The Legacy of Lord Regret: Strange Threads: Book 1 (8 page)

Loppolo nodded determinedly. ‘And archers with flames!’ He began shouting orders as soldiers fanned out around him. Towards
the back of the army, a couple of deserters broke loose.

As the enemy drew closer above and below, Rostigan knew there was no more controlling the situation. He had done what he could
by getting an army here in time – the only thing left was to stand beneath the breaking wave, and hope it did not knock him
down.

‘At ’em!’ came Hunna’s bellow, and the Plainsfolk rode forth, spears held out before them.

‘Charge!’ called Loppolo, almost too late, for his soldiers barely achieved running speed before clashing with the Unwoven.

Everything descended into chaos.

From his back Rostigan unsheathed a broadsword most would need two hands to wield. Before him an Althalan twisted away with
blood spraying from his neck, vividly painting the yellow grass. Another soldier swiped at the grinning Unwoven who’d dealt
the blow, cutting a long gash down its arm. White blood oozed from the wound, too slow and sticky to spurt. Grinner laughed
harshly and lashed out with his injured arm, landing a blow that broke the soldier’s nose back into his skull.

‘Go for the heads!’ shouted Rostigan, as he dashed at Grinner. He brought his sword down in a overhead sweep and, with a confident
sneer, Grinner held his own up to block the blow. Their swords met, and there was a very brief moment during which a look
of confusion began to form on Grinner’s face, and then both swords drove down deeply into his head at cross lengths. Like
a partially attached quartered melon his head flopped to pieces about his neck, and Rostigan gave his body a heavy kick to
send him away.

Something kindled in the deep place – a little flame in the void, burning brightly. Rostigan was instantly wary of it, for
it gave out a glow of warm satisfaction. So long since he had felt such a thing, he could not bring himself to douse it. Instead
he cradled it like a treasure, making
sure to keep it small and contained. He would not allow it to grow, to consume him.

A scream sounded nearby as a Plainsman was torn from his horse by a swooping silkjaw, borne into the air leaving a trail of
misted blood. A second ’jaw crash-landed nearby, bowling over a couple of soldiers. It scrabbled to stand up bat-like on the
elbows of its wings, swinging its long head about, searching for targets with hollow eyes.

Of all Regret’s creations, Rostigan disliked silkjaws the most. Everything about them was wrong. He was not sure they were
even truly alive, for they carried nothing of flesh about them. Instead, the bones that gave them shape were bound together
by sheets of coarse white silk, which stretched and contracted like fibrous muscle. They had no voices, and the only sound
they made was the occasional rustle or clack of bones. The ’jaw on the ground opened its mouth, elongating the strands that
held it together, giving a clear view of fangs embedded along misshapen jawbones. It gnashed so hard it drove the points through
its own snout, and didn’t appear to feel a thing.

A soldier leapt at it, slicing the silk along its wing, and it snapped down over his head and shoulders, biting savagely.
The act looked like a semblance of feeding, but there was no stomach in the creature’s empty body. Instead, blood soaked its
white silk, and it shook its prey to absorb as much as possible.

A red silkjaw was a happy silkjaw.

A flaming arrow thudded into its side, but failed to set it ablaze, for the soaked strands were already too damp.

‘I told him threaders work best,’ muttered Rostigan, as he turned away. He could attack the silkjaw himself, even slay it
– but it would be a laborious matter of cutting and slicing until the beast was a pile of bone and fluff. His time was better
spent on the Unwoven, for he could kill them far more quickly.

He strode headlong into the thick of it, where bodies already grew plentiful underfoot. Unwoven had begun to spread out, and
many of them now faced multiple opponents. Rostigan chose the ones who moved about with greatest ease, who batted away swords
as if they were switches – until they met him, of course. Always he went for the heads, for there was no helmet, no shield,
no weapon that could stand in the way of his sword. His bouts were swift and methodical, and again and again he crunched through
skulls with powerful downward blows. Soon he took hurts of his own, and in places his armour dinted painfully inwards. He
knew that he was bleeding at his side, that shards of metal were sticking in his flesh.

In the sky, silkjaws fell apart as threaders undid the magic that bound them together. One dove towards him even as its wings
unspooled, bones falling free of the tatters. He sidestepped as it ploughed into the ground, and lifted its head almost piteously
as its last fibres dropped away. Plenty of the creatures remained airborne, though – taking
them apart, Rostigan knew, was not swiftly done, nor every threader’s talent. Some of the threaders were employing fire instead,
sending up thin snakes of it from torches, and arrows flamed upwards too. Here and there white shapes suddenly blazed, as
’jaws flared to cinders.

