Frostborn: Excalibur (Frostborn #13)

by Jonathan Moeller

“Even if we have to continue the conversation in the Tower of the Keeper in Tarlion once Tarrabus is defeated,” said Ridmark. His hands slid down her arms and squeezed her hands. “Good night, Calliande.”

  “Good night, Ridmark,” said Calliande.

  He stepped back, smiled, and walked off through the camp.

  Calliande lifted her tent flap and sat down on the cot, pulling off her boots, and then sprawled onto the cot, her eyelids heavy. Maybe it was just as well Tormark had called Ridmark away. Calliande was utterly exhausted, though she had no doubt that finding herself in Ridmark’s arms at last would have kept her wide awake. She smiled to herself, a wave of happiness going through her. She regretted that Ridmark had lost his wife and Morigna.

  Nonetheless, she was overjoyed to have him in her life once more.

  As she drifted off to sleep, a strange thought occurred to her.

  The Tower of the Keeper.

  She had never heard of it before. Calliande felt like she had heard of it before, but she could not quite recall it.

  As if she had forgotten it.

  Or had removed the memory from her mind.

  Before she could grasp the thought, she fell asleep.

  Chapter 4: Champions

  Arandar Pendragon, Prince Regent of the realm of Andomhaim and lawful heir to the throne of the High King, awoke before dawn.

  For a moment, he lay in silence, staring at the ceiling of the pavilion, enjoying the brief interval of peace. There would be no peace for the rest of the day, and it was possible that today was the crisis point. Tarrabus might try to break out of the siege walls and launch an assault on either Tarlion or Arandar’s army, or the dvargir might try something clever with their fiendish weapons.

  But for now, all seemed peaceful in the siege camp.

  If Arandar lay quiet for a few moments, he could almost imagine that the realm was not gripped by a bloody civil war, that the Frostborn were not coming down from the north, that he had not seen his children in too long.

  He got up at once.

  Arandar had never preferred lying about when there was work to be done, and God knew he had a stupendous amount of work to do. He disliked ignoring problems as well. Ignoring a problem never solved it.

  So, he got dressed, sat on his camp stool, and called for his squires.

  Arandar could have shaved himself and donned his own armor, and frankly, he would have preferred that. But he was the Prince Regent, and he was going to be the High King if he was not killed in the next week or so, and the High King had to do things in a certain way.

  That included relying on his squires and pages.

  Two boys of about fourteen came into the tent, one stocky, one thin, and both wearing blue tabards adorned with the red dragon sigil of the House of Pendragon. The stocky boy was Karlus Durius, the eldest grandson of fierce old Dux Kors Durius of Durandis. The thinner boy was Owen Gwyrdragon, a nephew of Prince Cadwall Gwyrdragon of Cintarra. Both Dux Kors and Prince Cadwall were some of Arandar’s most loyal supporters, and it was expected that Arandar would use some of the younger sons and grandsons of his vassals as squires and pages. Fortunately, both Karlus and Owen were competent boys, and one would day become fine knights and perhaps loyal lords.

  Or they would die alongside Arandar.

  The responsibility for so many lives pressed heavy upon him, but he kept the doubts from his face.

  “Good morning, my lord Prince!” said Karlus. Already he had his father’s and grandfather’s booming voice, heavy build, and confident manner. “How may we serve this morning?”

  “A shave, then my armor,” said Arandar. Owen moved to the table and took Arandar’s razor and some soap. “Any messages?”

  “A few, lord Prince,” said Owen, handing the razor and the soap to Karlus. The larger squire began applying the soap to Arandar’s face with more vigor than was necessary. Fortunately, the squire made up for it with precise handling of the razor.

  “Any fighting in the night?” said Arandar, tilting his head back.

  Karlus began to scrape the razor along Arandar’s jaw. “Only a little, lord Prince. A band of the dvargirs’ pet kobolds raided one of the camps. The Mhorluuskan orcs under King Zhorlaskur drove them off.”

  “And then ate them,” said Owen.

  Karlus grunted. “It is their custom, Owen.”

