Heir to the Raven (The Pierced Veil, #1)

by J. Wesley Bush

  The pony whickered nervously, raising her nose as she caught scent of the predator. “Be easy,” Selwyn told her softly, “We’re not going any closer.” After several moments, the aksu-kal did not reappear, but neither did it run off. It was old and crafty, and they had been through this game several times already.

  Selwyn let his eyes unfocus and considered the dilemma. If he came at it in the brush, the beast would have a lethal advantage, yet if he waited it would slip away once night fell.

  What to do? He thought of King Alec the Half-Sword’s dictum that battlefield tactics were only the principles of single combat writ large. Perhaps the reverse was true as well. But what tactic would apply? A frontal attack would fail, as would any attempt to surprise the creature. He rummaged through his memories for any bit of lore that might help. For years, he had prepared for this moment, plying every knight he met for information on the beasts.

  And then it came to him: aksu-kal relied upon scent when charging wounded prey. They had strong noses, but weak eyes.

  “Come on, pony. I have an idea.”

  Galloping back the way he had come, Selwyn found the kudu still grazing, six females and a handful of calves. Their snouts were wet and pink from the wild melons they foraged. Striped backs turned quickly at his approach, and the mothers began to shepherd their young away. Selwyn gave the pony a kick and then raised up in the stirrups as she charged the kudu. He lofted the boar spear and sidled in beside a frantic mother, driving the spear into its shoulder. The kudu nosed into the ground, nearly wrenching him from the saddle as he struggled to keep hold of the spear. He turned about and finished it off with a second thrust.

  Time was critical. He alighted from the saddle, pulled out a skinning knife, and sliced the kudu from sternum to crotch. One of the stomachs popped in a foul spurt of half-digested grass and intestines erupted like a bloody pile of snakes. He ripped out the viscera, leaving a hollow ribcage filled with blood. “This is all worth it,” he said under his breath, scooping handfuls of the sticky fluid and dousing himself from head to toe. When this ran out he cut the neck and drained what more he could. Rising, he stowed away the skinning knife and took up the spear. The pony kept her distance, snorting fearfully at his approach. “It’s just me, you fool animal,” he whispered in a consoling tone, grabbing the reins and swinging back into the saddle.

  After returning to the spot where he had last seen the aksu-kal, he hobbled the pony and approached the bushes. “You’ve taken no kill for days,” he told the lurking beast, “I must smell like wounded prey. Are you more hungry or wary right now?”

  A muted growl was his answer. The aksu-kal nosed out from cover, watching Selwyn cagily as it circled at maybe ten paces away. The name meant trap-jaw in Jandari, and its over-sized, triangular head was mostly muscle and jawbone. Scars marked its flank and muzzle and one tattered ear hung limp as a pennant. Snout to tail, it was four yards in length and weighed at least fifty stone. The thick, pebbled hide was gray with black striping. It roared a challenge, baring two massive tusks curving down from its upper jaw.

  Selwyn pivoted, tightly gripping his boar spear to meet the challenge. “That’s it, you big beast…” he said in a choked voice, the pulse in his throat threatening to burst. Suddenly the aksu-kal leapt, a roaring, gray-black streak.

  He backpedaled, barely keeping his footing. The tip of the spear grazed the aksu-kal’s shoulder, causing it to turn aside. It pivoted, seeming to twist in midair, and came charging back, incredibly nimble for its size. Yelling in terror, Selwyn planted his spear in the dirt and gripped tightly as the thing impaled itself deep in the chest. Steel sidebars extended to either side of the spear tip, intended to hold the prey in place. Perhaps they did with boar, but this was another matter. Dropping to its stomach, the aksu-kal wrapped paws around the haft and dragged Selwyn to the ground. In an instant it scrambled to him and raked a three-toed claw across his leg. Boiled leather armor parted right along with the flesh beneath it. Blood washed his thigh as darkness flashed across his eyes. God in Heaven this thing is strong.

  The aksu-kal heaved itself atop him. Selwyn could feel the weight of its bulk, the haft of the boar spear still protruding from its chest, and the stinking heat of its breath. Fumbling blindly, he drew a rondel dagger from its sheath. The beast batted his helmet with a paw, knocking it askew, then bit down hard on his shoulder. The armor held, but he felt something pop beneath the terrible force. The beast reared back at the unexpected taste of steel mail.

