Nine weary men trudged along the road on the outskirts of Serfium. Quintillian had found that his voice became quite choked that night in the village when he had to part from Athas and Mercurias, heading north on horseback as fast as they could go, and Brendan and Marco, heading south at equal pace. The captain had spent some of the nights’ travel walking with him, but more on his own as his mind churned with ideas and plans for the near future. Instead, the big but ever quiet Bors had spent most of the time as Quintillian’s closest companion. He’d become quite good friends with the gentle giant over the last few weeks, surprised as he was by how calm and intelligent the man was, despite his initial appearance.
Kiva walked with his head down, a wax tablet and stylus in hand, periodically scribbling notes in the dim pre-dawn light as something leapt to mind and occasionally tutting in frustration and scribbling them out again. Clovis and Scauvus spent most of the time as they travelled ahead and out of sight, scouting the wilderness for any sight of Velutio’s mercenary groups, but had found nothing but occasional signs of units having passed. Now that they’d reached the built up area, the two of them had pulled back in and walked only a few yards ahead of the rest of the column. It would be at least another hour until sunrise and the streets were empty and silent. Kiva put away his writing materials as they passed the first building, far out.
Quintillian watched the captain looking this way and that as they walked in the eerie half-light. They passed a few recently constructed buildings on the very edge and then came to a long open stretch of road. Quintillian wondered for a moment why these houses had been built so far out with a long stretch of countryside between them and the main mass of the town, but then he spotted the shapes looming out of the dark; shells of collapsed buildings standing like land-locked shipwrecks, jutting wall fragments reaching toward the canopy of the night. Young trees grew within the ruins and many were covered with ivy. With a nervous swallow the lad realised why the captain had been so quiet recently and why his head turned constantly as they moved. He found himself wondering which one of the sad ruins had held Livilla and the boy named for his uncle while the flames had charred their bones. A shudder ran down his spine. Fire. It always came back to fire where the captain was concerned. Perhaps his family’s death was the Gods inflicting their punishment on Caerdin for harming one of their own. He shook his head, angry with himself. He was of the Imperial line too and he was damn sure he was no God, so Quintus the Golden had been naught but a man, which meant that none of this was the working of fate or Gods, and there could be no curse on the captain. In actual fact the man, and probably his uncle and Velutio for that matter, were only doing what they each believed in their own way to be right. A serious of unfortunate and sad accidents and necessities.
He almost walked into the back of the captain as he was deep in thought and hadn’t noticed the man stop in his tracks. This must be the one then. About a hundred yards from the road a crumbled wall rose up out of a dip. Fragments of a roof were visible in the corner, where some kind of creeper had grown and held the fractured masonry and tile together. He swallowed again, worried that he might shed a tear if he pondered too much on the sight before him. Yet, unbidden the visions came: pictures flashing in his mind of screaming women and children, unable to escape the inferno as the soldiers surrounding the villa threw more and more lit torches in. A haystack flaming next to the wall perhaps. The roof collapsing when a fireball exploded into the sky as the flames found the fuel for the under floor heating. Quintillian cursed his imagination. He could see it clearly. Perhaps that was for the best though, since there were no tears in the eyes of Kiva Caerdin as he looked on his old home. His eyes were grown hard and a sense of furious purpose shone in his face. Quintillian understood. The urge to shed a tear was gone in him now, replaced by a cold anger. He would exact revenge on Velutio for everything the man had done in his life.
He was still seething silently and personally when he became aware that Caerdin had started walking again, past the ruins of the broken villas and into the town itself. The walls of Serfium were white and clean, even in this curious early morning light as they passed between high-walled houses and narrow side streets in the town that was once the centre of the summer villa locale for the Empire’s elite. The sun was not far off now, and the light increased noticeably every few minutes. He shrugged off the feeling of loss and sadness from the burned villas they’d passed and concentrated on the town itself. Presumably the captain knew where he was going and what they were going to do, so he would just follow along.
