Once A Hero

by Michael A. Stackpole

  Cleaveheart had weathered the parry without so much as a nick, so whatever the magick was that allowed the sword to chop up my armor, it had no effect on my sword. That was good because with my armor being useless, we would be reduced to a battle of skill. The emperor had skill, there was no doubt about it—as Aarundel had noted in Cygestolia, having a long life allows one to learn a lot about a subject.

  The emperor came at me again, lunging low, then flicking the blade up and around in a cut meant to carve a furrow through my chest. Pivoting on my right foot, I drew myself out of line with the attack. Two hands on my hilt, I chopped Cleaveheart down, momentariiy trapping his blade against the floor. He pulled back, and I whipped my sword up in a quick cut at his throat.

  He twisted around and went down, eluding Cleaveheart's sharp kiss by an inch. The flat of his blade slapped across my flank, and half-melted armor rings tinkled as they bounced off the floor. I jumped back from that hellish sword as the burning sting started in my side. My retreat gave him time to roll to his feet and step away from the smoking impression his sword had made in the floor.

  "As always, Manchild, time is on my side."

  "Neal, give him to me." The Red Tiger stood in the archway, bloodied blades at the ready.

  "No, the emperor is mine." I raised myself up to my full height and struck a single-handed guard with the tip of my blade pointing down toward the emperor's knee. I opened my mouth as if to speak, then advanced a step, extended, and lunged. The emperor batted my blade aside, then snapped his blade down and around in riposte aimed at my heart. I brought my left hand down and slapped the white-hot blade away with my gauntlet. I felt the searing kiss of hot metal against the back of my hand, so I flicked my hand forward like a cat ridding its paw of water and threw the gauntlet at the Emperor.

  He slashed his fiery blade back through the space between us, cutting the gauntlet in half. The cuff flew in a fluid blob to splash steel-gray against one of the pillars. The incandescent hand, leather straps burning merrily, struck him in the middle of the chest and dripped down the front of his ring mail. The quilted gambeson beneath it began to smolder. The emperor retreated quickly to escape the smoke rising in his face, but his swift movement only made the fabric burn faster.

  A quickstep to my left and he came into range again. I brought Cleaveheart down in a heavy cut that caught him on the left shoulder. Rings snapped apart, and he screamed as I chopped down through muscle and bone. He tried a halfhearted cut at my midsection, but I slid Cleaveheart free and parried him strongly. Shifting my sword to my left hand, I brought my right fist up and caught him in the mouth, smearing crimson across his white face and chin.

  He staggered back, then collapsed. He sat down hard enough to jar the crown from his head, but he retained his sword. Tears filling his eyes, he tried to roll up to his feet, but the punch still had him too unstable to be able to manage it. He slipped again and tried to regain his balance by burying his sword in the floor. It sank into the stone as if cutting through nothing more substantial than water, so it did not help steady him,

  Unbalanced, he released the blade. That quenched its flames and froze it in place, but he had fallen too far from it to use it to lever himself to his feet. He crashed back to his buttocks, then rolled over onto his ruined left shoulder. He screamed, arching his back, then went limp. The smoking cloth sent a gray column toward the ceiling, where it gathered into a cloud and filled the face of Tashayul.

  I leaned forward and scooped the crown up with Cleaveheart's tip. I slowly turned and was surprised to see the Red Tiger had advanced from the doorway. He looked at the crown and then me and back at the crown again. Straightening up, with both swords at the ready, he looked me in the eye, saying nothing, yet saying everything by raising one eyebrow.

  Back by the door Aarundel held his ax at the ready, and the Dreel tensed in the shadow of a pillar. Between them stood Sture, the captains of my Steel Pack, and the Steel Hunt's Drogo. I saw them study the both of us and I knew their thoughts. Though I had fought beneath the Red Tiger's banner, the Dun Wolf was his equal in song and legend. I wielded Cleaveheart, and as everyone knew, the man who possessed that sword was destined to win an empire. I had killed this emperor, and I had been responsible for Tashayul's death. While the Red Tiger might have inspired the uprising against the Reithrese, no man, not even Beltran, had a more legitimate claim to the crown than did I.

