by Robert Brady
I had thought so many times how much easier my life would be if Glennen would conveniently die. I could have accepted finding him in a puddle of his own puke in the barn. This ripped me apart – to have to sit with him, helpless, as he gave up.
He had pushed the bowl away. I saw it. He’d taken an interest. He was about to turn the corner.
We’d come so close to getting him back!
I don’t know how long I knelt there. I didn’t know that Men traditionally expressed their grief here. I didn’t know that they would have left me there for a week if I wanted to, and said nothing about it to me afterwards.
I didn’t know that the behavior I saw as normal from Glennen, to just get back to work after Alekanna died, had seemed strange to other Foveans, and that my behavior, to fall apart, had been normal to them.
I didn’t know and I didn’t care. The sun had risen out of the windows and the shadows were short when I finally looked at them. Shela waited there with Lee, leaning on the long table, watching me. I didn’t see Glennen. His blood and puke and urine stained the floor five feet from me. The table had been pushed up against the far wall.
I placed the same hand I had used to hit the table on the floor, and used the same shoulder I had used as a battering ram to brace myself as I tried to rise. The pain in both made me gasp. I grit my teeth, tried again, and finally got to my feet.
Shela came to me slowly, as if afraid that I would explode or hit her. I watched her, saying nothing.
“Your grief was great,” she said.
“The man was great,” I said.
She nodded. She regarded Lee, who sat quiet, just watching me. “You know that this daughter of yours stood your vigilance. She wouldn’t be removed from the room, or nurse, or even soil her diaper, waiting for you.”
I grinned. I reached out and stroked her cheek. She bit my finger, a needle-sharp baby tooth piercing me.
“He died,” Shela said finally.
“I know.”
“His Oligarchs are preparing him,” she said. “The bells from Adriam’s temple have been ringing. J’her doubled the Wolf Soldier guard and sent for another thousand from Thera.”
“Probably a good idea,” I said.
She took my hand and looked at it. It throbbed. She turned it over, and I could see the meaty side swelling.
“Not broken,” she said. “I have never seen bones so thick as yours. No wonder no man can beat you.”
“Well,” I said, grinning, “I am a tough guy, you know.”
“Not so tough,” she said, and she kissed my lips gently. “Not so tough that you don’t mourn his dying.”
I felt a tear roll down my cheek.
“You know, I feared you would react like you always do,” she said.
I felt my eyebrows drop.
“Oh, you know what I mean,” she said. “You would work it into your plans, your schemes, and you would build on it. When I walked in, I wondered if you would use this to convince the other Dukes to turn on Ceberro, or to justify an invasion of Conflu.”
“Ceberro,” I said. “So you know –“
She kissed me. “I am not stupid, White Wolf,” she said. “I saw him in the ring. You beat him so that he could beat you through me. How better to overturn The Conqueror than to repaint him as The Coward. I have rescued you before – people would believe I did it again.”
“He must be enjoying himself now, then,” I said. “Lupus the Weeper.”
She shook her head. “Before he left, he said to me, ‘Protect him well, that is my king now.’”
“Ceberro?”
“No man can doubt how much you loved him,” she said. “And many did, White Wolf. Many thought that you were an opportunist carving your ambition from a keg of mead. Devarre even thought you might be feeding him liquor.”
“Who?”
“Devarre?” she said. She punched me. “One of the Oligarchs? I wondered if you knew their names.”
I smiled. “Was it that obvious?”
“You called him ‘Two’ once,” she said. “I don’t think you were aware of it, but the rest of us enjoyed a laugh after.”
I just shook my head. She released my hand. The swelling had gone down now.
“Plains magic?” I asked her.
“The benefits of owning a witch,” she said.
I kissed her, let her tongue into my mouth, tasted this girl who loved me. It went on long enough were Lee started to bat our faces and to giggle.
We broke the kiss and looked at her. Her own face turned red, and Shela immediately held her away.
“How long did she work on that?” I asked.
Shela just snorted and beat a path to our chambers.
