The Crimson Shield Read online

  ‘I killed two of them,’ said Sarvic. ‘Not one.’ Ten Marroc put to death for every Lhosir murdered. The demon-prince had made sure everyone knew.

  Valaric turned away. ‘You want to fight them, you fight them my way.’

  ‘And what way’s that, Valaric? Sit around and wait for them to get old? They won’t stop coming. It’s like it was fifteen years ago, all over again.’

  ‘Is it? And how would you know that?’ Valaric turned back sharply. ‘Fifteen years ago you were barely even a boy. You know nothing, Sarvic, and no, it’s not like it was the last time. The last time they came we still had our pride. No, we don’t wait for them to get old, we wait for the Vathen to come, you clod. The demon-prince has gone off looking for the Crimson Shield. The Widowmaker’s setting his camp, and say what you will about him but the Nightmare of the North is far less fond of his ravens than that bastard Twelvefingers. Or he would be if people like you stopped to think for a bit.’ Valaric’s eyes glittered. ‘My way is the way of letting the Vathen and the forkbeards kill each other. That’s what they both want, after all. It doesn’t matter to me who wins, because afterwards we finish them off, whoever they are. Vathen, Lhosir, we take our land back from both. That’s my way, Sarvic, and I’ll be needing an army to do it, not a handful of angry murderers. A Marroc army, you fool.’ He pulled at Sarvic’s shirt and then waved his hands in disgust. ‘Look at you. Throw that away. Get the blood off you. And stay out of my sight. You’ll know when it’s time. Keep quiet, and if that’s just too much for you, go and find others and tell them the same.’ He gave Sarvic his own shirt and then looked down. ‘New boots?’ Sarvic nodded. ‘Throw them in the river. You got blood on them.’

  He pushed Sarvic back out into the alley. The forkbeards were probably long gone, but Sarvic stuck to the shadows as he made his way home. Just in case.

  It was only later that he realised where Valaric had taken him. The back of the Grey Man.

  24

  SHADOWS UNDER STARS

  The monastery gates stayed closed. In the morning light it was clear that the fire had hardly touched them. Medrin swore and cursed and had the Lhosir cutting down trees to make a ram for something to do, all of which seemed to Gallow a waste of time. Jyrdas simply shook his head, laughed and walked off while the others set to work. He didn’t come back until the middle of the day.

  ‘There’s a rise a few miles back that way.’ He pointed inland. ‘You can see all the way to Pendrin castle.’

  Medrin looked at him as though he was mad. Tolvis shook his head. ‘Getting excited, One-Eye?’

  Jyrdas cuffed him. ‘Strawhead! There’s two hundred men could come at us from Pendrin, and they saw that beacon lit as we came in, clear as I did. They know we’re here. They won’t know our strength and that’ll make them cautious, but they’ll come. Be quite a fight when they do. Glorious.’ By which he meant they’d all die.

  ‘Are they marching on us already?’ snapped Medrin.

  Jyrdas gave him a scornful look. ‘Even with two eyes I could never see across twenty miles of hills and look inside a castle. If they’re on the move, they’re not close. Take them a day to sort their arses and their elbows from one another, but they’ll be on the move before long, I’d reckon. Master of Pendrin castle was a fierce old sod last time I heard.’

  ‘They’ll be on us tomorrow then?’ Medrin’s jaw twitched. None of them liked the idea of trying to force a ram through the monastery gates, not with the bridge curved like it was and the islanders up above dropping rocks and javelins and burning pitch and Maker-Devourer knew what else on them. But the bridge was the only way in.

  Jyrdas shrugged like he didn’t much care either way. ‘Might be. Might be they’ll wait longer. Might be the old bastard’s off elsewhere bashing some other heads and they won’t come at all. If he is there, then sooner or later he’ll come. I’ll stake my eye on it.’

  Medrin looked up at him askance. ‘Which one?’

  Jyrdas didn’t answer. He towered and glared instead, letting his size speak for him. The two of them stood glowering at each other until Horsan, who was every bit as big as Jyrdas, came and stood beside his prince and Medrin turned away with a shake of his head.

