Donarec and the Warlord

by Zackery Arbela

  “You’re not an Ashirzaai. By law you are as free as any Irzemyai.”

  “Tell that to the Irzemyai! They find it hard to remember this.” Again she drank, though this time more slowly. “They are a vile lot in general. The sooner we leave this land the better.”

  “What bothers you about them?” Donarec asked. “Do you object to the subjugation of the Ashirzaai?”

  “I could give the spit in my mouth for the Ashirzaai. But...when my people fight against humans, sometimes captives are taken. They are killed if troublesome, kept for ransom if valuable, or sold if profitable. That is the way across the world...even Eburrea, I am told. But...the one thing we do not do is use them for our pleasure. Such couplings are considered unnatural, because no child can result from them.”

  Donarec shrugged. “I imagine, for the Irzemyai, that is part of the appeal. No bastards.”

  “It is an abomination. To hold them for their pleasure, and denying them the chance to have their own children. Those women...their lines die when they enter their masters possession.”

  “It’s the way of things here,” Donarec said. “We’ll leave this place behind soon enough. For what it’s worth, my own people hold...similar views on such matters. Liaisons between humans and kuyei are forbidden, for much the same reason.”

  “Then your own folk can be considered among the righteous, and worthy of respect.”

  And, not for the first time, Donared noted the way Tudai’s skin seemed to glow in the darkness, the deep, almost violet color of her eyes, the way her breasts swelled against her shirt. And Tudai’s mouth opened slightly, as she saw into his face, the sorrow that lay behind the mask...the way things suddenly seemed warmer...uncomfortable, but not necessarily unpleasant.

  Donarec cleared his throat and set the cup down. “I’m tired now,” he said after a moment. “Ti...time to rest.”

  “I...I agree.” Tudai stepped back. “The wine is not to my liking, anyway.”

  Donarec turned and went to the door. As he pulled it open, Tudai said, “Sleep well, Donarec.”

  “And you, Tudai.”

  Donarec went into the hallway, thinking over what had just happened and trying to make sense of it. He didn't get very far though, as a man was waiting in the hallway.

  “The Overlord commands your presence, sir.”

  “What...now?”

  “That is correct, sir. If you will follow me…”

  Donarec followed the servant down the hall, reaching the end and turning around the corner. As soon as they vanished from sight, other men appeared at the other end. They moved quietly on bare feet, wearing dark clothing and drawing blades as they went. One of them paused for a moment...Jokko, son of Lord Kitaar. He held up a hand, then pointed to one door, then the other. They quickly took position, looking to their leader for the command.

  Jokko waited for another heartbeat, listening for any sound of movement. Unlikely...the Night Steward was bribed earlier to direct patrols and servants away from this area at this time of night. From one of the rooms came the faint sound of snoring. He grinned in the darkness and gave his men the nod.

  Jokko went into the second room. The Ijjini wench lay on her side, eyes closed. They flew open as his knife pressed against her throat.

  “One squeak,” he whispered, “and I’ll bleed you out like a sheep in the market.”

  She said nothing, only glaring in fury as his men followed in, hauling her up and binding her hands and feet. Just before they gagged her, he whispered, “When this is done, I’ll do you a mercy and kill you quickly. It will spare you from what my father has in mind.”

  It was the smell that woke Jaag from a pleasant dream...something involving a bed, silken sheets and an entangling mass of limbs and feminine giggles. Such dreams always came when he went to bed stinking drunk, which explained why he did it as often as possible.

  But then something intruded...instead of the jasmine perfume that usually accompanied such nocturnal delights, the smell of sweat and unwashed bodies, accompanied by a muffled curse as a foot bumped into a chair…

  His eyes opened. Back in the room, and two men were coming towards him, one with a rope, the other with a sack. His mind rushed to full alertness, pushing past the last dregs of sleep and wine - in the mountains of Gusannagar, those who lingered in their sheets while enemies were about seldom saw the dawn.

