The High King's Tomb

by Kristen Britain

  Such thoughts brought Amberhill peace, and after a spare meal of bread, cheese, and flat ale, he slept.

  The next morning, it was not dawn that awakened him, or even the whinny of his agitated stallion, but a blade at his throat.

  PIRATES

  “He a pretty one, aye.”

  Six of the most disreputable characters Amberhill had ever seen glared down at him where he lay, smelling of fish and their own unwashed bodies. Their hair and beards fell in stringy snarls and their clothes hung off them in tatters, practically rotting off their bodies. None wore shoes, and Amberhill very much doubted they possessed enough teeth among the lot of them to fill one mouth.

  He deemed the one who held the rusty cutlass to his throat to be the leader. He had a bulbous nose that was pocked and discolored from disease, but was ornamented with a gold ring. His eyes were yellow and red rimmed and horny growths protruded from his feet. They looked rather like…barnacles.

  “Never ye mind the Eardog,” he said to Amberhill. “We hain’t seen women for many a year. He can’t recollect the difference.”

  Amberhill swallowed carefully, not wanting to be nicked by the rusted blade, and thinking this was a rude start to his morning. He wanted to protest he was not a woman, but he feared that in their desperate state, the six would not care. Were they prison escapees? Perhaps, but they looked to be something far worse: sailors. “What do you want?”

  “Liquor! Women!” the one called Eardog cried. He was missing an ear, and drooled excessively.

  “Shut it, Eardog!” the leader snapped.

  Eardog subsided, but a crazed expression remained on his face.

  “We lost our bearings, see? Our ship run aground, all wrecked and ruined. We look for the nearest port.”

  Seamen, indeed, Amberhill thought, and madmen. Their ship was grounded? They sought the nearest port? Insane.

  “You are far from the ocean,” he said.

  “T’is a strange thing wot happened to us long ago,” the leader said. “A strange tale of witches wot cast an evil curse on us. Aye, bottled up and becalmed on the endless sea. No merchanteer for the picking, no land for the seeing. Nothing. Until now!”

  Not just sailors; pirates!

  “We could eat the horse,” Eardog suggested.

  The others muttered their agreement, and a brown gob of drool leaked from the leader’s lip onto Amberhill’s lapel.

  “Tasty land flesh, eh?” the man said. He licked his fingers as if already savoring the meal. “Tired of scaly fishes we are, aye. Ate me sea satchel.” He burbled madly.

  “And bilge rats,” Eardog added.

  “Aye, and bilge rats, till there were no more.” His grin was hideous, showing his few rotting teeth. “The horse, men! See to it we got some land flesh!”

  All but the leader shuffled out of Amberhill’s view, but shortly he heard hooves pound the ground and pirates shouting obscenities at Goss.

  “My horse will kill them,” Amberhill said.

  “We shall see, me fine cat.”

  This was followed by the sound of a wet impact.

  “Cap’n Bonnet!” Eardog cried. “It killt Bonesy!”

  An intolerable odor wafted over the area, like rotting offal with a tinge of dead fish floating belly up in a marsh. Amberhill’s guts knotted up. The stink enraged Goss all the more and he bugled his fury.

  The captain’s face flushed with veiny lines and his neck seemed to swell like gasping gills. “Lost men to the ocean, aye. Lost ’em to hunger and scurvy, aye, and when we hove aground, more lost. Ye will help us kill that beast, or so help me, I will carve out yer heart meself for a snack.”

  Captain Bonnet retracted the blade. Amberhill stood and assessed the situation. The dead man, Bonesy, lay in a heap with his brains bashed out, but oddly, his corpse appeared far more decomposed than it ought for a fresh kill. Goss scraped his hoof into the earth, his neck frothy with sweat.

  Five pirates were left. Three, including Eardog, surrounded Goss, but dared not advance within striking range of his hooves despite their weapons—a couple of cutlasses and an ax. Another stood well off. He bore an adze, and was probably ship’s carpenter.

  The pirates had thrown his sword and gear in a pile out of reach. Fortunately they had not searched him thoroughly.