  Arandar would have smiled, but the razor was too close to his face for that. In ancient days, the orcs of Mhorluusk had been like the orcs of Kothluusk, fanatical worshippers of the blood god Mhor. Unlike the orcs of Kothluusk, the orcs of Mhorluusk had the habit of cooking and eating their vanquished foes. In time the orcs of Mhorluusk had abandoned the blood gods, accepted baptism in the church of the Dominus Christus, and sworn to the High King. After much theological debate, the orcs of Mhorluusk no longer ate humans, orcs, halflings, or dwarves…but they still cooked and ate any captured kobolds and trolls and a few other creatures of the Deeps, a custom that inspired unease among both the men of Andomhaim and the orcs of Rhaluusk and Kothluusk.

  Right now, Arandar had larger concerns.

  “Then King Zhorlaskur was successful?” said Arandar.

  “It seems so, lord Prince,” said Karlus. “The kobolds were all killed, captured, or repulsed.”

  “There was one other message,” said Owen.

  “The usual, lord Prince,” said Karlus. “Dux Leogrance and the other nobles and kings ask that you ride with them to inspect the walls shortly after dawn.”

  “Have one of the pages send word that I will join them,” said Arandar.

  Owen ducked out of the tent and returned with Arandar’s breakfast as Karlus toweled off the last of the shaving soap. Despite all their other problems, lack of food was not one of them. They had captured the granaries of Caerdracon and Calvus, and the commoners of both duxarchates had been glad to be rid of Tarrabus and his murderous Enlightened. Dux Leogrance had been able to draw more food from his prosperous duxarchate of Taliand. Fresh bread lay on the plate, alongside sliced sausages and even some fruit. Arandar took a bite of the bread, surprised that it was still hot. Evidently, some of the more enterprising men-at-arms had built an oven.

  “Any report from the watchmen upon the walls?” said Arandar.

  “Aye, my lord Prince,” said Karlus. “But nothing new. The traitors have not stirred, nor have their dark allies.” He laughed to himself. “I reckon they are not eating as well as we are.”

  “No,” said Arandar, taking another bite of bread. “They are not.”

  That troubled him for another reason. Hungry men were desperate men, and desperate men were dangerous. Tarrabus was strangling Tarlion beneath his siege walls, but Arandar’s army was, in turn, strangling the false king and his allies. Sooner or later the stalemate was going to explode, and when it did, Arandar was not sure the loyalists would prevail.

  He finished his breakfast, washing down the bread and sausage with a swallow of mixed wine, and got to his feet as the squires helped him into his armor. The duties of the Prince Regent governed most of his life, but with his armor, Arandar insisted on having his own way. A man’s armor could save his life, and Uthanaric Pendragon’s elaborate armor had not saved him from Imaria and the Weaver. Arandar donned a chain mail hauberk, strengthened with a steel cuirass and steel plates at the shoulders and elbows and knees. Karlus brought him a blue surcoat adorned with the red dragon of the Pendragons, and Owen buckled the sword belt around his waist, the soulblade Heartwarden hanging at his left hip and a dagger at his right. Arandar considered his reflection in a small mirror. He looked thinner than he remembered, his face more lined and more gray streaks in his curly black hair. His eyes were black and hard, his nose hooked both by birth and a few blows to the face.

  He looked, Arandar realized with a chill, like the High King of Andomhaim.

  Just as well, he supposed. There was work to be done.

  “Bring my horse,” he said.

  He left the pavilion and walked into the camp.


  The banner of the Pendragons flew from a staff before his pavilion, rippling in the breeze rising from the southern sea. Around him rose the pavilions and tents of the lords of the countryside near Tarlion itself, lords sworn directly to the High King. To the west, he saw the camp of Dux Leogrance of Taliand, and to the east the somewhat less orderly encampment of King Ulakhamar of Rhaluusk. Further west and east and southeast along the siege wall rested the camps of the other lords and kings, each one assigned to guard a portion of the earthwork wall.

  The earthwork siege wall rose a hundred yards away. It was nearly fifteen feet tall, heaped from the labor of countless men-at-arms, and the top had been worked into a crude breastwork. It was a stupendous feat of engineering, and stretched for nearly six miles from the eastern bank of the Moradel and to the shore of the southern sea, encircling all the city of Tarlion and Tarrabus’s own walls.

  Unfortunately, Tarrabus had dvargir engineers among his mercenaries, which meant his walls were more impressive.

  Two hundred yards beyond Arandar’s wall stood Tarrabus’s contravallation wall, built of packed earth, and every few hundred yards loomed watch towers fashioned of planks and dvargir steel. Another two hundred yards beyond that stood Tarrabus’s circumvallation wall, even higher than the first two walls, and it encircled Tarlion completely.

