by Dragon Lance
“No, thank you, Sergeant. They’re too far ahead. If I go galloping after them, I’ll scare off any game in the area “He put a hand to his aching back.
Parnigar asked, “Shall I stay with you, sir?”
“I think you’d better. I may have to walk back to Sithelbec from here.” His back stabbed at him again, and he winced.
The news that Kith-Kanan had dropped out was passed ahead. The speaker expressed regret that his son would miss the hunt. But this was a rare day, and the expedition should continue. Sithel’s course through the trees meandered here and there, taking the path best suited to his horse. At more than one place he paused to examine tracks in the moss or mud. Wild pig, definitely.
It was hot, but the elves welcomed such heat-for it was a good change from the ever-present coolness of the Quinari Palace and the Tower of the Stars. While Silvanost was constantly bathed in fresh breezes, the heat of the plains made the speaker’s limbs feel looser and more supple, his head clearer. He reveled in the sense of freedom he felt out here and urged his horse on.
In the far distance, Sithel heard the call of a hunting horn. Such horns meant humans, and that meant dogs. Sure enough, the sound of barking came very faintly to his ears. Elves never used dogs, but humans rarely went into the woods without them. Human eyesight and hearing being so poor, Sithel reckoned they needed the animals to find any game at all.
The horns and dogs would likely frighten off any boar in the area. In fact, the dogs would flush everything-boar, deer, rabbits, foxes-out of hiding. Sithel shifted his lance back to his stirrup cup and sniffed. Humans were so unsporting.
There was a noise in the sumac behind and to his right. Sithel turned his horse around, lowered the tip of his lance, and poked through the bushes. A wild pheasant erupted from the green leaves, bleating shrilly. Laughing, the speaker calmed his prancing horse.
Sithas and a courtier named Timonas were close enough to see each other when the hunting horn sounded. The prince also realized that it meant humans in the woods. The idea filled him with alarm. He tightened his reins and spurred his horse in a tight circle, looking for other members of the party. The only one he could spot was Timonas.
“Can you see anyone?” Sithas called. The courtier shouted back that he could not.
Sithas’s alarm increased. It was inexplicable, but he felt a dangerous presentiment. In the heat of the summer morning, the prince shivered.
“Father!” he called. “Speaker, where are you?”
Ahead, the speaker had decided to turn back. Any boar worth bagging had long since left these woods, driven off by the humans. He retraced his path and heard Sithas’s call from not too far away.
“Oh, don’t shout,” he muttered irritably. “I’m coming.”
Catching up to him, Sithas pushed through a tangle of vines and elm saplings. As the prince spurred his mount toward the speaker, the feeling of danger was still with him. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the glint of metal in a stand of cedar.
Then he saw the arrow in flight.
Before Sithas could utter the cry that rose to his lips, the arrow had struck Sithel in the left side, below his ribs. The Speaker of the Stars dropped his lance and pitched forward, but he did not fall from the saddle. A scarlet stain spread out from the arrow, running down the leg of Sithel’s trousers.
Timonas rode up on Sithas’s left. “See to the speaker!” Sithas cried. He slapped his horse’s flank with the reins and bore down on the cedar trees. Lance lowered, he burst through the dark green curtain. A quick glimpse of a white face, and he brought the handguard of his lance down on the archer’s head. The archer pitched forward on his face.
The royal guardsman accompanying the party appeared. “Come here! Watch this fellow!” Sithas shouted at him and then rode hard to where Timonas supported Sithel on his horse.
“Father,” Sithas said breathlessly. “Father...”
The speaker stared in wordless shock. He could say nothing as he reached a bloody hand to his son.
Gently Sithas and Timonas lowered the speaker to the ground. The rest of the hunting party quickly collected around them. The courtiers argued whether to remove the arrow, but Sithas silenced them all as Kencathedrus studied the wound. The look he gave the prince was telling. Sithas Understood.
“Father,” Sithas said desperately, “can you speak?”
Sithel’s lips parted, but no sound came. His hazel eyes seemed full of puzzlement. At last, his hand touched his son’s face, and he breathed his last. The hand fell to the ground.
