Hero Born Read online

  It was not unusual to see other ships at sea – this was a well-used area, after all – and it normally sufficed to keep a wary eye on other vessels until they passed out of sight. ‘That’s fine. Watch it closely. Have me wakened if it does get closer before dawn. And pass on that order to your relief.’

  The Captain returned to the stern, stopping at the base of the ladder. ‘Steersman, one degree towards the east. There’s a ship out there, to the west. See if it has matched our change of course when the sun comes up, after you have rested.’

  ‘I can see the shape, now you point it out,’ Cannick confirmed. ‘Thank the gods for the light nights; in a few months we wouldn’t have known it was there at all.’ He squinted. ‘Couldn’t have said it was a ship, right enough. Lookout has good eyes.’

  The Captain paused as he opened the door to his cabin. ‘We may all have cause to be thankful for that before long. Pass on the orders when you are relieved. And if any of the men come up on deck, send them back below and tell them I said they should get as much rest as possible. Best to be ready.’

  He was in his bed in moments; the advice on rest applied to him, too. But sleep did not come as quickly. He lay, his eyes fastened on the ceiling but seeing nothing but the faces of an old woman and a frightened boy. And a phrase rang, over and over, echoing in his mind: ‘When heroes and kings come to call…’

  In a dark, damp, crowded room below the Captain’s cabin, a boy, confused, battered in body and mind, numb shock his only defence against unbridled terror and despair, slept the deep, dreamless sleep brought only by utter physical exhaustion.

  But had he known the day that lay ahead of him when he woke, his eyes may never have closed in sleep at all.

  Chapter 4

  They were coming, he knew that. No messenger had forewarned him, but living for years, so many long years, in a world limited to the dust and gloom of these few chambers perversely had brought with it an acute sense of the wider place around him. Servants and retainers moving about their daily routines around his quarters, unseen beyond his doors but betrayed by their soft murmuring and quiet tread, created a rhythm that needed only the merest change to attract his attention. He had listened.

  At first, there had been abject dejection that his existence had descended to such banality but, before long, there was a resurgence of the curiosity of his youth, the voracious appetite for information that had been far more the reason for his success than the chilling ruthlessness for which he had been known to the public eye. He became absorbed in the noises, the movements, the rhythms. Over time, the changes, and not just the routine, brought understandable meaning and, bereft of any distractions, he had become adept at reading that meaning. And it had helped the hours to pass.

  From time to time, they would come for him. When they remembered that he could be of some use. And they would be surprised at his knowledge of the world outside his chambers. Not of the movements of servants – such trivialities were so far beneath them that they had no interest in that class other than knowing that the required services had been performed even before they realised they were needed. No, their surprise would be at his knowledge of the machinations of court politics, and even of the swirling currents of affairs within and between nations. But, then, he had never seen servants and their movements as trivial. Not in the sense that he had appreciated them, of course, but rather in the sense that every one of them was an opportunity to be exploited: the wine-bearer waiting behind the pair of nobles deep in conversation; the ostler helping an ambassador dismount while he dropped his impassive visage and ranted, safe from the gaze of the court; the handmaiden in the bedchamber of the visiting king’s wife; the concubine in the bedchamber of the visiting king. He had, in previous decades, made it his business to know by name every servant in the palace. Few of those were still in service, but enough remained to paint a picture of the world near and far. Whenever he was summoned, he revealed only a fraction of what he knew – it went against the grain to do otherwise – but he gave them enough to engender a sense of wonder, or suspicion, at his knowledge; he cared not which, he enjoyed both. They concealed their surprise, of course, but he had spent too many years reading other men to miss the glimpses of their true feelings. He had so few moments of genuine pleasure any more, but these times were counted among them. He, too, would never reveal such emotion, but he was well-practised at concealing it, and they were mere novices in reading it. And an air of mysticism was always handy.

  Nevertheless, as he left them, they would always see him as their fool. And he would always see them as his puppets. And he despised them for both.

  Unseen knuckles rapped softly at the door. They had come to summon him to the court. He rose and grunted acknowledgement. By the time the servant entered the room, the smile that had played around the corners of his eyes had been replaced by his familiar cold mask.

