Within the Hollow Crown

by Antoniazzi, Daniel

  The three upperclassmen bowed and stepped aside as Argos paced over to Halmir. The youngest recruit of the group stood tall as his Master placed a hand on his shoulder.

  “Halmir, it is time to test your mettle. I have faith that, when tested, you will prove as true as any member of our company, past or present.”

  “You do me honor, Master Argos.”

  “I have received news from one of my spies. The Crown Prince will not be in Anuen on the first of summer. So, I have to split the group. The majority of the work will still be in the capital, so I am sending you three there as planned. But you, Halmir,” Halmir got a chill when his name was spoken. Two parts pride, one part anxiety, “You will be charged with the Crown Prince, Nathaniel Rone.”

  “Of course, Master,” Halmir bowed.

  “Good,” Argos nodded. “I do hope that we will meet again, but if we don’t, I know that you will all honor me, in life and in death.”

  “What’s the name of the place where I’m going?” Halmir asked.

  “It’s the Castle Hartstone, in a place called Deliem,” Argos responded. “The dawn approaches fast. Ready yourselves for battle.”

  ---

  On the first day of summer, Prince Nathaniel arrived at Castle Hartstone to oversee the marriage of Count Michael Deliem and Lady Sarah Ralsean.

  On the first day of summer, Jareld and Thor left Hartstone before sunrise. They had an exciting new lead, and they wanted to avoid the crowd of the wedding.

  On the first day of summer, Sir David Noble donned his armor, ready to defend his title in the opening ceremonies of the Jousting Season.

  On the first day of summer, the Prince stood before a courtyard full of people and gave a speech about love, nobility, and marriage. The people cheered, Michael and Sarah smiled.

  On the morning of the wedding, Lady Vye debated with her dresser about her sword.

  Vye had agreed to wear her formal wear. To be that version of Lady Vye. But as the Military Advisor, she should also be decorated with a sword. It just made sense. But the dresser was only interested in putting Vye “in the spirit of things,” and she felt that Vye’s sword, just the size of the damn thing, wasn’t in that spirit.

  On the morning of the wedding, several hours later, Lady Vye regretted that decision. The moment she regretted it was the moment right after she saw Michael die.

  Book 2

  Kings Slain

  Chapter 13: Attack of the Turin-Sen

  The jousting tournament was going well, King Vincent thought. At least, except for the jousting.

  The crowd was having a good time, taking advantage of the available meats and ales, and watching the tournament with cheers and jeers. But King Vincent wasn’t just interested in the social aspect of the affair. He enjoyed a good jousting tournament, and this one failed in that department. The problem was Sir Noble. He was too good.

  Through an incredible display of raw skill and practiced technique, Sir Noble was winning each joust squarely, and without incident. He played well to the crowd, controlling their cheers with a wave of a hand as a conductor might tell the orchestra to crescendo.

  Unfortunately, the competition left something to be desired. In a standard playoff system, the thirty-two contestants had battled down to sixteen, eight, four, and now two. But the two that were left were terribly mismatched.

  Sir Noble, who was very good, and Sir John, who wasn’t. Sir John had won by a series of flukes: two faults, one broken lance, and an opponent who had broken four ribs in the previous round. The final run would be a rout. But Sir Noble took it as seriously as anything. While he was getting help from his squire, Sam, to put on his chest plate, a small boy approached him on the lane.

  “Prince Anthony,” Noble said, seeing the boy, “What are you doing out here?”

  “I want to ride with you,” Anthony said, in a very excitable way.

  “I’m sorry, Little Prince, but your father would never allow it,” Noble said, looking at the clumsy horseman across the track. “That man over there is going to try and hurt me.”

  “But you won’t let him, will you?!”

  “No, of course not,” Noble leaned in and whispered, “I’m going to hurt him first.”

  Anthony giggled at this secret.

  “I’ll tell you what,” Noble said, after a moment, “As soon as I’m done with this gentleman, I’m going to do a victory lap. Do you want to join me for a victory lap?”

  “Yes, yes, yes!” Anthony said, jumping up and down like a little boy, which he was.

