The King's bastard cokrk-1

by Rowena Cory Daniells

  The sleds stood on frozen Viridian Lake, waiting to be loaded so the monks could set off tomorrow. As a final-year acolyte it was not his place to tell first year monks what to do, but…

  Jeering male laughter made Fyn stiffen. The sound carried from the next inlet along the lake's shore. He made his way carefully along the snowy bank, towards the outcropping that hid the inlet. Climbing onto the ledge, he crawled along until he could stretch out and look down onto the scene below, his head almost level with the monks'.

  There were four of them, their different coloured robes revealing their affiliation with different abbey masters, but these four had always been fast friends, united by their similar natures. The monks had cornered a flock of grucranes. These large, cumbersome Affinity beasts survived Rolencia's cold winters by cohabiting with people. In exchange for a warm roost at night near the chimney pots of homes, they kept watch over the buildings. One of the flock was always awake, a stone clutched in its claw. If it fell asleep, the stone would fall and wake the others, so the birds made excellent sentries. Many a household had been saved from thievery or fire, always a constant threat with wooden homes, by the raucous cry of the sentry grucrane.

  This particular flock slept on the abbey's chimney vents and spent their days on the lake, swimming and fishing in summer, fossicking along the shore in winter. Now they were confronted by Monk Galestorm and his three friends. The flock's leader had shepherded the birds into a hollow in the shoreline, effectively trapping them because, unless the heavy, ungainly birds took to the air, the only way out was closed off by Galestorm and his friends. Used to nothing but kindness from the monks, the birds milled about in confusion.

  While his three companions watched, Galestorm shoved a stick at the Affinity beasts, then made an opening, only to dart in and block it off before the grucranes could escape.

  Indignation filled Fyn. He wanted to jump down and defend the grucranes, but there were four monks and only one of him. It would be madness to risk a beating over a bird, even an Affinity-touched bird.

  Galestorm misjudged the distance, or else really intended to harm the grucrane, for his next jab took it in the chest. It gave a raucous squawk of protest.

  'Hey!' Fyn yelled, swinging his weight over the ledge and jumping down to the frozen lake below. A snow bank absorbed the impact of his landing.

  'Fyn Rolen Kingson, what're you doing here?' Galestorm strode towards Fyn, swinging the stick so that it cut the air with a sickening swish.

  Fyn's heart thundered and he glanced over his shoulder, but the rocks behind him were too steep to climb. He faced Galestorm. 'Leave the grucranes alone.'

  'And what are you going to do about it, coward?'

  Cruel laughter followed Galestorm's taunt.

  Fyn shrank inside. The moment Galestorm was distracted, the lead bird took off, flapping madly to gain height, then circling protectively as the others spiralled above him, heading towards the abbey.

  'Did you hear?' Galestorm asked his ready audience. 'The kingson faints at the sight of blood — '

  'Watch out. The birds are getting away,' Onetree yelled.

  Galestorm spun around, swore, then tossed the stick aside. He pulled out his slingshot, grabbed a stone from his pouch and let fly into the mass of grucranes. One bird gave a forlorn cry, falling to the lake with a solid thump.

  Fyn could not believe his eyes. 'You idiot!'

  Galestorm faced him, his top lip lifting in a sneer.

  Fyn tried to go to the aid of the injured bird but Galestorm stepped into his path, reaching for him. Without thinking, Fyn evaded the grab, caught Galestorm's arm and flipped him off his feet. The air left Galestorm's lungs with a satisfying whump as he hit the ice, then skidded across the lake on his back.

  The other three monks protested.

  Fyn ignored them, hurrying over to the bird. It was trying to rise with an injured leg, wings flapping unevenly. Taking off his cloak, Fyn threw the woolen mantle over the bird, then gathered it in his arms. The Affinity beast was trembling badly and he pressed it against his chest to reassure it. Nothing infuriated Fyn more than wanton cruelty.

  Shouts from Galestorm and his companions told him they were coming up fast behind him. He could not protect himself, let alone the bird. What had possessed him to interfere? They would kill the bird and beat him black and blue.

  Still, he turned to face his tormentors.

  'What's going on here?' a deep voice called.

