The Traitor's Heir (54 page)

“Rise.”

They rose. Only the Right Hand met the Master's dreadful gaze.

“Master,” he said, “a new servant is brought before you.”

“I will test him.”

Every nerve in Eamon's body went stone cold. The voice coursed through him, robbing him of strength and filling him with fear. He knew that voice – how he knew it! – and it knew him.

He began to tremble. He could not go through with this! They would kill him, and strike at Hughan, and the house of Brenuin would be razed from the earth. It would be his fault for letting himself be made a Hand. There was no courage in his limbs and no cry in his throat. He was lost!

“Test him, Master,” Cathair said. There was something close to adoration in the Hand's voice. “Test him and make him true.”

All except the Right Hand sank to one knee again. Eamon tried to kneel. His knees were so weak he feared he would fall. He could not bring himself to do it. He was struck immovable by the terrible grandeur of the one by the throne.

The Master came to stand before him, his hair like wreaths of living flames and his face, though pale, terrifying, showing not weakness but indelible strength. Eamon quailed. How could Hughan, of mere flesh and blood, hope to stand against this being? The grey eyes were on him, driving into his very heart.

“Will you bow to me, Eben's son?” The voice was glorious and hideous.

“Yes, Master,” Eamon stammered. He staggered to his knees until the hem of the throned's robes were before him, and still he felt as though he stood too tall.

He heard the unsheathing of the great sword. He shut his eyes, pressed his face against the ground, and quivered.

“Will you renew your pledge to me, Eben's son?”

“Yes, Master,” he whispered. He reached out and touched the pommel of the sword that he knew was stretched towards him. He laid his injured right hand over its eagle, feeling pain as sore flesh and metal touched.

“I renew my pledge.” He felt the throbbing red light growing around the mark in his hand but he dared not look up. His hand shook. “My blood, my blade, and my body are all given in your service.”

“Will you swear a new oath to me, Eben's son?” The Master's voice seemed both within and without his mind. It permeated him, reverberating through every pore and fibre.

Eamon nodded speechlessly.

“Will you swear to be mine and mine alone, a hand swift to avenge me, obedient to and glorifying none but me alone, forsaking all other oaths and service, even to the end of your days? Will you be as my Hand in this city, and in these lands?”

“My hand is witness to my pledge; I ratify it,” Eamon answered, holding his hand aloft.

“You cannot serve them both,”
Alessia's voice warned. But a new vow was weaving its tendrils round him. He could not shake himself free. It was too late.

Suddenly the throned's hand was on his forehead; it was a cool hand, bearing power.

“I will test your service, Eben's son.” Eamon knew with dread certainty what would follow: he would be breached.

The ground fell from under him. His whole world became the hand pressed hard against his head. He opened his eyes and gasped.

He did not see the plain.

He saw a broad expanse of tangled woodland in the arms of a valley. Men lay dead there; some wore blue, others red. Their arms and shields were unfamiliar to him, but on some he saw the sword and star and on others the Master's eagle. Men fell around him. A watchtower was in the distance, its roof and pennons caught in a torrent of flame. The charred stonework spewed a guttering coil of smoke. The nearby woods burned, filling the night with ash as well as blood and death.

He saw a man ride through the press of the dead. His sword lifted high, the heavens seemed to light the blade. His bright helm was ringed with a shining crown. The rider called and men rallied to him.

The King, for so he was, rode down the narrow field. There was a man before him, seemingly wrapped in flames. The man laughed, red hair shaking about him like a mane. His face was violent with delight.

The King rode on towards his foe. There seemed to be no force that could stop him and no power that could stand against the piercing brightness of his sword. But the riding King did not see the man who suddenly rose from among the fallen dead, and he did not see the stroke of a reddened blade arching towards him.

With an unearthly scream the King's steed plummeted to earth in a froth of fear and blood. The King was thrown down hard. As he fell his helm was cast aside and he saw the man who had struck him.

It was the First Knight.

Even as the King fought to regain his feet the flaming man came upon him, sword long and terrible in the light.

