Nights of Villjamur

ELEVEN

The horses rode in a rhythm matching his heartbeat, or was it the other way around? Brynd had done this for so many years it had become a dulled instinct, the sort of routine only noticed when he was not riding the length and breadth of the Empire. Brynd had been forcing his companions to ride until the horses were exhausted, only stopping at hamlets and villages when the wilderness proved more violent then anticipated. Bitter winds, followed by harsh sleet. The few remaining Night Guards crested the hill that overlooked the port of Gish. It was a bleak landscape this side of the island. Low clouds skimmed the horizon, undermining massive skies.

Because of the recent deaths of his comrades, at nights when they rested he sometimes stared at his sword blade and at the white-skinned man reflected back, and tried to make more sense of himself. Perhaps he had grown used to the luxury of command, standing so far back from any direct combat. He had wanted this, an opportunity to prove himself a true man – because of his unusual skin tone as much as his sexuality. People always judged him in unspoken terms, so he had to respond with action only because that was expected of him. And look where that action had taken him – many good soldiers and friends, dead.

Maybe there was too much time to think on these journeys.

The estuary was crowded with sailing vessels of the Jamur Second Dragoons. Brynd’s own first regiment. Two dozen longships were blocking off one side of the harbour, allowing only a few fishing boats to pass out to sea. He could see the raised standards of at least two divisions – the Wolf and Eagle Brigades – on the shore this side of the port town. Gish had only become a military port in recent years, following assessments of how the ice age might affect the navigational channels of the major island of Jokull.

Blink while reading the history of this region and you might miss that it had become a significant commercial centre too, based upon supply and billeting of the army. It was now humming with armourers licensed directly from Villjamur, innkeepers, fishermen, wool merchants. And, below the gloss, the side of life that respectable people always looked away from: brothels, gambling dens involving big dogfights or dice, slaves beaten senseless over a chore forgotten, and brawls between soldiers over a spilt tankard.

Brynd looked back towards the ships, deciding after his recent encounters that he wanted as many vessels as possible to escort them on the return voyage. If nothing else, it would provide a positive statement: Here she comes, the new Empress, and she’s well protected.

Two hours later, they boarded the Black Frieter, the largest of the longships docked at Gish. An old boat, once thought to house souls of the damned, it had been recovered from pirates decades ago, and now took its place in the Empire’s fleet. Sea Captain Sang greeted them, if it could be called a greeting, then made sure the carriage would be well protected on the adjoining shore by several women of the Wolf Brigade. These quieter moments of travel always forced Apium to analyse the current status of the military.

Apium was always suspicious of the Dragoon Marines, despite them being a focal component of most military campaigns. They were a crucial force across the entire Archipelago, having developed effective techniques for short raids, and larger-scale invasions. A formidable reputation preceded them, even though it hadn’t been put to good use in recent years. An air of arrogance surrounded them; they assumed nothing could be done without their participation. Sang herself was the embodiment of this, a low-born, in cultural terms, who had achieved great things. And even Apium was certain she was more vulgar in her manner than most male soldiers he’d known. She’d boasted to him once about all the islands she’d visited – travels around the entire Archipelago that no one else had managed. Said she’d even circumnavigated the Varltung islands, but he wasn’t so sure, since there was no proof of such a voyage. She would customarily employ mainly women sailors, using the few men simply for raw physical chores. And he could make a good guess as to what services these might include.

Apium had joined Brynd, Lupus and Nelum on deck. Brynd was commenting on the salt refinery recently built, and that as yet stood as nothing more than a precarious shack on the quayside. He was clearly unimpressed.

Gish was altogether a decrepit place. No major division of the army had been deployed from here for a good while, so many soldiers were rotting away here – their time taken up with gambling, brawls, casual sex. That, he reflected, was what you got from doing nothing more rigorous than training exercises.

Brynd was exceptional in taking the opportunity of using cultists to develop training strategies on Kullrún, an islet off the opposite coast of Jokull. Cultist technology was normally used to scare men senseless, to drive back arrows, form illusions of troop movements, create phantoms that followed them long into their dreams at night. Any threatening scenario could thus be recreated, played out again and again, until the soldiers learned how to kill their enemy in the most efficient manner. A time-consuming business, but essential for producing the best soldiers. When it came down to it, when a soldier aimed an arrow at another man’s face for the very first time, releasing it could prove difficult. And many of the soldiers currently in the Dragoons, Marines or Regiment of Foot were fresh recruits who had signed up to avoid the hardships of the ice age since the military provided a guaranteed wage.

