Yesterday's Kings

by Angus Wells

  “Silly boy.” Martia hugged him closer, deepening his embarrassment for all the pleasure he felt. “Of course you can. You know you’ve always a place with us. Did we not know your parents before—”

  “They died,” Cullyn supplied pragmatically.

  “They were our friends,” Andrias said, “as are you.”

  “And I worry about you,” Martia added, “living all alone in the forest. What life is that for a young man?”

  “I survive well enough.” He’d have shrugged had the weight of her hefty arm not rested across his shoulders. “I’ve brought you meat, no?”

  “Surely,” Martia said. “I’ve no doubt at all that you’re a great hunter. But what of friends? What of … women?” She loosed him long enough to cast an eye over the room. “See Elvira there? She fancies you, and always has. You could do far worse than bed with her.”

  Cullyn blushed and said, “I know. But—”

  “Ask her,” Martia said. “Take her upstairs, eh?”

  “And then?” Cullyn asked. “Would she come live with me in the forest?”

  Andrias snorted laughter. “I doubt that. Elvira’s a taste for tavern life.”

  “So there’s no point to it,” Cullyn said.

  Andrias laughed again, joined by his wife. “There’s always a point to it. It depends what you do with it.”

  “I think,” Cullyn said nervously, “that I must think about it.”

  “So be it, but don’t strain your bow hand.” Andrias laughed, joined by Martia. “Now, are you hungry?”

  Cullyn nodded.

  “Then find a seat and we’ll bring you food.”

  He found a table and sat, feeling awkward. He thought that all the folk in the place stared at him, and talked about him: the forest strangeling, his parents dead and he a hunter along the edge of the fey folk’s barrier. Not one of them.

  He was grateful when Elvira brought him a bowl of soup, and bent low across the table so that her flounced blouse exposed her cleavage, and smiled at him, as if she knew some secret they shared. Save he was not sure what secret that might be.

  He sat, drinking another mug of ale as she delivered a platter of roasted pork, with bread and vegetables, and all the while wondering what her smiles meant. Promise or only enticement? He could not be sure; neither of her intentions nor what he wanted. He felt curiously afraid.

  The hostelry closed. Folk quit the place, leaving Cullyn alone with his wonderings. Andrias and Martia came to him, suggesting he find his bed, for he was more than a little drunk now. Then Elvira suggested that she take him to his room, which he thought a fine idea. He rose from his seat to fall into her strong arms as the hall spun around his eyes and he felt his legs weaken.

  He was vaguely aware of standing up; of throwing his arm about her shoulders as she held him upright. He could smell the sweet scent of her, perfume and kitchen smells mingled, and knew that she was strong. He kissed her ear and said, “I love you.” She tossed blond hair against his face and said, “You don’t; you’re only drunk.”

  He said, “I do. I swear it.”

  She said, “You’ll think different come the morning. They all do.”

  “No!” He shook his head as solemnly as he could. “I shall feel the same.”

  “We’ll see,” she said.

  HE WOKE THICK-HEADED and alone.

  She was gone, and he lay stranded on an isolated bed that stank of sweat and booze and sex. He could smell what they had done together and regretted his drinking, which had made it less than his expectations, and lay a while wondering why they had come together, save they had both wanted it. But then they found it did not fulfill their expectations, and so she had left him.

  He rose and bathed his face. He felt somehow sad, and not at all eager to meet her again, for he was no longer sure of his feelings. He had wanted her, but now he was no longer certain, as if the accomplishment of the promised act had taken away the pleasure of anticipation. But still he went down to the hall, because he was hungry. He wondered how he should greet her—as a lover or a serving wench?

  She made it easy for him. She was clearing tables and met him with a cheerful smile and a hearty “Good morning.” He wondered if he should kiss her, but she seemed too busy, so he only gave her back the same greeting and found a cleared table to which she came when she’d cleared the last of the others.

  “Breakfast?” Her smile was wide and cheerful—as it always was—and he wondered if the last night had meant anything to her other than the satisfaction of a purely carnal appetite. “Are you hungry?”

