The Shadow of the High King

by Frank Dorrian

  ‘It can be done,’ Arnulf said with a growl through clenched teeth, slamming a fist on the table impatiently. ‘We will take this fortress.’ He looked about at them all as they watched him in silence. ‘But we must adapt, brothers. Force will not win the day. So we must use wit. And stealth.’

  His finger traced the outline of the Shield’s enormous walls. ‘The one weakness that Celdarin’s Shield has is its very enormity. Lord Rebacht has neither the men nor coin it takes to fully man the fortress. He is a Border Lord, and as such the Gaussemen are a constant pain in his noble arse. He will have men stationed to guard the towns and passes along the Shattered Marches, as is his duty, to secure the Southscar River. This will leave Celdarin’s Shield vastly undermanned.’

  ‘But still manned, Lord Arnulf,’ said Ceagga, concerned as he leant closer to inspect the drawing. ‘A handful of men could still make this monstrosity certain death for an entire army.’

  ‘That is true, Ceagga,’ said Arnulf, nodding, lips pursed. ‘But we are not an army. And we are not going to assault the fortress. We are going to infiltrate it.’

  Arnulf pointed to the walls. ‘Unassailable,’ he said. ‘In broad daylight, that is. At night, undermanned, they are vulnerable. And scalable.’ He saw them all look at each other from the corner of his eye. ‘The Valley can conceal our men until night falls. An army would be seen approaching up the slope to the gates, but with stealth on our side, our men can be in position and ready to strike without raising alarm.’

  He moved his hand to the gatehouse and jabbed a finger down at it. ‘We will need men on the inside, however, to blind the eyes atop the walls before we make our move.’ He looked up at them then and saw the confusion lurking in all their faces. This was new to them, he knew, and it seemed the kind of work fit for cutthroats and assassins rather than warriors, no doubt. And it was. But to survive against what was to come they would have to adapt, no matter how much glory they thought they would sacrifice in the process.

  The end would be worth it. For all of them. They thought too much of battlefield honour and fighting on the frontline swinging sword and swinging shield and bringing glory to their family name. Noble, brave without a doubt, but suicide against such a thing as Celdarin’s Shield.

  All of a sudden, he missed Harlin, and his talented sword arm. The boy would have understood. He would have offered to be first atop the walls, would have offered to be wherever the fighting would be at its thickest, its most dangerous. He would have kept confidence for what Arnulf had in mind and not questioned too much – simply done. He would have brought results.

  And then Arnulf remembered Easthold, and was glad the boy was gone from him.

  ‘My lord,’ Hroga was saying, shocking Arnulf from his reverie. ‘How will we have people on the inside of the walls? What is your plan?’

  ‘We enter in disguise, a small group of us.’ His words stunned them into silence. It was alien to them, these warriors of the north, to think of such tactics. Emasculating, for most, to consider even doing so. But, to his pleasure, and relief, they listened to his next words intently.

  ‘The gatehouses must be secured, for if things should go awry with our plan I would not see our men trapped like rats with a drop to the Valley’s rocks their only means of escape. There are two – here, and here.’ He indicated them with a finger, his men leaning close, all voices silent, save the campfire’s.

  ‘The first gatehouse faces the ascending slope on the march up the plateau, the second is more awkward. The road beyond the first wall runs to the east of the fortress, looping back around to the west to feed into the second gatehouse, creating a death trap for anyone who breaches the first wall, as there is no way to enter through the second without ladders or taking the next gatehouse from the outside.’

  ‘Target practice for their archers,’ Hroga muttered.

  ‘Precisely,’ agreed Arnulf, ‘which is why I want the eyes atop the walls put out before we make our push. To be successful we must take the keep, and quickly. Rebacht and his men could hold out in there for months if we fail to do so.’ He straightened and looked around at his men, muttering amongst themselves about what he had suggested. The snatches he caught of it sounded much more positive than before.

  What was it they say about old dogs and new tricks? He smirked, whatever it was, it would be proven wrong when they took the Shield.

