by Stuart Hill
“Did you have to let her do that?” she snapped at Oskan.
“Do what?”
“You know full well what I mean. That braying. And while I think about it, I thought we’d had words before about your mule wearing ear-warmers. We must have looked and sounded like a circus!”
“As for her braying, I know no way of stopping her once she’s in full flow,” Oskan replied with dignity. “And warmers are a complete necessity for an animal with ears of Jenny’s length. Just imagine the delay that could be caused if she got frostbite.”
“I can assure you that frostbite to any part of that animal’s anatomy wouldn’t delay us for a second. If she were unfit to travel, I’d personally poleax her,” Thirrin said with venom. Then she added as an afterthought, “And I’d enjoy it!”
Oskan and Jenny withdrew with dignity into an offended silence, and the journey continued with Tharaman making lighthearted remarks and observations in an attempt to improve the atmosphere. Even Taradan’s jokes could make no impression on the steely silence, and he and the Thar were reduced to murmuring to each other until they stopped for the midday meal.
But before long Thirrin and Oskan had forgiven each other and were chatting together as though nothing had happened. Tharaman-Thar watched them from his enormous height and concluded that young, as-yet-unmated humans were completely unfathomable.
The cavalry had now pulled ahead of the infantry by several miles, as had been agreed. If all went well, Thirrin would reach Frostmarris and secure it within two days, and the infantry would take approximately four to five days to join her, depending on conditions. So far, the news from the Wolffolk spies was good: The city was still unoccupied and there was no sign of any Imperial troops on the approach roads. It looked as if Scipio Bellorum was being sensible and consolidating his position before striking north. Perhaps he’d even wait for the spring, like any normal human being. But Thirrin wasn’t counting on it. She preferred to expect the unexpected when dealing with the Polypontian general.
They camped that night under a brilliant starscape that glittered and shimmered as though the sky itself had frozen and was coated with frost crystals. The human soldiers all had tents of thick hide, which slept three troopers, and each one had a fire burning brightly just outside the flap. Thirrin, Oskan, Tharaman, and Taradan sat comfortably around their own campfire enjoying the mixed scents of spicy wood smoke and the clean smell of snow. They’d already discussed and analyzed their plans with a thoroughness that had satisfied even Maggiore Totus, so they were content to sit and chat. But it was while they were talking that Thirrin had an idea.
“Oskan, the Oak King rules the woodlands at the moment, doesn’t he?”
“Yes, until the summer solstice, when the Holly King takes over. Why?”
“I want to thank Their Dual Majesties for their support during our retreat from Frostmarris, and I think I know just how to do it. Could you summon their soldiers again, do you think?”
“Yes, I should think so.”
“Good. We’ll reach the eaves of the forest early tomorrow morning. Be ready then.” She would say nothing more about it and soon went to bed, leaving the others to stare after her.
“It seems human females love cultivating a mystery as much as those of the Leopard People,” said Tharaman-Thar, and purred as though amused.
The next day they began their march before dawn. The crunch of frozen snow under hoof and paw seemed magnified in the silence of the early hour, and the silken chink of equipment rose around the column of six thousand like a gentle breeze through steel trees.
They were already beginning to leave behind the wild and rocky landscape of the northern Icemark, and small stands of trees began to appear on the horizon. In the spring and summer there’d be fields of wheat and barley lining their route, but winter had hidden everything under its monochrome cloak.
As they rode on, the east began to grow pale and gradually the black of night gave way to the pink and blue of dawn. Then the sun rose into the sky and the snow glowed gold, so that they seemed to be walking through cold fire. On they marched; slowly the road began to dip into a broad valley until at last they had their first glimpse of the forest in the distance. Night still held an outpost under its eaves, and a sound like the sea reached their ears as the branches stirred and waved in the wind.
“Oskan,” Thirrin said, “be ready to call on the Oak King when I give the word.”
The warlock urged Jenny forward from her position just behind the Queen and Thar. “I’ll be ready, but what exactly do you want me to say?”
“Just call them. I’ll be my own herald when the time comes.”
