by John F. Carr
If there had been any place left to desert to, he would be an army of one. He wondered to himself, What kind of army will I have by the time we reach Harphax City?
He heard the clomping of horses before he saw Captain-General Demnos and his guards. Demnos was riding a dappled-gray charger and wore a floppy hat to keep the rain off.
“Your Majesty, where are your Bodyguards?”
Lysandros pointed back to the column. “Over there somewhere. I don’t see them with all this rain.”
“Well, I advise you not to go anywhere without them again.”
“What are you talking about? Is there talk of rebellion among the soldiers?”
“Worse, Your Majesty! The Bastard Prince has had his scouts posting notices to the effect that all deserters will be welcomed. Fortunately, our own scouts got to the notices first, and most of the men cannot read.”
“He’s close, then.”
“Aye, aye, Your Majesty. Him and his Army of Greater Beshta. Phidestros is also offering a reward of fifty thousand gold Crowns for your head!”
“Damn his eyes! I should never have allowed him to leave the Host. How is my wife?”
“The Queen?” Demnos’ face wrinkled. “No one knows; we haven’t heard a word from the capital since we left Kyblos. You should put her out of your mind, Your Majesty. You need to concentrate on our problems at hand. The Bastard, for all his faults, owns a lot of respect among our soldiers.”
“You think some of the men might take him up on his offer of amnesty?”
“Of course! Your soldiers are tired, weak, starving; morale couldn’t be worse. If the back-stabber’s army appeared out of the fog this moment, half our army would throw down its weapons and surrender. The other half would run.”
Lysandros tried to maintain his calm. Things can’t be this bad, can they? Maybe… Demnos had no reason to lie, and every reason to tell the truth.
Already he could feel a sense of menace emanating from the line of soldiers. It’s my imagination. Demnos has me fretting like a virgin on her wedding night!
“We must keep this news from the men at all costs.”
Demnos shrugged, as if he thought the spark had already struck the primer pan.
“Send more scouts out,” Lysandros ordered. “We need to know where the Bastard is holed up.”
“Yes, Your Majesty. I’ll do my best. The black-hearted Bastard’s offered a reward for my head, too!”
“Double rations for everyone tonight. I want the men in fighting trim.”
“We’re close to an empty larder, Your Majesty. We’d better hope he fights soon, or we’ll all starve to death.”
III
“I want you to leave immediately for Zygros City,” Styphon’s Voice said, as he leaned back to take a puff on his pipe.
“Yes, Your Divinity, but isn’t it a bit late in the season for overland travel?” Archpriest Danthor asked. He knew that overland travel to the far north during the fall in a pre-mechanical civilization was difficult at best what with washed-out roads and freezing rain or snow.
“You’re going to take a fast galley. It should get you to the coast in about a quarter moon.”
Right, as long as a nor’easter doesn’t come up! he thought. “Yes, Your Divinity. But why the hurry?”
Anaxthenes made a smile that only needed fangs to make it positively snake-like. “First, Grand Master Soton now controls Agrys City and, secondly, the Selestros problem is about to be solved. Once Great King Lysandros returns to Harphax City, Selestros will meet the King’s headsman.”
He held his thumb and index finger apart by just a fraction. “We are now this close to owning all the Five Kingdoms. The time has arrived to ensure that the Zygrosi do not cause us problems next spring. It is well known that Great King Sopharar is a member of the Zygrosi League of Dralm. Our agents in Hos-Zygros tell us that he is preparing to send an army south to aid the Agrysi League of Dralm against our own Host of Styphon’s Deliverance. This is not a friendly act.”
Danthor nodded. “What can we do to stop him, Your Divinity?”
“A good question. Grand Master Soton will be busy conquering the rest of Hos-Agrys and, since we don’t have an army to send, we will have to use other means to put a wrench in Sopharar’s wagon wheel. In this case his brother, Prince Eudocles. The Prince is heavily in our debt, hates his older brother and is as ambitious as the winter is long—and it is very long in Hos-Zygros. With the right encouragement, he will do as Lysandros did before him. Thessamona will accompany you with her little vials.”
Danthor nodded. The downside to being one of Anaxthenes’ right-hand men was that he had to do a lot of unpleasant work. He also needed to show that he was more than just a functionary. “Your Divinity, isn’t it true that Grand Duke Eudocles is also Phidestros’ real father?”
“Yes, there’s considerable evidence that this is so.”
“Therefore, Your Divinity, by replacing one enemy with an ally we will have neutralized the Zygrosi League of Dralm, while sowing discord within the Agrysi League of Dralm. The Agrysi will be most disheartened when they learn their ally, Great King Sopharar, is dead and will not be supporting them in their war against the Temple.”
