A Hero's throne tae-2

by Ross Lawhead

  Daniel recoiled as the light stabbed into his eyes like pins.

  “Who are you?” he asked the golden rider.

  “I am Dreams of Life,” the golden rider answered, although Daniel could not hear the words spoken. He felt them, somehow, and it warmed him. “And I have sights to show you.”

  “And you?” he asked the silver rider automatically.

  “I am Dreams of Death.” Daniel felt a chill roll through him. “I, too, have sights.”

  Daniel pushed away at the silver rider and the rider fell into the distance.

  The golden rider dismounted and came nearer.

  “What do you wish?” he asked in a honey-thick voice.

  Daniel did not know, and this uncertainty made him worry that the rider would leave him then, in the cold and uncertainty. But the rider was there, mounted again, with his yellow steed galloping alongside him.

  He turned his head to the other side and saw, far off and very distant, no more than a star twinkling in the distance, the silver rider, and again he felt a chill. He turned back to the golden one.

  “What do you wish?”

  “What do I wish?” Daniel asked himself, and it seemed to him that he was being offered a gift, a single gift, whatever he desired.

  His father is before him, and his mother. He is a child again, just thirteen, and his parents are back together, and they are eating a meal at the table. It is quiet, but a comfortable, contented silence. Daniel makes eye contact with his dad and he smiles.

  There is a pounding on the door. His father’s face blanches.

  “Don’t answer it,” his mother whispers. “Leave it.”

  “They know we’re here,” his dad explains, rising. “They always know. You can’t fool them.” He walks to the front hall.

  “Do we have enough?” his mother asks.

  Father doesn’t answer. He opens the door a crack. Daniel peers into the hallway and sees a very tall, very thin man in a black suit and bright orange and yellow tie. He tips his hat, showing wolflike ears, and displays a hungry grin. “Good evening, sir,” he lilts. “Collecting tribute.”

  “We gave less than three months ago. They wrote it down. I got a receipt-”

  “Entirely different sort of tribute, sir. Here’s a pamphlet. This is the head tribute-for the children? You do have a child.” His eyes find Daniel’s, gazing at him like a cat would a canary-patiently predatory.

  The pamphlet shakes slightly in his father’s hands. He puts it down on the cabinet top by the door. “Yes, yes. I remember reading about this. Of course. I have something in here. I put it aside when I. .” He bends and opens the door of the cabinet, rummaging around amongst some metal objects. “Yes, here it is. A silver spoon. One of my wife’s heirlooms.”

  “Ah, yes, very nice,” the tribute collector appraises. “Yes, this would do quite nicely. . if your son were twelve or younger.”

  “He is, he is,” his father chirps.

  “Come, sir, we both know that boy is thirteen and three months if I’m a day.”

  “Yes! Yes, of course, how could I forget? Here, take this bowl instead. Silver also-see the mark just here? We can just. .”

  His father holds out the bowl and reaches for the spoon. The tribute collector with the wolf’s ears takes the bowl but still grips the spoon. “I’ll tell you what; I’ll keep both,” he says, then tosses them into a black velvet bag that he grips under his arm. The objects vanish with a clinking rattle. “I’ll make a mark here to say that you’re up-to-date on the head tribute, and give you a voucher for the spoon.” He produces a black, padded folder and unzips it, then starts scribbling in it. “And that way, the next time one of us comes knocking, you just whip out the voucher, we make the tick, and Bill’s your auntie, the job is done. What do you say?”

  “Well, I think I’d rather-”

  “Only I have just accepted the spoon, technically, just by holding it. If you want I could summon my troll; he’s just there at the end of the road, see? And we could all go down to the offices and sort this out. Quite frankly, though, all that hassle is more than my job, or your life, is worth. Wouldn’t you say?” He holds out a chit of paper in front of his father’s face.

  “Yes, fine, fine. That’s fine,” his father says, taking the voucher.