  All I had to do was slip it from my sword and place it on my head. Beltran might fight me for it, or might pledge his fealty to me. Through that simple action I would become the most powerful Man on the face of Skirren. I would become the hero of heroes. I would be the liberator of Mankind, and everyone, including the Elves, would have to respect me. They would have to deal with me as an equal. They would have to please me, placate me, and that could mean they might even give me Larissa.

  The stink of blood and burning wool cut through the idyllic fantasy my mind began to weave around her image.

  I looked over at the Red Tiger. "There is a prophecy that says he who wields Cleaveheart will win an empire."

  He nodded stiffly if solemnly.

  "And so I have." I flipped him the crown. "I have chosen to win it for you."

  Chapter 17:

  Memories Of Childhood

  Spring

  A.R. 499

  The Present

  ***

  DURRIKEN'S DEATH AFFECTED Gena in ways it took her a long time on the road to sort out. She recognized almost immediately the utter irrationality of her becoming angry with Rik for having died on her. His death spoiled the dreams she had not even realized she harbored until he was killed, and she felt betrayed by that. Knowing that such resentment was not logical did not help abate it, but did let her feel it coming on and shunt it aside before it could prompt behavior.

  She also felt pain at Rik's loss and found herself quick to take offense at even the slightest hint of disdain for him. Within hours of his death the Fisher family suffered another loss; Waldo was found dead, the victim of ingesting poorly prepared mussels. His body had swollen up, and his tongue turned purple as it filled his throat and cut off his air. He literally strangled to death in the night on his own tongue, and she found that death fittingly ignominious for a man she detested.

  The tears cried for Waldo annoyed her because she felt there should have been much more of a display for Rik. She found herself unable to cry in public and knew that her upbringing made public displays of grief and emotion as alien to her as the custom or burying valuables and favorite items with the dead. Among Elves those things were shared out as keepsakes. She almost laughed when one Fisher proclaimed the family vault proof against grave robbers, because Gena believed if Men refrained from interring jewelry and other such things with the dead, no thief would bother even to try to break in.

  Looking up ahead of her on the road, she saw Berengar gently shift his weight with each step his horse took. She owed him a debt of gratitude because he had insisted that Rik be buried before Waldo and in a place considered more honorable within the tomb. That had brought arguments, but Berengar would not be denied. She smiled as she recalled him telling a reluctant relative, "Gainsay me, you scheming snake, and instead of Neal Elfward, I'll be haunting your nightmares."

  Gena gave Spirit a touch of her heels and brought her horse around the string of spare mounts and pack horses to Berengar's side. "My Lord, I owe you an apology."

  Berengar feigned polite surprise easily. "An apology?"

  Gena nodded. "We have been on the road for a week now, and I have been singularly poor company. I have returned silence and apathy for your care and concern for me."

  He shrugged his broad shoulders eloquently. "You have had good reason to be quiet. You have suffered a loss."

  "As have you."

  "Waldo? Yes, he was a loss, but I was not as close to him as you were to Rik." Berengar hesitated for a second, then frowned. "Not wishing to speak poorly of the dead, but Waldo was pusillanimous and prickly. He
traded more on our family name than he did on his own deeds, and he judged people not by their own worth, but the worth of their position in the world. I think I actually liked Rik more than Waldo, and if offered a choice to summon one of them from the grave to join us here, I would choose your friend."

  "You are most kind in excusing my behavior."

  "Actually, Gena, your silence has allowed me to think about our mission and all that attends it, well away from the pressures and politics of Aurdon." Berengar looked back over his shoulder to the south, where Aurdon lay seven days back down the road. "Away from the city, traveling into the heart of this decaying empire, I am becoming aware of how petty and trivial our struggles are."

  "How so?"

