The Black Wolves

by Kate Elliott

  “Just when our escape route had been cut off and we were sure to be slaughtered by superior numbers, the eagles arrived. Each reeve was carrying a Wolf.”

  “A wolf, Your Highness?” exclaimed one of the young men in a tone of honest surprise. “Wouldn’t the wolves bite the reeves? How could they carry them?”

  Several of the soldiers guffawed at his ignorance, and another young bantam puffed his chest up and said, “My uncle was a Black Wolf. In our grandfathers’ time they were the Hundred’s most elite soldiers, you ass. Eiya! Begging your pardon, Your Highness. They disgraced themselves when they did not protect your honored father and it was ill done of me to praise them.”

  “It’s never a disgrace to remember our elders kindly, as you do your uncle. It was once a great honor to serve the king as a Black Wolf.” Jehosh glanced at Kellas, hesitated, then went on without mentioning Kellas’s history. “Anyway, there we were, out-numbered and trapped, a cliff on one side and our enemy on the other. The reeves flew in Wolves and dropped them at the rear of their army. We crushed them from two directions. Later we called it the nutcracker.”

  Jehosh wore a glowing smile as his audience laughed appreciatively at this predictable joke, then soaked up their approbation as he briefly spoke to each one in turn before he and Kellas went on their way.

  Out on the street, he said, “I really have let the administration slip out of my hands. What if I begin to make rounds regularly of the militia stations here in the city, Captain?”

  “You are good with soldiers, Your Highness.”

  “All the best times of my life have been in the field. When I’m not living out of a camp tent and waiting for the next skirmish, I miss the knife’s edge. Here in the palace I feel I become a clerk, counting coins. Perhaps I should institute a new custom. I could ride a circuit of the assizes courts, hear the people’s grievances, make myself known.”

  “King Anjihosh did just that, Your Highness. He made his presence known throughout the Hundred by attending assizes courts in every region in the company of the Judge Guardians. Your father continued the circuit.”

  “Yes, I remember how it annoyed me when he required me to ride with him when I was a boy. Sitting and listening to court cases seemed the most tedious thing in the world. Let dutiful men do that work, I told him!”

  “As I recall you wanted to join the Black Wolves. Lord Vanas already had.”

  “I passed every test for the Black Wolves, Captain.”

  “Did you? I never knew that.”

  “Even you didn’t know everything, Captain. I convinced my father it would be proper and fitting for his son to join.”

  “But you never did.”

  “I just wanted to prove I could. The truth is, I wanted my own company, not to be one of his. I wanted to fight the northern raiders on my own terms and with my own people.”

  Kellas glanced toward Lord Vanas, who waited patiently at the head of the company of mounted soldiers accompanying the king. These guardsmen, and indeed all the city militia, wore badges whose embroidery cleverly displayed the crossed spears indicating their loyalty to the palace interwoven with a wreath of green ribbons, the mark of Vanas’s personal household.

  “On to the Wolf Quarter, Vanas!” called the king.

  “Wolf Quarter is restless at night, Your Highness.” Vanas indicated the starry sky. Their impromptu tour of the militia barracks and posts in each quarter of the city had taken the whole of the afternoon after the fiasco of the reeves’ convocation, something for the king to do to make him feel he still had control. Now darkness cast an ominous shadow on Vanas’s words.

  “All the better I should inspect these troubled neighborhoods for myself, is it not?” demanded Jehosh with an edge of challenge.

  Vanas glanced at Kellas. “What does your chief of security say?”

  Kellas had been given a quiet gelding, and he rested hands on the pommel, enjoying the restful feeling of a solid horse beneath him. “The king’s chief of security feels that if any quarter of this city is so dangerous that the king cannot safely ride there, then we have greater problems even than court officials eager to ally with his heirs in expectation of his death. If you cannot establish control over one city, Your Highness, then how can you expect to be respected and obeyed as king?”

  Vanas’s glare had the bite of lightning.

  Jehosh’s smile was sunny. “Wolf Quarter it is. I have not forgotten how to command men, eh, Captain Kellas?”

