Kingmaker's Sword (Rune Blades of Celi)

by Ann Marston

  The strange man crouched on the packed earth floor, sitting on his bare heels beside my pallet. He wore a one-piece garment of tanned and stitched deerhide that covered him from throat to ankles but left his arms bare. Those arms looked as if they were made of skin, bone and gristle, thin as birch twigs. They looked withered and wasted with age and went with the wild grey hair only thinly streaked with black.

  He thrust a crudely made earthenware cup at me, its contents steaming gently.

  “Drink this, boy,” he said and cackled again. “It be bitter as sin and death, but it be making you feel alive again.” He pushed the cup with surprising strength into my hands and nodded eagerly as I lifted it to my mouth. “Drink up. Drink up. It be naught but snowberry root, willow bark and chalery leaf.”

  I took an experimental sip. He was right. Vile tasting as swamp water. I made a wry face and tried to give back the cup.

  “Nae, nae,” he insisted, pushing it back. The toothy skull of a tiny rodent dangling from one ear, half hidden by the untamed thatch of hair, swayed and danced with his movement. “Drink. Ye’ve lost blood from the shoulder. That be helping to build more.”

  I held my breath and gulped it down in one long swallow, trying it to get it through my mouth fast enough to avoid tasting it. My stomach contracted sharply as the drink arrived with a hard splash, but I held the revolting stuff down and lay back against the furs, gasping.

  The old man clapped his hands in glee, then took the cup. “Good lad. Good lad. If ye can keep it down, it be working quick and lively for ye. Feel better soon, ye will.” He set the cup aside and squatted there, his head cocked to one side like a bird, studying me with unabashed curiosity. “Quite a size, ye be,” he said in delight. “Quite a size, indeed. It be’d a good time I had to drag ye up from the river, boy. The river, it be sending me gifts now and then, but never something like yerself. Ye be ill-used, lad. Ill-used. Be ye on the run from the Ephir’s guardsmen, then? Hounds from Hellas, they be, for sure, and the old Ephir be the chiefest hound.”

  Keeping up with his jackrabbit conversation was making me dizzy. The old man grinned and reached out to pat my shoulder. As the gnarled hand touched me, I noticed for the first time my shoulder was wrapped in a poultice made of leaves and grass, secured by a strip torn from the hem of my shirt. It didn’t hurt at all. And neither did my chest. Or my head. Whatever else he was, he was knowledgeable in the arts of healing.

  “There be’d poppy in the drink, too, lad,” he said. “It takes away pain and gives sleep. Ye be needing sleep to heal yerself. Go off wi’ ye now. Ye be safe wi’ old mad Jeriad. Ye be safe.”

  I believed him. My eyelids sagged of their own accord, and I gave in to sleep without a struggle.

  ***

  I knelt, head bowed, in the midst of the featureless, blighted landscape, ash caked around my nose and mouth. Beneath my knees, the gritty cinders bit deeply into my skin. My blood, lurid red against the colourless ground, made small lumps of clotted grit that crumbled to dust at a touch. A wind I did not feel moaned and howled, sifting clouds of ash like drifting rain from the grey of the sky.

  This was a dreamscape of my enemy’s making. His hand, the darkness he carried with him, had sculpted these dunes of ash and cinder. He drew me here against my waking will just as surely as the Watcher on the Hill drew me into his own dreamscape. I had neither the strength nor the skill to resist either of them.

  Pain rasped through my chest with each choking breath I drew. Hollow urgency pounded in my blood. My enemy was near. I had to get away. Every heartbeat brought him closer and I could not let him find me. I had no sword, no weapon of any kind. Here in this dead, burnt land, he could kill me as easily as he breathed and there was no way I could oppose him.

  I staggered to my feet. The effort made me dizzy, but I forced myself to stumble forward. The ash dragged at my boots as I sank to the ankles in the fine, powdery stuff. Pain wracked my whole body. I had to drag each foot free of the clinging grit, willing the muscles of my leg to swing the foot forward. One foot after the other in slow, aching progression. Too slow. Too slow. The struggle left me exhausted after only a few dozen steps. But I had to go on. I had to. He was behind me and his sinister laughter, ringing with triumph, carried on the wind. Sobbing in frustration and defeat, I fell again to my knees.

