Shanakan (The Fourth Age of Shanakan Book 1) (2 page)

It took Cal Serhan nearly two days to cross the plains between the foothills and the fortress of White Rock, and it was dull walking. The road was not the winding, living thing that the track through the mountains had been; full of interest and surprise at every turn, with each crest opening onto new sweeps of mountain and valley, on waterfalls, sky blue lakes and red ponds filled with weed. The road to White Rock was straight and mostly hemmed in by thick underbrush and tall trees, still in leaf, but red and yellow with autumn colour. You could walk for three hours and not notice a change.

The road skirted a couple of villages, but the people eyed him with apprehension, and he did not attempt to engage them in conversation, nor they him. These small settlements were his only relief from monotony, and he dawdled through their lands, looking at everything. It was very different out here on the plain. His home, his village in the fiords, was a poor place by comparison, the fields no more than scratches and patches on the feet of great masses of rock that cast their cold shadows over the water. But here he noticed burned houses, and untended fields returning to weed and scrub, so even in the midst of nature’s generosity there was hardship. He remembered the bandit’s remark: the farmers have the rough end of it.

On the evening of the first day he caught the sound of a stream off to one side of the road, and struck out into the forest, coming to its bank in less than a hundred yards. He picked a spot where a great tree had fallen across the water, creating a clearing, a pond, and a temporary bridge. There was soft grass here, and he could lean his back against the tree’s thick trunk while he ate. It was a quiet and peaceful place, with a dappled light that was strange and exciting to one who had grown up with the solid shade of pines. He fell asleep easily to the gentle sound of water and woke refreshed.

The second day was like the first. The road kinked a couple of times at bridges over small rivers, and after the second he could see the fortress directly ahead of him, rising above the trees. It took a lot of walking to make it seem any bigger.

As he drew near, late in the afternoon, the castle bulked threateningly above him. It was massive. As the man Delf had told him, the main gate was set nearly seventy feet above the plain, flanked by huge towers rising perhaps another seventy feet above that. Serhan had never seen a building on this scale, and had to remind himself that it was only stone, built by men to protect a weakness that dwelled within. It was like a cliff, and cliffs looked impressive until you realised that they were an expression of the sea’s power, not the rock’s.

From half a mile away he had been able to pick out two guards before the gate and he had no doubt that they had seen him, and were watching him.

He reached the foot of the rock, and trudged up the steep path. It was more of a road, really, nearly twenty feet wide. Wagons and horses could pass here with ease.

At the top he stopped in what felt like a small square in front of the guards and the gate. Walls rose on three sides, and the fourth was a fatal drop back to the plain. Archers’ slits stared down blankly from the stone. It was an intimidating space.

The guards looked him over, but remained leaning comfortably against the stone walls either side of the gate.

“I have come to offer my services to the great one, to Gerique,” Serhan said.

The bigger of the two guards sighed. “Piss off,” he said. The other guard sniggered.

Serhan was surprised. Perhaps this was some sort of test? “I’ve come a long way.”

“I should care?”

“You should care enough to go and fetch your officer.”

“Well I could do,” the guard said, shifting his weight and taking a step forward, “but he gets a bit sharp if we waste his time, so be a good lad and run along home.”

They were not taking him seriously. They thought he was no more than a boy from one of the villages out on the plain below. Serhan looked up at the walls. This was going to be difficult. These men were not bandits with blunt swords and no idea how to use them. Their confidence was born of experience, not bravado. He took a firm grip on his staff and walked towards the gate.

Both guards drew their swords.

“Stop,” the bigger one said.

Serhan said nothing, did not slow.

The smaller guard hung back, giving his colleague room to swing. The big one raised his weapon and released a sweeping forehand blow with the flat of the blade – not a killing blow, but designed to bruise, to discourage. Serhan stopped abruptly, taking half a step back and slightly unbalancing the man as he tried to compensate. The blade swung an inch short of his chest, and he followed the hand with one end of his staff, pushing him round and bringing the other end up sharply between the man’s legs.

The guard gasped, but tried to swing the blade again, less convincingly. This time Serhan stepped inside the arc of the sword and tripped the man with the staff between his ankles. The guard went down with a crash, and Serhan delivered a sharp kick to the knee even as he pivoted away to face the other guard.

The second man hadn’t wasted time when he saw what was going on, and was coming in fast. Serhan struck the man’s sword hand with his staff, knocking the blade high, at the same time stepping forward with as much force as he could manage, driving his shoulder into the guard’s chest.

This gave him enough of an advantage, and a couple more blows disarmed the man and spun him round with the staff across his throat. He felt the guard’s hand move downwards and brought up a knee to block it.

“Touch that dagger and I’ll break your neck,” he said.

The guard stopped resisting.

By this time the first guard was back on his feet, although it was obvious he was having trouble with his knee and was still bent over. He advanced towards Serhan, sword held with deadly intent.

“Come much closer and your friend here is going to be in serious trouble.”

The guard stopped and eyed him with considerable malevolence. He was weighing the sword, trying to decide what to do.

“What do you want?” he asked.

“Just fetch your officer.”

For a moment he thought the man was going to attack anyway.

“Just go and fetch the captain, eh, Colly?” the smaller guard said.

Colly seemed to relax, slid his sword back into its sheath, and limped into the gate without a backward glance. Serhan plucked the smaller guard’s dagger from his belt and released him, pushing him away from where his sword lay.

The guard sat down against the wall, easy now that the matter was out of his hands, and looked at Serhan.

