The Sword of Morning Star

by Richard Meade

  His face expressionless, Albrecht said, “I think not, Kor. You complained because the Lands of Light had little army. This will give your men something on which to stretch their muscles.”

  With the point of his dagger, Kor picked his teeth. “And pull your chestnuts from some very hot coals.”

  Albrecht spread his hands. “Which King of Boorn would you have to reckon with, friend Kor—myself or Sigrieth’s son?”

  Kor, frowning, thought about that. “Aye, we’ve worked well in harness so far, and great rewards beckon if we continue. But with Sigrieth’s seed, there’s no compromise. Still, this is something we’d not counted on.”

  “Have you fear of the one-handed bastard?” Albrecht rasped.

  Kor flipped his dagger high in the air; it came down point first and quivered in the wood of Albrecht’s table. “I fear no man,” he said harshly. “Nor half-wolf, either, for that matter. How many soldiers have they?”

  “At most, they raise forty thousand. We have more than three times that number.”

  “Aye,” said Kor, “but much of that not men at all—only half-wolves.”

  Albrecht flushed. “Be not contemptuous. They will fight, as you shall see.”

  “Summon Eero,” Kor said tersely.

  Albrecht hesitated, then gave a call. Immediately, Eero was there with them. “Your Majesty?”

  Kor rumbled: “Look at me, Eero.”

  Eero did. “No,” said Kor remorselessly. “I mean full in eye.”

  Eero’s clawed hands clenched nervously, but he met Kor’s pale stare. But five seconds was more than he could endure, and then he turned his head.

  Albrecht’s voice was savage. “You are dismissed. Leave us.”

  Eero growled something and strode out. When he had gone, Kor said roughly, “You see? They cannot look a human being in the eye. I doubt not that in numbers they are fierce. But something there is in them that, in the last chance, quails. There is too much wolf, not enough man.” He drained his tankard. “Besides,” he said, “I myself have fought against Sigrieth’s army in actions where we had him outnumbered two and three to one and come off second best. Sigrieth was like a demon, and inspired his men as well to demonhood. Sometimes he conjured up real demons…”

  “Sigrieth is dead.”

  Kor arose, went to the door of the pavilion, stared out at the vast confusion of the encampment; Albrecht looked at that blocky, ferocious figure outlined against the last light with hatred in his heart. When the battles were won, when the time had come, Kor’s barbarians would see how half-wolves could fight…

  Then Kor turned. “Yes,” he said, in a different tone. “Sigrieth is dead. And surely the Gods would not visit us with two of his like in so short a time.”

  “The one-handed man they call Morning Star is an impostor.” Albrecht said it quickly, and belief rang in his voice if not in his heart.

  Kor sat heavily. “Aye, likely. Give me more wine. Very well, we move tomorrow. Still, there is in me a foreboding—”

  All that week, the outlaws had come in. From every lair, covert and crevice in which a man in Boorn could hide, they came, in small bands or large ones—but however they rode, their tight discipline and quiet confidence, their responsiveness to their leaders showed their army training. These were ex-soldiers, veterans, the hard-bitten remnants of Sigreith’s army, dispossessed by half-wolves. Alike, they were motivated by hatred and revenge of Albrecht and Eero and all his kind; but they were not children to be led into battle by a child; and when the leathery officers and noncommissioned officers of the bands confronted Helmut, it was with clear, appraising, and dubious eye.

  But once they saw him, their doubts uniformly melted. Luukah had not fighting experience, and so could not recognize a fighting man; and Helmut thus had had to prove himself to him. But these tough and hardened leaders (most of whom had already heard of his exploits: the five men in the Neoroma alley; the detachment of half-wolves beyond the Frorwald; the battle in the forest) recognized him for what he was at once. Something in his eyes and in the set of his mouth; the way he wore his sword; that imposing weight of steel at the end of his wrist; and, above all, his quiet, lack of bluster, the knack for giving terse, clear orders—these won them over with magical speed.

  And so, overnight, the plain outside of Markau, where once the wolves had prowled, became an armed camp of men. Truly, it was a raggle-taggle force, poorly supplied, but it grew in numbers every day. Inspecting it with Hagen, Helmut was pleased. “We have full ten thousand here.”

