Crownless

by M H Woodscourt

  Father’s ashen lips lifted in a broad smile. “You grow more every time I see you. How do you pass your days, my son?” A cough traced lines of pain across his sunken face. “Do you grow your mind…as your body grows…as a prince should?”

  Jetekesh considered how to answer, but his frustrations were so near the surface, they just bubbled over. He blurted out how Mother was even now discharging the fencing master. How Jetekesh could no longer ride or hunt or enjoy any other traditional pastimes that might spoil his appearance.

  The king listened, his mouth a grim line. He sighed as Jetekesh finished. “I…feared this. I shall speak with the queen, I promise you, Kesh. Come.”

  Jetekesh gently crawled across the bed to kneel beside Father’s ravaged body. If Jetekesh breathed too strong, Father might break apart and float away like embers in a hearth.

  The king raised his emaciated fingers to stroke Jetekesh’s cheek once. His hand fell to his side. “I’m told…you met the wandering…storyteller. How do you like the tales of Shinac?”

  “Mother says they’re meant to stir up unrest and rebellion among our people.”

  Father’s bright eyes locked onto Jetekesh’s. “Your lady mother also says you shouldn’t fence or dream or think for yourself.”

  Jetekesh scowled. “That may be, but Jinji Wanderlust started to tell me one of his stories, and I found it distasteful. He thinks a prince should serve his people, when certainly it’s the other way around.”

  “It seems to me…Jinji of Shinac may be wiser by far…than anyone here at court.”

  The door flew open.

  Mother stood highlighted in the doorway, hazel eyes wide and raging. “I told you not to exhaust your father, yet here you are still. Your tutors are waiting, my son.” Her eyes traveled to the window. “What have I said about sunlight? Jetekesh, useless, disobedient son! You’ll be the very death of your king. Out. Go.”

  Jetekesh scrambled from the bed. Mother’s lips pursed, but he hurried past her without a word and shut the door behind him. Guilt and loathing roiled in his stomach, struggling for victory over each other. He stalked to a suit of armor down the hall. The urge to kick it swept like a tremor through his frame, but Mother was so near. She would scold him for losing his temper. For letting emotion show on his face. For ruining his appearance. Jetekesh shut his eyes and breathed. He must conquer his temper.

  Anger was his enemy. He must control himself. Must be in control.

  Mother insisted on it.

  Father would want it.

  For Father.

  He stormed down the corridor toward his study. For a wild moment, he considered changing course midway. Perhaps he would visit Jinji in the dungeon instead.

  No. If he displeased Mother again, there would be no end to her fury.

  4

  Rille

  Keep Lunorr had fallen.

  Word reached Yeshton by messenger as he sat in a tavern to wait out a storm. Sage Province had been overrun by the Imperial Forces of KryTeer. The soldier sat now in silence with his comrades at the tavern table, a tankard of ale gripped in his hand, untouched. The hastily scrawled report lay before him, a testament of Yeshton’s high hopes dashed to bits. He couldn’t read the bitter words, but Nallin could.

  The tavern was half filled because of the storm, and those who sought shelter this night were grim. Sage Province lay thirty miles from here. So close. Too close.

  “What’ll we do, Yesh?”

  Yeshton ignored Brov’s soft murmur. Duke Lunorr was probably dead. KryTeer had no use for him. That vast empire needed no hostages or tools to plow its way through Amantier toward Kavacos. Most had assumed the Empire would march straight through Amantier by way of Ivy Province, the most direct and prosperous stretch of Amantier. Take that course and lay ruin to the wealth of the kingdom; surely then Amantier would buckle before the dread sword of KryTeer’s Blood Prince.

  So why Sage Province? It was small, indirect, even unpopular. Duke Lunorr had been out of favor with the court and gentry since his elder brother, King Jetekesh, had fallen ill several years before. Everyone knew Queen Bareene despised the duke, for he spoke his mind. By his way of thinking, the queen was a selfish, gluttonous hag who would sooner sell Amantier to its enemies than suffer for her country’s sake, should the choice be laid before her. So he had accused her the last time he’d appeared at court.

  Such a declaration would have meant death for any other man, but Duke Lunorr was third in line to the throne, and that lent the duke certain protections. Nevertheless, Duke Lunorr had essentially exiled himself to his home province, and there he seemed content to stay.

