Dragontiarna: Knights
Page 10
The black-eyed knight moved with surprising speed for such a big man. His hand darted out and closed around her mother’s wrist. She let out a cry and stumbled back.
“Do not,” spat the black-eyed knight, his voice arrogant and contemptuous, “presume to touch your betters, peasant bitch.”
“Take her outside, Sir Paul,” said Tarrabus. “Her presence offends me.”
Sir Paul dragged her mother out of the room, ignoring the woman’s wails. Aeliana stood where she was, uncertain of what to do, but disgusted with her mother’s pleading. Tarrabus remained where he was, his eyes distant, his expression lost in thought.
“My lord,” said the dark-haired knight. “What should we do with the child?”
“Hmm?” said Tarrabus. “Ah, yes, of course.” His cold eyes fixed on Aeliana, and he smiled. “Well, girl, what’s your name?”
“Aeliana,” she said, and then added, “my lord.”
Tarrabus snorted. “Brighter than her mother, isn’t she, Sir Claudius?” Sir Claudius grunted. “But what shall we do with you, Aeliana?”
Aeliana thought it over. She was frightened and awed by the man in the chair, and she didn’t want to show any fear to him.
“You should kill me,” said Aeliana.
Sir Claudius looked taken aback, perhaps even disturbed.
“Should I?” said Tarrabus. “Just why is that?”
“Because if you hurt me and leave me alive,” said Aeliana, glowering at her father, “then someday I will have revenge and kill you.”
Sir Claudius looked even more disturbed, and his hand moved to his sword hilt.
But Tarrabus threw back his head and roared with laughter, and Aeliana felt a flush of pride. Suddenly she realized that she craved this man’s approval, more than she had ever desired the approval of her weak and simpering mother.
“You are a fierce little thing, aren’t you?” said Tarrabus. “I might have a use for you after all. Great days are coming, and I need helpers.” He smiled. “You want to please me, don’t you, Aeliana?”
“Yes, my lord,” said Aeliana.
“Perhaps you have more of me in you than your mother,” said Tarrabus. “I hope so, for your sake. The world is most unforgiving of weakness.”
“Begging your pardon, my lord,” said Sir Claudius, “but what are you going to do with her?”
“I’ve needed closer ties with the Red Family of Cintarra for quite some time now,” said Tarrabus. “What better way than by providing the Matriarch with a new disciple? Perhaps I have found a perfect candidate for the training of the Red Family.”
Sir Claudius grunted. “Ah. She might not be so fierce in front of the Matriarch.”
“We’ll see, won’t we?” said Tarrabus.
The door swung open, and Sir Paul returned.
“She’s making a scene out front,” said Paul, walking to Tarrabus’s side. “You know how women get when they’re rejected. She’s probably going to try and hang herself or some damned fool thing in exchange for sympathy…”
He trailed off as he saw Aeliana still standing there.
“What the hell is this?” said Paul. “You’re not keeping the brat, are you?”
“That,” said Tarrabus, his tone frosty, “is my bastard daughter.” Paul’s stance at once became less belligerent. “Aeliana, might I introduce Sir Paul Tallmane and Sir Claudius Agrell?”
“My lords,” said Aeliana. She remembered the formal curtsy she had seen her mother do, and she emulated it as best she could. Both Sir Paul and Sir Claudius gave her stony stares, but Tarrabus laughed again.
“Tell me, Aeliana,” said Tarrabus. “What did you think of your mother?”
“She was weak,” said Aeliana. “She shouldn’t have grovelled like that.”
“No,” said Tarrabus, rising to his feet.
“My lord,” said Paul. “I don’t presume to give advice, but we should do something about the woman. The way she’s wailing and carrying on, rumors are bound to spread.”
“You may have a point, Paul,” said Tarrabus. “Very well. Go to her and tell her that I have changed my mind and that you’re going to bring her to me at Castra Carhaine. Escort her to the castra…and once you’re there, take her to the dungeons. Do whatever you want with her, so long as the body is never found.”
