As the captains were talking among themselves, Aram moved away, leaned against the wall and contemplated the western plains. The broad prairie lay empty, wide, and still under the declining sun. Off to the northwest, Burning Mountain sent thin tendrils of smoke curling into the cloudless sky. Swinging his gaze northward and then eastward across the distant rumpled verdure of the green hills, Aram looked the other way. All across the grasslands to the northeast and east, thousands of shelters dotted the landscape like so many malformed mushrooms which had somehow grown out of the earth in decently ordered lines. Thousands of men roamed between them. Aram could hear the distant cacophony of raucous laughter, ribald shouts, and the occasional argument.
Pivoting to look southward, down along the winding course of the Broad toward Stell, he stopped short, staring.
Across the top of the hill that rose gently beyond Dane’s old farm, hundreds of white stones had been laid out in neat rows. Findaen approached from his mission to send Kipwing into Lamont. Aram grabbed his arm and indicated the white stones.
“Our people?”
Findaen gazed at the distant hilltop and then met his eyes and nodded. “Yes, even the Duridians are there. Many of the bodies had already begun to decompose rather badly. We – it was decided that all our dead would be buried there – our people as well, Lord Aram.” He spread his arms wide in a gesture of futility. “There seemed nothing better that we could do. In time, we figured that their loved ones could come and pay respect to the dead.”
Understanding Findaen’s quiet distress, Aram looked at the distant graves and nodded. “You did well – and right. The white stones?” He asked softly.
“Brought up from the river,” Findaen replied. “We made a record of the burial place of each man, and Arthrus and his workers inscribed the names in the rock.”
Aram gazed at the graveyard for a long moment; then he reached out and gripped Findaen on the shoulder. “Stay here – and keep the others here. I’ll be back after a while.”
Leaving the fortress, and avoiding the troops, he went down through the swale past the buildings of the abandoned farm and climbed up among the graves. It was as Findaen had said; the stones told the names of every man who had died in the first great confrontation with the forces of the grim lord.
No doubt there would be other graveyards like this in other places as time went forward, and this place, with its sad harvest of men too young to die, would also grow.
Aram wandered among the stones, reading names of men he’d never met as well as a few which he had known. Finding himself on the crest, he sat for a while and gazed into the south, toward Stell and the heart of ancient Wallensia, and thought on all that had happened, especially that event that had caused this place of the dead to be. From there, his thoughts naturally moved on to those things which lay before him. There would undoubtedly be other battles with the armies of Manon, fiercer and bloodier than the battle of the stream. And then there was the problem of what to do about Elam and its wicked ruler.
The one thing that was abundantly obvious was the fact that the frontiers of the free lands must be expanded as far as possible while still being rendered defensible. And the numbers of free people must be made to grow. But in almost every direction there existed obstacles to these desires of his. It seemed to Aram that formidable problems lurked just beyond every horizon.
There were reasons for encouragement as well, however. His army, now, had been properly blooded, and Seneca was coming. And down there to the south where his gaze was fixed at that moment, there were more of Ka’en’s people, yet in chains, bound in vile service to the god who’d abandoned righteousness for evil. If they could be made free, their strength, of whatever size and quality, would be added to his.
Abruptly, Aram knew how he would spend the next few weeks as he waited for Seneca to arrive.
Rising, he went back down through the bottom of the swale, regained the fortress and climbed up to join Findaen and the others.
Just as he reached the top of the stairs, a shout arose.
“Someone comes from the west!”
34 .
Thom Sota and his wife, Kay, with Marcus of Elam sitting in the back of their wagon, had descended the south side of the smoking black mountain, turned eastward, and were heading along a faint track in the rolling grasslands. They were more than a month behind the schedule Thom had earlier established for finding their way into the east to join with Lord Aram and the alliance of free peoples.