  He nodded and she bustled off to return with a platter of bread and a mug of steaming tea that she set down before him with the same encompassing smile. He sipped the tea and nibbled at the bread, and then a platter of eggs and ham and sausage was set before him, and he realized how hungry he was. He set to eating even as she bent toward him and whispered, “I enjoyed last night. Shall you stay?”

  He felt his cheeks grow red and heard her laugh, and said, “I don’t know. Andrias is to sell my stuff, and I don’t know how long that will take.”

  She shrugged as if it mattered not at all, but her smile stiffened a little and she turned away, busying herself, and he dug into his breakfast as he wondered if he wanted to remain or return to his familiar surroundings. He found it difficult to understand these transactions of men and women.

  Andrias emerged from the kitchen to rescue him. The landlord was wiping his hands on a greasy apron. “Leave the tables for now, Elvira. Go help Martia in the kitchen, eh?”

  She shrugged again—or was it a flounce?—and disappeared through the rearward door. Andrias grinned at Cullyn. “How was it, then?”

  Cullyn blushed anew. “It was … Well …”

  “Your first time?” Andrias supplied.

  Cullyn nodded.

  “It’s not always the best,” Andrias said. “You need to practice. It gets better.”

  Cullyn hid his fresh embarrassment behind a mouthful of food. “What about the stuff I brought?” he asked. “Can you sell it?”

  “Easily.” Andrias waved an expansive hand. “I’ll take most of it, and sell the rest. That skull alone should fetch a good price.”

  Cullyn asked, “How long?”

  And his friend laughed and said, “You’ll need to stay a while yet, and decide about Elvira. But … a day? Perhaps two?”

  Cullyn smiled and asked, “What shall that cost me?”

  “Little,” Andrias said. “I’ll take the cost out of the meat, and charge you the least I can.”

  Cullyn nodded. “I need salt,” he said, “and flour. I made a list.”

  He drew the scrap of paper from his tunic and passed it to Andrias, who studied it a moment, his lips moving as he read the words. Then: “Once the meat and the skull are sold, I can get you all of this, and coin left over.”

  “How much?” Cullyn was abruptly eager. “Enough to buy the horse?”

  It was his ambition to purchase such a mount as Lord Bartram’s cavalry rode. A horse that he could ride swift through the forest, yet with muscle enough to haul a cart. He had saved toward this end for years, hoarding what coin was left from purchasing supplies against the time he might afford the beast. Horses were in short supply in the Borderlands, mostly the property of the Border Lords and their men. The farmers used mules, or the great plough-dragging shires, but Cullyn was intent on owning a hunter, and had stored his coin with Andrias to that end.

  “Perhaps this time you’ve enough for a mule or a plough horse.”

  “I want a hunter,” Cullyn said.

  “Then likely you’ll need to wait,” Andrias replied, “until the Summer Horse Fair.”

  Cullyn sighed. That was three months off.

  “You’ll get the best bargains then,” Andrias said.

  Cullyn nodded and drank the last of his tea. “Get me a good price, eh?”

  “My word on it,” Andrias promised. “Do you want to come with me, when I sell your meat?”<
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  Cullyn shook his head. He hated bargaining and would sooner wander the small confines of Lyth, or take the road out to stare at the keep. He wondered, briefly, if he should invite Elvira to accompany him, but then decided against it. He felt a need to be alone, so he scrubbed up the last of his breakfast and went out into the streets of the village.

  He wandered a while, wondering at the houses and how folk could live so close-packed, then found the road that led to the keep. It went into the open country, where the slope rose toward the fortress. Up toward the great stone walls and wooden buttresses of the castle, which stood on sparse moorland that had been stricken of trees and undergrowth so that the keep might not be approached unseen, but sit alone and defensive behind its great walls.

  He could not understand how anyone would choose to live so confined. But still it was fascinating. As is a spider to one who finds arachnids frightening.

  He halted not far from Lyth’s walls and stared at the mighty structure. And then he saw the gates open and the drawbridge fall down across the moat, and a troop of riders come out.

  Their horses made a great clattering on the drawbridge, and then a steady thunder on the roadway beyond, so that Cullyn was standing beside the track as they passed by, darting aside so that he not be run down.