  They made their ram and carried it to the bridge anyway. Then they had a good long look at what they were about to try and even Medrin had to bow his head and agree that it wasn’t going to work. With the curve of the bridge being what it was, they could get maybe six men to swing the ram, while the gates were solid wood and iron. Maybe, left to get on with it for a bit, the ram might have been enough, but six men left no one to hold shields over them and the bridge was too narrow for shield bearers to stand to either side. Whoever had built it had known what they were doing.

  ‘Bugger to get stuff in and out,’ muttered Tolvis, which didn’t help.

  Medrin sent them back to the woods with their axes. They’d build a cover for the ram, he told them. A wooden box on wheels with the ram hanging inside, thick and strong enough to keep out stones and javelins. Jyrdas just laughed. ‘Over that bridge? I don’t think so.’ He watched them work, merrily telling them everything they were doing wrong without lifting a finger to help. ‘It’s not going to work,’ he said. ‘Nice as it is to get a bit of practice swinging my axe, I’d rather it was at someone’s head. Even if you get it to the gate, they’ll just drop fire on you.’

  As the sun started to fade, Gorrin came back all out of breath from the rise where Medrin had sent him to keep watch. Someone with two eyes that actually work, Medrin had said, and it wasn’t like Gorrin was much use for anything else with his arm smashed up. ‘There’s a force on the way from the castle. A few miles away. Can’t see how many.’

  ‘Couple of hundred.’ Jyrdas yawned.

  ‘Could be that.’

  ‘Or could be anything else!’ snapped Medrin.

  ‘Well that’s how many men he has.’ Jyrdas shrugged. ‘Might have killed a dragon while no one was looking and grown a few more from its teeth, I suppose. Might have.’ He shook his head and rolled his one eye.

  Gorrin blinked, confused. ‘They’re setting a camp. I can’t see all of it.’

  ‘Was here a couple of years back,’ said Jyrdas, stretching and stifling a yawn. ‘That was when I first heard about the shield. Just a ship of us. Thought we’d have a fine old time sacking a few villages up and down the coast. Couple of hundred men came out of that castle right quick and they were a mean lot too.’

  ‘You fought them?’ Medrin frowned.

  ‘Nope, we hopped back on our ship and buggered off sharp-like.’ Jyrdas cricked his neck. ‘Weren’t here for a fight. Not that time.’

  ‘How far to this camp?’

  Gorrin winced and held his arm. ‘Couple of hours if they march quick. Could have been here by nightfall if they’d kept on coming.’

  Jyrdas shook his head. ‘Worn down from a day’s march and no idea how many we are? No, and they know that no one’s getting into that monastery in any hurry. Could take the fight to them, I suppose. Wait until dark and then fall on them in their beds. Make a big noise. That way they won’t see we’re not so many after all. Might work. Probably would if they were Marroc. Not so sure about here – ferocious bunch, these sheep-shaggers. Could be they’ll hold and then likely as not they’ll kick us back into the sea, but it would make a good offering to the Maker-Devourer either way.’

  ‘We’re here to get the shield,’ Medrin growled. ‘Fine. Jyrdas, go back to the ship. Take the men we left there. Fall on them in their beds and send them running.’

  Jyrdas looked at him like he was mad. ‘What?’

  ‘You heard. Take the men watching the ships and do it.’

  ‘I see. Well, if that’s what you want, then yes, I could do that. Don’t see as how it would help you. Thirteen against a couple of hundred. We’d have to be mighty terrible indeed.’

  ‘Aren’t you?’

  ‘There’s me with my one eye. Still terrible, I reckon. Then there’s Latt
i with that jaw I cracked for him. Maybe not quite as mighty as he was right now. And Yeshk with his foot. I mean, he’ll fight well enough once he gets there, but that might not be until tomorrow morning. And Dvag’s got three broken fingers on account of that punch he threw at Blue Forri, and Forri’s shoulder hasn’t been working right ever since. But, right enough, if you want some heads broken, we’ll do that. Pity about none of us getting to see the Crimson Shield in the end, but when they burn our ships and pin you to the cliffs and send you off to visit us in the Maker-Devourer’s cauldron on the morrow, you can tells us all what you thought it would look like, eh?’

