The Cuckoo, page 10
“And what were the charges against Roper?”
“Corruption, for bringing down Uvoren and his allies, and a separate charge that he’d exceeded his mandate in Suthdal.”
Keturah cursed herself bitterly. With all their attention tied up in the south, their enemies had been plotting at home. Had she not told Roper, all those months before, that he did not think through the consequences of his actions at home? And she had fallen into the same trap, allowing herself to become equally blinded by the campaign, and forget their civil enemies. She should have foreseen all of this. “And the statue?”
“Just a few days after the Ephors decreed Lord Roper should appear before them, a herald arrived with news that his army had been struck down by plague, and the survivors were starving in Suthdal. Lord Tekoa was said to be dead, and the army on the verge of mutiny.”
“And then?”
“Well, after that… all the talk was that Uvoren should have taken the throne instead. Roper’s campaign was declared illegal, and he was made a public enemy. That old villain Uvoren has been venerated ever since. It’s become a cult, and Vinjar made himself wildly popular by having the statue made.”
Keturah was silent a moment, and then threw herself back in the chair. “No wonder the crowd was so vicious.”
Harald narrowed his eyes furiously. “Who was vicious to you?”
Keturah jerked her head to say that it did not matter, and picked up the wine once more. “I rather suspect all Tore’s plotting will be in vain,” she observed. “The army is completely loyal to Roper. When he comes back with fifty thousand men, I don’t think even the Ephors will be too keen to cross-examine him for corruption. The legions would riot. But this will not do. I am barred from the Central Keep, and will be heckled if I set foot outside the house! And that statue!” She stamped her foot. “I want that down.”
“There’s nothing you can do, Miss Keturah,” said Harald, gently. “We can’t have you trapped in this house, we should get you out of the fortress.”
“I think not,” said Keturah indignantly. As much as she had been shaken by the vitriol of the crowd, her pride was also wounded. Roper’s uncanny abilities in the field were far superior to his statecraft. Keturah had taken that responsibility as her own and could not bear the idea that Roper might return from a campaign in which he had spent everything, to find the Hindrunn had turned against him. “I shall not be chased from my home by the effigy of the monster who poisoned me and tried to assassinate my husband,” she declared. “I’ll fix this.”
Harald shook his head in dismay. “Miss Keturah. Please! Tore rules these streets, and will do anything to get at your husband. If you stay here, you are in terrible danger!” Despite her defiance, the look in his eye plucked between her ribs: desperate concern and fear which nearly brought tears welling to the surface. She had grown up with this man as her caretaker: played with him when her father was away; confided in him when her mother had lost her mind. “Please,” Harald said, crossing to her. He knelt in front of her chair, clasping her hands in his own.
“Don’t,” Keturah commanded, looking away from him.
He turned over her hands and stared, appalled, at the ill-healed wounds on her palms. They were deep cuts from an enemy halberd which she had seized in her desperation, fighting for her life in a canvas tent. “You must have seen terrible things in the south. And your father… I miss him every day.”
“Harald!”
“I can’t bear it, Miss Keturah. You walk through that door alone, half-starved, terribly scarred.” The world before Keturah was blurring, and she could feel her breaths turning to hiccoughs. She did not want to look at the marks on her hands, and tried to revert to fury at how feeble she now seemed. “And I know, girl. I’ve been there, in the fighting. And afterwards you’re just relieved to survive, but when you get back, and there’s nobody left who saw it with you, or understands what it was like, and it isolates you on top of everything—”
And she broke. All that had been bubbling beneath the surface for months: Tekoa’s exile, the threat of plague and pressure of starvation when carrying her first child, what had happened in that blood-washed tent and the appalling destruction of Hafdis’s body; all of that erupted past her iron control. She howled, leaning into Harald, who put his arms round her shoulders and held her. Ormur was by her side too, one hand on her back and looking down in some confusion.
“We must get you out,” said Harald, one hand on the back of her head. “You are not safe here.”
