Chapter Thirty-Two Cat
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Cat
It is dusk when Cat lays eyes on Alerae for the first time in years, and the contingent of soldiers waiting at the city gates seems miniscule compared to all who have walked with them.
A gentle wind slides through the air, fluttering his flag.
Slowly, he dismounts from his horse. He gently takes the flag-pole and hands it to a young boy that has been walking at his side since three cities back, eyes wide and hopeful.
‘Please take care of it,’ he murmurs. The boy nods and holds the flag as steady as he can.
Elician dismounts. Madame Leonde comes off her wagon.
Partho and Leferge step forward to join them.
‘They won’t let us enter like this,’ Leonde tells them simply.
Cat looks back towards the people who have followed him, now far outnumbering the standing army of Alelune.
He never asked them to, but they have come anyway. They have come to see.
And because of that, Gillage knew they would be coming.
The stories have spread far ahead of them.
Anticipation served their cause well as the supplies and support that made their trip feasible were often collected in advance.
In towns awaiting aid, the stories were a boon, pre-empting deliverance.
Here, they are not. The soldiers in front of the gates of Alerae are dressed in black armour and their horses are bold.
They stand to defend the city, but they are severely outnumbered.
‘I don’t want to fight,’ Cat says.
‘I am here to speak to our king about Altas. I will be let through,’ Leferge states with easy confidence. ‘If you issue your challenge, then I will ensure you will be permitted to enter the palace as well. Witnesses,’ she suggests, side-eying Elician and Partho, ‘are also permitted.’
‘Not several thousand witnesses, I wager,’ Partho comments dryly.
‘We all came to see,’ Leonde says.
‘You’ll know if I fail,’ Cat replies. ‘You’ll know if I lose.’
‘Oh,’ Leferge muses. ‘I suppose Leonde should come. But as for the rest…’ The great general does not seem displeased in the least about leaving thousands of potentially furious people at the gates of Alerae.
If she were any less diligent a soldier, Cat might even suspect she is enjoying the logistics of this particular confrontation.
Decision made, they approach the city bearing a flag of truce. Leferge initially turned her nose up at the suggestion – what does she need to be pleading a truce for? But the others insisted, and she relented.
Elician walks at Cat’s side. ‘Do you know what they’ll ask you to do when you mount your challenge to the throne?’ he asks quietly.
‘No.’
‘And what happens if you fail?’
‘Then you’ll be imprisoned and tortured and a lot of people will die,’ Cat replies.
Elician has always protected him and kept him safe.
He will protect him from this final challenge too if that is what Cat wants, and ensure he does not die even if that is the will of the gods.
But Cat doesn’t want that. He wants to do this right.
He wants to be the king that Elician and Madame Leonde hope he can be.
The king that Partho has sworn himself to serve. A king that Leferge can be proud of.
His people need something better.
They need something good. And so he must truly succeed here, on his own. No matter the cost.
‘If you fail,’ Partho interjects, ‘I will see to it that the King is returned to Soleb.’
‘Careful, my lord, I might start thinking you like me,’ Elician says. But even in the joke, Cat can hear the subtle notes of relief. He hopes it will be enough.
They reach the line of awaiting soldiers, and the centre rider strides his horse forward.
His armour is glittering and bright, a dark cloak latched to his shoulders.
He removes his helmet. Cat’s hands tremble at his sides.
‘Nured.’ He identifies the man who has always led Gillage’s guard, his voice barely audible to himself let alone the people around him.
Elician freezes in place, muscles tensing enough that his veins pulse visibly against his skin.
‘Reaper Alest,’ Nured jeers. ‘Come to be returned to your cell?’
‘No,’ Cat responds. Better, but still too quiet.
He clears his throat, forces himself to breathe.
‘No. I – I invoke a trial of the gods and challenge my brother, Gillage of Alelune, for the right to reign,’ Cat says.
His words sound strained even to his own ears.
He tries as hard as he can to not look down, to not curl up and pull away, to not reach for his wrists as a phantom pressure seizes them tight.
Hold still. Do as they say. Don’t utter a word.
His memories whisper to him. His hand closes around the blue stone at his neck, and he clings to the comfort it provides.