  "Here, were I traveling in the company of Aurdon Rangers, our journey would be taken as an invasion from over the border. There, in Aurdon, my name and my family can get things accomplished in an instant. Here, in Ispar, my crest would mean nothing if a Red Tiger were not standing on top of it." His blue eyes flashed with amusement. "Realizing that something which you value is worthless outside a very small, confined place is humbling. And, of course, this whole discussion must seem very silly to you because of the chronological view your longevity affords you."

  Gena started to deny his claim, but the wary way in which his eyes began to narrow stopped her. "There once was a time when what you have said would have been accepted by Elves as akin to a natural law. The struggles of Men were seen as battles between herds of animals. They were interesting and even diverting, but they were not seen as causing much in the way of permanent change in the world."

  "Until Neal."

  "Neal did influence our way of looking at things, yes." Gena wiped some sweat from her brow with the back of her left hand. "Some Elves, my great-great-grandfather among them, thought Men had been dismissed too lightly. Neal proved a boon to those wishing to advance that view. Men, and their actions before and since the time of Neal, have proved that view to be correct."

  "Even so, the snarling battles between Men cannot be seen as being nearly as important to Elves as they are to those of us involved in them."

  "That is a valid point, but one that cannot stand without analysis. Take, for example, the situation that we are riding now to correct. There are those among my people who might argue that the Fishers and the Riverens fought five hundred years ago and they are fighting now, so that Neal's effort to keep the peace failed utterly. To suggest, however, that the failure means his attempt should never have been made is wrong and even dangerous."

  Berengar nodded slowly. "So your perspective over time suggests that anything which waxes will wane, like the tides rising and falling."

  Gena smiled. "That is an excellent example. The fact that the tide will reach the same low point in the night that it saw in the morning does not mean the beach will not be wet at noon."

  "I see that holding for natural forces, but Human enterprises?" The count looked around at the rolling green meadows covering the hillside up which they rode. "If that idea is valid, then it might be imagined that the Red Tiger's empire will rise again."

  Gena frowned. "I suppose that is true, but things do not necessarily run in circles, though they may be cyclical. For example, we know there will never be another Reithrese Empire to conquer. If the empire is to become powerful again, it might be as a federation of strong provinces.

  "Or a strong leader may rise up and reunite it under his leadership." Berengar shook his head. "The one thing that I have not liked about having been placed in the imperial line is the amount of politics into which I have been thrust. My family branch broke off from the main line four generations back: my great-grandfather was the emperor, though my great-grandmother was scullery maid or some such. My mother's uncle managed to convince Hardelwick, the current emperor, to legitimize our line. All that did was get my two cousins killed, it seems. I am hoping that I am far enough removed from things that I won't be a target."

  "I hope you're not a target as well. This uncle who got your line legitimized, he is the Atholwin we are going to visit?"

  "Yes. He is my mother's uncle. We used to come up here, my brother Nilus and I, in the summers to get away from Aurdon during the humid season. Just over the rise we can see the town of Blackoak with the castle at the other end of the valley." He hesitated for a second. "In fact, if I remember correctly, on the down side of this hill is a grand old oak in which my brother and I built a tree house. We hung a rope from one of the branches and used to swing on it while pretending we were soldiers preparing to storm the castle."

  Gena flicked a horsefly off Spirit's neck. "You speak of that time as if you treasure it."

  "I do." He turned to look at her with curiosity in his eyes. "It is easy for me to remember my childhood, because it was not that long ago. I remember things like running and laughing, my first taste of a raspberry tart, and the first time I ever fell in love. It occurs to me that while I envy you your long life, I think I should feel the loss if I were to be so far removed from times of simple pleasures."

  "Such memories do not fade, no matter the years." Gena took time to look around as she considered how much she wanted to tell him. Still stung by the fact that Berengar knew things about her that she had not shared with Durriken, she chose to husband facts for the moment. "Among the Elves, children are a rare and blessed event, with the gulf between parent and child often being measured in centuries. Even so, because we have such a long life, as adults we are not so pressed to accomplish things that parents cannot take time to nurture and enjoy children. A child is, in essence, property of the family into which he is born. When my brother and his wife conceived and bore a son, all of us raised him, from great-grandfather on down."

