The Far Far Better Thing

by Auston Habershaw

  Artus took the man’s hand and shook it. He put a hand on his shoulder. “If you need anything, let me know. And thank you.”

  All three of them teared up then. They all knelt again before leaving, muttering blessings and invoking Hann’s name on his behalf. When they at last retreated through the flap of the tent, Artus fell back into his chair. He rubbed his face—he felt like he’d just run a mile. “Gods and saints . . .”

  Michelle came from behind a curtain in the tent that walled off her bedchamber. She pressed a goblet into Artus’s hand. “You know money isn’t going to solve their problems, Artus.”

  “What else can I do? What else can I offer them?” He gestured to his fine clothes and the sumptuous tent that surrounded them. “How can I be living like this and they think it’s an insult to take my coin?”

  “You’re prince, Artus—you deserve all this.” Michelle sat in a chair next to him. “You need to start acting as your station commands.”

  Artus scowled. “The hell I do! I’m not a lordling! I’m not like Valen . . .”

  Michelle pursed her lips—a sign that she was angry. “Valen isn’t like you, no. Valen wishes he were like you. You’re a natural leader, Artus. You have the bearing of royalty. You need to stop acting like a peasant.”

  Artus knew he should have left it at that—he knew he could walk away and just let the statement hang, but he couldn’t. He thought of his mother, his sisters—all so far away, across the mountains, living in a four-room farmhouse. “I am a peasant, Michelle. It’s in my blood! I’m no more a king than those three are!”

  Michelle paled. “Don’t say that, Artus! I know you grew up in common surroundings, but you mustn’t lower yourself like that!”

  Artus took a sip of wine. “And why not? What’s so bad about being common?”

  “Because people don’t die for common men!” Michelle snapped. “Because you are leading an army that believes in you! Do you know how much of this army’s cohesion relies on their opinion of you? Do you think Myreon commands their loyalty? No—it’s you, Artus. Only you.”

  Artus froze, staring at her. Gods, she was right, wasn’t she? Everybody was counting on him to be . . . to be what? He was a farmboy and a cutpurse and a pretty decent tail and a more than decent brawler, but a prince? It was absurd. Tyvian, what the hell did you get me into?

  Michelle took his hand and squeezed it. “You are doing fine, Artus. You’re doing just fine.”

  “I don’t belong here, Michelle. I’m not cut out for this.”

  She grinned and kissed him on the nose. “Then it’s a good thing I’m here to tell you what to do.”

  The tent flaps opened and Valen ducked inside. He looked out of breath. “Artus . . . Your Highness, I mean.”

  Artus stood up. Valen’s face was grim. “What? What is it?”

  Valen motioned for Artus to follow. “You’d better come see this.”

  Valen filled Artus in on the vague story of how Barth’s scouting parties had caught the Delloran—the accounts Valen had received varied widely—but what was certain was this: he had been a member of the Ghouls and he had almost certainly been left behind. He had a nasty arrow wound in his thigh that had become infected despite being bandaged. Evidently, the Ghouls felt the cost of amputating a leg and feeding the crippled man indefinitely was too high, and they’d dumped him.

  Much of this, though, Artus had to piece together later. He should have heard it firsthand, but instead of bringing the man to him for questioning, the soldiers of the White Army had kept him for themselves.

  The Delloran, stripped naked, was in the middle of a ring of jeering White Army volunteers. He was delirious with infection, his nose was broken and eyes nearly swollen shut from the beating he’d received. On three sides of him, their teeth bared and growling, were three hunting dogs. Somehow, they were the least feral element of the scene.

  The Delloran swatted at the dogs as they darted in and out, testing him. He couldn’t stand and was therefore rolling around on his back, his whole body trembling. The peasants roared for blood. One of the dogs rushed in and caught a hold of the Delloran’s hand in its jaws and began to worry it back and forth. The Delloran screamed, blood pouring down his arm, his other hand beating ineffectually on the dog’s head. Another dog got a piece of his good leg—by the thigh—and began to drag the Delloran along in the mud with short, sharp tugs. The man’s screams were mingled with barely coherent pleas, then names Artus couldn’t recognize, and appeals to Hann’s mercy.

