Assimilated

by Nick Webb

  “How do you know so much about the inside of this place?” Priam’s voice sounded suspicious, but his voice always sounded suspicious when it came to things that Aeden could do and know and Priam couldn’t because of his status.

  “Easy. I met a fine young officer at the pub, and bought him several rounds of ale.” It was mostly true. Aeden had bought him several rounds, but had also bribed him, which in his inebriated state the officer was far more likely to accept. Aeden’s father surely hadn’t noticed the absence of a few coins from the pile that had accumulated in the family’s vault over the years. His father may only be the sixth duke of Elbeth, but he was also the holder of the ancient scepter of King Rossam the Second, an ancient name that still held weight in the kingdom, figuring as it did so heavily into the Chronicles.

  Aeden winced at the thought of his still unfinished copy of the Chronicles next to his bed at home. He made a mental note to work extra long the next day to transcribe as much as possible from his father’s copy of the holy book.

  “And he just told you the entire layout of the barracks? Drunk?” Priam arms waved in the air, Aeden could just barely see, but his ears distracted him.

  “Did you hear that?”

  “Hear what?” Priam’s arms dropped and they both listened.

  A voice. Down the nearly pitch-black passage they had just traversed. They strained to hear it.

  “I tell you I swear I heard something,” a man said, breathing heavily. “No, not a rat. No, I heard a voice. Just … just come on.” The man conversed with someone, but his companion’s voice was too muffled to hear clearly. “I know the guard just passed here, but all the same I heard something.”

  Aeden grabbed Priam’s arm and hauled him further down the hallway, taking care not to move too loudly, and yet hurrying as fast as he could. He counted, one, two, three openings in the wall, and felt for a handle. His hand caught it, and it turned just as the hallway began to brighten somewhat with the approach of another torch. Pulling Priam into the room, he shut the door, gripping the handle so as not to allow the latch to shut on its own and thus announce their presence.

  They held their breath. The voices outside in the hallway grew louder—the pair of guards outside arguing about the presence of trespassers in the barracks, or the even greater likelihood that the stray noises were probably ghosts—conjured by some dark sorcerer, no doubt. Aeden grinned at the thought of being mistaken for an evil wizard, and he imagined reaching out an imaginary, ghostly arm into the hallway to spook the passing men.

  “What was that?” one of them said.

  “What?” said the other.

  “Something just touched me! Touched me foot!”

  Aeden stiffened. Had he really just done something?

  “Just a rat, you stupid wretch! Look there! It’s scurrying away, probably gone mad from your stench!”

  Aeden breathed easier, and sensed Priam relax a little as the voices faded, their mumbling growing fainter as they passed farther down the hallway. They didn’t move until all was quiet, and only then did Priam nudge Aeden’s arm.

  “Ok, let’s get this over with. Do you have the torch?” said Priam.

  Aeden spun around, reaching out for his friend, who now seemed just out of reach. “You’re kidding me. Priam, I gave you one job and that was it. If you really forgot the torch I swear I’ll—”

  A flash of sparks and a flame interrupted him, illuminating Priam’s grinning face. The other boy always loved a good joke.

  “You swear you’ll what?”

  Aeden, uncharacteristically, was speechless, but recovered quickly, smirking as he brushed past Priam towards the tidy wooden desk in the far corner, weaving his way around targets, dummy soldiers, and piles of practice gear.

  “Well that didn’t take long,” he said, picking up a piece of parchment from the clean, orderly desk. “Let’s see … Rossam … Rossam … Rossam … where is Rossam … hey, here we go. Looks like I’m—hey, this can’t be right.”

  “What? Lemme see,” said Priam, reaching over Aeden’s arms to grab the parchment, but too slowly to snatch it from the other boy’s hands.

  “It says I’m in the twenty to twenty-five year old bracket. I’m seventeen! What are they thinking?” But it was true—right there, under the heading intermediate young adults, was the name Aeden Rossam.

  “Hey, at least you’re ranked in the middle of the group, so Lord Caldamon obviously thinks very highly of you. He’s a friend of your father, right?”

