‘I look ridiculous.’
‘Well I could shave off all the beard, sir,’ said a manservant, standing by with soap and razor.
Jaygee leant against the doorframe, watching a bald Garon whirl around the room, polished metal mirror in his left hand, right arm in a sling and eyes fixated on the patch of hair on his lip and chin. A magnificent beard had once hung there.
‘Jay, what do you make of this?’ Garon suddenly demanded.
Quain might have replied with a witty remark involving goats. Then again, even he might have suppressed that urge under the glare Garon gave Jaygee.
‘It’s a very noble look, sir — intimidating, even.’
Garon tossed the mirror onto a table where it landed with a clatter. ‘I’ve got to go up in front of the men like this tonight!’
Jaygee excused himself with a nod and left.
***
That evening, Garon strode into the Great Hall. He kept his eyes determinedly on the chair at the head table as he passed his men, only consenting to look at them when he’d reached his seat. His special operators were among those present, and every single one of them had their head freshly shaved. Those that had beards wore them shaved back to the lip and chin. Garon blinked, swallowed and drew breath. He raised a goblet of wine in a toast. ‘To the fallen, rest. To those of us left behind, always be a step ahead of your enemy.’
All but one repeated the toast.
As they drank, there was a faint ‘tink’ ‘tink’ ‘tink’ sound of a wine goblet vibrating against a plate. Zeivite sat quivering, staring straight ahead.
It was in the room.
Why did no one else see it?
The burning Ripper was swiping aside tables and setting them alight with its great steel claws. It turned and stared at the mage with its dead, black eyes.
It was coming for him.
Chapter 1
Prince Cory
The Battle of Haliford, 1821: ‘The Battle That Never Was.’
People’s Army of Valendo led by Mercenary General Garon Allus Artifex-Dendra.
Deaths: None.
Kingdom Army of Valendo led by King Jeremiah Dendra the 4th
Deaths: None.
Civil war was averted, a new constitution was written and the first representatives of the three southern city states elected.
— Excerpt from the War Histories of Valendo
Spring, the year of the Church of the Sun, 1867 — fifteen years after the last Battle of Beldon Valley.
General Garon's body lay enshrined in a suit of plate armour on top of the funeral pyre, his soul beyond the care of the archpriest standing over him on a platform.
The archpriest stood like a dark angel in a black robe too heavy to be moved by a playful wind that toyed with his wispy hair. The bronze sun hanging around his neck shone in the daylight, striking out from a blue sky above the mountains.
He calmly surveyed the souls that he watched over. They filled the churchyard and spilt out down the road to the city. A king and his queen, princes, ministers of high office, soldiers, miners, tavern keepers; men, women and children from all walks of life. The funeral pyre was lit and the archpriest cleared his throat, placing his right palm over his stomach. Hushed conversations faded and all eyes turned to him. He drew breath, the air infused with the taste of melting mountain snow.
‘Garon Allus Artifex-Dendra was the son of a shipbuilder. He was a husband, father, grandfather, mercenary, soldier, our king-consort and the greatest general the Kingdom of Valendo has ever known...’
The people listened to the eulogy and the fire blazed.
Cory squeezed his eyes shut. Rolling waves of heat washed over his face. It felt as if, on passing the boundary of his skin, the waves transformed into a burning sensation of grief that washed down inside him. Closed eyes kept the funeral pyre smoke from invading, but his eyelids still stung with the tears that forced their way out despite his resolve to stay strong in front of so many people.
He summoned in his mind the image of his grandfather smiling. The old general had done a lot of that with his youngest grandson over the years. Beneath the thick, well-groomed grey beard and moustache, it was clear there was a huge smile. Even the eyes, blue and deep as a glacial lake, smiled, and the ears lifted just a touch. The world always seemed a brighter and better place with his grandfather’s smile and his wild stories.
Listening to the archpriest’s eulogy, he felt he scarcely knew a fraction of his grandfather’s achievements or the many other dimensions of his character. It was as if he had held a sparkling diamond in the palm of his hand for a lifetime without ever turning it around to see its other sides, or even realising that he could.
