The Lost Prince (legends of Ansu Book 3)

by J. W. Webb

  Finis

  ***

  Here concludes Book Four of The Legends of Ansu.

  In the next Legend, The Glass Throne, we find Corin an Fol trapped in the meshes of Darkvale, Shallan enduring Car Carranis under siege, whilst Barin battles barehanded with a troll. Ariane of the Swords leads a guerrilla war against Caswallon, and Zallerak is faced by the fury of Vaarg the firedrake.

  ~ JWW

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  The Glass Throne

  Sample - Chapter 1

  The Rider

  The Ptarni Plains surrounded both rider and horse, a vast expanse of featureless grey. No solitary tree or hillock broke the monotony. Just mile upon mile of tall grasses, swaying and sighing, as the bitter wind carried with it the fresh promise of snow. A desolate landscape, its only occupants wild birds and prowling beasts, and the odd thin river struggling through. Men said the Ptarni Plains were endless or that nothing but void lay at the other side.

  Olen Kaanson knew better. He alone of the Rorshai people had seen the other side. A journey of many days—during which he nearly starved—had revealed dark mountains, and beneath them an alien city high in the clouds. Olen had told no one of his journey, the arduous task he set upon himself, after taking advice from the Seeress of Silent Mountain. She who had warned so long of the coming war.

  Four weeks ago he’d ridden to Silent Mountain, climbed the long winding, wind freezing stairs, and then entered the horse skull cave that led to her silent chamber. Once there he had lain with her, as was expected—paying her price for counsel and warning. No one knew her age, though they say she was around in his grandsire’s day. The Seeress appeared a woman in her forties, wild-haired and dark of eye; her body sharp and lean. Her voice husky with the drugs she took to aid her inner vision.

  “What brings you here, Kaanson?” she had asked Olen, knowing well the answer. Her eyes teasing him and long fingernails tracing a thin line of blood down his cheek. “Are the dreams taking shape inside your head?” She smiled as she loosened the drawstrings of his breeches.

  “They are, wise one,” Olen had replied after they were done, and then told her of his nightly visions. Dreams of war and dreams of blood. Nightmares where dark silent creatures stirred in empty tombs. And the stranger, the reflection in the water. The harbinger of war. A warrior, scarred of face, across his back a huge sword and in his eyes intense purpose.

  “The fulcrum, yes I’ve seen him too.” The Seeress crouched by the fire. She’d thrown a cloak over her nakedness to shield her from the chill. She held something in her left hand. Olen couldn’t see what it was. He gasped as she tossed it into the fire and the flames roared and crackled with sudden urgent life.

  “He is coming soon,” the Seeress told Olen. “Him and another, arriving from the south. They bring with them the first snows of winter. They also bring death.”

  “What must I do?”

  “You must fare south, Olen of the Yellow Clan. But before that you need to ride east.”

  “East? I don’t understand. That way lies only grasses and wind and the edge of the world.”

  “Not so.” The Seeress tossed another tiny object into the fire, and again the flames surged and fizzed. “Beyond the plains are mountains and past those wide fertile lands where men and women dwell, fight and screw and starve and hunt, much like any other land. The closest of these lands is called Ptarni, the furthermost Shen. There are others but they don’t concern you. Ptarni does. Those ruling that land have long had their eyes on the Four Kingdoms.”

  “I have heard of Ptarni of course, but I thought it myth. A place of whimsical fancies, a city in the clouds lost to dream and mystery.” The Seeress showed her secret smile. Her teeth were perfect though her eyes were shadowed with darker purpose. She turned toward him, her nakedness revealed again. Despite who she was, Olen felt his loins stir anew.

  “You’ve seen the riders out on the plains? Where do you think they come from, fool?” The Seeress’s laugh was cold and brittle, like cracking ice on a thawing lake. Her eyes were charcoal daggers of sardonic wisdom.

  “There are many lands both north and south, perhaps those riders are from these.” Olen struggled to make his point. “We Rorshai watch over the grasslands in constant vigilance. And yes, I have seen strange horseman watching from afar. I deemed them merchants, or else maybe scouts from Permio, or Raleen across the mountains.”

