‘Amrath! We stand before You clad in bronze and iron. We stand before You with swords drawn. Our swords are ready. Our swords are sharp. We will make the music of bronze and iron, the music that lifts joy in Your heart. Blood we will bring You. Death we will bring You. War we will bring You. You who delight always in blood and death and war.’
Behold the Army of Amrath, preparing to march on Illyr.
Gods, there are a lot of the sweaty buggers.
Tobias, Raeta and Landra going to join them.
It takes a long time, planning to kill someone. Tobias has thought and thought round and round. Infiltrate Malth Elelane. Bribe the guards. Co-opt someone close to him. Get Raeta a job as a scullery maid, poison his wine. But it wouldn’t work. It wouldn’t godsdamned work. And the Army of Amrath — yes, they were referring to it as the Army of Amrath in capitals and portentous voices now, with entirely straight faces, seriously – and the Army of Amrath sailed to Ith and he still hadn’t thought of a plan as he watched them go in their black ships, and he still hadn’t thought of a plan when the news came that they had taken Tyrenae.
‘Fucking hell. I mean … fucking hell.’
Landra had laughed hysterically. Raeta had bitten her lips white.
Tobias had looked at Raeta bleakly. ‘To be fair to myself, it’s harder than you’d think, killing someone.’
A vast crowd of chancers, gamesters, shysters, hucksters, cut-throats, con men and whores were pouring over to Ith in the Army of Amrath’s wake, mad keen to follow it to Illyr. Morr Town was even more crowded than it had been for Sunreturn. Every inn was heaving with people, ships sailed every day across the Bitter Sea to Tyrenae with another load of soldiers, salesmen and interesting if undefined types looking to make a quick bit of cash. Amazing, the skillsets the people of Morr Town turned out to possess.
‘They can perfectly well get fleeced by the Ithish, you know,’ Tobias told one sweet and lovely young lady who was boarding in his inn. She was sailing to Tyrenae the next morning. Planning to sign up with the heavy cavalry, obviously. What else? ‘There are sexually transmitted diseases, loaded dice and ruinous loan rates in Ith already. You don’t need to export them.’
‘Why,’ Sweet Face said sweetly, ‘should foreigners get all the fun? He was our king first.’
Gods, he should pray for another storm to drown the whole bloody lot of them. Wipe the earth clean.
‘Thirty years ago,’ said Tobias when Sweet Face had left them, ‘thirty years ago, Marith’s own grandpa led an invasion of Illyr. There’s a very famous song about it. The refrain goes something like this: Glorious they sailed, a mighty host in golden ships. I alone came back. Most of this lot probably still have empty places at the dinner table where their dad or uncle used to sit.’
‘Never underestimate people’s desire to hopefully possibly get rich while hopefully possibly being part of killing things,’ Raeta said.
Making a killing in every sense. Yeah. I know. And the good people of Tyrenae were reported as being remarkably accommodating to their new king’s followers. Very little a White Isles accent couldn’t get you. The drink flowed like water. ‘Hurrah for King Marith’ shouted everywhere. Various very grand Ithish ladies alleged to have developed quite a talent for striptease.
Tyrenae could have held out against him for bloody years, behind its walls. Cowardly sods.
‘You fought with him,’ said Landra. ‘You shouldn’t be surprised.’
‘What can I say?’ said Tobias wearily. ‘Maybe I’m just too much of an optimist.’
And then it had struck him. The answer struck him.
All these plans he’d made, rejected, break into Malth Elelane, bribe the guards, co-opt an insider, poison his drink: they all had one stupid stupid stupid flaw.
It’s easy as piss, to kill someone, if you’re quite happy to die doing it.
Endless, endless soldiers in bronze armour, armed to the teeth, their helmets covering their eyes. Men and women and children. The injured. The half-dead. Parading before Good King Marith, swords and spears and knives sparkling in the sunshine. Men and women, voices and faces from all over, chaos and confusion of half the world flooding into Tyenae to fight for the new king. We stand before You with swords drawn. Our swords are ready. Our swords are sharp.
Sail to Ith. Join them. March into Malth Tyrenae. March up to the boy. Stab him in the gut. Die.
He dies. We die.
Hard? It’s easy as piss. His death and my death, Tobias thought. A kind of dim pleasure, in thinking that.
By a truly staggering coincidence, the next boat sailing for Tyrenae turned out to belong to Raeta’s brother. His new ship, bigger and flashier than the last one, the one Tobias had arrived on the White Isles on. The figurehead was a woman, her hair dark, holding a silver disc like a shield. The sails were new and black.
