The Collarbound, page 28
But the ungifted simply placed themselves around Mezyan, eyes glazed over, empty shells building a barrier of flesh to block his path. As people brought forward shackles, the kher guards at last agreed to help, although it was clear from their body-language that everyone was unnerved. Mezyan disappeared, too short to be seen amongst the throng of humans. His words seemed to shrink with him, the fire he carried growing smaller and dim.
‘We should move, now,’ Kilian said urgently. ‘In case it gets worse.’
Isha could only nod.
Kilian navigated their way out of the crowd, ducking under people’s arms, using his elbows like levers to move them aside. He was taller than her and could see a way out. It was a struggle to keep up with him, questions baying around her, words like grunts banging inside her skull. A man stepped between them and she lost sight of Kilian. When someone walked on her robes, she tripped, her golden belt coming undone. She held onto her clothes with one hand to stop them from getting caught in people’s feet again, twisting the belt between her fingers. Under her breath, she cursed the underworlds, the skies, and everything in between.
Upwards, she couldn’t see beyond the wall of shoulders and necks, except for the curved underside of an arch. She followed the shaft of sun and the motes of dust outside. The inner courtyard was full of people discussing what had happened, with kher guards struggling to keep the entrance clear.
Outside, at last, she could hear herself think.
Kilian popped out of the crowd behind her. ‘You all right?’ he asked.
‘I thought you were in front.’
‘I came back for you.’ He took her hand this time. They walked past the Nest’s gates and into the grass that lined the river. Here it was quieter. Speech became speech once more, not howls. Kilian was still holding her hand; she pulled it away before retying her robes.
‘Are you sure you’re all right?’ Kilian asked. ‘You look like you’re going to faint.’
Her head was still spinning, but her thoughts were her own, and it was cooler outside the gates.
‘I need to sit down,’ she said.
The ground was damp. Groups were chatting on the moors, with apprentices who seemed relaxed; some might even have ignored the bell and didn’t know about Mezyan’s announcement yet. Taking an unsteady breath, Isha hid her hands, squeezing them between her legs, where no-one could see them shaking.
But it was impossible to escape entirely. The small retinue Mezyan had come with were waiting beside his mount on the other side of the bridge. His horse was grazing beside its standard. The flag was red and black. The wings moved as if the hawk was flying. The Renegades seemed tense.
She couldn’t tell if the roar inside her skull was the river or her blood.
Sighing, Kilian placed his arms behind his back, resting his weight on the flat of his hands. He was still wearing his green shoes – it was his only pair. ‘Feeling better now?’
She rubbed her cheek, as if she could erase the tattoo there.
‘I’m fine,’ she lied.
Kilian cocked his head to one side. His lanky blond hair fell sideways over his eyes. For a moment she wondered if he would see it, if by staring at her long enough he would guess at the bird of prey within her tattoo and understand what it meant.
‘It’s about your family, right?’ he said. ‘They’re much closer to the Shadowpass. I get why you’re worried.’
The word ‘family’ made her flinch. Kilian seemed concerned, but he was putting up a brave front. After all, the Sunrisers were far away. From the Nest, even her farm and the Shadowpass were far away.
‘Aren’t you?’ she asked.
Kilian laughed, but he sounded strained. ‘Why should I be? Mages are everywhere. And we can mindlink ungifted to do what we want.’
As Lady Siobhan just proved. She wasn’t sure it was a reassuring fact.
‘The halfblood isn’t going to cause us any trouble,’ he concluded.
Isha passed her hands around her knees and hugged them to her chest. ‘What are the lawmages going to do with him?’
Kilian shrugged. ‘Hang him, I guess?’
Isha didn’t answer. She thought of Uaza telling her she was born to become a killer. She thought of the banner, the raptor with its long, square wings spread out as it flew above them. She thought of the Renegades attacking her farm. Of her mother hiding her with a foster family. Of hawks and Hawk.
Of the fact that the Nest would hang its enemies.
‘Don’t worry about it,’ said Kilian. ‘It’s got nothing to do with us.’
They didn’t sit in the moors for long. Caitlin came to find them. She called them over, but the scream of seagulls and the rush of the river meant they couldn’t hear a word. She waved impatiently.
