Picking up a flat rock, Yu Yu threw it far out over the waves. It struck once, skimmed for another twenty feet, then disappeared below the surface.
He sighed. Now he had a sharp sword, no money, no women, and was sitting in the sunshine of a foreign land wondering why he had travelled this far. He had not intended to leave the lands of the Chiatze. His first thought had been to strike out for the mountains to the west and join a band of robbers. Then he had come upon the battlefield, and the dead Rajnee. He recalled the moment when he had first seen the sword. It was jutting from the earth just behind a bush. Sunlight had glanced from the blade as Yu Yu was robbing the corpse. The Rajnee was carrying no coin, and Yu Yu had pushed himself to his feet and walked to the sword. It was quite beautiful, the blade gleaming, the long, two-handed hilt wondrously fashioned and leatherbound. The pommel was of silver, embossed with a mountain flower. Reaching out, Yu Yu drew the sword from the earth.
He then forgot his original purpose and decided to head north-east, filled with a desire to see foreign lands. It was most peculiar, and sitting in the sunshine of the Bay of Carlis he could not, for the life of him, remember just why he had thought it was such a fine idea.
Two days later something even more mysterious occurred. He came upon a merchant who was travelling in a cart with two pretty daughters and a retarded son. The wheel had come off the cart and the group were sitting by the roadside. In his new life as a robber and an outlaw Yu Yu should have stolen the man's gold, ravished his daughters and left the scene richer and more relaxed. Indeed this had been his plan, and he had marched forward, adopting what he considered to be a menacing expression. Then, to show his intent, he grasped the hilt of the sword, ready to draw it and terrify his victims.
An hour later he had repaired the cart, and escorted the merchant to his home village some six miles to the east. For this he received a fine meal, a kiss on the cheek from both daughters, and a small sack of supplies from the merchant's wife. You are too stupid to be a robber, he had told himself, as he resumed his journey.
And now that stupidity had brought him to Kydor, a land where men bearing Chiatze features stood out like . . . like … he struggled for a simile, but could only come up with 'warts on a whore's arse'. This was not entirely pleasing and he stopped thinking of similes. However, the point was a good one. How could a Chiatze warrior become a robber in a land where he would be instantly identified wherever he went? It was a nonsense.
At that moment a young, blond-haired woman emerged on to the small beach. To Yu Yu's surprise she ignored him and began to remove her dress and undergarments. Once naked she ran across the sand and dived into the water. Coming to the surface she swam in long, easy strokes, curving round to approach Yu Yu's position. Treading water, she threw back her head, and swept her hands through her wet hair. 'Why are you not swimming?' she called out to him. 'Are you not hot sitting there in wolf fur?'
Yu Yu admitted that he was. She laughed and swung away, swimming out into deeper water.
As swiftly as he could Yu Yu struggled out of his clothes and hurled himself into the sea, landing on his belly, which was painful. Not, however, as unpleasant as what followed. He sank like a stone. Thrashing his arms wildly, he fought for the surface. His head broke clear and he sucked in a great gulp of air. For a moment he bobbed in the water, but then he breathed out and disappeared once more beneath the cold water.
Panic swept through him. Something grabbed his hair, hauling him up. He struggled wildly, and broke through the surface once more.
'Take a deep breath and hold it,' the woman ordered him. Yu Yu did so, and bobbed alongside her. 'It is the air in your lungs that lets you float.'
Reassured by her presence, Yu Yu relaxed a little. What she said was true. As long as he held air in his chest he floated.
'Now lean back,' she said. 'I will support you.' As she floated alongside him he felt her arms below his spine and he gratefully dropped back into them. Glancing to his right he found himself staring at a pair of perfect breasts. Air whooshed from his lungs and he sank. Her arms pushed him back to the surface and he spluttered for a while. 'What kind of an idiot leaps into the sea when he cannot swim?' she asked.
'I am Yu Yu Liang,' he managed to say, between great gulps of air.
'Well, let me teach you, Yu Yu Liang,' she said.
The next few minutes were a joy as she taught him a rudimentary stroke that allowed him to pull himself through the water. The sun was warm upon his back, the water cool upon his body. Finally she bade him make his way to the shallow water close to the beach. Then he watched as she waded back to where she had laid her clothes. Yu Yu followed her.