  ‘Two groups of our most experienced will enter the fortress a few days before hand,’ Arnulf continued. ‘Lord Rebacht is known for having weekly markets held in the inner ward for the wealthier of his underlings, fine furs, silks and spices from the east. Our men will pose as merchants peddling such wares, with others posing as their hired bodyguard. They will find lodgings beyond the second wall and wait for nightfall on the market night. The inner gatehouse will be taken first, then the outer, when the guards are distracted and we give the signal to move. The walls will be taken after. Once the walls and courtyard are clear, we enter the keep and put the remainder of Lord Rebacht’s men to the sword.’

  ‘Easier in the saying than the doing, my lord,’ grumbled Sweyn, a note of despondence still lingering, though Arnulf suspected he, too, was beginning to see things in a new light.

  ‘Aye,’ said Arnulf, going to him and laying a hand on the man’s shoulder. ‘But in my experience few things worth having are easily attained, brother.’ He moved away and made a round of the table, taking note of the look in each man’s eye. He saw doubt, uncertainty, discomfort, but bravery and loyalty in all – what he had come to expect of them.

  ‘I promised you all glory beyond reckoning,’ said Arnulf, as he strode slowly around them, ‘and should we succeed in this attempt, you will have more than I could ever hope to have given you. They will write songs of the night Celdarin’s Shield fell to the Blackshield Dogs, they will write histories of its fall by our hand, the story will be known through every holdfast in Caermark, and the Gaussemen will toast our valour while the Ironbrand grieves his loss.’

  He saw it then – the idea dawning upon them at last. They shared glances, smiles, nods. Arnulf’s Dogs were not ones to shy away from a challenge, not where there was a chance to earn such renown. They were not comfortable with the tactics, he understood that – but they would adapt, as they must. There was no choice left for them. Not now. Not ever.

  He could hear them, discussing the plans, suggesting ideas and improvements to one another, formulating, plotting, the scent of impending victory so thick about them all Arnulf had to fight to keep from smiling again, knowing they would follow him once more without question.

  He saw them clasp hands with each other, cheering at last, swearing new oaths to one another, fists raised in the air as they shouted Arnulf’s name and howled like dogs.

  They broke camp after the next morning’s training, the newbloods looking sharper than ever before, giving the veterans in their ranks more than pause for thought while they sparred.

  Steel sharpening steel, Arnulf thought, watching Jorric being sidestepped and swept from his feet with a kick to the back of the legs by a lad some two or three years his younger, red-faced with frustration as he picked himself up off the ground. New fangs for an old hound.

  They struck out southwards again beneath their banners, back down from the shelter of the ruins and into the crags and crunching trails of the Shalefells. The pale sun beat down on them again as they rode, their black cloaks making them sweat and thirst. On the horizon a shimmer made the landscape waver gently, as the splintered rocks baked in the heat.

  Four days on, the tips of shadowed mountains began to peak over the southern horizon when Arnulf crested high ground to scout ahead with Balarin and Ceagga. When first he saw them, he pointed to where they lay and called to his men. ‘The Valley awaits us, Dogs!’ he cried, shouts and raised fists rippling down the serpentine column stretching back out of sight.

  Come noon on the sixth day, there came something atop the south western horizon that alarmed them all. Smoke. A thick, bl
ack trail of it, rising from something beyond their sight near the mountain range, even when higher ground was found.

  ‘What lays to the west of here, my lord?’ Balarin asked of Arnulf as they rode on. Arnulf could hear the murmuring disquiet and passive interest that followed behind him, word of the smoke being passed down the column. He thought for a moment.

  ‘The Spear Hills,’ he uttered. It was Lord Garrmunt’s territory that lay westward of here, his holdfast Garr’s Cairn was built into the side of one of the mountains there, if he recalled correctly.

  ‘The Spear Hills?’ Balarin repeated, mouth agape. Arnulf nodded, eyeing the smoke wearily.

  ‘Aye,’ he said. He jerked his head at the smoke that still hung in the sky. ‘Though what that means, I cannot say.’