Nured laughs at him, and it sounds like the precursor to fire and ash pressed against his face.
It sounds like the harbinger of whips coming in the dark, of clubs and knives and do you want to see something new?
It’s the sound that comes before hisses of warning and despair and promises that the others are there, they see what is happening, that he is not alone.
But he feels alone. He always feels so alone.
‘You have already been warned – our king will accept no challenges from the dead.’
‘He will today,’ Partho says at Cat’s back.
‘Captain. Emerged from the Blue Lands at long last, have you? Just to watch this boy die?’
‘That is for the gods to determine,’ Partho responds, bold and strong and without any hint of amusement.
‘The challenge has been issued, and so this trial must be held.’ Nured snarls, prepared to argue, but Partho grins a savage grin, and his hand lowers to his own sword.
‘Unless you wish to defy the gods right here in our most holy city?’
‘And you, General Leferge? You speak for this pretender?’
‘I speak for no one but the army,’ she replies.
‘And the army wishes to speak with the ruler of Alelune. For that, I will wait until the end of the challenge so I may lay my grievances at the appropriate monarch’s feet.
’ Then she places a hand on Leonde’s shoulder.
‘Madame Leonde wishes to serve as witness for the people to ensure the proceedings are done justly, and I have accepted her request as acting commander of the Alelunen army. We have all heard the challenge be issued, and it is now King Gillage’s sacred duty to respond. ’
Nured is not prepared for such a thing. He gnashes his teeth, but his eyes flick to the army waiting for an excuse to march.
Then, he turns back to the palace. ‘By sacred right then…come,’ Nured orders.
He snaps his fingers and the line of soldiers break.
They are meant to follow. Cat slips his fingers into Elician’s palm.
‘Don’t leave me,’ he begs, knowing full well that neither has a choice in the matter. Not now, not after coming so far.
‘I’m here,’ Elician says. ‘I’m here, but I swear to both gods, if he so much as puts a finger on you, or if you lose this, I’m going to kill him before he can do anything else.’
‘How?’ Cat asks, voice trembling.
‘I’m sure if I thought about it hard enough, I could give him a stroke. It’s just a little more blood in the brain,’ Elician hisses. Cat blinks, and he stares at Elician, feet moving without conscious thought. He doesn’t notice the city, the people, the horses or even Nured.
Just a little more blood in the brain.
Just a little more life.
Just like the plague. For the more life there is, the more death comes.
And death…inevitably leads back to life.
It has to – it must. It is water and earth and wind and a god standing over it all.
His eyes lift towards the sky, towards the fractured shades of red and gold and blue, the sun and the moon both occupying the sky for a brief moment in time. One a gentle reflection of the other.
Cat trips over his feet when they reach a long set of stairs. Elician hauls him up and they keep walking. They walk without stopping, faster and faster until they come to a room that Cat has never been allowed in, a room that is designed expressly for this purpose.
The stories that preceded their army’s approach to the city would have told Gillage to prepare. And so he has.
The Proving Ground for challenges to the throne is beautiful.
White alabaster towers reach like trees up to the sky.
They split and splinter at the top, arching this way and that, each bough connected by gossamer threads.
Just beyond them lie the stars. It takes Cat only a moment, but when he shifts his weight just so, he can see how the threads form figures along the stars.
They connect dots to form constellations of glimmering heroes and mythos that he read about in Marina’s book or heard about from the tongues of the people he walked amongst to get here.
And each thread shimmers with possibility, with promise.
There is another door at the other end of the room.
It opens, and Gillage strides in. He is dressed in perfect robes of glittering silver and blue.
‘So, you’ve come to die,’ Gillage announces.
He sounds like Nured. There is an emotion in Cat’s chest, nameless but present.
It hurts, aching in a way that Cat does not quite understand.
Who else has ever cared for his brother save a man who can only provide cruelty to others?
His brother stands with the regalia of a king, his feet shoulder-width apart.
But his crown is too large for his head, and it needs to sit tilted to stay firmly on his skull.
He is barely fourteen and has not yet taken the shape of a man.
He looks no different now than he did when he set Reapers on fire in the cells below for fun.