Devil's Night Dawning: The First Book of the Broken Stone Series

by Damien Black

  His voice had become sorrowful; keen as his sixth sense was, Adelko fancied he could literally feel the monarch’s pain. ‘And so it may rightly be said that this tragedy is my doing!’ he continued, before reverting back to white-hot anger in the blinking of an eye: ‘Yet here and now do I vow that blood shall atone! Krulheim shall not be allowed to escape justice! No, nor this idolatrous foreign hedge wizard, who thinks it clever to unman brave knights with sorcerous chicanery! Tell the heralds without – one hour more I shall linger to hear petitions, and only those made by victims of this cruel civil war! Then let the hall be cleared, let every knight and man of arms go look to his weapons – for we shall not be long in riding out to meet this impostor! Thule marches on Linden, does he? Well we’ll meet him there, and send him to Gehenna where he belongs on a tide of his own blood!’

  A resounding cheer filled the hall. Even Adelko, unmartial as he was, found himself joining in without thinking. Only Horskram remained silent, keeping his usual alert composure.

  ‘And that was our first meeting with the King!’ finished Vaskrian, having interrupted Adelko a couple of minutes earlier so he could re-enact Freidheim’s speech-making – it was already clear to Braxus that he was the enthusiastic type when it came to military matters. ‘We haven’t seen him since – well, except at feast times, but he’s so far away up the other end of the hall, we don’t really get to see him...’

  Braxus continued to scrutinise the pair of them as they lapsed into awkward silence. It was painfully obvious the youngsters were concealing plenty.

  ‘You make a meal of your first encounter with your King,’ he said at last, ‘but stint on details of your journey to meet him... Well, I’m sure your master is as wise as they say the Argolians are in swearing you both to secrecy.’

  Adelko glanced nervously at Vaskrian. The young monk might have known many things that Braxus didn’t, but lying well certainly wasn’t one of them. His mentor, this friar Horskram, had evidently given him strict instructions. But then the Argolians were well known for being a secretive bunch.

  Ignoring the guilty looks on their ingenuous faces the knight continued: ‘Your Order is not unknown in my realm – fear not, I will respect the learned friar’s wishes by prying no more into your business. It’s clear to me that he doesn’t want you sharing it with too many people.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Adelko, looking plainly relieved.

  Braxus saw no reason to pry further in any case – he had already learned the most valuable thing he could from them, namely the state of mind of the king they had come to petition. And what he’d learned didn’t put him in an optimistic mood.

  ‘And what about you, my lord, if I may make so bold?’ said Vaskrian. ‘It’s always good to hear a knight errant tell his story…’

  Sir Braxus laughed. ‘If it’s knights’ tales you’re after, then you can begin by addressing me as one – “sir knight” will do, I shan’t be a lord until I inherit my father’s lands and title.’

  Vaskrian looked puzzled at this. ‘But in Northalde the heir of any baron is called “lord” – as a courtesy title, if you will.’

  ‘Pah,’ snorted Braxus. ‘Where I come from we don’t stand on ceremony half so much as you Northlendings. We call a man what he is – at present I hold no lands, command no men but these, my fellow emissaries. I am trained to arms, and deeds of courtly love... and feats of both have I accomplished many, of that I can assure you! But until I inherit my father’s estate I am what I am – a knight, no more, no less.’

  Vaskrian chewed his lip, clearly thrown by this casual rejection the world order he had grown up in.

  Looking at him brought a stab of guilt to Braxus’s heart. The Northlending squire reminded him a little of Paidlin. He was a couple of years older and looked a lot tougher – but then Paidlin might have looked like that in two summers, given the chance.

  The amputation had been taken care of quickly and cleanly by the King’s chirurgeon, as befitted the squire of an honoured guest at court. That had saved his life – but the poor lad’s career was over before it had begun.

  Adelko took advantage of his temporary silence to interject: ‘You said “fellow emissaries”, my – sir knight... what message do you bring from your land? Will the Thraxians be supporting the King’s cause against the rebels?’