She climbed up the rocks to where a small waterfall cascaded down to the beach and washed the salt from her body. Yu Yu gazed on her beauty, almost awestruck. Then he scrambled up and also washed himself. They returned to the beach and the woman sat down on a rock, to let her body dry in the sunshine.
'You came in with the lord Matze Chai,' she said.
'I am . . . bodyguard,' said Yu Yu. The excitement caused by her nakedness made Yu Yu feel light-headed. His grasp of the round-eye tongue, feeble at best, came close to deserting him.
'I hope you fight better than you swim,' she said.
'I am great fighter. I have fought demons. I fear nothing.'
'My name is Norda,' she said. 'I work in the palace. All the servants have heard the stories of the demons in the mist. Is it true? Or were they merely robbers?'
'Demons, yes,' said Yu Yu. 'I cut arm from one and it burn. Then . . . gone. Nothing left. I did this.'
'Truly?' she asked him.
Yu Yu sighed. 'No. Kysumu cut arm. But I would have if closer.'
'I like you, Yu Yu Liang,' she said, with a smile. Rising to her feet, she dressed and wandered away back up the rocks to the path.
'I like you too,' he called. She turned and waved, then was gone.
Yu Yu sat for a while, then realized he was growing hungry. Putting on his clothes he thrust his scabbarded sword into his belt and walked back up the hill. Perhaps, he thought, life in Kydor will not be so unpleasant.
Kysumu was sitting on the balcony of their room. He was sketching the outline of the cliffs and town across the bay. He glanced up as Yu Yu entered. 'I've had a great time,' said Yu Yu. 'I swam with a girl. She was beautiful, with golden hair and breasts like melons. Beautiful breasts. I am a great swimmer.'
'I saw,' said Kysumu. 'However, if you wish to be a Rajnee you must put aside carnal desires, and concentrate on the spiritual, the journey of the soul towards true humility.'
Yu Yu thought about this, then decided Kysumu was making a joke. He didn't understand it, but laughed out of politeness. 'I am hungry,' he said.
Elphons, Duke of Kydor, angled his grey charger down the slope towards the grasslands of the Eiden Plain. Behind him came his aides and his personal bodyguard of forty lancers. At fifty-one Elphons had found the long journey from the capital tiring. A man of great physical strength, the Duke had lately been plagued by sharp pains in his joints, most especially in the elbows, ankles and knees, which were now swollen and tender. He had hoped that the journey from the damp and cold of the capital to the warmer climes around Carlis would relieve the problem, but so far there had been little change. He was also experiencing difficulty at times with his breathing.
He glanced back at the convoy of five heavy wagons, the first carrying his wife and her three ladies-in-waiting. His fifteen-year-old son, Niallad, was riding alongside the convoy, the sun glinting on his new armour. Elphons sighed and heeled his horse onward.
The weather had been clement during their mountain passage, but as they made their way slowly down towards the plain the temperature rose. At first it was a pleasant warmth, after the cold mountain winds, but now it was becoming intolerable. Sweat trickled down the Duke's broad face. He lifted his gold-embossed iron helm from his head and pushed back his hood of silver mail rings, exposing thick, unruly grey hair.
The
slim, balding aide, Lares, rode alongside the Duke. 'Uncommonly hot, sire,' he said, pulling the stopper from his leather canteen and pouring water on to a linen handkerchief. This he passed to Elphons, who wiped it over his face and grey-streaked beard. Instantly the hot breeze felt cool against his skin. Unclipping his heavy red cloak he passed it to Lares.
Far below, Elphons saw the wagons of the merchant convoy enter the deep woods bordering the long Lake of Cepharis. His mood soured. They had first caught sight of the convoy earlier that morning, as a dustcloud on the horizon. Slowly they had gained on it, and were now a mere half-mile behind them. Elphons had been looking forward to arriving at the lake, divesting himself of his armour and swimming in the cool water, and did not relish the thought of sharing it with two score wagoners and their families. As always the young Lares was in tune with his master's thoughts. 'I could ride down and get them to move on, sire,' he said.