  He was ready.

  ****

  Shortly before dawn, the Captain woke from a fitful sleep. Sitting up, he pulled on his boots and shirt and reached automatically for the sword from lying beside him in the bunk. Some old habits refuse to die. He buckled it on as he left the room and, in moments, was below deck.

  He hesitated. Even after all these years, he felt a touch of nerves before entering her presence. Taking a breath, as Brann had done only a few hours before, he walked in. He stood, looking down at the bundle of rags, unsure if he should wake her. As he watched, however, he gradually became aware of her face, eyes unblinking, staring calmly back at him.

  He jumped. Slightly.

  ‘Think you I was unaware of you, boy?’ she said softly. ‘Much use to you I would be, were I not even able to notice your approach. Much use indeed.’

  He bowed his head, a faint smile twitching the corners of his mouth. ‘Apologies, my lady,’ he said. He was about to continue, but she pre-empted him.

  ‘Want to know what the day brings, do you? Want to know of approaching others?’

  His eyes narrowed. ‘You know the other ship?’ he asked.

  She shook her head slightly, the charms tinkling gently. ‘I see many things, my boy, ships, weather, mortal spirits among them, but I recognise the identity of no ship but this one,’ she said quietly. ‘But sometimes I cast the bones for myself, not just when you ask, so I do. Today I did. And so already I know of others approaching. Would you know more?’

  He nodded, once. ‘I would, my lady. As ever, anything you can tell, I would know.’

  The bones were lying on the floor in front of her. With a surprisingly deft sweep of her arm, she caught them up and cast them in a single movement. They rattled to a halt and, without taking her eyes from them, she reached to the side and drew one of the candles closer. ‘Danger approaches, twofold,’ she said.

  He stiffened. ‘Two ships?’

  She shook her head. ‘Specific, it is not. But men or weather, all that approaches means this vessel harm, so it does. Take care, so you should.’

  ‘We have few friends in this world, and none out here in this sea,’ he murmured. ‘Is there anything else?’

  She poked one long finger at two of the bones, staring intently at them. She brushed the other relics aside, as if to concentrate on the pair. Silence hung heavy as she stared, unmoving. The Captain checked himself, feeling the urge to hurry her, but knowing the futility of doing so.

  She nodded once, as if now sure of something that she had suspected. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘There is more. If conflict there is, I cannot say the outcome, neither I can. Conflict will swing many ways, at the whimsy of fate and the decisions of men. But one thing is clear: if you fight or if you run, you will lose some in your charge. How many, and who, is down to you. Down to you, it is. But this much is clear: men will die today.’

  He cursed the capriciousness of Calip. Why could the god of luck and chance never allow anything to be straightforward?

  She spoke again, her tone final and dismissive. ‘I see no more. Take care and think clearly, so you should. Think cl
early as you battle nature and man. Perhaps you can use one against the other.’

  ‘Use them to fight or to run?’

  ‘I see no more,’ she repeated, sweeping up the bones and watching them as she fiddled with them absently. ‘Take care, boy.’

  He thanked her, and turned to go, his shadow flickering in the candlelight. As he reached the doorway, he stopped, his fingers tracing the scar on his cheek as he stared, his eyes on the floor but his mind clearly elsewhere.

  Without looking up, she murmured, ‘Something else bothers you?’ She almost sounded amused.

  He turned. ‘It does, and that you well know.’ He could have sworn that she smiled in the dim shadows. ‘The boy. What is it about him? What did you see, and why did he affect you so? Why does it trouble me? I cannot rid my head of it.’

  She shrugged, a strangely normal-looking gesture from one such as her.

  ‘I saw what I said, and I said what I saw,’ she said simply. ‘I know it troubles you, as it troubles me and it troubles him, so it does. Do not forget that: it troubles him, most of all. It is never pleasant or easy to be introduced to your destiny, even if you know not what it will be. Especially if you know not what it will be. Just knowing it is there, that a choice awaits you, is not welcome for anyone, let alone one so young.’