  The column was led by a handsome man whose long blond hair streamed from under his half-helm. He wore a mail shirt and carried a cross-picked boar lance, and the horse he rode was such as Cullyn wished to find. Beside him was a fair-haired woman, pale-featured and lovely, dressed in hunting clothes. And then … Cullyn’s heart beat faster … a younger woman whose hair was red as an autumn sunset, her face an oval of desire even though her lips were pursed in an expression of disapproval as she glared at the two riders ahead.

  He stared at her, and for a moment their eyes met. He smiled and ducked his head. She stared at him, irritably, and then was gone, followed by a small squadron of horsemen. Cullyn was not sure how many because his attention was occupied by her face, and he could see little else.

  He watched them go down the road into Lyth and he followed after, even though—as he descended the slope—he saw them emerge from the farther gate and ride toward the forest.

  “WHO WERE THEY?” he asked Andrias. “I’ve never seen a woman so lovely.”

  “Do you mean Vanysse, or her daughter?” Andrias asked.

  “One was fair and older,” Cullyn said. “The other was … beautiful.”

  From across the room, Elvira scowled at him.

  “Vanysse is the elder,” Andrias told him, “married to Lord Bartram, but …” He tapped his nose. “Word has it that she favors her husband’s captain. Likely you saw her riding out with Amadis. He’s captain of the guard.”

  “And the other?”

  “That would be Abra,” Andrias said. “Lord Bartram’s daughter by his first marriage. Don’t you know?”

  Cullyn shook his head.

  “Bartram was made a Border Lord by Kristoferos,” Andrias explained. “Then Kristoferos died and Khoros came to power. Didn’t your father teach you any history?”

  Cullyn shook his head again.

  Andrias sighed. “Well, anyway, we’re now ruled by Khoros, who mistrusts anyone appointed by Kristoferos. But … to avoid civil war, he could not risk offending the Border Lords appointed by his brother. So he left them in place and sent them captains of his own persausion, who’d watch and report back to him. Amadis is one such. The king’s man. And—is rumor true, the lady Vanysse’s lover.”

  “Why,” Cullyn asked, in his innocence, “does Lord Bartram allow that?”

  “Politics,” Andrias said bluntly. “As I understand it, the lady Vanysse was chosen for Lord Bartram by Khoros himself, as a marriage of convenience. Her dowry was substantial and she is, undoubtedly, beautiful—and half Bartram’s age.” He grinned cynically. “I imagine she favors Bartram once in a while, so he accepts her favors and turns a blind eye. And should he argue, he’ll find the king’s troops knocking on his door. He’d not want that any more than Khoros—it’d occupy too many men, to no one’s good, and leave the way open for the fey folk to come back.”

  “Do you believe they would?” Cullyn asked.

  Andrias shrugged. “Perhaps.”

  “They’ve not,” Cullyn said. “Surely not since my father fought the Great War.”

  “As did I,” Andrias told him. “But I’d not see them back.”

  “Why not?”

  Andrias shrugged again. “They’re different. They’re not like us. The gods know, they set up the Barrier across the Alagordar.”

  That barrier no man could cross, or return from. There was no understanding of it, save that it confused mens’ minds and turned them around. The great river ran through the heart of the forest, from the Kandarian side to the other, which men named Duran. Cullyn had been there often enough, watching the farther bank, where willows drooped as naturally, and waterbirds—coots and moorhens, ducks and stately swans—went about their business as if all were normal. Otters swam there, hunting the fish that he sometimes caught. Neither was the river very deep: a horseman might ford it easily … but if he tried, either he disappeared forever, or found himself fording back to the Kandarian side. It was Durrym magic—what the fey folk had established to protect themselves after the Great War—and no man understood quite how they had gained that magic.

  “Perhaps,” Cullyn said, “because we drove them out and they wanted their own land, without us.”

  Andrias laughed and shook his head. “You’ve lived alone too long in that forest, lad. You should listen more to what the Church says.”

  Cullyn shrugged in turn.

  “Anyway,” Andrias said, “I shall get the best prices I can. Give me a day, eh?”

