“One up,” Oliver said smugly, and it seemed to the two as if they had unintentionally taken sides.
“Not so!” Luthien was quick to call, and Oliver turned to see Katerin running full out. She skidded down into a crouch and hurled her spear, catching a fleeing cyclopian right in the back of the neck, dropping it to skid across the cobblestones on its ugly face.
“It would seem as if they were evenly matched,” Oliver said, and his sly tone made Luthien realize that he was talking about more than fighting.
Luthien didn’t appreciate the comment; Oliver saw that as soon as he had uttered the words. He rushed off, rapier held high. “Are you to watch or to play?” he cried again.
Luthien let go of his anger, put aside his confusion and all thoughts of the two wonderful women. Now wasn’t the time for deep thinking. He caught up to Oliver and together they rushed headlong into the battle.
Merchant houses were raided by the dozen that fateful morning in Montfort and scores of slaves were freed, most of whom gladly joined in the fight. Hundreds of cyclopians were beaten down.
The human merchants, though, were not summarily killed, except for those who fought back against the rebels and would not surrender. Giving them the option to surrender was Luthien’s doing, the first order he had given to his rebels before the assault had begun. Luthien did not comfortably assume the role of leadership, but in this matter he was as forceful as anyone had ever seen him, for the young man believed in justice. He knew that not all of Montfort’s merchants were evil men, that not all of those who had prospered during Greensparrow’s time necessarily adhered to or agreed with the wicked king’s edicts.
The final fight for the city was a bitter one, but in the end the cyclopian guards, city and Praetorian, were simply overwhelmed and the taking of Montfort was completed.
Except for the Ministry. The rebels had avoided attacking the place until all else was accomplished because it was too defensible. The five doors which led into the cathedral, including the secret one that had been cut in the eastern wall and the broken section of that same wall, had been secured and braced and could withstand tremendous punishment.
But now the Ministry was all that remained as a bastion for those loyal to the king of Avon. And with the mines taken, those brutes bottled up inside could not look anywhere close for support
Luthien and Oliver headed back for the place after a tour of the conquered merchant quarter. Luthien had hoped to find Viscount Aubrey alive, but had seen no sign of him. He wasn’t surprised; vermin like Aubrey had a knack for survival and Luthien suspected that he knew exactly where to find the man.
The two companions joined the bulk of their army, which had gathered in the courtyards about the great structure of the Ministry, hurling taunts, and occasionally an arrow, at any cyclopian that revealed itself in any window or atop the smaller towers.
“We can get in there!” Shuglin the dwarf declared, running up and grabbing Luthien by the arm.
“They have nowhere to run,” Luthien assured him, his voice soothing in its tone of complete confidence. “The battle is over.”
“There could be near to five hundred of them in there,” Katerin O’Hale interjected doubtfully, joining the three.
“Better reason to stay outside and wait,” Luthien was quick to reply. “We cannot afford the losses.”
The friends moved about the courtyard, helping out with the tending of the wounded and trying to organize the forces. Now that the cyclopian threat was ended, a myriad of other problems presented themselves. There was looting by many of the frustrated commonfolk who had lived so long with so little, and more than one merchant house had been set ablaze. Skirmishes took place between dwarfs and men, two races who had not lived beside each other in any numbers since Morkney had shipped most of the dwarfs off to the mines, and decisions still had to be made concerning the fate of the captured merchants.
Early that afternoon, Luthien finally caught sight of Siobhan again, the half-elf walking determinedly his way.
“Come with me,” she ordered, and Luthien recognized the urgency in her voice.
From across the courtyard, Katerin and Oliver watched him go.
“It is business, that is all,” Oliver said to the woman.
Katerin scowled at him. “What makes you believe that I care?” she asked, and walked away.
Oliver shook his head, and admired Luthien more at that moment than ever before.
“This is the most dangerous time,” Siobhan said to Luthien after she had escorted him far away from the crowd. She went on to tell of the looting and of dissatisfied murmurs among the rebels.