  She smiled at the count to soften the blow of not telling him everything. "My great-aunt, before she went beyond, spent a great deal of time with me, despite having duties to her husband's family. From her I learned what I know of magick as well as much about Neal Elfward. From her and my grandfather I learned of him directly, whereas all you have are stories that have been told and retold until they no longer resemble the truth."

  "I know that, yes. Still, the stories have some validity. For example, I know of Neal's love for Elvenkind from the stories. I even heard of a story sung in Najinda that tells of Neal's true love for an Elven maid. Is that true or an example of exaggeration?"

  Gena shrugged the question off, avoiding a direct answer. "In those days, for Neal to touch a sylvanesti would have resulted in his death and her disgrace."

  "Not so today, I take it."

  Gena blushed. "No, not so."

  "I'm sorry. Please, I didn't mean to embarrass you." Berengar hunted for the proper words. "Your affection for Durriken was obvious yet circumspect. I didn't know . . . not that I cared . . . well I cared, but I did not wonder . . ." He blushed in turn. "Forgive me. This is none of my business."

  "You are forgiven if you wish, but I did not count it a fault against you." Desirous of moving away from a discussion of her personal life, she smiled at Berengar. "How long is it since you last visited your uncle?"

  "I was a child when last I spent any real amount of time with him, but most recently I was here when I traveled to Jarudin for our family's investiture." Berengar shook his head slightly. "The years have not been kind to Atholwin. His health was declining then, and I do not imagine his sons' deaths have improved things very much. It will be interesting to see him again."

  Gena looked up as they came over the hilkop. Hoping to burn the melancholy note from Berengar's voice, she pointed to a huge budding oak halfway down the hillside. "There, is that the tree you remember?"

  "Yes, yes it is." Berengar's face brightened. He touched his heels to his mount's ribs and started to trot toward it. "There, on the eastern side you can see a couple of boards .Still in the branches. Likely not our fortress, but another. Uncle Atholwin must have great-grandchildren who still play in those boughs."

  Gena laughed and rode after him, th
en reined back when Berengar raised his left hand. "What is it?"

  "Something we never had in that tree."

  Closer in, swinging from a limb jutting north, Gena saw a stretch-necked corpse. She rode forward and worked around to the east to keep the wind coming from her back so she'd not smell the body. By the look of the flesh and the clothes, it had been hanging there for the better part of four days, for the weather had been dry and hot and the corpse showed every sign of being desiccated by the wind and sun.

  Drying had tightened the lips to reveal a meagre collection of yellowed and rotting teeth in the dead man's mouth. His eyes were gone and a raven perched on the branch above him. It had a bit of something in its beak, but flew off to the north when she came in too close for the bird's comfort. "There is a sign on his chest."

  Berengar rode up beside her and studied the corpse as it slowly twisted around and back again. "The Truth is life. In life he lied, now he is denied the Truth."

  Gena shivered. "That's not the sort of acorn I would hope my oaks would produce."

  Berengar focused his eyes further down the valley. "This is not the same place I remember from last year. . . . I mean to say, we have come to Atholwin's holding, Blackoak, but the village looks smaller, and the roof is gone from one of the castle's towers."

  "Yes, but there are still people down there, and fresh pennants flying from the other towers."

  "True enough." Berengar took a deep breath, then exhaled slowly. "Let us ride to the castte and see how things stand there. If Atholwin lives, there will be an explanation for this."

  "And if he does not?"

  "That, Lady Genevera, could also explain this."

  They rode around the village instead of through it, keeping to a huntsman's trail that had partially returned to the wild. The bridge over the dry moat had a few rotted timbers in it, but the patches proved strong enough that their horses did not punch a hoof through. In drawing nearer the gray stone structure, Gena did see that the smallest of three towers had fallen into disrepair, though the walls looked strong and were manned by soldiers in livery that Berengar identified as belonging to his mother's uncle.