“Stop!” he spat. “Not you, sir. MacGilly, I am not one of your fool sheep. Have a care.”
The Hillman flushed.
Anne came over to the left side and deftly ran the tight sleeve up the arm without twingeing his shoulder. “Force is not always the answer,” she said.
“Everything I do is wrong,” the Hillman said bitterly. And froze.
Anne pointed. “Out,” she said.
MacGilly looked horrified, humiliated; so upset that Gabriel felt for him. But Anne was right.
He began to lace his own doublet. “Give me your theory,” he said. “You have two minutes.”
“Highness, we think the gates will open in a sequence, at intervals, and not all at the same time. The sequence is not alterable, and is dependent on the constellation that dominates the particular gate.” The Yahadut scholar tugged at one of his side locks and looked as nervous as MacGilly.
Gabriel stopped wriggling in the doublet. “Say that again,” he said.
The Yahadut nodded. “There are at least seven gates, my lord, and you yourself have posited as many as fifteen.”
Gabriel nodded and looked at Morgon, who had his hands steepled in front of him and his eyes closed. “Or twenty-two,” Morgon said.
“Dame Julia’s experiments were aimed at the only gate whose location she knew for sure,” al-Shirazi said.
“Lissen Carak,” Gabriel said with something like satisfaction.
“Yes, my lord. That is—”
“By God!” Gabriel said. “That is to say there’s something like a three-day difference between Arles and Lissen Carak.”
The eastern scholar bowed. “You have it.”
“In our favour,” Morgon said.
“How is it in our favour?” al-Shirazi asked.
Morgon’s eyes were still closed. “It is not as if the opening of this gate leads us to Lissen Carak,” he said, as if this was obvious.
“Would you be lord of all the worlds?” Blanche said quietly.
Gabriel closed his eyes and engaged that part of Al Rashidi’s borrowed memory palace that showed him maps. Not really maps. More like pilgrim itineraries; lists of locations.
“Pavalo,” he said. “You say you led the raid on the lost library …”
“Yes,” Payam said.
“You saw these … maps. Charts. Itineraries.” Gabriel didn’t look at him.
“Yes. I saw them. I took pictures of them with my mind, and gave those pictures to my master.” Payam’s voice was rich and low, but somehow it contained a sense of a great fear, conquered.
“How old were they?” Gabriel asked.
“Very old,” Payam said. “As old as the oldest things in the library.”
Gabriel still didn’t open his eyes. “When did the not-dead attack the library?” he asked.
“Before the rebel even existed,” Morgon said. “Yes, Gabriel; I agree. This game has gone on a long time.”
“Is there any way Ash can assume, or believe, or even guess we have these lists?” Gabriel said.
“It depends on whether we think that the rebel had allies,” Morgon said.
“So much to fucking know,” Gabriel said in frustration.
Blanche nodded. “Yes, my lord. But now you have three days, where before you had none.” She smiled hesitantly.
George Comnena shrugged. “Very well, I’m the slow one. Why?”
Gabriel opened his eyes. “Here it is, George. The gates do not all interconnect. That is, you cannot go from each gate to any location. Imagine them as seaports, with a variety of seas beyond. It is easy to reach Galle from Liviapolis, and easy to reach Genua from Harndon. Yes?”
Michael blinked. “Damn,” he said. “I thought we were going to—”
“Yes,” Gabriel said. “I rather hoped we’d just march through and fight, too. But it doesn’t work that way. Al Rashidi had the master lists; now Morgon and I have them.”
Michael took a couple of breaths as the reality of it all hit him. “We’re going to other worlds.”
“We’re taking the largest human army since Aetius won Chaluns to other worlds,” Gabriel said.
The silence was absolute.
“And we will have three days to cross those worlds, locate the correct gate, win it from Ash’s allies, and go through to face Ash,” Gabriel said.
“Oh God,” Michael said. But he smiled, because Gabriel was smiling. “But that’s good?”
“Better than no days at all,” Morgon said.
Michael rose. He looked at the star charts, understanding little of what he saw. “But,” he said, “but … it takes a key, does it not? To open a gate?”
