by John Marco
"Lord," exclaimed Richius. "What the hell happened?"
Dinadin said nothing, but Richius could see from his expression that his companion shared his shock. Whatever misfortunes Edgard's men had met in Tatterak had left them ragged and defeated, no longer proud enough to even care for themselves. Their beards were overgrown, their uniforms threadbare and filthy, their cheeks pale and sunken. Of all these things, it was the sight of so many bony faces that distressed Richius the most. Even his own men in the valley had not fared so badly. When their supplies had dwindled to nothing and Aramoor's caravans had ceased coming to their aid, they had the lushness of Dring with which to fill their stomachs. But Tatterak had no such bounty for its people. Unlike the valley of his adversary Voris, the warlord Kronin's land was a rocky, unforgiving place, and the Triin who lived there had to be hardy and frugal to survive. Without the aid of the Empire, Richius knew, none of the troops could last. Richius frowned. Clearly, they hadn't lasted.
"This is absurd," he said angrily. "We ride in here and nobody even challenges us or asks who we are. Are these Guardsmen or not?"
He grunted in disgust, then noticed a single man walking past them. The soldier walked as if in a fog, his shoulders slumped with weariness. He shuffled past Richius and Dinadin without a glance, his expression apathetic, his gait so slow that he seemed on his way to nowhere. He was just as unkempt as the others, and Richius would not have noticed him at all if not for the golden tassels of a captain that he bore on his right sleeve.
"You there," cried Richius, bringing his horse to a stop. "You're a captain in this army?"
The man looked up quickly, startled by Richius' tone.
"What's that?" he asked, blinking, and Richius saw the yellowness of hunger staining his eyes.
"Who are you, soldier?" asked Richius.
The man reared back belatedly. "I should ask you that, stranger. No one from the city is allowed in this camp. You'll have to leave at once." He began walking around Richius' horse and added quietly, "We don't have the gold for whatever you're trading."
Richius realized suddenly that the casual garb he and Dinadin wore gave no hint of who they were, or even that they were soldiers at all. With their leathers and their horses smeared with grime, he supposed they could have easily been mistaken for traders from the Empire.
"Captain," Richius shouted after the man, turning his horse to follow alongside him. "We're not merchants. I'm Richius Vantran."
The man stopped and looked up again at Richius, his jaw falling open. Richius reached into his pocket and fished out his ring, the ring bearing the crest of the House of Vantran. Only those of the royal blood of Aramoor possessed the bands of gold and onyx, and Richius had always found the ring a useful tool in places like this that made all men anonymous.
"Sir?" the man asked cautiously, taking careful study of the ring. After a moment he inclined his head and said, "Forgive me, my prince, I didn't know you were here. There was no news of your arrival."
"We only arrived in Ackle-Nye yesterday. We saw your encampment from the windows of our rooms in the city. You must have gotten here yourself last night, yes?"
"Late last night," said the captain wearily. "Closer to the morning, really."
"And you're Edgard's troops?"
"Yes, Prince Richius. The duke is here. Have you word from home, my lord?"
Richius smiled sadly at the hopefulness in the man's voice. "I think I'm more in the dark about home than you are, Captain...?"
"Captain Conal, sir," the soldier answered. "I've been Duke Edgard's captain of cannons since old Sinius died."
"Sinius was killed?" asked Richius, remembering the bald man who was always at Edgard's side. "When was that?"
Captain Conal cocked his head and recollected for a moment, then said finally, "Two months now, maybe three. He was killed in the battle for the Dead Hills, near Falindar. A bad battle, that. Even the duke took a wound there. Nearly wiped out a third of us. That was the start of the worst of it. Didn't you hear about it in Dring?"
Richius spared a look at Dinadin and, seeing his companion's slight shake of his head, said, "We don't hear much in the valley, Captain, but from the looks of things here, all the bad news we've heard is true. You arrived here last night, you say?"
"We left Tatterak four days ago. Things went wrong there, my lord. But I think the duke should be telling you all this. I can take you to him if you want."
"That would be best," answered Richius.
"I'll see to your horses, my lord," said Conal. "Follow me, sirs."
