hard to follow, though. As they passed through the fourth wall, which had already dumbfounded the senses with a height and thickness that surpassed the unimaginable dimensions of the three that had preceded it, the vista opened to reveal row upon row of villas that rivalled those of the most affluent area they had seen before entering the citadel. Beyond them, a massive keep rose like the bluffs of a great cliff, shining as white as the curtain walls, the houses and every other vertical surface they had passed.
Despite Einarr’s warning still hanging in the air, the words were out of Brann before he knew they were coming. ‘It’s like a whole town within a city,’ he gasped.
Einarr sighed, and Grakk nudged Brann in amusement. ‘These buildings furthest from the keep are the servants’ quarters, while the more affluent properties belong to nobles of the highest order who are permitted to have a second home close to the centre of power.’ He seemed to particularly enjoy the boy’s desperate attempts not to react.
The Scribe led them to a wide and intricately decorated wooden ramp that rose at a shallow gradient and doubled back on itself over and over until it reached a yawning doorway around two-thirds of the way up the front of the keep. A few levels above the door, the wall facing them dropped back to form a massive terrace the full width of the building.
‘We have roads of this shape cut into our mountains,’ mused Einarr. He looked at Grakk. ‘I assume this will be for defence? They can burn it easily if they want to cut off this entrance. But what is the reason, when these lower doorways exist?’ He indicated a series of wide entrances at ground level.
‘The ground-level portals give access for the supplies and serving-slaves in peacetime,’ Grakk explained. ‘The lower levels are for storage and for the work of the slaves and have narrow passages that are easy to defend and hard to attack, and with lanterns rather than windows supplying light, while the doorways themselves have suspended above them slabs of stone, ready to be released were the keep requiring to be sealed. Furthermore, concreted bins above and behind the doorways hold rocks ready to be let pour into the alcoves of the doors to shore up the stone slabs.’
‘And the levels upwards from this door that seem to be our destination?’ said Einarr.
‘The province of the Emperor’s extended family and those they choose to accompany them. From that terrace upwards, they live a life like none other. There the corridors are wide, windows draw in light and air, and opulence serves both to enrich the lives of the ruling class to the extreme that they desire and to diminish the importance of those who visit. This is the heart of an empire, after all.’
Konall was unimpressed. ‘Not so easy to defend, then.’
‘They feel, young lord,’ Grakk said with a grin, ‘that if an enemy host has battled past four huge walls and the areas of massacre between, broken through to the lowest level of this keep while under attack from above and fought through several levels of narrow passages to reach this stage, they will be either too depleted in numbers and energy to resist the defenders or will be indomitable. Either way, one more stage of defence will not alter the outcome. And they like their opulent living.’
Brann looked at the tribesman, who had the appearance of a creature of the wilds but the words to rival a Scribe. ‘How do you know this, Grakk? Have you visited here often?’
Grakk smiled. ‘Never, young curious fellow. But there exists a place where all the knowledge of mankind is written and stored, and there I have been. Not recently, nor even as recently as long ago, but often.’
Any further questions were cut short by their arrival at the doorway, where a large platform afforded more than enough room for the bearers to lower their burdens onto broad boards that shone with the evidence of constant care. The eight slaves who had carried the party hardly seemed out of breath and, although impressed, Brann couldn’t help wondering if such impressive strength could not be put to better use than carrying people around a city.
Grakk seemed to read his mind. ‘It’s a better fate than finding themselves in the mines, quarries or war galleys,’ he said quietly. ‘There is always someone in a worse position than you, and someone in a better. It is life.’
The Scribe was waiting at the doorway and, on their approach, he turned without a word and led them into a world that drew a gasp of astonishment even from Einarr.
Grakk grinned. ‘The desired effect of the first impression has been achieved!’ But even so, his face showed his own admiration for the sight that greeted them.
The doorway opened onto a hallway the size of a town square, and extending above what looked like three full storeys. Two statues, each the size of a two-storey house, depicted in smooth white stone a lightly armoured warrior on a rearing horse, caught in the moment of thrusting a lance the size of a young tree, and his foe, a six-headed monster with each of the snake-like necks coiled to strike forward with massively fanged mouths. A large smooth black rock formed the boss on the warrior’s shield and gold gleamed on his helmet, bracers and greaves, sword hilt and the trappings of his steed, matched on the fangs and claws of the beast, while its many-faceted eyes were jewels of the deepest red.
‘So the fables are true,’ Grakk breathed. ‘Sometimes words on parchment cannot do justice to the wonder of reality.’
Hakon clapped him jovially on the shoulder. ‘The desired effect of the first impression indeed, oh wise one.’
Grakk still looked dazed. ‘I have a feeling it will not be the last impression we will have.’
They paced the length of the hall between the looming might of the statues, their boots clacking against tiles of alternate squares of white and pale yellow and the noise echoing off walls of a shiny white stone that, Brann saw on closer inspection as they neared the far end of the room, was streaked with veins, much like the strong cheese made in the southern parts of his homeland, though far more impressive.
A stairway the width of the Blue Dragon (again, he was measuring in units of ships, Brann realised) took them a third of the height of the chamber before it split right and left, the two arms sweeping round on themselves and meeting close to the ceiling where a golden balustrade edged a broad balcony that encircled the room, murals stretching the length of each wall in myriad colours.
Closer examination of the murals proved impossible at the summit of their climb as the Scribe took them straight forward through a wide opening into a wider corridor, rising at a gentle angle. Closely spaced windows, tall and slender and high-set, cast beams of sunlight onto a row of alcoves in the inner wall, each bearing a statue a little taller than a man. As they passed, Brann saw that many of them were actually carved in the likeness of men or women, while others were animals or even small trees or ornate flowers. All were in the same white stone as the two in frozen conflict in the hallway, and all were crafted to the same impeccable standard, down to the last crease at the corner of an eye or insect on a leaf.
The passage stretched for what seemed an eternity before turning abruptly, repeating the pattern. Each turn, sometimes taking them into the interior, sometimes back to the outer walls of the building, revealed more artistic treasures: statues, murals, tapestries the length of a bowshot, ornate weapons and armour, stuffed exotic animals – many of which Brann and, from their expressions, several of the others, had never imagined as existing – and carvings etched into the white veined stone of every wall.
Einarr spoke, directing his words at the back of the Scribe’s tattooed head. ‘We must have climbed a fair part of the building by now, Narut.’
‘The noble sir is correct,’ the man said, his neck colouring at the use of his name. ‘We shall in time reach the highest levels, where the royal residences are located, though we will not, of course, enter that area, but pass it by.’
‘Of course not,’ Einarr agreed.
‘Immediately above the royal chambers are the rooms of state.’
‘Thank you, Narut.’ Einarr’s voice was amiable. ‘That is very helpful.’
‘As the noble lord commands.’
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