A Warrior's Burden: Book One of Saga of the Known Lands

by Jacob Peppers

  “No, Maeve,” he rasped, and his great chest was rising and falling with suddenly rapid breaths. “I would not wish that on him, not on anyone. Princes are not known for living peaceful lives—that I know better than anyone.”

  She considered leaving it then. Perhaps only a fool would try befriending a thunderstorm, but it took a special kind of idiot to step into the maelstrom with a thought to challenging it. She was on the very verge of leaving it, in fact, but then she remembered the boy sitting on the bed, the boy who did not understand why so many wanted him dead, who was looking to her for the help he so desperately needed.

  Maybe only a pure idiot would spit into a hurricane. And maybe she was that idiot, after all. “Don’t you tell me no, Cutter,” she snapped. “That boy has a birthright. And whether you want him to have it or not doesn’t make any difference—that birthright is his, and it’s going to follow him all his life. Better that he knows the truth, all of the truth. Besides, a fugitive can be hunted, can be killed, with little fuss, but princes are not so easily cast aside. And if his identity becomes known, your brother will not so easily be able to dispatch him, for the people would not sit idly by while a member of the royal blood was slain out of hand.”

  He stared at her, clearly surprised by her outburst, and she couldn’t blame him—she was surprised herself. She waited tensely, holding her breath, to see if he would decide that he’d had enough of her and would reach for the great axe still strapped to his back. He did not though, and after a time, he grunted. “Even if I wanted to prove that he was a prince, it’s useless. Feledias destroyed all the records of his birth—you know that as well as I do. As far as the world knows, Matthias doesn’t exist at all, or at least he’s just another fugitive from the law with a price on his head.”

  Maeve met his gaze, clearing her throat. “Not all the records.”

  He frowned, clearly trying to figure out what she meant, but she said nothing, only waited, watching him, letting him come to the realization on his own.

  She saw it when it came, saw it in the tightening of his features, the narrowing of his eyes. “No.”

  “Cutter—Prince—it’s the only wa—”

  “Maeve, in case you’ve forgotten, the man has no love for me. Besides, last I heard, Feledias threw him in the dungeon. Likely as not, he’s dead already, and even if he isn’t, he may as well be, for there’s no way we’d ever make it to him.”

  “You know he’s not dead,” she said. “The people are willing to put up with a lot from their princes, Cutter”—she paused, meeting his eyes meaningfully—“a lot, the gods know they’ve had to, but the people love Petran, and they would not sit by and watch him be executed. After everything that happened, they are already…disillusioned with the royals. To see their Petran killed…it would cause a revolt.”

  “Maybe,” Cutter agreed, and there was no denying the reluctance in his voice, “but Feledias may not see it that way.”

  She grunted. “I don’t have any love for your brother, Prince, but he is the cleverest man, the cleverest person—a far greater compliment as, by and large, men are fools while the gods saw fit to grant all the cleverness to women—I have ever met. If I have thought of it, rest assured that he has as well. No, the historian still lives, of that I am certain.”

  “Fine, probably you’re right. But even if he does, the man isn’t exactly loyal to the crown and especially not to me. Why would he help?”

  “You’re right,” she admitted, “Petran is not loyal to the crown, but he is loyal to the truth, that above all else. It’s the reason why the people love him so. He will share the truth of the prince’s existence—of his birthright—not in service to you but simply in service to the truth.”

  He frowned. “Maybe. It will be dangerous.”

  She shrugged. “The truth is always dangerous, Prince. After all, it’s the reason why Feledias saw fit to throw Petran into the dungeons in the first place just as it’s the reason why your brother will never—can never—stop until Matt is dead.”

  She could have given him more reasons, a thousand to show him that her idea—while dangerous—was their only option, but she did not. Instead, she only stood silently, watching him, knowing that the tornado chose its path the way it would and no one—certainly not a foolish old woman with her best years far behind her—could leash it and guide it the way another might guide a dog. Besides, while Feledias was always known for his cleverness, for his ability as a tactician and a troop commander and Cutter, his brother, known only as a killer, Maeve knew the man well enough to know that he was no fool himself, possessed of a cunning many would not have credited him with.

  Still, he took his time, considering. Then, finally he grunted. “It will not be easy, sneaking into the capital and into the dungeons to free him.”

  And that was all. For all his faults—and as far as she was concerned, Maeve thought the man had many—one of those things she had always admired about her prince was that, once a task was before him, no matter how grim, he did not hesitate as most did. Instead, as with so many other things in his life, he charged directly at it as if it were some enemy to be conquered. “No,” she said, “it won’t be easy. But then…when is it?”

  He nodded then let out a heavy breath. “Okay. We’ll leave tomorrow.”

  She put a hand on his shoulder, felt him tense beneath her. “You’re doing the right thing.”

  He grunted, turning back to stare at the flame. “I hope you’re right.”

  She watched him then. Others, not knowing him as well as she did, might not have seen the tenseness in his posture, might not have noticed the worry lines in his eyes, but she did, and she knew that that tenseness, that worry, was not for himself but for the boy. The love, it seemed, that he had felt for the mother had been transferred to her son.