  “Raleen across the mountains?” The Seeress cackled and rounded on him, pulling Olen toward her and kissing his lips hungrily. The need was upon her again but Olen wanted answers. He pulled away and wiped her spittle from his mouth. She glared at him in frosty silence.

  “I have been out on the steppes, as far as any of our people. I once road east for three long days, seeing nothing but wind, eagle and sky. An empty land, I deemed it.”

  “You need to travel for thirty days, Olen Kaanson. Then you’ll see the mountains, and amongst them the city in the clouds.” She reached forward, smiling again. “Come, fill me again with your urgent seed, then shall I tell all I know of the threat in the east.” And so Olen had loved her again, hard and fast until she yelled out his name in sated rapture. As he stood above her, donning his garments in watchful silence, the Seeress had crouched close to the fire, whispering words and tossing rune charms into its hissing midst.

  At last she had stopped, and as Olen stood waiting at her cave’s entrance, the Seeress had stood before him naked and bleeding. It was then that she told him what he must do.

  That had been a month ago.

  And he’d done her bidding. Ridden mile upon wind tossed mile, over grasslands, low hills and craggy slopes. Passing beneath wind torn trees and fording icy rivers that hurried to the gods only knew where. On the thirtieth day Olen had reined in sharp, at last seeing the mountains revealed by winter dawn. Tall and stark they stood, and in their midst a golden city, just as she’d described it.

  Ptarni—the fabled realm. Olen had ridden closer throughout that day. He’d stopped at the west bank of a huge brown river. Its mile wide waters sluggish, the banks rimed with ice. In the distance that golden city glimmered some twenty miles ahead, appearing to float in the mist surrounding the mountains.

  Olen gazed north along the river. A mile or so that way, a great bend stole the river from his eyes as its midst was lost to willow and grasses. He turned south. Here the river flowed more or less straight. Olen shielded his eyes and stared harder along its banks. He saw shingle strands and iyots, where lone cranes stood as patient sentinels. Beyond the islands and birds, Olen could just make out the square shapes of what looked to be buildings on his side of the river.

  Intrigued, Olen guided Loroshai—his black stallion—southward along the banks until the buildings revealed themselves alongside a road. A road leading west away from the river and vanishing into the vastness of the plains.

  Olen urged Loroshai forward until he reached the road. To his right the building loomed high. A great storehouse, it appeared. There was no one around so Olen slid from Loroshai’s saddle and tied the beast to a stunted tree. Silent—as only his people can be—Olen stole close to the building. A single door waited ajar.

  He ventured within, only now realising just how huge this building was. Huge and empty. But Olen could see where wains and carts had been stowed as there were wheel tracks and runnels everywhere across the cobbled base of the building. He wandered through, seeing stables and rooms with hooks where tools or weapons must have been racked and stowed.

  For what purpose? Olen guessed he already knew the answer to that. Grim-faced, he left the building behind, and remounting Loroshai, urged the horse follow the road into the maze of grasses ahead.

  For five days Olen followed that track. It was pitted and churned by wheel and hoof, evidence that a large company had passed this way recently. As night fell the track faded into the gloom of a steep ravine. Olen chose that moment to take shelter beneath a quiet cluster of trees a half
mile ahead of the ravine.

  He woke to the distant grumble and grind of metal on stone. Olen rolled free of his blanket and reached up to Loroshai’s saddle where he retrieved his horn bow and a half dozen arrows; his golden hilted scimitar was already strapped to his waist. Rorshai riders seldom parted with their swords.

  He spoke a few cool words to Loroshai and then, silent and painstakingly slow, crept and crawled closer to the ravine. Behind him the sun rose glorious and bright. The creaking grew louder, announcing wagons on the move, and Olen could hear voices too. Guttural accents speaking a tongue he didn’t understand. Ptarnians, no doubt.

  Olen reached the point where the track channelled into the ridge. Here he left it and took to scaling the sharp rise on the left. Half hour later he crested that shale slope and gazed down in astonishment at the sight greeting him below.