I sat there, rubbing my hand, looking at the dent in the table. I sort of remembered putting it there, but not really. I saw another next to it, on the side, where I had shouldered it into the wall. The table had been made of some hard wood; it was a miracle that I hadn’t broken something. It sure felt like I had.
Another thing that had played out well for me. Even my weakness made me stronger. King of Eldador, and the Ceberro problem taken care of, unless of course he’d just scammed Shela. Ceberro the opportunist - and what an opportunity for him now. If he wanted to take advantage of me, he would have already.
Might as well go see, I sighed. If he quit the palace, then I’d know that he’d left to marshal his troops in Angador and Vrek.
I left the table, the chairs and the mess for the servants, walked to the door, and pulled it open. I planned to go to find Hectar, to get his opinions, then to meet with the Oligarchs.
Instead the nobility crowded the hall. Ceberro and his family, Hectar and his, the Oligarchs, the court barons, J’her and forty Wolf Soldier guards, standing at attention.
“His Majesty Declared, King Mordetur of Eldador!” my major announced. They all went down on two knees. We had no tradition here – I would be the second king of Eldador. Apparently the resident Dukes had worked it out with the Oligarchs. I stood there, stunned, not knowing what to do. I searched for and found J’her’s eyes. He grinned at me, and then saluted, his hand over his heart. I saluted back.
“Stand,” I said. “All of you, get up.”
They stood, hesitant, waiting to see what I would do. This was critical, I thought. Screw this up and it will haunt your reign.
“I thank you all,” I said, simply. “This is a difficult time, for Eldador and for me, and for each of you, I am sure. We have lost the father of our nation, a great man, and a uniter.
“Let us take a week to heal,” I said. “For a week, if any man or woman comes to the capital who is hungry, let him be fed. If any comes who is poor, let him have shelter. If any come who is full of fear, let us protect him.
“We are an Eldadorian family,” I said. “Let us look after our brothers, our sisters and our cousins.”
They applauded. Hectar and Ceberro looked at each other, then at me. That had to sound pretty radical to them. So be it.
We could find worse things in life than being good to each other.
Chapter Eleven
Bells and Whistles
“When Glennen took the throne of Eldador,” the priest of Adriam said, “he stood in his armor, on a pile of stones, and he said to the rest of us, ‘I am your King.’”
We stood on the steps of the royal palace. A Man named Dred Barr, the high priest of Adriam for the Eldadorian city, and whom I had never met, officiated from the highest step, right before the gigantic wooden doors to the palace. Every baron, every earl, every Duke of Eldador, and every wealthy commoner who could get a place, had come to this event. Avek Noir had come to represent the Trenboni with Ancenon. Four Uman delegates of Sental, the bearded and furred representatives of the cities of Volkhydro, the lithe horsemen of the major clans of Andoran, including my father-in-law, Kills with a Glance; even a delegation of black-haired, yellow-skinned Confluni had come.
There were black men in white robes called, ‘Toorians,’ who had s
ailed in from the Silent Isle. Eldador had been a good trade partner with them, bringing their native fruits and pelts to the north and reselling their wood-crafted furniture.
For a week we had given away bread and housed the homeless. The ranks of the Wolf Soldiers had doubled. J’her complained along with Two Spears that we would never train them all.
We had all agreed that we would have the ceremony, then the funeral, and that this would be our tradition. Never let Eldador be without a monarch.
So we all crowded the stone courtyard between the gates to the palace walls and the steps to the palace doors. Shela had dressed in a beautiful red gown that showed off her cleavage. Lee wore another gown to match, cut more for a baby. Glennen’s kids were in black, of course. Alekennen already cozied up to Groff’s son – she would leave with them to start her new life as his prospective bride.
“So let the new King, Rancor Mordetur, who is already known to us as the Just, the Conqueror, and the Wise, come before the All Father now.”
