Half a War Read online

  ‘You cannot give away what you do not know.’

  ‘You don’t trust me to act a part?’

  ‘Trust is like glass,’ said Rulf, swinging his great horn bow over his shoulder and helping Yarvi up with one broad hand. ‘Lovely, but only a fool rests lots of weight on it.’

  Hardened warriors of Gettland and Vansterland had surrounded the clearing on every side, and Mother Adwyn cut a lonely figure in their midst. Koll almost felt sorry for her, but he knew it would do neither of them the least good.

  ‘It seems my treachery was better than yours,’ said Yarvi. ‘Twice, now, your mistress has tried to cut me from the world, yet here I stand.’

  ‘Treachery is what you are known for, spider.’ Mother Adwyn spat purple bark-juice at his feet. ‘What of your sacred ground of Father Peace?’

  Yarvi shrugged. ‘Oh, he is a forgiving god. But it may be wise to hang you from these trees and slit your throat as an offering, just in case.’

  ‘Do it, then,’ she hissed.

  ‘Mercy shows more power than murder. Go back to Grandmother Wexen. Thank her for the information you have given me, it will be useful.’ He gestured towards the dead men, already being trussed by the feet to be hung from the branches of the sacred grove. ‘Thank her for these rich offerings to the Tall Gods, no doubt they will appreciate them.’

  Father Yarvi jerked close to her, lips curled back, and Mother Adwyn’s mask slipped, and Koll saw her fear. ‘But tell the First of Minsters I piss on her offer! I swore an oath to be avenged on the killers of my father. A sun-oath and a moon-oath. Tell Grandmother Wexen that while she and I both live, there will be no peace.’

  Never Bloody Enough

  ‘I’ll kill you, you half-haired bitch!’ snarled Raith, spraying spit as he went for her. Rakki caught his left arm and Soryorn his right and between them they managed to wrestle him back. They’d had plenty of practice at it, after all.

  Thorn Bathu didn’t move. Unless you counted the jaw muscles clenching on the shaved side of her head.

  ‘Let’s all just calm down,’ said her husband, Brand, waving his open palms like a shepherd trying to still a nervous flock. ‘We’re meant to be allies, aren’t we?’ He was a big, strong cow of a man, no edge to him at all. ‘Let’s just … just stand in the light a moment.’

  Raith let everyone know how much he thought of that idea by twisting far enough free of his brother to spit in Brand’s face. He missed, sadly, but the point was made.

  Thorn curled her lip. ‘Reckon this dog needs putting down.’

  Everyone’s got their sore spots, and that tickled Raith’s. He went limp, let his head drop sideways, showing his teeth in a lazy grin as his eyes drifted across to Brand. ‘Maybe I’ll kill this coward wife of yours instead?’

  He’d always had a trick for starting fights, and wasn’t half bad at finishing them either, but nothing could’ve made him ready for how fast Thorn came at him.

  ‘You’re dead, you milk-haired bastard!’

  Raith jerked away, near-dragging his brother and Soryorn down in a shocked tangle together on the dockside. Took three Gettlanders to drag her off – the sour old master-at-arms, Hunnan, the bald old helmsman, Rulf, and Brand with his scarred forearm wrapped around her neck. All strong men, straining at the effort, and even then her stray fist landed a good cuff on the top of Raith’s head.

  ‘Peace!’ snarled Brand as he struggled to wrestle his thrashing wife back. ‘For the gods’ sake, peace!’

  But no one was in the mood. There were others growling insults now, Gettlanders and Vanstermen both. Raith saw knuckles white on sword hilts, heard the scrape as Soryorn eased his knife free of its sheath. He could smell the violence coming, far worse than he’d planned on. But there’s violence for you. It rarely keeps to the patch you mark out for it. Wouldn’t be violence if it did.

  Raith bared his teeth – half-snarl, half-smile – the fire coming up in his chest, the breath ripping hot at his throat, every muscle tensing.

  Could’ve been a battle for the songs right then on the rain-damp docks of Thorlby if Grom-gil-Gorm hadn’t come shoving through the angry press like a huge bull through a crowd of bleating goats.

  ‘Enough!’ roared the King of Vansterland. ‘What shameful pecking of little birds is this?’

  The hubbub died. Raith shook off his brother, grinning his wolf’s grin, and Thorn tore free of her husband, growling curses. No doubt Brand had an uncomfortable night ahead, but it had all worked out well enough to Raith’s mind. He’d come to fight, after all, and wasn’t too bothered who with.

