The Immortal Crown

by Kieth Merrill

  Under the cover of darkness on the night before Machous’s planned incursion into Hellosós, five carts would be driven into the Couloir of the Curse’ed and left with the oxen in yoke.

  The carts would be laden with fresh fruits, barley bread, and wheels of cheese. One would be filled with kegs of ale and flagons of good wine. He would also include fresh cottons and even linen. The curse’ed would be drawn to the carts and, while they were distracted, Akkad and another archer from Tirbodh’s command would lead Machous and seven of his best men through the valley, past the ancient gates of Hellosós, and into the encampment of turncoat kings­riders.

  It was a simple plan—dangerous—but one that could prove highly effective.

  Before the procession of carts left Village Mordan, Machous added five sheep, seven goats, and a gaggle of geese. As his offering grew from a single cart with a few essentials to five carts spilling over with food and raiment and relief, Machous felt a curious emotion. Unfamiliar as it was, it satisfied him in a way he could not explain.

  Before the sun rose over the eastern wall, the news had scurried into every hovel, shelter, and shanty. A caravan of food and wine and raiment had come in the night. Every one of the condemned still able to walk or crawl gathered at the laden carts like a swarm of ants to a bird fallen dead.

  Some pressed their faces into the dirt, believing it was Mother Earth that offered her gifts in sorrow for their pitiful misfortune. Pilgrims thanked the God of gods and Creator of All Things for His kindness. The wisest among them read the parchment that bore the sigil of the king and told the truth of it.

  Drakkor is an outlaw and enemy of the Peacock Throne. These gifts are from your king, who cares for you. He honors you for your loyalty to him. Take no action to thwart the workings of the king.

  Akkad, Machous, and his men wrapped their faces and hands in wet cloth and passed through the dreaded valley on the far side.

  When they reached the south end of the ruins of Hellosós, they hid themselves behind the ancient towers that stood beyond the gate. One lay in ruins. The other was half standing and offered good shelter and a place to hide until dark.

  On the wall of the ruined tower, Akkad drew a diagram with a chalk stone, marking the positions of the night watch on either side. Akkad and the archer led the chosen men to the outposts one by one. It was too easy. All but one of the night watch sat by fires against the chill of the night. Glowing targets in a gallery of blackness.

  The deaths of Drakkor’s watchmen were silent and swift.

  CHAPTER 68

  Tirbodh’s snoring stopped with a coughing snort, and his head jerked forward. He froze when the point of a dagger touched his throat.

  “Make no sound,” Machous whispered as Tirbodh awakened to his senses. His blade was pressed into the softness beneath the man’s chin. “If I wished you dead, you would be.”

  “Captain Machous?”

  “Commander Tirbodh. Or should I say traitor?”

  Machous lifted his blade, forcing Tirbodh to rise slowly on its point. Tirbodh squinted at the dark shapes of the men standing at the opening of the shelter, which was built into an alcove of an ancient wall. Akkad and the second archer stood with arrows nocked and bows half drawn.

  Tirbodh’s shoulders sagged, and Machous could see the man understood what had happened and why they were here.

  Machous punished the disgraced commander with his eyes. Tirbodh glared back with unblinking defiance in spite of the dagger at his throat.

  “Will you kill me before I stand before my king to plead my case?”

  “You are unworthy to lie on your face before the king.”

  “It is a right granted by the king himself.”

  Machous laughed. “If you faint from blood in battle or strike your commander or come to your duty drunk, perhaps you have right to plead before the king, but treason?”

  “Have you never doubted the judgments of the sovereign?”

  “Never!”

  “Then you are either a fool—or the greatest champion of the king who ever lived.” Tirbodh spoke smoothly, but his tone was uncertain.

  Does he mock me at the point of my blade? Machous stiffened at the thought.

  Tirbodh flinched as Machous increased the pressure on the dagger at his neck. “How is it possible that you and your tiny force have breached Drakkor’s defenses, crossed the couloir without raising a warning, and passed the ancient gates unseen?

