Wrath of Kings

by Glen Cook

  “Think trying a little harder and remembering a little better might help?” Inger didn’t believe him and he knew it. She needed that money desperately. Her gestures toward the populace were expensive. Already she was taking loans from the Estates. “Very well. General?”

  “I’ve applied all the persuasion I can, Your Majesty. The men in the outlying posts were selected for dedication to the King’s ideals. They’re stalling till your direction becomes clear. They don’t want to pledge, then be embarrassed. There would be less difficulty were your cousin not so much in evidence. It’s the wait-and-see attitude you find everywhere. You can’t blame people, really.”

  “Maybe not. But meanwhile our neighbors are watching us. The Alteans may be benign, but Volstokin wouldn’t mind paying back the beating they took when they interceded in the civil war. Speaking of which. Everyone predicted civil war if I took over. It’s peaceful out there. What happened?”

  Liakopulos replied, “The estimations were predicated on the assumption that you would take power illegally.”

  “Michael?”

  “There is emotional resistance. Some army units, for instance, might rebel if there was an uprising here. What it is, nobody wants to start it. The rebel fever is out there, but it’s unfocused. I’d say, right now, the main reason for lack of resistance is absence of a charismatic leader. There is no pretender, no rallying point, just an undirected dissatisfaction.”

  “No pretender,” Inger mused. She turned to Gales. “Josiah, that brings us to my cousin.” Her expression soured.

  Gales’s crisis of conscience had been solved for him. He was now Inger’s creature heart and soul. She had accomplished the transition through the timeless expedient of seduction. He was now her agent in her cousin’s camp.

  Gales said, “Your Majesty, any restlessness in Kavelin is nothing to that in the Duke’s camp. He’s very bitter. He’s carrying on like you’ve robbed him of his birthright. It won’t be long before he and the sorcerer Norath hatch something. I expect they’ll turn to me when they do. His Lordship thinks I’m his agent still.”

  Inger nodded. “I imagine you haven’t seen a tenth of Dane’s fury. He had hopes of making Kavelin a base from which he could establish a western empire. I’ve been a severe disappointment. Tell me more about Norath. He worries me.”

  “I can’t, Your Majesty. No one sees him. He stays sequestered. What’s he doing here? What’s his relationship with your cousin? Colonel Trebilcock and I have discussed this repeatedly without reaching any conclusions.”

  “Michael?”

  “I sent queries to Al Rhemish. There’s been no response. I doubt we’ll learn much anyway. Norath was Megelin’s chief adviser. Suddenly, he’s here. That may be all we’ll ever know.”

  “My cousin has the answer. Perhaps I can pry it out…. What’s that?”

  Someone was tapping at the door. The guard there opened it. “Messenger for Colonel Trebilcock,” he said.

  “Go ahead, Michael. Maybe they found the money.” Sarcastic smile.

  Michael went, curious and a bit nervous. He had been out of touch with his people since yesterday. What had happened? He listened to several minutes of urgent whispers. He returned to the meeting, interrupting continued speculation about Magden Norath. “Your Majesty, there is a rebel movement after all.”

  “Michael?”

  “Can’t really give you anything hard right now. I’m told messages are pouring in. Credence Abaca apparently launched a nationwide offensive at dawn, cadred by Marena Dimura troops. Several smaller garrisons have declared for him. So have the city fathers of Sedlmayr. So far Credence has limited his attacks to your friends of the Estates. The odd thing is, he claims to be Marshall, acting on behalf of King Bragi the Second.” That had shaken Michael when he had heard it. He had expected Kristen to remain in hiding.

  Inger turned pale. “Kristen’s brat? I thought…” She stopped before it became apparent she possessed guilty knowledge. “How strong are they? Why didn’t you warn us this was coming?”

  “I told you, there’s nothing hard yet. I didn’t warn you because I didn’t know. I haven’t been able to penetrate the Marena Dimura community. They won’t have anything to do with outsiders. Numberwise, Credence can’t have much, though. The Marena Dimura aren’t numerous, nor are they well-armed. He’s trying a coup. It’ll fall apart in a few days.”

  “General?”

  “I’d agree, Your Majesty.”

  “You and Michael go deal with it. Now. I’ll expect a report before I turn in.”

  “As you wish, Your Majesty,” Liakopulos said.

