-point why. He tried to gather his wits together sufficiently to work it out, because he needed to show that he understood all this; although its tangled strangeness seemed to have tied knots in his thoughts.

“I don’t see Nerogun playing second fiddle to anyone,” he objected. “Because… because, what would he have to gain by that sort of treachery? He already has all the power that he needs. He’s at the top of his tree. Doesn’t need to be beholden to anyone. Wouldn’t want to be.”

“Perhaps not,” said Huldarion. “Who else, then?”

“That little nervous man,” said Thoronal, “who knew where all the spyholes were. The archivist.”

“I doubt that,” said Parthenal irritably, for once letting his dislike of his cousin show. “Tamu is harmless.”

“He may appear harmless. But he doesn’t seem to like the rulers of the castle.”

“He likes us,” said Parthenal.

“Tamu may know where the spyholes are, but he’s unlikely to be the person monitoring them,” said Uld. “Who could have been listening to you talk inside the chart room? That’s our man – or anyone whom he reports to.”

“What about the Keeper of the Keys?” asked Shebel.

“Melegan? He’s too indolent to be a spy,” said Tiburé with certainty.

“That soldier Jeveran,” said Solon.

Huldarion frowned. Clearly he did not like the suggestion. Yet Rothir felt it was more likely than Tamu, because Jeveran had influence and confidence where Tamu had neither.

He thought, with a vague lurch of uneasiness, that he would never before have considered that Huldarion was a man to dismiss an idea simply because it was unwelcome. Something had changed. What had changed? Maybe merely himself… he felt another slow surge of black and silver bars, and tried to focus on the names.

“Perhaps Shargun is the traitor,” added Uld.

At that Huldarion nodded slowly, as if that idea were more welcome. “Possibly; although, like Nerogun, Shargun already wields sufficient power. A traitor is, perhaps, more likely to be someone a little lower down the ranks, somebody who wants to rise. Do you remember the man in the armoury, the day we came here?”

“The assistant to the Keeper of the Swords?” said Thoronal. “That insolent man?”

“Iajo,” said Huldarion. “For some reason he springs to my mind.” He sighed. “But there is no point in guessing. We shall just have to assume that everyone inside Kelvha Castle is potentially a traitor. Even if it’s only one man.”

“Or woman,” added Rothir.

Huldarion’s eyes narrowed slightly. Yet Rothir considered it to be a fair point. If Huldarion was to marry Meya he needed to be aware of the possibility that she might not be all she seemed.

For nothing in this place is what it seems, he thought. Everything is stripes and shadows. Huldarion has to keep his eyes open. And with an instant of clear apprehension he felt that Huldarion must not allow himself to be blinded by his desires, even as he drew closer to fulfilling them.

“Or woman, indeed,” Huldarion answered levelly. “And now I need to go back to the castle. Another dinner awaits, with too much wine and pastry, and the High Prince’s company.”

“Which is not scintillating,” said Parthenal. “Do I have to come?”

“No, you need not attend,” Huldarion replied. “I expect Sashel will not turn it down.”

“Life in the castle seems to suit Sashel.”

Huldarion seemed to consider this before answering, “He likes some aspects of it, I believe.”

“Good. I admit I don’t,” said Parthenal. “I mean the ceremony, the hierarchy, the way they speak to their servants.”

Huldarion put a hand briefly on his shoulder. “I know that. I don’t care for it either. And I know that many of the Riders are frustrated by having to linger here, their skills unused.”

“All that pastry, and nothing to do,” said Rothir.

“Speak for yourself,” said Veron. “How long before we ride out to battle with the stonemen?”

“A fortnight at the soonest,” Huldarion answered. “The scouts left yesterday – the second group. The ones I sent out earlier are returning now in ones and twos. Crade arrived this morning.”

“Do the Kelvhans know that? Where d’you meet him?” Veron demanded.

“I have a place,” said Huldarion. He nodded to them and departed with Thoronal, Uld and Solon in his train. A king with his retinue, thought Rothir, of which I seem to be no longer part. They all had to duck as they went out through the crooked doorway.