The Falcon Throne (The Tarnished Crown Series) (21 page)

He ran after them.

The fitful breeze swirling sparks and embers into a glorious dance had blown them high overhead, capricious, then dropped them onto the nearby roof of a barn housing Harcian horses meant for sale into Cassinia. Timber, hay and straw fed the swiftly growing flames… and in scant moments live horseflesh would feed them too.

Roric helped three other men unbar the barn’s heavy doors and haul them wide. Almost deafened by the terrified horses as the animals neighed and kicked and squealed, they stared at each other in the growing glow of flame. Stared into the burning barn, swiftly filling with smoke. Where was the barn-man? Harcia would never leave its valuable horses unguarded, but there was no sign of him. Had he turned coward and fled?

“You there!” Roric shouted at the others who’d run from the waterfront, who hesitated now in the face of so much danger. “Four of you stand fast to take the horses we bring out. The rest of you find a way to block each end of this street! If the horses escape us we can’t have them bolting free. They’ll break their legs, and the necks of any man in their way.”

“You be going in there?” demanded one of the men who’d helped haul open the barn doors. Short and brawny, he had the olive-skinned look of southern Cassinia about him.

Roric glared. “I am. And so are you–and you–and you! Or I swear by Clemen’s falcon you’ll be answering to the duke. Now, with me!”

He plunged into the madness. Through the smoke and leaping flame saw ten panic-struck animals still trapped in their stalls, wide eyes white-rimmed, flaring nostrils blood red, sleek coats foamed with the sweat of fear.

“Halters!” he shouted to the men who’d followed him, pointing at the hooks beside each stall’s door. “Let your animal free without one as a last resort only!”

Because he was Clemen’s duke, and these strangers’ leader, he had to go deepest into the barn. Leaving them to save those horses nearest to safety, he fumbled through the choking, flame-flickered darkness to the last stall on the right, hissing as his fingers blistered on hot timber and metal. The stall’s door was already ajar. As he leapt to pull it open he nearly tripped face-first over the crumpled body at his feet. One swift touch found sticky-wet hair and crushed bone.

So much for Harcia’s barn-man, poor bastard.

The horse that had killed him jinked and jittered in a corner. The thud of its iron-shod hoof against timber sounded as menacing as a sword-hilt pounding on a bossed Harcian shield. Muttering a plea for protection, Roric dragged the dead barn-man out of the way then scooped up the dropped halter. With his wary, smoke-smeared gaze fixed on the snorting stallion, he cleared his dry throat. It was like swallowing gorse.

“Steady, there, steady,” he crooned. “I’m here to help, so stand steady.”

Many times in the Marches he’d gentled a warhorse driven wild by the stench of fresh blood and spilled entrails. He had the knack of calming fretful beasts. Dimly aware of raised voices at the front of the barn, of stall doors crashing timber to timber and shod hooves clattering on brick, he eased himself forward until his reaching fingertips met shivering, quivering muscle. The horse half-snorted, half-squealed at the touch on its arched neck, a heartbreaking cry for help, as above their heads the fire ate its ravenous way through the vulnerable barn roof and down its wooden walls.

“Steady, beast,” he said again, and in a single, deft move slipped the halter over the horse’s head. Then he kicked the stall door wide, stepped back and tugged on the halter’s lead rope. For one dreadful moment the horse resisted, torn between terrors. And then it leapt, like a great stag, through the open doorway and over the dead barn-man, pulling Roric off his feet, tightening the rope around his hand almost to bone-breaking
point. With his own great leap he lunged after it, grabbed hold of the halter’s cheek piece, used his body weight to slow the horse’s flight towards safety.

Outside the burning barn he threw the lead rope into waiting hands, then ran back inside. In those brief moments the fire’s ferocity had increased. He twisted sharply sideways, nearly falling, as another man and horse escaped the inferno. Tried to hold his breath against the stink of burning hay, burning horseshit, burning horse. Whatever great prices the Harcians had hoped for these horses before tonight, they’d have no chance of fetching them after.

Another wild-eyed horse and its rescuer burst out of the smoke. No time to ask how many were left to save. There was at least one, he could hear the frenzied thudding of hooves against a timber stall. Thankful now for his leather cloak, for the woollen hood he pulled low to his forehead, Roric pressed his forearm to his mouth and nose and pushed through the blinding smoke. A sane man would say he’d taken leave of his senses, risking his life for a horse, but he couldn’t leave a living thing to burn in this place, to burn as helpless Liam had burned.

