A King in Cobwebs

by David Keck

  “The Banished and the Lost, they will be listening, watching, waiting. The very air of this night trembles with it. There is not a beast or bird asleep this night. They all keep watch.”

  “And the denizens of the Still Kingdom teem upon the Bourne of Jade.”

  “And the Thurser Lords of the Halls of Silence. They will be gazing from the eaves of their forests.”

  “The Sons of Atthi may cast their minds back upon the Hornbearer’s days with fond hearts.”

  “And to think that our Durand fought till his bones cracked.”

  “And threw a dukedom away.”

  “It is a hollow prize.”

  Durand watched the boy breathing.

  As Durand stared through the crowd of scorched and mangled specters, with the Rooks taunting and the poor king slowly dying, he realized: the sanctuary ought to have been barred to such things, yet here were the Rooks picking their way along the broken edges of the windows, in and out of the consecrated space.

  Durand was moving, stepping through the eerie crowd.

  The Broklambe children clutched at ankles, clung to pillars. Some, he saw, were worrying at the tiles with brittle fingers.

  “They have hidden something in this place,” said Durand.

  Semborin turned. It was his whole hunched body that moved, like a beehive. “What do you say?”

  Already, Durand had his knife at the edge of one square tile. The Broklambe dead crowded eagerly.

  He blinked at a cough of reeking air. There was a hole.

  Inside, he saw something. A putrid something, as slick as a pot of boiled apples. An infant, maybe. There were coarse stitches. The stiff fan of a black wing grafted. This would have been the Whisperer or the turnskin thralls or mad Prince Biedin. He wondered how much evil these men had done. He wondered whether thrones or vengeance or any of it could be worth even one such horror.

  “Look not, Durand Col.” Semborin had lowered himself. “But much is explained.” He looked to the boy king. “We will set this right, and then we will see about His Highness.”

  The Broklambe children worried hungrily at tiles here and tiles there. A spot near the king. Another high on the wall where a bit of molding had their attention.

  Semborin pressed a finger to his temple, and, by his glance, Durand guessed that the Patriarch could then perceive the Lost or the hiding places or both. “A tidy bit of desecration,” pronounced Semborin. He gave Durand a rheumy squint, but did not ask how Durand knew. “Now, let us see what can be done.”

  Semborin summoned the priests to work. “This is matter for priests,” he told Durand. “You have seen enough.”

  Durand pushed through the guards in the doorway, thinking that he had, in fact, seen too much. For guilt. For jealousy. For greed. For power. Too many horrors. Maybe they would put the Mount of Eagles to the torch. Maybe they would drag the old throne into the square. There could not be soap or sunlight enough to make the place clean.

  In this mood, he nearly stumbled over Almora.

  She stood before him with Ailric at her shoulder.

  “Almora,” Durand managed. He had the presence of mind to say, “Do not go in.” And he thought to add a few words to say that the king was in no greater danger.

  But the girl only nodded. This had not been her errand.

  “We are taking a moment to think,” said Almora. He could see Maud stalking off with Beoran on her heels. “Sir Durand, there were others who might have watched over the king, yet you had me go alone. You had me go alone to argue over the doom of the realm. Or rather, you had me go with Ailric when you, you were battle commander of all Errest.”

  Ailric, knowing an awkwardness when he saw it, attempted a shallow bow. “I have no place here—”

  But the girl raised a few fingers, and he was silent.

  “You might have seen Ailric and me. How he is with me. You might have been thinking of that. It’s this I was wondering about. Whether you thought I’d keep faith.”

  Had he been thinking of this? The boy watched over her. He recalled their long talk under the trees of Hesperand.

  “You’ve done nothing,” he said.

  “You must know, there is no question. We are bound to marry. I have agreed. Everything that has been promised, you will have. You need not fear.”

  Behind him, they were digging up the rotten things. Clinks and scrapes reached them, while, at the same time, the bewildered dead abandoned the sanctuary, passing all around until Almora spoke from a silent crowd of mindless faces: Euric, Ragnal, Gol. The black Broklambe creatures huddled. Sometimes, Durand could not even see Ailric’s consternation through the throng.