  “By all accounts you have always conducted yourself gloriously as a field general, Your Highness.”

  Jehosh raised a hand with a flourish, as in answer, and they moved forward with foot soldiers advancing before and behind carrying lanterns on poles. On the main avenues folk had come out to light threshold lamps, as required by a law enacted in the first year of Anjihosh’s reign. People stared and, as they belatedly recognized the king, tapped fists to chest in the old-fashioned way. Jehosh blazed, his good mood gaining strength. But Kellas wasn’t so sure every gaze was a friendly one, and he noted how Vanas subtly altered the order of the march to make sure the king was surrounded by soldiers on every side so a cast spear or loosed arrow would strike one of them instead of the king.

  Kellas’s instincts did not give him any sense they were walking into an ambush, nor did he see ugly hatred in people’s gazes, just discontent and frustration. Yet a stormy murmuring became audible as they neared South Gate, where arrested men were held in the shrine prison before being marched out on work gangs.

  “Let me ride ahead,” said Vanas.

  “No! If I fear those I rule, I might as well hand the reins to Chorannah and let her do the driving.”

  Jehosh drove his horse forward, outpacing everyone. Vanas blocked Kellas’s horse as soldiers surged after the king.

  “Captain Kellas, are you trying to get him killed? It was never proven to my satisfaction that you weren’t involved in King Atani’s death. You might wish to see Jehosh suffer the same ugly fate.”

  Kellas glanced at Vanas’s sword, still sheathed, and let his gaze rest on Vanas for long enough that the other man shifted nervously in the saddle. No need to raise his voice. He could make a quiet tone snap harder than a whip just by telling a truth no one dared admit. “If you encourage King Jehosh to hide in his chambers then I can assure you, Lord Vanas, you will kill his kingship as readily as if you cast the spear yourself. I mean no offense, but Jehosh has a streak of laziness and self-indulgence that we all observed when he was young. Has anyone checked him in all these years? I wonder, for it appears several of his once trusted companions have changed allegiance. Have you, Lord Vanas? Now, if you don’t mind, as his chief of security I would like to make sure his person is secure.”

  He clipped his mount forward quickly enough that he entered South Gate Square at the king’s side. The Beltak shrine rose on one side of the main gate, and the prison on the other. Although all the gates were closed for the night, lines of soldiers braced themselves behind big, rectangular shields in front of the prison gate, and soldiers had moved into position atop the walls with crossbows cranked and ready to release.

  Despite this show of force a crowd of several hundred people stood shoulder-to-shoulder in front of South Gate, singing lustily and in a ragged unison the ancient story of the dragonling who had rescued her sweetheart from the prison of a tyrant. Their voices faded to silence as Jehosh rode into the square with soldiers behind him and all the weight of kingship on his brow.

  He still knew how to make an entrance.

  That the assembly was surprised to see the king was evident by the buzz of whispers. Torches and lanterns burned, illuminating faces: rough-looking men ready for a fight; older women draped in anguish, no doubt the mothers and aunts of young men condemned to the work gangs; women hiding their faces beneath scarves so they couldn’t be recognized; men of all ages shifting with determined anger.

  His face reddened from anger, Vanas reined his horse up beside the king’s. “I will order
them to disperse, Your Highness. If they do not, then we will arrest them.”

  Jehosh studied the people, for all their faces were turned to him. “No. Bring me a shield and four strong men.”

  “But Jehosh…” Vanas muttered in a tone so direct, without the usual distance of hierarchy, that it set Kellas’s ears humming.

  “I know what I am doing, Van,” replied Jehosh in a similar voice, like the argument of brothers. “If we cannot quiet a restless gathering, then think what a party our enemies will make of our incompetence. Let the choices we made years ago not end in our spears cutting down old women armed with baskets of food.”

  With obvious reluctance Vanas called forward four soldiers from those guarding the prison gate. They came with haste, stepping on toes, shoving several people aside too brusquely. People stamped feet to make thunder. The air charged as in the moment before lightning strikes. The pulse of danger flooded through Kellas in warning, and he slipped his sword halfway out of its sheath.

