Prince of Fools (The Red Queen's War 1)

“He was alive? He told you?” I asked.

“He had a breath left in him. He didn’t use it to tell me how he escaped, but I could see the iron marks on him and his hands were broken. You can’t escape slave shackles without breaking bones. He only had four words for me. Four words and a smile. The smile first, though I saw it through tears, biting down on my curses so I could hear him. I could have been there quicker, I could have run, found him hours earlier. Instead I’d gathered my belongings, my weapons, as if I were going on a hunt. I should have run them down the moment the snowbank gave up its hold. I—” Snorri’s voice had grown thick with emotion and now broke. He bit the word off and ground his jaw, face twitching. He lowered his head, defeated.

“What did Karl say?” I couldn’t tell you where along the way I’d started to care about the Norseman’s story. Caring was never my strong suit. Perhaps it was the weeks together on the road that had done it, or more likely some side effect of the curse that chained us together, but I found myself hurting with him, and I didn’t like it one bit.

“They want the key.” Spoken to the ground.

“What?”

“That’s what he said. He used his last breath to tell me that. I sat with him but he hadn’t any more words. He lasted another hour, less than that maybe. He waited for me and then he died.”

“A key? What key? That’s madness—who would do all that for a key?”

Snorri shook his head and held up a hand as if begging quarter. “Not tonight, Jal.”

I pursed my lips, looked at him hunched before me, and swallowed all the questions bubbling on my tongue. Snorri would tell me or he wouldn’t. Perhaps he didn’t even know. Either way, it was of no great consequence for me. The North sounded more terrible by the minute, and whilst I was sorry for Snorri’s losses I had no intention of chasing dead men across the snow. Sven Broke-Oar had taken Freja and Egil to the Bitter Ice. And Snorri seemed to think his wife and son were still alive there now—and perhaps they were. Either way, that was a matter between Snorri and the Broke-Oar. Somewhere between us and the northern ice would be a means to unlock the two of us, at which point I’d be off before the G of Good-bye had cleared the Norseman’s beard.

We sat in silence. Or almost silence, for it seemed as if Baraqel’s voice spoke just beyond the edge of hearing, gentle and full of music. After a time I lay down and set my head on my pack. Sleep took me quick enough, and as it caught hold the voice came more clearly so that in the moments before dreaming washed over both me and the voice, I could almost make out the words. Something about honour, about being brave, about helping Snorri find his peace . . .

“Bugger that,” I replied. Words muttered half-asleep over slack lips—but heartfelt nonetheless.

SIXTEEN

We came to Ancrath along the border roads between Rhone and Gelleth. Snorri travelled with a native caution that kept us safe on several occasions, holding us back amidst a wood as battle-ragged troops marched south, taking us into the corn when brigands rode by in search of wickedness. I was keener to avoid such encounters than Snorri, but my senses were better honed to detecting the approach of trouble across a crowded feast hall or through the smokes of an opium parlour than on horseback across open country.

In the town of Oppen, just a few miles into Ancrath, I bought more serviceable travelling clothes. I made sure to buy sufficient quality to mark me out as a man of distinction, though of course normally I’d not be seen dead in sturdy boots and tough-wearing garments made to withstand rough treatment. I’d rejected the idea of letting a Rhonishman fit me for cloak and hat but decided I could suffer the attentions of an Ancrath tailor. Snorri snorted and stamped so much during the fitting that I had to send him out to find an axe more suited to his tastes.

The moment he’d gone I started to feel an unease. Nothing to do with the slight stretching of the magics that bound us, and everything to do with the certainty that the necromancer who had sought our deaths in Chamy-Nix would still be hard upon our trail. Her or that creature that had watched me from behind its mask at the opera. The Silent Sister’s trap had been set for that one. I was certain of it now. She’d been prepared to sacrifice the lives of two hundred, including some of Vermillion’s finest—including me, damn it—to burn that one monster. I could only pray the crack I’d put in her spell whilst escaping hadn’t let it free. And of course other servants of the Dead King might lurk around any given corner. Even in a tailor’s shop!

In the end I left Oppen with a sense of relief. Being on the move had become a habit, and I wasn’t sure I would ever feel entirely comfortable settled in one place again.