Rules of Ascension: Book One of Winds of the Forelands (6 page)

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Authors: David B. Coe

BOOK: Rules of Ascension: Book One of Winds of the Forelands
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“How did he know where we were staying? How did he get past the barkeep?”
Cadel saw no reason to correct him. “I’m not sure.”
Jedrek dropped his voice to a whisper. “So are we doing it tonight?”
“Yes. In the wood. He’ll be on horseback.”
“That shouldn’t be a problem.”
Cadel nodded. “I agree. We also have to avoid the city gates.”
“That shouldn’t be a problem either. Did he pay you already?”
“Yes. More than twice what we were promised.” Cadel grinned at the expression on Jedrek’s face. “Wish you had held out for a bigger blade?”
“I should have gotten two.”
They circled once through the city, then returned to the inn at which they were staying.
“Go upstairs and change out of your performance clothes,” Cadel said. “Then join me down here. We’ll eat supper and go back to the markets. From there, when, it’s time, we’ll make our way to the wall.”
Jedrek nodded and climbed the stairs to their room, while Cadel claimed a table in the back of the inn and ordered two plates of fowl and greens.
The two men lingered over the meal, which, though not particularly good, was not as bad as some of the meals Cadel had endured in inns like this one over the years. They left the inn just as the sunset bells were ringing. The sky had darkened to a shade of deepest blue, except in the west where the last rays of crimson and yellow still blazed. To the east, Panya, the white moon—the Qirsi moon—hung just above the city wall. A handful of stars could be seen overhead,
pale as Qirsi skin. The air was still, which would make it harder to slip by the guards, but easier to hear the approach of their prey.
Cadel and Jedrek walked slowly back through the marketplace. Many of the merchants’ tables had been cleared away to make room for the Revel’s street performers. Tumblers soared through the air, twisting and rolling like swallows on a warm day. Bright flames leaped from the mouths of fire-eaters, and jugglers tossed gold and silver balls into the warm, sweet air. A company of Qirsi sorcerers conjured flames of every imaginable hue that danced and whirled as though they were alive. Musicians played at intervals along the street, the music from one group mingling with that of the next.
In the center of Thorald City, outside a great tent, young men and women of Determining and Fating ages stood in a long, winding line, waiting to have their futures foretold by the Qirsi gleaner inside. For all the spectacles of Bohdan’s Revel, the dancers spinning and gliding in the streets, the falconers displaying the talents of their birds, the tournaments of strength and speed and sword skill waged by men of fighting age, the gleaning remained its most important element, just as it lay at the core of the traveling festivals found in the other kingdoms of the Forelands. For children in their twelfth and sixteenth years, it was all they could think of during the turns leading up to the Revel’s arrival in their city.
The gleaning was yet another custom of the Southlands, brought to the northern kingdoms by the Qirsi invaders. A Qirsi man or woman possessing the gleaning power, the ability to divine the future, would offer a glimpse of each child’s fate with the aid of the Qiran, a great crystal said to be imbued with magic of its own.
Having traveled for several years with Eibithar’s Revel, Sanbira’s Festival, and smaller fairs in Aneira, Wethyrn, Caerisse, and Braedon, Cadel had learned a good deal about the gleanings and how they worked. He knew, for instance, that the Qiran itself was little more than a pretty rock. It served mostly as a medium through which the Qirsi sorcerers could convey what they saw to the awed children. The Determining, done at the younger age, also was not what it seemed, at least not anymore. Once, perhaps, there had been some magic in it. Over the years, however, it had become little more than a means for steering children into apprenticeships at the appropriate age. Still, for the children gazing into the Qiran as the Qirsi before them summoned forth an image of their future lives, it was a wondrous event. Cadel still carried vivid memories of his own
Determining, though he shouldn’t have been surprised by what he saw: himself as an adult, presiding over Nistaad Manor, tending to the vineyards and stables, and collecting tribute from the surrounding villages. At the time he thought it prophecy. Later, long after he fled southern Caerisse, he realized that it had merely been an informed guess.