Paul and Claudius shared predatory smiles. At the age of four, Aeliana did not entirely understand what was happening, but she did realize she was likely never going to see her mother again. That saddened her, but not unduly. Her mother had been weak…and she had never been kind to Aeliana, regarding her only as a way to gain greater favor with Dux Tarrabus.
“Aye, my lord,” said Paul. “It will be a pleasure.”
“Meet me at the castra’s gate by dawn tomorrow,” said Tarrabus. “And not hungover, mind. We have a long journey ahead of us.”
Paul and Claudius bowed, and both knights left the room.
“Well, Aeliana,” said Tarrabus. “Would you like to come with me to Cintarra?”
“What are we doing in Cintarra, my lord Tarrabus?” said Aeliana.
Tarrabus smiled. “We shall bring you to someone who can teach you to become strong, strong enough to carry out my will.”
He held out his hand. Aeliana put her hand in his grasp, and her father led her from the inn.
###
That had been nineteen years ago.
Later, Aeliana realized that her mother had died a very painful death.
She didn’t care.
The weak deserved their fates. Aeliana hadn’t liked either Paul Tallmane or Claudius Agrell very much, nor the rest of the young knights who had clustered around her father in hopes of favor and advancement. Paul and Claudius had believed the Enlightened doctrines about strength and power, but in the end, they had neither courage nor vision and were nothing more than opportunistic thugs.
Ridmark Arban killed Paul Tallmane at the Iron Tower, and Claudius Agrell died during Arandar’s siege of Castra Carhaine.
Aeliana jumped over another alley, moving closer and closer to the monastery. In the street below, she saw a flicker of light as one of the watchmen patrolled, a lantern in hand. Aeliana waited until the man passed. Once he was clear, she jumped over another alley, moving as silently as a shadow.
The Red Family had taught her that, along with many other things.
###
The journey to Cintarra had been the most wondrous experience of Aeliana’s young life.
She had never been more than five miles from that inn before in her life, but now she crossed the realm of Andomhaim with her father’s knights and retainers. The city of Cintarra was huge, nearly a quarter of a million humans, orcs, and halflings living within its walls, and Aeliana had gaped at the buildings in wonder. She had never seen so many soaring towers, high walls, and tall palaces.
And there, in one of the secret refuges of the Red Family, Tarrabus had introduced Aeliana to the Matriarch.
“The Red Family is, of course, an immense fraud,” Tarrabus had told her, years later, when she had been old enough to understand. “The Matriarch claims to be the voice of Mhor, the old orcish blood god of murder, but that’s nonsense. She uses that as a tool to control the Family, to bind them to her will.” Her father’s mouth twisted with amused contempt. “The church of Andomhaim uses its false teachings of mercy and charity to make men docile and easily ruled. I suppose the Matriarch’s method is rather more cunning. She uses her nonsense about Mhor to make her followers into fanatical murderers for profit.”
At the time, when she had been four, Aeliana hadn’t understood any of that.
She had been terrified of the Matriarch. The dark elven noblewoman wore a gown of midnight blue, her pale face stark and alien, her eyes filled with a bottomless black void. Power hung around her like a cloak, and the grim, deadly assassins of the Red Family attended upon her every word.
“This is my bastard daughter Aeliana,” said Tarrabus when they met. Aeliana offered the Matriarch a d
eep curtsy, just as her father had said. “As a token of my esteem for our growing alliance, I have brought this child to you for training. I ask that you teacher her the arts and skills of the Red Family, to make her into a jewel among assassins.” He smiled at the Matriarch. “I shall have much use for her in the years to come.”
The Matriarch did not smile but instead inclined her head, the gesture of an equal to another. Tarrabus’s expression did not change, but even then Aeliana knew that he would find the Matriarch’s presumption annoying.