After returning to Woody’s to collect his wife, Thom had decided that trying to move Kay through the wooded wilderness on the east of Elam was too dangerous and too difficult. Also, there were a few pieces of furniture in her possession, inherited from her mother, that were simply too precious to leave behind. He had therefore decided to go back out into Elam proper and attempt an egress along the main road northward and out through the gates into Cumberland.
At the gates of Elam, they had been detained.
In the current political climate, it had seemed suspicious to the captain of the guard that any citizen would willingly abandon Elam for less civilized regions unless that citizen had less than legitimate reasons for doing so. And the cuts on Thom’s face and arms, just now in the process of healing, required a lie about attempted robbery in order to defray doubts about the origin of his injuries. After several hours of interrogation, however, since nothing incriminating came to light and the search for the missing nephew of the High Prince remained the prime directive for all uniformed officers, the captain let Thom and Kay go. They rejoined Marcus, who’d been kept hidden in Governor Kitchell’s house, and in the very early hours before the coming of day, started east.
Now, they felt that they were getting close. They’d seen no one, but the worn and trampled grass gave evidence that a large body of men had recently come this way. Now, no more than a few miles ahead, they could see the outlines of a large dark structure beginning to rise out of the prairie.
Suddenly, a distant roar mounted up and redounded across the countryside and it seemed to come from the vicinity of the fortress-like building that crouched on the horizon. Thom drew the oxen to a halt and looked back at Marcus with raised eyebrows.
“What now?”
Marcus shook his head. “It doesn’t sound like conflict – it was more like a cheer.”
Turning his attention forward, Thom nodded slowly. “I think so, too. I hope we’re right – I’d hate to have Kay out here in the open if things turn nasty.”
They sat for a while after the cheer, if that was indeed what it was, faded. After it died away, no other sound arose to contend with the gentle sound of the summer breeze caressing the tall grasses.
Finally, Thom snapped the reins, moving the oxen forward once more. “Whatever it was, we’re obviously getting close. What do we do – go straight in? Isn’t there a border or something?”
“How would I know?” Marcus shrugged. “I’ve never been this far east either, you know.”
As they drew closer to the large structure ahead of them, Thom stopped once more and moved his gaze from north to south across the wide expanse of grassland. “I don’t see anyone. You don’t suppose they’ll just let us drive in without a challenge?”
“Lord Aram didn’t seem like a careless man to me,” replied Marcus. “But then, he may not have survived – we may be dealing with someone else, now.”
Thom shook the reins, moving the oxen forward.
“Dear Maker, I hope not,” he said.
As they came closer to the fortress – for that’s what it was – it became obvious that they’d been seen and their progress tracked. Dark shapes stood upon the walls with their attention turned sharply toward the west and the approaching oxcart. Moments later, it became apparent why there was no challenge rendered by border guards.
Coming to the top a grassy rise, Thom pulled the oxen to a halt, staring. Kay gasped.
Before them was a great river flowing broad, strong, and slow from north to
south. At least a half-mile wide in places, it was a formidable, if not impassable, barrier. The great river of Elam, impressively broad in its own right, especially in the south where it approached the sea, was a mere stream by comparison.
Once he had taken in the impressive sight, Thom’s discerning eye found where the tracks of the army that had preceded them went down over the bank and into the waters where the slow-moving stream was agitated into ripples along the northern edge of a series of islands. Evidently, there was a ford of sorts that crossed the river near those islands. But there was something more.
At the southern end of each small island, downstream and to the right of where they sat, there was a round beam of wood, imbedded at the vertical into the ground. On top of each of these large poles, there was a ring of steel through which a thick rope, serving as a cable of sorts, stretched from bank to bank and into an anchor at each end. On the far bank, there were many rafts or perhaps flat-bottomed boat, moored to other poles. Thom had never encountered a ferry system, did not even know the proper name of what it was that he looked upon, but he instinctively knew that the peoples of the east had fashioned an effective means of moving men and material across the broad river to his front.