  “He pulled a slick one,” Michael observed as he and Liakopulos stalked through the castle halls.

  “You should have seen it coming. It was too quiet.”

  “Maybe. Still, it should peak today and fall apart before the end of the week.”

  Michael guessed wrong. Sundown brought the second phase of Abaca’s campaign. It left the nation staggered. He employed the Harish on loan from Yasmid. Michael had all but forgotten them. Half the religious fanatics struck in the vicinity of Vorgreberg. Three teams of three hurled themselves at Greyfells and Norath. Norath’s sorcery saved him and the Duke, but both were gravely wounded. Most of their captains were slain. Josiah Gales missed death by sheer luck.

  The Estates suffered even more grievously. Abaca’s planning had been meticulous, and aimed at the heart of the opposition. He was using men who did not care if they came out alive. Their strike crippled Inger’s ability to respond to the rebellion.

  Almost immediately, the surviving cadre battalions of the South Bows and Sedlmayr Light regiments declared for Bragi II.

  Michael and Liakopulos flanked Inger at a table on which a map of Kavelin lay. Their voices were soft, and concerned. “Count out Delhagen, Holtschlaw, Uhlmansiek, and Orthwein,” Michael said. “Damn. Four provinces gone already. And half a dozen more suspect.”

  “General, what about the other regiments?”

  “The Damhorsters will stick. The Vorgrebergers and Queen’s Own are safe.

  And, of course, the Guard is sound.”

  “What about the Breidenbachers and Borderers? And the garrison in the Gap?”

  “The Borderers are too dispersed to go either way. Split them according to the sentiment of the area where they’re stationed. Maisak is temporizing. I haven’t heard anything from the Breidenbachers.”

  “Do something. If they go…. look at the damned map. The whole east would be against us. Some of their units are within a few miles of Vorgreberg.”

  “You forgot the Midlands Light,” Michael said. The Midlands Light hadn’t taken part in the summer exercises. None of its men had gone east with Ragnarson. It remained at full strength.

  “Let’s not talk about them,” Inger said. “About them we should pray. If they go, we’re dead.”

  “Don’t give up on them,” Liakopulos said. “They’re mostly Wesson, but Credence never had much influence with them.”

  “Find out,” Inger ordered. “Find out fast. If they stick, start using them. Use them fast.”

  Liakopulos said, “May I remind Your Majesty that I’m due to resign? I believe Colonel Gales was supposed to replace me?”

  “You’re both too valuable where you are. You agreed to stay as long as I needed you, General. You conscience won’t let you stay to fight Abaca?”

  “We can fight him,” Michael said. “But we won’t like it. He’s our friend.”

  “Not anymore, he isn’t. He chose enmity. Look. I want to hit back. Hard, and soon. Before this can become a real war. Can you finagle that into your sense of duty?”

  “All right,” Michael replied. “All right. We’ve started. Redouble the Palace Guard first thing. There will be more attacks by assassins.” He’d never confessed that he had brought the Harish into the kingdom himself, then had let Abaca get control. Nor did he admit that he knew quite a bit about what Credence was doing. His goals were not those of either party to
the fighting.

  Abaca spent Harish assassins liberally. He kept the Crown’s forces at a standstill. Desertions plagued both sides. Norath, repeatedly attacked and twice more wounded by the Harish, not armed with his pride of monsters, and unable to cope with Abaca’s woodland guerrilla warfare, found an excuse to return to Hammad al Nakir. Megelin hadn’t fared well in his absence anyway.

  Winter’s arrival saw the sides at a standoff. Inger controlled the cities and castles. Abaca controlled much of the countryside. Their soldiers showed little inclination to mix it up. They could see no reason to fight men with whom they had stood shoulder to shoulder during the Great Eastern Wars.

  Michael became a man in the middle, playing a game with purpose and parameters known only to himself. Both sides believed he was their man. For a time. In reality he began fighting his own war, as a third force. It was touchy and dangerous, and he had to be alert every instant. Whatever he might pretend, he knew he had no real friends inside Kavelin. That cannibal bitch had eaten them all.

  For the first time Michael knew fear. It was just a feather’s caress, and mainly fear of failure, but it was fear nevertheless. “Damn you, Bragi,” he muttered frequently, like an incantation. “Why did you have to go crazy at the end? Why did you have to run off on us?”

