The Path of Anger (9 page)

‘General . . . ?’ ventured Viola.

He raised a hand towards her, warning her to remain silent, and walked towards the square, hunting for anything unusual within the crowd. He could feel it, picture it . . . death, was lurking somewhere nearby, ready to pounce. But on whom? In what form? He couldn’t say, but he could sense it. And when he spotted the hunched figure hidden by an old patched cloak and a hood with rippling folds, he knew, even though it looked like an old man hobbling among the onlookers, gazing intently at the marquis.

Dun-Cadal finally reached the crowd, the cheers aggravating his still aching head. He took one last bite of the apple and let it fall to the ground. The core was quickly crushed by passing feet. The figure advanced. There were cries of joy, laughter, and then a commotion started a few feet away. Curses and insults were exchanged and several halberdiers left their formation to aid their companions. A fight had broken out at the edge of the procession, small but enough to distract the guards. And the closer Dun-Cadal came, the more his alarm grew. Whatever happened would happen soon.

The cloaked figure stumbled against a guard. The latter almost seemed to apologise to the old man, but his smile vanished as his legs gave way beneath his own weight.

Very soon . . .

The old man held the soldier’s body for a few seconds before letting it drop silently and creeping up behind the marquis’ back. A short distance away the halberdiers were separating three sailors from what looked like a furious Nâaga.

Now.

The old man straightened up suddenly, but the movement seemed curiously slow to Dun-Cadal’s eyes. With a twitch of his shoulders,
he shed the patched cloak and hood, revealing a much younger man dressed in a green cape, with a thinner hood still masking his face in shadow. On his belt, two daggers sat next to the dull pommel of a sword. He wore leather bracers on his wrists and his relaxed stance was evidence of an extraordinary composure.

Dun-Cadal came to a sudden halt, his breath cut short. He had been trained to seek out, recognise and detect the approach of assassins. He had protected the Emperor by becoming his shadow, watching for the slightest sign of suspicious movement at the Imperial court. When the Marquis of Enain-Cassart slowly turned round, he knew it was already too late.

‘Now then, young man—’

The councillor’s beaming smile vanished as the blade pierced his throat. There was no cry, nor any word, just bubbles of blood that flowed into his mouth before trickling from the corners of his mouth.

Fast and precise. And without any sign of remorse and regret, or even satisfaction at a duty accomplished. But Dun-Cadal could guess what the man was feeling. He had done similar work for years. To defend the Empire it had sometimes been necessary to strike first . . .

Enain-Cassart fell to one side without the time to realise that his life was ending, and the cheers died away in general astonishment. For a brief moment, lasting no longer than the space of a breath, there was only the distant sound of water lapping in the harbour. And the flapping of the assassin’s green cape, caught in the wind, against his boots. The sound matched the beat of blood in Dun-Cadal’s temples and hypnotised the general.

Killing. He’d done it himself, many times, in the same manner.

‘You were an assassin, weren’t you?’

That was before the Emperor had allowed him to train a successor and be promoted to the rank of general in reward for his services. He’d given his uniform to his student . . .

To Dun-Cadal’s right, a woman with dirty hair tied back in a ponytail and pink cheeks covered in tiny red veins stood gaping. When she finally recovered enough to speak, her voice rang out across the dumbstruck square.

‘Assassin!’ she screamed.

And the crowd finally began to stir, panicked citizens fleeing the scene while the halberdiers hastily escorted the three remaining
councillors to their carriages. Alone, standing over the marquis’ body, the assassin seemed to take a perverse pleasure in watching the stampede. He hardly moved when the guards surrounded him, spears and halberds levelled in his direction.

Dun-Cadal had forgotten about that uniform from the very moment another man had donned it in his place. He had left it behind, like a legacy. A simple green cape . . . a ghost from his past. The general breathed heavily, darting brief glances at the handful of onlookers still lingering a few feet from the scene, as curious as they were frightened. For years he had tried to drown his memories in alcohol, and in the last few hours his entire past had resurfaced. From Eraëd to Frog . . . from Azdeki to the man who’d replaced him at the Emperor’s side.

‘Throw down your weapons!’

‘On your knees! Get down on your knees!’

