Mordraud, Book One (56 page)

Without knowing why
, Gwern asked himself if Saiden had caused it.

“
What?”

“
Down there.”

Saiden p
ointed below, to what should have been the theatre of ruins the tower stood on, but was instead distorted by enormous snow mounds. Mounds that looked like suffocated houses, given their height.

“
But where are we?”

“
A village just outside Eld. Towards the north, a couple of days’ travel from the fief.”

“
But... before we were...”

“
We’re not really here,” replied Saiden, vaguely annoyed. “Stop asking all the questions and look around you.”

Gwern sc
anned invisible streets and envisaged neighbourhoods and houses, but the snow made everything one single mass. No people, no trees. A pure white desert. As a landscape, it was very different to what it should have been. Yet, beneath his feet a tower stood strong. It made no sense.

“
It’s not possible.”

“
I’m endowing you with my sight in this precise moment,” exclaimed Saiden, slightly irritated. “Now stop it and focus.”

“
Where is everyone?” asked Gwern in dismay.

“
They’ve died of cold. The smartest have journeyed to Eld, in the hope of finding something they can eat or burn.”

“
What a terrifying winter...”

“
Hmm... Perhaps you still haven’t got it.”

Saiden
pointed again towards the frozen wilderness. “Look closer.”

Gwern
concentrated on the spot his teacher was indicating, but saw nothing. Only by sharpening his eyes did he notice a dark patch vibrating on the white background.

“
Is that a bear?! It shouldn’t even be awake in cold like this. What’s it doing out of hibernation? And so near Eld?!”

Gwern
squinted to break a film of ice, and withstood a second shiver that shook through his guts. “It looks very thin. It might not be a bear... Maybe it’s a big stray dog...”

“
It’s not a dog. It really is a bear. And it hasn’t woken up for a snack. Its hibernation should have been well over by now.”

“
What?!”

“
Do you know what day it is today?” asked Saiden without replying.

“
No, I’ve lost track... I don’t know how long’s gone by. I’d say it’s a little after the Rite of Winter’s Eve, when the war usually ceases... Even though I didn’t think I’d already been here a year.”

“
Indeed, you haven’t been here a year. It’s a bit longer.”

“
Really?!” Gwern burst out in amazement. “Yet it feels as if so little has passed... But... wait a moment, sir... It was late autumn when I first came to your tower...”

“
Indeed.”

“
Therefore... How can that be...?”

“
I’ll ask you again: in your opinion, what day is it today?”

Saiden
smiled as if he found that murderous cold highly amusing.

“
I don’t know... I really don’t know...” replied Gwern.

“
Does the Cherry Harvest sound about right?”

“
But that’s late spring!” Gwern was struggling for breath, and words. “Absolutely not!”

“
Oh, yes, it does make sense. So... you’re standing outside your house, you see this snow storm... It shouldn’t still be winter, but well into spring. Someone, somewhere far from here, is chanting. And he’s doing it rather skilfully. However, you’re unaware of that for the time being. You can do little more than place your faith in a divine curse, am I right?”

Gwern
looked around, seized by total confusion.

“
Well then, if a mere chant can trigger such a winter, that means men can outstrip the Gods’ power?!”

“
And so?”

“
I don’t understand any of it...”

“
Go on, push yourself.”

“
But I don’t even know how we managed to
move
to get
here!”

“
All too complicated,” Saiden cut him short. His eyes shone peculiarly – an even blend of snow white and pastel blue.

“
But how can it already be spring, with all this snow?! There must be a mistake!” reaffirmed Gwern.

“
Answer my question.”

Gwern
stood numbly on the glass roof and began shivering uncontrollably. It was too cold. The scene was appallingly depressing. Everything was dead and frozen. The whole world buried by an immense shroud of the purest snow.

He glanced at
Saiden, in the hope that he would stretch out a helping hand. But he was contemplating the boy’s pain with not the slightest pity. The air swirled around him, strangely sliced into eddying drools of frost. As if his body were surrounded by threads of invisible energy.

