The Briar King

by Greg Keyes

  “You don't have to repeat all of that rigmarole, you know,” Stephen confided. “The sedos doesn't care if you say anything or not.”

  Desmond scowled. “Perhaps not. The dark saints, however, care a great deal.”

  “The dark saints are dead,” Stephen said. “You're showing your ignorance, chanting like some Watau wonderman. The sedoi are the remains of their puissance, their old tracks of power. The potence is there, but it's insentient.” He switched his tone to one he might use with a small child. “That means it can't hear you,” he said.

  Desmond tried on another smile, but it seemed strained. “You're talking about things of which you know nothing,” he said.

  Stephen laughed. “That's good, coming from a thickwit like you. What don't I understand? You're making changelings. You just sent Brother Seigeriek's soul off to steal a body, and now you're sending Ashern to do the same. Knights in the queen's guard, perhaps? Is that a lock of hair I see around Brother Ashern's neck? A personal item is needed to find the body, yes?”

  “Lewes, shut him up until I'm done,” Desmond grunted. He held up an admonishing finger. “Don't kill him, though.”

  The hulking monk started toward Stephen.

  “You're the ones who don't understand what you're doing,” Stephen said. “Your knowledge is less than complete, and more superstition than anything else. That's why you needed me. You still do.”

  “Oh, and you're ready to help us now?” Spendlove said. “I doubt that, somehow.”

  “Call off Lewes,” Stephen said. “Call him off, or I'll use this.” He brought the horn from his haversack, the one the holter had carried from the Mountains of the Hare to d'Ef.

  Desmond's eyes pinched to slits.

  “Hold off, Lewes,” Spendlove said. He stepped a little away from the girl, holding his empty hands out so as to make clear he was not threatening her. “Where did you get that?”

  “You should have spent a little more time in the scriftorium and a little less time buggering corpses,” Stephen told him. “Do you know what this is? I think you do.”

  “Something you ought not to have. Something you won't have for long.”

  “I don't need it for long. Only for an instant.”

  Desmond shook his head. “You can't think I'm that stupid. The ritual involved—”

  “Is as meaningless as the one you're gibbering now. Any sedos can unlock the power in the horn. Any lips can blow it. And look here, we have both.”

  “If you really know what you have, you know better than to use it,” Desmond said. “Calling him won't help you.”

  “You're afraid to name him? I'm not. The Briar King. The horned lord. The Nettle-man. And the thing about calling him, you know, is that I really don't know what will happen, and neither do you. He might kill us all, though the Codex Khwrn claims that the holder of the horn won't be harmed. A chance I'm willing to take, that, considering how by your own admission, you've some nasty things planned for me.” He raised the horn, wondering if there really was any such scrift as the Codex Khwrn.

  “Stop,” Desmond said, a note of desperation in his voice. “Wait a moment.”

  “You're so partial to the dark saints, yet you don't want to meet one?”

  “Not him. Not yet.” He cocked his head. “You don't know everything, Brother Stephen. Not by half. If you wake him now—if you call him out of his wood before we've finished the preparations—you'll have more blood on your hands than I ever dreamed of.”

  Stephen shrugged. “Let's not wake him, then.”

  Desmond's voice took on a bargaining tone. “What do you want?” he asked.

  “The girl. Let her go.”

  “You know this slut?”

  “I've never laid eyes on her before. But I won't watch you kill her. Let her go, and let the two of us walk away.”

  “Where's the holter?”

  “I told you. He's dead.”

  Spendlove shook his head. “He probably went after Fend. They're old friends, those two.”

  Lewes was only a few yards away, tensing as if to spring.

  Stephen raised the horn almost to his lips and waggled a warning finger at the giant.

  Brother Ashern, standing bare-chested on the sedos, cleared his throat.

  “Seigereik has probably opened the gate by now,” he said. “There may be no need for me to go.”

  Desmond laughed bitterly. “You always were a coward at heart, Brother Ashern. You've the most important task of all. You're to kill the queen, if the others fail. She'll trust you.”

