The Blood Knight

by Greg Keyes

  “But why me?” Anne asked.

  “The throne isn’t open to just anyone,” Mother Uun replied. “And of the possible candidates, the Faiths probably consider you the best chance for preserving the world.”

  “And the Briar King?”

  “Who knows what his desires may be? But I should think his intention is to destroy whoever fills the throne before the sedos power can destroy him and everything he embodies.”

  “And what is that?”

  Mother Uun raised an eyebrow. “Birth and death. Germination and decay. Life.”

  Anne set her cup down. “And how do you know all this, Mother Uun? How do you know so much about the Skasloi?”

  “Because I am one of his keepers. And along with him, my clan preserves the knowledge of him from generation to generation.”

  “But what if none of this is true? What if it’s all lies?”

  “Why, then I know very little at all,” the Sefry said. “You must decide for yourself what is true. I can only tell you what I believe to be so. The rest is up to you.”

  Anne nodded thoughtfully. “And the Crepling passageway? There is an entrance in this very house, isn’t there?”

  “Indeed. I can show you if you are ready.”

  “I’m not yet prepared,” Anne said. “But soon.” She settled her cup down. “You seem very helpful, Mother Uun.”

  “Is there something else, Your Majesty?”

  “Male Sefry can remember the passages, can’t they?”

  “They can. Our kind are different.”

  “Are there Sefry warriors here in Gobelin Court?”

  “It depends on what you mean. All Sefry, male and female, have some training in the arts of war. Many who live here wander far in the world, and many have known battle.”

  “Then—”

  Mother Uun raised a hand. “The Sefry of Gobelin Court will not help you. In showing you the passageway, I fulfill the only obligation we have.”

  “Perhaps you should not think in terms of obligations,” Anne said, “but of rewards.”

  “We make our own way in the world, we Sefry,” Mother Uun said. “I don’t ask you to understand us.”

  “Very well,” Anne said. But I will remember this once I am on the throne.

  She rose. “Thank you for the tea, Mother Uun, and for the conversation.”

  “It was my pleasure,” the Sefry replied.

  “I’ll return shortly.”

  “Whenever you wish.”

  “You said you were going to tell me what was going on,” Austra reminded her as they reentered the sunlight. They shielded their eyes from the glare.

  Something seemed to be happening at the far end of the square, but Anne couldn’t tell what it was. A small group of men broke off from the rest and moved in her direction.

  “I have dreams,” Anne said. “You know that.”

  “Yes. And your dreams told you about this Crepling passage?”

  “I saw all the passages,” Anne said. “There’s a sort of map in my head.”

  “That’s rather convenient,” Austra replied. “Who showed you this map?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You said you had a vision. Was it the Faiths again? Were they the ones who told you about the passages?”

  “It isn’t always the Faiths,” Anne replied. “They are, in fact, more confusing than helpful. No, sometimes I just know things.”

  “Then no one actually spoke to you?” Austra pressed, sounding doubtful.

  “What do you know about this?” Anne said, trying to keep a sudden burst of anger leashed.

  “I think I was there, that’s all,” Austra said. “You were talking in your sleep, and it seemed as if you were talking to someone. Someone who frightened you. And you woke up screaming, remember?”

  “I remember. I also remember telling you that you aren’t to question me so boldly.”

  Austra’s face went stony.

  “Begging your pardon, Your Majesty, but that isn’t what you said. You said I was free to question you and make my arguments in private but that once you had spoken on a subject, I was to be obedient to that word.”

  Anne suddenly realized that Austra was shaking and very near to tears. She took her friend’s hand.

  “You’re right,” Anne said. “I’m sorry, Austra. Please understand. You’re not the only one under a strain, you know.”

  “I know,” Austra said.

  “You’re right about the vision, too. There was someone in the dream, and it was he who showed me the passages.”

  “He? A Sefry, then?”

  “I don’t think so,” Anne said. “I think it was something else. Something neither Sefry nor human.”

  “The Kept, you mean? The Scaos? But how could you ever trust that creature?”

  “I don’t. I’m sure that what he wants in return for his help is to be released. But remember what Mother Uun said—that I command him. No, he’ll give me what I want, not the other way around.”

  “A real Scaos,” Austra murmured, wonder in her voice. “Living below us all this time. It makes me sick to even think about it. It’s like waking up to find a snake coiled around your feet.”

  “If my ancestors kept such a thing alive, they must have had their reasons,” Anne said.

  While they were speaking, five of her Craftsmen stepped up and formed a hedge around her. She noticed that Sir Leafton also was approaching.

  “What’s going on at the other end of the square?” Anne asked.

  “You’d best find a safe place, Majesty,“ Leafton said. “Someplace that is easily defensible. We are already attacked.”

  PART IV

  THRONES

  The Sefry are known almost everywhere except the islands, for they dislike crossing water. But oddly, in history they are nearly invisible. They do not fight battles; they do not found kingdoms. They do not leave their names on things. They are everywhere and nowhere.

  One wonders what they are up to.

  —FROM THE AMENA TIRSON OF PRESSON MANTEO

  If you wish to know what a man really is, give him a crown.