  “Shall I discuss tactics with a commander in disgrace?”

  “Has a single choice erased a lifetime of deeds? Since you refuse my right to stand before the king, perhaps you will honor my last request before you take my life.”

  Machous tightened his jaw. He was about to refuse when he realized patronizing the prisoner might serve his ultimate purpose. He pushed his pride aside. He kept the telling short but spared no detail as he talked the former commander of archers through the events of the previous days.

  After Machous finished, the men sat in silence.

  “What happens now?” Tirbodh asked.

  “I will find Drakkor, kill him, and carry his head to the king as I have sworn.”

  “As one who has disgraced the emblems I once bore, I almost regret saying that you are destined to fail.”

  Machous could feel Tirbodh’s eyes searching him. He could feel the pulse of his heart through the handle of his weapon. The bond between kings­riders was something understood but never voiced. Deeply rooted. Preternatural. Unbreakable? He held Tirbodh’s eyes and slowly lowered the blade.

  “You mock me with your flattery,” he said. “I am hardly the greatest champion of the king who ever lived. There are few more renowned in the leagues of the kings­riders than you, Meshum Tirbodh, commander of archers.” He spoke Tirbodh’s title with honor and respect.

  Tirbodh’s tongue slipped across his dry lips in suspicion. He wiped the trickle of blood from his neck.

  Machous motioned for Akkad and the archer to lower their weapons, then slipped the dagger into his belt. “I said I have never doubted the wisdom of His Greatness, Orsis-Kublan, Omnipotent Sovereign and King.” He raised his chin, a wry smile tugging at his lower lip. “I lied. The truth is, I have, many times. My father was among the rebels who rode with Orsis-Kublan in the overthrow of the Romagónian kings, and to the day he died he also doubted. What I learned from my father has sustained me in the life I have chosen, the loyalties I have pledged.”

  Machous inhaled deeply. “He used to say that no man is perfectly right or completely wrong. We live our lives in shades of gray, in shadows. Sometimes in the dark and sometimes at the edge of light. The Book of Wisdom says we must always choose between good and evil. But sometimes we must also choose between good and good—or evil and evil. The apothegm is written: ‘Seek the better of the one and the lesser of the other.’”

  “Whatever you choose, you can never succeed,” Tirbodh said, his voice contrite.

  Machous offered his hand. Tirbodh took it and was lifted to his feet by the captain’s strong arm. “Not without your help,” he said. “You are destined to die—whether today by my hand, or at Kingsgate beneath the punisher’s ax, or by this evil prince in whom you have misplaced your trust.

  “You betrayed your king because you deemed him unworthy of your trust. There are times it is so. Even many times, perhaps, but neither is this sorcerer worthy of your trust. Has he not betrayed his promises already? I am told that, since coming from the Mountain of God, you are treated like men of low caste, not officers of a king.”

  Machous looked to Akkad, and Tirbodh followed his eyes.

  “Whatever the failings of the king are, and however unworthy of your trust he may be, you must not tarnish yourself because of his shortcomings. You are a man of courage and honor and nobility. Drakkor is not worthy of a man as irreproachable as you. He is a rogue and a villain and the enemy of
all good. He does not deserve a man of principle to stand at his side.”

  Tirbodh held the captain’s eyes a long time, then slowly bowed his head. His hubris, anger, and resentment melted away in the heat of his rising remorse.

  “We are not men who will be remembered in songs, my old friend,” Machous said, “but we are good men who have lived with honor. On the day we die, our only hope should be that some we have known will say of us, ‘They did the best they could.’ In this moment, we are trapped by our destiny. By the whims of fate, we stand in a crucible of evil. It is only for us to choose the lesser.”

  At last Tirbodh raised his eyes. “What would you have me do?”

  CHAPTER 69

  “Equus will be mine! The gods decree it!”

  Qhuin felt the weight of the prince’s hand on his shoulder as he pushed to his feet and circled to the opposite end of the table.

