by Dan O'Brien
An empty building was like a graveyard marker.
He stole out across the open avenue. His cloak clung to his frame from dampness and will alone. He passed without notice as the midwife continued on into the alleyway, humming a nameless tune as she delved deeper into the darkness. He glanced out into the street once more before he produced his blade, gripping it as if it was an ice pick.
He felt the dryness in his mouth, the urgency. The need to inflict pain, to hurt another coursed through his veins. He saw the woman come to the end of the alleyway. Mumbling to herself, the song was still fresh on her lips. She turned and nearly tumbled as she gasped. The midwife brought a hand to her mouth in revulsion. Honestly, the simple thief had not really thought of how he must look. His dark cloak was frozen solid in some places; mud caked in others from where he had been forced to the ground by the warrior-prince. His face was blued from the cold whip of the wintry air as well the sheets of rain and sleet that haunted every step of the people of Getzenut, even that of its vilest criminal.
Her eyes darted one way and then the other. There was no escape.
Faidan stood taller as he approached. The sound of the thunder made him wish she would scream, so that only he could hear her shrieks. He touched the cold blade to his face, tracing the dull edge along the curve of his jaw as he shifted his feet. Faidan leaned back as he watched her. “Awful day to be walking about,” he crooned, his viper’s mouth opening and revealing crooked teeth.
She held a canvas bag in her hands. As she eyed the thief, she lost her grip, the contents within spilling out onto the ground. Dark loaves of bread and wheels of cheese, covered in cloth, fell free. She reached down to grasp them; but as she crouched, her fearful eyes snapped back to Faidan. “Please, there are fairer women than me.”
Faidan wished to laugh. He lunged forward, his spindly hands possessing a grace despite his vacant soul. Greedily pulling the canvas bag from her hands, he pushed her over. She spilled back into a filthy puddle that had settled next to the stone building.
The thief had not eaten in days. He had been waiting until his purse was full to rest at the Bard’s Song before making his way farther to the north. The thief cursed ever coming to this place. He had lost his monies, as well as being humiliated by the youthful prince who had sneered upon him as all those in positions of power and wealth had in the past. Faidan grumbled mindlessly as he scooped the bread and cheese back into the bag, hesitating before placing the soggy ones in.
Food was food to those who starved.
Looking up, his sleepless eyes caught a glimpse of the miserable midwife. He stood to his full height and placed the bag aside––comfortably outside the sheets of frozen rain. Stepping forward, he loomed over her (as the prince had him, he thought hatefully) and brandished the blade.
Her lips trembled and her mighty bosom heaved as she tried to back away, scrambling in the puddle with her hands and feet. “Please,” she begged again. Abandoning her escape and coming forward on her knees, she laced her fingers together as if she was praying.
Faidan had never been a religious man. He was neither a disciple of either Exodus nor Chaos. The Thieves Guild worshiped only what could be taken. They had no avatar, no idol to which they placed their beliefs.
The words that he uttered then startled him. It was a question he had asked of no victim, even of the man whose life he had taken in order to find his place among the thieves. “What’s your name?”
The question surprised her. “Bethany, my lord.”
My lord, wondered Faidan. Never in his life had he ever been referred to as thus––not once at an inn or at a house of tricks. It sent a chill down his spine. His smile elongated, revealing more misshapen and neglected teeth. “To which house are you a midwife, Bethany?”
Bethany looked past him down the alleyway. It was barren and desolate. She was alone. “No house, my lord. I work for the cleric. I’m his assistant.”
His mind wandered. People spoke of seeing lights in Aridus Castle. There were hushed words of the return of Chaos.
Bethany saw his inner reflection and lowered herself, trying to brush past the thief in thought.
Faidan’s eyes opened as he saw her barreling forward. She outweighed by a stone or two. He slashed at her, raking a thin line down her exposed spine. She cried out, a shrill sound accompanied by the roar of thunder and lightning flashing across the sky. Twisting and falling, her eyes filled with tears as she looked back up at Faidan’s bent figure. His blade was wet with the warmth of her blood.
“That was unwise,” he spoke.
His breath came out in clouds of freezing air. The temperature had dropped and soon rain and sleet would turn to snow; such weather so close to the warm season was unheard of. He reached down and snatched her wrist. Faidan then lifted her with a snap, a feat that would have seemed impossible given the spindly nature of the thief. Greed and lust overwhelmed him––gave him the strength he needed to carry through with his deed.
Tears streamed down her face. Her body was limp as he pulled her close to him. The stink of his breath made her turn away. He drove the blade deep into her gut, feeling the fat give way to the blade. A moan escaped her lips as she fell against him, her blood mixing with the sleet on his cloak. He let her fall and for good measure, he loomed over top of her for a few moments. Grinning wickedly, he then drove the point of the blade into her swollen bosom repeatedly. He pulled away from her, stumbling back against the slick stone walls.
His eyes widened. He looked at the blade smothered in blood and then to the dead midwife, her arms soaked in the puddles around her body. The tendrils of her blood scattered like webbing in the water beneath her, mixing like an alchemist’s potion.
Faidan shook his head, unintelligible words tumbling from his lips.
