by George Hatt
“I have been honest with you, and I shall continue to be so,” Betina said. “Power is consolidating in the Empire, and the old ways of constant small wars will soon be dreams of a distant past. Draugmere and Balgroth’s merchants have their provinces latched tightly to the Imperial teat, and thus gain more riches from peace than they could carry home from war. A few years from now, they might even send troops when the Emperor calls. Aternis is still broken from our betrayal and the trouncing it received at the hands of Mithrandrates during the last Uprising. And Hastrus will wither and die when someone finally takes the Shoraz-Athar Rift and we no longer need to detour through that waste of land.”
Betina stepped closer to Grantham and caressed his cheek with the backs of her fingers. “That leaves only us, Grantham. Without the strength of Brynn and Relfast stopping them, Imperial troops would not be content to patrol their cobblestone roads—they would occupy our cities and castles. My Lord Torune and your Lady Drucilla would then be true governors—administrators collecting taxes and repairing granaries for Emperor Mithrandrates. Only our dominions combined can stop that happening and keep Mithrandrates’ creeping reforms on the paved highways where they belong.”
Grantham gently took Betina’s hand and lowered it to her side. “Lady Drucilla and Lord Torune would never share power in such unified dominion. One must prevail over the other.”
Betina smiled. “That is why war—real war—between us is inevitable. Do not believe the other Representatives if they tell you otherwise. Prepare yourselves.”
“So why do you tell me this?”
“Perhaps I lie,” Betina said. “Maybe Hastrus plans to attack you from the north, and Duke Philo offered me expensive trinkets and baubles to trick you into sending all your forces south to defend against a phantom army that never comes. Maybe Hastrus and Relfast plan to split your dominion between us.” She touched an icy blue gem that hung above her full breasts and turned as if to walk away. “Or perhaps I tell you the truth, and I give you time to prepare out of genuine respect. Our two dominions are the last truly deserving the names of the old kingdoms they once were.”
Grantham let her leave with the last word. When he was alone, he continued his walk. The duke thought best when he was walking, and the breeze whispering through the leaves refreshed his racing mind. He felt at times that he was the last one from whom Lady Drucilla should take counsel, but his advice to her had always proven sound. There were even those who credited Brynn’s recent fortunes to the duke’s steady hand. But behind every steady hand is an analytical mind, he thought. Such a mind I wish I had.
But errors come when one thinks too hard, so he walked. That Betina was trying to play a mind game with Grantham, and by extension Lady Drucilla, was certain. But which game? Grantham stopped to examine a tree that was gloriously clothed in thousands of tiny, light pink flowers. For a moment, his entire world was filled by one of the delicate flowers, and the rest of the branches, the tree, the Citadel behind it, faded into a blur.
Grantham could have no productive thoughts yet about Betina’s threat of war, so he thought of the other words she said, words invoking the former glory of their provinces’ shared past. One could argue whether Brynn and Relfast were the greatest provinces of the Mergovan Empire, but there was no questioning that they were the greatest of the sovereign Kingdoms before the Empire subsumed them all. It was a point of pride for their people, even if those days of liberty had long faded into a beguiling mix of history and legend.
The duke shifted his gaze to Temple and let his mind drift to the heavens. Is Mahurin the greatest god? Or is He the only true god? Perhaps there are no gods at all. Perhaps all three questions are equally meaningless…
Grantham laughed softly to himself and continued his walk. This was no time to face his theological questions, even though he had found himself deferring those questions over and over. Someday, soon, I will face my questions, Great Mahurin. I will bring them before You, and we shall have a reasoned discussion. This I owe to you, whether you exist or not.
He chose to postpone his brewing crisis of faith yet again, but not the political decision before him. Grantham selected his next course of action and walked with purpose back across the plaza toward his borrowed apartments at the Citadel.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Paardrac
Paardrac traversed the wildernesses between the Clans, wandering through forests and craggy gullies that were too wild even for the bravest hunters. This was not the realm of man, but of kor-toth, of wandering ghosts and forgotten demigods. What little magic remained in the world coursed with the frigid rivers that splashed from their homes in the mountains to the forests below and pooled around barrows and dolmens more ancient than the druids’ most hoary legends.