  “If he blows that horn, I won't be killing any queen,” Brother Ashern said defensively. “Seigereik has the gates open by now, and Fend and his men will be inside soon. It's a ride of less than half a bell, even in the dark. They'll get the queen, sure enough.”

  “We don't even know it's the real thing,” Lewes growled. “It could be a cow horn he picked up someplace.”

  “Or it could be I've been traveling with the holter who saw the Briar King, who went into his very demesne. Surely Fend told you about that. That was what Fend was after in the first place—the horn. Do you think he found it?” This was all guesswork, of course, but Stephen saw from their faces he had caught the sparrow.

  Lewes was edging closer.

  “No, Lewes,” Spendlove said. “He's right, and so is Brother Ashern. Soon the queen and all of her daughters will be dead; the holter can't kill Fend and all of his men by himself. The deed is accomplished. We've no need to kill this little whore.” He produced a knife from his belt, one that glittered with actinic light. “I'm going to cut her loose.”

  Stephen pressed the horn to his lips, a tacit warning.

  He hadn't counted on how fast Spendlove could move. The knife was suddenly a blur in the air, and then a shearing pain in Stephen's arm. He gasped.

  He gasped, and the world filled with sound.

  Stephen had never intended to blow the horn, of course, nor did he really believe it would do anything if he did. He'd been counting on Spendlove's superstitious belief in the dark saints.

  He didn't even know how to blow a horn, though he had seen it done and knew that it wasn't like a hautboy or recorder; it involved buzzing the lips or somesuch. Just putting air in it shouldn't work.

  But the clear note that soared into the dark air denied all that. And it wouldn't let him stop. Even as he sank to his knees, blood spraying from his arm, the horn blew louder, sucking the wind from him as the very rocks and trees seemed to take up the note, as the sky shivered from it. Even when Brother Lewes hit him and tore the instrument from his hands, the sound went on, gathering force like a thunderhead, building higher until it was deafening, until no other sound existed in the world.

  Brother Lewes knocked Stephen roughly to the ground. Grinding his teeth, Stephen pulled the knife from his arm, nearly fainting from the redoubled pain that brought. He rolled onto his back, vaguely bringing the blade up in a gesture of defense.

  But Brother Lewes was doing something odd. He seemed to have found a straight stick and driven it into his own right eye. Why would he do that?

  When a second arrow struck the monk in the heart, it all suddenly made sense. He watched numbly as Lewes pawed at the shaft, gave a final mutter of consternation, and fell.

  “Aspar,” Stephen said. He couldn't hear his own words for the sound of the horn.

  Clutching the knife, he stumbled to his feet. He willed away the pain in his arm, and it went, just as the feeling had gone out of his body on the faneway. Grimly he started toward Desmond.

  The monk watched him come. Stephen was peripherally aware that Aspar was attacking Owlic, now.

  In the air around them, the note from the horn was finally beginning to fade, but slowly.

  “You're the greatest fool in the world,” Spendlove screamed. “Idiot! What have you done?”

  Stephen didn't answer. His first breath after blowing the horn felt like a winterful of icy draughts. He knew Spendlove would kill him. He didn't care
. Raising the knife he began to run straight toward the other monk, his wounded arm forgotten.

  Desmond glanced down at the bound woman and then, fast as a cat, he grabbed Brother Ashern, positioned over the first still slightly twitching victim. He stabbed Ashern in the heart. At nearly the same moment, an arrow struck Desmond near the center of his chest, and he grunted and fell back.

  That gave Stephen an instant to choose, and in that instant he felt a bright certainty. He shifted his charge, putting his shoulder into the dying, goggle-eyed Brother Ashern and knocking him from the mound. Then he knelt by the other man, the one still gaping at his own bowels.

  “Forgive me,” he said, and drove the shining knife into one tortured blue eye, pushing it in as far as it would go.

  “Once the blade is in,” he remembered reading in the Physiognomy of Ulh, “wiggle well to scramble the brains. Quick death will follow.”

  He wiggled, and something in the earth beneath him seemed to groan.

