Ximo shook off the memory and the fear that accompanied it, suddenly aware of the silence that had stretched between them.
He pulled on the pipe to cover his loss of focus, breathed the rich smoke across the surface of the table, trying to break Néit’s gaze. The rolling smoke failed to reach the lord, the draw of the fire too strong for such gentle persuasion, and it was sucked away, across the table top, spiralling up toward the rafters and out into the crisp night air.
“Well?’ demanded Néit.
“The dark of night is always the best help,” Ximo replied sagely, hoping his tone would not betray the lie in his mind. That night haunted him far more than he could admit, even to himself and he wasn’t about to be interrogated by Néit about it, at least not now, not here.
Ximo rocked his chair forwards onto all four legs, dropped his elbows heavily onto the table with a thump, but still got no reaction. He ran a calloused hand over his thawed beard and shook his head. It was always difficult to second-guess what was going on behind Néit’s expression and many of the low castes wouldn’t dream of such familiarity, but they already been through a great deal and he knew how far to push…most of the time.
“So, what d’ya have in mind for tonight?” asked Ximo.
Néit threw back a mouthful of mead, poured another measure, lent forward, clicked his tongue in annoyance, and fixed his companion with that hunter’s gaze.
Even now, after all these months, Ximo still found it difficult to hold it. He dropped his eyes to the suddenly fascinating landscape of the battered tabletop
“Tonight, I’m going to drink,” said Néit simply.
No change there, thought Ximo.
“Tomorrow,” continued his lord, “fine weather or foul, you will spend the day in the market, and here on the dock.” He took a swig and pointed the cup at Ximo. “See if you can get wind of any folk with plans to travel. Maybe one of them might have finally come to a decision in our absence. I don’t care who, and I don’t care where; any party large enough to cover our trail and keep us safer than we would travelling alone. Once we’re on the move we’ll just adapt, take our chances as they come.” He looked back into the flames. “Spring is nearly here. We need to leave before it arrives.”
Ximo nodded and sat up. “Ho, bluffer there, another bottle!” he called, his voice cutting through the half-hollow clok of cups and the easy banter around them. “Hey! Make that two!” he added before turning back to his lord. I’m buggered if I’m going to spend yet another bloody day freezing my balls off, he thought as he stared at Néit over the rim of his own cup, without getting well and truly pissed tonight. “Mind if I join you in the drinking, Néit?” he asked aloud.
The noble smiled lightly again, nodding. “Sure, but remember what I said about using my name.” He glanced around the bar just to make sure no one was listening to their conversation and looked the young man full in the eyes. “Don’t!” he hissed.
“Still? But surely –”
“No, the risk is too great. There may not be any of them in Gearlynn, but they will be here soon enough. Better they don’t hear the name at all when they do, so just drop it. We may not have found our way out of here yet, but that doesn’t mean it’s the same coming in, especially if the reason is means enough.” He placed a long-fingered hand on Foe Bane laid across the table top, “And we both know it is.” He spat into the fire. “Had the Clann paid more attention to risk, and less to reputation, we would not be here; it’s a lesson well learnt and one I intend to carry with me.”
Ximo’s gaze fell to the spear. “The Clann was betrayed.”
“Yes, so you said, but if I’d been as concerned as about reputation, I would have been in the Great Hall when the Reckoning came and no doubt butchered along with the rest, not across the water playing the rake, and staying alive.”
“True,” said Ximo with a nod. This was much travelled ground between them, ground given a fresh lease of life whenever watered and it had become tiresome weeks ago; Néit’s growing melancholy, much watered by the fine Gearlynn mead available in every tavern and food-hall in town, was accompanied by outbursts of almost uncontained anger that put Ximo even more on edge.
“So, here we sit,” stated Néit angrily, “Clann Caevàl Reckoned and found wanting, and you –”
“Ah, here she comes!” interjected Ximo a little too enthusiastically, overtly eyeing the serving girl over Néit’s shoulder as she weaved through the tables towards them.
The girl placed two jugs on their table. Néit reached out for the handle of one, just as Ximo reached out for the waist of the girl. She deftly sidestepped him and he missed his mark. Néit however found his and yet again set to hopelessly flushing out his anger, just as he had most nights of the long, harsh winter.
Ximo sat back, resigned to yet another night of maudlin regret spattered with a fury aimed toward a target on which there was no sight, mark, or distance, not even for a blind clout. He pulled his kit from his bag, laid the tools of his preferred trade on the table, and began checking each arrow for sign of damp warp.