Lan stared at the ship for a long time before they embarked. She looked very white.
‘What’s wrong?’
‘Nothing. I …’ She stared at the figurehead. ‘I … I thought I recognized this ship.’
‘Seen it in Toreth Harbour, maybe.’ Winced, as he mentioned the place name. Lan jerked like he’d stabbed her. He said hurriedly, ‘You’re holding everyone up, come on.’
‘Another’s Luck. No, I’d remember the name.’
‘Bloody stupid name.’ Oddly enough, it did look vaguely familiar. Something about the figurehead of the woman, the way her face looked. Familiar in a not-good way. Made him nervous. ‘Raeta said her brother only got it recently. The paint’s all new, you can see it’s been repainted, done up. So you probably wouldn’t recognize—’
Oh.
Another’s Luck.
Oh.
‘It looks like a lot of ships do,’ said Tobias. Gods gods gods, if she realizes, if Landra realizes what ship this is. Another’s bloody luck, gods yes. ‘Let’s just get on board, yeah, before it whatever the term is. Casts off. We’re holding the queue up. Come on.’ Before she realizes what ship this is. Was. The Brightwatch, it had been called when she last saw it. The figurehead had had yellow hair, had been holding a sunburst. Had had as its cargo a dead man.
First chance he could, Tobias cornered Raeta.
‘You know, don’t you? What ship this is?’
Raeta shrugged. ‘My brother got it very cheap.’
‘I’ll bet he did. What happened to the last owner, then? Your brother tell you that?’
‘I would rather imagine,’ said Raeta, ‘that he’s dead. Wouldn’t you?’
‘Gods, Raeta! And if Landra — if Lan finds out?’
‘She will not find out,’ said Raeta.
‘She’s wracking her brains right now trying to work it out. She’ll remember. It’s hardly the kind of thing you don’t remember. This being the ship she brought Marith back to Malth Salene in and all.’
Raeta looked at him. Her blue eyes opened very wide. She looked … ah, gods, she looked like something … something … A sound in Tobias’s ears. Rustling leaves. Like … like …
‘Raeta?’
‘She will not find out,’ said Raeta. ‘It’s not … ideal, no. I’m sorry. But unless you want to wait … My brother did get it very cheap. And the name fits.’
Painless journey. Sea smooth as silk. Smooth as a well-paved road. The winds were very favourable, the sails bellied fat and shining, the sky was cloudless blue. A school of dolphins raced the ship one afternoon; they even saw a whale blow. The fishermen off the coast of Sel Isle waved and cheered their passing. ‘Good luck! Good luck to you! Joy to the king!’ Tobias and Raeta and Landra sat on deck and watched the sun rise, watched the sky change, watched the sun set. Tried to relax.
‘Pretty.’
‘Pretty enough. Not much different to yesterday. Bit more cloud.’
‘One of nature’s wonders, the sunset. Never the same twice.’
‘Yeah? Could say the same thing about a bleeding wound.’
A few of days of life left. Wondered if Raeta and Landra had worked that out yet.
Hard to relax.
They’d reach Tyrenae in record time, Raeta’s brother said. Benefits of Good King Marith having a weather hand in his service. Sweet west wind and calm sea and the ship fair danced on the wind. How kind of Good King Marith. Another’s luck indeed. Poetic, like. Or something.
And Tyrenae! Soldiers everywhere, not so much a city as an army camp. If Morr Town had been crowded with eager young faces longing for battle, Tyrenae was filled to overflowing, bursting at the seams, the air heavy with bronze and leather and horses and men’s sweat. The perfume of ten times a thousand pairs of muscular thighs. The smoke of forge fires and cook fires. The endless, endless clang of the smith’s hammer. The sheer amount of piss and shit and body fluids an army in peace time can produce. Almost nostalgic, the smell, like the way Tobias’s tent had smelled on damp mornings, in the Company. All those strong, excited, pent up young men …
A grain ship was mooring up at the quay beside Another’s Luck. Wagons waited to take its load. Marith must be stripping the White Isles bare to feed his soldiers. Sailors on their own ship shouted as they got everything secured; the human cargo surged for the gangplank, the crew strained to unload bales of wool cloth for soldiers’ cloaks.
‘I remember him when he first arrived in my squad,’ said Tobias. ‘He was dressed in tatters, his hands shook, he hadn’t had a bath for gods know how long, his hair had lumps of dried puke in it. He looked about twelve. He looked like someone had just nicked his favourite toy. He looked like he’d wet himself if someone spoke to him.’
