The Bitterbynde Trilogy (4 page)

Massive rectangles of fabric covered the stone walls from floor to ceiling. Across them blazed spectacular scenes of forests, mountains, battles, gardens—scenes the lad recognized with that primeval instinct, but which he could not recall ever having beheld. On closer inspection, he perceived that the landscapes were in fact composed of countless tiny stitches in colored threads.

A voice from farther along the corridor jolted him into a panic. He sensed he should not be here, guessed he would be punished severely if caught. There was no time to dash back to the stair-head. Softly he sidestepped behind the nearest tapestry, flattening himself against the cold stone of the wall.

Two men strolled leisurely into view. Their raiment was simple in design but sewn of sumptuous fabrics. The first, clad in black velvet edged with silver, was pontificating to the second, who wore brocade in the colors of a Summer sunset.

“… lower third of the structure,” he expounded, “which is occupied by the servants, was long ago hewn from a massive bulwark of living rock. Those levels are riddled with natural caves and tunnels extended by excavation, while the upper levels, reserved exclusively for us, are constructed of huge blocks of dominite mined out from those diggings. Internal and external stairways spiral their way between the multiple levels, but of course we of the House only travel in the lift-cages.”

“What are the stairways for, then?” asked the second man, demonstrating remarkable obtuseness. Magnanimously, the first lord gushed on, gesturing with his pale hands, while the menial behind the tapestry trembled in his rags.

“The servants are arranged according to a complicated hierarchy. The lower ranks, being forbidden to ride up and down between levels in the busy lift-shafts, must needs use the stairways, which reach the ground at exits near the domestic goat caves. Forbidden to trespass in the higher regions of the Tower, they pursue their drudgeries out of sight of their betters. Only the higher echelons of servant are permitted to personally serve the lords and ladies of the Tower. They use the upper stairs or, on rare occasions, the lift-cages.”

He cleared his throat.

“You, my dear peddler, who visit Isse Tower from regions rife with warm underground springs, will be interested to discover how our bathwater is heated for the Relayers and our scented ladies.”

“Mmph,” was the grunted response.

“All heating here on the upper floors is achieved by means of an ingenious furnace.”

“Extraordinary,” mumbled the orange guest.

“Extraordinary? But no,” contradicted the black-and-silver lord. “Isse Tower is, after all, the chief stronghold of an ancient and powerful dynasty second only to royalty. We of the Seventh House of the Stormriders deserve only superlative service for our creature comforts!”

“Which no doubt is well earned, as compensation for being forced to dwell in such an island as this,” said the visitor somewhat sourly, “surrounded as you are by wights and wilderness. No doubt you and your servants are rarely able to leave the Tower, or never, unless you go with a well-guarded caravan.”

“On the contrary, we come and go on the sky-roads as we please,” cried the other. “And what matter the servants? It does them good. They are safe here, and well fed—too well fed for the paltry amount of work they do, the lazy gluttons. What need have they to wander?”

Their voices had begun to fade, indicating to the cringing eavesdropper that they had turned around and were pacing away from him. As the conversation died to a whisper, he peeped around the fringed border of the tapestry. The aristocrat and the visiting merchant had indeed vacated the corridor. Instantly the lad darted from his haven and hurtled down the stairs.

But he was not to be so easily reoriented. Frantically, he searched through the lower level for some passageway or gallery he knew. He felt certain the first person he met would redirect him to Floor Five as ungently as possible, but he preferred to try finding his own way—which was why, when he heard an approaching voice for the second time, he concealed himself once more. This time he slid into a dim niche in the wall, between two stone ribs supporting arched vaults.

The figure that wandered into view was that of Mad Mullet, the compost-hauler. His job was to carry vegetable scraps from the kitchens down to the ground. There he blended them with animal dung to form a scrumptious medley for the use of the kitchen-gardeners.

His approach was usually heralded by his odor, and by the curious rambling monologue he voiced wherever he went—a monologue that was barely intelligible at the best of times. As he ranted, he drooled. He was, as his nickname suggested, mad. However, being proud of bearing and regular of feature, he was quite comely to look at, and thus rated higher in the servants' hierarchy than the deformed lad—not that Mad Mullet cared one whit.

