Deathknight

by Andrew J Offutt

  Deathknight

  Andrew J. Offutt

  © Andrew J. Offutt 1990

  Andrew J. Offutt has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

  First published in 1990 by Ace Books an imprint of The Berkley Publishing Group.

  This edition published in 2016 by Venture Press an imprint of Endeavour Press Ltd.

  To Christopher John Offutt, firstborn and writer.

  Table of Contents

  Dramatis Personae

  FALC

  2

  3

  4

  TWO

  2

  3

  THREE

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  FOUR

  2

  3

  FIVE

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  SIX

  2

  3

  4

  SEVEN

  2

  3

  4

  EIGHT

  2

  3

  4

  5

  NINE

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  2

  3

  4

  5

  TWELVE

  2

  EPILOGUE

  Dramatis Personae

  The Order Most Old

  the Master

  the High Brother

  Sir Ashalc

  Sir Ashamal of Mersarl

  Sir Ashax

  Chemis - monk at the High Temple

  Sir Chondaven of Ryar

  Sir (Pryor) Coineval

  Sir Falc of Risskor

  Sir Kaherevan

  Sir Pameris

  Sir Relashah the Gasser

  Sir Sench of Southradd

  Sir Senithal

  Sir Sijamal of Missentia

  Sir Vennashah

  *

  Holders

  Arisan of Secter

  Barakor of Missentia

  Chasmal of Lango

  Chazar, his son

  Daviloran of Cragview

  Daviloran, his nephew

  Faradox of Lango

  Mellil, his daughter

  Hanliven of Ryar

  Havenden of Kem

  Kaladen of Missentia

  Kinneven of Lock

  Kinnemil, his daughter

  Minndeven of Ryar

  Stavishen of Lock

  Synaven, Arlord of Zain

  *

  Historical

  Bazarga Redstar

  Jalan - a soldier

  Sai MaSarlis – Emperor

  Sar Sarlis – Conqueror

  Sath Firedrake - Liberator

  Shardanis – Emperor

  Sharsarlis – Emperor

  *

  Others

  Alazhar - Housechief of Chasmal Holding

  Altmer - Prefect of Chasmal Holding

  Arle - agent of Chasmal

  Baysh - Housechief of Faradox Holding

  Sir Bellenevin, Morazain

  Chalan - peacekeeper at Daviloran Holding

  Colax - an innkeeper

  Corunden - an innkeeper

  Ezalil - an ajmil

  Garsh - peacekeeper at Kinneven Holding

  Jinnery - a farmer of Zain

  Jorgen - Prefect of Kinneven Holding

  Mandehal

  Parshann - a farmer of Juliara

  Querry - a farmer of Zain

  Querryson Chalis - his son

  Sak - rejected by the O.M.O.

  Shalderanis – “Emperor”

  Salih - an ajmil

  Sarminen - peacekeeper at Daviloran Holding

  Sendaven - rejected by the O.M.O.

  Sereah - an ajmil

  Shar - Prefect of Faradox Holding

  Simayil - an ajmil

  Sulah - an ajmil

  “In each ending there is a beginning”

  — ancient Sijese saying

  *

  “In the beginning is the seed of the end.”

  — Sath Firedrake’s addition

  FALC

  He drew rein when his mount topped the final rise on the Old Road and he had first sight of the walls of Lango-by-the-Sea. While he sat gazing down at the city, he stripped off soiled tan gloves and the long, white derlin. Cut full, almost voluminous, the hooded sun-robe buttoned down the front. The sleeves were long and full and the hood designed as protection from dust-and sandstorms: it ran to a point and could be drawn over the head so as to cover the wearer’s face completely.

  He drew it off over his head without disturbing the buttons. He bundled and folded it while his mount, Harr, stood patiently. His rider, having uncovered clothing of unrelieved black, felt no movement. With meticulous neatness he packed the derlin away in a knapsack of black leather, one of three hung on his mount. Knapsacks, bedroll, harness and canteen were all of black with the merest touches of maroon. He drew on gauntlets of leather black as the wings of a crawk, with a narrow border of maroon.

  He rode down to rose-walled Lango with his eyes of dark, dark blue slitted against those mites called anjoni that danced before his face. The sun was low over the ocean to the east and its late afternoon rays painted buildings gold and orange amid pools of purple shadow. With the scent of the sea in his nostrils he began the “Song of the Omo,” in the singsong murmur that was as close as he could come to singing:

  Oh how I love the open road!

  The sky above sunlit with gold!

  Honour lies ahead on this long ribbon of dust —

  O let me but ride the open road!

  Oh how I hate the falling rain,

  For I am not a field of grain!

  Weary buttocks tonight and ever more mistrust;

  Oh you may have this rearward pain!

  Oh how I love my slith’ry st —

  Nearing the city walls, he broke off and slid into a repetition of the second verse of “Destiny Wears a Black Cloak,” in the same muttery singsong:

  Pitfalls and treachery and call of lechery!

  How these conspire to firm my desire

  To seek a different road!

  Ashah accept me!

  Ashah guide me!

  Ashah deliver me;

  Sath inspire me!