I stood up next to the priest, and faced the crowd of thousands. I looked up and saw the Aschire bowmen on the walls. Grim-faced Wolf Soldier guards in pristine gray and black tabards stood posts everywhere. If the city turned out now, it could probably turn back the combined Fovean armies.
Which is what I wanted, because if anyone ever wanted to move against Eldador, the time had come.
“Rancor Mordetur, do you take on the legacy of the Stowes, to rule this land with wisdom and with justice?” the priest asked me.
“I do,” I said.
“To what god do you swear your oath?”
“To War,” I said. Plenty of warriors worshipped war. I heard a murmur, however. Glennen had worshipped Adriam.
“Then be recognized by your people as his Majesty, Rancor the First, of House Mordetur, King of Eldador.”
The crowd cheered. The monarchs here didn’t wear crowns. I wore the circlet that I usually wore to hold my hair back, and my armor, because Glennen had worn his on his crowning.
This was as much tradition as Eldador had. This turned out to be a pretty good thing, too, because it stopped the crossbow bolt that took me right in the chest a moment later.
I remember thinking, “Wow, the sky is really blue today,” before I even realized that I lay on my back.
“Alarm!” the cry rang out. The sky flashed yellow from the defensive spells that encircled the building. Close those doors, now that the horse had left the barn!
Shela kneeled at my side, her hand at my neck. Lee screamed herself red-faced. Rennin and Ceberro were on either side of me with their swords out, and no less than one hundred Wolf Soldiers circled all of us. The priest made a hasty retreat; I placed him as more of the church-going religious man than any type of hero.
“White Wolf?” Worry painted Shela’s face.
“I don’t think it did more than knock me down,” I said. “Rennin, a hand!”
Rennin took me by the front of the breastplate and hauled me to my feet like a doll. My chest throbbed dully, but in that general ‘someone just punched me’ pain, not the ‘Oh, look at the bolt sticking out of me,’ pain. As if I needed more evidence, I actually stepped on the offending weapon.
Shela scooped it up before I could get to it, and it glowed red. I thought that she wanted to destroy it in her anger, then I realized that she was using it instead. Not hard to guess for what.
“Bounty hunters,” she announced. “He is a Dorkan, and he is within the walls of the palace still.”
“Can you find him?” Ceberro demanded. He did it too forcefully for my tastes. I didn’t trust him, no matter what he said to Shela.
Shela’s brown eyes scanned the warriors around us and landed on the captain of my Wolf Soldier guard. She reached out with the left hand and touched his forehead. “Accept my power,” she commanded him.
I knew this man as Tehern, a Volkhydran who had killed four men in a drunken brawl over a woman. I had purchased him from Ulep’s headman for one hundred gold coins. He was a pile of muscle with hair, beetle-browed and with weathered skin. He looked like nothing more than a fighting man, but he possessed a sharp and cunning mind and he had done well with the Wolf Soldiers.
He took a step back, the fear obvious in his wide, staring eyes. He closed those eyes and opened them again, then shook his head.
“Do you see the face?” she asked him.
“I do,” he said. “I – oh, War, I see the face!”
She nodded. “That is the man who would kill Lupus,” she said. “Bring him.”
He nodded and left with his guards without even looking at me. I shouted, “He’ll be going for the dungeons,” and a few of my Wolf Soldiers turned and nodded to me as they ran after him.
“Why the dungeons?” Ceberro asked.
“Either they found a way in through there,” I said, “or he will hide there. They’re extensive. Our trying to find him with magic isn’t going to be a surprise to him, so he is going to want to be somewhere where he can hide from someone tracking him.”
“But if he’s a suicide attacker?” Ceberro argued.
I shook my head. “He would have done the job with a sword or dagger then,” I said. “He thinks he is going to get away and brag of this.”
Rennin looked me in the eye. “He won’t,” he informed me.
I nodded. The courtyard boiled in pandemonium. Nobles and commons looked for someplace to be other than wherever they found themselves, as people tend to do when you fence them in and don’t tell them why. Wolf Soldier guards held their perimeter, many of them probably recognizing the men and women who had sentenced them for their previous crimes. That had to be sweet, I thought. Getting to jail your jailer. Even with my Wolf Soldiers’ knowing that they couldn’t exactly poke these nobles with a sword, just the position that both were in had to be rewarding.