The buildings around the quayside were so tall they blocked out the light. They were built of black stone. Looked like teeth. Lodging houses, whole families living five, ten people to a room. So inhabited by a lot of people. So a lot more young men looking for a way to prove themselves while making some cash.
‘Mind your backs!’ a voice shouted. A wagon of tin ore went crashing past them. Ith was famous for its tin. Made very good bronze, did Ithish tin. Bronze that kept an edge very well. A troop of soldiers marched past in the other direction.
‘We could still … not do this,’ Tobias said pointlessly. ‘We could just go home again. Boat’s not sailing until tomorrow night.’
Raeta said, ‘We could.’
‘Someone has to be king,’ Tobias said pointlessly.
‘Someone has to use all that Ithish tin,’ said Raeta. ‘All those strong healthy bodies, all that wheat. Couldn’t just leave them alone to sit around doing nothing, could we?’
Another wagon went past, carrying a load of sarriss. The sarriss certainly weren’t pointless.
The boiling mass of people and goods pushed them up the streets further into the city. Dancing on it, like the ship at sea. Whirled round and along. Eager eager crowds: like a festival, the atmosphere in Tyrenae. The air fairly buzzed.
‘We’ll find an inn today.’ Tobias almost had to shout over the chaos. ‘Get the stuff we need tomorrow. Scout out.’ The paving stones were bobbing up and down after days at sea. He felt tired and worn down. His leg was killing him. The crowds shoved past him, looking for the same thing. ‘Watch your backs,’ a voice shouted as a wagon rolled past, almost knocking into him.
They got settled in an inn called The Weeping Woman, beside the west gates, where they could have a cupboard beside the scullery-cum-latrine for double what a room had cost in Morr Town. The west gates, it quickly turned out, being the major point of ingress for the city’s meat supplies and egress for the city’s effluent.
‘Bloody hell,’ said Raeta.
‘That, Raeta, woman, is the true smell of war. Bronze, hot metal, sweaty men’s bodies and all that, yeah, maybe, but twenty thousand tons of human shit and horse shit and cow shit … that’s the authentic odour of glory.’ Tobias’s head was hurting something desperate. In the common room, two women were talking loudly in the harsh rough accents of Immish. Tobias slumped over a beer listening to them. Immish women. His own countrywomen. The older woman had a voice and a turn of phrase that reminded him of his mum.
Back and forth, like a loom working, discussing the beautiful young soldiers, the fine ships in the harbour, the bountiful nature of the new king.
‘A statue spoke aloud, today, in the Great Square,’ said the older woman. ‘A statue of Turnain the Godking. Milk and honey ran from its eyes and its mouth. It spoke in praise of the king.’
‘What did it say?’ the younger woman asked. Her eyes went dreamy, thinking about it. A moment of splendour in her foetid life. She was only perhaps as old as Landra Relast.
‘Milk and honey flowed down from its eyes and its mouth,’ the older woman replied. ‘People caught it in their hands, said it was sweet to drink. Nane elenaneikth, that’s what they say it was saying. Joy to Him.’
‘It was a trick,’ a man at the next table shouted to them. ‘I saw it.’
The two women raised their cups to him. ‘It probably was at that,’ the older woman said. ‘But it spoke. I heard it.’ A pause. ‘Course, I was off my tits on firewine. It might have been saying anything.’
‘We’ll need to get ourselves armour,’ said Raeta. She didn’t look entirely comfortable saying it.
Tobias touched the purse at his neck. ‘I’ve got plenty of blood money, haven’t I?’
They had something resembling a wash and a meal, went out again into the city. Even in the evening twilight, the place was running with people, all the shops and stalls were open. Everyone caught up in the preparations, buying and selling their lives before the war. And it’s remarkably easy, buying arms and armour, when everyone and his wife and his kids and his dog is buying it too. Churning the stuff out night and day. Selling it alarmingly cheap. ‘If you’re fighting for Him,’ the armourer shouted, ‘you can have it at cost. Amrath! Amrath!’ The state of the bloke suggested he hadn’t stopped to eat, or wash, or sleep, for the last week. He looked basically insane. Six children in the back of the shop were hammering bronze as if their lives depended on it, and one stopped for a breath and another screamed ‘Don’t fucking stop!’ and hit him. In the dark, the whole thing was lit by the forge fire. The children’s faces looked scalded red. Fucking hell, thought Tobias, and I thought people were looking to make money out of this.
‘If you’re joining the Army of Amrath, joy to you!’ a woman shouted, seeing them gathered at the shop door.