  “Right….” Aeden scanned the page. His father. Lord Caldamon. Could it be… no. His father wouldn’t do such a thing. Would he? Aeden felt he knew the answer to that question even as he thought it. Of course he would. His father had high opinions of himself and lofty aspirations for Aeden—if he could only measure up. But to satisfy his father seemed a never-ending, unattainable quest. “There you are,” he said, pointing to another part of the page.

  Priam’s face fell. “Priam Switchback, sixteen to nineteen year old group, intermediate. Hmm, I thought I would have made advanced at least.”

  “Well at least this list doesn’t matter all that much. The pre-trials count for a lot more. If you can do good there, they’ll place you within your group more favorably, and really, you’re better than all these people—look, half of them I know can’t even hold a sword properly.”

  “Yeah….” Priam mumbled. To Aeden he clearly sounded dejected, and he made a mental note to see if his father might do something for Priam as well. Perhaps sway Lord Caldamon to elevate him to the advanced group. But he thought better of it. No telling what Lord Rossam might say.

  He was unstable, his father, and Aeden could never predict when the man would praise him or scream at him, hurling obscenities and insults. Most of the time, the man was cool and collected. Calculating, almost. But that was the public face. He showed a far more complicated face to his family.

  “Hey, what say we get back. If my mom finds that I’m gone, I’ll never hear the end of it.” Aeden replaced the list, and thought of the reason why his mother would never let him hear the end of it.

  Cyrus, his brother. If Cyrus were still here, he’d be in the twenty-six plus bracket, most likely expert. But the men who snatched the boy those many years ago effectively ended both the chance that Lady Rossam would ever let her younger son out of her sight, and Cyrus’s swordsmanship career. And probably his life.

  “You stuffed clothes under your bed sheets, right?”

  “Yeah, but she could always go in there with a candle and see that I’m not there. And if that happens, I’ll never leave the house until I’m a hundred and twenty,” he said with a chuckle, remembering that his own parents were around one hundred themselves. They weren’t so old as to feel the call to give up their mortal affairs and walk east, over wind and zouree, to the deathless lands, but they certainly weren’t as spry as when they were in their eighties.

  His grandparents on the other hand, they must be nearing one hundred and seventy or so, and would feel the call any year now. But they’d retired west to the seashore and Aeden hadn’t heard from them in years. Good thing, too, he thought. Grandfather was worse than father, from everything the servants had told him.

  Noises from the hallway made them realize they’d overstayed their welcome. The sounds were different this time—urgent tones and stomping boots. Someone had realized the barracks had been breached.

  “I told you you damaged the lock! Someone saw it!” Aeden hissed.

  “It wasn’t my fault! You said you’d bring a key! You said you could steal your father’s!”

  “Shh!” Aeden waved at the torch in Priam’s hand, indicating for him to extinguish it. With the room bathed in darkness once more, the acrid smell of the still smoldering torch bit into Aeden’s nose.

  “They’ll smell that if they open the door and look in. We’ve got to get out of here. Follow me.”

  They waited at the door until the noises sounded somewhat more distant, and crept out into th
e dark hallway, this time with more urgency than before. Holding his hand out to his left he felt for the opening that would indicate the hallway that would lead to the exit, and beyond that, freedom. Or at least a warm bed.

  Torchlight, and shouting from ahead of them changed his mind. Grabbing Priam’s cloak in one fist, he turned and ran back down the hallway the direction they had come from with the other boy in tow. Passing the door to the swordmaster’s office, they raced around the curved hallway, which Aeden knew would eventually meet up with where they had just been—forming a loop that comprised the center of the building. Other minor hallways and offices jutted off from that loop, but if they could just avoid detection until they had completed the loop, all would be well.

  Flickering light ahead of them forced Aeden to reconsider his plan yet again. He stopped suddenly, and Priam jostled into him, causing his sword to clatter onto the floor again. Stooping to pick it up, he noticed a door off to their left. Voices from ahead of them mixed with the voices behind, and Aeden knew that their only way lie through that door. He darted over, pulling Priam behind him, grabbed the handle, swung the door wide and slipped inside.

