Jorundyr's Path: Wolf of the North Book 2

by Duncan M. Hamilton

  One fear she had held walking into the university on the first day proved to be misplaced, however. Her ability to keep up academically was never in question. Although they had only completed a handful of assignments, it brought her enormous satisfaction each time she looked at the grade on her paper, and her position in class, both marked with a ‘1’.

  WULFRIC

  Wulfric tossed and turned in his hammock. Adalhaid was dragged from the carriage. She was confused at first, not fully understanding what was to come. She was smart, she was calm, she was brave. She knew how to behave in a robbery. Coin and possessions are not worth a life. Then she realised they meant for more than that. Rape first, followed by slavery. She knew it before they intended her to. She became afraid for the first time. Wulfric could feel her fear, and it tore at his heart. He was watching, powerless to intervene, for even in his sleep he knew he was not really there.

  She looked left and right, searching for a way of escape, but there was none open to her. She was smart. She knew it. Wulfric could hear the thoughts forming in her mind, and wanted to scream for her to stop. To scream ‘let them do as they please, it doesn’t matter’, to promise that he would search her out and find her no matter where they took her, but he couldn’t. He wept as he had when he was a small boy.

  He watched her grab for the reaver’s dagger. The reaver didn’t expect it; she was always one step ahead of everyone else. Wulfric could feel the pressure of the point on her skin, hesitant at first, then stronger as her defiance grew, as her resolve to die a brave death with a blade in her hand overcame the fear of what might come after. Wulfric remained still and mute, an observer and nothing more, as his rage, anguish, and desire to intervene tried to tear him inside out.

  His eyes opened to darkness, and the unfamiliar sound of creaking wood. He swayed from side to side, and it took him a moment to realise he was on the ship, in his hammock. The dream was too visceral to release him from its clutches even on waking, and he could still feel the pain. He had watched her die in his dreams a dozen times now. He wiped the wetness from his eyes and slipped out of his hammock, knowing he would not sleep again that night.

  He stumbled with the roll of the ship as he walked to the companionway steps, bumping against the solid form of a body in a hammock.

  ‘Watch where you’re going, arsewipe.’

  Wulfric recognised the voice. Enderlain.

  ‘Fuck yourself,’ Wulfric said, the residual anger he felt from his dream still coursing through his veins.

  ‘Fuck myself?’

  For a big man, he moved quickly, and in less time than it took to draw a breath, Enderlain was out of his hammock and standing before Wulfric.

  ‘You need to learn your place, boy.’

  Wulfric had not shied from a fight in many years, but few were the times he had hungered for one as much as he did in that moment.

  ‘Call me “boy” again, and you’ll be picking your teeth out of your arsehole.’

  ‘You must be tired of living, boy, that’s all I can say.’

  ‘If you two arseholes keep mouthing off, neither one of you’ll have to worry about living much longer.’ A third voice from the darkness.

  ‘Your hammocks or a long swim.’ A fourth voice. ‘Your choice.’

  Wulfric looked around, his eyes having adjusted to the gloom. He could see the shapes of a number of men watching them from their hammocks. More than enough to make good on the threat.

  ‘Another time, then,’ Wulfric said.

  ‘Look forward to it.’

  AETHELMAN

  Aethelman had acquired an everlasting light—called magelamps in the south—on his travels. They were magical in nature, but with the extermination of mages in the south there was no one left alive who knew how to make them. Each one was ancient and irreplaceable. They were sturdy and, if given basic care, seemed to be genuinely everlasting. There were a great many in existence and, although expensive, they were affordable if the need was great enough.

  Aethelman’s was small, a glass sphere that sat comfortably in the palm of his hand, but even at that size it would fetch a high price in the south. He valued it too highly to consider selling, however. It was the only thing he possessed worth passing on after his death, and he often wondered to whom he should leave it. They would likely find good use for it at the Hermitage, but it had been with him so long he preferred to think of it with someone whose life had been of importance to him. So many of them were already dead, it made his heart ache.

