A Cruel Wind

by Glen Cook

  “So,” she said, voice rattling. “What’s this you’ve found, Royal?”

  “Ah, Mama, a sad one,” he replied. “See the tearstreaks? Come, come, find a sweet.” Lifting the boy before him, he entered the stall.

  The woman rifled a small package and found a piece of sugar candy. “Here, little man. For you. Sit down, Royal. It’s too hot to tramp around town.” Over the boy’s shoulder she asked a question with a lifted eyebrow.

  “A hot day, yes,” said Royal. “The King’s men were witch-burning again. She was young. A black-hood had me take her child away.”

  From the shade beside the old woman the boy watched with big, sad eyes. His left fist mashed the rock candy against his lips. His right rubbed the few tears still escaping his eyes. But he was silent now, watching like a small idol.

  “I was thinking we might foster him.” Royal spoke softly, uncertainly. The suggestion closely skirted a matter painful for both of them.

  “It’s a grave responsibility, Royal.”

  “Yes, Mama. But we have none of our own. And, if we passed on, he’d have the farm to keep him.” He didn’t say, but she understood, that he preferred passing his property to anyone but the King, who would inherit if there were no heirs.

  “Will you take in all the orphans you find?”

  “No. But this one is a charge Death put on us. Can we ignore Her? Moreover, haven’t we hoped through our springs and summers, into our autumns, hopelessly, when the tree couldn’t bear? Should I slave on the land, and you here selling its produce, merely to bury silver beneath the woodshed floor? Or to buy a peasant’s grave?”

  “All right. But you’re too kind for your own good. For example, your marrying me, knowing me barren.”

  “I haven’t regretted it.”

  “Then it’s settled by me.”

  The child took it all in in silence. When the old woman finished, he took his hand from his eyes and set it on hers in her lap.

  Royal’s farmhouse, on the bank of the Aeos two leagues above Ilkazar, blossomed. Where once it had been dusty within and weathered, tumble-down without, it began to sparkle. The couple took coin from hidden places and bought paint, nails, and cloth for curtains. A month after the child’s arrival, the house seemed newly built. Once-crusty pots and pans glistened over the hearth. Accumulated dirt got swept away and the hardwood floor reappeared. New thatch begoldened the roof. A small room to the rear of the house became a fairy realm, with a small bed, handmade cabinet, and a single child-sized chair.

  The change was marked enough to be noticed. The King’s bailiffs came, reassessed the taxes. Royal and the old woman scarcely noticed.

  But, though they gave him all love and kindness, the child never uttered a “thank you.” He was polite enough, never a bother, and loving in a doleful way, but he never spoke—though sometimes, late at night, Royal heard him crying in his room. They grew accustomed to his silence, and, in time, stopped trying to get him to talk. Perhaps, they reasoned, he had never obtained the faculty. Such afflictions weren’t uncommon in a city as harsh as Ilkazar.

  In winter, with snows on the ground, the family remained indoors. Royal taught the boy rustic skills: whittling, the husking and shelling of maize, how bacon is cured and hung, the use of hammer and saw. And chess, at which he soon excelled. Royal often marveled at his brightness, forgetting that children are no more retarded than their elders, just more innocent of knowledge.

  Winter passed. The child grew in stature and knowledge, but never spoke. They named him Varth, “the Silent One” in their language. Spring came and Royal began working the fields. Varth went with him, walking behind the plow, breaking clods with his bare feet. Soon shoots sprouted. Varth helped with the weeding, planted stakes for the tomatoes, and threw stones at birds threatening the melons. The old woman thought he would make a fine farmer some day. He seemed to have a love for tending life.

  When summer came and the melons fattened, the tomatoes reddened, and the squash grew into green clubs, Varth helped with the harvesting, packing, and the loading of Royal’s wagon. The old woman opposed his return to Ilkazar, but Royal thought he had forgotten. So he went with them to market, and a good day they had there. Their crop was one of the earliest in, their produce was exceptional, and Ilkazar was out in force, seeking fresh vegetables. Later, when tomatoes and squash were common, they would be spurned in favor of meat.