  Another sound rode the wind, thin and sweet as a cool trickle of clear water in a desert. A woman’s voice? In my delirium of exhaustion and pain, I thought I heard my name. I listened, not breathing, concentrating on the sound.

  Yes! A woman’s voice. Kerri’s voice! And she called to me. Called my name.

  I rubbed the grit from my sore, crusted eyes. I saw nothing but the bleak, grey land. Ash clogged my throat when I tried to call out to her, and I could not manage even a hoarse croak.

  “I’m here,” I thought desperately. “I’m here, sheyala!” But the link between us was barren and empty.

  And my enemy was nearly upon me.

  I threw back my head and opened my mouth to shout defiance at him. No sound came out. Ashes filled my throat, strangling my voice, choking me, and I could not breathe.

  ***

  The knowledge that Cullin was dead swept over me as soon as I opened my eyes, and submerged me in a wave of grief and loss. Cullin and Kerri. Both gone. This business with Mendor and Drakon was none of their fight, but they were dead because of it, and I was alive. Through some quirk of the gods’ humour, I was alive, dragged out of the river by a half-mad bird of a man. I could not remember freeing myself from the dead tree. It seemed unlikely the old man could have extricated me from that himself. But surely I would have drowned had I not been impaled upon the sharp stub of branch that kept my head out of the water. Mayhap old mad Jeriad was stronger and more spry than he looked.

  I owed him my life. For whatever reason he had been down searching along the riverbank, I owed him thanks and I owed him my life.

  And I owed Drakon and Mendor a death—three times over. The debt would be paid. And soon.

  Old Jeriad scuttled into the half-circular room, carrying a brace of skinned rabbits in one hand. “Ah, look at ye,” he cried happily. “Look at ye, boy. Ye be awake and colour be in yer face. Ye be not the half-drowned near corpse I dragged from the river. The drink always works. Always. Be ye hungry now?”

  “Aye, verra hungry,” I admitted.

  He chuckled. “Young men be naught but walking appetites,” he said. “I remember. I remember well.” He brandished the rabbits. “These be sizzling quick now, and there be fresh greens and bread. Good for you. Be making you strong. Healthy again. Wait you here. Dinner be soon. Wait you here.” He vanished through the hide that served as a door. Moments later, he was back, carrying a cup which he thrust at me. When I drew back in distaste, remembering the foul taste of the last concoction, he cackled in amusement. “It be only water, boy,” he said. “Just sweet water from my own spring behind the dun. Drink it. Ye be needing it. Drink up. Drink up.”

  I thanked him and took the cup. He sat on his heels beside me, knuckles of one hand on the earthen floor between callused feet for balance, and watched me closely. “Ye lost people,” he said suddenly. He put one gnarled finger on my chest just below my breastbone. “There be a darkness in ye, boy. A darkness. Not of yer own making, but it be there nonetheless. Have ye run afoul of them, then? The black sorcerers?” He shook his head. “Bitter bad, they be, lad. Bitter bad.” A troubled expression flitted across his face. “They be out there now. Searching all up and down the river and along the water meadow. Searching well. They not be seeing old mad Jeriad, but I watched them. They be gone now. Gone upriver.” He cocked his head to one side and fixed me with that raptor’s sharp gaze. “Be it you they search for, boy?”

  “I think so,” I said. I described Mendor and Drakon to him, and he nodded eagerly.

  “Aye, lad,” he said. “Those two be’d with the black sorcerer’s men. Bitter bad, they be. After ye, be they?”

  “They killed the man
who was the only father I knew,” I said. “My friend and my kinsman. And they killed a young woman who had asked me for help.”

  “Wicked bad,” he mourned. “Wicked, they be. I know them. Wicked men, all.”

  I looked at him. The black eyes, strands of midnight black among the yellowish grey hair. “You’re Maeduni yourself,” I blurted in sudden recognition.

  He held up a hand, waving it in negation and shaking his head vigorously. “Nae, nae,” he sputtered. “I be nothing. Just old mad Jeriad. Once, I be Maeduni. Mongrel, they called me. None of their own. None of their own.” The black eyes glinted. “Mother be Celae. You know Celi, boy? Nemeara it be once. Celi now. You know the Fair Island?”

  “I’ve heard of it,” I said hoarsely.