Luthien didn’t understand the seemingly illogical reactions, but he saw what was happening around him and could not deny Siobhan’s fears. This should have been their moment of glory, and indeed it was, but mingled with that glory was a tumult of confusing emotions. The rebel mob did not move with a unified purpose, now that the actual battle had ended.
“The fighting will ebb for many weeks perhaps,” Siobhan said.
“Our only strength is in unity,” Luthien replied, beginning to catch on to her reasoning. Their goals had been met; even the Ministry could hold out only as long as the food inside lasted. The cyclopians bottled within the massive cathedral could not threaten them in any substantial way, for the rebels held strong defensive positions across the open plazas that surrounded the Ministry. If the cyclopians came charging out, their numbers would be decimated by archers before they ever engaged in close combat.
So Montfort had been taken, but what did that mean? In the weeks before the final attack, Luthien and the other leaders had clearly defined the goal, but they had not devised a plan for what would follow.
Luthien looked away from the open plaza, westward over the merchant section, and the plume of black smoke from the torched houses showed him beyond doubt that this was indeed a dangerous time. He understood the responsibilities before him and realized that he had to act quickly. They had taken Montfort, but that would mean nothing if the city now fell into disarray and anarchy.
The young Bedwyr inspected himself carefully, noted the muck from the sewer and the blood of enemy and friend alike. The magnificent crimson cape, though, showed no stains, as if its magic would tolerate no blemishes.
“I have to clean up,” Luthien said to Siobhan.
She nodded. “A washbasin and a clean change of clothes have already been prepared.”
Luthien looked at her curiously. Somehow he was not surprised.
Less than an hour later, with less time to prepare than he would have liked, but with the breakdown of order growing among the celebrating populace, Luthien Bedwyr walked out into the middle of the plaza in front of the Ministry. The young man’s head swirled as he considered the mass of onlookers: every one of his rebel warriors, every one of Shuglin’s kin, the Cutters, and thousands of others, had all come to hear the Crimson Shadow, all come to learn their fate, as though Luthien served as the mouth of God.
He tried not to look at their faces, at the want and need in their eyes. He was not comfortable in this role and hadn’t the slightest idea of how or why this responsibility had befallen him. He should get Oliver to address them, he thought suddenly. Oliver could talk, could read the needs of an audience.
Or Siobhan. Luthien looked at her closely as she guided him along to the steps of a gallows that was under construction for those captured cyclopians or merchants who were deemed worthy of such an end. Perhaps he could get Siobhan to speak.
Luthien dismissed the thought. Siobhan was half-elven and more akin to elves than to men. Yet if ten thousand people were now gathered about the plaza, watching from the streets, the wall, and no doubt even below the wall in the lower section, where they could not see but could hear the relayed whispers, not seven hundred of them had any blood other than human.
He walked up the steps beside Siobhan and took some comfort in the familiar faces of Oliver, Katerin, and Shuglin standing in the front row. Th
ey looked expectant and confident; they believed in him.
“Do not forget the city’s true name,” Siobhan whispered in his ear, and then she stepped to the side of the platform. Luthien, the Crimson Shadow, stood alone.
He had prepared a short speech, but the first words of it would not come to him now. He saw cyclopians in the windows of the Ministry, staring down at him as eagerly as the gathered crowd, and he realized that their fate, and the fate of all Eriador and all of Avon, was held in this moment.
That notion did little to calm the young man.
He looked to his friends below him. Oliver tipped his monstrous hat, Katerin threw Luthien a wink and a determined nod. But it was Shuglin, standing patiently, almost impassive, burly arms across his chest and no telling expression on his bearded face, who gave Luthien the heart he needed. Shuglin, whose people had suffered so horribly in slavery under the tyranny of Duke Morkney. Indomitable Shuglin, who had led the way to the mines and would hear no talk of ending the fight for Montfort until the job was done.
Until the job was done.
His cinnamon eyes steeled, Luthien looked out to the crowd. No longer did he try to recall the words of his speech, rather he tried to decipher the feelings in his heart.
