by Paul Kearney
Corfe remembered a blind old man whose empty eye-sockets had been full of mud. A man whose life he had saved at risk to his own. He remembered sheltering under a wrecked cart and watching the rain pouring down on the displaced tens of thousands who walked the Western Road.
“Tell His Holiness that I hope he remembers the turnip.”
The two clerics gaped at him, then closed their mouths and glared.
“Leave this place at once,” Alembord said, his jowls quivering. “No one makes mockery of the head of the Holy Church. Leave or I shall call some Knights to eject you.”
“Knights—so you are getting those together again, are you? The wheel comes round once more. Tell Macrobius that Corfe will not forget, and that he should never forget either.”
The renegade Inceptine clapped his hands and shouted for the Knights, but Corfe had already turned on his heel and was walking through the gate, some small, odd sense of mourning twisting in him. Ridiculous though it was, it felt like the loss of a friend.
T HE rest of his day was spent in the fog and mire of administrative matters, problems which he could get his teeth into and worry until they stopped kicking. It helped. It filled in the time, and kept his mind from thinking of other things.
Corfe managed alternately to bully and wheedle the Commissariat into issuing his men a week’s rations for the march south. He divided his men into five under-strength tercios, each under a man recommended by Marsch as a leader, or rimarc as it was named in their own language. Marsch he made into an ensign of sorts, to Ebro’s glowering outrage, and Andruw as adjutant was entrusted with the rostering and organization of the command.
Twelve men had to be rejected as unfit; the galleys had broken them too completely for them ever to undertake active service again. These men Corfe sent on their way, giving them their rations and telling them to go home, back to the mountains. They were reluctant to leave because, Marsch said, they had sworn the oath along with the rest and would be bound by it until death. So Corfe asked them to act as recruiting agents once they regained their native valleys, and to send word of how many other tribesmen would be willing to take service under his banner when the spring came. He knew now that Lofantyr would never give him regular Torunnan troops. His command would have to be self-supporting.
As for the banner they would fight under, it took some thought. The tribesmen were pagan, and would baulk at fighting under the holy images which dominated the banners of the Ramusian armies, even if such banners were allowed to them. Corfe finally solved the problem in his own way, and had a seamstress in the garrison run up a suitable gonfalon. It was hastily done, and somewhat crude in conception as a result, but it stood out well atop its twelve-foot staff. Bright scarlet-dyed linen, the colour of sunset, and in sable at its heart the horned outline of the cathedral of Carcasson in Aekir. It was as Corfe had last seen it, a stark shadow against a burning sky, and the tribesmen were happy with it because to them it seemed the representation of Kerunnos, their horned god whom they worshipped above all others. Torunnan soldiers who saw the banner as it twisted lazily in the breeze saw only the outline of the cathedral, however, not its other, heretical, interpretation, and in time Corfe’s men would be given a name because of that banner. They would be called the “Cathedrallers.”
Now this last day in Torunn was wheeling to a close. The sun had disappeared behind the white summits of the Cimbrics in the west and Andruw was seeing to the last details of the command’s organization. Corfe set off for the Royal palace and his audience with the Queen Dowager, and so preoccupied was he with the events of the day and the planning for tomorrow that he did not take off the scarlet Merduk armour, but wore it through the corridors of the Royal apartments to the bafflement and dismay of footmen and courtiers.
“L EAVE us,” the Queen Dowager Odelia said sharply when Corfe was shown into her apartments by a gaping doorman.
They were not in the circular chamber this time, but in a broad hall-like room with a huge fireplace occupying one wall, logs the thickness of Corfe’s thighs burning within it and iron firedogs silhouetted against the flames. The fire was the only light in the room. Corfe sensed rafters overhead, invisible with height. The walls were heavily curtained, as was the other end of the room. Rugs on the floor, soft under his boots after the stone of the palace corridors. The sweetness of a gleaming censer hanging by long chains from the ceiling. Crystal sparkling with firelight on a low table, comfortable divans drawn up to the fire. The place was how Corfe imagined a sultan’s chambers might be, upholstered and draped and hidden, hardly any bare stonework visible. He took off his brutal helm and bowed to the golden-haired woman whose skin seemed to glow in the hearthlight.