‘It’ll be ready in three days,’ said the armourer. ‘Can’t do quicker than that, I’m afraid. Rushed off my feet.’
Part of Tobias thought: too slow. Too slow, damnit.
Part of Tobias thought: three more days!
‘So I’ll have a scout around tomorrow morning,’ said Tobias. ‘Get things sorted.’
Raeta nodded. Landra nodded. The children’s hammers came down and it was too fucking symbolic. Like all this shit.
They went back to the inn in silence. Condemned bloody men. Three days of life. The common room was filled with singing and laughter, the two women hawking themselves unsteadily, toasts and shouts of ‘Illyr! Illyr!’ Tobias ran into Sweet Face. She was wearing a very nice dress and jewels, drinking beer with two soldiers of the Army of Amrath.
‘Tobe!’ she shouted, waving at him. ‘Fancy seeing you here! Isn’t this fun? Aren’t you so glad you came? Get him a beer, Acol,’ Sweet Face ordered one of her friends.
Depressingly, she looked plumper and in better health than she had back in Morr Town. War is always good for some people.
‘Oh, yeah. Definitely.’
Friend came back with a cup of beer. You could almost smell the beer over the stink in the air.
‘To Illyr,’ Friend said. He, Sweet Face and Lover clunked cups. Tobias reluctantly joined in.
‘My grandpas died in Illyr,’ said Lover. ‘Both of them. Never even got their bodies back to bury. One of the survivors said he thought the Illyians ate them.’ A long pull of beer. ‘Can’t fucking wait to get stuck into them back.’
‘I need to see my brother,’ Raeta said the next morning. She looked like Tobias felt. Lying awake all night, all three of them, thinking ‘I should be doing something, I’ve got three days left of life, I shouldn’t be trying to sleep.’
Left Landra in the inn. ‘I’ll bring you back a meat pie,’ Tobias told her. She winced.
Again, the city was bustling, bursting with people, have they slept at all? Tobias thought. Detritus of last night mixed with the filth of the morning. All bathed over with fresh light rain. The sun through the rain was silver. It felt good on Tobias’s eyes. Soft; soothed them. He was noticing these things more, it occurred to him.
He walked fast, up towards the fortress of Malth Tyrenae. Listing in his head all the things he needed to find out. Gates that were open. Gates that weren’t. Soldiers’ marching patterns. Ideal plan: march in with a whole load of soldier boys, swords drawn, faces eager, yada yada yada, march up to Marith, kill him. Easy. Only three more days of staying in an inn that stinks of shit.
A shadow fell on him. All the plans gone from his head. Easy? Easy? Just give up and die now. Kill yourself.
So cold.
He was standing in the shadow of Malth Tyrenae. Towers thrusting themselves up shredding the sky. A scream, a curse against happiness; someone, something, had taken stone and wood and iron and built all of life’s pain. It was almost pitiful thinking of someone trying to live there. I am not going in there, Tobias thought. Gods, no way in hell am I going in there. Several thousand years of people torturing each other, in there. Eltheri Calboride watched his parents murdered, in there. Undyl Silver Eyes killed his own children, in there. Until Ysleta his sister killed him. In there.
A troop of soldiers marched up to the gateway. Huge black gates open to admit them. Fools! he wanted to shout. Go back! Go back! Go and live in bloody boring peace, like I once did. They marched in with their heads high, armour gleaming, the tramp of their feet was musical. The open gates yawned after them. The shadow of the towers seemed to devour them.
How much do I really value Lady Landra Relast’s life? Tobias thought. Like, really? She’s so keen on killing him. Get her in, armed and smiling. Leave her there and leg it halfway across Irlast.
That’s, like, my job.
Thirty men had marched into the Imperial Palace of the Asekemlene Emperor. Four men had marched out.
A wagon laden with grain sacks went in through the open gate, the driver singing cheerfully to the oxen pulling it. Two men on horseback rode out of the gate.
Tobias drew back in horror as Thalia rode out after them. She was all dressed in white, a white cloak trimmed in thick gold fur. She looked more beautiful than he had ever seen her.
He was wrapped up against the rain and she didn’t see him. She rode off down into the city. ‘Out into the forest,’ he heard her say to the men guarding her.
Stood by the walls and watched after her for a long time. The rain stopped.
Another troop of soldiers marched up, so young some of them looked, their armour badly put on because they didn’t have a clue what they were doing. Their armour smelled new. New leather, new forged metal, gods, some of them you’d think their swords and helmets were still hot from the forge they looked so new and bright. Disappeared into the gate.
