The Shadow of the High King

by Frank Dorrian

  He yanked on the reins and wheeled his horse around. ‘Have someone clean this mess up before the rest of the men see!’ He kicked the beast into a canter, spitting out the taste of death that lingered in his mouth.

  They camped that final night in the shelter of hills, the light of a thousand fires casting a dim glow over the land, their halo snuffing out the stars above. The River Thegn flowed nearby, glittering with firelight where it spilled out from the Marrwood. That vast, black mess of trees, mist-woven and threatening, had done nothing to lift the spirits of Ainric’s men as it had appeared on the horizon. Nor his own. The way the road stretched off into it, as though being swallowed by some enormous, crooked maw that waited for them all. And the way that Thegnmere jutted from its distant centre like a broken tooth, its shattered towers jagged and stained red by the dying sun… He’d had a rousing speech planned for days now, intended to be delivered the very moment they had sighted the town. But words had failed him at the sight of its desolation.

  No banners flew atop those towers, nor from what remained of the Eagle’s Keep. No movement could be seen atop the walls, nor in the Marrwood. It all looked so… dead.

  Ainric lay beneath his blanket again, sweating despite the chill that crept through the material. He could still hear them, hear their accusation – those fuckers Hanton, Fullen and Tannic. And see that smug bastard Garrmunt’s smile.

  Where are the enemy, Ainric?

  Where are your scouts, Ainric?

  Where are they, Ainric?

  Where are they, Ainric?

  He shot bolt upright in bed, clutching his head, trying to chase the sound of their voices from his mind, that accursed prickling playing at his temples again. They faded, leaving him with a crushing headache, like claws wedged in his skull. Cursing loudly, he went to the water jug near the tent flap and poured himself some, his throat parched.

  Outside the camp was faintly alive. He could hear the men on guard duty as they roamed in pairs as ordered. They were as jumpy as he, and spoke in hushed tones to one another that made him suspicious as he sipped his water.

  Do all these fools speak ill of me? he thought bitterly, wiping sweat from his brow.

  He dressed, and crept to the tent flap, putting an eye to the gap between the fabric. Outside, the night was dark, and the dying embers of campfires still glowed all around, throwing wavering shadows across canvas walls. The forms of his two guards stood outside brought him some small comfort with their silence and lack of insolence. He could hear the distant sounds of footsteps and mumbled conversation. Across from him, in the shadows of a soldier’s tent, something moved and caught his eye.

  A red silk sleeve, a finely woven shirt, a black eagle embroidered upon the heart. A pale face caught the firelight briefly, setting his skin to prickling as he recognised it. It couldn’t be. That sharp nose, the heavy brow, the ever-grimacing mouth…

  Deorwin?

  His cousin looked straight at him, vanishing into the shadows a second after their eyes touched. Ainric recoiled from the tent flap, biting his fist.

  How was the miserly bastard still alive? And how did he get into the camp?

  Another thought struck him then… had Deorwin orchestrated this? His own cousin? Was this all his doing? Had he killed all those men of his? The scouts? The guards? The expensive fucking horses?

  A cold rage took him. He winced as claws lodged themselves in his skull. It made sense. The man was a schemer, a weaver of webs. A sly, slippery, eely bastard. Why though? Why would he raze his own town? Why draw him and so many other lords here?

  Why have Thegnmere when you can have all the north.

  He meant to kill them all. Seize their lands. He was capable of it, too. The bastard had smashed Greylake into nothing once and look how rich it had made him! He wanted more. He wanted Farrifax.

  Ainric went and fetched the knife from his sword belt. You leave me no choice, cousin. He strode out into the night. Thegnmere is mine.

  His two guards jumped and reached for their swords as he burst from the tent flap, knife clutched firmly in hand. They fell to their knees, blubbering apologies, murmuring of how the night felt ill and the shadows seemed to creep. ‘Shut up, the pair of you,’ he snapped at them, eyes scanning every shadow, looking for the flash of red silk. ‘Both of you, come with me, there’s someone who must die tonight.’ He saw them glance at each other uneasily before he turned away.

  There. A silken shimmer, passing by a dying fire, vanishing behind the angle of a tent. ‘Bring light,’ he said to the two men at his back, ‘the bastard is elusive.’ With a growl he stomped off after his cousin.