It took another two hours of riding to reach the first trees, where Thirrin called a halt. Oskan dismounted and waited while two buglers blew a fanfare that echoed through the woodlands. Then, stepping forward, he called, “Greetings to His Majesty the Oak King, Lord of the Great Forest and all wild places after the Solstice of Wintertide. Greetings also to your brother monarch, the Holly King, Lord of the Great Forest and all wild places after the Solstice of Summertide. Queen Thirrin Freer Strong-in-the-Arm Lindenshield, Wildcat of the North, sends felicitations, as does her ally Lord Tharaman, One Hundredth Thar of the Snow Leopards, Lord of the Icesheets, and Scourge of the Ice Trolls.”
His voice died away in the shadows of the trees, and a silence fell. Even the wind dropped to an unearthly calm. But just as Oskan was drawing breath to call again, a raging tempest blasted through the forest, howling and roaring as though someone had opened a door on a hurricane. Then the wind dropped again to nothing, and from the dark tangle of undergrowth a division of soldiers stepped forward. Their skin was the gray-green of bark, their eyes were the brilliant green of newly opened oak leaves, and their armor was as polished and glossy as young acorns.
A murmur rose up from the human troops and leopards, and the horses whickered nervously. Thirrin raised her hand for silence and dismounted. “Welcome, soldiers of the Oak King. Take my friendly greetings and gratitude to your lord, and add this message: Queen Thirrin of the Icemark happily cedes to Their Dual Majesties the valley that descends from the uplands to the eaves of your forest. She cordially suggests they fill it with trees and wildlife, and so extend the borders of their realm in perpetuity. Let them know that Queen Thirrin offers this in gratitude for their help against her enemies, and for the succor they gave to her people during their retreat to the north.”
After a moment of silence an oak soldier stepped out of the ranks and raised his spear in salute, and the rest of the division beat spear on shield until the forest echoed with a thunderous rattling roar. Then, as the sound slowly faded away, the wind rose again to fill the forest, and the oak soldiers stepped back into the undergrowth. The wind dropped, and in the calm the beautiful and refined voice of Tharaman-Thar was heard.
“I have lived to see wonders not even dreamed of by our poets. I stand beneath giant plants that scratch the sky with their branches, I have allied my people with the humans of legend, and I have seen soldiers made and molded from the stuff of the land. What a time I have lived in! What a life I’ve been granted! If I die in this war, I will have no reason for sorrow. I’ve had wealth beyond counting, and I fight for my friends who rise over the greatest of all and who stand in the eye of the One!” And he threw back his head and let out a roar that blasted through the trees and rose into the sky like a banner of sound streaming in the wind. Immediately his leopards answered him, and the great noise sent crows and ravens for miles around climbing the skies in their thousands.
23
Frostmarris lay on the plain before them, pristine in its blanket of snow. The white Wolffolk who’d drawn Thirrin’s sleigh during her journey to the northern lands were now acting as scouts and had been sent ahead to confirm that the city really was unoccupied, while the cavalry stayed hidden under the eaves of the forest. The werewolves had been gone for more than an hour, and Thirrin was beginning to consider sending out riders when a distan
ce-thin howling sounded through the freezing air.
“What are they saying?” Thirrin asked Oskan impatiently, but he raised his hand to silence her while he concentrated.
At last he said, “Frostmarris is unoccupied by any living human people.”
“What does that mean?” Thirrin snapped.
He shrugged. “I’m only reporting their exact phrasing. But I suppose they mean there are no soldiers of the Empire in occupation.”
Tharaman-Thar stood sniffing the breeze that blew directly from Frostmarris, and after a moment said, “The city smells empty. I smell no human people, no horses, no dog-friends or cat-companions. Only rats and mice and the smaller creatures. Frostmarris is waiting to be reoccupied.”
Thirrin nodded. “Then mount up. My capital awaits.”