  “Aye,” said Hagen as they rode back through the town gate. “And my forces and those of the other lords will swell the total when we rendezvous at Alserbach. I think a shade over forty thousand may we gather. But you know the intelligence from Sandivar. His harriers and falcons circle daily over Albrecht’s camp at Grancsay and bring him word. And now Kor has joined him, is supplied, their armies melded; and I think tomorrow they will move.”

  “So shall we,” said Helmut.

  “Before we do,” said Hagen, “though you have a thousand details nagging at you, it would pleasure me should you find a few minutes to walk with Nissilda and take a leave of her that will give her some comfort. She fears for me, aye; but she fears for you as well.”

  “I shall do that,” Helmut said. “But you know, Hagen—”

  “Aye. Sandivar has told me. Yet it is more than passing possible that neither of us will see her ever again. This is not a light task we undertake, nor are many likely to come out of it unscathed. If the memories she has of us are last ones, let them also be pleasant ones.”

  “I think now, when Vengeance is stabled, I shall ask her to walk with me in the garden.”

  Hagen nodded. “That were well.” He twisted in the saddle. They had ridden to the castle entrance, on its hill inside the town, and now they could overlook the plain, with its encampment. “Do you feel it?” he asked. “There is a change in weather. The sky’s o’ercast, and the wind is rising.”

  “Aye,” said Helmut.

  “It is a portent that I do not like.”

  “Perhaps it’s one for Albrecht.”

  “Perhaps.” Hagen swung down and handed reins to a lackey. “I’ll tell Nissilda you’ll be waiting in the garden.”

  The rose shattered; the wind, fiercer now and with an edge of cold, blew its pink petals wheeling and drifting across the grass. Nissilda shivered. “Indeed,” she said. “It is early, but the year is waning. Fall comes on—and then winter.”

  “Of course,” said Helmut. “Winter always comes. And then spring again…” But the sky had indeed gone lead gray, and the air was full of chill. They walked on down the path; and she held his arm that ended in the morning star.

  “And so tomorrow you must go,” she said.

  “Aye.”

  “And then the battle. So few against so many.”

  “But Albrecht fights from greed and fear; and Kor for plunder only. We few fight from other motives: to restore Boorn as the world’s keystone; to stand between half-wolves and humanity. To keep the dark from falling.”

  She looked at the sky. “It falls already.”

  “But it can be rolled back if we are strong and fortunate.” He spread his cloak and drew her inside it against the chill.

  “Mayhap—only… so much cast on the single throw. And they so many more than you and…” Her voice faltered. “Sandivar. Could not he use his magic?” Her fingers squeezed his arm. Could he not conjure up other troops with sorcery or hurl lightning bolts—?”

  “He has used all sorcery that he’s allowed. Should he hurl lightning bolts, you could warrant that the other side would find a sorcerer who would hurl them back—and thus began the Worldfire. No, what we seek now—peace, safety, and sunlight for humanity—must be bought as always in the only coin valid: risk and courage. When last things come to last things, man’s strength and bravery and his love of the home for which he fights must be the strongest wizardry of all. There is no other way.”

>   “Aye,” she said. “In that, you must be right. But for a woman, such things are difficult to fathom. Still, there is a pride in me that my father goes, that you go, to fight for things with meaning; and that must sustain me ere you come back.” She halted, and she was trembling a little. “May I give you a favor to wear?”

  He said nothing. From about her throat she unbound a scarf and, pulling free of his cloak, wrapped it about his upper arm above the morning star. “Will you wear it?” she asked. “Will you wear my favor?”

  “With pleasure,” said he, looking down into her eyes. “But, Nissilda, you must not be misled. Inside, I am badly crippled; I cannot love.”

  “I know,” she said. “But I can.” Then she stood on tiptoe, her lips brushed his, and she whirled and ran quickly away. Helmut remained motionless until she had disappeared in the hedge’s maze. Presently, he let out a long breath, his hand caressing the perfumed gauze bound on the other arm. Then he strode away, sword gear clanking. There was much he had to do.

  CHAPTER XII

  Long before dawn, in the teeth of a cold wind coming from the north, the army moved. They had made good distance when the day broke, cold and gray as the belly of a fish, the lowering clouds nevertheless streaked with a strange, forbidding light. Despite his heavy cloak, Helmut shivered. “This is a grayness that I have seen before,” he said to Sandivar.

