The Iron Ghost Read online

  The argument below seemed to reach some sort of crescendo, and the white-haired man flew backwards, knocked off his feet by some unseen force. He lay unmoving in the snow, while the robed man stood stock still, apparently uncertain of his next move.

  Grondel crouched again. Now that silence had come back to the hills, he no longer wished to be so exposed. There was an uncanny quality to the man now standing, looking at his fallen opponent. Grondel’s hands went to the prayer bones at his throat and he counted through them, fingers trembling. The fires never showed me this, no matter all the burns I took for them.

  Abruptly, the figure turned away, looking up towards the low hills that rolled away behind him, and with a gesture, the ground began to shake violently. Grondel let out a low cry as he stumbled to his knees, striking his shin painfully on a rock. When he looked up again, the hill directly in front of the figure had seemingly split down the middle, revealing a rocky crevasse lit with flickering cold-lights. The man paused to fetch his unconscious companion, slinging his inert body over his shoulder, and then he disappeared into the hill.

  Grondel stood there for some time, waiting to see if the opening into the hill would close up, or if either of the men would come back out again. There appeared to be nothing stopping him from climbing down to the crevasse and following them both in. Perhaps he would find kindred spirits there, men who understood that to truly see you must suffer the purity of the flames, and perhaps they would teach him the secrets of the fire they summoned from their own hands.

  But as he stood there with the night growing colder, he found himself thinking of the way the man had stood in silence, waiting and listening, and he knew that to follow him into the hill would be to rush to his own death. This place had a dark history, and in the past that had been useful – he could commune with the fire here safe in the knowledge that he was alone – but a new curse had come to the Wailing Hills. Grasping his prayer bones in a hand that was still shaking, Grondel made his way into the night.

  27

  ‘All of them. Dead.’

  Prince Dallen stood staring at the bodies, swaying slightly on his feet. He looked like a scarecrow, ragged and bleeding from numerous wounds where the dead arachnos had snipped at him with their pincers. Sebastian kept as close as he dared, ready to grab him if he should fall. He didn’t look strong enough to be standing.

  ‘Your highness – I am sorry.’

  Dallen shook his head. His eyes were deeply shadowed. ‘They never attack like that,’ he said, still not looking at Sebastian. ‘The arachnos can be dangerous, yes, but if you give them space and don’t provoke them . . .’ His voice trailed off. ‘I’ve never known anything like it.’

  ‘It was dark magic,’ said Sebastian. Blood trickled down the prince’s fingers and dripped onto the packed, white snow. ‘The mage who attacked us caused them to act that way. There was nothing you could have done.’

  ‘I’ve flown with these men and women for all of my adult life, Sebastian. They looked to me as their prince, yes, but I was also their squad leader. And the wyverns –’ They had found the bodies of the wyverns by following the sooty smears they made as they landed. Charred and smoking, they were unrecognisable as the extraordinary creatures they had been. ‘I raised Rillion from a yearling.’

  Now Prince Dallen did stumble, the strength seeming to drop away from his legs, and Sebastian took hold of his arm quickly. The prince leaned on him briefly, gratefully, and then stepped away.

  ‘Your highness, we must do something about your injuries. I have bandages and salve in my pack, if you will let me—’

  ‘You cannot touch me,’ said Dallen. Seeing the look on Sebastian’s face, he gave him a watery smile. ‘I do not mean to be rude. But the touch of a warmling can be very uncomfortable for us.’

  ‘Your highness . . .’ Sebastian bit his lip, wondering if he was overstepping his boundaries here, ‘it would be easy to give in to grief. I have been where you are now, and I urge you not to.’

  For a long moment Dallen didn’t say anything at all.

  ‘I should like to do what I can for the bodies, first,’ he said eventually. ‘I can do that much for them at least.’

  They began to gather the men and women of Dallen’s squad together on the ice. Their injuries were extreme, and more than once Dallen had to stop, the back of his hand pressed to his mouth. Wydrin came over to lend assistance, but Sebastian sent her back to the small fire they had made, telling her to rest up. She looked as though she might argue with him at first, but she was still pale and exhausted from her experience with the werken – he could tell from the careful way she moved – and eventually she relented, joining Nuava by the fire. Watching her go, Sebastian felt a familiar heat in his chest. The urge to find this mage, to hunt him down, was enormous. He could feel it as a restlessness in his blood, the same as when he hunted with the brood sisters. The wyverns had burnt like tapers, screaming in the night; someone would pay for this.

