Product Description
An over mighty duke holds sway in the kingdom of Ropeua. But times are changing. The king is old, and mad. As the reign ends the future is uncertain. A warrior prince waits in the wings. Others bide their time. And in the capital an insignificant rogue seeks loot and adventure, unaware that the choices he makes could have as much importance as the ambitions of dukes and princes. Behind them all, the very fabric of the world is in flux, and the gods themselves tremble, as the time of the cusp nears, when even the immortals might fall.
HORN OF THE RIVER GOD
By
FRANCES MASON
Copyright Frances Mason 2017
The author asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
Contents
Product Description
Copyright Frances Mason 2017
Preface
Chapter 1: Augustyn: Thedra
Chapter 2: Jared and Javid: Thedra
Chapter 3: Alex: Thedra
Chapter 4: Jared and Javid: Thedra
Chapter 5: Agmar: Glede
Chapter 6: Alex: Thedra
Chapter 7: Alex: Thedra
Chapter 8: Eleanor: Navre
Chapter 9: Alex: Thedra
Chapter 10: Agmar: Glede
Chapter 11: Sophie: Thedra
Chapter 12: Alex: Thedra
Chapter 13: Jasper: Lurvale
Chapter 14: Augustyn: Thedra
Chapter 15: Jasper: Lurvale
Chapter 16: Arty and Oly: Thedra
Chapter 17: Jasper: Lurvale
Chapter 18: Rose: Thedra
Chapter 19: Augustyn: Thedra
Chapter 20: Augustyn: Thedra
Chapter 21: Jasper: Lurvale
Chapter 22: Strange Creature: Thedra
Chapter 23: Alex: Thedra
Chapter 24: Conner Mac Naught: East of Es Wol
Chapter 25: Rose: Thedra
Chapter 26: Agmar: Glede
Chapter 27: Conner Mac Naught: East of Es Wol
Chapter 28: Rose: Thedra
Chapter 29: Alex: Thedra
Chapter 30: Sophie: Fountain of the Nymphs
Chapter 31: Eleanor: Thedra
Chapter 32: Raoul: Thedra
Chapter 33: Alex: Thedra
Chapter 34: Jasper: Vrong Veld
Chapter 35: Jasper: Vrong Veld
Chapter 36: Oliver: Thedra
Chapter 37: Jasper: Vrong Veld
Chapter 38: Strange Creature: Thedra
Chapter 39: Jasper: Vrong Veld
Chapter 40: Arthur: Thedra
Chapter 41: Jasper: West of Vrong Veld
Chapter 42: Alex: Thedra
Chapter 43: Raoul: Thedra
Chapter 44: Agmar: Peat Bogs
Chapter 45: Arthur: Thedra
Chapter 46: Sophie and Eleanor: Thedra
Chapter 47: Agmar: Peat Bogs
Chapter 48: Arthur and Oliver: Thedran Plain
Chapter 49: Alex: Thedra
Chapter 50: Arthur and Oliver: Thedran Plain
Chapter 51: Eleanor: Thedra
Chapter 52: Strange Creature: Thedra
Chapter 53: Alex: Thedra
Chapter 54: Oliver: Thedra
Chapter 55: Alex: Thedra
Chapter 56: Arthur: Thedra
Chapter 57: Sophie: Summer Palace
Chapter 58: Arthur: Thedran Foothills
Chapter 59: Sophie: King’s Forest
Chapter 60: Arthur: Thedran Foothills
Chapter 61: Jasper: Thedran Foothills
Chapter 62: Arthur: Thedran Plain
Chapter 63: Agmar: Thedran Foothills
Chapter 64: Prince Richard: Summer Palace
Chapter 65: Arthur: Thedran Plain
Chapter 66: Alnoth: King’s Forest
Postscript: Strange Creature: Thedra
Preface
In the fiftieth year of the cycle of the Primal Dragon, year 3757 in Ropeuan reckoning, I, Mekel, master scribe of the Brotherhood of the Leaves, set down for posterity the Chronicles of the Cusp, otherwise known as the Song of Agmar, whose eponymous composer, by his own admission the greatest of the Bards of Seltica, is one who played a part, however small, in the history he relates. I do this in honour of Pulmthra, whose learning reveals to men the knowledge of Thulathra, king of all gods and light of all skies, and so that, as He would wish, those who follow might not forget the events of Agmar’s youth, when the planets aligned and the heavens turned at the cusp of Selta and The Anvil, and The River of Fire – that great and most terrible of constellations, for it is the beginning and end of all constellations – turned between the light and the void, and the fate of men and gods hung in the balance. Though the bard’s tale is usually sung, or recited in sophisticated verse, your modest scribe understands that the felicities of such forms may deter some readers not brought up to the courtly fashions and so, for now, we set down in as plain prose as possible an epic more suited to verse. Lamentable though this choice must be to so gifted a bard, the prerogatives of Pulmthra, great god of Learning, must outweigh the sensitive taste of Selteltathra – whose Song fills the heavens with celestial music and evokes pity and terror in the hearts of the very gods – as the influence of the planets must outweigh that of the more distant constellations in the lives of men.