‘Shouldn’t we get up?’ said Kilian.
It was Isha’s turn to shrug. ‘If it’s that important, she’ll come and fetch us.’ She hoped it wasn’t. She didn’t want to face other mages right now.
Unfortunately, it was. Red-faced and grumpy, Caitlin stomped closer until they were within shouting distance.
‘Get up!’ she ordered. ‘Sir Daegan wants us.’
So Isha and Kilian picked themselves off the riverbank, and shook the grass out of their robes, and complained about grass-stains, before following Caitlin back inside the Nest.
They had to push through a crowd as thick as mud, which parted reluctantly, then climb up the steps leading to the balcony. The mages and Mezyan were gone, but groups were sitting on the staircase and talking, kher guards were patrolling the hall, and a few maids were rolling up the Renegade banner.
In comparison, the corridors were strikingly empty. Their footsteps padded dully on the stone. Isha could hear Caitlin’s short breaths. The passageways were bleak slabs of grey with no windows.
Most of Sir Daegan’s followers were already there by the time they arrived in front of his chambers. As they waited, the last latecomers hurried to join them. Soon they were all huddled in front of his door, not unlike the figures bunched in front of the tavern before it opened in the evening, hoping for a beer and some food. Isha wondered why Sir Daegan needed this ragtag band of apprentices clogging his entrance.
The answer came once they heard his controlled voice further down the corridor. Caitlin straightened her posture, and the other disciples copied her. The group was unrecognisable. Instead of slouching youngsters, they looked like a small army, standing to attention in their grey uniforms, forming two columns on either side of his door.
Sir Daegan came into view, with Sir Cintay in step beside him. Although he was wearing a deeply dyed blue robe and had washed his hair, the Sunriser’s features were still stark, shaped by hunger, sunburn and fear. Behind the mages, two human servants were carrying a chest, one manservant for each thick copper ring on the sides. From the way they moved, it was heavy.
Sir Cintay saw the apprentices, and the apprentices saw the effect they had on Sir Cintay. He had lost his convent. He must have had followers of his own, who hadn’t survived, or who were still suffering at the Renegades’ hands. People he had taught and cared for but couldn’t protect. He shuddered as if they were ghosts, spirits escaped from over the Edge.
Sir Daegan, still chatting pleasantly, unlocked his front door.
‘Please, do come in.’ Sir Daegan waved everyone inside.
It was a tight fit. The apprentices had to hug the walls, and only a few people – Caitlin, some of the older disciples – managed to claim an armchair. Sir Daegan took a seat, as did Sir Cintay, while the manservants lowered the chest onto the carpeted floor between them. The packed bodies in the small living-room, and the fire, which had been stacked before they came in, meant the air was stuffy, thick with the smell of burning sap and sweat.
Sir Cintay was tall but thin, as if someone had tied him to a rack and succeeded only in lengthening his arms and legs, somehow contriving to keep him alive. He stooped when he walked; from a wound or from shame, Isha couldn’t tell.
‘I am glad you were able to retrieve it,’ said Sir Daegan. ‘I heard it was your convent’s most precious possession. It would be a shame for such a relic to be lost.’
Sir Cintay nodded, but his eyes said something else. His shoulders were curved as he crouched in his exquisite seat, amongst silk cushions. As he rubbed his hands nervously, his sleeves sometimes showed the old scars around his wrists.
‘We told the Renegades we would be worth nothing as hostages if we had nothing of ours to bring with us,’ said Sir Cintay. He spoke low, as if whispering could prevent anyone from hearing, when there was nothing else to listen to but the spitting fire. ‘So, Hawk agreed to let us take a chestful – no more, no less – of our goods with us. She confiscated what remained.’
‘I am glad.’ Sir Daegan smiled and waited.
‘Before we do this …’ started Sir Cintay.
Sir Daegan interrupted him at once. ‘Of course. Let it be known, then, that in exchange for your most generous gift, I will ensure you have a place at the Nest, now and for as long as the trouble with the Renegades lasts.’
Sir Daegan glanced at the assembled apprentices. They were witnesses, Isha realised, who would be able to testify of the terms of the trade.