Still, he thought, sighting down an arrow, turning the shaft slowly in the fire light, looking for deviation along its length, at least we ain’t staying in the Butchers. A fella never gets any peace in a shit-hole like that.
Néit rolled off his mattress with a husky groan, climbed to a decidedly unsteady stoop, staggered left, and collapsed into a much-abused chair, its slim legs creaking under his careless weight. He screwed a grubby fist into his aching sockets to crack the sleep that bound his lashes, and peered bleary-eyed around the drinking hall of the Noble Rat, shuttered dark and devoid of sound, its fires long since dead and cold. Mice skittered across table tops strewn with mugs and jugs, scattered plates and spattered food, and rats stood twitching in-amongst the flattened straw strewn across the floor, their noses high, alert to the Doriànni lord’s waking.
He had not taken to his much-changed circumstance well, not well at all; his Clann was Reckoned, and he bereft; the escape from Adelanti over storm-tossed waters in that sieve of a boat; the interminable snow-bound captivity behind the fallen walls of backwater shit-hole, had all served to focus his considerable energies inward. Under normal circumstances, such reflections may have been welcome, or indeed beneficial, but his nascent grief had a self-interested greed grown strong over the months of winter internment, demanding it be suckled, its milk the mead that Gearlynn brewed in abundance.
Néit pressed at his temples, the all too familiar pounding of a colossal hangover coming on strong, burrowing its way through his skull to lodge somewhere behind his left eyeball. He looked again, absently dusting bits of flattened straw and squashed scraps of food from the blanket still wrapped around his shoulders, trying to recall why he was sitting in such dismal surroundings.
Never should have played Stones with those Baecodán soldiers — stupid at the best of times, but gods, when that drunk; could have lost what little I –
‘Shit!’ he cursed, sudden alarm spiking the familiar pound to a driving thrust so painful it blinded his left eye.
Panic washed his skin cold, as he realised Foe Bane was nowhere to be seen. He lurched to his feet, spilling over the table with a crash and clatter that sent the mice and rats fleeing in all directions.
‘No, no, no! By all the fucking Hells, no!’ he raged, anger and shame exploding in his chest, threatening to burst his aching skull wide open as he threw aside the mattress — and nearly choked on his relief. Foe Bane lay untouched beneath, the spear held snug in its carrying case, the whole cushioned on a bed of tinder-dry straw.
‘There you are,’ murmured Néit thankfully, snatching up the spear and folding back into the chair, cold sweat running down his face as a wave of nausea crashed over him. ‘Rotten gods….’ he breathed as the hangover hammered his skull like a smith’s anvil on market day, clutching the spear white-knuckled, as though he were at the rail of that cursed ship, the Blue Maru, the consequence of the previous night’s indulgence beating at his body.
Eventually the storm of nausea passed and he sniffed down the last of it, looking up and pushing back his long, sweat-soaked hair stuck to his face and neck.
What’s that awful smell?
He sniffed the air, then himself.
‘Gods, it’s me,’ he croaked with a wry smile that made him wince, his cold-chapped lips splitting again. You need a drink, Néit…hair of the dog; the only sure remedy for what ails you.
‘Hey back there?’ he called to the bar, and beyond.
Nothing stirred, not even the mice. He tried again, only louder this time. Still no one stirred, if indeed there was any one to be stirred.
‘Hey! You out back!’ he shouted, wincing again as his lip split further and the taste of blood flavoured his already foul mouth. He slammed his fist with a crash onto the table top, making the spear jump and the rats flee.
‘What d’ya want?’ asked a drowsy voice from beyond the drape.
‘Service, you fool, what else?’
The pockmarked face of the Noble Rat’s landlord appeared through the parting drape, and spying a Doriànni lord sitting by the cold fire, stepped through to stand behind his bar, as though Néit had simply walked in off the street and sat down, as opposed to drinking him dry of mead the evening before and sleeping in the prime spot at the fire all night.
‘How can I help, my lord?’ he said with a servile leer, combing a dishevelled wick of hair back over his baldpate, his mange-patched beard squashed to one side where he had slept on it.
Néit turned. ‘Set the bloody fire,’ he snarled, ‘it’s freezing in here!’
‘Yes, lord,’ replied the landlord, making to step round the counter.
‘And bring hot food.’
‘Yes, lord,’ replied the Asqueri, turning back to the kitchen.