  Braxus laughed again. You had to relish the irony. ‘Why no!’ he said, trying not to sound too exasperated. ‘In fact, I was sent here for virtually the opposite reason – I come on behalf of my father, who would seek your King’s help with a planned uprising against our own.’

  Both youths gaped at this. ‘But that makes you a rebel and a traitor,’ said Vaskrian hotly. ‘You’re no different from Thule!’

  He looked genuinely angry, as if he were about to challenge him to a duel of honour right there and then. Brave lad. Foolish, but brave – you had to give him that.

  Braxus merely chuckled again, although this time his mirth carried a bitter tinge.

  ‘That, I would say, all depends on the nature of the sovereign one seeks to oppose,’ he said ruefully. His retinue were mostly talking among themselves in Thrax, but Vertrix was listening, a grim expression on his face.

  ‘Our last King, Cullodyn son of Morwyn, was a good man,’ sighed Braxus. ‘Twas he who turned the truce with Freidheim after Corne Hill into a lasting peace. Morwyne was cowed after the hiding you dealt us there, but ever in his heart he hated you, and would have continued the Border Wars if he’d felt able to. Cullodyn, he was cut from a different cloth – he saw the folly of making war on a powerful neighbour when so much of his own kingdom remained unpacified. He spent the entire thirty years of his reign fighting the highland clans, who still dispute the crown and wish to see the Kingdom of Thraxia broken up. You see, our problems are similar to yours.’

  He caught the young monk frowning. But then he was of highland stock. True, the Northlending highlanders were of mingled blood and had embraced the Creed long ago, but they could still trace their ancestry back to Slánga’s forebears.

  Well, the novice would just have to weigh his loyalties in his own time. They had asked to hear his story, and now he was giving it to them.

  ‘But now we have another problem,’ he continued. ‘When Cullodyn passed four years ago he was succeeded by his nephew Cadwy. At first we thought he’d be a decent king like his uncle – he’d distinguished himself in the wars against the highland clans, and promised to be as wise in rule as he was cunning in the field.’

  ‘So what went wrong?’ asked Vaskrian.

  ‘A southland witch called Abrexta the Prescient is what went wrong,’ replied Braxus, before telling them of the troubles her sorcerous meddlings had plunged the realm into.

  They looked a little more sympathetic after that – at least they weren’t still accusing him of fomenting treason. These Northlendings were a serious lot but give them their due, they did have a strong sense of justice.

  A lowly novice and squire – perhaps he was a fool to even care about placating such. But they were listening to him, which was more than could be said of the high-born nobles and influential courtiers who had snubbed them since they arrived. Perhaps they should consider themselves fortunate just to be lodged at the palace, he reflected bitterly.

  ‘Now, we’re not trying to kill our King, or even depose him, you understand,’ he continued, doing his best to reassure them further. ‘But we need to act to save the kingdom, and the only way we’re going to do that is by taking the capital and putting that witch to the sword – her, and whoever’s put her up to this! Personally I think the southerners are behind it – they’re every bit as troublesome as yours, and this Abrexta hails from their lands. Well, we’ll find out. But first we need to storm Ongist so we can get her away from the King, and to do that we need an army. Even without having to worry about fighting Slánga’s lot we still don’t have enough men to do it without getting help. Help from your King.’

  Vaskrian frowned. ‘Begging your par
don, sire, but I think our King’s got his hands full dealing with his own problems.’

  Braxus returned the frown. ‘Aye, that seems to be the case. We arrived here three nights ago, and so far he’s been too busy even to hear our plea.’

  ‘How did you hope to convince him in any case?’ asked Adelko. It was a shrewd question. He might have added: Why would the King of the Northlendings help a country he and his ancestors fought for generations? The young knight had been asking himself the same question all the way from Port Grendel. He still had mixed feelings about his father’s master plan. But then he had mixed feelings about everything that concerned the old man.

