Regardless of how the battle played out today, every man in the ring would be called upon to sacrifice some portion of his life.
Knowing all this, Orden felt gratified when his captain bent low at the waist, smiling, and said, "I would be pleased to serve with you, if you would have me in this ring."
"Thank you," Orden said, "but you'll have to miss this opportunity to waste your life. Duty calls you elsewhere."
Captain Stroecker turned smartly and left the great hall. Orden followed him out to gather his troops for battle.
Already his captains had set men on the walls. Artillerymen had pushed the catapults out from beneath the protective enclosures in the towers above the gates, had begun firing, testing their ranges in the dark. It was a poor time for such tests, but Orden did not know if they'd ever get a chance to test the catapults in daylight.
At that moment, a horn sounded in the western hills, off toward the road from Castle Dreis.
Orden smiled grimly. So, he thought, the Earl comes at last, hoping for a share of the treasure.
* * *
Chapter 34
THE RUNNING MAN
In Khuram it is said that a running man with a knife can kill two thousand men in a single night. Borenson worked faster than that, but then he was a force soldier, and he carried a knife in each hand.
He did not think about what he did, did not watch the quivering of his victims or listen to the thrash of limbs or gurgle of blood. For most of the night, he hurried through the job in a mindless horror.
Three hours after he entered the Dedicates' Keep, he finished the deed. It was inevitable that some of the Dedicates woke and fought him. It was inevitable that some women he killed were beautiful, and some men were young and should have had full lives before them. It was inevitable that no matter how hard he tried to block the memories of their faces from his mind, moments would come that he knew he'd never forget: a blind woman clutching at his surcoat, begging him to wait; the smile of a drinking companion from the hunts, Captain Derrow, who bid him a final goodbye with a knowing wink.
Halfway through the deed, Borenson recognized that this was wanted of him, that Raj Ahten had left the Dedicates unguarded knowing they would be killed. He had no compassion for these people, valued them not at all.
Let friend dispose of friend, brother raise knife against brother. Let the nations of the North be torn asunder. That was what Raj Ahten wanted, and Borenson knew that even as he slaughtered these innocents, he had become a tool in Raj Ahten's hand.
Leaving the Dedicates totally unguarded was not necessary. Four or five good men could have provided some protection. Could the monster take such delight in this?
Borenson felt his mind tear open like a seeping wound, every moment became a pain. Yet it was his duty to obey his lord without question. His duty to kill these people, and even as he revolted at the slaughter, he found himself wondering time and time again, Have I killed them all? Have I fulfilled my duty? Is this all, or has Raj Ahten hidden some of them?
For if he could not reach the vectors that Raj Ahten had taken, Borenson needed to kill every Dedicate who fed Raj Ahten's power.
Thus, when he finally unlocked the portcullis to the keep, blood covered Borenson from helm to boot.
He walked into Market Street, dropped his knives to the pavement, then stood for a long time, letting rain wash over his face, letting it wash over his hands. The coldness of it felt good, but during the past hours the blood had clotted in gobbets. A little rainwater would not wash it free.
A fey mood took Borenson. He no longer wanted to be a soldier for Orden, or for any king. His helm felt too constraining, as if it would crush his head, it hurt so. He threw it to the ground so that it rattled and clattered as it rolled along the paving stones, down the street.
Then he walked out of Castle Sylvarresta.
No one stopped him. Only a pitiful guard had been set.
When he reached the city gate, the young fellow on guard took one look at his blood-covered face and fell back, crying, raising his index finger and the thumb as a ward against ghosts.
Borenson shouted a cry that rang from the walls, then ran out into the rain, across the burned fields toward the distant copse where he'd hidden his horse.
In the darkness and rain, a half-dozen nomen with long spears made the mistake of jumping him. They came rushing toward him in a little vale, leaping from the blackened earth like wild things, running forward with their longspears.
Their red eyes nearly glowed in the darkness, and their thick manes made them look somehow wolfish. They snarled and loped forward on short legs, sometimes putting a knuckle to the ground.