  But not even the three walls were high enough to block the view of the city of Tarlion itself.

  Arandar saw the tops of the city’s ancient white walls gleaming in the dawn sunlight, and over the battlements he saw the towers and spires of Tarlion itself. He had grown up in the city, and he recognized all the landmarks at sight. There were the dual towers of the Great Cathedral of Tarlion, where the High Kings of Andomhaim were crowned, the slender spire of the Tower of the Magistri, where the masters of the Magistri charted the course of the thirteen moons, and the stern octagonal towers of the Castra of the Swordbearers, where the Knights of the Soulblade took their formal oaths and unused soulblades were stored until they were bestowed upon a new bearer. Behind the Castra rose the tarnished copper dome of the Tower of the Keeper, where no one had set foot for centuries.

  Over all the domes and spires rose the Citadel and the Tower of the Moon.

  A massive stone crag stood at the southern end of the city. Atop the crag soared the walls and towers and courtyards of the Citadel, the ancient seat of the High Kings of Andomhaim. Within the heart of the Citadel rose a slender white tower, its peak a thousand feet over the walls of Tarlion. Everything within Tarlion had been built by human hands, save for the Tower of the Moon. The high elves had fashioned it in the ancient deeps of time, and within the Tower was the Well, the source of the magic of the Magistri.

  Arandar gazed at the city. His ambition had been nothing more than to become a knight and a Swordbearer with a household and a family of his own, free of the long shadow his father had cast over his life. Now Arandar was returning as the heir to the throne of Andomhaim, and the government and defense of Tarlion were his by right.

  It wasn’t something he had wanted, but the duty had fallen to him, and he would not shirk it.

  Four young Swordbearers in armor and two Magistri in white robes waited outside the pavilion. Tarrabus would not scruple to have Arandar assassinated, but four Swordbearers and two Magistri would be able to handle almost any threat. The six men bowed as Arandar approached, which was irritating, but he understood the necessity. He nodded in response, and Owen and Karlus returned with his horse. Arandar swung into the saddle with a grunt, adjusting Truthseeker’s scabbard, and set off along the wall, his bodyguards and squires following him.

  It did not take long to find the chief lords and kings. Like Arandar, the Duxi and the Comites and the knights all had their squires, and the orcish kings brought their chief headmen along with them, who were in turn attended by their most prestigious warriors. The result was that when the lords and knights and kings gathered, they practically formed a small army on their own with all their guards and squires and vassals.

  Arandar rode towards them.

  There were so many of them. Dux Leogrance Arban, who looked more patrician and stern than any of his sons. Dux Kors Durius, stocky and fierce, Prince Cadwall Gwyrdragon, handsome and proud, Dux Sebastian Aurelius, young but seasoned after a year and a half of warfare, Dux Gareth Licinius, old and stern. Master Kurastus of the Magistri and Master Marhand of the Swordbearers. The three kings of the orcish kingdoms were there as well. Old gray-bearded King Ulakhamar of Rhaluusk, the scowling young King Zhorlaskur of Mhorluusk, and Silent Malhask, the King of Khaluusk. King Malhask had lost his tongue to an arrow while fighting an ambush of Shaluuskan ghost orcs, but that had not diminished his ferocity in battle, possibly because the scar had left his face twisted into a terrifying grimace regardless of his temper.

  They were the most powerful men in the realm of Andomhaim, save for the nobles who had sided with Tarrabus Carhaine. Every one of the men was accustomed to command, save perhaps for Dux Sebastian. Every one of them had vassals and knights and servants.

  And it was Arandar’s task to command them.

  He was aware that some of the nobles thought they could do a better job than Arandar had done. Most likely they were right. But Arandar was the last living son of Uthanaric Pendragon, and he would do his duty.

  The lords turned to face him as he approached, and Arandar heard someone shouting on the other side of the siege wall.

  “Lord Prince,” said Dux Leogrance. The Duxarchate of Taliand was the oldest one in the realm, and by tradition, that gave the Dux of Taliand seniority. Leogrance Arban looked like the statues Arandar had seen of ancient Roman senators, stern, aloof, and remote, though he had the same cold eyes as Ridmark.

