Steel Sirens Page 18

  Two soldiers come up the steps to flank us.

  Pella gives me a look: That settles that.

  Gates rumbles open, sliding smoothly into their dock.

  A chorus of cries chases us, outrage at the frivolity of my visit and our arbitrary selection.

  Valk comes through, and the gates clank shut. When we pass through again, I hope it’s to very different cries.

  “Wait. I’ll have a boy sent to escort you.” The herald flips his hand at a guard, who trudges up the steps.

  A boy? I don’t know much about the household or staff of a duke, but I know Governor MacTallum has two servants for greeting guests; a groom and a maid.

  The herald and remaining guards return to their posts. Valk, Pella, and I survey the bailey, the walls, the geography.

  I’ve also never been inside a castle, but this place seems unremarkable. It looks more like docklands. Supplies are stacked along the inside wall in awkward pyramids; wine, flour, crockery, salt. Each crate is stamped, the cargo we overheard the guildsmen complain of.

  Cords of wood and barrels mostly obscure the guard house. How would they know if anyone infiltrated? Maybe they don’t care; the magus is probably enough.

  At the bailey’s edge lay the spines of stairways once leading to the inner bailey wall… More guards patrol here but they must reach the heights from inside. The stairs are little more than splinters.

  A pair of keep doors high as a house split, their growing maw revealing a hint of the hall within.

  “Do we enter?” asks Pella.

  “It wasn’t exactly clear where the boy would be sent.” I survey the yard. “If we’re not meant to go in, I’m sure someone will stop us.”

  She nods. Valk stands with hands on hips, essentially catatonic until some sort of fighting erupts.

  We mount the wide stone steps. Emeree said this was a small keep, as castles go. When I look across the step and realize a man at the far end looks noticeably small, I have a hard time believing her.

  We file into the great hall and freeze. I realize not one of us has ever been inside a castle. Passing through the keep doors is like dying; I’ve only ever imagined what’s on the other side, and now all secrets of this unattainable place are revealed.

  Emeree would laugh at this; in fact, I think she might be.

  The hall is a long stone chamber lit mostly by a bank of west-facing windows. Wood trusses hold the ceiling like beautiful ribs, scrolled and carved with detail no mortal eyes could ever hope to discern from below. This is what wealth means, I decide. Paying a craftsman to carve a beam with intricacies no one will ever see.

  I think of my mother’s stag head.

  This is also love, and I wonder which one motivated the Arundel sires.

  To our left, wide doors stand open, a portal to a deeper and more mysterious portion of Castle Lowe.

  Ahead, mounted high on the stones, is a shield. Its face is round and it almost touches the roof beams, but I could easily reach its bottom edge. No man could carry it; I think it’s like the shields Nordmen use to adorn their long ships. Wedges of grey-green and white radiate from the Arundel crest, the rampaging lion. Below him:

  Age Officium Tuum

  I know these words; at least, I can puzzle them out thanks to my father.

  Act Your Office

  The gold leaf has faded, maybe under the irony of being hung in the hall of a man like Carven Arundel.

  Aside from the awe of ignorance and an infatuation with the colored glass set in a few windows, there’s nothing remarkable or opulent about the hall. It holds the same odors as an abandoned house; mossy water-damaged stone, dry unoiled wood, and stale air.

  This is deceptive, though. Pella is the first to point it out with a deep sniff. “Ham. Is that ham?” she whispers. “New potatoes. Onions. Turnips. Something candied.” Her eyes close. “All the best of winter garden.”

  Somewhere deeper within the castle a lavish lifestyle is unfolding. I have the image if Carven cocooned away from windows, away from shouts, knelt upon his table gobbling great mouthfuls of food, guzzling wine, and doing gods-know-what while his city ignites.

  Footsteps echo beyond the inner door.

  “Portreeve?”

  The boy is no more a boy than Keldan; I’d say the two are close in age. This boy even shares my brother’s coloring, skin the color of good bread, dark hair swept down like a horse’s forelock. He’s lanky under his brown breeches and muscled the way I think of warriors who haven’t yet realized what they are.