“A worthy token, my lord Tarrabus Carhaine,” said the Matriarch. Her voice was both beautiful and nightmarish, musical and terrifying. She beckoned with a bony hand, rings of gold and dark elven steel glittering on her fingers. “Come here, child.”
Aeliana obeyed, her heart hammering against her ribs.
“Do you have it within you to kill?” said the Matriarch.
“Yes, my lady,” said Aeliana.
For the first time, the Matriarch smiled, and it made the ancient creature look even more terrifying.
“We shall see,” murmured the Matriarch, “won’t we?”
###
Aeliana came to the last house before the street leading to the monastery, and she climbed down the brick wall, her hands and feet finding footholds with ease.
For seven years, after her father had given her to the Matriarch, the Red Family had trained her in their bloody arts. She had learned swordplay and archery, the uses of daggers and knives, poisons and disguises, and a thousand other things an assassin needed to know. Aeliana had killed her first man when she was nine, accompanying the older assassins on their missions for the Family.
Her father visited her a few times a year. Tarrabus Carhaine was the Dux of Caerdracon, one of the most powerful noblemen in the realm of Andomhaim. The duties of his high office caused him to travel across the High Kingdom regularly. But in addition to that, he was the leader of the Enlightened of Incariel, the secret society and cult that would use the power of the shadow of Incariel to transform men into living gods. Tarrabus told her of his plans, how he could become the High King and destroy the church, raising the cult of Incariel in its place. How he would use the shadow of Incariel to make men immortal and invincible.
And how she would serve him for all time as his silent hand and his assassin, purging the realm of those who opposed him.
It was a beautiful dream, and she yearned for the day when she would finish her training with the Red Family and join her father. Indeed, that day seemed at hand. Her father killed High King Uthanaric Pendragon and claimed the throne, and the most powerful nobles followed him and the Enlightened. A few rebel lords opposed him, but Tarrabus would soon sweep them aside.
Aeliana’s lips thinned with the memory.
It had been a beautiful dream…but twelve years ago, half her lifetime ago, her world had been destroyed.
###
“Your father is dead,” said the Matriarch.
“What?” said Aeliana. “No, that’s impossible. He cannot be dead.”
She stood in one of the Matriarch’s lairs. The Red Family owned numerous houses both in Cintarra and in the villages outside the city. The Matriarch, ever fearful that her enemies would catch up to her, constantly moved from house to house, never spending more than a day in a single location, and always while cloaked in spells of obscuring and concealing. The Matriarch had fled to Andomhaim to escape the urdmordar, and she always worried that they would catch up to her one day. The Matriarch also feared the Orders of the Swordbearers and the Magistri, but above all things, she dreaded drawing the attention of the Warden of Urd Morlemoch. It seemed that she had irritated the Warden at some point in the distant past, and lived in fear of the day the Warden would take his vengeance.
It said a great deal about the dark elves that they thought nothing of waiting tens of thousands of years to take vengeance for a petty slight.
But all that was far from Aeliana’s mind.
“No,” she said. “No, it’s not possible.”
The Matriarch raised an eyebrow. “Do you doubt me, child?”
“My father cannot have been defeated!” shouted Aeliana.
There had been rumors, of course, disturbing ones. Tarrabus Carhaine had laid siege to Tarlion for nearly a year, but he had been unable to break into the city and claim the High King’s Citadel. For that matter, the Enlightened of Incariel had killed High King Uthanaric and his legitimate sons, but the bastard Arandar had survived and claimed his father’s title. Arandar rallied an army and claimed Tarrabus’s strongholds in Caerdracon one by one, marching south to confront Tarrabus before the walls of Tarlion. Aeliana had no doubt that her father would destroy his enemies, that he would annihilate Arandar’s rebel host when the hour came.
But to hear that her father had been overcome…
“Do not,” said the Matriarch, “ever contradict me, child.”
She gestured and cast a spell, blue fire blazing around her fingers, and agony exploded through Aeliana.
