by Robert Brady
“Ha!” he countered, and squeezed my forearm hard. “It will be the drink, and you’re the reason I drink so much!”
“The least I can do,” I told him. We released each other and sat on the divan in my chambers’ sitting room. Shela brought us beer from the dining area, and sat at my feet. The three Dwarves with their package stood behind Kvitch while he sat and sipped their beer. In Dwarven protocol, you ignored them until they had a point to make or a gift to give.
Kvitch regarded her. “I knew he was going to marry you,” he told her.
“Did you?” she asked.
He nodded and took a pull from his beer. Leaving the foam on his lips, he added, “We wouldn’t make a stupid Man a Dwarf.
“But we had a hard time finding a smart one!”
“So you’re here because you like being hit?” I asked him.
This was the humor of the Simple People, the Northern Dwarves. Very frank, no holds barred. Most Men didn’t like them, and they didn’t like most Men, because of it. I’d become an honorary Dwarf in part because I appreciated their ways.
Kvitch’s face became serious. He introduced me to the other Dwarves, who each bowed. With Dwarves, even the women have beards. None of them spoke so I didn’t know which was what.
“You lost your armor and your sword,” Kvitch said.
“How the hell did you know that?” I asked. It hadn’t been that long. I’d been without my armor for four months, my sword for two.
“The armor is Dwarven,” Kvitch said. “It called to us when it was returned to Earth. The sword was a relic – everyone who really knows Steel heard it die.
“You always wondered how I found you so easily, when I needed to, didn’t you?”
I smiled. “You mean, at my coronation as King?”
Kvitch took another pull on his beer. “How did we know you were being coronated, J’ktak?”
J’ktak was my Dwarven name – the good Man.
“Fair enough.”
He summoned the other Dwarves and they removed the wrappings from their gift – a new suit of armor and a new sword.
The armor wasn’t the complete metal shell that my last had been. It was a simpler breast plate and cuirass, scalloped steel sleeves and greaves with horses tooled into them. The helmet was a cap and nose guard with a light, chain net behind it.
The sword was nothing like the Sword of War – although almost as long, it reminded me more of Vulpe’s old sword, Fury. Straight, double-edged, the hilt was like a ‘W’ with loops rather then points toward the hand, and wicked barbs at the end.
I picked it up and felt the perfect balance. The Dwarves and Shela fell back as I took a couple practice swings.
“That is the Sword of Dawn,” Kvitch told me.
“Why that?” I asked. They’d made a leather sheath for it. I picked it up and sheathed the sword.
One of the Dwarves said, “We are not sure. We allow a sword to name itself – this one chose that name.
“It was the hardest sword I’d ever forged,” she added. I knew her for a female now that she spoke, her voice less gravelly.
“It fought me from the start,” she continued. “It wouldn’t quench – I feared I’d lose the metal because it was too many times in the oil. I prayed to Earth and Steel, and then it took the quench, but they I couldn’t sharpen it.”
I’d felt the blade – the edge was good.
“Doing so required files with diamond ingrained,” Kvitch said. “Normally, that would ruin a blade.”
“Give me your weapon,” Shela ordered me. I handed her the sword in its sheath and she pulled it.
Given the opportunity, a Dwarf would describe every hammer stroke on the blade and armor, beginning to end. I switched back to the armor.
“I like this,” I said.
Another Dwarf nodded. “Unlike the blade, this armor came to me easily,” he said. “I had sought to replace your old armor, but the metal told me you no longer needed it.”
I laughed. Yeah, I guess I wasn’t the shaky novice who’d come out of the Great Northern Mountain Range nearly 18 years ago.
This was more of a warrior’s armor. It would keep you alive, but not get in your way, and it wouldn’t take 20 minutes to put on.
“How do I repay this?” I asked, simply. These gifts were grand, and should be expensive.
Kvitch laughed. “Well, you let me recarve those horrid Dwarves in your throne room,” Kvitch said. “That is a start.”