The elves stood around their fallen monarch in abject disbelief. The one who had ruled them for three hundred and twenty-three years lay dead at their feet.
Kencathedrus had retrieved the fallen archer from the guardsman who watched him. The commander dragged the unconscious fellow by the back of his collar to where Sithel lay. “Sire, look at this,” he said. He rolled the inert figure over.
The archer was human. His carrot-colored hair was short and spiky, leaving his queerly rounded ears plainly visible. There was a stubble of orange beard on his chin.
“Murder,” muttered one of the courtiers. “The humans have killed our speaker!”
“Be silent!” Sithas said angrily. “Show some respect for the dead.” To Kencathedrus he declared, “When he wakes we will find out who he is and why he did this.”
“Perhaps it was an accident,” cautioned Kencathedrus, inspecting the man. “His bow is a hunting weapon, not a war bow.”
“He took aim! I saw him,” Sithas said hotly. “My father was mounted on a white horse! Who could mistake him?”
The human groaned. Courtiers surrounded him and dragged him to his feet. They were not very gentle about it. By the time they finished shaking and pummeling him, it was a wonder he opened his eyes at all.
“You have killed the Speaker of the Stars!” Sithas demanded furiously, “Why?”
“No —” gasped the man.
He was forced to his knees. “I saw you!” Sithas insisted. “How can you deny it? Why did you do it?”
“I swear, Lord —”
Sithas could barely think or feel. His senses reeled with the fact that his beloved father was dead.
“Get him ready to travel,” the prince ordered numbly. “We will take him back to the fortress and question him properly there.”
“Yes, Speaker,” said Timonas.
Sithas froze. It was true. Even as his father’s blood ran into the ground, he was the rightful speaker. He could feel the burden of rulership settle about him like a length of chain laid across his shoulders. He had to be strong now, strong and wise, like his father.
“What about your father?” Kencathedrus asked gently.
“I will carry him.” Sithas put his arms under his father’s lifeless body and picked it up.
They walked out of the grove, the human with his arms wrenched behind him, the courtiers leading their horses, and Sithas carrying his dead father. As they came, the sound of hunting horns grew louder and the barking of dogs sounded behind them. Before the party had gone another quarter-mile, a band of mounted humans, armed with bows, appeared. There were at least thirty of them, and as they spread out around the party of elves, the Silvanesti slowed and stopped.
One human picked his way to Sithas. He wore a visored helmet, no doubt to protect his face from intruding branches. The man flipped the visor up, and Sithas started in surprise. He knew that face.
It was Ulvissen, the human who had acted as seneschal to Princess Teralind.
“What has happened here?” Ulvissen asked grimly, taking in the scene.
“The Speaker of the Stars has been murdered,” Sithas replied archly. “By that man.”
Ulvissen looked beyond Sithas and saw the archer with his arms pinioned. “You must be mistaken. That man is my forester, Dremic,” he said firmly. “He is no murderer. This was obviously an accident.”
“Accident? That’s not an acceptable answer. I am speaker now, and I say that th
is assassin will face Silvanesti justice.”
Ulvissen leaned forward in his saddle. “I do not think so, Highness. Dremic is my man. If he is to be punished, I will see to it,” he said strongly.
“No,” disagreed Sithas.
The elves drew together. Some still carried their lances, others had courtly short swords at their waists. Kencathedrus held his sword to the neck of the human archer, Dremic. The standoff was tense.
Before anyone could act, though, a shrill two-tone whistle cut the air. Sithas felt relief well up inside him. Sure enough, through the trees came Kith-Kanan at the head of a company of the militia’s pikemen. The prince rode forward to where Sithas stood, holding their father in his arms.
Kith-Kanan’s face twisted. “I – I am too late!” he cried in anguish.
“Too late for one tragedy, but not too late to prevent another,” Sithas said. Quickly he told his twin what had happened and what was about to happen.
“I heard the hunting horns at Sithelbec,” Kith-Kanan said. “I thought there might be a clash, so I mustered the First Company. But this-if only I had stayed, kept up with Father —”
“We must have our man back, Highness,” Ulvissen insisted. His hunting party nocked arrows.
