by Greg Curtis
He was no hero as much as he might want to be, Briagh thought guiltily. Still, he couldn't have taken on a wolf pack on his own. And he had saved the arcanist's life. Surely that counted for something? But really, he had done little save run away.
Then again, that was exactly what he had been doing all his life and it was a strategy that had kept him breathing. He wanted to keep breathing.
Chapter Eight
The palace chapel was all but empty save for Elan and the coffin in front of her. A couple of servants who normally attended the king stood at the door behind her, allowing entry to only a select few. More stood at the entrance to the cemetery just outside, making sure that no one entered through the gates and got to peer in to the chapel through the windows. But if they tried it wouldn’t have mattered. The windows were stained glass anyway.
It was a shame Elan thought. The palace chapel should be enjoyed. And not just by the royal family. Retainers, servants of all walks, palace guards, visitors and members of the Court all had the right to use it. But they seldom did and most days it was left empty.
The chapel was one of the parts of the palace she liked the most. It was normally quiet and peaceful. Usually it was filled with the scent of the freshly cut flowers set out in vases along the walls. And every so often there was a festival of some sort to the Great Sage, or an official function, and it would be filled with well-wishers. It was here that royal babies would be welcomed into the arms of the Great Sage, hand-fastings would be performed, blessings conferred upon those entering the faith and so forth. At those times the pews would be filled with happy people in their finery. It was here that in six months she would be be hand-fasted to her husband, whoever he was.
But it was also here that funerals for the royal family were held. Where the dead would be fare welled before their bodies were taken outside to be buried in the cemetery grounds. Already she could see the hole with the mounds of earth beside it that had been prepared for the newest burial. For her father.
How was she supposed to feel about her father's death, Elan wondered? He wasn't really her father anymore. He hadn't been for a very long time. Not since that damned morph had cursed him. What made her father who he was had died that day, ten long years before. The figure in the coffin was just an echo of the man he had been. And in truth she didn't remember a lot of her father from the time before he had been cursed. Just bits and pieces.
She remembered him tucking her in to her bed at night when she was little. Patting her fondly on the head and telling her how pretty she was. The typical things little girls remembered of their fathers. But for the last ten years he had done none of those things. And that was now half her life.
Standing here now in front of his coffin and staring at his body, she wondered what she should think.
She was sad. Angry too. But mostly she was confused. Perhaps that was in part because he didn't look like he had in life. The servants had done a good job in finding his body, washing and dressing it, and making him look like a king. It was the one thing he hadn't looked like for the past ten years. For much of that time he hadn't even dressed, choosing instead to run around naked like one of the wolfhounds he thought were his kin. But now as he lay there, the madness in his eyes was finally gone. His face was a picture of quiet consideration. In death it almost seemed as if his humanity had returned to him.
And what was she supposed to think about her mother? The wolf mother. The woman who was now responsible for killing her father. Anger? Hatred? Pity? Again, Elan didn't know. She guessed the people had a very clear view of her. Hated and fear. But they didn't know that the wolf mother had once been their queen. And they didn’t have the same relationship with her as Elan had once had.
To add to that there was the terrible damage done to the city. To Abysynth. Thousands had been killed and the city had been all but destroyed. And it had been done by the very two people who were supposed to protect it. Her mother's pack had killed at will across the city. And her father, howling like a dog and wearing nothing but a cape and a pair of boots, had ordered the cannon to fire. Cannon against wolves – that was always going to be a bad idea. As had been loading them with fire shot. Elan had no idea how many wolves had been killed by the cannon – few she suspected – but the city had burned because of it. And all the while her father had run around like a crazed loon, shouting at the moon and barking like a dog.
It was all so confusing. And it was made more so by the fact that those of the Court who had survived had had the Imperial Quarter locked up tight after the attack. Because they couldn't let anyone know that the king was dead! The instant they did there would have to be a coronation of Myrim, the new king. And while her brother was still alive and well, he was in no fit state to go through a ceremony. He couldn't speak, so he couldn't recite his vows. He wouldn't be controllable either. The servants might be able to dress him, though even that was a struggle, but getting him to walk on two legs – to sit and kneel where and when he was supposed to – that was going to be impossible. Sal of course was no better. Which was why both of them were currently locked away in the royal hunting lodge, far from the city, and never seen.
So to tell the people that the king was dead was to reveal to them that the kingdom had no royal family. Or rather, no successor. Even to say he had been wounded would lead to the same result. If he was too badly hurt to act, his sons would be expected to stand in for him. And unfortunately for them, the king's demise at the teeth and claws of the wolves had been witnessed. An entire squad of imperial soldiers had seen him taken down. A few soldiers had found the body. At the moment it looked like all of the Court's nightmares of the last ten years had just come true.
