Fire & Ice

Chapter 3

Chapter 3

CARRO PICKED UP the cup from the merchant’s table, feigning interest. A mother and a daughter had come to the stall and the mother had asked if the merchant had any good sets of tableware for sale, unwittingly saving Carro from doing what he dreaded for a few minutes.

While her mother spoke to the merchant, the daughter studied the items on the table, a dusty collection of bric-a-brac, the sort of things that remained after grandmother had died and all her relatives had scavenged her possessions.

The girl was nervously winding a thin strip of leather with a gull’s tail feather attached around her fingers that marked her as one of the newly blooded virgins.

She let her eyes roam over Carro’s short-hair Knight’s cloak and the straps of his riding harness, which dangled from underneath. Her expression was one of fear or interest; he couldn’t decide which. He knew her vaguely, like he knew most people here, or they knew him. His stomach churned. He did not want to do this, not in the safe haven of his childhood.

He glanced over his shoulder, between the crowded stalls with the garlands of yellow paper that hung from their canopies. A steady stream of patrons tottered out of the meltery, faces red from bloodwine. All those were signs that the Newlight festival was in full swing.

The Junior Knight Captain leaned against the wall, the map in his hands. He was looking straight at Carro.

“Can I assist the dear sir?” the merchant asked.

Carro started. The mother and daughter had left.

“Um . . .” He put down the cup he was still holding.

The merchant was a middle-aged man, his short-cropped hair and beard more grey than black. Age had lined his face, but his eyes were clear and blue. He wore black. Everyone in the Outer City knew what that meant.

“Oh, it’s you.” The man smiled. “I had been wondering how you were getting on with the Knights.”

“Very well, thank you.”

“You know that all of us in the Outer City are proud of you?”

Carro stands at the stall; the table has suddenly become a lot taller. The cover of the book feels rough under his fingers. He opens it, marvelling at the beautiful print on the pages of glossy paper. The book’s scent floats on the breeze, releasing the smell of fifty years of hiding in a musty cupboard.

“I want this one,” he says.

The merchant reaches across the table. He wears a short beard, black, the same colour as his clothes. It’s the colour of the Brotherhood of the Light.

The merchant says, “I don’t think your couple of foxes of pocket money would pay for that.” He eases the book out of Carro’s hands. “Besides, I don’t think you want to be seen with this. Your father would whip you if he knew you had it.”

Carro shivers. His father would, too. His father doesn’t like the Brothers. It’s illegal to possess anything that belonged to families who supported the old king. But he promised his friend Isandor. And the book is so beautiful.

Carro puts his hand in his pocket and closes his fingers on the gold eagle, the metal warm and heavy against his leg. It’s not his money; well, some of it is, but most of it is his friend’s. He takes it out and puts it on the table.

He says, “I want the book.”

“You’ll be flying in the race today?”

Carro gasped. The words of the past were still on his lips. I want the book. He blinked at the merchant, who was waiting for a reply.

“Oh—um—the race. Yes, I will.” His heart thudded. He hated how he had these spells where he drifted off into his memories.

“So you’re here to visit your parents?”

Carro glanced over his shoulder again, where the Junior Knight Captain was still looking at him, drumming his fingers on the side of the sled. No way to get out of this. He closed his eyes and sighed.

“No. I’m afraid I’m on patrol. Do you have any illegal items?”

The merchant took in a sharp breath. His eyes widened. No, he hadn’t expected that either, knowing of Carro’s prior interest in old books.

Carro ploughed on, speaking rehearsed words with a tongue that felt like a tanned hide. “You can give illegal items to me now, and there will be no fuss. If I have to call my Captain . . .” He shivered. The merchant might tell the Captain that he had sold Carro some of those illegal items.

“No, no, you needn’t do that.” The man rummaged in the space under the bench and retrieved a box with a dusty assortment of bric-a-brac. There were some forks, silver, richly stamped with the crests of the old families of the Thilleian house. There were metal stands for lights—the silver globes gone of course—and a couple of sheets in neat print. Carro ran his finger over the paper, feeling the raised profile of the ink. It felt familiar. His books were like that. The old people used to have machines that melted ink onto the paper. Carro’s books were still under his bed in his father’s house, the books he hoped no one would find.

Carro took the box, meeting the merchant’s eyes. He cringed with the anger in the man’s expression. “I’m sorry, but I’m asking every merchant.”

“Sure,” the man said, his voice stiff. “You know this sort of stuff turns up every now and then.”