‘And a Belly Warmer; your best brandy mind, sweetened with honey.’
The landlord turned back to Néit. ‘Which is it, lord: fire, food, or drink?’
‘All of them!’ snapped Néit, his head pounding hard again.
‘Boy!’ bellowed the barman, making Néit wince.
‘Yes, master,’ replied a young voice from behind the drape.
‘Clear the grate and get it lit.’
‘Yes, master.’
‘Wife, get —
‘Yes, yes, yes, I heard it all,’ interrupted a high-pitched, vaguely feminine and clearly annoyed voice. ‘How could anyone miss your songbird warbling! Well, food won’t be ready ‘till it’s ready, and not a moment sooner! Can’t do nothin’ about that now, can I? He’ll just have to wait, like the rest of us.’
‘Well get to it,’ replied the innkeeper with a sidelong glance toward Néit, ‘don’t want to keep ‘im waiting too long.’
Fortunately, the boy was quick on his feet, and the fire soon crackled with renewed life, the room brightened somewhat by fire light and a wash of dim sunlight struggling past the half open shutters.
Néit, a fresh-brewed cup of Belly Warmer in both hands, inhaled the sweet scent of apple blossom honey, cheap brandy, and soft spice, the hunch falling from his shoulders. He felt a sudden cold saliva fill his mouth — and promptly threw up into one corner of the fireplace — ash, steam, and smoke hissing out of the chimney place, the stench of bile boiling into the tavern. Néit, pitched forward, forehead pressed hard against the righted table, hands clinging to the corners, what little colour he still possessed draining from his face, ash settling on the musty blanket wrapped around his shoulders, hung on as the room revolved sluggishly around to the left, the table, it seemed, turning the other way and waited for the world to stop moving.
Slowly the nausea faded, and gingerly he sat upright, smoothing back his long, lank, hair from his cold brow. He wiped the sweat from his upper lip, and looked around, head pounding. There was no one in sight, so he turned back to the sputtering fire, threw more kindling at it, and languidly attempted to fan full life back into it.
‘I think…’ he muttered apologetically to the weakened flames, ‘I need to get my old ways together again.’
A stick of kindling cracked in reply, spitting orange embers at him.
He sat back into the chair as the tavern-wife stomped over, noisily dropped a plate of mashed eggs, a hunk of bread and presumably the dripping from last night’s pig in front of him. Néit attempted a reproving scowl, but even that made his eyes ache, so he simply waited for her to stomp back into the kitchen and when all was quiet, when the mice and rats had returned to feast, he slowly, warily, broke his fast on the simple fare.
By the time mid-morning sunlight slanted past the shutters, Néit had pushed back the empty plate having chased off the nausea with the grease of the meal, the heady pounding now little more than a distant drumming. He pulled a bronze toothpick from his pouch, and set to picking his long incisors clean, his gaze settling on the leather-bound spear, his mead-misted mind contemplating, not for the first time, the weight of its significance.
Foe Bane was the only evidence of his identity, and whilst that meant little sitting here, a stranger sitting in a ramshackle lakeside tavern enclosed by snow and ice, it was only a matter of a mild day or two before the Crow Moon waned, and the current tedium would likely end very rapidly, and with very dire consequences for them both. He was in no doubt Dúmnon forces would be looking for him just as soon as the Wandering Season began, and it was simply a matter of when, not if, they came to Gearlynn looking.
So, what to do? he asked himself, running his tongue over his eyeteeth, the smooth fronts, and the dagger-sharp tips.
The answer was plain, and in truth he was simply prevaricating, as he had been doing all winter. Despite his youthful reluctance to take his place within the Clann, he had always known his days as the wilful son would end, just not so soon…nor under such grievous circumstances. Though there lay a dilemma in itself, the flipped side of the coin as it were; the Clann was no more, there was nothing to conform to, their enemy had seen to that with great success. Clann Caevàl, that lineage extending back long aeons was ended; the Ker-Caevàl burnt down, the ground no doubt salted with the powdered bones of his ancestors, the spirit of Caevàl killed, or worse…enslaved; his kin slaughtered — butchered like sheep on the block by Dúmnon betrayal.
‘Bastards…’ whispered Néit, and his face flushed hot, fist clenching suddenly.