The Fating, however, was a different matter. Done in the sixteenth year, it relied entirely on Qirsi magic. Fatings foretold good marriages or failed love affairs, great wealth or grave misfortune, long life or untimely death. Those awaiting their moment with the Qiran might be giddy with anticipation or debilitated with fear, but no one took it lightly. Even Jedrek, who scoffed at the legends and paid little heed to custom, had once admitted to Cadel that his Fating, which offered glimpses of the life they were leading now, had left him troubled for many turns after.
Cadel had often wondered what his Fating would have revealed. He left his home early in his sixteenth year, before the festival arrived at the village closest to Nistaad Manor. Tall and strong for his age, with a dark mustache and beard already beginning to appear on his face, he was able to pass for an older man almost immediately. To have sought out his Fating in another village would only have served to call attention to himself.
At this point, he had little doubt about what the Qiran would have shown him. He was living the life he was meant to live. He didn’t need a Qirsi sorcerer to reassure him of that. Yet, even now, seeing the children of Thorald waiting to take their turn in the Qirsi’s tent, he could not help but feel the call of the stone.
“Corbin! Honok!”
Wincing inwardly, Cadel turned at the sound of Anesse’s voice. He and Jedrek could ill afford to be trapped in a long conversation, or, worse, caught in a lie. It was nearly time for them to make their way to the city wall.
“I thought you had plans for tonight,” Anesse said. She was wearing a long, blue dress that was almost a perfect match for the color of the sky. It had a tantalizingly low neckline.
He summoned a smile. “We do. We’re on our way there now.”
“You’re certain we can’t lure you to the banquet?”
“Sadly, yes. You’re certain we can’t convince you to remain in Thorald for another day or two?”
She nodded. “Sadly.”
Cadel glanced for an instant at Kalida, who was steadfastly avoiding his gaze and Jedrek’s, her face as red as her dress.
“Well,” Anesse said awkwardly. “We should be on our way.”
“So should we.”
“Goodbye again, Corbin. Honok.”
“I hope to have the pleasure of singing with you again,” he said.
The two women turned and started up the road toward Thorald Castle. After watching them walk away, Cadel and Jedrek turned as well, and cut back across the market to the south end of the city. Cadel would have preferred to go over the city wall somewhere between the south and east gates. But all the land between the gates belonged to the Sanctuary of Amon, and Cadel wished to avoid any encounters with the clerics. Instead, they made their way to the southwestern wall, between the south gate and the lower river gate. There were a few small houses in this part of the city, scattered along a narrow lane. But most of the residents were at the banquet or enjoying the Revel. The houses were dark and the street empty.
At least six guards were stationed at each of the gates, and two more walked atop each of the three wall segments between the river gate and the south gate. A small watchtower separated one segment from the next, and each tower held two bright torches. Obviously, their best chance was to climb the wall near the center of the middle segment, as far from the torches and the well-manned gates as possible.
Cadel was most concerned about the timing of their climb, which, in turn, depended upon how the guards on that middle segment had decided to keep watch. If they were walking the wall together, they could be avoided with relative ease. If not, he and Jedrek faced a far more difficult task.
Walking as quietly as they could through the tall grass that grew behind the houses, the two men soon reached the wall. It was made of rough stone, and it stood at least twelve fourspans high. Doing his best to remain in the shadows, Cadel looked up at the torchlit tower, trying to spot the guards. He heard them before he saw them. They were talking loudly, laughing about something, walking northward atop the wall. Cadel and Jedrek waited until the guards had gone past; then they began to climb.