  The glaring Gettlanders shifted to let King Uthil through, his drawn sword cradled in his arm. Raith hated him, of course. A good Vansterman had to hate the King of Gettland. But otherwise he seemed very much a man to admire, hard and grey as an iron bar and every bit as unbending, renowned for many victories and few words, a mad brightness to his sunken eyes that said he had only a cold space where the gods usually put a man’s mercy.

  ‘I am disappointed, Thorn Bathu,’ he grated out in a voice rough as millstones. ‘I expected better from you.’

  ‘I’m all regret, my king,’ she growled, glaring daggers at Raith, and then at Brand, who winced like daggers from his wife was far from a novelty.

  ‘I expected no better.’ Grom-gil-Gorm raised one black brow at Raith. ‘But at least hoped for it.’

  ‘We should let ’em insult us, my king?’ snapped Raith.

  ‘A little insult must be suffered if one is to maintain an alliance,’ came Mother Scaer’s dry voice.

  ‘And our alliance is a ship on stormy seas,’ said Father Yarvi, with that honeyed smile of his that cried out for a headbutt. ‘Sink it with squabbling and we surely all will drown alone.’

  Raith growled at that. He hated ministers and their two-tongued talk of Father Peace and greater good. To his mind there was no problem you couldn’t best solve by putting your fist through it.

  ‘A Vansterman never forgets an insult.’ Gorm wedged his thumbs among the knives bristling from his belt. ‘But I have a thirst upon me, and since we are the guests …’ He drew himself up, the chain made from the pommels of his beaten enemies shifting as his great chest swelled. ‘I, Grom-gil-Gorm, Breaker of Swords and Maker of Orphans, King of Vansterland and favourite son of Mother War … will go second into the city.’

  His warriors grumbled bitterly. An hour they’d wasted arguing over who’d go first and now the battle was lost. Their king would take the place of less honour, so they’d have less honour and, gods, they were prickly over their honour.

  ‘A wise choice,’ said Uthil, narrowing his eyes. ‘But expect no gifts for making it.’

  ‘The wolf needs no gifts from the sheep,’ said Gorm, glowering back. King Uthil’s closest warriors swaggered past, gilded cloak-buckles and sword-hilts and ring-money gleaming, swollen to new heights of undeserved arrogance, and Raith showed his teeth and spat at their feet.

  ‘A dog indeed,’ sneered Hunnan, and Raith would’ve sprung on the old bastard and knocked his brains out on the docks if Rakki hadn’t hugged him tight and crooned, ‘Calm, brother, calm,’ in his ear.

  ‘Blue Jenner! Here’s a surprise!’

  Raith frowned over his shoulder and saw Father Yarvi drawn aside by some old sailor with a brine-pickled face.

  ‘A welcome one, I hope,’ said Jenner, clasping hands with Rulf like they were old oarmates.

  ‘That depends,’ said the minister. ‘Have you come to take Queen Laithlin’s gold?’

  ‘I try to take any gold that’s offered.’ Jenner glanced around like he was about to show off some secret treasure. ‘But I’ve a better reason for being here.’

  ‘Better than gold?’ asked Rulf, grinning. ‘You’ve changed.’

  ‘Far better.’ Jenner guided someone forward who’d been hidden at his back, and it was like someone stabbed Raith right through his skull and all the fight drained out.

  She was small and slight, swamped by a weather-stained c
loak. Her hair was a wild tangle, a cloud of dark curls that twitched and shifted in the salt breeze. Her skin was pale, and chapped pink round her nostrils, and the bones in her cheeks showed so fine and sharp it seemed they might snap at a harsh word.

  She looked straight at Raith with big eyes dark and green as Mother Sea on a storm-day. She didn’t smile. She didn’t speak. Sad and solemn she seemed, and full of secrets, and every hair on Raith stood up. No axe-blow to the head could have knocked him quite so senseless as that one glimpse of her.

  For a moment Father Yarvi’s mouth hung foolishly open. Then he shut it with a snap. ‘Rulf, take Blue Jenner and his guest to Queen Laithlin. Now.’

  ‘You were ready to do murder over who went first, now you don’t want to go at all?’ Rakki was staring at him, and Raith realized Gorm’s men were strutting in after the Gettlanders, all puffed up near to bursting to make up for going second.

  ‘Who was that girl?’ Raith croaked out, feeling giddy as a sleeper jerked from an ale-dream.

  ‘Since when were you interested in girls?’