Somewhere in the nightmarish smoke-and-fire gloom a voice cried out in anger. “Stop it, you stupid creature! I’m trying to help!”

Shocked, Roric stumbled. That was a
woman
.

“Wait! Wait!” she shouted. “I have to—”

And then a thump, and a muffled cry of pain.

“You, there!” he called, turning, half-blinded by smoke. “Are you all right? Where are you?”

“Help me! Quickly! The stall door is stuck, I think the heat has warped it!”

She was in the second-last stall on the left, tugging at the stubborn door with one hand, fending off the panicked horse with the other.

Roric heaved the door open. “You fool! What are you doing?”

“What do you think?” she snapped. “I’m saving this horse!”

He stared down at her, dumbstruck. Not a woman. A
girl
. Her deep voice had fooled him into thinking her grown. Tall for her age, and slender, she was swathed in a dark woollen cloak, with a thick mass of honey-gold hair, now tangled and sweaty, escaping her hood’s confinement. Her flawless skin was smudged charcoal black, and in the fireglow her eyes were eerily piercing. Crystal blue, the irises ringed a dark grey.

“Give that horse to me!” he said, finding his voice. “Before it tramples you.”

It was taking all her girlish strength to keep hold of the lead rope. “I can’t. There’s one more still trapped, and you must save it. Now move, ser, or
you’ll
be trampled!”

Shocked anew, he stood aside. It was that or be kicked to the ground. Girl and horse pushed by him. A warning groan, and part of the roof at the barn’s far end caved in, showering sparks and embers. Pitched high above the renewed roar of flame, a scream to freeze a man’s blood and crack his bones to splinters.

The last trapped horse.

Men were shouting at him from the barn’s burning doorway, waving their arms, urging him to flee. But he couldn’t. Not yet. His debt to Liam was far from paid… and he could still see the challenge in that reckless girl’s blue stare.

Staggering, barely able to breathe, refusing to see the ravenous flames, feel their heat, admit the rest of the barn could collapse on him any moment, he searched for the horse. Found it, and felt the tears leap to his eyes. The poor beast was truly trapped, its quarters pinned beneath a burning roof beam. The anguish in its almost human eyes nearly stopped his heart. Sobbing, he kicked his way into the smoke-filled stall. Fumbled beneath the folds of his leather cloak for the dagger on his hip, pulled the blade free… and plunged it deep into the horse’s throat. A twist, a wrenching downward pull, and it was done. Blood gushed, mercifully swift. Sizzled and smoked on the burning wood, the hot ground. One whispery groan and the horse collapsed, released from torment.

Three unsteady strides beyond the confines of the burning barn and the ruined building fell in on itself. Shuddering, his lungs heaving, Roric whirled about. Fountains of sparks flew skywards, caught in a swirling updraft, despite everything still beautiful. A crowd had gathered in the road to shout and point and keep hold of the rescued horses.

He seized the nearest man’s arm. Shook it. “The girl! The girl! Where is she?”

“Girl?” The man boggled at him, confused. “What girl? I never saw no girl. B’aint no girls in this muckery, scunner! You done got yourself knocked on the head!”

No use arguing. She must have abandoned the horse and run, afraid of getting into trouble. So he’d never see her again. Ah, well. She was only a girl… and the world was full of them.

Turning at the sound of freshly raised voices, he saw that the Harcian
horse-copers had finally arrived to claim their stock and bewail their losses. This was no place for the unacclaimed duke of Clemen. Sliding into the shadows, Roric made himself scarce.

“Your Grace?”

Weary to the marrow of her aching bones, heartsick at the losses Ardenn had sustained, Berardine continued to stare through the unshuttered window of the dayroom in her trading factor’s house. It had provided an excellent view of the harbour, the docks… and the chaos of the fire. All the coin her duchy poured into Clemen’s greedy hands, the harbour fees and galley tolls, the warehouse rental, the import taxes, the haulage imposts, the foreign trading levies and poll taxes, and still it could not muster sufficient men and buckets of water to save Ardenn’s warehouses from burning.

Shame on them. Oh, shame. It was enough to make a grown woman weep. But she couldn’t. She was Baldwin’s wife. How could she disgrace him, betray him, by showing such weakness?

“I’m sorry. Madam?”

Turning slowly, because she must not appear eager to look away from the carnage, Berardine raised an eyebrow at dishevelled Master Tihomir. “Yes?”

“Madam—”

“Yes, Tihomir. What do you want?”

Short and portly, he shifted uneasy feet. “Madam, there is a man.”

She waited for a moment, then raised both eyebrows. “And?”

