The Two of Swords: Part 14 Read online

  The Two of Swords: Part 14

  K. J. Parker

  www.orbitbooks.net

  BY K. J. PARKER

  The Fencer trilogy

  Colours in the Steel

  The Belly of the Bow

  The Proof House

  The Scavenger trilogy

  Shadow

  Pattern

  Memory

  The Engineer trilogy

  Devices and Desires

  Evil for Evil

  The Escapement

  The Company

  The Folding Knife

  The Hammer

  Sharps

  The Two of Swords (e-novellas)

  BY TOM HOLT

  Expecting Someone Taller

  Who’s Afraid of Beowulf?

  Flying Dutch

  Ye Gods!

  Overtime

  Here Comes the Sun

  Grailblazers

  Faust Among Equals

  Odds and Gods

  Djinn Rummy

  My Hero

  Paint Your Dragon

  Open Sesame

  Wish You Were Here

  Only Human

  Snow White and the Seven Samurai

  Valhalla

  Nothing But Blue Skies

  Falling Sideways

  Little People

  The Portable Door

  In Your Dreams

  Earth, Air, Fire and Custard

  You Don’t Have to be Evil to Work Here, But It Helps

  Someone Like Me

  Barking

  The Better Mousetrap

  May Contain Traces of Magic

  Blonde Bombshell

  Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Sausages

  Doughnut

  When It’s A Jar

  The Outsorcerer’s Apprentice

  The Good, the Bad and the Smug

  Dead Funny: Omnibus 1

  Mightier Than the Sword: Omnibus 2

  The Divine Comedies: Omnibus 3

  For Two Nights Only: Omnibus 4

  Tall Stories: Omnibus 5

  Saints and Sinners: Omnibus 6

  Fishy Wishes: Omnibus 7

  The Walled Orchard

  Alexander at the World’s End

  Olympiad

  A Song for Nero

  Meadowland

  I, Margaret

  Lucia Triumphant

  Lucia in Wartime

  Copyright

  Published by Orbit

  ISBN: 978-0-356-50621-0

  All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2016 by K. J. Parker

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.

  The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.

  Orbit

  Little, Brown Book Group

  Carmelite House

  50 Victoria Embankment

  London, EC4Y 0DZ

  www.orbitbooks.net

  www.littlebrown.co.uk

  www.hachette.co.uk

  Contents

  Title Page

  By K. J. Parker

  Copyright

  Hope, reversed

  About the Author

  Hope, reversed

  The horse-archer, whose name was Chantat mi Chanso, considered the shot and figured he must have pulled it at the last moment; a snatch in the release, sending the arrow low right, into the fleshy part of the thigh rather than the heart. He was annoyed with himself. He’d have to watch that before it turned into a bad habit.

  The enemy had fallen off his horse – quite a pretty little mare, carried its head well, rounded nicely on to the bit; but too much trouble to lead back through the battle, and who was buying women’s horses these days, anyway? He considered shooting the man again, but he discovered he only had five arrows left. Slovenly, to leave a wounded target, but that really only applied to animals, not people. He wondered why a big man had been riding such a small horse, but it was none of his business.

  Talking of which – he really ought to be getting back, he knew. Down in the valley the big battle was slipping away without him. What did you do in the big battle, Daddy? Oh, I wandered off and shot stragglers, while your Uncle Garsio and your Uncle Razo captured the enemy standard, killed the emperor and looted his golden treasury. No, that wouldn’t do at all.

  He rode past the mare and over the brow of the hill, looking for his squadron. Last he’d seen of them they’d been out on the far east wing, cutting up Ironcoats. But they didn’t seem to be there any more. He looked again, more carefully; the Dream of Bright Water was easy to spot, because their dragon was the only one with a real gold head; it caught the sun and sparkled, you could always tell it was them. And now he couldn’t see it, and that was worrying.