  When the bodies were lined up together, Dallen asked for some privacy. Sebastian moved back to the fire, and then watched as the young prince summoned the cold with his own strange magic. Within seconds the corpses were covered in a thin layer of glittering ice, beautiful under the moonlight. Dallen raised his hands, trembling with the effort, and a long, sinuous shape formed on top of the ice; a simple wyvern, its long head bristling with icicles. The ice wyvern lay across all of them, binding them together.

  ‘I will take those bandages now, if you have them,’ said Dallen afterwards. ‘I will bind my wounds myself.’

  Sebastian nodded, not questioning. He retrieved his pack from its place by the fire, and passed Dallen what supplies he had.

  ‘That is extraordinary,’ he said. ‘What you did with the ice. And beautiful.’

  ‘The cold-summons isn’t just about disabling enemies,’ said Dallen. ‘It is also how we build. The talent runs strongest in the royal family.’ He paused, his bruised face tense with pain. Sebastian thought it likely he was thinking of his father again. ‘I will take these some distance from your fire. It is difficult for me to heal so close to a heat source.’

  Sebastian let him go, and then headed back to their small circle of light. Wydrin was standing now, her arms crossed over her chest.

  ‘So you’re saying this mage has been dead for centuries, and now he’s back?’ Her lips were pressed into a thin line and there were two points of colour, high on her cheeks.

  ‘Joah Demonsworn. It was him. She even called him by the name.’ Nuava was still trembling slightly all over, like a cornered rabbit. Wydrin had brewed her a hot cup of tea heavily laced with grut, but she was just holding it in her hands.

  ‘This is the same mage whose tomb you took Sebastian and Frith to see, isn’t it? So why is he suddenly so bloody lively?’

  Nuava shook her head, spilling a little of the tea over her hand. It must have been scalding, but she didn’t appear to notice.

  ‘It was the Prophet. All along. She wasn’t who she said she was. We should have known, I should have known, but Tamlyn was so adamant we listen.’ She took a shaky breath. ‘There was something wrong about her from the beginning. That voice, the way she spoke. It wasn’t right for a child.’

  Sebastian felt his stomach drop a few inches. It was probably nothing, he told himself. There were many strange things in Ede, and they were thousands of leagues from Relios.

  ‘What do you mean?’ continued Wydrin. ‘Who is this Prophet?’

  ‘She came to us some months back. Tamlyn was at her wits’ end by then. Skaldshollow was under near continual attack from the Narhl, and then the Heart-Stone was taken.’ She glanced over to Prince Dallen, but he was turned away from them, far from the fire and their conversation. ‘The Prophet promised that she could solve the Narhl problem for us, and she told us lots of things that seemed very wise.’ She sniffed. ‘They seemed wise at the time. There were other incidents. She healed one of our soldiers, closing up his wound and banishing his fever. She seem
ed to know so much, for someone so young. My aunt was convinced, Bors less so.’ She paused then, and Sebastian saw tears slipping silently down her cheeks. He reached over and squeezed her shoulder.

  ‘What did this Prophet tell you to do?’

  ‘She told us that help would come from outside Skaldshollow, and that she’d had a vision. Of three black griffins.’ Nuava swallowed hard. ‘That’s how we knew to hire you.’

  Wydrin caught Sebastian’s eye, and he saw the knowledge there as cold and certain as the moon. He cleared his throat.

  ‘Nuava,’ he said, ‘what did the Prophet look like? You say she was a child?’

  ‘No more than twelve or thirteen years old, I’d have said. She had long brown hair and wore it in a braid, and she had blue eyes. But when she spoke, she didn’t have a croaky voice, like an old woman, but she sounded old, like she’d lived for so much longer than anyone you’d ever known. Like everything was a joke and we had yet to understand it.’