Our tale begins in the year 3703, when the world was already old but not yet so wise as Kemthi, mistress of our sisters of the library, nor learned as Pulmthra, patron of my most honourable brotherhood.
Chapter 1: Augustyn: Thedra
Augustyn was nine years old and afraid.
The trebuchets of Louis, duke Vrong Veld had been bombarding the town of Relyan for three days now. In the distance he could hear them, the creaking as the counterweight was released, the rush as the giant slingshot whipped forward, the dreadful silence when you held your breath, almost wishing for the sound of destruction to end the waiting, and then the crash, into the walls or onto the roofs of the town below. His father was on those town walls with his mother’s father, Humphrey, count Relyan. Up here, at the top of the castle keep, the men at arms had talked about the tactics of siege until Augustyn’s grandmother had silenced them, but he recalled the detail of their descriptions vividly. Perhaps even now the viscount Riverton, his father, and the count Relyan, his grandfather, were directing the soldiers as they poured oil down on the men who climbed up scaling ladders, swords in hands, grimy in the torchlight. And then the oil would be lit. Men on fire, screaming and falling on others so that they caught light too until beneath the walls of the town all that could be seen was a giant screaming twisting beast of fire and flesh, writhing and dying to the jeers from the battlements.
Creak, rush, silence, crash. Shouts, clashing weapons. The smell of acrid smoke was strong.
The keep was a long way from the town walls, atop the hill which looked out over the river mouth to the north, the bay to the east and the fields to the south. West were the cliffs that he had once tried to climb with a scullion, unsuccessfully. The ships had burned in the bay a week ago when old galleys laden with oil had sailed in, not furling sails, but coasting straight into the count’s fleet, and the fields had burned as the army approached. Peasants had fled into the town as their hamlets were sacked, telling tales of murder and rape against which his mother had tried to block his ears, but his grandmother had berated her, saying that as future count he should not be sheltered from the realities of war and politics. The only fire he could see now was the River of Fire, that river which flowed in starlight across the night sky. He lay on his back, looking up at that river, cool and calm for all its many fires, maybe in
finite in number, his grandmother lying by his side.
“They’ve overrun a section of the south wall,” a soldier said.
His grandmother pointed to the constellations, naming them for him.
“There is The Anvil, constellation of Fulkthra, god of fire and earthquakes and blacksmiths. Once Fulkthra fought with far seeing Saruthra, who rules the sky, throwing fire from the earth so far into the sky that it reached the moon. One of Sky’s eyes was knocked out, and even he could not find it.”
“And they’ve taken the tower above the weaver’s quarter.”
“The Eye of Sky.”
“Yes, Augustyn.” She hugged him to her and he could smell the scent of flowers of the fields, crushed and hanging in a pomander around her neck. She told him, “Saruthra in his anger struck Fulkthra with a lightning bolt, and shattered his heart. Dalthi, the great mother, gathered the pieces of her son’s heart and put it back together, but her tears for the harm her sons had done each other blinded her, and she missed a piece. Later Fulkthra found it and fashioned a beautiful gem from it.”
“What are they doing. Shit! They’re turning the tower catapult.”
“The Heart of Fire.”
“You remember well, darling.”
“And within shines the fire of the Primal Dragon.”