  Even should KryTeer desire a bargaining chip, the duke was the worst candidate for it.

  A secret suspicion tugged at Yeshton’s mind as he swallowed a draught of ale. Was the queen behind it? Had she, dared she, sell her own countryman to the enemy? Might she strike a deal with the enemy to maintain her throne at the cost of her people?

  Yeshton took another long drink as he struggled against the notion.

  “D’you think the Blood Prince is after her?”

  Yeshton glanced toward the youthful Nallin, just sixteen, who had been one of Duke Lunorr’s household servants until he’d proved his uncanny skill with a blade. Nallin was plain faced, but brave and levelheaded. Respectful too. Yeshton studied him now.

  “Her who, lad?” asked Brov over his tankard.

  Nallin blushed a brilliant red. “Oh, uh, n-nothing. Just thinking aloud. S’all. It’s nothing.”

  Yeshton pounded the table with his own tankard and looked hard at the youth. “Is it nothing, boy, or are you hiding something? If you’ve a thought of what the Blood Prince is after, you’d best spill it.”

  The boy lost that bright red blush along with the rest of the blood in his face. Though Yeshton was fond of Nallin, he’d never let on that he was. He pushed his men hard. Made them earn their keep. Had meant to make them indispensable to Lunorr until every last one of them was knighted…Yeshton kept his gaze rooted on Nallin now. Brave though he might be, Nallin wouldn’t long hold up against Yeshton’s will.

  “W-well, sir.” Nallin glanced around, but none of the other tavern patrons dared to approach the table where sat nine armed men bearing the heraldry of Sage Province. The droop of his shoulders told Yeshton the boy would hold nothing back. Nallin took a breath. “It’s just, sir…well…I was thinking how KryTeer has no reason to storm Sage Province and destroy Keep Lunorr. E-except for one thing.”

  “And? So?” Brov leaned across the table, close enough Yeshton could smell the ale on his breath.

  Nallin’s face reddened again. “I swore I’d never tell.” He glanced at Yeshton. “It’s Rille, sir. Lord Lunorr’s daughter.”

  Yeshton’s eyes narrowed. Rille? That wisp of a girl, too sickly to leave her chambers within the keep? Barely ten, wasn’t she? Not of marriageable age, not lauded for her beauty and wit. Chamber maids whispered sometimes that she was a halfwit, but the duke wouldn’t admit it. He had no male heirs. His wife had died some years before in an accident on the road. Lunorr doted on Rille, but few ever saw her. Yeshton had glimpsed the child once from her window in the keep’s tower. At the time he’d thought little of it, and never since, until now.

  And now the poor girl is dead or captured. I’ve failed my lord.

  “Why would the Blood Prince want young Rille?” asked Brov, as usual taking his place as Yeshton’s voice for the group. Yeshton always let him.

  Nallin ducked his head and sucked in a breath. “See, she’s not normal. Not…not natural. She’s different.”

  “All that means the same thing,” piped up Kivar, elbowing the youth beside him. “Be more specific, lad.” A mocking glint caught in his eye, but it flickered and died. The raucous drinking when Yeshton and his men had first reached the tavern had ended long ago, and mirth felt forced and foreign now. Unwelcome as the KryTeeran invaders. Not even the warmth of ale could lighten the mood.

  Nallin shov
ed his tankard aside and leaned toward Yeshton. His voice lowered as he spoke. “Lady Rille…she’s a witch.”

  Kivar whooped with laughter, but it was harsh and humorless. “Listen to the lad. Superstitious little fool! You sound like a sailor full of tales of merfolk and buried treasure. That ale’s gone straight to your head.”

  Nallin flinched, cheeks red as blood.

  “Ease up a mite,” barked Brov. “There may be something there. But I think Nallin’s only half right.”

  Kivar snorted and swigged his ale.

  “Maybe there’s no such thing as witches,” said Brov, “but KryTeer’s known for its magicians and such. They believe in magic. The Blood Prince too. Maybe he’s heard tell of Lady Rille from those who think she’s a witch, and he came to catch himself a prize.”