  ‘The girl the demon inhabited would look around twelve now,’ said Wydrin, still looking at Sebastian. The spots of colour had vanished from her cheeks. ‘And this sounds like her. Like Bezcavar.’

  Sebastian winced at the name.

  ‘The demon would have reason to lure us out here,’ he admitted. ‘This Joah did say he was here for us. Bezcavar was looking for revenge.’

  ‘Except that Bezcavar’s man has scarpered, taking Frith with him.’ Wydrin stood up abruptly, and Sebastian recognised from the way she was stepping from one foot to the other that she was looking for a fight. ‘You have to summon it, Seb. Get the demon here so we can question it.’

  Nuava was looking at each of them, turning back and forth. Her eyes were wide and wet.

  ‘And how do you propose I do that?’ said Sebastian, trying to keep his own temper under control. ‘Wydrin, I cast off my oath to Bezcavar. We destroyed the armour that summoned the Cursed Company. I have no ties to that creature any more.’

  Wydrin shook her head. ‘I don’t really believe that. Do you? You swore an oath in blood. I think if you tried, if you really tried, you could get that snivelling demon bastard to show its face.’ One hand was resting on the pommel of Glassheart now. Sebastian thought it likely that she didn’t know she was doing it. ‘We need to find out where he’s taken Frith. We need to know what this Joah’s intentions are.’

  Sebastian touched the scar on his face, remembering the sharp sting as he’d pressed the blade of his own sword to his cheek: the moment he’d forsaken his own gods in a desperate ploy to save the lives of men and women who had already exiled him in disgrace. ‘We can try,’ he conceded finally. Nuava started, spilling more of her tea.

  ‘You are going to summon her here? You are bringing the Prophet here?’ The fear in her voice was clear.

  ‘It will be all right, Nuava. The being you call the Prophet may not even come.’

  Feeling faintly foolish, he took off his gloves and slipped a dirk from his belt. He pressed the blade against the palm of his hand, feeling the pain. Letting himself feel the pain, because that’s what Bezcavar craved, of course. The Prince of Wounds.

  ‘I spill this blood in the name of Bezcavar.’ The blood welled up and he cupped it in his hand. ‘I know you’re there, demon. I know you’re listening, so why don’t you come and play?’

  For a long moment, nothing happened. Wydrin paced by the fire, one hand on her sword, while Nuava seemed to be trying to make herself as small as possible. Dallen had approached the fire again, his arms and legs now partly bandaged.

  Sebastian opened his hand, letting the blood drip onto the snow.

  ‘I spill this blood in the name of Bezcavar. Come on, demon. I know you must hunger after all paltry offerings, desperate little creature that you are.’

  ‘And your offering certainly is paltry, good Sir Sebastian.’

  They turned as one at the sound of that voice, and Sebastian felt his blood grow cold. There she was, standing in the dark, lit in shades of grey and orange by the moon and their dying fire; a girl, taller than he remembered, wearing leathers and furs, her long brown hair brushed back from her face and secured into a braid. Her eyes were filled with blood, and her hands were red to the wrists. When we first met it was her feet that were covered in blood, he thought distantly. He squeezed his hand into a fist, sending a spike of pain up his arm, and Ip smiled in corresponding pleasure.

  ‘It is you,’ he said. ‘Do you have nothing better to do than to pursue us, Bezcavar?’

  ‘But Sir Sebastian, we never said a proper goodbye.’ The demon in the shape of a girl came a few steps closer, and he could see how her face had changed too; the roundness of a child’s features were growing sharper, more angular. When she is older, she will be quite beautiful, thought Sebastian. ‘When you rudely threw my sword to the ground and dismissed me, did you think our pact was over?’

  Wydrin stepped between them. Her dagger was out of its scabbard.

  ‘Where is he? Where have you had him taken?’

  For the first time there was a flicker of unease from Ip. She looked away from Wydrin towards the fire, and smiled.

  ‘Ah, Nuava, it is good to see you again.’

  The girl shrank back, saying nothing. Ip shrugged.

  ‘For what it’s worth, your brother hardly suffered at all. A great personal disappointment to me, you must understand.’ She turned to the Narhl prince. ‘Your people have been most entertaining. I felt each of them die, and it was glorious. Joah always was so good at causing the maximum amount of pain to many people at once. It has been quite the tonic, this little battle.’