  —PROVERB FROM THE BAIRGHS

  A SPAR HEARD the death knells before he ever saw the town of Haemeth.

  The sound carried in long, beautiful peals along the waters of the White Warlock River, startling a flock of hezlings into furtive flight. The southern sky was dark with smoke, but the wind was going that way, so Aspar couldn’t smell what was burning.

  She’s a stranger. Would they ring the bell for a stranger?

  He didn’t know. He didn’t know much at all about village customs on the north side of the Midenlands.

  He urged Ogre to a trot. The great horse had strengthened steadily during the ride down the Warlock, grazing on rye and early fengrass, and after only a couple of days he was nearly his old self. This was cause for hope, but Aspar tried to keep away from that dangerous emotion. Winna had been far sicker than Ogre, and no medicine could bring back the dead.

  The road wound along the low lip of the river valley, and after a few moments, Haemeth finally came into sight. Situated on the next large hill, it was a town of surprising size, with outlying farms and steadings spread out into the lowlands and along the road. He could see the source of the woeful music now, too, a spindly bell tower of white stone capped in black slate, so peaked that the whole thing looked rather like a spear.

  A second tower, this one thicker and crenellated on top, stood on the highest point at the other end of town, and it seemed as if the two towers were joined by a long stone wall. Most likely the wall went all the way around the town, but since Aspar was looking up from below, all he could see was a handful of rooftops peeking over the top.

  The smoke was coming from several huge pyres that had been built down by the river, and now that the wind had shifted a bit, he knew what they were burning.

  He kicked Ogre into a gallop.

  More than a few heads turned toward Aspar as Ogre brought him up to
the crowd, but he ignored the shouts demanding that he identify himself, swinging himself down instead and striding toward the fire.

  It was difficult to count the corpses, heaped as they were, but he reckoned there were more than fifty. Two of the blazes were already so hot that white bone was beginning to pop and fall into the coals, but in the third he could see faces beginning to blister. His heart labored as he searched for Winna’s sweet features, smoke stinging his eyes. The heat forced him to step back.

  “Here,” a burly fellow shouted. “Watch yourself. What are you doing?”

  Aspar turned on him.

  “How did these people die?” he demanded.

  “They died because the saints hate us,” the man replied angrily. “And I’ll know who you are.”

  About six men had gathered behind the fellow. A couple of them had held pitchforks or long poles for working the fire, but other than that they didn’t seem to be armed. They looked like tradesmen and farmers.

  “I’m Aspar White,” he grunted. “The king’s holter.”

  “Holter? The only forest within six days of here is the Sarnwood, and it don’t have a holter.”

  “I’m the holter of the King’s Forest,” Aspar informed him. “I’m looking for two strangers: a young woman with blond hair and a dark young man. They would’ve come in with two cowherds.”

  “Don’t have much time to look for strangers,” the man said. “Seems like all we have time for these days is grief. And for all I know, you might be bringing us more of that grief.”

  “I mean you no harm,” Aspar responded. “I only want to find my friends.”

  “You work for the king, then?” a third man put in. Aspar glanced at him from the corner of his eye, unwilling to take his gaze completely off the more threatening fellow. The new speaker was sunburned, with close-cropped hair, half gray and half black, and was missing an upper right tooth.

  “The way I hear it, their aens’t no king.”

  “True, but there’s a queen,” Aspar said. “And I’m her deputy, with full power to enforce her laws.”

  “A queen, eh?” the thin fellow said. “Well, we could use a good word with her. You see what’s happening to us here.”

  “They don’t care in Eslen what’s become of us,” the first man exploded. “You’re being fools. They didn’t send this man here to help us. He’s just come for his friends, like he said. As far as he’s concerned, the rest of us can rot.”

  “What’s your name?” Aspar said, lowering his voice.

  “Raud Achenson, if it’s anything to you.”

  “I reckon you’ve got somebody on the pyre there.”

  “Mighing right I do. My wife. My father. My youngest boy.”

  “So you’re angry. You’d like someone to blame. But I didn’t put ’em there, you understand? And Grim hear me, I’ll put you there if you say one more word.”

  Raud purpled, and his shoulders bunched.

  “We’re with you, Raud,” said a fellow behind him.

  That released the big man like a catapult, and he sprang at Aspar.

  Aspar punched him in the throat, hard, and he went down.

  Without stopping, Aspar leapt forward and caught the man who had cheered him on, grabbing him by the hair. He yanked out his dirk and put the tip under the man’s chin.

  “Now, why would you try to kill your friend?” he asked.

  “Didn’t—sorry,” the man gasped. “Please—”

  Aspar released him with a hard push that sent him tumbling. Raud was on the ground, gasping for air and getting little, but Aspar hadn’t crushed his windpipe. He gave the rest of the crowd a hard look but didn’t see anyone who looked like a taker.

  “Now,” he demanded, “what happened here?”

  The gray-and-black-haired man studied his feet.

  “You won’t believe it,” he said. “I saw it myself, and I don’t.”

  “I maunt I’ll try it, anyway.”

  “It was a thing like a snake, but so big. It crossed upstream. We reckon it poisoned the water. The greft sent his knights after it, but it killed most of ’em.”

