Nights of Villjamur

SIXTEEN

Jeryd watched the night sky vibrate with light and colour. Marysa held his arm tighter. She shivered a little, and he couldn’t tell if it was from the cold or the eerie event above their heads, but it wasn’t important, just the fact that she was holding him once again, just like old times. As the lights reflected off her glossy black eyes, he was so grateful to be with her again. It had taken her absence to make him realize just how much she meant to him, and he was shocked that, as a rumel, he was actually suffering from such emotions as humans normally did. He had always assumed that it was that rumel quality of level-headedness that put them a notch above their hominid cousins.

‘Rumex,’ Marysa breathed, ‘isn’t this wonderful? What’s causing it?’

Jeryd had no answers, and his tail was perfectly still in contemplation. ‘Perhaps this is some prior indication of the ice age? Perhaps not. I’m even willing to put a few Drakar on it being some kind of cultist trickery.’

They were both hypnotized by the display, these beams and flickering shafts of light changing form and colour in front of the stars. All around them, other people were equally entranced, craning their necks to see more clearly between the tall buildings, stepping out on balconies, scrambling for the higher bridges, as if getting closer would enable them to understand the bizarre occurrence any better.

Jeryd had taken Marysa out for a few drinks that evening and to watch a golem dance display put on by cultists from the Order of Pugandr. He had been genuinely impressed with the dwarfish, clay-like creatures that skipped about on stage.

But all through this magical evening, he couldn’t quite shake the feeling of being the victim of observation, even when he found himself lost in contemplation of the extraordinary events in the sky. This was a city where at night you would easily see shadows stepping out of alleyways behind you, or hear the sound of ghostly feet scuffing on the cobbles. It was a city that bred paranoia.

But who cares if someone is tailing me, just as long as it isn’t those Gamall Gata kids.

Randur stared out of the window, his slender, naked body illuminated by the weirdly ignited sky. His sword, garments and boots lay scattered on the floor somewhere behind him as he grasped the edge of the window frame to watch the varying colours shoot across the heavens. A diffuse glow of green and red undulated like an immense curtain drifting in a slow breeze. Impossibly high. Impossibly wide.

Lady Yvetta Fol stepped up behind him, placed her palms on his buttocks. ‘Impressive,’ she said, sliding them slowly up and down, then giving a gentle squeeze.

‘Yeah,’ Randur said. ‘I’ve never seen the sky look like this before. I wonder what the hell is happening?’

‘I wasn’t talking about the sky.’ She slapped his rump. Her many gold rings stung his bare skin, and he shuddered at the cold metal. Her breath crept slowly up the back of his neck as she moved his long hair to one side. Her fingers skimmed the ridges of his shoulder blades and spine. She kissed one shoulder hungrily.

As he turned around, her palms continued to move across his lithe dancer’s torso, which she had already compared favourably to that of her husband, old and fat and lazy, and she murmured something vaguely about waiting for him all her life. But he couldn’t keep this up all night. Where the hell did she get her appetite from? It made him wonder if she had been storing up frustrated libido for years, releasing it all tonight, on him, and now he was the prey instead of the hunter.

His lips touched her rings, caressing the display of wealth. Earlier he had cautioned her about a thief, one of Randur’s latest fictions, suggesting that a wave of crimes was washing through the upper levels of the city, with wealthy ladies being targeted for their vulnerability. And after seeing the concern on her face, he pressed her fingers to his lips and offered his loyal protection for the evening. ‘You simply don’t need all these right now.’ Randur slipped the rings from her fingers, dropped them discreetly into one of his upright boots. ‘You’re beautiful enough just as you are, my dear.’

Eyes creasing, she gave one of those small exhalations of pleasure, like the ones he had been hearing all night. ‘You really think that?’

He placed a finger over her lips. ‘I imagine every man would.’

‘Well, certainly not him.’

Him would be her husband, the influential Lord Hanton Fol.

Her grey hair was now ruffled after making love three times already. For a lady of fifty years, she was still slim, only mildly wrinkled. He had enjoyed what they did tonight – she was certainly a skilled performer, despite the dents in her confidence from her husband’s complaints, and the fact that he was always sleeping with much younger women, whenever he was actually in Villjamur. Lord Fol was a wealthy landowner, who supplied the army with crucial foodstuffs distributed to their garrisons across the Archipelago. Lady Yvetta was rich in her own right, owning a substantial estate on Jokull, and also several trading ships. Randur was aware of these facts from gossiping with the servants before he came here. He confirmed her value from the proliferation of jewellery and ornaments that were crammed into her balconied mansion.

Her hand cupped his groin, and he groaned, partly in pleasure, and partly in dismay. She began kissing his neck, holding her lips for a moment on his collar bone. He ran his hands along her spine, noting the suppleness in her ageing skin. You can mix gain and pleasure so long as you’re doing things right. He was now pushed against the window frame, the glass chilling his back. Her hand continued to work on him, perhaps a little too eagerly.