“You look like a bogey-man destined for the terrifying of children, Corfe,” Odelia said in that low tone of hers. A voice as dark as heather-honey, it could also cut like a switch.
“Take off the armour, for pity’s sake. You need not fear assault here. Where in the world did you get it from anyway?”
“We must make do with what we can get, lady,” Corfe said, frowning as his fingers sought the releasing straps and buckles. He was not yet familiar with the working of this harness, and he found himself twisting and turning in an effort to take it off.
The Queen Dowager began to laugh. “We had a contortionist come to amuse the court with his antics last spring. I swear, Colonel, you put him to shame. Here, let me help.”
She rose to her feet with a whisper of skirts, and Corfe could have sworn he saw something black scuttle from beneath them into the shadows beyond the firelight. He paused in his struggles, but then Odelia was before him and her nimble fingers were searching his armour for the straps which would loosen it. She had his back-and breastplates off in a twinkling. They thumped dully on the rug, and after them in swift succession came the vambraces, the baldric which supported his sabre, his gorget, pauldrons, thigh-guards and gauntlets. He was left standing amid a pile of glinting metal, feeling oddly exposed. He realized he had enjoyed the sensation of her hands working about him and he was almost disappointed when she stepped back.
“There! Now you can sit and sup with me like a civilized man—if a badly dressed one. What happened to the fine clothes I had the tailor run up for you?”
“These are my campaigning clothes,” Corfe said awkwardly. “I take my command out at dawn.”
“Ah, I see. Have a seat then, and some wine. Stop standing there like a graven image.”
She was different this time, almost coquettish, whereas before she had been intense, dangerous. In the kindly light of the fire she seemed a young woman, or would were it not for the veins thrown into vivid relief on the backs of her hands.
He sipped at the wine, hardly aware of it. The fire cracked and spat like a cat. He wondered if he dare ask her what he was doing here.
“The King knows of your . . . patronage,” he said as she sat as if waiting for him to begin. Her gaze was alarmingly direct. It seemed to draw the words out of him. “I do not think he approves of it.”
“Of course he does not. He resents what he sees as my interference in his affairs, though they were my affairs before he was born. I am not a figurehead or a cipher in this kingdom, Corfe, as you should know by now. But I am not the hidden power behind the throne, either. Lofantyr grows into his kingship at last, which is good. But he still needs someone to watch over his shoulder sometimes. That is the burden I have taken upon myself.”
“You may have set me up for professional ruin, lady.”
“Nonsense. I knew you would equip your men somehow, just as I know that you and your command will acquit yourselves admirably in the fighting to come. And if you do not, then you are not worth worrying about and I shall cast about until I find another promising soldier to bring under my eye.”
“I see,” Corfe said stiffly.
“We are all expendable, Corfe, even those of us who wear crowns. The good of Torunna, of the whole of the west, must come first. This kingdom needs capable officers
, not sycophants who know how to nod at Lofantyr’s every suggestion.”
“I’m not sure exactly what I’ll be able to accomplish with my five hundred savages in the south.”
“You will do as you are told. Listen: Lofantyr has begun outfitting what he sees as the true expedition to bring the rebellious southern fiefs to heel. It will be under the command of one Colonel Aras and will march in a week or ten days. Two thousand foot, five hundred horse and a train of six guns.”
Corfe scowled. “A goodly force.”
“Yes. You are being sent to deal with Ordinac at Hedeby—not one of the most important rebels, but the king feels he will be more than capable of tying down your motley command; he can put over a thousand men into the field. By the time you have been trounced by him, Colonel Aras and his command will have arrived on the scene to pick up the pieces, send you back to the capital in disgrace and get on with the real work of the campaign, the defeat of Duke Narfintyr at Staed.”
