Lady Of The Helm (Book 1)

by T. O. Munro

  “You mean your elven Grandfather? He thought…” Eadran tried to exploit the opening but struggled for a suitably delicate line of enquiry.

  “Of course I do!” The glare she gave him was withering; once again he was that bashful teenager unmanned by the world of experience within her youthful frame. Once again she took pity on his discomfort with a smile of reassurance and forgiveness. “The Lord Andril, my grandsire and the most venerable lord of the Silverwood, more ancient even than Feyril.”

  “Did you ever meet him?”

  Quintala shook her head. “He came to see my father, brought me to him as a babe in arms. Andril told him that I was to be brought up in a human court, as my brother had been brought up in the court of Medyrsalve.”

  “But Rugan was the son of a Prince.”

  “And I the mere daughter of a Seneschal. I am not sure if it was my father’s human race or modest station which offended Andril more. Still enough was enough as far as he was concerned, countless human lovers and two mixed race off-spring put my mother quite beyond the pale of his tolerance. He took sail for the blessed homeland beyond the sea not long after I was born and took my mother with him.”

  “Her choice?”

  “I don’t know. I never knew her. My father told me she was the loveliest gentlest creature he had ever met, but that she was also scarred and damaged, all too easily bent to the momentary will of another.”

  The half-elf fell silent and this time Eadran elected not to intrude. After a few moments of saddle staring reflection she looked up and shook her head so her silver hair cascaded about her shoulders. Eadran caught his breath at the unconscious beauty of her and wished once more that he could have held her whimsical heart for more than a couple of summers. Gulping back such useless regrets he sought distraction in politics. “Tell me Quin, what do you think moves Rugan? He must have become Prince of Medyrsalve near two centuries before your birth. What drives his ambition?”

  “He is the heirless prince,” Quintala observed. “Elves are not often blessed with children, but we the half-elven it seems are as near barren as makes no difference. Rugan has had many wives, but only one child, a boy who lived and died a normal human span yet fathered no progeny of his own. Should the Prince ever die, there is an obscure princely line derived unbroken from Rugan’s uncle that stand to inherit the province. However, there is little love between the Prince and his human kin. I would guess that, despite being the longest reigning ruler in the Petred Isle since before the Vanquisher, uneasiness about his throne is still a major driver in my half-brother’s actions.”

  Eadran frowned. “The security of our people, it seems, is held hostage by the in-securities of your half-brother. Well, whatever promises it takes to move the old rogue we will make them. Near half the empire’s strength rests with Rugan, Oostsalve and the garrison of Salicia.”

  “I have reason to be grateful for those insecurities,” Quintala growled. “Remember they drove Rugan and his grandmother to demand the right to practice magic based on his elven parentage, rather than be forbidden like all humans since the edict of Werckib. It is a precedent that has served me well.”

  “Aye, but wielding magic will hardly ease the distrust of his people and his human kin.” Eadran, entranced by the power of his insight, blundered onwards oblivious to the half-elf’s darkening expression. “Methinks, Quin, that if you and he were simply long lived humans, rather than sorcerers as well, then the prejudice you have complained of these past two centuries might be less in evidence.”

  Quintala’s voice was as cold as her glare. “I like the way I am Ead. Thren the Eighth may have decreed that all the people of the Salved blasphemed against the Goddess by wielding magic, but that is not how it once was here. Or how it is now in the Eastern lands. His abandoning of magic cost us a whole empire beyond the ocean, all bar that sorry little toe-hold of Salicia. ”

  “Now Quin, you know your history, the madness of Chirard and the kin-slaying. Is it no wonder that Thren of old saw human use of magic as the root of all evil, the source of an insanity that nearly destroyed our people. And in that time, aye we may not be the warlike conquerors we once were, but we have traded and prospered and been at peace these five long centuries since.”

  “The vanquisher himself was a warrior-mage,” Quintala snapped. “I’d not yield my humble powers even ‘n it meant a warm welcome by those countless fools who every day cross the street or crescent themselves at my passing.” The fury of her retort subdued the Prince and after a few minutes of uncomfortable silence he was grateful for the conciliatory tone with which Quintala pointed out a pale mile post glinting in the moonlight. “We have made good time. Listcairn is but five miles down the road, Ead.”

