The Grim Company (35 page)

Those Highlanders who had pulled steel put their weapons away, though the King’s guards kept their hands close to their hilts. The hulking form of the Shaman walked slowly across to the crimson-garbed man. Yllandris watched, filled with awe. Despite his frail appearance, if this wizard really was Salazar, he possessed enough power to collapse the very mountains around them.

‘Why have you come here?’ the Shaman asked. His voice was unusually quiet, almost apprehensive.

The old man stared down at his counterpart’s hand in distaste. The Shaman saw the look, grunted and tossed Mehmon’s head backwards into the fire which now blazed behind them. The chieftain’s body was already engulfed in flame. Mehmon had saved himself several minutes of intense agony with his desperate story. Whatever one might say about the former chieftain of the North Reaching, he was wily until the end.

Salazar leaned on his cane and tried to blink the tiredness from his eyes. ‘You once made me a promise,’ he said simply. ‘A promise to repay a vow you broke. The time has come to honour it.’

The Shaman narrowed his eyes. ‘What do you need of me?’

‘You know of events in the Trine?’

‘I care not for the outside world.’

‘I destroyed Shadowport. I believe Marius perished within.’

‘Marius,’ the Shaman muttered. ‘He was ever the slyest among us. I would not consider him dead until I saw proof.’

Salazar nodded. ‘Be that as it may, Thelassa now moves against Dorminia. The White Lady has three companies of mercenaries from Sumnia in her employ. They plan to invade. Without help, we cannot hope to win – and my magic is near spent. I lacked the reserves even to Portal here. My journey has taken the best part of a week, using what little power I have available to me.’

The Shaman growled low in his throat.

Salazar stared boldly back. ‘We once fought side by side, Mithradates. United in our tragedy. United in our desire for
vengeance
. Do you remember that much, at least?’

‘I remember. There are some things I cannot forget. I try – but I
cannot forget
.’

‘It is our curse, Mithradates. Our curse and our blessing. I would speak somewhere more private.’

The Shaman shot the King a glare and Magnar rose from his throne. ‘Go back to your homes,’ he ordered loudly. ‘Anyone still here in the time it takes a man to piss will spend a night in the stocks.’

At once relieved and disappointed to be dismissed, the assembled Highlanders began to depart. Yllandris was preparing to follow her sisters when a strong hand seized her firmly by the shoulder. She spun around to stare into the steely gaze of King Magnar himself.

‘Walk with me,’ he said softly. He seemed uncertain – and, Yllandris thought, at that moment, very young.

‘Of course,’ she said. Her smile couldn’t quite reach her eyes, however.

How can a son watch his mother burn?

Grim Tidings

 

 

 

‘Hurry this up. I have things to do.’

Eremul shot the hard-eyed woman a look of undisguised anger. She smirked slightly in response.

You believe you can read my thoughts. I see that glowing bauble beneath your ear. Well, you conceited harpy, I have ways to guard against unwelcome intrusions.

The effort of maintaining a mental shield to defeat the Augmentor’s probing had given him a splitting headache. In fairness, that was almost a welcome distraction from the throbbing lump protruding from his arse, which had swollen to the size of an orange. All in all, he had seen better days.

Recent events in the city had done nothing to improve the Halfmage’s mood. The Tyrant of Dorminia had been absent for a week, leaving that damnable Supreme Augmentor to assume temporary command of the city while Grand Magistrate Timerus regained his strength. The golden-haired commander of Salazar’s elite enforcers had wasted little time in putting Eremul to work, employing him in the dual role of both adviser and errand boy. His latest task was to gather every book he could find containing information about the distant nation of Sumnia. At first he had been secretly pleased with the assignment, thinking he might get a few hours’ respite back at the depository. He had not counted on being shadowed at every turn by Goodlady Cyreena, whose company was about as welcome as a poker up the arse.

Still, much as he despised the malevolent bitch glaring at him from across the room, the true depths of his loathing were reserved solely for himself.

He had held Salazar’s very life in his hands. He could have liberated Dorminia and its people from the grip of its tyrannical, murderous lord and ushered in a new age of justice and prosperity for all. Oh, the city would have been seized by Thelassa in short order, he had no doubt, but life under the White Lady’s banner would surely be better than the random executions and systematic terrorization that were part of everyday life in this festering heap of shit.

He could have been a
hero
, or at the very least an unsung martyr. Instead he had chosen to save his own skin, as befitted the coward he undoubtedly was. He only hoped the Magelord of Thelassa never learned of his actions. In one fell swoop, he had ruined the White Lady’s plan for liberating the Grey City without the need for a bloody war.

Preparations for Dorminia’s defence were well under way. The Crimson Watch had already begun sweeping the poorer districts and conscripting young men into the makeshift army that would defend Dorminia from Thelassa’s hired mercenaries. Eremul doubted the forced enrolment of the city’s dregs would prove to be of much benefit. When given a choice between a known tyrant and a potential saviour, only a fool would fight tooth and nail for the former.

The Halfmage had seen enough of the White Lady’s agents up in the abandoned lighthouse to predict a swift end to the conflict – especially with half the city’s Augmentors forcibly retired and probably suicidal. Dorminia was slipping from Salazar’s grasp, and there was little the ruthless old bastard could do about it. Even a Magelord has limits, and Salazar had exhausted himself destroying Shadowport. And no one knew quite what the White Lady herself was capable of.

‘What do we have so far?’ he asked irritably. There was a small stack of books on a table next to Goodlady Cyreena. She glanced at the spines.

‘Before the Fall: A History of the Events Leading up to the Godswar. A Grand Tour of the Sun Lands. The Soaring Spires: An Examination of Thelassan Society. The Warrior Princes of Sumnia
. What’s this one?’ She picked up a small tome covered in purple leather. ‘
Staring into the Abyss: The Planar Convergence
. What does this have to do with the war?’