  He sighed again. ‘A pledge to grant favourable trading terms once the King is restored to his wits and Abrexta and her nest of traitors rooted out,’ he replied. ‘Plus an annual surfeit of Thraxian furs and mead, and a certain sum to be paid out of the treasury once order is restored. Then there’s the possibility of mining ebonite in the Brekkens, if we should succeed in crushing the highlanders utterly. That black metal is harder than steel, they say – though to be honest none have ever learned to smelt it since the times of the ancients. Still it’s an extra incentive, if you will. The rewards we offer are all speculative, of course.’

  He felt his spirits sinking like a scuttled man o’ war. The more he spoke of it the less likely to succeed his suit seemed. In fact one might have more joy trying to forge something out of ebonite.

  ‘Perhaps we have come here on a fool’s errand,’ he said sourly, giving free rein to his gloomy thoughts. ‘But there seems little else we can do under the circumstances.’

  The Thraxian knight lapsed into a moody silence. His jocularity erased by his storytelling, he gazed across the battlements at the rolling surf with sad eyes.

  ‘Our King is a just man – he will hear your plea at least,’ said Vaskrian. The knight grunted noncommittally, looking none the happier.

  Adelko bit his lip and said nothing. Part of him sympathised with the highland rebels. True, the tales Braxus told made the Thraxian clans sound completely different from the god-fearing, peaceful folk he’d grown up with: the way he put it, the men that followed Slánga were little better than bloodthirsty savages.

  But then that was his side of the story. If the young monk could have sat and talked with this Slánga, what kind of picture would he have painted of the lowland knights – who kept his people confined to the ragged ranges while they squabbled and fought over the country’s rich lowlands?

  Thinking on this and the troubles of his own realm, Adelko reflected how fragile a thing a kingdom was. Loremasters told how the Urovian New Empire was made up of seven older kingdoms that had been pacified and united during the Hundred Years Conquest – yet in this corner of the world kings struggled to rule a single realm.

  Rebellion and war, bloodshed and treachery – was it worth all that to keep a kingdom together? His own people had lived meagrely but stably in small, tightly knit communities for centuries – why couldn’t the rest of the world follow suit and learn from its more humble occupants?

  Adelko recalled Horskram’s words on the road to Kaupstad, about wars being fought time and again for the wrong reasons. He felt he was beginning to understand his mentor’s world weariness better.

  It was not a feeling that he relished.

  CHAPTER IV

  A Realm Divided

  Lord Visigard’s face was set grim as he gave his liege the latest news of the muster. Princess Hjala Ingwin, the King’s only daughter, watched him keenly as he did.

  ‘The White Valravyn has commenced marching and will be outside the walls of the capital in full panoply in two days’ time,’ said Visigard stiffly. The old raven didn’t look nearly as self-important as he normally would giving such news, Hjala reflected. Rather he had the look of a man who was grateful to be giving such news at all.

  Hjala knew all too well why that was, but of the strange and terrible incident that had disrupted the Order’s war preparations nothing was said.

  They were in the King’s solar high up in the palace, although its spectacular view across the city was the last thing on the princess’s mind. Hjala had plenty else to think about. She had also been present when Sir Tarlquist and the monk Horskram had told her father of the dreadful attack on Staerkvit a tenday ago. It had been decided on the spot that the less said about it on the eve of war the better.

  And a good job too, the princess reflected as the Royal Marshal droned through his report: for what her aunt Walsa would have had to say about it alone.

  ‘The barons of Efrilund have also begun marching,’ continued Visigard. ‘Lord Vymar of Harrang and Lord Fenrig of Hroghar will travel overland with their men, while Lord Aesgir of Sjórvard brings troops and supplies south by sea.’

  Lord Toros of Vandheim had already done likewise: his knights and soldiers were encamped with the Royal Army and the Jarl of Stromlund’s forces outside the city. As usual, the problem lay with the Wolding barons, who were procrastinating as they always did on the eve of any conflict, in the hope of extracting some petty concession or other.

  The latest news of them made matters only worse.

  ‘The Woldings are refusing to let the Highland chieftains pass through their domains until they pay a toll for the privilege,’ said Visigard, sighing and shaking his head. ‘We had to factor that into our bargaining with the hill-land barons.’