  Sometime in the heart of winter, when neither Inger nor Credence was watching, Michael disappeared. He reappeared only rarely, at random, in unpredictable places. As Derel Prataxis had observed on his deathbed, Michael Trebilcock had his own shadow empire and shadow government. He simply slipped off into that shadow world, where his own people served with unquestioning loyalty, both to him and to the dream. They were almost everywhere, and were as spectral as he.

  He became an invisible boulder in the stream of war, unseen but felt, and feared by everyone. No one could fathom his motives, but he had to be accounted for in every plan. He remained there, like that rock. Backs had to be watched. Unwritten rules, apparently benefiting Kavelin as a whole, had to be observed. He who ignored Michael did so at his peril.

  Michael’s war was intended to buy time. He knew something the other principles did not. Only Kristen, Sherilee, and Ragnarson’s children shared the secret.

  Buying time. Awaiting a chance to wake the cruel storm that would be put paid to relentless ambition and bickering for all time… that was what Michael called the inevitable. The cruel storm.

  For in Throyes a man who was not dead had set his feet on a path to coldness of heart.

  A Path to Coldness of Heart

  Contents

  One: Year 1016 After the Founding of the Empire of Ilkazar; The Price of Hubris

  Two: 1016–1017 AFE; Mountains Far

  Three: Winter, 1017 AFE; Scattered Views

  Four: 1017 AFE; Dread Realm

  Five: Year 1017 AFE; Spring Threatening

  Six: Year 1017 AFE; King Without a Throne

  Seven: Year 1017 AFE; Eastern Empire

  Eight: Year 1017 AFE; The Desert Kingdom

  Nine: Spring, Year 1017 AFE; The Lesser Kingdoms

  Ten: Summer, 1017 AFE; In the East

  Eleven: Summer, Year 1017 AFE; Legendary Confusion

  Twelve: Year 1017 AFE; Kavelin: Shadow Dancing

  Thirteen: 1017 AFE; Eyes of Night

  Fourteen: 1017 AFE; Ghosts of Tangled Destiny

  Fifteen: Summer, Year 1017 AFE; Sedlmayr

  Sixteen: Year 1017 AFE; The East

  Seventeen: Year 1017 AFE; Ghosts

  Eighteen: Year 1017 AFE; Distracting Darkness

  Nineteen: Year 1017 AFE; Chaos in Peace

  Twenty: Year 1017 AFE; Peaceable Kingdoms

  Twenty-one: Winter, Year 1017 AFE; An Era Ended

  Twenty-two: Winter, Year 1017 AFE; Throyes

  Twenty-three: Autumn, Year 1018 AFE; Weather Developing

  Twenty-four: Autumn, Year 1018 AFE; Strange Attractors

  Twenty-five: Late Autumn, Year 1018 AFE; Desert of Despair

  Twenty-six: Late Autumn, 1018 AFE; Beyond the Resurrection

  Twenty-seven: Winter, Year 1018 AFE; Spiraling In

  Twenty-eight: Winter, Year 1018 AFE; Run in Circles

  Twenty-nine: Winter, 1018–1019 AFE; Fire and Maneuver

  Thirty: Year 1019 AFE; New Year Begun

  Thirty-one: Year 1019 AFE; Knots at the End of the Rope

  ONE: YEAR 1016

  AFTER THE FOUNDING OF THE EMPIRE OF ILKAZAR THE PRICE OF HUBRIS

  The prisoner clamped his jaw on a shriek. He had moved too suddenly, turning. He did swear softly. He could not work his muscles, could not build the strength to escape if his wounds did not heal. And they would not if he kept trying before the meat was ready.

  A clatter rose outside. This austere suite might be his entire world for the remainder of his existence: a reward for having befriended a woman and having saved the life of a man.

  It was the middle of the night. Darkness with stars filled the single foot square window high in the east wall, well beyond his reach. He should be sleeping.

  He lay in bed, back to the doorway, feigning sleep, when the visitors arrived. Three, from the sounds of it: one large, one small, one delicate. Female, if fragrance did not lie.

  “He heals slowly,” one said. “The physician blames his despair.”

  That voice belonged to Lord Ssu-ma Shih-ka’i, commander of Shinsan’s Western Army. It was by Shih-ka’i’s grace that the prisoner lived.

  A second familiar voice said, “The physician should look closer. He’s clever. He’ll show you what you expect to see till you relax. Then you’ll be dead.”