“They’d better retake that tower.”
“Yes. But the Primal Dragon and Mother Earth had other children, didn’t they?”
“The Dragons of Dalthi.”
“The Dragons of Dalthi,” she said with satisfaction, “and their constellation is there,” she pointed, “Draco Minor, half hiding behind the dark of the moon.”
“Maybe we should go and help them.”
“You stay put,” his grandmother said to the soldier, “you’re here for a reason.”
“Yes, milady. Just…they look sore pressed.”
When it waxed full the moon was a disk of swirling, ever changing colours, as if a rainbow had been liquefied and poured into the night sky, its spectra combining and separating and recombining, flowing together and streaming apart, and ejecting in weird multi-coloured coronae, but now it had waned to a slim crescent and a darkness against the stars, only a single massive corona, of blue, purple and indigo arcing beyond the boundary of the dark side. Smoke drifted across, obscuring more stars and the corona.
Creak, rush, silence, crash. Screams. Was that smoke he smelled of burning buildings or dying men? Like when the smoke of a wood fire mixes with a spitted boar, the smells mingled, making fine distinctions impossible.
“And what is the moon, Augustyn?” she asked him.
“Another world?”
“Like ours?”
“It must be nicer. The gods dwell there. Maybe they don’t have wars.”
“The gods war as much as men, though it doesn’t mean the same to an immortal. But you’re right, that they dwell there, but they dwell here also.”
“Isn’t that their home?”
“I don’t know, Augustyn. I’m not sure that gods have homes. They are powers that rule our world and give it shape.”
“And it would have no shape without them?”
“Perhaps. Perhaps only the gods know.”
“And they won’t tell us?”
“They may.”
“But the gods don’t speak to us…to me…I mean…”
“Oh, but they do. They speak to all who know how to listen. They speak in the whispering of the wind in a gulley, in the rustling of the leaves of the forest, in the rush of the waves and their crashing against the rocks of the headland, the suck of the water through the pebbles of the beach, the passage of the clouds across the warmth of the sun, in the turning of the tides and the cycle of the seasons.”
“And in the shitting of gulls and the livers of gutted sheep,” a soldier said sarcastically.
His grandmother glared at the soldier’s back and continued. “They speak to us everywhere and at all times, if only we’ll listen and recognize their voices, hear and understand their language. Some men are too stupid to listen.” She looked pointedly at the soldier. “But they speak especially in dreams, at least to more intelligent men and women, and to little boys.”
“But I never remember my dreams, Gran, except the bad ones.”
And he was afraid again. He knew that she had been talking to him to distract him from the sounds of war and thoughts of death and demonic planes of fire and torment, so much like the world below the city walls.
“Shit!”
He heard another trebuchet, or no, not a trebuchet, another kind of catapult, and this one was closer. Much closer. Was it one of their own, replying to the fire of the enemy, trying to shatter their engines of war?
Creak, rush. There was no silence this time. Instead there were screams.
The castle keep shuddered and he felt himself falling. He was falling into the tower as it crumbled. As he fell he could hear the trebuchets in the distance, one after another after another. Creak, creak, creak, rush, rush, rush, crash, crash, crash. Giant fists hitting the town from the sky. But the sound was strangely muffled and he was breathing in dust and there was screaming all around as timbers struck stone in a rhythmic knocking sound.
He awoke to the sound of knocking.
He was 60 years old. He was Augustyn, viscount Riverton, count Norfelds, marquis Pecta Bodre, marquis Glede, first duke Relyan, but most people simply called him The Duke. He was hated by many and feared by more. He no longer needed to fear. And yet, some nights he awoke in a sweat, and that time was on his mind, that time so many years ago. Perhaps it was a trick of age, showing him the distant past to ready him for the too near end. He peeled the sticky silken sheets from his body and went out into the hall. A man was there, dressed in shabby vest, stained tunic, and rough spun hose, like an actor, juggler, or similarly disreputable inhabitant of North Bank, that ramshackle appendage of the great city of Thedra, capital of the Realm of Ropeua, Kingdom of the Seven Cities. The man bowed and scraped, like a juggler who has just performed for his dinner. He was one of Augustyn’s spies.
“News, Your Grace.”
