The Red Queen (98 page)

It was queer to see so many people and realise that most of them were slaves. No wonder the Chafiri were nervous, even if the Redland folk were passive and obedient. Remembering the reaction of the slave woman to my announcement that the Red Queen had come, I had no doubt that the passive facade would be sloughed off the moment she revealed herself to her people, and then the whole nature of the power structure in Redport would change in a moment. I ought to have been elated at the thought, but seeing Rushton had been a cold and painful reminder of my priorities. I had said we needed to find Dragon, but in fact I sought what Cassy had left for me, and Dragon was the means by which I would find it, if I had read the clue aright. Then my task was to leave Redport and seek out Sentinel.

Ahead a group of Ekoni turned into the scythe. Clad entirely in white trews and wearing long snowy tunics with blood-red overtunics, they had their hoods thrown back to reveal gleaming bald heads, and wore great curved swords hanging at their hips. They were marching in formation and looking about, their faces hard and watchful and impartially suspicious, and I noticed that everyone, Gadfian and slave alike, made haste to get out of their way. The precision of their movements in concert reminded me of the Hedra.

We had moved aside with a lot of others, and in their wake came several Redland slavewomen and boys bearing large red birds on their upraised arms.

I had noticed a good many unrestrained animals about – unharnessed muliki eating from piles of hay thrown down on the cobbled street for them, dogs lying in the shade of buildings panting, the occasional well-fed and languid cat stretched indolently on a sill, even a little lithe, long-bodied furry creature that many of the Gadfians allowed to run about their arms and shoulders, presumably as favoured pets. Once a herd of goats like Brunt flowed from a lane and were chivvied into another by shrill boys.

What shocked me was not the fact that the birds sat tamely on the arms of the passing slaves, but that they were red plumed, for I first thought them to be flamebirds, the smaller ancestors of the immense Agyllian birds. As they drew nearer, I realised their feathers had been coloured by some sort of dye, then their feather fluffing and loud cries ceased abruptly and they turned their collective gaze on me so noticeably that the slaves carrying them peered at them, then at me in puzzled confusion.

Swallow swiftly turned away into a lane and I was relieved to be able to follow him, though it took us a good long while to find our way back to another scythe street, yet we were now very close to the shore. From that moment I noticed what maybe I ought to have noticed earlier. Every animal I saw, whether a muliki in harness drawing a load, a dog or a cat, or one of the furred creatures coiled on the shoulder of a Gadfian, looked at me, fell silent and followed me with their eyes.

At first I thought I was imagining it, then a muliki that had been clip-clopping up the scythe street towards us, stopped dead and actually reared up to wrench the reins from the human holding them, so that he could turn and watch me pass, completely ignoring the protestations and curses of the man who had been leading him.

It was uncanny and nerve racking.

Fortunately the general and purposeful movement of people had stopped them noticing what would have been immediately obvious to anyone sitting on a step or leaning on a sill. But sooner or later someone
would
notice and would comment on it to someone else who had noticed, and maybe I would be stopped and Swallow questioned. The block inhibiting me from using my Talents meant I had no way of reaching out to ask beasts not to look at me and I prayed that Darga would find us very soon, so that I could make contact and ask him to speak to the other animals. I had no doubt that they were recognising me as Innle of beastlegend, for had not Brunt and the strange little white dog I had encountered during the previous night told me of beasts who had been going about announcing my coming? That must be the reason for the particular attention of the beasts of Redport, for I had been in cities and around unknown beasts before, and only some of them had seen me for what I was.

Suddenly, almost at the end of the scythe street, Swallow suddenly moved into one of the shadowed lanes and went along it a little way; I followed, wondering what had alarmed him. ‘I remember the first time I dreamed of you, Elspeth,’ he said softly, intensely, ‘a horse bowed down to you. Then I saw it in reality after you had rescued Iriny from the Herder flame.’

‘I beastspoke it . . .’ I began, strangely frightened by his intensity.

He held up his hand. ‘Yes, but what I have never told you is that the aura of the horse in my dream turned gold and seemed to flow into yours. And when I saw you in Guanette, I saw that happen again. It happens whenever you are near Gahltha or Maruman, and sometimes I have seen it happen with other beasts – when you beastspeak Rasial, though not with Darga. It is as if, for a moment, something from these animals flows into you. Just now, coming along the street, the aura of every beast that looked at you glowed gold and yearned towards you.’