  “My mam had magic,” he said confidentially. “Celae magic. Some came to me. Not enough. Nae, not enough. Be taking a lot of Celae magic to beat back the black sorcerer.”

  I looked at him in shock, a sudden, cold sensation in my gut. I saw the smooth, unwrinkled skin around his eyes and covering his forehead and the high cheek bones. Not an old man, after all? But gods, surely not only twenty-seven. Surely not only three years older than I.

  He dragged a hand through his hair, sensing my discovery. He cackled in delight. “Magic,” he told me. “Magic did this, boy. Magic be hard to control. He tried to take my magic, the black sorcerer. He tried but I tricked him. Burn me, it did. Burned him, too. They say it addled my wits. But I be alive and others be dead and he can’t find me now. No, he be thinking old Jeriad be dead.” He winked and chortled again. “We won’t be disabusing him of that notion, will we?”

  I shook my head. “Of course not,” I said. “Tell me about your mother, Jeriad.”

  “She be’d Celae,” he said and laughed. “She be dead, too. Dead these fifteen years past. Escaped him that way, she did.” He sprang up suddenly. “Rabbits be cooked,” he announced. “Be ye hungry?” And he skipped away.

  I tried to organize my spinning thoughts. Jeriad a prince? Gods, he appeared no more capable of being a prince than a fox is capable of flying. But twenty-seven? He could not be that young. Surely he could not be Kerri’s lost princeling. But his mother was Celae, and he had magic. I had lost the sword, but was it still leading me? Leading me to this? To Jeriad?

  Oh, Kerri, I thought bleakly. Kerri, I think I’ve found your lost princeling, and he’s a travesty. I’m so sorry, sheyala. But what will I do with him? And what do I do now?

  ***

  He brought the meal to the small room in shallow baskets, together with an ewer of fresh water. He ate with all the fierce concentration of a wild animal, discouraging all conversation. My own concentration was hardly less intense. The simple food was good and I was more than hungry enough to do it justice.

  Half-way through the meal, I heard the faint but unmistakable sound of metal clinking against stone and the soft whicker of a horse. I froze, and Jeriad grinned widely around the rabbit haunch as he continued, unconcerned, to gnaw at it. He glanced up through the fringe of his hair, black eyes glinting, and reminded me sharply of a hawk peering through a thicket.

  The horse’s foot clanked against a stone again. I sat, unmoving, hardly daring to breathe as I waited for the shout of discovery outside the stone walls. But it did not come, and Jeriad grinned wider than ever.

  Presently, Jeriad cocked his head to one side and listened intently. “They be gone,” he announced calmly. “They be wanting you bad, boy. But they be gone now.”

  “Why did they not look in here?” I asked, curious and puzzled as well as vastly relieved. Then I shivered. “Did you use magic?”

  “Magic?” He hooted with delighted laughter. Even his beard seemed to curl upward with mirth. “Nae, nae. No be magic, boy. Show you on the morrow, I will. On the morrow after noontide when you be feeling better.” He fixed me with that shrewd raptor’s gaze. “And mayhap you be telling me why the black sorcerer’s men be looking for a young Tyr nobleman, will ye not?”

  “I’ll tell you now,” I said. “I’m called Kian dav Leydon ti’Cullin.” My name obviously meant nothing to him. I had not expected it would, but I owed it to him. “Two of the men out there are Falian nobles, my enemies. The others are Maeduni mercenaries. They’re General Hakkar’s men.”

  He nodded. “Aye, the black sorcerer. I’ve had dealings with him, I have. A wicked man. Heart be black as his name. He tried to take my magic.” He frowned, then grinned slyly. “But he failed. He failed. Old Jeriad tricked him. Why they be hunting you?”

  I told him the story, including how Drakon had gleefully informed me of Cullin’s death, and how Kerri died. Jeriad listened carefully without interrupting, nodding now and then. His intense, watchful gaze never left my face. When I finished, I found my hands clenched so tightly, my fingernails had dug bloody half-moons into my palm.

  “These be wicked times,” he said, shaking his head. “Be sad and terrible times.” He gestured to the food in my lap. “Eat, boy. Be good food there. Don’t be wasting it.”

  I looked down at the half eaten meal. I had lost my appetite. “I’m not very hungry,” I said apologetically. “I’m sorry. It’s good, but...”