“You should hand in any illegal material as soon as you get it.” Carro hated his own words.

“I hadn’t gotten around to doing that.”

All lies. Carro wanted to hear no more, lest the merchant dig up uncomfortable truths from Carro’s past. This was enough warning, for both of them.

Seated on a mound of snow, with his peg leg sticking out awkwardly into the narrow alley, Isandor opens the book on his knees. His skinny fingers trace the writing. He whispers, “Wow.” A lock of glossy hair falls over his shoulders.

“A real diary from the time of the old king,” Carro boasts. “The best he had. You should have seen his face when I showed him the money.”

“You’re a real hero, Carro.”

Carro smiles. No one else calls him a hero.

“Who wrote this?” Isandor has a dreamy look on his face.

“The king’s court historian.” Carro bends forward and flicks the pages, trying to ignore his numb and cold fingers. Heroes are not bothered by cold.

“Wait.” Isandor stops Carro’s hand. There is a drawing on the page with many lines leading from one box to another. “Look at this. It’s a map of the city with this thing they call the Heart.”

“The Heart? There is no such thing.” Carro feels uncomfortable. His father has spoken of this thing once and he’d seen it when he flicked through the book.

“It is the Heart,” Isandor says. “It says so in the book. It’s a machine under the palace. They say it’s the source of icefire.” Isandor raises his head. His eyes are distant. “You know this book sings?”

“Sings?” Carro shivers.

“Yes, can’t you hear it?”

Carro shakes his head. “What song?”

“There isn’t a song. It’s like the band in the meltery. The music just plays on and on, but no one takes any notice of it until it stops. That’s what it’s like.”

Carro shrugs. It’s strange. Then again, Isandor has Thilleian blood, Carro is sure about that.

The old king only needed to reach into the air and icefire would spark from his fingers. He would kill people with it. Old people still tell the stories.

Carro carried the box across the marketplace to the sled, repressing memories unlocked by the musty smell. Other merchants, all people he knew, followed his every move with stone-hard looks on stone-hard faces. He wanted to scream that it wasn’t his choice to do this job, that he’d been told to do it, that the Knights who had come with him were all older and hated him, that . . .

He dumped the box on the luggage tray of the sled. The Knight Captain strolled to the sled and rummaged through the contents in a bored fashion.

“Another load of old junk,” he drawled. “You know, we’ve collected so many light stands over the past few days, one wonders where the lights are.”

Carro didn’t meet his gaze. The silver light globes were always gone by the time these items came to the market. Even if the lights had been complete when the merchant obtained the items, he would know better than take the globes to the market. They were worth a fortune, those bulbs that needed only icefire to glow.

The merchant hadn’t given up everything he had, Carro was sure of that. But he’d hoped that by going to the Brother’s stand first, he could spare the man a more thorough inspection.

No such luck.

The Captain flicked his fingers and pushed himself off the sled.

The other two Knights of the patrol moved towards the stall. One spoke, but they were too far away for Carro to hear what he said. The merchant shook his head. Then the second Knight grabbed the edge of the table and turned it upside down. Pots and plates flew everywhere, shattering on the frozen ground.

As Carro had suspected, there were more boxes underneath—boxes holding far more damning material than the few stands and leaflets he had collected. He could see the spines of books and items of clothing in black and silver: the colours of the Thilleian house.

“You said you inspected that one?” The Knight Captain raised his eyebrows at Carro. “Are you Apprentice puppies capable of anything?”

Carro clenched his fists. The Brotherhood merchant was looking straight at him.

“I thought you would actually be of some use to us here,” the Captain continued. “That’s why I asked your Tutor if you could come. You did weasel your way into the knighthood from this slum, didn’t you?”

Carro shrugged.

“Answer me when I ask you a question.” The Captain slapped Carro in the face. “And look at me when I’m talking to you.”

“Yes, Captain.” Carro met the man’s eyes.

“Then go and carry all that rubbish onto the sled.”

“Yes, Captain.”

Carro set off to the ravaged stand, past the yellow garlands that seemed to mock him. His cheek stung, but he resisted the urge to wipe it. Every merchant and many of the market’s customers were looking at him. Carro, the pride boy of the Outer City. Carro, the son of a lowly merchant who had made it into the Eagle Knights. Carro, who had come back to betray his own people.

“I want that merchant watched,” the Knight Captain said behind him to another member of the patrol. “See who visits him and what they bring, or buy.”