  He looked up just as Desmond hit him. He felt his nose collapse and tasted blood in the back of his throat, and when he bounced down the sedos, he barely felt anything. Desmond came grimly after him, snapping off the arrow in his chest. Stephen watched him sidestep another arrow, and then the monk had him by the collar, and Stephen was in the air again. He crashed to earth on the other side of the hill.

  He'll have cover here, Stephen thought. Aspar won't be able to shoot him without moving. I'll be dead by the time he gets here.

  Desmond came around the sedos and kicked him in the ribs. Stephen grunted; he couldn't breathe through his nose, and his mouth was full of blood.

  “Enough of you, Stephen Darige,” Desmond said. “That's very much enough of you.”

  Stephen felt something in his hand as he tried to flop back, and he realized he still had the knife. Not that he would ever have the chance to use it. Spendlove was too fast. He couldn't throw it, the way Spendlove had.

  Or could he? He remembered Spendlove drawing his hand back and flipping it toward him. As lightning-quick as the throw had been, Stephen remembered it, every nuance of the motion. He thought of his own hand making the same motion.

  Spendlove came, almost contemptuously. Stephen, not even half risen, cocked his hand and threw.

  He was certain he had missed, until Spendlove, eyes wide and unbelieving, reached for his sternum, where the hilt stood, just below the arrow wound.

  Stephen leapt up, fierce exultation finally moving his limbs. Spendlove hit him again, in the chest. It felt like a sledgehammer, but Stephen lurched forward, throwing his arms around the monk.

  Spendlove put both of his hands around Stephen's neck and began to squeeze. The world went gray as the monk's fingers bit into his neck. Stephen, with winter in his belly, wondered how Spendlove could be so stupid. Was it a trick?

  He decided it wasn't; Spendlove was just mad with rage. With both hands, Stephen grabbed the hilt of the knife and pulled down.

  “Oh, shit me,” Spendlove said, watching his guts spill to the ground. He let go of Stephen, took three steps back, and sat down heavily on the mound. He wrapped his arms around his yawning belly.

  “I wondered why you didn't think of that,” Stephen commented, dropping to his knees.

  “Too mad. Saints, Darige, but you know how to make me mad.” His eyes rolled back. “You've killed me. Me, killed by the likes of you.”

  “You shouldn't have betrayed the church,” Stephen pointed out. “You shouldn't have killed Fratrex Pell.”

  “You're still a fool, Brother Stephen,” Spendlove replied.

  “I know others in the church must be involved,” Stephen told him. “I know you took orders from someone. Tell me who. Make absolution to me, Brother Desmond. I know you must regret some of what you've done.”

  “I regret not killing you when I met you, yes,” Brother Desmond allowed.

  “No. That night on the hill.”

  Spendlove looked very weary. If it weren't for the sanguine river flowing through his crossed arms, he might have been preparing for a nap. He blinked.

  “I never had a chance,” he murmured. “I thought they would make something better of me. They made something worse.” He looked up, as if he saw something. “There they are,” he said. “Come to get me.”

  “Tell me who your superiors were,” Stephen insisted.

  “Come close, and I'll whisper,” Spendlove said, his eyelids fluttering like broken moths.

  “I think not. You've still the strength to kill me.”

  “Well, you've learned a little, then.” He lay back. “It's better that you live to see the world you've made, in any case. I hope you enjoy it, Brother Stephen.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “They're here.” Spendlove sounded suddenly frightened. His head threw back and his back arched. “It's only ashes, now. I was a fool to think I could be more. Great lords!”

  The last was a shriek, and then he lay still, his body as quiet as his face was tortured. Stephen sat watching him, chest heaving, slowly trying to become sane again.

  Aspar finally hit the troublesome monk in the neck and, while he staggered, put the last shaft in his heart. That left only the leader, who had gone behind the mound with Stephen. Aspar sprinted from cover.

  The fellow he'd just shot hadn't given up, though. They met halfway to the mound, and he cut at Aspar with a sword, the steel a gray blur. Aspar stopped short, hopped back, then leapt forward inside the length of the weapon, crossing his dirk and the hand ax he'd acquired in a village two days back. He forced the sword down, then brought the hand ax up, edge-first, under the monk's chin, splitting his lower jaw. In return he got a blow from the sword-pommel that sent him sprawling.