  “A pleasure.” The tribute collector smiles, tips his hat again-his soft, grey, triangular ears peeking out. He turns, and the door closes behind him.

  “Ian?” his mother, above Daniel, her hands on his shoulders, asks.

  “Fine, fine. It’s fine-I’ve got a voucher,” he explains, waving his hand.

  “What voucher?” There is nothing in his hand.

  “Never mind,” his father says with a forced smile. “Let’s get back to dinner, eh? Fish! I love fish! It’s not every day you get fish.”

  They resume their meal.

  “Mum?” Daniel asks. “When can I go back to school?”

  “Quiet. Finish up.”

  “Where’s my sword?” Daniel, age thirteen, asks.

  “You never had one,” his father replies. “Remember? Remember how you never had one?”

  “Shall we watch TV today?” his mother asks.

  “I don’t know if we can risk it,” his father replies.

  Daniel looked away, and the scene winked out of existence. He was falling again, the golden rider beside him.

  What do you wish?

  Freya floats before him, and he sees, as if from a great way away, but with every detail up close, the life they could have together. Quiet, warm, lovely. A terraced house in the city, drive to work, drive home, dinner, an evening on the sofa. They sit, arms around each other, the TV illuminating them and the room in a pleasant glow, issuing a chorus of gentle laughter.

  A sound from the other room, a cry, almost a squeal of discomfort from a tiny throat. “Every night,” Freya said, rising, her body softer now, plumper, climbing over him. “Why won’t he stay down? Even for just this night?”

  She exits and he, the he he could be, sits for a stretch, but becomes uncomfortably lonely. The squeals can still be heard from the next room, growing louder, more piercing. He rises.

  The next room is an infant’s room, but there was never an infant in it, he realises, somehow. Freya stands in the centre of the room, not holding a baby, but holding his sword, the blade he received in Ni?ergeard-Hero-Maker. The squeal, he knows now, upon passing into the room, has turned into a cry of torment, of alarm.

  “I can’t put him down,” Freya says, gripping the sword by its blade. “Why won’t he stay down? Even for one night? Here, you try-you try putting him down.” She holds the sword out to him and he grasps its blade, which bites him.

  A blink of the eye, the scene disappeared.

  What do you wish?

  This time it was a deliberate desire of his, something he almost didn’t dare to ask, a desire that had consumed his life for the past eight years.

  His face is scarred and raw from battle, but he is wearing royal finery from an age that has past and at the same time an age that has never been. He wears a jewelled crown and on his lap is his sword, Hero-Maker, sheathed, to represent peace. Beneath him is a chair constructed from stone, iron, and gold. The throne is standing atop a mound, much like Gad’s, but not made from the ruins of beauty, but a thing of beauty in itself. Many ridged steps in many colours of marble fall beneath him, trimmed with gold and lit with a hundred candles and silver lanterns set into compartments in the stair structure. He is sitting on a platform of stone and light, and from around every side there are people of the nation, every man, woman, race, and creed, cheering and praising his heroism and bravery. Behind them rise the buildings of Ni?ergeard, restored, and the tree-carved outer wall, rebuilt, but with open arches between the trunks instead of blank stone. Children run and spin beneath the stone boughs, which glitter with silver light.

  “How did he do it?” a little girl asks her mother. “How did he become the king of Ni?ergeard?”

 
“He killed all other claimants,” the girl’s mother answers. “He alone was victorious.”

  Ni?ergeard would never be fortified again. The awakened knights would not be put to sleep. There would never be a need for them again.

  He raises his eyes and sees a crack in the darkness-the ceiling tears and the sky is visible. Ni?ergeard is rising and will soon appear in the open air, and it will carry him upon his hero’s throne.

  He stares into that sky and it becomes larger and larger in front of him, until whiteness is the only thing he sees.

  But now there are shadows, and the sun is the golden rider.

  “I wish for victory,” he told him.