  An army was camped in the wedge between the hills. Down there a stream glittered in the morning sun, on either side were scattered bushes and clumps of stunted trees. Amongst these and as far as his eyes could see along the ravine, Olen saw men, horses and various carts and wagons of all sizes and construction.

  He tried to count the wagons but there were too many. They filled the deep cut of the ravine, spanning its fifty feet basin for at least a mile until a shoulder of rock thrust across his vision and Olen could see it no longer. Instead he focussed on the men, antlike and scurrying to and fro below.

  They were strange to behold. To his Rorshan eyes they appeared clumsy and awkward, weighed down by heavy plate armour of various colours and hue. The few faces he could see (most were hidden behind chained masks hanging from the pointed helms they wore), were hard, scarred and swarthy, their hair long oily and black. Occasionally a man would doff his helm to wash his face in the stream, or else wipe sweat from his forehead. There was no doubt in Olen’s mind. These were professional warriors.

  For almost two hours Olen crouched in discomfort, watching and listening, as the strange men shouted and yelled at each other as the army broke camp and made ready to move. In the distance he see could the wagons already rolling out of view. There must have been over a thousand. A thousand wains loaded with weapons, supplies, food and ale—all the things needed by an army on the march.

  He watched as the nearest soldiers saddled their ponies whilst the wagon riders whooped and hollered their oxen and mules into noisy movement. Another hour passed as the winter sun climbed the ridge behind him. Though some rode the shaggy ponies most went on foot—a comfort to Olen on that cold morning, and those ponies he’d seen would prove no match for Loroshai. Olen waited until the last soldier had vacated the ravine’s valley. Then he stood in one fluid motion, easing the cramp in his legs.

  He needed to warn his people—and fast. Olen returned to the spot where Loroshai grazed in the sunshine. He saddled and mounted the horse and bid him trot northwards along the edge of the ridges away from the ravine. After several miles the terrain flattened out, returning to the familiar carpet of blue grey grasses and pale winter sky.

  Olen turned west, deeming himself a safe distance from the foreigners. He steered closer and soon spotted the endless train of wagons wending across the steppe lands. Again he tried to count their number but it was impossible. At least they were moving slowly, Olen guessed it would take them many weeks to reach Rorshai. With that last thought in mind the lone rider spurred his war beast to quicken his trot. Olen was desperate to get back, but he must needs pace himself. Loroshai was one of the finest horses owned by the Yellow Clan, but even he needed rest and breaks from the arduous journey ahead. It had taken Olen thirty days to reach the foreign river. It took him twenty-three to return.

  During that entire journey the words of the Seeress echoed through his head. “He is coming via a dark road. You must be ready! He is the harbinger and the war cannot be won without him.”

  “How will I know him?” Olen had asked her.

  “By the length of his sword and the smell of destiny that surrounds him,” she had answered. And so Olen Kaanson rode.

  ***

  Rogan froze as he saw the distant trail of dust rising up to greet the afternoon. Could it be? Then he smiled, recognising the rider as their own beloved Olen, his war chief and eldest son of the leader of the Yellow Clan, or the Tcunkai (thinkers) as Olen’s father the Kaan liked to call them.

  “Teret! Your brother comes and he looks in bad need of ale!” Rogan yelled laughing at a dark-eyed girl who was crouched behind him in the stockade, milking a cow’s teats into a wooden bucket. The girl stood, wiped her comely face with a sleeve and, after hurdling the fence, came and stood beside Rogan. Teret’s face lit up when she saw her eldest brother guide his lathered steed into the corral.

  “Brother! We feared you were lost! It’s almost two months since anyone has seen you. Where have you been?” Teret ran forward to hug Olen as he slipped exhausted from his saddle. The smile fled from her face when she saw the worry worm eating at his brow.

  “What is it? What have you seen?” Teret’s dark blue eyes were haunted by worry as she threw her brown arms around her brother, noting how weak and thin he appeared. “You need rest,” she told him.

  “There is no time!” Olen shoved his sister back. “Take care of Loroshai, Teret. He needs sustenance and rest—and lots of water. We ride out on the morrow!” Teret made to question her brother but his bleak gaze left the question in her mouth. Obeying, she turned and led the big horse towards the stables behind the homestead.