Orating, chanting, and singing in a queer high-pitched tone, Mad Mullet passed quite close by the place where the lad crouched, endeavoring to resemble a grotesque carving decorating the wall. The lad noted that the eyes of Mad Mullet appeared unfocused, blank, as if fixed on some distant object that none but lunatics could discern.

On tiptoe, the lad followed him.

Mad Mullet was sometimes wont to frequent the furnace levels. He might lead the way back to Floor Five.

Through the worm-ways went the two, and Mad Mullet never looked back, nor did his step falter. He led the way, but not where the lad had hoped. Without warning, a gust of pure, cold air buffeted the two. Light broke on them like a blue crystal, and they emerged upon a stone-flagged balcony as vast and sheer as the floor of the ballroom.

For the first time, the lad was Outside.

In his awe, he momentarily forgot that he was trying to keep his presence hidden from Mad Mullet. Stumbling to the edge, he gazed out to the horizon, cramming his memory with the scene. When it was filled he looked down, then from left to right, and at last he turned his head and craned upward to discover what loomed above.

Built at the sea's edge, the dominite fortress, black and glistening, towered more than forty stories straight up above the canopy of the surrounding forest. A soaring pile crowned with turrets, battlements, chimneys, and slender watchtowers, the fortress was defined by walled demesnes flanked on one side by a harbor and on the other by a sea of trees.

Balconies randomly toothed the sheer outer walls. Footed by jutting platforms leading nowhere, several arched gateways, set at varying altitudes, faced the four points of the compass. High above ground level, at the seventh story, the circumference of the structure suddenly narrowed on the western side like a giant stair, creating a wide, flat shelf that ended in midair. No parapet or balustrade enclosed this space—instead, a row of iron-capped bollards, evenly spaced, lined the edge. Below, the outer walls of the Tower dropped precipitously—the lad reckoned it was more than a hundred feet—to the ground.

It was here, on this brink, that he was standing.

As he woke to that fact, he woke also to the proximity of the madman beside him. But in the next instant Mad Mullet was no longer at his side, for with a clear cry of “I can fly!” he had stepped joyously from the platform and plummeted to his death.

As the lad later overheard, such “flights” were no uncommon occurrence.

2

THE HOUSE OF THE STORMRIDERS

Tale and Travail

Unremembered, yesterday is extinct
.

Without yesterday, today has no meaning
.

Who are you, if forgotten?

Who are you, but the sum of your memories?

E
RTISH SAYING

Despite being immured within the dark, airless, walled spaces of the Tower, despite the fact that he was badly informed and struggling to comprehend his plight, the foundling came to understand that in some way the existence of Stormrider Houses revolved around horses. The sound of horses echoed from unexpected directions in the dominite cavities, the warm scent of them wafted suddenly to the nostrils from Outside, along with a thicker, avian odor as of caged birds. Horses were hoisted up and down the towers in lift-cages, and horses were kept in stalls in the upper stories. When he began Outside work, the newest and most lowly menial of the House was able to divine their purpose.

One morning the foundling was sent Outside to a balcony, to trounce the dust from floor-rugs. Flat-based cumulus clouds floated tranquilly like latherings of soap bubbles on invisible water, their frayed rims gilded by the dawn. Viewed from high on the balcony, the clouds were almost at eye level. This was the first time the boy had truly ventured into the open air, and excitement made him shiver.

Leaning over the battlements and looking far down, he could see the demesnes laid out like a map—the kitchen gardens, the neglected flower beds, the stables and training yards, the wizard's hall, and glimpses of the rutted road between the trees that overhung it. Horses roamed the meadows, hattocking tracks, training yards, and stables below. They all seemed to be burdened with pairs of panniers slung on either side of their flanks, but what those baskets contained, the watcher could not tell from a distance.

