Nineteen days before the Black Mausoleum
The tremor woke him up. Hadn’t been asleep for long, so no point smashing down the door yet. He’d had a good look at that as he’d been shoved inside. The door was strong enough, but the frame had been wedged poorly and in haste into whatever stone this place was made of. A good charge or two would bring it down.
The alchemist was crouched over Siff. The shit-eater was still breathing. Wasn’t moving much more than that. Skjorl rolled over and let himself fall back to sleep.
When he woke up again, the room looked exactly the same. Same light. Shit-eater lying sprawled across the floor. Alchemist sitting beside him. He couldn’t tell how long they’d been there. Hours. Could have been the middle of the night; could have been the next morning for all he knew.
‘Alchemist!’
Her head jerked up. She’d been sleeping. ‘What?’
‘What’s your plan?’
‘I don’t know.’
He unfolded himself and walked to the door. Peered through the cracks. Two men on guard outside. They looked bored and sleepy. ‘We could leave. If you want.’
‘No.’
Hardly a surprise. He sat down again.
‘Someone has mastered dragons. Whoever that is, I need to talk to them. It doesn’t matter who they serve. Whether it’s Speaker Lystra or Speaker Hyrkallan or some other speaker I’ve never heard of, they’ve mastered dragons again.’ She turned to face him. Her eyes were wide. ‘Do you know what that means?’
‘It means hope, alchemist. I know that.’
‘Yes.’
‘I saw Taiytakei as they brought us here. I saw soldiers who are of these realms and others who are not. Among the Adamantine Men it’s said that the Taiytakei brought the disaster upon us.’ He looked at her. She nodded. ‘Yet would you help them?’
‘I saw one Taiytakei. One.’ She growled at him, which made him smile. He stretched out and lay back down again. The last few days had been long ones. Adamantine Men learned to catch their rest when they could.
Some time later the door opened. Someone threw in a loaf of bread and a skin of water and slammed it shut again. The bread was hard as stone and tasted of mould but it was bread. Skjorl couldn’t remember the last time he’d tasted bread. No one had made it since the Adamantine Palace burned. He savoured every mouthful, mould or no mould.
The shit-eater was still unconscious. The alchemist was somewhere else, lost in thought. Skjorl stared at her for a while, thinking about what he’d do if she hadn’t done her blood-magic to his head.
The door opened again. There were more soldiers this time. Eight, maybe nine. Skjorl didn’t get the chance to count them before they piled into him, ignoring the others, pinned him down and tied his hands. Then they dragged him out. They didn’t take him far, just to another cell along the same passage, hardly a dozen yards from where they’d started and empty but for a heavy chair. Took most of them to tie him to it, but they did. When they were done, one of them stood in front of him and cracked his knuckles.
‘You’re a spy.’
He had an accent, this one. Not a strong one, but an accent nonetheless. One Skjorl could place. Another outsider. Skjorl grinned at him. ‘You’re a shit-eater.’
The man punched him in the face and broke his nose. ‘Your speaker sent you. You’re a spy.’
Skjorl said nothing. Said nothing when the man punched him again. Said nothing when they held back his head and poured water over his face until he was sure he was going to drown. Said nothing when they told him what else they were going to do, what bones they’d break, what pieces they’d cut off him and how they’d burn and scar him. The men of the speaker’s guard took worse from the brothers of their own legion, after all, before they were finally given their dragon-scale and their axe and sword. A last test. No one ever said so, but the ones who failed never saw another full year, dragon-scale or no.
Skjorl’s test had lasted three days. The shit-eater here grew bored after a couple of hours. When he stopped Skjorl laughed at him. He spat out a tooth.
‘I am an Adamantine Man, shit-eater,’ he said, as if that was enough.
They left him for a while. He didn’t bother struggling or trying to break free. Concentrated instead on recovering his strength. When they came back, they picked him up, chair and everything, and turned him round so he couldn’t see the door.
‘I know about you,’ said a new voice. Heavy accent again, but the words were careful, shaped with thought and spoken slowly so they could be heard. ‘Adamantine Men. They raise you from the cradle to fight dragons.’
Skjorl said nothing. He was what he was. An Adamantine Man never broke.
‘I’ve led soldiers in three worlds now. I would take your kind over any other. You have my profound respect. I’m sorry for the beating. Pointless, I realise, and if my captain had been here, it wouldn’t have happened. He’d have known better, because he’s one of you. I’m also sorry that I have to take this from you in such a way, but time is pressing.’
Skjorl waited for the blow. He didn’t flinch, didn’t tense his muscles, just waited for whatever would come.
What came was a tickle in his head, that was all. Like the alchemist’s fingers but infinitely lighter and defter. The faintest sense of something taken away, cut with an expert scalpel. For a moment Skjorl thought he saw the flicker of a knife with a golden hilt reflected in the polished armour of the soldiers around him.
‘Now,’ said the voice again. ‘Tell me why you are here. Tell me everything.’
Skjorl told him everything. Afterwards, when they took him back to his cell, he sat down and wondered why he’d done that, because it wasn’t like they’d ripped it from him, piece by piece, fighting for every word. More like he’d decided it was right to tell what he knew, and just didn’t know why, that was all. He watched, strangely detached, as the same soldiers dragged the alchemist away and closed the door behind her. He listened to her shout, heard the scrape of wood on stone. That would be the chair. Voices. The man who had asked him questions, then the alchemist, then another one, a woman, one he’d heard once before, a long time ago only now he couldn’t place her. She sounded sharp and angry. There was something about a garden. Something about moonlight.
His brow furrowed. He was sure he ought to care about these things.
A tiny tremor ran through the walls. The shit-eater was still on the floor, unconscious or asleep or pretending, one or the other. Down the hall the voices stopped. When they started again they were fast and urgent, words buried once more under strange accents. He caught one clear enough though. Over and over, shouted like an alarm.
‘Dragons!’