“You fight pretty well with that stick,” he said. “Where did you learn?”

“Where I was taught.”

“Never seen it. Can you teach it?”

“Maybe.” Serhan smiled. “We’ll see what your officer says.” He lobbed the dagger back to the guard, who caught it deftly and put it back in its sheath. The tension was gone now. It was an officer problem.

The limping guard came back out with three other men. One of these, the tall one, Serhan thought, was obviously the officer. He was somehow very much in charge, though it was hard to tell from the uniforms. Something in the way he stood, perhaps, or the way the guards stood around him. He was nearly a foot taller than Serhan, thin and rangy with close cropped sandy hair and green eyes.

“You’ve been beating up my guards,” he said.

Serhan nodded. “I have come to offer my services to Gerique.”

“And they wouldn’t let you in. Well, you’ve got my attention. Do you want a position in the guard? It seems you have skills that would be useful.”

“Fighting isn’t what I do best.”

The officer raised an eyebrow. “So. You’re a cook? A musician? What?”

“I’m a tactician, a strategist, a planner. I find solutions to problems.”

A couple of the guards looked at each other.

“You’re saying that you want to work
with
the Faer Karan, not just for them?”

“Yes.”

“It’s not wise. Do you know what they’re like?” The captain’s voice was calm, but the tone discouraging.

“I have a pretty good idea.”

There was a long pause while the officer looked at him. The guards were completely still and quiet. They were looking at him, too. He couldn’t read their expressions.

“All right.” The officer said abruptly. “You know this means that you’ll have to meet with them, and they’ll probably kill you for sport, but if that’s what you want, follow me.”

He followed the officer through the gate, and two of the guards walked behind him. They entered a large courtyard and crossed to a door on the far side. The captain gestured to Serhan to walk beside him.

“I hope you know what you’re getting into. Some advice: you do what they say. Exactly. And you never argue. They have short tempers and a taste for other people’s suffering. Most of the people here would do anything to avoid a face to face with the Faer Karan.” He was silent for a moment. “Look, are you sure you want to do this?”

“Yes.”

The officer shook his head. “Crazy. The colonel is the only one to go up there regularly, and he hates it.” He offered his hand. “Darius Grand, Captain of guard. You are?”

“Cal Serhan. I’m from the west. Out beyond the World’s End.”

“Rough country. Wish you’d go back there. Or I could make you a sergeant of the guard if you like. Your skills would justify that.”

“Thanks, but no.”

They went down three flights of stairs. There were no windows down here because they were in the heart of the rock itself. It was colder, but not damp and the air was smoky and stung his eyes a little, the only light coming from oil lamps.

They walked down a corridor and the captain banged on a large, solid looking door. It opened and there was another pair of guards on the other side.

“One for the lockup,” Grand said to them. They opened what was without doubt a cell door.

“You’ll wait here until the Faer Karan get around to you. It could be weeks.” He turned to the guards. “Look after this one, lads. He’s for upstairs.”

Serhan stepped into the cell and looked at it. There was a bed, a chair, and a hole in the floor. An oil lamp hung from a hook on the wall, and one of the guards lit it.

“Last chance,” Grand said.

“Thank you, Captain, but I’ll stick with it.”

Grand shook his head and stepped out of the cell. “Get him some food and a jug of ale,” he said to the guards. “And let me know when our masters send for him. I’ll take him up myself.”

Then he was gone. The cell door slammed. The big door at the end of the corridor shut with a clang and he was left with his own thoughts and the whispering of the guards outside. He sat on the chair and closed his eyes. Something that was a bit like fear and a bit more like excitement plucked at his nerves. He shivered.

Step one complete, he thought.

*              *              *              *

About an hour later he heard the big door open again and voices outside in the passageway. The noises came closer and a loud voice outside said “Open it!”

Serhan stood up and faced the door as it opened.

A short and portly man stepped through the opening. He was wearing what was obviously an officer’s uniform, buttoned and braided to excess, but in every respect he was the opposite of Darius Grand.

Some men are big. Gris, the man who’d taught him stick fighting had been big, but Gris was like a slab of stone. This man’s chest was clearly in awe of his belly, even though he wasn’t exactly obese. He stood in the light of the lamp inspecting Serhan.

“I am Colonel Stil,” he announced eventually.

“Cal Serhan at your service, Colonel,” Serhan said.

“Ah, but you’re not, are you?” the colonel snapped.

“I’m sorry?”

“I know your type, Serhan.” He voiced the name carefully, like an insult. “You’re ambitious. You want power, and you think the Faer Karan are the way to get it.”

“I only wish to serve.”

“No you don’t. Nobody wants to serve. We do it because we have to, because it’s better than the alternative. If Captain Grand hadn’t already told the bastards that you were here I’d have you thrown from the walls.”

Serhan had never seen an adult quite as angry as the colonel. His face was red, his fists were balled. It was like seeing a child in a temper tantrum. But for all that anger, he didn’t move to strike. He was afraid. Not of Serhan himself, but of the Faer Karan. Afraid to do anything that might anger them, and also, perhaps, afraid that someone else might have their ear, might be preferred over him.

So here was an enemy.

“Colonel, I think you have mistaken my purpose. If I don’t die in the next few weeks, I hope that we have the chance to work together. I’m sure you can teach me a great deal about the Faer Karan, and the way things work around here.” It was an attempt to mollify, albeit a fairly clumsy one.

The colonel seemed momentarily taken aback, and paused. There was something like a flicker of hope in his eyes, but his expression quickly hardened again.