“My allies!” he shouted. “My friends! I see before me not a city conquered.”
A long pause, and not a whisper rippled about the gathering.
“But a city freed!” Luthien proclaimed, and a huge roar went up. While he waited for the crowd to quiet, Luthien glanced over at Siobhan, who seemed perfectly at ease, perfectly confident.
“We have taken back a small part of what is rightfully ours,” the young Bedwyr went on, gaining momentum, gaining heart. He held up his hand, thumb and finger barely an inch apart. “A small part,” he reiterated loudly, angrily.
“Montfort!” someone yelled.
“No!” Luthien quickly interjected, before any chant could begin.
“No,” the young Bedwyr went on. “Montfort is just a place on a map, a map in the halls of King Greensparrow.” That name brought more than a few hisses. “It is a place to conquer, and to burn.” Luthien swept his hand around to the plume of smoke behind him, diminished now, but still rising.
“What gain in taking Montfort and burning Montfort?” he called out above the confused murmurs. “What gain in possessing buildings and items, in holding things, simple things, that Greensparrow can come back and take from us?
“No gain, I say,” Luthien continued. “If it was Montfort that we conquered, then we have accomplished nothing!”
A thousand shrugs, a thousand whispers, and a thousand curious questions filtered back to Luthien as he paused and held his conclusion, baiting the crowd, building their anxiety.
“But it was not Montfort!” he cried at last, and the whispers diminished, though the curious, confused expressions did not. “It was nothing that King Greensparrow—no, simply Greensparrow, for he is no king of mine—can take from us. It was not Montfort, I say. Not something to conquer and to burn. It was Caer MacDonald that we took back!”
The plaza exploded in roars, in cheers—for Luthien, for Caer MacDonald. The young Bedwyr looked at the beaming Siobhan. Remember the city’s true name, she had coached him, and now that he had spoken the words, Siobhan looked different to Luthien. She seemed as if the cloud had passed from her face, she seemed vindicated and confident. No, more than confident, he realized. She seemed secure.
Siobhan, who had been a merchant’s slave, who had fought secretly against the ruling class for years and who had stood beside Luthien since his rise in the underground hierarchy, seemed free at last.
“Caer MacDonald!” Luthien yelled when the gathering had quieted somewhat. “And what does that mean? Bruce MacDonald, who fought the cyclopians, what did he fight for?”
“Freedom!” came a cry directly below the platform, and Luthien did not have to look down to know that it was the voice of Katerin O’Hale.
The call was echoed from every corner of the plaza, around the city’s dividing wall, and through the streets of the city’s lower section. It came to the ears of those who were even then looting the wealthiest houses of the city, and to those who had burned the merchants’ houses, and they were ashamed.
“We have taken back not a place, but an ideal,” Luthien explained. “We have taken back what we were, and what we must be. In Caer MacDonald, we have found the heart of our hero of old, but it is no more than a small piece, a tiny gain, a candle’s flicker in a field of darkness. And in taking that, in raising the flag of Caer MacDonald over the Ministry once more . . .” He paused, giving the crowd the moment to glance at the great structure’s tall tower, where some figures were stirring.
“And we shall!” Luthien promised them when they looked back, and he had to pause again until the cheering died down.
“In taking back this piece of our heritage, we have accepted a responsibility,” he went on. “We have lit a flame, and now we must fan that flame and share its light. To Port Charley, in the west. To the isles, Bedwydrin, Marvis, and Caryth, in the north. To Bronegan, south of the northern range, and to Rrohlwyn and their northern tip. To Chalmbers and the Fields of Eradoch in the east and to Dun Caryth, until all the dark veil of Greensparrow is lifted, until the Iron Cross and Malpuissant’s Wall divide more than land. Until Eriador is free!”
It was the perfect ending, Luthien thought, played to the perfect syllable and perfect emphasis. He felt exhausted but euphoric, as tired as if he had just waged a single-handed battle against a hundred cyclopians, and as satisfied as if he had won that fight.