  The room was lit.

  And occupied.

  “Well, I see that young Lord Rossam has graced us with his presence. To what do we owe the honor?” A young man, perhaps thirty, stood in the center of the room, flanked by two guardsman. His clothing and demeanor suggested a man of rank and arrogance, and the way his hand hovered over the hilt of his sword suggested he was itching for a fight.

  “Lord….” Aeden began, looking at the other man questioningly.

  “Bleak.” Came the cold reply. And Aeden recognized the source of the attitude. The elder Lord Bleak was the twentieth Duke of Elbeth, and was quite advanced in age, probably no more than five years away from feeling the call to the east. This was probably one of his youngest grandsons. Or great-grandsons. Aeden smirked inwardly—the career prospects from the man before him looked grim.

  “Ah yes, Lord Bleak. Just on some business. For my father.”

  A mocking sneer covered the other man’s face. “Surely,” he began with embellishment, “a lord so respected as your father would simply conduct his business during daylight hours.” His smile disappeared and his voice descended to a hiss. “I think you’re here up to no good.” His gaze passed to Priam, who, thankfully, had covered his face with his hood. “And who is your friend?”

  Aeden felt that Lord Bleak must not know Priam was there. As a commoner, if caught breaking into the barracks, even though he was with Aeden he’d be treated harshly. Too harshly.

  “Just a servant. Since I’m on my father’s business, he gave me all the tools at his disposal. That included several rather useless servants, so I brought one to help me.”

  Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Priam stiffen, ever so slightly. He knew the other boy was sensitive of his status, and hated being considered of lower class. But there was no way around it. Not this time.

  “And just what is this business?” The lord’s hand rested on the hilt of his sword. His eyes gleamed, and Aeden could tell he was itching for a duel, longing to put some higher ranked nobleman in his place. Aeden’s hand dropped to his own sword. The itch was contagious, it seemed.

  “None of your business.”

  “Everything that goes on here at this hour is my business. Lord Caldamon has placed me in charge of the night watch, and so I’m making it my business. Tell me now!”

  “I could, but I’d have to report back to my father that the younger Lord Bleak was prying into Lord Rossam’s affairs. And I don’t think he’d like that.” This last part Aeden emphasized and shook his head as he spoke. It had the desired effect. Lord Rossam’s reputation was well known, and Lord Bleak clearly knew what he was capable of.

  He stammered. “I … I don’t think that will be necessary. Still, you are trespassing on the property of the lord of the city. You will answer for that.”

  Aeden reached into his pocket. He froze when the other two men’s hands went to their swords, and so he proceeded more deliberately. Extracting a small purse of coins, he tossed it at their feet with a distinctive clink.

  “There is your answer. Take it, and tell no one I was here, and I will not tell Lord Rossam that I was hindered,” he said, looking at the other two guards squarely in the eyes. “If you don’t, well…” he shrugged, “Lord Rossam has been in quite a mood lately. We’ve already lost two servants this week.”

  Lord Bleak took a step forward. “Are you threatening me?”

  “Of course not. I’m just suggesting a profitable course of action for all involved. What are your thoughts, gentlemen?” He addressed this last part to the two guards, who looked at each other.

  One of them spoke. “He’s right, my lord. I don’t want to run afoul of Lord Rossam. If he sends his son on secret business, who are we to stop him? Especially with such a persuasive shiny argument there on the floor.” He eyed the bag greedily.

  Lord Bleak gripped the hilt of his sword even tighter. “Fine. Get out of my sight. But if I ever catch you again, I’ll report it to Lord Caldamon. Go!” he pointed to the door. Turning to the men he jabbed a finger at them. “And escort them out. Make sure they actually leave.”

  When the two guardsmen had shared the coins between the three of them, they followed the two boys through the door and past other confused-looking guards. At the entrance, Aeden bowed low to them.

  “And a fine evening to you two soldiers!”

  “Thank you, Lord Rossam. Regards to your father,” said one of them, nervously.

