Mordraud, Book One

by Fabio Scalini

  Another excessive effort. That time Mordraud tumbled to the floor, and they all laughed until purple in the face.

  “Chief, I think it’s time for you to get to bed! Like a young kid, after dinner!” pronounced Mercy, spluttering. He was also at the end of the road, like all the others.

  “Bah, go screw yourselves. I’m not drunk!”

  Mordraud didn’t achieve the desired effect. His friends hooted even louder, and Hammer dragged him to the door without listening.

  “You’ve got to speak to Eldain tomorrow. If you blame us, we’ll be in trouble... Go to bed, boss. We’ll drain the rest of the keg toasting your health!”

  “Bastards...” groused Mordraud, staggering off on dangerous legs.

  The night was warm and veiled with a slight mist. The town was livelier than usual, thanks to the Empire’s unexpected lull. Mordraud wondered whether it really wasn’t time to get to bed, but the idea of sleeping in that pitiful state didn’t entice him. He’d be sick, and then nauseous till lunchtime the next day.

  “I’ve got to work it off a bit...” he mumbled, heading towards the town walls. “The lads on guard might let me up to get a breath of fresh air...”

  The soldiers on duty recognised him at once and made fun of his state, but with no nastiness. Without realising it, Mordraud had become a minor celebrity. Survivor of the Battle of Fire, commander of his own regiment, killer of Lances. All in less than a year. An achievement that was obvious to all except himself.

  The view from the walls was always glorious. The countryside was brightened by the soft light of a moon concealed by fine clouds, and the breeze was cool and pleasant. His drunkenness gradually released its hold, and the reasons he’d sought that solace with such determination resurfaced with implacable niggling. In a now well-familiar ritual, Mordraud took out his pipe, filled it with a couple of pinches of tobacco and lit it with an ember from the brazier at the foot of the stairs. It was Adraman’s favourite blend, which the captain unfailingly stocked him with when they met in the mess tent of an evening. Since he’d found him wounded after the battle, Adraman had become a friend. They saw each other rarely, but never missed a chance for a smoke together to update one other on life at the front. Mordraud felt sick, and puked the contents of his stomach over the side of the battlements.

  ‘You’re a bastard... a real bastard.’

  The wine had by now lost all effect on him. It only took a moment of thinking about Adraman to also conjure up Deanna in his head.

  The red dress. Her fingers toying with the laces. And, above all else, her bare legs clutching him.

  Adraman who offered him the pipe. Adraman who taught him how to fill it, and light it.

  Deanna, naked and writhing in his arms. Her skin in his hands. Her rounded breasts swaying in his face.

  Adraman. Deanna. Adraman. Deanna.

  Mordraud threw up what little remained in his stomach, in the hope of also spitting out a sliver of his soul. But that bitch wouldn’t show itself.

  ***

  When the door opened behind her, she was ready that time.

  “Didn’t I tell you to leave this house?”

  Mordraud didn’t utter a word. He was soaking, from head to foot, but his clothes were dry.

  “Did you throw yourself down a well? Did you want to kill yourself?”

  “More or less.”

  Mordraud locked the door and swooped down. Deanna put out her arms to keep him away, but he grabbed her hands and flung her onto the upholstered armchair.

  “I told you there wouldn’t be a second time, you bastard!”

  “Say it again!” he snarled.

  “You’re a bastard!” whimpered Deanna.

  Mordraud seized the hem of the red dress and tore it. Beneath, Deanna was completely naked. She was panting, but wore the same look as on that afternoon. Spurning. Contempt.

  “I don’t want you to!”

  “Oh yes you do.”

  Mordraud parted her legs, planted himself between them to prevent her from shutting them, and yanked off his shirt, whipping off the row of buttons, which tinkled on the floor like mute rain. The sword and the strain had done a marvellous job with his muscles.

  “Because you have the heart of a bastard too. Like me. We’re the same, we are... Weren’t you aware?”

  Deanna dug her nails into his chest and dragged them down to his belt. Eight tracks of blood, but no pain. Mordraud pushed her thighs wide and pulled her up to balance on the armchair.