Some ways behind, Loppolo roared encouragement as he waved his sword, thickly protected by soldiers and threaders, and no
enemy came within spitting distance of him. Then a sudden series of silkjaw dive-bombings thinned his guards, and Rostigan
saw Tursa knocked from his horse. The king’s steed cantered sideways as his soldiers jostled to enclose him once more, the
group moving away from Tursa. Dazedly the fat advisor lifted his head from the churned earth.

Redstreak strode out of the tumult wearing a rabid grin. Tursa saw him and started, a terrible fear shining in his eyes. Redstreak
moved towards him, flexing his hands and rubbing them together. Tursa looked around desperately.

‘Rostigan!’ he mewled. ‘Help me!’

Rostigan was already running at Redstreak, whose head snapped about to see who was coming. Deftly, Redstreak slipped around
what would have been a tremendous blow, which, in missing entirely, sent Rostigan staggering forward. Redstreak danced around
behind him, and Rostigan felt iron fingers close upon his throat. He twisted, swinging Redstreak off his feet – the Unwoven
weighed little for all his strength, and held on tight.

‘I don’t know what you are, warrior,’ came his voice in Rostigan’s ear as the grip contracted, ‘but I bet you die when your
head comes off, just like everyone else.’

Rostigan saw spots before his eyes, and awkwardly plunged his sword over his shoulder. Redstreak shifted his weight, pushing
off Rostigan’s hip to clear himself of the blow.

‘Oh, hold me,’ chuckled Redstreak throatily, swinging about Rostigan as if his neck was a beanpole, pulling him off balance
this way and that. ‘Embrace me, why won’t you love me?’

Rostigan dropped his sword as his hands went to his throat, trying to prise the fingers loose. In the deep place, his little
flame snuffed out.

‘Your flesh is strong,’ said Redstreak, digging in his jagged nails. ‘But I think I can do it. I think I can!’

Rostigan tried to gasp for breath, but no air entered his lungs. The pressure increased, grinding the bones in his neck, and
he fell to his knees. Where the flame had gone out, the deep place yawned wide, and he saw his life unfurl like a great scroll.
He’d bested opponents worse than a single Unwoven before. Unexpected – was that not the very nature of death?

Is this where it ends?

Strangely, he felt something like relief.

Redstreak gave a grunt, and suddenly the constriction around Rostigan’s neck went away. He sucked in air and rolled, coming
up to see Tursa backing away with a sword
that dripped whitely. Redstreak was staring at the advisor malevolently, one of his arms severed at the elbow.

‘Can you do it with one hand?’ Tursa snarled.

Redstreak reached out with his good hand to grab the elbow of Tursa’s sword arm before the man could strike.

‘Can you?’ Redstreak said. He squeezed with a force that brought the sound of cracking bones. Tursa instantly lost all colour
and dropped his sword.

From behind, Rostigan caved in Redstreak’s head.

He wrenched his sword free of the toppling corpse, and rubbed his bruised neck with a grimace.

‘Thank you,’ he croaked to Tursa, who was cradling his jelly-limp limb with a kind of strange fascination.

‘Did you see what I did? I chopped off his arm!’

‘That you did. Now listen to me, Tursa – you get yourself back to the king, you hear me? Tursa?’ He gave the man a little
slap, and Tursa jolted, finally looking at him. ‘Back to the king with you, yes? Maybe one of his threaders can fix you up.’

Rostigan turned back to the battle determined to make up for lost time. Although the Unwoven fought furiously, there were
fewer of them now, for they had never tried to stay together. Each time one of them fell, more soldiers were free to help
surround those who remained. Many of the silkjaws still airborne were at least partially undone, flapping wildly to compensate
for trailing wings or dangling bones. Others were redly saturated, and these were the worst, ripping and tearing through groups
of soldiers,
resistant to fire, yet threaders attacked them wherever they landed, hands raised to send out myriad gestures. The best thing
to do, Rostigan decided, was to hasten things as much as he could, in the hope of saving that many more soldiers. If there
were enough left unscathed, maybe they could press on to the Pass.

He pushed aside others to get to the fighting, still avoiding confrontations with silkjaws when possible. Each time he reached
an Unwoven, down it went with his sword in its head. As the sun moved across the sky, enemy numbers dwindled, yet still they
fought on. There was no trace of fear on their faces as they stood ever-increasingly alone, no heed paid to the swathes of
fallen comrades about them, no glancing around for a way to retreat – only laughter and hatred.