  The old woman, from her usual place in the shade, said, “If for nothing but luck, the adoption was wise. Look! When they can’t get melons they take tomatoes or squash.”

  “It’s early in the season. When the stalls are full and there’s produce left for the hogs, things won’t look so bright. Do you think we could get a tutor for Varth?”

  “A tutor? Royal! We’re peasants.”

  “Castes are castes, but there’re ways to get around that. Silver is the best. And we’ve got some we’ll never use otherwise. I just thought he might want to learn his letters. Seems a pity to waste a mind like his on farming. But I wouldn’t get involved with anyone important. The village priest, maybe. He might take the job for fresh vegetables and a little money to tide his wine-cellar between collections.”

  “I see you’ve already decided, so what can I say? Let’s tell him, then. Where’s he off to now?”

  “Across the square watching the boys play handball. I’ll fetch him.”

  “No, no, let me. I’m getting stiff. Mind you watch the tomatoes. Some of these young things are dazzlers. They’ll steal you blind while you’re trying to get a peek down an open blouse. Those painted nipples…”

  “Mama, Mama, I’m too old for that.”

  “Never too old to look.” She stepped between empty tomato crates, past the remainder of the squash, started across the square.

  Soon she returned, disturbed. “He wasn’t there, Royal. The boys say he left an hour ago. And the donkey’s gone.”

  Royal looked to the corrals. “Yes. Well, I’ve got a notion where he’s gone then.

  You

  mind the sly young ’prentices from the wizards’ kitchen.”

  She chuckled softly, then grew grave. “You think he went back where…”

  “Uhm. I’d hoped he wouldn’t remember, being so young. But the King’s lessons aren’t easily forgotten. A death at the stake is a haunt fit for a lifetime of nightmares. Have some candy ready when we get back.”

  Royal found Varth about where he expected, astride the donkey, before the King’s gate. The plaza was less grim than usual, although, apparently, the boy hadn’t come to see the leavings of executions. Looking small and fragile, he studied the Palace’s fortifications. As Royal entered the square, Varth started for a postern gate. The sentry there was a gruff-looking, middle-aged veteran who stopped him and asked his business. He was still trying to coax Varth into answering when Royal arrived.

  “Pardon, Sergeant. I was minding my stall too close. He wandered away.”

  “Oh, no trouble, no trouble. They’ll do that. Got a flock of my own. What’s in down to market? Woman was talking about going.”

  “She’d better hurry. The melons are gone already. The tomatoes and squash will be soon.”

  “Look for me this evening, then. Save a squash and a few tomatoes. I’ve a craving for goulash. And mind where that donkey wanders. He has a likely lad aboard.” He offered Varth a warm parting smile, sincere in its concern.

  Varth betrayed no emotion as Royal led the donkey away. But later, as they pushed through the twisty alleys and the old peasant asked, “Varth, would you like to learn the cleric arts?” he grew ecstatic. Royal was surprised by his intensity. For a moment, indeed, it seemed the boy might speak. But then he settled into his usual stolidity, revealing only a fraction of his inner joy.

  So, after the last squash were sold and the three returned to the farm, Royal went to visit the parish priest.

  Time passed and the boy grew until, at an age of about ten, he was as tall as Royal and nearly as strong. The old couple
were pleased. They cared for him like a precious jewel, giving the best of everything. In a land where disease, hunger, and malnutrition were constant companions of the poor, he had the gift of an excellent diet. He grew tall in a land where tall men were rare.

  His learning, under the tutelage of the priest, went well. He learned to write quickly, often used notes where another would have spoken. The priest was impressed with his ability. He refused all payment except the occasional gift of produce. He insisted that the teaching of an eager student was ample reward. He soon took Varth to the limits of his own knowledge.

  As it must, sorrow one day entered the house by the river above Ilkazar. In the fall, after a last load had been sold at market, the old woman suffered a seizure. She cried out and went into a coma, never to waken. Royal grieved, as a husband of long-standing will, but accepted the loss in his stoic way. She had had a long, full life, except for her barrenness, and in the end had even had the pleasure of rearing a son. Moreover, Royal was pleased to see Varth equally stricken by her passing. While he had seldom been demonstratively affectionate, neither had he been disobedient or disrespectful. His mind simply dwelt away, as if in a shadow world where life couldn’t reach him.

