The Pilgrims

31

All had eaten and bathed, even Lalie, who was again tied up on the front porch and none too happy about it. Sharfy, Eric (and Loup, who had been put on notice visions were to transpire) were all patiently waiting for Anfen to fall asleep or busy himself on some hours-long mission, but as yet he was still around, and hadn’t seemed to notice all the furtive glances his way.

Siel now sat on Eric’s mat with her legs crossed, heels pushing into the brown flesh of her thighs. He lay with his eyes about level to her knees, chin resting on his hands and pleasantly close to hypnotised while her quiet voice spoke as though telling children a story. The half-giant’s footsteps occasionally creaked from other rooms, even her softest tread enough to make the floor shake as she put cloth covers on the bird cages and bade each bird good night.

Said Siel, ‘The castle was not always home to its current dwellers. It used to house powerful magicians from many schools. Before that, it housed no one, for it was not a castle but a hunk of magic stone, shaped, we guess, by the dragon-youths’ very own claws and teeth. But the dragons left no clue as to their use of it.

‘For much of history, none dared go close. Not until the mages arrived to start their work: hollowing out stairways, halls and chambers to make a great house of it. They dwelled there for a long time, developing their arts, ignoring the rest of the world, which had so mistrusted them and driven them away from the cities.

‘Then five centuries ago came the War that Tore the World. All eighteen cities were dragged into a tangled mess of allegiances, betrayals. More people died in that war than live today, and the Great Spirits intervened to end it before we killed each other completely. Stories are told of Mountain stepping into a valley and sitting, legs crossed, to block the path of two great armies marching at each other. Catapulted rocks flew from both sides, striking his front and back, but he wouldn’t move.

‘When the War finished, the magicians devised a plan for permanent peace. They relinquished the castle to the Mayors for a staggering price, and retreated to their newly built temples. By agreement, the castle formed its own peacekeeping army, a force greater than that of any one city, or any two … but not great enough to defeat several cities at once. Cities took turns sending wise people to the castle to govern disputes. Of the eighteen cities, six had run of the castle for five years, then six others for the next five years, and so on. They made decisions by court, a charter of principles as their guide. Disputes were settled this way. Not without complaint, of course. But for the most part, peace held.

‘If only the dragons could tell us what they had done to that mountainous sculpture to make its airs run so thick with power … but they keep their secrets. Men who dwell there live longer, untroubled by sickness. Mages bask in the potent airs or at least pay a lower price for the magic that goes through them. It has been a temptation to all who have sat in those thrones, and walked those halls, to remain forever. It took a long time for someone to reach for the prize with enough cunning and luck to seize it. Vous was the one to do it.’

Siel paused to sip her drink, the same strong brew Case had been sipping most of the day. They’d seen Lut begin to make a new batch of it from roots and fat red berries. Eric sipped a far more agreeable drink, the Levaal equivalent of tea, its taste sweet and nutty.

Siel went on, ‘He was born of a powerful merchant family in the city of Ankin. He knew sons and daughters of other powerful families across the world. They all resented and mocked the magicians’ system, resented its taxes on their wealth, its limiting of their cities’ greatness. Their parents and grandparents had mouthed the same complaints, but this generation decided to act. Vous, a gifted speaker, a skilled swordsman, soon earned his cause a small, devoted following. They were few, but had great wealth behind them. They recruited the help of rogue mages, many of whom hated the Schools’ decision to sell the castle to the Mayors.

‘It was easy for Vous, with bribery, lies and blackmail, to be Ankin’s nominated wise-man when the time arose, despite his youth. It was a longer, dirtier battle to get his co-conspirators nominated as their respective cities’ wise-men. A trail of intrigue and murder churned in their wake. The families emptied their safes of riches, knowing the prize they reached for would be greater. And they achieved their goal. For the first time, all six wise-men had the same interests at heart.

‘The rules appeared to be followed, when the newly appointed wise-men set forth for the castle gates from their cities to claim rule. They appeared to rule justly at first, and fears were soothed. But much went on behind the stage of this performance. In five short years, with vast new resources and powers, the six used the same blackmail, bribery, lies, and murder on a grander scale. Soon the ring of cities closest to the castle were the first of what we now call ‘Aligned Cities’. Puppets of the conspirators were put in charge of each, generals were likewise replaced, and those cities’ armies swelled the castle’s ranks. War brewed silently and invisibly. The cities further away did not see it coming.

‘When five years had passed, the next six nominated wise-men came to claim their place. They were brought up to the castle halls and killed. This act was kept secret for three years, time enough for more drastic change. The first war mages were created, wilder and harder to control than today’s. An army of them began to grow in secret. Many heard their screams, and wondered what foul thing spoke death’s tongue.

‘People were slow to believe a tyrant had really seized the castle. People in Aligned Cities learned not to rebel when their city’s food was withheld. In time, anything posing a threat to Vous and his cohorts was stamped out: the magic schools, folk magicians, half-giants, things and peoples you’ve not yet heard of. We who serve the Mayors’ Command, a fragile alliance at best, are high on their list. There are slave farms, mines, and other places to send us. Six Free Cities remain.’

As Siel paused to drink from her cup, the silence was startling. Across the room Loup began snoring as though to fill it. Anfen got up, stretched, and sat with them. ‘I’ve been listening to your history lesson,’ he said to Siel. ‘Painfully brief. But the key things were covered. May I join you?’

‘Your pardon, good people,’ said Case, sitting up from his mat. ‘I don’t feel right lying in here, comfy and warm, while that poor girl’s out there in the cold.’