It was the strangest sensation. She had never understood before that she might not be able to stop herself from crying. Always it had been a conscious choice in whether or not to let go, but on this occasion, there was no restraining it. And perhaps for the first time ever, it felt a release. So she let it come, sobbing into Harald, simultaneously shocked and relieved by what was happening.
At last she composed herself, leaning back to offer the legionary a watery smile. “I’m going nowhere, Harald. I will not be driven from my home by a memory. I will see that statue smashed.”
“It isn’t worth it.”
“It is, Harald. If I start running now, when shall I stop? I won’t ever live in fear. It’s no good resolving that in future: it’s a decision I must take now, or not at all. But as I seem to be at some risk, perhaps you’d perform me a service tomorrow?”
“Anything.”
“Ask Tore if he will guarantee my safety for a parlay. I have some things to say to him.”
“I will.”
Keturah beamed and pressed the familiar birthmark behind Harald’s ear, as she had when she was a child. She turned to the neglected plate of ham and bread, and tried to show it proper appreciation.
That night, she showed Ormur into Tekoa’s room, the bed made with woollen blankets and a small fire in the hearth for light rather than warmth. She bade him goodnight, but the boy barely registered it, gaping around the stone chamber in disbelief as she closed the door. Outside, she found Harald waiting for her. “The boy seems a bit overwhelmed,” Keturah observed.
“I know. He’s extremely loyal to you, Miss Keturah. He said you’d trapped the man who killed his twin brother.”
Keturah smiled wearily. “Indeed.”
“That’s a story I shall need to hear tomorrow. Why did you bring him back from the mountains?”
“He’s soon for the berjasti anyway,” said Keturah. “And I thought he needed to get out of that school. He was haunted up there; his brother killed, along with two of those who were sent to protect him. He just needed to escape that place. He’s already ahead of his peers in everything important: he is best served now by some time in which he can digest the last few months.”
Harald admired her a few moments. “What a woman you’ve returned,” he said.
“It is quite wonderful to see you again, old friend,” said Keturah.
They embraced and said goodnight, Keturah returning to the familiar bed she had occupied before her marriage. The blankets smelt of her childhood and the horsehair mattress was almost euphorically comfortable after months sleeping rough. She had meant to consider how she would defeat Tore, but was claimed within moments by a deep and dreamless sleep.
By the time she woke next morning, Harald had already left on her behalf. She rose, marvelling to find herself in her own home. Even the cold stone steps down to the parlour were a familiar joy. There, she found Ormur sitting by the fire, and they took tea and toasted bread while they waited for Harald.
It was mid-morning by the time they heard his thundering on the door. Ormur rose to unbar it. “Check who it is first, Ormur,” Keturah called after him. “It wouldn’t take much deduction from Tore to work out where we’ve fled.”
She heard the boy call through the door, and then froze when an unfamiliar voice replied. She did not catch the words, but Ormur had begun to remove the locking bar. Keturah scrambled after him and knocked his hand away. “Don’t,” she whispered. “What did he say?”
“That he was a herald, sent by Lord Roper,” Ormur replied, voice low as hers.
Keturah narrowed her eyes. “I fear very much he has been sent by Tore.”
“Tore?”
“He may have captured Harald,” whispered Keturah. “And… questioned him. Go upstairs and look out of the window. If you’re seen, say that nobody else is in.”
Ormur disappeared upstairs, and the voice came again through the boards of the door. “I’m looking for Keturah Tekoasdottir.”
Keturah stayed silent, and Ormur was soon back downstairs, now armed with a poker. “Just one man I could see,” hissed the boy. “But he looked rough.”
Keturah deliberated. It could be a trap—indeed, it seemed most likely that it was—but a locked door would not stop Tore getting to her if he was determined.
“Thank you, Ormur,” she said, speaking normally now. “We may as well face whoever it is. Put that thing down,” she added, but Ormur held the poker resolutely before him. Keturah lifted the locking bar, and stepped back, pulling the door with her.
