The Long War 01 - The Black Guard (17 page)

‘Hasim?’ he asked in his heavy Ranen accent.

‘Yup, think so… just about… I’m… dead,’ his friend replied.

Magnus looked out of the cell door and, seeing no sign of the gaoler, stood and moved to the window. Hasim smiled at the sight of his old friend, but that was all he could do before he slouched against the bars and lost consciousness.

* * *

Magnus tried to remain as quiet as he could while he reached through the bars to investigate Hasim’s wounds. The Karesian was cut badly across his left thigh and, although he’d stopped much of the bleeding with his belt, the wound was ugly-looking. The cut on his lower back was of more concern and it was still bleeding. Magnus knew Hasim was strong and wouldn’t give his life away easily, but the Ranen was nonetheless impressed that his friend was still alive.

The Ranen priest closed his eyes and attempted to calm his mind. He had never called on the battle rage and the voice of Rowanoco in the same day, and he knew he needed to be at peace for the healing to work.

Hasim was an old friend, from the days when Magnus had journeyed with Brom and, although he’d not known that the Karesian was in the city, his presence made sense. The last he had heard, Hasim was in Fjorlan, sampling the local wheat beer and telling Ranen women outrageous lies about his heritage.

Hasim had got on well with Algenon, Magnus’s elder brother and thain of Fredericksand, and Magnus knew Hasim would be the ideal person for his brother to send south. Magnus did not concern himself with Hasim’s mission. He was a simple man, not given to worrying about things beyond his control, and currently he needed to focus on summoning the voice of his god.

With a hand placed through the bars, he lifted the remains of Hasim’s tunic and touched the wound on his back. ‘Rowanoco, the earth shakes at your passing, let it be healed by your voice.’

His hand remained on the wound, but the voice did not come. ‘Rowanoco, hear me now. I am your child, your servant, your hand and your will. This man is my friend and I would see him live. Talk to him now, let him receive your voice and be a man again.’ The words he spoke caused tears to appear in his eyes as he let himself feel pain, anguish and regret at the recent treatment meted out to those he held dear. Rowanoco would lend him his power only if his priest was truly in need, and Magnus knew this meant he needed to soften his iron will and let his emotions flow through him.

‘Rowanoco, father of all, blessed of the Low Kast, of the plateaus of Ursa, of the frozen wastes, visit us now and heal this man… please.’

The last word stretched on the Ranen priest’s lips and he felt his hand become warm. In the deep recesses of his mind he heard a distant rumble as if an earthquake were echoing through his head. The voice of Rowanoco the Earth Shaker, god of the Ranen, began to fill him.

More tears came into his eyes as his god leant down and spoke to him. He felt peace, calm and tranquillity at the sound of the Giant’s words and, although he could not hope to understand what was being said to him, he sensed a strength of purpose that he had rarely felt. His hand began to glow as he became a conduit for the god’s power.

Rowanoco, the Ice Giant, reached across uncounted layers of the world and lent his power to the priest. Magnus’s hand smoothly ran across Hasim’s back and the wound began to close. Slowly at first, he felt the blood stop flowing and the flesh knit itself back together. He heard Hasim’s heartbeat quicken a pace as the deep cut became no more than a scar and the blood around it disappeared.

Without thinking, Magnus moved his glowing hand to rest on Hasim’s leg and, with merely a touch, the second wound was healed, leaving only a mark that looked as if it had been there for years.

Hasim coughed as Magnus fell back on to the floor of his cell. The Ranen glanced around and was glad to see that he’d been quiet and had not alerted Castus, the gaoler.

He breathed heavily, shaking his head to clear a slight residual dizziness. Above, he saw Hasim slowly open his eyes and blink rapidly, his face pressed against the barred window. The Karesian groaned and moved only tentatively, slowly letting his senses reorder themselves. He looked down at the belt still tied tightly round his leg.

