The Long War 01 - The Black Guard (36 page)

‘I didn’t kill him because we… share some of the same friends,’ Rham Jas said, immediately realizing how foolish it must sound.

Brom laughed for the first time since leaving Cozz. ‘Sorry, I didn’t realize you were a regular at the Black churchmen’s annual parties.’

‘It’s not like that,’ Rham Jas muttered, again letting his petulance show. ‘I’ve heard of him is all.’

‘So have I, though I would still have killed him.’

‘Then maybe you should practise a bit more so he doesn’t beat the snot out of you next time you meet.’ Rham Jas spoke with more venom than he had intended.

Brom reined in his horse and stopped a few feet behind his friend. ‘I know I’m being quiet, but keep that shit to yourself.’

Brom was more than physically wounded by his encounter with Utha the Ghost. Rham Jas didn’t stop, but spoke over his shoulder as he led the horse further into the secluded gully. ‘I’m just pointing out that, if you want to decide who gets to live and who gets to die, maybe you should get better with that shiny sword. I beat him, so I get to decide whether he lives or not.’

Rham Jas heard Brom grunt, a sound that was equal parts anger and agreement. The sound that followed, as Brom kicked his heels into the horse’s flanks, was pure anger and the Kirin turned just in time to see Brom jump from his horse to tackle him to the ground.

The friends landed in a heap on the grassy track, with Brom positioned on top of Rham Jas. ‘I can still pummel a little shit like you, Kirin,’ the young lord shouted as he smashed his fist into Rham Jas’s face.

The blow was solid and unexpected, and Rham Jas had to roll to the side to avoid further punches. He raised his leg sharply and kicked Brom in the back before shoving him roughly off to the side.

‘Is that the best you’ve got, Ro?’ Rham Jas shouted back, as he got to his feet and kicked Brom in the stomach, knocking the breath out of him.

Brom growled in anger and dived at the Kirin’s legs, again tackling him to the ground.

‘It takes a brave man to shoot a longbow, you horse-fucker.’

Brom punched and kicked wildly at Rham Jas. Most of the blows landed, but they caused minimal damage. The Kirin held his hands up to protect his face, but got a nasty knee to the side which made him wince with pain. He grabbed out at the Ro’s neck, causing Brom to pull his punches and try to wrestle free from the choke hold. A solid palm strike from Rham Jas sent Brom backwards and allowed the two men to get to their feet, panting.

They stood looking at each other. Both men were bleeding from various minor wounds.

‘Are you finished?’ he asked the young lord of Canarn. ‘Because this isn’t terribly helpful.’

Brom was scowling and touching his jaw. Rham Jas had deliberately struck him on his existing wound and made it worse. Blood was visible at the corners of his mouth and his beard was stained red. He stood, scowling for a further moment, before straightening up and spitting out a globule of blood.

‘Do you have anything to drink?’ he asked.

The Kirin turned to where their horses stood grazing next to a copse of trees, oblivious to the fight. ‘There’s a bottle of Darkwald red in my saddle pack,’ Rham Jas replied, letting his customary grin return, ‘but I stole it, so I get more than you.’

‘I don’t give a shit, I just want something that’ll make me drunk.’ Brom sat down heavily on the side of the track.

Rham Jas shook his head and walked away from Brom to fetch their horses. He led them off the track and a short way into the trees, making sure they were out of the sight of any other travellers who might be using the Kirin run. He then turned to Brom, who hadn’t moved from his position on the ground and was still spitting out blood.

‘Get off the track, Brom. If we’re going to get drunk, we should maybe take some sort of cover.’

Rham Jas tied the horses’ reins to a thick tree trunk and Brom stood up. He was rubbing his back where Rham Jas had kicked him and his jaw was possibly now broken. Rham Jas knew that the bumps and bruises Brom had given him would disappear quickly and he’d be able to tease his friend about his weak constitution.

They settled down quickly and Rham Jas sensed his friend would much rather drink than talk.

‘One bottle of wine isn’t enough to forget anything of note, Rham Jas,’ Brom stated.

‘True, but the kindly old gentleman I stole it from had other interests too.’ The Kirin retrieved a small leather pouch from his saddlebag. ‘Do you know what this is?’

Brom looked at the pouch and shook his head. ‘Is it a very small bottle of Volk whisky?’

Rham Jas opened the pouch and produced a bronze pipe and a circular container. ‘This, my dear boy, is rainbow smoke. It seems that drugs are rife in your country, whether the clerics want to admit it or not.’

