Old Man's Ghosts (17 page)

‘What?’ Narin asked irritably. ‘You see anyone out there?’

‘Only your friend, circling the block.’

‘That’s good, isn’t it?’

‘Perhaps. It occurs to me, however, that if there’s a second faction searching for you, we do not know what we’re looking out for. Wyvern soldiers are easy to notice, unknown Astaren less so.’

Narin grunted. ‘If it helps, Enchei doesn’t reckon they’ll be Astaren.’

‘He’s sure?’

‘Seems to be. He says they’re more likely to be mercenaries in the pay of one – shamans hiring their skills out rather than elite soldiers on a mission. Gealann, he called them.’

‘At last some good news, then.’

‘Really?’ Narin said with a puzzled face. ‘How?’

‘The world of the Astaren is closed to the likes of us, but we’ve already met someone akin to a shaman during our investigation. Their world is not so insulated from the normal course of things, they are not untouchable. Our district posts may yet provide a useful thread to follow through this maze.’

Narin nodded, finally understanding. ‘So nothing for it but to wait, for our new favourite novice or Enchei.’

He looked down at the fire and gave a weak smile before laying his heavy coat on the floor in front of it.

‘In that case, I’m going to sleep like a dog. Wake me when there’s someone to bite.’

*

Hands clasped within the warm sleeves of his silvery fur coat, Kebrai watched the ship ease into dock. His characteristic lilac eyes sought one figure amongst those on board, but all on deck were hidden from the cold in heavy woollen robes or luxurious white furs. Kebrai knew just from the ship’s lines that it was House Leviathan in origin, but the stylised whale shape at the prow made that clear to the whole Empire. The ship was an ocean-going trader of the Etrage merchant House, one of several that operated from the Ren archipelago off House Moon’s southern coast.

A line of three triangular flags down its mast declared its home port while the purple sails, when raised, bore the cask and bottle emblem of Etrage – echoed on the bronze brooch Kebrai currently wore. He pictured the port, Ren Jir, in his mind – a far cry from the great city he stood in now, but a sight that lived long in the memory. Modest in size, Ren Jir was an over-sized town built on ground hard-won from the island’s forests, surrounded by giant trees that stood close to five hundred feet tall. Some rose out of the sea itself up to a mile off-shore, creating channels their ships were forced to keep to, while those on land loomed to create a daytime twilight filtered green and red.

Preventing the jungle from reclaiming the city was a constant struggle for the inhabitants, but there was gold of a sort all around that kept the effort worthwhile. Wealth hung from those very trees besieging Ren Jir in the form of the rusty fronds of a parasitic plant. Jirrin was the spice that underpinned the wealth of the House of Etrage and the ship’s hold would be full of tightly-packed linen bundles of dried Jirrin, ready to be ground to powder.

Its hot, earthy flavour had paid for labourers from House Moon to wage war against the jungle in Ren Jir – just as it had paid for the polar bear furs worn by the disembarking merchant and his associates, and the intricate gold filigree on the lapels of each that declared their position within the merchant house.

To Kebrai’s surprise, there was an outsider among them – pale enough to be mistaken for a Leviathan perhaps, but as soon as the woman set off down the gangway ahead of the rest he saw she was not. The high collar of her coat and hat half hid her face, but she glanced in his direction and he recognised the sharp features of House Eagle along with the purple collar of the noble caste.

A potential employer, or something else?
Kebrai wondered, blinking in surprise at the sight.
Jester’s Cold Heart – they’re just who we don’t want involved here. Bastards or fanatics they are, usually both. It’s not often I’m rooting for House Dragon, but the sooner those two go to war the better – and the better for us if Dragon come out on top. Damn House Eagle to the lower hells with its Mindwalkers and Storm Paladins. This life’s fickle enough without getting knifed by some mind-stolen friend or the like.

Before he could fathom what her presence indicated, the Eagle noblewoman headed off in the other direction and the main group reached him. The principal among them was a man of mixed descent, a beguiling combination of Leviathan’s greyish hair and purple eyes, and the dusty-dark skin of House Moon. Tall and elegant, he had all the poise of an Imperial, though his blue collar showed he was indeed merchant caste.

