The Kings Man (15 page)

The women had been feeding the small children and infants and they now took them up the stairs to bed. By this time, the beardless youths had returned and they were fed. They’d only just received their meal when the Utland raiders returned, wet-haired and laughing. The raiders took pride of place at the top of long table, and there they were joined by the women, among them several older women like Iron-hair, who they treated with deference.

Food trays were delivered by children of around ten and eleven, and some adults. He wasn’t sure if the adults were slaves; they had the same witchy look around the eyes as the Utlanders. He was having trouble working out the hierarchy.

Since there was no-one telling him what to do, Garzik went in search of a meal. He followed the slaves and serving children down the passage to the kitchen.

Here it was all a bustle as food was served up. Here, he found Trafyn up to his elbows scrubbing pots.

As soon as the squire noticed Garzik, he left his post. ‘You have to get me out of here. I’m a lord’s son.’ He gestured disgustedly to the busy kitchen. ‘This is beneath me.’

An old woman spotted him, clipped him over the ear and dragged him back to work. When he looked like he was about to argue, she slapped his face. Furious, he raised his hand.

One of the beardless youths caught his wrist before he could strike the old woman. Claw-face swung Trafyn around and smacked him so forcefully the squire fell to his knees.

A string of fast, nearly unintelligible Utland speech left Claw-face’s lips. It might have been impossible to understand the words, but the meaning was clear.

Something else was also clear. Claw-face was not a beardless youth. Claw-face was a woman. And suddenly the mystery of the missing women was explained. They dressed and acted like men.

But why?

As Claw-face turned away, she noticed Garzik staring. ‘What?’

‘You’re...’ he didn’t have the right word.

‘A beardless,’ she said, as if it meant
great warrior
.

‘But...’ He opened his mouth then realised even if he could phrase his question it was impossibly rude to ask why she took the role of a man. So he ducked his head to show respect and retreated.

Back in the long-hall, he found a warm spot near the fire not far from the long table and sat hugging his knees. Now the interactions at the table took on more complexity, for Claw-face and the other beardless flirted with the young women as much as the raiders did.

If he hadn’t been feeling faint with hunger, he would have been happy just to sit and watch and try to figure out what was going on. But he was starving.

What the Utlanders didn’t eat, they threw to the dogs. He was just about to try fighting off the dogs for a bone, when a girl of about eleven came by with a bowl for him.

He wondered if it contained tainted Affinity meat and hesitated.

The girl wrinkled her short nose, as she mimed eating. ‘Is good.’

He took a mouthful. So good: rich and tasty. He gulped down another mouthful. Right now, the chance of Affinity contagion didn’t matter. It was more important to keep up his strength.

He’d been afraid the Utlanders would starve their slaves, but here they seemed generous. The soup filled his belly.

‘Rusan, Rusan!’ the Utlanders called on Captain Rusan to tell the story of how he’d killed the wyvern to confirm his captaincy.

The story unfolded with much laughter as Rusan strutted about and acted out his part while Olbin took the part of the wyvern. Two children were roped in to play the parts of himself and Trafyn. They pretended to be tied to a mast and cried for help. He flushed. He hadn’t panicked, Trafyn had.

The story finished and the other captain stepped forward to act out his adventures.

Tired as he was, Garzik couldn’t sleep. It was all too new and interesting. But he did doze, slipping into a half-sleep where the singing and laughter of the Utlanders mingled with memories of King Rolen’s great hall... Byren returning with the manticore chitin and gifting it to his father to make a fabulous coat of armour. Piro pretending to be a goat-herd and driving him crazy with worry for her. Piro telling him she was going to be a beardless warrior like an Utlander because she had Affinity after all and she couldn’t bear to live her life locked away in Sylion Abbey. Piro laughing, taunting him as she ran up the tower steps ahead of him. He just knew if he caught her and kissed her, he could convince her to give up this mad idea.

But when he reached the top of the tower he found himself in the Utlander’s long-hall and remembered Piro was dead. A wave of sadness swamped him.

Someone walked past, an old woman leading two children. They looked to be about ten years old and seemed to be playing some kind of game, for they had their arms linked so they could walk back-to-back in perfect unison. As they passed him to stand directly in front of the fireplace, he saw the second child’s face.

It was identical to the first. Twins, then. Everyone waited breathlessly, watching the identical twins and the old woman.

Iron-hair welcomed the three with great courtesy.

The old woman removed the twins’ cloak to reveal their nakedness. They were girls, joined at the base of the lower back. Fused.

Was he dreaming, after all? Garzik sat up, rubbing his face.

Seeing them reminded him of something. When he was little, he used to creep over to the men-at-arms’ table to listen to their tales. Now a story came back to him, one that had made no sense at the time. They’d called the Utlanders in-bred, claimed that brothers took sisters to their beds and their union produced monsters.

Later, he’d asked Byren and Orrade about it. They’d dismissed it as the kind of stories men told about their enemies to make them seem less than human.

Now...

With eerie coordination, the fused-twins walked the length of the long table, escorted by the old woman. Every now and then they would swap, one taking the lead instead of the other. The switchover was smooth and effortless.

When this happened, the one in the lead one would indicate a particular person then whisper to the old woman, who would make an announcement. Her voice was surprisingly young for someone with pure white hair.

Most of what she said made no sense to Garzik. He could follow instructions at sea but there were many new words on land and, besides, everything the old woman said rhymed and the words seemed to be chosen for their pleasing sound patterns.

Some of the things the fused-twins said through her made everyone laugh. Some things were greeted with hushed silence, then awed whispers. The fused-twins stopped in front of one-eared Jost. He sat up, looking hopeful. His two friends leaned forward.