Brom laughed, shifting his position to lean more easily against a tree. ‘So, if we get caught, we’ll be babbling like fools? I like it.’

‘Don’t worry, we’re in no real danger of getting caught,’ Rham Jas replied as he unscrewed the container. ‘Cozz has no clerics and the bound men there would never chase us up here. The Black churchman will have to get back to Tiris before they can seriously start looking for us again.’

Brom considered this and didn’t look especially reassured. ‘That’s where we’re heading too. We’re walking into the troll’s mouth, wouldn’t you agree?’

Rham Jas liked Brom a great deal, but the young lord could be terribly dim-witted sometimes. ‘We’ll get there days ahead of them and, as far as I remember, you didn’t explain your plan to them. They’ll just assume we’ll go into the wilds and lie low. The idea of us going to Tiris is so stupid it won’t occur to them.’

‘So, our stupidity is what’s going to keep us alive?’ Brom raised an eyebrow.

‘Precisely… I wouldn’t have it any other way.’

Rham Jas realized Brom must be in turmoil now that he knew his father was dead, but if his friend could take away some of the burden with humour, drugs and alcohol, then he would.

Rham Jas carefully loaded the pipe with a pinch of brightly coloured powder and sat back next to Brom.

‘We’re going to die, you know,’ the Kirin said, with no real build-up.

Brom looked at him. ‘What?’

‘Well, there are only two of us… your father is dead, which means the city has likely been sacked and, by the time we get there, there may not be anyone to save.’

Brom bowed his head. ‘It means something else as well.’ His words were quiet and solemn. ‘It means that I’m now the duke of Canarn.’

Rham Jas offered his friend the bronze pipe. ‘Dukes first, my lord,’ he said with a grin.

Brom took the pipe and, using a flint and steel from the pouch, touched a small flame to the bowl. He drew in a deep breath and Rham Jas sensed the familiar smell of high-quality Karesian rainbow smoke. Brom held his breath in for a moment and nearly coughed. Then he slowly breathed out a plume of sweet-smelling smoke and let his head fall back against the tree trunk.

‘Do you think Bronwyn…?’ Rham Jas began, only to be cut off by Brom.

‘Don’t,’ he said. ‘As things stand, I can imagine she’s still alive, hiding somewhere in the secret tunnels. Maybe she even got out of the city.’

Rham Jas took the pipe. ‘Whereas my customary brand of optimism would paint a rather grimmer picture of things?’ He tapped the pipe against his boot to remove the burnt crust of powder.

‘Exactly… just let me think happy thoughts for a moment.’

Rham Jas took a deep pull on the pipe and let the effects wash over him.

* * *

Karesian rainbow smoke was considered a decadent pleasure in Tor Funweir, illegal and possible to obtain only from mobsters and other shady characters. Rham Jas liked it as an aid to relaxation and found the Ro objection to it bizarre – probably just another example of the clerics disliking something simply because it was foreign and they didn’t understand it.

The effects were mild. A feeling of comfortable lethargy made thinking happen slowly and an elevated mood usually followed within a few minutes. The stronger stuff produced more of a mellow high that enabled long periods of sitting around with few cares and a tendency to babble.

Rham Jas and Brom had emptied the pouch within the hour and, with breaks to pass round the bottle of wine, had successfully achieved a degree of calm.

They’d tied the horses securely and retreated deeper into the trees to lie across a grassy hillock well off the track. They’d ridden away from Cozz through the night and now, as they lay looking up at the cloudy sky, Rham Jas estimated that it was nearly midday. Neither man had said much as they let the rainbow smoke flow through their bodies and, with the exception of the occasional contented exhalation, they lay in silence.

Rham Jas was still worried about his friend. When Brom had arrived in Ro Weir, several weeks ago, his intention had been to return home as a liberator. Now, with the knowledge that Duke Hector had been executed, the young lord would have to reassess his plan. Rham Jas thought that getting into Ro Canarn would not be too tricky – finding a ship from Tiris would be possible and it should be fairly easy to stay hidden while they did so. The uncomfortable truth that informed the Kirin’s thinking, however, was that the two of them would need help to make any impact when they reached Canarn. Rham Jas was a killer with few equals and Brom was a dangerous swordsman, but an army they were not.

‘What did you mean?’ Brom broke the silence.

‘What did I mean about what?’ replied Rham Jas vaguely, rubbing his eyes to focus through the drug-induced haze.

