The Passage of Kings

by Anant V Goswami

  “I am not bound to answer you boy, you will do as I say, or you will refuse a dying man’s wish, a dying father’s wish,” said King Henrik in an unexpectantly calm voice.

  “Dying? Whose father is dying?”

  King Henrik pulled back his hood and at that moment, lightning flashed in the sky, and the king’s face was illuminated for a few heartbeats, enough for Garen to make out the tears of blood, red against the pale cheeks of the king, rolling down from eyes that were slowly losing their blacks to a hazy white.

  The White Curse had found its next prey.

  Garen staggered back, his heart in his mouth, and shock on his face.

  “No. No. NOOO! Not you, father, not now, not when I need you the most.” Garen’s voice trembled and he felt as if he was back in the dungeon from his childhood.

  “Don’t embarrass yourself, you are a man grown. If you really want to do something for me, then kill the boy and his sister, and perhaps you may buy me some time, not that I want to linger anymore in this rotten world.”

  Garen knew he was defeated. He stood glued to the spot, as rain battered his cloak. He wanted to reach out and embrace his father, but he knew Henrik Swolderhornn was not a man made for embraces.

  Men don’t embrace each other, they embrace war, and they embrace victory, and when things don’t go their way, they embrace death with a mad man’s smile, Garen remembered his father telling him once, having completely forgotten the night when he had held young Garen in his arms in a dungeon that was dark and terrible.

  “I will do it,” Garen whispered. “I promise you, I will.”

  “Good,” said King Henrik as he wiped the blood away from his face and hid his face behind the hood once again, “and do not speak of this to anyone, not Marston, not your brother, and definitely not your mother, although I know she would rejoice at the news. And don’t take this gloomy face in front of others tomorrow, you have just been crowned king, show them you are happy, bed a few whores for all I care, and forget about me and the curse. Rage, my dear son, rage into the night.”

  You remember these words but forget who you were when you first spoke them to me. And now you die.

  Why do you die?

  ∞∞∞

  The men did not look back, and neither did the warriors of Maeryn. Their eyes were glued to the road ahead, and they knew that looking back would only make them ache for the comfort and the safety of their tents. And where they were going, safety was one thing that no one expected to find. Garen Swolderhornn was mounted upon Shatterhooves, the horse looking proud and regal, adorned with a richly decorated grey and white caparison, and gilded chanfron and criniere. Garen himself wore a horned greathelm, and plate armor emblazoned with a grey warhorn on the chest and two golden warhorns on the gauntlet. A steely looking grey cape hung from his shoulders, draped on the back of the horse. Grey eyes with flecks of gold were the only things visible on the king’s face, as he rode in front of a long column of archers, swordsmen, pikemen, and crossbowmen, on Fornhornian horses that trotted along with grace and elegance.

  The soldiers behind him wore hauberks made of chain mail and surcoats that bore the grey and black colors and sigil of the Swolderhornn dynasty. Heavy coifs made of linked chains covered their head, whereas knights wore plate armor, without the cape. The grey and Calypsian men were followed by thirty Maeryn warriors, wearing light plate armor and no helm, their golden hair flowing behind them with a rage, their foreheads painted with three blue dots in the shape of a triangle, and leading them was Diyana, the princess of Maeryn, daughter of Queen Ayana, her turquoise armor and cape matching the blue of her eyes and the sky. The Maeryns were followed by the hundred men-at-arms of Harduin, all of them wielding a long sword, led by the boy king Sanrick, looking clumsy and uncomfortable on his horse that looked like a pony beneath him. Elsa Faerson rode beside him, a flower among steel, an oasis in a desert.

  Finally, the rear was brought by Olver, leading fifty of his most elite bodyguards, knights sworn to protect him, on armored horses that shone like diamonds in the bright sunlight, along with mules and ponies laden with provisions that were supposed to last them for months. And so, this was the composition of men and women who were given the task of saving the realm.

