Within the Hollow Crown

by Antoniazzi, Daniel

“What do I see?” Gallar asked.

  “He says the East Tower rang. The East Tower. Anuen is on the West coast. Sir Dorn came back by boat, Sir, from the Caves of Drentar. He would have landed right there in Anuen and walked up the main road to the castle. The West Tower would have rung. He should have been coming in from the West.”

  “There are many reasons he could have come around the long way,” Gallar said.

  “Then,” Jareld went on unabated, “I checked his account of the events in the Caves of Drentar.” Jareld tossed a few books around until he found the one he wanted.

  “According to this,” Jareld said, reading from King John’s journal, “Dorn said he remembers the moon of the solstice on the night he made it back to the ship.”

  “So, he left the Caves on the Solstice. We all know that much.”

  “Then why did he not make it back to the Castle until the eighteenth of March? It doesn’t take two months to get from the Caves of Drentar to Anuen. Even if he hit bad weather, which he never mentioned, it shouldn’t take more than three weeks.”

  “He was sailing the King’s Galleon alone. All of his comrades were dead. He was probably not a great navigator.”

  Jareld held up a finger. It was his index finger, and he held it up in such a way that made Gallar think that Jareld had anticipated this objection. He kept the finger up with his one hand while his other hand found a faded parchment.

  “I took the liberty of finding a copy of Sir Dorn’s Testified Accomplishments. These were recorded at his acceptance into the League.”

  He handed the parchment to Gallar, using that extended index finger to point to the third entry. Gallar already had an idea of what it would be, but he read it anyway. Sir Dorn, it seemed, was the Vice Admiral of Count Arwall’s 2nd Navy. He had gotten to that point, apparently, by being the Chief Navigator aboard the capital ship of the Count’s 1st Navy.

  “Certainly,” Gallar said, handing back the parchment, “It does seem odd.”

  “Odd? Master, he was a seasoned sailor. He would have had some trouble, but he could have gotten the ship going. And he could have navigated by the stars alone if his compass didn’t work. He could have navigated by the migration of trout, I’d be willing to bet.”

  “Trout are freshwater,” Gallar said, feeling the need to appear smarter than his pupil on something, at least. “So, he took some time, you think, getting back to Anuen, but you haven’t proven anything. There are still plenty of explanations, and none of them has to do with the Saintskeep.”

  Jareld used that same finger to delay Gallar’s further objections while his left hand grabbed up some leather bound notes.

  “This,” Jareld said, flipping through some pages, “Is the Royal Historian’s transcription of Sir Dorn’s testimony, the night he returned to Anuen:

  … I was just recovering from the hit I had taken, and saw that the King was also injured. I knew our time was short, and our mission a failure. When the Wyrm poised to strike again, I charged in to stand between it and the King. In striking the Dragon, my sword became embedded in his thick hide, and when he turned, I was left without a weapon…

  “He goes on for a bit here. The King eventually signaled the retreat, and only three men left the room: King James, Sir Dorn, and Sir Martin. He describes how Sir Martin collapses from his wounds, but Sir Dorn keeps trying to carry the King back to the ship. And eventually:

  … And I lay the King out on the damp, dirty ground of those evil caves, and at the King’s request, I performed the Final Rites of the Resting, and saw that before I had even finished, the King had passed from our world…

  Jareld closed the texts and looked up with that look on his face again. The look on Gallar’s face didn’t quite match. Jareld continued:

  “See: He performed the Final Rites. You need a sword to perform the Final Rites.”

  “You think he used the Saintskeep?”

  “He would have had to. His sword was gone, and he doesn’t mention picking up another. Besides, he was carrying the King the whole time, so his hands would have been occupied.”

  “But if he performed the Rites with the Saintskeep, which would have been presumptuous of him, by the way, then why didn’t he return to Anuen with it?”

  “Exactly! I think he brought the sword back to the continent, but not to the Prince.”