This realm, borderless and beyond the reach of the Caeldrynn and the Empire alike, was Paardrac’s refuge now. It was also his larder, for he knew every edible root, berry and grub within reach. And increasingly as he strayed farther into the unknown, the wilderness became his companion. Kor-toth stalked him, but let him be. The creatures left the evidence of their presence—deer carcasses savaged by their claws and proboscises, as well as the occasional wolf or lion—almost as if they wanted Paardrac to find them.
The druid also felt the presence of the land wights more and more strongly as he made his way deeper into the wilderness. A druid could always see the personality of individual trees and rocks, and could tell whether it was ready to be cut down or rooted out. Thanes and jarls often wait patiently for weeks before building a longhouse while druids discuss what to do with a particularly large stone that has to be moved before it can be built. But now Paardrac could hear their names whispered through the early morning fog or rustling softly behind the midday breeze.
The terrain became steeper as Paardrac stalked into the wooded foothills of the Stone Kingdom Mountains. He had no compelling reason to go there other than the mountains were far beyond the reach of Clan Riverstar. But so was the rest of this wilderness. However, the land spirits were not telling him stay away. And that is what distinguished experienced druids from neophytes—the knowledge that peaceable silence from the spirits is often the only endorsement a man can expect of his actions. When the land wights are displeased, Paardrac had told Barryn more than once, they will fill your soul with terror. When they favor what you do, you will hear nothing.
The afternoon wore on, and Paardrac found a sheltered place on top of a wooded hill to make his camp. He spoke to the trees, stones and the hill itself and made himself known to them. He asked the spirits for permission to build a fire with fallen wood and a shelter from coniferous branches he would carefully harvest from living trees. Weeks had passed since Paardrac had heard another human, and now he could hear the voices of the spirits quite clearly.
Paardrac dreamed that night of three red-haired women, unabashedly nude and ageless, speaking to him from the woods under a starry sky. In the distance to the north, the stars were obscured by dark clouds whose bellies flashed with lightning. The druid realized he was dreaming, but he kept himself asleep long enough to speak to the dream women.
“We have been watching you since you left your kind,” the one in the middle said. They looked like triplets, and as Paardrac looked closer he saw they all looked like the High Druidess. “We have been wandering your dreams and learned your language while you sleep.”
“Who are you?”
“We are the First Ones, those who were here countless ages before your kind arrived in the world.”
Fear crept into Paardrac like icy water soaking into his woolen tunic. In the ancient tongue of the Star Runes, the druid quietly said an incantation to dispel illusion. The women glanced at each other, then their shapely legs and bellies exploded into writhing, scrabbling masses of chitin, spines and bulbous, arachnid shapes. They reeled but quickly regained their footing. The torsos of the three women remained, but they now extended forward and upward from the bodies of three kor-toth. “It knows magic
,” the one on the right said to her compatriots.
“Perhaps its will is strong enough to speak to us while it is awake,” the left one said.
“No. Not yet. He must remain asleep,” said the middle one. She ambled toward Paardrac on her five pairs of cane-like legs, her bulbous abdomen expanding and contracting behind her in rhythm with her breathing. “Why are you venturing into our hunting grounds?”
“I seek refuge from my own people,” Paardrac said. “I broke my vows as a druid, so I am banished to the wild places where the First Ones roam.”
“Do they follow you into our woods and valleys? Your kind kill our kind, and not without good reason. You are soft, and your flesh is sweet,” she said, leaning close to Paardrac.
Paardrac shook his head. “There is no reason for my people to follow me. They believe I will meet my doom in the wilds. Perhaps they are correct.”