  “Lord Dux,” said Arandar. “My lords. It seems we have news?”

  Dux Kors snorted and spat in the dust. “Another one of these champions. The false king must be getting bored.”

  “Sieges grow wearisome the longer they wear on,” said Prince Cadwall.

  “Aye,” said old King Ulakhamar, and the other two orcish kings nodded.

  “Better to sit in one’s own hall with a halfling servant pouring wine,” said Cadwall.

  Ulakhamar laughed, his tusks rising from his gray beard like yellowed spikes. “Bah, you humans love the soft life too much. Better to wage a battle than a siege or to sit in comfort.”

  “Let’s see what champion Tarrabus has chosen now,” said Arandar, dropping from his saddle. Owen and Karlus took his reins, and Arandar’s bodyguards fell in around him. He climbed the ladder to the rampart of the siege wall, Dux Leogrance and Dux Gareth following him.

  From the top of the wall, Arandar could see the tents of Tarrabus’s army in the narrow space between the contravallation and circumvallation walls. There were a lot of men and dvargir between those two walls.

  One of them had come forth, stopping halfway between the contravallation wall and Arandar’s siege wall.

  “Do the dogs of the bastard Arandar cower in the dirt like crawling worms?” roared a knight wearing a blue surcoat adorned with the black dragon sigil of the House of the Carhainii. Two men-at-arms stood behind him, one of them holding a lance topped with the banner of Tarrabus Carhaine. “Come forth, worms! Send a champion to prove your worth, and you shall see that the might of Tarrabus shall carry the day!”

  “A boastful fellow,” said Dux Leogrance.

  “And repetitive,” said Gareth. “He’s made the same speech thrice in the last few moments.”

  Arandar stared at the Carhaine knight, and then recognition came. The man was named Sir Rhison Mordane, and he was one of the household knights of Tarrabus Carhaine. He had been a close companion of men like Paul Tallmane and Caradog Lordac and Aventine Rocarn.

  “Almost certainly he is one of the Enlightened,” said Arandar.

  “That was my thought as well,” said Gareth.

  “If you choose to respond to this challenge, my lord Prince,” said Leogrance, calm and formal as alway
s, “then you must send a Swordbearer. A normal knight would be at a severe disadvantage.”

  “Agreed,” said Arandar.

  “My son Valmark is a Swordbearer,” said Leogrance. “He bears the soulblade Hopesinger, and he would be a match for this boasting cultist of a false god.”

  “My son Sir Constantine is also a Swordbearer,” said Gareth.

  Arandar said nothing, but he kept himself from sighing. The lords might have been loyal, but they never stopped jockeying for position and prestige and glory among themselves, even among lords who were friendly like Leogrance and Gareth. Arandar supposed that was the nature of politics.

  And as High King, it was his duty to master those politics. Sometimes a weak king was worse than no king at all, and Arandar had no wish to be a weak king.

  Which meant he had to decide. Perhaps he could send an orcish champion to challenge Sir Rhison. The orcs would greet that with enthusiasm, but even with orcish ferocity, they would not be a match against someone wielding the powers of the shadow of Incariel. It had to be a Swordbearer.

  Sir Valmark Arban was a good choice. Leogrance Arban’s second son was in his late thirties, fit and strong and a capable warrior. Sir Constantine was younger, but he was no less capable, and he had been in some of the fiercest fighting in the Northerland and Caerdracon. Yet Valmark was a second son, and Sir Constantine was Dux Gareth’s only surviving child, save for Imaria Shadowbearer. In the cold arithmetic of war and succession, it would be better for Leogrance to lose his second son than for Gareth to lose his only son and heir.

  That made Arandar think of his son Accolon and his daughter Nyvane. Both were safe with Queen Mara in Nightmane Forest, and it horrified Arandar to have to decide whose children would die.

  But the High King had to make those kinds of decisions.

  “Dux Gareth,” said Arandar. “I hope Sir Constantine will do us the honor of defeating Sir Rhison in a duel.”

  Valmark Arban would have been a good choice, but Taliand was the most powerful duxarchate in the realm. Nor had any of the battles been fought in Dux Leogrance’s lands. Most of the Northerland had been conquered by the Frostborn, though Castra Marcaine still held out. Arandar could not show too much favoritism to any lord, but the glory of a victory would raise the morale of the men of the Northerland.