‘I don’t know what it means,’ I muttered, reeling inwardly at his words. ‘I think somehow they see . . .’

‘The Seeker . . .’ Swallow said. Some people had entered the lane and were making their way towards us.

We went back onto the scythe street, and I walked behind Swallow’s erect form, my scarf pulled forward and my head bent, praying that would stop beasts noticing me. But then an old slavewoman opened a door and began to mop the step, and the dog that ambled out with her stared at me until the woman turned to see what it was looking at. She fixed me with a squinting gaze full of puzzled suspicion and I remembered how Riyad had dealt with a slave who angered her and hurried after Swallow.

Suddenly I remembered the dog I had almost fallen over when I first entered Redport. It had spoken of seeing my wings. Was it possible
that
was what the beasts were seeing – my winged and greenish spirit-form somehow overlaying my flesh? But that did not explain why their aura would turn gold and incline to mine.

Swallow said softly over his shoulder, ‘Look.’

I lifted my head to see with great relief that we had reached the broad cobbled way that ran around the shore. I looked out across the glittering waters of the bay to where the greatships were anchored, seeking the purple sails of the Shambalan ship. But before I could discern it, I saw the notorious
Black Ship
.

My heart plummeted, for surely it could be no coincidence that it had appeared in Redport Bay within a day of my entry to the settlement. I felt a sick certainty that Ariel was aboard. The only consolation was that he must have just arrived, and that being so, it might be possible to get what I needed in Redport and leave before he came ashore. The fact that Dragon was somewhere in Redport, and maybe had even been captured by the Gadfians, filled me with fear for her and for my quest, because I knew that if he got hold of her, Ariel would use her against me.

And what would I do if he threatened her life?

‘We have to find her,’ I muttered.

‘Fear not,’ Swallow said. ‘The
Black Ship
has only just come into the bay. See, they are only now anchoring.’

With relief, I saw that he was right, for even as I watched, the anchor dropped heavily and was swallowed by the water. Behind the
Black Ship
I could see straight through the Talons to the open sea – not the vast expanse I had seen from atop the cliffs at dawn, but a constrained bar of misty blue and grey. The greatships I had seen from the cliffs were not visible from that angle, but Ariel must have seen them.

I dragged my eyes from the Talons to look left and right along the wide curving boulevard bounding the shore only to note with some unease that it was deserted. There was not a person in sight other than Swallow and me and it was so silent that I could hear waves slapping the white rim of the sand.

‘We need to move,’ Swallow said. ‘This area must be forbidden.’

I nodded and scanned the shore; there, a little distance away and so close that it was no wonder I had been unable to see it from afar, was an island. It had to be the Palace Island, for I could see no other in the bay, yet there was no wilderness on its humped and stony form, nor any palace, only stones grown over with some sort of low spiky creeper. Two bridges connected it to the mainland: the nearest, a narrow, covered walk with gates at either end, both barred and buttressed; the other more distant bridge an impressive stone arch that seemed excessive given the shallow froth of water running between the island and strand.

The statues standing either side at the end of the bridge appeared to be its only guards, and in truth I could see no reason why the bare, stony island would be guarded. But the heavy silence and the absence of people anywhere made me as wary as a fox scenting a baited snare.

‘Elspeth,’ Swallow said urgently, glancing behind us, and he stepped onto the pale boulevard, heading towards the Palace Island. When we were almost opposite the stone bridge, I saw a narrow lane opening between two stone buildings on our right, and called out softly to Swallow to enter it. He obeyed without a word, and I followed, immensely relieved to be off the deserted boulevard.

‘She is not there,’ Swallow said. ‘Nor Darga either.’

I ignored him to study the bridge and what I could see of the island beyond it. This close, I saw that a good deal of what I had thought to be natural stone outcrops were the remnants of buildings. There were two toppled pillars, and a partial wall with a section of intact roof, all overgrown with the spiky creeper. The only visible inhabitants of the place appeared to be several little goats like Brunt and some long-legged black birds standing at the edge of island and occasionally diving in to emerge with a fish.