  “I’ve seen it, too,” Aspar said, “so I’ve no trouble believing you. Now, I’m going to ask you again, and this time someone answer me. Two strangers, a man and a woman, the woman with wheat-colored hair. They would have come with two children, cowherds named Aethlaud and Aohsli. Where would I find them?”

  A woman of middle years cleared her throat at that. “They might be at the Billhook and Bail,” she offered uncertainly.

  “You there!”

  The shout came from uphill, and Aspar turned to find a man riding down from the city gate. He was dressed in lord’s plate and mounted on a black stallion with a white blaze.

  “Yah?” he answered.

  “You’re Aspar White?”

  “Yah.”

  “You’ll want to talk to me, then.”

  The man reached down and clasped Aspar’s hand, then introduced himself as Sir Peren, servant of the Greft of Faurstrem, whose seat was Haemeth. The holter mounted Ogre, and together they started up the hill.

  “Your friends spoke of you,” Peren said once the crowd was behind them. “Winna and Ehawk.”

  “You know them? Where are they?”

  “I will not lie to you,” Peren said. “I saw them last this morning. They were dying. They might be dead by now.”

  “Take me to them, then,” Aspar said, knowing his voice was harsh, unable to do anything about it.

  Peren glanced at him. “You’ve found it, then?” he asked. “The cure?”

  Aspar looked downhill to the pyres. A whole town infected by the woorm’s poison, and him with a bagful of the fruit.

  “Is the greft infected?” he asked rather than answering directly.

  “No, but his son led us against the waurm,” Sir Peren replied. “He, too, lies on his deathbed.” The man seemed nervous, Aspar thought.

  Aspar relaxed his shoulders with a deep breath. They had been waiting for him. Either Ehawk or Winna had told someone he’d gone to find a cure, and word had gotten around.

  Was he a prisoner? It was starting to feel that way. He probably could kill Peren and escape, but that meant Winna and Ehawk would surely die if they weren’t already dead.

  “I’ll see my friends,” he said. “Then we’ll see about the greftson.”

  By the time they reached the tower, two more armed and armored men had joined Peren in escorting him. Once they passed the outer keep, a servant took Ogre, his only ally, and by the time they entered the bailey and came into the audience of the greft, he had seven guards following him.

  The Greffy of Faurstrem wasn’t a large or prosperous one, and the audience chamber reflected that fact in its modesty. An ancient throne of oak sat on a small stone dais, with a banner draped behind it depicting a hawk gripping a scepter and an arrow in its claws. The man on the throne was ancient, too, with a silver beard that nearly piled in his lap and rheumy gray eyes.

  Peren dropped to his knee.

  “Greft Ensil,” he said. “This is Aspar White, the king’s holter.”

  The old man shook, every part of him, as he raised his head to regard his visitor. He stared at Aspar for a long, wasted moment before speaking.

  “I thought I would never have a son,” he said at last. “The saints seemed to be denying me. I was almost resigned to it, and then, when I was sixty, the saints made a miracle and gave me Emfrith. Emfrith, my lovely boy.” He leaned forward, eyes blazing.

  “Can you understand that, holter? Have you any children?”

  “No,” Aspar replied.

  “No,” Ensil repeated. “Then you cannot understand.” He sat back and closed his eyes. “Three days ago he rode out against a thing I believed only existed in legend. He went out like a hero, and fell like one. He is dying. Can you save him?”

  “I’m not a leic, my lord,” Aspar said.

  “Do not make mock of me,” the old man shrilled. “The girl told us. You
went to the Sarnwood to locate the cure for this poison. Did you find that cure?”

  “Is she alive?” Aspar asked.

  The men around Ensil looked suddenly uncomfortable.

  “Is she alive?” Aspar reiterated in a louder voice.

  Ensil shook his head.

  “She died,” he said. “As did the boy. There was nothing we could do.”

  And suddenly Aspar smelled autumn leaves, and he knew murder was about—but whether already happened or on the way, he could not know. His throat thickened and his eyes burned, but he stood straighter and made his face stone.

  “I’ll see her body, then,” Aspar said. “I’ll see it now.”

  Ensil sighed and signed with his hand. “Search him.”

  Aspar dropped his hand to his dirk. “Mark me, Greft Ensil. Maunt my words. I have the cure for your son, but it isn’t a simple tonic or the like. It needs doing in a particular way, or the result is poison that will only kill him all the quicker.

  “And here’s the other thing. If Winna Rufoote is already dead, from whatever cause, then you won’t have my help. If you try to force me, I reckon I’ll fight and probably die, and I swear to you, so will your son. You cann? Now, I’m reckoning you say my friends are dead because you’re afraid I only brought antidote enough for one or two. Trouble with that is, if they aren’t really dead, you’ll kill ’em soon so I don’t know I’ve been tricked.

  “But I know already, and I have enough cure for all three of them. The only thing will save your son is that girl drawing breath. So I’ll see her body, dead or alive, sprootlic. Now.”

  Ensil stared at him for another long moment as Aspar battled doubt. Had he guessed right? Or was she really dead? He couldn’t believe the last, so he had to believe the first, even if it got him killed.