  “Not a witch,” said Marder from the end of the table. His voice was soft but firm. “Rille’s not a witch. She’s something else. Not evil. She sees things.”

  Kivar’s derisive smile fell away. The skeptical looks on Yeshton’s men turned thoughtful. Marder never spoke unless he must. And he never spoke anything but the truth. Those in Yeshton’s company held Marder in a strong regard bordering on reverence, for the man was battle-scarred, with a stub on the end of one arm and burns that covered half his face. He’d served Lunorr for many years, and he knew things—knew what other men spent a lifetime learning.

  Yeshton looked between Nallin’s hopeful glance in his direction and Marder’s direct, calm eyes. Yeshton sighed. “What say you, Marder? Did the Blood Prince come looking for Rille?”

  “It’s just possible. Some say Rille’s mother had the same gift. That’s why she was killed.”

  Nallin made a sound, and when Yeshton looked toward him, the boy was nodding. “That’s what I heard. And…and I met Rille once, before I joined this company. She spoke to me. Called me by name and I never told her my name. She inquired if I knew where someone was. I had no idea what she even meant.”

  “Who?” asked old Marder. “Who was she looking for?”

  Nallin shrugged. “A storyteller. I asked if she wanted a maid to tell her a bedtime story, but that seemed to frustrate her. She said I should know what she meant. That I was connected to the storyteller. The housekeeper came just then, and I was scolded for even talking to the young lady. I was commanded never to reveal our conversation or the nature of the child. That was six months ago, and just afterward I was brought to your company, as you may recall. I’d overheard the chambermaids talking about Rille before that. How she’s a witch. I…didn’t believe it at first, but now…” He looked at Yeshton. “D’you think she meant Wanderlust? D’you think she saw…the future?”

  A shiver ran the length of Yeshton’s spine, but he kept his expression implacable. “It doesn’t matter what I think. It matters what the Blood Prince thinks and why he ambushed Keep Lunorr. That’s our one concern.”

  “So, what do we do?” asked Brov.

  Yeshton downed the last of his ale, slammed the tankard against the table, and rose. “We ride for Sage Province and see what’s left. All but you, Kivar. You will return to Kavacos and report what we know. If the Blood Prince has crossed into Amantier, it means open war. We must answer him.”

  Yeshton tore his eyes from the remains of his lord, drawn and quartered, head on display for any who entered the burnt-out skeleton of Keep Lunorr.

  Yeshton and his company had made good time, reaching the keep just as dawn crept over the eastern mountains. They’d taken the old forest road, little used even in broad daylight. Within an hour’s ride of the keep, Yeshton had ordered his company to abandon the road and cut through the woods where KryTeer’s spies, unfamiliar with the terrain, would become lost if they tried to maintain a vigil.

  His caution proved unnecessary. Not a single KryTeer soldier or servant had remained at the keep to claim Sage Province. Not shocking. The Blood Prince wasn’t known to creep across the land, conquering territories one by one. Instead he killed the leading lords, bathed in their blood, and moved his mighty forces through the land, burning, raping, murdering, until he reached the heart of the enemy country. Conquered it. Went home. So he had done in Shing. So he had done in Tivalt, Neminar, and Vylam in years past.

  The KryTeer Empire was ever growing, swallowing the whole world like a vast, ravenous snake. Amantier was the last bastion to stand against that viper, but Yeshton had known it was only a matter of time. Amantier would become just another province under Emperor Gyath. That vile man’s son and heir, Blood Prince Aredel, was like a dread specter, a veritable demon, storming across the world like a thing possessed. And where he struck his sword, the earth bled.

  Yeshton picked his way through the rubble of the keep. Brackish blood swirled in puddles of muck. The air was still and hollow. Bodies still littered the reddened earth, though it had been several days since the attack. Foolish, superstitious peasants. Would they not come to bury the dead? Many their own kin too.

  The tower of the keep still stood, but it was a blackened husk. Yeshton sighed. He must resign himself to the fact that the Blood Prince had taken young Rille, or she was dead like her lord father.

  “Well, drat,” said Brov as he came up behind Yeshton. He halted beside him and shook his head. “What now? We’ve no master and no money. We’re cut adrift, and no respectable lord will take us in without the proper papers. I don’t fancy being sold to some no-good second-rate nobleman.”