  “Good. Now, get out of the--”

  Sir Noble stopped mid-sentence. A bit of smoke was rising from the ground, only ten paces from the jousting track. The bit of smoke became more smoke, then even more. It didn’t rise up to the sky. It dissipated about three meters off the ground. And it didn’t expand, nor did anything catch fire. It just stood there, always billowing in the wind, but never moving. Like a smoke-shaped door.

  It actually was a door. A magical door. The creator of this spell was a firm believer in the idea that a door should always look like a door. He just didn’t take to the idea that one side of the door and the other had to be in the same building, or even in the same country.

  And to drive that rather alien thought home to Sir Noble, the smoke wavered as a man stepped out. Clad all in black, except for a red belt, a sword at his side. Maybe some would have noticed the mundane details about this man: his height, weight, eye color, the cut of his square jaw. But if you asked anyone, the only thing they would have told you is that he was a Turin.

  He held his sword in the air, shouting something that sounded like, “Ten Potter Inside!” It was actually, “Tempo Turin Sai!” which meant, roughly, “Now is the time of the Turin!” A moment later, a woman, also Turin, emerged. Similarly dressed, similarly armed. Once she was clear of the smoky door, it dissipated, whisked away in the wind.

  The two soldiers charged at the King’s Canopy. Noble should have laughed. He should have been cracking up. Two soldiers, with only swords, charging the King’s Canopy? It was worthy of a circus act. But he wasn’t laughing. He herded Prince Anthony and Sam behind him, backing them away from the jousting track.

  Somehow, he knew something was wrong. These weren’t any ordinary soldiers. He didn’t know their names. But they were Gerard and Sandora, the eldest of the Turin-Sen. Between them, they had more than forty years of training with swords. And that’s not counting the magic. They had arrived by means of a mystical door. The sort of thing Noble hadn’t heard about except in fairy tales.

  “Who’s that?” Anthony asked, pointing at Gerard and Sandora.

  “Never mind, Prince Anthony,” Noble said, “Just stay behind me,”

  The Royal Guards were no slackers. Half a dozen of them were already surrounding the King’s body, while another dozen notched arrows. These guys were crack shots. They could hit a target at two hundred yards, but they would wait. If the Turin attackers closed within a hundred and fifty yards, the archers would hit them with kill shots...

  Gerard and Sandora didn’t seem to notice or care about the archers. They were still racing to the King’s Canopy. Noble heard the reassuring twang of the bows singing over the field. The shots were hitting dead center. Gerard and Sandora would be pin cushions...

  But that’s not how it happened. And somehow, Noble knew it wouldn’t. The arrows were deflecting away from the Turin. Just before impact, they would fly wide, or wobble off course. The arrows never made it to within arm’s reach of the assailants.

  The Royal Guards grabbed the King and shoved him out the back of the canopy, heading for the Keep. Those who remained behind prepared to engage the assailants. By the time Gerard and Sandora reached the canopy, the King and his Guards were almost at the moat. It was only then that it occurred to anyone that the King might not be the target.

  Noble turned to Anthony. “Anthony, listen to me: I need you to go with my squire here. Sam, take him to the East Tower.”

  “Wh
ere are you going?” Sam asked, taking the boy’s hand.

  “Into the thick of things,” Noble answered, mounting his horse and grabbing a lance.

  Noble kicked his steed into action, charging across the distance to the King’s canopy. He had hesitated too long, he knew, but he could still do some good when he got there.

  The assailants reached the canopy. They cut through the Guards like so much warm butter. Noble never would have imagined members of the Royal Guard could be so easily bested. Once the guards were down, a few Nobles drew their ceremonial swords, but the Turin were making quick work of them.

  Noble was still another ten seconds away when he saw the Queen being pulled out of the canopy. Unfortunately, she would be dead in eight. Gerard grabbed her under the arms and held her. She struggled something fierce, but there was little she could do against such a well-trained man. Gerard held her still while Sandora stabbed her. She didn’t die when the sword went in. She died when Sandora pulled the sword back out.

