Chapter Sixty-Five: City Walls

The city walls loomed dark above them. Mulberry could smell the lime odour of the mortar in the walls, the scent brought out by the chilly damp that pervaded the air here by the river. Aurelia was fast asleep, a solid, warm weight on the centre of her back, which Mulberry found oddly reassuring. She ran her fingers along the damp, mossy contours of the wall despite the cold. Somehow, that too - the reality of the wall and the bits of moss that crumbled beneath her fingers - was also a comfort.

Marcus was a few steps ahead, scrabbling over a partly collapsed section of stone. It had been a long while since the empire had been small enough that the city had seriously needed these walls for protection. If an invading army ever made it this far, that would mean that the empire had already fallen, its people already scattered. The city was such a small part of the empire, and the empire so great and powerful around it, that the city, despite its symbolic importance, was safe. The empire ruled with an iron hand for ten days travel in any direction from here, even if one went across the sea. The lawmakers in this city controlled the peace and prosperity of all those lands, but that peace and prosperity was what was valuable, not the buildings the lawmakers worked in.

That was not to say, of course, that the city was without protection. The imperial guard made an excellent police force. There were firefighting forces too, and a corps of inspectors who specialized in the petty murders and crimes of passion that any large city was heir to. And near the palace, naturally, there were more guards than you could shake a stick at. Despite all this protection, Marcus was not concerned about climbing this fallen bit of wall. After all, Tsuga was at their rear, helping Mulberry up onto the first and lowest of the tumbled stones. And, after all, wasn't Salix leading them? Flora Salix, whom he had seen drop a in a matter of seconds? Flora Salix, who had nearly killed a man, then saved his life, at Marcus' request? Yes, of course she was leading them. She had told them where to find this place, where the wall had tumbled so that it was only five stone blocks high, rather than ten, and the fallen blocks made a rough staircase for them to traverse. Flora Salix, who had been behaving oddly all day.

In the morning, another of those pigeons had arrived. Salix had read the bird’s message, then crumpled the paper, and burnt it as it sat cupped in her palm. She had not shared the contents even with Tsuga, but something in the message caused Salix to change their path. She had pulled them off of the main road, away from the city gates. She kept them out of view of roads and houses, whenever possible. Even Flora Tsuga had thought it was odd, so close to the capital, to home and safety, but she did not question her superior.

So Salix had led them to this old, damaged section of wall, and Marcus only wished it wasn't dark, and that the moss hadn't rendered the stones so slippery. If Mulberry slipped, and she or Aurelia were hurt, he would never forgive himself.

Marcus stepped down a block, reaching for Mulberry's arm. He hauled her up to his own level. Somewhere ahead and above in the darkness, Salix impatiently called out, "Let's go! Hurry it up!", But Marcus held Mulberry embarrassingly close for a moment.

Then he let her go, saying, "Give me the baby. I'll carry her."

Mulberry shook her head. "No, Marcus, I can do it. I'm stronger and more agile than you think."

"She's my daughter. Not yours. I should carry her."

If it had not been dark, Marcus might have been shocked by the look on Mulberry's face. It hurt her when he talked like that. She knew Aurelia wasn't hers, but she loved the baby. She had known the child almost as long as Marcus had, after all. It wasn’t fair for him to talk that way. In the weird half-light of a late fall night, however, all Marcus could see was that Mulberry frowned slightly, and then looked down.

Mulberry allowed her hands to form warm, firm, little fists before she nodded, saying, "Yes, Marcus. Of course. T- take her."

She was surprised to find she felt ashamed as his hands gently untied the sling, lifting the baby from her back. The sudden gush of cold air along her back, combined with the lightening of the load she carried, made Mulberry shiver and dance a little in surprise. Marcus did not seem to notice, however, as he was holding Aurelia up against his chest as he adjusted the sling so the baby hung against his front. He talked quietly to her even though she slept through the whole exercise. He carefully adjusted a fold of cloth so the baby's cheek rested against the fabric, instead of the cold metal of his breastplate. Mulberry thought it odd that he still wore his armour. She supposed he felt naked without it.

Tsuga hissed up to them from below, "Keep moving! Senior Salix seemed really insistent that we get within the walls quickly." Tsuga was still at the bottom, and she looked odd from this high, foreshortened angle.

Marcus nodded and took Mulberry's hand, helping her up the next step. All the while, he used his other hand to cradle Aurelia's head. He gritted his teeth as he pulled himself up on the next rock, still cradling the baby. Then Marcus looked up into the dark gap where he had last seen Flora Salix. All he saw was black nothingness between the stones. He blinked.

"Salix?" He called, as loudly as he dared. There was no answer. For a moment, all he could hear was the wind blustering and keening around the great stone blocks that formed the wall. Then was a sudden crash, and Marcus remembered nothing more.

Mulberry, one step down, gasped in astonishment. Three strong men, dressed in black, had jumped out of the gap Salix had disappeared into. In an instant, one of them had hit Marcus with a club, sending him to the hard floor of stone blocks. He had gone down with a sickening thud, and Mulberry struggled to get to him as the baby wailed. Mulberry couldn't tell if Aurelia was hurt or not. She wasn't dead, which was a good thing. A good thing, yes, and more than Mulberry could say for sure about poor Marcus. If he was dead, she'd - she'd kill those men herself, Mulberry decided.

