Vengeance of Hope

by P J Berman

  It isn’t exactly glamorous, but it will have to do, Silrith thought as she looked around inside. The room was small and fairly dark, with a curtain across the doorway and the furnace outside gave away that this would normally have been inhabited by the blacksmith. As many of the tools as possible had been moved out of the room and on the far right, where normally the end of the room would be open, another curtain had been hung to give her some privacy.

  She wasn’t sure why her uncle was taking this down-to-earth approach, but decided that there may someone in the inner ward that he thought she needed to impress with a grand and regal entrance and it just wouldn’t do for her to be covered in mud, sweat and blood. If that was the case, this was certainly the lesser of two evils and she was intelligent enough not to complain.

  In the centre of the room was a large bucket of water and while the guard waited outside, one of the maids helped Silrith strip off her clothes and the other came in with another bucket of water, which had been on the fire just long enough for it to be mildly warm.

  As she stepped into the first bucket, finding with relief that it too had been heated to a comfortable temperature, it seemed to Silrith that every single muscle in her body ached like nothing she had ever experienced before. The warm water on her skin felt exquisite as it was slowly poured over her. After she had finished bathing and drying herself, one of the girls brought her some replacement sandals and a new dress to wear; orange in colour, with white under-trousers, which they helped Silrith put on before assisting her to arrange her hair, then leading their new mistress back to her horse.

  Moments later she was re-joined by Gasbron and the other men. A mounted guard led them to the open Alyredd Gate; the horses’ hooves clattering against the stone floor. As those in front moved aside to form a guard-of-honour, Silrith and Gasbron lead the rest of the column into the courtyard at a canter. Having all of them come through the Alyredd Gate mounted on powerful steeds added to the ceremony. Gasbron had told her that in reality, the men had left the citadel on foot. It had been decided beforehand that having horses to tether up in the forest would add to the possibility of the ambush being spotted.

  As they dismounted, Silrith looked around her approvingly. She saw that there were a fair number of people there to greet her, though many of them were the retinue of the Alyredds and their various guests. The heavily bearded Lord Yathrud stood out from all others though. He wore a tunic so yellow it was almost a shining gold, with blue patterns around the neck that matched the colour of his cloak. As she walked over to him, beaming, she could see that Yathrud’s face was full of joy.

  ‘Uncle,’ she said, bowing her head slightly. But on impulse she cast all formality aside, throwing her arms around him and holding him tightly to her. He embraced her and gave an affectionate laugh.

  ‘I cannot begin to describe my relief at seeing that you are safe, my Queen,’ he said as they parted. She had thought to put on some façade of unshakable strength. Yet the mere sight of her adored uncle had undone all of that. She didn’t care that this show of affection might look unseemly. Who were all these people to judge her behaviour after what had happened to her in recent days? Her father was dead, she had been arrested and her dear Lady’s maid executed, both accused of his murder. Then, after having to walk most of the length of the Kingdom, she’d had to kill a man for the first time when Gasbron’s men had saved her. Yet she knew she’d have to kill many more if she was to stand a chance of defeating Jostan, though the thought disgusted her.

  To the underworld with anyone who tried to criticise her show of emotion. This was who she really was and she wanted to savour it, before the coming war turned her into someone different. Everyone in the north that she thought she could trust had either betrayed her or had been too cowardly to support her. She had courage, but what she needed now was hope. Yathrud’s intervention gave her that hope and out of love for his niece, not for money or some sense of reluctant duty. Such people were hard to find. As the formality of the situation returned, Silrith gathered herself.

  ‘My Queen,’ Yathrud said with a smile. Stiffly he bent down on one knee, followed by all those surrounding them; his head still bowed so that it was almost hidden from view by his long grey hair. ‘It is so wonderful to see you alive, after your predicament. If I may, I would like to take this opportunity to pledge formally and publicly my allegiance and that of my soldiers and allies, to your cause, my Queen, to fight for you and show all the world that you are the rightful Queen of Bennvika. Will you bestow this honour upon us?’

