The Doomfarers of Coramonde

by Brian Daley

  But all these Yardiff Bey knew he could overcome, bring to their knees with a single word when the time was ripe. It was the aliens who worried him. Van Duyn and the men he had conjured were an unknown, unlooked-for quantity in the great equation of his plan. Their presence from another cosmos might upset natural balances, set all his prophecies and calculations awry.

  Yeessss. His hand toyed with the catch of his ocular—though even he would only dare open it at dire need—as he came to a decision. He must eradicate this Van Duyn, as he should have done earlier, and with him any fellow interlopers. Bey’s eye went to a pigeonhole in the wall where rested a melon-sized crystal of complex cut which he had used for the imprisonment of a mighty demon after long struggling. He considered calling it forth and dispatching it to slay Van Duyn, but he knew he could only demand one service of it, it would be foolish—and dangerous—to use the demon unnecessarily. Besides, there were other ways open to his hand and mind.

  His attention was broken as a rapping came at the heavy, bronze-bound cedar door. He spoke a syllable of Command. The massive valve swung inward by some silent agency to reveal Fania and his bastard son Strongblade, ostensible Ku-Mor-Mai.

  Fania still boasted much of the beauty that was close to being her only asset, regal bearing being an effective disguise for the fact that, while clever in some ways—and most capable of treachery—the now Queen Mother was far from bright. There were pearls secured among the locks of her hair, which she kept the color of jet. The robe she wore emphasized length of leg, whiteness of throat and the yet-youthful tautness in her waist.

  He felt a momentary flash of hunger for her but dismissed it immediately. He disliked yielding to grosser appetites, preferring to go his own fastidious way, avoiding contact with mere mortals as much as was feasible.

  Strongblade was wearing fine mail armor of black iron and red gold; he carried at his side the enchanted greatsword Flarecore, and his face held a stubborn aspect. It was none too intelligent a face, and in centuries of life Yardiff Bey had seen its type often, had frequently been forced to break and discipline the people he’d chosen as tools. He was completely confident in his own supremacy.

  As always in the absence of onlookers, the two bowed before him, but not so low as they had been taught and, in contravention of form, Strongblade spoke without receiving the wizard’s let to do so. “The new levies are near ready to depart. I’m told I’m not to be their commander.” His face flushed red. “Am I not Ku-Mor-Mai? It is my right to lead my liegemen.”

  Fania interrupted, never one to stay long out of a conversation. “He is your son! He should be the one to destroy Springbuck and bring back the coward’s head on a lance.” She drew herself up dramatically, puffed with pride. “Then he can sit the throne with the respect of his people.”

  Bey leaned forward, elbow on knee; when he turned his eye on her, what she saw there made her tremble and turn from his face. In his intimidatingly controlled voice, he said, “Do you think Yardiff Bey would play his pawn as if it were a knight? I had Strongblade trained at arms so that when the time came he could kill Springbuck, then sit the throne and obey me—and nothing more. What is his smattering of military lore to the likes of Bonesteel, who marches now to throw in with them?”

  He turned the frightening gaze from the Queen to his son. “I shall warn you this one time not to presume on our kinship again—ever! Ours is a relationship of convenience alone, my convenience. Take the place I grant you and show gratitude; do not think you could any more lead and rule than you could use that sword you’re wearing as it’s meant to be used. Or can you? Come, show me.”

  Teeth bared furiously, Strongblade took Flarecore from its ornate scabbard. The green-blue blade was filled with minuscule writings and runes. Holding the weapon in both hands, he thrust it toward his father. “I can’t work its damned enchantment,” he grated, “but I can use it to effect, if that occasion should come to pass.”

  Yardiff Bey stood, face cold and awful to see. He said, “I see that you have both forgotten your places.” He made a quick pass with his hand and the room was dark and chill, and Fania and Strongblade felt a sudden terror clutching their hearts. The sorcerer stepped forward and calmly pulled Flarecore from his son’s weak, quivering grasp. He moved back and whirled the big blade one-handed over his head as if it were a feather. With the other hand, he formed a Sign of potency which left a glowing red trail suspended in the air behind it. Thunders filled the room and he called out in an unnatural language and was answered as from afar by howlings and shrieks. Flarecore’s blade began to glow, then abruptly went white-hot, throwing off flame and spark.