  Clasping both hands to the hilt, Selwyn rammed his dagger into the underside of the aksu-kal’s jaw. It shook its head fiercely side to side, but he held desperately to the blood-soaked dagger. It lunged downward, driving the blade deeper into its brain. With a shudder, the beast collapsed, still but for a few twitches.

  Selwyn lay exhausted for several moments, barely able to breath for the dead weight of the monster. At last he crawled free and eased himself against a spindly candelabra tree. Despite the pounding of his heart and the painful wound, his mind felt coldly rational. It must be shock, he thought. From what he could tell, the slash on his leg was broad, but not terribly deep. He thought the leg would still bear weight. If I can only get home, the clark can probably save the leg. If not, a scholar needs hands, not legs.

  Pushing agonizingly to his feet, Selwyn looked about for the pony. Only then did the sound of her panicked whinnies break through his own pain.

  Left leg dragging, he hurried to where she lay on her side, hind legs frantically kicking. He could see in an instant what had happened — spooked by the fighting, she had tried to run in hobbles, but had stumbled on a termite mound and broken her front legs. Selwyn retrieved the boar spear and returned to the pony again. “Never even knew your name, poor thing,” he said wearily. “If it helps, I may not be long behind you.” After taking the spear in an overhand grip, he brought it down hard, just behind the shoulder. She died without a whimper.

  In a haze of pain, he bandaged his leg, retrieved what he could carry from the saddle bags, and butchered some meat from the pony’s shoulder. Finally, he began working at the aksu-kal tusks, keeping one eye on the surrounding grass. The fresh kills would bring scavengers, some of them dangerous. He drew his broadsword and hacked at the anvil-like jaw until it yielded its ivory.

  He would set off for the Green Lady. With the Long Rains still a month away, the river was his only reliable source of water. Boats should be plying it in both directions, and with any luck, one would carry him to Wicke’s Keep. Selwyn took a last glance at the aksu-kal, feeling a wistful sadness for his foe, then took a limping, painful first step toward the river.

  CHAPTER 3

  H elaena Harlowe led her tithe of bowmaids along the right flank of the Jandari relief force. In the light of the twin moons, the tall, waving grass looked like an argent sea, but its beauty was lost on her as she watched anxiously for signs of the enemy.

  Vyr were opportunists and unlikely to ambush a border army, but Canoness Judit said a full tribe might take the chance. They were nearly to Far Ingarsby and Helaena hoped fervently the Vyr were still at the village, drunk on victory and wine and easy to kill.

  To her left, the army stretched in a quarter-mile column, comprised of a vanguard of knights and serjeants and a main body of yeoman horse and militia.

  Saafi, her battlemate, pulled up alongside and asked anxiously, “What do you think we’ll find? Will it be bad?”

  “Nothing we haven’t seen before,” Helaena told her firmly. “We’ll sky-bury the dead and then be off.” She needed to be brave for Saafi, the youngest and least experienced of the tithe, but a similar worry curdled in her stomach. She remembered a farmstead destroyed a month back. The Vyr had used and butchered old women, carried off marriageable ones, and flayed the headman.

  By light of the twin moons, a village kraal came into view, and as they approached, she could see blackened patches all over the hedge. Cattle and goats wandered freely around it. That’s odd, Helaena thought. They
normally slaughter anything left behind.

  “I think I hear voices,” Saafi said a few moments later. “Or is it just the wind?”

  Straining her ears, Helaena blinked in surprise. “A few of them must still be here. We can catch them!”

  Lord Dexter must have heard the voices as well, for the old man’s standard-bearer trumpeted Align for Battle. The army quickly shifted from column to line, with men in the center and bowmaids on the flanks. “Look lively,” Dexter barked out. “The whoresons are in our grasp!”

  Helaena twisted in the saddle, freed her bow, and strung it, holding tightly to Buttermilk with her knees. The quiver she wore bounced a rhythm across her back as she urged the pony to a quick canter. The rest of her tithe kept pace, little Delia grinning eagerly, stout Berna frowning, and the rest barely visible through the red dust kicked up by the army.