  They rode at the army’s head, Helmut on Vengeance, Rage swinging at his belt, Death and Destruction loping tirelessly at his stirrup-irons. Waddle’s deceptive, shambling gait matched the war-horse’s without difficulty. Hagen took the rear, with his own men, to keep the massive column moving.

  “Aye,” said Sandivar. “I can imagine where.”

  “There we fought all our battles in such murk.” Fog blew before them in tatters, and the wind keened. He turned in the saddle, looked at the marching column, mostly foot, with cavalry on either flank. “Well, mayhap it shall be my portion again, that endless underworld of battle, ere this is over. If so, I warrant I’ll have company.”

  He turned forward once again and drew his cloak about him. There was, now, really, nothing to think about. Sandivar had verified by those aerial spies of his, the birds of prey, that Albrecht was indeed in motion southward toward them. And they went north to meet him, and when the two armies collided, they would decide the fate of mankind for centuries yet to come. And yet, thought Helmut now, it was a battle that had been fought so often through the aeons. Let light glow forth, and always someone came to stamp it out—or try. Perhaps that was man’s fate—by learning, to see god-hood; and, by his greeds and lusts, always to have it snatched away from him.

  But maybe, if he could win this battle, at last there would be peace. One thing certain—if he lost it, Boorn, the Lands of Light, all civilization were lost as well. He could only try, offer his courage and his blood as sacrifice.

  Beneath his cloak, his good hand crept over to touch the filmy scarf still bound round his upper right arm. Frozen within, yes; yet odd how much strength the gauze lent to him when his fingertips touched it. And after all—what was frozen could thaw. He felt again the brush of Nissilda’s lips. Well, he had that much more to fight for, anyhow. If anyone could thaw him, it must be she…

  On they rode to Alserbach, a crossroads at another vast plain, where the lords had gathered. Here another great encampment, with cooking fires burning and horses stamping and whickering in the cold. To the summons sent around, nearly every lord of Boorn had responded; a few sent no answer at all, afraid of Albrecht, yet unwilling to be against Sigrieth’s son. With those he would deal harshly when he had the crown. But as for now, it pleasured and heartened him to see how many of them had come and what men they’d brought with them—tough ex-soldiers, like those who followed him. And surely, all told, they would tally forty thousand.

  That night, he conferred with the lords in his pavilion, which bore a pennon with a morning star device. Another of Sandivar’s hawks had wheeled in; and the old man said: “They camp tonight at Rabohene—Albrecht, Kor, their army.”

  “So.” Helmut bent over a map. “They marched so far today; tomorrow so far again. And if we make our rate tomorrow as it was today, then the two of us collide right here.” His finger touched a spot.

  The lords looked at one another. “The Moor of Yrawnn,” said Hagen.

  Luukah shook his head. “Outnumbered as we are, that were a bad place to do battle. The Moor is level as this table top, wide and open, and with their superior numbers they could there engulf us.” His fingers moved up the map. “If we hurry, we could catch them here, in rough country, where, perhaps, we could maneuver.”

  Hagen smiled grimly. “And exhaust our men and horses ere we fight. No, Luukah, you do not understand. Fighting on the Moor of Yrawnn, we shall have some slight advantage—not against the wolfmen, but against the barbarians.”

  “You are right,” said Luukah. “I do not understand.”

  “But Kor will. Great victories and great defeats are both long celebrated in the barbarian camps. It was here that Sigrieth’s army dealt the barbarians under Gondor, Kor’s father, their greatest defeat.”

  “Aye, I’ve heard of that battle. The barbarians poured into Boorn in force, and Sigrieth rallied but a quarter of their number. They clashed on Yrawnn, and by the good chance of a heavy fog, Sigrieth’s movements were concealed from Gondor’s. He took full advantage and did such slaughter that the barbarians fled and no house in Gondor’s kingdom that did not wail its dead. But what has that to do with now? We shall not have such fog to help us—at least it were a miracle should we.”

  “Who knows?” said Helmut. “These days are gray. Be that as it might, the barbarian legend is that my father on that day conjured up very demons from the underworld to fight by him—how else could so few defeat so many? If aught come to give us advantage in the battle, then perhaps their superstitions will undermine their courage—Anyhow, we shall fight on the Moor of Yrawnn. Now, to bed, good gentlemen; tomorrow is another hard day’s march.”