Yet Dragon might still be there, concealed, I knew. She had hidden herself in ruins before, after all, and although the island was flat, not all of it was visible from the mainland.

‘That must be Long Pier,’ Swallow murmured.

He pointed to the northern shore, and I saw there was a long pier running out into the bay. Even as we watched, I saw some slaves pushing a hopper slowly along the pier towards the purple-sailed greatship of the emissary.

I looked at the island again and felt a powerful longing to cross the bridge and search for Dragon and Luthen’s memorial crypt, where I was suddenly absolutely certain I would find whatever had been Cassy’s last message to me. But despite the fact that there was not a soul in sight, my instincts clamoured against venturing there.

‘It feels like a trap,’ Swallow muttered.

‘Yes,’ I said, glancing back at the
Black Ship.

The sun was on the verge of sinking behind the Talons by the time we reached the gates of Slavetown. We had lost time, having twice been forced to take refuge in side streets, which had resulted in us becoming lost in yet another impenetrable tangle of small lanes and narrow side streets. Once we had left a main street to avoid a group of aggressive Ekoni coming towards us, apparently questioning people randomly and roughly. When I noticed they were dragging some people away, I decided caution was the better part of valour, and we stepped into a lane. Nor did we dare to wait there until the Ekoni passed, having seen one man pursued into a lane and dragged out by his hair, begging to be told what he had done. The next time, we were following a good wide road and were forced to dart into a lane to avoid being crushed under the wheels of a closed carriage. It was of the same design as the wheeled barrels, but bigger and more ornate. Waiting for it to pass, I was eager to see who was in it, but there were no proper windows, just an ornate pattern of perforations that would let whoever was inside peep out. To my surprise, two beautiful small grey ponies were drawing the carriage, and I thought I must have been wrongly informed that there were no horses in Red Land. But then I overheard a Gadfian man who had also entered the lane tell his companion that the beasts were mutated muliki from over the sea and that the chariot they pulled belonged to the High Chafiri Prime, and carried his wife.

I recalled Nareem’s difficulties with the Prime’s wife, and also his upstairs chamber where some Chafiri women came to be fitted with dresses by his deft slaves. Had I more time, I could have made use of his chamber to learn more about Redport and the Gadfians. As it was, after the carriage passed, we had to retreat into yet another snarl of narrow lanes because there were Ekoni swaggering along in its wake – household Ekoni, I guessed, from the blue caps they wore, which matched the livery of the grey ponies. They were once again apparently randomly selecting people and questioning them roughly.

By the time we found our way out to Slavetown, I was determined to enter without delay, for there was little time left before I would have to leave again, if I did not want to be trapped inside. But as we were about to approach the gate, a group of Ekoni marched from the other direction, and to my dismay, they stopped to speak with the two Ekoni stationed there. There was nothing for it but to be patient. Swallow and I could handle two between us if something went wrong, but not more, for aside from their shining curved blades, the warriors carried daggers and moved with the lithe strength of people able to fight with their hands and feet as well as with weapons; it was the way coercers moved.

‘What do you want to do?’ Swallow asked.

‘Wait and enter,’ I said. ‘I am afraid you will have to wait with me and get me safely past the Ekoni.’ Because there was time, I gave him the memory of my journey from the south of the settlement to the north, emphasising the locations of the houses of Riyad and Nareem, where he could take refuge at need, simply by speaking the word
Obernewtyn
, the coercive key I had implanted in the minds of both Riyad and Nareem. ‘I believe the slavewomen will help you if you tell them that you are my friend.’

‘I hope I will have no need of a safe house,’ Swallow said. ‘But tell me, do you truly think Dragon would go to Slavetown, given what you said about Matthew and her?’

‘I think that she would not go there of her own accord and certainly not to find Matthew, but if one of her people spotted her, they would surely see Slavetown as the safest place for her, given that the Ekoni don’t go there once the gates shut at dusk.’

‘But why would they want to hide her at all? I thought the Redlanders were ready to rise up and throw off their oppressors as soon as Dragon appeared,’ Swallow said.