But they all belonged to Sir Daegan. How fair could such a jury be?
‘You know …’ Sir Daegan slipped into a fatherly, maybe even tender, tone. ‘Lady Siobhan has promised all Sunrisers are welcome at the Nest. But Lady Siobhan is growing older and, by your own account, there will soon be more Sunrisers than guestrooms. What then? Soon it will be about payment and rent and services due. Soon there will be mages who will have to live with the lacunants, or inside the city gates.’
Sinking into his armchair, Sir Cintay seemed to be ageing before them; his features were drawn, and white hair peppered his head.
‘I am well aware,’ he said.
But I was not, thought Isha. What did that mean for Passerine? Would he be thrown out without money or powerful friends to fight for his place at the Nest? What about her?
‘But no vassal of mine will ever be sent away,’ added Sir Daegan. ‘If you truly have what you promised, you will have proved your loyalty a hundred times over.’
Sir Cintay gestured to the manservants. One of them knelt before the chest and, after rummaging around his belt for the key, unlocked it.
The apprentices craned their necks. Isha didn’t, but she heard their gasps of excitement. Caitlin, who was closest to the high mages, mindlinked to the disciples next to her. The picture went from mind to mind until Kilian shared it with Isha.
Isha perceived two facets of the same scene. From where she stood, she saw nothing of the chest but its leather and metal straps, and the back of the manservant leaning over it. At the same time, she had Caitlin’s view of it, the glint of gold and precious stones inside; a folded square of turquoise silk; a glass flask filled with quicksilver, which sloshed with the ungracefulness of metal when the servant pulled it out. She sensed Caitlin’s eagerness: sharp, exuberant.
The servant placed both hands under the silk wrapping, holding it that way before Sir Cintay. The Sunriser mage unfolded the fabric, revealing what it had been protecting.
It could have been a child’s crown, small and wrought with gold. And then Isha understood it wasn’t a crown but a choker, meant not for the brow but for the throat. The pattern was familiar; she recognised the way the gold threads melded together, the intricate carvings scratched in the soft metal.
It was a collar.
‘May I?’ asked Sir Daegan.
‘It is yours.’
Sir Cintay sounded exhausted. His convent’s relic. And he is selling it to pay his rent. Isha was sorry for him. As a man responsible for lives and treasure, he had decided the treasure was worth less than the lives. If her understanding of Sunriser convents was correct, he had never been anyone’s vassal, either. This was the first time he had relinquished his authority to another mage.
And it’s the same for me, she thought. If I don’t want to belong to the Renegades, I have to belong to the Nest. It didn’t feel like much of a choice.
Sir Daegan lifted the collar to eye’s height. He didn’t smile. He didn’t need to. He was like a cat licking its lips beside a half-chewed mouse.
‘You may leave us,’ he said.
Sir Cintay’s jaw tensed as he bit down on the retort that might have escaped his lips. The manservants closed the chest, replacing the precious items inside, with the exception of the collar, which stayed in Sir Daegan’s lap. Sir Daegan stroked it with the tip of his fingers, as if it were an unlikely pet.
Sir Cintay got up, but didn’t leave. When he spoke, the words seemed to come with difficulty, as if he were forcing them through his teeth.
‘As your vassal, I have a favour to ask.’
His hands folded above the collar, Sir Daegan displayed a patient smile. ‘Please do.’
Sir Cintay swallowed. It was obvious that, whatever it was he wanted to say, he only said it because it was more important than his pride. That was something mages didn’t often do.
‘Spare Mezyan’s life,’ he said. ‘I know you are Lady Siobhan’s adviser. Convince her. Please.’ Each sentence was shorter than the one before; each word sounded more painful to speak.
Sir Daegan gave out a curt laugh and, as if on cue, most of the apprentices sniggered. Isha hated the way the sound of laughter drained all colour from Sir Cintay’s face.
‘Don’t kill a messenger.’ An edge of desperation filtered into his voice. ‘The Renegades won’t take kindly to it. They’ll wash the ground with more blood than you would need to drown ten khers. It will be … It will be my people who pay that price.’