“You are wearing it,” Gabriel said. “Or so we hope.”
Blanche looked away. Clarissa sighed.
“So many hopes,” the Queen of Arles said.
The Inner Sea—Aneas Muriens
Aneas and Master Smythe were the last awake. The dead were buried; the wounded tended as best as could be managed.
“When will Orley come?” Aneas asked. “I do not want to wait.”
Master Smythe was smoking. “He must come immediately, or not at all,” he said. “But either he comes in the next day, or Ash comes in person, and takes back the well; in which case, no power of ours can stop him.”
Aneas nodded, and took the proffered pipe.
“Or he does not come. Once I have attuned the well to me, Ash cannot take it back without coming in person. Orley must strike soon. And thanks to the wyverns, we can watch his approach.”
“He could come tonight,” Aneas said. “We have not scouted him today.”
“You grant him superhuman powers,” Master Smythe said. “Our enemy could come tonight, in which case, I would stand here, half attuned, and probably die facing him in single combat. But in a day or so, I will have a limitless source of power, deeper and greater than my power in the circle of the Wyrm in the Green Hills, and even there, you will notice, our great enemy has never chosen to challenge me.”
“There is a well?” Aneas asked, daring, in his fatigue, to question the dragon.
“Something like one. It is more a coincidence of aesthetics and other forces, but you may think of it as a well, if you wish.” Master Smythe reached for the pipe. “Cover me for another day.”
“I would stay longer than that for the chance of crossing swords with Kevin Orley.” Aneas narrowed his eyes and they glittered in the near darkness.
Master Smythe smiled darkly. “Your people need rest. They have taken casualties; humans spend time mourning, in my experience. And are better for it.”
“Dragons do not mourn?” Aneas asked.
“Dragons, in my experience, seldom have the fellow feeling that would create the necessary condition for mourning. Rejoicing is more usual.” Master Smythe blew an excellent smoke ring at the moon.
“But you will not remain here?” Aneas said.
“I may,” Master Smythe said after a long exhale. “I am still weak, and badly injured. This animation you are looking at is made of catch and clay; I cannot take the form of a dragon, I could no more fly than … than you. Indeed, I came within the changeling’s whim of being unmade. If I did nothing but hold this place, I would still serve your need.”
Irene stepped onto the moonlit beach. “Our need?” she asked. “Are we not your tools, Master Dragon?”
Master Smythe took the pipe and inhaled deeply. And then passed it to her. “I have tried my very best to treat you as allies,” he said. “I fear you, but I do not hate you. Indeed, I rather fancy you.”
“Me, in particular?” she asked.
Aneas looked back and forth between them. He felt a curious jealousy; he knew Irene well enough to know that this, from her, was flirtation.
The dragon laughed softly. “Perhaps from time to time,” he admitted. “I have often admired the daughters of men.”
“So often, that you have spread your fatal seed across all the Nova Terra,” she said, when she’d handed the pipe to Aneas. S
he took a flask from her shoulder bag, pulled the cork with her teeth, and handed it to the dragon.
He sniffed and drank. “Mmm,” he said. “Candied wine.” He looked at the moon. “Yes, Irene,” he said. “I confess. It has been my pleasure to give humans the weapons they need to survive.”
“Your blood,” she said.
He shrugged.
“Constantly nurtured, and reinforced, especially in the north country,” Irene said.
Aneas was trying not to choke.
“And reaching its apogee in the Muriens family,” she went on.
The dragon took another swig and handed Aneas the bottle. “Bravo,” the dragon said.
“And your rivals never noticed,” Irene said. “They missed your entire ploy, and you’ve had a thousand years to play the game of bloodlines and kings; Ash thought you were raising allies for a war, and instead you were breeding them like racehorses. A race of sorcerer soldiers. Or two or three.”
“How did you fail to make yourself empress?” Master Smythe asked.
“I didn’t fail,” Irene said softly. “You succeeded. You succeeded so well that your finished tool is more dangerous than you are, yourself.”
Aneas stood silently. He passed the wine to Irene, who drank a long pull.