The cavalry swung out onto the plain in a double column of horse and leopard. The troopers rode smartly, their lances raised and pennants snapping in the wind, as Thirrin and the Thar stepped out with an awesome presence. Just behind them Jenny trotted along, twitching her woolly-warmer-covered ears and occasionally giving a little hiccupping bray that was quickly cut short when Oskan sharply tugged the reins.
Their pace soon ate up the distance between the forest and the city, and as they approached the main gates the tension rose. The setting sun made a fire of the great bronze Solstice Bell that hung above the barbican. Thirrin leaned forward in her saddle — only the greatest restraint stopped her from galloping ahead. Suddenly Grinelda, Leader of the white Wolffolk, appeared in the gateway, and throwing back her head she howled in greeting. The cavalry quickly climbed the winding track that led to the huge portcullis, where they reined to a halt.
The gates stood wide open, and a cold wind blasted through the long entrance tunnel, bringing with it a surprising lack of scents. Normally, the city would have smelled, or rather reeked, of wood smoke, dung, cattle, horses, baking bread, roasting meat, beer, and general humanity. But now it only breathed the breath of winter: snow and ice and emptiness.
Oskan looked at Thirrin, expecting a long rousing speech about reclaiming her rights and the symbolism of Frostmarris reoccupied. But instead she looked pale, and after staring along the tunnel for a while she said quietly, “Come on. Let’s go in.”
The rattle of iron-shod hooves on the cobblestones echoed around them as they emerged into the main thoroughfare. The streets looked the cleanest Oskan had ever seen them, under their unsullied blanket of snow. Only the almost humanlike paw prints of the Wolffolk scouts marked it in places, clearly showing where they’d searched through the buildings and streets for any sign of occupation. But all was empty.
Thirrin led the cavalry along the slowly climbing main street to the citadel. Here, too, the main gates stood open. She dismounted to walk across the wide courtyard, leading her horse. Then she turned and barked out orders to her commanders, who scurried off to stable horses, check barrack blocks, and post sentries on the walls of city and citadel. Then she walked to the double doors of the Great Hall and, followed by Oskan and Tharaman-Thar, she pushed them open and strode inside.
After the brilliance of the bright winter day, the hall seemed as black as night. Slowly their eyes adjusted and the huge, dark, cavernlike space became clear. The hammer-beam roof was still hung with its ancient battle standards, and at the far end the massive oaken throne still stood on its dais.
Thirrin strode forward, her boots ringing loud on the flagstones, and headed for the throne. On reaching the dais she quickly climbed it, and with an unconscious sense of ceremony, she sat down.
“Bring me light and life into this darkness!” Her voice boomed into the hall, and the space filled with scurrying soldiers and servants who lit the torches that lined the walls. One group of housecarls dragged a log through the doors and laid it in the central hearth. Then, bowing to Thirrin, they threw torches and glowing coals into the kindling and a great blaze leaped up. “Bring food into this hall! Bring bread and meat, bring beer and mead! Bring the salt and set it on a table before me!” Thirrin called again, not knowing where the words that leaped into her mind came from but happy to let them flow.
More and more servants hurried in, setting a table before the throne and rushing through the corridors beyond the Great Hall as they searched for the items and utensils of a living household. And as they hurried on their quests they opened doors and cupboards, shutters and windows, letting in the air, letting in the light of the day.
Now human and leopard soldiers spontaneously crowded into the hall from the courtyard. Before them sat their Queen on the Throne of the Icemark; beside her sat the mighty form of her ally Lord Tharaman-Thar of the Icesheets, and on the steps of the dais sat her chief adviser, Oskan the Warlock. An awed silence fell on the soldiers as they stared at the young warrior-queen, the towering leopard, and the powerful young warlock, but then a mighty cheer rose up, mingled with roaring and howling.
“We have returned! We have returned, my soldiers and beloved allies. And while we live, we will never leave again!” Thirrin called into the hall, her voice as high and as fierce as a hunting hawk’s cry. “Close the gates against the winter and our enemies, and with the spring let us be ready to defend the Icemark!”
Again the cheering rose into the rafters, and over it all, a high-pitched braying could be heard from the courtyard as Jenny joined in the celebration.