  “Ah, the last town in Morsalve. We will be entertained by the constable this evening and, on the morrow, refreshed we will enter your half-brother’s domain.”

  “That is as well, I have no need of another night spent beneath the stars,” Quintala said.

  “And I had thought your elven blood would make you glad to wonder at the heavens, why on such a night as this one can even note how Alcor has a dim twin, the rarely sighted Zirma.”

  The half-elf did not at first join the Prince in his enthusiastic survey of the constellations of the night sky, but she looked up as he cried out, “what was that?”

  “What Ead?” She scanned the dark bowl of the sky and its countless pin pricks of starlight. “What did you see?”

  “A shadow, it passed across Alcor, there again, another obscuring Gelir for a moment.” Just as Eadran was about to name another star momentarily eclipsed, they heard the beating of great wings. The Prince and Seneschal exchanged a look, puzzlement but not yet alarm. Then even as Quintala clamped her hands to her ears Eadran heard it, the most beautiful song ever. How could the half-elf wish to block it out, at once sorrowful and yet uplifting. It was the kind of music that made Eadran weep that his own talents were too limited to attempt even so much as a few bars of the magical song.

  He leant towards the Seneschal, reaching for her arm to pull a hand from her ear that she might join him in wonder at this magnificent music. But Quintala leant away from him, fell backwards off her horse hitting the ground with bruising force her hands still clamped in position. Eadran looked at her lying on the ground, her face a picture of horror quite at odds with the glorious melody that filled his senses.

  Then the women came, the beautiful winged maidens. Two of them hovered by Eadran’s side, lifted him free of the horse and soared into the night sky. Eadran was aware of others of their kind lifting some of the lancers who, as a group, stood around open mouthed in rapt enjoyment of the music. Perhaps half a dozen of them joined the Prince in his flight, but the rest could only stand and stare. Looking down Eadran saw Quintala still obstinately closing her ears, her mouth shaping an O of something, alarm or jealousy, Eadran could not tell which.

  And then he had eyes only for his airborne companions, looking from one beautiful face to another, amazed that such creatures should exist, his mind oblivious to the mission he had been on or to anything other than the joy of this moment.

  Then they stopped singing.

  A cold wave of reality flooded over Eadran. They were foul not beautiful. Yellowed teeth and strong but tattered wings. Hair matted and lank, features pock marked and above all the odour of decay hung around them.

  Eadran choked back bile trying to frame the questions that flooded in his mind. “Who are you? What do you want?” But before he could speak, the creatures let go.

  It took his body fully ten seconds to reach the ground and barely a hundredth of that time to stop when it got there. In death, as in life, Eadran made a slighter impression than his brother had.

  ***

  Gregor was rolling up his maps in the midst of the quiet bustle of an army breaking camp when the fire exploded next to his chest. Bellowing in pain he dragged the Ankh free, holding it by the chain to better see the frightful burst of red light and heat which ev
en now was fading into milky whiteness.

  “Sire,” one of the sentries rushed into the tent, sword in hand, in instant response to the cry of alarm.

  Gregor would not look at him. He had only eyes for the dimming fire in the great gem and when at last the gem was wholy white it was with blurred vision that the king commanded. “Bring the Lord Feyril to me.”

  ***

  “What were those creatures, Seneschal Quintala?”

  “Not of this world, Lancer,” Quintala knelt beside Eadran’s broken body lying face down on the cobbled road. “They were Harpies. Occasionally one or two might fall into this world through some hole between the planes. I heard of them in the Eastern lands, but never in such numbers or here in the Petred Isle. How many men did we lose?”

  “Five, my Lady. Five and the Prince.”

  “Aye and the Prince,” Quintala repeated as she rolled Eadran’s corpse on to its back.

  “By the Goddess’s teeth,” the lancer crescented himself.