  “He’s awake!” The men rushed in. Jaag rolled to his left, hand wrapping around the hilt of the fighting ring. With a grunt he swung it around, striking the shoulder of the fellow with the rope. The man fell back with a cry, the ring embedded in his flesh. Jaag reached for his sword, even as the man with the bag let go and reached for his knife. He barely had time to pull it free before there was a flash of steel, and he saw nothing more.

  Jaag wrenched the sword free and turned to the first fellow, cutting his down with another efficient overhand chop,, then wrenching the fighting ring free from his body. He stepped past the bodies and out the door, into the hallway…

  “There he is!” More men in the hallway. Two of them were carrying a struggling Tudai out of her room, bound and gagged. He recognized Jokko of House Vaien, who pointed at him. “Get that bastard!”

  Jaag turned and ran, as at least half a dozen men followed after him. He turned a corner, then another, then burst into a large hall, dominated by a pool of water with a statue of a nymph in the middle, a trickle falling out of a jug held in her hands. He ran around it, then halted as another band of armed men appeared ahead.

  “That’s him!” One of the newcomers pointed at Jaag. “Sehrem favors us, take him…” He fell silent as the Vaien men came in and halted.

  “Who are you?” one of them asked.

  One of the men pulled away the cloth tied about his face. “I am Yod Yozara, and I’m here for that man!” He pointed at Jaag.

  “You can't have him,” replied Jokko. “Lord Kitaar Vaien commands us to take him!”

  The Yozara’s drew their weapons. “You can’t have him,” Yod Yozara said. “And there are more of us than there are of you!”

  Yod raised his word, ready to tell his men to attach. The Vaien’s did the same, and for a moment he was forgotten as they were about to settle scores then and there, deep within the Warlords palace.

  More footsteps, and then another corridor filled with armed men, who skidded to a halt as they entered the hall. “What the hell...is that you, Yozara?”

  Yod Yozara squinted as he tried to make out the voice and the face behind it in the dim light. “Iolo?”

  Matuzal Iolo came forward, looking at his rival, then at the Vaien men. “What are you doing here?”

  “I've come for that man!” Yod pointed at Jaag with his sword.

  “Well, you can't have him.” Matuzal then glanced at the Vaien’s. “Is that swine Kitaar with you lot?”

  The Vaien’s looked at each other. One made a gesture and they left, headed back the way they came.

  The Yozara’s and the Iolo’s then turned on each other. “That’s our man,” Yod Yzara said menacingly.

  “I disagree,” Matuzal Iolo growled back.

  Jaag gripped both his weapons, considering the cosmic joke about to take place, and failing to see the humor. Only a moment away from bloodshed, and he was caught right in the middle…

  The servant opened the door to the Warlord’s study. “In there, honored sir.”

  “At this time of night?”

  “He commands it.”

  Donarec went through. The door closed shut behind him, and the hairs on the back of his neck rose up. Something was not right here…

  The bright light from earlier was gone, replaced by shadow shafts of starlight coming through the tall windows. Movement at one end...Orazaak walked in on bare feet. He wore a loose pair of trousers and nothing else. The runes on his torso glowed with a faint blue light, their reflection also giving his eyes a cold, ice-like shine as well. In both hands he held a sheathed sword.

  “You summoned me, l
ord?” Donarec asked.

  Orazaak said nothing. Despite his age and protestations of ill health, he looked as fit as a man of twenty-five, faint scars shifting as his muscles rippled like water. He hurled one of the swords across the room, sliding it across the floor until it came to a half by Donarec’s foot.

  The Warlord drew his own blade and hurled the scabbard into the shadows. “Pick up the sword,” he said.

  Donarec glanced down at the weapon. “And if I don’t?”

  “Then I will cut you down where you stand, and mourn the loss after.” He raised the sword into a guard position

  After a moment, Donarec picked up the sword. He drew the blade and led the scabbard fall. He held it in both hands, the weapon well balanced, the steel high quality. Evenly matched…

  With a shout both men charged, and the room resounded with the clash of their blades.

  Twenty years ago…

  “How did he die?”

