Horn of the River God: Book I of The Song of Agmar

by Frances Mason

  Some fled to the north, the one direction in which they had not been tightly encircled, with only a small contingent sparsely spread, commanded by Oliver. With the other knights and Yeomen of the Crown he toyed with the fleeing men, casually swinging to this side and that, spinning his steed to chase, cutting through a neck here and lopping off an arm there, driving his sword point down into one man’s back, knocking another over with his steed’s rump as it spun, crushing another between his steed and that of another knight so that the man’s eyes exploded from his sockets and his head was torn off and rolled about, kicked this way and that by fleeing men and chasing steeds. And the steeds rode over the screaming faces of men who had fallen and tried to regain their feet, while iron shod hooves shattered their skulls and drove their flailing bodies into the dirt.

  Those rebels who had fought between Arthur’s host and the copse, and who had escaped the encirclement and maintained some discipline, now fought a rear-guard action, while marching toward the open fields between the copse to their east and the hill to their southeast, on which the Monks of War had mustered.

  A shout went up from the host of Crimson Monks, “To the glory of War.”

  And now the Monks of War advanced, their ranks tightly packed, crimson greave to crimson greave, iron boot to iron boot, their skill in the saddle as remarkable as their feats with lance and spear, sword and axe, mace and hammer. Unlike some monks, no shame of bloodshed limited the Monks of War, for drawing blood in war was their sacrament, their glad offering to their terrifying god. Their trot down the hillside turned to a canter, the canter built to a gallop, and the sound of shod hooves thundered as the Crimson Monks streamed down to the plain like a flood of metalled blood.

  Conner led his men toward the monks. “You know what to do,” he called to his men. They rode or marched to meet, and Conner, seeing Jasper, galloped toward him, fearless, his sword raised. Before he was within shouting distance, the Crimson Monks lowered their lances and charged, though their ranks flowed around the rebel leader, who was left facing Jasper. Jasper threw down his lance. Conner smiled. “King of the common man am I, king of peasants, king of beggars” he called out to the knight commander of the Vrong Veld chapter of War’s Monks, “how the high and mighty bow before the low.” The words were lost amid the sound of thundering hooves, but the confidence of the rebel leader was clear.

  Conner turned around, and the Monks of War crashed into the unprepared rebels, tearing their bodies apart. Broken bodies were launched into their further ranks. Lances shattered and were used as clubs to smash helms or short spears to bloody stunned up-looking faces. Then the monks threw aside their lances, which were no use in close quarters, and drew the weapons of their various preference. One smashed his giant war hammer into the head of a heavily armoured rebel. Blood fountained in all directions as helm and head were crushed and forced down into the man’s neck. Another monk hewed left and right with his battle axe, sending heads to roll across the ground like red fruit spilled from a stall in the marketplace. Several monks worked together with longswords pointed forward, to ride over men as if fording a stream of screaming flesh above which arms flailed like impotent waves.

  Conner no longer vaunted. On his face was clearly written shock as he turned back to yell at Jasper. At first the monk could not hear the rebel leader, then as he closed on Conner, the rebel’s voice became clearer. “Why?” he screamed, his face no longer confident, but twisted in fear and rage, “we serve the same lord.” Then Jasper drew his giant two handed sword, with a broad five foot blade and thick foot long hilt, and advanced. “And you will best serve him dead,” he said, then spurred his mount forward, rose up in his stirrups, gripping the hilt of his great sword in both hands, and cut down, dropping back into his saddle as he did to combine the falling weight of his body and heavy armour with the power of his great muscles. The blow split Conner’s helm and head, and cut down through his neck, cutting his torso in two and continuing down through the saddle to sever his horse’s spine. The horse collapsed to the earth, bearing down its grizzly cargo, its front hooves kicking wildly as what had been a man was spread across the dirt, guts and blood and eyes and limbs and shit and armour mixed indiscriminately with soil and burnt wheat as the horse screamed and struggled to return to its feet but was defeated by its crippling injury. Jasper dismounted, and carefully approaching to avoid the kicking hooves, mercifully killed the horse.