The mourning music that tradition dictated had trumpeted its last note, one which cloaked the crowd like a soft, comforting blanket. Cory opened his eyes and stared into flames that danced like excited little demons. Their feet, hidden beneath fiery robes, kicked and tramped on the wood that cracked and spat up bright orange sparks. Mesmerised by their games, he blinked to escape their spell, drew in a deep shuddering breath and tried to exhale the sickening feeling of grief inside. The little fire demons defeated his efforts by throwing hot smoke into his throat. He coughed. Grief still chewed and clung onto him.
‘I don’t want any of that depressing nonsense they usually play at funerals,’ his grandfather had told him, long before Cory had even considered his grandfather might actually die one day. ‘I want that piece Lister wrote honouring the victory at Beldon Valley. Always wakes me up and gets the heart pounding.’
The orchestra started its rousing recital with heavy drum beats and the crowd took the cue and began to leave.
The last week of Cory’s life had been filled with attending to every last detail of the funeral arrangements. At the start, he’d had no idea what to do; priests and masters of ceremony normally did this job. It was the last challenge the old general ever set him, and, irregular though it was, Archpriest Ranold himself insisted it was in accordance with Garon’s last will and testament. Cory had no choice. He’d asked the people who normally did this job for help and directed them to follow his grandfather’s wishes.
Cory had no plan for what to do next. The rest of his life seemed to stretch away from him like an endless grey mist. There was only one plan of action he could think of.
Cory took hold of himself and, without explanation to family around him, left the fire demons behind and strode purposefully through the crowd. The younger of his two older brothers, Sebastian, watched him go. Cory looked back through the crowd, pointing to a horse tethered by the entrance to the churchyard. His brother gave a single nod — not that permission was required between these brothers at a time like this. Cory flicked the reins free, mounted the horse and headed along the road towards the lake. He searched the skies for somewhere to place his attention in an attempt to escape from the painful, draining feeling within. A swan glided down, flared its wings and made an almost elegant landing on the water. The splash made ripples, glittering in the sunlight, as the bird drifted behind a stand of yellow flowers straining up to the sun. Cory stared without focus into the ripples for a time he couldn’t measure. Drawing a deep breath, he attempted again to loosen the grief that held him.
He looked back towards the city and the wind caught his loose curled black hair and blew it away from one ear. Smoke from the funeral pyre was barely visible now. The orchestra had packed up and gone; the mourners melted away to their daily lives. How long had he been by the lake?
Cory clamped his knees to the flanks of the brown stallion and it took off. Cory lost himself in the rhythmic thumping of hooves on the ground and the landscape around him. Winter snows had lost the battle with the warming weather and were in full retreat. The valley walls streamed with seasonal waterfalls shedding their own tears into the lake. He followed a suddenly unfamiliar river up the valley, never having seen it run so high. The riverbanks were soft and treacherous. Cory quic
kly slowed the stallion to a fast walk, the hooves sinking with a cracking crunch producing a new rhythm to accompany the chattering river.
Free from the concentration the faster pace demanded, he looked above the valley walls. The land ended and the sky began halfway to the heavens here. The highest peaks shone with permanent snow that the lower, darker crags could not reach. The huff of the horse’s breath mixed with the clank of cowbells. Brown cows lifted their heads from their green feast and watched with drowsy eyes as the horse and rider passed by. This route up the valley wound its way with the river. With the soft going, Cory was beginning to think keeping to the road might have been a better idea.
If souls really did part from the dead and visit their favourite places before moving on to the light of Heaven, this is where his grandfather would be travelling now. So Cory had to be here too.
The river followed a bend in the valley and it’s chattering sounds were drowned out by the constant thunder of falling water. The white towers and walls of Dendra Castle casually slid into view, rooted on its rocky hill. The continuous thunder grew to a louder, more spacious sound. Cool, wet mist hung in the air as the valley and castle hillsides closed in to embrace the lone rider.