The blade plunged down, piercing the throat of one that called still upon the name of his First Knight.

“Even thus are you mine, Eben's son.”

As the vision began to fade the throned was before him. There were sobs of anguish in his throat. Burning tears rushed down his cheeks and he shivered with cold fear. The Master was over him, an unbreakable tower of fire and steel.

“You will never undo that stroke. The house of Brenuin is fallen and the service of your house is given to me. You are bound to me. You will be true to me.”

Eamon lowered his head. His hope lay, shattered and bleeding, like the broken corpse in the valley of Edesfield.

“I am true to you, Master,” he whispered. Inwardly, he wept.

He felt a searing pain on his forehead and resisted the urge to cry out. The throned was withdrawing his hand. The fingers left a new, heavy mark upon him, one that he could never remove. Broken and bound, he knelt before the throned.

The Master stepped back.

“I have tested my servant, Eben's son, and found him true.” The voice was victorious. “Let him be my Hand, in this city and over the River.”

Eamon trembled as Cathair and Waite drew him to his feet. His arms were drawn back and his red jacket was taken from him. Cold air passed over him; he felt vulnerable, naked. The Right Hand came to him, bearing a black garment. Thick, black clothes were set upon him and a cloak was darkly clasped about his shoulders. The Master smiled at him.

He was a Hand.

He was to be stationed as a Hand of the West Quarter and awarded lodgings in the Hands' Hall. He was assigned to the especial care of Lord Cathair, who would in effect ward him until he grew accustomed to his role. His duties had not essentially changed: he was to continue assisting Captain Waite at the college, but he would also have duties at the palace – and work from the Master himself – via Lord Cathair and the Right Hand, when it was allotted to him. He would learn about the deepest workings of the city, be privy to its politics, economics, and trade disputes, and be an integral part, so Cathair told him, of setting policy on the upcoming culling.

The black cloak was heavy and cumbersome as he walked slowly up the Coll, overtaken by dozens of Gauntlet and servants. He had accompanied Captain Waite back to the college and collected his things. He was to take them back to the Hands' Hall, after which Cathair had insisted that he should join the West Quarter's other Hands for a celebratory drink. His forehead still burned – perhaps that was what people shied away from as he passed.

A cool wind came in across the sea with the eventide. He turned to face it. All the hope that the morning had brought was shrouded in black. He had reaffirmed fealty to the wrong man; strengthened the wrong oath. He had been a fool to think that he might do otherwise.

Hearing footsteps approaching, Eamon looked up. Mathaiah Grahaven was watching him.

“Good evening, Lord Goodman,” he said, bowing.

Eamon's heart curdled. Lord Goodman. Had he not always dreamed of coming as far as he had done that day? Why, then, was the title so grievous to him?

You will go farther even than this, son of Eben.

As Eamon shook the voice away the young man turned to continue along the Coll. Suddenly his voice leapt to his throat.

“Mathaiah!”

The young man turned warily. “My lord.”

That joy again! And none could gainsay him this due. The title was his. He had earned it.

“Mathaiah,” he said, shaking himself as though by it he might cast off his oath. “You must take a message to Hughan.”

Mathaiah gaped at him. His face set into a disbelieving line. “A message?” he repeated. His tone grew hard. “Your garb is message enough!”

The words cut to his heart. “Don't you understand?” he cried. “Hughan is in danger!”

“He is now, my lord,” Mathaiah retorted curtly. As he stalked away his face was streaked with tears.

“Mathaiah –!”

He will not listen to you
, the voice told him.
He never did.

The door was answered slowly when he knocked, and he stood, shivering, in the cold. He felt more vulnerable in black than he had ever felt in red.

He had been to drink with the Hands. Lord Cathair had toasted his health and long service, and Eamon had stayed as long as he could deem polite before leaving, ostensibly to retire. He had even done so. But his room had been cold and dark, engulfed by the wings of the palace and the hall's red stones. The stones now answered to his hand – he could go where he wished. But he did not want to be in the Hands' Hall. He did not want to be alone.