  Noble lowered his lance and charged. That woman would pay for killing the Queen. But Gerard saw him just in time. The Turin swept his hand across his body, as though swatting a very slow fly. As his hand moved, so did the horse. It was as though his mount had been the subject of a very strong, but unfelt wind.

  Noble was tossed from his saddle and rolled across the ground, bashing his arms and legs on every bump in the grass. He lifted himself, one limb at a time, to his feet. Gerard and Sandora were abandoning the Canopy in pursuit of the King. But before she left, Sandora left Noble with a parting gift.

  She slashed her heavy sword against the support beam of the canopy. The wood cracked, folding under the weight of the tent. It was about to crash down.

  Noble leapt to the Canopy, shouting, “Everybody out!” He sidestepped chairs and dead bodies, reaching the ailing support beam just in time. He dropped his sword, holding the beam up with his own two arms, giving the survivors time to drag themselves to safety.

  But he couldn’t hold on forever. The support beam creaked and splintered, giving way. Noble tried to get clear of the falling structure, but he tripped on a dead body and, once again, his body slammed to the floor.

  The body belonged to Princess Helena, the King’s second child. She was hugging the body of her husband, Caerwil, also very much dead. Noble’s face cringed. The Royal Family was getting smaller and smaller.

  Noble rolled onto his back, pawing at the ground, trying to find his sword. There it was. He stabbed up, tearing a hole in the canopy. He forced his way out of the silky womb, standing and taking in the scene.

  The Royal Guards were shoving the King over the drawbridge, crossing the moat. Behind them, but catching up fast, Gerard and Sandora kept running. Tireless. Intimidating. Deadly. Noble took a couple of deep breaths. His horse was rearing, back on its feet, ready to go. Noble staggered to his horse, but then he heard something, and his heart almost stopped.

  It was a scream. But unlike any scream Noble had heard before. It was complicated. It was made of two parts pain, two parts terror, five parts despair, and one part death. It chilled Noble to the bones. He turned to the bridge, from where the scream had emanated.

  At the bridge, one of the Royal Guards, the owner of the scream, was lit up. Glowing. Incandescent. It would have been beautiful if it weren’t so obviously painful.

  It was like being struck by lightning. But if the lightning lingered. Stayed on you. Held you in its electric fingers, draining every ounce of life from your sorry corpse. Shocking you down to the soul, until there was nothing left of you to resist. The Guard’s gray-white body toppled over the side of the drawbridge, splashing into the moat below.

  Noble mounted up, his eyes fierce with rage, ready to charge into the fray. But then he saw it happen again. It wasn’t a bolt of lightning. It was a spell. Sandora held her hand out, shouting words in the Turin language. From her hand, a small light shot out, with the speed of an arrow, looking like a candleless flame. It struck another Guard in the heart. The Guard screamed for the remaining seconds of his life, as the light crackled all over his body. He collapsed forward.

  Noble was too far away. Even on horse, there would be nobody left by the time he got to the fray. And what would stop Gerard or Sandora from using that witchcraft on him?

  He spun his horse around and went directly for the East Tower. The enemies seemed too powerful, and the Kingdom was unprepared for them. King Vincent would shortly be dead, he knew. The Queen was already dead. So were Princess Helena and her husband. Prince Nathaniel was in Hartstone, performing a wedding, and Princess Emily lived in the Duchy of Brimford. There was only one person left to defend in Anuen.

  “Sam!” he yelled, as he arrived at the East Tower, “Where’s the Prince?”

  Sam emerged from a second story balcony with Anthony in hand.

  “Get in here, before they come for us,” Sam called down.

  “No!” Noble said, “Give me the boy, quickly.”

  Sam lowered the reluctant Prince, as gently as possible, into Noble’s arms. He seated the young heir in front of him.

  Sam said, “Where are you going?”

  “As far from here as I can manage,” Noble said. “Try to give me some time to get to the woods.”

  “Yes, Sir,” Sam said, and he ducked back into the Tower, heading for the stairs.

