The Dusk Watchman

CHAPTER 1

He felt it as a distant cry; an eagle’s shriek swooping down from the heavens. In his bones he heard it, rumbling up from the dark places underground to shake the very stones of the city. He stared up at the overcast sky, then all around at the courtyard. The veteran soldier found himself suddenly and unaccountably afraid. He reached behind his back and drew one scimitar, but the reassurance of it in his hand was eclipsed by a mounting sense of foreboding.

There was a clatter from the street outside and he struck blindly as he turned, but there was no one behind him. Voices broke through the soft patter of rain on stone, sounding confused and angry, but not like men ready to kill. Then the whispers started, running around the courtyard, and he turned a full circle, his scimitar ready, but saw nothing but empty ground and bare high walls.

The voices in the street grew in number; he heard broken sentences that tailed off into nothing. He felt suddenly weak and though he still circled, his movements were more hesitant as his knees threatened to collapse. The whispers were so close now, in his shadow. Cold fingers probed at the recesses of his mind. Instinctively he shook his head, trying to clear the sensation, but it had no effect.

A moment later the claws came.

He gasped and dropped his sword, clutching his head in both hands as tiny teeth started to tear at his mind. Their chill touch dug deeper and he fell to one knee. For a moment he was paralysed by shock and pain. He didn’t notice his own nails tearing into his skin, nor feel the blood running down his fingers. The greater pain was inside his skull: an icy fire that spread through his mind leaving a scorched trail of memories.

Now he screamed. Oblivious to the impact of stone, he toppled over. He convulsed, writhing on the ground as the claws rooted in every forgotten corner, rending with swift, dispassionate precision. Words from his past were ripped away. A memory of his proud parents flashed past his eyes, then their voices were empty sounds. He felt a name torn out and scattered to the winds. Eventually the pain receded, to be replaced then by a numbing cold; one that made him gasp for breath and shake uncontrollably. He lay on the ground, knees drawn up to his chest and arms wrapped around his head. Stars burst across his vision before the cold took him. Darkness wrapped itself around him and he sank willingly into its embrace.

He felt himself shaken awake and rolled onto his back. A hushed voice was speaking urgently above him. It sounded familiar. When he opened his eyes a whip-crack of pain flashed through his head.

The voice spoke again, a word he thought he recognised, but his mind was a mire. He tried to speak, but it came out only as a feeble moan.

‘Amber,’ the voice hissed, ‘Amber, you must wake up!’

He felt himself pulled into a seating position, but as soon as the pressure lessened he flopped back to the ground. The Land swam and blurred around him as he was hauled up again.

The voice didn’t give up. ‘Listen to me, Amber: you must listen.’

He was held steady, and now dim shapes slowly started forming before his eyes: a blank courtyard wall and a weathered face with light hair and a smear of mud on one cheek — a man he thought he’d once known.

The man crouched before him, maintaining a firm grip on his arms and staring hard into his eyes. ‘Amber, I need you on your feet.’

He didn’t move. He could not fathom the words washing over him, nor command his limbs to move.

In frustration the man shook him like a doll and clouted his boot to try and attract his attention. ‘On your feet, Amber — if you don’t get up now, you’re dead.’

He looked down at the boot the man had struck, then at the man’s own bare feet: they were mismatched. One was normal, the other a squat lump with fat little toes. The sight sparked something in his mind, causing him to flinch even as he said a name: ‘Nai.’

‘Yes, that’s right,’ the man said encouragingly. He cast a nervous glance to one side before returning his attention to the stricken man. ‘Now you, your name is Amber — remember? Say it, say “Amber”.’

His first attempt came out as garbled nonsense as panic filled his mind. Name? My name…

His head snapped back as Nai slapped him hard across the face. ‘Say it, Amber. Say it. ’

‘Ahh- Amber,’ he gasped as tears spilled from his eyes and without knowing why he started to keen softly until Nai struck him again, then grabbed his head to keep his attention focused.

‘There’s no time for that. Don’t think, just do as I say, soldier! Your name is Amber, do you understand me? Your name is Amber and you need to get on your feet.’ Without waiting for a response Nai arranged Amber’s feet so they were flat on the ground, then stood on them and hauled on the big soldier’s arms.

Amber felt himself lurch forward, but he was unable to do anything to help, instead concentrating on the one word he understood, the name he clung to with the desperation of a drowning man. He nearly toppled onto Nai, but the smaller man caught him in time and held him balanced.

‘A little help would be useful right about now,’ Nai muttered as he manoeuvred himself around and underneath Amber’s right arm. Before he tried to stand he grabbed Amber’s lost scimitar and slid it back into the scabbard on his back, then gave him a pat on the shoulder.