“I see the King has everything planned in advance,” Corfe said. “Is there any hope for my men and me, then?”
“I can only tell you this: you must defeat Ordinac speedily and move on to Staed. Colonel Aras does not outrank you and thus cannot give you orders. If you both arrive together at Staed, you will have to share the conduct of the campaign between you and thus there will be a greater chance of success for you and your men.”
“What do you think of my chances, lady?”
She smiled. “I told you once before, Corfe: I think you are a man of luck. You will need all your luck if you are to prosper in this particular venture.”
“Is this a test you’ve had the King set for me?”
She leaned closer. The firelight made a garden of shadows out of her features, started up green fires in her eyes. Corfe could feel her breath on his skin.
“It is a test, yes. I promise you, Corfe, if you pass it, you will move on to better things.”
Abruptly she grasped his worn tunic and pulled him close. She kissed him full on the lips, softly at first and then with gathering pressure. Her eyes were open, laughing at his shock, and that suddenly angered him. He buried his fists in the gathered hair at her nape and crushed her mouth against his.
They were on the thickly carpeted floor, and he had ripped open the bosom of her dress while her laughter rang in his ears. Buttons flew through the air like startled crickets. The heavy brocade resisted even his hardened fists and she leapt up and down in his grasp as he sought to tear it off her.
Suddenly, the maniac absurdity of his position struck him, and he desisted. They crouched on the carpet facing each other. Odelia’s breasts were bared, the round breasts of a woman who has given suck. Her dress had ripped to the navel and her hair was in banners about her shoulders, shining like spun gold. She grinned at him like a lynx. She looked incredibly young, vibrant, alive. He craved the feel of her again.
This time she came to him, sliding the gown from her body as easily as if it were a silken shawl. She was surprisingly wide-hipped, but her belly was taut and her skin when his hands met it was like satin, a thing to be savoured, a sensation he had almost forgotten in the recent burning turmoil of his life.
He explored the hardness of her bones, the softness of the flesh that clothed her, and when they finally coupled it was with great gentleness. Afterwards he lay with his head on her breast and wept, remembering, remembering.
She stroked his hair and said nothing, and her silence was a comfort to him, an island of quiet in the raging waters of the world.
S HE said not a word to him when he rose and dressed, pulling his tunic on and buckling the strange armour. Dawnsong had begun, though it was not yet light. His men would be waiting for him.
Naked, she stood and kissed him, pressed against the hard iron of his armour as he slipped the sword baldric over his head. She seemed old again, though, her forehead lined, fans of tiny wrinkles spreading from the corers of her eyes and the soft flesh hanging from the bones of her forearms. He wondered what magic had been in the night to make her appear so young, and she seemed to catch the thought for she smiled that feral grin of hers.
“Everyone needs a smidgen of comfort, the feel of another against them every so often, Corfe. Even Queens. Even old Queens.”
“You’re not so old,” he said, and he meant it.
She patted his cheek as an aunt might a favoured nephew.
“Go. Go off to war and start earning a name for yourself.”
He left her chambers feeling oddly rested, whole. As if she had plugged for a while the bleeding wounds he bore. When he strode his way down to the parade grounds he found his five hundred waiting for him beneath their sombre banner, silent in the pre-dawn light, standing like ranks of iron statues with only the plumes of their breathing giving them life in the cold air.
“Move out,” he said to Andruw, and the long files started out for the battlegrounds of the south.
TWENTY-ONE
T HE squadron was a brave sight as it hove into view around the headland. War carracks with their banks of guns, nefs bristling with soldiers and marines, darting caravels with their wing-like lateen sails; and all flying the scarlet of the Hebrian flag at their mainmasts and the deeper burgundy of Admiral Rovero’s pennant at the mizzens. As they caught sight of the party on the beach they started firing a salute. Twenty-six guns for the recognition of their king, every ship in the squadron surrounded with powder-smoke as the thunder of the broadsides boomed out. Abeleyn’s throat tightened at the sight and sound. He was a king again, not a travelling vagabond or a hunted refugee. He still had subjects, and his word could still bring forth the bellowed anger of guns.
