Blood Song

Then he saw it, the open window, the absence of sheets and blankets on their beds. Leaning out of the window he saw the knotted linen dangling a good twenty feet below, which left another fifteen foot drop to the roof of the north gate house and ten more from there to the ground. For Nortah, like the rest of them, it was hardly a challenging prospect. The lingering morning mist would enable him to slip away under the noses of the brothers on the wall, most of whom would have been preoccupied with the anticipation of breakfast.

For the briefest moment Vaelin considered finding Master Sollis or the Aspect but discounted it. Nortah’s punishment would be severe and he already had at least a half hour start. Besides, Vaelin didn’t even know if Sollis or the Aspect were in the House, they may well be at the Fair too. And there was another possibility, ringing loud and terribly clear in his head: What if he makes it there first? What if he sees?

Vaelin quickly gathered a water bottle and a couple of knives then strapped his sword across his back. He went to the window, took a firm grip on Nortah’s rope and began to descend. As expected it was an easy climb, taking barely a moment to reach the ground. With the mist all but gone he had to be wary of being seen, standing flat against the wall until the brother on the battlements above, a bored looking boy of about seventeen, wandered away, then sprinting full tilt for the trees. The run would have seemed short on the practice field, scarcely two hundred yards to the forest, but it felt like a mile or more with the wall at his back, expecting every second to hear a shout of alarm or even the thrum of an arrow. At this range few brothers would miss. So it was with relief that he entered the cool shadow of the trees and dropped his speed to a half sprint, still faster than he would have liked for comfort but he couldn’t afford to waste any time. He stayed in the trees for half a mile or so then turned onto the road.

It was busier than he had ever seen it, packed with farmers driving carts laden with produce for sale at the fair, families making the once a year journey to see the contests and the many spectacles on offer, this year no doubt the promise of a First Minister’s execution added a certain spice to the occasion. None of the travellers seemed daunted by the prospect. Vaelin saw cheerful, laughing faces everywhere, he even passed a cart full of what he took to be woodsmen from their collection of axes, all singing a raucous doggerell about the impending event:

“His name was Artis Sendahl

He was a greedy old goat

King Janus came to count his purse

And stretched his greedy throat.”

“Don’t run so fast, order boy!” one of the woodsmen called to him as he passed, swaying as he raised a stoneware bottle. “They can’t choke the bastard ‘til we get there. Some bugger has to cut the wood for the fire.” The rest of the woodsmen roared with laughter as Vaelin ran on, resisting the urge to see how well a drunkard could cut wood with his fingers broken.

He heard it before he saw it, a dull roar beyond the next hill, the sound of thousands of voices speaking at once. As a child he had thought it a monster, snuggling into his mother’s embrace in fear. “Hush now,” she said, stroking his hair, turning his head gently as they crested the rise. “Look Vaelin. Look at all the people.”

To his boy’s eyes it had seemed every subject in the Realm had come to the expansive plain before the walls of Varinshold to share in the blessings of summer, a vast throng covering several acres. Now he found he was amazed to see the crowd was even larger than he remembered, stretching the whole length of the city’s western wall, a haze of mingled exhalation and wood-smoke hanging over the mass, tents and brightly coloured marquees rising from the carpet of bodies. For a youth who had spent much of the last four years in the cramped fortress of the Order House it was almost overwhelming.

How can I track him in this? he wondered. Behind him came the song of the drunken woodsmen again as their cart caught up, still rejoicing in the death of the King’s minister. Don’t look for him,

he realised. Look for the gallows. He’ll be there.