Richius and Dinadin dismounted, and Conal quickly took the reins of their mounts and led the procession through the smoky camp. When he found a young horsekeeper, brushing the coats of two other beasts, the captain gave over the horses with an order to find a good place to shelter the animals. The younger man protested at first, arguing that there wasn't enough feed for the horses they had already, and that any riders from the city should find their own stable lodgings. Without revealing Richius' identity, Conal merely lowered his voice in the stern, trained tone of a leader and ordered that the two new horses be well looked after. After this the young soldier complied, however reluctantly, and led the two horses into the crowd, leaving Conal free to escort Richius and Dinadin to the duke.
"I'm sorry, Prince Richius," Conal apologized. "The boy is strained and things are a bit desperate. He'll take care of your horses, though, don't worry."
Richius waved the remark away. He had seen what desperation could do to military courtesies. They walked quietly through the camp, while a flock of homeward-bound starlings dotted the bright sky. To Richius, the birds looked more like bats or vultures soaring over a graveyard. Winter was drawing near. It was time for the birds to abandon their summer nests in search of warmer climes. If he and his men were still here when the season closed, Richius knew, the coming winter would be desperate.
Edgard's pavilion was on the other side of the encampment, the side farthest from the stink of Ackle-Nye. Despite his rank, the duke's place was no more splendid than those of his underlings. It was as ragged as all the others, and only a tiny flag thrust into the dirt marked it as his residence, bearing as it did the crest of the dragon. Inside the pavilion, Richius could see several figures moving about, their silhouettes cast through the thin fabric by the light of the rising sun. Voices passed through the fabric, too, and one of them Richius recognized at once as Edgard's.
Conal put up a hand to slow them. "Come in with me, my lords. I'll tell the duke you're here."
The tent was unguarded, and the three men slipped quietly through its entry flap. As they did so, the others in the tent gave a brief glance in their direction, then looked away and continued their conversation. They were standing around a table, empty glasses in their hands, talking in voices too loud for sober men.
Richius recognized Edgard at once. The heavy skin, the long legs, the gray beard, the booming voice that still sang in his ears as it did when he was a child. But Richius' smile melted away when he saw that where a left arm should have been there hung only a uniform sleeve, pinned up at his shoulder.
Conal wasn't lying, thought Richius sadly. Edgard really had taken a wound, and a bad one. But how, he wondered? His duty was to plan battles, not fight them. That the Drol had forced the war duke of Aramoor into combat was remarkable, and Richius was surprised he wasn't dead from such a wound.
Conal moved away from Richius and Dinadin, going over to Edgard and telling him something in a voice too low for them to decipher. Richius saw Edgard glance in his direction, and he tried to force the smile back onto his lips. Edgard did not return the gesture, and Richius wasn't surprised that the duke's face didn't spark with recognition. This war had changed him, too, and it couldn't be expected that any friend, even one as close as Edgard, should recognize Richius after what the valley had done to him.
Without taking his puzzled eyes off Richius, Edgard leaned closer to the man at his side. He took his arm in a friendly way,
pulling him near and asking him, Richius supposed, to excuse them. The man, whom Richius didn't recognize, looked at him suspiciously, then nodded in compliance and left the tent. Edgard looked hard at Richius.
"Richius?" asked Edgard cautiously, his eyes narrowed. "Is it you, my boy?"
Now the smile returned to Richius' face, and he went toward the duke without awaiting permission, his arm outstretched. "Yes, Edgard," he said. "It's me."
"Oh, my boy," said the old man, wrapping his single arm about Richius and kissing his cheek. "You've changed so much! I scarcely recognized you. And what is this?" He put his hand to Richius' face and playfully rubbed the short beard there. "Do you wear your beard like a Talistanian now?"
"You mean like yourself?" asked Richius, gesturing toward the man's own unshaven face. Edgard chuckled. All the puzzlement was gone from his old face now, and he glowed with real warmth. It was the kind of welcome Richius expected from this man who had been more like a father to him than his own blood father had ever been.
"Oh, it's good to see you here, Richius," said Edgard. Richius didn't know if it was the dim light in the tent or the liquor making his host emotional, but it seemed that Edgard's eyes were sparkling with tears. "I thought you might be dead by now. Gayle was telling me stories of the valley war. Have you come for retreat, my boy?"