It alm
ost seemed as if his teacher were
split from reality
, untouched by the blizzard.

“
If chanting can make you more powerful than the Gods,” whispered Saiden malevolently, “then now, here facing this absurd storm covering all things, can you state with certainty who is man, and what separates him from being a god? Is a mere chant enough? A few perfectly intertwined lines, a melody shaped by a choir in admirable harmony... Can these really overturn reality so drastically? Or does there necessarily have to be a force to draw on, one that goes beyond any divine or mortal form?”

A tremor took
Gwern’s breath away. The fit that had been so long in the brewing finally surfaced, with the violence of a punch in the mouth, accompanied by a jittery and hysteric cry.

“
How, my friend, can the Gods exist – even just one – when we can be far more powerful than them?”

Saiden p
icked him up off the floor and took him back inside the tower. Gwern had fainted halfway through his speech.

“
It would be a mundane god, don’t you think?” he concluded, chuckling softly.

“Master Adraman is about to set off.”

“
I know, Adrina. What is it you want?”

“
Don’t you want to go down and say goodbye?”

“
I already said my goodbyes last night.”

Deanna
listened to the servant’s steps fade away, and then returned her attentions to her needle and thread. One of her loveliest dresses – a long fitted garment in dark purple wool trimmed with fur – had lost three of its buttons. Deanna felt a shiver run up her legs, climb her thighs and melt across her back just at the thought of how they’d come off.

‘
I can’t take it to the dressmaker... It would be the third one this week.’

She was rather good at sewing
. Her mother had taught her various stitches when she was still a child, and she’d never forgotten them. But her mind wandered too much for her to handle the needle dextrously. She’d already pricked herself several times, and had had to suck her finger often to clean up the blood. It tasted of liquid iron.

She
and Mordraud had become rather resourceful at secluding themselves without being noticed. At night in the woodshed, or the tool-room next to the stables, when the cold condensed their breath into thick white clouds, and the darkness unveiled all their fantasies. Or in the reading room, or even in the kitchen, when the whole household was asleep, and they had to go slowly, in silence. They’d taken extreme risks in broad daylight, hidden away in some tiny abandoned courtyard Mordraud had stumbled on during his solitary walks. The brutal violence of their first encounters had mellowed and fragmented. Mordraud was at times gentle, others aggressive. He would dominate, but occasionally he would want to be dominated, which was the way she enjoyed it most. They were two lovers at their first forays, and they studied each other as in a duel. They spoke little, but felt even less need for it.

‘
Sooner or later we’ll devour each other like animals,’ she considered, while finishing the second button. ‘Because that’s what we are... hungry beasts.’

Adraman
suspected nothing. Being a cuckold husband had its unwitting advantages. He could possess his wife when he wished, without quarrels and without protests. Deanna no longer ousted him from the marital bed, as she had done so many times before. Her role was very similar to work, but she avoided dwelling on this too often. Guilt pangs were always just round the corner, ready to leap at her throat. Occasionally, as she waited to hear Adraman’s breathing grow heavy with sleep, she felt like a whore. Other times, like a good wife – when she saw him smile with his eyes shut, satiated under the covers, safe in his home.

A drop of
blood had escaped her lips and was penetrating the purple fabric of her dress. Deanna was entranced by the red pattern developing before her eyes – a mark she would once have found intolerable, yet at that moment it struck her as beautiful and fascinating in its own way. The blood ganglions grew, anchoring into the weave of the wool. The perfect circle started to deform, under the thrust of chaos. It echoed the bloom of an imaginary flower.

‘
It looks like a snowflake.’

Maybe she was getting everything wrong
.

She
’d never felt so alive.

***

“BEHIND YOU!”

“
WHERE?!”

Mordraud
saw the lance fly out of the freezing mist, hit his comrade’s back square on, and drag him onto the ice like a broken toy. The ground was rough marble. Nothing could be seen, nothing could be heard. Only the sound of hooves, a few swords bashing on metal, and the odd cry of pain. It was morning, yet it was as if the sun had forgotten to rise.