  *

  The gatekeepers heard. At sight of his clothing and gear, they opened for him without question or comment. The black-clad man rode past just as silently so that they fancied they heard even the faint creak of his leather mailcoat. His mount rolled yellow eyes at them. They saw him send forth his tongue to take an insect out of the air.

  Harr paced through the city, noisy as any city and all cities, and as full of colour and brightness, bustle, and occasional beauty amid ugliness. He did see evidences of damage from the quake a couple of weeks ago, which had been more severe than usual. Here and there work parties laboured at repairs. People glanced at Harr’s rider and stayed out of his way. Most looked away as well, although a few stared. The traveller’s face — all of him that was unclothed, though it was bearded and moustached — was unusually dark even on Sij, but that was not the reason people stared or looked affectedly away. He was abundantly accustomed to it by now and it was easy for him to appear not to notice. Almost, he did not.

  He had been to this eastern coastal city before, and knew his way to the House of Chasmal. He directed Harr there at the plod, with care for others in the streets. Harr knew every whim and knee-pressure and rein-twitch of his master, as well as six vocal commands, two whistles, and his
own name — which his master had chosen because in time of trouble it could be bellowed out in one breath.

  They paced carefully around workmen repairing a ragged crack in the street. The result of a smallish afterquake, Falc assumed, seeing no damage to the buildings here.

  A little deeper into Lango he halted without a sound or the sign of a smile while a panicky mother hustled her child from his path. Like nearly every woman of Lango, she had surrounded her deep blue eyes with a busy design in red-brown cvarm, the same dye that so darkened her nails. Harr availed himself of that opportunity to take six or eight ants off a drainpipe, with one whip of his tongue.

  Another time the traveller drew up rather sharply because of the cart emerging from a blind cross-street. The driver was having trouble with his dray-beast. He showed nervousness, and made some obeisance, and looked quite helplessly apologetic in his faded, dusty clothing. All the while, he jiggled and slapped his reins and said nasty things to the recalcitrant beast. It, meanwhile, showed interest in Harr.

  The interest was not mutual. Harr was a war-darg, and a consummately well-trained one at that. Harr was a rather austere and ascetic beast, if such attributes could be said to be possessed by a darg.

  A party of three peacemen — watchmen or police employed by the city’s ruling Council of Holders — drew up on the far side of the troubled carter. They made faces and stood in such ways as to show contempt while making an elaborate display of patience. Their uniforms were bright green with blue; their metal was polished to high gleam. The traveller said nothing and showed nothing, recognising in this uniformed trio the attitude of the hired help of the powerful. That provided opportunity and suggested action.

  He did not resist the temptation. With a quiet word to Harr, he swung down onto the cobbles.

  The cart’s driver looked fearful as the dark man paced toward him, full black cloak a live thing about him. The buckle of his weapons belt provided the only colour in his sombre garments. A carnelian the size of his palm without the digits was intagliated with the snarling head of a writh.

  Keeping his gaze fixed on that buckle, the carter made no move to defend or to flee. He did make a sign, pressing the first and middle finger of one hand together and drawing them up the centre of his tunicked chest. On dull old quiet boots of black, the traveller turned so as to come up alongside the dray-darg’s blinkered head from the rear. He muttered a word or three just before he slid all three fingers under the beast’s halter, immediately back of the blinder. A slight tug of the black-gloved hand brought a complaining hiss from the darg before it allowed itself to be set in motion. The cart, piled with speckled melons, clatter-rumbled across the intersection. Its driver appeared to be in a semi-shock of relief.

  At the last moment he thought to make the offer: “Do have yourself a melon, good Sir Knight of the Order!”

  “Wi’ thanks,” the traveller said in a good voice, and released the darg’s halter.

  The cart rumbled by. As its tailgate passed, the traveller easily plucked out a melon, without choosing. They all looked good, head-sized red-orange fruits speckled with yellow. He stepped away holding it against his chest with his left hand. The cart rolled on down the narrower side street. The traveller’s long cloak, cut so that its hem was concavely arched between two points, swirled like the wings of a gigantic crawk as he turned. He strode back to his mount, hardly pausing to direct an abbreviated bow to the three peacemen.

  They stood staring in open-mouthed silence. This, from a Deathknight!

  The dark man swung into Harr’s saddle one-handed, getting his cloak’s skirt out of the way with a gesture made unconscious by long repetition. None of the three peacemen or the two Langomen who had come along and paused to watch saw him move his legs or gauntleted hands or heard him speak, but the charcoal-and-maroon-equipped darg started forward the instant his master’s buttocks touched the saddle.

  “Sir Omo,” the leader of the police trio said in greeting, and his hand was nowhere near the neck of his holstered electric pistol.

  The traveller, having accorded them that brief bow previously, took the words as acknowledgment only and said nothing. Harr paced on.

  His dark rider would far rather be called omo than Deathknight. Over two hundred years had passed since the founding of the Order Most Old. O.M.O. had become OMO and its black-swathed servants, the Knights of Ashah, were often called by those initials. This omo rode on through the city’s noise, and was stared at and avoided. He saw only three others who were mounted, and none others who appeared to be from outside Lango’s walls. The sun was riding the eastern horizon with the dull glow of old gold when he reached another wall and high gate.