‘It doesn’t,’ he snapped in response. ‘It’s something I’m studying in my spare time. That book shouldn’t be in the pile.’

The Augmentor flicked through the pages, her lips pursed in concentration. He had thought her pretty, he recalled – until it became clear she was a barely functioning sociopath. That had killed any latent desire he might have felt.

Not that my passions amount to anything worth a damn
. He hadn’t been intimate with anyone except his right hand for longer than he cared to remember.

‘You believe this? All this nonsense about demons and bogeymen?’ The woman’s voice was scornful.

Eremul sighed in irritation. ‘My wizardly forebears stormed the heavens themselves, did they not? It follows that there is a dark counterpart to the celestial plane.’

‘Your time would be better spent researching how to protect our northern borders from the abominations that plague us. Those are
real
threats – not childish nonsense.’

He couldn’t resist giving the goodlady a scornful look. ‘I am led to understand it is
your
duty to combat these menaces when they threaten Dorminia. Perhaps it is difficult to find the time. After all, you are so very busy terrorizing the populace.’

Cyreena stared back at him. There was something vaguely familiar about that face, but at that moment all he could focus on was the seething hatred burning behind her eyes. ‘I do as I am commanded,’ she said. ‘Nothing more. As should you.’

‘Oh, don’t you worry about my dedication,’ he spat back. ‘After all, did I not save Salazar’s very life? I ought to be posing now for a sculptor. I deserve a statue somewhere in the city, surely. Why, it would barely count as half a job. Ardling could surely negotiate a discount.’

The Augmentor’s voice softened. ‘You sound bitter. I would not blame you for hating our master.’

Her words surprised him. He narrowed his eyes. ‘This is what you do, isn’t it?’ he said accusingly. ‘You tempt the gullible into treacherous thoughts so you can arrest them for treason later on. You fucking
succubus
.’

She stared at him and said nothing.

‘You’re worse than the rest of them,’ he continued. He knew he should probably keep his mouth shut, but recent events and his subsequent treatment as some kind of skivvy for that perfect golden-haired bastard lording it up at the Obelisk had enraged him. ‘How many careless fools have you led to the noose with your tastefully exposed tits and serpent’s tongue? How many families have you destroyed? Do you take some kind of sick pleasure from this?’

Goodlady Cyreena sneered in response, a look of such utter contempt that Eremul was impressed in spite of himself. ‘That’s rich coming from you, Halfmage. You’ve been informing for his lordship for years. The only difference between us is that I do this willingly – not because I’m too much of a coward to choose otherwise. You’re like an abused dog that still tongues his master’s arse hoping for a pat on the head.’

The woman’s words cut him like a blade. She had struck him right where he was weakest. He felt the blood pounding in his head, closed his eyes and gripped the sides of his chair so hard his fingers hurt.
You bitch. You ruthless, perceptive bitch.

His magic burgeoned inside him. He was a hair’s breadth from evoking and unleashing it at the Augmentor when he felt a prick on his hand. He looked down.

There was a tiny speck of blood on his palm. The woman had crossed over to him and stabbed him with her hairpin, which had been hidden underneath her hair. He had forgotten it was there. He felt himself go numb. When he tried to wriggle his fingers they refused to respond.

Goodlady Cyreena watched him like a hawk, her hairpin poised to stab him again. When she was certain he was fully paralysed, she relaxed and placed the pin back in her hair.

He tried to summon his magic again. It was useless. The enchantment that numbed his body also dampened his ability to channel his own magical reserves. He was as powerless as a newborn babe.

Wonderful. The day just gets better and better.
He couldn’t even move his mouth to hurl an obscenity at the damned woman.

‘I want to show you something,’ the Augmentor said. She grabbed his chair and spun him around to face the door, then pushed him outside. A child was kicking a stone down the street. The boy looked up curiously as they emerged into the afternoon sun.

The clouds that had hung over Dorminia like a shroud for the last few days had finally dispersed. Now a new problem faced the city. Bodies were beginning to wash up, hundreds of them, bloated corpses floating in on tides that had travelled all the way from the flooded remnants of Shadowport. The City of Shades was slowly regurgitating its dead.

Eremul watched the clean-up operation in the harbour as the goodlady wheeled him slowly down towards the docks. He had no idea what the woman planned to do with him, but he suspected it would not be pleasant.

Maybe she’s going to throw me into the harbour. Will my chair carry me straight to the bottom like a stone, or will I float free to enjoy a more leisurely drowning? I can hardly decide which I prefer. Perhaps a net will sweep me up and deposit my corpse on one of those trawlers.

He felt strangely calm. If he was going to die, drowning probably wasn’t such a bad way to go.

As it turned out, it appeared his tormentor had other intentions. They stopped short of the harbour and took a left turn into a narrow street piled high with stinking rubbish on either side and peopled with rough-faced men and women. Whether it was Goodlady Cyreena’s demeanour or just the sheer absurdity of an attractive woman wheeling a legless cripple around in one of the scummiest parts of town, no one bothered to molest them as they made their way down the alley. Eventually they stopped in front of a run-down house, little more than a shack, with a broken door and a roof that sagged in the middle and was coated in bird shit.

The Augmentor stood there for a time, staring at the decrepit little building. ‘This is where I was born,’ she said. Her voice was carefully neutral but the words shocked him nonetheless. He found that he could move his eyebrows now. One of them arched up in surprise.

‘You won’t remember the riots that took place during the Culling,’ she continued. ‘I imagine you were indisposed at the time.’

What gave you that idea,
he wanted to say, but his lips still refused to form the words. He made do with a frown.