“
Mordraud!”

“
ADRAMAN?!”

Enemies
all around. Corpses and wounded men heaped up on blood-soaked snow.

“
Adraman? WHERE ARE YOU?!”

“
Here...”

Mordraud
’s guts picked up on the hiss of a lance lowered towards his chest. The fog shifted like a curtain, and a horseman appeared. Mordraud tried to sidestep, but his legs were ice. A shimmering white patina covered him from head to toe, even stopping him from keeping his eyes properly open. He waited. The spear was a whisper away from his face, but he grabbed its tip. A yank knocked the rider to the ground, and he took a heavy blow on the compact snow. He refused to release his hold on his beloved lance, so Mordraud smashed him in the teeth with its grip. A few controlled movements. It was like fighting inside a frozen lake.

“
Mordraud...”

“
Adraman!” he shouted, but his voice seemed to hover just beyond his mouth, raining to the ground in icy slivers. “Carry on talking! Talk to me!”

“
My horse... Its heart’s burst...”

Mordraud
was unaware how the battle was going. Impossible to see, impossible to understand. It was the twentieth day running that Cambria had attacked. Targeted assaults, with sizeable heavy infantry and always fresh troops. Under normal conditions, the Empire would never have been able to even dream of capturing the Rampart with that taunting. Under normal conditions.

“
Adraman, can you hear me?!”

“
Yes...”

“
Say something!”

“
Curse the sodding Gods...”

“
That’s it, Adraman.”

Mordraud
’s foot slipped on the frozen chest of a corpse the snow had partially buried. A lad he’d seen around now and then; perhaps the youngster had even joined his company. His face was black and shrivelled, like a lump of coal.

“
Carry on!”

It was
Red. He thought back to his friend while they drank together. While they played dice. The last time he’d seen him alive was four or five days earlier, at his side, as they advanced beyond the Rampart.

He hadn
’t even noticed Red had failed to come home that night. How long since he’d slept, he asked himself in alarm.

“
How long’s it been going on, Mordraud?”

Fog as dense as milk.
Adraman’s voice was growing nearer. A soft white light enveloped all, reflected from metallic skies and the ice-clad earth

“
Ten months, more or less.”

“
Ten... months...”

Three
soldiers materialised like ghouls a pace from him. Hard to say whether they were friends or foe. The world was white. Their features, their hair, their eyes. Their protections all looked the same. Mordraud squeezed his sword hilt, but had to look at his hand to be sure it was still there. His fingers were completely numb. His nose was a stone planted between two crushed cheekbones.

“
Cambria?” he croaked at the three strangers. Their swords were lifted menacingly in full response. They seemed rested, just a sprinkling of fresh snow on their shoulders and helmets. Mordraud dodged the first lunge, and his bones crackled with the frost. He’d now learnt how to fight while submerged in icy water.

F
ew.

Calculated
.

Movements
.

A
sword-tip placed between two breastplates, seeking out unprotected flesh. Fending it off would mean the loss of an arm. His nerves couldn’t withstand the vibrating of the steel, the blow of the two blades as they clashed. He’d never noticed how many weak points armour might offer up. The armpit, or the cavity between the legs. Mordraud used them all, meticulously. The last one was the toughest. Before dying, the Cambrian foot-soldier settled a punch full in Mordraud’s face. His teeth rattled in his mouth, and the skin on his cheek split like wet paper.

“
Adraman!”

His
mouth was oozing blood, but at least it was warm. Extremely warm. If it weren’t so excruciating, it might even be a pleasant sensation.

“
How many are there?! I can’t... get free...”

“
I’ve seen to it, don’t worry. The battle must be over. There aren’t that many around now.”

“
I can’t feel my legs...”

