Kal Moonheart Trilogy: Dragon Killer, Roll the Bones & Sirensbane (19 page)

‘This is the biggest and strangest robbery that I've seen for years,’ Dogwood mused, pacing around the column that held Kal and Zeb. ‘As Captain of the Senate Guard it is my duty to help—’

‘I can give you a description of—’ Kal began.

Dogwood held up a meaty hand right in front of Kal’s face. ‘
It is my duty to help
,’ he repeated, ‘all the senators whose money vanished from your vault tonight. The Snake Pit is closed until further notice, and I'm leaving a squad of my men here on permanent guard. Their first task will be to make an inventory of all assets, so don’t attempt to remove anything from the building.’

Kal couldn’t see the fury in Zeb’s eyes, but she felt the chains pull tight and shake as the owner of the Snake Pit fought against her constraints. The Captain of the Senate Guard just stood and watched with a leering grin on his fat face.

* * *

Finally set free, Kal stumbled home through the balmy dawn. There was no breeze to dry the sweat; she couldn’t decide what she needed more—a bath or her bed. Her rooms were nearer than the bath house, so bed it would be. Kal lived in the attic of a large residential block on the corner of Satos Square—an old textiles factory that had been converted into living quarters. Market traders were usually setting up in the square at this time, but this morning a giant stage was being constructed ready for a concert to celebrate Midsummer.
Just don't wake me up too early in the afternoon
, Kal thought to herself.

She flung open all her windows before getting under a thin cotton sheet. Lying awake, unable to switch off her thoughts, Kal reflected on the day. The so-called
King of Thieves
had taken everything from her; not only had she lost her money, but with the Snake Pit closed, she had also lost the opportunity to quickly recoup her losses. And she had lost the merchants’ documents that she had spent all day chasing around the city after.

What would Ben think when he got to hear about all this? Not since they had first entered the city together, six years ago, had she been in such a pickle. Thinking of Ben, though, she started to relax. There was no problem that Senator Benedict Godsword couldn’t solve by throwing money at. Things would turn out alright in the end, she hoped, even if it meant relying on Ben to tide her over.

Kal fell asleep finally, and in her dreams she travelled back to when she and Ben, both of them penniless and tired after two months’ traveling through the Wild, first caught sight of the white walls of Amaranthium …

* * *

And in the corner of Kal’s bedroom, a black shadow hung, its shining red eyes staring at the outline of her body beneath the sheets. Its wings were folded and its long claws were still … for now. But on Midsummer Night its time would come, and a monster would stalk the city for the first time in half a millennium.

I.v

Arrival

I wouldn’t say that Ben was a father figure—he was only twelve years older than me, after all. And he wasn’t exactly that experienced in the ways of the world, either. Everything he knew, he had read in a book. ‘A traveller should avoid the east bank of the Cold Flow,’ he declared, quoting a popular (but fifty-year-old) guidebook,
Walking the Wild
. ‘There are raptors that hunt around the edges of the Great Lakes.’

Well, it turned out that they might have been less of a problem than the trolls that hunted around the
west
bank.

We spent almost a week hiding up a tree at one point. ‘Don’t worry,’ Ben had said afterwards. ‘When we get to Amaranthium, we’ll be safe. There are no monsters there. It’s been centuries since the walls have been breached.’

No monsters. Just five million people, packed into fifty square miles of urban sprawl, all trying to get along and get ahead.
At least in the Wild there are places to run and hide.

We travelled south through tangled forests and rocky moorland. There were no roads in the Wild, and very few settlements. Like our old home, Refuge, a village needed to be hidden or well-defended, and self-sufficient. It took a certain kind of people to make a life for themselves out here—the kind who accepted that one day their village might be wiped off the map by trolls, goblins, freakwolves … or worse.

In a wooded valley we found a community who had built their huts in the trees above a river. They hardly needed to ever leave their homes, since they could just drop a fishing line down through their floorboards. We received a cautious welcome, but Ben soon won the villagers over. He paid for their hospitality with tales and songs—stories of the gods and their exciting exploits. He was a gifted storyteller, and held everyone in state of enraptured attention, even me who had heard his stories a million times before. I had no doubt he would be able to resume his schoolteaching career once we reached the city.