  Artus had seen enough. “Hey! Stop! Stop it!”

  No one heard him. Nobody paid the least attention. They were chanting for blood, their eyes fixed on the grisly scene, shouting themselves raw. Artus wished he had a horse, but it was too late to have one fetched—the prisoner would be dead before then.

  Fine—the old-fashioned way it is. Artus pushed aside a man at the back. When he tried to slap Artus back, Artus caught his arm, twisted it, punched him just beneath the nose hard enough to knock out teeth. The man dropped like an empty sack. The next two men Artus pushed apart with each hand on a shoulder. They went to curse him, but then noticed who he was and recoiled. A third man—this one close to the action—jabbed his elbow back at Artus’s face. Artus ducked it, kicked him in the back of the knees and grabbed him by the hair.

  By this point, word had spread—the Young Prince was here and he wasn’t happy. A hush fell over the crowd. They fell to one knee almost as one. The only sound left was the snarling of the dogs—the Delloran had passed out.

  Artus dragged the peasant he had by the hair into the ring and threw him facedown in the dirt. Then he drew his sword and, with three quick strokes, killed the dogs. “Whose dogs were these?”

  Silence.

  “I asked you all a question!” Artus searched the bowed heads for some sign of the guilty party, but there was nothing. He couldn’t even see their faces.

  Artus kicked the man at his feet. “You—explain yourself!”

  “Begging your pardon, Your Highness, but . . . but . . .”

  Artus whacked his arse with the flat of his sword. “Out with it!”

  “He’s a Delloran, sir!” The man squealed, “He’s only a Delloran!”

  “He’s a man!” Artus yelled. “And you were going to feed him to the dogs? A human being?”

  Again that still, sullen silence. Artus didn’t need them to speak—he knew what they were thinking. But they’ve done the same to us. To our children. To our wives.

  He looked down at the naked Delloran. He still lived, but only barely. He nodded toward the White Guard, who had been waiting patiently at the crowd’s edge for orders. “Take him to the healers. I want him to be able to talk to us, and soon.”

  The white-robed undead stepped forward quietly and picked up the Delloran between the two of them with no sign of strain. The crowd of peasant militia parted for them as though their state was contagious. Artus glared at them. “I want you all to think about this: What makes you better than the Dellorans, anyway?” Artus held up his bloodied sword. “As of this moment, it’s one thing less than before. Take care you don’t become the thing you hate.” He wiped the blade of his sword on a peasant’s back, leaving a streak of blood, and sheathed it. “Where is Gammond Barth? Have him sent to my command tent straightaway!”

  Valen gave Artus a cruel grin. “With pleasure, sire.”

  Artus stepped over the bodies of the dogs and left, not looking back. Behind him, the silence remained.

  Later, in the command tent, Valen brought in Barth as though he were a bouncer escorting a man out of a bar. When Artus related what had happened, Barth shrugged. “You might think I can tell these men what to do, Your Highness, but I don’t. Not all the way. The men said they was going to take him to you. I believed them.”

  Artus wasn’t buying it. “The hell you did, Barth! You know better than anybody how angry the men are—you knew this would happen!”

  Valen nodded, his arms crossed. “I want names, B
arth. Those men are to be hanged.”

  Barth sneered at Valen. “And what, then the White Army starts decorating the trees with Eretherian bodies? Just how much rope do you think we have, rich boy?”

  Valen took a step toward Barth, his hand falling to his sword. “These men violated the conventions of war!”

  Barth stepped right up to the young knight, nose to nose. “Kroth’s teeth, you naive ponce! There are no bloody conventions of war—Sahand keeps proving that, day in and day out! The more you cling to your toy soldier ideals, the worse this is going to get.”

  “Toy soldier ideals? My men are the only real soldiers in this entire army! Unless they learn some discipline, your peasant mob is going to be the death of us all!”

  Artus stepped between them and pried them apart. “Stop it, both of you! We’re only a few days out from Tor Erdun—we can’t afford to lose either of you in some stupid brawl!”