They passed a corner with an ironmonger’s that was closed as the shopkeeper would be still abed, and reached a wide crossroads surrounded by old buildings whitewashed and with red tile roofs. Kiva stopped at the crossroads and frowned. He beckoned to Clovis and Scauvus and then pointed up the side streets. “No point in being foolhardy. We’re being looked for as a unit. Clovis? Take Julian that way. Scout through the edge of town to the other end and then work your way back to the temple in the square. Scauvus? You take Pirus the south route and do the same. Move fairly fast. You’ve only got around half an hour before the streets will start to fill up, so I want you in the temple in twenty minutes at the latest. Stay out of sight and out of trouble.” His face serious, he added “and don’t go anywhere near the harbour. The town’s still asleep, but there’ll be people working down there.”
The men saluted quietly and then started to jog off down the side streets until they disappeared around the curve of the road and out of sight. Quintillian glanced around himself. The Grey Company were diminishing rapidly as people were sent on errands missions and now only five men walked down the road into the centre of the town. Kiva and Bors walked on either side of him, with Alessus and Thalo behind, paying careful attention to every window, door or alley they passed. They really were running out of time. The light was coming up fast now and Quintillian could pick out colour in the windows of houses.
The street was long and straight and as the light continually improved, so did the range of vision. Quintillian suddenly spotted an edifice far ahead in the centre of the street: a fountain ten or fifteen feet high carved in the forms of the Sea King and his mermaids. He smiled. “Funny thing Captain, but I’ve come full circle now. I passed that statue months ago just after we landed on the mainland. We went out to the north so I haven’t seen any of this part of town.”
Kiva nodded. “I know Serfium quite well. The town hasn’t changed, but the feeling of the place is different.”
“How long is it since you were last here?”
The captain shrugged. “At least ten years. I try not to come back too often; it’s not very pleasant for me and I’m a reminder of worse times to the people I know here.”
The captain picked up a little pace as they neared the central square. It was saddening to see the town he knew so well, that he’d called home for years, so different now. Gone was the happy festive atmosphere that was the heart and soul of the community in the old days. Thirty years ago generals, senators, governors and other rich or important men had private villas around Serfium and with them came family and attendants, servants and slaves. The whole town had thrived and embraced its Imperial status. Now Kiva walked past a hollow, cylindrical marble stump used as a flower planter. In his mind’s eye it still bore a magnificent bronze statue of the Emperor Corus the Great, conqueror of the steppes, dressed in the garb of a soldier. Without looking, he could remember across the square the statue of Basianus the Fair in priestly garb. There was no point in looking for the statue of Quintus the Golden, once ten feet high in marble and bronze and towering on its pedestal in front of the Tribunal building. That had been one of the first casualties of the new regime. Velutio had torn down all the Imperial statuary across his demesne, shattering the marble and melting down the bronze to arm more troops.
He looked up to see Quintillian watching him with a look of concern. He smiled weakly. “Sorry. Getting soft in my old age.”
Quintillian laughed gently. “Somehow I can’t see that.”
The captain stopped and the other four clustered around him. “What now?” asked the young man.
“Now?” Kiva repeated. He pointed ahead. “Now we go in there and hope there hasn’t been a change of priesthood in the past ten years.”
The temple of the Divine Triad dominated the square more even than the public Tribunal. Law and order had never been a great issue in Serfium, quiet coastal town of wealthy homes. The Tribunal had only really been used for regular public meetings and occasional minor disputes. The temple on the other hand, had to be grand enough to support some of the most important families in the Empire. There were only three cities in the Empire with larger temple complexes than Serfium, and one of those didn’t count, being dedicated to strange eastern Gods in Germalla.
The temple itself was circular, but with a curved porch of high marble columns facing the square; a portico of impressive dimensions itself. A triangular pediment above showed the birth of the Gods in a marble frieze that had seen better days, much of the paintwork having faded or flaked off. Behind the colonnade stood two high embossed bronze doors. They would not be locked; the doors of the Triad temples were never locked.
