with Odin’s blessing but the giants’ breath rolled down even so, and one summer’s day every warrior in his army froze where he stood and the snows drowned them.
‘The Broke-Oar has it that those taken from Uuliskind are excavating the dead. Freeing them from the ice.’
Grandmother paced along the front line of our number. Martus, little me, Darin, Cousin Roland with his stupid beard, Rotus, lean and sour, unmarried at thirty, duller than ditchwater, obsessed with reading – and histories at that! She paused by Rotus, another of her favourites and third in line by right – though still it seemed she would give her throne to Cousin Serah before him. ‘And why, Snagason? Who has sent these forces on such an errand?’ She met Rotus’s gaze as if he of all of us would appreciate the answer.
The giant paused. It’s hard for a Norseman to pale but I swear he did. ‘The Dead King, lady.’
A guard made to strike him down, though whether for the improper address or for making mock with foolish tales I couldn’t say. Grandmother stayed the man with a lifted finger. ‘The Dead King.’ She made a slow repetition of the words as if they somehow sealed her opinion. Perhaps she’d mentioned him before when I wasn’t listening.
I’d heard tales of course. Children had started to tell them to scare each other on Hallows Night. The Dead King will come for you! Woo, woo, woo. It took a child to be scared. Anyone with a proper idea of how far away the Drowned Isles were and of how many kingdoms lay between us would have a hard time caring. Even if the stories held a core of truth I couldn’t see any serious-minded gentleman getting overly excited about a bunch of heathen necromancers playing with old corpses on whatever wet hillocks remained to the Lords of the Isles. So what if they actually did raise a hundred dead men twitching from their coffins and dropping corpse-flesh with every step? Ten heavy horse would ride down any such in half an hour without loss and damn their rotting eyes.
I felt tired and out of sorts, grumpy that I’d had to stand half the morning and more listening to this parade of nonsense. If I’d been drunk too I might have given voice to my thoughts. It’s probably a good job I wasn’t, though – the Red Queen could scare me sober with a look.
Grandmother turned and pointed at the Norseman. ‘Well told, Snorri ver Snagason. Let your axe guide you.’ I blinked at that. Some sort of northern saying, I guessed. ‘Take him away,’ she said, and her guards led him off, chains clanking.
My fellow princes fell to muttering, and me to yawning. I watched the huge Norseman leave and hoped we’d be released soon. Despite the call of my bed I had important plans for Snorri ver Snagason and needed to get hold of him quickly.
Grandmother returned to her throne and held her peace until the doors had closed behind the last prisoner to exit.
‘Did you know there is a door into death?’ The Red Queen didn’t raise her voice and yet it cut through the princes’ chatter. ‘An actual door. One you can set your hand against. And behind it, all the lands of death.’ Her gaze swept across us. ‘There’s an important question you should ask me now.’
No one spoke – I hadn’t a clue but was tempted to answer anyway just to hurry things along. I decided against it and the silence stretched until Rotus cleared his throat at last and asked, ‘Where?’
‘Wrong.’ Grandmother cocked her head. ‘The question was “why?” Why is there a door into death? The answer is as important as anything you’ve heard today.’ Her stare fell upon me and I quickly turned my attention to the state of my fingernails. ‘There is a door into death because we live in an age of myth. Our ancestors lived in a world of immutable laws. Times have changed. There is a door because there are tales of that door, because myths and legends have grown about it over centuries, because it is set in holy books, and because the stories of that door are told and retold. There is a door because in some way we wanted it, or expected it, or both. This is why. And this is why you must believe the tales that have been told today. The world is changing, moving beneath our feet. We are in a war, children of the Red March, though you may not see it yet, may not feel it. We are in a war against everything you can imagine and armed only with our desire to oppose it.’
Nonsense of course. Red March’s only recent war was against Scorron and even that had fallen into an uneasy truce this past year … Grandmother must have sensed she was losing even the most gullible of her audience and switched tactics.
‘Rotus asked “where”, but I know where the door is. And I know that it cannot be opened.’ She stood from her throne again. ‘And what does a door demand?’
‘A key?’ Serah, ever eager to please.
‘Yes. A key.’ A smile for her protégée. ‘Such a key would be sought by many. A dangerous thing, but better we should own it than our enemies. I will have tasks for you all soon, quests for some, questions for others, new lessons for others still. Be sure to commit yourselves to these labours as to nothing before. In this you will serve me, you will serve yourselves, and most importantly – you will serve the empire.’
Exchanged glances, muttering, ‘Where was Red March in all that?’ Martus perhaps.
‘Enough!’ Grandmother clapped her hands, releasing us. ‘Go. Scurry back to your empty luxuries and enjoy them while you can. Or – if my blood runs hot in you – consider these words and act on them. These are the end days. All our lives draw in toward a single point and time, not too many miles or years from this room. A point in history when the emperor will either save us or damn us. All we can do is buy him the time he needs – and the price must be paid in blood.’
At last! I hurried out among the others, catching up with Serah. ‘Well that settles it! The old bat’s cracked. The emperor!’ I laughed and flashed her my cavalry grin. ‘Even Grandmother isn’t old enough to have seen the last emperor?’
Serah fixed me with a look of disgust. ‘Did you listen to anything she said?’ And off she strode, leaving me standing there, jostled by Martus and Darin as they passed by.
From the throne room I sprinted down the grand corridor, turning left where all my family turned right. Armour, statuary, portraits, displays of fanned-out swords, all of them flashed past. My day boots pounded a hundred yards of staggeringly expensive woven rug, luxuriant silks patterned in the Indus style. I turned the corner at the far end, teetering on the edge of control, dodged two maids, and ran flat out along the central corridor of the guest range where scores of rooms were laid ready against the possibility of visiting nobility.
‘Out the fucking way!’ Some old retainer doddered from a doorway into my path. One of my father’s – Robbin, a grey old cripple always limping about the place getting underfoot. I swerved past him, Lord knows why we keep such hangers-on, and accelerated down the hallway.
Twice guardsmen startled from their alcoves, one even calling a challenge before deciding I was more ass than assassin. Two doors short of the corridor’s end I stopped and made an entrance to the Green Room, gambling that it would be unoccupied. The room, chambered in rustic style with a four-poster bed carved like spreading oaks, lay empty and shrouded in white linens. I passed the bed, wherein I’d once spent several pleasant nights in the company of a dusky contessa from the southernmost reaches of Roma, and threw back the shutters. Through the window, onto the balcony, vault the balustrade and drop to the peaked roof of the royal stables, an edifice that would put to shame any mansion on the Kings Way.
Now,