  Garen had said his farewell to his father, alone in the massive royal tent, where he had received an unexpected embrace from his mother, and also his father’s sword. It hung heavy from his leather belt as he rode toward The Endless Forest, sheathed in a bronze scabbard that added to the weight. Garen wondered if Olver regretted not meeting his family before leaving, although he had declared numerous times that he did not wish to delay their departure by going back to his kingdom and saying his farewell.

  The boy has more honor in him than I previously thought possible. I wonder what he would have done in my place, I wonder if honor would have lost against the wish of a dying father. But then, where is the honor in sleeping with the girl whose ancestors slaughtered your own? Although, my honor would also waver in front of a face as fair as hers.

  The column of Aerdonians was slowly snaking its way through the forest of Eravia, their going made slow by fallen trees and broken branches, an aftermath of the storm that had raged on for the entirety of the previous night. Garen could feel the chill of the dawn through his steel armor, but he also knew that the sun would beat down on them like whips on a slave’s back, the moment they would enter the grasslands of Calypsos. It was Diyana who had suggested that they enter The Endless Forest from the grasslands, and not from the forest of Eravia. “The trees are not so dense near the grasslands,” she had said, “it will make our going easy for the first couple of days at least.”

  “And after that?” Olver had asked, pouring over the map of Aerdon sprawled on the table before him, his finger trailing the route that they were supposed to take.

  “After that we are on our own, for no map has ever been drawn that describes the land after a journey of two days into the woods, Men who have returned from the Endless Forest only made it to two days, before either the dread of the forest forced them back, or they were just scouts who were sent to patrol the perimeters,” Diyana had said with a smirk, red fingernails as sharp as knives tapping the arm of the chair she sat on.

  “So, each day that we survive after the second is a victory,” Garen had said.

  “Or mayhaps, brings you closer to death.” Elsa Faerson had spoken from the corner of the tent, where she had been sitting quietly in the shadows for the longest time.

  My death or yours, girl?

  After a few hours, the road had begun to climb steadily, and Garen noticed the dense growth of aspen and sweet chestnut trees giving way to the pines that grew on the hills of Eravia. Garen had studied the map as well, and he knew they would have to go over the hills of Eravia, and then through the swamps before they would emerge out of the forest and enter the grasslands, and he also knew that the hills were home to wolves and the bandits, although he knew the bandits wouldn’t dare attack so many men, but he could not say the same about the wolves.

  They had made good ground from when they had left early in the morning, but as the road began to climb a long incline, their going got slower, and the mules and ponies began to lag behind. More often than not, Garen and his men had to halt and wait for the others to catch up. By midday, they were well into the hills as Garen glimpsed the sea of trees from atop a hill, stretching in all directions, a splash of different types of green and brown scattered here and there, and Lake Aerdos, sparkling in the distance, like a small sea that had somehow been cut off from the ocean. Tracks of wolves and other four-legged creatures started to appear frequently and once or twice, Garen swore he saw something grey and massive run swiftly among the trees. For a long time afterward, Garen kept glancing sideways, hoping to spot a wolf behind the dense growth of trees and bushes, so he could hunt it down and get his blood pumping before they reached the grasslands, however, he did not glimpse anything, and he had to content himself by just ogling P
rincess Diyana, who had taken his fancy. The men were in a jolly mood as well, singing and laughing, and sometimes joking and jesting with the women of Maeryn. And during halts, Garen would notice a man sneak off into the woods with a Maeryn woman, only to return with disheveled hair, or a piece of clothing missing. Garen himself had been known for his womanizing ways back in Riverhelm, and it was said that he had bedded all of the fair maidens in the city, lowborn or high, and now he was just going through them twice. And perhaps he would have tried his luck with Diyana of Maeryn, if he had been in the mood, but the encounter with his father had taken away all the joy and happiness from him, leaving him miserable and gloomy.

  Maybe after I save the realm and my father, I will pay a visit to the city of Silentgarde, up in the mountains of Zaeyos and discover what she hides under that turquoise armor of hers.