For a moment, Borenson considered letting them kill him.
But instantly an image of Myrrima formed in his mind: her silk dress the color of clouds, the mother-of-pearl combs in her dark hair. He recalled the smell of her, the sound of her laugh when he'd kissed her roughly outside her little cottage.
He needed her now, and saw the nomen as mere extensions of Raj Ahten. They were his agents. He'd brought them here to kill, and though Borenson's men had driven and scattered the nomen through the hills, they would become a scourge on this land for months.
It did not matter to Raj Ahten. The nomen would do his will as they sought to feed on human flesh. They would do all the killing he'd asked, but they'd take the weak first--the children from cradles, the women at their wash.
The first noman rushed Borenson, hurled its spear at close range, so that the stone blade shattered against Borenson's mail.
Quick as a snake, Borenson drew the battle-axe at his hip, began swinging.
He was a force warrior to be reckoned with. He cleaved the arm off one noman, spun and hit another full in the chest.
He began smiling as he did so, considered each move in the battle. It was not enough to kill the nomen; he wanted to do it well, to turn the battle into a dance, a work of art. When one noman rushed him, Borenson slammed his left mailed fist into its fangs, then grabbed its tongue and pulled.
Another tried to run. Borenson gauged its pace, watched the bobbing of its upright ears, and threw his axe with all his might. It was not enough to split the beast's skull; he wanted to do it perfectly, to hit the target just so, so the bone would make that splitting noise and part like a melon.
The noman went down. Only two stood, rushing him as a pair, spears ready. Without his endowments of sight, Borenson would never have been able to evade those black spears.
As the nomen lunged, Borenson simply slapped the speartips away, so the jabs went wide, then he grabbed a spear, launched himself forward and spun, impaling both beasts through the navel.
Both nomen stood in shock, pinned together.
When he finished, Borenson stepped back and observed the nomen. They knew they would die. They couldn't heal from such a wound. The creature in back fainted, dragging its companion to its knees.
Borenson walked on, considered the way he'd fought, the precise movements. His deed had been as close to poetry or dance as he could achieve.
He began laughing, chuckling a throaty rumble, for this was the way war should have been--men fighting for their lives. A good man struggling to protect home and family.
The skirmish itself somehow seemed more a balm for his troubles than the rain. Borenson retrieved his axe and helm and hurried to his horse, running through the downpour.
I will not wash these hands, he told himself. I will not wash my face, until I stand before my prince and my king again, so they can see what they have done.
Thus Borenson took horse and began racing through the darkness. Four miles down the road east of town, he found a dead knight of Orden, took the man's lance.
His mount could not equal Gaborn's fine hunter. But the road was clear, if somewhat muddy, and on a night like this, with rain to cool them, Borenson's horse could run forever.
So Borenson raced over the hills until the rain stopped and the clouds dispelled and stars shone bright
and clean.
He'd planned to head to Longmont. But when the road branched both east and south, the fey mood was still on him, and he suddenly turned east, toward Bannisferre.
Dawn found him riding over green fields that held no sign of war, through vineyards twenty miles north of Bannisferre where young women stooped to fill baskets of ripe grapes.
He stopped in such a field and ate, found the grapes dripping with water from the night's rain; they tasted as succulent as the first grape must have tasted to the first man who ate it.
The river here was wide, a broad silver ribbon gleaming beneath the green fields. Borenson had thought last night to leave himself bloody, but now he did not want Myrrima to see him this way, to ever guess what he'd done.
He went down to the river and swam, naked, unmindful of the pig farmers who herded animals past on the road.
When the sun dried him, Borenson put on his armor, but threw his bloodied surcoat into the water, letting the river carry away the image of the green knight on the blue field.
Surely, he thought, Raj Ahten's troops have reached Longmont. I'm so far behind them, I'm too late to join the battle. In truth, he no longer cared. No matter what the outcome at Longmont, he planned to renounce his lord.