  For a moment Medrin stared at Jyrdas like he was a rabid animal needing to be put down. Whatever favour Jyrdas had had, Gallow reckoned he’d just lost it. But he’d said what he’d said, and so had Medrin, and neither of them would move an inch now, and so Jyrdas and the others would march off into the twilight and get themselves killed just to prove a point, and Medrin would let it happen, and when they sailed empty-handed back to Andhun, Jyrdas would take the blame.

  ‘There might be another way,’ Gallow said. Because there was, and he’d been thinking about it all through the day.

  Medrin fixed an eye on him. ‘You can go with Jyrdas too. The mighty Gallow Truesword. The Screambreaker seems to like you. You can show us you’re not a sheep even if you look like one.’

  ‘I’m here, aren’t I? There was another time we went looking for the Crimson Shield, you and I. Don’t think I’ve forgotten.’

  ‘And don’t think I have, either.’ Medrin glowered, poised to go on, then bit back on whatever words were waiting. Instead he laughed. ‘So, what is it, this other way? Going to take some nice Marroc words with you and ask these nioingr to open their gates for us?’ He rolled his eyes. ‘If it was that easy—’

  ‘Go on,’ butted in Jyrdas. ‘What’s this other way that none of the rest of us have thought of then, clean-skin?’

  ‘We climb the cliff.’

  Several of them laughed. ‘And how do we get there? Got an Aulian witch squirrelled away to cast some spells so we can walk across the water?’

  ‘When the tide’s right out, you can see rocks down in the water almost right across the gap. That’ll be about an hour after dark.’ The look on them changed right there, Jyrdas and Tolvis and a few of the others who could see where he was going. Even Medrin, but then no one had ever said Medrin was stupid. ‘Won’t be easy, but there’s rocks to hold right across to the bottom of the cliff.’

  ‘And some right buggers of waves in between them,’ grumbled Jyrdas. ‘No place in the Maker-Devourer’s cauldron for the drowned.’

  Gallow shrugged. ‘If you don’t think you can do it . . .’

  ‘Don’t you start.’ Jyrdas’s one good eye burned. ‘So if you get across the water, then what, clean-skin?’

  ‘Climb the cliff.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘Climb the wall. Slip inside. Open the gate.’

  Jyrdas was shaking his head. ‘Might as well just get that Aulian witch of yours to grow us some wings – would be a mighty sight easier than making the sea be still and making the watchers on the wall go blind and stupid. I’ll grant you might climb the cliff. Don’t know how you’re going to climb the wall on the top of it though. Get a cloud to carry you?’ He laughed.

  ‘They’ll be watching the bridge. They won’t be watching the other side.’

  Medrin was looking at Gallow intently. ‘O One-Eye, you don’t know this man like I do. Gallow here could climb that wall right enough. Always was good for that sort of thing.’ He smiled. ‘Jyrdas, go and get the men from the ship and bring them anyway. Gallow opens the gates for us or else you can show the nioingr over the hill how terrible you are. One or the other.’

  ‘I’ll want two more men with me. Climbers who aren’t afraid of the sea.’

  ‘Loudmouth,’ said Medrin at once. ‘He’ll have to be quiet for once. Be a new experience for him and he needs the practice.’ He started looking among the others for a third.

  ‘Me,’ said Jyrdas. ‘I’ll go.’

  For a long time Medrin held his eye. Then, very slowly, he nodded. ‘The Screambreaker’s men. All three of you. Fitting. Even here, with a hundred miles of sea between us, he has to make his point. Go on then, One-Eye. You do that.’

  ‘And if we bugger it up and you have to go traipsing across the hills to bring down a few nightmares on Pendrin’s sleeping army, you can do that yourself. Can’t think of anyone better.’

  Gallow hid a smile. Medrin wore his on his face but there was no love in it, not one little bit. ‘Nicely done, One-Eye. Nicely done.’

  Jyrdas laughed and ran off to get the men from the ships. If someone came in the night and set fire to them both, well then that was just the Maker-Devourer’s way of telling them that they weren’t meant to have the shield – that or that they were meant to fight their way to the nearest fishing village and steal themselves a new boat. Gallow and Tolvis went and sat at the top of the cliff, looking at the monastery, far enough from the bridge so they didn’t have to worry about the odd javelin. They watched while the islanders on the wall watched them back. Gallow’s eyes traced the routes around the cliff.