Around him were four clerks in anonymous dark woollens from varying minor Houses under Leviathan, while a knot of brutal-looking House Shadow mercenaries followed. Rather more notable was the bodyguard standing in the merchant’s lee, her red hair flying loose in the breeze. Though she wore a white fur too, it was open at the front to reveal a scarlet and white tunic with polished silver clasps as well as ornate pistols and sword. Kebrai gasped inwardly as he realised she was a Banshee – a member of House Siren’s renowned elite warrior cadre.

The merchant approached Kebrai, seeing he wore the mark of the House of Etrage, who bowed respectfully.

‘A cold day for a vigil,’ the man said. ‘Is demand for Jirrin so high that you would wait here for us to arrive?’

‘Business, I regret, is somewhat slowed by the weather,’ Kebrai replied. ‘My vigil was not for Jirrin however.’

He grunted. ‘Not here for me? Very well, I expected as much. Ainai, I will wait to hear from you – Frasin, you will oversee the unloading.’

Kebrai bowed as one of the clerks scuttled back to the ship, waving over the harbour porters who were waiting nearby. Kebrai had already secured their services so the valuable cargo would not be waiting out on the dock and a dozen handcarts stood behind the porters to transport the Jirrin bundles to their warehouse.

Without a further word the merchant swept past Kebrai, clearly familiar with the route to the offices they maintained in the Imperial City. The Banshee gave Kebrai a hard look as she followed and the rest were quick to fall in behind, all except one.

The clerk called Ainai was as tall as any of them, but stood with head bowed as though trying to hide that fact. Without speaking the woman looked up and fixed Kebrai with a small smile – one that chilled his blood, though it was familiar enough. She was striking to look at – fine cheekbones and delicate features – but unearthly for it.

Only a fool would call her beautiful. Her looks could strike a room silent but it was through wonder or terror, not desire. For desire there needed to be a spark of life and Priest at rest looked as vital as a perfectly-embalmed corpse – ageless and soulless.

‘A chilly welcome, Kebrai,’ Priest said, ‘I hope your news will warm my heart instead.’

‘Priest,’ Kebrai acknowledged, resisting the urge to kneel. ‘I have news at least. I am uncertain of how far progressed you would like events to be by now.’

Like everything about his master, her name was a mystery even to Kebrai. Even the title of Priest was something of a misnomer. It was an obscure designation from her past rather than a comment on her caste, informing only an exclusive few as to what Priest had once been.

‘Ready to be concluded,’ Priest said with a twitch of her lip. Behind her, almost half the crew of sailors paused in their unloading and all looked up as one – staring for a moment at Kebrai before returning to their duties as though nothing had happened.

Kebrai stifled a shudder.
Sea Snake Devotees,
he realised.
Here to take the prey.

He couldn’t help but stare at the nearest; dead white face and pale blue eyes. His mouth was a cruel reptilian slit, almost lipless with a black tongue inside.

Our own warrior cult, but without the honour or dignity of the Banshees. How many has she brought? Twenty? I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many employed at one time. She must be as hopeful as Sorpan about what this renegade could tell us.

‘We are not yet ready,’ Kebrai said, his mouth dry, ‘Sorpan demands caution at every step, but there is progress. Sharish has the scent and houndsmen will be walking the streets this evening.’

‘I sense there is something more,’ Priest said. ‘You have more than the usual look of a mouse about you.’

Kebrai ducked his head. ‘Sorpan has discovered a complication, perhaps two.’

‘And they are?’

‘The proximity of a well-known Lawbringer to the prey, and an overlapping hunt.’

‘Hunt?’ Priest said, one eyebrow faintly raised. ‘We have competitors?’

He shook his head. ‘They are hunting a friend of the prey; Wyvern warriors on a mission of honour. Sorpan has suborned four and they now serve Sharish as houndsmen, but there are others and they have the backing of a nobleman.’

To his surprise, Priest smiled at that.

‘House Wyvern, you say? What a curious turn of events.’

She drew her heavy woollen cloak tight around her body and nodded towards the direction the merchant was walking in, still visible through the diminished numbers on the Harbour Walk.