  Fyn looked beyond them to see Oakstand, the weapons master, approaching with Sandbank, a third-year healer.

  'Why aren't the sleds being loaded?' the weapons master demanded. Oakstand was short, with a deep chest and a scar that puckered one side of his forehead, creeping up into his hair which grew white along the scar's length. It must have been striking once but now the rest of his hair was iron-grey. For a man who knew how to disarm and kill an armed opponent in three swift moves, he was amazingly patient with the boys.

  'I've got an injured bird.' Fyn indicated the bundle in his arms. One long clawed leg projected from it in an ungainly manner. The bird had calmed down.

  'A grucrane?' Healer Sandbank asked. 'Give it to me. I'll take it back to the abbey.'

  Fyn handed the bundle over. 'Careful, something's wrong with its wing and I think one of its legs broke when it hit the ice.'

  'So the kingson is a healer now?' Galestorm asked.

  The weapons master frowned. 'Enough, Galestorm. I want the sleds packed and ready to leave at first light. Fyn, get back to the abbey.'

  For a heartbeat Fyn considered revealing how the bird had been hurt, but it was his word against four monks and they could cause trouble for him later, so he hurried off. Behind him, Fyn could hear the weapons master ordering Galestorm and the others about and knew they would regret failing in their duties.

  Monk Sandbank was already three body lengths ahead of him, following the winding trail up the slope to Halcyon Abbey. As Fyn watched, the healer rounded a curve, disappearing behind snow-cloaked evergreens.

  Taking to his heels, Fyn ran up the slope, rounded the corner and looked up. No sign of the healer, who must have been hurrying to pass the next bend so quickly. Head down, Fyn concentrated on where he put his feet, not wanting to slip on the icy snow. Already the chill of the night was settling in and he was without a cloak. He rounded the next bend and nearly ploughed into a snowdrift.

  That was strange. He didn't remember stepping off the path.

  Fyn spun around only to find himself eye to eye with an old woman wearing moth-eaten furs. Her lips pulled back in a gap-toothed leer that might have been a smile.

  Startled, he took a step back, overbalancing into the snowdrift. The snow broke the impact of his fall but he was still a little winded. Gasping, he lay stretched out on his back. When he went to get up the old woman prodded him in the chest with her staff, effectively pinning him there.

  'You struck a monk.'

  'He tried to kill a grucrane.'

  'What's that bird to you?'

  What indeed? Fyn shook his head, not even sure why he had bothered to answer her the first time. She was obviously mad, god-touched in her own way.

  'No idea, just like the other one.' She shook her head and laughed to herself. It wasn't a pleasant sound, ending in a raw hacking cough.

  After the fit had passed, while she was labouring to regain her breath, Fyn gestured up the rise behind him. 'If you are ill, seek out the healing monks. They have a hot potion for a cough like that.'

  She glanced up behind him. The light was fading rapidly and he could hardly see her face for the glow of the nacreous sky behind her. Here, under the pines, it was already twilight.

  Alert black eyes fixed on him. 'Most surely they do, Fyn Kingson, but not for the likes of me. No, not them pure and mighty servants of Halcyon!'

  He did not know what to say to that.

  'Not much longer.' She hawked and spat to one side, wiping her mouth on the back of her hand. Obviously weary and
ill, her eyes met his and held. 'Now, mark my words, Fyn Kingson.'

  Her body jerked and her head tilted back until he could see the lines of dirt under her chin.

  Fyn drew away in revulsion as an aura of power gathered around her frail form, making her seem larger. Even with his weak Affinity, Fyn could tell this was the untamed power of a Renegade.

  'A seer!' He tried to scramble back, but the snowdrift held him. He should have been terrified. He should have denounced her to the mystics master, who would have ordered her immediate execution.

  But he was fascinated, despite himself.

  One clawed hand lifted to point at him, though from the angle of her head she could not see him. She was relying on Unseen sight.

  'Unwanted youngest son, god-touched, nameless boy. I see you fleeing for your life. I see a day when the Goddess Halcyon's name is said only in whispers — '

  Fyn laughed. He could not help it. The goddess was revered throughout Rolencia, served by seven hundred faithful monks in the abbey alone, all trained by the weapons master, sheltered behind defensive walls, built into the very mountain itself. Nothing could…

  'Pah!' She shuddered and spat again, frowning down at him now that her vision had passed. 'None so blind as they who will not see! Very well, I wash my hands of you.'