  ‘Arise, uncle,’ Silrith told him cheerfully and she deliberately continued in a voice that could be heard by all. ‘It is I who should be honoured, to have such loyal and illustrious friends who would risk all to support me.’

  She held out her left hand, which Yathrud took and kissed, before getting back to his feet, again followed by the others.

  ‘And my good cousin Bezekarl,’ Silrith exclaimed as she turned to the mop-haired teenager next to Yathrud.

  ‘My Queen,’ he bowed, blushing slightly.

  ‘Oh less of that cousin,’ Silrith said, laughing lightly, taking his hands in hers and looking into his eyes ‘We’re still family remember. It’s been too long.’

  Yathrud ushered her towards the three men next to Bezekarl.

  ‘And may I introduce you to our guests, who have rallied to your cause. First, the Chief of the Hentani tribe, Hojorak, son of Vorad, and Blavak, his interpreter.’ Hojorak was a huge man, so much so that Silrith had to take a slight step back to get a full view of him.

  Broad as well as tall, he had slanted eyes and his round face was decorated with swirling blue tattoos. He had long black hair and a heavily bearded chin, while he wore a brown tunic and trousers with a similarly coloured jacket. With this, he wore a pair of boots and a large wolf-fur hat. His clothes were made of woven hemp and his boots from leather, while all were lined with goatskin for insulation – and who could fail to notice the long scimitar strapped to his belt.

  Despite his imposing image, to Silrith’s eye, there was little to mark him out as a man of rank at first look. She decided the quality of the sword and the goatskin must be the giveaway when compared to many of his people. Blavak, on the other hand, was much shorter and slighter in build than his master, with a somehow more expressive demeanour, Silrith sensed.

  ‘May I express my gratitude for your support, Chief Hojorak?’ Silrith began as Blavak immediately started translating. ‘I only wish I could be more certain that it will be worth your while. How many warriors can you supply?’

  ‘Two thousand, your Grace,’ Blavak said proudly after conferring briefly with his master. ‘One hundred and fifty of our best arrived with us, but my master says that his younger brother Prince Kivojo is marching here with the main force as we speak and is expected within two to three days.’

  ‘It warms my heart to hear news of this kind from such a renowned warrior as yourself, Chief Hojorak.’ Silrith knew that flattery of such a man couldn’t do any harm in building friendships.

  ‘And this is Prince Shappa of Etrovansia,’ Yathrud said. Silrith had to catch her breath as she laid eyes on the tall, muscular Prince, with his wavy hair and piercing dark eyes, wearing his shining chain mail tunic and ceremonial armour.

  ‘Your Grace,’ he said coyly, yet somehow flirtatiously, as he kissed her hand, never taking his eyes off hers.

  ‘Noble Prince,’ she replied, bowing her head slightly in greeting. They had met, but not since they were children, so in a sense, it was very much like meeting for the first time. ‘What brings you here? I had heard there were some rather major events within your family back at home.’

  Shappa chuckled, rolling his eyes at his own misfortune.

  ‘Yes, I seem to have been banished. Except, no, what did they call it? I was ordered to leave voluntarily – yes that was the diplomatic line. Just because my brother, wanting to take the crown for himself, convinced my father that I was plotting against him and th
e senile old fool believed him.’

  ‘It seems that you and I have something in common in that regard,’ Silrith said.

  ‘And that’s just the beginning of our common ground, I hope,’ Shappa jested daringly, causing Silrith to raise her eyebrows. She was surprised by his familiarity, yet she couldn’t deny that she appreciated it.

  ‘Anyway,’ Shappa continued. ‘That explains my presence here, as well as that of my five hundred men, my ten warships and their respective crews. My father was too old and my brother too wrapped up in his own affairs at court to realise that there were some who are still loyal to me and to my late mother’s family. Since many of my troops have served under me as their Prince and Duke for the past few years, all it took was for me to allow them to bring their families and they just seem to have ‘forgotten’ to turn back.’