  Hjala pursed her lips. Highlanders were far from rich and proud as the day was long – there would certainly be no paying of tolls, not from their purses at any rate. They had no other route to the muster, shipcraft being virtually unknown to them. The Woldings were taking full advantage of their feudal privileges to drive the hardest bargain they could with the Dominions.

  ‘Damn the Woldings, curse their wretched hides!’ shouted the King, slamming a broad fist down on the solid oak table before him with enough force to rattle it. ‘It’s always the same with them! I’ve a good mind to make war on them after we’re done with the southron traitors – I should have offered the Highland chieftains their lands to help us crush those robber barons years ago!’

  ‘Your policy has ever been to make peace wherever you could, and resort to war only as a final recourse,’ Lord Ulnor reminded him crisply.

  He said this in a manner that suggested he had long disapproved of such clemency, and would have happily seen the King’s angry suggestion played out long ago.

  Princess Hjala had never fully trusted the cold-eyed steward and his icy reasoning. The Royal Seneschal stood at her father’s right shoulder as she stood at his left, facing Visigard across the table. That was appropriate, she reflected somewhat bitterly. In the presence of the steward and marshal she felt just like a left arm: not useless by any means, but clearly not the most important limb in the kingdom’s complex polity. At least she was privy to her father’s counsels, she reflected philosophically – that was more than most high-born women could say.

  ‘We have taken steps to... appease the Woldings,’ clarified Visigard cautiously, adjusting his girdle. ‘They have at any rate agreed to take our part in the war – the passage of the Highlanders is also being negotiated.’

  In charge of the security of the capital, Visigard was a rotund, barrel-chested knight of about sixty winters. His voluminous side whiskers cascaded down his ruddy cheeks in a snowy tumble, and his bald pate was a shiny red. Though he was a seasoned Commander in the Order of the White Valravyn, Hjala found him somewhat comical. She didn’t doubt his loyalty or efficiency, but his pomposity and appearance made it difficult for her to take him entirely seriously.

  ‘And what has been promised them?’ asked the King, his face frozen over with cold rage.

  ‘Nothing, in short, that cannot be renegotiated after the rebellion has been put down,’ interjected Lord Ulnor. It disturbed Princess Hjala that the seneschal seemed always to know of every negotiation that transpired in the kingdom before her father did. Fortunate indeed that he had proved as loyal as he was
effective, she thought uneasily.

  ‘Very well,’ said the King, waving his hand dismissively. ‘You are right – now is no time to discuss such lowly matters. The Woldings can be dealt with after the war – in the meantime, how soon can they get here?’

  Visigard licked his lips nervously. ‘Our emissaries say a tenday at least – perhaps longer.’

  ‘A tenday!’ the King spat. ‘Why, do they not know that Thule has invested Linden already, that my own son and heir is sorely pressed to defend it against the entirety of Krulheim’s traitorous army?! At this rate his men will be marching across the Vyborg by the time ours move a foot towards the fight!’

  ‘The Highlanders are ready,’ said Visigard, doing his best to mollify his irate liege. ‘They’ve always had the knack for mustering and moving swiftly – assuming the agreement with the Woldings is concluded in the next day or so, they could be here in a week’s time.’

  ‘Aye, and good subjects that makes ‘em, even if I do barely have a say in their lives up in that blasted wilderness they call home,’ replied the King irritably. ‘But it’s not lightly armoured clan swordsmen I need to win this war – it’s armoured knights, as many as I can get! You know as well as I do how rich the southern fiefdoms are – that means Krulheim and his barons can field a mighty army. The one advantage we might have over him is in heavy horse.’

  ‘Do not be so quick to dismiss the highlanders, Your Majesty,’ interjected Horskram from his seat. He was sitting next to Tarlquist by a window overlooking the streets of the citadel. ‘Much of Thule’s army will not be ahorse as you rightly say, and doughty clansmen have proved more than a match for common footsoldiers ere this occasion.’

  Tarlquist nodded his assent. ‘Aye, my liege, and forget not my Order, that your very brother commands. Any raven is worth five lesser knights!’