  Whatever troubles were brewing in Garrmunt’s homelands were none of their concern. He could only hope whatever it was would be a blessing for him and his men, and not some new hindrance or evil waiting to sweep them up in its path.

  It was the next day when they passed over a rise in the land, the Shalefells thinning and giving way to open plains of long, wiry grass, that to the east they spotted a faint silhouette against the evening sky. One that Arnulf and his Oathbound all knew.

  Great Armingstone, seat of the Ironbrand, the greatest city of Caermark. The Keep of Faldarun and its marble towers rose like red-tinged fangs atop a mountain of clustered buildings, peeping over the city walls in a jagged mess. A constant haze hung over that place, Arnulf often thought to himself, the smog of so many living so crowded, a smear on its architectural grandeur. There was no other place like it. They said it had been built by the Old Empire in a forgotten age, its many spires and domes crafted by hands that held talent no one could equal today. Arnulf was not sure how much of it was true, but whoever had built it, it mattered little – these days you could smell the filth of the place from a mile off. A festering shit heap behind white stone walls.

  Still, despite the filth of it all, the construction of the place had to be admired. He could even hear the men behind him exchanging awestruck remarks. ‘It must have been built by giants,’ said one, Dran, Arnulf thought. ‘Men can’t build such things.’

  ‘Neither can giants,’ another said, Elric, perhaps. ‘I heard the gods helped men build it.’

  ‘Bollocks,’ said Dran, ‘if the gods helped build it, then why does it smell so bad?’

  ‘The gods need somewhere they can shit, too.’

  Arnulf let himself smile as laughter erupted in the ranks behind him.

  ‘We have come far, Lord Arnulf,’ Ceagga said cheerfully to his side, sweating beneath his helm. ‘We make good time for the Shield, it will be ours before the winter comes calling, should all go well.’ Arnulf opened his mouth to agree with him, when one of their outriders came tearing down from a hill to the west. It was Torc, he saw, as he galloped towards the advancing column.

  ‘Lord Arnulf!’ he came crying, his horse skidding to a halt across some of the last stones of the Shalefells. ‘Riders approaching from the west!’

  ‘How many,’ Arnulf said flatly, wheeling his horse around in a blur and leaving the column with Balarin and Ceagga flanking him.

  ‘Three hundred at least, my lord,’ Torc answered, ‘maybe more, knights by the look of them. They carry the royal banner.’

  ‘The royal banner?’

  ‘Aye, my lord, they’re the King’s men it seems. They ride eastwards, from where we saw the smoke above the Spear Hills yesterday. I’d say they’re making back for Great Armingstone.’

  Arnulf pursed his lips at that. He decided, nodding to himself. ‘You three come with me,’ he said, wheeling around again. ‘Hroga,’ he bellowed to where the Oathbound rode near the bannermen.

  ‘Aye, lord,’ came the answer.

  ‘Keep them heading south, we will return shortly, something foul stirs in the west!’

  Leaving Hroga to lead the men, Arnulf led Balarin, Ceagga and Torc back westwards at a gallop, over the stone-flecked hill and down into smooth grassland beyond, the scent of crushed lavender in the air.

  Before them a cloud of dust rose drearily into the western sky, travelling along the road that led east to Great Armingstone. They reined their horses in amidst the long grass, and watched it draw closer from a safe distance. ‘Knights it is,’ Arnulf said, the distaste in his voice making his men grunt and mutter curses of their own. ‘And infantry too, lest my eyes deceive me.’ Farther back, screened by the riders, he could make out the shapeless mass of a fair number of men marching in close formation, forced to chew upon the dust cast up from the road by the horses ahead of them

  As the dust cloud drew nearer Arnulf could see the riders shrouded by it. The sun flittered red and dull from their plate armour. Flapping above their heads on each flank were two great banners. One was deep green, and showed a black boar’s head upon a broken shield. The other was red, bearing the sigil of the chained and crowned bull worked in golden thread.

  ‘You were right, Torc,’ Arnulf sighed, casting a vague nod at the distant knights. ‘Lord Garrmunt betrays the crown and burns the north, and now the Ironbrand’s men ride from the Spear Hills, where smoke stained the sky only a day past. Events grow ever more interesting, brothers. Come, let us return before they grow too curious of us.’ They rode back to the column as one, taking their respective places.