  “Do it again.”

  Deanna began slowly scratching his back, neck and sides. Sometimes gently, others with all her strength. Mordraud consumed her. He just had to be careful not to devour her. No love. They were just two animals locked in a cage.

  “Fuck me...”

  Deanna squeezed her legs around him and crossed them. Mordraud clutched her head and took her hair between his fingers. The armchair squeaked and rocked, on the verge of breaking. So he picked her up and threw her on the desk, steadying himself with a hand against the wall.

  “You’re a bastard... That makes two of us...” murmured Deanna, slowly passing her tongue across her lips. Mordraud considered biting it off. The table creaked under his thrusts, and a leg collapsed.

  “Not... too much noise...”

  “BE QUIET!”

  They fell to the floor. Deanna pinned his arms down and took control of the movements. The world was upside down. Mordraud felt the aftermath of his drunkenness return with a terrifying violence. Deanna went on scratching him and biting his neck, as she continued writhing and pounding him against the cold stone slabs.

  Mordraud came close to fainting, and Deanna had to cover his mouth to prevent him from shouting. In the end she crumpled too, slumping on top of him. They fell asleep like that, embracing on the floor, united by the blood that trickled from Mordraud’s chest onto her breasts.

  ***

  The rope was taut, and bent the plank it was tied to. The six dangling corpses swayed in the wind, knocking each other like chicken carcasses left to dry in the shade. The crowd was breaking up, content with the spectacle. The soldiers had taken the rostrum away, and only the hangman remained, next to his handiwork, admiring this with satisfaction. The Emperor’s justice had run its course.

  “One less threat to worry about,” Asaeld pronounced, entreating him to go home. “And if there are any more like these, they’ll think twice before attempting something of the sort.”

  The Lance commander had been diligent and swift. With men sent to root around in every hovel or brothel, and hidden in every well-known or minor watering-hole or den, he’d met little difficulty in routing out the plotters, who were unaware of what was about to happen. How he’d really found them, and where he’d dug up proof of their guilt, Dunwich didn’t actually know. But Asaeld was in a position where he had no margin for mistake or flippancy. Dunwich was convinced he’d done the best job possible.

  But killing them was perhaps extreme. They’d gone from judgement day to the gallows before the full moon had waned. The six condemned men were certainly no lambs. They’d already had their rubs with gendarmes, some for murder, others for brutal theft or usury. Sinister figures who everyone wanted to see hanging in a noose. The years of war against the rebels had made people suspicious and paranoid. Instead, Dunwich hadn’t enjoyed a single moment of that public execution.

  “Did we at least find out what their plan was?” he asked, standing still and observing the swaying bodies. “Who paid them, or who was behind it? There’s always someone behind it all...”

  “Cambria’s too big a city, with too long a shadow...” replied Asaeld. “And everything is concealed within its shadow. The war and the Empire are inconvenient, they are a hazard to business, besides draining in terms of manpower. Criminality prospers. Loralon tightened the strings on the net, by throwing several men with corrupt dealings into prison. I saw to it personally not even a year ago.”

  “Is that it? Just a question of money?”


  “And power – gold’s best friend.”

  “Well, I’m pleased things have been sorted for the best...” Dunwich shook his head and smacked his lips. “Yet, I’m not sure why, but I don’t feel that it’s properly settled... There’s something about it I don’t like.”

  “Perhaps it’s been too long since you had a nice spell at the front. You’re like me, my boy...”

  “And how?”

  “You enjoy war. And you love being in charge.”

  Dunwich nodded, but didn’t lose his little-convinced expression. “Now the Long Winter project’s also on hold... I don’t know whether to be glad or not.”

  “Are you never happy with things?!” Asaeld burst out, in frustration. “And to think you were the one to suggest it!”

  “Are you going to start on that too?!” But Dunwich saw straight away that Asaeld was making fun of him. They’d already spoken about this many a time, but Dunwich unfailingly fell for his bait. “I only said...”

  “...why don’t we use chanting, dear colleagues?” concluded the commander, mimicking his voice. “And wipe away Eld, like a storm crossing a parched meadow!”