  Noble turned the horse and headed for the woods, just beyond the fields of the tournament. The remaining soldiers were heading for the Keep, but it was too late. King Vincent, bereft of guards, had fled to the North Tower, there to make his own last stand against the invading assassins. And waiting for him in the North Tower was Selikk, a third member of the Turin-Sen.

  Selikk murdered the King, defenestrating him, the Royal Body splattering on the ground.

  Sam and the remaining Guards tried to exact retribution against the Turin-Sen, but the foreigners slaughtered them all.

  Noble tried not to think about the terror in his heart as he led his horse into the first steps of the murky woods.

  Chapter 14: An Uninvited Guest at the Wedding

  Michael had never written a book on how to staff a castle. Some have argued that he should have. He was particularly good at it.

  Your best diplomat should be your High Lieutenant. Sounds obvious, perhaps, but most Counts didn’t follow this rule. Most appointed a close friend or a cousin that you couldn’t let down but didn’t know what else to do with. Michael chose Landos on merit, because he knew that the level-headed negotiator would be just the person to outsmart and out-charm those people who you never wanted to meet.

  Always find a really good chef to be your main chef. A well-cooked meal could be the key to avoiding an international incident. And it makes people content. A good sommelier wasn’t a bad idea, either.

  It is important that your Castellan knows which way is South. This had been a problem in several castles in recent history. Michael took the time to test his Castellan on direction sense. He did not want to find out in the middle of a siege, as some had, that his catapults were facing the North Wing when they should have been facing the enemy force.

  Make sure your Military Advisor did not rip the testicles from bothersome nobles, at least not without permission. She was allowed to think about it, and even ask frequently, just so long as she didn’t do it on her own.

  Finally, when and if you can manage to find a fanatically loyal (if somewhat insane) jester as a servant, do so.

  ---

  The events that transpired only moments after Michael and Sarah’s marriage were something as follows:

  Nathaniel finished a rousing speech by announcing Michael and Sarah as husband and wife. The newlyweds released the doves and kissed, earning a resounding cheer from the crowd. A flurry of rose petals precipitated over the procession.

  Michael, Sarah, and Prince Nathaniel were on the East Balcony, which was half a story above the courtyard. Just high enough to be seen from anywhere in the crowd, not so high as to seem like an arro
gant ass.

  Vye and the other honored guests sat along the front of the crowd, just under the balcony. Vye was stuck next to Rutherford and Lady Caroline, relieved that Caroline showed no signs of being pregnant. Behind them, crowded in tighter than a nun’s legs on a Sunday, were the commoners. Nothing like free food to assure a good turnout.

  Michael stepped forward to make his speech, “Lords and Ladies, Citizens, and Guests,” he began, and then continued in some well-worded but ultimately empty expression of thanks. Vye was not paying attention. She was distracted by the smoke.

  Not like a raging fire kind of smoke. Just a little wisp of smoke, rising from the ground right in front of the East Balcony. Where was the smoke coming from? Vye looked left and right, to see if anyone else had noticed, but everyone was fixated on Michael’s speech. He must have said something funny, because the crowd chuckled.

  Then the smoke got wider. It became a thin veil of smoke, about the size of a door. Vye nudged the only person next to her, Lord Rutherford. Rutherford, however, was trying to clap extra loud to impress Michael. Vye turned around, looking to the back of the crowd. She wanted to find Gabriel.

  Her distraction must have been noticed, because Michael stopped his speech.

  “Lady Vye,” Michael said, “Am I boring you?”

  There was another light chuckle from the crowd. Vye turned back to the Count, embarrassed. She blushed.

  “I’m sorry, Your Grace,” she said, “There’s just something…strange over here.”

  “Well,” Michael said, more to the crowd more than Vye, “Don’t keep us in suspense. What is it?”

  “It’s… Oh, Shit!!” was what Vye said.

  The reason she said this was that when she looked back to the smoky doorway, there was a Turin man there, sword drawn, and charging at the crowd.

  The man was Halmir, and while his charge seemed panicked to some, Vye could tell that his movements were precise, and his footing certain. He knew what he was doing.