When I’d become King of Eldador, Kvitch had seen the columns that lined the throne room in Galnesh Eldador – depictions of Dwarves straining to hold up poles, that help up the ceiling. It had so offended him – not by their design but by the crude stonework – that he’d come back a year later with a team and recurved them all. Now, you could go to Galnesh Eldador and actually think real Dwarves were there, straining forever against the weight of the ceiling.
“I’d thought that another gift,” I admitted.
The third Dwarf shook his head. “You have done much for the Simple People,” he said. He was an older Dwarf with grey in his beard and long hair down to his butt. “Fighting the Great North, you will do more. Ever have they been a threat to us.”
“Indeed?” I said, and sat back down.
The Dwarves sat as well. “The Great North was cut off from the rest of Fovea,” the older one said, “but a century ago they found their way to us.”
“They considered us animals,” Kvitch said. “And hunted us.”
I was shocked and let my face reveal it.
The female shook her head. “The Uman-Chi were sought, and they would not help us,” she said. “They feared the Men from the North. When we met you, we knew your story of your origin was a lie, because you treated us like other living beings.”
I had no idea.
“And when you showed us how to defeat the Dorkans,” Kvitch said, “we used those tactics on the Men from the North. They worked, and they hunt us no more.”
I lowered my head. “I would have fought them with you, had I known,” I said.
“You took our vengeance on the Fovean High Council,” Kvitch said. “Something I informed Kvarl you would be sure to do.”
Kvarl was the Dwarven King.
“Now you will deliver our vengeance to the Great North,” the younger male Dwarf said. “These gifts will help you do it.”
Shela resheathed my sword and laid it down next to my new armor. “That sword is strange,” she said.
The three Dwarves with Kvitch nodded.
We talked for a while longer, updating me on all of my friends among the Simple People. There had been a few Andarons trying to go to the Herd that Cannot Be Tamed, but of the few who were allowed to go there, almost none returned.
Certainly none with a horse companion.
They left when they were tired and, when I woke in the morning, they were already gone. That is the way with Dwarves.
On the last day of the month of Eveave, Eric marched into Vol at the head of an army of 30,000. I met him with my Wolf Soldier guard. Nina and Nantar, both fellow members of the Free Legion, rode behind him.
“Emperor Rancor Mordetur,” he said formally, “I am Eric Aileenson, King of the Volkhydran people.”
There were a LOT of people watching, and the ones closest passed what they heard to the ones behind them. There were not the expected cheers for the new King.
“I demand that you remove yourself from Hydrus, and that you withdraw to neutral Medya,” he informed me.
The air practically crackled with tension. I’d had no problem defeating the Volkhydran army against veteran generals. Who was this upstart?
I was wearing my new armor and my new sword. Blizzard pawed the ground and snorted in the cold. Beside me, Shela on one side looked indignant, and Dragor on the other probably hadn’t realized he was holding his breath.
Next to him, the Duke of Vol was actually shaking.
“Eldador recognizes the new Volkhydran King, Eric Aileenson,
” I decreed. Jaws among the Volkhydran army dropped. Failing to do that would have been an easy tactic – the cities would have started fighting to replace him.
“We will withdraw to Medya,” I continued. “We will concede the port-city of Hydro to Volkhydro. We will not fight.”
The cheer that rose up from the Volkhydran army was deafening. It was echoed by the people watching. The release of air from Dragor almost knocked him off of his horse.
I looked Eric in the eye. I couldn’t help thinking, “Don’t screw this up, son. Don’t push for more. Take the victory.”
He nodded and he kept his mouth shut.
I turned to Dragor, “Do you chose for Eldador, or Volkhydro?” I asked him
He didn’t hesitate. “I chose for Volkhydro,” he said.
He kicked his horse and crossed the space between us. Nantar made room for him to stand beside his new King.
“Volkhydro recognizes Dragor, Duke of Hydro,” Eric said.
“Vol recognizes the new, young King, Eric Aileenson,” the Duke said, and he crossed the distance, as well.