  The priests were singing.

  Not a death song. Not a song of reverent dread.

  They raised their voices in a building harmony, high, bright, and wild. Like washerwomen pounding at the river. The old priest threw life at the death of the Host Below.

  At once, Durand knew what he must say.

  “You are not bound, Ladyship. I kept out of their talk to watch the boy, or because I needed to rest a while and let my mind work.” Where the marketplace bickering of the boy’s supposed liegemen could not be heard. “You are not bound to me. Ailric is a fine boy, though I’m sure he will have a job to win your hand. For my part, he is free to try.”

  Almora blinked. “What do you mean?”

  “I make no claim upon you or your father’s domains. I claim no one and nothing.” Dead faces turned, but he only smiled. Maybe the guards had heard him too. “If you wish, we might keep it secret till things can be arranged for you. I’m not sure you’d wish to be ward of the king or some king’s regent. You will decide.” How that would end, no man could say. Durand could only hope.

  Ailric was still looking on, clearly astonished behind his accustomed reserve.

  “And Ailric, if Heaven will hear me, you have what blessings I can give.”

  The girl clapped before talking hold of Ailric’s hand.

  “Your Grace,” said Ailric, bowing.

  “You need not style me ‘Grace’ or ‘Lord,’ my friend.” Durand smiled. “Good luck to you both,” he said, and left.

  He should have felt fear at this. Fear for his future, now uncertain. But, in his heart, he found only gladness.

  * * *

  DURAND WALKED OUT into the holy gloom of the Hall of the Hazelwood Throne, his Lost followers trailing him among the orchard of columns. He stopped before the reliquary throne. Blacked by time, here were the very bones of the ship that carried the Sons of Atthi from their shattered home across the seas: black framed in gold and precious stones.

  In recent years, the broad window above the throne had been smothered up in black curtains. Now, already, the twilight before dawn glowed in the web of colored glass. Scenes came to life in the glass: heroes, castles, ships, and a sea full of childish kings and sailors.

  The Lost trailed Durand across the tiles, and now Durand even grinned at his collection of monsters. Almora and the boy had gone back into the Council meeting.

  Durand marveled that between all the rooftops bristling upon the Mount of Eagles, there was room for the Eye to shine upon that window. There would have been generations fighting the builders over such a thing, Durand was sure.

  The light had the Lost clinging to the backs of the various columns. But Durand, duke of nothing, rounded on the things. And, for the first time in God-knows, he spoke.

  “Here,” he said. “It’ll be dawn in a moment’s time, you know. The bells will ring, if the Patriarch’s lads remember. And you are free.”

  He peered into the staring faces: the bloodied, the burned. And he raised a hand to the round window full of light.

  “What use is there in trailing after me? Here is the Gate of far Heaven, beckoning. Here is your chance and hope of better than grubbing at shadows and pestering a fool. Here,” he pressed. “Go, I tell you.”

  The dead stared from their hiding places, and Durand could not have said they understood. “If
it’s me that’s holding you, I say go. I have seen maragrim thralls beyond counting. The Hornbearer. Heraric, the Prince. Biedin, even. None of them could drop the greed or guilt or pain they hung on to. But I must take their lesson. I’ve been a fighting man. I’ve slain men for countless causes, but mostly to keep my people from harm. I’ve been no monster.”

  The dead watched him. It seemed their faces turned toward him. It was hard.

  “I will not turn from you. Not now. And I confess there was wrath and cowardice and greed in my dealings with you. But I will come to the Bright Gates in time and try my fortune there, and so ought you all. By our Creator,” Durand implored, “by his Queen, by the Warders of the Bright Gates, by the Champion, the Maiden, the Nine Sleepers, by the whole Court of Heaven, I say go now. Seek the Bright Gates. If some madness of mine has bound you, let me break your fetters and cast them away.”

  Some ray of the Eye of Heaven burst between the rooftops and pinnacles of that old palace then, kindling the east window with a new fire and painting the throne room with color.