  They moved through rows of tents, torches held aloft, Ainric leading. He followed that shimmer of silk through shadow and dying firelight. Did his headache worsen when he lost sight of it? Surely not. He’d need a cup of wine once this was over though. Maybe he could even sleep then.

  ‘Milord,’ one of the men following him said after a while, ‘who is it that we’ll be… taking care of, tonight?’

  ‘A traitorous snake,’ he said, wincing in pain as he lost sight of his cousin, ‘never you mind his name.’

  ‘Yes, milord.’

  Deorwin was heading for the edge of camp. Ainric slinked in his wake, trying to cut him off, yet every time he thought he was ready to pounce, knife poised, there was nothing to be found save shadow and canvas, and those claws in his head would tighten their grip fearfully.

  They came to the edge of the encampment, close to the Marrwood. ‘Where is he?’ Ainric seethed, clutching his head, temples aflare. ‘Where is he!’ He could see only darkness, swaying black trees against a purple night sky. Pockets of torchlight moved around the camp perimeter – had none of these fuckwits seen him? He could not have gone far.

  ‘Who, milord?’ one of the two men with him said, sounding perplexed.

  ‘Deorwin, you imbecile!’ He rounded on the man, and saw the confusion written upon both of those slow, simple faces. ‘Who do you think we’ve been following?’

  The two men glanced at each other, hesitant to answer. ‘We don’t know, milord,’ said the other one, a dim-looking fellow, his hairless brows troubled beneath his iron helm.

  ‘Are you two blind or just stupid?’ Ainric muttered, eyes screwing shut as the ache in his head sharpened suddenly. ‘What am I paying you fools for?’ He looked up towards the Marrwood, pain fading.

  There. To the side of the road. A shape loped through long grass, heading uphill, making for the wood. It stopped briefly, a pale face catching moonlight as it turned towards them.

  ‘There!’ Ainric jabbed his knife at his cousin’s retreating back. ‘After him!’ They set off at a jog.

  A pair of men on patrol came sprinting towards them halfway up the slope, challenging them with spears levelled. ‘Stand down, lads!’ one of his guards called, hand on sword.

  ‘It’s Lord Ainric,’ one of newcomers said with a note of horror, lowering his weapon. ‘Milord! We –’

  ‘No time!’ Ainric snapped, pelting up the slope, ‘the bastard went this way. With us, men!’ Baffled, the two men joined them as they made for the woods, sprinting along with them.

  Breathless, the five of them reached the edge of the Marrwood, where the beaten road was swallowed by its black mouth. Deorwin was gone again. Sharp pain drove at Ainric’s temples almost urgently. He had to find him, before the man’s betrayal went any further.

  ‘This way,’ he grunted to the men at his back, sighting broken branches hanging low near the mouth of the wood, swinging gently in the night’s breeze.

  The Marrwood was pitch black and ate their torchlight greedily, even a few dozen feet in. They moved as an island of pale light, the clutching limbs of trees twisting and reaching like a living archway above them.

  ‘Deorwin!’ Ainric called into the blackness outside their frail pool of light. ‘Deorwin! I know you’re here, cousin!’ Only silence answered him. Sharp pain dug at his temples, pressing behind his eyes. He grunted, knucklin
g them. ‘Deorwin!’

  ‘There’s no one here, milord,’ one of the men said, a note of concern betraying his anxiety.

  ‘He’s here,’ Ainric snarled over his shoulder. ‘Give me that fucking thing!’ He snatched the torch out of the man’s hand and held it aloft, taking a step forward.

  ‘Deorwin! Deorwin, you traitorous shit! I know you’re here! Show your face, cousin, the game is over!’

  Silence. The men at his back shifted uncomfortably.

  ‘Burn it,’ Ainric muttered.

  ‘I beg your pardon, milord?’ said one of the men.

  ‘I said burn the fucking wood!’ The men recoiled slightly as he rounded on them. They shared nervous glances.

  ‘As you say, milord,’ came the choked answer.

  The torches made spiral trails through the dark air as they were hurled amongst the distant trees. If a man chose to hide like a snivelling rat, then like a rat he would be smoked out of his burrow.

  Flames sprang up off the sides of the road, chasing away the night, their glare casting long-limbed shadows from the trees across the road, as though they stretched and clawed away in fear. And in the centre, not twenty paces away, a pale-faced figure in red silk stood, dark eyes burning into Ainric’s own.