He and Rovero went below as soon as the longboats brought the King’s party out to the ships. The squadron put about immediately, the ponderous carracks turning like stately floating castles in sequence, the smaller vessels clustering about them like anxious offspring.
Rovero went down on one knee as soon as he and Abeleyn were alone in the flagship’s main cabin. Abeleyn raised him up.
“Don’t worry about that, Rovero. If there’s one thing I’ve learned in the past weeks, it’s not to stand on ceremony. How long before we strike Abrusio?”
“Two days, sire, if this south-easter keeps up.”
“I see. And what of the city when you left? How bad is it?”
“Sire, wouldn’t you like to change and bathe? And I have a collation prepared—”
“No. Tell me of my kingdom, Rovero. What’s been happening?”
The admiral looked grim, and hissed the words out of his lopsided mouth as though they were a curse uttered to someone behind him.
“I had a visit from Golophin’s bird yesterday. The thing is almost destroyed. We have it in the hold as it cannot fly any more. It bore news of Abrusio, and this.” The admiral handed Abeleyn a scroll with Astarac’s Royal seal upon it. “It was meant for you, of course, sire, but the bird could go no farther.”
Abeleyn held the scroll as gingerly as if it might burst into flame any second. “And Abrusio?”
“The Arsenal is burning. The powder magazines have been flooded, so there is no worry on that score. And Freiss is dead, his men taken, burned or fled into the Carreridan lines.”
“That is something, I suppose. Go on, Rovero.”
“We are holding our own against the traitors and the Knights Militant, but with the fire and the press of the population we cannot bring our full strength to bear. Fully two thirds of our men are fighting fire not traitors, or else they are conducting the evacuation of the Lower City. We may be able to save part of the western arm of Abrusio—engineers have been blasting a fire break clean across the city—but thousands of buildings are already in ash, including the fleet dry docks, the Arsenal, the naval storage yards and many of the emergency silos that were meant to feed the population in the event of a siege. Abrusio has become two cities, sire: the Lower, which is well-nigh destroyed and is, for what it’s worth, in our hands, and the Upper, which i
s untouched and in the hands of the traitors.”
Abeleyn thought of the teeming life of his capital in summer. The crowded, noisy, stinking vitality of the streets, the buildings and narrow alleys, the nooks and corners, the taverns and shops and market places of the Lower City. He had roved Abrusio’s darker thoroughfares as a young man—or a younger one—out in search of adventure disguised as just another blade with money in his pocket. All gone now. All destroyed. It felt as though part of his life had been wiped away, only the memories retaining the picture of what once was.
“We’ll discuss our plans later, Admiral,” he said, his eyes unseeing, burning in their sockets as though they felt the heat of the inferno that was destroying his city. “Leave me for a while, if you please.”
Rovero bowed and left.
He is older, the admiral thought as he closed the cabin door behind him. He has aged ten years in as many weeks. The boy in him is gone. There is something in his look which recalls the father. I would not cross him now for all the world.
He stomped out into the waist of the ship, his mouth a skewed scar in his face. That damned woman, the King’s mistress, was on deck arguing about her quarters. She wanted more room, a window, fresher air. She looked green about the chops already, the meddlesome bitch. Well, older woman or no, she’d no longer be able to twist this king about her finger as it was rumoured she had in the past. Wasn’t she getting rather stout, though?
T HE King of Hebrion stepped out of the cabin on to the stern gallery of the flag carrack, which hung like a long balcony above the foaming turmoil of the ship’s wake. He could see the other vessels of the squadron in line before him scarcely two cables away, plain sail set, their bows plunging up and down and spraying surf to either side of their beakheads. It was a heart wrenching sight, power and beauty allied into a terrible puissance. Engines of war as awesome and glorious as man’s hand had the capacity to make them.