Welcome back… the wind whispered into his mind. He had the oddest sensation; it felt like he was seeing the castle for the first time, yet it was a place he had travelled to most days of his life for as long as he could remember.
‘It’s going to be very different in there from now on,’ Cory muttered. Maybe his grandfather would be listening.
Thunder shifted to a fierce roar where the fall of water hit its plunge pool. Cory guided the horse around the pool on a narrow trail and looked up, drops of water falling from his not-quite-sodden hair. Overhead, a rope bridge with wooden boards cut a shadow across the bright sky, connecting the base of the castle with the top of the waterfall cliff. The castle stood noble and undefeated, but not even the beauty of its white walls and tall towers tempted enough tradesmen in peaceful times to its gates. The castle had been abandoned as a residence for the royal family before Cory was born and given over to military use. Down the valley in Tranmure, a new castle had been built though it was more a palace styled like a castle than a construction for defence. It catered well for the needs and desires of visiting traders and foreign ambassadors alike.
Cory squeezed his legs, encouraging the horse to trot up the steep, cobbled access road, curling around and up the otherwise vertical sides of the castle’s rocky perch. Arrow slits in the walls watched the approach. Overhead murder holes for burning oil showed signs of past battles, with faded black smudges hanging below them like the tattered rags of an ancient widow. At the gate, a token guard snapped to attention as the horse clattered into the open courtyard. Cory left the horse with a stable boy and looked up at the cold, empty battlements. It felt very different here.
He headed for what was once a reception room for guests. It was an open, airy space with a flagstone floor. Racks lined the walls filled with blunt practice swords. Cory carefully folded his dark blue formal jacket, placed it in the corner of the room and did the same with his white shirt. He strode back across the room and grasped the hilt of a long sword, pulling it free in one fluid movement.
‘Always warm up and stretch before you get going; it will help prevent strains and you’ll be able to keep going longer.’
The voice of his grandfather, from the past.
‘Keep practising these drills I’ve taught you.’
‘But, Grandfather, it’s the same thing over and over again…’
‘I know, Cory. This is a foundation on which you will build your ability to fight. Your body must know how to do these movements without you having to think about it.’
Cory flowed his limbs and body through all the sequences the general had taught him — not battling against the grief within, just allowing it to be. An hour or more went by. Sweat coated his body despite the cool air. His mind had cleared; grief had dropped somewhere along the way. A dull ache of superficial wounds was all that remained. Returning the sword to the rack, he picked up a water jug from the table and took a long drink. The cold water seemed to not only refresh but also washed away some of the strain he had been carrying all week. The funeral was over and it had run smoothly. Everyone dies one day. Not even the old general of Valendo can ignore the light of Heaven’s call forever.
He looked into that grey mist that was his future with open eyes and saw previously hidden paths and choices. For now, he would once again conquer the five towers of the castle. He ran from the training room, upstairs, across battlements and onwards to the once gruelling haul up the first tower. The spiral stairs fell away beneath his pumping legs until he reach the top of the tower and then he repeated the feat with the remaining four.
‘Battles can last all day with no rest, no food or drink. Sometimes a battle can be won just by outlasting your enemy. Don’t be the first to fall to exhaustion.’
The general would sit in the courtyard keeping count of how long it took young recruits to do the five tower circuit.
Cory retrieved his shirt and jacket before ending his run in the briefing room. Standing in front of his grandfather’s chair, he caught his breath, wiping sweat from his forehead and eyebrows with his shirt. The general had spent long hours here with Cory and a group of other teenagers in commander training, playing out battles on the table. Stones and pieces of carved wood represented soldiers, archers, cavalry and other fighting units. He taught the young men the strengths and weaknesses of them all, dreaming up new formations and units, trying to imagine how they would work in battle. The general’s spells of striding around the room and challenging his students changed over time. He gradually sat more, looked greyer, more tired, and his eyes became increasingly red-rimmed. Cory got lost in his thoughts as he remembered happier times in the past…
The would-be commanders learned how hard it was to follow a plan through; the deeper into battle you got, the more likely it was the plan would be abandoned. The enemy wouldn’t always do just what you wanted. General Garon placed great importance on field commanders using their initiative. He made the boys fight him as a team while he played the part of an enemy locked in with just one battle plan from beginning to end. When the celebrations subsided after they beat him for the first time, the general murmured, ‘Something is missing from our battlefield, gentlemen. Can anyone tell me what?’