  “Wish for pain,” a voice said behind him.

  Daniel turned. The silver rider, Dreams of Death, was standing before him. “No.”

  “Pain will save you. Pain is your future.”

  “Pain is not an end-or even a means,” agreed Daniel. “Pain may be unavoidable, but surely it is not necessary?”

  “You say that, but true sacrifice is rarely voluntary-very few would ever take the pain that leads to true victory willingly.” He shook his head mournfully in an odd, lurching fashion.

  “Certainly. But I’ve given so much up already.”

  “Would you give up what you most desire?” the silver rider asked.

  “Anything.”

  “What is the most that you would sacrifice?”

  “Everything,” Daniel replied.

  “What is victory worth to you?”

  “Everything,” Daniel replied.

  “What is the most that you would sacrifice?”

  “Anything.”

  “Would you give up what you most desire?”

  “Certainly. But I’ve given so much up already.”

  The rider inclined his visored head. “You say that, but true sacrifice is rarely voluntary-very few would ever take the pain that leads to true victory willingly.”

  “Pain is not an end-or even a means. Pain may be unavoidable, but surely it is not necessary?”

  “Pain will save you. Pain is your future.”

  “No.”

  “Wish for pain,” the silver rider told him.

  “I wish for victory,” Daniel repeated.

  “Wish for pain.”

  “No.”

  “Pain will save you. Pain is your future.”

  “Pain is not an end-or even a means. Pain may be unavoidable, but surely it is not necessary?”

  The rider shook his head. “You say that, but true sacrifice is rarely voluntary-very few would ever take the pain that leads to true victory willingly.”

  “Certainly. But I’ve given so much up already. .”

  The dialogue continued, as logical as a dream, back and forth, oscillating, endless.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Books, A Sword, A Knife

  I

  London, Westminster

  23 October 1731 AD

  It was an hour past midnight. This was the darkest time of the night and the quietest. He had come up near the Banquet Hall, nearly all that remained of the magnificent Whitehall Palace. It had burnt, of course; withering like everything withered in the furnaces of time. All was fire around him.

  Ealdstan walked down the night streets of London toward Westminster, shining his silver lantern before him. His mood blackened as he looked around. Where there wasn’t ridiculous poverty, there was absurd excess. Where there wasn’t indifferent disdain, there was inebriation. The land was circling the gutter. No number of righteous warriors could stave English civilisation from rattling merrily and uncontrollably down the path of disaster. The whole nation in a runaway cart, with no man to steer it. His righteous warriors could not fight a lazy, loutish public spirit. Evil was not bold anymore, it was insidious.

  Human and animal excrement ran through the streets, between the cobbles, along the gutters, and into the sewers. Just walking through the city was a defilement. He wondered how anyone could stand it, but then he realised that few knew anything else.

  A horse-drawn carriage came along the cobblestones-a matched pair of greys pulling an elaborately styled box carriage with ornate decorations and velvet curtains shut tight. They were tied in place to avoid an accidental view of the outside world. This was how the rich coped with living in the city.

  The carriage turned at the end of the street, passing a gang of drunken revellers who shouted and jeered at the vehicle and its driver. One of the drunkards dropped drawers and waved his private parts after it, to the loud amusement of those around him. The group then fell back into line and started a bawdy chorus as they processed down the road.

  They passed close enough that Ealdstan could smell the beer on their breath and in their clothes, but due to the enchantment he wore they were never aware of his presence. As he walked away, he felt as if he were wearing the disgusting smell of old alcohol like a coat. Another layer of fetid filth, clinging to him.

  Best get this over with quickly.

  He made it, somehow, through the hell of modern London and arrived at Ashburnham House. He went up the drive and stood before the door. He knocked on it with his staff, and after a lengthy amount of time, the door was opened by a very tired and very annoyed-looking butler. The butler blinked and then walked past him to look up and down the street. Not seeing anyone, he grunted and, muttering oaths under his breath, pulled the door closed-although not before Ealdstan had stepped through it.