Quintillian whistled through his teeth. “That’s a big temple. The Temples of the triad on Isera are small comparatively.”
Kiva nodded. “A lot of that’s down to your grandfather. Basianus wanted no temple on the island to be bigger than his own. You see he may have been called ‘the fair’, but nicknames are rarely accurate.”
Quintillian frowned. “I didn’t know there was a temple to my grandfather on the island?”
“There isn’t now” the captain replied. “You see, your uncle became very egocentric long before any serious slide into … well anyway, you know what I mean. He had the temple Basianus built torn down and his Golden House built over the site. In fact some of the stonework was reused; I remember him building the place. He had all the statues of your grandfather put to one side and the bases were re-chiselled. Your grandfather’s name was removed from them all and replaced with his own. In fact, there aren’t many Imperial statues left now, but any time you find one of Quintus, there’s at least half a chance it’s actually Basianus with the name changed.”
Quintillian frowned. “You mean that even before he went insane he destroyed statues and temples of his own uncle?”
Kiva nodded. “Of course. It was standard practice when a previous Emperor had been condemned for anything in the public eye. He had to distance himself from Basianus you see?”
Quintillian nodded and stepped to keep up as the captain had begun to stroll toward the doors of the great temple.
They stepped into the shade of the colonnade and it was only then that Quintillian realised that the sun must actually officially be up now. A quarter of an hour ago there had been little difference in the grey half-light between being sheltered or in the open air. Now the eyes had to adjust as one stepped from the open air into the shade of a canopy.
The captain reached the doors and grasped a huge bronze handle, wrenching it to one side and heaving the doors slowly open. Normal practice was for the doors to be opened just after sunrise by the priests, but Kiva was in a hurry. The handle squeaked and screeched as it turned and strained and the veins stood out of the captain’s forehead as he hauled on the heavy bronze door, pulling it gradually open.
The main room of the temple within was a domed circular span, with small chapels and rooms leading off in various places. The main area of habitation was to the rear, through doors denied to all but the priesthood. This alone was the public space, but what a space! The dome was perhaps forty feet high in the centre, with a huge diameter. The room itself could easily contain the entire population of the town of Serfium. A dark look crossed the captain’s face. That very ability had been proved over twenty years ago while Velutio’s army had rampaged around Serfium hunting down the remaining soldiers of his opposition while the frightened populace flocked to the one place they felt safe. Hundreds of terrified people crowded into this room, listening to screams and sounds of battle outside; to occasional sounds of collapsing buildings and the roaring of flames. The captain shook his head to clear it of such memories. Not his memories, for he had been miles away with his horse on a hilltop, but he knew well what had happened in the town. Some of them had been his friends, and some of his friends had not made it to the temple and had been trampled, speared, burned or even raped in the streets before they could make it to sanctuary. A victorious army always had to be tightly controlled by its commanders, or it could easily become a mob, but it seemed that Velutio had wanted a mob once the battle was over. A mob would give him fear, and fear was a very useful weapon to a new power.
As they stepped into the wide open central dome, a figure in a white robe stepped forward from the rear doors. He was an old man, perhaps even what one would consider venerable, with a short and well-tended beard and white hair cut in the old fashion. With a slight limp he stepped up the stairs onto the circular central platform and held his hand up in greeting.
“Kiva, my boy, it really is good to see you. I had feared the worst. Messengers ride into town every day now asking whether people have seen you. It must have been hell out there.”
The captain smiled and mounted the central platform himself, reaching out to shake hands with the elderly priest. “Pelian. You’re looking good. I’m afraid I’m going to have to impose on you and ask for sanctuary for myself and the rest of the company.”
The priest nodded. “Well you’d better come in the back and divest yourselves of your packs.”
Quintillian stepped up onto the platform, but the captain just watched the priest turn and walk across the room. “Pelian…” Kiva said, “what’s up?”
The priest stopped and turned. “Nothing Kiva. Why?”