Mordraud
clambered up a mound of snow and slid down the other side. A slab of ice studded with bodies. Many foe, many friends. Eldain’s men never gave in, but they’d almost used up all their resources. They fought with nerve, sinew and bone.

“
Here I am, Adraman.”

Mordraud
spotted the slumped mass of a horse emerge from the mist, along with four or five soldiers who lay face up in pools of their own steaming blood, plus Adraman. The accursed snow gave no sign of stopping. His friend was now practically buried beneath the dead animal and flakes as big as walnuts.

“
Help me, pull me out from under here!”

Adraman
was in a bad way. A nasty gash on his forehead and a shoulder in poor shape, but he was still breathing. His torso wasn’t crushed and the cold hadn’t yet claimed him.

Mordraud
dug in a leg beneath the horse’s back, bent over, and began shoving. Adraman tried to haul himself out but was lacking the strength.

“
Come on, Adraman, put yourself into it! This beast weighs a tonne!”

“
I can’t move them...” Adraman’s face contracted in sheer panic. “My legs... WATCH OUT!”

Mordraud
glanced over his shoulder and saw it. Black and gold armour. A horse rigged out in the same colours. An Imperial Lance.

He did
n’t dare release his hold on the lump of animal. He might break Adraman’s legs – if they weren’t already broken. His sword was on the ground, out of reach. The Lance decided not to charge, opting for more drastic action: he circled them, stopped opposite, and began chanting in hush tones. His voice played with the snow, a black snowflake in a sea of white.

“
Go on, Mordraud, run! Take cover!”

“
I wouldn’t even think of it!”

Mordraud
dug his feet into the snow and pressed down as firmly as he could beneath the horse’s body. He managed to prop the animal up with his back and an arm, freeing Adraman’s legs. The Lance raised his hands towards him and a light began hovering between his fingers – a green light Mordraud had seen many a time.

“
MORDRAUD!” Adraman yelled in despair, but the young man replied merely with a half-smile. Three flashes flew in the fog and crashed one after another into his chest. Three blows with an astounding force. Mordraud felt his body splinter into a thousand pieces under the burden of an impossible pain. He smelt the stench of his hair, of his singed flesh. Threads of smoke floated up from his charred leather cladding.

But
his hand had already reached the dagger he kept strapped to his thigh. His one free hand.

A flick of the wrist. His aim calculated on the fleeting instant, with eyes clouded by the mist. The shot.

The dagger lodged in the Lance’s uncovered neck, and he crumpled to the ground without even a cry.

“
Thanks, Mercy...” he muttered, as he went back to pushing at the dead beast. He was the one who’d taught Mordraud to throw the kitchen knives. Adraman’s legs were finally out from under the horse, and the young man could collapse to the ground. His whole chest was burnt. The air just didn’t want to penetrate his lungs. The flashes had left him with an unpleasant green shadow printed on his sight.

“
You’re a fool, a frigging fool!”

Adraman
had dragged himself to Mordraud’s side with his hands and, after unleashing a couple of feeble punches at his shoulder, slumped on top of him, drained of energy.

“
I told you to get out of here. Why didn’t you listen to me?! Look what they’ve done to you...”

‘
Hey, I’m not dead yet!’ Mordraud began, but his voice didn’t come out as it should have. It was more a wheeze, an inarticulate scrape.

‘
He didn’t kill me, I’m still alive!’

“
Why did you do it, my boy?!”

Adraman
was weeping. His tears froze among the shaggy bristles of his beard. Mordraud found this oddly amusing.

“
Why did you go and get yourself killed?”

‘
But I’m not dead!’ he’d liked to have yelled, but he couldn’t. Perhaps it was the cold, or the exhaustion. Or the three fireballs he’d taken square in the chest. He didn’t know. His body had stopped taking orders from him. Adraman was sobbing desperately. If his friends had seen him then, they’d have taunted him mercilessly.

‘
I’m... not... dead!’

Then a doubt began to spread
.

‘
Is this what it’s like to die? Is this what you see?’

“
Mordraud...”