Oh please, not a fourth time…

To the bed again, sliding his hands along her legs, his tongue licking feverishly from her ankles to her thigh, until she couldn’t stop groaning. The soft light from the window – the heavenly display – enhanced every curve of her body, smoothed every line of ageing. At an agonizingly slow pace, Randur’s mouth advanced across her body. She groaned ecstatically, her fingertips gripping the bed sheets.

A thumping at the door.

Randur stared into her startled eyes.

Bugger. He whispered, ‘Who is it?’

‘How should I know?’

Thumping again. A voice shouted, ‘Lady Yvetta, this is Anton!’

Yvetta whispered, ‘My husband’s brother.’

Shit, Randur thought, immediately checking for an obvious escape route. The window, the exit of so many a lover in the night, seemed an appropriate choice.

‘I know you’re in there, Yvetta,’ the voice continued. ‘I was brought news that you entered your chamber in the company of some young man. I can’t allow our family name to be disgraced in this way.’

‘Nonsense,’ she shrilled. ‘I’m utterly alone.’

Randur leapt off the bed, threw on his shirt and breeches.

Yvetta hurried over to the door to intercede.

While she wasn’t looking, he flipped a couple of bracelets from the dresser into his pocket.

‘There’s no one here, Anton. Really,’ she protested.

‘Let me in to see for myself,’ the voice said.

‘Give me a moment,’ she said. ‘I must make myself decent.’

Randur, meanwhile, had alternative concerns: ‘Where’s my other fucking boot? Oh.’ He grabbed it, fled to the window, opened it silently, then stepped out on the balcony. Before he closed the window again, he blew her a final kiss, and whispered, ‘When you next read some sweet stanza, think of me, as I will of you, my love.’ She returned his gaze with a look of anxious foreboding.

It was a freezing cold night. Colours still drifted across the sky, but there was no time to appreciate the view. With one of his boots still in his hand, he emptied its contents and pocketed the jewellery.

As the sound of raised voices came from within Lady Fol’s room, Randur quickly shoved his boot on, leapt to the next balcony with his dancer’s agility, then climbed up to the roof. There must, he reflected, be easier ways to acquire some money. Careful not to slip to his death on the icy stonework, he edged along until he came upon an emergency spiral staircase. He descended it quickly, then jumped out onto the street.

‘Evening,’ he greeted a couple walking by, waving while he began to button his shirt. ‘Lovely night, isn’t it?’

Commander Brynd Lathraea stared up at a sky fragmented into colour, vivid streaks of red and green drifting across the darkness like sheets of rain. They had been back on the island of Jokull for a day, and they had stationed further up the coast. Another hour or two for them to get to Villjamur, but after Dalúk Point he was painfully aware of how badly their plans might be kept secret. They had then camped for the next night a fair distance up the coast.

‘Shit me,’ Apium said, clambering off his bedroll, and nearly stepping on the dying fire as he scrambled to Brynd’s side. ‘Bollocks.’ He brushed sparks off his cloak.

Brynd stood with hands on his hips, craning his neck to see through the overhanging trees. The other two Night Guardsmen approached them, but said nothing, just stared entranced at the massive light show above.

‘What, in Bohr’s name, is that?’ Apium muttered eventually. ‘D’you reckon it’s something to do with the Freeze?’

‘Cultist work that, captain, without a doubt.’

Nelum agreed. ‘Indeed, this is nothing natural.’

‘I said earlier something strange was happening all across the Archipelago,’ Brynd muttered. ‘I don’t like it at all.’

‘Always the cheery sort, aren’t you?’ Apium said.

Brynd glanced across to Rika’s carriage. By now one hundred soldiers from the Dragoons were stationed protectively in a perimeter all around their camp, while pairings of troops patrolled further out. He was deliberately monitoring an hour’s journey in every direction, so if there happened to be any more draugr, they would be taken out quickly. Brynd wasn’t taking any further chances, either with his remaining men or his precious charge.

Two hours after the heavenly display had finally faded, a female private from the Dragoons guided her horse quietly through the forest towards them.

‘Commander,’ she saluted him, then dismounted.

The other three Night Guards leapt to attention, then gathered around their leader.

‘Yes?’ Brynd eyed the solid young woman.

‘Commander, your presence is requested urgently.’

‘Apium, Nelum: stay here. Your life before the Empress’s.’

‘Sir,’ the two men said in unison. They drew their swords and took up position by the carriage.

‘Lupus,’ Brynd turned to the third, ‘come with me and bring your arrows.’

‘Of course, commander,’ Lupus replied.

The two jumped on their horses, followed the Dragoon into the darkness of the betula forest.