‘In a storysong there would be an instant uprising when a lost queen returned to her people, but in reality, how
could
an oppressed people rise instantly if they had been slaves half their lives? Do they have plans laid out? Weapons good enough to defend themselves? Even if they do, they would never have used them, and there are bound to be all sorts of things they never imagined having to deal with. As to an uprising, maybe that is less simple than it sounds as well. I assume the Ekoni have weapons – how will they deal with them, and what do they mean to do with the Gadfians afterwards? And what of the foreign slaves, and slaves who collaborated with the slavemasters, or fell in love with them?’ I added, thinking of Gretha and Nareem. ‘Are they expecting Dragon to decide these things, or at least to approve them, or do they look upon her as a figurehead? And what about this sceptre she is supposed to produce? I doubt her people will need any proof of who she is beyond her face, but maybe there is some aspect we do not understand about her rule. Remember it took the rebels in the Land years of plotting and scheming before they rose, and even then it only happened in stages.’

‘If it were me,’ Swallow said. ‘I would have a plan in place and aim to do as the rebels did in the Land. I would have groups of people ready to move against the Gadfians in several different locations at once and a signal to alert them that the time has come to act. That would divide the Ekoni and force them to fight on several fronts. I would have identified all of the Chafiri compounds, too, and I would have people ready to take them over, probably household slaves. If the Gadfians regard the Redlanders as nicely tamed, they will be able to take over easily, especially given how few Gadfians there are compared to slaves.’

‘Few or not, I have no doubt the Gadfians will fight, and the Redlanders will also need to take care that no harm comes to any of the people from the land of the white-faced lords,’ I said. ‘In fact, given the weapons they probably have aboard their ship, I would wait for them to leave Redport before I made my move, just in case they decided it behoved them to take the part of the Gadfians, and turned their weapons on Redport.’

‘There’s a nasty thought,’ Swallow muttered. ‘The Redlanders ought to take one of the white-faced folk hostage. The one operating the ore-refining machine would be perfect, though he may not be important enough to stop the others from using their weapons on Redport.’

I thought again of the little gold-faced man who had spoken to Gilaine, and found I could not imagine him ordering his people to fire on Redland. And what of Salamander and his
Black Ship
, and Ariel? The thought of the latter was a reminder that the uprising was not mine to order or to understand. I must swim through it as through a turbulent sea, concentrating only on keeping to my own course and afloat. And with the arrival of the
Black Ship
, that would mean leaving as swiftly as possible.

I glanced around, suddenly longing for Maruman to appear. I recalled the dream in which I had seen him beneath the towers and wondered if that was where he was, or if he had finally returned to the camp. It was a pity I could not reach out to Ana to ask. But if Swallow could find the blocking machine and destroy it, I would be much more able to find and help Dragon and discover what I needed for my quest.

‘How do you think they will greet you?’ Swallow asked.

‘It depends if Dragon or Matthew is with them.’

‘If neither?’

I shrugged, weary of talking and impatient to get into Slavetown. Because of the Talons, this part of the settlement had fallen into shadow now that the sun had begun to wester, although I was sure there would be a strip of bright water and buildings illuminated by the sunlight falling through the Talons. Yet the coolness was very pleasant. I realised Swallow was still waiting for an answer and said, ‘If the Redlanders seem hostile, I will make physical contact and coerce what I need from them.’ A thought occurred to me. ‘In fact, maybe the best thing I could do would be to show the Redlanders what I am, as they seem to have some reverence for Misfits. Rather than force my will on them, I would far rather present myself to them as an ally.’

‘Yet you are not truly an ally,’ Swallow said shrewdly. ‘You are the Seeker and you have your own purposes and priorities, which have nothing to do with what is happening in Redport.’

‘I do not see that our ways must oppose one another,’ I said coolly. ‘And in the end, my quest will serve the Redlanders and the Gadfians, whether or not they know it.’

‘You know, if Dragon is with the leaders of her people, she might have told them the truth about you,’ Swallow said.

I shuddered. ‘I pray she has not mentioned me or my quest to anyone,’ I said, unable to imagine how this news would be taken by a people on the verge of a long-planned uprising. It would seem a mad distraction and the last thing they would want from their newly restored queen.