After the stories, the village priest led us all in a prayer to the forest god, Mena, asking her to safeguard our passage to the city. ‘That’s something else they don’t do in Amaranthium,’ Ben told me as we sat by the fire supping large tankards of honeyed mead. ‘People don’t pray to the gods anymore. They’ve been gone from the world for a thousand years; everyone has given up hope of them ever coming back. If people do visit the temples, it’s to beg the Dragon not to ever show up again.’

‘Let’s just hope that our being there doesn’t encourage him to pay a visit, then,’ I joked.

Ben laughed. ‘I’ll feel safe just so long as you’re by my side, Kal,’ he said. ‘Now, have you had all you can manage of your pint?’

I drained my tankard just to spite him.

* * *

The forests of mountain pine and ash gave way to sweet-smelling cypress and holly oak as we made our way south. The weather improved too; we only every got mild summers in the mountains, but the southern sun was hot, even under the trees. And then one morning, I picked up a new and different smell. Ben seemed amused, but wouldn’t tell me what it was; he insisted that I climb a tree and have a look for myself. I was an expert tree-climber, having spent my youth searching and sketching birds’ nests in the forests around Refuge, so pretty soon I was in the upper branches of the tallest tree on the highest ground … and what a view!

At first, my brain couldn't process what I was seeing. The land ahead was divided into fields of green and blue. It wasn’t until I noticed that the blue land was flat all the way to the horizon, that I realised: I was seeing the sea for the very first time! I screamed in triumph and looked down to see Ben grinning back up at me from the lower boughs.

‘What else can you see?’ he asked.

‘A city!’ I replied. ‘A great white city on a hill, with a massive domed building at the top.’

‘That’s the Basilica,’ Ben said, ‘where they remember the gods, all twenty-four of them. The hill is Arcus Hill. And somewhere under there is the tomb of Arcus and Banos, waiting for us to discover it!’

Ben’s story was that he was descended, not only from Amaranthium’s long-lost line of kings and queens, but also from the god Banos himself. Did I believe him because he was such a gifted storyteller, or was it because part of me desperately wanted to believe that there were untold riches buried in a long-forgotten tomb?

‘We’re splitting it fifty-fifty, right?’ I called down to him.

‘Seventy-thirty!’ he laughed. ‘Kal, we’ve already agreed on this!’

* * *

By twilight, we were sitting atop a cliff with the sound of the surf crashing beneath us and gulls squawking overhead. Ben had spread out his travelling cloak on the damp grass, and we were making a point of picnicking on every last morsel of our supplies. Tomorrow we would be dining in Amaranthium.

We had circled around to the east of the city, and from the headland we had a view over the patchwork of fields that lay outside the walls. Another wall, about half as high, and a moat protected the farmers. Between the walls, and before the great East Gate, there was a cleared area of ground that was lined with rows and rows of twenty-foot-tall statues: warriors with spears, shields and visored helmets guarding the road into the city.

‘The Field of Bones,’ Ben said, following my gaze. ‘The statues are in honour of a legion that marched out to battle an invading horde of monsters and never returned. They were slaughtered, right down to the very last man.’ He gave a wry smile. ‘Just one of the happy events in the city’s history that drove my ancestor, King Aldenute—the last ever king of Amaranthium—to suicide.’

‘It’s exciting!’ I said, standing up and taking in the views across the sea and city, breathing in the fresh, salty air. ‘Seeing your stories made real, Ben. Slaughter! Suicide! Heroes and monsters … what’s so funny?’

Ben was watching me, shaking his head in amusement. I went to him and brushed the crumbs out of his beard and tried to straighten his wild hair. He was a mess. ‘If you don’t fix yourself up,’ I said, ‘they’ll never let us in. They’ll think that
you
are a monster, come to sack the city.’

‘We can’t enter by the main gate,’ he said. ‘They won’t let us in.’

‘What? Why not?