Rostigan made for the last one he could see, but it was dead before he got there. As it fell, the remaining silkjaws rose
into the sky toward the Roshous Peaks. Rostigan stalked across the Fields in the glow of sunset, ignoring the cheers that
broke out around him. Small patches of yellow grass that had escaped the stain of blood lit up like pools of gold in the dying
light. Threaders moved amongst the bodies, looking for wounded amongst the dead.

Rostigan found Loppolo talking earnestly with his officers. Nearby, Tursa sat cross-legged and whimpering while a threader
made motions over his damaged arm. Hunna rode up, the white smears of Unwoven blood along his horse stuck with bits of silk.

‘By the Spell,’ he said, as he dismounted, ‘I am thankful, Loppolo, that you were here with us.’

‘Aye,’ said Loppolo. ‘Though the cost has been great.’

‘Better these here and now,’ said Rostigan, ‘than multitudes later, oh king. The sacrifice is worthwhile.’ He glanced between
the two leaders. ‘I wonder, my lords, if we dare push our luck?’

‘What’s that?’ said Hunna.

‘With so many Unwoven warriors fallen, the Dale will be poorly defended. Imagine how they will sing of you both, should you
rid Aorn of Regret’s people for good!’

Loppolo looked like he didn’t understand, while Hunna stared in undisguised astonishment – then threw back his head and bawled
laughter.

‘Have you gone mad, fellow?’ he said, slapping Rostigan’s shoulder. ‘You want to take this battle-bruised bunch to the
Pass
? I admire your mettle, as do all who saw you fight this day – my soldiers are already telling each other stories of
Skullrender
– but if you think they will up and follow you into that place after what they’ve just endured, you have lost your mind.’

Rostigan wondered if one more time would hurt. A few carefully chosen words to convince Hunna of the idea’s worth, accompanied
by a little threading to ensure they took root, and perhaps they really could cleanse the Tranquil Dale … yet he had already
broken his rules once, and did not want it to become easy for him. Besides, he had
to admit, looking around at the bloody, battered soldiers still standing, that maybe Hunna had a point.

Circling crows were beginning to caw, their voices seeming to signal an ending.

‘Enough then,’ he said.

Considered by some to be the greatest city in Aorn, Althala was certainly the biggest and the richest. Streets were paved
with white cobblestones, buildings were solid and opulent in design, and everywhere storefronts spilled colourful produce
out into thoroughfare displays. People moved in thick streams, happy and nodding to one another as they went about their business.
Everything was clean and well presented – drains in the sides of footpaths channelled rain and refuse into underground caverns
below the city, and even the occasional beggar was surprisingly well groomed. If it was anything like Yalenna remembered,
a beggar would need a special licence from the city, which would only be granted if they were debilitated somehow. Others
claiming poverty would be given two choices: leave Althala, or work in city-run farmland on the fertile plains to the east.

Today, however, it wasn’t the beauty of the place that fuelled the bounce in various steps, as Yalenna quickly learned.

‘I hear Loppolo’s steaming,’ she overheard a rotund woman say to a cloth trader.

‘I warrant that’s true,’ replied the trader, holding out a length of blue silk for inspection. ‘He knows he’s at risk of falling
into Braston’s shadow, and disappearing entirely.’

The woman chortled as she pawed the silk. ‘Very nice. Oh, but it’s marvellous, isn’t it? I can’t believe it, I still can’t!
If you’d told me last week that I’d see the Lord of Justice himself return to life and reclaim the kingship – that I would
stand in the castle square and
see him wave
– I would have thought you mad. And yet!’

‘It certainly is amazing,’ said the trader. ‘Now, can I cut you off this much?’

Yalenna moved on, somewhat troubled. She understood the people’s joy – she was looking forward to seeing Braston herself –
but she did not like the news that he’d supplanted the rightful king. How had it happened? Willingly she hoped, akin to Arah’s
offer to step aside as Priestess. But even if that were the case, and talk of Loppolo
steaming
was just idle gossip, Yalenna felt Braston had made a big mistake. While it had been difficult for him to abandon his people
– the hardest part of killing himself – he must know,
must
know, that he simply had no right to pick up where he had left off. Perhaps to him it seemed like no time had passed, but
that was no excuse.

Pausing to eavesdrop on the woman and trader was the only delay Yalenna allowed herself. With the density of the
population here, the blessings that seeped from her were finding many homes.