  ‘Since I saw this one.’ He blinked into the crowd, hoping to prove to both of them he hadn’t imagined her, but she was gone.

  ‘Must’ve been quite a beauty to draw your eye from a quarrel.’

  ‘Like nothing I ever saw.’

  ‘Forgive me, brother, but when it comes to women you haven’t seen much. You’re the fighter, remember?’ Rakki grinned as he heaved up Grom-gil-Gorm’s great black shield. ‘I’m the lover.’

  ‘As you never tire of telling me.’ Raith shouldered the king’s heavy sword and made to follow his brother into Thorlby. Until he felt his master’s weighty hand holding him back.

  ‘You have disappointed me, Raith.’ The Breaker of Swords drew him close. ‘This place is full of bad enemies to have, but I fear in Queen Laithlin’s Chosen Shield you have picked the very worst.’

  Raith scowled. ‘She doesn’t scare me, my king.’

  Gorm slapped him sharply across the face. Well, a slap to Gorm. To Raith it was like being hit with an oar. He staggered but the king caught him and dragged him closer still. ‘What wounds me is not that you tried to hurt her, but that you failed.’ He cuffed him the other way and Raith’s mouth turned salty with blood. ‘I do not want a dog that yaps. I want a dog that uses its teeth. I want a killer.’ And he slapped Raith a third time and left him dizzy. ‘I fear you have a grain of mercy left in you, Raith. Crush it, before it crushes you.’

  Gorm gave Raith’s head a parting scratch. The sort a father gives a son. Or perhaps a huntsman gives his hound. ‘You can never be bloody enough for my taste, boy. You know that.’

  Safe

  The comb of polished whalebone swish-swish-swished through Skara’s hair.

  Prince Druin’s toy sword click-clack-scraped against a chest in the corner.

  Queen Laithlin’s voice spilled out blab-blab-blab. As though she sensed that if she left a silence Skara might start screaming, and screaming, and never stop.

  ‘Outside that window, on the south side of the city, my husband’s warriors are camped.’

  ‘Why didn’t they help us?’ Skara wanted to shriek as she stared numbly at the sprawling tents, but her mouth drooled out the proper thing, as always. ‘There must be very many.’

  ‘Two and a half thousand loyal Gettlanders, called in from every corner of the land.’

  Skara felt Queen Laithlin’s strong fingers turn her head, gently but very firmly. Prince Druin gave a piping toddler’s war-cry and attacked a tapestry. The comb began to swish-swish-swish again, as though the solution to every problem was the right arrangement of hair.

  ‘Outside this window, to the north, is Grom-gil-Gorm’s camp.’ The fires glimmered in the gathering dusk, spread across the dark hills like stars across heaven’s cloth. ‘Two thousand Vanstermen in sight of the walls of Thorlby. I never thought to see such a thing.’

  ‘Not with their swords sheathed, anyway,’ tossed out Thorn Bathu from the back of the room, as harshly as a warrior might toss an axe.

  ‘I saw a quarrel on the docks …’ mumbled Skara.

  ‘I fear it will not be the last.’ Laithlin clicked her tongue as she teased out a knot. Skara’s hair had always been unruly, but the Queen of Gettland was not a woman to be put off by a stubborn curl or two. ‘There is to be a great moot tomorrow. Five hours straight of quarrelling, that will be. If we get through it with no one dead I will count it a victory for the songs. There.’

  And Laithlin turned Skara’s head towards the mirror.

  The queen’s silent thralls had bathed her, and scrubbed her, and swapped her filthy shift for green silk brought on the long voyage from the First of Cities, nimbly altered to fit her. It was stitched with golden thread about the hem, as fine as anything she had ever worn, and Skara had worn some fine things. So many, and so carefully arranged by Mother Kyre, she had sometimes felt the clothes wore her.

  She was surrounded by strong walls, strong warriors, slaves and luxury. She should have felt giddy with relief. But like a runner who stops to rest and finds they cannot stand again, the comfort made Skara feel dizzy-weak and aching-raw, battered outside and in as if she was one great bruise. She almost wished she was back aboard Blue Jenner’s ship, the Black Dog, shivering, and staring into the rain, and thrice an hour crawling on grazed knees to puke over the side.

  ‘This belonged to my mother, King Fynn’s sister.’ Laithlin carefully arranged the earring, golden chains fine as cobweb that spilled red jewels almost to Skara’s shoulder.