  He crouched in front of her, a move that was almost imploring. ‘But who is he? Is it good or bad for us that he is here? What will he do? What should I do?’

  She laughed, quietly and briefly. ‘Who he is, is less important than who he will be, so it is. And good or bad for us, depends on him. And what he will do, will be his choice, so it will. And what should you do? Nothing. Nothing that you would not do otherwise, had you not heard of any destiny. Do not free him, if you would not otherwise free him. Do not speak to him if you would not otherwise speak to him. His destiny is not yours to influence, not yours, no. If his fate is now to be a slave, so be it. If there comes a time when you would use him otherwise, so be it. Cera will sit in the Hall of the Gods and spin the thread of his destiny accordingly, so she will. She will spin as she spins for all of us now and before and all who ever will be. She will spin, she will spin, she will spin, and we all must accept our place on her tapestry.’

  She cocked her head to one side and looked at him in amusement. ‘But why ask me of him, when you have the boy on your ship that you can ask yourself?’

  He stood. ‘As ever, you are right. Apologies, my lady. I am thinking so deeply about it, that I cannot see the most simple truth. I thank you, as ever, for your assistance.’

  He made to leave once more, but her voice stopped him. ‘Take care of him, while you have him. Tomorrow, especially. And take care of yourself, Einarr.’

  He froze. Without turning, he said, ‘I will do my best – on both counts,’ and left.

  Brann stirred and, as memories flooded back, he jerked into a sitting position, discovering that he had acquired new aches from his awkward sleeping position to add to those from his journey draped over the back of a horse. At first disorientated, he peered around the cramped hold at the sleeping boys. The last of the drowsiness left him, and he reacquainted himself with his surroundings, examining the room and its inhabitants in the detached way that was becoming so familiar that it had almost moved to his subconscious. Almost. He felt sure he would never truly be at ease with the feeling of separation.

  Discovering a hard lump under one leg, he fished out the cheese in its rag covering. Remembering the way that Boar had thrown it down, and noticing the careful way it had been wrapped, he guessed that Gerens had stored it for him. He silently thanked the sleeping youth beside him, still not quite sure why the brooding, in many ways intimidating, youth had chosen to take him, to whatever extent, under his protective wing. His hunger overwhelmed his thoughts, and he wolfed into the food. He noticed the bowl on the floor, and greedily gulped down the water. It was lukewarm, but it still tasted sweet and precious. He leant back against the wall, and the hilt of the stolen knife dug into the small of his back, reminding himself of his folly. Fear swept through him and he cast about for somewhere to dump it, but the room was so bare of all but sleeping boys; it would surely be found, and that could mean the death of all of them.

  He pulled out the knife and twisted it in his fingers. A cold melancholy sank over him, and he ran a thumb along the sharpness of the blade. The death of all? Or the death of one? With interest, he found that the prospect of death did not concern him, one way or another, but the ease with which it could be achieved fascinated his darkly dispassionate mind. He ran the keen edge across his wrist. The slightest of pressure, the least of effort, the simplest of movements would be all it would take to make the most momentous of impacts of a life.

  The approach of unmistakable footsteps jerked him back from his introspection and he shook his head, thrusting the thoughts back down, buried alongside his suppressed emotions. As quickly and quietly as he could manage, he slipped the knife once again into his waistband and curled up on his side, closing his eyes in the hope of avoiding Boar’s attention.

  It was in vain. A heavy boot in the small of the back, no more than two inches from the knife, made him yell in pain.

  ‘Morning, maggot,’ Boar said with satisfaction. ‘Time to get up. For some reason, the Captain wants to see you.’

  He unfastened Brann’s manacles from the chain on the floor and, grabbing the front of his tunic with one hand, hoisted him to his feet. His knees immediately buckled and he fell back to the deck.

  Boar grinned maliciously with the few teeth he possessed. ‘Better get the legs working. Easier to walk than be dragged – especially on the ladders. Mind you, more fun for me that way.’ He laughed, amused at his own wit.