Panic welled in his chest.
Since the day that he had taken a life near a decade ago, he had never committed a murder with so much zeal––so much lust for death. He scanned the alleyway, the rain resonating in his ears. Never had he enjoyed a human’s death as much as he had just then. He fell to his knees next to her, his hands sorting through her dress, searching vainly for her purse. His fingers shook as he carried out his deed. Rooting through her apron, he found the white satchel and heard the jingle of the coins within.
The storm lashed out again. A white-hot flash of lightning darted across the sky. Faidan nearly leapt from his skin as the thunder rumbled; it was if the earth was splitting open at his heels. He looked back at the body of the midwife (Bethany, he reminded himself) and then darted back out into the open avenue, brushing past an elderly herder and his wife. He did not bother to wait and see if they looked down the alleyway and saw the dead woman––nor did he care. There was little reprieve for a man who had twice that day committed atrocities against the distant land of Getzenut.
NICHOLIA LOOKED BACK as he saw the spider-like lightning crawl across the sky. The individual spikes looked as if some supreme being had reached out through the veil of death and beyond to grasp at the living. He looked back over the streets just outside the crumbling Hall of Thorns, as the previous lords of Getzenut had referred to it. Now, it was little more than the deathbed of the king, N’ione.
He had long ago committed to memory the streets and buildings that surrounded the once-grand hall; though he had been away from the city for many years, not returning until word of his father’s illness reached him far to the east. He ran his hands over the raised stone that depicted ancient warriors in flight, feathery wings bursting from the backs of warriors of Getzenut. Once, the city had fought alongside Arantania’s greatest warriors and the Kingdom of the Crimson Shield. That was long before the time of N’ione and even longer before the headstrong warrior had been conceived. He pushed open the doors, the hinges giving way easily; he had come through hours before the assault on the outer wall.
He made a point to spend as much of his time as he could with his father, the last moments of the dying man’s life. The doors opene
d wide, a flash of lightning revealing a place that had once teemed with life and energy. He remembered running through the halls, screaming and playing with others of the kingdom––carefree and exuberant.
Now, it was cold and dark. It was a throne of sadness and death.
The warrior-prince walked down the halls, ignoring the mighty stone pillars that lined the walls. Evenly spaced and wrapped into a stone relief with scores of roses that intertwined, they cascaded far beyond view. Never had the Hall of Thorns been considered a large place. There was the introduction hall and the throne room that led off to the side, where the chambers of the king’s family made their home. Nicholia placed his hands on his hips as he walked beneath the arch of the throne room. The door was only half of what it had been; the other piece had long ago dislodged and was on its side near the entrance.
Nicholia had taken a room at the Bard’s Song because he could not find it in himself to sleep within the tomb, even though his father lay on his deathbed. Many within Getzenut perceived his return as an ill-omen; he was neither an experienced governor nor of the age that was required to govern.
But, it was his by right.
Political scandals and power struggles permeated Prima Terra. Getzenut was farthest from that arena; yet, there were those who would contend him for the crown. He shook his head at the thought and stepped into the throne room. The rough cough of his father drew his attention from deeper within the private chambers of the king.
Nicholia quickened his pace. Crossing through the remnants of the throne room, he did not pause to glance at the dust upon the throne or the misplacement of the crown. The door to the king’s private chambers was opened slightly and already the warrior-prince could hear the wheezing of his father, the hoarse struggle to breathe. Nicholia pushed open the door with his outstretched hand and covered his face as he often did. His father was nearly incapacitated and an invalid by all conventional standards. He could no longer care for himself as he so often desired to.
His time was passing.
The prince moved around the side of the bed and saw the open window across the room. Curtains flailed as the storm raged outside. The crack and roll of thunder and lightning cast eerie shadows over the room, haunting an already haunted man. Nicholia stood before the window and pushed the curtain aside, gripping the purple windowpane to slam it down and shut out the cold air.
“No…leave it be,” croaked the king, reaching out with a miserable shake of his hand.
Nicholia looked back at his father and grimaced, desperately trying to hide the look on his face.
His father’s placid skin was freckled in liver spots; his fingernails had grown long and brittle from lack of use. His head was propped up onto three plush pillows. Their purple color was the same color as the walls and curtains. The royal colors of Getzenut were purple and yellow, as was painfully apparent in the way that everything was painted.
“Of course, father.”
Nicholia moved away from the window and knelt near the bed. Pushing aside the sheath of his sword, he grasped his father’s weak hand in his own. He felt a swell of pity looking at how old and frail his father had become. A great man who was as much a warrior as he was a sovereign in his youth, it saddened the young prince that he now waited for death where once he would have rode out to greet it.
His father closed his eyes, the act taxing upon his limited strength. A mane of gray hair was fine where it had once been lush. The dark brown of his pupils were tainted in pain and remorse, a lifetime worth of regrets weighing upon his mind. He turned to his son, his eyelids opening slowly and managing a weak smile.
“I have grown so very old….”
Nicholia smiled. His eyes were glassy as he tightened his grip on his father’s hand. He cursed himself for staying away from this place for so long––from his place beside his father as his son. “You look as if you could live another lifetime, father.”