  As the forces of Arthur, Wulfstan, Jasper and Sir Marl chased the routed army across the plain the leaders flocked to the prince’s banner. Oliver realised something was wrong, not seeing the prince anywhere near him in the field. Agmar and Sir Marl reached him first.

  Agmar leapt off his horse and ran to the prince. “Highness, are you injured?”

  The prince’s helm had been removed. His face was pasty white, as if he had been bled dry by a thousand leeches. He shook his head, though he barely had the strength to hold it up. Then it lolled. “My strength flees, but not a drop of my blood has been spilled.”

  “How?”

  “Poison,” Arthur gasped. His breath was laboured, and sweat beaded on his brow.

  “How?”

  Arthur motioned Agmar and Sir Marl forward, and his bodyguard away. Then he whispered to them. “Armour. I thought I knew. I suspected the armour I won, because Amery and Augustyn gave it together, in amity. Those two.” He laughed weakly. “They’d fight each other like two mongrels fight over a rotten bone. And the cockroaches.”

  “The cockroaches?” Agmar asked, wondering if the poison had affected the prince’s brain.

  “So I didn’t wear it,” Arthur said with bitter laughter. “I didn’t suspect my own armour. He’s cunning, that one.”

  “Wulfstan wished not to provide aid,” Agmar said quietly. “And however grudging, he is Augustyn’s man.”

  “And the monks of War hesitated until the day was decided,” Sir Marl added. “They follow Amery’s command.”

  Arthur’s head lolled again.

  “We must find you a physician,” they both insisted in unison.

  “It’s too late,” he whispered, “the poison is strong.”

  “But you are stronger.”

  Arthur tried to shake his head, but did not have the strength. “I have worn the armour too long. Fought for too long. Pumped it through my own veins with my efforts. I feel it in my flesh, in my very bones. I thought it only weariness, and didn’t heed it, and so it’s killed me.” Oliver rode up and dismounted, running to Arthur’s side. Then Arthur snapped his head up once more, and looked fiercely at Oliver. “Remember your oath.”

  “My oath?”

  “Remember,” Arthur roared with sudden force, then collapsed back and whispered, barely audibly, “remember.”

  Oliver realised Arthur’s meaning then, and said, “Your kin are mine,” and gripped his cousin’s hand. But the prince’s once powerful grip was now as weak as a child’s.

  Arthur, seemingly satisfied, slumped again, and closed his eyes. Then his eyes opened. “Where is my son?” he whispered, his eyes unfocussed.

  “He is at the Summer Palace with the king, cousin.”

  “My son. Bring him to me.”

  Once again Agmar wondered whether the poison had affected the prince’s brain. Oliver saw the expression on his face and that of many others there. Sir Marl held his gaze, and asked, “Here?” Oliver shook his head.

  “Not here,” Arthur muttered, “Marl!”

  “My lord?”

  “You know your duty. The crown depends on you. You must leave for the north. Today. Don’t delay.”

  “Your will is my command, Highness.”

  The prince’s apothecary and physician both reached Arthur at the same time as Wulfstan, limping on crutches, and Jasper, and ignoring rank, pushed aside all others to attend him. Agmar thought Wulfstan’s face betrayed satisfaction. Oliver strode over to Jasper and, taking him aside, hissed, “if you have had a part in this, even the god of War himself won’t save you
from my wrath.”

  “Poison is not the way of War,” Jasper said stiffly, and gestured toward Wulfstan’s barely concealed gloating. Oliver knew that, though the Monks of War were mercenaries, they were also men of honour. And now he thought he detected shame in that monk’s stern face. But shame means guilt. He pressed the point:

  “And it is the way of the Dark Monks? Do you think me a fool? Do you think I didn’t see you hold back when the prince stood in need.”

  “Whenever I had charged, the poison would have felled him.”

  It was true. Oliver could not deny it. But he suspected there had been more to this day’s tragedy than that. “A royal prince’s death will serve War well. The land will be washed with blood. Is that your wish?”