  The lore master had been a waste of time. She knew nothing more about the Stones than Aethelman had been told when he was an acolyte. She had never even ventured beyond the currently occupied parts of the Hermitage. It struck Aethelman as odd that the person most steeped in the priesthood’s ancient secrets and lore didn’t have the curiosity to venture into the monastery’s forgotten corners in search of knowledge. It was such a waste.

  And so Aethelman walked a corridor that had likely not felt the feet of a human in centuries, with nothing but the small, radiant globe in the palm of his hand. It cast a bubble of light around him, and painted the cold stone walls with warmth. His footsteps echoed into the pitch darkness ahead of him, and his task suddenly felt overwhelming. What hope could a foolish old man have of discovering secrets that had been forgotten centuries before? Then again, what else was there for a foolish old man to do with his remaining years? He smiled and pressed on, listening as each footfall bounced between the walls and on to oblivion.

  Before the Hermitage was built, there was a cavern on the site. It possibly remained somewhere below, or beyond, in the mountain. Aethelman wondered if he might find it, and if he did, what it might contain. It had been a place of refuge for a persecuted people, millennia ago. In the days before the Empire, ancient magisters had roamed the world, giving spiritual guidance and healing. They had practised magic in much the same way as the Grey Priests, seeing it as the influence of the gods expressed in the world of man. When the Empire grew, and along with it their sorcerers and priests, they sought to push out what had been there before them.

  The ancient magisters fled their oppressors until they were too spent to run any longer. They took shelter in that great cavern and waited for the end, but it never came. The Imperial Mages—men and women who saw magic as a science, something to be studied, understood, and controlled—made it their mission to eradicate those who viewed it as something entirely different. Some people could clearly not bear the fact that others saw the world differently to the way they did. While the magisters waited in the cavern for the Imperials to come, they created tools to defend themselves. The Stones were one of those creations.

  It was the ferocity of the warriors of the Northland tribes that stopped the Empire. Their armies reached the northern forests and could go no farther. Any that tried were never seen again. The Empire halted after several attempts, satisfied that they had swallowed up enough of the world. The Northmen could keep their forests and their old ways.

  Grateful to the men and women who had saved them, the refugee magisters set about using their powers to care for the sick. The gods of the north were the same as the old, persecuted gods of the south, so they fit in perfectly. In a short time they became what was now known as the Grey Priests. They ventured forth among the people, tending to both body and soul. The cavern became a church, and then a monastery, and then the Hermitage, each new iteration built atop the old.

  In all they did, they never forgot about the terrible measures they’d gone to in order to survive. The Fount Stones, weapons born of that desperation, had been let out into the world—given to those who had been daring enough to take the fight to the Empire. In an effort to undo this mistake, they made it a requirement for any person wishing to join their order to search the land for a year and a day before they could truly call themselves a Grey Priest.

  It was possible the cavern didn’t even exist, or if it had it might long since have been filled in. As with much of the rest of the Gr
ey Priests’ lore, this story was handed down orally. What was once a small, insignificant cave could easily have become a great cavern in the retelling. Apocryphal or not, Aethelman thought the story held at least a seed of truth. It made the cavern the obvious place to begin, although after such a long time, he doubted anything of worth would remain. As the cavern grew into a monastery, it seemed likely that anything of value would have been relocated. It didn’t mean the end, however. There were plenty of old rooms and corridors that had remained shut up for centuries.

  The light from his globe reached his first obstacle. The hallway before him was bricked up. Aethelman walked forward and traced along the seams in the masonry with his fingertips. Was the passage blocked to keep something in, or merely to seal an unused and derelict part of the monastery?

  Aethelman was tempted to try and go through. His magic had always been strong at the Hermitage, stronger than it ever was anywhere else, but that might have merely been a boon of youth. Was smashing through a heavy stone wall beyond him now?

  He placed his hand flat against the stone and took a deep breath, then hesitated. The Hermitage was a labyrinth of known and forgotten passages. He could seek a way around. He might regret wasting his energy in opening up the wall. Such effort took far longer to recover from than it once had. He smiled at the idea of opting instead for a path of lesser resistance.