"No," Richius responded gently, sure that Edgard wanted him to say differently. Then, lying to spare the old man worry, he said, "But we are all well enough, Uncle. We have Voris on the run for the first time in months." He gestured over to where Dinadin was standing, still in the doorway, silently watching. "May my companion come inside?"
"Of course," said Edgard. "And who is this young man?"
Richius made to answer the duke, but Dinadin stepped quickly forward, saying, "Dinadin of the House of Lotts, my duke." He bowed.
"Dinadin!" the duke cried. He went to him and kissed him, too. "Oh, I'm sorry. I must be going blind not to have recognized you!"
Dinadin laughed. "We're all a little dull these days, my duke."
"Dinadin's turned out to be my best cannoneer, Uncle," said Richius. "I'd have taken the valley months ago if I had twenty more like him."
Dinadin seemed to shrink away from the compliment, his cheeks flushing. "Richius exaggerates."
"Nonsense," said Edgard cheerfully. "You were both fine pupils. Now sit, and let's have some talk!"
The duke motioned them to the few rickety chairs strewn around the small table. A map had been laid on the table, its edges tattered and its ink blotched by the moisture of glasses. Wine stains streaked its old parchment, but Richius could still see clearly that the map was of Lucel-Lor. There was a decanter on the table, too, filled now with only the scarlet residue of its previous contents. As the three men took their seats, Edgard lifted the decanter and thrust it toward Captain Conal.
"Conal," said Edgard. "See if you can hunt down more of this wine."
Conal, who had dutifully remained standing, quickly took the decanter from the duke, then left the pavilion.
"It's all we've been doing since we arrived last night," the duke said. "I sent some men into Ackle-Nye for supplies and they came back with nothing but wine and beer."
Richius frowned. Trying to keep his tone congenial, he said, "It's a bit early for drink, Uncle. Besides, it looks to me like your men need food more than wine. Some of them can hardly stand."
"True," agreed Edgard ruefully. "But there's just not enough food to go around. Even the poorest peasant won't sell us any. You should see them starving in Tatterak." He paused, shaking his head. "I tell you, Richius, you've never seen anything like it. Tharn's been setting fires to the croplands. Even Kronin's own warriors are starving. He is a bastard, that one. He'd see his own people starve just for his bloody revolution."
"Is that why you're here?" asked Richius. "No food?"
"No food, no troops, no anything. I sent word to your father months ago, telling him Tharn was on the move, but I didn't get an answer back."
"But what about the city?" pressed Richius. "Surely there's at least one merchant there with some food for you."
"Not from what my men told me. There's not one of them left that's not selling whores or wine. They're all just waiting to head back through the Run."
The "Run," Richius knew, was the Saccenne Run, the passage linking Lucel-Lor to Aramoor and the rest of Nar through the Iron Mountains. It wasn't an easy trip, and there was no way that any merchant who had tied up all his money in wine could get it through the Run. A sardonic smile began to play on Richius' lips. To his reckoning, these merchants had been the cause of the war, them and the priests. The Daegog had let them in, and it was their greed and zealousness that had fostered Tharn and his revolution to turn back Lucel-Lor's clock, and now they were paying for their vices. They had been given the grim choice of returning to Nar penniless or taking the chance of being trapped here like the rest of them. Good for them, thought Richius dryly.
"So," said Richius slowly, trying to approach his questions gently. "You have no word from Aramoor, then?"
Edgard frowned, but before he could answer Conal returned, a freshly filled decanter of wine in his hands. Without a word the captain placed the wine on the table and, obviously conscious that his presence had broken the conversation, quickly left the tent. Edgard watched him go before speaking again.
"You're fortunate to have loyal men like Dinadin around you, Richius," said Edgard. He had picked up the decanter and was pouring the thickly colored wine into Richius' glass. "I haven't trusted a man so much since Sinius."
"Yes," said Richius sadly, remembering Edgard's old companion. "Your captain told us that he was killed. A fine man."
"The best," Edgard agreed. "Conal's a good man, too, but not like Sinius."