  “If you want me to help kill the horse,” he said, “I shall need a blade. My own sword ought to do.”

  Captain Bonnet laughed. “Nay, me cat. Ye will calm the beast, see? We will do the carving.”

  Amberhill shrugged and glanced once more at Goss. He was not the most predictable of horses, and no doubt the foul stench of the sailors offended him. He hoped it worked to his advantage, as it already had with Bonesy.

  He found himself more than a little irritated by being accosted by this band of cutthroats and alarmed by the amount of time this was costing him. Time he should be using to catch up with Lady Estora and her captors.

  He’d be at a disadvantage without his rapier, but as the Raven Mask, he knew to never be unprepared for any situation that may develop. He marked again where each pirate stood, and cross-drew twin knives from wrist sheaths.

  The first he threw dropped the carpenter. The second he used to deflect a blow from the captain. He whirled and pulled another knife from a boot sheath and now he parried blows from the captain with both.

  From the corner of his eye, he caught Goss rearing at the end of his tether, the remaining pirates holding their weapons before them, but backing away from the stallion’s flying hooves. In Amberhill’s experience, seamen rarely possessed any horse sense and that was all for the better in his opinion.

  The captain’s sword work was not fine, but it was relentless and he hacked at Amberhill like a windmill, one blow after the other. Amberhill parried blow after blow with his knives.

  A branch cracked, and Goss was free, rearing and thrusting his hooves at the pirates. They yelled and scattered.

  The captain faltered just a hair, and Amberhill dove to the ground and rolled. He ended up by his gear and rose to find a pirate running at him with cutlass raised.

  Amberhill threw a knife and it took the man in the belly. The pirate staggered and fell to the ground, quite dead. The enraged Goss bounded over to the pirate and started pummeling his body, causing an eruption of stench and gore. Amberhill gasped, wishing his horse would go after the living.

  He heard a grunt behind him, and rolled away as the captain’s sword slashed down where he had just been standing. He circled with the captain, his gear between them.

  He batted away a thrust. They circled some more, Amberhill aware of the sailors on the fringes of his concentration yelling encouragement to Captain Bonnet.

  “Give up, me cat,” the captain said, “and I’ll make yer death less painful.”

  It was a dreadful chance, and Amberhill knew it, but this had all become a damned nuisance. When the captain raised his arm to deliver another blow, Amberhill threw his last knife. It didn’t mean he hadn’t other weapons on him, but they were not made for throwing.

  Captain Bonnet screamed—it was a gurgling scream—and dropped to the ground grabbing at the knife in his throat. Blood spurted between his fingers.

  Before the captain even fell, Amberhill grabbed his rapier and parrying dagger and turned just in time to skewer a pirate rushing him. Behind him, Eardog’s eyes widened, and he turned tail to run. Amberhill slid the knife from the twitching captain’s neck and hurled it into Eardog’s back. The pirate fell into the brush and did not move.

  Amberhill wiped his brow with his sleeve and paused to catch his breath, only to retch on the vapor of putrefaction that arose from the bodies. He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and covered his nose and mouth. As he watched, the flesh of the corpses sank into their bones with unnatural speed.

  “Five hells,” he muttered.

  Goss still reared on the long dead corpse of the one pirate with a methodical ferocity that stunned him. The bones were by now quite pulverized. “Gos
s! For heavens sakes! He’s dead already.”

  Amberhill picked his way into the mess and, taking Goss’ tether in hand, he spoke soothingly to calm him and led him well away from the gore. He returned to collect his gear. When he went to pull his knife from the remains of Eardog, he found much to his surprise, jewels and gold coins shining among the bones. Using the tip of his knife, he jostled the bones about, and more coins and jewels spilled out of the pirate’s carcass. He checked the others, and sure enough, he found a great fortune of wealth beneath their now papery skin and among their bones.

  “How extraordinary.” He’d never seen such a thing before and wondered how it could be, but even more than being surprised by the treasure, he was dazzled by its shining beauty.

