Defiant Peaks (The Hadrumal Crisis) (47 page)

Shame was more lacerating than the creature’s talons now digging into his shoulders. He was no warrior when he couldn’t even safeguard this defenceless scholar. He was failing Micaran just as he had failed every last one of those Halferan men enslaved alongside him. He was truly only fit for chains.

Chains. Corrain swung his feet upwards and forwards with all his might, arching his back so violently that his knees left the ground. If it could claw him then he could surely hit back and that heavy loop of chain striking the Kinsman’s back should give it something to think about.

The creature sprang away with a venomous gasp. As soon as he he was relieved of its weight, Corrain rolled over, his fists ready.

The Kinsman crouched like a wrestler, its unnatural mouth wide in a menacing snarl. Corrain got slowly to his feet as he waited for the creature to make the first move. He was more concerned with assessing Micaran’s plight.

He could see the adept huddled on the ground with his knees drawn up and his arms wrapped around his head. Micaran was doing nothing to fight off the Eldritch Kin. His shirt was a bloodstained mess of rags and Corrain could see bright lifeblood pumping from a rip in his breeches to stain the dry turf.

‘Micaran!’

As he yelled, the Kinsman leaped forward, clawed hands spread and fangs bared. Corrain dived straight at it, ready to wrestle it to the ground and snap its neck if he could.

Instead, he felt a paralysing chill as he passed straight through its shadowy body once again. The only constant in this fight seemed to be inconsistency. No matter. Only the remaining four stood between him and Micaran. He just had to get the scholar away before the murderous creatures ripped the fool to shreds—

‘You can strike them when you’re angry enough but you can’t hurt them,’ the Soluran observed, leaning against an oak tree. ‘They’re not your fear.’

Corrain halted. ‘Who are you? Why are you doing this?’

The Soluran smiled with malice to equal any of the Eldritch Kin. ‘I’m the man who knows what you fear most.’

The Kinsmen now looming over Micaran tore at his quivering flesh. Their taloned hands were bloodied to the elbow, wet stains dark on their dusky blue skin.

But Corrain had seen the evil creatures standing immobile while the Soluran was speaking. His silence had loosed them to renew their attack.

‘What do you think you know about me?’ he challenged him.

In the next instant, the Soluran was at his side, whispering into his ear. ‘I know that you fear losing those who look to you to defend them. I know that you fear seeing them die while you look on, unable to do anything to save them. I know that you fear dying alone, so far from home that no one ever knows what has become of you, only wondering if you failed or you fled to live out your days in disgrace.’

Corrain couldn’t help shuddering. The Eldritch Kinsman at his other shoulder hissed with satisfaction. Its spittle stung his cheek, sharp as frost. The Soluran chuckled and Micaran screamed.

Corrain couldn’t look away. Micaran wept, his defiance weakening. His arms sagged to leave his head unprotected. His eyes were screwed tight closed as his mouth gaped in a silent scream of terror.

One of the Eldritch Kin clawed at his head, ripping locks of hair from his scalp. The pale bone of Micaran’s skull showed through the bloody gashes. Another stabbed at his hand, time and again until the scholar struck out, flailing wildly in vain hope of evading such torment.

The Eldritch Kinsman thrust its talons deep into his forearm. Micaran couldn’t shake off its grip so the creature wrenched his arm wide. The third creature sprang forward to rake at his face. Micaran barely managed to block its blow with his free hand.

Corrain’s warning died in his throat, bitter as ashes. That was just the move his attackers had wanted the scholar to make. The third Kinsman dug its claws deep into Micaran’s wrist, securing a firm hold. The two creatures pinioning him cackled with terrible glee as they dragged his arms wide.

The last Kinsman advanced, hissing with delight. It drew one talon delicately down the side of Micaran’s face. Blood gushed from the wound, oozing down his neck.

The mentor suddenly thrashed in his captors’ grip. Where he had been weeping in utter despair, now he bellowed with furious defiance.

Corrain’s heart soared. ‘Fight back! You know they’re not real!’

What did this Soluran know? He was right about Corrain hating the memory of chains and being stripped of his weapons but he hadn’t been most afraid of dying in this northern forest. This was where he’d come in hopes of finding a wizard, only to secure the Mandarkin Anskal’s services and to double and redouble Halferan’s misfortunes.

True enough, Corrain was terrified of his guilt being revealed and he had buried that dread deep in his innermost heart. But such fear still came second to the nightmare of finding himself back on the corsair island. If the Soluran knew that, surely this forest would have been fringe trees and ironwoods, not oak and hazel thickets?

In the blink of an eye, the Soluran was on the far side of the clearing. The Eldritch Kinsman hissing at his side was nowhere to be seen. Corrain took a long stride forward, free of his fetters. He took another step, ready to drag the vile creatures off Micaran.

Too late. Even as the scholar fought to free himself from the two holding down his arms, the third slashed at his face and neck in sudden frenzy. Blood sprayed high into the air and Micaran slumped insensible between the Eldritch Kinsmen. The creatures crowed with exultation as they ripped into his chest and stomach to eviscerate him.

A horse whickered irritably at the rankness of murder tainting the sweet woodland air.

Corrain spun around to see the man from Wrede, dressed as he had been in Ferl, riding the same bay colt.