  He snorted in derision. “How ye be expecting to heal if ye no be eating?” he demanded.

  “I’m sorry,” I said again.

  He bounced up and took the small basket. “Be good for breaking yer fast, then,” he said cheerfully. He put his hand on my forehead. “Sleep then,” he said quietly. “Sleep be good, too.”

  My eyelids suddenly felt too heavy to hold open. In spite of myself, I began to drift off into sleep. I heard his voice as if from an incredible distance.

  “Others be searching for you, lad. Not the black sorcerer’s men. Others be coming to look for you.”

  ***

  The next afternoon, Jeriad changed the dressing on my shoulder and pronounced me fit enough to get out of bed for a short while. The wound had already begun to close and appeared to be healing well enough. I saw no signs of wound fever, and the skin felt cool and healthy when I placed the inside of my wrist against it.

  When he had finished with my shoulder, he brought me my clothing. The boots were dry, but stiff as jerked venison. The shirt, wrinkled but clean and neatly mended, was ragged at the bottom where he had torn the strip to bandage my shoulder and patch the corresponding rip in the shirt. It still boasted its cascade of lace at throat and wrists, but the lace was tattered and frayed as a wind-flayed leaf. The kilt and plaid were in little better shape. He had mended the rents as best he could with threads drawn from the fringed end of the plaid, and the regular pattern of the tartan was skewed over the mends. I was not about to complain, though.

  I dressed quickly, and tried to thank him, but he merely cackled with glee and waved away my fervent expressions of gratitude. When I tried to give him my plaid brooch, he looked first at it, then at me, exasperation plain in his eyes.

  “Now what would old mad Jeriad be wanting with the likes of that?” he demanded. “I be having no need of pretties.” He beckoned. “Come. Come. I be showing you why those accursed riders never be finding old mad Jeriad. Come.”

  He ducked through the skin door covering, then held it open for me, beckoning again. I followed him through into another semicircular room, this one half full of jumbled rock. A few feet from the opening, a curving stone staircase, the risers broken and cracked, hugged the gentle arc of the wall. Half way around the curve under the stairway, a rough arch opened. I had to stoop to see into the opening.

  The chamber appeared natural, the walls made of rough, raw stone. Sand white as snow covered the floor. I heard the hollow, musical sound of water dripping slowly far back within the cave. A fire blazed a few meters from the entrance, and the smoke wafted gently toward the back of the cave. It explained part of my question of the night before. Drakon and Mendor’s men had not been able to smell the fire because the smoke had dissipated long before it reached the open air. It was a very clever arrangement fo
r a man who did not wish to be found.

  Jeriad tugged at my arm to urge me out of the underground chamber. He scampered up the steps and stood waiting for me at the top. I followed cautiously, a little more unsteady on my feet than I would have liked to be, and mindful of the broken steps.

  When I reached the top of the stairs, I looked around in astonishment. I stood against the crumbled remnants of the walls of what had once been a tower. Behind me, the undressed stone rose twice the height of my head, a tall triangle of rock, thrusting out of the ground like a broken tooth. Ahead of me was another tumbled pile of stones. Jeriad scrambled over them, waving me forward, a wide grin splitting his face.

  A little less agile than he, I climbed the pile of rock and found myself standing in the ruins of what had been the main room of the tower. It was hardly recognizable as such now, though. Except for the one section of wall by the steps, the whole tower lay in a scattered heap, covered by thick growths of bracken, moss and wild flowers. When I turned around, even though I knew the entrance to the lower floor was there, I could not see it. All that was visible was a pile of rocks. The pattern of light and shadow hid all signs of it.

  “You see?” Jeriad chortled. “You see? Old mad Jeriad be more clever than they think.”

  I grinned. “Not so mad,” I said. Somewhere in the distance, water flowed noisily between narrowed banks. There was only one place I knew of on the Shena where the water boiled and seethed over rock-strewn rapids—Pagliol’s Needle. I was back in Isgard The river had carried me a good five leagues from the Maeduni border. It had served me well. I turned back to Jeriad. “I will have to leave soon,” I told him.

  “Not yet,” he said, shaking his head. “No, not yet. Ye be needing more healing first. Two days. Mayhap three. Then go. Not yet.”