  When they had left, all but Sandivar, who shared the pavilion, the old man said, “You sounded very confident.”

  “A general must, always. Besides, many times has my father told me of that battle. The hills through which we pass tomorrow are so curved that the wind blows always south to north across the moor, its gale continuous.”

  “Yes,” said Sandivar, “we shall have the wind at our backs, for what that’s worth.”

  “Which may be much or nothing,” Helmut said, and slumped down at the table. With his good hand, he rubbed his eyes. “By the Gods,” he said, “I am weary. Though little time has passed for you, ten years now have I fought in terrible combat, hardly ceasing, and now that I come back to this clean earth, still it goes on. And I am tired of combat, Sandivar; and tired, too, of being frozen within, unable to love, unable to smile. I had not known how great the price would be when I consented to pay it. To be an emperor with an empress whom I cannot love; to father children at whom I cannot smile; to remain the killing machine only that you and that decade down there have made of me—But, hells and devils! What Boorn needs now, I reckon, is indeed a machine for killing, so perhaps all is as well.” He drank a great draught of wine and slammed down the tankard.

  Sandivar was silent. Then he said: “It was not lightly done, the thing I did. But it was necessary. Still, no sacrifice have I asked of you that my own flesh and spirit did not make as well; for in that, we are one flesh and spirit.”

  Helmut turned and stared at him. “What mean you?”

  “I mean that I am your grandfather,” said Sandivar, “and your mother was my daughter; and had it not been for the sorceress Kierena—she who was the Black Bitch-wolf—and my own lust and foolishness, perhaps she would today be yet alive. What you have suffered has been naught to what I have endured, within, here, where a rat of remorse has gnawed since first you saw the light of day.” And he touched his breast.

  Helmut still stared, wordlessly.
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br />   “But time now that you know,” said Sandivar. “You were told your mother died in bearing you, but that was not the case. She died the victim, brokenhearted, of a court intrigue. Let me explain.” He poured more wine.

  “Albrecht’s sister, who was your father’s wife and Gustav’s mother, was a bride of arrangement only. Then, hunting, one fine day, Sigrieth halted at the hideaway in the Frorwald where I lived, widowed, with my daughter; and there, in Tessa—she was but eighteen at the time—he found his one true love. We were brought to the court, where the termagant, Albrecht’s sister, the Empress, had her own lovers; and the arrangement might have gone well had not Albrecht, seeing how deeply Sigrieth loved poor Tessa, feared that someday she might displace his sister as Empress. So when you were born, he began a court intrigue against her that so deeply shamed her that, at last, she killed herself—and Sigrieth never learned the why…” Sandivar shook his head. “It was a brutal, foul, and slanderous campaign against one so young…”

  Helmut digested this. Then he said, “If you were at the court, why did you not put a stop to it?”

  “I was no longer there.” Sandivar stared down at the dirt floor of the pavilion. “There was a woman of the court—black loveliness—who also sought the Empress’ throne, and thought she might achieve it through sorcery. Kierena.” His voice was dry. “One thing in life she wanted—the throne of Empress of the Gray Lands. She thought that sorcery might help her get it; and, knowing me proficient in that art, she used her charms upon me. I was not then so old and withered, nor proof against what I thought was love. So I yielded, and taught her more than I ever should. Your father, learning of this, and sorcery forever banned in Boorn, had no choice but to invoke his edict, and she and I both were exiled. Nor…” his voice faltered, “saw I her again until the other day, on a path in the Frorwald.”

  He stood up. “Well, there you have it. You are my flesh. My liaison with Kierena separated me from Boorn, and, unable to prevent disaster, I learned in helplessness of death after death: my daughter’s; Sigrieth’s; Gustav’s; all as Albrecht worked his plots to get the throne. You I managed to rescue, but only you. Meanwhile, Kierena, seeing Albrecht, who had always lusted after her, with the crown, came back to Boorn. I had taught her lycanthropy; and this fitted in well with his plans. Thus—” he drank wine, “whoever died outside of Markau I have on my soul’s reckoning. But that’s another matter. I have done all I can to make amends. I have used all magic that I am allowed to use. The rest is up to you, to every fighting man out there, and to the Gods.”