The duke placed a cap on his balding head and blinked the sleep from grey, impatient eyes. “Out with it, man.”
“It is as we thought.”
“Good, good.” He picked up a purse from his desk, took out a silver coin and flipped it to the man.
“Thank you, milord.” He left.
The final piece of the puzzle that he had been trying to solve for two years now. He ran his hand over his forked beard, which had turned clear white quite suddenly in the last two years, though the ring of hair beneath his crown retained enough black streaks to still be called grey. In Thedra only he fully understood the significance of what his network of spies had discovered. Each spy had only part of the puzzle. Only one other would understand the whole and its significance. The information could be useful, if used in the right way at the right time, when the board was cleared of other, inconvenient pieces. For now he needed to involve that one other. Only she could definitively prove the truth. She was widely respected and would be believed by the Privy Council and the Assembly of Lords, if ever Augustyn had need to convince them. If not, the pawn he sought to place on the board could easily enough be sacrificed and another strategy chosen.
He went to the shelves set in the wall by the window and took down one of the tiny mechanical birds arrayed there in neat lines. They had been crafted by Jared Pentafax, one of the many talented people Augustyn patronised. A master of the Arts Runic, Astronomic and Mechanic, a former monk of the Brotherhood of Leaves, and what some might call a wizard, Jared was a genius in the crafting of such devices. On each of the shelves was arrayed a dozen birds, and there were twelve shelves, one for each of the cities and major towns of Ropeua, excepting only Thedra, as well as one for each of Gwendur in Vrongwe, Karl ar Kamnat in Suut Seltica, and Kemet, crumbling city of the ancients. Unlike messenger pigeons these mechanical birds could not be shot down with arrow
or crossbow bolt; they were too small and flew too fast. Even if an enemy could bring one down, they would only tell their secret to the person Augustyn had chosen. They could not be seduced or bribed or tortured to reveal their secret, and Jared had constructed them with traps that would harm any unwelcome wizard who might try tinkering to extract the mechanical messenger’s secrets. The bird was shaped like a sparrow but smaller, coloured a dull metallic grey that would not glint in the sun, its amber eyes staring dully, tiny inscribed runes barely visible on their surface. He pressed the signet of his ring, shaped like a crowned heart, into a hollow on the bird’s belly, shaped like an impression of the same, and turned the bird as if winding up a clockwork toy. It clicked when he had turned it full circle, and the runes in the bird’s eyes flamed into life momentarily before dissolving into the amber which was now alive with inhuman intelligence. It turned its head side to side, like a natural curious bird, though its movement was somewhat jerky, awaiting Augustyn’s command. He took from his desk a slender silver ring with a dolphin in relief for house Navre on the outside and Eleanor’s family mermaid engraved on the inside, and put it in the bird’s beak.
“Find the owner of the ring and tell her this: ‘That which was lost is found.’”
He took the bird to the window and threw it out. It hovered in front of him, like a hummingbird over a flower, staring at him, awaiting a final command. “Go, now.”
It darted away, flying south, toward the mountain pass.
He leaned on the window ledge. Below his palace, which spread across the top of the northern tower of South Gate, he could see, on the southern tower, the great dome of Jared’s Observatory, its giant external lens tracking the moon across the sky, letting Jared peer deeply into that heavenly body’s kaleidoscopic, churning spectral storms. Beyond the observatory was a stairway that defied both logic and common sense. Jared’s twin brother Javid called it his Star-way. The name was not fanciful, for the stairway spiralled far into the sky, beyond the reach of sight, even in the bright light of day. And every day it grew, the magic of its amazing construction evident in the empty spaces between each step. Jared and Javid had been Brothers of the Leaves for many years, but had left that bookish order, preferring, they had said in twin’s unison, “the practical philosophy of science and runic magic to the endless subtle distinctions of textual debate.” The practical projects of these brilliant twins were great works that future ages would wonder at, and Augustyn flattered himself that they were the work of his own hands and his own skill too; they could not have been accomplished without his patronage, and that patronage was only possible because he had himself climbed so high, by dint of political cunning and hard work, building on the ambition and hard work of his forefathers.
Horn of the River God: Book I of The Song of Agmar Page 1