  “It’s not funny. I was talking about giving the Lances and the Arcane more space in the war. The Long Winter is still an insane plan, and it’ll be hard to see it through...”

  “That’s why the Empire needs people like you, Dunwich!” Asaeld cupped an arm around his shoulder and firmly guided him away from the gallows’ spectacle. “Smart young men, and devoted to our sacred Emperor!”

  “Hmm, sacred... Let’s not overdo it... Perhaps you mean unhinged.”

  “In fact, I was joking...” Asaeld muttered, smiling amiably.

  “I really was joking.”

  XXI

  “Tall, with dark hair, probably stocky. Eyes of an intense green. Talks without an accent from Eld, Cambria or the East. Has, I presume, a baritone voice. You might find him with a very thin and pale boy with light brown hair and bright blue-tinged grey eyes. I’m interested in both. Find out what they’re doing – I want the details. Don’t let yourself be noticed.”

  At the bottom of the parchment, a more energetic and angular hand lacking in the care of the first calligraphy had added an askew post-script. Like a quick approval to an order.

  “Kill them.”

  The note was signed with a stylish ‘D’. Mordraud scrunched the sheet up in his hands and used it to staunch the blood gushing from the wound in his shoulder. The blade had come close, very close, to puncturing a lung. He’d have had a slow death, right on the steps to his home.

  “You, Dunwich... you damned...!”

  His first thought when the dagger stabbed into his back was that he deserved it, when it came down to it. That Adraman had found out about them, and had taken the wise decision to eliminate him. He still had the smell of the man’s wife on his skin, her breath in his throat. His head was a heavy load, weighted down by the wine and the hard stone he’d fallen asleep on. Deanna had already gone when he recovered, and so he crept out before dawn came, terrified at the idea of being stumbled upon by Adrina or the other servants. As he was going out the door, he could think only of Deanna, of a kiss he was sure he’d felt while sleeping.

  The assassin must have spent the night outside waiting for him. He’d slithered up behind as Mordraud came down the steps, and had struck, but with little accuracy. Maybe sleepiness, or his unsteady steps of a still half-drunken state. In any case, the result was Mordraud hadn’t died under the first blow, not even crying out. He’d turned, wrenching the knife from the man’s hand, looking at him in simple and total bewilderment.

  “Ah! But you’re not... You...” he’d burst out, expecting to find himself face to face with Adraman in person.

  The assailant was a tall stout old man, covered by a long grey cape. He looked like any ordinary tramp – the fief was rife in elderly citizens with not even a few coppers or a home, people who’d lost their entire families. However, the knife that came out from the folds of his long cloak was too lovely to be an heirloom. Mordraud clamped his wrist before he could lift the blade, and struck him in the mouth with a head butt. His shoulder was excruciatingly painful, but his biggest concern at that precise moment was to make no sound. If he were to be seen outside Adraman’s house at that time of night, he’d lose his job. The killer was of secondary importance.

  “Who sent you?” he hissed, a breath from the man’s face. “Dunwich did, isn’t that right?!”

  The old man struggled to tear the sword from Mordraud’s grasp, but his grip was like steel. Seized by panic, he nodded, attempting also to speak, but his tongue and teeth had been pulped by the head butt and he merely succeeded in whining a few incoherent words. Mordraud saw a dim light appear in a window of the house opposite. He wasted no time. He took the old man’s head with his free hand, dashing it against the marble corner of the entrance steps. One, two sharp blows. The man flopped down like a sack of potatoes.

  “So you want me dead, do you? Can’t wait to settle it on the battlefield?!” he barked, after dragging the corpse out of the villa’s grounds, to a narrow rubbish-cluttered alley. Another old man claimed by the night. Nobody would wonder at it or do anything.

  ‘If you’ve even touched a single hair on Gwern’s head... I’ll come and get you, right in your lovely Cambrian home.’

  He’d have to hurry. It wasn’t long until the morning assembly at the barracks, and he shouldn’t be found missing. He would be showered with questions that he’d be in no fit state to answer, given his poor aptitude for lying. He’d pretend he’d fallen asleep somewhere in his drunken stupor. Besides, what could a soldier on leave do if not trash himself with wine, he asked.