  ‘If only I’d had the luxury of that sort of loyalty in the north,’ Silrith mused ruefully. ‘But,’ she said, her face lightening again. ‘What I see here in the south restores my confidence in my subjects. If we can all stand together, we can show this Kingdom the real truth of how Jostan claimed the throne and perhaps I may even get the chance to assist in the solving of your problem also.’

  Chapter 7

  KRIGANHEIM, BENNVIKA

  On the day following Zethun Maysith’s visit to the tavern to address the drinking customers, the streets were bustling with people. The army recruiters were out knocking on the doors of houses, surveying the quality of all the young and middle-aged men and women they could find, though in truth they would take anyone who could run while carrying a weapon. As they did, they quoted the King’s call to arms and supplied crude weapons to those who weren’t able to produce a better one from within their own household.

  Most of the recruiters were Invicturions, or were army scribes and clerks, or held one of a variety of other positions that required them to be literate. They would write down the name of each person they recruited and the man or woman would write their mark next to their name. From this point, they were honour-bound to fight, though as Jithrae soon found, the notion of the men and women themselves having any choice in this was little more than a myth.

  Still, he had joined with no further hesitations after his conversation with Naivard. Naivard himself, however, as expected, was declared ineligible through a combination of his age and his position as magistrate’s clerk. He would be needed to help keep order in the city. The army was not due to assemble for a few days yet, so that gave Jithrae a chance to go with Naivard to the assembly area, to witness the public assembly there.

  In the middle of the city centre, there was a crudely constructed, but sturdy wooden stage topped by eleven chairs arranged in a crescent shape, facing the audience. The speaker sat in the middle chair, flanked by the ten Demokroi, of whom Jithrae and Naivard could see that Zethun Maysith was seated on the far left.

  As Zethun waited in his wooden chair, the speaker stood and proceeded with the formalities of welcoming the audience to the assembly, introducing the Demokroi and explaining the rules for the benefit of those who hadn’t attended before. The audience’s voting was based on an ‘aye/nay’ system, the result which could be overturned either way by any individual Demokroi, while any motions carried were subject to the King’s approval before being put into practice.

  But first, there was one further formality, which consisted of the speaker asking the Demokroi if the law courts, markets, granaries and other public buildings could be opened. In reality, this was just an archaic tradition from a bygone age, as many of these places were already open at this time, but technically if any Demokroi said ‘no’ they would have to be closed until further notice.

  However, this stage passed without event and with this done, the speaker sat down as he gave permission for the Demokroi to address the crowd one by one, working from left to right, thus allowing Zethun to make the first speech.

  Like the nine other Demokroi, he wore a brown tunic and breeches, as this was a colour commonly associated with the lower classes and therefore had become the traditional uniform of a rank designed to help them – in theory. The speaker, in stark contrast, was rather more grandly dressed in purple robes. As he stood, Zethun briefly composed himself, trying to cover his nerves and took a deep lungful of air.

  ‘It is indeed an honour to make the opening speech in this, our first assembly under the reign of our new King, who as you all know, this very morning began putting into action his plan to raise an army to march on the Hentani. Now, this is a pre-emptive strike, designed to stop a rebellion before it starts. It is not my place to question the King’s reasoning in this, but what is not being addressed is that you, the people of this Kingdom, have another, greater enemy. This army is being formed to quash any chance of a full-scale rebellion from a conquered people, who have lived peacefully under Bennvikan rule for some years now. It is not the Hentani whom our families need protecting from. It is not they who steal our lands. It is not they who abduct our wives, sons and daughters.’

  ‘No,’ shouted a middle-aged man in the centre of the crowd, as others began to take up the same reply.

  ‘No,’ Zethun continued. ‘Instead, it is our own nobles. Our Governors and the other Congressors.’

  ‘Damned Cons,’ someone shouted. This was a common enough term to describe the members of the Congressate.