  The monk was silent, his face impassive except for the grinning scar he could not command.

  “The king will rage as never before,” Oliver said.

  “He will rage of assassins, not warriors,” Jasper said, and now his lips seemed to surrender to the cruel smile of his scar, though Oliver could not be sure.

  “If Amery thinks he can outplay Augustyn he’s a bigger fool than he thinks I am.”

  Jasper looked seriously at Oliver, only his scar grimly smiling now. “That den of Death will be cleansed again. It’s too long since we harvested the heads of the Temple of the Harvest. They grow proud in their shadows, and their master grows proud with them, but no longer. With such a prince as Arthur fallen, none will stand in our way. The Day of the Sublime Sanctification will return. We will exterminate them like vermin.”

  “What? The Day of the Sublime Sanctification? That mythic purging of the cult of Death by the Crimson Monks? Are you mad?”

  “It’s no myth. And once more the blood will run from their foul temples and putrid monasteries, and fill the streets like wine. And sate War’s eternal thirst.”

  Chapter 66: Alnoth: King’s Forest

  Alnoth, Yeoman of the Crown, had been in the saddle for many hours, first riding out with the princess, then riding back to the palace, now returning to ensure her safety. With him were half a dozen other Yeomen from the palace. He had taken a fresh horse from the stables. He would not rest until the princess was safe.

  He had failed the king. He felt that failure almost as physical pain. So much had been entrusted to him. The fate of the king was the fate of the kingdom, and so protecting the body of the king was protecting the peace of the realm. He had come so close. If only he had arrived a few moments earlier, he could have alerted the others and the assassins would have been dragged away before they could strike. The king would have protested, believing them to be true priests, and the others would have been reluctant to countermand the king, but they would have put his safety first and suffered the consequences stoically. It was their role. Protect the body of the king. At any cost. And now the king was dead.

  In the distance, among the shadows of the trees, riding along the path toward them was a large, disorderly band, followed by a cloud of dust kicked up by rapid hooves. They were closing fast. Alnoth saw the lady Katherine and breathed a sigh of relief. The princess’s party. But why were they riding so fast? He reined in his steed. The others came up beside him. He could not see the lady Amelia.

  “Where is the princess?” Adelold asked him.

  His fellow Yeoman was right. Alnoth could not see the princess either, nor any other women besides the lady Katherine. She rode up to them, a ragged train of male servants behind her.

  “Your Grace,” Alnoth said, “where is the princess?”

  “We were attacked.”

  “More assassins?” His heart sank. Not only had he failed the king, but in riding to the palace he had abandoned the princess to her fate. But the lady was shaking her head.

  “Bandits? In the King’s Forest?”

  Still she shook her head, and said, “Fiks.”

  The Yeomen all muttered the name and spat. For generations the Fiks had plagued the realm, their dragon prowed longboats raiding upriver from the seventh city of the realm. A city not theirs, put to the sword, and now filled with their northern stench. Recently the western duke, Wulfstan, had punished them for their presumption. He had won back much of the land around the city of Gleda. But still they raided. They were a plague, and like all plagues, it seemed there was no cure.

  Alnoth asked again, with an anger directed more at the Fiks than the marchioness, “Where is the princess?”

  “I don’t like your tone,” she said, holding her head proudly high, “I am marchioness Anweld. You will not address me thus.”

  In exasperation he said gruffly, “And when the princess is safe I will bow and scrape to your satisfaction, woman.”

  The servants around the marchioness all gasped at this impropriety. Her face flushed with blood, her eyes flashing fire. “I will not be spoken to in this way by a common…by a common lout.”