  Cullyn ducked his head in agreement, and then wondered what to do with the remainder of the day. Elvira was gone and he could hardly hope to see Lord Bartram’s daughter again, for all her beauty occupied his mind. There had been something there in that flash of contact and irritation that … he was not sure; only that it was hopeless.

  He went out from the inn to wander the small streets again, studying such things as he could not afford. Swords, and handsomely tooled scabbards; saddles accoutred with gold and silver chasings; bright brass stirrups and cooking pots beyond his means. He grew miserable and returned to the inn, where he knew friends and would not feel so alone and poor.

  The common room was empty of guests at this hour. Martia stood behind the long serving table, polishing mugs and glasses, beaming at him as he came in.

  “Andrias is off selling your bounty,” she told him. “A mug of ale?”

  He nodded and she drew him a tankard of the dark, bitter beer.

  “You seem”—she hesitated—“unhappy.”

  He took a mouthful of the ale before he replied. “I saw someone today. I …”

  “Abra,” Martia nodded. “Andrias told me. An odd lass, that one—and far beyond your reach. She resents her stepmother, and has little time for anyone save her father.” She shrugged her plump shoulders. “Forget such dreams, lad. Abra’s prideful, and besides, she’s betrothed to Wyllym of Danzigan Keep.”

  Cullyn grinned and took another sup of ale. “I’d not think to bed a lord’s daughter.”

  Martia chuckled, reaching across to pat his cheek. “And before last night, you’d not thought to bed anyone, eh?”

  He felt his cheeks grow warm and hid his face in his mug. Martia laughed aloud. “Elvira’s a fine girl,” she said. “You could do worse. Listen.” Her laughter faded as her tone grew earnest. “Why don’t you give up forest life and live here? With us? We could use a strong young man like you. You’d be useful here, and you’d find a decent enough living. And Elvira to warm your bed.”

  Cullyn set down his mug. “My thanks,” he said, “but no.”

  “Is living alone in the forest so wonderful, then?” Martia fixed him with accusing eyes. “Do you enjoy it so much?”

  He thou
ght a moment and then nodded. “Yes. It’s …” He shrugged. “I enjoy it.”

  “Wondering if you’ll have enough to eat? Snowed in come winter? Dragging that cart here to trade what you’ve hunted down?”

  “Yes,” he said. “But I’ll have a horse soon, and be able to ride.”

  “Obstinate boy.” Martia shook her head in maternal irritation. “You’d be better off here. You could have a warm room, good food. And Elvira.”

  Cullyn emptied his tankard and smiled at her. “I have a warm room,” he said, “and the snow’s not so bad. And I doubt I could live here. I think I’m too used to the forest.”

  “I give up! The gods know, but perhaps you’re fey yourself.”

  “Perhaps,” Cullyn agreed as she drew him another tankard.

  “But don’t say that to anyone else,” she advised. “Folk here think you’re strange enough already. Don’t give them further cause to doubt you.”

  “Why should they?” he asked.

  “Because you live solitary, in the forest, where the fey folk set up their Barrier. Some wonder why you stayed, after your parents died. They wonder if you’re not in league with the Durrym.”

  Cullyn laughed. “I’ve never seen a Durrym. I’ve heard my father’s stories about the Great War, but he said they looked much like us. And he thought they were only fighting us to protect the land that was once theirs.”

  “Likely so,” Martia allowed. “But Lord Bartram’s got a new churchman, who preaches that the Durrym are an abomination, as are all who mingle with them. Which might be you, simply because you live so close to the Alagordar. So be careful, eh?”

  Cullyn nodded, wondering why the Church must make such a fuss of nonevents. The Kandarians had driven the Durrym eastward across the river, and since the Great War there had been little enough fighting. There had been raids in the early years, but nothing since he had grown to what he supposed was his manhood. It seemed to him that the fey folk had gone away, that the Alagordar was marked as division between Kandar and the Durrym. So why condemn anyone for living within the forest?

  “I’ll be careful,” he said. “Indeed, does Andrias find me good prices, I’ll be gone tomorrow.”