Shadows moved in the dark around him, and as he waited by the door he heard the last whispers of the city. Most lights were doused, though those at the palace still burned; its great windows were like eyes weeping flames. He watched the moon creep from behind a cloud.

At last he heard fingers unbolting the door. A servant welcomed him with tired eyes.

“Mr Cartwright, is Lady Turnholt here?” Eamon asked.

“Yes, Mr… my lord,” the servant corrected himself, starting at the black. “She's in her chamber.”

“May I go up to her?”

“Of course, my lord,” the servant replied, lowering his eyes.

Eamon thanked him and made his way upstairs. Light flecked the corridor and he knew that it emanated from the fire in Alessia's room. He followed it, the way so familiar to him that he barely thought about it. His shadow grew behind him as he approached the door. It stood a little ajar.

He knocked.

There was no answer. Carefully, he peered inside.

Alessia was sitting at her dressing table, her hair undone all along her back. A brush lay still in her hand and her eyes gazed far away.

He walked to her and gently touched her hair. Seeing black in the mirror she turned, terror on her face.

“My lord,” she began, shaking.

“Alessia!”

Her eyes widened in relief. “Eamon!” she whispered, hurling her arms about his neck. “It's you!”

“Of course,” he answered. “Who else should it be?”

“Nobody, nobody!” Alessia cried, and pressed her lips against his until his whole world was her wild hair and wilder kisses. He laughed and caressed her, until at last she stepped back to look at him.

“What happened to you today?” she asked. She seemed unsure whether she should smile or weep. Her hands lightly touched his forehead where the throned had marked him. He did not know if she could see it, but her fingers were a balm to his troubled brow.

“I got some new clothes,” Eamon answered, trying to make light of it. “Do you like them?”

“They do suit you… but perhaps I liked the old ones better.” Alessia smiled. “Black seems to swallow you a little.”

“How should I dress to please you, my lady?” Eamon asked.

She laughed and laid her hands upon his shoulders. The black cloak felt stifling on him and seemed, as he held her, to dwarf them both.

“The colour and dress matter little to me,” she told him, “while it is you who wears them.”

Overwhelmed, he kissed her gentle lips, losing himself in her warmth – a warmth that penetrated the cold recesses of his soul. It was all that mattered then.

He stayed with her that night. The grey dawn stole upon them all too swiftly. In that half-light he held her close and wished that he could lie there with her forever; that her lithe limbs, soft laugh, and deep heart might be his whole world.

But he knew it could not be. His discarded black haunted his sight.

“Do Hands have to go to parade?” Alessia murmured.

He shook his head and buried his face in her neck. “No,” he answered, “not now, not today, not ever.”

“You're lying!”

“You're worth it.”

She fell silent and then looked at him seriously. Her hands touched his back; her fingers explored his scars. He did not mind.

“I have never asked you…” she said at last. “When were you flogged?”

“On the ship.”

“What did you do?”

“Nothing.”

She was silent. He watched her thought in her eyes until she met his gaze again. “If you didn't do anything…”

“There was a miscarriage of duty; the three cadets were under my command. So I claimed the fault as mine, and took their punishment.” He remembered the bite of the lash, the rip when the knots caught his flesh, the cadets' terrified faces. “They were just boys.”

“Mathaiah,” Alessia guessed with her usual, deadly accuracy. “He's important to you, isn't he?”

Sorrow filled him. “I tried to tell him,” he told her. “About the danger to the supplies, and the cull that's to happen here. He could have got a message out but he… he wouldn't listen to me.” He fell silent as the enormity of the statement hit him. They had each saved the other's life. Now there was no measure of trust between them.

Alessia kissed his cheek. “I'm sorry.”

“So am I.”

They rose together and Eamon delighted in helping her to dress. He tenderly brushed her fine hair and offered her his hand. He did not don his cloak, but rather gathered it over his arm. They went downstairs together. As Alessia held his arm, he felt the happiest man in the world.