“The Wandering Star approaches,” the creature said, abruptly changing the subject. “It is too far away for your people to see, but the First Ones feel its disturbance. Its powers again course and pulse across the land. Subtly for now, but the old magics will become stronger and stronger as it nears. Your kind call it the Chaos Moon and suffer mightily when it is close.”
Thunder pealed in the distance, and the clouds were closer. The creatures looked at each other and scuttled backwards into the woods. “We will not eat you this night, for we have hunted and are well fed.”
Paardrac awoke beneath a spring thunderstorm crashing in from the north. Rain fell suddenly and harried the trees, while thunderbolts shattered the air all around the hill and illuminated the inky-black woods. Paardrac struggled down the hill to flee the lightning. He tripped over roots and rocks as the rain hammed down on him, and then saw a white flash and nothing more. Paardrac came to moments later tangled in the exposed roots beneath a great oak tree riven down the middle by the lightning strike. He rolled over the root to gain his footing and stepped into empty space. Paardrac fell into a shallow void blasted into the side of the hill and landed on flat stone.
Paardrac stood and gazed around him in wonder and for a moment forgot the danger of the lightning and ignored the sharp ache in his shoulder. Above and behind him, tangled roots and flat, broken rocks glistened and flickered in the storm. Before him, a rectangular void opened into the side of the hill. Another bolt split the air nearby, and Paardrac ducked through the opening into the hill.
The walls, floor and ceiling of the passage were built from immense, rough-hewn stones taller than a man and about half as wide. Paardrac felt the stony tunnel take a slight incline as it led deeper into the hill, then suddenly walked a wider blackness. The druid stopped and knelt to feel the ground in front of him with his hand. Rough steps led a short way down. Paardrac followed them down and explored the chamber, keeping his right hand on the wall. He circumambulated the chamber and ended up back at the steps. He sat down and took stock of his situation. Paardrac knew only that the chamber was round, had no other openings in the walls, and seemed to be covered with spirals carved into the rock. As his eyes finally adjusted to the dark, Paardrac could also just make out a dark shape in the middle of the chamber, but the fitful light from the passing thunderstorm provided no further clues as to what it was.
The druid froze. He heard the gentle, unhurried clinking of claw on stone approach from the passage behind him. Paardrac then relaxed, knowing his spirit would soon walk with his ancestors in the Blessed Realms while his body nourished the kor-toth that had been stalking him. Paardrac moved deeper into the chamber and faced the doorway. Mighty ancestors, greet me with love when I join you in the Lands of Summer. Let my actions in this world honor your blood, which I share. Holy gods, accept my body as a sacrifice…
A mass of giant spider-like legs and pedipalps reached out of the darkness of the passage, and the horrifying creature was in the chamber. It curled its abdomen high over its thorax and lifted two pairs of its front legs up and out.
“Holy gods!” Paardrac gasped aloud. The chamber suddenly filled with a ghostly blue light as the kor-toth lit up with bioluminescence. Blue and white lights danced within its abdomen and up and down its legs. In a breath, Paardrac lost the shape of the kor-toth. His entire existence was nothing but those dancing lights…and then a woman’s voice.
It seems you have led us to a new lair, and it is filled with the trinkets that your kind covet. Take what you can carry, and go in peace. We are more curious than hungry.
Paardrac’s mind was freed, and he watched two more kor-toth slowly erupt out of the passage and light up, bathing the chamber in enough light for Paardrac to see clearly. He turned and obeyed the first creature. The eery blue light revealed spiral carvings that covered the walls, the ceiling and a rough stone altar in the middle of the chamber. Gem encrusted gold objects were piled high on the ground around the altar—cups, model longships, jewelry, weapon fittings—along with gold coins.