‘Private, what’s the issue?’ Brynd enquired as he ducked to avoid branches, his sabre in hand.

‘Those draugr creatures you warned about earlier. We’ve spotted some.’

‘How many are there?’

‘Approximately fifteen, it seems, commander – at the edge of the forest, on the Baering Moors.’

Brynd was above all determined not to let these creatures harm the new Empress. And furthermore he wanted to find out where they came from, what their motives were or who had sent them. He’d never heard of such a thing in the Empire, so why now, why on Jokull?

Through the trees, hooves thudding against the forest floor, twigs snapping as they brushed past.

They finally came across a group of Third Dragoons, the Wolf Brigade of around forty men, their helmets glinting in the light of the moon. Their official standard – a white wolf rampant, against a green background – leaned against a tree in the forest clearing. Brynd was reassured at the number of soldiers assembled.

Their sergeant stepped forward, a blonde woman wearing the familiar black and green uniform of the Dragoons. She sheathed her sword, placed her wolf’s-head shield to one side. He saw her face was tracked with abrasions from the tribal campaigns she had led successfully a while back.

‘Commander Lathraea,’ she said. ‘I’m Sergeant Woodyr. Has Private Fendur explained the situation?’

‘She has,’ Brynd confirmed.

Lupus jumped down, tethered both his own horse and Brynd’s to a tree.

The three of them then proceeded over to the edge of the forest. Quietly, she pointed. ‘Look.’

Brynd’s eyes narrowed.

Across the moorland, about a hundred and fifty paces away, stood a group of draugr, the moonlight from the moon Astrid casting bold, eerie shadows across the earth around them. Wind blew constant ripples through the short grass, but the draugr didn’t move, only their fluttering garments. It was an ethereal picture.

‘They’ve been standing there, as if unwilling to move, for some time,’ Woodyr explained. ‘At least half an hour now since we first discovered them.’

Brynd’s eyes grew accustomed to the scene, seeing the figures were dressed in rags, merely strips of cloth hanging off their flesh, both men and women. ‘Have they done anything at all yet?’

‘No, commander,’ the sergeant confirmed.

‘Has anyone approached them?’

‘Not after your earlier warnings. We waited for you to arrive to assess the situation.’

‘I’m glad to hear it.’ Brynd turned to Lupus, said abruptly, ‘Shoot one.’

The private walked to the very edge of the forest. With a clear aim at most of them, he nocked an arrow, brought it to anchor point. ‘Any one in particular, commander?’

Brynd tilted his head, said, ‘Try that one.’ He pointed towards the nearest motionless figure. ‘Aim for the head. We know that a body shot isn’t all that effective.’

Lupus released the arrow. It whipped through the air and struck the draugr in the eye with a crack as the skull shattered. The creature fell to the ground under the force of the blow, twitched slowly, like a fish on dry land. None of the other draugr reacted. They merely remained stationary in the moonlight, staring ahead, or at nothing at all.

‘Cover me,’ Brynd ordered. ‘And, sergeant, line up all the archers you’ve got. Make sure they watch my back and keep the rest of those things away.’

‘Yes, commander,’ Woodyr replied, and returned to her unit.

To his left, the archers lined up against the fringes of the forest.

Brynd made his way across the moor, stepping tentatively over the soggy grass, crept up to the creature that Lupus had just shot. Its skull had been split by the force of the arrow, the shaft still buried deeply. Stitching around the creature’s neck, a black line evident across its blue-tinted skin. Brynd unsheathed his sword and poked at it, but it didn’t respond, maybe it couldn’t sense the touch of the metal against its skin. A worrying sign.

Brynd glanced back at the forest, reassured at the metal glinting in the moonlight, the swords and arrowheads at the ready should anything happen to him. He walked on between the other draugr. Their heads were all tilted to one side, making them appear to be asleep – except he could see their eyes clearly reflecting the moonlight.

He approached one of the creatures that looked like a woman, the long blonde hair stirring gently in the breeze. He scraped his sword down one arm, drawing black fluid from beneath the skin. The draugr didn’t react, obviously couldn’t feel any pain. Was this in any way a human after all? He realized that, whatever they were called, these creatures were not alive in any normal sense, but in all his years in Jamur service he had never seen anything like them.

Returning to the fallen draugr, Brynd untied his belt, hooked it around the creature’s ankles, dragged it back to the edge of the forest, his feet slipping on the grass, and all the time looking back to check that none of the others were now following.

Sergeant Woodyr came forward to help him. ‘What do we do, commander?’

‘I don’t see these ones as a threat exactly, but I think we should shoot them all down. We’ll need a barred caravan, then pile them in and bring them back to Villjamur. They can’t be left standing out here. Make sure to cover them up so the public don’t see them. There’s enough panic in the city already.’

‘Sir,’ she saluted, then gave her men the order to fire.

Dozens of arrows were instantly let loose.