Ghost in the Yew: Volume One of the Vesteal Series

by Blake Hausladen

  I woke with a start, fighting away foul dreams. The orange of sunset made its way through the room’s broken window, and I began to notice the smell of the place. The bed stank of unwashed bodies and moldy wine. I’d missed these qualities on the way in and worried what else I’d overlooked. I stole a look out the window.

  The town was a much different thing in the twilight. The quiet had been replaced by the burp and bump of tired and drunken men who pulled empty carts or leaned on alley whores. I searched for a night watchman making the rounds with a torch, but there were no street lamps for such a man to light.

  It was time to go. I got myself together, snuck past the innkeeper, and made straight for the stables. I had the saddle set and was climbing up when the stable boy spotted me and ran back into the inn. I made it out into the street as the innkeeper emerged with a half dozen men.

  “Come now, don’t be leaving us so soon.”

  I turned my back on them and urged Clever down the ugly street. Whatever else they said, I did not hear it. I should not have stopped at the inn and counted myself lucky that their plans for me had waited for the dark of night.

  I slowed us to a trot as we come upon a wide, wooden bridge. The streets on the far side were straighter and better lit, and downstream, a tall tan-stoned fortress guarded the high hill above the town’s wide harbor.

  I was happy to see Almidi’s friendlier half until I spotted a blue uniform upon a black horse along the docks. One of Erik’s bluecoats. I cursed and turned Clever into an alley.

  A trio of broken down men upon a nearby stoop leered up at me, but they were the least of my worries.

  Has Erik somehow followed me here?

  I shook my head. I was again a fool. He did not need to follow me. He knew where I was going. All he had to do was put a watch on the mountain road and keep me from hiring a boat. He had ridden straight here.

  The drunks gathered themselves up.

  Think, simple girl. Think.

  I opened Leger’s purse and kicked around the small collection of tin pennies until I found the last silver half-piece. I waved it back and forth and asked, “What’s the next town east of here with a harbor?”

  Their eyes tracked the coin. One hiccupped and said, “Kormandi, in Thanin. Three days up the east road. It is faster to sail around though, miss.”

  I tossed the coin over their heads, and they elbowed and cursed each other trying to snatch it. I nudged Clever out, peeked once at the bluecoat, and rode back into Almidi’s darker streets.

  I felt like a one-woman parade, but none of them seem inclined to run and tell the bluecoats I was there. I almost chuckled. Erik had not thought to offer these poor souls the very few bits of tin it would have taken to net me. The colonel wasn’t the methodical hunter I’d feared—he was cocksure and lazy.

  I caught sight of the gates. The dingy pair who stood guard looked like they had been set aside so they couldn’t break anything important. I began to chuckle but stifled it. Their spears were very real, and I gave them my full attention. It was perhaps the smartest thing I had done in my whole life.

  I did not slow Clever as I approached. “Is this the right road to Kormandi?”

  One nodded. “Tough road, though. Most sail around.”

  The other barked an expletive and fumbled with his spear. “It’s her.”

  I yelped, ducked his determined stab, and kicked Clever forward. He knocked the second man to the ground.

  I let Clever pick his pace, and he thundered down the road with a happy fury. The shouting behind us faded, but I did not ask Clever to slow until a pair of long hills had flown beneath us. I hid us in a thick stand of trees and settled Clever with soft strokes while I watched the road.

  It took the colonel longer than I’d thought it would, enough for the moon to break above the ocean. She was bright and I could count the red dimples upon her yellow face, and I was able to spot the bluecoats the moment they crested the hill. I made sure it was all of them as they galloped by. My plan would be foiled if the colonel was smart enough to leave a man to guard the mountain road.

  When the sound of them faded, I moved further back from the road and became the ghost the journey had trained me to be. I skulked south and west through fields and pastures, found a thin bridge across the river, and cut northwest around the town.

