“Termin Resk,” he said, squinting at the kneeling man. He was a stocky fellow of middling years, a former Realm Guard sergeant, now leader of the Damned Rats, with a dire reputation to match. Resk gasped out something in response; his words, either a plea or an expression of defiance, were quickly choked off by a tightening of the chain around his neck. The outlaw’s stubby fingers clawed at the iron links to little effect, his head increasingly resembling a quivering, reddened blob.
Vaelin’s gaze tracked along the chain to the manacle on the wrist of the man holding Resk. Taking the full measure of the fellow, Vaelin found him to be taller than himself by an inch or more. The man’s bare chest was broad and impressively muscled if marred by numerous scars, some recent, and Vaelin recognised the telltale mark of a whip. The sweat of recent exertion shone on the man’s dark skin and he met Vaelin’s gaze with a cool, appraising stare beneath brows marked by a series of pale, precisely placed scars.
“You are far from the empire,” Vaelin observed, speaking in Alpiran.
The man’s eyes narrowed at the words. From his colouring, Vaelin knew him to be of the southern provinces where the Emperor’s tongue wasn’t always known, but he saw comprehension in his face.
“It is not my empire,” the man replied, his Alpiran accented but clearly spoken. He jerked the chain, causing Resk to grunt in pain, eyes bulging now. “You are this one’s enemy?” he asked.
“He is a . . . bandit,” Vaelin replied, using the term most commonly ascribed to outlaws in the Alpiran Empire. “I enforce the law in these lands.”
“Then you serve her.” The tall man’s eyes betrayed a small glimmer Vaelin recognised: hope. “You serve the Queen of Fire.”
“She doesn’t like that name.” Vaelin gave a formal bow. “Vaelin Al Sorna, Tower Lord of the Northern Reaches by the grace of Queen Lyrna Al Nieren. And you are?”
He saw the tall man’s hope joined by another emotion then, his brows bunching with a particular sense of recognition Vaelin hadn’t seen for many years. “Alum Vi Moreska,” he said, the muscles of his forearms bunching as his fists tightened the chain. In response Resk let out a final, choking gurgle and fell limp, all light fading from his bulging eyes. “I request safe harbour,” Alum Vi Moreska said, unfurling the chain from Resk’s corpse with a skillful flick of his wrists. “For myself and my people.”
Vaelin nodded at the mineshaft. “There are more of you in there?”
“Many.” The man met Vaelin’s gaze once more, letting out a hard, shame-filled sigh as he sank to one knee. “On behalf of the Moreska Clan, I pledge our allegiance to the Great Queen in the hope she will bestow upon us the gift of her renowned mercy and compassion.”
CHAPTER TWO
In all, they had taken six outlaws alive; the rest, over a hundred in number, had perished in either the stockade or the mine. Captain Nohlen, commander of the North Guard contingent, reported a total of four hundred and twenty-three people in chains in the mine, plus another thirty-two corpses besides the outlaws’.
“Bad business, my lord,” the man advised Vaelin in his typically clipped tones. “They didn’t die easy. Those that didn’t perish in the fight had been worked to death, I’d say.”
The slaves were all of the same clan as Alum, the Moreska, and Vaelin could find none with an unscarred back. There were no children or old people amongst their ranks.
“The pirates took them away,” Alum said after describing how their ships had come under attack by a flotilla of pirate vessels in the Arathean Ocean. “We know not where. If the gods are kind, they were given a swift death. If not . . .” A shadow passed across the man’s face, and his nostrils flared as he fought to master himself.
“When did this happen?” Vaelin asked him.
They sat together at a fire pit where the outlaws had cooked their meals, the embers still warm and littered with bones. Alum had taken a spear from one of the dead and used it to describe a series of intricate symbols in the ashes as he spoke. “Six months, maybe more. A man loses sense of time when he labours beyond sight of the sun.”
“The pirates? Do you know which port they called home?”
“They spoke a language not known to us, but had the eyes and faces of those from the lands of the Merchant Kings. Many bore fresh scars, and their ships had plainly seen recent battle. They had the look of desperate men, so desperate they didn’t hesitate to kill any who cast a defiant glance their way. After weeks at sea they brought those of us still alive to this land of damp and cold, where they sold us to these dogs so that we might dig into this mountain for the metal they craved.”
“Why were your people sailing the Arathean?”
Alum’s spear paused in the ash as an even deeper sadness crept over his face. “This,” he said, jabbing the spear at the symbol he had drawn, “is the sign of Malua, Lord of Sand and Sky. These”—the spear shifted to the smaller symbols on either side—“are his children, Jula, Lady of the Rains, and Kula, Lord of the Winds.”
“Your gods,” Vaelin said.
“A word we do not use. In our tongue they are ‘Protectors.’ Since the time of the first feet upon the sand, we have held true to Malua and his children. The Emperors always respected this. As long as we pledged loyalty with the dawn of each new season and sent our warriors to join their host when they called, we were left in peace. The Empress”—Alum’s jaws bunched and his lips twitched in restrained anger—“feels differently.”
“Empress Emeren wanted you to worship the Alpiran gods?”
Alum nodded. “She tried to sunder us from the loving arms of the Protectors. She sent envoys that spoke of unity, of how all subjects of the empire must now come together because the Queen of Fire, having seized all the lands of the Volarians, now looked upon ours with envious eyes. More than that the Empress sent people to settle lands that had always been ours, lands the Emperors had long shielded from outsiders. They scraped furrows in the sacred earth to grow crops, hunted all the animals they could find, leaving none for the next season, claimed the wells as their own. When we drove them off she sent soldiers. We are fierce but they were many. Long we fought but the blood of our clan seeped away with every battle.”
Alum paused to look around, pointing as his gaze alighted on Captain Nohlen. “That man has skin like mine,” he said. “The old ones told stories of another tribe that had once fought against the Emperor and fled across the sea to find refuge in the north lands. We sought to follow their example.”
“The exiles came here four generations ago, it is true,” Vaelin said. “They were made welcome, as are you.” He gestured at the symbols in the ashes. “And your Protectors. As for your children, the Merchants’ Guild in North Tower keeps a ledger of all pirate sightings. Perhaps some clue to their home port can be found there. You’re welcome to accompany me on my return.”