  He grasped the back of Brann’s tunic again and, lifting the boy’s torso from the ground, started dragging him along the short dusty corridor, his legs trailing behind him. Mindful of the comment about the ladders, Brann forced his stiff limbs to move and scrambled until he was upright.

  ‘There you go,’ Boar smirked. ‘Got you walking again, didn’t I? Can’t say I’m not good to you.’

  Thinking it unwise to offer any reply, Brann climbed the ladder and waited at the top for Boar’s massive form to emerge. The huge oaf pointed him to the door of the Captain’s cabin, and knocked on it three times. At the sound of a voice from within, Boar opened the door, pushed Brann through, and followed him in.

  ‘You wanted the boy, Captain,’ he said.

  Rising from behind a simple rough desk that seemed, to judge from the remains of a meagre meal left from the night before, to double as a dining table, the Captain moved towards them.

  ‘That will be all, Boar,’ he said, dismissing the man.

  Alone with the man responsible for the loss of everyone and everything he held dear, Brann stared at him. He should have been overwhelmed with rage, or terror, or hatred, or all of these. But all he felt was a dull resentment, as if the world he was in was unwanted but unreal. He stared blankly at the Captain.

  The subject of his stare drew a chair up to the desk and gestured to Brann to sit. Placing food in front of the boy, and nodding in reply to Brann’s questioning look, he said, ‘Yes, eat. It is just the leftovers of some bread and cheese from last night, but I am guessing you have not seen much food these past couple of days.’

  As Brann launched into his second breakfast of the morning, the Captain sat down opposite him.

  ‘Slowly, slowly,’ he cautioned. ‘If you throw it back up, you would be as well not bothering to eat it.’

  Brann forced himself to take the advice. He felt conscious of the man staring at him, as if he were assessing him, and looked up at him. What could the man tell from the way he ate? Why watch him now? Feeling that he had no way of knowing the answer, he shrugged slightly and returned to the food.

  For a few long moments, the sound of his eating was the only noise in the room, and as Brann became aware of it, the noise seemed to become louder with each bite. The tensi
on was eventually broken by the Captain.

  ‘Apologies in advance,’ he said. ‘You will find me blunt. Too many years in the company of professional men who expect orders and know nothing of small-talk.’ He stood up, and spoke abruptly. ‘I am wondering what you made of what Our Lady said to you.’

  Swallowing a mouthful of bread, Brann said, ‘Your Lady? You mean…?’

  The Captain cut in. ‘The old woman below deck, yes. She is our wise woman. She reads the bones, as you saw, helping us prepare for changes in the weather or…’ He paused. ‘Or other things.

  ‘But the vision she had with you – I have never known it before. That reaction, the strength of that trance… I have never known it to be like that.’

  ‘Maybe she has not been well,’ Brann suggested, noticing that the ship had started to rise and fall more violently. ‘The movement of the ship, sea-sickness, and things like that.’

  The Captain laughed, a natural sound that was startlingly at odds with his grimly efficient appearance. ‘Oh, boy, if only I had your innocence around me more often. No, no, she has been at sea, with us and many others before us, for at least seventy years now – well, seventy that we know of. No, that reaction was something different, and powerful. Do you remember what she said?’

  Brann nodded, not realising that he had stopped eating. ‘I cannot forget it. Do you want me to repeat it for you?’

  The Captain sat down again. ‘No need. I, too, cannot remove it from my head.’ He leant back, running his hands through his now-unruly black hair.

  Hesitantly, Brann asked, ‘Do you know what it means? All this talk of destiny and suchlike? Is it real?’

  ‘That you can be sure of,’ the Captain nodded. ‘If she says it, it is real – in some fashion or another. She sees future possibilities, but what actually transpires depends on so many things: random occurrences, decisions – considered and intuitive – of many people, twists of fate, the whims of the gods, and on, and on. So she cannot say what you will do, only what you will face. So, whatever happens to you, at many points you will have to decide what path to take. And one of those decisions, one of those paths, will be one on which hangs the fate of others. That she knows. What that decision will be, may not be decided yet – it may change several times according to the way your life goes between now and then.’