Her factor had yet to clean all the soot from his round, fleshy face. Beneath the fire’s lingering evidence his stubbled cheeks were pale. Lines of strain tugged the corners of his mouth into decline.

“Oh, Madam!” he wailed. “I told
no one
you were coming, or that you would be my most honoured guest. I swear it on my life. I serve you honestly, diligently, my loyalty is beyond reproach.”

“That’s for me to decide, Tihomir, not you,” she said, her reply sharp, unhesitating, even as her thoughts raced. Someone had betrayed her presence in Eaglerock. If not the trading factor, then who? “This man. He asks for me by name?”

Tihomir nodded, miserable. “Madam, he does.”

“Who is he?”

“He won’t tell me.”

“A rude rascal, then.”

“I tried to send him away,” said Tihomir, his voice rising, cracking. “I told him he was wrong, that you weren’t here. He refused to heed me and–and—” He swallowed, convulsively. “Madam, he is very tall and strong.”

“Has he a sword?”

Tihomir shook his head. “No, Your Grace. But he looks no stranger to bloodshed with a blade.”

She stiffened her spine. Straightened her shoulders. “Admit him.”

“Madam!” Jaw dropped, the factor stared. “Is that wise?”

“Look out of the window, Tihomir. Dawn fast approaches and the entire merchant district is still frantic after the fire. Would you have this tall, strong man on your doorstep at sunrise, for all and sundry to see and wonder on?”

“Madam,” he said, wilting. “But I’d not have you meet this stranger unshielded. Shall I send for our warehouse men, for protection?”

“The men who failed to notice until it was too late that the warehouses they’re paid to safeguard were on fire? Those men, Tihomir?”

He looked close to tears. “Madam,” he whispered, and withdrew.

Waiting for him to return, Berardine repinned her heavy, coiled hair and smoothed the folds of her deep-pink damask dress. Beneath its pearl-sewn bodice, and her chemise, she could feel her skin damp, feel the too-swift thudding of her heart against her ribs. This man… this unknown, inconvenient man… what mischief had he come to make? To whom did he owe loyalty? And how would she foil him? Her belly churned, sickly. But it was too late now for regret, that she’d brought Catrain with her to Eaglerock.

A hesitant tapping on the dayroom door, which her trading factor had closed behind him. She folded her hands before her and lifted her chin. “Come.”

The door swung wide, revealing Tihomir and the stranger who’d refused to give his name. Indeed he was tall, and lean, and strapped with militant muscle. Young yet, but clearly mature. He wore a soot-stained, spottily burned leather travelling cloak, thrown back over his broad shoulders. Beneath it his plain doublet and hose showed greatly the worse for wear. His coppery hair, kinked with the hint of a curl, was close-cropped and filthy, stuck to his well-shaped skull with dried sweat. His bronze-brown eyes were red-rimmed, watchful, set a trifle too widely over a crooked, once-broken nose. His mouth was generous, his chin determined. Not a handsome man, but neatly made. There was something teasingly familiar in his looks.

He met her steady stare calmly. “Madam. Please, be easy. I’ve not come to do you harm.”

“No?” She nodded at his hip. “Then surrender your dagger.”

The merest hesitation, then he tugged the weapon from its plain sheath. The dayroom was lit brightly enough to reveal the blade stained with dried blood, imperfectly removed. She heard her breathing hitch before she could stop herself. Furious, she glared at her trading factor, who was staring at the staining blood in unabashed horror.

“Take that dagger, Master Tihomir, and bring it to me.”

Fingers trembling, Tihomir plucked the dagger from its owner’s loose grasp and proffered it to her.

“The blood isn’t human,” the man said, his gaze never leaving her face. “One of the Harcian’s horses was trapped in its burning barn. I couldn’t save it.”

“So you killed it?”

He shrugged. The gesture was indifferent. The look in his eyes was not. “They’ll be compensated.”

“I see. So I’m to believe you’re free to dabble your fingers in the duke of Clemen’s purse?”

His lips twitched. There wasn’t a hint of fear or deference in him. “You are.”

Tihomir was still holding the bloodstained blade between trembling thumb and forefinger, as though he expected it to cut his throat at any moment. Taking pity on him, she took it from him. A beautiful weapon, despite the marring blood. Certainly no poor man-at-arms’ possession. Her fingers sat comfortably about its leather-bound hilt and her forearm, taking its beautifully balanced weight, gave no protest at the burden. Its edge was sharp. She could easily imagine it cutting a horse’s throat. Or a man’s.