‘The Black cleric… Utha the Ghost. You said you knew him.’

‘Actually, I said that we have some friends in common,’ corrected Rham Jas, ‘but I get what you’re saying.’

Brom half turned and rested his head on his hand. ‘So?’

‘It’s quite a long story… and I may not be in the best condition to do it justice,’ Rham Jas answered with a dopey grin.

Brom lay back down and breathed out, letting a manic chuckle escape his lips. ‘Hasim always said you were no good to anyone after rainbow smoke.’

‘I wouldn’t listen to Hasim about… well, anything, really.’ Rham Jas didn’t lose his grin, but sat up, immediately feeling light-headed.

‘I didn’t kill Utha because some people I respect think well of him.’ The Kirin knew that the risen could be found in the Deep Wood of Canarn, but he doubted Brom would ever have had contact with them. ‘Do you remember that tree I told you about?’ he asked.

‘The black heartwood tree,’ replied Brom

‘Well, it was… sort of sacred to my people… and to some other people that lived in Oslan.’

‘Other people? Make sense, man.’ Brom was becoming irritable.

Rham Jas had long thought the trees extinct in Tor Funweir, that the Purple clerics had cut down or burned every one they could find. They could still be found in some places in Ranen, but the main concentration was in the Kirin woods.

‘The forest-dwellers revere the trees. They call them the Dark Young of the Dead God. I suppose they’re afraid of them, as if they’re not exactly what they seem to be. They just looked like ancient, strange-looking trees to me.’

Brom was confused and gazed up at the dark sky. ‘What does this have to do with Utha?’

Rham Jas smiled. ‘I did say I was a little too far gone to be a good storyteller,’ he said, wishing they had some more wine and rainbow smoke. ‘I lived side by side with the risen most of my young life. I hadn’t even heard the term
risen men
until I came to Tor Funweir; they were always the Dokkalfar to me.’

Brom’s expression showed that he, like most men of Ro, believed the church’s propaganda that the risen were monstrous beings. ‘I thought…’ he began.

‘Yes, yes, you thought they were undead monsters. Everyone in your stupid country does. Except maybe Utha the Ghost.’

Brom looked even more confused. ‘He’s a crusader, Rham Jas, which means he hunts and kills risen men.’

‘All I know is that they like him. Their taste may be suspect, I grant you, but they see him as a man of honour and I won’t kill a man who is counted amongst the Dokkalfar’s few friends.’

Rham Jas had not asked exactly why they considered the Black cleric a friend, but, during a recent trip to the Fell, he’d heard the name Utha the Ghost spoken with fondness. The Dokkalfar were paranoid and did not give their trust or friendship easily – their treatment at the hands of men had taught them to be wary – but Utha had done something to make up for the dozens he’d killed. Rham Jas had never had to earn their friendship as his first twenty years of life had been spent living alongside them, and their strange tree had gifted him with extraordinary abilities.

His wife used to enjoy walking in the Oslan woods and listening to the strange beings singing, a sound Rham Jas, too, missed when he was away from them for too long. Even now, he looked for any opportunity to return to the deepest woods and spend time with the Dokkalfar.

‘Was it worth it?’ Brom asked. ‘Leaving him alive to continue chasing us?’

Rham Jas lay back down. ‘I have a feeling about that cleric,’ he said mysteriously. ‘I suspect he won’t be chasing us any more.’

‘You still should have killed him… but I don’t want another fight about it.’ The laugh accompanying Brom’s words showed that the rainbow smoke had relaxed him considerably.

‘Maybe. But I didn’t,’ replied the Kirin.

Something occurred to Brom, and he again directed a puzzled look at his friend. ‘How is it that I don’t know you at all?’

‘You’ve known me for years, you idiot,’ Rham Jas answered.

‘But I didn’t know any of that. I doubt Hasim or Magnus knew any of that either. Does anyone actually know you, Rham Jas?’ Brom was prying in a way that the Kirin didn’t like, but he meant well, so Rham Jas let it slide.

‘There was someone, but she was killed by Purple clerics…’

‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ said Brom quietly, resting his arms under his head.

His few friends knew that there were certain lines beyond which Rham Jas should not be pushed. He rarely talked about his wife and had long ago learned that the mere mention of her would cause people to stop talking to him.

Rham Jas shook his head and an idea began to form in his mind – the kind of idea that only occurred to him when his mind was totally relaxed with the drug.