"What happened to him?" asked Dinadin.
"Caught an arrow in the back at Dead Hills. That's where I got this." Edgard pointed to the ugly stump that was left at his shoulder.
"Jiiktar?" asked Richius.
"Yes. And God damn all of 'em. Those things are too fast for men to fight against. The wound was so clean I didn't even know I'd lost my arm until I saw it laying next to me. That's when Sinius found me, and the arrow found him."
Edgard stopped and took a deep pull from his glass. Richius could see that the memory still pained the old war duke. What other things had he seen, Richius wondered? What was so horrible as to make Edgard of Aramoor retreat?
"Edgard," said Richius gently. "What of Aramoor? Has retreat been called?"
"No," said Edgard bitterly. "At least not by your father. I called retreat myself. Didn't you hear of it in Dring?"
Richius shook his head. "No. All we heard was from Blackwood Gayle's men, that things were going badly in Tatterak. But I had no idea..." He broke off, the shock of what he was hearing hammering into his mind. "Edgard, what's happened to you?"
"Oh, my boy," Edgard said gravely, lowering his glass onto the map and staring into it blankly. "The war in Tatterak is over. Tharn and his warlords had been breaking through for weeks. Kronin's castle might not even be standing anymore. We left while the Drol were laying siege to it. They were trying to get to the Daegog." Edgard laughed and took another drink. "I hope they got him, too."
"How can that be?" asked Dinadin. "Kronin has more warriors than even Voris does, plus all of you to help him. Even Talistan has its troops based there."
"It's like I said. Tharn was gaining ground for months. He's like a king to the peasants in the countryside. Why, some of Kronin's own villages started to take his side. And as for Talistan, Gayle's bastards always left the real fighting to us. Most of them had retreated to safer places in Tatterak. Gayle himself even went down to help you in the valley, didn't he?"
"Yes, we had his help," said Richius. "For as long as I would take it. I'd rather lose the whole damn war than win it with Gayle's aid. But to retreat, Edgard! How can you, without even a word from home?"
"It was retreat or die, Richius. The nig
ht we left Mount Godon..." Edgard put up a hand to silence himself. "I'd better start from the beginning, or you'll never believe a word of it. I sent word to your father months ago, begging him for help. He never answered me. My guess is that the king wants to end the war without actually calling for retreat. Maybe he thinks losing the war legitimately will keep the emperor from being too angry with him. Either way, I'm running things my own way now, friendship or no."
"Oh?" challenged Richius. "And what about the emperor?"
"Same answer," said Edgard defiantly. "If he wants Lucel-Lor so badly, let him come and take it himself. Or Talistan can win it for him. Let the House of Gayle have their people slaughtered. I won't fight a hopeless battle for the Daegog, and certainly not for the emperor. Anyway, it doesn't matter. Mount Godon has fallen. Tharn has the Daegog, and it's just a matter of time until the rest of Lucel-Lor falls."
Richius gave Edgard a surprised look, shocked at the notion of his withdrawing without the emperor's consent. But the duke's expression didn't soften under the accusing stare. Not that Richius expected it to. This was, after all, Aramoor's duke of war, and despite outward appearances, he was as proud as a lion. There would be no apology from him.
"Retreat," said Richius finally. "I wouldn't have thought it of you, Edgard."
"Don't judge me too harshly, Richius. I haven't told you the worst of it yet. I called retreat just in time. It wasn't just Drol warriors that attacked Mount Godon. It was magic."
"Magic?" blurted Dinadin. "You've seen Tharn, then?"
"No, but I've seen what he can do. My God, I thought all the talk was just a legend." He wrapped his single hand tightly around his glass, as if some great chill had come over him and only the glass could warm him. "Unbelievable."
Richius put his own hand over the old man's and gave it a reassuring squeeze. "Tell me," he coaxed.
"I cannot. There aren't words. He's got powers, Richius. To command the sky, the lightning. He's from hell, I swear it."
It seemed to Richius that Edgard was raving. Suddenly sure that it was the drink that was unbalancing the duke, Richius pried the glass forcefully from the old man's hand. "Enough," he snapped, pushing the glass to the other end of the table. "Tell me what you saw."