Unless they could convince the people otherwise.
Which left her precisely where she was. Standing in front of a coffin in a locked chapel, staring at a man she barely recognised as her father, about to bury him even though he was officially still alive and helping with the city's recovery. Wearing black, but officially only because she was in mourning for the people of the city. It was just so wrong on so many levels. First her father's curse had been a secret. Now even his death was a secret. And the only people who would mourn his passing were herself and a few members of the Court. No one else would ever know.
Not that she knew whether she was allowed to cry or not. Maybe it wouldn't be dignified? Maybe it would reveal to the world that the man in the coffin was her father. Or maybe she had done most of her crying when she had been ten years old.
“Princess.”
A soft voice spoke from just behind her and a hand found her shoulder in an attempt at comfort. It didn’t help. Because even if she might not have the tears in her for the death of her father, she still felt the loss. For the longest time she had clung to the faint hope that what had been done could be undone. That her family could be healed. Now it was too late.
“Argen.” She greeted her old tutor without turning around to face him. She didn't need to. She knew his voice. Just as she knew his long face, grey hair and deep set wrinkles.
“Are you alright?”
“With this? With my father's murder? My mother's killing of him? With the lies being spoken by the Court as they parade an empty carriage with blackened windows around the city and pretend that my father still lives and tours the worst affected areas? With my hand-fasting in six months to a man I have never met? With my brothers out of their minds? Abysynth in ruins?” Finally she turned around. “No of course I'm not alright!”
“I understand Princess. But it will get better. Or at least easier with time.”
“It will only get better when someone catches that accursed morph!” Anger surged through her. There had to be restitution made for what had been done. And blood was the only currency she would accept.
“Again Princess, the morph in the Arcanium is not the one who cursed your family. He is not responsible for this.” Argen managed to look both upset and sympathetic as he said it. But then he was a priest. They were g
ood at that.
But they were also supposed to know the right thing to say, and he just didn't seem to lately. First the Court had told her repeatedly that the morph in the Arcanium was not the one that had attacked her family. Then, when she hadn't agreed with them they had asked her old tutor to come and tell her the same thing. It was all politics of course. The Court wanted a calm Princess who wouldn't cause them any more trouble. And they were happy to lie to get that.
“Bad blood is bad blood. One morph came and cursed my entire family. Ten years later another arrived just in time to somehow help my mother steal something and start this war. They should all be sent to the underworld!”
“You know better than that Elan. You learnt the lessons of the Great Sage as well as any.”
“They hold no comfort for me. Not now.” It was wrong of her to say that to him. He was a good man and a friend. And his faith in his god was unquestioning. He wanted others to share it. But it was also the truth. Of all the gods that people worshipped, the Great Sage was perhaps the best. Certainly he was the wisest. It went with being the God of Wisdom. But now wasn't a time for wisdom. It was a time for passion – the blood red passion of vengeance! Maybe it was time to make some offerings to the Bloody God, and to stop worrying about what the people who saw her might say?
“Is there any word?” Elan changed the topic before it could become any more difficult.
“Little, I'm afraid. None of it good.” He let his gaze fall a little. “No one knows of your mother's fate. Some say she fell in the battle. Others that she escaped. They've found and blocked up the entrances to the sewers through which she and her pack gained access to the Imperial Quarter, but no one has gone down to chase her through them.”
“The city's in ruins. The Escarpment has been completely destroyed. The Merchants Quarter, Warehouse District and Docks have taken extensive damage. Using the cannon was a terrible mistake. As for the dead, there is as yet no final count. Some are putting it at five thousand. Some put it much higher. City guards have only just started going from house to house, pulling out the bodies. The streets are littered with them.”
“The Imperial Quarter lost over five hundred people, half of them soldiers. They could fight the wolves but the dire wolves proved too powerful and too savage to be brought down with just a single shot. Their teeth could also rip through chain and leather armour. Several noble houses have been completely wiped out as the wolves came up through the sewers connecting to their basements. It gave them the element of surprise. House Varden and House Lindisee are no more. House Dunn is survived only by a son who is gravely wounded.”
“The Windgarth Academy has lost both students and masters and the royal park was turned into a killing ground. The Temple of Asbeth was also badly damaged with a dozen priests and priestesses killed. The Goddess of Healing will surely be fuming. As for the palace itself, it appears forty staff have lost their lives – along with your father of course.” He added the last hastily.
“And the people?” She asked not only out of a sense of duty but because she truly cared for the people. Unfortunately, being only the princess and she could do nothing.
“Upset, shocked, wounded. Unsure how this could have happened. Waiting to hear from the king. To get some answers. The sighting of the royal coach is not enough. And they're confused at why the gates to the Imperial Quarter are locked.”