  How the men feared him, his father. Aeden feared him too, but it was mixed with something else. Love, he supposed. The man could be kind at times. Well, kind was not quite the right word. Generous, perhaps. Involved and demanding, which Aeden knew was motivated by a desire to see his son succeed, surely. And there was the fear. Fear at not knowing when the man would strike him next. Fear of being cast off into the priesthood to wallow with the other disinherited nobles for the rest of his life.

  But it didn’t compare to the fear he saw in his mother’s eyes when the man went on a rampage. He didn’t hurt her, not physically at least, but she feared for the servants. And her children: Aeden, and his younger sister Cassandra.

  The boys kept to the shadows on the way back to their houses—the Switchbacks lived in a seedier part of the city than the Rossam estate, but it was in the same direction. The moon overhead cast a white pall on the stone buildings, and the usually red iron window casings seemed black against the white stone.

  “You coming over tomorrow to practice? We’ve still got some time before the tournament,” said Aeden.

  “Yeah, but not till the afternoon. I’m supposed to meet someone in the morning.”

  Aeden glanced over at his friend, who had been uncharacteristically quiet since they left the barracks. “You? Meeting someone?”

  “Yes, me. It’s the master healer. He asked me to come by the clinic.”

  “Really? The master healer?” Aeden chuckled. “What would he want with you?”

  “Maybe to invite me to be a healer,” Priam shrugged, “or something.”

  “Father says they’re a bunch of sorcerers.” Aeden lowered his voice. “You’ve never … felt … anything, have you? I mean, like you had powers or something?”

  “No. But he wants to see me all the same.”

  Aeden nearly thought Priam was joking again, as the other boy was wont to do. It couldn’t register in his mind that someone of as high a stature as the master healer might want to see someone of Priam’s status over Aeden’s. Surely the old man was mistaken. Aeden made up his mind to appear gracious.

  “So, you’re going to go? Would you join them if he offered? People like father don’t like them, but the king seems to. And the lord of the city of Elbeth. They both give the society their public support. I’ve heard the priests don’t like that.”

  “Yeah, I can’t imagine they would. The priests do
n’t claim to have any power, but just do all those ritual things and solemn chanting and stuff. Seems pretty boring compared to the healers travelling the kingdom and helping people. The poor and commoners and all that.”

  “They heal nobles too. They healed my family during the plague here. I was a kid, but I remember the master healer himself putting a hand on my head and then saying I was clean. Father sure didn’t seem to mind them then, but I remember him grumbling about them after we walked away from the healer’s clinic.”

  The full moon had risen to its zenith in the sky, reminding Aeden how late it was, but his family’s estate loomed ahead at the end of the street. A solitary candle burned through the window of his father’s study, and he wondered if perhaps he had been discovered. Peering intently at the empty room, he could detect no motion. Surely his father had just left it burning accidentally. Or one of the servants forgot to make his rounds at the end of the day. He sincerely hoped it was not the second possibility. If Lord Rossam knew of a servant shirking his duty, well, it still pained him to think about the last time that happened.

  Priam peeled off down a side street and looked back to Aeden. “I’m off to my house. I have to get up pretty early.”

  “Hunting again?”

  “Yeah. Father said we need more skins to make me some boots and some new clothes. And he can sell the meat. Plus, he likes exploring the mountains. You know that—he’s brought back some pretty wicked looking things—ancient pieces of metal and stuff. The lord of the city pays him for anything interesting he can find.”

  “Ok, see you next week. Remember the pre-trials—don’t miss them,” Aeden said as Priam turned to jog back down the street.

  The other boy disappeared and Aeden approached his family’s sprawling estate. The main building, three stories tall, loomed over the street itself with only a small courtyard separating them, while the rear of the massive house looked over a larger courtyard complete with fountain, bathhouse, and several outbuildings for the servants and storehouses for the goods produced on the family’s farms and ranches scattered out past the city walls. As it was still early summer, the tenant farmers and ranchers had not brought in the Rossam’s share of the harvest yet, but come fall the rear of the estate would be bustling.