  ‘It’s beautiful,’ Skara croaked out, struggling not to spray sick all over the mirror. She scarcely recognized the haunted, pink-eyed, brittle-looking girl she saw there. She looked like her own ghost. Perhaps she never escaped Yaletoft. Perhaps she was still trapped there, Bright Yilling’s slave, and always would be.

  At the back of the room she saw Thorn Bathu squat beside the prince, shift his tiny hands around the grip of his wooden sword, murmur instructions on how to swing it properly. She grinned as he whacked her across the leg, the star-shaped scar on her cheek puckering, and ruffled his pale blonde hair. ‘Good boy!’

  All Skara could think of was Bright Yilling’s sword, that diamond pommel flashing in the darkness of the Forest, and in the mirror the pale girl’s chest began to heave and her hands to tremble—

  ‘Skara.’ Queen Laithlin took her firmly by the shoulders, fixed her with those hard, sharp, grey-blue eyes, jerking her back to the present. ‘Can you tell me what happened?’

  ‘My grandfather waited for help from his allies.’ The words burbled out flat as a bee’s droning. ‘We waited for Uthil’s warriors, and Gorm’s. They never came.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘He lost heart. Mother Kyre persuaded him to make peace. She sent a dove and Grandmother Wexen sent an eagle back. If Bail’s Point was given up, and the warriors of Throvenland sent home, and the High King’s army given free passage across our land, she would forgive.’

  ‘But Grandmother Wexen does not forgive,’ said Laithlin.

  ‘She sent Bright Yilling to Yaletoft to settle the debt.’ Skara swallowed sour spit, and in the mirror the pale girl’s stringy neck shifted. Prince Druin’s little face was crumpled with warrior’s determination as he hacked at Thorn with his toy sword and she pushed it away with her fingers. His little war-cries sounded like the howls of pain and fury in the darkness, coming closer, always closer.

  ‘Bright Yilling cut Mother Kyre’s head off. He stabbed my grandfather right through and he fell in the firepit.’

  Queen Laithlin’s eyes widened. ‘You … saw it happen?’

  The dusting of sparks, the glow on the warriors’ smiles, the thick blood dripping from the tip of Yilling’s sword. Skara took a shuddering breath, and nodded. ‘I got away disguised as Blue Jenner’s slave. Bright Yilling flipped a coin, to decide whether he would kill him too … but the coin …’

  She could still see it spinning in the shadows, flashing wit
h the colours of fire.

  ‘The gods were with you that night,’ breathed Laithlin.

  ‘Then why did they kill my family?’ Skara wanted to shriek, but the girl in the mirror gave a queasy smile instead, and muttered a proper prayer of thanks to He Who Turns the Dice.

  ‘They have sent you to me, cousin.’ The queen squeezed hard at Skara’s shoulders. ‘You are safe here.’

  The Forest that had been about her all her life, certain as a mountain, was made ashes. The high gable that had stood for two hundred years fallen in ruin. Throvenland was torn apart like smoke on the wind. Nowhere would be safe, ever again.

  Skara found she was scratching at her cheek. She could still feel Bright Yilling’s cold fingertips upon it.

  ‘You have all been so kind,’ she croaked out, and tried to smother an acrid burp. She had always had a weak stomach, but since she clambered from the Black Dog her guts had felt as twisted as her thoughts.

  ‘You are family, and family is all that matters.’ With a parting squeeze, Queen Laithlin let go of her. ‘I must speak to my husband and my son … to Father Yarvi, that is.’

  ‘Could I ask you … is Blue Jenner still here?’

  The queen’s displeasure was palpable. ‘The man is little better than a pirate—’

  ‘Could you send him to me? Please?’

  Laithlin might have seemed hard as flint, but she must have heard the desperation in Skara’s voice. ‘I will send him. Thorn, the princess has been through an ordeal. Do not leave her alone. Come, Druin.’

  The thigh-high prince looked solemnly at Skara. ‘Bye bye.’ And he dropped his wooden sword and ran after his mother.

  Skara was left staring at Thorn Bathu. Staring up, since the Chosen Shield towered over her. Plainly she had no use for combs herself, the hair on one side clipped to dark stubble and on the other twisted into knots and braids and matted tangles bound up with a middle-sized fortune in gold and silver ring-money.

  Here was a woman said to have fought seven men alone and won, the elf-bangle that had been her reward glowing fierce yellow on her wrist. A woman who wore blades instead of silks and scars instead of jewels. Who ground propriety under her boot heels and made no apologies for it, ever. A woman who would sooner break a door down with her face than knock.