  The swordsman came on, stabbing down, slower this time. Aspar batted the blade aside and sat up fast, punching his dirk into the man's groin. When he doubled, Aspar withdrew the blade and put it through his heart, which finally stopped him. Groaning, Aspar climbed painfully to his feet and resumed his run to the mound where Winna still lay bound.

  “Winn!” Beyond her, he could see the last monk folded around his belly, with Stephen watching laconically from a few yards away. The boy was bleeding freely from his arm wound, but otherwise looked well enough.

  Winna was looking up at him, her eyes strangely calm. Kneeling, he cut her bonds and with a muffled cry lifted her into his arms and yanked off her gag.

  “Winna—” He wanted to say more, but he couldn't, for it felt as if he'd swallowed something big and got it stuck in his throat. And why was his face wet? Was his forehead cut?

  Winna sobbed then and buried her face in his neck, and they stood that way for a long moment.

  Finally, he pushed her back gently.

  “Winna, did they hurt you? Did they …”

  “They didn't touch my body,” she whispered. “They talked of it often. He wouldn't let them, Fend. He wanted me pure, he said. He wanted to do things in front of you. Is he dead?”

  “Fend, no. Not yet. Winna?”

  “I knew you would find me.”

  “I love you, Winna. If you'd died …”

  She wiped her eyes, and her voice was suddenly its old practical self. “I didn't die,” she said, “and neither did you. So here we are, and I love you, too. But the queen will die if we don't do something.”

  “I've the only queen I care about,” Aspar said gruffly. “I'll kill Fend, right enough. But first, by the Raver, I'll see you safe.”

  “Nothing of that. We started this together, Aspar. We'll stay in it together.”

  “She's right,” Stephen said, rising behind them. “We've got to do what we can.”

  “That we've done, I think,” Aspar said.

  “No,” Stephen said. “Not yet. We may not be able to help them at Cal Azroth, but we have to try.”

  “You made a damned good fight here, lad,” Aspar said. “You did us all proud. But look at you. You've no fight left in you. If we don't bandage that arm, you'll bleed out.”
/>   “Bandage it, then,” Stephen said. “And we'll go.”

  Aspar looked at the two determined young faces and sighed, feeling suddenly outnumbered.

  “Winna, aren't you the one 'sposed to have sense?” he asked.

  Winna lifted her chin toward Stephen. “My name is Winna Rufoote,” she said.

  “Stephen Darige, at your service.” He shot Aspar a look that said, you could have told me, but didn't say anything. As-par felt suddenly embarrassed and put upon.

  “Has he been as stone-stubborn with you as with me?” Winna asked Stephen.

  “I don't know. I don't know how he could be any more stubborn than I've known him to be,” Stephen replied.

  “Well, he can,” Winna said. “But I'm his match.” She went up on tiptoe and kissed him. “Aren't I, love?”

  Aspar felt bloodfire in his cheeks. He pursed his lips.

  “Sceat,” he grunted. “We'll go, but we do it as I say. Yah?”

  “Always,” Winna agreed.

  “And we get the horses. We'll need 'em.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHANGELING

  NEIL FELL TO HIS KNEES, vomiting. He couldn't feel the stone beneath his hands, or even his hands, for that matter. Threads of darkness stitched across his vision.

  “Welcome, Brother Ashern,” the knight who was and was not Vargus Farre said. “You're late. Was there trouble?”

  Neil couldn't compel his vocal cords to answer.

  “What's wrong with him?” another voice asked. Neil closed his eyes and saw the voice as a fidgeting blue line, like lightning.

  “I don't know,” the false Vargus replied. “I was sick at first, but not like that.”

  “It's no matter,” the new voice said. “We can do what needs doing, with or without him. But we cannot wait.”

  “Agreed,” Vargus replied. “Brother Ashern, when you've recovered from your journey, find the queen. If she's not already disposed of, then do so. Remember, she thinks you are her personal guard. Your name is Neil. Do you remember that?”