  “Indeed, soldier, indeed.” Quintala touched her face, surprised at the salty tear that had trickled to the corner of her mouth. She had liked Eadran, liked him enough to let him share her bed. However, she had thought two centuries of watching successive lovers age and die had inurred her against any deep emotional attachment. “Apparently I was wrong,” she voiced the thought aloud.

  “Beg pardon, Seneschal. What is to be done?”

  “We gather our dead and carry on with our mission. Mayhap the blood of Gregor’s heir will move Rugan to action more readly than the Prince’s words ever could have.”

  ***

  “Camp is near broken, sire. Findil has the rearguard to cover our withdrawal to Proginnot.” Feyril had automatically begun with a progress update before he saw the king’s pained expression and realised this was no routine summons. “What has happened, sire?”

  Gregor made no answer but simply held up the royal ankh, dangling by its chain so the whiteness of its central gem glinted in the lamplight. Feyril’s mouth opened in astonishment. “No,” for the first time since the beacon fires were lit, the elf lord was non-plussed by a turn of events. “Not Eadran. How? The Great Eastway is two hundred leagues away. What danger could befall him there? Who would harm the King’s son, in company with a troop of royal cavalry.”

  “I think, my Lord Feyril, you had the answer all along and I was a fool to deny it. There is at work a mind far darker and more dangerous than my long lost brother and a sadistic orc. I am only sorry to have doubted you and in so doing brought us all into such peril.”

  Feyril was silent, unwilling to intrude on the King’s reproachful grief.

  “Ah, see, the stone begins to change,” Gregor mused as colour began to bleed into the gem again. “Who will it be, that the ankh tracks now. Xander perhaps, or Udecht if by some grace of the Goddess my treacherous brother has succumbed to one of his allies. Or is it Giseanne, safe in Rugan’s court if both my brothers are dead.”

  “Do not trouble yourself with such thoughts, sire. There is still an army to be commanded and a battle to be fought on the morrow.”

  “You are right in this, as in all things, old friend.” Gregor still hesitated as the colour of the stone deepened into pink and then still darker. A moment later King and Elf exchanged looks of stupefaction as the jewel settled in a deep throbbing red colour. “What trickery is this?” the king demanded.

  Feyril shook his head in desparate apology. “Sire, forgive me, I was mistaken. But I was so sure, so sure I had failed. I am sorry and how I have compounded my error these last five years.” The elf slipped to his knees, suddenly looking all of his sixteen hundred years.

  “Oh Feyril, in that awful year, only you stood true.” Gregor seized the supplicant elf by the arms and hauled him up. “Do not berate yourself. My own neglect was far greater than any omission of yours. Now we have a chance, both you and I to make it right. The Goddess grants such grace but rarely and we shall accept her gift.”

  “Aye, sire.” Feyril conceded, his own mood lifted by the king’s energetic enthusiasm. “Aye, but first we have some twenty thousand orcs to fight.”

  “Indeed, old friend, and now I have something else to fight them for.”

  ***

  Kimbolt ran a finger along the wound in his neck. Dema had been angry enough to draw blood at his mean spirited praise for her victory. But, to himself alone, the captain would admit hers was a remarkable feat. Still more so for she had achieved it with a force of orcs and men who would, by custom and history, as soon slay each other as attack a common enemy. Yet, in all the camps and hard riding they had done, Kimbolt could not recollect a single argument within or between the two divisions in Dema’s command. In a company of human soldiers it would have been remarkable, in a company of orcs it was unheard of, in a mixed force it was nothing short of miraculous. That, more so even than the ferocious efficiency with which she had destroyed Hetwith, was the true measure of her generalship.

  Not that they had rested on any laurels. As soon as the gruesome looting of the near dead was over, they had mounted up for another frantic ride due south, Dema driving them harder than before from one ruined magistry to another. And so, their briefly made camp was to be broken once more for another ride which Kimbolt gauged must take them into the very centre of Morsalve, perhaps within sight of Morwencairn itself.