Elan could understand that. She would be confused too. This was the time when the people most badly needed their king. They needed guidance. They needed to be told things would be all right. That the dead would be buried, the injured treated for their injuries, and the rest could go on with their lives. They needed to hear that the city would be rebuilt.
But they had no king. And unfortunately a number of the imperial soldiers had seen the king be taken down by the wolves. They knew he was dead. And the word had spread. So everything was currently about maintaining the illusion that he was still alive. Pretending to the imperial soldiers that he had only been wounded. That he had fought off the wolf and carried on fighting. And making certain that word of what they had seen did not go any further than their barracks. If the suggestion got out that he was dead, even as gossip in an alehouse, everything would be lost. Ten years of the Court's careful plotting would come to an abrupt end. All the court needed was to limp on another six months when Elan could provide them with a new king.
Elan desperately wanted to be able to take action now, and was angry that she couldn't. In other lands she knew, women had more say. She wished that this was one of those lands. Then she could have gone out and started directing the soldiers and the workers in their tasks. Perhaps brought some comfort to the people. But she could not do that here. If she did, the first question out of anyone's mouth if they saw her trying would be to ask where the king was Those were his duties. Her role was wholly decorative.
“And the globe?” She asked because while she couldn’t do anything officially, she still wanted to find and kill the morph who had started this. And the globe was where she had to start.
“Some news. The arcanists say it is one of those rare artefacts that is both magical and technological. That the magic in it has something to do with both the mind and the animal.”
“Could it be how my mother was somehow able to increase the size of her pack so greatly? To control dire wolves?” It sounded logical.
“Perhaps?” Argen shrugged helplessly.
“And Julius said before that that the morph had been staying in the Arcanium for many nights. At least the arcanists thought so. He wore the collar of a royal wolfhound. Maybe he was guarding the globe. Waiting for the right time to give it to my mother.”
“He did not give it to her.”
“Maybe he did. And maybe saving the arcanist was only an incidental act. Maybe his true role was to close the doors to the east wing, giving my mother more time to find it and escape.”
“The wolves could have killed the arcanist and had the Arcanium completely to themselves. And he killed a wolf.” Argen tried to object once more. It wasn't hard to see the direction her thoughts were heading and he obviously didn't like it.
But Elan could see the truth. Yes, a wolf's body had been found on the floor of the east wing, but what did that mean? Her mother might not have complete control of her pack all the time. And the fact remained that she had got in and out safely – in part because the doors had been locked behind her. That was the doing of the second morph, working in concert with the first one who had struck ten years before. Unless he actually was the first one returned, despite what Argen claimed.
Argen didn't respond for a while after that, choosing to let the silence linger between them. Which was fine by Elan. She needed time to think. She needed to work out how to capture the morph and then extract a confession from him. Or maybe she should just kill him. She hadn't decided.
“There is one other fact that I have learned about the globe, Princess.” Argen eventually spoke again.
“Yes?”
“The arcanists keep detailed records of who accesses their artefacts. Every time one is taken down and studied, a note is made.”
“You have the morph's name!” Elan couldn't keep the excitement from her voice. Finally he had said something she truly cared about.
“No Princess. The globe had scarcely been looked at for many years. It has been moved a few times for cleaning, but no more than that.” Argen shifted his weight a little on his feet and looked a touch nervous.
“So no one was interested in it?” Elan didn't understand that. It seemed to be the key to this entire disaster. But if no one had cared enough to even look at, it why would her mother have stolen it?
“Someone was interested in it Princess. Very interested. He studied it on a great many days, made sketches of it and subjected it to tests. Just not recently.” If anything the priest seemed to become even more uncomfortable.
“Who? When?” Elan wanted to know.
“Ten years ago. Until just b
efore …” Argen's voice trailed off.
“Who?” Suddenly Elan truly had to know. Because as her thoughts raced ahead she knew exactly what Argen was trying not to say. That the globe was somehow linked to what had happened to her family's fate.
“Master Barachalla.”
“Master Barachalla? The royal technologist?” It wasn't what Elan had been expecting to hear. She could understand that he might be interested in such a thing. But he was no enemy. He was no morph either. He had no magic of any kind. He had often complained that it was unfair that so many were born with gifts who were unworthy of them. She remembered that quite clearly.
She remembered too that he had been a kind man. And old. Very old. Maybe it was just the memories of a child, but she seemed to recall that he had had wrinkles on top of his wrinkles. Wrinkles even extending up onto the top of his bald head. Probably even under the white hair that had sprayed out from around his ears. White hairs on his arms as well. She had been endlessly fascinated by that. His deeply bronzed skin with snow white hairs sticking out of it. And as she recalled, he had been a good teacher and had taught her science. He had taught her brothers too. He might well have taught her father.