‘The city is closed to non-residents. You need papers—the right documentation. People in the city are assessed every year, and anyone who doesn’t come up to scratch—doesn’t earn a wage or pay their taxes, basically—gets kicked out. I’m sure if I knew the right people I could get us some fake papers, but …’ Ben spread his palms.

I sat back down on our makeshift blanket and turned my gaze to the sea, waiting. I didn’t bother trying to think of a solution to our dilemma; I knew Ben would already have a plan; a crazy scheme based on something that he had heard in an old legend. And sure enough …

‘My father’s favourite gory story was about the time when monsters were inside the city walls, and all hell was breaking loose on the streets. Aldenute was worried about his daughter, the princess, so he went up to her chambers to make sure that she was safe. As he approached her door, he heard screams within. So he drew the Blade of Banos and kicked the door down …’

I couldn't help myself. I just knew he would be doing all the actions too. And yes, when I turned, Ben had his ancient sword out and was waving it around.

‘The king burst in to find his daughter covered in blood, and a naked man standing over her with a knife. Without hesitation he decapitated the intruder and ran to the princess. She was in shock—covered in blood but unhurt. She couldn’t speak; all she could do was point to the corner of the room.’

When Ben pointed over my shoulder, I actually looked around. How could he still manage to get me like that!

‘Curled up in the corner was a dead man-sized insect: a carniclaw that had managed to tunnel up under the palace. The king, in his panic, had killed his daughter’s lover, who had actually saved her from the beast.’

I exhaled in delight at his story, shivering at the morbidity of it all. ‘Very good, Ben. But what are you suggesting? That we dig a tunnel into the city?’

‘No,’ Ben said, jumping to his feet. ‘We don’t need to. Because my father told me something else … the accident was hushed-up on the king’s orders. The tunnel entrance was blocked and concealed, but the tunnel itself, Kal …
the tunnel is still there!
’

END OF PART ONE

PART TWO

THE MURDER

II.i

Little Dragon

Kal opened her eyes. For a brief moment, the smile remained on her lips as she remembered her dreams. Then harsh reality came crashing back into her head: the robbery! She groaned as she got out of bed. Today, Kal was going to have to do the one thing that she hated doing—she had to go and beg Ben for help. And the worst thing about it was that Ben would just smile and say, ‘No problem!’ and Kal would feel even more wretched and helpless. It would be just a loan, she promised herself, until she and Zeb got back on their feet.

Until, Kal swore, the day she caught that goddamn
King of Thieves
 …

A blaring, parping sound cut through her thoughts. Kal dragged herself to the window and stared out over the square. It was twilight on Midsummer Day, and a band was starting up on the stage. A girl was emptying her lungs into a trumpet, while two lads were smashing away at metal-strung citterns. Another girl tried to keep the racket in order by banging out a relentless rhythm on a snare drum. The stage had been constructed with a domed wooden cover, that not only amplified the sound, but was seemingly specially designed to focus it directly at Kal’s bedroom.

She pulled all the windows shut and tried to gather her thoughts, but an insistent knocking at her door put paid to that.
Now what?
Kal didn’t have any friends who were apt to just drop in on her, so she was immediately on high alert. Wrapping herself in a dark blue silk robe, and picking up a dagger from her table, Kal went and opened the door to her apartment.

The woman standing in the corridor outside wore a steel breastplate with the twenty-four stars of the Republic picked out in brass. She carried a heavy wooden staff with a metal tip.
A lictor!
The personal bodyguards of senators used their staffs to physically move crowds out their masters’ path.

‘The senator is waiting outside for you, Miss,’ the lictor said.

Kal mentally kicked herself. She had forgotten! On top of everything else she had to deal with today, she had a date …

‘Give me five minutes!’ she said, and slammed the door in the lictor’s face. Kal went to her basin and splashed some water on her face. Luckily she had already planned her outfit in advance: she took it down from where it was hanging in the corner of her room and squeezed into it.
Must cut down on the kebabs!
she told herself.

Five minutes later, Kal opened her front door and stepped out. The lictor raised an eyebrow, but otherwise did a pretty good job of maintaining a professional composure. Together, they went down four flights of narrow stairs and emerged into Satos Square. Kal followed the lictor as she used her staff to encourage the crowds to make way.