‘Come – tell me everything on the way.’

Narin awoke in the afternoon to find Enchei come and gone, Novice Tesk arrived and his own wits somewhat restored after those precious hours of sleep. Tesk had brought the reports they had been waiting for and shown the presence of mind to question each Investigator as she did. As a result, Narin found himself hurriedly swallowing a few mouthfuls of food while Rhe read aloud the report on shamanism and old religions of the lands of House Iron – most particularly the high plateau region shared by Houses Redeve and Gold.

Aware the daylight was against them, longest night a mere Ascendancy away, Rhe and Narin set out for the north of the city, leaving Tesk in the rented room to check the remaining reports before returning to her duties. In his paranoid state Narin felt the girl’s calculating gaze watch him all the way out of the door – ambitious novices were often more than willing to jockey for the attention of a Lawbringer like Rhe – but once out on the snowy streets his more real concerns took over once more.

They crossed the Imperial District and headed for the Mason’s Bridge that wove a stepping-stone path across the narrower north-western edge of the Crescent. As luck would have it, the lesser bridge across the Crescent led straight into House Iron District and little more than half an hour after waking, Narin found himself on the mainland side looking back at those following. The dark stone bridge was narrow and old, its shoulder-high parapet crested with snow. Just five yards across at any point, it afforded a good view of all those crossing in their wake and, despite their investigation, Narin found himself anxiously lingering as he watched for Wyvern faces above the heads of the locals.

‘Enchei didn’t say where he was going?’

At his side, Rhe shook his head. ‘Only that he had urgent business and was fetching Irato to watch over you.’

‘Did it look like he had a lead?’

‘More the opposite,’ Rhe said. ‘He looked like a man haunted, driven to desperate measures.’

‘It’s affected him this much? I’m surprised. He’s lived as a hunted man for almost two decades now.’

‘And now the hunt is closing in. Whether or not he was sure before, the death of Administrator Serril’s far too much of a coincidence to ignore. If his former paymasters are behind this, they know exactly what he’s capable of – and what they need to do to take him.’

‘So they hire in outsiders, mercenaries, for the hunt itself, to avoid risking conflict with House Dragon?’

‘It would be a logical move,’ Rhe said. ‘The goshe affair was a distraction, it postponed the war between Houses Dragon and Eagle, but the tensions remain and the Imperial City is technically a Dragon protectorate.’

Narin scowled, lifting his head slightly as he caught sight of a dark face on the bridge, only to realise they wore a white servant-caste scarf, not the red of a warrior. While their sullied honour might be the reason they wanted to kill him, no warrior caste would stoop to such a demeaning subterfuge.

‘Aye, wouldn’t want them to cancel plans for a brutal war now, would we? Only a fool’d hope the distraction was enough, that they might take the opportunity to step back and not bother with the slaughter.’

Rhe inclined his head. ‘Hope does not make one a fool, but certainty of belief will give him a jester’s crown. They are great powers with a history of enmity and a shared border – one preeminent in the Empire, the other determined to be. Neither will rush into war, but it will happen and the other Houses are cautious of provoking Dragon in the Imperial City. No one wants to be on the receiving end of House Dragon asserting its authority, not when they were denied the chance to make an example of the goshe.’

‘So what makes these Gealann so ignorant?’ Narin asked ‘Or so greedy that they’re willing to take such risks? Or do House Dragon only care about the actions of other Houses right now?’

‘Perhaps Enchei angered his former masters so greatly they’d be willing to offer him as a prize? They punish the deserter and send a brutal message to their own ranks, but how far could revenge go? Far enough to reward the mercenaries with whatever secrets they can pry from Enchei’s mind and body?’

With a gesture Rhe indicated they had waited enough and the pair set off down the Public Thoroughfare running through the heart of Iron District. The cold had barely impacted business on the busy street – shops of every kind lined the wide avenue all the way to the wedge-shaped fortress that split it in two, left and right towards the districts flanking Iron.

‘It’s quite a risk.’ Narin admitted hesitantly, ‘but Enchei’s in no doubt what’ll happen when he dies, he’s warned me of it several times. What if his former masters could be reasonably certain of that? Maybe not so great a risk when they made him the man he is before training him how to think and act.’