  Best to get back down there and find them. He nudged Firebird into a gentle canter, keeping her over on the soft verge. He wondered how Garsio had got on; he’d been plugging away shooting Ironcoats from a standstill (did they count if you weren’t moving? They’d never actually clarified that point) but he’d soon have run out of arrows doing that, so he’d have had to go back to the packhorses for some more. Had they brought enough? Fifty sheaves had seemed plenty when they set out that morning, but who could have anticipated a day like this?

  Nothing to be seen on the road except dead Ironcoats. He glanced at the fletchings of the arrows that had killed them, but they were all reds and greens, no sign of the yellow and white of the Bright Water. Maybe it hadn’t been such a good idea to go hurtling off after the men in the red cloaks. It’d be embarrassing if he couldn’t find the Bright Water and had to muck in with another squadron until they got back to the wagons. And if you piggybacked on another squad, didn’t you have to pay for your arrows?

  Something caught his eye and he pulled Firebird up short. Under an overhanging rock beside the road he saw dead men and dead horses; no Vei, not Ironcoats. He jumped down, looped the reins round his wrist and came closer.

  It was horrible. At least fifty or sixty; he didn’t recognise any of them, but there was their dragon, crushed almost flat, its pole snapped. A whole squadron, near enough. None of them had been shot. They were cut about and stabbed, there was blood everywhere.

  One of them was looking at him.

  He wasn’t sure at first. Dead men with their eyes open can look so very intense; yes, you, I’m talking to you. But this one blinked. He let go of the reins and edged over, stepping over dead bodies. The man licked his lips and said, “I can’t feel my legs.”

  “I’m sorry,” Chanso said. “How can I help? I don’t know what to do.”

  The man just looked at him. He wasn’t cut up like the others, but the way he was lying wasn’t right at all. “Horse threw me,” the man said. “Think my back’s broken. I can’t move.”

  What Chanso really wanted to say was: I’m sorry, but don’t look at me like that, it’s not my fault. Two kites swooped down over his head, turned into the wind and pitched on the rocks above him. He looked at them; they looked back. In your own time, they were saying. We don’t want to hurry you, but we’ve got work to do. He waved his arm and yelled, but they didn’t move.

  “Please,” the man said.

  Please what, for crying out loud? Please lift me up and carry me back to the wagons, or please shoot me? “I’ll get help,” Chanso heard himself say; then he raced back to the horse, scrambled u
p on her back and got out as fast as he could.

  He followed the road, simply because it was better going than trying to pick a way through the stones. He’d gone a few hundred yards when he heard shouting. He reined in and looked round and saw horsemen coming at him from three sides. They were riding big, heavy horses. They were Ironshirts.

  Which made no sense, as the enemy had no cavalry in this battle, that was the whole point. But there they were; spearmen, therefore most likely the notorious Dragons’ Teeth lancers – don’t go tangling with them, sunshine, they eat little boys like you. He reached round for an arrow, realised just how stupid that would be, wrenched Firebird’s head right round and galloped back the way he’d just come.

  Was it just conceivably possible that while he’d been away, in the half-hour or so his back had been turned, some fool had contrived to lose the battle? Impossible. There weren’t any enemy left, we killed them all. Whoever these lunatics were, they couldn’t have anything to do with the real outcome of the day. That had been settled long ago. They could only be some purely local anomaly, a minor incident out on the edge of the main action. It would be stupid to get himself killed by an irrelevancy. He gave poor Firebird a vicious kick and felt her accelerate. Then he glanced over his shoulder. They were closer now; much closer. It was as though he could already feel them, cutting his skin. He flapped his legs wildly, hammering Firebird’s ribs, but she couldn’t go any faster.

  And then he was in the air, watching the road coming toward him. And then—

  “Wake up, for crying out loud.” There was a hand gripping his jaw, waggling it from side to side. He grabbed at its wrist and it let go. “You’re all right, you’re fine. All over. Time to go.”