  This time, the dead did not cower. This time, they stood, half-wondering in the slanting column of light that poured through the window and glittered in the candle smoke. The beggar king, Ragnal himself, the one-eyed giant, the Lady of Yrlac, the blue-clad plowman of Hesperand; one after another, they turned their eyes from Durand Col to face the great Eye of Heaven. One by one, the great company of them, faint then as shadows, walked into the light and out of Creation, all vanishing like shade at noontide.

  Durand heard, just then, the rap of a brass-shod staff on the stone.

  “Not you too, now,” he said.

  But, with all that had been going on, it seemed that he had not been listening—or not to the commonplace sounds of Creation. Now he heard a clamor of voices echoing in the high hall, like a mob beyond a sanctuary’s windows, though he could not have guessed a direction.

  As Durand wavered before the throne, a portal swung open, filling the vaults with voices. And there was Baron Vadir of the Swanskin Down, a bowshot down the orchard of columns. He had been commanding the guard.

  The man stalked into the hall with an eye on the door.

  He called down the hall. “Lord Durand, the people have come. Hundreds from the city. They have heard many tales. There is a new king in the Mount of Eagles. The king is dead. The king lives.”

  The voices rang in the passageways of the palace. “It is too late to tell you ‘Bar the gate,’ I think.”

  “They boiled up like mice from burning house, Sir Durand. There must be half a thousand gates to this palace for those who know them.”

  “Your men must hold the throne room, Vadir, but I will not shed Atthian blood.”

  “Nor I,” called Vadir, but a ring of knights tumbled backward, overborn by the throng of common people pouring into the hall, filling the long aisles and crowding the broad nave. Yet just as the mob seemed ready to overwhelm them, the spell cast by the Hazelwood Throne, and the glass that shone like garnets and emeralds, and the pillars studded with gems seemed to cow the multitude. People goggled at the windows and then looked up into the gilded vaults over their heads. The ancients had worked traceries of gold wire into winding designs that flew up each column. They met and wove in liquid patterns in the dusky archways above, like the patterns in the cellars of the High Sanctuary. Most would never in their lives have seen the Hazelwood Throne.

  Vadir and two dozen baffled knights had fetched up at the foot of the dais with Durand. The whole of the surviving Great Council rushed into the room and stopped also. In a moment or two, the mob would wake up. God knew what they might do.

  “Durand,” called a whispered voice, and Durand turned. Deorwen had appeared between the columns where the little sanctuary was hidden. The sight of her made Durand smile, despite it all. He wondered if she’d been there long enough to hear his great speech; he supposed he’d said it all aloud.

  Deorwen was beaming.

  “Well? What is it?” said Durand.

  Rather than making an answer, Deorwen stepped to one side. And there, tottering on a very plain crutch, appeared the boy king himself, with Patriarch Semborin a respectful two paces behind.

  “Your Highness!” said Durand.

  Two hundred people flopped to their knees in a dull thunder, as quick as if they’d been cut down by a scythe. Sobs of thanksgiving erupted here and there, but the majority pressed their faces to the floor. They’d come to the Hall of the Hazelwood Throne and now, in their marrowbones, they knew it.

  Durand, however, saw the trembling boy. The queen and the Patriarch had let him walk. They stood among the columns, watching him totter like a foal. The lad’s eyes blinked from shadows as gray as the pale bowls of mussel shells. Durand caught the boy’s arm and got an abashed look.

  “They should stand,” Reilan said.

  “You tell them, Highness,” said Durand, and nodded to urge him on.

  “Rise!” Reilan said. “It is no time for the Sons of Atthi to kneel.”

  The crowd, half of it, got to their feet.

  “Throne or bed, Highness?”

  Heremund the Skald bandied alongside like a shepherd’s dog, watching Almora, Ailric, Moryn Mornaway, a grinning Alret of Garelyn, old Maud of Saerdana, Ludegar of Beoran, sly Highshields, fat Hellebore, and one or two more of the Great Council. None but Garelyn looked cheerful. With Patriarch Semborin, they created a procession.

  “Throne,” Reilan said, so Durand helped the king to the dais. The Hazelwood Throne was up a few marble steps from the rest of the hall, and the boy was on one leg for now.