  As farmers have always done, and will always do, Varth and Royal buried their dead, then returned to working their fields. But the peasant was old, and his desire to live had failed with the death of his wife. Early in the spring, with the first crops planting, he joined her quietly in the night. Varth thought him sleeping till he shook him.

  Varth wept again, for he had loved Royal as a son should love a father. He went to the village, found the priest, brought him to say the burial service. He worked the farm to the best of his ability and finished the season. At market he often sold cheaply because he refused to haggle. Then, having worked the summer in memory of his foster parents, he had the priest sell the farm and began a life of his own.

  T

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  UTUMN, 995 AFE

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  OWN FROM THE

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  OUNTAINS OF

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  EAR

  Ravenkrak was an ancient castle built so deep within the Kratchnodian Mountains, on a high peak called the Candareen, that few people down in the settled lands knew that it existed. Yet seven people who followed a winding mountain trail would soon put the name on countless pairs of lips. Six were called Storm Kings by those who knew them not. Their destination was the capital city of the northernmost of the Cis-Kratchnodian kingdoms, Iwa Skolovda.

  At their head rode Turran, Lord of Ravenkrak. Behind him, eldest, cruel-faced and graying, Ridyeh came, then Valther, the youngest brother, who was quite handsome. Next came stolid, quiet Brock and his twin, Luxos. Luxos was tall and lean as a whippet; Brock was short and heavily muscled. Jerrad came last. His sole interest in life was the hunt, be it for a mountain bear or a dangerous man. Six strange men then.

  The seventh was their sister, Nepanthe, the last-born. Her hair was black and long, a family trait. She rode proudly, as befit her station, but hers was not a conquering, militant bearing. She rode not as the virgin mistress of Ravenkrak, but as a sad and lonely woman. She was uncommonly beautiful in her waning twenties, yet her heart was as cold as her mountain home. But her aloofness, here, was caused by opposition to her brothers’ plans.

  She was weary of their plots and maneuvers. A week earlier, braving eternal damnation, she had summoned the Werewind to seal the passes through which they now rode, in order to keep her brothers home. But she had failed, and now they no longer trusted her left behind.

  The party approached Iwa Skolovda’s North Gate nervously. They were dead if recognized. A feud as bitter as blood, as old as the forests, as enduring as death, existed between Ravenkrak and the city. But their entry went unchallenged. It was autumn, a time when northern trappers and traders were expected with summer pelts for Iwa Skolovda’s furriers.

  They rode to the heart of the town, through thick foreign sounds and smells, to the Inn of the Imperial Falcon, where they remained in hiding for several days. Only Turran, Valther, and Ridyeh dared the streets, and that only by night. Days they spent in their rooms, honing their plans.

  Nepanthe, alone and lonely, stayed in her room and thought about things she’d like, or things she was afraid, to do. She slept a great deal and dreamed two repeated dreams, one beautiful, one dreadful. The bad one always grew out of the good.

  In the first dream she rode out of the Kratchnodian Mountains, south, past Iwa Skolovda and Itaskia, to fabulous Dunno Scuttari, or the cradle of western culture, Hellin Daimiel, where a beautiful, intelligent woman could make herself a place in the sun. Then the dream would shift subtly till she was afoot in a city of a thousand crystal towers. She wanted one of those towers as her own. Warmth flooded her when her gaze touched one in particular—always emerald—and she was inexorably drawn. Both fear and eagerness grew as she moved nearer. Then, at twenty paces, she laughed joyously and ran forward.

  Always the same. Nightmare then came roaring from the dark dominions of her mind. Touch the spire—it was a spire no more. With a roar like a fall of jewels, the thing crumbled. From its ruins a terrible dragon rose.

  Nepanthe fled into a dreamscape that had changed. The city of crystal towers became a forest of angry spears, striking. She knew those spears meant no harm, yet she feared them too much to question the cause of her fear.

  Then she’d awaken, perspiration-wet, terrified, guilt-ridden without knowing why.