  ‘There he is,’ Ainric sneered, ‘take him, men!’

  ‘What the fuck?’ one of the men cursed behind him, etiquette forgotten. ‘Get back, milord!’ Two of them were suddenly in front of him, swords drawn.

  ‘What’re you fools doing,’ Ainric roared, shouldering past them, jabbing his knife at where his cousin stood in silence. ‘Take Deorwin Marreburg pris–’

  Deorwin’s form swam, rippled like disturbed water, black stains spreading across his fine silk shirt, the fabric loosening and lengthening, growing in height. In his cousin’s place stood a figure all in black, hunched, gangling, and hooded.

  It raised itself to its full height as the flames ate through the wood, the boughs above now ablaze with a roar like howling wind. It looked up at Ainric through its hood, its face a silver mask sculpted in the visage of a man, regarding him with empty, shadowed eyes.

  The words ‘fuck me’ had barely left Ainric’s mouth when arrows felled the men either side of him. Spinning, he saw shapes moving through the trees to the sides of the road, the tell-tale creak of bows accompanying them.

  ‘Run, you idiots!’ shrieked Ainric, turning back and sprinting from the wood. Bowstrings snapped, something sharp grazed his shoulder, another his calf and he stumbled and fell down the darkened slope towards the camp, the screams of his men fading behind him.

  Ainric bit down against the pain flooding his lower leg, picking himself up from amongst the long grass. Below, the war camp burned.

  Men ran to and fro in confusion, caught unawares, driven by blind panic. Horsemen rode through burning tents in showers of golden sparks, trampling men down into the earth, swords flashing red as they swung and hacked and killed. Slumped black shapes were caught by firelight, mangled things, cleaved corpses, some still moved to either writhe in pain or crawl out of sight. His army was falling to pieces before his eyes.

  ‘No,’ Ainric uttered feebly, breaking into a limping run, clothes sticky with blood. ‘No!’ Panic over took him and he plunged down the rest of the slope into the burning camp heedless of danger.

  Men ran in all directions, frenzied in their escape. Screams, shouts, weeping. The air was filled with sparks, embers from burning tents, aglow with fell flames. Ainric ducked into the shadows of a baggage cart that had escaped the burning, as a pair of plate armoured riders thundered past, warhorses snorting and snarling, swords swiping left and right, twitching bodies left in their wake.

  There came the sound of a multitude of bowstrings cracking, the sound shuddering through the air from the slope beneath the wood. With a hiss, and rapid-fire thudding, arrows bit home through the outer edge of the camp, dropping exposed men with shuddering gasps. An arrowhead pierced one of the cart’s planks inches from Ainric’s head, and he ran out into the open with a whimper. He found himself screaming as another volley ripped open the ground behind him a moment later.

  Ainric buffeted into fleeing men, slipped through mud and blood and gods knew what else, picked himself up, fell again, blinked back tears, cringed at the pain in his shoulder and leg, felt the blood drying, felt the cuts burning, staggered on.

  The world was a burning eddy of fire and smoke and shining steel as Ainric ran, making for his sons’ tent, their family’s banner mercifully unburnt where it stood. He came slipping and skidding to a halt as he neared it, staring in horror at the fallen forms of his sons’ guardsmen sprawled in the dirt, their blood still spreading about them.

  ‘Peyton! Alard!’ Ainric screamed, not wanting to know what lay in that tent, head shaking, refusing to believe. He screamed their names again, voice hoarse with smoke, exhaustion and fear.

  The tent flap moved. A shape emerged, firelight catching the edge of a steel blade gripped in its fist.

  ‘Enmar!’ Ainric spluttered, recoiling, heart pounding. His captain of infantry’s dead eyes regarded him coldly as he stepped over the fallen guardsmen. ‘Are my sons inside Enmar? Are they harmed?’

  ‘No, my lord,’ Enmar drawled, hollow cheeks twitching, lank hair plastered to his face with sweat and something else… blood? Ainric shook his head.

  ‘Where are they, Enmar?’ he quavered, shaking his captain by the shoulders. ‘We must flee, make for the horses, ride for Farrifax – we must find them, Enmar, hurry!’