May you always smell clean
.

May you never catch a cold
.

May you discover hidden talents
.

While there was a time when she would have taken pleasure from this, the bleak truth of it was that her magic constantly damaged
the Spell. Without the ability to reign it in, being close to so many people made it all the worse.

She moved towards Althala Castle, its great white spires visible for leagues around. She navigated the streets easily enough,
finding it remarkable how little had changed. She recognised plenty of municipal buildings, and wondered if the School of
Threading still stood. That was where she had been placed as a young girl, all but abandoned by her merchant father. Thankfully,
Mergan had recognised her great talent, and she had lost herself quickly in her new life. She did not deviate to go looking
for the school now, however, her purpose overriding any sentimental urge.

Soon she came to the immense public square lying in the castle’s shadow, an empty space under high balconies punctuated only
by a few ornamental trees. She headed for the castle entrance, where Althalan guards, dressed in silver armour over red garments
– something else that had not changed – manned either side of a grand archway.

‘Excuse me, miss,’ said a young man politely – a captain, by the look of his shoulder plumes. ‘May I ask what business you
have in the castle?’

‘My name is Yalenna,’ she said. ‘I seek my old friend Braston.’

The captain gaped in surprise and looked her up and down again. She was still dressed in her white robe, her snowy hair flowing
freely down her shoulders. It had always been considered an unusual colour, but not so rare that it made her instantly recognisable.
Still, coupled with her name, and the robe, and who she asked for, she could see him sorting through the implications.

‘Er … the, the
Priestess
Yalenna? You claim?’

‘That’s right.’

The other guards were grouping around, ogling her with various degrees of curiosity and suspicion. The captain glanced sidelong
at them – some of them were older and more grizzled than he – and tried to look less flustered.

‘How can I trust you’re really her?’ he said.

Little bundles of threads spilled from her, sinking into the guards. If they could see what she saw, she thought, there would
be no doubting her word.

She tapped the lightning insignia that clasped her robe together. ‘Does this not carry weight in Althala anymore?’

‘Forgive me, miss,’ said the captain, ‘but there are other priests and priestesses who bear the same symbol.’

‘I have a simple solution,’ said Yalenna brightly. ‘Take me to Braston and he’ll tell you who I am.’

‘If you’re really her,’ put in an older guard, ‘why don’t you give us a blessing?’

‘I already have.’

The man frowned. ‘What is it, then?’

Yalenna shrugged. ‘I’m not sure, good fellow. I do not shape the nature of what I impart, unless I choose to. Would you like
me to find out what it is you’ve received?’

She extended a hand at him, and his went to his sword. She ignored the action, instead searching his pattern for any new insertion.
There
it was, still wriggling into place.

‘Ah,’ she said. ‘Anything you plant will blossom and thrive, even in the harshest soil.’

The man looked bemused, while the others chuckled.

‘Off to try your hand at some gardening, Das?’ asked the captain, and chuckles became laughter.

Blessings, Yalenna reflected, were sometimes wasted.

‘What about me?’ asked another guard. ‘What did I get?’

She found herself growing impatient. ‘I am not here for your amusement!’ she snapped, which made them all jump a little. Forcing
her voice back to an even tone, she said, ‘Captain, please, take me to Braston. What is your concern? If I’m not who I say
I am, he has nothing to fear from me.’

The captain thought about that for a moment, muddling through it a little confusedly – then gave up, and nodded. ‘Very well.
I will take you to the king.’ He gave a little bow. ‘I am Captain Jandryn. You lot,’ he added, as some of the others made
to move with him, ‘stay here.’

Some of them looked disappointed.

Jandryn led her, not through the arch, but back into the square, towards other surrounding buildings that were part of the
castle complex.

Here the stone was not as white as elsewhere in Althala, and there hung a certain smell in the air – sweat, and other unpleasantness
resulting from human confinement. Rows of doors with viewing panels lined the corridors, some of them open to reveal empty
cells. Some of them looked only recently vacated.

Ahead Yalenna heard voices, and a hearty laugh that felt like a warm blanket on her soul. Whatever madness it was that had
returned her to the world, she was not in it alone. He was here too.