With a smile he turned to look through the bars at Magnus. The priest smiled back and the two old friends looked at each other for a few moments before Hasim spoke. ‘I think Bronwyn is safe, I got her as far as I could,’ he said weakly. ‘I just hope Brom is still alive somewhere.’

CHAPTER 5

Weir was the only city in the lands of Ro where a Kirin man could live without being constantly hounded by clerics. The Kirin were the mongrel offspring of Karesian and Ro, and they were generally dismissed as criminals and slavers by both their parent races. Rham Jas was no slaver and thought that, on some level, he was a good man; however, he had to concede that he was currently working as an assassin.

Weir rested on the Kirin Ridge, a narrow sea channel between Tor Funweir and the arid expanse of Karesia to the south. It was a hot, dirty and dangerous city, and Kirin criminals and Karesian mobsters controlled at least a third of it. Rham Jas despised the majority of them, but he was clever enough to trade on the misplaced sense of brotherhood they showed towards him. He knew he was safe as long as the Kirin hated the Ro more than they hated each other.

Like all Kirin, Rham Jas was dark-skinned, lighter than the men of Karesia but swarthy in comparison to the Ro. He was tall, but slender, and had eyes that were never still and a near-permanent grin. His hair was wavy and thin, hanging in lank curls to his shoulders. He was approaching his thirty-sixth year of life, but felt much older and enjoyed moments of immaturity to remind him that age was not a good thing.

Currently, he was sitting in the shadows on the roof of a particularly nasty inn called The Dirty Beggar. He’d been up here for about an hour and was beginning to think that he’d been given bad information. Rham Jas had been paid a decent amount of gold to kill a drunkard named Lyle. Apparently, Lyle had got into debt to the wrong people and was having his account closed. In Weir, that tended to mean death or something approximating permanent incapacity. Rham Jas had certainly been hired to cut off legs in the past.

He had been making a living from the mobsters of Ro Weir and other undesirables for nearly ten years. In that time, he’d discovered that he had a knack for assassination. Previously he’d been a hunter and a family man, living in a small village in a particularly isolated spot along the Kirin Ridge. Now he was discovering that a longbow was also an excellent way to kill people.

Rham Jas also carried a katana at his side. It was a gift from his wife and, though he rarely used it, he thought it wise to carry a sword when on a job – and it held certain sentimental value.

He pulled his cloak tightly around his shoulders and peered over the edge of the building to the street below. The Dirty Beggar was full and sounds of drunken revelry filled the night air. Outside stood a group of leather-armoured thugs, a local gang paid to keep order in the street. Several patrons of the tavern were being told to leave, and several more were vomiting on the flagstones. It was getting late and Rham Jas hoped he’d be able to finish the job tonight. Having to return to kill the man tomorrow would be annoying.

A gentle breeze passed overheard, carrying with it the scent of a nearby man. Rham Jas had an excellent sense of smell and guessed that someone was trying to sneak up on him from across the roof. He spun round quickly, levelling his bow with lightning speed at the dark figure several metres away.

‘You speak or you die… it’s that simple.’

The figure held his hands wide in a gesture of submission and stepped closer, pushing back the hood of his cloak and revealing a young face, no more than twenty-four years old. He had curly black hair and carried an ornate longsword. Rham Jas recognized him and slowly lowered his bow.

‘And what do you want me to say, you Kirin horse-fucker?’ The young man smiled, revealing youthful good looks despite his full beard.

‘Perhaps tell me what you’re doing here, you Ro bastard.’ Rham Jas sat on the ground, leaning against the side of the roof, and loosened his hold on the longbow. He regarded the man closely. He had not seen him for at least a year and was impressed with how he carried himself. He had always been dangerous, despite his years, and now he had an air of menace that Rham Jas thought suited him.

‘I’m glad you’re still alive, Brom. I heard what happened at Canarn,’ the Kirin said.

The young man looked down, showing signs of anguish. ‘May I sit?’

Rham Jas reached for the bottle of wine he kept for jobs that involved lots of waiting and motioned to the ground next to him. ‘Please. But keep your head down, I’m on a job.’