  Enmar laid a calm hand on Ainric’s shoulder, face a blank, dead mask as ever. ‘In time, my lord,’ he said slowly. Ainric felt then, the mail he wore beneath that same, dirty white tabard, now splattered with fresh blood. ‘In time,’ the gaunt man said again. Ainric’s eyes fell to the sword the captain gripped in his other hand, as the one upon his shoulder tightened its grip. Blood dripped from its end.

  ‘No,’ Ainric muttered, hands slipping to his side, head shaking numbly.

  ‘You must come with me, my lord,’ Enmar ordered. ‘There is someone who would meet with you.’

  ‘My boys –’

  ‘All in time, my lord,’ Enmar said, voice soothing, gently. ‘A messenger comes to speak with you, to bring you judgement in his master’s name.’

  Ainric opened his mouth to protest as Enmar dropped his sword and slammed his mailed fist into his face.

  It was with a blinding, sparking white light and a foggy confusion that Ainric came to the realisation that he was being dragged by the feet through the camp as it burned around him. Noises came to him still, less intense now, fewer in number, the screams of the dying all around, the spitting and crackling of fires engulfing wood, canvas, flesh. A great pain shot through his head, and he felt with a trembling hand that his cheek was split under his eye from a hefty blow. What had happened?

  His head swam and throbbed, and he was dragged through mud, muck, rock and shit, but to where he could not tell. Embers spun in clouds and flurries high into the night sky from the raging fires, as stars watched down over Ainric sombrely.

  He turned his head and vomited on the ground and himself as he was dragged to whatever fate awaited him.

  ‘Ah, you are with us once more, my lord.’

  ‘Enmar?’ Ainric slurred through an aching jaw.

  ‘Aye, my lord.’ His captain grasped him by his right foot, a man in heavy plate taking his left.

  ‘Where do you take me?’

  ‘All in time, my lord,’ came the gaunt man’s answer. ‘All in good time. Rest now, my lord. Rest.’

  They dragged him further still in silence, heedless of whatever they pulled him through. He vomited again before they let go of him. He was dragged to his feet by the two of them. Enmar with his dead eyes and pale face he recognised. The other was wearing a closed helm, face hidden, the surcoat on his fine plate too dirty and bloodstained to make out the heraldry.

  They were in the middle of the camp, he guessed, his head swimming. The
way before him was blocked with burning tents and bodies, and the light stung his eyes, setting him off balance. He swayed drunkenly and the men at his shoulders shoved him to the ground, where he landed heavily on his hands and knees, the shock jolting through him sickeningly. As he looked up his mouth fell open in horror.

  Through the flames before him there came a mount and rider.

  Ainric beheld a white horse, pale as moonlight, and he who sat astride him was more great and terrible a sight than Ainric could have ever imagined.

  Clad in dark plate, ridged and furnished brutally yet beautiful in its visage, with spines like those of some armoured beast, disturbingly eloquent in its craftsmanship. Covering their face was a great helm of blackened steel. A master work, sculpted like the features of a horned, snarling demon or grotesque animal, and upon their head was sat a crown of pale gold.

  The voice that spoke to him was not that of any man Ainric had ever heard the like of. It did not sound as though it could belong to anything that lived. There was something of it that could have been from a beast, so unnatural it was, and another that was a cruel element of something dead, but there was something of a man to it, as though all three at once spoke through one hideous mouth encased in black steel.

  ‘Ainric Callen,’ it uttered, and he felt himself tremble and shrink in upon himself, his eyes screwed shut so tightly his face hurt. ‘Lord of Farrifax,’ it continued, ‘and the Kennock Vales, in the name of King Aenwald of Caermark.’ Each word sent a wave of sickness through his body. Ainric looked up slowly, tears streaming down his face, cutting paths through soot, blood and filth.

  The rider sat there astride his mount still, clutching its great black reins in spined, sharp gauntlets as the camp burned around them brightly now – a demon made manifest with all the corporeal certainty of metal and flesh. He could feel the weight of the rider’s gaze upon him like a millstone laid upon his back. Yet he could see no eyes behind that foul helm, its scorched horns, curved like those of some fell ram or goat, jutting forward like speartips.

  The firelight danced playful, serene patterns across the pale gold crown he wore, that simple circlet of yellow metal, so plain, yet frightful in its symmetry, as each spire that jutted from the band was sharp, stark, like the blade of a sword.