And passed the bottle to Master Smythe.
“It goes so well with the pipe,” he said apologetically. “Irene, even if I allow what you say … still, admit that my way has done men no harm and much good?”
She took the wine, drank some, and said, “Shouldn’t this be empty by now?”
Smythe nodded. “Allow me my little ways,” he said.
She smiled. “I do not think that Ghause Muriens would agree with you. She was harmed; used as a brood mare.”
“My mother was no one’s tool,” Aneas said hotly.
“How many others have been harmed?” Irene went on.
“If I meant you harm, you would be harmed,” the dragon said. “Sometimes people use their own will. Ghause was never my tool.”
“You have manipulated us; treated us like horses in a stud farm,” Aneas said suddenly. “Oh my God …”
Smythe looked at the distant stars. “You do it to each other,” he said. “And I am much better at it. And Aneas, before you launch into a torrent of recriminations because the patricide here has uncovered my little plan, may I note that, without me, the gates would still be about to open, but Alba would have no more talent at its disposal than Etrusca or Galle? Mmm?” He breathed the pine-scented night. “The pipe is almost dead.” The moonlight shone on his pale face and dark beard, and for a moment he looked demonic. “And yes, Irene, I find you attractive. Even your … brilliance.” He bowed. “But I will not interfere further. Aneas, I will remain here until I am healed, or until the alliance is desperate. I beg you to protect me against our common foe while I am weak.”
Aneas glanced at Irene. “What should we do?” he asked. He bottled up whatever he might have thought about the manipulation of his family as breeding stock for sorcery. The thought might have made his mother smile. Or spit.
Irene met Aneas’s eye and for a moment they held eye contact. She looked away first. “Kill Orley,” she said. “I will sleep better knowing he is dead.” She looked back. “Can we defeat him?”
Aneas shrugged. “We destroyed a great many boats, and he must have pursued closely if he can attack soon. And Master Smythe insists that if he does not attack soon, he will have control of the well.”
“So either he attacks soon, at nearly even odds, or never,” Irene said, finishing the wine.
“Precisely,” the dragon said.
“But we have almost no watch set,” Irene said.
“A calculated risk,” Aneas said. “Tessen and Lewen can stay awake.”
“And if he comes, and we defeat him?” she asked.
Master Smythe nodded. “I am ever more hesitant to offer advice, this deep in the entanglement,” he said. “But I’d say, when the danger is past, go south. And find … Tapio.” The dragon took a deep breath, as if he was smelling the air, and he looked south. “Tapio is about a hundred and fifty leagues from here, give or take a swamp. If you go south, you will find him.”
Aneas blinked. He was falling asleep on his feet; his head had just nodded to his chest. “Ten days’ travel?” he asked.
Smythe’s smile was inhuman. “Perhaps not so much. Ask me in the light of day. You need sleep. Even I need sleep.” He nodded. “Good night.”
Irene kissed his cheek. “Good night, dragon,” she said.
He laughed, but only when he was well up the beach.
“Oh,” he said to the darkness, “what fools we mortals be.”
Behind him, Irene hugged herself. The autumn air was chill.
Aneas looked at her. “You should …”
“Go to bed?” she asked. She tilted her head to one side. “It is odd; three weeks ago, I bathed every day, sometimes twice, and I was very particular about every aspect of my person; fastidious. Cautious. And ruthless, because I thought that was what was required.” She turned and glanced at the stars. “I have learned more from these weeks than from a mountain of scrolls and books. And despite that, this takes every iota of my courage.”
She stepped up to him and he flinched; she put a hand behind his head and pressed her lips to his so hard that their teeth bumped.
Aneas was wide awake in an instant.
His heart hammered away in his chest.
Her mouth tasted of wine and cloves; the cloves told him she’d planned to kiss him, which seemed reassuring. And very like her.
He put a hand on her back as her tongue explored his mouth, and tried not to think.
She had no idea how to kiss. None whatsoever. She was clumsy as his first partner. And brave.
And a woman.
Aneas began to laugh. “No, silly!” he said.