  They hastened into a gallop as the village approached. The Vyr still hadn’t left the village. She frowned at that, since it meant the vanguard would get to take them alone. Sure enough, the knights and serjeants set lances and charged through the night gate shouting Jandaria! For Jandaria! and Uukhoi! She soon lost them to the thick walls of the kraal.

  Screams erupted from the village, followed by cheers. Perplexed, Helaena reined in Buttermilk and looked to Saafi, who seemed just as confused. A moment later, the horn sounded All’s Well.

  Leading her tithe into the village, Helaena stared in wonder at the scene. A few huts were scorched, and two bodies lay wrapped in cloth upon the green, but perhaps fifty others survived, thronging the expedition and cheering madly. Not all joined in the celebration. On the village green, near the godthrone, stood an older couple and a weeping woman of perhaps thirty. Bizarrely, a girl rested against the godthrone, hands bound by hempen rope, mouth stuffed with cloth, and a noose around her neck. She was bruised and dirty.

  The strange group was soon forgotten as she and Saafi dismounted and joined the festivities. Wide-eyed children tugged her sleeve and leggings, begging for attention. Berna was soundly kissing one of the local boys in the shadow of the hedgerow. Saafi quaffed a mug of sour ale brought by another of the locals.

  “What happened here?” Helaena asked. “How are you still alive?”

  The children talked over each other in piping voices, speaking nonsense about glowing hedges.

  “It’s true, m’lady,” a lanky herdsman said, sounding as if he hardly believed it himself. “One of our own, that Larissa who sits by the godthrone, she’s a witch. Made a dark pact to save herself.”

  “Did you find a sacrifice? A child, perhaps?” Helaena knew something of pactmaking.

  “No, m’lady. Naught such as that. She flopped on her knees in that hut over there, praying to some power.”

  Helaena gave Buttermilk’s reins to Saafi and pushed into the crowd. She approached the older man at the godthrone, whose carved staff marked him as the elder. “Release this girl. She is innocent.”

  “That is not for you to judge.” The shrewish woman beside him jabbed a finger in Helaena’s face. “There’s something wrong with that girl, always has been. We’ve been waiting for one of Lord Dexter’s men to come give her justice!”

  The weeping woman moaned and sat down heavily in the dirt.

  Ignoring the shrew, Helaena removed the noose from the girl’s neck, then pulled a dagger and began sawing at the bindings. “She made no sacrifice, you simpletons, and it is certainly for me to judge. My father is Garzei Harlowe, duke of this march and your liege.” The last was punctuated with a fierce slice of the cords around the girl’s wrists.

  The girl ripped the filthy cloth from her mouth. “I didn’t make no evil pact. I swear it, m’lady,” she blurted, giving the shrew a murderous look. “A faie came to me and I asked for help. That was all.”

  Lord Dexter and Canoness Judit joined them soon after. No amount of talk could convince the elder that Larissa was blameless, but it didn’t matter. Her days in the village were over.

  “She must travel to court and be seen by the magus,” Dexter said, turning to Canoness Judit. “Detail two maids to see her safely to Nineacre. Garzei wrote that the king is soon expected there.”

  “But she’s my daughter,” the weeping woman protested. “Her place is here with me.” Helaena felt a pang of pity. Judging from her appearance, the world had drained the woman like a leech.

  “She belongs to the kingdom now,” Canoness Judit said, resting a hand on her shoulder. “If she is righteous, then God bestowed this gift for the good of all. And if not, we have a duty to protect others from her.” She turned to Larissa and gave a rare smile. “Come, child. Gather your belongings and say your goodbyes. You leave on the morrow.”

  The expedition was on the march again within an hour, trailing the Vyr and leaving Helaena and Saafi behind with the peasant girl. They declined the elder’s surly invitation of lodging, instead bunking on the village green.

  “I don’t see why we should escort her back,” Saafi fumed, sitting on her bedroll. “Marta can’t shoot properly, nor Esteri ride. Why not them?”

  “Likely because I’ve dealt with pactmakers before.” Helaena swatted at a gnat buzzing her ear. “King Randolf’s magus stays with us often, and I see the magus to the Swans when visiting Mother’s people.”