We fell silent as another group of white-capped Ekoni came marching up to join the others. I noticed daggers and looped whips thrust into their belts, and thought of how many of the slaves bore scars. This struck me as odd, given how meekly all the slaves seemed to behave. On the other hand, the glimpses I had seen of the slaves through the eyes of Matthew and Gilaine had not shown them to be all passively acceptant, and I had seen myself how the slaves of Nareem’s household kept a mask over their passions.

If all of the Redlanders were so, Dragon’s arrival might serve as a spark falling onto a mound of tinder. Swallow moved past me to peer out the end of the lane and then turned back to say the second group of Ekoni had stopped at the Slavetown gate and seemed to be conferring with the first.

‘Maybe the Ekoni have got wind of Dragon’s arrival in Redport,’ Swallow said.

‘Or this is Ariel’s doing,’ I said. ‘He has had time enough to come ashore now and if he foresaw Dragon’s coming, he might have coerced the Ekoni to search for her.’

Swallow turned to look out of the lane again and said, ‘Elspeth, they are going in – both groups. What do you want to do?’

‘Let’s follow,’ I said, suddenly sick of hiding and waiting. I had also just remembered that the Ekoni made regular patrols within Slavetown, and perhaps that was all that was happening. ‘If either of the Ekoni at the gate seems inclined to stop us, let him get hold of me. I will use the contact to coerce him and find out what is happening. If necessary, you must knock the other one out then we can drag him into Slavetown and I will coerce him while he sleeps, out of sight of the gate.’

Swallow nodded, eyes dark with a combination of alertness and excitement. At my suggestion, he removed his cap and tunic and pulled the older tunic over his robes and freed his hair so that he would not look like a Gadfian, and as soon as all but two of the Ekoni were out of sight, we emerged from the lane and approached the gate. I was prepared for action but the two Ekoni were so involved in a muttered conversation that they did not even look at us as we approached. I contemplated stumbling against one of them, but thought better of it, and in seconds, we were past them, unchallenged and virtually unnoticed.

We moved along the narrow street running away from the gate and I was startled to realise it was straight. I did not think I had walked along a single straight street in all of Redport. The slavewomen had told me that if I wanted to locate the spokesman of the Landfolk, Deenak, I should go along the Knife to the Infinity of Hope. If I was not mistaken, we were walking along the Knife now. A glance along streets running off it made it clear that the rest of the streets were very much the same tangled coil as the streets in the larger settlement, though these were very narrow, save for this one street.

The Ekoni were just ahead.

‘No one seems very surprised or afraid of them,’ Swallow murmured, and I realised he was right. I was reassured to think this was no more than a regular and not very thrilling occurrence, but I stopped and drew him into one of the side streets. ‘You had better turn back or you will be trapped in here at curfew.’

‘A little longer,’ Swallow said, peering along the lane we had entered. As he set off along it, I turned to follow and realised the lane led to a small infinity. Unlike the other infinities I had seen outside Slavetown, this was surrounded not by flat-roofed red dwellings but by narrow buildings with shared walls and steep roofs like Land buildings. Indeed, we might have been in Sutrium if not for the red colour of the buildings. The strange thing was that they were unmistakably
old
buildings, and yet how should such buildings be old? There had not been any slaves here before the Red Queen was slain a decade before. Was it possible there had been Landfolk living here in the time of the Red Queens? That would explain the architecture. Then another thing struck me. I had noticed that morning how ancient was the wall about Slavetown, yet there had not been any slavery here a mere ten years ago. In fact, the whole of Slavetown looked a good deal older than the mere decade within which the Gadfians ruled Redport. Perhaps it had simply been a walled and ancient part of Redport that had been used to house slaves.

‘Elspeth,’ Swallow murmured, nodding towards a well where people were drinking or resting on the rim surrounding it. There were other people clustered about two food stalls nearby, eating or waiting to be served. The steaming food was served on trays, upon which rested a large number of small bowls and a pile of the same flat bread Gretha had given me, and I wondered if it was as highly spiced as the meal I had eaten at Nareem’s table. I noticed that people set the trays and tiny bowls on a table to one side where several boys washed them in a barrel of water and dried them, stacking them back on the counter to be reused