Linesh, although not so spacious and the fruits of his labour were very different.
No statues, he realised as he scanned the space, seeing many rectangular marble boxes, each carved with Far Western script and the corners decorated with curved columns. But there were no gods here, no heroes of ancient legend, and no beasts of any kind.
“Mausoleums, sarcophagi and monuments to the honoured ancestors,” Ahm Lin said, emerging from the shadowed recesses of the shop. He had divested himself of his apron and wore a quilted jacket and trews. A pack sat on his shoulder and he carried a sturdy yard-long stick of ash. “My stock-in-trade these days. People here are almost as in love with death as they are in your Realm.”
“I thought you might have carved another wolf,” Vaelin said.
Some of the cheerfulness slipped from Ahm Lin’s face. His gaze grew sombre as he turned to regard the shop with the air of a man saying goodbye. “No, brother. One wolf was enough for any lifetime.” He brightened quickly and hefted his stick. “Shall we go? I just need to ask my neighbour to have a care for the place whilst I’m gone.”
“Your wife,” Vaelin said. He had been dreading the woman’s reaction upon seeing him again. His presence had never boded well for her husband. “Don’t you wish to . . .”
“I sent her home,” Ahm Lin said, moving briskly to the doors.
“Home?” Vaelin asked.
“Back to Alpira. It was for the best.”
There was a guardedness to the mason’s tone that forbade further questions, and Vaelin duly followed him into the street. Ahm Lin spent a brief moment in conversation with the wheelwright next door, the two men embracing before they parted, whereupon the mason turned his back on his shop and strode with a determined step in the direction of the town barracks.
“Come along then,” he said, waving his stick for them to follow. “I’m keen to hear what you’ve been up to for the past ten years or so. I only caught a few glimpses and it all seemed very fraught.”
* * *
◆ ◆ ◆
Sho Tsai permitted only one night’s rest in Min-Tran before resuming their search. He accepted Ahm Lin’s suggested north-westerly course without question, causing Vaelin to reflect that the captain may have long harboured some suspicion as to the stonemason’s true nature. The fact that he hadn’t disclosed this to the Merchant King owed much, Vaelin assumed, to Sherin.
After a march of over twenty miles the rolling hill country descended into an undulating plane stretching out to the northern horizon like an unbroken yellow-green sea.
“The Iron Steppe,” Erlin said. “They say you can ride for a thousand miles without sight of hill or mountain, until you reach the tors, of course. Hopefully, we won’t be going that far.”
He raised his voice as he spoke, directing the implied question at Ahm Lin. In response, the mason merely turned in the saddle of his squat pony to offer a bland smile. Vaelin rode beside him for the first two days, myriad questions churning in his mind but somehow failing to escape his lips. Finally, on the second day Ahm Lin turned to him with an exasperated sigh and said, “You can ask her when you see her, my lord. What lies between you two, or”—he cast a meaningful glance in Sho Tsai’s direction—“anyone else is not for me to say.”
“Your song is as strong as ever then,” Vaelin observed with a note of chagrin.
“Stronger, I’d say. I’ve come to understand that the passage of years does much to nurture it, like a tree nourished by the rain of many seasons.” A shadow passed across his face and the usual smile turned into a reluctant grimace. “Years ago it told me you had lost your own song, and more besides. I’m sorry.”
“War always takes more than it gives.” Vaelin hesitated before speaking his next question, one he suspected Ahm Lin might well ignore. “Your wife. Why did you send her away?”
“Because the song was clear. She couldn’t stay here any longer, not if I wanted her to live.”
“So, it’s told you what’s coming. This kingdom will fall.”
“You know that’s not how it goes with the song. I do know it’s louder now than it’s ever been, even during those last days in Linesh when it seemed the Emperor’s host would soon rend the city to rubble and flame.” He lowered his head, a note of self-reproach creeping into his voice. “It first began to swell when