When he settled in, I turned to the Duke. “I would treat with this new King, if you would grant us embassy in your city.”
The Duke of Vol turned to Eric, who nodded, his jaw set. The scar on his face twitched involuntarily, and then so did mine.
Nina put a hand to her lips to hide a smile. She’d clearly seen it. There was no mistaking whom this kid’s father was – he looked just like me. Personally, I saw Aileen’s nose and eyes in him.
“I will make room for your persons,” he said. “The troops, I request, can remain in separate camps.”
“I can guarantee for Eldador,” Eric said, “if you choose to send these troops to Medya.”
That was a mis-step. I’d be insane to trust my safety to foreign troops, no matter the guarantee. I’d whipped this army a couple times, and pretty well.
“My Wolf Soldiers won’t leave me,” I informed him. “I ask that you respect their oath.”
Eric nodded.
People were going to be talking about that. Was I planning something? Did I really trust him?
Then again, if it went completely perfectly, they’d be talking about that. It went how it went – there was no changing it. The ones who were going to resist the young king and the ones who were going to support him both had something to work with now.
I ordered my Wolf Soldiers to create a Jess Doonar and wait for me. Oddly, Eric did the exact same. As a member of the Free Legion, he’d been shown by Nantar and Nina the value of that Roman invention, and he’d embraced it. No matter what happened and what worked out, Volkhydro was already changed forever.
This could be Sparta to my ancient Greece if I didn’t watch myself.
We rode silently into the city. Past the gates, there were people in the streets who wanted to see the new King. I was sure the word that he’d been recognized by two Dukes and won back Hydro was spreading quickly. Now that I knew what to look for, the same people whom I saw cheering for Eric, I saw glaring at Nina. She wasn’t showing but, if she was already with child, then this was going to get worse, fast.
The Duke didn’t turn over his throne room and he didn’t have a war room, like Dragor. Gharf Bendenson had hollowed out a section of their wharf space for his troops, and then taken out a smaller area for his personal chambers, and we were brought there.
A Sea Wolf was sitting anchored in the river – a surprise for them all. It was a special, with Eldadorian Fire, but not the Bitch. Simply my own insurance policy, if I needed one.
Eric stopped his horse and stared at it, then turned and looked at me.
“It’s a beautiful ship,” Nina said. “Perhaps sent to honor the new King?”
I smiled. “A reminder of the value of an alliance with Eldador,” I agreed with her.
In other words, a reminder of the folly of pushing too hard. If that ship raised a red battle flag, the whole city would evacuate in terror.
We entered the residence and dismounted. Places like this, in the winter, would have an anteroom for horses in order to keep them close and warm. This was no different, and we took care of our horses.
Eric watched me brush down Blizzard.
“Lupennen said you had more of his get,” he said.
I nodded. “A couple on the way through mares, as well,” I said.
“I’d like one,” Eric said.
I looked at him over my shoulders. “You can try,” I said. “This isn’t always up to me.”
Lupennen had taken his own horse, and Tartan Stowe had taken a stallion from a group I thought were unridable. Hectaro, now Duke of Galnesh Eldador, had gotten his own by breeding his own mare with Blizzard.
I’d given Little Storm to Jack, but actually I had expected Jack to fail.
Eric nodded.
“You did a good job,” I said to him. “I’m really proud of you.”
Eric accepted that but didn’t smile. Whenever he looked at me, I think he saw his dead mother, who’d loved me and wilted, waiting for me to return to her.
We returned to the main room, where a long, rectangular wooden table with a map of Volkhydro on it was surrounded by chairs. Braziers burned throughout the room, and Volkhydran warriors in their furs looked on from all entrances. Many of them blatantly gripped their sword hilts as they watched me – making it clear that it would take one order for their new King to put them into action.
No love lost there.
The collected nobles, Nina and Shela included, rose as Eric and I entered. It clearly surprised Eric. I smiled but said nothing – that crap took a while to get used to.
Nantar was seated next to Nina. Karel of Stone was seated next to him. Once again, out of the blue and uninvited.