  By first light, Almidi and its green valley were far to the east and I’d found the road that made its way up the dry toes of the mountain. A single tall pine on the next hill was the only living thing I could see.

  I trembled from the chill in the air and worried that I had no idea at all what I was doing.

  10

  Arilas Barok Yentif

  “This is the last stretch of road before we reach Urnedi Manor,” the driver shouted over the squeak and bump of the old carriage. The cur had been chattering away ever since we had crossed into the province of Trace, and his bleating had only gotten worse when we got a look at the mountains and started across toward the desolate peninsula. Enhedu was not on any map I had ever seen.

  The miserable carriage ride had taken eleven days of my life. Most had ended at a manor or estate, a messenger having gone before us to inform each of our arrival. My hosts never showed themselves, and the accommodations were even more of an insult. The bumpy dawn-to-dusk rides were exhausting, however, so I managed to do little more than eat their cold food and sleep in their musty beds. I was even left wanting the simple entitlement of a proper morning bath. I wished with each that I’d gotten a chance to snatch Dia along for the ride.

  I contemplated refusing to get back into the carriage several times, but with Hessier trailing us, I had no choice. I opened the shutters, hoping to see a cobbled drive or manicured lawn but found instead a rutted dirt road. A branch swatted me across the face.

  “Leger!”

  No response came and I could not imagine where he had gotten so much wine. The carriage lurched, and I fell into the tiny space between the seats.

  “No more of that,” my alsman roared with fire and venom. “Bounce us once more, and I will hang your skin from a tree.” The deep, penetrating sound reminded me of my father’s voice. I considered calling up some small praise to him but heard voices up the road.

  “Hail to the gates,” my driver called.

  “Welcome, Barok, son of Vall, Prince of Zoviya, and Arilas of Enhedu,” a deep, loud voice replied from off to the right as we came to a merciful halt.

  I’d had enough of father’s game. I opened the door and leapt out to begin lambasting the whole, wretched bunch of them. But as I looked up a long stair at Urnedi Manor, I could find no words. The ugly mass of stone and wood set before me was no manor. It looked more like the castle haunt of some crazed priest. The twenty-some uneven steps had been hewn right out of a great, gray table of rock. A stout, round tower loomed over the stairs and the gate they led up to. The tall doors were open, and the keep behind them was a massive square of dark masonry twice as tall as any of the trees in the surrounding forest. Its surface was marked and dotted with high, barred windows, arrow-loops, and a few rough patches where hunks of stone had simply fallen away. The battlements along the top of the keep were jagged and broken like rotten teeth set along stone gums, and atop the corners of the walls were the broken stone columns and rotting timber posts of a fallen priests’ cupola. Around this crumbled dome, smoke rose from three chimneys, giving a small sign of life to a place well-suited for the dead.

  Movement on the stairs drew my eyes back down, and I became aware of the people standing along them. Women wrapped in undyed cloth and men in leather breeches and dark tunics all stood silently staring at me.

  I waited for the manor’s guards to issue from the gates and drive the mob away but none came. A member of this herd began moving toward me.

  “Leger. Dispatch this beggar.”

  “Lord Prince,” the driver said without moving from his seat atop the carriage, “this is Urs Sedauer, the Reeve of Urnedi, and his wife, Madam Sedaue
r.”

  The man reached his hand toward me. “Welcome to Urnedi—”

  “Filthy worm,” I said and struck his hand with the baton. A sharp crack sounded from it, and the man shrieked and moved away. The gathered rabble gasped, and some of the women began to cry.

  “Wretched women, what are you doing here? You are not fit to be seen or heard by me.”

  Leger stumbled around the back of the carriage. “Do not offend the prince again, Reeve.” He slurred, pointing vaguely at Urs. The paunchy man was sitting on a step clutching his crippled hand. Another man crouched to examine the wound.

  I smiled at my thug’s pronouncement and walked around in a small circle. “Can we leave now?”

  Instead of my father’s envoys stepping forward to rescue me, the carriage began to move.