  11

  ANDHUN

  Andhun knocked on the ambassador’s door. He looked about nervously, but was confident that Rodulf wouldn’t be up and about so early. He and Oswyn had watched Rodulf stumble back to his house with a whore and a bottle when the tavern closed. He reckoned it gave them the morning to conduct their business, but the fact that Rodulf was sleeping off a debauch did not mean he didn’t have spies lurking about the place. It was difficult not to be paranoid when plotting against someone as vicious as Rodulf.

  Andhun jumped when the door opened. He took a breath and was greeted by a sour-faced servant who stared at him with disdain, but said nothing.

  ‘I’d like to see the ambassador,’ Andhun said, irritated at having to break the impasse with a man who was clearly beneath him.

  ‘Do you have an appointment?’

  ‘No. I’m a member of the council, and I need to talk with him urgently.’

  ‘I’m afraid you’ll need an appointment. The ambassador is a very busy man, and it’s rather early.’

  Andhun bit his lip with exasperation mingled with fear. He had already been standing at the doorstep, in full view of anyone who cared to look, for far too long. ‘We’re all busy men. You’ll let me in to see him or I’ll have the hide whipped off your back, you jumped up sout—’

  ‘Show him in, Ruger.’ The ambassador’s voice came from the back of the house.

  The servant smiled, his demeanour unaffected by Andhun’s outburst. ‘This way.’

  He led Andhun through to the back of the house. It was decorated in the southern style, and showed far more refinement than Andhun’s. He took note of several features he thought would improve his own home, although if everything went to plan he would be relocating to his newly built castle in the near future.

  The ambassador was sitting at a large wooden desk. He watched as Andhun walked into the room. The servant disappeared silently.

  ‘What’s so urgent you’ve had to disturb me in my home?’

  ‘There are some matters that I need to discuss with you in private,’ Andhun said.

  ‘My choice of who will be awarded the barony, perhaps?’ dal Ruedin said in a fashion that left no doubt as to it being rhetorical.

  ‘In short, yes,’ Andhun said. He always felt more comfortable with a little small talk before cutting to the core of an issue.

  ‘It’s not looking good for you,’ dal Ruedin said. ‘A wild province like this needs a firm hand. A hard man comfortable with violence and action. You don’t strike me as either. Men who are skilled with coin are useful, don’t get me wrong, but in service. Not leadership.’

  ‘I assure you, when it’s called for I can be capable of a great deal.’

  ‘I’m sure you can,’ dal Ruedin said.

  Andhun shifted on his feet, but it didn’t elicit an offer to sit. ‘Perhaps I can make the decision easier on you?’

  ‘You want to escort the next silver convoy?’ Dal Ruedin actually smiled.

  Andhun laughed, comforted by the fact that they were finally getting down to business, something he considered himself highly skilled at. ‘No, nothing like that. I had something altogether different in mind. Gold, in fact.’ He and Oswyn had put together a sum few men would be able to turn a blind eye to, and certainly not a man who had to work for his living, like dal Ruedin.

  ‘You mean to bribe me?’ Dal Ruedin said.

  ‘Everything has its price,’ Andhun said. ‘How much does a barony cost? I’m sure you’re eager to leave this place, and get back home. I can help that happen all the sooner.’

  ‘I left home when I was four years old,’ dal Ruedin said. ‘Fencing schools, the Academy at Brixen, the war against the Ostians. I haven’t had a home for more than a few months at a time. As for family? I’ll take a campaign tent and a willing whore over either.’

  ‘That still doesn’t answer my question,’ Andhun said, the sickening feeling that the deal was slipping away from him forming in his stomach. ‘Your price?’

  ‘Fat people disgust me, Andhun,’ dal Ruedin said. ‘I didn’t think I could find you any more disgusting, but here I am, surprised. Trying to bribe one of the Markgraf’s officials? I don’t even have to convene a trial for that. You there, Ruger?’