  Kadesh-Cor slapped his hands on the shoulders of the kings­rider captain. The man stiffened. Boiled leather creaked and iron clunked on iron. The captain’s courage eroded in the acid drip of intimidation.

  “Your men sit with their hands on their swords. It would seem the spirit of rebellion rises in proportion to the distance from king and castle. Or is it simply fear and foolhardiness?” He leaned close and croaked in a hoarse whisper, “The wrath of the king will surely come. Not here. Not today, but it will come.”

  He straightened as he continued his walk around the table. His fingers dragged across the tops of the men’s shoulders. He stroked their helms and hoary heads with a condescending hand.

  “Why do you choose to ignore the whisperings of the truth? Do you walk in willing blindness to push troubles from your minds? ‘The man who does not see, always falls into the pit,’” he recited from the Book of Wisdom.

  Qhuin winced at the dire warning of the prince.

  “My lord grandfather, the king, is very old. The days of his greatness are shortened . . . to a very few.” The tone was sympathetic, but his eyes confessed the pleasure of it. “His hours are spent in weariness and slumber. Carefully crafted royal lies protect his dignity, but death stalks the halls of Kingsgate.”

  The passing of a king was a calamitous event. As bad as things might be during the reign of a disfavored king, the one who takes his place could be even worse. The thought of a dead king and what might become of them in the inevitable wake that followed the transition of power settled over the company in a thick cloud of worry.

  “Wipe the mud from your eyes. The king is dying, and when he journeys to the underworld, I will be king.” Kadesh-Cor’s bold words were more prophecy than prediction. A sorcerer more than a prince.

  “Tolak may be firstborn, but he shall never sit upon the Peacock Throne. He is hated by the king. They have quarreled all their days. I honor the man who gave me life, but he is a fool. There is a wedge between us over the deference shown me by my grandfather and my claim to the castle at Blackthorn. Like the head of an ax left to rust in the crotch of an oak, our family is forever split, and the heaviest of the limbs is about to fall.”

  Qhuin could whisper to horses, but he could also discern the hearts and minds of men. He tried to envision the dominions of Kandelaar under the rule of Prince Kadesh-Cor. What would he choose to call himself? What honorific rose higher than “His Greatness, Omnipotent Soverign and King”? “His Divine Excellence”? The thought amused him.

  Kadesh-Cor incarnated himself as omnipotent ruler and king for the men about the table. He thrust his chin and wagged a finger at his noble friends. There was blood from his face on his hand.

  “It will be my feet you will wish to kiss when the day of your reckoning comes. It will be for my mercy that you will beg. It will be my wrath rained down for your rebellion, your mutiny, and your disloyalty in the Tallgrass Prairie.”

  He circled behind his kinsmen and scourged them with a lashing tongue. “The poets will write of you indeed. A song your children will sing to their children and their children to the tenth generation. A silly song of weaklings and milksops sung by jesters, clowns, and fools. A song of merriment and laughter. A song of cowardice to shame those whose blood you are. They will forget you, and you will disappear like the stench of hog rot blown by the wind.”

  The prince let the words hang in the air, and Qhuin could not take his eyes from the wounded face. He could feel the rising tension and prickling sense of looming dread.

  A leather pouch hit the table with a dull, metallic thud and sagged to the shape of a fat, bruised pear. The jangling suggested coins. The weight promised gold.

  Kadesh-Cor spoke first to the captain and his kings­riders. “If you refuse to obey the command of your future king”—and then to the Huszárs—“or repay the debt of kind tolerance, perhaps I can entice you with this.” Kadesh-Cor gestured to the purse in the center of the table. “Everything has a price.”

  What sovereignty could not command, gold could buy. There was nothing in the prince’s cloistered existence that cast doubt on the truth of that dictum. It did not come from the Book of Wisdom. It came from experience.

  But he had misjudged the men around the table.

  The captain stood, resentful and indignant. “By your leave, m’lord, we shall prepare for the return.” Without waiting for dismissal, he left the table and pushed his way through the gathered company. The kings­riders followed, though not all of them with equal resolve. Three glanced back at the fat sack of coin that could change the destiny of their lives.