  “What are you doing? Stop,” I ordered. The driver turned the carriage back up the road instead, climbed up onto the back of the unguided carriage, and dumped my trunks over the side. One burst open, spilling clothes upon the road. He jumped back into his box and lashed the horses into a gallop.

  Urs and those gathered around him had retreated halfway up the stairs with looks of horror, some still crying.

  No porters hurried down to attend to my possessions, no valets appeared to show me up the stairs, and my alsman crashed to the ground. One of the women moved to help him but retreated, no doubt smelling his affliction.

  The carriage moved out of earshot, leaving only the rustle of leaves and the sobbing of women.

  Discarding the baton, I set my eyes above the crowd and started up the stairs unaccompanied. The leather-clad pair before the gates stiffened as I approached, as if into attention. Both wore simple short swords. I blinked.

  These are my guards.

  I looked back at Leger and willed him to rise and slay these vulgar people. He let out a great groan instead and vomited on himself. The wine looked like blood, prompting more groans and gasps from the herd.

  My fury revived, I turned my back on them and marched up through the gates. Peasants. I would have been waiting there all day for someone to show me in.

  The outer wall proved thicker than I had first thought, as it took four full strides for me to reach the small, triangular courtyard beyond. But once there, the dark and ominous shape of the keep brought me to a halt. It rose up before me and so dominated my field of vision I had to tilt my head all the way back before I could see the top of the ancient, gray beast. Casting my eyes down its weathered surfaces and along its base, I recognized it was set at a perfect forty-five degree angle within what must be a square of the same thick walls with an identical tower at each corner.

  Understanding better the keep’s construction, it had less hold over me. And yet, counting the openings through which an arrow might claim me, I could not suppress a shiver.

  I found the keep’s entrance straight ahead though well above my reach. The arched gate was on the second level of the keep and had a long, narrow drawbridge that spanned the open air between it and the corner tower.

  My mongrel guards approached, hesitated before coming to a halt. One of the two stiffened back into attention. His face was a mask of fear, but I could also see understanding in the bend of his lip and tilt of his head.

  A woman whispered something as she moved through the gate, trailed by the reeve. He was in obvious pain, his hand swollen and ugly. He made no comment as he approached.

  The smarter guard’s growing understanding proved almost rudimentary when he said with a bow, “A stairway around to the right will take us up to the drawbridge, my lord.”

  His bow was a mockery, but the directions were welcome. He sent his fellow to fetch my belongings and followed me up the stairs.

  The preposterous comedy needed to come to an end. I began to hope it was all a big act, part of some lesson my father wanted me to learn.

  I walked across the drawbridge beneath the arrow-loops and wondered if my father’s men were there, watching and judging me. The thought began to make more and more sense. This was not a punishment. This was a lesson. I was being tested. I straightened my back and evened my pace.

  Ever behind me, the guard volunteered, “Beyond is the entrance hall, empty now but for some workman’s benches. The stairs are to the left. Below is the well, kitchen, and stores. Everything else is above.”

  An education on castle architecture was not something I needed, but with the possibility that my father’s men were above, I nodded and stepped inside.

  I remembered Urs’ broken hand and chewed on my lip. Assaulting the reeve was not a good way to start things off. I would have to find an appropriate compensation for the injury.

  The entrance hall proved to be a frightful gray box with light coming only from the arrow-loops along each wall. As I moved toward the stairs, the guard stepped close and shouted my name up the stairs.

  I suppressed a desire to strike the man, fearful of what my father’s men would want to see. The stairs proved to be the narrowest I’d ever climbed. I grinned at the mystery solved. One-way traffic meant everyone had to announce themselves so that those of lower rank would never get in the way.

  The guard followed, saying simply, “Gern.”

  I reached a landing and brief hallway with a reinforced door at the far end. There was also a second thin door to my left that stunk of a privy.