  This wall was stuccoed in an off-white now gilded by the setting sun. Pale green paint divided the wall into wedge-shaped panels pointing alternately up and down. The points of the green-painted sections were upward. Black wood and black iron barred the red gate, which was visibly thick. While the tower to the right of the gate appeared empty, the traveller knew that it was not. He sat his darg, looking up at the tower. A man stepped from it into view atop the wall. He wore green and green and brass, with brown leathers. A soft, side-flopping cap of green leather rode his shoulder-length hair, rather than a helmet. The hair was of such a dark blue that it appeared almost black. His crossbow was not wound. He said nothing, but only stood gazing down, waiting for the dark man to speak.

  He did: “I am Falc of Risskor, member of the Order Most Old and years-long Contracted with Holder Kinneven of Lock in Juliara. He sends by me a message to your lord, whose blood I hope is swift and warm.”

  “Sir Omo,” the sentry acknowledged with a little inclining of his head, and gestured to someone below him. “Open for Falc of Risskor, Deathknight of the Order and bearing message for Holder Chasmal.”

  His “Deathknight of the Order” was both pretentious and redundant, but the traveller said and showed nothing. He was sure that no insult was intended. People did like to say the words! That did not dissuade the Sons of Ashah from wishing uncharitable things to him who had first uttered the unfortunate word “Deathknight.”

  The gate opened. Falc of Risskor, O. M. O., rode into the courtyard of the House of Chasmal of Lango. Soon one of Chasmal’s green-collared, green-headbanded slaves, delighted with the melon presented him and charmed with the information that Harr would appreciate the seeds and rind, was prepared to lead Harr away to good care. The youth turned back.

  “Wi’ respectful abjections, S’r Deathknight... might one ask why such a noble war-darg bears the name of a blossom?”

  “Ah,” Falc said, “you are from over around Morazain and Shoe Lake, then. But hush; he does not know his name is also a small shadeflower. Perhaps his master has a sense of humour, and perhaps it is a word chosen because it is easy for a dutiful darg to recognise.”

  “Ahhh!” The young man smiled. “He knows his name and responds to it, then!”

  To that the dark man said nothing, and Harr was led away by a “boy” who wondered if it were true that this shivery, midnight-clad man from the farthest south never smiled. That could not be asked, with or without “respectful abjections.” And how had he known where the groom was from?

  Falc stood looking after them, wearing a whimsical expression as he watched Harr’s lazily carried tail. He and the darg had been together for years, and trusted each other. Never mind that a harr was a lovely little blossom of spring, in shades of pink or nursery fulve with its stamen centered in black. Harr did not know the meaning of his name, or his master’s strange sense of humour. To the darg the sound “Harr” meant “This Self,” and he responded instantly. Further, Harr had no compunctions about charging and chewing men and other living things including dargs ridden by enemies of his master; indeed, like his master, Harr enjoyed it.

  As for the boy; no matter where they moved or were moved and no matter how long they remained there, people from the Morazain/Shoe Lake area never quite lost that odd lengthening of the short a sound
.

  Falc, carrying one fold-top knapsack battened with thong, entered the House of Chasmal. Patiently he awaited the fetching of Chasmal’s Housechief.

  The Housechief came. His medallion of office shifted importantly on the chest of his green robe with his movements. No big man at all was this Alazhar, and with a bit more hair at cheeks and chin than above, where his dome shone like a copper skullcap before the receding line of still-blue hair. He wore three rings, one on each finger of his left hand. The gold signet was ostentatiously huge and shiny.

  “Falc of the Order Most Old greets the honourable Housechief Alazhar. My Contractor, Holder Kinneven of Lock in Juliara, has sent me with a message to your lord, whose blood I hope is swift and warm.”

  Alazhar, who was familiar with Falc from three previous visits over several years, heard out the formality and nodded. “And yours, Sir Falc of Risskor. Holder Chasmal will be occupied for some hours, and then will surely be glad to welcome and hear Sir Falc. Holder Kinneven’s blood is swift and warm?”

  “He had no complaint when I departed Lock.”

  “Good, good. What may we supply? Wine or beer; a snack, perhap? Bathwater, a companion?”

  “Nothing of food or wine. I would not reject a horn of beer and a bath in private, if you could arrange, and perhaps a companion after — depending on your lord’s pleasure and availability.”

  “I fear it may be a matter of some hours, Sir Omo. Do come.”

  Soon servants had been importantly dispatched to fetch beer and hot water, and Falc was remarking that he had not previously seen this chamber to which Alazhar led him.

  “Your memory impresses,” the Housechief said. “It is best for the bath in private your honoured Order requires.”

  “M’thanks, Alazhar.”

  He accepted a carved rhyton from the whisper-footed ajmil who had fetched it, but politely did not drink while she and Alazhar were present. With a querying look Alazhar indicated the young slave who, undismissed, stood gazing at the floor before her toes; Falc shrugged, signifying an unvehement negative. Alazhar nodded his understanding.

  “Get hence,” he said, and the ajmil departed without a glance at the men.