They were too wrapped up in the game; they had forgotten their history. Garon sat in his chair and tossed a small triangle of blue painted wood onto the table in front of the boys.
‘A battle mage changes everything you know about commanding a battle. I’ll play the dumb army again, except this time I’ll use a mage too.’
The dynamics changed; sections of the field could suddenly become inaccessible, barred by fire. Great chunks were taken out of formations in an instant. The boys tried to attack them, but archers were ineffective. If they ever got soldiers close enough, the mage moved to some other part of the field. The mostly dumb army won. The general gave the boys a mage and after a few battles they understood how to use them better. Battles were more evenly matched. The casualties on both sides were higher. Much higher. Lastly, Garon introduced limits on how much the mage could do. ‘They can’t keep going forever. No two are alike and they have a habit of inventing something new every time they come to the field.’
‘How do you kill a battle mage?’ Cory asked.
‘Luck, or with another mage being really inventive, or… by killing them in their beds before they get to the battlefield,’ Garon replied tersely. They laughed, not taking him seriously. Garon didn’t laugh, his face darkening. ‘You can be sure the enemy has already thought of that.’ Then there was silence. ‘A new battle, boys.’
The general then laid out new pieces on the table including six much larger ‘T’ shaped pieces and told them, ‘This is the last Battle of Beldon Valley.’ He had them play out this battle o
ver and over again, with him playing the enemy Nearhon side. He challenged them further by taking out one of their special units at a time. He took away the special operators and they lost. Then he took out the silver warrior and they lost. The same with the black rider. He took out their battle mage and they lost fast.
Take out the general who brought them all together and you lost years ago on some other battlefield, Cory thought to himself.
No one ever figured out how to stop the last enemy mage escaping. It was hard enough getting the other two fast enough to still win.
‘Stopping the enemy coming to the battlefield in the first place seems like a good strategy,’ Cory said. ‘Why did Nearhon make war with us in the first place?’
‘It’s complicated, a question for the scouts, diplomats and, well, King Klonag himself. Essentially, because they want something we have and think the best way to get it is to fight for it,’ Garon replied.
‘Maybe I should be a diplomat.’
Garon grinned. ‘Maybe you should be a general and a diplomat.’
‘How do I do that?’
‘We’ll need to think about that one…’ Garon only thought for a few minutes. ‘You like music, don’t you?’ It wasn’t really a question. ‘Yes… Yes, this idea has real potential.’
He grew excited; he got up and paced the room, then gripped Cory by the shoulders and stared at him with a strange and mischievous look in his eyes as he told him his idea. Cory had never seen his grandfather react like this before. The plan took six months to negotiate and execute. In that time, Queen Amari died and the better part of Garon died with her. But he didn’t give up on this diplomatic project.
No peace treaty had ever been signed. There had been no contact with King Klonag of Nearhon, but there had been some trade with Plain Lake City. The king’s brother, Prince Karl, was governor there and had proven cautiously open to contact. His youngest child was by all accounts a gifted musician. A violin player. Tranmure had the finest known orchestra house and music academy, so the invitation was sent for Prince Karl’s daughter to attend the academy as a guest. An official emissary was received in Tranmure. Some unofficial ‘emissaries’ were also received. But then Valendo had her own scouts in Plain Lake City and other parts of Nearhon. The emissary stayed long enough to develop a proposal on living and security arrangements and took it back home.
The General's Legacy - Part One: Inheritance Page 3