  As he poked among Captain Bonnet’s ribs, a brilliant flash of red caught his attention, and he spied a ring on the captain’s finger. It was gold, fashioned into a fierce dragon with its tail wound around its neck, its eye inlaid with an exquisite blood ruby.

  Surely he would have seen this on the captain’s finger before, but he hadn’t. He slid the ring off. Captain Bonnet’s finger was now no more than bone, so it came easily into Amberhill’s hand. He slipped it onto his own finger and it fit perfectly. He admired it for a time, how it shone in the light; he breathed upon it and polished it with his handkerchief, then regarded it for a while longer with much wonder and delight.

  Eventually he tore his gaze from it and started to collect the rest of the treasure from among the bodies. He’d hide it—hide it all. He couldn’t carry it away with him right now, and there was no sense in leaving such largesse in the open like this for just anyone to find.

  He collected sapphires and opals, diamonds and emeralds and lapis lazuli. There were the coins both gold and silver imprinted with the dragon sigil from lands unknown, and strands of fine links of the same. He discovered jade and topaz, pretty brooches and more rings. He loved the smooth kiss of the gems on his skin and the cold bite of the gold and silver. He stashed the treasure in the hollow of a tree.

  He would return for it later. A treasure such as this would restore his estate ten—no, a hundred times over and he could start the horse breeding farm he dreamed of. He didn’t even steal it, and any curse laid upon it must have surely been lifted with the demise of the pirates. Surely! He almost giggled at the prospect of all debts repaid and his estate’s finances secured in prosperity forever.

  When he finished he wiped his hands clean. And paused. What was he doing? The time he had wasted hiding treasure when he should be pursuing Lady Estora’s abductors! It was now midmorning. His ugly greed had reared high, obscuring his mission, delaying the lady’s rescue. He had behaved dishonorably again, had dishonored the memory of Morry.

  I am no better than my father, he thought in disgust.

  Ashamed, he tracked down Goss and tacked him. The stallion was nervous, his skin twitching. Amberhill cursed himself further, for it would be a while before Goss was calm enough to ride.

  Well, he decided, patting his stallion soundly on the neck, at least the world is less six insane pirates and I am flush with treasure. Truly, a caper worthy of the Raven Mask. Now it was time I rescued the beautiful noblewoman.

  He turned and led Goss westward.

  “Clay!” Sarge bellowed.

  He’d already lifted Estora off Falan, and she stood by her white mare’s head, speaking softly to her. Falan had done remarkably well on this mad dash through the woods, a tribute to her breeding and training. But now she held her right forehoof aloft and looked miserable. Estora prayed she’d be all right.

  Clay, the scout, joined them.

  “Check out the mare,” Sarge said.

  Clay dismounted and went to Falan, probing her leg in a practiced manner. Falan did not appear to be afflicted by pain at his touch. He cupped her hoof in his hands, concentrating, then pulled a hoof pick out of his pocket.

  “She’s a stone is all.” He worked the pick inside the hoof, and after a bit of prying, the stone popped out. It wasn’t large, but it had been significant enough to bother Falan.

  “Prob’ly bruised somewhat,” Clay said, “but not badly.”

  “She won’t slow us down?” Sarge demanded.

  “Don’t ’spect so,” Clay said. He patted Falan’s neck, and returned to his own horse.

  When Clay had finished with the mare, she planted her full weight on the hoof and Estora was much relieved.

  “If she comes up lame again,” Sarge said in a warning voice, “we’re leaving her behind and you’re riding with me. We’ve already wasted enough time here.”

  He helped Estora mount, and once again they were off. It went like so many days before, Sarge pushing them at a furious pace through the unpredictable footing of the woodlands. Estora worried about Falan’s hoof, but the mare’s gait proved unflagging and solid.

  As the day passed, the forest thinned and grew more patchy, and at times they had to cross fields and meadows. As always, Clay scouted forward to ensure they’d pass unobserved. They hurried from thicket to thicket, sometimes keeping to streambeds that had high banks and growth around them. In the distance, rounded mountains began to dominate the horizon, and it was clear they were headed in their direction.