‘Bastards!’ he swore aloud, a thousand thoughts of terrible vengeance flashing to mind, a sudden wrath enfolding his hung-over deliberations, the old grief surging anew through his veins, filling his limbs with a fury that burnt to his very core, the overwhelming urge to hunt, to kill, to tear at throats with his teeth; visions of his foe falling before the Bane, hewing limbs from bodies, heads from —
He took a sharp breath, filling the angry void with stale, vomit tinted air, and exhaled…long and slow, muscles relaxing, core cooling, calm coming back to his centre, the violence of his Doriànni nature clearing as twenty years of warrior discipline and training re-asserted themselves over the natural predator instinct of his kind. He opened his eyes, and his cold gaze fell to Foe Bane, lying on the table before him.
Timing and distance, Néit. His uncle’s words again.
He hadn’t understood the words the first time he’d heard them, nor for years after, but he had been an excellent student even by his uncle’s standards, embracing the Stalking Art with a passion that saw him practicing beyond the lessons he was required to attend, finally seeing past the poetic mysticism — all meant to obscure — to the core of their meaning.
With clear intent, true timing, and correct distance, all action becomes achievable, even that which appears impossible.
It had taken him years of physical hardship, contemplation and bloody-minded attitude to come to an understanding of those words, and the ability that came with them. Of all the duties required of a Caevàl Stalker, it was these lessons that meant the most to him and these lessons that gave the most to him. Under the Hunt Master’s tutelage, he had become…dangerous, even by Doriànni measure, at least for one so young. But his growing prowess had been accompanied by a certain detachment, a detachment seemingly engendered by his understanding.
With understanding, his uncle had explained, comes unshakable commitment, even to impossible choices, to impossible actions, and thus we make the impossible…inevitable. That is the Stalking Art. These are the wonders our forebears performed, and the Song Weavers sing of.
But Néit’s detachment had led to conflict, not wonders. And that was why he had been in the Sea Witch and not the Great Hall that night. He uncurled a fist and laid the open hand on the scabbarded spear.
Caevàl is not ended, it is here, at this table, in this foul-smelling honey-bucket. My intent will decide what shape that future will take, not that of Clann Dúmnon…or any other for that matter. He picked Foe Bane up off the table. My intent, my timing, my distance must align with yours…and for that there is only the Thousand Breath Form.
He looked beyond the shutters, to the snow laden clouds above the town.
The Thousand Breath Form in the snow! Uncle would have sold his eyeteeth to see that.
The very thought of his old mentor laughing at all made Néit smile, and he felt the skin on his lips part anew. He smiled wider, welcoming the pain and the tang of blood, threw back the last of the Warmer, stood, gathered their meagre belongings, strode over to the bar and dropped the bags on the wooden counter.
‘Yes, lord, how can I serve?’ asked the innkeeper, looking up from wiping a spill of something cold and congealed from the other end.
‘My belongings; you have somewhere to store them, somewhere safe?’
‘’Course, lord, got a strong box for just such, and a small fee gets my word they won’t be touched ‘till you return.’
‘How much?’
The landlord undid each bag and made a show of inspecting the innards, buckled them back up, took a sidelong glance at the ash covered fire pit, the empty dish on the table, looked up at the ceiling, scratching at a scab on the side of his neck, making it bleed through his beard, apparently calculating.
Néit shifted his weight slightly, and for a joyous moment considered gutting the filthy creature with his street sword for his lack of respect, and disgusting ways. Already close to a killing mood, Néit took another calming breath as the man concluded his summing up, looked at the noble, and grinned a black-toothed smile. It was a disturbing sight.
‘You got coin?’ he asked. Néit nodded. ‘That’ll be two coppers then.’
Néit reached under his coat for his pouch, plucked out two copper, and dropped them onto the counter. A fat grimy hand shot out and swept them up in triumph as Néit shouldered Foe Bane, span on the balls of his feet, and strode toward the doorway.
‘My servant will return before the day is out to collect,’ he called without turning, his tone murderous. ‘Make sure all is in order, or I will know the reason,’ he warned, yanking aside the hide curtain covering the doorway.
Sunlight burst over him as he stepped onto the street, one hand shielding his eyes from the glare of the morning sunlight, the other white knuckled around the hilt of his street sword, he headed Dawnwards, turned onto Gate Street, then, realizing he was headed away from his destination, took an ill-considered right turn into the narrow and constricted lanes of the Darkside Slums.