In assassinating innocent Dedicates, men and women who had committed no crime but that of loving a good and decent king, Borenson had done more than any master had a right to ask. So now he'd renounce his vows to Orden, become a Knight Equitable. Of his own free will he'd fight as he deemed best.
Borenson went on to a pear tree beside an abandoned farm, and climbed, taking the fattest pears from the top--same for himself, some for Myrrima and her family.
From the treetop he saw something interesting: over a rise lay deep pools with steep sides beneath a grove of willow trees, pools as blue as the sky. Yellow willow leaves had fallen into water in great drifts, floating over the surface. But also on the pools were roses bobbing, red and white.
A wizard lives there, Borenson realized, dully. A water wizard, and people have thrown roses into the water, seeking its blessings.
He climbed quickly down from the tree, ran over the rise to the still waters, and approached solemnly, hopefully. He had no roses or flowers to sweeten the wizard's water, but he had pears that it might eat.
So he went to the edge of the pool, where the willow roots twisted down a gravel bank, and there he sat on a broad black root. The crisp leaves of the trees above him blew in a small breeze, rustling, and Borenson called for long minutes, "O wizard of the water, lover of the sea, O wizard of the water, hear my plea."
But the surface of the pool remained unperturbed, and he saw nothing in the shining pool but water striders that skated over its flat surface and a few brown newts that floated beneath, watching him from golden eyes.
In despair, he began to wonder if the wizard had died long ago, and people still sweetened the pools in hopes that someday another might come. Or if this was a haunted place, and the local girls threw roses in the water to placate someone who had drowned.
After long minutes of sitting on the willow root, and calling with no results, Borenson closed his eyes, just smelling the sweet water, thinking of home, of Mystarria, of the peaceful healing waters in the pools of Derra where madmen might go to bathe, and have their troubling thoughts and memories washed from them.
As he lay thinking of that place, he realized that a cold root was brushing his ankle, and thought to move his foot, when suddenly the root wrapped round his foot, squeezed tenderly.
He looked down. At the water's edge, just beneath the waves, was a girl of ten, skin as pale blue and flawless as ceramics, hair of silver. She stared up at him from beneath the water with eyes as wide and green as all the seas, and her eyes were unblinking, completely motionless. Only the crimson gill slits at her throat pulsed slightly as she breathed.
She withdrew her hand from his foot, instead reached underwater and grasped at the willow roots.
An undine. Too young to be of great power.
"I brought you a pear, sweet one, if you will have it," Borenson said.
The undine did not answer, only stared up at him and through him with soulless eyes.
I killed girls your age last night, Borenson wanted to tell her, wanted to cry.
I know, her eyes said.
I will never have peace, Borenson whispered wordlessly.
I could give you peace, the undine's eyes said.
But Borenson knew she lied, that she'd pull him down into the waves, give him love, and that while she loved him, he could survive beneath the pools. But in time she'd forget about him, and he would drown. She could give him only a brief few days of pleasure before death.
I wish that, like you, I could be one with the water, and know peace, Borenson thought. He remembered the great seas of home, the white breakers rolling over a green as deep as aged copper.
The undine's eyes went wide at his memories of the sea, and a smile formed on her lips, as if grateful for the vision.
Then he took one of his golden pears, reached down to the water, gave it to the undine.
She reached for it with a wet, slender blue hand, with long nails of silver, but then grasped his wrist and pulled herself up enough so that she could kiss his lips.
The move was unexpected, quick as a fish jumping for a fly, and Borenson felt her lips brush his for only a moment.
He placed the pear in her hand and left, and for a long hour afterward he could not quite remember what pain had brought him to that pool, with roses of red and white bobbing among the golden leaves.
He managed to find his mount, then rode at leisure, letting the horse graze as it walked; soon enough he reached the little meadow outside Bannisferre where Myrrima's cottage lay among the wild daisies.