The captain’s hand went now to his sword hilt. Quintillian opened his mouth, but got barely a syllable out before Kiva interrupted him. ”Shh!”
The priest smiled. “Come on, we have much to talk about.” This time, Quintillian picked up on the look in the old man’s eyes and realised that he hadn’t actually agreed to the captain’s request for sanctuary, more side-stepped it. The young man’s hand now also went to his sword pommel. Something was very wrong here and he had the feeling the priest was doing his best to warn them. The old man turned again for the rear door and it was at that moment that an arrow whistled out of the air above and struck the priest through the chest. Quintillian drew his sword, as did Kiva ahead of him and the other three behind. A figure appeared on the balustraded gallery that ran around the circumference of the dome, with a crossbow in hand. Quintillian’s sharp mind told him there were more than one, as his bow was loaded and he’d not had time to reload. Before he could think what to do, the captain had wrenched his throwing knives off the thongs round his neck and hurled them up into the open canopy. More by luck than by judgement, one of them grazed the bowman on the shoulder, the other fell considerably short and clattered to the marble floor, skittering across to the wall. Behind them the huge bronze doors clanged shut with a sound that reverberated around the central room. Simultaneously, ahead of them the door to the priests’ chambers slammed.
Behind him Quintillian heard the stretch of a bow string and the creak of the wood. An arrow whistled past his head as Thalo, probably the fastest and most accurate archer Quintillian had ever heard of, released. The arrow took the man Kiva had grazed directly in the forehead, slamming through the bone and knocking him backwards and out of sight on the balcony. Quintillian’s smile crashed from his face as the whistle and thud of the arrow was answered by the snapping sound of four or five crossbows releasing. Turning in horror, he saw Thalo jerking this way and that as the bolts plunged into his torso and head, his arms and legs flailing and spasming as though he danced.
He heard himself shout something as he ran towards the company’s archer, but had no idea what it was. Panic and grief hit him in waves and that horror amplified yet again as he saw Bors running for the stairs to the side that led up and onto the balcony. It was such a wide open space he’d never have stood a chance. Another two crossbows released, hitting the big gentle man at the same time, both in the back, and hurling him across the room, where he landed at the foot of the steps and lay there jerking rhythmically. Quintillian knew enough to know that the man was already dead but that his nerves wouldn’t let him rest yet.
Kiva was already moving, though Quintillian was riveted to the spot. His life had turned upside down in a matter of seconds. He’d lost two of the group who mattered to him more than anyone, and he was in danger of losing the other two. He saw Alessus and Kiva making for the rear door.
“No!” he screamed. For just a moment, Kiva stopped running. Perhaps he thought the lad had been hurt but he stopped and, a moment later, so did Alessus. A shudder of relief ran through Quintillian as he saw a dozen crossbowmen leaning over the balustrade. There was precious little hope the two would have even reached the door, let along force it open before they were both exterminated as the other two had been.
Again, he found his head turning. The body of Bors lay still, the jerking having finished, his head and one arm on the stairs. The way he had rolled as he fell, the two bolts had been driven deep into his beck and then sheared off at the entry point. His long sword, the largest single handed sword Quintillian had ever seen, lay some six feet away where it had slid as he hit the floor. A pool of dark blood was slowly spreading across the white marble at the foot of the stairs. Too dark. One of the bolts had gone through his liver. Taking in the horrifying scene, his head still turned until he found Thalo, lying with an arm and a leg folded beneath him, the way he had fallen. His bow lay close by and his eyes stared at the centre of the dome, unable to close. His mind flickered through scenes from the last two months: Thalo nodding seriously at him as their arrows came down from the farmhouse wall and took down an enemy soldier before the archer raced away to beat Marco to the loot; Bors, only two nights ago, grinning and handing him a canteen he thought was water only to find it was filled with fiery, thick liquor. Other scenes of their travels, both happy and sad, but all of comrades; comrades now gone. Quintillian was angry.