  He stops at Pella. Of course. “The herald didn’t send your names.” He rests fists on his hips, arms swallowed by an oversized tabard.

  “Thom. Thom Bandragan, of Braemar. This is my daughter Pella, and my man Valkar.”

  “Brecan,” he says, barely audible even in the hall’s echoing stillness.

  Two guards arrive to flank him. “No weapons in the keep, aside from the artifact,” one says. “And no servants, men at arms…”

  One down. I nod to Valk, trying to hide my worry. If this goes well, hopefully we won’t need him.

  I hand him my jeweled dagger. “Store it at the inn, and don’t leave it unattended.”

  Valk grunts and shuffles off without hesitation, playing his part wonderfully.

  Pella clutches her case when the guards eye it. “I’m not giving my rebec to that hulk!”

  “Open it.”

  She complies.

  So that’s a rebec. I would have called it an ugly lute-fiddle.

  I just keep learning.

  “Open that one, too,” the second guard instructs.

  “That is the instrument. It doesn’t open. Father, please. Have a word…”

  We’re saved by the page. “This way, ser portreeve.” Brecan gives us a small bow.

  I walk just behind him, Pella padding along beside me. “It’s been at least five years since I passed through here. Have you been at the castle long?”

  “My whole life. My father is General Straithe.”

  The man Oranna thought could be an instrument. But not his son; there’s a hollow ring to his words. A bitterness and... what is it I sense?

  “It must be exciting,” says Pella. “Living here with such a city right on your step.”

  “I don’t go out.”

  I decide to take the risk. “Really? I’d be out of this place every chance I got.”

  He wheels around.

  “Because there’s so much to see in the town. Not for any other reason.”

  Brecan watches me and Pella. He writes things about us with his eyes. Sweaty, smiling, talkative, subversive. Maybe he doesn’t think these things, but whatever he is thinking, whatever he perceives, Brecan is noting every bit.

  When he turns away our pace intensifies. Pella skips to keep up.

  “What’s the hurry?”

  “The Duke doesn’t like to be kept waiting.”

  “I was told he had company.”

  “They have...probably left. Hasty leave-taking. I’ll take you to the steward.”

  We pass through the inner hall, a cavernous room that’s been stripped of all decoration and accoutrement. Guards stand stiffly in the corners, their eyes following us like fogged mirrors. None accompany us or speak. We enter a long hallway flanked by doors and proceed to the end. Low, oily torches gutter in their sconces, and the runner below our feet is worn, weathered. Everywhere I look are signs of disrepair. We’ve yet to reach that grand inner core.

  Brecan stops here. The steward, an ancient man with a bald egg head and bagged eyes comes out to examine us. His eyes light on Pella and he nods.

  “The portreeve for His Grace, Carbry,” whispers Brecan even though Carbry seems deaf as a post.

  “Mmhm. Name?”

  Does anyone talk to each other here? “Thom Bandragan.”

  “Bandragan! Oh. I’ve not heard that surname – anyhow.” Carbry sharpens and turns on Brecan. “Go back to your chamber, boy. If it’s decided you’re needed for something, y
ou’ll know.”

  Brecan sighs, giving me and Pella a look. He seems to catalog us one last time before stalking away.

  “Portreeve with an artifact. Hum. Down on your luck?” Carbry trembles.

  “No. But my people are superstitious, and the Church have encouraged me to part with this lovely. And my daughter plays so beautifully; I don’t know which is a greater treasure.”

  He turns to open the door without further word. We follow him into a brightly lit room that steals my breath and stops Pella short.

  Here it is, the grotesquely opulent inner sanctum.

  This chamber is almost as vast as the entry hall. Where the entrance was austere and proud this is… something else.

  Silk pennants, wool runners in crimson and aquamarine. Chandeliers blaze at each other in competition, reflected in real glass mirrors. Plush green velvet chairs are scattered at the far end. The room is a square within a square, creating a corridor around all four sides. This is for one reason: Paintings.