  Orazaak looked at the messengers from Ganascala, two Irzemyai in their middle years who were clearly in awe of the Warlord...like pilgrims standing before a statue of their god, only to see it step down and pour itself a cup of tea.

  He raised the cup to his lips. There was a bitter taste to it, which he’d long since learned to ignore. Made from a common weed found in ditches along the farmers fields, long a folk remedy for every kind of stomach malady. It was the only thing that soothed the pain in his belly these days...even the runes were no longer able to do this. There was some sort of meaning in all that, but Orazaak didn’t think it worth the time to figure out what that might be.

  He glared at the messengers, who took a step back. “Have you swallowed your tongues? Answer the question!”

  One of the men cleared his throat nervously. “He died in his sleep, lord. No violence. It was a surprise...but not unexpected.

  “The Mighty Akozaar dined with the leading men of the city the previous night.” The other messenger spoke. “A great feast though he ate little. His health was failing, it was plain for all to see, though his mind remained as sharp as ever. He partook of some food...soup, I think it was, and a cup of watered wine, then bade us all a good night. Those were the last words he ever said.”

  “One of his attendants found him in his bed the next morning,” the first messenger concluded. “There was no pain or sign of poisoning.”

  Orazaak set down the cup. “So,” he said, “who rules now in Ganascala?”

  The messengers looked at one another. Orazaak could almost see the wheels spinning in their head. He’d only asked out of curiosity, but they clearly thought he was looking for an excuse to take their city for himself. A curious notion...but he didn’t bother to correct them.

  “Lord,” one said at the end, “when it became obvious to the Mighty Akozaar that he would soon be joining the Blessed Sehrem, he took steps to ensure that what came after would be peaceful and orderly. He decreed that after his passing, three magistrates would rule the city, selected every two years from the leading Irzemyai families of the city and elected by the leading citizens of Galascala.”

  “There were some who objected to this,” said the other, “and they caused a brief moment of disturbance. But they were quickly suppressed.”

  Akozaar always had a talent for planning ahead. Orazaak allowed a brief smile to flit across his face. “Thank you,” he told the men.

  They stood there for a moment longer, until they realized he had dismissed them. They bowed and left his study.

  Orazaak remained in his seat. There was a brief flare of pain somewhere in his belly, and he felt the warmth of the runes as they attempted to combat whatever was causing it. He put the cup to his lips and drank, and a moment later the pain faded away.

  “Only two of us left,” he murmured. Shinza in Avaiea...and himself. The last two decades were a long litany of deaths among the Osa’shaq, of all ranks. One by one time claimed them...the lords of cities and their ministers and generals. Every year, letters or envoys would come, telling him of yet another comrade leaving the place of life. Some died in battle, others in accidents. More than a few, he suspected, were suicides, though that word was never used. But most died as Akozaar had, in their beds, betrayed at last by bodies grown old and decrepit, past the point where even the runes might restore them.

  In these last years, he’d spent long hours in this room, looking back on the past. The end was coming...for him it would still be a while, but he could hear the soft footsteps, see the edges of the shadow. It was, for an Osa’shaq, an odd thing to consider. Death was not unfamiliar to him, quite the opposite. In his seventh year, a knife was placed in his hand and at the command of the trainer he stabbed it into the flesh of a condemned slave. It was a lesson, to impart that men died the same as animals...and a test, to see if he had the steel in his spine to kill without no more concern than it be a job well done.

  Many died at his hands...and by the time he reached his sixth decade of life, many comrades died at his side. Death in battle...for most Osa’shaq, that was the fate awaiting them. The runes healed all but the worst wounds, savages fell under his blade, killed like insects. But sooner or later one lucky arrow would get through, one spear point...something. And then the Osa’shaq would die. For those who lived past their third century, the reward would be to train the next generations. And when the day came when the runes started to fail, the Masters would put them down like farm animals that had outlived their purpose. It was the way of things...only the Masters might live forever, though he knew that in the end even they faced an End. Whatever they might claim, Death was the Final Master, and all would meet Him.