  Yeshton shook his head. “It’s not up to us, Brov. We ride to Kavacos to meet our fate.”

  Brov scratched his bristled chin. “Here now, Yesh. I understand your respect for the law. I appreciate your stalwart integrity. But as for me…I just can’t abide the notion of starting over. You helped us get far. Maybe we could’a even broke free of our bonds. Been knighted. I dunno. But I just can’t abide starting over. Maybe…maybe I’ll take a gander at seafaring.”

  “You would run from your oaths, man?” Yeshton understood the desire to avoid a bondsman’s life. He and his company would be snatched up by a middling nobleman in need of foot soldiers and plowed under the enemy cavalry in the first wave of combat. Returning to Kavacos meant death for all. Yeshton was a skilled swordsman, but he wasn’t naive enough to think he could survive against the onslaught of KryTeer on the front line. Yet honor mattered more than his life.

  Brov rubbed the back of his neck. “Blast it all, yes. I won’t be treated like cattle. Lord Lunorr valued us. We won’t be that lucky again. Besides, Amantier is finished. I won’t give my life up for a lost cause. We can’t win, Yesh. We’ll all die for nothing. KryTeer’s too powerful. And frankly, Queen Bareene’s not going to put up much of a fight, for all that she throws around that word, ‘sedition,’ like it matters to her. There, I said it. Lord Lunorr was right, and we can’t dispute that. I only regret we sent that poor, humble storyteller to the chopping block on her say-so. Not sure why Lord Lunorr even cared…”

  Yeshton sucked in air. Why would Duke Lunorr send Yeshton and his company all the way to Rose Province to capture a harmless vagrant for the sake of a queen he loathed? Yeshton had been so caught up in pleasing his lord and master, he’d not stopped to ask the question until now.

  She sees things. So said Marder. She inquired after a storyteller. So said Nallin.

  Yeshton scowled at the sky. He’d never know the answer now. Duke Lunorr and his farseeing daughter were long gone. And what did it matter? Brov was right. Amantier was as good as conquered.

  “Go, Brov. Take any who would follow you.” Yeshton eyed his comrade and smiled faintly. “I will report you for running off, but Rose Province is a week away. You’ll have time to reach Drea Wharf and charter a boat. Sail to Tivalt. They don’t much care there if you’re a runaway, so long as you can use a sword.”

  Brov’s jaw tightened. “Come with us.”

  “No. I can’t. I’ll die for Amantier before I leave its shores.”

  “It’s a waste,” said Brov.

  “Honor is never a waste. F
arewell, my friend.”

  They all left. Yeshton couldn’t blame them. At first Nallin had said he would ride with Yeshton to Kavacos, but Yeshton ordered him to go with the others. He was too young to waste his life.

  Yeshton watched them ride away into the trees, heading northwest toward the sea. Toward freedom, or death if caught. But they wouldn’t be. They were all too clever for that.

  Turning toward the southern forest, Yeshton swung into the saddle of his own horse. He took up the reins.

  Something shuffled in the dense thickets to his right.

  Yeshton caught the hilt of his sword and listened.

  The thickets rustled.

  And again. Nearer.

  “Don’t kill me, good sir. It would be murder.”

  Yeshton pulled his hand from his weapon at once. “Who goes there?”

  The whisper of leaves drew his eyes to a bush laden with ripening berries. From within that thorny shelter rose a small girl, perhaps as old as ten, though she was so slight and frail it was hard to be certain. Long, pale curls tumbled down her shoulders, and eyes of bright amber considered him with a look of calm far beyond her years. She wore a silken nightgown torn and stained with dirt and blood. Her feet were bare.

  Yeshton swung down from his horse and knelt on one knee, head bowed. “My lady. I am your servant.”

  “Yeshton, son of Yarmir, isn’t it?” asked Lady Rille.

  “Yes, my lady.”

  “You will take me to Kavacos. You will take me to the storyteller.”

  Yeshton’s eyes widened. “Yes, my lady. The journey will be hard and dangerous.”

  “It doesn’t matter. We must hurry. The Blood Prince is seeking me. He won’t give up. Make haste.”

  5

  The Dungeon

  “Hold a moment, Sir Knight.”