“Captain” he called out. “They want me; you’re incidental. Don’t give them a reason to kill you.”
A voice from high above echoed his sentiments. “The boy’s right. I don’t really care whether we take you in living or dead. In fact dead would be easier, but I think his lordship would prefer you alive.”
Kiva stepped back. Unable to see over the balustrade from his position near the rear door, he walked backwards toward Quintillian, with Alessus close by. Not far from the centre of the circle he stopped and looked up at the figure on the balustrade: a thin and perhaps even slightly effeminate man. “Phythian?” he called. “That you?”
“Of course it’s me Tregaron. How many other people make such a use of crossbows in this number? I told you a year ago in Burdium that you’d not stand a chance if we’d been on different sides.”
The captain snarled. “Why kill Thalo and Bors. You know them for fuck’s sake!”
The man he’d called Phythian smiled a dead smile. “You’ve got too much of a reputation these days Tregaron. We’re all well aware of how dangerous the Grey Company are, so we all shoot first and then decide what we should have done.”
The captain growled. “So what now?”
Phythian shrugged. “We wait for the other four and then take you all to Velutio and see how much the lord will give us if we don’t have the full set. I don’t suppose you’d like to tell us where your sergeant and the other three are, would you?”
Kiva snarled again. “Tythias got them back in the hills” he lied. “They won’t be giving him any trouble. The murdering bastard had them knifed in their sleep.”
Phythian nodded. “Very well. The Lion Riders will have to claim the rest. Still, we’ll be sitting pretty just from what we have. I think by now you’ve traditionally dropped your weapons when you know you’re surrounded and there’s no hope.”
Kiva dropped his sword. Quintillian blinked. He hadn’t for a moment considered that there really wasn’t a way out; the captain always had something up his sleeve. As Alessus also dropped his blade with a low growl though, he realised that he would die if he didn’t join them. Swallowing back the misery he let his fine blade, the one that had once belonged to Jorun of the Lion riders, fall to the marble with a clatter. Two of the men from the balcony trotted down the stairs and edged round the three of them without getting too close, collecting up their weapons. The captain growled at them and then looked up at his captor.
“Do you have any idea who this boy is that you’ve laid your hands on?”
Phythian laughed. “Wrong question Tregaron. Do I care is what you need to ask.”
“You might” replied Kiva “ if you knew.”
Phythian trotted lightly down the stairs to where the three of them stood. The other soldiers had collected all the weapons now and were busy dragging the bodies behind the stair case. He smiled that snake-eyed dead smile again as he walked round the three in a slow circle. He stopped in front of the boy. “Let me guess. He’s someone important enough that you think it’ll change my mind.” He stared deep into Quintillian’s eyes. “Ah yes. He has to be one of the Imperial line. Curious, since I thought they’d all died. Nice try Tregaron, but you see if he were a God, as they say the Emperors were, then this wouldn’t happen, would it?”
He raised his hand and one of the archers above let loose a bolt that plunged deep into Quintillian’s thigh, ripping through the muscle until it protruded from the flesh at the rear.
“Presumably Gods aren’t indestructible then.” Phythian gave a laugh that was as dead as his smile and cradles his hands.
“Get in the back chambers” he told the three.
Kiva and Alessus reached out to help Quintillian walk. He had gone pale with shock and, though the wound was far from mortal, a surprising amount of blood trailed along the floor as they half-supported, half-dragged the young man across the floor toward the rear exit. The captain stopped as they reached the door and it opened of its own accord. Beyond another six men stood in the priests’ robing chamber, crossbows already levelled at them. Kiva’s hope for an escape from the rear chambers faded instantly. The bodies of half a dozen priests lay strewn around the floor of their own chambers. Phythian was unlikely to be turned around with any kind of appeal to reason or honour if such sacrilege was not beneath him. He turned to look at the cold, mad man that had brought them to this and spat on the floor.
“When I’m back on top there won’t be a fucking hole in the world deep enough for you to hide from me, Phythian.”