The thrill, the comradery, was back within the swelled ranks of the rebels. Luthien knew, and Siobhan knew, that the danger had passed at least for the moment.
The armies of Greensparrow would come, but if Luthien and his friends could maintain the sense of higher purpose, could hold fast to the truths that lay in their hearts, they could not lose.
Whatever ground Greensparrow reclaimed, whatever lives his army claimed, they could not lose.
The rally did not lose momentum as the minutes slipped past; it would have gone on all the day, it seemed, and long into the night. But a voice sounded from the top of the Ministry, an answer to the claims of Luthien Bedwyr.
“Fools, all!” cried a figure standing tall atop the tower’s battlements, and even from this distance, some four hundred feet, Luthien knew it to be Viscount Aubrey. “What have you taken but a piece of land? What have you won but a moment’s reprieve and the promise of swift and terrible vengeance?”
That stole more than a little of the mirth and hope.
Luthien considered the man, his adversary. Even with all that had transpired, Aubrey appeared unshaken, still meticulously groomed and powdered, still the picture of royalty and strength.
Feigned strength, the battle-toughened Luthien pointedly told himself, for though Aubrey wore the weapons and ribbons of a warrior, he was better at ducking a fight than waging one.
Luthien hated him, hated everything he stood for, but could not deny the man’s influence over the crowd, which did not recognize the ruse for what it was.
“Do you think that you can win?” Aubrey spat with a derisive snicker. “Do you think that King Greensparrow, who has conquered countries, who even now wages war in lands south of Gascony, and who has ruled for twenty years, is even concerned? Fools, all! Your winter snows will not protect you! Bask in the glories of victory, but know that this victory is a fleeting thing, and know that you, every one, will pay with your very souls for your audacity!”
Oliver called up to Luthien, getting the man’s attention. “Tell him that he was stupid for not better blocking the sewers,” the halfling said.
Luthien understood Oliver’s motives, but doubted the value of his methods. Aubrey had a powerful weapon here, a very real fear among the rebels that they had started something they could not hope to finish. Montfort—Caer MacDonald—was free, but the rest of their world was not, and the force
they had beaten in this city was a tiny fraction of the might Greensparrow could hurl at them.
They all knew it, and so did confident Aubrey, standing tall atop the impervious tower, apparently beyond their reach.
When Luthien did not move to answer, Oliver did. “You talk so brave, but fight so stupid!” the halfling yelled out. A few half-hearted cheers arose, but did not seem to faze the viscount.
“He didn’t even block the sewers,” Oliver explained loudly. “If his king fights with equal wisdom, then we will dine in the palace of Avon by summer’s end!”
That brought a cheer, but Aubrey promptly quenched it. “The same king who conquered all of Eriador,” he reminded the gathering.
It could not go on, Luthien realized. They could gain nothing by their banter with Aubrey and would only continually be reminded of the enormity of the task before them. Oliver, sharp-witted as he was, had no ammunition to use against the viscount, no verbal barbs which could stick the man and no verbal salves to soothe the fears that Aubrey was inciting.
Luthien realized then that Siobhan had moved to stand beside him.
“Finish your speech,” the half-elf said to him, lifting a curious arrow out of her quiver. It looked different from her other bolts, its shaft a bright red hue, its fletching made not of feathers but of some material even the half-elf did not know. She had discovered the arrow that morning, and as soon as she had touched it, it had imparted distinct telepathic instructions, had told her its purpose, and for some reason that she did not understand, the telepathic voice seemed familiar to her.
With her elven blood, Siobhan understood the means and ways of wizards, and so she had not questioned the arrow’s presence or its conveyed message, though she remained suspicious of its origins. The only known wizards in all of the Avonsea Islands, after all, were certainly not allies of the rebels!
Siobhan kept the arrow with her, though, and now, seeing this situation, the exact scene which had been carried on telepathic waves, her trust in the arrow and in the wizard who had delivered it to her was complete. A name magically came into her head when Luthien took the arrow from her, a name that the half-elf didn’t recognize.
The Crimson Shadow Page 35
