Articles of Faith

‘It doesn’t work, you know.’ It was Tarfel, from within the store’s gloom. ‘Your name, I mean.’

‘Oh aye?’

‘Lemons. They’re not bitter, they’re sour. That’s different.’

‘You’re telling fucken me! I’ve been telling those half-wits forever! Oh, but it’s all “Ah Lemon, what’s the difference, you’re a shite-heap either way”.’

Chel sensed an opening. Lemon seemed grateful to have someone to talk to. ‘They don’t sound like they’re very nice to you.’

Lemon frowned. ‘Are you joking? They’re the best bunch of bastards I ever rode with. Not that they know the value of an education, mind.’

‘You’re educated?’

‘I may not have attended a fancy Hacademy, but knowledge is power, wee bear, as the powerful know. Like me.’ She jabbed a thumb at herself. ‘For example, these folk we saw earlier today.’

‘Who? The prince and I didn’t really—’

‘Hush and listen, this could save your life some day.’

‘Oh?’

‘Aye, “oh”. See, thing is, most people, they don’t get hit by arrows much.’

‘That so?’

‘Indeedy. So, if and when they do, they don’t know what to do. They think that’s it, and they should just keel over, curl up their toes, back to the ancestors.’

‘Whereas …?’

‘Ah, you can fight on with an arrow in you! You can fight on with a dozen, like a fucken pin-cushion. I knew a fella, a Clydish man, mark you, not like one of you northern piss-sheets, fought on with sixteen arrows, two spears and a sword in him. Carried on for hours, cracking heads and ripping limbs.’

‘And he lived?’

‘Well, no, but he didn’t lie down and die at the first blow, did he?’

‘So what’s the big secret? If you’re hit by an arrow, don’t die?’

‘Aye. That’s the secret: don’t die. Now budge your skinny arse, before I help you along.’ She gave a meaningful wave with a fat-headed hammer, and Chel began to drag himself back into the store. The door closed behind them, and Lemon bolted it.

‘Hey, Lemon?’

‘What do you want, bugger-bear?’

‘What about the big guy? He got any names?’

‘Oh, Rennic? Hundreds. More than the rest of us combined.’

‘And what do you call him?’

‘We call him boss.’

SEVEN (#ulink_176194e3-37ea-5ec3-a153-c29f3f7e6f5b)

Chel and the prince sat in the stuffy gloom of the barge store, surrounded by vegetables.

‘Why did you antagonize them?’

‘Sorry, highness?’

‘You were riling them up, Chel. I’ll be ransomed in Kurtemir – ghastly place, but accessible at least – and until then all you have to do is be quiet and meek. I’m assuming you’ll be included in any arrangement, of course, but I can’t see why you wouldn’t.’

‘Thank you, highness.’

‘Didn’t they teach you manners, etiquette, politesse? Where was it you grew up?’

‘Barva.’

‘And they taught you nothing of diplomacy, of catching more flies with honey than vinegar? It’s simple, Chel: it’s important for people to like you, or they won’t do what you want.’

‘Nobody does what I want anyway, highness.’

A moment of relative silence passed. Chel lay back against bumpy sacks, feeling the soft advance of sleep, lulled by the barge’s gentle rock and the river’s wash. Even the dull agonies that racked his body couldn’t stave it off. ‘Highness, when the Norts attacked, you were down in the stables … Why were you hiding in the mule cart? Why not just take one of the horses if you wanted to flee?’

‘Oh, that’s simple enough. I can’t ride.’

Chel blinked in the darkness, long and slow. ‘You can’t ride?’ How could a prince not ride?

‘No, never learned. Mendel promised to teach me, but well, the brigands, his injury, Corvel’s death, et cetera. You know. Anyway, why do all your insults revolve around intercourse with animals?’

‘Highness?’

‘It’s always “pig-sucking this”, “horse-stroking that” with you. Is there something I should know?’

Chel coughed, shifting against the scratchy bulk behind him, feeling throbbing aches all over. ‘I suppose I picked it up from Lord Sokol’s regulars. Most were from the fields, I imagine that sort of thing came up a lot.’

‘I’d like you to cut it out, Chel. You’re sworn to a prince now, and such vocabulary is …’

‘Unseemly?’

‘I can see we understand each other, Chel. Chel?’

He was already asleep.

***

Somewhere in the small hours, hazy dream images slipped away: Heali falling over and over, the knife glinting in his hand, while soft yellow flames licked at a slumped form on the stones below. Chel rubbed his eyes and winced. The prince was snoring beside him on the floor of the store, their legs pressed in the gaps between crates and barrels. The darkness was near-absolute, only a sliver of indigo starlight lighting the boards where they lay. The starlight moved, and Chel turned his head to look up at the deck grille above them. A shape blocked most of it. A man-shape.

‘Your highness?’ The voice was low, whisper-soft. The barge creaked and flexed around them, the sound of the river’s wash now dominant, and Chel had to strain to hear. ‘Are you there?’