When Mergan first brought the Wardens together, she had not known Braston well. He had visited the School of Threading once
or twice, and she remembered shaking his hand as a nervous young slip of thing. Later, once she had been made Priestess, and
ruled in her own right, they had exchanged a missive or two, their interactions always very polite and reasonable. It had
not been until they had journeyed together to the Spire, and afterwards spent the better part of a decade hunting and killing
the remaining Wardens, that they had grown truly close. After all, they had been all that stood between Aorn and disaster
– especially once Mergan had disappeared – and had needed to constantly support and trust each other.

Perhaps it was because of that trust that she now felt a little nervous, wondering how pleased he would be to receive her.
After all, she had been the one to convince him to take his own life. She had needed to be staunchly adamant and convincing
in her arguments even while harbouring her own doubts … which, it now turned out, she had been correct to have, for their
deaths had seemingly solved nothing.

She had persuaded him to kill himself
for nothing
.

She rounded a corner and there he was. Muscular enough for two men, his barrel chest stretching wide the V-shaped neckline
of his shirt, he stood at least a head above the others in his entourage. Every hair of his golden beard was perfectly in
place, and his golden eyes twinkled merrily as he regaled his audience with some tale or joke. As she swished around the bend
into his view, however, she ensured they would not hear the end of it.

‘Yalenna!’ he exclaimed. His face lit up in a way that assuaged her worries, and it was a release to smile at him fondly.
He, on the other hand, was having none of her restraint, and bustled towards her, careful not to knock anyone else over in
what for him were tight confines. He seized her under the arms and she laughed as he lifted her up in an enormous hug to swing
her about.

‘Braston,’ she said giddily, once he set her down, ‘you never did that before!’

‘I’m happy to see you!’ he said, beaming. ‘By the Spell, if you weren’t here, I don’t know what I’d do!’

‘It looks to me,’ she said wryly, ‘like you know exactly what you’re doing.’

‘Oh, this …’ he glanced about at the guards, jailer, and nobles who accompanied him, now watching them together in open fascination.
One of the guards held a brown-clothed prisoner with chained hands, who looked terrified.

‘Just apportioning a little justice,’ said Braston. ‘You would not believe the state of this place!’

To Yalenna the jail looked cleaner and kinder than some she had seen in other cities, but she held back comment.

‘I hear you’re raising an army,’ she said instead, though it came out a little sharper than she intended.

Braston grunted, and lowered his voice. ‘I’m sure you know we’re not the only Wardens to return. Stealer too, I think, for
Silverstone has disappeared without a trace. I’ve also heard of goings-on in the Sunshine Downs that seem to have the mark
of Despirrow about them. And if those two are back, and us as well, I can’t see much reason to hope that the others aren’t
here. Even now Karrak is probably scheming with Forger, raising up their own forces. We’ll hear about them soon, no doubt,
and I do not wish to be slow to react. I wish to
pre-empt
!’

Yalenna stared into his earnest eyes. It had always been easier for him, she knew, to face a foe that he could see, could
fight. Already he was focused on taking down the others, as he had been all those years ago – yesterday.

‘Also,’ he continued, ‘have you heard? The Unwoven
have not been dealt with yet. They have begun sending hunting parties out of the –’

‘You must realise,’ she interrupted, ‘that what we were trying to achieve when we ended our own lives has failed.’

Anger flashed across his face, and she forced herself not to look away. He, however, seemed more eager to forget her mistakes
than she was, for he smoothed his expression, and took a deep breath.

‘But Yalenna,’ he said, ‘
they
are the more immediate threat.’

‘Maybe so. But we cannot –’

‘Cannot what?’ He took her hands and squeezed them. ‘Use this time we’ve been granted against all expectation? Do some good
while we’re here? Yalenna, I do understand that there must be some mysterious reason for our return – or maybe it’s not mysterious,
maybe the Spell simply wants us to exist! But even if it’s something less pleasant than that, we don’t yet know what it is.
Am I supposed to stand idle while Karrak rebuilds his empire?’

‘Of course not, but we must choose our actions carefully. I have already heard that you deposed the King of Althala.’

‘I would not say deposed.’

‘Wouldn’t you?’

Braston grimaced. ‘But the people, Yalenna, they were so glad to receive me! I appeared on the very throne where I died and,
after the initial shock, you should have seen how they fell at my feet, how they praised the Spell for such a
miracle! They would not have it any other way than I be king again.’

‘And you, Braston – would you have it any other way? What if we discover that our purpose lies elsewhere? What if we must
perish once more? Do you not think it affects the kingdom to have its rightful ruler cast down? I’m sure the people would
still have been glad to see you whether or not you became their actual ruler. Instead you have changed the natural order by
assuming control.’