Lord Bromvy of Canarn, son to Duke Hector, ducked into the shadows and sat on the dirty tavern roof next to his old friend, leaning against a stone ledge which concealed them from the street below.

They sat silently for a minute, the bottle of wine passed between them, until Rham Jas judged it was time to speak. ‘What of your father?’ he asked gently.

Brom shook his head. ‘I don’t know. The last I heard, the knights of the Red had taken the keep and arrested him. I was in Ro Tiris when I got the news. Little I could do but run here.’ He took a deep swig of wine. ‘There’s a price for my capture, the fucking Purple have enlisted every disease-ridden mercenary this side of Karesia to hunt me down.’

‘You’re worth something at last. I’d be flattered, Brom,’ Rham Jas said with a grin.

‘That’s because you’re a worthless Kirin mongrel,’ his friend replied with little humour.

Rham Jas’s smiled broadened. ‘True enough, but I’m not yet a Black Guard.’ The term was used for those whose family had betrayed the crown. It was a brand placed on the cheek to identify a man as belonging to a dishonourable house. Brom had been named to the Black Guard, but not yet captured and branded. Rham Jas assumed that the young lord was unlikely to turn himself in.

Movement from the street below caught the Kirin’s eye and he placed a finger across his mouth. With slow, deliberate movements, Rham Jas stood and positioned himself above the ledge. Drawing back on his longbow, he scanned the street. He saw a fat man, dressed in a bright green robe, accompanied by two paid women. Lyle did not look worried and Rham Jas guessed he was not aware of the grievous insult he’d given to the local mobster – nor of the fact that he was about to die.

‘What’s this man done exactly?’ Brom whispered.

Without taking his eyes from his target, Rham Jas said, ‘Not sure,’ before releasing an arrow from his hunter’s bow. It hit the mark, just above Lyle’s right ear; a good shot, thought the Kirin, as blood erupted from the wound. Lyle was clearly dead and the two women screamed and looked in horror at the pieces of skull and flesh that now covered their clothes.

‘Right, off we go then,’ Rham Jas said cheerfully.

He winked at Brom and darted back across the roof, grabbing his backpack and ducking to remain in the shadows. At the far side of the roof was a wooden staircase which snaked its way round the corner of the building. Rham Jas didn’t look back to see if his friend had followed as he darted off the roof and deftly descended the stairs. He could hear distant sounds of commotion from the street and knew he needed to remove himself as quickly as possible.

He heard Brom running behind him, making more noise than Rham Jas thought was wise, as they leapt off the staircase to land on a lower building opposite.

Rham Jas loved the feeling of having got away with a crime. He also loved the feeling of shooting an arrow through the head of a Ro. He rarely took jobs that required him to kill Karesians or Ranen, and his inherent hatred of the Ro had earned him a certain reputation amongst the mobsters of Ro Weir. Prejudice was greatly prized where assassins were concerned.

The two men moved quickly across the second roof and came to a stop at a window leading to an adjoining tower. Rham Jas had propped the window open earlier, and now he swiftly jumped to grab the robe he’d fastened to a beam within.

Brom looked impressed as the Kirin climbed nimbly through the open window. He disappeared inside for a moment before reappearing at the window ledge. ‘Do you want a fucking invitation, your lordship?’ he said to Brom.

The man below smiled and began climbing the rope. Once Brom had joined him inside, Rham Jas pulled up the rope and closed the window.

The room they had entered was a storage room of sorts, with several racks of clothing and several more of dried food rations. Brom looked around with curiosity while Rham Jas removed his armour and dressed in a set of commoner’s clothes he had prepared beforehand.

‘Rham Jas, where exactly have you brought us?’ he asked.

‘It’s the lower level of a drunk tank, where people with nowhere else to go end up when Brown clerics find them being sick in back alleys. This is where they keep the crap they give homeless folk. The food costs money, but occasionally a drunk has a few coins on him.’