The man who stood on the threshold did indeed look rough, with a squashed brawler’s nose and a massive, round-shouldered physique. He wore the herald’s crest though: a diamond-profiled owl. Perversely, Keturah found the man’s appearance convincing. If this was a disguise, it was an exceptionally feeble one. Tore would surely have avoided this bruiser at all costs if he had truly wished to fool her.
The bruiser bowed to Keturah. “The Black Lady, I presume. I am Virtanen Lanterison, a herald lately with your husband’s forces in Suthdal. May I come in? The news I carry is not yet for everyone’s ears.”
Keturah stepped back to show him in. “I suppose you’d better. Tea, Virtanen?”
“Well that would be extremely welcome, it has been a long journey.” He stepped over the threshold, nearly wedging his bulk into the doorway. He followed Keturah into the parlour in a muscular waddle, taking a seat at her invitation, while she fetched a birch-bark cup and a sprig of pine. She was breathing fast. Whether or not this man was who he claimed, things were about to change. She noticed Ormur was still hovering just out of sight from the parlour, clutching his poker.
“A long journey indeed to deliver such news, sir. When did you last see the army?”
“Six days since, my lady.” Keturah unhooked the kettle and steeped the pine needles in steaming water. Virtanen leaned forward to accept the cup. “Thank you.” He toasted her briefly before sitting back. “My lady, my news is extensive and I must be blunt, not all of it is good.”
Keturah took a cup of her own and sat opposite Virtanen. “We will get to it. First, what was the situation when you left?”
“Context is all,” he acknowledged, inclining his head once more. “The army had just taken Lundenceaster.”
Suddenly, there seemed no doubt that this man spoke the truth. A wave of relief swept Keturah, so palpable that it felt as though someone had tipped cold water over her head. She gasped, and closed her eyes briefly. Well done, my love. She looked back at Virtanen and toasted him. “So not all of your news is ill, sir,” she said softly. “Come now, at what cost?”
“Two legions lost,” Virtanen admitted, and Keturah recoiled. That was a dreadful price to pay. Ten thousand men! She ought to have expected it, she knew. The city had been packed with defenders, and Roper’s army had been weak.
But the herald was trying to catch her eye with an expression which said, Brace yourself. It seemed he was not finished. “And among them,” he said gently, “your cousin, Pryce Rubenson.”
“Pryce?” said Keturah blankly. The sprinter took terrible risks in battle, but his death was still incomprehensible. A man whose will seemed one of the laws of nature: where anything was possible in his presence, and you had the impression that whatever he desired, the world would accommodate it. She and Pryce had not been close: their characters too unyielding to rub along easily, and he too proud to have much of a relationship with anyone except Gray. Nonetheless, they were family, and Keturah felt some certainty leave her at the news that he was dead. A world without him was a flatter place. “Someone who burned so bright was never going to last,” she said. “Did anyone see him fall?”
Virtanen shook his head sadly. “My very great condolences, lady. It is as you say: brilliance is fleeting.” Despite his appearance, the herald was clearly a man of diplomacy. “But while there were plenty of witnesses to his bravery during the battle, I’m afraid there were none to his death. He actually survived the breach, and was killed very soon after by Vigtyr the Quick.”
“Vigtyr!” hissed Keturah. “The army knows? That he’s a traitor?”
“They know. Leon Kaldison arrived with that news just a few hours after Pryce had died.”
Now that was cruel; that Leon should have been so close to rescuing the situation. She thought of the journey she had taken to the haskoli, and wondered if she could have travelled a bit faster, and arrived a day earlier. What difference might that have made?
She looked bleakly at Virtanen, suddenly exhausted by the tidings he had brought. “I hope I can lift some of your despair,” he said with a small smile. “It is my pleasure to report to you that Legate Tekoa is alive. He has returned to the army, and was safe and well six days ago. The plague has been vanquished from the Skiritai.”