  “Why would he do that?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Jareld, what was the first thing I taught you when you said you wanted to be a Master Historian?”

  “You said that I had to know more than the names and the dates.”

  “I told you that you had to understand the reasons. Why do you think he did this?”

  “I really can’t think of any good explanation. But it’s worth looking into.”

  “I agree. You will leave tomorrow with Thor.”

  Gallar turned and left the library. Jareld, stunned by what had just happened, dragged his hand down his face before taking pursuit.

  “Wait a minute,” Jareld said, catching up to Gallar. Gallar kept climbing the stairs, so Jareld had to make his argument in transit. “I shouldn’t be the one who does this. Certainly there are other people who should go on a quest like this.”

  “Like who?”

  “Oh, I just assumed we would find a worthy knight or something. You know. Someone who can fight off bad things.”

  “Look, you’re almost done with your tenure here. The only requirement you haven’t fulfilled is your Field Practical. This sounds like a perfect opportunity.”

  “Oh, that isn’t fair,” Jareld said, with a younger-brother-like scorn. “Tommy Brimmerfell graduated by translating the Edicts of Temec.”

  “And a very good job he did of it,” Gallar said, getting to the staircase. He hoped to have Jareld out of breath before they reached the forth floor, but the Towers had twelve floors, incase they became necessary.

  “Of course he did a good job of it,” Jareld said. “They’ve already been translated into seventeen languages. He had texts to work with.”

  “But he translated them into Galbosian, and we both know how difficult a language it is.”

  “It’s a difficult language to speak,” Jareld said, navigating the second floor landing. “It uses fourteen vowels and consonants that can only be heard by dogs. But it’s easy to write. It has thirty-one characters; it conjugates verbs the same way as Cirilian. The most complicated rule in Galbosian text is with the tildes, but it turns out Formal Galbosian doesn’t use tildes except in the first word of a sentence.”

  Jareld felt his point was well made, but found himself following Gallar across the landing on the third floor and even onto the next flight of stairs.

  “Tommy Brimmerfell was a certain kind of Historian, and I gave him a Field Test that seemed appropriate to him. To you, I’m giving one I find appropriate to you.”

  “You’re asking me to track down the most sought-after artifact in the history of the Kingdom of Rone. The same one that has caused the untimely demise of dozens of treasure hunters. Are you sure you’re not overshooting a little?”

  Jareld would have said more, but he was running out of breath when he and Gallar started up the fifth flight.

  “Jareld,” Gallar said, stopping mercifully in the middle of the staircase, “I’ve always been impressed with you. I’ve always expected great things from you. I think the challenge here will be to rise up to your worth.”

  “Why would I search for a sword that I couldn’t use?”

  Despite Jareld’s many protestations, there he was, navigating his way through a cave full of plain old mud. Thor was up ahead, holding one of their few torches up to the wall. The torches had been provided by King Vincent, current King of Rone, when they had visited Anuen. There, they had double-checked Jareld’s findings with the original documents, then found the last piece of the puzzle: The final entry in the ship’s journal.

  The ship that carried King James II and his League of the Owl across the sea to the C
aves of Drentar had a regular log kept by one of the Knights. The journal ended with their arrival at the coast of the Caves, because you generally don’t take a ship’s journal off the ship; that would ruin the point. All of the entries started with the date and the ship’s coordinates. Sir Dorn did not maintain the journal on his return, so the last entry is just the coordinates of the shore of Drentar. Except that isn’t the last entry, really. Several pages later, there is an entry that contains only the date and the coordinates. Previous scholars reasoned that Sir Dorn had decided one day, on his return journey, to keep up the journal, and then later decided against it.

  But when Jareld actually looked at the coordinates, they were vastly different from any of the previous coordinates. Again, this fact had been easily overlooked before: It seemed that Dorn was just incorrect, or that he had taken a different route back home.

  But when Jareld calculated the coordinates, sure enough, they ended up in the middle of land. And that land was Arwall, Dorn’s old stomping ground.