Over the course of their travels throughout the Forelands, Cadel and Jedrek had climbed rock faces in the Glyndwr Highlands, the
Grey Hills of Wethyrn, and the Sanbiri Hills that would have appeared impossibly sheer to most people. Once, several years before, they had climbed a peak in the Basak Range of southern Aneira to arrange the death of an Aneiran noble who enjoyed hunting bear in the mountains. This wall, rough as it was, offered ample handholds and footholds. They climbed quickly, like lizards on a rock, and were soon within a few fourspans of the top of the wall.
Hearing the guards again, Cadel raised a hand, indicating to Jedrek that they should stop.
“ … Three bloody nights in a row,” one of them was saying, as they drew closer to where Cadel and Jedrek clung to the stones. “During the Revel, no less. There’s no justice in that.”
“Captain doesn’t care much for justice. If he thought you’d give him your wage, he’d probably let you off. Me, I’ve been on the wall for two in a row. And it looks like I’ll be up here again tomorrow night.”
“It’s the banquet that does it. That’s where the captain is. Him and his favorites. They’re filling their bellies with wine and mutton while …”
Their voices were fading, as was the clicking of their boots on the stone path atop the wall. Cadel nodded once, and he Jedrek resumed their climb. As he reached for his next handhold, however, Cadel felt the stone beneath his right foot begin to give way. Grabbing desperately for anything that would hold him, he dug his fingers into the first stone he could find. Only to have it come away in his hand. The foothold under his right foot gave way, and as it did, his left foot slipped, leaving him hanging by his left hand. Small pieces of rock clattered down the face of the wall and into the grass below. Flailing with his feet, he quickly found new toeholds, but the damage had been done. The guards had stopped talking and were heading back in Cadel and Jedrek’s direction.
Cadel looked at Jedrek, who was glaring at him as if had just shouted Jedrek’s name at the top of his voice. The guards had almost reached them. With Panya, the white moon, full and climbing into the sky behind them, they would be easy to spot against the dark stone. So Cadel did the only thing he could. He still clutched the stone in his right hand, and now, with the guards approaching, he heaved it with all his might, up into the night sky and over the wall to the other side. After several seconds he heard it land on the ground outside the city.
The guards did, too. They stopped just above Jedrek and Cadel, but on the far side of the city wall.
“What do you see?” one of them asked.
“Not a bloody thing. With Panya as low as she is, it’s black as pitch down there.”
“I’m sure I heard something.”
“So did I. But I promise you, whatever we heard wasn’t human. No person I know could see in that kind of dark.”
“You think it was wolves?”
The other guard laughed. “Wolves? More likely it was rats from the river, or a fox from the wood.” He laughed again. “Wolves,” he repeated, as the guards began to walk away again.
“Shouldn’t we tell the watch?”
“Sure, we can tell the watch. We’ll tell them the city’s under siege from a pack of hedgehogs.”
Cadel took a long breath and looked over at Jedrek again. His friend was grinning, his dark eyes shining in the moonlight. Cadel had to grin as well.
When they could no longer hear the guards’ voices, they finished their climb, peering cautiously over the edge of the wall before swinging themselves onto the walkway, hurrying across, and beginning their descent on the other side. Without any further mishaps to slow them, they were on the ground again before Panya had risen high enough to illuminate the outside of the wall.
“Where to now?” Jedrek whispered.
“The Sanctuary of Kebb, by the river.”
His friend smiled, and Cadel knew why. Kebb. God of beasts, god of the hunt.
“How appropriate,” was all Jedrek said.
The great hall of Thorald Castle shimmered with torch fire and candlelight. The smells of roasting meat, baking bread, and sweet wine filled the air. Dozens of long wooden tables, each piled with mutton and fowl, rich stews and dark breads, steamed greens and fresh fruits, and large flasks of light wine from the Thorald cellars, lined the walls of the enormous room. All of them were crowded with men, women, and children, whose voices and laughter blended into an incomprehensible din.
The floor in the center of the chamber had been left open for the
dancing that would follow the banquet, and just in front of the main table, which had been placed on a great dais, a group of musicians played.

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