The man just laughed again. “We shall see. I can’t see you bouncing back quickly from this. Anyway, your friends are coming; I can hear them. Let’s hope they don’t do anything stupid, eh?” He motioned with his finger and unseen hands slammed the rear door shut. The heavy door cut off all noise from within the dome and Kiva growled again, furious with his impotent position.
He stopped in silence and could hear his heart beating. Where was his plan now? Where were the allies he needed? He glanced around at the six men training their weapons on them. Perhaps he and Alessus could take three each. The lad would be no use now with a leg than wouldn’t support his weight. But then they had no weapons and would each take two or three bolts before they reached the archers. No, it was no use. There was no way they could get out of this for now. He frowned at the six guards. “We’re going over to the corner. We need to get the boy comfortable. Ok? We’re not escaping, so don’t shoot.”
There was no acknowledgment from the six, so he turned to look at the boy. Quintillian was now out cold. Perhaps the pain; perhaps the loss of blood. He and Alessus lifted the boy by the shoulders, eliciting a lifeless groan, and dragged him over to two benches at the room’s corner, where they lay him gently on one.
Alessus made a harrumphing noise as he undid the scarf from his neck and tied it around the boy’s leg just above the wooden shaft. “Wish bloody Mercurias were here.”
Kiva shook his head. “No you don’t, and neither do I. Just staunch it as best you can. There’s no hope of us getting out of here now, but it’s quite a long road to Velutio, and anything can happen between here and the city. Perhaps Phythian might have a little accident.”
Alessus nodded. “Wonder what the hell’s happening out there?”
As if in answer, the doors were suddenly thrown open and the young Julian limped into the room, two bolts through his shin and one in his shoulder. Alessus looked up in concern and Kiva raised an eyebrow. “The others?”
Julian shook his head sadly and walked across to the other three in silence, lowering himself painfully to the bench and sitting as comfortably as he could.
Kiva rumbled deep in his throat. He was so angry now he could almost feel his heart boiling in his mouth. “Bors and Thalo, Pirus, Scauvus and Clovis. Five good men.” They’d served in more battles together than he could count in the last twenty years and with rarely more than minor wounds. Only one fatality some ten years ago, after which they’d taken on Julian to make up the unit’s numbers. And now five down in five minutes. Almost half the company, and things didn’t look over hopeful for the rest either. That was what happened when you dealt with politics and blood feuds; battles he could cope with. He hoped to hell that Athas and the others would find out about this before they walked innocently back into Serfium.
Phythian and his archers marched into the room.
“Tie them” he ordered two of his men. “Securely.”
As the two men came into the corner of the room with heavy cord and began to lash them around the wrists with their arms behind their backs, Phythian took a seat on a table and crossed his legs, kicking the air idly. “I often wondered how you got this awesome reputation, Tregaron, and now that I’ve actually fought you, I’m still wondering.”
Kiva snarled. “You haven’t fought me yet, Phythian. This was just using poor innocent priests to trap us, but don’t worry; I’ll let you fight me soon.”
Their captor laughed again and then turned to someone without a bow, possibly his second in command. “Get them roped together and shackle each of their left legs onto a chain. I don’t want any chance of these four going anywhere.”
Kiva looked round at Julian, Alessus, and finally at the unconscious Quintillian. His mind raced as he tried to fathom a way out of this mess, but there seemed to be precious little chance of any escape. Perhaps Athas and the others would find them on the way to Velutio. Perhaps Tythias would head south. Perhaps even, and this seemed the least far-fetched of the three, prince Ashar would learn of their peril and do something about it. The only other hope would be to find a friend in the city, though it had been a very long time since Kiva had had a friend there. Perhaps this Sabianus would prove to be someone he could deal with. There were many possibilities, but all of them either relied on someone coming to their aid, or slim chances he would have in the city itself, providing Velutio didn’t have them all executed the moment they arrived.
With a sigh, he wondered how such a promising week had produced such a bad day.