  Fania screamed and buried her face in her hands. Strongblade had gone dead-pale with fear. The wizard came close to them again. “Down!” he roared in a voice terrible to hear. “Down before your Master for the peril of your lives and souls!”

  They instantly threw themselves down at his feet as Strongblade began to froth with madness and plead while Fania wept and kissed the hem of his robe, begging incoherently for mercy. He let them go on so for some moments more, until he saw that they might be permanently impaired if he continued their punishment. Then he spoke a Dismissal, whereat the room was light once again and the thunder and other sounds died away, as did the light along Flarecore’s blade.

  When they were able, the two staggered to their feet and helped one another to the door, sobbing and leaning on each other, and were permitted to leave.

  Bey was left holding Flarecore, satisfied that they would give him no more inconvenience for some time to come. Still, it had been rather sharp of Fania—uncharacteristically so—to scheme thus. With Strongblade gone warring, she would naturally reassume the authority she had been forced to yield at his coronation. Perhaps he’d better ease the Ku-Mor-Mai’s dependency on his mother to inhibit further plottings. It might even be a good idea to teach his son the spell which caused Flarecore to burn. That would look impressive, add some legitimacy to his reign and infuse him with a measure of independence from Fania.

  * * * *

  The little hunting party wound its way up the easy slope leading away north from Boldhaven Bay and the city of Seaguard, Coramonde’s primary trading outlet on the Central Sea. The city harbor falling behind was divided by a long, fortified promontory, effectively separating the small fishing craft and common commerce ships from the luxury barges and military vessels.

  Seaguard itself was protected from land by a high, thick, well-fortified wall along which watchtowers were spaced, each virtually an independent fortress. To the east were the salt marshes.

  The party was small but illustrious, and so had taken precautions to make an inconspicuous departure. It included five members; a tracker-guide, two military men of high ability and rank who wore no insignia of command and two of even higher station. These were the emissaries of the Prince of the Waves, Lord Paramount of the Mariners, and the King of Seaguard, whose title in the salutations of Coramonde was Seashield, though in truth he was more inclined to sharp bargaining and profit than war on the deeps.

  They wended their way through the low foothills of greenery and bright flowers, giving no attention at all to tracking other than to see if any other riders had preceded them, for they were not hunting the beasts of the forests; they hunted coconspirators. Two days they spent riding, though it pleased the emissary of the Prince of the Waves little, for he was more used to the roll of a deck under his feet in a following wind, not liking having to ride this uncertain-tempered creature with its disturbing gait. Still, he forebore to complain, since he was there at the direction of his liege, He who Sails Forever.

  He had been selected for this mission of conspiracy because he possessed in good measure the ability in suave dissembling and courteous haggling so prized by landsmen, although he was known on his own ship as a martinet. For this reason, too, he did not bewail sleeping on the ground or hearing the howls of wolves and the roars of lions in the night; he controlled himself when, once, they were
menaced by a giant bear whom they had surprised on the narrow track they traveled.

  On the night of the third day they found—thanks to the guide’s almost magical sense of direction—a small lodge built into the side of a hill at the foot of Drear-spike, that bleak needle of rock which thrust itself up in a forest shunned by most men. A warm fire awaited them in the hidden and guarded covert, together with five more men.

  The soldiers were sent outside on watch with others who had come there earlier as bodyguards for those conspirators who had already arrived. The guide was sent to another room to occupy himself with thoughts of his payment, in the company of others who had served a similar function; all were careful to show no curiosity at what might transpire in the main hall. As the light of hearth and candles illuminated the low, smoke-dyed rafters of the place, the gathered men sat and conferred, after introductions were made for those not known to one another.