  “I found something,” Thor called back. Jareld sloshed his way further into the cave to see what Thor was looking at. It was an inscription on the wall. It was meticulously carved, so that it didn’t just look like chicken scratch. Sir Dorn had also taken the time to sign his name in full, with his title: Sir Richard Dorn, League of the Owl. Jareld took out a bit of parchment and a quill.

  “Oh,” Thor said, “As long as you have that out, you should probably copy down the inscription.”

  Jareld glared at Thor. Thor looked back in a way that would have made most people think he was engaging in a staring contest, but Jareld knew that was just his face. He found his inkbottle and started copying down the inscription.

  Chapter 4: Things To Talk About When Dining With The Count

  Because Vye had returned very late from her brush with political disaster, she did not have an audience with the Count until the following morning. She arrived in the dining hall to see Landos already seated and waiting for the rest of the breakfast company.

  “Good morning,” Vye said.

  “My Lady,” Landos responded. Vye took her customary seat across from Landos, the two seats flanking the end of the table, where Michael sat.

  “So,” Vye said, reaching for a loaf of bread, “Have you had a chance to speak with the Count about Harold?”

  “Not yet,” Landos said. “I suspect it will make for good breakfast conversation. And you should know better than to eat before the Count has arrived.”

  “The servants should know better than to put food in front of me in the morning,” Vye answered, tearing off an end of the loaf. “And the Count can go fuck himself.”

  “I’d be happy to,” said Count Michael Deliem, entering the room, “If you could just draw me a diagram of how it could be accomplished.”

  Landos and Vye bit their lips as Michael made his way to the head of the table. Behind him, Gabriel, the Marshal, took a seat further down the table. If the breakfast table had been more crowded, this would have been necessary. Now, it was just Gabriel showing his general disdain for social interaction.

  “Good morning, Your Grace,” Lady Vye said.

  “Good morning, My Lady,” Michael responded. “Welcome back to civilization. Or some form of it anyway.”

  Michael sat, and the others followed suit. Michael had just turned twenty-eight, and had become Count when his father died four years earlier. He wore a trimmed beard, dark-brown, and had green eyes, which his tailor used as inspiration for the design of his formal robe; the family crest of a Stag against a striped green and white silk backing.

  Gabriel was a much older man. He was primarily in charge of the castle and it’s guards. He trained them. In fact, he was Vye’s first sword instructor, before she left the Kingdom and trained with Tallatos. For as long as she had known him, he had looked sixty, with shoulder-length gray hair and a raspy voice. But Vye knew that even now, if you wanted a good sparring partner, he was your best option.

  “So,” Michael said as his bowl was filled with soup by a servant, “What happened?”

  “A close call is what happened,” Landos said. “Another close call.”

  “Is it an interesting story?” Michael asked.

  “It’s a familiar one,” Landos said. “Lord Rutherford went to visit Lord Endior sometime last week, presumably to discuss a new trade route.”

  “I thought you left an explicit order for him not to go on any more spontaneous diplomatic missions,” Vye said between spoonfuls of soup.

  “I did,” Michael said. “In fact, I think I left two identical orders.”

  “He’s going to keep getting us into trouble, Michael,” Gabriel said. He was the only one comfortable enough with the Count to call him by his first name. “He’s not going to listen until the worst happens.”

  “So,” Landos said, “When there, he happens to run into Marisa Endior…”

  “Big coincidence,” Vye said.

  “And he tries to woo her…”

  “Again,” Vye commented while grabbing an apple.

  “...And when things don’t go according to his plans, he grabs Lady Endior and drags her back to his Manor.”

  “I don’t like where this is going,” Michael said.

  “Halfway home, Rutherford has to take a piss, so he dismounts, and Marisa turns the horse around and returns home. Her father declares Lord Rutherford a menace…”

  “He is a menace,” Vye said.

  “And the rest you know,” Landos said, finally grabbing a bite of food.