  During one of their infrequent breaks, Estora asked Sarge what the mountains were called.

  “If you don’t know,” he said, “then I’ve no call to tell you.”

  If Estora survived this ordeal, and especially if she became queen, she’d make it her business to know the geography of every corner of Sacoridia. She’d never bothered to know in detail anywhere but her own Coutre Province, and the immediate surroundings of the castle in Sacor City.

  Of course, if she survived and became queen, she was not leaving the castle ever again!

  The evening found them in a woodland gentler and less dense than the Green Cloak they left behind, and here they stopped for the night. Although all was routine, Sarge appeared more agitated than usual, counting off on his fingers as he paced, and checking the moon. Estora surmised he was required to reach their destination on a specific day.

  Whittle joined up with the group and this time Estora could hear him telling Sarge, “No sign of our hero.”

  Sarge looked pleased and announced the watch schedule for that night.

  In the morning she was roused early. Clay checked Falan’s hoof before they set off and pronounced it sound.

  “We’ve a hard day ahead of us,” he confided to Estora.

  More difficult than all the days that proceeded this one? She could scarcely believe it until Sarge set off. They rode faster and longer, deeper into the night, their horses slathered in sweat and stumbling until finally, at some awful hour, Sarge called a halt. By this time Estora was so exhausted she was slumped over Falan’s neck. When Sarge helped her down, she could hardly stand unaided.

  “We will wake before dawn,” he warned her. His tone was almost jovial. “It will still be dark.”

  A VOICE IN THE DARK

  Karigan and Fergal settled down behind a cluster of boulders to keep watch. Not that they could see much in the dark, but moonlight pooled in the clearing that was the Teligmar Crossroads, and they’d be able to detect any movement there. Their initial inspection of the area showed no sign of a trap; turned up nothing, really, and so they hid the horses and found this spot for themselves. If Timas Mirwell wasn’t playing some joke on them, they were in a good position to see whatever it was they were supposed to see.

  They took turns keeping watch while the other slept. Karigan dozed uneasily, her back at an uncomfortable angle against a rock. Her mind chattered endlessly, debating with itself as to what it was Timas thought she’d “want” to see, and why. Did it have something to do with Beryl? He indicated he knew why they’d come to Mirwellton—to make contact with Beryl.

  Just as Karigan’s mind settled and it seemed she might get some rest after all, Fergal gently shook her wrist.

  “Whaaa—?” she began.

&n
bsp; “Shhh. Someone’s coming.”

  All at once Karigan was fully alert and upright, peering into the dark. Five riders approached through the woods, halting short of the crossroads by several yards.

  “Clay,” a man said, “I want you to go on ahead and take a look around.”

  “Aye,” one of them replied, and he urged his horse away from the others, heading for the crossroads.

  The first speaker then turned in his saddle to address the others. “Jeremy, you’re with me. Whittle, you are to stay here with the lady.” He and the rider named Jeremy left Whittle and “the lady” behind, guiding their horses toward the crossroads but halting just at the edge of the road, remaining within the cover of the woods. They sat there, apparently waiting. Waiting for what?

  Karigan wondered if “the lady” seated on the white horse might be Beryl. But she didn’t think Beryl would be riding sidesaddle. Perplexed, she whispered to Fergal, “I’m taking a closer look. You stay here.”

  Before he could protest, she called upon her ability to fade and stepped out from behind their cluster of boulders. She crept toward Whittle and the lady as silently as possible. When she got near enough to identify features, she almost gasped aloud. She hastened back to Fergal and behind the boulders, dropping the fading.

  “That’s Lady Estora on the white horse,” Karigan told him without preamble. “Her hands are bound—she’s a prisoner.”

  Fergal’s mouth dropped open in surprise.

  “We’ve got to act,” Karigan told him, “and we’ve got to act quickly. That’s our future queen being held captive, and we have no idea of what’s about to happen to her. I need your help, Fergal. Will you do exactly as I ask? I’m going to be asking a lot of you.”