  ‘Certainly not sneak into a general’s house and screw his wife,’ he thought darkly, as he ran towards the dormitories. ‘I’ll get myself sent off to the Rampart tomorrow, even if it means having to stow away in a cart! This really has to be the last time! Definitely!’

  Mordraud realised he was even no good at lying to himself.

  ***

  The hard part was not feeling embarrassed.

  Gwern closed his eyes and breathed in slowly. He stretched out his arms, planted his feet firmly on the floor, and began singing a silly but complicated tune at the top of his voice: a melody rich in shifts, grating notes and abrupt changes. He was standing at the top of the stairs. Its curves raced towards the distant floor in a sickening play of bends.

  Below, Saiden was murmuring something. He didn’t even seem to be moving his lips. The tower was on the brink of exploding through the power of his voice. It was as if the staircase, the porphyry cubes housing the rooms, and everything within the space were vibrating in resonance with his chanting.

  Gwern’s task was to overpower it.

  Impossible, he considered, terrified.

  “Louder!” yelled Saiden. “And even a bit better perhaps!”

  Gwern was practically shouting, without even articulating the notes. He entirely lost his concentration, wondering how Saiden had managed to chant and tell him off at the same time. He even had time to realise just how awful his sounds were. He’d learnt nothing yet. Without finishing the tune he was working on, he slumped to the floor, gasping.

  “Try to at least get to the end of it tomorrow!” Saiden bellowed again, as his chanting faded out soon afterwards. An unexpected effect of the echo, which caused Gwern a painful stab of headache.

  Saiden burst out laughing.

  It was boggling how the man had initially struck him as nice, mused Gwern glumly.

  He’d been practising for eight long days, but it all seemed like a waste of time. Apart from the first few basic instructions, Saiden had hardly shown himself, except to humiliate him. He always ate alone. Once a day, after sundown. Two glasses of water in the morning, one in the evening. A dry rusk. And nothing more.

  ‘He wants to starve me into it!’ reflected Gwern, as he returned to his room in embarrassment. ‘And he’s succeeding...’
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  Nobody could survive very long on eating so little. Or rather, survive and sing the whole day at the same time. His throat was always parched, his tongue rough and heavy, and his teeth hurt. He was beginning to hate anything that brought music to mind, and only a fortnight had gone by.

  “What am I going to do?!” whimpered Gwern, tossing himself onto the wooden bench softened only by a thin woollen blanket. “I know nothing of chanting, I know nothing of how a harmony works... I’ll die of thirst before I figure out how to sing that damn tune! That’s if I don’t go and take a jump, out of shame...”

  He felt too weak to practise. And practise what, he thought, depressed. Gwern shut his eyes and fell fast asleep.

  The morning wake-up routine was always the same. A couple of taps at his metal door, and two glasses of water placed on the narrow bridge connecting his room to the oval staircase. Gwern drank as if on the verge of death, but his throat was too dry to reap any relief. He was about to consume his day’s reserves, but then stopped himself halfway through the second glass, otherwise he wouldn’t have a drop of saliva that afternoon, not even enough to whisper.

  Saiden, as Gwern had now worked out, didn’t show himself. The boy once again, unwillingly, went back to training, always with that same unpleasant feeling on his skin – of being an imbecile singing in a cell. Not even a hint of progress. Luckily, he’d occasionally tried practising with Sernio, and even if he didn’t know what he was doing, at least he was in tune. His tutor had explained a few things, but Gwern didn’t know how to put his observations into practice. The boy’s trouble was with the low notes, which were impossible for his childlike voice to reach. Not that the high register was any more of a success, he reflected ironically. He scarcely knew what register was – he used the word purely because he liked the sound of it. It conveyed the idea well. Gwern glanced at the half-empty glass, heard his stomach rumble atrociously, and experienced the most unwelcome feeling of not having the time to make it to evening. He’d have to get a move on, drag out voice even where he didn’t have any. With fear gnawing at his guts, he had his first sensible idea after days of uncontrollable despair.