  Garelyn ducked close. “Sir Durand,” he said, “we reached an agreement. If the boy lived.” He nodded a bow to the king as Durand helped him across to the throne. “Ludegar and old Maude have got men enough to guard the boy till he’s of age, but neither one will bend their neck to the other.”

  The crowd sang, paeans of praise.

  Heremund happened to catch Durand’s eye. The man wore a big, doltish grin.

  Garelyn tilted his head. “Eodan’s dead, Highshields is crooked as an adder, and Almora’s a girl. It was Heremund’s idea—though each of them think they devised it. They none of them trusted me.”

  Durand helped the boy up one step and then another. Really, he should have carried the boy, but there were too many eyes on him. He hadn’t the heart.

  “I don’t understand,” Durand said.

  “Nothing else would satisfy,” said Garelyn, but, by then, they’d reached the broad dais and Durand was walking the boy to the Hazelwood Throne. The populace looked on, and the barons of the Council ringed the throne a respectful few paces from the boy. The Patriarch and his men had found the Evenstar Crown. Someone had even brought up old Ragnal’s sword with its gilt eagle cross guard.

  As Durand settled the boy into the seat—thinking that the crowd might have waited a day or two to see the king enthroned, considering all he’d been through—he found himself at the king’s right hand with the queen opposite. There would be greater oaths and greater rites to come, but the High Patriarch of Eldinor was no fool. Ancient Semborin raised the Evenstar Crown over the boy’s head and spoke in a voice that made even Lady Maude blink.

  “Barons of the Great Council, people of Errest the Old, before you sits Reilan, son of Ragnal, your undoubted king by blood and rite to whom it is your duty to do your homage and service. Are you willing to do the same now before the Eye of Heaven?”

  The assembled people knelt low and rumbled their consent. “I swear it.” Few were the common people who had sworn such an oath before. None spoke the words lightly.

  Next, the barons, every one, came forward, knelt, and swore terrible oaths with their hands between the boy’s small hands as the Patriarch held the Evenstar over the boy’s small head. Their lands were his lands. Their lives and their treasure they pledged to his service against all creatures who can live and die.

  As Duke Alret of Garelyn took his turn, he gave Durand a winki
ng look, and Durand too came round and swore his oath, though he had no land or titles to owe the boy.

  As he stood, every eye of the barons was upon him, and the High Patriarch had come from around the throne bearing Ragnal’s gilded sword with its eagles and precious stones. The king’s jeweled belt was wrapped around the scabbard.

  “Durand Col, you have sworn to serve your king, and now His Great Council bids you stand.”

  Durand looked into the faces of the barons on that high step. He saw Heremund grinning from the rows beyond, and Deorwen at the queen’s side.

  The rough Patriarch clapped the rattling High Kingdom sword into Durand’s hands—the sword which had so nearly slain him in Acconel.

  “Durand of the Col, as you are held in high honor by the magnates of the Great Council, the lords and banner knights of the kingdom, and are known by all to have bled much on the king’s behalf, we call you to stand as the Regent of Errest and Lord Protector in the minority of His Highness, Reilan, King of Errest.”

  Durand took a deep breath, gulping, he was sure, like a fat pike in the bottom of some fisherman’s boat.

  “I— What?”

  “Will you, Durand, serve as Regent and Protector?”

  For a dizzy moment, Durand looked over the crowd of them. Here was the prize that all of Biedin’s machinations had tried to conjure, now dropped in Durand’s hands, unbidden. And, looking at Maude and Garelyn and Beoran and the rest, he was sure that it would be a devil of a thing, but he must do it. They were right. There was no one else.

  And so Durand nodded then and swore his oath.

  He turned to the people in the great hall, and raised his hand toward the boy upon the Hazelwood Throne.

  “Long live the king!”

  The people of Eldinor shouted the dust down from every corner of the Mount of Eagles, and ten thousand birds took to the air.

  * * *

  WITH THE KING finally ensconced in the royal apartments, Durand found an anteroom where he could sit and think a moment. His life would change now. It would no longer be enough for him to stand behind his master and growl. Already, men sought him out with a petitions beyond counting. There was, for example, hardly a serving man left alive in the Mount of Eagles. Durand would be cook, laundryman, and regent all at once if he could not find the men.