Boys and girls from the poorest parts of the Empire fighting for the richest.

Was that how all armies had been recruited throughout history?

A few hours later, Brynd was the first to step down off the Black Frieter and onto the main island of Southfjords, under a massive sky filled with fast-moving cumulus, looming over a landscape littered with small wind-ravaged trees tilting at an angle. Terns arced over their heads, heading off towards their high cliff colonies further along the shore.

The four guards set off along a gravel track that cut up through a green hill, and Brynd suspected that those black-clad strangers, carrying swords and axes, would be an intimidating spectacle for a young woman who had been told nothing of why she was summoned home.

Even in decay the temple was an imposingly beautiful building, with its limestone arches and soaring spire flanked by two smaller ones. As Jorsalir structures went, this was certainly one of the more extravagant temples, more sizeable than the churches Brynd had seen back in Villjamur. Maybe several hundred years old, so not remotely ancient by the Archipelago’s standards, obviously it had been constructed in a period when the Jorsalir had commanded phenomenal power and wealth, unlike now, when the Council even levied tax upon them.

As they approached the building, three women stepped out, their green gowns whipping around their bodies in the wind like banners of war. The looks on their faces were just as grim, and Brynd asked his companions to remain still while he moved ahead alone.

Two of the women were ageing slightly, greying hair framing their delicate features. The third was younger, but the graceful way she walked and her general demeanour made her appear ageless. He noticed a white dryas attached to her breast.

‘Sele of Jamur,’ Brynd greeted them. ‘Commander Brynd Lathraea of the Night Guard.’

There it was: that shocked look on their faces as they took in his skin, his eyes – always the same reaction.

‘Ah, the albino? Sele of Jamur, commander,’ said the youngest of the three. ‘My name is Ardune, and I’m a priestess here. These two are my clerics.’

‘You received notification of our arrival?’

‘Indeed,’ Ardune said. She blinked several times in the wind, as she looked back over his shoulder towards the other three men.

Brynd tactfully drew his cloak over his sword. ‘And does the Lady Rika know what has been happening?’

‘She’s been told very little, but has been waiting inside the temple for some time now.’

‘Right,’ Brynd said. ‘Well, I’m here to return her to Villjamur. We must leave as soon as possible.’

‘You’re taking her away then,’ Ardune said. ‘Just like that?’

‘She has a role to fulfil, priestess,’ Brynd explained. ‘We can’t always choose what we want to do in life.’ And I myself know all about that.

‘Indeed not, commander, but you cannot simply take her. She has a life here, you understand?’

‘Yes, I do,’ Brynd continued, trying to be sensitive to the priestess’s feelings. ‘However, she’s been enjoying a quiet life here because of who she is. If she was a native, or simply a peasant, she’d never have been able to live in such a privileged position. Well, now the time’s come for who she is to really matter. You understand, it’s not just a few priestesses that this matters to – it’s an entire Empire?’

Something faded in her eyes then, conceding defeat. ‘Quite. Well, please be sensitive. She’s a person, not just a title.’

‘Of course I will. Remember, I’m the one who has to tell her about her father. I promise I’ll not crush her.’

Ardune appeared to have a genuine affection for Rika. Still, Brynd didn’t know what to make of her, since he wasn’t one to trust the mind of a Jorsalir. Not that they were untrustworthy in themselves, more that they had conditioned their minds to think on a different level, to question the world in a way no one else did. It gave them an air of superiority that he felt was unjustified.

Ardune led him inside the temple.

Rika’s room contained minimal furniture, a few parchments on the wall, faded through exposure to sunlight, fabrics smelling of dried lavender, darkened limestone, a small burning fire in the corner. If there was indeed Bohr or Astrid up there, Brynd assumed they didn’t much care for elaborate furnishings.

She was sitting on a chest, Rika, staring out of a narrow arched window, a book forgotten on her lap. This was clearly Eir’s sister, although her face was more slender, making her cheekbones jut out unattractively. Her black hair was tied back plainly – no style in her appearance, no finesse.