It was a tempting thought, but Elphons pushed it aside. The wagoners would be no less hot than he, and the lake was common ground. It would be enough for the Duke and his retainers to ride close and wait patiently. The wagoners would get the message and move on more swiftly. Even so, it meant that before the day was over the Duke and his retainers would be eating dust thrown up by the convoy.
Elphons patted the sleek neck of his charger. 'You are tired, Osir,' he said to the horse, 'and I fear I am not as light as once I was.' The horse snorted and tossed its head.
The Duke touched heels to the animal's flanks and began once more the long descent. A solitary cloud drifted momentarily between the sun and the land and Elphons enjoyed a few seconds of relief from the heat.
Then it was gone. With the prospect of the lake looming, Elphons drained the last of the water from his canteen, and swung in the saddle to watch his wagons making their slow and careful descent. There was scree upon the road and if not handled with skill a wagon could slide off and smash into shards on the rocky slope.
His wife, the silver-haired Aldania, waved at him, and he grinned back. As she smiled she looked young again, he thought, and infinitely desirable. Twenty-two years they had been wed, and he still marvelled at his luck in winning her. The only daughter of Orien, the last but one king of the Drenai, she had fled her own lands during the war against Vagria. Elphons had been merely a knight at that time, and had met her in the Gothir capital of Gulgothir. Under any normal circumstances a romance between a princess and a knight would have been short-lived, but with her brother King Niallad slain by an assassin, and the Drenai empire in ruins, there were few suitors for her hand. And after the war, when the Drenai declared for a republic, she was even less sought-after. The new ruler, the fat giant Karnak, made it clear that Aldania would not be welcome back home. So Elphons had won her heart and her hand, bringing her to Kydor and enjoying twenty-two years of great joy.
Thoughts of his good fortune made him forget burning heat and painful joints, and he rode for some time lost in the memories of their years together. She was everything he could have wished for: a friend, a lover, and a wise adviser in times of crisis. There was only one area in which he could offer any criticism. The raising of their son. It was the only subject on which they rowed. She doted on Niallad, and would hear no words said against him.
Elphons loved the boy, but he worried for him. He was too fearful. The Duke twisted in the saddle and glanced back. Niallad waved at him. Elphons smiled and returned the wave. If I could turn back the years, thought the Duke, I would throttle that damned story-teller. Niallad had been around six years of age when he had learned the full story of the death of his uncle, the Drenai king. He had suffered nightmares for months, believing that the evil Waylander was hunting him. For most of the summer the boy had taken to creeping into his parents' bedroom and climbing into bed between them.
Elphons had finally summoned the Drenai ambassador, a pleasant man with a large family of his own. He had sat with Niallad and explained how the monstrous Waylander had been hunted down and how his head had been cut off. The head had been brought to Drenan, where, stripped of skin, it had been displayed in the museum, alongside the assassin's infamous crossbow.
For a while the boy's nightmares ceased. But then news had come of the theft of the crossbow, and the murder of Karnak, the Drenai ruler.
Even now, nine years later, Niallad would not travel without bodyguards. He hated crowds and would avoid large gatherings when he could. On state occasions, when Elphons forced him to attend, he would stay close to his father, eyes wide with fear, sweat upon his face. No one mentioned it, of course, but all saw it.
Elphons returned his attention to the trail. He was almost at the foot of the slope. Shading his eyes he stared ahead at the wooded lake a quarter of a mile ahead. There was no one swimming. How curious, he thought. They must have pushed on. Hardy men, these wagoners. And yet they had women and children with them. One would have thought they would have appreciated a cooling swim. Perhaps they realized the Duke was close behind and were nervous about stopping. He hoped this was not the reason.
Lares moved alongside him and waved the troop of twenty soldiers forward. They cantered past the Duke and rode ahead to scout the woods.