Blue smoke curled up from a cooking fire, and one of Myrrima's ugly sisters--Inette, he recalled her name--stood feeding grain to the scrawny black chickens at the front door.
As he rode up, Inette looked up at him, a smile on her ruined face. The smile quickly faded. "You all right?"
"No," Borenson said. "Where's Myrrima?"
"A messenger came through town," Inette said. "Troops are gathering. Lord Orden is at Longmont. She--Myrrima left last night. Many of the boys from town have gone to fight."
All the ease of heart he'd felt for the past hour now drained from him. "To Longmont!" Borenson shouted. "Why?"
"She wants to be with you!" Inette answered.
"This--this won't be a picnic or a day at the fair!" Borenson shouted.
"She knows," Inette whispered. "But--you're betrothed. If you live through it, she wants to live with you. And if you don't..."
Borenson hung his head, thinking furiously. Sixty miles. Nearly sixty miles to Longmont. She could not have walked there in a night, even in a pair of nights.
"Did she travel afoot?"
Inette shook her head numbly. "Some boys from town went. In a wagon..."
Too late. Too late. Borenson spun his horse, raced to catch her.
* * *
Chapter 35
BETWEEN STRONG ARMS
Gaborn heard Iome cry out as he rode toward Longmont. Her cry was so startling that at first he feared that she'd been shot with an arrow. For hours now they had been traveling, stopping every few minutes to switch horses, and Iome had not made a single complaint. He slowed and turned in his saddle to look back.
He saw at first that King Sylvarresta sat in his saddle, head nodding. The King clutched the pom of his saddle with both hands. He wept softly, breathing in gasps. Tears streamed from his eyes.
Iome, too was hunched. "Gaborn, stop. We've got to stop!" she cried, taking the reins of her father's horse.
"What's wrong?" Gaborn asked.
"Gaagh," King Sylvarresta said.
"Our Dedicates are dying," Iome said. "He...I don't know if my father has the strength to go on."
Gaborn felt an overwhelming sadness envelop him. "Borenson. I should have guesse
d." He felt dazed. "I am so sorry, Iome."
He rode up next to the King, took the King's jaw in his hand. "Can you ride? Can you stay on the horse? You have to ride! Hold on!"
Gaborn pushed the King's hands firmly to the pommel of the saddle. "Hold! Like this!"
King Sylvarresta looked into Gaborn's face, clutched the pommel.
"Do you have strength to ride?" Gaborn asked Iome.
She nodded grimly in the dark.
Gaborn let the horses canter lightly, kept a close watch on his charges.
King Sylvarresta was gazing up at the stars as they rode, or watching the lights of a town as they passed.
Five miles later, they rounded a corner, and King Sylvarresta went flying off his horse. He landed on his hip, slid in the mud and grass at the side of the road. Then just lay, sobbing.
Gaborn went and whispered soft words to him, helped King Sylvarresta back on his horse; then Gaborn rode behind, cradling King Sylvarresta between strong arms.
* * *
Chapter 36
THE SERPENT RING
Through the long night, King Orden waited impatiently for sign of his son. It was hard, this waiting, the hardest thing he'd ever done.
Orden's men carried all two hundred thousand arrows from the armory to their perches along the castle's battlements. On the wall-walk beneath the west tower, they set a great bonfire, a message of distress, in an effort to call aid from any who might see its light or smoke. Near that fire, his men set great cauldrons of oil to boil, so that the putrid scent of them filled the castle.
Orden commanded five men to go north three miles, to set a similar fire on the peak of Tor Loman, so everyone within twenty leagues might see it. Duke Groverman had not heeded Orden's petitions. Perhaps sight of the battle pyres would shame him into it.
Just before dawn, two thousand knights arrived from Groverman, explaining their delay. Groverman had heard of the fall of Longmont, and thought to retake it, but had sent word to Sylvarresta. Apparently his messengers never made it to the King alive. After a day of waiting, he'd sent a hundred scouts on force horses to Sylvarresta and learned that the castle had fallen.
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