Her knees turned to water beneath her, and she collapsed with a scream, thrashing and howling like a wounded dog. Her teachers in the Red Family had trained her hard, but they had been forbidden from using the harsher methods of punishment new members of the Family endured. Aeliana had never known pain like this in her life, and it overwhelmed her.
But she rallied, gritting her teeth and forcing herself to her knees, to her feet. She was Aeliana Carhaine, daughter of the true High King of Andomhaim. She would not show weakness to anyone. She would not!
The agony faded away, and Aeliana let out a shuddering breath, trying not to scream or sob.
“Understand this, child,” said the Matriarch. “You are mine. Body and soul, you belong to me, and you are mine to command as I please. Your father gave you to me for training, and now your father is dead. I know it amused you to think of yourself as a king’s daughter, but all that is done now. You are my slave, and nothing more.”
And for years, the Matriarch amused herself by tormenting Aeliana.
At first, she didn’t understand why, but the grim knowledge came in time. Tarrabus had dared to speak to the Matriarch as an equal, and he had possessed the power to back up the presumption. The Matriarch had never been able to repay Tarrabus for that slight, so instead, she would inflict her vengeance upon Tarrabus’s daughter.
Aeliana was still an assassin of the Red Family, still earned money for her kills. But the Matriarch took every opportunity to mock Aeliana, to jeer at her, and the other members of the Red Family followed suit. She made Aeliana wait on the other assassins at meals like she was some common serving churl. Or she gave the least lucrative assignments to Aeliana.
Once, with a dozen members of the Family in attendance, the Matriarch had offered to give a successful assassin whatever reward he pleased. The assassin had responded that he wanted Aeliana, right now, while the others watched. She had been seventeen at the time, but that hadn’t been the first time she had been with a man. Twice Aeliana had seduced her targets in preparation for killing them, so she didn’t find the experience particularly objectionable. (Truth be told, she thought men and women both put too much emotion into the act of lovemaking, which in the end was mostly a tedious and messy chore to be completed when necessary.) But the humiliation of having to strip off her clothes in front of the Family, to lie there on the table as the grunting fool had his way with her, and even worse, as the others watched and laughed and offered counsel on how to improve her performance…
Right about then, Aeliana realized she wanted vengeance. On the Red Family, on Ridmark Arban the slayer of her father, on the realm of Andomhaim itself.
She wanted vengeance, and she needed power to get it.
And there was one source of power that the Matriarch, Ridmark Arban, and Andomhaim all feared.
None of them dared challenge the Warden of Urd Morlemoch.
###
Aeliana walked the final street to the gates of the monastery.
In a way, these were the final steps of a long journey, the journey that had taken her to Urd Morlemoch.
She had thought that her father had possessed power, that the Matriarch had power.
In Urd Morlemoch, she had learned what power really was.
###
In the year 1488, the year the Guardian Rhodruthain opened the gate between Andomhaim and Owyllain, Aeliana took her revenge upon the Red Family.
She couldn’t kill the Matriarch, at least not yet. But she could kill the Matriarch’s followers. Her plan to escape involved poison, forged dinner invitations, and a house fire, but in a single hour, her scheme killed a dozen assassins of the Red Family, and the same night she stole a horse and fled from Cintarra.
And she turned to the northwest, heading towards the Torn Hills and Urd Morlemoch.
The journey was long and dangerous. Aeliana had to avoid both the fanatical Mhorite orcs of Kothluusk and the bands of pagan orcs that roved the Wilderland. Wyverns hunted the forests of the Wilderland, to say nothing of urvaalgs and more dangerous beasts, but Aeliana had stolen a weapon of dark magic during her escape from the Matriarch, and she was able to kill several urvaalgs.
At last, she reached the gloomy, spell-haunted Torn Hills, and she fought her way past the undead and twisted creatures that lurked there, along with the Devout, the nation of mutated orcs that served the Warden.
And then, months after she escaped from Cintarra, she beheld the ancient, half-ruined citadel of Urd Morlemoch, the stronghold of the dark elven archmage known as the Warden.