‘Throw down your weapons!’

The soldiers’ peremptory commands were barely audible above the general commotion. Their spears were still pointing at the assassin. He seemed to accept the situation, looking in turn at the face of each man threatening him. His closed lips did not tremble, in fact he was terribly calm. Why? Why was he behaving this way? Any other assassin would have committed his crime as stealthily as possible, using the crowd’s movements to make good his escape.

Only when a soldier dared to move forward did he finally react, seizing the man’s spear with a firm hand and giving it a sharp tug to bring it towards him. His hapless victim was unable to parry the dagger thrust into his chain mail with enough force to perforate the metal mesh before digging into the soldier’s abdomen.

This was a message. A warning. A threat directed at all of the councillors. As he climbed into his coach, Azdeki turned back to watch the scene. The circle of soldiers around the assassin tightened. At its centre, two daggers slashed the air and the clatter of blades and armour filled the square. And then, before the astonished eyes of the old general standing a few yards away, the killer emerged from the ring. A dagger in each hand, he shoved two soldiers aside and nimbly bounded out into the square.

It was him . . . Reyes’ protector, his loyal assassin . . . the
Hand of the Emperor
. . . Why? How? Dun-Cadal was borne away on a
floodtide of emotions and questions. But there were no answers, no comforting explanations. He had to know for sure . . . He had to stop that man! He ran, following in the wake of the guards. Onlookers dispersed ahead of the fugitive, yelling in alarm. No man dared to stand in his path. But another squad of soldiers deployed in a street that ran into the square, positioned to intercept the criminal and looking confident. There was no possible escape, the old man kept repeating that to himself.

The assassin didn’t even slow at the sight of the wall of spears blocking the street. He dodged right with a twist of his hips, sprang on top of a barrel at the bottom of a rusty drainpipe and took a flying leap towards the flower-laden balcony of a house across the way. The stunned soldiers halted in their tracks. Behind them, Dun-Cadal spotted an alley to his left and ran into it, coughing from his exertions. It had been a long time since he run this hard, but he paid little heed to his laboured breathing or to his still-pounding head. Looking up, he saw the assassin’s silhouette. He was climbing a rooftop with ease.

‘Stop him!
Stop him!
’

‘He went that way!’

‘We can’t lose him!’

An alley, a street, and then another . . . Several times, Dun-Cadal almost collided with startled passers-by. As he ran, he tracked the assassin, jumping from roof to roof. His shoulder slammed into a woman carrying a basket of laundry. Grimacing, he struggled to keep his balance, ignoring the woman’s insults, and resumed his chase. After five minutes, however, a sharp stitch in his side forced him to come to a halt. His hand pressed over his heart he leaned against a wall, listening to the guards’ distant shouts. Breathing heavily, his face and lungs on fire, he drew in air deeply as he gathered his wits. The days when he had fled over rooftops, taken bold leaps, employed the
animus
, were long gone. He had been one of the greatest knights. And now?

He was nothing but a crazy old fool, lost in Masalia, waiting and hoping for a violent death to find him in some dive in the city’s slums. But it wasn’t death that had found him, no. It was a young red-head, and she’d brought his entire past with her . . . Closing his eyes, he heard a voice, a murmur from the past . . .

‘I’m ready . . .’

His knees folded and he slid down the wall, his face covered in sweat . . .

‘I’m ready!’

‘No. I won’t change my mind, Frog.’

The lad’s words, so long ago, just before their destinies became linked. With unexpected aplomb, he had told Dun-Cadal he was ready to leave the Saltmarsh, to cross the rebels’ lines, to fight and to kill other men. Heedless that it was an entirely different matter to their training with sticks, Frog had believed he was ready to commit irrevocable deeds. Because a life once taken could never be returned . . .

‘Yesterday you said I’d made enormous progress!!!’

‘For an armless man, learning to lift a sword with his feet constitutes enormous progress,’ Dun-Cadal replied with a sly grin. ‘That doesn’t mean he’s capable of defeating an army.’

With the help of his makeshift crutch, he hobbled back to the leaning cart. In the two months he had been here, this was the first day he had managed to remain standing for more than two hours without suffering for it.