  She put her back to him, hobbling off between the snow-coated pines, their white skirts joining with the deep snowdrifts.

  'Don't go that way. You're not following the path,' Fyn called after her.

  She laughed softly and kept going. 'Follow me own path, boy, always have.'

  He rolled over onto his stomach and came to his feet, determined to set her right, at the very least warn her off approaching the abbey, but when he turned around, she was gone.

  'You there?' he called, brushing snow from his breeches.

  'Is that you, Fyn?' the weapons master asked. The glow of his lantern gave the snow a golden cast as he weaved between the snow-shrouded pines. 'What are you doing off the path, lad? Don't you know it's not safe to be out alone so close to midwinter?'

  At midwinter the cruel god, Sylion, reluctantly relinquished his hold on Rolencia, giving the kingdom over to the goddess's care. With a major change of power the barriers between the Seen and the Unseen world were dangerously weak. And to think, he'd been too surprised to use any of the wards to protect himself from renegade Affinity.

  Fyn blinked, the after image of the master's light dancing in his sight. With the arrival of the lantern came full dark.

  'Well?' the weapons master demanded. 'The others have all returned to the abbey.'

  'I wasn't watching my feet, Master Oakstand,' Fyn said, knowing he sounded foolish. 'I…' He was about to mention the old woman, but was surprised to find that he could not speak of her. When he tried his tongue grew thick and clumsy in his mouth. He swallowed and the sensation passed, but he suspected it would return.

  'Eh, well, come on then.' The burly master led him through the snow and Fyn found he was only a few steps off the path.

  They trudged up the hill in silence for a bit, then the weapons master slowed, his heavy eyebrows drawing together.

  Fyn waited expectantly. Their lantern failed to illuminate the great looming towers of the pine trees that stood silhouetted against the froth of sparkling stars. Twilight seemed to have passed abruptly, something to do with the seer, Fyn guessed. He wondered if she was out there even now, watching them. He should denounce her but he couldn't, not when she seemed so frail and sick, not when she had a ring of dirt under her neck. He had never visualised a renegade Power-worker like that. Evil, perhaps… but not vulnerable.

  Fyn glanced to the weapons master. Oakstand's scar from the last great battle with Merofynia reminded him that his mother had been betrothed to his father as part of the peace. Strange to think of Queen Myrella as a child, leaving her home in Merofynia to come and live in Rolencia, and his father waiting seven years for her to grow up. For the first time, Fyn wondered if the eight-year-old Myrella had felt as homesick as he had, when his parents sent him to the abbey at six years of age. It was not as if either of them had had any choice.

  'They'll run the race for Halcyon's Fate on Midwinter's Day,' the weapons master said abruptly.

  Fyn had to collect his thoughts. He nodded. 'The Proving.'

  'Wanted to get this said before the race, Fyn. You're small, but winning's not about brute force, it's about strategy. You've got a good head on your shoulders.'

  Fyn could see where this was going, and his stomach churned. His father expected that Fyn would eventually become weapons master, leader of the elite band of warrior monks, able to support Lence, when he became king. But…

  The weapons master grinned. 'I'm offering you a place in the ranks of my elite warrior monks. Who knows. I've got plenty of fine warriors, but it's thinkers I need to train as leaders.'

  Fyn's heart raced. This was everything his father had hoped for him and for the future of Rolencia. But… 'I can't do it.'

  'What?' The weapons master looked stunned.

  Fyn felt equally surprised. 'I'm sorry. I'd be the joke of the abbey.' Heat raced up his cheeks. All he wanted to do was run to Master Wintertide and ask his advice. 'Surely you've heard what they're calling me. Coward, snivelling — '

  'Hold up. Is this about that time with Hawkwing?'

  Fyn nodded miserably. 'I fainted when his finger was cut off.'

  Oakstand laughed. 'The moment I turn my back to take a leak, you acolytes chop each other up. Teach you to be more careful next time!' He sobered, sharp eyes on Fyn. 'Now, as I remember it, you held his finger in place until the healers came while everyone else panicked.'