  After having camped in the night, near a shallow stream and surrounded by the sound of howling wolves and running water, the column had resumed its journey with renewed strength and passion in the early hours of the day, galvanized by the fact that the road had finally ceased to climb, and had leveled off, making their journey easier once again, much to the delight of the mules and ponies. Leading his men from the wooded hills of Eravia, their leaves wearing the dazzling crowns of droplets giving birth to mini rainbows as sunlight bounced off their surface, Garen himself felt much more hopeful of the future. A sense of conviction had replaced the doubts of uncertainty that had been lingering in his head.

  And so, the column continued its journey, men and women of the four kingdoms of Aerdon, led by their young and regal rulers, looking mighty on their destriers, except for Sanrick perhaps, who, Garen sometimes thought would fall from his horse or get tangled in his stirrups whenever they had been riding for long durations without a halt. That is when Elsa would scream for them to stop, feigning hunger or exhaustion; however, Garen knew that she did it all for her brother. However, Olver Liongloom never asked for a break, and neither did his soldiers look weary. They marched on, their faces resolute and their eyes full of determination

  The men of Indius are hard to break, thought Garen as he remembered the tales of valor and bravery that had come to be associated with the kings of Indius. He remembered his nursemaid, the old, wrinkled Shauna, whispering to him in the dead of night, reading from a book that looked as ancient as her, stories from the Battle of Lies.

  Three arrows in his back, and one he took in his eye, yes my lord, four arrows and still he fought, Shauna’s voice came floating back, fought while his men were getting butchered all around him, fought as he plucked the arrow from his eyes, and pried his eye out with his own dagger, yes, he did, for the eye was bleeding like a river, and he wanted to see his enemy. They finally captured King Philis, drenched in his own blood and his enemy’s, and they tortured him for days, but they could not break his spirit, my lord, they couldn’t.

  And now I travel with the boy who is a direct descendant of King Philis, thought Garen, who I will have to betray.

  ∞∞∞

  Twelve days went by, and it was on the morning of the thirteenth day that the descent finally began. It had rained every day, and it had not taken long for the joy of men to turn into sorrow, as sleeping on wet cloaks, finding dry firewood and insect bites started to take a toll on their morale. Even the men from Indius began to feel irritated, and it was only the warriors from Maeryn who dwelled in the mountains, and lived among the trees, who were finding no difficulty facing the tribulations of nature. But as the soldiers slowly started to crawl their way down the slopes, their horses waddling through streams, leaping over fallen trunks, the sky cleared, and a scorching sun emerged from behind the grey clouds.

  “Rejoice while you can, for it is this sun that you will come to hate when you ride through the grasslands,” Diyana had said, “you will find no tree to offer you shade, and no stream to bathe and cool your sweltering bodies.”

  What a rousing speech.

  “If only I could fuck her mouth shut,” Garen had heard one of the Calypsian soldier murmur in annoyance.

  “The girl only wishes to warn us of what we will come across, you fool,” an archer riding beside him had grumbled, “fucking her won’t change anything.”

  “Oh, but It will give me the strength to face the heat of a thousand burning suns,” the soldier sniggered.

  “I’ll tell ye’ where ye’ can find the heat o’ a thousand burning suns, it's between them long legs of hers,” another soldier with crooked teeth and half an eyebrow said with a chuckle.

  Garen had stopped paying attention to their conversation as he did not wish to hear about the ways in which they would make love to the Maeryn princess. But he did know that the troubles of the past thirteen days would look petty before the days which were yet to arrive. The grasslands were known for their unbearable climate, and the ferocity of the sun and its heat, known to boil the water out of a steel cauldron and burn the skin off the bone.

  Let’s see if the mountain dwellers can bear a little sun on their backs.