  “Enough!” shouted the king. “I will have silence!”

  To people who had only glimpsed the king in passing and never heard his voice, the sound struck like a hammer’s blow. They subsided, making way, and the four soldiers set down their shields. Jehosh stepped onto one and they hoisted it up to their shoulders. Now he seemed a figure out of a tale, floating upon the air with the sky as a cloak. The players of Hasibal used this trick to elevate characters meant to have a towering presence.

  “On law, the land is built.” Jehosh had a clear, loud voice, and his command of the Hundred-speech made him seem one of the people. “So spoke my grandfather King Anjihosh the Glorious Unifier, he who brought peace. Law is a better shield than a sword! So spoke my father, King Atani the Law-Giver, who believed that every road in the Hundred should be marked with a law pillar. That way every person who walks out the door of their household can see that the law reaches from the north to the south, from the Eagles’ Claws to the Spires, from the east to the west, from the ocean to Heaven’s Ridge. In every town stands an assizes where judges make their rulings. The nine Judge Guardians—the highest judges in the land—oversee these courts.”

  “Sheh!” cried a woman’s voice out of the crowd. “My son committed no crime, Your Highness. He was swept up off the street for no reason.”

  “My brother, too!” shouted a man closer to the front, emboldened by the woman’s interruption. “He was inked and marched out without ever standing before any assizes.”

  Jehosh cast a startled glance at Vanas, who shook his head in the manner of a man who cannot answer the question. But the king did not retreat.

  “Let no person say justice is not served in the Hundred! All people arrested must first have a hearing before the assizes. Only then, if they are found guilty, will they be remanded to the work gangs. I will send extra clerks to every quarter’s assizes to assist in recording all claims brought forward. The king’s assizes atop Law Rock shall be the final arbiter. Let it be known, by my word as king, spoken this night.”

  The burning torches lit him but he burned with a fire of a different kind: his grandfather’s steely presence, his father’s quiet determination. Where had this Jehosh come from? Kellas wondered as he studied the crowd and the soldiers whose faces turned like flowers toward a life-giving sun. Maybe the years had matured him. Had Jehosh become a man who could be worked with, influenced, and perhaps even persuaded to a different path?

  “I will tour the prison tonight!” cried Jehosh. “Those whose cases have been properly adjudicated at the assizes will be marched out tomorrow. Those who have not been seen will be retained for judgment. Now I ask you to disperse peaceably to your homes so that we may make an orderly beginning tomorrow.”

  Remarkably, the expectation of a storm about to hit faded. The king waited, still elevated on the shield, as first a few people slipped away into the side streets, heading home, then others followed in larger groups. Only people carrying sacks of provisions for condemned kinsmen remained, unwilling to depart.

  When the square had cleared the four soldiers holding up the shield eased it down and Jehosh stepped gracefully onto solid ground looking as smug as if he had just come from Queen Dia’s bedchamber. Only then, when the danger had passed, did the prison gates open and a familiar man venture out with the sort of swagger a man wears when he isn’t sure of his welcome.

  “Your Highness! What brings you to South Gate?”

  “News of trouble that I have quelled,” retorted Jehosh, looking the other man up and down. “And what brings you here, Supreme Captain Ulyar? What has the commander of my Spears to do with a shrine prison that houses criminals about to be sent out on work gangs? Last I saw you earlier today, you were shit-nosing my son Tavahosh as he usurped a post that should not belong to him.”

  Ulyar had the look of a spooked horse trying to shy away from a ravening bear, but he made a business of signaling his attendants to bring up his horse as he recovered his self-possession. “I work in concert with the priests to keep the Hundred safe, Your Highness. I could not help but hear your ringing words, and it would go against my promise to safeguard the land if I did not speak up. Every man in this prison is a criminal. The shrines simply have expedited the process of condemning criminals so as not to clog up the assizes from practical and necessary matters. It will take days to clear the work gang in the prison now, and that will mean everyone must wait and the prison will become clogged with yet more people awaiting their hearing.”