  ‘I am, my lord,’ came the reply from outside.

  ‘Have the sergeant of the watch called to take Andhun to the village square.’ He turned his gaze back to Andhun. ‘Twelve lashes is my price.’

  ‘Lashes? You can’t—’

  ‘I can. I have. I suggest you get out before you make it worse for yourself. Irritate me again and twelve lashes will seem like a sweet mercy.’

  WULFRIC

  ‘In pairs,’ Enderlain shouted.

  All the men formed up into pairs. Everyone avoided Wulfric’s gaze and stayed well clear, leaving him standing on his own, just like his first day of training in the glade at Leondorf. At first he thought they were afraid of him, but he quickly realised it was something very different.

  ‘You’re with me,’ Enderlain said.

  Wulfric raised his eyebrows.

  ‘Last man standing gets an extra ration of ale,’ Enderlain said. ‘I don’t want anyone getting sent to the infirmary, so as soon as you’re knocked down, you’re beat.’ He turned his gaze back to Wulfric. ‘Except for us, that is.’

  Standing next to him in full daylight, Wulfric realised how big he was, both a fraction taller and considerably wider. It wasn’t something he was used to, even in the Northlands.

  ‘Let’s see what you’re made of, Northlander.’

  JAGOVERE

  Jagovere made his way toward the upper deck at the rear of the ship to join the Graf. By rights he should have been taking part in the training, but with the Estranzan coast drawing ever nearer, he was under pressure to complete a huge amount of paperwork to ensure their logistical requirements were met when they got ashore.

  ‘Skiving off, Captain?’ dal Rhenning said, when Jagovere reached the top of the steps leading to the upper deck.

  ‘I wish. Too much to arrange before we make landfall.’

  ‘How’s the Northlander fitting in?’

  ‘About as well as I would expect,’ Jagovere said. ‘Which is to say, not at all.’

  ‘Give him time,’ dal Rhenning said.

  ‘I don’t know why we’re bothering. Saving him from the headsman’s block more than repaid his attempt to help you on the road.’

  ‘There’s a good, brave heart in the lad, but right now it’s full of emotion that will lead him to nothing but trouble—and, like as not, straight to the headsman we saved him from. You benefitted fro
m someone giving you a chance, as I recall.’

  ‘Pay a visit to the Northlands twenty-odd years ago?’ Jagovere regretted saying it as soon as the words left his mouth.

  Dal Rhenning’s face darkened. ‘No. He’s not one of mine.’ He paused a moment before continuing. ‘I did right by your mother, and you. I could have as easily turned my back. There are plenty who would have.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Jagovere said.

  ‘It’s all right. Situations like ours are never easy. I only wish I’d found out about you earlier.’

  ‘All’s well that ends well.’

  ‘That boy has seen tragedy. I can see it in his eyes. I’ll help him if I can,’ dal Rhenning said, ‘but even my patience is limited. If he can’t settle in with the others, we’ll cut him loose.’

  They fell silent as they watched the men start their exercises, their eyes on Wulfric and Enderlain. Wulfric was almost as tall as Enderlain—the biggest man in the Company—who had the advantage of experience and the lean muscular bulk that came from years of soldiering.

  They circled each other for a moment, and Jagovere felt a pang of regret that he had not chosen to join in. He had no enthusiasm for the pile of paper waiting for him in his cabin. Enderlain made a probing jab, but Wulfric easily moved out of its way. Jagovere had seen Enderlain fight many times, both in training and when the stakes were far higher. When he chose his moment, Jagovere knew the fight would be over quickly.

  Enderlain pounced forward but, with a burst of speed that surprised Jagovere, Wulfric was out of the way. Enderlain appeared to be equally surprised. Wulfric snapped a fist out at Enderlain so fast it was little more than a blur, but the cracking sound it caused could be heard from the upper deck. Enderlain roared and raised his hands to his face, which was splashed with blood from what Jagovere assumed was a broken nose.