Atop the altar sat a bronze spectacled helm heavily laden with gold trim. Knotwork and coiled dragons writhed on the cheek pads and spectacles; richly decorated gold plates hung from the back and formed the legendary helm’s aventail. Wonder racked Paardrac’s exhausted body harder than the terror of the spiders. He knew what he gazed upon. Children grow up hearing the couplet as they huddle around ruddy hearth fires during cold winter nights:
In darkness dwells the Kingshelm | where dragons’ dens are sealed
And duty dares the man who gains | to find his death or be the Dragon Chief
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Alcuin
Alcuin Darkwood had business in the capital beyond jousting and hustling for clients in the capital. He was the Most Honorable Elected Grand Master of the Mercenaries Guild, and thanks to his competent leadership, it looked like he would be elected to another four-year term.
Splendid, he thought. Just fucking splendid.
The mercenary commander walked up the broad stairs to the columned Guildhouse flanked by his two bodyguards. The three wore no armor, but carried swords and daggers for self defense in accordance with municipal law. Even in the capital—especially in the capital—a man of his position must take precautions. Alcuin wore the ceremonial armored gauntlet denoting his status as Grand Master.
He paused before the iron-bound, arching double doors and flexed the fingers in the gauntlet. He was only mildly bitter about the prospect of reelection. The paperwork, correspondence and hard decisions all made for a righteous pain in the ass. But it was, all told, a great honor to lead one of the most professional and respected guilds in the Empire.
Alcuin strode into the great hall of the Guildhouse and hammered his gauntleted fist three times on a block resting upon the ancient round table. The sudden, thunderous sound brought the annual meeting to order, its echoes reverberating through the high stone chamber for a moment after the murmuring of the eight assembled mercenary commanders stopped.
The Guildhouse was, many years before, the temple of the war god Taern and was saved from the iconoclastic ravages of the Church of Mahurin when a rich mercenary paid a “love offering” generations ago to the church and was allowed to headquarter in it. By twists of fate and the commander’s mastery of coin and politics, Taern was demoted from war god to patron saint of mercenaries. Thus, his 30-foot statue survived the Harrowing of the False Gods to loom over the Mercenary Guild’s proceedings. Taern’s stern, bearded countenance and two-handed sword gave the hall an atmosphere that was at once martial and hallowed.
Alcuin removed the gauntlet of office and laid it in front of him on the round table. “Under the auspices of Saint Taern, patron of mercenaries, and with the blessing of the Great God Mahurin, I, Alcuin Darkwood of the Black Swan Company, call to order this Council of Commanders of the Mercenaries Guild. The first order of business is the reading of the names of the fallen.”
The commanders stood, and the secretary-scribe handed Alcuin a scroll with the names of the Guild members who had died in battle since the body’s last annua
l council. These he read aloud: Bryson Carswith, Pug the Carter’s Son, Jurgen…after he read the first 100 names, Alcuin passed the list to the commander on his left, who read the next hundred. They each had a century of names to read and several more—the list was more than a thousand. It had, after all, been a relatively peaceful year. The Morgane’s solemn eyes flashed with sadness at the only women’s names to be mentioned, for they were her warriors.
Alcuin finished the list then handed the scroll back to the scribe. “These are the Brothers and Sisters of the Mercenaries Guild whose duties have ben fulfilled. May they find their rest in the Kingdom of Mahurin and prepare to march at the End of Days with their general, Saint Taern.”
“Their duties were fulfilled,” the commanders said in unison.
That solemnity done, Alcuin moved on the mundane business of the Guild. Over the next several hours, the commanders re-elected Alcuin, ratified 2,372 new guild memberships, added six former clients to the Guild’s black list, and amended the bylaws to correct inconsistencies and grammatical errors that Demon Company’s master of coin had found.
“Your staff is nothing if not thorough,” Alcuin told Edoc Jynn, Demon Company’s commander, when the corrections passed with a unanimous vote. He picked up the agenda and read. “Next before us is a hearing on the possible expulsion of the Wurath Lancers, a 200-man company of cavalry, on grounds that they broke contract with their employer, Baron Finlies of Hastrus, and took employment with his opponent, Baron Shardath of Hastrus, a violation of the bylaws of this Guild and an affront against the whole of the profession of arms. Do I have a motion to open this hearing?”
“So moved,” said the commander of Galieon’s Light Horse.