Out in the shadows of the city, in the houses and cellars, in the secret rooms and locked attics, a stirring could be sensed. The ghosts and spirits-of-place whispered and muttered on the edge of hearing, glided and flowed on the edge of sight. They were pleased with the turn of events; it was they who had driven the small garrison of Polypontian troops out to die in the snow. It was they who’d haunted their movements through the city. And it was they who had joined them on watch in the dark of the night, filling their minds with a slow-growing fear, which had evolved into a terror that had driven them mad.
Several had been shot by their own comrades, who had quite rightly been convinced that they were possessed, and others had thrown themselves from the battlements in the dead of night rather than face the horror of what they knew stood just behind them. And when the surviving members of the garrison had finally decided to risk sheltering in the forest, it was the ghosts who had followed them down to the gates, whispering and laughing on the edge of their minds, watching them set out into the storm that raged and howled beyond the barbican.
The ghosts and spirits-of-place were pleased with events. The Queen had returned, and some of the people, and the rest of the folk would one day come back and they could slip back into their minds, becoming the warp and the weft of legend and stories — becoming the fireside companions of long winter nights, living their lives for a while in the minds of the breathing, in the blood that still flowed, in the feelings that still thrilled to nerves that still sensed.
For a night and a night, the ghosts flowed through the streets, being careful not to frighten these soldiers of the land and their allies. For a night and a night, the guards on the walls were aware only of a light now and then or a sound like laughter caught on the wind. But then the ghosts settled back into their shadows, and waited again in the dark of the city, in the cellars and attics and lost secret rooms — waited for their people to return and give back the strength to their legends.
Elemnestra arrived in the city two days later. There were now thirty thousand soldiers garrisoned in the barrack blocks and in the houses throughout Frostmarris. The north road became a lifeline of supplies from the province of the Hypolitan, and was patrolled daily by cavalry. Over the next few weeks the plans of defense were put in place. It had early been decided not to stand siege locked up in Frostmarris, and so a series of deep trenches and embankments of earth were painstakingly dug from the frozen land of the plain. Concentric defensive rings surrounded the city, extending out to the eaves of the forest at the point where the road entered it. The thirty thousand soldiers were stretched a little thin in some places, bu
t it was hoped that in the spring the fyrds from different parts of the country would come to help. There was also the question of the allies. The Wolffolk gathering was continuing, it was reported, but progress was slow. It could be well into spring before the muster was complete. And the Vampire King and Queen remained as elusive and enigmatic as ever. They were a law unto themselves, and would arrive to help if and when they chose.
In the meantime the Wolffolk scouts continued to spy on Scipio Bellorum, and reported massive troop movement coming through the pass from the Empire. In the south of the country where the general was based in the city of Inglesby, the first breath of spring could be felt. There wasn’t exactly a thaw, but at night the stones of the houses no longer cracked in freezing temperatures, and during the warmest parts of the day the ice and snow looked as though it just might start melting, given a little more encouragement.
Bellorum, like all brilliant generals, was well attuned to his surroundings and felt the change in the air. He smiled his grim smile and sent more messengers through the pass. His armies were gathering, and soon he’d be ready to unleash his attack. Before him lay a four-day march to the capital of this little land, but he was too sensible to strike north without first securing his rear. He’d learned his lesson during the winter when he’d lost thousands of troops in a blizzard on a reckless mission to seize the capital. But now he was once again in full command of his instincts. There were two cities and three major towns in this Southern Riding, as it was so uncouthly called by its inhabitants, and they needed to be captured and garrisoned before he moved on Frostmarris. Nothing would be left to chance this time. The Icemark needed a war that was precisely planned and ruthlessly executed, and both precision and ruthlessness were his forte.
He stretched his elegant legs out to the fire burning in the hearth before him and called the servant for wine. There were at least another ten days or so before things really got under way, and like many old campaigners, he was determined to enjoy the luxury of rest while it was still available. His general staff officers could handle the bread and butter of the logistics; as a true artist of war, he’d wait until the canvas was ready for the master’s hand.