On the other side, a wide, flat expanse of water—Isse Harbor, shimmered like rose-and-gold silk in the morning. From the shore projected a pier on marble stanchions, reaching far out into the bay, with docks and wharves set at intervals along its length. Still standing firm after uncounted centuries, Isse Harbor's wharves had proved a marvel of engineering, a reminder of the lost skills of glorious days long past. Here anchored Waterships of the sea—splendid lily-winged birds of the deep, come from the outland runs to roost at this haven, if only for a while. They brought tidings and trade; their cargo was rich with barrels of pickled meats, fat flavescent cheeses, bales of cloth, sacks of flour and beans, casks of wines and spirits. There were stone jars brimming with honey, preserved and dried fruits, salt meat, sainfoin, stockfeed, leather, pots and porringers, pitchers and porcelain, fragrances, essences, spices, saffron, scrim, shabrack, musk, muslin, madder, purpurin, talmigold, tragacanth, wax, and all other manner of provisions.

The youth's goggling eyes traveled to the north and west. Here, wooded hills rolled gently away to a horizon wrapped in a niveous haze. Beneath the innocent roof of leaves, it was said, roamed all manner of eldritch wights both seelie and unseelie, but although the boy searched, he could see no sign of such incarnations. He had heard that a haunted crater-lake lay nearby to the northwest, and to the east, two miles from the sea, a puzzle most curious—the ancient remains of a Watership, its back broken, wedged in a cleft between two hills. Were such a legend true, the Empire of Erith must indeed be wondrous and perilous.

A satin scarf of a breeze floated up from the forest. In the south, gulls circumaviated Isse Harbor. Dust motes swarmed from the patterned rugs as the youth beat them, causing him paroxysms of sneezing. Reeling, he leaned against the parapet to recover. At that moment his watering eyes saw a sight that assured him he had sneezed his wits out through his nostrils.

At first it seemed to him that high and far off the dark shape of a large bird—an eagle or an albatross—was flying out of the sky in the southeast. Yet, as it approached, the silhouette resolved itself into the shape of a winged horse and rider galloping through powder-puff clouds toward the fortress. The youth blinked and shook his head. A second look cleared any doubt that the vision not only existed, but was closing in rapidly. The rider's head was the skull of a monster, or else he wore a winged helmet with a faceplate. Saddlebags bulged behind his thighs; his cloak billowed. The bird-horse moved fast, but with a strange and unnatural gait, placing its hooves with quick, mathematical precision just below the clouds' condensation level, simultaneously beating its wings in long, graceful arcs.

Sagging against the parapet, the foundling stared. Blood drained from his head. Almost, he fainted. Surely the world must be turned upside down if a horse possessed wings to fly! As he gaped, looking like some rooftop gargoyle, a fanfare issued from a silver trumpet on the ramparts, cleaving the morning air with long, ringing notes. The aerial cavalier reached an upper story of the fortress and entered in at a platform jutting from the outer wall. His heart jumping like a scared rabbit, the youth sank to his bony knees. Then, recalling his task and how he would be beaten more vigorously than the carpet if he were discovered idling, he hastily returned to pounding mats, invoking dust, and sneezing.

Now at last he could make sense of the term he had heard so often—“eotaur.” The word referred to the mighty, horned Skyhorses, the pride of the Stormriders. And it was not the last marvel he was to discover.

Being shunned and ignored was not without its advantages. It meant that the lad was able to go about the mazy ways of the Tower largely unnoticed. He began to ascertain that insignificance was, in many ways, advantageous to his education.

In one instance, he had managed to elude Grethet and find an unobtrusive pantry-nook to doze in, when he was roused by a sound like the cooing of two doves. Within earshot a chambermaid was seated on a cider-barrel, her young child nestling on her lap. The two were conversing.

“… brought news from Namarre,” said the mother softly. “I heard one of the upper-level chambermaids say so.”

“Where is Namarre?” asked the child, snuggling her downy head closer to her mother's shoulder.

“It is very far away.”

“The eotaurs must be truly strong, to be able to gallop from very far away.”

The mother shook her head. “Even the greatest among them has not the strength to come all the way from Namarre without resting. Letters and other air cargo must be relayed. Isse Tower is a Relay Station.”

“What is a Relay Station?”

“One of the staging posts where inland and outland runs meet. At Relay Stations, incoming mounts and Relayers interchange with fresh couriers. Messages and payloads are transferred.”