  The man crouching over him was no Vei; too old to be on the raid, properly speaking, his hair was streaked with grey and his face was deeply lined. The pattern of fine scars on his forehead was Glorious Destiny. “What happened?”

  “Tell you later. Right now, we’ve got to go. Come on.”

  “Just a minute. What happened? Where’s my horse?”

  “Forget the bloody horse, we’ve got a spare. Come on, will you? Or we’ll leave you here for the shitehawks.”

  An arm clamped to his elbow yanked him upright; he tottered and caught his balance. He tried to pull away but the older man was much stronger, dragging him along with one hand, shoving him between the shoulders with the other, so that he had to go forward or fall over. He heard the sleeve of his shirt rip. Another voice called out, “Get a move on, will you? They’re turning.”

  “Oh, shit,” said the older man, and Chanso realised he was terrified. “Look, pick it up, can’t you? Or they’ll kill us all.”

  He was being hustled towards a line of boulders along the verge, where a rockfall had been cleared out of the road. As he got closer he could see men behind it, three, no, four, all no Vei, and, behind them, six horses. They were watching something behind him, as anxiously as heavy betters at a horse race. The strong man grabbed a handful of the back of his shirt and boosted him over the boulders.

  “Now can we get out of here?” pleaded one of the men angrily.

  A moment later, Chanso was on a horse – he wanted to explain, I’ve already got a horse, I don’t need one; then it occurred to him that maybe he didn’t any more. He twisted round to look for Firebird, but someone grabbed his reins and he had to catch a handful of mane to stay in the saddle as the stranger’s horse broke into a gallop. As soon as he was secure in his seat he craned his neck round and saw a grey line sweeping towards him. More of the terrible Ironshirt lancers. Fear flooded his mind, drowning everything else. He had no control over anything. He clung on tight, like a little boy.

  After a very long time, the pace slowed and eventually he came to a halt. He looked up, realised his face was wet with tears. The strong man threw him back his reins; he muffed the catch and had to gather them handspan by handspan.

  “I think they’ve given us up,” someone said. “Conselh, what do you reckon? Are they still following?”

  The strong man took another long look before answering. “I believe so,” he said. “Looks like they’ve found some other poor buggers to play with.” He swung one leg over his pommel and dropped lightly to the ground, then flopped in a heap, sliding his back down against a bank. “Don’t know about you boys but I’m about done. If you want to keep going, I’ll catch you up.”

  “The hell with that,” someone else said. Then he nodded at Chanso. The strong man sighed, nodded back. “Right,” he said. “What’s your name, son?”

  “Chanso. Chantat, Bright Water.”

  The strong man shrugged. “Can’t say I’ve heard of you. I’m Conselh, this is Trahidour, Folha, Verjan and Clar, we’re all Celquel, Glorious Destiny. Did you see us?”

  “What?”

  Folha, a skinny young man with a small chin and a huge Adam’s apple, grinned. “Guess he didn’t.”

  “Fine,” Conselh said. “Anyway, we were hiding, hoping those Ironshirts wouldn’t see us, and you led the fuckers straight at us. We used our last eight arrows fixing them; also, your horse, sorry about that, I never was much of a shot. Still, you can have that one, Dolor won’t be needing it any more, poor bugger.” He stopped. Something about Chanso’s face was confusing him. “You do know we lost the battle, don’t you?”

  “I—” He was all choked up and could barely speak. “No, I didn’t. I got drawn off, and—”

  A slight frown told him that Conselh didn’t want to know. “Well, we did. Buggered if I know how. One minute we were shooting Ironshirts like a pig hunt, next thing we knew there were Dragons’ Teeth right up us. They smeared us all over the hillside like cheese on bread. We’d used up all our arrows, so we were empty-handed, and those monster horses of theirs can outrun us easy. It’s like someone set it up like that, but it makes no sense. I mean, we killed thousands of them before the lancers showed.” He closed his eyes for a moment and leaned forward, as if he had stomach cramps.