  It was the softest clink of chainmail, a sound Kimbolt was learning to distinguish from the clanks of less well fitted armour, which heralded the Medusa’s approach. The Captain spun round to see a picture of uncharacteristic lethargy. Her shoulders drooped, there was a weary set to her jaw, and even the sparkle of her gauze clad eyes seemed dimmer than before. She set herself beside him with a sigh. They sat a moment thus, monstrous general and captive Captain, before she spoke. “What, Kimbolt, no insolence left? I had thought you might tempt me into making you a matching scar for the other side of your neck.”

  “You seem tired, Lady.”

  “Not tired, Captain.” She shook her head and gazed across at the orcs and outlanders who, in keeping with the Medusa’s mood, had slowed their feverish preparations for another night’s ride. “Tell me Kimbolt, as an ambitious soldier, what did you aspire to? Was it some quiet comfortable garrison post or did you want to test your mettle in the heat of battle?”

  Kimbolt shrugged. If Dema were in a conversational mood, then words were a cheap way to delay the ordeal of a frenzied gallop across the fields. “Every soldier wants to know if they have what it takes, to lead their men in a great victory.”

  Dema nodded, “you see, Captain, you and I we are not so different after all.”

  Kimbolt gulped back the many responses that sprang to mind and settled for a non-commital “hmm.”

  “We are soldiers. We seek to prove our mastery of our craft in the greatest battle of our time. Yet hear I am, still fifty leagues from where that battle is being fought. I am too late.” There was tangible sorrow in her voice, but Kimbolt seized upon her words.

  “What battle, Lady? Where?”

  “The battle that decides a kingdom. Grundurg will be there and Xander with enough force that even that fool could not lose, but I am here kicking my heels in the ruins of the Salved’s great folly.”

  “Who are they fighting, tell me Lady, who? Has King Gregor taken the field?”

  She shook her head and looked him up and down. “There will come a time Captain, when you will have to make a choice, a real choice, as I have done. I trust that when that time comes you will choose wisely.” While he puzzled at her meaning and fretted as to the battle of which she spoke, the Medusa stood up and bid the orcs and outlanders back about their business.

  “In the meantime, another of his servants has failed our Master,” the Medusa said. “And so it falls to Dema to rescue the situation. To make another desparate ride to accomplish an impossible mission. To do it in expectation of little praise or reward save her own satisfaction and the begrudging recognition of an ill-trained slave.�
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  “Another mission?”

  “Aye, it’ll be a while yet before you are re-united with your servant girl, Captain. We ride east to prove yet again, that one should not send a little wizard to do a soldier’s work.”

  “East? to Medyrsalve?”

  She ignored the question, muttering to herself. “Odestus, how many times have I had to save your skin?”

  ***

  The Sun was getting low in the western sky as Xander looked up again at the flame flecked ridge. The day was drawing to a close and in another couple of hours the royal army would be able to melt away into the forest behind them. But they had not got another couple of hours.

  The day had had its frustrations for the returning exile, the time it had taken to find the enemy, the setbacks as first the traps and then elven archers and sorcerers had disrupted the initial assault troops. The thunderous charges of the royal cavalry that had repeatedly repulsed the wolf riding orcs. However, sheer weight of numbers had at last begun to count. The boulder throwing ogres and the flame wielding outlander wizards had punctured great bloody holes in the battle lines atop the ridge. Try as the enemy might to re-deploy their numbers and maintain a solid front, it was now a fragile line, at best no more than three ranks deep. And, at last, Maelgrum himself had arrived, along with the rest of the wizards shepherding the shambling stumbling reserve force. Xander yanked back on the bridle to steady his shying horse as the animal caught the scent of the fearsome late arrivals to the battle. The traitor Prince grinned as he imagined the reaction on the hill when Maelgrum’s special guard advanced and kept on advancing.

  He drew his sword, and swung it above his head to urge this latest attack. Orcs and outlanders alike, parted to let the legion through. The fading sunlight glinted off the blade as Xander urged them. “Go on you beauties, tear them apart, bite their faces off, feast on their flesh.”

  The lurching shambling creatures made no reaction, oblivious to all but the wizardly will which drove them forward and upward, urging them to climb the hill and feed.