Thought of the nice eager young men he’d led to their deaths, in the Free Company of the Sword, because Skie had paid him.
The open gate was like a hole in the world. His head felt full of screaming. It sounded like Marith’s voice screaming. Echoing round and round, screaming for death. Shook his head and stared, wondered that the whole damn city couldn’t hear it.
No, he thought. I kill Marith myself, and I die, and that’s the best fucking thing for both of us.
Three more days of life left.
So a strange few days. As you’d expect. Sitting in the inn, waiting for death. Landra sat in their tiny room, not speaking, refusing to go out. Waiting. Counting it down. ‘We should have paid more,’ she said, ‘to try and get the stuff sent more quickly. Couldn’t we go back? Offer the man more money?’ She polished her knife and sharpened her knife. She had begun to scare Tobias like Marith did. He and Raeta spent a lot of time in the inn common room or sight-seeing trying not to look at any of the sights of Tyrenae. Avoided being in the same room as Landra with her eyes watching the sun move across the sky only waiting, waiting for her death and Marith’s death.
Two more days of life left.
They went to visit the statue of Turnain the Godking in the Great Square. Some kind of sticky, milky smelling something was indeed dripping down its marble face. Which was a shame, as Tobias had always kind of wondered what the Godking of Caltath could possibly look like, and now he’d never know. People were collecting the stuff in cups, rubbing their hands in it. Flies buzzing all over it.
One more day of life left.
Been close to death so many times. But never quite knowing, like this. Always assumed in the back of his mind, no matter how bad, even when he’d been fighting the dragon — always assumed he’d survive. Your own death’s an impossible thing to think about.
If all goes well, tomorrow, this time tomorrow, I’ll be dead and Marith’ll be dead. How can you really think about that?
Stood and watched the sun set over the walls of Tyrenae. Last fucking sunset. Three helmets, three mail shirts, a small sword for Landra were delivered to the inn as the evening light was fading. Cheap, ugly, rough work. The boys carrying it all ran off exhausted, more orders to deliver. Everyone in the city armed and waiting.
‘Dinner and drinks are on me!’ the landlord shouted, when he saw the equipment. ‘Conquer Illyr for us, Tobe!’ Seated them at the best table, served them stale bread, stale butter, meat stew that was nothing on the stew at the inn in Morr Town. It smelled greasy and not entirely appetizing over the smell of human shit and animal shit. Predictable: this is our last night alive, so the food’s inedible and the drink’s worse. Tobias took a long swig of beer that tasted of piss over the smell of shit.
Sweet Face at another table was eating stew with her mouth open, had slopped some down her dress. Tobias’s leg was aching like a bastard. He let out a belch and tasted rancid stew again. He thought: fuck, but I liked being alive. Looked at all the people crowded into the inn gulping down beer and stew and talking and laughing, a bloke had his arm round Sweet Face’s waist. You all like being alive, thought Tobias. And tomorrow I’ll be dead, and if I fail, a few days after tomorrow you’ll all be dead.
Fuck, Tobias thought slowly, why do we all do this?
Sweet Face came over, maybe seeing him looking like death and murder. Tried to chat. Hard to chat. She had stew round her mouth. Terrible fear he’d tell her. That it’d burst out of him. ‘Guess what I’m going to do tomorrow, Sweet Face? Want to give me a last kiss?’
‘I like your necklace,’ Tobias said at last, desperately.
Sweet Face giggled. ‘Have a look. Isn’t it lovely?’
Now he was actually looking at it, it was. Gold and amber, fine thin links like it had been spun. Very fancy. Meant leaning in close to her chest, too.
‘Acol found it just this morning,’ Sweet Face said. ‘In a latrine dump. Isn’t that a joke? Wiped the shit off and it was beautiful.’
One night of life left. Tobias watched Landra sharpen and polish her knife. Sharpened and polished his own knife.
‘What if we can’t find him?’ said Landra. ‘What if he’s closeted away in a throne room somewhere, guarded by forty men?’
‘Then we wait until he comes out,’ said Tobias.
Raeta said, ‘We’ll find him.’
Yeah. They would. A huge bloody fortress, but they’d find him.
‘He’s the king,’ said Tobias. ‘I think it’ll be pretty obvious where he is.’
They went to bed early. Two options, the night before you’re going to die. As Raeta and Landra were with him, Tobias chose the sensible one.
Tobias thought: I could betray them and run I could I could.
Raeta and Landra were asleep beside him, like they weren’t worried or scared. Slow gentle sound of Landra’s breathing. Smell of her breath. Smell of her hair.
One night of life left.
Comforting, like.