The man pursed his lips. ‘This hardly seems fair.’

‘Who are you?’ Corrain was ready to pull the man clean from his saddle. He wanted to get his hands around someone’s neck today.

‘That doesn’t matter.’ The man smiled. ‘What matters is what you believe.’ He jerked his head beyond Corrain. ‘Do you believe you can kill him? If so, you can avenge your friend.’

Corrain heard a twig snap behind him, as though someone had taken an incautious step. Turning as quickly as he could, he saw the Soluran barely a pace away, staring with horror at his own foot.

The Eldritch Kin had disappeared. Micaran lay limp in a welter of blood.

The Soluran looked at Corrain, aghast.

The Soluran ran. Corrain chased him. Without any clear path, the undergrowth was thick enough to hamper the desperate Soluran. Not thick enough to slow Corrain with the prospect of vengeance before him.

Birds flew up from the thickets, calling loudly, harsh with fright. Corrain ignored them along with the thorns raking his bare arms and the brambles tearing his unprotected shins. If such discomfort was real then so was the Soluran.

He was gaining with every step. Now the man was almost within reach. With a sudden lunge, Corrain seized hold of his cloak. He hauled on the cloth, twisting to use his body weight to bring the Soluran down.

The clasp at the cloak’s collar gave way with an audible snap. No matter. The man was staggering sideways in a vain attempt to regain his balance.

Corrain was on him, wrapping his arms around him and bearing him down to the ground. As the Soluran writhed, Corrain twisted to get on top of him. He drove his knee into the man’s groin to cut his struggles short with a shrill yelp of pain.

The Soluran doubled up around his agony. Corrain got one hand around his throat and forced his head backwards, driving his other fist deep into the man’s midriff just for good measure. The Soluran retched, about to vomit.

Corrain clamped the hand he’d just used to punch him over the man’s face, to hold his nose and mouth closed. Drowning on his own spew would kill the bastard just as surely as a blade and Corrain had nothing to cut his thrice-cursed throat.

The Soluran tried to dig his nails into Corrain’s hands. His fingertips slipped on the sweat and muck coating the Caladhrian’s skin. Corrain tightened his grip around the man’s throat, feeling for the vessels carrying blood to Micaran’s murderer’s brain.

The Soluran struggled more frantically. Corrain pinned him with a brutal knee just below his ribs. As he brought all his weight to bear, the man’s thrashing weakened. Corrain didn’t yield, not about to be caught out by that brawler’s trick.

The hired gig swayed as they rounded a corner. Corrain grabbed frantically for the rail. Micaran’s body slid across the seat and the adept’s dead weight almost tipped them both out onto the cobbles.

The driver glanced over his shoulder as he felt his vehicle so perilously unbalanced. ‘Is your friend all right?’

Corrain searched desperately for any sign of life; the faintest breath or the slightest hint of Micaran’s heart still beating to be found at wrist or neck.

‘Get us to Tolekan Street,’ he yelled. ‘As quick as you can!’

Or should he direct the gig to the Red Library? Could Master Garewin and one of his fellow adepts work some marvel? If Micaran wasn’t truly lost but somehow held at Saedrin’s threshold? For an endless moment, Corrain clung to that frailest of hopes; that Micaran’s undeserved fate wouldn’t be another death to be laid to his account.

Then brutal reason reasserted itself. Corrain had seen enough dead men to know that he held Micaran’s corpse in his arms.

Tears trickled down his cheeks even as he felt rage burning beneath his breastbone.

What of the Soluran? He could only hope that somewhere in this city, the bastard’s body lay just as lifeless.

Though that wouldn’t be the end of it, not by a long measure. Not once Corrain called down Hadrumal’s vengeance on whoever was behind the murderous adept. As long as some wizardry could find out who that might be. Despite himself, doubt closed cold fingers around Corrain’s heart.

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY-
F
IVE

Tolekan Street, Col

33rd of Aft-Winter

‘T
HEN
I
PLACED
the artefacts in the Archmage’s keeping.’ Jilseth couldn’t recall when she’d last picked her way through a conversation so carefully but satisfying the Col mage’s curiosity about events in Halferan was the price of him telling her whatever he knew or suspected of Jagai dealings in Col.

So far she was telling the truth as long as Olved didn’t ask her what Planir had done with the Khusro treasures after that. She still hoped to avoid telling him a bare-faced lie, not least because she had got the worst of this deal. Olved could only tell her that the Jagai domain’s shipmasters traded with this city’s merchants with no more and no less duplicity on either side than occurred in any port from here to Zyoutessela.

Olved leaned forward in his chair on the other side of the fireplace with its merrily dancing fire. ‘Has Khusro Rina told the other warlords what his wives are doing?’

‘Not as far as we know.’ Jilseth explained before Olved could press her in his tiresomely impatient fashion. ‘The Archipelagan Kheda tells us that their voyage hasn’t been kept a sworn secret since that would suggest they had something underhand to hide when this finally comes to light.’

She shrugged. ‘On the other hand, the only people who know of this trip are those directly involved, such as the crew of the galley which brought them to Attar. As far as their visit to Halferan itself is concerned, only their personal bodyslaves accompanied the women and by all Aldabreshin custom and practise, no one can demand that those men reveal their mistresses’ business, not even Khusro Rina himself.’