  “Get a grip,” advised one of the others. “Time for all that later. Let’s get moving.”

  “No,” Conselh said. “We’re out of sight here, we stay put till those bastard Teeth have pulled back and then we move on. I don’t know what it takes to get it into your thick skull, but they’re faster than us.” He grinned. “My kid brother,” he said. “You’ll get used to him.” The man who’d been speaking shot Conselh a foul look, but he didn’t see it. “Now then,” Conselh went on, “time we started thinking. We need to get back to the wagons, that’s if the Teeth haven’t got there first—”

  “For crying out loud, Conselh,” Folha said. Conselh ignored him.

  “Now if the boys back at the wagons have got any sense,” he went on, “they won’t be where we left them, that’s for sure. You got any arrows?”

  Chanso reached round to his quiver and pulled them out. All of them were broken.

  “Figures,” Conselh said, after a long silence. “The way our luck’s going. Five bows, no arrows. Probably a good thing, saves us from thinking we could make a fight of it, which I don’t suppose we could, with those Teeth. Better off without.”

  “I don’t think they’re taking prisoners,” Verjan said; he was the short one, broad-chested, with a beard and no moustache.

  “Why should they?” Conselh shook his head. “Our best chance lies in being more bother than we’re worth. Same goes for the wagons, I guess. What’ve we got that the Ironshirts could possibly want?”

  “Lives. And horses,” Folha replied. “And carts.”

  “Well, yes, there’s that. No use us trying to figure it out, anyhow, we haven’t got the brainpower.” He got up and peered cautiously over the bank. “Looking good at the moment,” he said. “Let’s make a move. Don’t know about you boys, but I’m sick of this place.”

  Conselh and Folha were both wrong about the wagons. They were still there, and the Ironshirts hadn’t wanted them, or the horses, or any of the gear; not even the arrows, which they’d u
sed as kindling. Another thing they’d got wrong was the assumption that Ironshirts didn’t know anything about the no Vei. Apparently they knew that if a no Vei’s body is burned, his soul finds no peace, because they’d filled the carts with dead bodies before setting light to them.

  It was a long time before anybody spoke. Then Folha said, “Do you reckon we’re all that’s left?”

  Conselh didn’t answer. Verjan said, “There must be more than just us. But I’d have thought they’d have headed back this way and we’d have seen them.”

  Trahidour, the tall, slim young one, was rootling about among the ashes. “Leave that,” Conselh snapped at him; he turned round and held out eight arrows, intact and undamaged. “I take that back,” Conselh said. “Any more?”

  Just one more, which they found after a long, disgusting search, making a total of nine between the six of them. “Makes no sense having one each,” Conselh said. “You. Any kind of a shot?”

  Chanso remembered his last effort. “No.”

  “Folha, you’re elected Minister of Defence. Sorry, make that Secretary of State for Supply, I don’t want you shooting at any Ironshirts, that’ll just piss them off. Deer only, and for crying out loud make sure you don’t miss. Got that?”

  Folha nodded and dropped the arrows into his quiver. Eight of them were red and black, the ninth was white and red. Chanso hadn’t seen any yellow and white, not even among the ashes. “Now where?” he said.

  Nobody wanted to answer that. Then quite suddenly Conselh grinned. “Home, of course. Where else?”

  “Talk sense,” Verjan snapped. “We’re on the wrong side of the sea, for one thing. Or had you forgotten?”

  “So we get a boat. Don’t look at me like that, we get to the sea, we’ll find a boat.”

  “Fine. Which direction is the sea in?” Conselh opened his mouth, then closed it again. “You don’t know, do you? You haven’t got a clue.”

  “It’s that way,” Folha said quietly, pointing. “Look at the sun,” he explained. “But Verjan’s got a point, hasn’t he? We don’t know this country, and we’re going to stick out a mile. What we want to do is get back to Choris Anthropou. We know where that is, follow the road, you can’t miss it.”