  Death in battle. That was the way for a man like him. Instead he sat here, his insides slowly rotting. There were at least three or four decades of life left to him, enough to watch another generation of Irzemyai rise and fall. He knew what the people whispered...that he was cold, uncaring, a just ruler to be sure, but without a hint of softness. Like being ruled by a statue...if only they knew what it was like. To watch men he’d trained, who were his sons in all the ways that mattered, grow old and die, and turn to dust, then watch their sons do the same, and their sons after…

  It was a terrible loneliness, made worse by the passing of his fellow Servants, the only men whom he could speak with as equals. Akozaar...Kazovar...Arragaz...Sehrem. His brothers...his friends. Only he and Shinza were left, and from what he was told, Shinza was not long for this world. He contemplated making the journey to Avaia, to see the man one last time, and knew he could not, that Beremi would tear itself apart in his absence, and he had worked too long to bring this city into being. When he passed, it would be his legacy.

  He took another sip from the medicinal brew, grimacing at the taste. This was to be his fate then, to wither and die, a relic from a lost age, while the vultures gathered above, waiting for his last breath and the chance to feast….

  “Why are you holding back?”

  Orazaak’s mocking words carried across the room, even as Donarec barely parried another strike that would have opened him up from shoulder to navel had it hit. Steel skirled on steel as he turned about, moving back on bare feet, sword raising again to the guard position. He was breathing heavily, sweat dampening his brow and the back of his shirt.

  The Warlord by contrast barely looked winded, the runes glowing faintly in the dim light. He paced back and forth, like a caged beast looking on a creature served for his dinner...which seemed disappointing to his eyes. “You can do better,” he said. “Your ancestor was the finest swordsman I ever knew...you have something of his skill!” The last word came out as a shout as Orazaak attacked, and against Donarec was barely able to hold his own.

  The Warlord may have been a dying man, but even in his decline he was a formidable opponent. Every attack was met with a block, every move perfection in its smoothness and form. Donarec suspected that if anyone was holding back, it was this strange old man with the glowing skin. He realized all the old stories he’d heard about Kasovarec - Ka
zovar! - as a boy were not just old family legends, puffed up to boost the profile of his house (the Kasovaron’s were newcomers among the Eburrean elite, and the disdain was not always hidden.)

  The stories were real, if this crazy old man was anything to go by. Donarec knew if Orazaak was fighting at the peak of his strength and ability, this fight wouldn’t have lasted more than the span of a heartbeat...

  Swords clashed and locked. Donarec grunted as he bent back slightly, the blade beginning to squeal and bend under the pressure. He twisted slightly, letting the swords slide away as he moved back. The Warlord did not attempt to stop him, but let him pass. The runes flickered slightly for a moment as he looked down, barely breathing at all from the effort.

  “Why do you hold back?” he asked again, barely a whisper.

  “I’m not,” Donarec responded. “I can barely hold my own!”

  “Should I make it easy for you?” Orazaak held his arms wide, turning towards his opponent. “There, strike me down! I am open and exposed, go for the heart and drive the blade in deep!”

  Donarec held his place. He lowered his sword, letting the point touch the floor. “What are you after?” he asked.

  “To die honorably.” The Warlord let the sword fall to the floor. “Look at me, Eburrean! I am rotting from within. The runes don’t prolong my life, only my suffering! I am the last of my kind in this world, and every day I remain is a misery. Men like me were not meant to die in their beds, but on their feet in battle! So kill me now! Plunge that sword into my heart, and all that I have is yours.”

  Donarec stood here. “I am not an assassin,” he said at last.

  “It’s not assassination. It’s an act of mercy.” Orazaak shook his head. “Damn you, Kazovar would not have denied me this request…”

  “Kazovar is dead.” Donarec let the sword fall to the floor. “And I won’t be a tool for your suicide.”

  The Iolo’s and the Yozara’s stared at each other. Swords and knives were out, the air practically hummed with their mutual antagonism. The great families of the city had nurtured their rivalries for a generation, despite the best efforts of the Warlord to tamp it down. Orazaak was dying, everyone knew this, though they all had the courtesy to not say it in public. And when he was gone, it would be best if one family already had primacy over the others.