  In addition to the King and the emissary there were these:

  Roguespur, son to Fim the Northwatcher, who had escaped the death of his father and nation, being a boy in training in the south during the attack of the druids and wildmen of the Cold Isles. He was light of skin but dark of hair, eye and expression, and there was the gleam of vengeance hunger in his countenance as he sat wrapped in his long scarlet cloak. Around his neck was a chain of thick links and from it a heavy key dangled against his mailed breast. This was the key to the throne hall at his father’s castle, and he had dared much to take it from that place when he went alone to scout his foes as they made merry in the stolen castle that should have been his. He was Roguespur, who would never know peace until he had exacted payment for his father’s death.

  And there was Honuin Granite Oath, Factotum of a large province in the southwest of Coramonde, in former times one of Surehand’s closest friends and a renowned warrior and outdoorsman. Though be was now gone fat and much white had crept into his walrus mustache, he was still a man to deal death, as canny as any at warcraft.

  Two more sat across from each other at the board, and the most remarkable thing about them was that they were not at death strokes, for these were Angorman, self-proclaimed Saint Commander of the Order of the Axe, and Balagon, Divine Vicar of the Brotherhood of the Bright Lady; they and their respective followers of warrior-priests had been at odds for over fifty years.

  For two hundred years the Brotherhood of the Bright Lady had been devoted to deeds of bravery and justice, and had been priests of that noble Celestial Goddess, while at the same time being warriors errant, committed to her to the exclusion of all other women. Their number never stood higher than one hundred, for such was their rule, though they often numbered fewer, it being their habit to seek out the most arduous trials and challenges to exhibit their faith and conviction. To be accepted to the Brotherhood, a man must be a proven fighting man of the first rank and accept religious schooling to earn a priestly vestment; or alternatively, but much less frequently, he might be a priest of the Bright Lady who proved himself at arms on her behalf to the satisfaction of the Divine Vicar. If he had not done so already, he must forswear worldly pleasures, particularly those of the flesh.

  Then, nearly fifty-three years before, Balagon rose to Vicarship of that fine and honored Brotherhood although he was but twenty, for his piety was as unquestionable as his moral fibre, and there were none who could stand against him in combat. At that time, from the northernmost isles which even the wildmen did not often visit, there came Angorman, a salty young roughneck who had heard of the deeds of the Brotherhood, seen an image of the Celestial Goddess carved on the bowsprit of a wrecked ship and decided on the spot to join them. He brought with him little but his impudence, his lofty ideals, a sense of destiny and his great axe.

  But the roster of the Brotherhood stood at one hundred and he was denied the membership he’d endured so much to achieve. He was put off for a time, made to prove himself, which he did with a martial vigor which impressed even the vaunted fighters of the judging board. But at last he would accept no more forestalling and angrily demanded admittance. This Balagon refused; the Brotherhood might stand at one hundred but no more, and his sense of moral rectitude would never permit Balagon to violate this technicality. Angorman, on the other hand, would not content himself to wait until an opening occurred; thus, hotheaded and heedless to the other brothers’ counselings of patience, he set off to found his own circle of warrior-priests, naming himself a Saint. The Order of the Axe swelled with men ready to follow charismatic Angorman for the Celestial Goddess. The years brought hard feelings, and even battle between the two groups, but out of commitment to the Perfect Mistress and a grudging respect for each other, Balagon and Angorman had done their best to abate such friction.

  Still, there was no amity between them, and so they sat and eyed each other. Balagon wore his black ring-mail, covered with the white robe of his office, and at his side was the broadsword Ke-Wa-Coe, which in the Old Tongue means Consecrated of the Goddess. His thin white hair was held back with a simple circlet of leather, and on his finger was the heavy seal ring of his station.

  Angorman was dressed all in brown, with his forager’s cloak pulled tight against him for the chill. He still wore his hat, for his head was hairless save for the thick, flaring white eyebrows. On that slouch hat, a wide-brimmed and high-crowned trademark, was the brassard of his order, a crescent moon with a great axe superimposed, thick and wrought of silver. Angorman’s legendary axe, Red Pilgrim, rested against the back of his chair; it had been agreed that no weapon should be put between any of them met there, and Red Pilgrim was impressive to see—a six-foot handle of ash ending in a flanged double-bit of heroic size.