He looked back at the cluster of men standing atop the walls. One man, somewhat taller than the rest, stood among them. Immediately in front of this man there was a large round object which, when manipulated by him, flashed brightly in the sunlight, so brightly in fact that when Thom perceived that this object was directed at him, he flinched. But no harm followed the flash.
While they sat there, looking from the river to the fortress, wondering how to proceed, a group of men, three of them on horseback, appeared on the slope below the walls of the fortress and made their way down to the river. Without hesitation, the horses splashed into the river and began making their way across through the shallower water below the islands. Immediately, the other men pushed one of the flat-bottomed boats into the stream and began plying across the river while keeping four large metal hooks fastened onto the cable, two at the bow, and two astern. The first horse and rider exited the water and cantered up the hill to Thom, Kay, and Marcus. It was the archer captain, Wamlak.
He inclined his head to Kay, nodded to Marcus, and then addressed Thom with a grin. “I see you’ve healed up nicely, Thom, though that one scar’s a beauty, isn’t it? Lord Aram will be glad to see you. Welcome to freedom.” He turned and pointed down the slope. “When Dane gets the boat to the shore, just drive your cart up onto it, and they’ll do the rest.” He looked at Marcus. “Hello, Your Highness. You’ve come to the right place. Come and see Lord Aram.” Before Marcus could answer, Wamlak pivoted his horse and rode back down the slope toward the river.
“Well,” Thom said, “that was easy enough.” He looked at Marcus with an expression of relief on his scarred face. “So, Lord Aram lives.”
Marcus gazed up at the cluster of men on the wall, and the taller figure standing among them. “Maybe, after all, he can’t be killed. The wolves name him the Deathslayer, after all.”
Without responding, Thom started the oxen toward the water’s edge.
When they reached the edge of the river, the oxen balked at climbing the ramp onto the barge but Thom prodded them until they complied. When the wagon was secured with ropes so that it wouldn’t move, the men used long poles which they thrust into the bottom of the river and by the application of force began to move the barge toward the eastern shore. On the upstream side of the flat-bottomed boat, suspended from a rope stretched between poles fore and aft, were four hooks, two at the bow and two at the stern.
When the boat reached one of the stout posts embedded in an island through which the cable was stretched, the polemen pushed against the current while the hooks at the fore, first one and then the other, were moved to the far side of the post. The process was repeated with the hooks at the aft, and then again at the post on the next island as they moved with fair rapidity from island to island and so across the broad river.
By the time they reached the eastern shore, the oxen were eager to abandon the novel experience and wasted no time in moving back onto solid earth.
Wamlak met them and pointed up the road that curved along the southern wall of the fortress. “Some of the men will see to your oxen, Thom. You may go on in and up the stairs to the right inside the great door. Lord Aram will be glad to see the three of you.”
Lord Aram, in fact, had abandoned the parapet and waited for them inside a long hall located on the second level of the fortress. There were chairs and tables in this room which the eastern lord indicated with a motion of his hand. “You must be tired. Sit – I’ll have food and drink brought in.” With that he looked over and nodded to a young man standing nearby who spun on his heel and left the room. Aram looked back at the three of them, nodding graciously to Kay and then addressing Thom and Marcus together. “I’m pleased to see you both.”
Thom glanced sideways at Marcus, who acknowledged Lord Aram’s greeting silently, and then he met the gaze of the “barbarian king”. Drawing himself up to his full height, and adopting a military-like stance, he stated plainly, “I came to pledge my fealty, my lord, and offer you the service of my sword – if you’ll have me,” he said.
Aram watched him for a long moment, and in his emerald eyes there occurred a subtle change, as if he had reached a judgment. “You fought well and bravely, Thom. Not only will I accept your service, but I want you for a captain. We need good officers, especially ones in the ranks, who will strengthen and encourage the men.”
Thom’s mouth set in a firm line as he inclined his head. “I am at your service, my lord.” He indicated Kay. “This is my wife. As her presence will suggest, we have come to stay.”