The Warding Season was always the fresher, cleaner season in Adelanti, and it was no different here in Gearlynn. Life did not rot so quick when covered by ice and snow, and though the air was thick with dung smoke and the smell of frozen piss, one could still breathe easy, even in the poorest quarters, and there was little traffic on the mud-choked, refused-littered lane. He passed the occasional beggar too desperate or too stubborn to be driven inside whatever hovel they might call home by the cold morning, though none dared even look up at the Doriànni lord sweeping down the lanes, long coat snapping around his legs, seemingly oblivious to the cold or the danger. Unmolested, Néit entered onto Long Valley Way, the approach to Valley Gate, its guards gathered close around a small charcoal-fired brazier, warming their hands, chatting quietly together in the way that only guards do, biding time until something more interesting occurs. Some way ahead of Néit, and traveling in the same direction were four figures, all wearing thick cloaks, three bearing heavy burdens. One of the guards gave his mate a poke with an elbow and a knowing nod over his shoulder, and all three turned. The mate stepped forward, raising a hand, signalling the group to stop as they drew close to the post, and the lead figure, unburden by the large wicker baskets the others carried, stepped forward.
From his distance, Néit could not hear the quick exchange that followed, but the easy laughter from the guards and the casual stance of both groups served to assure Néit there would be little trouble passing through, and quickening his pace, he strode up behind the cloaked figures as one of the guards pulled back the huge timber bolts on the door within the gate, and waved the group through. The man who had been doing all the talking gave a nod to the others, turned around, and headed back, a grim frown on his weathered Huwan brow, most of his features lost behind the thick red beard of the Sabrosi caste, or Bloodbeard, as Ximo called them. Apparently too preoccupied to notice, Néit he passed without acknowledgement, and Néit followed the group through the gate, turning from their path to find the space he was looking for, a sheltered corner, where the palisade wall turned, the snow still deep and the air frosty.
It took a while to clear the ground beneath his feet, the task serving to warm his self-abused body, and by the time he was satisfied with a roughly cleared patch of frozen earth, Néit had broken into a cleansing sweat. He dropped his battered winter coat to the ground, dropped Foe Bane on top, stripped completely naked, and he threw himself into the deep drift piled against the timber wall. The shock of the cold stunned his body rigid for a moment, but he managed to stagger to his feet, and using great scoops of night-frozen snow, scoured away the grime and old sweat from his skin, the melt water washing away the smell of vomit, smoke and stale alcohol from his hair, and his spirit, leaving him tingling, almost red raw with the cold, and for the first time in weeks, completely clean.
Quickly, the cold biting hard at his flesh, he pulled on his doe skin breeches and boots, shook the melting snow from his hair, drew Foe Bane from its case, placed his feet shoulder width apart, hands in front of his body, took three deep breaths, exhaled the last slowly, relaxing completely around the absence in his lungs. He repeated the breathing pattern once more and on the soft exhale, brought the long spear slowly up, then down and to the right, the first cut of the Thousand Breath Form, the first cut to form the bond, make Foe Bane his, make him First Lord of his Clann, but a braying note of a tusk-horn echoed across the frozen estuary, setting the crows atop the wall scattering into the frigid air with a raucous complaint, starting Néit from his efforts.
He looked up, gaze following the track leading up the hillside toward Ker-Baecodán, the Clann tower stationed there. High up on the western headland a beast drawn wagon had appeared at the cliff top, turning down onto the track, flanked by figures, all armed he judged, by their gait. He watched, the sudden thrill of excitement running down his spine, the possibility of escaping the trap that Gearlynn had become, crystalizing into a palpable reality before him; slowly, wagon-by-wagon, beast-by-beast, a caravan turned onto the track and began to make its slow, lumbering way down the track.
He swung the spear with a practiced ease through the drift to his right, swung again, stepped left, parried right, stepped right, parried left, right again and lunged. He turned on flat feet, his weight suddenly dropped low, all his focus on his breath as he exhaled, his muscles relaxing, letting the energy dammed in tension flow freely, the flow drowning all emotion. The turn became a spin on the axis of his spine, the freed energy rooting him to the ground and moving outwards at the same time, flowing from his centre; hip-to-elbow-to-wrist-to-palm, spear-grip-to-spear tip, breath both the centre and the circumference of the circle. He raised the spear of his fathers above his head, inhaled, and on the exhale, let his entire body relax, empty of nothing but his new intent.
Timing and distance, he reminded himself, timing, and distance.
And he began the Thousand Breath Form, the form that would forge the bond between spear and wielder, bronze and bone…magic and mind.