  ‘I was thinking,’ Tolvis said quietly, ‘that we could simply send half the men away on the ships while the rest of us hide nearby for a few days. They’d see our sails from up there. They’d think we were gone.’

  ‘Take them a few days to feel safe enough to come out.’

  ‘Are we in a hurry?’

  ‘The Vathen will march on Andhun sooner or later. You have to wonder what’s holding them up.’

  ‘The sword,’ said Tolvis. ‘That’s what the Screambreaker said. They were waiting for the sword. Their Sword of the Weeping God.’

  ‘I think they’re waiting for Medrin to come back with the shield. Maybe it’s fate for the two to meet again.’

  Tolvis puckered up his face. ‘That some Marroc idea? In which case I think it might be fate that either you or Jyrdas are going to kill Medrin if we stay out here much longer. Which would be a pity, because then the rest of us would have to tear your lungs out and stick you on a pole for old Yurlak. Medrin and the Screambreaker I can understand – they can’t stand each other, and there’s the whole thing about what happened to Medrin when he came to join the Screambreaker’s fight against the Marroc all those years ago, and then which one of them will stand in Yurlak’s shoes when the Maker-Devourer finally takes him. But you two? What happened between you?’

  Gallow shook his head. He stared out over the sea at the cliff beneath the monastery. A part of him was looking at the rocks, at the waves. They’d have to make their way around the base of the cliff with the sea crashing over them, right round to the other side. The waves would hide any noise. Good chance they’d smash them to bits as well. Stupid idea, except he really thought that perhaps it could be done.

  Another part of him had got to thinking about fate. About Arda and Tathic and Feya and little Pursic, and even Jelira, whom he still loved even though she wasn’t his. Wondering what their fate would be. Wondering where they were, whether they were in Varyxhun, whether they were safe. Whether he should have stayed on the road from Andhun and left Tolvis lying there in the dirt. Whether he’d see them again and whether he was meant to. Hadn’t really thought about it back then. He’d still been too angry with Arda, too desperate to see a way out, too eager for anything to delay the words that would inevitably pass between them. Kyorgan had eaten that anger. Bad luck for him to be in the wrong place at the wrong time – or was that simply fate too?

  ‘We did something stupid together once, that’s all,’ he said. ‘A long time ago. Didn’t end well.’

  Jyrdas was back as the sun set. He’d brought a great pile of wood with him and a bundle of sacks. ‘Still think we’ll fall off and drown in the sea,’ he said, ‘but if we’re going to do this, we’re going to do this properly.’

  25

  SEA AND STONE


  ‘But I like hearing about stupid things,’ hissed Tolvis. ‘Puts my own many foolish deeds into a more forgiving context.’

  Jyrdas hit him. ‘Shut it, Loudmouth.’

  They stood at the bottom of the cliff a little way from the bridge, where it was easy enough to scramble down from the top even in mail and with swords and axes hanging from their belts. They’d left their shields and Jyrdas was still muttering about that. Making them wear sacks over their mail seemed like it was his revenge.

  ‘When the Fateguard brought the shield back across the sea, they were going to take it to the Isle of Fates. Medrin wanted to see it before it went,’ said Gallow.

  ‘Yap, yap!’ snapped Jyrdas. ‘Everyone wanted a look at that damned shield. Now shall we all shout and wave at the islanders on the wall while we’re at it?’

  The other Lhosir were making a noise up on the cliff beside the bridge, jeering and shouting. They’d made the wood Jyrdas had brought into a bonfire and then gone to get more. It was burning nicely. Give the men on the walls something to look at. Take their minds off anything else. A fire made it harder to see a man hiding off in the shadows. Jyrdas’s idea. The sacks were to stop the moonlight from glinting off their mail.

  ‘A man might think you’d done this sort of thing before, One-Eye.’ Tolvis grinned. ‘Care to tell?’

  ‘Nothing this stupid.’

  They crept along the foot of the cliff. Low tide exposed a litter of rocks fallen from the cliffs long ago. The three of them picked their way slowly and carefully along the shore, hugging the shadows, down on their hands and knees where they had to. Spray from the breaking waves soaked them.