But neither of the fused-twins whispered to the old woman. They moved on until they came to Olbin. One of them said something which was greeted by silence, then Captain Rusan clapped his friend on the back and congratulated him.

Oracles.

The fused-twins were oracles. Affinity-blessed oracles. If this was Rolencia they would have been given to Sylion Abbey at birth.

That or exposed on a hillside.

Garzik couldn’t take his eyes off them. The fusion of their naked bodies exercised a terrible fascination. He couldn’t help wondering how much of their bodies were joined. Did they share one back passage? It was hard to tell.

Their task done, the fused-twins returned to the fireside. The old woman picked up the cloak. As she helped them dress, he realised it was really a robe with two head holes and four holes for their arms.

After settling the garment in place, the old woman went to escort them out, but one of the fused-twins turned very slowly towards Garzik. This meant the other one had to turn away. She looked over her shoulder with curious detachment.

As the first girl studied Garzik her lids lowered and her eyes rolled back in her head, and he knew she must be tapping into Affinity.

She whispered something to the old woman, who leant closer to Garzik.

For the first time he looked at her, really looked at her.

She had the smooth skin of a young woman; her hair wasn’t white due to age. She was also Affinity touched. Her odd pink eyes fringed by white lashes held him transfixed.

He was so surprised her words made no sense, although he did catch something about striking a light.

He pulled back, stunned. Her words had rhymed like a children’s word-game and he replayed the words over and over in his head as he tried to fathom them.

‘Good news or bad?’

He looked up to find Olbin crouched opposite him. The white-haired woman and the fused-twins had gone.

‘What did she say, hot-lander?’ Olbin asked. ‘What did the Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow say?’

‘Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow?’

Olbin nodded. He touched his own black hair. ‘White-hair is Today, mother of Yesterday and Tomorrow. What did they say?’

Garzik repeated the rhyme. ‘But I don’t understand it. Something about lighting a lamp?’

‘Not lamp. To make fire.’ Olbin gestured to the fireplace and mimed striking flint to tinder. Then he added a string of words, saw that Garzik did not understand and tried again. ‘You light the fire tomorrow and tomorrow.’

‘I thought they were Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow?’

Olbin laughed and Garzik got the impression he was being thick; that, or Affinity oracles were known for being cryptic.

Someone called for a song. A girl of about fifteen came forward, her clear, high voice carrying in the long-hall. Rusan produced his pipes, Claw-face a stringed instrument and someone else a drum, and they accompanied her.

Rusan had eyes only for the singer. She would have been pretty, if it wasn’t for the witchy look around her eyes. She entranced Olbin, who did not look away.

Garzik caught one word in five of her song. Like the oracles’ speech, the lyrics seemed crafted for the pleasing balance of their sounds as much as their meaning.

When the singer reached the end of a verse, everyone joined in, their voices blending. The effect was beautiful, but sad.

For some reason, it made Garzik think of his home, of things lost, people passed, Piro...

Tears stung his eyes.

The girl resumed her solo part and, to his amazement, Olbin wept openly. Garzik looked around. All of them wept, unashamedly – women and warriors alike.

When the songstress finished, Olbin wiped his eyes.

‘Good song.’ He thumped his chest, over his heart and said something else that Garzik didn’t understand but took to mean the song was good because it made him feel strongly.

Rusan put his pipes aside and set out to charm the songstress. She perched on the table, swinging her legs, listening intently.

Olbin joined them. He tried to cajole the singer into sitting on his lap. Songstress laughed and refused, but she obviously enjoyed the attention. The only one not happy was Jost. He cast both Rusan and Olbin dark looks and muttered to his two companions.

Iron-hair called for another song, something about lost raiders returning home. Soon the whole settlement was singing along with the chorus as the adventures of the lost raiders unfolded.

Children climbed into the laps of fierce warriors and drifted off in their arms. It was odd seeing men who had thrown injured sailors overboard without a qualm rocking children to sleep.

So many marvels... Garzik drifted off, carried on a wave of sound and half-grasped imagery.

T
HE NEXT DAY
the returned raiders and beardless tackled the task of repairing the ships, while some of the raiders helped with the heavier jobs around the settlement. Garzik kept his eyes opened, listened and mostly followed what was being said.

At one point he saw Rusan and Olbin head up the valley carrying a selection of foods and treasures from their ship. They went to a lonely cottage tucked into the hillside, where a thin stream of blue smoke rose on the still air.

The door opened and they handed over the gifts. Even from this distance, Garzik could see it was the white-haired woman. It made sense that she and her daughters would be valued by the settlement.

Living as they did, out here on the edge of the habitable islands, Utlanders would need people who had an affinity with the gods to intervene on their behalf.

While the men and beardless worked, young children helped by running and fetching. Back home, Garzik had been in training to become a warrior. He could hunt, plan a battle, read and write, but he was no carpenter. He couldn’t make a mortise and tenon joint, so they sent him to chop firewood. There was a large wood heap waiting to be cut down. Like cooking, it was a never-ending task.

Yet it was satisfying.

After a while, he paused to wipe his forehead and noticed Songstress coming down the path with a tray of honey cakes and cheese. The eleven year-old girl trotted along behind, carrying a jug of ale and cups with great concentration. Now that he looked, Songstress had the same short nose and full lips as the girl.

Sisters, no doubt about it.

When Songstress reached Rusan’s ship, the captain called a halt and came down the gangplank to see her. Olbin was only one step behind him. Watching them, Garzik couldn’t tell which one she preferred. It amused him, but it didn’t amuse Jost and his friends.