‘That was only the beginning,’ Dassem answered, and he let out a long steadying breath as if preparing himself for the memory to come. ‘I returned to my village. It was dark outside beyond the caves, early evening. I ran straight to my family hut. There, as usual, was my mother preparing the evening meal at the stone hearth. I moved into the light at the open doorway and greeted her, my arms open.’
He paused, turning half away, and breathed harshly. ‘My mother looked up. Her eyes widened in amazement. And then she screamed in complete horror. “Begone, ghost!” she howled at me. “Revenant! Fiend!” Nothing I said made any difference. She even threw stones at me. Then neighbours gathered and they too threw garbage and rocks. They drove me off from the village, calling me a ghost returned to torment them.’
He broke off, his voice choking, and he gripped the worn wood of the bokken, clenching his fingers until the knuckles whitened. Shear remained silent, watching, her eyes hidden behind her painted mask. After a time, he cleared his throat and continued, ‘I learned afterwards that four months had passed. It had been assumed that the leopard had claimed me. There had even been a funeral. I have stood upon my own grave.’
He studied Shear, his lips quirking drolly. ‘So you see. I am dead after all. There you are.’ He sighed then, lifting his shoulders. ‘Having nowhere else to go I returned to the caves and there found the ancient waiting for me at his small fire in the dark. I picked up the blade and returned to attempting to defeat him.’
‘And what happened?’ Shear asked for the third time, almost inaudibly.
He nodded, taking a deep breath to steady himself. ‘I defeated him. It took twelve years. Twelve years of constant training and duelling under his tutelage. I did not remain hidden in the caverns all that time, of course … I went out for food and to seek company. But all had been warned against the ghost – the living man claimed by death – and so I was driven from every village. Eventually, I would reluctantly return to my harsh tutelage, and in the end I pushed him back and beat him down – or he deemed me skilled enough and allowed me to do so. In any case, of course, it was Hood himself possessing that body. And when I emerged once more into the sunlight I was his trained sword. The Mortal Sword of Hood. And so I have been – or was. But no longer.’
Shear was hugging herself, eyeing him in wonder, though it was difficult to see past her mask. ‘That is not something one can just put down, I think, like an old coat, or a worn blade.’
He shrugged again. ‘We shall see. In any case, I no longer answer to him.’
‘Perhaps you do, though. Perhaps you cannot help but follow his path, as it is now part of you.’
He sighed, looking away to the distant fires of the camp. ‘Yes. It may be that our choices are determined and limited by our character and learned preferences, that is true. However, it is still reassuring to hold on to the conceit of freedom, is it not?’
Shear smiled beneath her mask and reached out gently with one hand to caress his cheek; her hand was cold and hard against his face, but welcome. ‘So, it is true,’ she said, ‘you are not like any other.’
Then she took his hand and led him aside to a meadow amid a copse of woods, and there she unbuckled her belt and let it fall into the tall grass, and he did as well. Tentatively, then, he reached up to her mask but gently she lowered his hand, saying, ‘No. I have chosen to do it.’
So she lifted it from her face and stared up at him, bared perhaps for the first time with another. Her eyes were dark in the night and held his. He lowered his mouth to hers.
*
Tattersail pushed aside the open door to the main keep of the Hold and surveyed the damage. Her boots crunched on the litter of broken glass and pots. Mock entered behind her, his hands clasped behind his back, one dark brow arched in silent commentary.
A long table had been overturned. Kegs had been broached and left on their sides. Spilt wine stained the flags. Chairs lay every which way, and the stink of old meat and stale beer assailed her. Servants busy cleaning halted in their work and bowed, then returned to their duties.
Stooping, she picked up the broken stem of a slim wineglass. They’d even broken her finest crystal. ‘Who was it?’ she asked.
Mock gave an unconcerned wave then tried to pour a glass from a decanter but found it empty. ‘The guards say it was Geffen come to try to take the Hold.’
‘Send a crew to arrest him and confiscate all he has as payment.’
‘Not necessary,’ Mock answered, setting down the glass. ‘He’s dead.’
‘Who did it?’
Mock swept his arms wide. ‘Does it matter? I hear his lieutenant murdered him and decamped.’ He stroked his chin. ‘A wise woman, that.’
A guard wearing the gaudy purple colours of Mock’s house guards – what Mock liked to call his ‘Palace Guards’ – approached and bowed. Tattersail didn’t recognize the fellow. ‘Hold secure, admiral.’
Mock acknowledged this then tilted his head thoughtfully. ‘And where is Commander Durall?’
‘Halfway to the Wickan Plains by now, I should think.’
Mock nodded. ‘And you are…?’
‘Egil, sir.’
‘Drew the short straw, did you?’
The man just shrugged in his leather hauberk. ‘Next in command.’
‘Perhaps I should have you thrown into a cell below, Egil.’
The guard’s thin lips quirked up in a sort of sardonic comment. ‘You’re rather understaffed for that.’
Mock nodded sourly, his own expression mirroring the man’s. ‘Painfully true … commander.’ And he dismissed him.
After Egil left – kicking through the wreckage as he went – Tattersail whispered, ‘I don’t trust that man.’
‘I trust no one,’ Mock answered, adding hastily, ‘excepting you, of course.’
‘So what do we do?’
He was systematically checking every keg and carafe for leavings. ‘We wait, love. We wait and see.’
‘See what?’
‘Whether the captains agree on challenging me after this. My bet is that they won’t.’
Tattersail crossed her arms tightly over her chest. Good. That’s one thing we don’t need right now. Across the hall, one surviving hanging caught her eye – Agayla’s dark foreboding tapestry – and she winced. Stupid vandals! Of all the things to leave undamaged … then she shrugged. Perhaps some aura of that formidable woman imbued it. She knew she certainly didn’t want to touch it. ‘So they still agree you should be admiral.’
A burst of laughter answered her and she turned. Mock was shaking his head, a jug in his hand. ‘You are so very charming, my dear.’ He filled a glass from the jug, took an experimental sip, made a sour face, and continued drinking regardless. ‘They all think they can do a better job than I … they just can’t agree who should! And they all know I have one thing they do not.’
‘Which is?’
The heels of his tall boots crackled over the litter as he approached, and he brushed the back of a hand across her cheek. ‘You, my dear. They all saw who broke the Napan lines and who allowed them to escape – you, my dear.’
He opened his arms wide, jug in one hand, glass in the other, winking. ‘I will check upstairs, love. I just pray no one vomited there.’