  ‘A most apt description,’ said Zethun. ‘They try to lull you into a false sense of security by telling you that this is simply what they get in return for allowing you to live on the land that they have been appointed to govern. They tell you that you should be thankful for what you have. But how can you be thankful as you helplessly watch your own family starve, all the time knowing that some Lord is growing fat on your taxes and an ever-growing share of your crops?’

  Another tirade of anti-nobility shouts erupted from the crowd as the other Demokroi and the speaker shifted uncomfortably in their seats, but Zethun wasn’t finished yet.

  ‘This has to stop and it has to stop now. It has always been the case in this Kingdom that there is some land that belongs to no Lord and is for the use by the common people, yet this fine tradition is now threatened. That is why I propose that the very first law to be put to the vote at this assembly is one that states that each nobleman must relinquish every inch of land that they have stolen from the common people and that their personal lands will be limited to those that they gained through appointment, or inherited by birthright, but not what they subsequently stole. Furthermore, I move that this new law should state that the amount of your crops to be taken by your local Lord should be dropped back to the original regulation of one-tenth of what is grown, so that it may give your families a fairer chance of survival.’

  A loud cheer went up and Zethun turned and bowed his head slightly to the speaker, before sitting back down. The speaker stood.

  ‘The notion has been proposed. Now let it be put to the test,’ he stated grandly.

  ‘All those against say nay,’

  Silence. Everyone in the crowd looked around nervously. This was unprecedented, but it was true, there had been no nay. For tradition’s sake, the speaker completed the vote in the proper form.

  ‘All those in favour say aye,’

  ‘Aye!’

  Hundreds of voices erupted in unison.

  The speaker then turned to the ten Demokroi, stating the same quotation. Zethun couldn’t believe his luck when nobody vetoed to reverse the outcome. In fact, their sheer readiness to comply with Zethun’s proposal suggested that perhaps they had been intimidated by the partisan quality of the day’s audience. Now they simply awaited the King’s approval.

  A few days later, the royal army had been fully assembled. Knowing the importance of setting off in style and making a statement of strength, Jostan had his troops arranged in a guard-of-honour formation. They reached from the forum outside the Congressate Hall, where Jostan now stood, through the thronging streets of Kriganheim, to the city gate, where the Kriganh
eim Divisios awaited him with their gleaming armour, their colourful rectangular shields and their lightweight, javelin-like spears. This was with the exception of the heavy cavalry, who were acting as his mounted escort.

  He wore a red tunic today; a conscious reference to the Bennvikan style. In politics, image was everything, even if it was designed to mislead. Even a fleeting tip of the hat to local customs could be enough for him to pave the way for a longer-term Verusantian infiltration of the Bennvikan culture he ultimately hoped to supplant. It would be Verusantian robes for the campaign itself. For now though, along with the Bennvikan tunic, he wore breeches and a cape. These were the same shade of scarlet as the rest of his attire and the cape was decorated with a golden lining, as was his red flat hat with white feathers on one side. His attire made it clear that he was there to command and not to fight, though of course he still carried an ornate gold-hilted sword on the side of his belt. He looked forward to the time after his coronation when he could perfect the image by replacing the hat with his crown.

  His appearance was in stark contrast to the soldiers around him; the Bennvikan flag adorning the centre section of the Divisiomen’s shields and the fabric that covered their mounts’ flanks. Against a blood red background, it depicted a golden six-armed King, each hand holding a star which represented a province, symbolising the idea that the King is the force that holds the six provinces together in one Kingdom. When emblazoned on their shields, this was sandwiched between two horizontal green stripes, the colour of the Divisios. Their emerald capes just added to their dramatic appearance.

  These troops were joined in the forum by four hundred and fifty of Jostan’s own spear-carrying Verusantian Lance Guardsmen, who had formed up in the forum’s centre in their striking jet-black armour and their full-faced helmets and whose leader, Ostagantus Gormaris, continued to stand guarding Jostan’s back, as he always did.