  On the fifteenth day of their journey, the trees around them began to grow sparse, with hardly any leaves on them, their color changing from the dark green of a rainforest to light yellow. The hooves of their horses made a crunching sound on the fallen leaves as they finally rode out of the beauty of Eravia and into the vast and desolate landscape of the dry grasslands of Calypsos. It was Garen who first emerged out of the woods and gazed upon the yellow plains that stretched before him, flat and without any depression or elevation, meeting the sky at the horizon where blue and yellow came together. Behind him, the other riders also emerged out of the trees, and for the first time the column spread out.

  “The Great Grasslands of Calypsos, vast and endless, yellow and ugly,” Sir Marston said as he trotted up beside his king, a tall, well-built knight, and the commander of the Calypsian army.

  “Why does everything have to be endless, Ser Marston, The Endless Forest, The Endless Grasslands, I swear if I come across anything else that begins with the word ‘endless’, I am sure to end my life,” said Garen as he plunged into the waist-high ocean of yellow grass, followed by other riders, their horses looking like ships sailing on a golden sea, their legs hidden in the grass.

  Onwards and onwards they marched, until the sun was directly above their heads and the first drops of sweat started to adorn the wrinkled foreheads of their faces. Garen knew the time of extreme suffering was slowly drawing near, the stories of the men who burned to their death crossing the grasslands were sprouting in his head. He looked around and saw that the soldiers of the other kingdoms were all riding side by side now, no longer having to ride in a column, alone with none besides them to talk with. But the heat had forced the soldiers to ride in silence, for talking required energy and that was something the soldiers needed to conserve. The sun had still not unleashed all of its fury, for none had died yet, and Garen knew some of them would.

  They rode until dusk, and as the sun slowly disappeared below the horizon, much to the relief of the Aerdonians, Diyana of Maeryn stirred her horse into a gallop, and caught up with Garen, strands of her wet blood-red hair sticking to her forehead because of the sweat that glistened off her skin.

  Even sweat does not diminish her beauty. She looks as graceful as ever. And here I look like a copper-less peasant before her.

  “We should halt for a break; our soldiers grow weary,” Diyana said as she came to a trot beside Garen, her horse half the size of the massive stallion Shatterhooves, who towered above every horse and man alike.

  “And make camp where? The size of the grass makes it impossible to sleep in.”

  “We can flatten the grass with our shields to make a clearing, and then, perhaps, his grace can sleep like a child in a soft feather bed, isn’t that what his grace expects?” Diyana whispered in a low silky voice.

  “Well, it escaped my memory that you lot carry shields. You see, men of Calypsos don’t need shields. We attack and not defend, and when w
e do need to defend, then we attack some more.”

  Diyana chuckled, “what sort of foolish bravery is that? You are very proud of your skills as a swordsman, aren’t you? Perhaps you consider yourself to be the next King Philis, or the next Sir Redwrath, The Knight of Pain.”

  “Who fought and died beside my ancestors, why shouldn’t I take pride in such a lineage?” Garen asked with a wrinkled forehead.

  “Because it was them who carried out the great deeds that make you so proud today, they fought the battles where thousands of men died, and battles where they killed hundreds. How many men have you killed, Prince Garen, or is it King Garen now?”

  “I have won every duel I fought, every tourney…”

  “How many men have you killed, Your Grace?” Diyana cut him short.

  The bitch plays with fire.

  “None,” Garen responded.

  “A man faced with death fights like a man who wants to live. A man who fights in tourneys fights for gold and fame. Although gold and fame are great motivators, but I have come to learn that staying alive is an even better one. It is against these men that the true mettle of your swordsmanship will be tested. But don’t fret, for that time will be upon us soon.”

  “And I will kill everything that comes my way, my lady, I promise you,” Garen said and then raised his hand and screamed for the others to halt.

  ∞∞∞

  The night did not bring any respite for the soldiers. The sun had long vanished and the stars now littered the night sky. The sun had taken the heat away but had left them with humidity which was proving to be as forbidding as the sun beating down upon their steel armor, if not more. And humidity meant an increased thirst, and an increased thirst meant an increase in the consumption of drinking water.