  Oblivious to all but his objective, he roared, “Where is the princess?” She gaped, open mouthed in shock. He reached out and yanked the reins from her hands and drew her horse up beside his own, so that he was thigh to thigh with her. He leaned threateningly toward her, glaring into her eyes. The blood ran from her face, her pride now replaced with fear. “I will not…,” she said, in so small a voice he could barely hear. Their faces were so close now he could see tears welling in her eyes, and she seemed more a small child than a proud noble. He thought of his eldest daughter, much of an age with the marchioness, and softened his tone, pleading, “Please, Your Grace. I mean no disrespect. Forgive my harsh words and understand I only fear for the princess’s safety. It is my duty to protect her. You, who are the granddaughter of a king, must understand the oath by which I am bound, the oath by which all Crown’s Yeomen are bound. We have failed the king. We must not...”

  “You have failed the king?” Her disbelief was evident. “The king is…”

  “The king is dead. Your cousin, Arthur, is now king. We must not fail the king’s sister.”

  “And the queen?”

  His anger rose again as he recognised the hopeful note in her voice. “She is dead.” His voice became acerbic, but dropped to a level that only the two of them could hear. “Does this please you, Your Grace?” And the honorific was said with such venom she could not mistake it.

  She tried but could not hide the satisfaction on her face. Though he did not, as a rule, strike women, he felt a sudden urge to slap the marchioness. But wanting her cooperation, he restrained the urge, and pushed down his anger far enough to speak with stiffly formal politeness to her. “Your Grace, where is the princess?”

  Her eyes moved in small rapid jerks, like nervous ticks but with a purpose, as she evaluated his face carefully. She seemed aware of how much he held back, but only said, “I don’t know.” She pointed back the way she had come. “When they attacked, those of us who could, fled. I was mounted at the time. They murdered many men. I didn’t see, but I heard the screaming. Perhaps some escaped.” She displayed concern, though he was not sure how authentic. “I hope Sophie escaped, and Amelia. But I couldn’t help them.”

  “How many Fiks?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t see. It all happened so quickly. There was screaming and dying men and I rode as fast as I could out of the glade. It must have been a lot.”

  He dropped her rein and spurred on his steed. The Yeomen rode quickly to just beyond the glade, then fanned out. The marchioness rode some distance behind with the servants, not willing to risk a further ambush without the protection of the Yeomen.

  When the Yeomen entered the glade they found a scene of utter devastation. The Yeoman Eoldwald was dead, his body hacked to pieces. Around him were the corpses of three Fik warriors.

  Dogs barked in the distance, and he heard a voice, much closer, but as if through gargled water. He turned. A male servant lay nearby, blood flowing from his mouth, a sword by his side. Evidently he had tried to fight the Fiks but, unarmoured and untrained against warriors, had stood no chance. Many of the other mal
e servants lay likewise dead, and two women, face down. The women had been raped to the point of bloodiness, their dresses torn, their legs and buttocks and backs exposed. For a terrible moment he thought of his wife and daughter. But that was absurd; they were safe in the capital. He gritted his teeth and resolutely cleared from his head all thoughts of home and family. The safety of the princess was his duty. And he remembered now, the princess wore the dress of a servant, rather than of a noble lady. He strode over to the women, hesitated, then gingerly turned them over. Both had had the soft flesh of their throats slit. He brushed the hair away from the face of one of the women, then the other. Neither was the princess Sophie or the lady Amelia. He sighed in relief and stood, and went over to the bleeding man-servant.

  He knelt beside him. He could not make out what he was saying, spluttering it through blood. He wiped away some of the blood, but there was too much to staunch. There was a wound in the lower chest. A blade had pierced his lung. He would not live long. He coughed, and a fine mist of blood sprayed from his mouth. More blood flowed from the wound, forced out by the pressure of the coughing. His eyes pleaded with Alnoth. Through the spluttering and coughing Alnoth thought he made out, “She lives.” For a moment his hope was aroused. Then the servant was still.

  “She lives,” he said, turning to the other Yeomen. “The princess lives. I’ll find her.”

  Adelold, said, “We protect the king. We can’t leave.”

  “The king is dead, and we’re too far from Arthur to aid him.”

  “But not to aid his heir. If anything happens to Arthur, young Richard will be king. We must protect the prince.”