‘An informed calculation,’ Rhe said, nodding in agreement. ‘A far more satisfactory interpretation – but it means there might yet be an agent monitoring events, ready to step in should the mercenaries fail entirely.’

‘Oh, thanks for that happy little aside,’ Narin said with a snort and a shake of the head.
Want to piss on my mood a bit more?

He bit the comment back, reminding himself their ranks were only technically equal now. Rhe remained a senior Lawbringer and wouldn’t appreciate being spoken to the way Narin would to Enchei.

Passing the brutal, iron-flanked walls where Iron District’s noble ruler presided, they pushed on to the further reaches of the district towards the old city wall that stood like broken teeth above what had once been a huge defensive ditch. As they walked, Narin noticed that they were heading away from the water that occupied two sides of the district – a river defining the western border while the Crescent marked the south.

Noble palazzos studded the shores of both; the largest were built parasitically around six white columns as ancient as the Imperial Palace. Ranging from a hundred feet high to almost three hundred, the pointed spires jutted out from the roofs of each palazzo like the spear-tips of the warriors within. Each one displayed the wealth of Iron’s ruling families; recessed friezes decorated in gold and obsidian, ornate stonework cresting each of the round palazzo levels and gas lamps studding the walls to illuminate their opulence.

‘Far from Samaleen’s domains,’ he pointed out, indicating that they were moving uphill towards the foundries and furnaces of Iron’s industrial heart. This part of the district was chaotic with smoke stacks belching to the clatter of metal and voices.

‘Far indeed,’ Rhe agreed. ‘A place of flame rather than water.’

The report had said exactly that, Narin remembered. The mountains and lakes that skirted the Veylesh plateau each had their own enclosed cultures, separate from the rest of the House Iron hegemony, and the high summer on the plateau was a scorching, relentless few months where the afternoon sun would kill.

During this time, so the report claimed, the boundary between planes blurred and the shadow demons of the otherworld could cross into the real. The tribes relied on shamans to protect them, as did the miners in the gold mines of the crater valleys flanking the plateau, and there were many old legends of renegade shamans co-opting their demon enemies as assassins.

Following the directions they had been given, the Lawbringers wove a path through narrow and grimy streets, the snow trodden to grey slush, until they reached what had to be their destination; the Minerild. A curved perimeter wall rose up before them, dotted with forges and foundries, while open archways led inside to a warren of twisting paths and dark tunnels. It was a huge circular building like a gigantic broken tower – almost a hundred yards across and without a single roof to cover it. Instead there were linked buildings inside the perimeter, all made of the same dirty grey brick, and one raised section of wall a hundred yards long that Narin suspected was to deflect the sea breeze.

Trusting their information, they headed in past flapping, bedraggled banners bearing the sigils of all nine subordinate Houses under the House Iron hegemony, along with half a dozen more symbols Narin didn’t recognise. The crowd of locals within were mostly grey-haired Irons, which made identifying the sandy shades of Gold and Redeve an easier task, but their goal was on the higher floor where a strange network of shrine-like edifices rose up from the patchwork of roofs within the perimeter.

Brick stairways led up the side of several buildings so once they had barged through to the interior of the Minerild, it was an easy task to ascend into the open air again. The shrines themselves were composed of slabs of pale slate, bound together by twists of verdigrised wire and shaped into squat cones and columns. So far as Narin could see, the placement of them was random, owing more to available space than any obvious pattern.

There were few people up there in contrast to the ground below, the weather making it treacherous, but a half-dozen figures had braved the cold and shuffled around the flat rooftops and narrow walkways between – all so heavily wrapped up it was impossible to tell the sex or descent of any. Just as they were assessing the sight, the nearest figure caught them looking around and angrily jabbed a finger in the direction of one of their kin before pointedly turning away.

They followed the direction and negotiated the three precarious bridges – each one little more than a plank securely fixed – until they came to a circular sort of shrine connected to those around it by sagging lengths of chain, each link adorned with a fluttering cloth that bore a symbol or character Narin had never seen. Before he could investigate them closer, the figure attending it slipped back a heavy hood to reveal the bronze skin and tattooed face of a man in middle years, long blond hair pulled back from his face by a spray of copper mesh.