  Valen retreated to a chair and sat down, pouring himself a cup of water from a clay pitcher. He put his elbows on his knees and leaned forward. In the flickering lamplight, he looked haggard—much older than his eighteen years would imply. “We need to do something.”

  Barth also found a chair, but on the opposite side of the tent. He was squinting at the map in the dim light. “The closer we get to Tor Erdun, the more we’re bumping into Sahand’s forces. I keep getting reports—unconfirmed, mind, but I believe them. We’re close. If we send out a probing force, we might just be able to engage someone or something.”

  “That isn’t the general’s plan,” Artus pointed out.

  Barth spat. “Hang the Gray Lady, and pardon me for saying so. She’s bloodless as a witch. Her plan’s all well and good for beating Sahand, I suppose, but it won’t do nothing for all those poor souls what he’s burned out of house and home!”

  Valen nodded slowly. “You know I hate to admit this carpenter is right about anything, Artus—sire—but he’s right about this. You are prince. This is your army, not hers.”

  Artus looked between the two of them—Valen was right, they hardly ever agreed. Here it was, then—the thing Michelle had been saying. His army. He was prince. At his word, they would all do whatever he said. Right now, they wanted permission to go tearing off after some splinter of Sahand’s army—on a bloody gnome hunt—and where would that get them? Maybe some satisfaction, but beyond that? Nothing. It was what Myreon said Sahand wanted them to do.

  Barth had his hands balled into fists. “Only give the word, sire! We’ll bring the bastards to justice!”

  “I don’t think so . . .”

  Valen grabbed Artus by the upper arm and shook him, as though trying to wake him up. “Take command, sire! Stop doing whatever that sorceress tells you to!”

  What would Tyvian do? Artus wondered. It was a question he asked himself daily, but he never seemed to come up with a reasonable answer. Long-term plans were always Tyvian’s forte. Pretending he was Tyvian didn’t give Artus any magical powers in that regard. Still, he could think of one piece of advice Tyvian would probably have given him, if he were there.

  Listen to the former Mage Defender, not the carpenter or the teenaged knight, you bloody dunce!

  Artus couldn’t help but laugh.

  “I don’t see what’s funny,” Barth said.

  Artus controlled his expression. “No. We carry on as ordered. Myreon is right.”

  Barth’s face darkened but he, too, got his expression under control. He bowed. “As my prince commands.” He stomped out of the tent.

  Valen watched the carpenter go. “You better hope she knows what she’s doing. This army can’t afford to lose a battle.”

  “Well, we’d better not let that happen, then.”

  Chapter 9

  On-the-Job Training

  The next few days saw the Ghouls take up a steady march overland, cutting across roads and farmland and woods without much care to the terrain. Captain Rodall set an ambitious pace for such uneven territory—anybody following them would have a hell of a time keeping up. As it was, they were only limited by the speed their supply wagons could make, and these were enhanced with wheels enchanted to make the progress relatively smooth. Tyvian wondered how many people would ever have guessed that the most expensive and useful tactical weapon available to the Ghouls was a bunch of wagon wheels.

  Tyvian had a lot more time to think about things, now that his role in the company had completely changed. He had gone from raw mercenary recruit to the indentured servant of Sahand’s personal assassin overnight. He was not altogether certain it was a step up. For those first few days, Tyvian’s duties were mostly sexual in nature. The rest of the time, however, Voth had him follow her around like some kind of lapdog, carrying her sword, her cape, her hat, or whatever else she didn’t feel like burdening herself with. She trotted him around the camp like a trained pony. The looks he got from the men were a mixture of envy and pity—a grown man being bossed about by a slip of a woman? The Ghouls spat when they said his name . . . which was still Duchess.

  Part of him—an old part, a deep part—wanted to challenge some of these hulking brutes to a duel or two, just to show them who was boss. Voth, though, had reminded him of just how thinly he was being tolerated by the captain. If he gave the Ghouls any excuse to run him through, he was good as dead. Rodall would have his head, and there wasn’t a damned thing he could do about it.

  So Tyvian held his tongue and endured the slights and kept his head down. And in the evenings, he had Voth all to himself. He told himself this was adequate compensation. And it almost was.