She raised a hand to cover her eyes. This was too much. She had felt mighty relief at the news Lundenceaster was taken, but that paled in comparison with this. She was shaking, tears overwhelming her once more. Everything had become raw and cool and sweet. It felt as though some pustule within had suddenly burst, and a tension went out of her.
There was a splattering noise, and Virtanen suddenly stood. “My lady.”
“Careless, I’m sorry.” She must have spilt her tea. Keturah glanced at her cup, but it was full. She sat forward, and cleared her eyes to see a great puddle shining on the floor beneath her chair. For a moment, she could not think how it had got there.
Then she realised. Her waters had broken.
The child was coming.
9
Built from Bones
“What have you done?” shouted Gray.
Roper could barely hear him over the noise of the legions erupting around them. “I have done,” he said, flushed himself and breathing hard, “what I have always said I will do. I have done what I had to.”
“You have made a weapon of their grief,” said Tekoa, gazing at the legionaries who were now roaring like bison. He did not sound angry, or appalled: just shocked.
“You have possessed the whole lot of them,” added Gray.
“Jokul will kill you!”
“Let him!” snarled Roper. “If anything happens to me now, the Kryptea go down too. I swore, before this campaign had even begun, that I would break Jokul someday. I swore the child that Keturah carries, your grandchild,” he added to Tekoa, “would live outside the Kryptea’s shadow. If they kill me, then I have achieved not one, but two of my life’s great tasks here in the south. It seems a good trade to me.”
This was no place to talk further. Gray clearly feared immediate Kryptean vengeance and began bellowing for the Sacred Guard. They assembled in heartbeats and clamped round the party as completely as an oyster shell. And not just the guard. Sensing the danger, regular legionaries swarmed around them too, determined to escort Roper clear of the crowd. He heard Leon snarling for one legionary to step back, only to be met with the reply: “I’m going nowhere.” Half an hour before, these men had been desperate to go home.
Over the heads of the crowd Roper could see an eddy of violent jostling and shoving. Jokul stood at the centre of this activity, a score of men keeping him safe from the attentions of the crowd. His defenders wore no uniform, but perhaps for the first time, members of the Kryptea had been forced to show themselves in the open.
“Leon,” called Roper, pointing at the knot. “Mark those men. This is not an opportunity we’ll get again.”
“I see them,” said the guardsman, pushing his way towards the group.
Jokul seemed to be trying to push away his defenders, snarling that they were betraying themselves and they should leave him to the crowd. Then he spotted Roper and raised a finger to point at him. “Tyrant!” he shouted. “Tyrant! Now you have truly revealed yourself. I will make you regret this, Roper Kynortasson!”
Roper shook his head. “You can’t!” he called back.
“I will!” Jokul’s face was suddenly flushed and quivering as, for the first time that Roper had ever seen, he lost control. “Do you hear me, Lord Roper? I will!”
Roper turned away, borne towards his hearth on a tide of protective legionaries. It had never been his intention to endanger Jokul personally. That was why he had not mentioned him by name. The Master had shown his claws and Roper had bared his teeth.
Roper reached his hearth and the Sacred Guard, along with the volunteers from the crowd, set up a cordon around him and his generals. The Chief Historian, Frathi, was already waiting by the fire, and on her face was a look of disdain such as Roper had never seen. “To think I helped put a tyrant on the Stone Throne,” she said.
“That word seems cheap today,” said Roper. “In my place, you would have allowed yourself to be blackmailed, and scuttled back north would you, my lady? The future of our people held hostage, and this kingdom ruled from the shadows by a band of murderers?”
“I would have allowed them their say, certainly,” she replied. “I did not really expect someone of your age to understand, but I thought that at least your advisers would know better.” She regarded Gray and Tekoa.
“We had no idea he was going to commit political arson,” Tekoa snarled back at her.