Sadly such precautions were necessary. There had been three attempts on the Duke's life in the last two years. Such was the Angostin way. A man held power only as long as his strength and his guile held out. And his luck, thought Elphons. The four major Houses of Kydor were involved in an uneasy truce, but disputes broke out often, and battles were fought. Only last year Lord Panagyn of House Rishell had waged a short and bloody war against Lord Ruall of House Loras, and Lord Aric of House Kilraith. There were three battles, all indecisive, but Panagyn had lost an eye in the third, while Ruall's two brothers were both killed in the second. Lord Shastar, of the smaller House Bakard, had now broken his treaty with Panagyn and allied himself with Aric and Ruall, which suggested a new war was looming. This was why, Elphons believed, Panagyn had sent assassins against him. Angostin law stated that the Duke's forces could not be used in disputes between Houses. However, if the Duke was dead, his three thousand soldiers would likely join Panagyn. The man, though a brute, was a fighting soldier, and highly regarded by the troops. With them he could win a civil war and make himself Duke.
Sooner or later I will have to kill Panagyn, he thought, for if he ever slays me he will see my son murdered on the same day. Elphons found the fear of such an outcome weighed heavily upon him. Niallad was not ready to rule. Perhaps he never would be. The thought made him shiver.
He looked up at the sky. 'Just give me five more years,' he prayed to the Source. In that time Niallad might change.
The Duke drew rein as his cavalrymen fanned out and entered the wood. Within moments they were galloping their mounts away from the trees and back to the convoy. The captain, a young man named Korsa, dragged his mount to a halt before him. 'There has been a massacre, my lord,' he said, forgetting to salute.
Elphons stared hard into the young man's ashen face. 'Massacre? What are you talking about?'
'They are all dead, sire. Butchered!'
Elphons heeled the charger into a run, his forty lancers swinging their mounts and following him.
The wagons were all drawn up within the trees some fifty feet from the water's edge, but there were no horses. Blood was everywhere, splashed against tree-trunks, pooling on the earth. Elphons drew his longsword and gazed around the scene. Lares and Korsa dismounted, while the other cavalrymen, weapons in their hands, sat nervously awaiting a command.
A cold winter wind blew across the lake. Elphons shivered. Then he climbed down from his mount and walked to the water's edge. Amazingly there was ice upon the water. It was melting fast. He scooped some into his hand. The mud beneath his feet crunched as he moved. Sheathing his sword he walked back to where Lares and Korsa were examining the traces of an overturned wagon. Blood was smeared upon the smashed wood, and a blood trail, like the crimson slime of a giant worm, could be seen leading away from the
wagons and deeper into the trees. Several bushes had been uprooted.
Elphons turned to one of the soldiers. 'Ride out and keep the wagons back from here,' he said. Gratefully the man swung his horse and rode away.
Melting ice was everywhere. The Duke scanned the ground. It was badly churned, but he found a clear imprint just beyond the wagon. It was like the mark of a bear, only longer and thinner: four-toed and taloned.
In the space of a few moments something had descended upon forty wagoners and their families, killed them and their horses and dragged them away into the woods. It couldn't have happened without a sound. There must have been screams of terror and pain. Yet, only a few hundred yards away, Elphons had heard nothing. And how could ice form in this cloying heat?
Elphons followed the blood trails for a little way. Dead birds littered the ground, frost upon their feathers.
Lares crossed the blood-covered ground. The young man was trembling. 'What are your orders, sire?'
'If we skirt the lake to the north how long till we reach Carlis?'
'By dusk, sire.'
'Then that is what we shall do.'
'I cannot understand how we heard nothing. We had the woods in sight all the time.'
'Sorcery was used here,' said the Duke, making the Sign of the Protective Horn. 'Once my family is safe in Carlis I'll return with Aric's forces and a Source priest. Whatever evil is here will be destroyed. I swear it.'
It was still early when Waylander strolled into the North Tower library, climbing the cast-iron spiral staircase to the Antiquities section on the third floor. The three acolytes of the priestess Ustarte were sitting at the central table, examining tomes and parchment scrolls. They did not look up as he entered.
Strange men, he thought. Despite the thick stone of the tower the heat was already rising within the chamber, and yet they were garbed in heavy grey-hooded robes, silk scarves around their necks, and each wore thin grey gloves. Waylander did not acknowledge them as he moved past, but he felt their eyes upon his back. He allowed himself a wry smile. He had never been loved by priests.
Waylander III: Hero In The Shadows ds-9 Page 13