Sithas shook his head. Before he’d even finished the gesture, some of the humans loosed arrows. Kith-Kanan shouted an order, and his pikemen charged. The humans, with no time to reload, bolted. In seconds, not one human could be seen, though the sound of their horses galloping away could be heard clearly.
Kith-Kanan halted the militia and called the Wildrunners back to order. Kencathedrus had been hit in the thigh. The unfortunate Dremic had been shot by his own people and now lay dead on the grass.
“We must get back to Silvanost, quickly,” Sithas advised, “Not only to bury our father but to tell the people of war!”
Before the confused Kith-Kanan could question or protest, he was shocked to hear his own Wildrunners cheer Sithas’s inflammatory words. The humans’ cowardly flight had aroused their blood. Some were even ready to hunt down the humans in the forest, but Kith-Kanan reminded them that their duty was to their dead speaker and their comrades back at the fort.
They marched out of the woods, a solemn parade, bearing the bodies of the fallen on their horses. The dead human, Dremic, was left where he lay. A shocked and silent garrison greeted them at Sithelbec. Sithel was dead. Sithas was speaker. Everyone wondered if the cause of peace had died with the great and ancient leader.
Kith-Kanan readied his warriors in defensive positions in case of attack. Watch was kept throughout the night, but it proved to be a peaceful one. After midnight, when he’d finished his work for the day, Kith-Kanan went to the shell of the unfinished keep, where Sithas knelt by the body of their slain father.
“The Wildrunners are prepared should an attack come,” he said softly.
Sithas did not raise his head. “Thank you.”
Kith-Kanan looked down at his father’s still face. ‘Did he suffer?”
“No.”
“Did he say anything?”
“He could not speak.”
Hands clenched into fists, Kith-Kanan wept. “This is my fault! His safety was my duty! I urged him to come here. I encouraged him to go hunting.”
“And you weren’t present when he was ambushed.” said Sithas calmly.
Kith-Kanan reacted blindly. He seized his twin by the back of his robe and hauled him to his feet. Spinning him around, he snarled, “You were there, and what good did it do him?”
Sithas gripped Kith-Kanan’s fists and pulled them loose from his shirt. With angry precision, he said, “I am speaker. I am. I am the leader of the elven nation, so you serve me now, Brother. You can no longer fly off to the forest. And do not trouble me about the rights of Kagonesti or halfhuman trash.”
Kith-Kanan let out a breath, long and slow. The twin he loved was swamped by hatred and grief, he told himself as he looked into Sithas’s stormy eyes. With equal precision he answered, “You are my speaker. You are my liege lord, and I shall obey you even unto death.” It was the ancient oath of fealty. Word for word, the twins had said it to their father when they’d reached maturity. Now Kith-Kanan said it to his twin, his elder by just three minutes.
Chapter 28
BURDENED BY COMMAND
Sithel’s body was borne back to his capital with haste. Sithas felt dignity was less important than speed; he wanted to present the nation with the terrible news as quickly as possible. The Ergothians might move at any time, and the elven nation was not ready to meet them.
The dire news flashed ahead of the caravan. By the time Sithel’s body was ferried across the Thon-Thalas, the city was already in mourning. The river was so thick with boats, it could be walked across. From the humblest fisher to the mightiest priest, all elves turned out to view the speaker for the last time. By the thousands they lined the street to the Tower of the Stars, bare-headed out of respect. Waiting for the cortege at the tower was Lady Nirakina. She was so stricken that she had to be carried in a sedan chair from the palace to the tower.
There were no hails or cheers as Speaker Sithas walked through the streets, leading the funeral cortege. His father lay in state in the Temple of E’li as thousands of his subjects came to pay him a last farewell. Then, with a minimum of ceremony, Sithel was put to rest beside his own father in the magnificent mausoleum known as the Crystal Tomb.