  “Will you rest?” she said. “If we are to go to the capital, we have a long journey ahead of us.”

  “Later,” he said, and though it was only the single word, she could hear the dismissal in it. Not a rude one, but one that spoke of deep thoughts, one that spoke of the many fears and worries plaguing him.

  “Goodnight, Bernard,” she said softly. He did not turn or answer, his gaze, instead, remaining locked on the flames, on the corpses burning somewhere inside of them. Life all around him but now, as was so often the case, his gaze was locked on the dead.

  She left him there, with the dead and the fire, left him surrounded by weeping villagers and the darkness. The darkness which hid none of the grief, the pain, which could be heard in the sobbing wails of those the Fey had left behind. The darkness that did not hide her worries, her regrets, and her fear, a fear largely surrounded around the way that, for the first time ever, she had seen her prince’s mask—that mask of invincibility, of certainty—slip. Would it slip again, that mask? And would that slip happen when they needed it most? In the end, would she and those with her die not, as she had so long feared, because of the monster her prince could be, but because of the man he was?

  No, the darkness did not hide her fear or her regrets. It did, however, hide the form of a figure lurking at the fire’s edge, just as it hid the deep, dark bruise on his face, one so very recently acquired. It also hid his expression—a mixture of terror and excitement. It hid, too, the man’s gaze, locked unerringly on Cutter’s hulking form. The man standing, lurking in the shadows, had lost his wife and more recently still, his pride. Some, in the face of such loss, would have crawled into a corner and closed their eyes, doing their best, in their grief, to forget about the world and hoping, too, that it might forget about them. But this man did not do that. In him, those losses, so recent, so fresh, served, as they sometimes did, like chisels, chipping away at who he was, at the life he had built for himself, and when all else was scoured away, there was nothing left but hate. No hope at all—save, perhaps, the hope of revenge.

  The darkness hid the man’s features as they twisted in anger, but worst of all, it hid his furtive movements as he turned
and disappeared into the shadows, heading for the village’s edge, leaving one prince behind in search of another.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  The lion does not thank the man who feeds it, just as it does not wonder at the life of that which it devours.

  It takes the meat, eats it, just as, if the man is foolish and comes too close, it will take the hand which feeds it.

  To the beast, after all, meat is meat.

  And men, the gods help us, are not so very different. Not so very different at all.

  —Words found in a soldier’s journal after battle during the Fey Wars

  They lay in the dew-laden grass, their forms nearly invisible amidst the green blades. They had been lying so for hours now, and Feledias’s impatience was growing by the second as his anger, his thirst for revenge gnawed at his insides like some voracious, hungry rodent. A hunger which would never be sated until Bernard, his traitorous brother, was killed, he and all those who had chosen to follow him.

  They had lain concealed so for hours, yet no one spoke, no one gave vent to the tired yawns which boredom often produced. Neither did they give voice to groans from aches and pains often occurring when men remained so still for so long. Not a single complaint was uttered, a single moan loosed, for many of those near fifty men with him shared Feledias’s hate for his brother, had been wronged by him in some way. As for those who did not share his hate, they, too, remained silent, for they knew well what would happen to them should they jeopardize this opportunity—the best they’d had in years—to finally catch and punish the fugitive prince.

  And so they lay still, the minutes ticking by, and with each that passed, Feledias’s impatience, his anger, grew, until it was a rodent no longer but some great beast writhing within him, ripping and tearing at him in its anxiousness to get the thing done.

  And into this silence, into this tense mood of anticipated murder, a man came. The horse on which he rode was a large beast, one considerably bigger than those coursers which the prince had ordered picketed some distance away so as not to reveal their position. A beast used not for war but for hard labor, and the man on it much the same, not a warrior, Feledias could see at a glance, but a man who, judging by his calloused knuckles and protruding gut, was a laborer, likely a farmer or woodcutter.

  Feledias, while angry at the man’s intrusion, was grateful, at least, to see that though the newcomer rode within a dozen paces of several of his troops, he did not notice him. He considered letting the man pass, had decided to do exactly that—after all, it would be his brother’s luck to be happening out of the Wood only to see several dozen men rise from the tall grass and accost the rider—but then the man spoke.

  Or, more accurately, yelled, his gaze turning this way and that. “Prince Feledias?” he shouted.

  The soldiers nearest Feledias, including Commander Malex, shifted the slightest amount, glancing at Feledias as the man’s shouting continued. Feledias was angry now, for even should they not show themselves, if his brother was close, he could not help but hear the man shouting his name, and even if they did not appear, his brother would likely not be willing to risk it, choosing to either go farther south in the Wood before exiting or, alternatively, to back track.

  “Prince Fele—” the man started again, then let out a shout of shock as Feledias rose, followed a moment later by his soldiers, all of them seeming to appear out of the grass like phantoms, blades in hand. The man’s mount, sharing its rider’s surprise, backed up several paces, the man, in his shock, struggling to gain control of it. Feledias understood the man’s discomfiture, one minute thinking himself alone, the next being surrounded by armed men, all ill-tempered from hours spent barely daring to move, to do anything but breathe, hours that might well have just been squandered by this fool with the bruised face.