‘More Lawbringers,’ the man announced wearily. ‘And there I was hoping cooperation might mean you didn’t bother coming back.’

‘It might have,’ Rhe replied sternly, ‘were it not apparent that there’s a killer in your midst.’

To Narin’s surprise the man laughed at the accusation and turned, whistling to attract the attention of another figure nearby. ‘Father, over here.’

‘You are Kobelt Ulesh Hoke?’ Rhe pressed. ‘I am Lawbringer Rhe, this is Lawbringer Narin.’

‘Aye, that’s me,’ the man said, amber eyes flashing in the pale daylight, ‘and I can tell you there’s no chance there’s a murderer here. That Investigator who came here, the Iron-born one, he could tell you that.’

‘We might need more assurances than that,’ Narin said, ‘given the fact that hellhounds have killed at least five people in the last few days.’

‘It was no one here,’ Ulesh asserted as his father joined them, almost the image of his son bar the lines on his face. ‘My father, Geret Hoke – Senior Kobelt of the Minerild. Tell them, Father, no one here would send demons on a hunt.’

‘Here? Only a handful have the power for such a thing,’ the older man said in heavily-accented Imperial, gesturing at the rooftops around them. ‘None are so stupid. We teach rituals of protection only, that is what this is all for. Perhaps if they had the knowledge, one or two of our most gifted Kobelen could draw a hunter into this realm, but no more than once.’

‘They could not control them?’

‘Them?’ The pair scoffed as one man. ‘Only I,’ continued Geret, ‘could control more than one, this thing is beyond Ulesh even. It will be years before he is strong enough. No other Kobelt here could summon more than one; no other Kobelt here would survive to try twice.’

Rhe adjusted his coat fractionally, just enough to make it clear his pistols were within easy reach. ‘You declare yourself our principal suspect then?’

‘Are you mad?’ the man gaped, as his son bristled with barely-restrained anger.

‘I am not, but I shall impress upon you my seriousness. I hunt a murderer and if this power’s so rare, you may know who possesses it – or at least can help us find them.’

‘And you choose threats to achieve this?’

Rhe shook his head. ‘I choose to believe you will help us, but you narrow my options by making such a statement. Are you protecting another? Taunting my authority? Simply mistaken or misguided?’

‘This is foolishness,’ Ulesh broke in, ‘even the priests of Lady Pilgrim know and trust us. Go ask them yourselves.’

‘What
do
you know of summoners then, what can you tell us?’ Rhe said. ‘The report I have tells me your kind are respected members of the community, so that is why I came with one Lawbringer beside me rather than a hundred.’

‘Most considerate,’ Geret growled. ‘Yet all we know of summoners is rumour. When they are exposed, they are hunted down.’

‘Your son follows in your footsteps,’ Narin said, keen to calm the conversation a touch. ‘Does the ability pass down through families?’

Ulesh nodded. ‘Often, but the last reported summoner was decades ago. I remember grandmother telling me the story.’

‘That man and his acolytes were all put to death,’ Geret declared. ‘I do not remember any mention of family. As for rumours, they are hearsay, no more. A tale from the Ren islands five or six years past, a power struggle between merchant houses, I believe, also the assassination of a House Rain general two summers ago – Ulesh, can you remember more?’

‘That massacre on Shols – House Storm’s lands. Was that not said to be a shadow demon? A dozen villagers killed when a trading ship from Ren was forced to beach there, all those who helped make repairs. The ship had sailed by the time of the massacre, though, and no one among the survivors could agree on the ship’s designation so it was never traced.’

Narin nodded, committing the details to memory rather than attempting to scribble them down in the freezing wind.

‘What about these shrines of protection? They’re wards against the demons? If you can protect against them, can you find them?’

‘The shrines disrupt energies; they exist to make it harder for the demons to cross into this realm. But a summoner tears at the veil – they cannot prevent that.’

‘Can they tell you if it has happened? Where it might be happening?’

Ulesh shook his head, glancing at his father to confirm his agreement.