  “This is not the last time he will get you into trouble,” Gabriel said.

  “His trouble comes too often for my taste,” Landos said.

  “Can’t you lock him up for being an idiot?” Vye asked.

  “The Barons would eat me alive if I try to remove his title,” Michael pointed out.

  “We have a naval outpost on the Island of Delinampora,” Landos said. “It could use a new Admiral.”

  “I can’t afford to lose the trade routes from Delinampora,” Michael said, “Which is the most likely outcome of putting Rutherford in charge of the naval base there.”

  “Just let me spend an hour in a room with him,” Vye said. “I think I know how to put an end to his untamed nature.”

  “I think you may be onto something, Lady Vye,” the Count said. Landos looked sideways at Michael. As High Lieutenant, he was essentially the executive officer of the entire County. If Michael were to lose his mind, it would be up to Landos to fix it.

  “Your Grace,” Landos said, “I don’t know how diplomatic it would be to let Lady Vye remove Rutherford’s balls.”

  “Never mind that,” Michael said, “But I’ve been inspired. I think I have a way to put a stop to our troublesome little baron.”

  Chapter 5: The Demographically Challenged

  Four people ascended, like moonlit shadows, to the summit of Lunapera Mountain, the Crest of the Moon. The peak was a lonely gray island of stone amidst the pine green sea of the forest. On the sheer cliffside, at a particular outcropping, you could look up and feel as though you were communing alone with the Moon himself. You could sell tickets to this view.

  The Lunapera is not within the borders of the Kingdom of Rone, nor would the four people ascending it consider themselves citizens of that Kingdom. They were Turin. Naturalists from the Towers of Seneca had long ago declared that they were not technically a different race of people, not in the same way that a horse is a different race from a chicken. They just had a different language. And different customs. And different skin. But the thing that stuck out in everyone’s mind is that they were different.

  Ask any citizen of Rone, and they’ll tell you that the Turin are primitive barbarians. Ask a Turin, and you’ll hear about the conquering, destructive Rone. The truth lies somewhere in the middle. See, the Turin were here first. They used to wander freely throughout the continent. The Rone are, by comparison, the newcomers.

  So, how is it that these Ronish ups
tarts control more than three fourths of the continent now? Well, it basically comes down to stone walls. The Turin have a more communal, tribal way of life. They like to share. It takes a village to raise a child, and all that. The Rone like to draw maps. And declare certain plots of land as belonging to certain citizens. Specifically, certain noble citizens.

  First children inherit the stone walls of the father. But there are always those pesky second and third and fourth children. And there was all this land on the continent without stone walls. At first, the Rone and the Turin found ways to barter and sell land between them. But some of the nobles decided that the land was theirs, and didn’t think these simple people were worth the silver. They lived in little idyllic villages, with no stone walls around them. Savages. How dare they?

  And that was the beginning of the Undeclared War. The Lords of the southerners marched in with superior numbers, superior weapons and armor, and an unearned sense of superiority. Most of the history books fail to mention the rape and murder that the more “civilized” Rone participated in. But they felt that burning villages to the ground was an acceptable way of making sure your third son had a plot of land of his own.

  But, hey, let’s be fair. The Turin weren’t saints either. They figured that the way to stop the northern advance was to reduce the number of nobles. Simple math, it seemed. So, they put a bounty on noble sons and pregnant noblewomen. There, the Turin said, dusting their hands off, that ought to make those nobles stop bothering us for a while.

  Alas, the Turin never understood how the nobility worked amongst the southerners. See, the Turin understood vengeance, but they didn’t understand noble vengeance. They expected that, at worst, the husband of the dead, pregnant noblewoman or child would come looking for them. As it turned out, these nobles could summon vast numbers to their banners.

  So the Turin were relegated to the heavily wooded, much colder northern lands. And despite the occasional raid on the Rone farms, an uneasy peace has stood for the last few centuries. But that was about to change.