  “I forget myself, m’lady,” Saafi said, knuckling her forehead in mock servility. “Of course you have.” Most bowmaids were daughters to knights or lords, for many still believed it took a warrior to birth a warrior. But Saafi’s father was a merchant who hoped she would make noble friends in the Sorority, friends with marriageable brothers.

  “Get some sleep, insolent peasant,” Helaena said with a laugh. “Morning comes early in the village.”

  CHAPTER 4

  B oatmen strained against oars to either side of him, but Timble lay blissfully idle, watching the Green Lady’s banks drift by. The men around him were brutes, their shoulders bulked by a lifetime of rowing. Timble, by contrast, was small of frame and prone to a certain roundness of belly. Men called him a fool. Maybe he was, but they were sweaty and worn, while he played a merry tune on his ox horn flute.

  Captain Timotei stepped over him, a squat, bearded fellow in loose-legged trousers and an oiled-leather shirt. The ship was flat and wide, built on a dugout bottom with planking affixed to either side with tree-nails, but it was crowded all the same. “Are you comfortable, Lord Fool?”

  “Fabulously,” Timble responded, setting aside the flute. “And happy to be quit of Belgorsk. We are, I trust, well and clear of the sentries?”

  “Aye. Bribed our way past the final border fort as you slept.” The captain leaned over the side and frowned at the river. “Shallow. The Long Rains need to come.”

  “Not until we reach Castle Harlowe, I should hope. Your craft lacks certain amenities, a roof being one of them.”

  “No fear of that. The rains are weeks away. Why Harlowe?”

  “The royal court of Jandaria is coming. King Randolf passed the spring with Duke Killyngton and now plans to summer among the Harlowes. Besides, anywhere is better than Belgorsk.”

  The captain was Belgorshan but seemed to take no offense. “Leax’s hospitality wasn't to your usual high standards?”

  “The priest-king was free with his liquor, to be sure, but has no patience for fools. Keeps a menagerie of freaks that he loves better than his own children, but a traveling fool is nothing. One ill-timed joke and he threatened to slit my nostrils!” Timble rubbed the tip of his nose protectively. “Trosketh is a big place. I’m never coming back to this corner.”

  “Nor I,” the Captain agreed. “Not while Leax keeps the river blockaded. Mudskipper is sturdy enough for the Hidden Sea, so long as we keep to green water. I’ll seek trade there.” He gave Timble a weighing look. “You just left the court. What’s the priest-king playing at, closing the river and mustering his men?”

  Noise from the riverbank drew Timble’s attention. A haggard young man stood by the river’s edge, leaning
on a boar spear and calling to the crew. His right leg looked crudely bandaged. “You there!” he shouted, “Let me aboard! I can pay.”

  The oarsmen looked to Captain Timotei, but he dismissed them with a wave. “In these parts? Most like it’s brigands. We drop anchor and they spring out from the bushes. Steady on.”

  Timble propped himself up on elbows, watching the fellow as they glided by. The young man seemed incredulous, shouting himself hoarse as they left him to die in the wilderness. “Don’t imagine we’ll see him again,” he said, swatting idly at the river fly biting his neck.

  “Suppose not.” The captain glanced astern at the dwindling figure. “He did seem earnest, though, didn’t he?”

  “Not worth the risk. Besides, this boat is already hired. Let him find his own.”

  The rest of the day passed nearly without incident. Timble darned the leggings of his motley, shared a large skin of wine with the first mate, and then ill-advisedly tried his balance by walking the gunnel. After being fished from the water, he spent the afternoon composing filthy quatrains about the crew.

  They took it with good humor, calling into question the legitimacy of his birth, the size and disuse of his manhood, and much else about his character besides. So diverting was the exchange that the man on the tiller sent them straight on to a sandbar. This misstep cost the crew two hours of digging and levering while Timble made helpful observations. By the time they had worked the craft free, the sun was low and Timble set to the task of drunkenness with sincerity.

  He awoke the next morning to a roaring hangover and the beaming, round head of the captain not more than a foot away. An obnoxious amount of sunlight seeped in past the captain’s beard and burned into Timble’s eyeballs. “Good gods, man!”

  “Arise, Lord Fool. Your town awaits.” The captain stood and motioned up the hill.