The king leaned forward to speak, but instead coughed hard into his other hand. His body heaved as his lungs expanded and contracted, fighting desperately to provide him with the breath of life for which he so struggled. He looked at his son, pulling his hand free. His brown eyes were glazed over as he spoke. “I heard screams and fighting, what has happened?”
“We were attacked. Asgots poured from the forest around us and as it seemed they would tear down the walls and consume us, they disappeared into thin air.”
N’ione, son of Mi’kalc, watched his son with wide eyes. “Asgots….”
Nicholia nodded grimly. “Thousands. They covered all the land that could be seen from the towers. They would have slaughtered us had they wished.”
The king tried to push himself up, but Nicholia restrained him. A gentle hand on his father’s chest kept him at rest as he should be. The young warrior-prince unlaced his hands from his father and stood. He paced away from the bed.
“What is the matter? What will you not speak of?”
Nicholia smiled. How well the man still knew him after all these years. Memories shrunk his smile to a fraction of what it was. “There was a voice….”
The king faltered, his breath ragged as he fell back. “What manner of voice?”
Nicholia’s face darkened as he thought of the deep tones of the voice––the sinister portents that it had revealed to him. “It spoke of the fall of Getzenut…soon.”
The cough returned. This time it was viscous, reeking of fluids.
Nicholia looked at his father. His hand resting on the top of his phoenix hilt, the warrior-prince rubbed the emblem rhythmically with his thumb. He could hear a song that was no longer sung. It was the song that had once announced Getzenut in the courts of Arantania.
The room had not been cleaned for some time. “Where is the midwife that Icarian had sent over?”
N’ione, dying king, looked at his son and shrugged his frail shoulders. The king shivered as he did so. His bedridden body had begun to atrophy, tire beyond its means. “I have not seen her. She went to the square for bread and cheese.”
Nicholia nodded absently and circled back to his father’s side once more. He knelt at his side as he had before. “Father, I wish to send for aid. I want to send riders to Arantania.”
The cough came again. It was a hacking, snarling sound.
His red-rimmed eyes glowered at his son. “The ties that you wish to call upon have not been so for an age. The Gargantuan will not readily send aid to our nation, my son.”
His father was in no state to argue heatedly.
“I returned because Getzenut, my home, was in terrible danger. Your health and the darkness that lingers beyond our borders is my concern. Never have I witnessed such boldness among the denizens of Chaos. There is something that lashes the beasts, commands them forward as a herder does his sheep. We must call for aid and soon––or else we will not survive another season.”
N’ione watched his son as one would watch an obstinate stone wall. He pulled his curled hands closer to his face, bringing with them folds of his sheets and blankets. He sighed, the sound like that of a deflating cushion. His labored breathing brought a pained look to his face. “Arantania was once a golden city, a cascading, boundless empire that united men. Darmon Hutchen and those of his line served the kingdom of old with a valor that is no longer found.” He coughed hard.
Nicholia started forward, but the dying king waved him away and continued. “The Kingdom of the Crimson Shield was the right arm of that empire. Together, they were a force that even the likes of Shaden Randh would not dare tempt. Me’lein, the empire of the far western coast, and Devonshire, the ancestors of Getzenut, were mighty and stood as pillars against the darkness.”
Nicholia gripped his father’s hand, tilting his head in sorrow at the state into which his father had degenerated.
Speaking had become such a burden that the dying king’s eyes widened as he spoke.
“There is no need to continue, father.”
N’ione waved him away once more, his face a
scowl. “Those empires, those powers are no more. Arantania, though still the light in the heart of men, has become a place that walks that line of good and evil, light and darkness. Me’lein has grown greedy and foolhardy, closing their borders to outlanders as had been done in the last age. Little is known of Devonshire, for they have refused open trade. Ships that reach their shores are turned away by flames from the skies. There are no alliances, no bonds of kin and honor upon which to call.”
Nicholia was not so easily deterred. “Arantania is still the law of Prima Terra,” cautioned the warrior-prince. Losing his grip of his father’s hand, he smoothed back his wisps of gray hair.
“The lines of Bel’tara are not as they once were. The call to arms that you seek…” He leaned forward. Nicholia cradled his head as he coughed hard into his own hand. Wheezing and groaning, he fell back. His eyes opened wide, tears pooling at the edges. He breathed out desperately, a thin sound emanating from his throat.
Nicholia was urged forward. His hands brushed at the fabrics of his father’s chest as the dying king reached to his son’s hands, his gnarled fingers wrapping around his son’s fingers. The warrior-prince shook his head, as he knew that death had taken hold, stealing the breath from his veins.
“No….” Nicholia murmured as his father rested against the pillow.
His eyes glazed over completely and the tears ran freely down his cheek. There was no more wheezing, no more struggle as N’ione, son of Mi’kalc, remained perfectly still upon his bed. The prince held his father’s head in his hands. He could feel the cold dampness on his father’s withered scalp and he fought back the sorrow, the anguish of watching his father pass.
“May you find peace among our forefathers,” he whispered as he pulled his hands from behind his father’s head and smoothed them out on the sheets.