I really hate that guy.
I sat next to Shela, not waiting for Eric. I raised an eyebrow and he seated himself down across from me, between Nina and Dragor. Everyone else sat.
Sorry kid, I thought. Can’t give it to you too easily.
“Where shall we begin?” the Duke of Vol asked.
It was his city, after all.
“Volkha, I think,” Eric said.
Nina shook her head, Nantar with her.
“The invasion of your nation by a new enemy, perhaps, your Majesty?” Karel suggested.
Eric turned his head and looked down the table, clearly surprised by Karel’s being there. He looked at me, and I frowned and nodded. That’s where I wanted to start.
Better that I not suggest it.
“If I may report my findings, then?” Karel continued.
Everyone leaned forward.
Karel simply leapt up onto the table and walked to the map. It was comical but also a huge breach of protocol, not that Karel cared. In fact, that was likely why he did it.
“There is a pass now through the Great Northern Mountain Range,” he said, “that they’ve widened and perfected, and it’s spilling out troops. They’re marching as far south as Myr, to three temporary fortresses they’ve completed, and they’re staging foot soldiers and training.”
“So fast,” Dragor commented.
I nodded. “We first encountered them four months ago, and none of this was even started,” I said.
The Duke of Vol turned to me, “And you said nothing?” he demanded.
I frowned. “I told your King, which is what I was supposed to do,” I informed him. “I offered to end the war and unite against this enemy. He chose to make a deal with them – to give them three of your northern cities.”
“I can attest to that,” Eric said. He leaned forward and made eye contact with his two Dukes. “The former King came to me to order me to evacuate Myr, and join his army.”
“I’d have killed him, too,” Dragor muttered.
Good sign from Dragor.
The Duke of Vol frowned. “And now we have them entrenched,” he said, “and much harder to dislodge.”
I nodded. “But you have the united might of the Volkhydran people, t
he Free Legion and Eldador,” I said. “We recognize that there is no force more threatening to Fovea than this.”
“Accept your own,” the Duke of Vol commented.
That couldn’t go unanswered. Fortunately, I didn’t have to answer it.
Eric stood. “Will you discuss that with me outside?” he asked.
The Duke’s jaw dropped.
“You may not like the Emperor,” Eric said, “but without his help, you are dead. If you can’t wait for that to happen, I will oblige you.”
Damn, son!
“My apologies, your Majesty,” the Duke muttered.
“You don’t owe apologies to me,” Eric informed him, and sat.
I regarded the Duke.
He rose. He bowed in my direction, and said, “I made light of you, your Imperial Majesty. I spoke out of turn. I appreciate and respect that, despite our differences, you chose the wisdom of alliance against a common enemy.”
One that would have left us alone, if not for you, wasn’t said, but just hung there in the air.
“His Imperial Majesty accepts your humble apology,” Shela stood and said. Kind of a back-handed acceptance of a back-handed apology. Both of them sat.
“How many troops can you commit?” I asked Eric.
“I’ve 30,000 from the East of Volkhydro,” he said. “I’ve heard nothing from the West.”
“If any will fight, it will be the sons of Volkha,” Dragor said. He was actually from the Volkhan side. “The Emperor’s emissary must have arrived by now –“
Eric frowned and interrupted him. “The Emperor’s emissary?” he asked,
“Lupennen and Lee,” I said, “and 300 Wolf Soldiers.”
“They’ll speak for both nations, then,” Nina asked.
I nodded. “Lee was clear,” Shela said. “And yes, she treats with Henekh Dragorson in the morning.”
“Henekh could never resist a pretty girl,” Dragor commented.
“Much less one who humbled the Confluni so completely,” the Duke of Vol said.
Nantar laughed. Karel, who had been updating the map, stood away from it.
“Here, I’ve added their hard points,” he said. “If I were the Men of the North, I would go West, not East. The East is ready, the West is not only isolated, but it is pressed against the Confluni. Who knows if the Confluni can’t be enlisted to help them?”