  It was not long, however, before their path wound clear of the cover provided by the hill, and led them to where the southern and western roads crossed with one another. The knights rode for the east as before, distant still, but one of the brothers called to Arnulf, and when he looked to where the man pointed, he saw five riders galloping ahead of the main body, less than half a mile away, flanked by the two bannermen, sun flaring from fluted armour now they were not enshrouded by dust.

  ‘Welcoming party,’ Balarin grated beside Arnulf. ‘They must be curious of us.’

  ‘So it would seem,’ Arnulf answered, stiffening.

  ‘Orders, my lord?’ said Ceagga, mouth set firmly, eyes following the group of riders fast approaching them.

  ‘Bannermen, with us, the rest of you keep moving,’ Arnulf barked over his shoulder, motioning for Balarin and Ceagga to follow him again.

  They rode out as one, side by side, out into the long grass again at a canter. The other party approached at similar speed through the waving fronds of fern and thorny shrub. One in the centre raised his hand in the sign of parley as they slowed and came to a halt, Arnulf returning the gesture, he and his men stopping some thirty paces away from them.

  The two parties eyed one another suspiciously for a moment, hands staying near weapons. Wariness was to be expected at the best of times when unfamiliar warbands encountered one another on the road, and these were most certainly not the best of times. Diplomacy would be key here, Arnulf knew – from a glance he could tell their host numbered almost near a thousand, maybe more if there were ranks further back still he could not see. The Dogs would not survive a fight with one of the King’s own armies out in the open, so exposed and outnumbered.

  The knights facing them were all clad in exquisite plate, fluted and ornamented with their individual heraldry in places, inscribed with ornate flowing script in others, litanies of faith to draw divine protection, every inch of them lordly and speaking of wealth or fame. Arnulf ventured he knew some of them, but could neither recall ever having had business with them before now. He had met and killed too many knights in his life as a mercenary for him to bother keeping track of them and their pretty symbols.

  ‘Hail, riders,’ came a muffled voice from the other party, a tall man whose armoured breast was embossed with charging boars in intricate bronze work, their bodies inscribed with words of devotion to Vathnir. His hand reached up to remove his great helm, sculpted into the visage of a boar’s head, the tusks etched and patterned finely to their very tips.

  The face beneath belonged to a man of late-middle years, lined and weary with age and war, his long grey bea
rd braided tightly into three thick ropes that lay across his chest. Arnulf felt the spike of recognition as the two eyed each other.

  ‘What business have you in this land?’ the man called to them, tucking his bulky helm beneath his arm. From this distance Arnulf could just make out his eyes flittering from he and his men up to their banners and back again, finding an ever so slight twinge of discomfort laying in that flickering gaze.

  ‘Hail, men of the King,’ Arnulf called back diplomatically, bowing his head but keeping his eyes upon them. ‘We journey south, to seek employment and fortune at the Shattered Marches.’ He heard a faint tinkle of laughter as the knights across from them looked at one another with their hidden faces wrapped in steel. He felt his teeth grit.

  ‘The Shattered Marches,’ the one without his helm said back to him, doubtfully, nodding slightly before spitting over to his side. ‘You would do better in the north,’ he said, frowning at Arnulf, his distrust open. ‘The King strikes his banners and summons all able men to march to the Middenrealms with him. The Shattered Marches are thinly manned since the call, a more barren place than ever before, and the Gaussemen lazy drunkards who think of nothing but wine and food instead of fighting.’

  ‘And fucking their livestock,’ a muffled voice to the left added, raising another chuckle from the haughty ensemble. The helmless man did not laugh, however. He kept his eyes upon Arnulf, his frame tense, eyes youthfully bright against his aging body. It was a test, of course, which one would speak first, give their name, their rank, and thusly lose the game being played. Arnulf narrowed his eyes into the man’s and held his stare, seeing the wrinkled brow crease as the challenge was taken.