  Prince Kadesh-Cor reacted to the kings­riders’ exit by drawing his sword. It was a single-handed rapier with a long blade. A cut-and-thrust weapon. No one dared breathe. He laid the point of it against the leather pouch and slid it slowly from the center of the table to the nearest kinsman.

  The man had been hunched forward with his arms crossed on the table, but now he sat up straight and swift at the offer. His face reflected fear, not fortune. His head moved side to side as he stood and backed away as if touching the pouch would bring instant death. He muttered an apology. “Not I, m’lord prince. I am a merchant. A man of goods. Not a hunter. Not a horseman.”

  Qhuin watched with fascination, surprised by the cowardice of these men whom he had admired.

  The prince skidded the treasure to the next Huszár, closer until it pressed against the man’s fat hand on the table. The Huszár picked it up. An audible gasp swept over the company like the sound of a rushing wind. He hefted the weight of the sack. “You are generous, m’lord prince, but . . .” He shook his head and plopped the pouch in front of the Huszár to his right.

  Baaly’s face brightened when the man had lifted the pouch, then faded as it thumped on the table again. The Huszár left his stool and moved away from the table. Others shrugged to their feet and followed as if the pouch of gold was a coiled viper.

  Qhuin watched as the Huszárs shuffled away and milled about in discomfort. Only Baaly remained at the table. The foolishness of youth. Naiveté or genuine courage? Qhuin wondered.

  “It is a day of disgust and disappointment.” The prince broke the silence with surprising calm. “A day of regrets that will yet express themselves.” He touched the bandage and worked his jaw against the pain he inflicted upon himself. The silk was outlined by dried blood.

  “Lest it become a day of shame, you must never speak of what you have seen.” He paused, inhaled deeply, and tilted his head, narrowing his exposed eye. “You must never whisper that Equus, the mythical immortal sire of all horseflesh created by the gods, is real. A magnificent stallion that you failed to capture. A horse whose blood we might have bred into our stocky horses of the north and spawned a generation of great warhorses like the world has never known. If I were you, I would not confess I had fainted from such a duty.”

  Kadesh-Cor thrust the point of his blade into the ground. “We can never tell our king that the stallion of the gods was in our hands and we let it sl
ip away.”

  Qhuin felt his pulse quicken as a wave of unexpected feelings washed over him. “ . . . In our hands and we let it slip away.” The words were a luminous text against the darkness of his mind.

  The prince steadied himself with one hand on the grip and the other on the pommel. “Whatever may come of your disobedience today, you have forfeited both honor and riches. And one thing more.” His smile was a crooked line of satisfaction. “You condemn yourselves to the misery of wondering—What if? From this moment, you will never take a breath without the question. With your final thought, you will wonder what might have been.”

  The pounding of Qhuin’s heart rose with the cadence of the prince’s prophecy. Kadesh-Cor was addressing the noble and mighty who gathered beneath the canopy, but his words pierced the heart of a slave.

  “What might have been?” Qhuin held his breath, and without conscious thought, his fingers tightened around the treasure in his secret bag. Clutch freedom in my hand. He could feel the cold heat of the stone through the leather. A sensation of power quivered up his arm and filled him with a sense of well-being. A calming sense of courage. The breeze had stopped. The only sound was the raspy weeta-weeta-weet-tee-yo from the tree above. The warbler had returned.

  “I’ll go!” Qhuin stood. “I will bring you the horse, m’lord prince.”

  Kadesh-Cor turned. His mouth moved in surprise. “You? You are nothing but a—”

  A strong voice stopped him. “The finest horseman in your stable, m’lord.” Horsemaster Raahud stepped forward. “If there is anyone present who can catch Equus, it is this man.”

  “You’ll go?” the prince asked with rising curiosity and an edge of enthusiasm. “Alone?”

  “I’ll take Master Baaly, if allowed, m’lord.”

  Baaly pushed back from the table and picked up the heavy bag of gold.