  The prisoner’s exact strategy. If only his body would heal!

  Shih-ka’i said, “The physician says his wounds pierced his soul. He over-reached—and it cost him everything.”

  Mist, Empress of the Dread Empire, considered before she replied. “It can’t be easy, living on after making so many bad decisions.”

  The prisoner, who thought of himself only as “the prisoner” because of his shame, compelled himself to relax, to breathe slow and deep. But he could not stop tears from leaking.

  Thousands had died because of his decisions. A kingdom might be destroyed by civil war. His family would be fugitives already. The child-woman he had loved… Who knew? If Sherilee was clever she would insist that she had known him only as someone who visited her friend Kristen, widow of his son and mother of his grandchildren.

  He thought about Inger, his wife and queen, seldom. When he did, though, it was with a grand ration of guilt. That love had died.

  Inger came to mind when the pain was bad. They met the last time he lay just outside the Dark Gate, she a volunteer nurse helping heroes injured while holding the wolves of the Dread Empire at bay. In his loneliness he had asked her to become his wife.

  He had lost another wife, Elana, and another lover, Fiana, before Inger.

  Women who loved him did not fare well.

  “Were I in charge here,” said the woman who had been a friend, and a wife to his best friend’s wife’s brother, “and I was sure that he would recover, I would brick up the doorway.”

  Lord Ssu-ma said, “I bear the man no love but that is excessive. He’s a cripple. He’ll never recover fully. And he’s nowhere where he can cause any grief.”

  The prisoner had no idea where “here” was. Inside Dread Empire territory, certainly. Though Shinsan had suffered severely lately, not one inch of ground had been abandoned

  How were Shinsan’s wars coming? He had helped facilitate the conclusion of one and had been the loser in another. The Matayangan front must have turned favorable, too. Mist had time to visit.

  She observed, “O Shing was a cripple.”

  “As you say. Vigilance is required.”

  The night visitors withdrew, to the prisoner’s frustration. He had hoped to hear something more heartening.

  Despair led to self-flagellation. Then, finally, feigned sleep segued into the real thing.

  Inger watched her captains b
icker over a map. They were getting nowhere. She was too tired to scold them. Too tired to ask what new disasters had them bickering.

  Ethnically, three were Nordmen from Kavelin’s old ruling class. Two were Wessons, freemen, descendants of long-ago immigrants from Itaskia. Inger was Itaskian-born, as was the sixth man, whom she had borrowed from her cousin Dane. Dane’s little army was wintering fifty miles west of Vorgreberg, too far away to provide quick support. Regions nearer the capital were less friendly. Dane’s men suffered virulent guerrilla attacks if they moved nearer to Vorgreberg. That forced them to cluster in stronger bands. Those became a strain on local resources, which, in turn, left the locals more sympathetic to the rebels.

  Inger refused to let Dane move into the city. She said she did not want to cede the countryside. In truth she did not want her uncontrollable cousin in position to control Kavelin by controlling her.

  He would try, given the chance.

  Power was his reason for having come to Kavelin. Power was why she had wed Kavelin’s lonely king.

  Inger sipped scalding tea.

  She was a tall, handsome woman whose blond hair had begun to streak grey. Time was not the thief of her beauty. Stress, fear, and lack of sleep were the demons responsible.

  The hot tea wakened her fully. “Silence! Thank you, gentlemen. Using the term loosely. Mr. Cleary, you talk. Everyone else stay quiet.”

  Cleary was the senior Wesson, a stout, sturdy man of thirty-three who had served King Bragi faithfully and remained loyal now that Bragi had fallen. Inger trusted him. The Nordmen and Nathan Wolf, borrowed from Dane of Greyfells, she trusted not at all. In Wolf’s case it was no secret that he was here to watch her because Dane no longer had faith in Josiah Gales.

  “Ma’am. Your Majesty. The contention arose because General Liakopulos has gone missing. No one knows where, when, or how. He was polling units out west to see where they stand, now. Our discussion concerned possible hows and whys of his disappearance.”

  Inger’s heart sank. This was bad news indeed, though not a surprise. Liakopulos had had little interest in supporting her. He had been Bragi’s man. He considered her incapable of, or uninterested in, pursuing Bragi’s reforms. “What are the theories? Mr. Wolf?”