He lowered his eyes as if he couldn’t hold their concerted gazes. The servants also kept their heads bowed. Sir Daegan rubbed at the corner of his mouth with his thumb, as he would to keep himself distracted during a boring conversation – or maybe it was to hide the fact that he was grinning.
‘You might find that you need to talk to Hawk and send messengers of your own to negotiate with her,’ added Sir Cintay. ‘If you kill Mezyan, she …’ He stayed silent for a long time, long enough for Sir Daegan to lift a hand, as if about to shoo him away. ‘She is stronger than you think. I believe the Nest will be surprised when it comes to dealing with her. We … the Wingshade convents were.’
‘I have heard you,’ said Sir Daegan.
Sir Cintay glared at him. Sir Daegan stared back. When it became clear that was the only answer he would get, Sir Cintay left, the servants in his wake.
Once he was gone, Sir Daegan lifted the collar towards Caitlin.
‘Would you like to hold it?’
The disciples crammed around Sir Daegan’s chair, passing the relic from hand to hand, commenting on how the gold was warm, like flesh, and supple, like fabric. Not only did they talk about it as if it were alive, they held it just as carefully. Isha stayed at the back of the room and shook her head when Kilian tried to pass the collar to her.
When the collar was returned to him, Sir Daegan turned to Isha.
‘Don’t you want to touch it?’ he asked.
To her dismay, he winked. The door that led to his lightlure was hidden from view, with a cluster of disciples leaning against it, but neither Sir Daegan nor Isha needed to refer to it.
A cage and a bind. Both powerful, both magic. If Isha hadn’t known Sir Daegan was ambitious before, she knew now. She had seen Lady Siobhan during the Groniz festival. Harsh winters had claimed stronger souls.
Everyone was looking at her. ‘No, thank you, sir,’ she said.
She still remembered touching Tatters’ collar. She pressed her thumb against her fingertips, trying to dull the ache.
‘Isha’s used to collars,’ said Caitlin.
It was her usual nastiness, but this time it hit its mark. Caitlin meant that Isha knew Tatters; but Isha heard that she was a collarbound herself, branded as a slave. She blanched. Sir Daegan observed her with interest, studying her reaction.
‘What can you tell us about collarbounds, then?’ he asked.
Isha shielded her mind from him as much as she could. A lie was difficult to pull off when facing a high mage – but she had learnt the power of untruths.
‘I wouldn’t be able to tell you more than what Caitlin or any of the others know, I’m sure.’
There, she thought. If we’re doing this, we’re in it together.
But Sir Daegan didn’t question her. He went back to admiring his purchase, holding it between his fingers, savouring the power coursing through the gold.
There would be a second collarbound in the city before long.
Chapter Fourteen
The next day, the mages were ready to give the half-kher their answer. The apprentices were teeming along the bank that separated the Nest from the city, standing in the white spray of the river. A circle of high mages, Lady Siobhan amongst them, stood together on the bridge. They brought Mezyan out to where his troops were waiting and undid his manacles, even conceding him his horse. As soon as he was freed, Mezyan climbed astride his mare to face them. One of his soldiers handed him a banner, which he held in one hand like a spear.
They had done this on purpose, but knowing it was artificial didn’t make it less effective. On one side, there was a swarm of curious faces, dressed in greys and blacks and blues, the colours of the Edge, of the sky, of the river crashing into the clouds. On the other side, there was only Mezyan and a handful of fighters. Red banner, red skin. The promise of blood.
Blood is thicker than water. Despite its width, despite its current, despite its drawn-out noise that never dulled, Isha wondered if the chasm would protect the Nest from what was coming.
Mezyan put his heels to his horse. As it stepped forward, Mezyan might have spoken – it was impossible to hear his voice above the roar of the waterfall. But Isha saw him throw back his head, as if he were laughing, before resting his banner next to his horse’s hooves.
Lady Siobhan wasn’t the one to answer him. Her frail mutterings wouldn’t carry; she couldn’t mindlink to a kher. When Isha saw Sir Daegan stride to the front of the group, her heart sank. The supreme mage wasn’t yet dead, but already the flies were buzzing around her corpse.