‘Now, push upwards,’ he said. ‘I can’t carry you all the way.’

Nai forced himself upright, and Amber felt his legs respond to the movement and straighten. For a moment he was standing tall before he slumped back down onto Nai.

‘Good,’ Nai puffed, ‘but we’d better try that again. I can’t carry you out of the city.’

‘I–I’ve lost-’

‘You’ve lost a name, yes, I know,’ Nai said in a softer tone. ‘It was stolen from you — it was stolen from us all, but you felt it worse than anyone.’

‘Wh…?’ Amber tailed off, defeated by the effort of thinking as a swirl of unformed questions clouded his mind.

‘Now’s really not the time for that conversation. Come on, try to take a step forward.’ He leaned forward, trying to make Amber move his feet and take his own weight. The right drifted a little and caught on the ground until Nai knocked it with his instep and got his boot flat on the ground again. This time Amber moved forward on instinct and the weight across Nai’s shoulder’s lessened a touch.

‘That’s good, now one more,’ he said encouragingly, and the pair began to make painfully slow progress across the courtyard.

Once they reached the gate Nai stopped and looked up at Amber. ‘You’re not strong enough yet, but I need you moving quicker than that or we’re both dead.’ He edged Amber to the wall and leaned him against it to take some of the weight off his shoulders, but a moment later a second voice broke the quiet.

‘Hey, who’re you?’

Nai turned to see a man with long blond hair standing inside the half-open gate to the courtyard: a Byoran labourer, by the way he was dressed, holding a cudgel in his hands. The man peered forward, his eyes slowly widening as he looked at Amber.

‘That’s a damned…‘ The man didn’t bother finishing his sentence but raised his weapon and headed towards them.

Nai saw a flicker of surprise in the man’s face as he advanced with his own empty hands outstretched.

The Byoran got ready to smash Nai in the face with his cudgel, but before he had fully raised his weapon, a flash of light erupted from Nai’s palms into the man’s face. The smell of scorched flesh filled the air and the man reeled, dropping the cudgel and clapping his hands to his cheeks.

Nai kept moving, drawing a dagger from his belt and punching the tip into the man’s stomach, then tilting it upwards and driving it towards his heart. Then he withdrew it and ran the blade across his throat, just to make sure. The Byoran fell without a further sound and lay spasming on the ground.

Nai bent and wiped the blade clean on the man’s shirt before he sheathed the weapon and eased the courtyard door shut again. Amber hadn’t moved throughout the brief struggle, and when Nai returned to him he didn’t seem to have even noticed it. He stood a little taller now, holding one hand on the wall to steady himself, but Nai could see he was still in no condition to walk down the street yet, let alone run.

‘Another turn about the grounds then?’ He asked as he slipped under Amber’s arm and turned the soldier around. He spared a look at the corpse on the ground, a small trail of blood making its way towards the courtyard wall. ‘Let’s just hope you prove useful enough to make this worthwhile.’

Struck by a thought, Nai stopped and passed a hand across Amber’s face, muttering arcane words under his breath as he did so. After half a minute he stopped. ‘At least the link’s still there,’ he muttered to himself. ‘Not sure who will be glad to see a Menin soldier after today, but King Emin might be able to use you to track down his turncoat, Ilumene. It isn’t much of a choice, but it’s the best one you’re likely to get, and a man in my profession could always use a king owing him a favour.’

Amber still didn’t respond and Nai’s expression turned pitying. ‘Gods, your parents wouldn’t have expected this when they named you for your lordly, albeit distant, relation — who could have? That was one of the odder sensations in my life, I think, having a name plucked from my mind — and it didn’t even involve necromancy! This life’s full of surprises, but let’s just be glad no one’s used your real name since you joined the army, otherwise I think you’d be on the ground, and undoubtedly crippled.’

He paused a moment, wincing, and had to blink away a sudden unpleasant sense of disjointed loss. ‘How curious: it’s uncomfortable to even try and remember — very uncomfortable. Well, no matter; he must be dead by now, and I can think of him as the Menin lord easily enough.’

He patted Amber on the shoulder again and directed him back across the courtyard. ‘And you, my friend; you’re still Major Amber, so not much has changed there really — except you’re a major in an army currently being obliterated, and you’re as fragile as a baby. Just as well I can think of a use for you, and a certain king who might pay rather well for that use.’

They started walking, short, shuffling steps away from the courtyard gate. ‘Don’t worry,’ Nai added with forced brightness, ‘you can thank me for saving your life later. Once I’ve sold you to the enemy.’