  Paintings line every bit of wall, from a cornice-lined ceiling almost to the green wool runners at the baseboards. Full length portraits in gilt frames; duty-stamp sized works of faces in carved mahogany frames; the paintings come in every shape and size, hoarded together on the stark white plaster walls. Styles differ, back drops, adornment. They have just one thing in common: Girls.

  A girl is the subject of every single one as far down the room as I can see. They’re painted in poses from fully clothed to obscene.

  Pella’s cold fingers slip into mine. I don’t look at her. This is too strange and awful to look away.

  In one, a woman stands with bow at full draw. She has lean legs parted in a bracing stance, full hips rotated, long lines beneath a verdant green dress. Her breasts are high and proud. Hers is one of the few paintings identifiable as a woman, and not a girl. Red-gold curls run riot over her shoulders as she takes aim on a stout brown bear. The forest surrounding her is as lifelike as she is, every brush stroke masterful. Skill makes this room more macabre, and around her the forest is astounding, beautiful, almost lifelike.

  In the next large painting, a woman closer to my age reclines against a white wall, seated on a crimson rug. Chestnut hair spills over her shoulders, covering one blue eye and magnifying the defiance of her expression. She cups one small breast, and with her other hand, parts herself for the viewer. The detail of her body is exquisite, so much that she seems real, familiar, and I look away ashamed.

  Pella shakes my hand. “The matron,” she whispers, pointing her chin at the kneeling girl.

  “What?”

  “The matron in the square who stopped you as we came in; that girl looks like her, yeah?”

  My shoulders stiffen, gut leaden.

  All of them. This is all the missing girls.

  Where are they now? The castle seems empty, silent. I glance at Pella and wonder if I look as blanched as she does.

  “So many nudes; the Duke must be quite a connoisseur of the female form.”

  Emeree surges at my observation.

  Carbry waits at the far end. “His Grace is quite proud of this collection, but he prefers to show it to guests, give the tour personally.”

  He snaps the door open and foot-taps while Pella and I hunch and shuffle through the gallery.

  It empties into a small common area, a foyer between three other rooms. Dark wood paneling steals the lamplight and a bust of some Arundel watches us from a corner. I feel its blank eyes could be watching us, reporting our movements to someone.

  Two of the doors stand closed. Beyond the open door, a group of figures crowd a low meeting table. In its center is an amphora of wine, cups around it untouched.

  “Portreeve Thom Bandragan and Miss Bandragan, General Straithe.”

  One of them turns sharply, taking us in. So, this is the general. He and his son are copies of each other, except the general keeps a more military appearance. His hair is close cropped, armor parade-day lustrous. They share the same tight, piercing expression.

  The others in the group turn more slowly, leaning over the table, or shuffling to get a look through the doorway at us. Visitors really are a novelty.

  They’re all standing. Not with the drawn back, easy posture of something concluding. Hands brace the tabletop. Shoulders are drawn up to ears, backs hunched for a pounce, a strike.

  Straithe is flanked by a slip of a figure in black silk. His robe’s hood conceals his face in the low light, but I can feel his eyes on me. In me. Gooseflesh erupts across my body. Pella squeezes my hand tighter.

  The mage.

  My gaze falls on the woman across from him. All decorum is lost; I stare at her unabashed. Copper skin magnifies the gold in her eyes and the highlights of flame twined through her thick braid. Leather armor from neck to boots covers everything and reveals everything. She’s fit and almost voluptuous at the same time.

  She pouts at our intrusion, full lips rolled out to show a glistening line along their crease. Her expression is the haughty lift of an alderman’s daughter. She is too good for me; too good for everyone present. This radiates from her as a force that steals my confidence and works to bend my knees in submission.

  And her armor. I know it. Should I ask if she’s missing a glove?

  Myranda.

  Dark, hot rage boils in me like tar. Her neck is slender, no match for my hands. One twist; they’d kill me, but I can get her first.

  Emeree snags my consciousness and snaps me back like a fisherman’s hook.

  Steady. Calm.

  I answer her instruction with a long slow breath.