  The last one of them met there was the man who had called them, maybe the only man of sufficient repute to draw them together under one roof, Andre deCourteney. He had come in quickest time, by methods taxing and dangerous—not available to anyone but his sister and a few other adepts.

  He was in vestments now, red, stiff-collared robes worked with occult designs, seated in a high-backed chair at the head of the table. When the Seashield and the emissary had made themselves comfortable, he began.

  “I welcome you, my lords, and thank you for your attendance on behalf of the true heir to the throne, Prince Springbuck.”

  The Seashield grunted. “It was gladsome hearing, this word that the Prince lives; I’d gotten rumors to the contrary. There’s hope now of getting Strongblade’s boot off our necks and ridding ourselves of Yardiff Bey.”

  Honuin Granite Oath wuffed out his mustache and said, “Aye, levies and tithes increase daily and now we have royal proctors peering over our shoulders at every turn so that I look about for them even when I answer nature’s calls.”

  “It isn’t the Prince’s plan to let this continue unchecked,” Andre said.

  Roguespur nodded. “But that’s not the worst. As our people muster for needless war with Freegate, the wildmen grow stronger in the land of my father. Bey sees to it that they get no interference and the day may soon come when, having spent itself against Reacher, Coramonde will find herself prey to them.”

  Andre said smoothly, “The Prince is moving his will and arm to curtail this brewing war by denying Strongblade the wherewithal to wage it.”

  “How?” asked the emissary, doubt in his eyes. Of all there, he least wanted to be drawn into plots and covenants, and so was the most dubious.

  The wizard folded hairy hands over his plump paunch and replied, “The Prince has aligned himself with King Reacher, rallied various loyal units of Coramonde behind him and obtained the help of the Horseblooded. Containing Strongblade at the Keel of Heaven, he’ll send agents to raise the flag of revolt throughout the suzerainty.”

  “But,” said Honuin Granite Oath, “we’ve few enough regular troops left, and the levies are under leaders loyal to Strongblade.”

  “Springbuck knows that, and has developed a plan to use the citizenry of the realm. They will rise to shake Strongblade from his throne an
d put out Yardiff Bey.”

  There were laughs of disbelief and roars of rage then. Some half rose from their chairs, speaking their opinion of this speech while the emissary listened silently. But above all, Honuin could be heard. “Arm the riffraff? Useless and foolish and worse! It wouldn’t stiffen their spines, it would only put thoughts of banditry and disloyalty in their heads.”

  “What fighting man will face a battle,” queried Roguespur, “when the man who stands next to him is an untrained woodcutter quaking in his boots and aching to break and run? Military engagements are decided by armored, mounted men who know the ways of war. Are you mad, to put this word before us?” And others seconded his remarks.

  At this Andre, brows knitted in anger, raised one plump-strong hand; from it a blinding light filled the room and a wind swept through it. They were thrown back into their chairs, even those servants of the Bright Lady, cowed by Andre’s magic. Hands went to hilt and haft but the wizard said, “Do not think because I have invited you here that I will tolerate such effronteries; no man speaks so to me!”

  His uncommon display of wrath silenced them. He resumed in a more sedate voice. “Some of you have heard how Bey has sent his first sally against us, the dragon Chaffinch, and how we have slain him and his corpse is rotting near Erub. We have help from beyond this world, albeit mostly aid of council and thought rather than of force. Yet it is in my mind that they are the kind of thoughts to turn a country upside down if they be heeded.

  “But mark you this, all my good lords, Springbuck will yet sit on the throne of Coramonde; of that I’m sure. Whether you will or not, you must answer to him in that hour, and if you will attend my rede you will rally to his banner. How say you?”

  They frowned in concentration now, weighing decisions. Roguespur was first to reply. “I, who once led a Legion of his own, am only the captain of a small company of mercenaries, now that Strongblade rules. I’m out of favor, yet Strongblade is friend to my father’s enemies, and that makes his enemy my friend. For what it may mean, I stand to the Prince.”