  'He still lost most of his finger and I fainted.' Fyn felt the master wasn't taking this seriously. He'd suffered enough jibes since then to make his life miserable.

  'True, but you fainted after the healers took him away.' The weapons master grinned. 'So what if he lost his finger? What's a man without a few scars?'

  Fyn shook his head miserably. 'It's just — '

  'Enough, lad.' Master Oakstand placed a hand on Fyn's shoulder and began to stride up the rise towards the gates, which were just around the next bend. 'You don't have to give me your answer right now. Think on it. Three of the last ten abbots came from my branch. Come on. Let's get inside before we freeze our balls off.'

  Fyn had to lengthen his stride to keep up with the master. Oakstand was right, the role of weapons master was a step towards becoming abbot. Halcyon's fighting monks had earned their reputation through years of conflict. But that was in the brutal past. They were living in a new, more civilised age of study and prosperity.

  As Fyn walked through the abbey's huge gates, he was relieved he did not have to accept the weapons master's offer immediately. It shamed him to admit he couldn't bear to see a bird suffer, let alone a person.

  He'd never be a great warrior.

  While Byren made camp, building a snow-cave on the bank of the canal, he kept one eye on Orrade. Working fast from long practice, he made the cave just large enough to crouch in, just large enough for two men and their travelling packs to stretch out. Once it was complete, they climbed inside and Byren heated some food on their small travelling brazier, tossing in salted meat and finely chopped vegetables, all prepared by the Dovecote cook. Halcyon bless her. This was their second night out and Orrade had been strangely silent all afternoon. Every now and then he grimaced with pain, and there wasn't a thing Byren could do.

  'Hungry, Orrie?'

  'Think I'll just turn in,' he muttered, rolling up in the blanket, huddling with his head in his hands.

  'Head hurting?' Byren asked softly.

  'Something awful,' Orrade admitted. So it must have been bad.

  Byren wondered if this meant his friend was about to have another Affinity-induced vision and if Orrade had sensed the change in himself yet. 'How did you know the raiders were coming?'

  'You asked me that before,' Orrade muttered. He rolled onto his
back, eyes hidden under his forearm. 'I don't even remember warning you. Must have felt their approach through the ice like you said. Sorry, can't think now, Byren.'

  Feeling useless, Byren stirred the food, cooking by the light of a single lamp. What would he do if Orrade became worse? The seer had said he would live, but men had been known to die from head wounds several days after getting up and walking around. At least they'd camped on the canal, so he could rig a stretcher and drag his friend. Get him straight to the castle healers.

  That made Byren realise he would have to explain why Orrade hadn't stayed at Dovecote estate with their healer. He would have to tell his parents Orrade had been disinherited. Old Lord Dovecote wouldn't want him to reveal the real reason, which meant thinking up a lie. Byren wasn't good at lying.

  Soon dinner was ready. The meat had already been cooked and, as for the carrots, he didn't mind if they were a bit crunchy, so long as they were hot.

  'Sure you don't want any?' He tried to tempt Orrade, who shook his head. At least he was still aware. That was good.

  Byren forced himself to eat, leaving plenty in case Orrade was hungry later, then turned in. On a major canal during midwinter, this close to Rolenton there was not much chance of a predator attacking their snow-cave, so he did not bother to keep watch. He had made sure their snow-cave was hidden in a fold in the canal bank. Unless someone was looking specifically for them, it would be hard to find. Still, he slept lightly, a warrior's sleep.

  Several hours later he rolled awake, on alert. Though he could not see the stars he guessed it was near midnight. A dull blue luminescence came through the arc of the snow-cave roof, a pale imitation of the stars' brilliance.

  What had woken him?

  There it was again, the softest squeak of snow being moved. He stared at the snow-cave entrance which he'd packed shut to retain their body heat. Snow shifted and fell in. Something, or someone, was trying to get in.

  Byren left his blanket roll and crept around until he was beside the closed opening, drawing his borrowed hunting knife. A hand poked through, followed by a head and shoulders. Byren grabbed the intruder and hauled him onto his back, knife at his throat.