Aram bowed slightly as he acknowledged Kay and then he glanced around before bringing his gaze back to her. “This rough fortress is no place for a woman,” he told her. “Perhaps you might rest here this evening and then tomorrow your husband may take you eastward to Derosa where my wife will see you placed into more appropriate quarters.”
Kay shook her head. “I’m not so soft as that, sir – to which my husband may attest. I’ve just spent two weeks sleeping in the back of an oxcart beneath the stars. Put me where you will – I will be fine.”
Lord Aram smiled thinly. “The Lady Ka’en has also spent a good deal of time making the best of outdoor accommodations. She is, after all, married to me.” He shook his head. “But she will have none of this. If I were to leave you here, she would lose all faith in my judgment. No – on the morrow, Thom will take you east into more civilized arrangements.”
The tone of his voice as he said this last gave no doubt but that the subject was closed.
“In the meantime,” he said, “rest from your journey, eat and drink.” Then Aram looked at Marcus. “I am going back up to the walls. When you have rested and eaten, will you join me? There is much that I would know of your homeland.”
Marcus nodded. “I am at your service, my lord.”
The sun had moved past mid-day and had begun its long westward decline when Marcus came out into the warm afternoon and found Aram standing at the west end of the parapet gazing across the river and the rolling prairie beyond. The lord’s eyes seemed to be gazing at something which only he could see. For a moment, when Aram did not turn and acknowledge him, Marcus considered backing away without interrupting the kingly man’s reverie. But then Aram turned and fixed his fierce eyes upon the younger man.
“Good afternoon, Your Highness.”
Marcus inclined his head in reply. “You wanted to ask me about Elam, my lord?”
Aram kept his hard, sharp gaze upon him as he asked without preamble. “How did your father die?”
Marcus started at both the content and the tenor of the question, but then gave his reply. “He was murdered, my lord.”
A succession of unreadable emotions chased each other through the green depths of Lord Aram eyes. “Murdered? By who?”
/> “By my uncle – Rahm.”
A frown took momentary possession of Aram’s face. “Are you certain of this?”
Marcus shrugged as he pointed west. “I can’t prove it, if that’s what you mean, my lord, but I am as certain of it as I am that the sun will set beyond that horizon in a few hours.”
Aram studied him for a long moment, and then, “How was it done?”
“I don’t know for sure.” It was Marcus’ turn to frown. “A poisonous agent of some kind was discovered in the palace water supply.” He shrugged again. “The investigators could not determine whether it was natural or if it had been placed there.”
“Where was Rahm – was he in the palace?”
Marcus shook his head. “No, he was in Aniza at the time, but his collaborator was in the palace. He was the only one to survive the contagion.”
“Who is this collaborator?”
“His name is Hurack Soroba. Once upon a time, he was my father’s Chief Councilor.”
“And you believe that he betrayed your father in order to advance Rahm’s fortunes?”
“I do,” Marcus replied.
“So, this Soroba is now Rahm’s Chief Councilor?”
“No – he went into the service of Manon, Rahm’s ally in the north.”
Aram leaned back against the top of the wall, but his eyes were fixed on Marcus’ face. “Tell me about him,” he said.
As succinctly as possible, Marcus related what he knew of Soroba’s history, up to and including his abandonment of Elam for a position in the court of the northern lord. As he told his tale, Aram’s somber features grew harder and yet more severe. It seemed to Marcus that that which he related was not only grasped and comprehended easily by the tall lord, but that it had also been expected, as if suspicions which he had heretofore entertained were now being confirmed.
When Marcus finished, Aram looked toward the southeast and spoke as if to himself. “So – Manon’s hand has meddled more deeply in Elam than I suspected.” After but a few moments, he looked back at Marcus. “It seems that your uncle is no more than a pawn of the grim lord.”
Kelven's Riddle Book Four Page 24