  “Then it might behoove the priests to stop arresting young men merely for loitering and for not having work tokens,” remarked Kellas.

  Ulyar shot him a glare meant to wither his pretensions. Kellas sighed. This sort of posturing got so dull so fast.

  Jehosh hadn’t even noticed. “Ulyar, I will appoint more judges, and the assizes can simply double its number of hearings. Is this going to be a problem?”

  “How are we to keep order? We’ll need more guards. The city militia does not have enough men.”

  “You requested the city militia be doubled two years ago. Where are all those men? What happened to the coin spent to train and arm them?”

  “They … ah … were sent to High Haldia due to the recent disturbances there, Your Highness.”

  Jehosh rubbed at his eyes as if Ulyar’s words, like dust thrown in his face, were obscuring his vision. “What of the elite soldiers you are meant to command? Temporarily call in the Fourth Company of the Spears. Now that I recollect, I thought they were sent to High Haldia to deal with the riots there, not the city militia.”

  A craven grimace flashed across Ulyar’s face, like that of a child caught out in a lie, and Kellas knew at once that Ulyar was hiding something important from the king. “It’s not … They aren’t … Yes, of course, I will take care of it all at once, Your Highness.”

  “Just to make sure there is no further trouble I want these same conditions put into place in Nessumara, High Haldia, Horn, Olossi, and any other major towns where you have heard report of disturbance. It would be best to impose a curfew until people’s confidence is restored.” He beckoned to Vanas. “Do it quietly, not with a heavy hand. Double night patrols so people become accustomed to seeing guards on the streets. Let them feel uneasy about sneaking about and assembling wherever they please.”

  “Yes, Your Highness,” said Vanas with a triumphant sneer directed at Ulyar.

  The other man said, “But Your Highness—”

  “That is an order, Supreme Captain Ulyar. Do I need to repeat it?”

  “I am yours to command, Your Highness.”

  “It is a relief to me to hear you say so. I was afraid I might have to appoint Captain Kellas in your place.” As Jehosh turned away, Ulyar could not restrain an expression of such raw fury that Kellas tensed, wondering if he would have to stop the man from stabbing Jehosh in the back, but Ulyar retreated to the horse being held ready for him. Vanas watched him go with a gloating smile.

  “Kill him, Captain Kellas,�
� said the king. “I want to be rid of that traitor.”

  “I recommend against it at this time, Your Highness. Consolidate your position before you force Chorannah into open war. Ulyar is easy to deal with because you know where he stands.”

  Jehosh looked at Kellas. “Do you disapprove of my actions this evening?”

  “Not at all, Your Highness. Your decisiveness with the crowd was exactly the measure needed. I am sure there would have been bloodshed had you not seen to the situation yourself. Naturally I approve of your solution.”

  Jehosh squared his shoulders, preening a little. “Do you, Captain? And why is that?”

  “Law is a better shield than the sword, as King Atani always said and as he believed.”

  Jehosh snorted. “Those idiotic law pillars my father insisted on raising. As if people have time to stop and read them, if they can even read.”

  “Yet of those pillars erected on the Istri Walk between Nessumara and Toskala, you have taken none down.”

  “Have you counted them all? No harm in being left as they are. I recollect that my father presided over the assizes on alternate afternoons. He always said people like to see justice out in the open. I shall do as he did. For I assure you, Captain, I see how I have allowed Chorannah to get the jump on me. It seems so obvious now! She’s far more clever than I realized. She’s offered the priests supervision of the assizes and the reeve halls in exchange for their support. That ends now.”

  Ulyar paused by his mount, turning back as if realizing he ought to listen in.

  Jehosh called, “Ulyar! You may return to the upper palace, since you have made your bed there.”

  “Be careful, Your Highness,” said Kellas.

  Jehosh barked a laugh. He seemed almost giddy. “We all know where we stand. Vanas, remain on guard outside so I am not disturbed. Let the people carrying provisions be admitted one by one through the night to give their gifts to their kinsmen. Captain Kellas, accompany me.”