“Oh,” she fell away. “Oh. I’m sorry.” Her eyes were bright. “I had to try.”
He looked at her in the moonlight.
“I am a fool …” she began.
“Shut up,” he said.
“No, it’s alright. I thought perhaps—”
“Irene,” Aneas said.
“I’m sorry,” she said, stepping back.
“Are you,” he might have said, “so very intelligent that you are an utter fool?” but he was wise enough not to need to ask. Instead, he put his mouth over hers, carefully. Her eyes widened. One of her legs rose off the ground and then went back.
She swayed.
“Oh!” she said, breaking free.
Aneas bowed. And grinned.
“Oh,” she said again.
“Now, do we roll dice for Looks-at-Clouds?” Aneas asked.
Irene giggled. “No,” she said. “Ohh,” she said softly. She broke away. “Oh,” she said again, and shook her head. “Shouldn’t we be on watch?”
“I have stood some watches this way,” Aneas said.
“Really?” Irene asked. She kissed him again. “No,” she breathed. “I wouldn’t notice a dragon landing. Oh, what a traitor the body is.” She slipped away. “Watch. I am not going to lose a battle to Kevin Orley because I have discovered kissing.”
Aneas laughed. “I have just discovered something greater than my hatred for him,” he said. “But I will kill him.”
Irene had slipped away, but she paused and looked back. “Not if I kill him first,” she said. “Now we’re on watch. Let’s watch.”
Aneas laughed to himself when she had gone to her post. He tasted her cloves in his mouth, and thought about Ricar Fitzalan. And being Duke of Thrake.
Redesdale—Ser Gavin Muriens
Redesdale was widely considered the western limit of Alba. No king’s writ past Redesdale was a saying, and the words west of Redesdale were synonymous with in the Wild. Sometimes a wag would use west of Redesdale to describe someone who was not quite right, or an idea too mad to be considered seriously.
The wall ran through Redesdale. I
t was a curious place on the wall; the Rede was a small stream with rust-red water running out of the big iron deposits at Luckhead and down into the Cohocton, out of sight but very close to the north. The terrain west of the wall was rolling hills with ponds and marshes at their feet, and the Empress Livia’s military road, built of layers of stone over a crushed stone foundation, headed west across the ridges on the south bank of the Cohocton, all the way west to Dykesdale, where Livia had lost a battle and a legion and the will to continue conquering the Nova Terra, almost two thousand years before.
The wall at Redesdale had intact towers every mile, which were sometimes garrisoned by the small town’s militia, and a fortified, triple-turreted gatehouse. The gatehouse had been rebuilt twenty times on old foundations, and the great marble statue of the empress herself had been knocked down, re-erected, beheaded, and had the head replaced countless times by various monsters and administrations. Her cloak had been so damaged in the years of the past that the stubby remnants looked like wings, and locals called her The Angel or Winged Livia. Courting couples came to touch her, and her feet, in military sandals of a lost age, were worn smooth. The iron portcullis of the central gate, a huge and very imposing piece of work, had thousands of locks of hair tied to it, so that it appeared furry in the weak autumn sunlight. Enterprising swains climbed to the top rungs to prove their love.
Behind the gates ran the wall road, about thirty paces east of the line of the wall; heavily built with rain gutters, mile markers, and decaying post houses. In times past there had been a great military bridge at Redesdale; the last bridge over the Cohocton. It had been broken in the time of the old king; the piers still stood. And on the other side, the road could be seen, running along inside the wall, and the wall itself still stood almost fifteen feet tall. In times of peace, it made an excellent sheep barrier.
The Earl of Westwall rode up at sunset with Ser Gregario and six hundred knights and men-at-arms at his heels. The rest of the army was strung out for ten miles behind him, and he had ridden ahead to get the gates open and to see if there was anything to be had out of the town, in the way of hot food or barracks space. His people were on their last legs; men shuffled along the road, barely lifting their feet, hollow eyed and slack jawed. In the day and a half since Ash descended from the dark heavens screaming his rage, the army had never stopped moving. Their commander kept them moving, terrified that the great dragon would come back and finish them while they were defenceless.