  ‘Enough,’ said Wydrin. ‘You will answer my question, demon, or I will open your throat.’

  Ip rolled her scarlet eyes at that.

  ‘I am not here, tavern-brat. My physical body is still safe in Skaldshollow, warming itself on the many fires that are now destroying the city. And besides which, could you really do it? Kill a child in cold blood? Ip is still in here with me, you know, and she would die too.’

  ‘Is she, though?’ asked Sebastian. ‘Perhaps Ip is long gone, or perhaps she longs to be set free from your tyranny. Do you even let her speak any more?’

  Bezcavar laughed at that. ‘Dear Sebastian, you are as ignorant as the rest of your ridiculous order. I am here by Ip’s choice. She accepted me into her head, and has no qualms about the agreement. Indeed, I can only be here by invitation.’ She grinned then. ‘Would that make it easier for you to kill her? You came very close at my temple in Relios, Sir Sebastian.’

  ‘Tell me where this Joah has gone,’ said Wydrin again. ‘Tell me where he has taken Frith, or I swear on my claws you will suffer for it, demon.’

  And there it was. Just for the briefest moment, Sebastian saw the confusion on Ip’s face. She recovered her habitual sneer quickly, but it was enough.

  ‘It will be you that suffers, sell-sword,’ said Bezcavar through Ip. ‘I will feed on all your deaths.’

  With that she vanished. Wydrin let out a growl of frustration, stalking back to the fire with her shoulders rigid.

  ‘By the graces, I will cut that demon’s head off myself,’ she spat. ‘What are we going to do now? We have no idea where they could have gone, and if he’s used the same spell that Frith used to spirit us away from the Citadel, it could be anywhere.’

  ‘We don’t know where they’ve gone,’ said Sebastian, ‘but the good news is, neither does Bezcavar. Did you see Ip’s face when you mentioned Frith? The demon was expecting us to be dead, Wydrin. Whatever this Joah has done, it wasn’t according to Bezcavar’s plan.’

  Nuava cleared her throat. ‘I’ve been thinking,’ she said, her voice strained. ‘Joah lived and died in these mountains. His stories are written everywhere, in this land. Before he took me away from Skaldshollow, he was talking to the Prophet about carrying on his work.’ She looked up at them, and for the first time since she’d appeared with the mage there was a glint of something like defiance in her eyes. ‘We don’t know
where he is, but we might be able to guess.’

  28

  ‘What on Ede does he think he’s playing at?’

  Bezcavar came back to Ip’s body with a sudden jerk, shivering violently at the transition. The girl was hiding underneath a discarded cart, its load of barrels scattered all over the road. All around her Skaldshollow was in chaos; Joah’s rampage had left hundreds dead and many more injured, and now she was stuck here by herself. Tamlyn Nox, no doubt, was out for her blood.

  This was not how events were supposed to pan out. Joah had always been Bezcavar’s most loyal servant – impetuous perhaps, and occasionally hot-headed, but he had done what the demon asked, most of the time. The demon had tried looking for him, searching for the familiar shape of the mage’s mind, but Joah had always been powerful enough to hide if he wanted to. It was one of the things that made him interesting, when they had worked together so long ago.

  And, back then, Bezcavar had inhabited an adult woman, a famous warrior from a forgotten land. The demon remembered that body with fondness – strong, beautiful, fast. It was a shame that it had come to bones and muck, as all human bodies did eventually.

  Ip shuffled forward to peer beyond the wheels of the cart. Men and women were still shouting to each other, but the panic was starting to fade as it became clear that the man responsible for the destruction had vanished. The magical fires he had set had proved to be quite difficult to extinguish, even in this frigid part of the world, but they were starting to get them under control.

  ‘Where is he? And why has he not returned?’

  The mercenaries were still alive, and bold enough to summon the demon. Worse still, Joah had taken the upstart mage somewhere, and something about that caused a slow trickle of fear in what passed for Bezcavar’s heart. He should have been glad that the mages, his old enemies, were gone, and yet there was that look on his face. Almost like grief.