  “I am sorry about the smell, my lord,” he said and cleared his throat. “We did not have time to muck out the privy pipes before you arrived. The door to the barracks was locked by order of the previous arilas. We do not have a key. The great hall is above.”

  “Urs,” I heard declared from below.

  “Barok,” I said up the stairs for a lark.

  The great hall was a surprise compared to the rest of Urnedi. It reached up four times my own height, and a single flying arch spanning the center of the large space. A gallery circled above, and instead of narrow arrow-loops cutting the walls, windows ringed both floors. All sixteen pair lit a recessed alcove that was set with a thin table, benches, and bookshelves. The spaces looked quite comfortable.

  I laughed aloud. How preposterous.

  I worried about my outburst and stepped toward Gern. “Do you think they heard me?”

  “My lord?”

  “Are my father’s envoys in the barracks? Tell me where they are, so I will know when they are watching.”

  “My lord, other than the rider who brought word of your arrival, no representatives of your family have traveled to Urnedi since the tax collector earlier this year.”

  It was a lie. They had told him what to say, and I was impressed by his delivery.

  Urs approached with his hand behind his back. “The hall is quite nice, yes?”

  “How many men did he send?”

  Urs turned to Gern. “The prince believes his father’s envoys are hiding in the barracks.”

  “Not possible. We have no guests. Sahin was supposed to be here to meet you, but he has not yet arrived.”

  “Who is Sahin?”

  “Enhedu’s only taxpayer,” Urs said with a little laugh, but he sobered. “Sorry, my lord, local humor. He is a craftsman here in Enhedu—a bowyer. For what purpose would your father’s envoys be at Urnedi?”

  “To evaluate me. Now keep your voices down. You can both continue the charade if you wish, but I know this is all a test.”

  “Prince Barok, in matters of the crown, I have never pretended anything. No one is in the armory, and no envoys of your father are at Urnedi.”

  “I do not believe you.”

  “I am no liar, sir,” he said and gathered himself up to his full height. “The armory door has been locked since the day an envoy arrived five years ago, took an inventory, locked that damned door himself, and returned to the capital with the key. I have a copy of the order if you doubt me further.”

  I looked from one man to the other. “Show me.”

  Urs retrieved a thick leather case from a high shelf and pulled a single piece of vellum
from it.

  “Signed and stamped,” he huffed.

  The document was as he had described. “Then where are they?”

  “There is no one else here, my lord.”

  I continued past the landing that led out onto the gallery, and then another that undoubtedly led to the keep’s apartments. The last flight opened onto the roof and its shoulder-high parapet. I jumped up one of the short stairways and crossed to the north corner of the battlement.

  The wall and towers I expected below were in ruins, and the town I had hoped to find consisted of three miserable shacks. The rest was hidden by the terrible forest. The ugly green carpet reached to the horizon in every direction. Only the gray of mountains to the south broke the monotony.

  I turned to see Gern upon the staircase. “Where are they? This miserable forest could hide an entire nation.”

  He turned and descended the stairs without answering my question. I pursued him, but the next landing was blocked by a pair of men carrying one of my trunks.

  “Prince, I did not hear you announce yourself. Please, excuse us.” They made their way into the hallway instead of back down, and I was forced to follow them.

  The passage turned left past another foul-smelling privy and then right again to the doors of four apartments. The first on the left was open, and I found Urs inside with a woman of similar age and beauty. She stood over one of my trunks, lifting clothes into a pair of wardrobes.

  “A fine room, isn’t it my lord?”

  Not. Most certainly not.

  The ridiculously-carved wardrobes were mismatched, the desk beneath the window was, at best, ill-suited for a third-rate scribe, and the bed. The bed, described generously, looked as though it had seen the start of a dozen useless peasants. The large fireplace and long bench in the far corner of the apartment were its most attractive qualities, like dimples on a pockmarked face.

  “I hope this will suit you,” Urs said with the same diffident tone I had so despised at the capital.