‘She has blankets,’ said Siel.

‘I’m going to see if she needs anything else,’ said Case, ‘like being treated like a human being after what she’s been through.’

‘Don’t go further than the porch,’ said Anfen, rolling his slanted eyes. Case didn’t acknowledge he’d heard.

Eric sighed. ‘Sorry about him.’

‘What’s his grievance?’ said Anfen. ‘Does he want to return home?’

‘It’s that Stranger woman. He thinks she’s his friend, thinks you’ve been unkind to her.’

‘Yes, her.’ Anfen looked troubled. ‘I wasn’t going to tell you this, but … the charm Case wore. Loup discovered one of its secrets. If you wear it and hold two of its active beads in a certain way, you have a vision, showing you what Case heard and saw within the castle, right up to his waking on the lawns. I spent the day examining it closely. On the lawns, you hear what he says to Stranger. You do not see Stranger, or hear what she says to him. Somehow, she has kept herself hidden from the charm, almost as though she knew at a glance what its purpose was, and hid from it.’

‘Or maybe she wasn’t actually there-’ said Eric.

‘She exists,’ said Siel. ‘I saw her and fired at her.’

‘But who is she, what does she want?’ said Anfen. ‘Her powers sound formidable. She does us no harm, but goes to great trouble to remain unseen. If she is really a friend, why?’

Said Siel, ‘We have not been unkind to Lalie. She has done many bad things. I would be glad to kill her, if allowed.’ She said this as casually as if saying she’d like a bath. Eric pictured her wrist-deep in a mule’s carcass, blood glistening down her arms as she sliced off its meat with steady calm hands.

Case crept out the front door, unsure why it felt like he was up to something mischievous. He just wanted to check on poor Lalie, out here on her own.

Didn’t he?

There she was, asleep, curled up like the house pet on a soft mat, pillow under her head, blankets over her, a clay jug of water nearby. He peered at her face: so different from the wild, angry thing she’d been, sprinting out of the hunters’ hall covered in blood. She didn’t stir at the creaking of floorboards under Case’s feet, loud though it sounded to him.

Cruel to keep her out here like this, he thought. He gazed around at the darkness. The quiet was broken only by a fresh-smelling breeze rustling the stony yard’s stiff clumps of grass. The night’s darkness was not total — there seemed as much light as if there were stars or a sliver of moon above, and that was probably the strangest thing. Direct from the front porch, that’s where they’d come from. The woods stretched out to the left as a thick, pitch-black line. A night bird of some kind screeched horribly from that direction, and he shivered.

It was a night bird, he hoped. So many perils, so many horrors. He’d thought the old world was a dark, terrible place. Maybe it was. But at least you knew there it was other people out to get you most of the time. Not some unknown, unnameable things …

He didn’t know why, but yes, his feet took him down the steps of the porch. And then, well, it seemed he was walking out through the stony field, a little adrenaline surging in his veins as he spun around, eyes sweeping all directions, looking for something. Or, of course, someone.

He’d known he would see her here, had known it before he excused himself and came outside. And there, not too close: a little glimmer of green.

Case ran for her. There she was! And he wondered: why should he have missed her so much? He hardly knew her. But she stood, that smile on her face, that glint in her eyes, eyes that seemed to see him inside out and to understand: You can’t help but to bewhat you are. Don’t worry! It’s not all bad! You’re fine. I see you as you are, as you used to be, as you might have been. They are all fine.

In her hand was a cup, and he knew what was in it. ‘I didn’t know if you’d come,’ she whispered, handing it to him. ‘A few nights, I’ve waited for you. This is as close as I dare get, even though your mage sleeps.’

‘He’s not my mage,’ Case said. He sipped the delicious cold wine, felt the buzz cloud his head. ‘I don’t want to be with them any more. Even Eric … well, even he seems to have fallen in with em. I want to be with-’

‘Shh, shh. Do they know you’re out here? Are all your companions asleep?’

‘No. They think I’m on the porch, there. Listen, be careful out here on your own. We’ve seen some bad things in those woods. Why not come in, introduce yourself?’

‘I cannot. There are reasons I cannot, which will make no sense to you, Case, though I know you mean well. I need you to trust me on this: I mean well too.’

‘I believe you, miss, but they probably won’t, no matter what I tell em.’

‘You need not tell them a thing.’ She touched his arm and it sent pleasant chills through him. ‘Case, do you know where they are headed? I follow, and keep many threats at bay. You would not have made it this far without me. But it helps to know Anfen’s intentions.’

Case thought back. ‘He said something about meeting a council-’

‘Council of Free Cities?’

‘That’s it, I think.’

‘Good,’ she said, nodding. ‘He must. And I shall help him get there, though he may not see it. You had better go back.’

‘Stranger, look, please be careful out here. I’m telling you. There’s something bad in the woods and we saw what it did.’

She laughed that sparkling laugh — damn it, nothing would hurt her, nothing could hurt someone with a laugh like that. ‘I am well aware of them,’ she said. ‘Tormentors, they are called. There are none nearby, for the present.’

‘What are they supposed to be?’

‘No one knows. The castle is as frightened of them as everyone else. Anfen may rest assured of that. They come from World’s End, from beyond the great wall, the Land None Have Seen. Few know this. But you must go back. There’s another mage, not far, in the guise of a wolf. I must hide, for his intentions aren’t clear to me. Sleep well, Case.’

‘You too, miss. And thanks for the drink.’ Case wiped away a tear, and wondered why he’d shed it. She’d vanished, but her voice came from the gloom: ‘Be safe, Otherworlder.’