  The butler went back to his bed and Ealdstan began to explore the house. He looked into most of the rooms before he found what he was looking for on the second story: a large, square room with bookcases arranged in a circular formation. The cases stood about five feet high and each had a white bust of some aged man’s head.

  He raised his lantern and went from case to case, pulling the odd volume out and leafing through it. Disordered, jumbled. The fools didn’t know what they had collected and accrued. There were bits and pieces of everything; poetry, sermons, legal documents, books of the Bible in Latin and English-his English, not the corrupted, inane language they babbled now-histories, lives of the saints, letters, chronicles, psalters, and all manner of miscellany. Nothing like his own personal collection, but priceless, of course. Priceless pearls before swine.

  He made a more ordered examination and found the volumes he had come for. There were only thirteen of them and he would be able to carry them easily. The rest. .

  He looked around the wooden room. It was warm in here, but there was no fire, which meant that some nearby room of the house was being heated. He concentrated and felt the source to be in the room below this one. He muttered a spell that he had mastered centuries before and the fire leapt in its hearth, kindling the mantle and racing up the walls.

  He left, clutching the volumes he needed under his arm, leaving billowing grey smoke issuing from the house behind him.

  II

  Berlin, Germany

  1 February 1935 AD

  “A beautiful machine, is it not?” the man seated in front of him was saying, his eyes darting looks at him in the rearview mirror. He spoke in a German that was not greatly removed from the language that Ealdstan had learned all those centuries ago, but it had gained a few idiomatic quirks, run in from impure dialects, he supposed. He had brought with him an enchantment, housed in a medallion that he draped around his neck.

  “It is powerful, efficient, and all running in proper order. Just like the Gro?deutsches Reich will soon be. You hear that sound she makes? An efficient and well-ordered engine makes very little noise, just as the Deutsch nation shall make very little noise as we reorder ourselves and eliminate all the rough elements that prevent the engine from working properly. That will be the Gleichschaltung, and it will bring in a glorious new dawn of peace. A unified Europe for Europe’s true children.”

  The dark, winter streets were a blur around them as the car sped through the city. When did these cities become so big? “What if the machine breaks and fails to operate?” Ealdstan
asked. He was using his broken and incomplete German that his sigil fixed, to prevent him from misspeaking as well as mishearing. He could have spoken English, but there was more to a language than just communication-the thoughts, ideas, and hopes of a people were tied into their lexicons. Ealdstan wished to understand the German mind, and not just their words.

  “Brechung?” The driver actually turned around in his seat to look at Ealdstan’s face. “Break? The Reich will never break. The people are strong in will! The people-”

  “No, no, the machine, the machine. This!” Ealdstan rattled his stick and thumped the roof. “What if this breaks? Do you have the ability to fix it? It seems inordinately complex.”

  The driver laughed. “I have some ability, yes, although I am no mechanic. Do not worry, it is a good engine!”

  Ealdstan glowered out the window. When had he last visited the surface? A hundred years ago? Perhaps less? There were technical wonders then, but they were kept by the rich and influential. Now it was as if the sky had broken open and rained mechanical marvels down on all the people. In his brief trip from the tunnel exit in Sudmer Mountain, he had seen radios, telephones, automobiles, and here in Berlin, the elephantine omnibuses. Men wore clocks on their wrists. Ealdstan remembered when exact time was only known from church towers. Now anyone could strap it to their arm. And here, just the start of the evening, and electric light was already beaming from lanterns just as small, yet brighter than his own enchanted lamps. And then there were the weapons. So many weapons.

  The car slowed slightly-out of reverence? — as the Reichstag came into view. Electric lights were strategically arranged to highlight its grand, sprawling design. It was obviously built to impress, but Ealdstan only sniffed and looked out the other window, then down at the sleeves of the large overcoat he had been given to wear over his robe.