It might have been years since that fat cop with bad breath had told me I would do time, but I’d still love to have him in my dungeon now.
I called for J’her. While I waited I tickled Lee’s nose to quiet her. Her mother held her almost distractedly as her mind and Power sought out our new enemy.
A one-year-old, she looked right at me. I thought about how she had quelled my anger with a touch of her hand. Funny how your daughter has that power over you. She gurgled and cooed at me as I made faces at her.
J’her pounded up the stairs two at a time, in his usual Wolf Soldier uniform, alone.
“Your Majesty,” J’her said, as he approached me.
I punched him in the face with my steel gauntlet. I held the Sword of War in my hand before I even thought of drawing it.
I would have let anyone else draw. J’her had served me well, however, and he deserved better.
He reached for his weapon and I marked him, parting his steel breastplate like silk. Rennin and Ceberro stood stunned behind me as I pressed him down the stairs, cutting his arms and his legs as he struggled to get his sword out. Wolf Soldiers were sprinting to my side already.
Faster than my Wolf Soldiers, Aschire archers pin-cushioned J’her with arrows. Some bounced from his armor, but the rest found his face, his elbows, the backs of his legs, anywhere where a chink showed in his armor.
He fell to his knees, and then to his face. He never got his sword out or a word of explanation. He had said enough.
“Your own man?” Ceberro asked, his voice hushed.
I flipped him on his back with my toe. His eyes were ruined with arrows.
“This isn’t J’her,” I said. “No Wolf Soldier would call me ‘Your Majesty.’ This is either our bounty hunter or another one.”
“Another,” Shela said. She laid her hand on his back, and his face changed. I recognized the Uman ears. A glamour had made him look like my Major.
J’her charged toward me with three squads behind him; through the crowd and up the steps. This time I simply looked at Shela, who concentrated for a moment and nodded. He stopped at the body, then looked at me.
“Th
is is my fault,” he said to me, absolute in his loyalty. “Lupus, I should have done better –“
“We are fighters, not guards,” I said. “And he was disguised as you, with a glamour. I don’t know how we would have done this differently. It isn’t that they attacked us, J’her, it’s that they failed twice that matters.”
“We have nobles from every land complaining,” J’her informed me. “We have sign of the bounty hunter trying to go over the wall, as well. The Aschire claim to have marked him. We found a fresh blood trail in the palace already, leading to the dungeons as you expected.”
“Keep me up to date,” I said, and caught myself. “Let me know what you are doing, as you do it.”
He nodded and took off. Rennin had a squad removing this new bounty hunter.
“You know, most people whom they want to kill, oblige them with dying,” Rennin informed me.
“You are making no friends among them,” Ceberro agreed, trying to get in on the joke.
“Well, your Grace, I think I have already made sure they won’t be sending me gifts on All Gods’ Day. I want the two of you to help me now.”
“I am at the service of the King of Eldador,” Ceberro said, and lowered his head. Rennin looked at him, rolled his eyes and then looked at me.
“What do you need, your Majesty?” he asked.
“I want these nobles herded into the throne room,” I said. “Wolf Soldiers will make them go, I want you to invite them instead, and tell them I want to address them and explain what’s going on. People who think they are powerful love that.”
Rennin frowned, and gave me a look. “He and I are people in power, you know,” he said.
“Shall I tell you why I am doing this, then?” I asked, looking him right in the eye.
He opened his mouth, then closed it. “I never really know if I like you, Rancor Mordetur,” he said.
“Of course you don’t,” I assured him. “I’m cruel and irritating. No one likes that.”
He shook his head and left with Ceberro. I turned and left with Shela and the remaining thirty Wolf Soldiers. It occurred to me right then that I really needed a cape, for exits like this. Such a stupid thought made me smile to think it.