  Seconds have passed, but the narrowed sets of eyes magnify the moment. “What have you brought? Come closer.” The speaker croaks this out.

  I shield Pella at my back, and we enter.

  Whoever he is, he sits at the table’s head. Because he’s the only person seated, I missed him behind the amphora.

  Cadaverous is a simplistic description, apt if he resembled a corpse.

  In fact, he resembles a nightmare.

  Finery hangs from him like a smock, not altered for his frame in any way. I’m not sure there’d be anything left if his clothes were cut down. His baby bald head is pocked with liver spots, face etched with dry flaking creases.

  His eyes, though...they’re hot and alive, fondling Pella. He’s not old, he’s withered. Desiccated.

  “Bow to His Grace,” whispers Carbry from the doorway.

  His Grace?

  This is not the man Oranna described. Young, strong, virile...this man is almost as much a wight as the thing we caught in the forest.

  “Portreeve of Braemar? I hunted the High Wilds once with my tutor. It gave us such sport. Some of the most beautiful of my lands.”

  “Thank you, Your Grace.”

  He raises an emaciated and steady arm. His cuff is paint stained. “Did you see my collection as you came in?” Carven looks at Pella as he says this.

  “Striking.”

  Carven leans in his chair to see Carbry behind us. “They’ll do. Have rooms made up.”

  To me and Pella he simply says, “Wait,” dismissing us with a flick of graceful fingers.

  Pella and I withdraw to the foyer room. I expect Carbry to close the door, but having swept us out, he disappears.

  “What do you make of that?” whispers Pella.

  “Still want adventure?”

  “Yes,” she says in a confident whisper. “And I want to spit that looney through his arse and turn him over the fire once for each of those girls.”

  “I was right to bring you.”

  “What’ll we do if he tries to separate us?”

  “Don’t. I’d prefer to have Carven by himself, but if it comes to force, you stay by me.”

  “So, your friend is in that sword?”

  I nod. “And the sword is in her, sometimes.”

  “Ugh. Now you’ve gone all philosophical, like brother Egmun. You’ve lost me.”

  I have to stifle my laugh. Th
e four are back to conversation, but it’s terse and low.

  Myranda’s hands work furiously, and Straithe closes himself with crossed arms. This was an argument underway before we interrupted.

  “What are they fighting about?”

  “I don’t know, but one of them help capture my entire village, so I’m curious to know.”

  We don’t have to wait long.

  Myranda boils over. “If the Inquisition are unhappy with my quotas, perhaps we should offer our services to an employer with lower expectations. Does that suit you, Arkis?”

  What is an Inquisition?

  The mage’s voice is sibilant, amphibian. There’s no offense or anger in his words. They chill the room.

  “You were adamant about what you could provide. And provide you shall. Our great works are performed on the backs of the laborers. They toil, suffer, and die content with the knowledge they’ve inched the world closer to glory. No slaves, no glory.” This sounds like nothing more than arithmetic.

  “Then perhaps you should be grateful for each one I bring you,” says Myranda.

  Arkis thins and looms higher. “I know you’re used to contracting with syphilitic ship captains and fat bureaucrats, men who tolerate your mediocrity. So, let me make things plain: This is beyond coin. It’s beyond a renegotiation. If you fail, we will hunt you down. And kill you… if we’re feeling merciful.”

  “You threaten me?” Myranda’s hand drops to her scabbard. Air thickens around us, oily. A stink of rotten flesh permeates it. Pella covers her nose. At my back, Emeree trembles in disgust.

  “Why are they talking about all of this in front of us?” asks Pella.

  “Because they don’t plan to leave witnesses.”

  “Your necromancy is not interesting or exciting,” says Arkis.” And you are not special enough for me to endure your amateur tricks.”

  During their exchange Carven slumps in his chair, eyes far away. A dumb smile twitches at the corners of his mouth.

  “Enough.” Straithe’s bark cuts between the pair. “His Grace has opened all of his lands to you; perhaps you two can find somewhere else Perhaps you two can discuss this in some other part of that vastness.”

  “We could...” drawls Arkis. “And we could take your son with us.”