  Olen turned to Rogan.

  “Summon the clan! We fare south in the morning.”

  “South?” Rogan scratched an ear. “That’s Anchai country—they’ll not like us trespassing.” The Anchai were known as the Red Clan, due to their love of blood sports and troublesome nature. They kept themselves aloof from the other clans. The Anchai settled the land near the great arm of mountain that thrust east from the High Wall ranges marking the southern borders of Rorshai. “Why south?” Rogan pressed.

  “Because that’s the direction he’ll be coming.” Olen thanked a youth that had just appeared with a large flask of ale. He downed the flask and sent the boy for another. “From the mountains,” Olen added—as though that explained everything.

  “Who?” Rogan’s eyes were saucers. No one came from the mountains these days. There was rumoured a pass but the Rorshai steered clear of that region—even the Anchai. Word was that secret way beneath the mountains was haunted by an unknown terror.

  That evening Olen spoke before his father, the Kaan and the thirty war chiefs of his clan. Olen told them of his dreams, his journey to see the Seeress (many paled hearing this), and the long hard trek across the steppe lands. Nobody spoke whilst Olen recounted what he had witnessed, first from the river and later looking down into that ravine. Olen was respected here. Even the Kaan had learned to listen to his eldest boy. But it wasn’t just that. Olen Kaanson had the Dreaming.

  “War is coming,” Olen told them. “A pivotal strife unlike any other. The clans must be summoned at the Delve!”

  “Good luck with that,” wry Rogan had muttered under his breath. Olen’s word might be respected by his own clan, but the shamans and head clan of the Delve were unlikely to be affected by his passionate call to arms. Moreover they probably wouldn’t even listen.

  “This stranger? The harbinger of war?” The Kaan leaned forward in his heavy chair and stared deeply into the fiery blue of his eldest son’s eyes. “What did the Seeress say about him?”

  “That he comes from the southlands, but he’s no southerner. And that he brings with him a destiny that even he cannot comprehend. She hinted he was a Longswordsman and man of few words. He journeys with another—a younger brighter soul.”

  “A name?”

  “Corin an Fol.”

  Early next morning Olen of the Yellow Clan led his hundred horsemen south toward Anchai country. They passed the Red Clans’ lands during the starry dark of night, thus avoiding certain conflict. Two days later the hundred reach
ed the folds of mountain leading to a crack in the rock from which darkness yawned like a smoky mouth.

  The hidden pass. Or as most there liked to call it, the haunted pass. There they fixed restless camp, waiting until the appointed moment when the stranger would appear. In his tent Olen was late to sleep. Sometime ere morning he must have dozed, only to wake minutes later to the sound of urgent thunder rolling out across the grasslands far to the east.

  On instinct, Olen rolled free of his blanket and eased his way out of the tent. No sleep tonight. Away east the thunder growled and boomed like prophesy. Olen nodded in silence to the watchmen posted at the edge of their camp. Uneasy, they watched their leader stride off into the gloom. Olen walked toward the rolling doom of thunder. A mile away from their camp was only open sighing grasses, and brittle breeze lifting the long shadow of his untamed dusky hair.

  It was then that Olen saw Him. The owner of the thunder. Far out across the plains He strode, a giant figure, eyes blazing and dark cloak billowing like thunder cloud behind Him. For an icy instant Olen felt that heavy gaze fall upon him. Then the giant was gone, storming off into the distance. Olen paled: it did not bode well to see Borian the Wind God whilst alone in the night. It was later that morning when the strangers arrived, and with them the first ravens of war.

  Glossary

  IMMORTALS

  The Weaver/Maker

  THE WEAVER’S CHILDREN, THE HIGH GODS

  Cul-Saan: first born, leader of rebellion against the Maker; now known as Old Night.

  Oroonin/The Huntsman: God of War and Trickery, he plays his own game.

  Elanion: wife and sister of Oroonin; guardian of first planet Ansu.

  Telcanna: Sky God, vain and capricious.