Down below her, Tsuga stared up at them, screaming "Senior Salix!" at the top of her lungs. She then began to scrabble up the rocks, dragging herself up them as quickly as she could, her sword drawn.

Mulberry pulled herself up to the level where Marcus and the baby lay, but one of the strong men pushed her down. Two of the men hauled Marcus up by his armpits. His head lolled on his chest in a way that made Mulberry sick to her stomach. The third man began to unstrap Aurelia from Marcus' chest, just as three more men pushed through the narrow gap and spilled down the rough almost-stairs.

Down below, Tsuga paused as a fifth man pushed through, then a sixth, and a seventh. Marcus and Aurelia, one still screaming, the other still unconscious, were pulled back into the dark city, and disappeared, while three of the remaining men began to subdue Mulberry. The other three went for Tsuga.

"Salix! Salix, where are you? Help!" Tsuga shrieked. The men were big, and there were six of them to her one, and they had already disabled the only other fighter Tsuga could rely on. She couldn't understand, brandishing her sword while two steps higher Mulberry tried to elbow one of the men in the gut, where Salix had disappeared to. Couldn't Salix hear them? Then a thought, a horrible, cold thought hit Tsuga right between the eyes. Someone had betrayed them. There had been something in those orders Salix had received that had caused Salix to lead all of them - Tsuga and Mulberry and Aurelia as well as Marcus - right to these dangerous men.

Tsuga felt her knees go weak and watched as two of the men sandwiched the still-struggling Mulberry between them, forcing her hands behind her. As they began to lead Mulberry off into the darkness, Tsuga realised that now all four remaining brigands could focus on her. She had no hope of fighting off all of them.

Tsuga thought she might throw up, but she forced the rising gorge back into her stomach. It was unbelievable that Salix would betray them, but it was equally unbelievable that the pigeon could have been intercepted, or that their superiors could have deliberately sent them into danger. Tsuga couldn’t understand what had happened. She looked at the men one last time, and, taking a deep breath, threw herself off the wall.

Mulberry turned just in time to see Tsuga fall.

"No!" She screamed, but it was too late. One of the men roughly holding her snorted a laugh. That he didn't understand was made clear a moment later.

Three quarters of the way to the ground, Tsuga rolled, breaking her dive into a somersault. One moment she was falling straight as the flight of an arrow; the next she was tumbling in the air, a black swirl of fabric that suddenly resolved itself into a small, black crow. Tsuga let out a single, long, echoing caw, then flew away as fast as her wings would carry her. Tsuga hoped that Mulberry had understood that Tsuga was not abandoning them, not really. There was just nothing she could do to help under these circumstances.

Mulberry burst into tears. So both the Florae were useless, she thought. It turns out that Marcus and Petro - of all people - were the only people of the empire she could trust. The rest were as traitorous and cowardly as she had been raised to believe, and she hated them. She struggled, and spat on one of her captors, earning a hard cuff on the ear for her troubles. She saw stars and staggered, but maintained her footing as they dragged her over the gap.

Mulberry found herself standing on a narrow ledge. The ledge had clearly been designed in more volatile times to allow defenders access to small arrow loops along what was supposed to be the midpoint of the wall. The ledge was narrow, but sturdy and stable, and the men pushed her along it roughly, but did her no real harm. As they descended a steep, small staircase, she was relieved to see that the men some distance in front of her were still bearing Marcus along with them. His head was still lolling on his chest, but so far as Mulberry could tell, he was breathing. The fact that he was still alive buoyed her spirits, and they were buoyed even further when she realised why the man at the front of the procession was walking so gingerly. He was cradling Aurelia in his arms as if she was the most valuable thing in the world. It shocked Mulberry to see a man who had treated Marcus so roughly treat the baby like she was made out of cut glass, but Mulberry was grateful for it. It meant that the baby was valuable, to someone, and would likely survive all this, even if Marcus and Mulberry did not.

                                                                                            ~*~

Tsuga flew long and hard, her wings aching with the strain. She was afraid she would tire completely and fall from the sky before she had reached her goal. Her first thought, the one she had thought when she was still falling, had been to go to the temple, to enlist the help of her fellow Florae. But that, she soon realized, would not be wise. Tsuga had trusted Salix and Salix had never done her wrong. In fact, the only reason Tsuga could come up with to explain why Salix would turn them over to their pursuers was if Salix had, in fact, been ordered to do so. The entire Order of the Blossom might be corrupted. There was no way of knowing whom she could trust, there.

No, there was no way that she could trust the order, and she didn't know who else to turn to. The imperial guard were clearly corrupted as well - even Salix had said so - and Tsuga did not know anyone who was in any of the other secret orders or associations. She could use her ring to insist someone help her, but she had to figure out whom to ask for assistance. No, there was exactly one person that she knew she could trust, and he was on his way North, to the border with Estavacan territory, to fight the war. The only person she could trust was Petro. She only hoped that she could, somehow, convince him to help her.