‘Jamur Rika, Sele of Jamur, I am Commander Brynd Lathraea and I have some… bad news for you, I fear.’ He hesitated. ‘Your father, Emperor Johynn – I’m afraid he passed away some few days ago.’

‘Oh,’ Rika replied. No emotion in her voice, nothing whatsoever. ‘Why, thank you for telling me this. It really is very kind of you to journey all this way.’

Brynd held her gaze as if to work out what was happening in her mind. She appeared to be barely disturbed by the bad news. He may as well have just told her it was going to rain today. He knew she had problems with her father, which was why she had spent the last few years in exile here. Was that her anger forcing out any other emotions? Or was it her religious training, her perfectly controlled mind making her emotionally dead?

‘The Council of Villjamur have nominated you as the one to inherit all that was your father’s, since you’re his eldest blood relative. You realize what this means?’

She met his gaze with silence, with a cold stare – no, a neutral stare, nothing in it. This girl seemed the embodiment of emptiness.

‘Jamur Rika, you’re to become Empress,’ Brynd said. ‘Ruler of the Jamur Empire, its nations, its people. I’m here, therefore, at the request of the Council, to escort you back to Villjamur immediately.’

She stood, gazing out of the window again – at the sea, the clouds. Gulls screamed as they accelerated upwards. More life in the natural environment than her reactions. ‘And what choice do I have in the matter?’

‘Honestly?’ Brynd said.

‘Yes.’

‘Very little.’ He sighed. ‘You have a duty.’

‘I also have a life here, commander.’

‘Yes, that’s not gone unnoticed,’ Brynd said, with a step towards her. He followed her gaze to a wild cat out on the grass below. It was ripping into a gull, blood covering the victim’s white wings that were half-extended, broken. ‘Strong cats you have here, for it to bring down a gull.’

‘Indeed,’ she said. ‘Everything here is that little bit more… wild.’

‘Nature’s creatures learn to cope in any conditions presented to them.’

‘It depends, of course, on what exactly those conditions are,’ Rika said.

Silence followed yet again, while Brynd stood next to her, hoping that this proximity might symbolize to her that he was at her side in more than just the physical sense. He watched the skies begin to bleed snow. Winds blew in stronger, the wall hangings rattled.

‘I’ll come with you,’ she sighed. ‘Just give me a moment to get ready.’

Apium hurled a pebble into the sea some distance away from the Black Frieter. It vanished from sight long before it pierced the water, lost in the eruptions caused by surf beating granite.

‘Well, at least she’s coming willingly,’ Nelum said, trying to light his pipe against the strong wind. He was failing miserably. ‘And, when she eventually strolls down here, we can embark and get her back home. And then we can put our feet up for a while.’

Brynd glanced over at Apium.

‘We can put our feet up for a bit, can’t we?’ Nelum said, examining their glances worriedly. He placed the unlit pipe back in his pocket.

‘Not exactly, no,’ Brynd confessed. ‘Chancellor Urtica has informed me of some strange occurrences further north, and we’ve to protect the Empire by investigating. It’s serious, according to eye-witness accounts. There have been reports of extensive killings, and it’s up to us to establish order, and to give the local populace reassurance.’

‘So why not send the Dragoons to investigate?’ Lupus asked. ‘Why send the elite soldiers?’

‘Lad’s got a point there, Brynd,’ Apium said.

‘Elite soldiers are required, and we’ve skills and training superior to the ordinary standards of the army. We in the Night Guard have access to some cultist-enhanced weaponry. After all, we’re cultist-enhanced ourselves, let’s not forget. And we possess better swords, bows that fire more accurately. And, anyway, I doubt that the sight of a massive army traipsing across the tundra would inspire any confidence that all is calm. It’s easier to move in small groups, so I want one or two units with us, a couple of hundred soldiers at most.’

‘Maybe the armies are needed elsewhere,’ Nelum stated, his mind working ahead, processing all the possibilities.

‘Not without my knowing,’ Brynd said. ‘You forget I’ve command of all the Empire’s armies.’

‘So now we’re to be galloping around after three-cocked unicorns,’ Apium grumbled.

‘We don’t know what these creatures are yet,’ Brynd said. ‘Unicorns or not, we shall go and investigate.’

‘Aye, maybe you’re right.’ Apium chuckled. ‘Look, here’s our Lady Rika.’