  Though her nights, because of the dreams, were anything but dull, Nepanthe was bored by day. Then all she had to occupy her mind was the dreariness of her life at Ravenkrak. She was weary of gray mountains snow-shrouded and ribboned with rivers of ice, and of continually howling arctic winds. She was tired of being alone and unsought and a tool for her brothers’ lunatic plan. She wanted to stop being a Storm King and get out in the world and just be.

  Finally, there came a night, their fifth in Iwa Skolovda, when the Storm Kings set things in motion. Under a cloudy midnight sky, with intermittent moonlight, the brothers left the inn. Armed.

  Valther and Ridyeh ran toward the North Gate. Turran and the others ambled to the Tower of the Moon, an architectural monstrosity of gray stone from which city and kingdom were ruled.

  In cellars, in dark places, rough men met and sharpened swords. This would be a night for settling scores with Council and King.

  Valther and Ridyeh neared the gate and its two sleepy guardsmen. One growled, “Who goes?”

  “Death, maybe,” Ridyeh replied. His sword whispered as he drew it from its scabbard. The tip stopped a hair’s breadth from the watchman’s throat.

  The second guard swung a rusty pike, but Valther ducked under, pressed a dagger against his ribs. “Down on the pavement!” he ordered, and down the man went, pike clattering. The other followed quickly. Valther and Ridyeh bound them, dumped them in the guardhouse.

  Ridyeh sighed. “When I saw that pike coming down…” He shrugged.

  “The gate,” Valther grumbled, embarrassed. Grunting, they heaved the bar aside, pushed the gate open. Ridyeh brought a torch from the gatehouse, carried it outside, wigwagged it above his head. Soon there came sounds of stealthily moving men.

  A giant of a man with a red beard emerged from the darkness, followed by sixty soldiers in the livery of Ravenkrak.

  “Ah, Captain Grimnason,” Ridyeh chuckled. He embraced the shaggy giant. “You’re right on time. Good.”

  “Yes, Milord. How’re things going?”

  “Perfectly, so far. But the end remains to be seen,” Valther replied. “We’ve got the hardest part to do. Follow me.”

  Arriving as Valther and Ridyeh were opening the city gate, Turran and the others found the door of the Tower of the Moon held by a single guard. Politely Turran said, “Bailiff, we’re Itaskian merchants, fur traders, and would like an audience with the King.”

  The watchman inclined his head, said, “Tomorr
ow night, maybe. Not tonight. He’s tied up in a Defense Council meeting. And isn’t it a bit late?”

  “Defense Council?”

  “Yes.” Lonely posts make men eager for company. This watchman was no exception. Leaning forward, whispering, he confided, “Ravenkrak is supposed to be stirring up the rabble. One of the men thought he saw Turran, the chief of the mad wizards. Old Seth Byranov, that was. Probably looking through bad wine. He’s a souse. But the King listened to him. Huh? Well, maybe the old fool knows something we don’t.” He chuckled, clearly thinking that unlikely. “Anyway, no audiences tonight.”

  “Not even for the Storm Kings themselves?” Luxos asked. He laughed softly when the old man jerked in astonishment.

  “Brock, Jerrad, take care of him,” Turran ordered. They bound and gagged the man quickly. “Luxos,” Turran called, holding a ragged piece of parchment to torchlight and squinting at it. “Which stair?” He held a plan of the tower that had been put together for Valther by those men sharpening swords in cellars.

  “The main if it’s speed we’re after.”

  Turran led the way. They met no resistance till they reached the door of the council chamber at tower’s top. There another bailiff tried to block their way. Leaning forward to look at their faces, he discovered the naked steel in their hands. “Assassins!” he cried. He scurried back, tried to close the door. But Brock and Turran used their shoulders, burst in over his sprawling form. Jerrad offered him a hand up after planting a boot on his sword.

  Councilmen panicked. Fat burghers threatened to skewer one another as they scrambled for weapons while retreating to the farthest wall. Their ineffectual guardian joined them. The King alone didn’t move. Fear kept him petrified.

  “Good evening!” said Turran. “Heard you were talking about us. Come now! No need to be afraid. We’re not after your lives—just your kingdom.” He laughed.