‘You’re . . .
stupid
,’ spat Frog, balling his fists with a fierce scowl.

Weary, the general slowly sat down on a crate and propped his crutch against the worm-eaten cart. The sun was setting in the distance, bathing the tall Saltmarsh grasses in a blood-red glow. He had become accustomed to the young boy’s insolence and was almost amused by it. He even put up with being called Wader. No one had dared give him a nickname before and his acceptance of one now wasn’t because he was separated from his army. The lad had come to represent a part of himself that might survive his own death; his knowledge, and . . . No, even more than that. Frog had become the son he had dreamt of so often and been unable to offer Mildrel. As he watched Frog, standing a few feet away from the campfire, his fists pressed hard against his thighs in a pose of sullen anger, he felt no regret about agreeing to teach him the art of war. The lad handled himself well and, more importantly, a raging desire to learn burned within him, to the point of consuming him. Dun-Cadal had felt the same when he was younger, but never to this extreme. The fire had to be dampened from time to time; Frog still had many things to learn. Among them, patience.

‘Stupid for wanting to keep you alive? Yes, perhaps.’

‘You don’t understand anything . . .’ the boy sighed before sitting down.

‘I understand that you’re in a hurry to leave here. Me too! You’ve been feeding us on whatever you can pilfer from Aëd’s Watch. And it’s crap . . . although it’s a bit tastier than those frogs you hunt out here . . . Speaking of which,’ he pointed at the boy, screwing up his face in disgust, ‘your hive frogs, they sit heavily on my stomach. Try to find something else.’

‘That’s exactly my point! It’s time to go!’ Frog protested, rolling his eyes.

‘Not yet. You’re not ready and neither am I,’ said Dun-Cadal, lowering his finger to indicate his outstretched leg.

It seemed sturdier now, enough that he had decided to remove the splint, but he had to build up the muscles before he could attempt anything at all. He would need another month before chancing a frantic escape across the enemy lines. He’d already reconciled himself to the idea, having no other real choice. And the one factor that had convinced him this plan was the lesser evil was Frog’s determination. He had started to train the lad without much conviction until he noticed that, after nightfall when he believed his teacher was asleep, Frog continued his exercises. He saw the boy’s silhouette brandishing the wooden stick that served as his training sword, and later, as the days and nights passed, using the knight’s own sword. Frog only permitted himself a few hours of sleep but he never complained. He kept his efforts secret, but every night he practised his moves.

‘Tomorrow . . . tomorrow, we’ll try a different lesson,’ said Dun-Cadal.

He picked up the flask lying at his feet and opened it slowly. Frog went to sit down under the far corner of the cart, swearing to himself.

‘You know how to parry and you’ve learned some offensive thrusts. Tomorrow I’ll show you how to attack someone from behind.’

‘Attack someone from behind?’ Frog asked in surprise as he drew up his legs. It was his favourite position, masking his lower face behind his knees, just as Dun-Cadal had seen him sitting the first time.

‘There’s no honour in fighting like that!’ he protested.

Dun-Cadal forced himself to drink a mouthful of Frog’s peculiar remedy. It had proved effective, but he had stop himself from
gagging each time he swallowed any of the mixture, even a drop. He gulped some more before leaning towards the lad.

‘There’s no honour at all in killing someone, lad.’ His voice was suddenly grim and subdued. ‘No matter how you strike. There’s no glory to be had in taking a life.’

The only sound was the crackling of the fire in the twilight. The pair stared at one another. Finally, Frog lowered his eyes to his knees.

‘You haven’t always been a knight, have you?’

Dun-Cadal set the flask down at his feet, cracked his knuckles and yawned.

‘No.’

With the foot of his healing leg he scuffed the ground before him, pensive. The lad hadn’t earned the right to learn more about him. If he opened up, it would change their relationship. Could he trust the boy with the truth? He was a child of the Saltmarsh . . . an enemy who had saved his life and rebelled against his own kind, instead of holing up at Aëd’s Watch. Would he be able to understand the course his mentor’s life had taken?

‘You were an assassin, weren’t you?’ asked Frog bluntly.

Surprised, Dun-Cadal raised his eyes.

‘What’s the difference between an assassin and a knight, do you think?’