The very next day, Sithas composed an ultimatum to the emperor of Ergoth. “We consider the death of our father Sithel to be nothing less than deliberate murder,” Sithas wrote. “The Elven Nation demands retribution for its speaker’s death. If Your Imperial Highness wishes to avoid war, we will accept an indemnity of one million gold pieces, the expulsion of all Ergothian subjects from our western territories, and the surrender of all the men present at the murder of our father, including Ulvissen.”
Kith-Kanan had had to delay his departure from Sithelbec. He arrived in Silvanost two days after his father’s funeral, incensed that Sithas had acted so precipitously with the last rites and his ultimatum to the emperor of Ergoth.
“Why did you not wait?” he complained to his twin in the Tower of the Stars. “I should have been here to see father’s last rites!” Kith-Kanan had just come from a long visit with his mother; her grief and his own weighed heavily upon him.
“There is no time for empty ceremony,” Sithas said. “War may be near, and we must act. I have ordered prayers and offerings to our father be made in every temple every night for thirty days, but for now I must rally the people.”
“Will the humans attack?” asked Hermathya anxiously from her place at Sithas’s side.
“I don’t know,” the speaker replied grimly. “They outnumber us ten to one.”
Kith-Kanan looked at the two of them. It was so unnatural to see them where Sithel and Nirakina had been so often seated. Hermathya looked beautiful, perfectly groomed and dressed in a gown of gold, silver, and white. Yet she was cold. Whereas Nirakina could inspire respect and love with a smile and a nod, all Hermathya seemed capable of doing was looking statuesque. Of course she did not meet Kith-Kanan’s eyes.
On the emerald throne, Sithas looked strained and tired. He was trying to make fast and hard decisions, as he felt befitted a monarch in time of trouble. The burden showed on his face and in his posture. He looked far older than his twin at this moment.
The tower was empty except for the three of them. All morning Sithas had been meeting with priests, nobles, and masters of the guilds, telling them what he expected from them in case of war. There had been some patriotic words, mostly from the priests, but in all the tone of the audience had been very subdued. Now only Kith-Kanan remained. Sithas had special orders for him.
“I want you to form the Wildrunners into a single army,” he commanded.
“With what purpose?” his twin asked.
“Resist the Ergothian army, should it cross the border into the forest.”
Kith-Kanan
rubbed his forehead. “You know, Sith, that the whole militia numbers only twenty thousand, most of whom are farmers armed with pikes.”
“I know, but there’s nothing else to stop the humans between their border and the banks of the Thon-Thalas. We need time, Kith, time for Kencathedrus to raise an army with which to defend Silvanost.”
“Then why in Astarin’s name are you so eager to start a war with Ergoth? They have two hundred thousand men under arms! You said it yourself!”
Sithas’s hands clenched the arms of his throne, and he leaned forward. “What else can I do? Forgive the humans for murdering our father? You know it was murder. They laid a trap for him and killed him! Is it such a coincidence that Ulvissen was in the area and that one of his supposed foresters perpetrated the crime?”
“It is suspicious,” Kith-Kanan conceded, with less heat than before. He pulled his helmet on, threading the chin strap into its buckle. “I will do what I can, Sith,” he said finally, “but there may be those who aren’t as willing to fight and die for Silvanesti.”
“Anyone who refuses the speaker’s call is a traitor,” Hermathya interjected.
“It is easy to make such distinctions here in the city, but on the plains and in the woods, neighbors mean more than far-off monarchs,” Kith-Kanan said pointedly.
“Are you saying the Kagonesti will not fight for us?” asked Sithas angrily.
“Some will. Some may not.”
Sithas leaned back and sighed deeply. “I see. Do what you can, Kith. Go back to Sithelbec as quickly as you can.” He hesitated. “I know you will do your best.”
A brief glance passed between the twins. “I’ll take Arcuballis,” said Kith-Kanan and went quickly.
When the prince had departed, Hermathya fumed. “Why do you allow him to be so familiar? You’re the speaker. He should bow and call you Highness.”
Sithas turned to his wife. His face was impassive. “I have no doubts about Kith’s loyalty,” he said heavily. “Unlike yours, Lady, in spite of your correct language and empty flattery.”