  “P-prince,” the man said, his eyes wide, trembling.

  “I am High Prince Feledias,” he said, smiling without humor as he noted the way the man’s eyes tracked to his bared blade and the bared blades of his soldiers around him. “And you are?”

  “C-Cend’s my name, sir, I mean, Prince…my lord.”

  Some farmer hick, a man who, in the right, natural course of things, would have never found himself in the presence of a royal horse let alone the kingdom’s ruler. A reminder, if any was needed, of all that was wrong with the world, all caused by his brother’s betrayal. “Cend,” Feledias said, allowing some of his anger to creep into his tone. “And what, exactly, has brought you here to disrupt me and my men at our work?”

  “W-work, my lord?” the man asked.

  Feledias bared his teeth. “Bloody work, farmer. Now, before you become a part of it, tell me why you have come, why you ride a cart horse and shout my name.”

  “F-forgive me, my lord,” he stammered, “I did not mean to…that is…”

  He trailed off, and Feledias glanced at his troops, sharing an amused smile before looking back to the man. “Out with it, farmer. We are busy men and have little time for your stupidity.”

  “O-of course, Prince,” the man managed, looking far stupider, in that moment, than the weary mount on which he rode, ludicrous really. The peasant cleared his throat, glancing nervously around. “I-it’s your brother, my lord.”

  The dark humor which Feledias had been feeling vanished in that moment. At least, the humor did. The darkness, as ever since his brother’s betrayal, remained. “What of him?” he said, moving forward, and there must have been some hint of his sudden change in mood either in his movements or his voice, for the man’s face grew pale.

  “I…that is, you’re looking for him, aren’t you, my lord? Your brother?”

  Feledias frowned, his eyes narrowing. “And if I were? Speak quickly, farmer. Have you heard some news of my wayward brother’s whereabouts?”

  “N-not as such, my lord,” the man managed.

  Feledias let out a growl and, reading his desires, two of his soldiers surged forward and in another moment the farmer was letting out a squeal similar, no doubt, to one of those barnyard pigs he likely raised as he was ripped off his mount and thrown onto the ground, two bared blades poised at his throat.

  “Then why,” Feledias hissed, “have you come?”

  “I-I didn’t hear of h-him, my lord,” the man stammered, his voice squeaking with his fear, his bruised face writhing with panic, “I-I saw him, I did.”

  “Saw him?”

  “Y-yes, my lord,” the man said, staring at the blades.

  “Do not watch the swords, for your eyes will not stop them from doing their work should I order it,” Feledias said. “Only your voice might do that. Now, tell me, where did you see my brother? The Black Woods?”

  “T-the Black Woods? F-forgive me, my lord, no. He is in my village. Ferrimore.”

  Feledias frowned. “Ferrimore.” He knew the place, of course, knew every town and city, every shithole in the entire kingdom, for even before his Bernard’s betrayal, while his brother had focused on killing—anyone, really, on that point he was never particular—it had been Feledias’s job to follow behind him, cleaning up the mess, appeasing terrified, grieving villagers who inevitably suffered when his brother passed through.

  “Ferrimore?” Commander Malex asked from behind him, his surprise clear in his tone. “But how? Surely he should have went to Valaidra. Why would he have chosen Ferrimore instead?”

  “There is only one reason,” Feledias said, his hands clenching into fists at his sides. “He knew we were waiting for him.”

  The soldiers shared uneasy glances at that. “Forgive me, my prince,” the commander said, “but how could he? How could he possibly have known?”

  Feledias’s frown deepened. “I think I know. It is that pet mage of his—I saw him, before, was present when he had one of his…fits. Visions, he calls them. More than once, those visions saved my brother and his merry little band from disaster.”

  “You mean the mage, Challadius?” Malex asked, surprised. “But…he died, didn’t he? Fi
fteen years ago?”

  Feledias hissed. “An illusion, no doubt. My brother’s pet mage has a knack for those, if nothing else.”

  Malex frowned, perhaps doubting it, but that was fine, just so long as he kept his doubts to himself. Feledias, though, knew it was true, felt it, inside himself. The mage was back. A foolish mistake, for he could have went on living in whatever pathetic rathole he’d crawled into and done so for a few more years. Of course, Feledias would have hunted him down eventually, once he’d dealt with his brother, but he promised himself now that he would make the taking of the man’s life, the tearing apart of it bit by bit, a priority. But first, there was the farmer to deal with.

  He turned back to the man. “How long ago did he pass through Ferrimore?”

  “B-beggin’ your pardon, my lord,” the farmer said, “but he didn’t pass through. Him and the others with him, they’re still there—they took rooms at the inn not a couple of hours gone.”

  Feledias felt his breath catch in his throat at that, but something the man said caught his attention, and he forced himself to remain calm, forced himself to resist the urge to sprint to the horses and to go riding off in the direction of Ferrimore as quickly as possible. It was something his brother would have done, in the past, trusting in himself—and more importantly, his axe—to carve his way past whatever problems a decision made in haste might produce. Feledias, though, had always been, by necessity, the thinker of the family, the strategist, and so he resisted the compulsion, kneeling beside the farmer instead. “Others? What others?”