  On the fourth day since the massacre at the village, the company came to a halt and set camp by the bend of a little stream that was flowing north. If Tyvian’s geography was as good as he’d hoped, they were close to the southern edge of Lake Country and the County of Hadda. Hadda was technically neutral in the conflict between the White Army and Sahand, but they wouldn’t welcome Delloran boots on Hadda soil at all. At night, Tyvian could see the lights of a castle no more than two or three miles distant—the Ghouls’ own campfires had to be visible to the castle, as well. Captain Rodall was announcing his presence, whereas before they had been moving so as to make it difficult for others to follow. This was a part of some larger game, but Tyvian couldn’t guess at what. It was like trying to predict a couronne strategy by the location of a single piece.

  That night, Tyvian tried to hold Voth in his arms, at least for a few moments. She twisted away, giving him a lopsided grin. “Now, now, Duchess—you don’t want to give me the wrong idea, do you?”

  “I assure you, I was merely offering to keep you warm a bit longer. A tiny little thing like yourself must freeze in these cool evenings.”

  Voth laughed and got dressed in a flowing silk robe of glossy black and embroidered with thread-of-gold. “My blood runs hotter than you think, Reldamar.”

  Tyvian lay back on the bed and thought of Myreon. He found himself thinking a lot about Myreon lately, particularly in this bed at times like this. Myreon would have stayed in his arms all night, holding him close. He would play with her strands of golden hair, feeling her breath push softly against his neck. He grimaced at the memory. He tried to think back, tried to pinpoint exactly where it had gone so wrong for the two of them. He couldn’t think of one thing, but rather hundreds of little mistakes, of small little splinters that eventually killed whatever romance they had. Most of them were his fault, he was sure. Gods, what a dunce I am.

  Voth snapped her fingers at him. “Hey, I don’t like you like that.”

  “Like what?”

  “Thinking. Your thinking tends to have fatal consequences.”

  “It isn’t as though I’m given much else to do.”

  “Is that a complaint I detect? Surely not from the man whose life I saved from a grisly end?” Voth examined her dead white eye in a mirror, poking at it softly. She did this a lot. “Besides, I’ve got good news for you: your slate of duties is about to increase.”

  “And h
ow’s that?”

  “You and I and Eddereon the Black and two others of the sergeant’s recommendation are about to part company with the Ghouls and go on a little side-mission.”

  Tyvian sat up. “Who are the other two? What are we doing?”

  “The men I think you know—two morons known as Hambone and Mort. The mission is, of course, still need-to-know.”

  “So what has this to do with me?”

  Voth picked up a small vial of some kind of oil and poured a drop into her dead eye. “These men need to be brought up to speed with what we’re going to be doing. I’m leaving the small unit tactics and such to Eddereon, but you I need to take over some of the more delicate aspects of their training.”

  Tyvian cocked his head. “Such as?”

  “These men need to be able to pass for Eretherian knights.”

  Tyvian nodded. Those two words—Eretherian knights—were enough for him to put a number of pieces into place and establish context for a number of different things, not the least of which was why they were here, a scant few miles from Hadda’s borders. He now knew what they were about to do—it should have been obvious, really, given Voth’s talents. They were about to kidnap and murder someone, and Tyvian had a pretty short list of who that might possibly be.

  All of them were friends.

  The next day, those selected by Voth as members of her “team” were left with minimal supplies, two horses, and Voth’s own tent. The rest of the Ghouls moved on, heading southwest. Witnessing it from the outside for the first time, he was surprised at how quickly the whole company was able to pick up and move. They were gone from sight before the sun had fully risen. Voth’s little party was alone.

  Mort, Hambone, and Tyvian were compelled to stand at attention while Eddereon went through any personal belongings the three of them had and presented them to Voth. Mort had a lock of hair from some mysterious brunette, some obviously shaved gambling dice, and an assortment of partially mummified chicken feet. Hambone had a smooth white rock, a compact Book of Hann with a flower pressed between the pages, and some brass knuckles. Tyvian had nothing whatsoever.