Anaxthenes gave him a smile of approval, while his eyes said something else: Watch it priest, it doesn’t pay to appear too smart.
Danthor was reminded of the Dhergabar University Faculty Senate where the Department heads saw every good idea as a potential threat from an adversary. “How does Grand Duke Eudocles’ son, Prince Phidestros fit into all of this?”
Styphon’s Voice paused. “We know there is no love between the two of them. However, in the past, we have been informed that Eudocles has given his son gold to support his troops. There could very well be some secret pact between the two of them; I wouldn’t put it past either one of them. Father and son are both very ambitious, deceitful and cunning. This is why I need someone I can trust, who is as crafty and unwavering as Eudocles, to act as my representative in Hos-Zygros. It will be your job to see that Eudocles takes our bait and neutralizes Hos-Zygros in the spring. Without the Army of Hos-Zygros to support them, the Agrysi League of Dralm’s army will fall quickly to Soton’s Hammer.
“If Prince Eudocles fails to take the required action in this matter, you can tell him we will withhold all further payments to him. Nor will we discharge his debts to our banking houses, and all his notes will become due immediately.”
Danthor nodded sagely. For a nobleman like Eudocles, who was in debt up to his armpits to Styphon’s House, having his notes called by Styphon’s Great Banking House would mean certain ruin. Or, Eudocles could turn to the League of Dralm; however, with his stained escutcheon, no one would believe any renunciation of Styphon’s House he might make.
“If I know my man,” Anaxthenes continued, “I don’t believe that such a warning will be necessary. However, the Great Kingdoms are in a state of flux and things have not always gone our way. It will be up to you to make sure this operation does. You will have an unlimited draft upon Styphon’s Great Banking House of Hos-Zygros to use as bait. He will need the gold to buy the loyalty of those Princes who can be bought and the rest to cause problems for those who have no price.”
NINETEEN
I
Prince Sthentros of Hostigos looked out the window of his chamber down at the golden dome, which looked like an earthbound sun as it reflected the morning light. The Styphon’s House Temple was surrounded by ruins. It was one of the first new buildings in Hostigos Town, since most of the town had been destroyed during the Siege of Tarr-Hostigos. For allowing Styphon’s House to build their temple and giving them ownership of Wolf Valley, with its sulfur springs, he had received a hundred thousand ounces of gold and a wagonload of fireseed.
The gold had gone quickly, most for repairs and refurbishment of the palace. Some for victuals which were in short supply throughout old Hostigos. Like so many things he had hoped to accomplish, the rebuilding of Hostigos Town was costi
ng more gold and happening far slower than he desired. For a while, after the riots in Harphax City, there had been a small flood of immigrants from Harphax City eager to till the Princedom’s rich farmlands.
Now, with their first crop about to be harvested, they were threatened with a plague of locusts coming from the west, Great King Lysandros and his starving horde. The Harphaxi Army was now an army in name only.
Great King Lysandros, only days away, was demanding cattle and foodstuffs they could not provide, not without starving his subjects this coming winter. He didn’t have enough farmers and serfs that he could afford to lose a single one. Nor did he have the troops to defend his borders, much less Hostigos Town.
He heard his door open and saw his manservant enter.
“What is it?” he asked.
“Your Highness, Highpriest Walthar wants to meet with you,” his manservant answered.
Sthentros nodded his head slowly; he was still suffering from a hangover from last night’s drinking bout.
“Tell him to enter!” he snapped. What was the Styphon’s House Highpriest going to demand now? Sometimes he wondered who was in charge of Hostigos, him or Styphon’s House.
The Highpriest Walthar, a small man lost in his yellow robe, entered his bedchamber as if he owned it. “Your Highness, one of our intelligencers reports that Prince Phidestros and the Army of Greater Beshta is within a day’s march of Hyllos Town.”
“That close! Do you think they’ll march into Hostigos Town?” He felt his stomach drop as if he’d swallowed a large stone.
The Highpriest smiled. “There’s nothing here that the Prince wants, Your Highness. We don’t have much food and the town was looted to the root cellars just last summer. Prince Phidestros is only in Hostigos because that’s where he expects to meet the Harphaxi Army. Most of the southern trails are flooded and there is no northern route due to the Investigation and the bandits. Western Hostigos and Nyklos are a wasteland.”
“Praise Styphon,” he muttered. Sthentros knew his position as Prince of Hostigos was precarious; soon Styphon’s House would be his only ally if anything happened to his son-in-law, Great King Lysandros. If Prince Phidestros defeated the Great King, well, then Great King-Elect Selestros would be the new Great King. Selestros would quickly appoint one of his cronies as Prince of Hostigos and Sthentros would either have to fight for his crown, or flee.
He had less than five full companies of soldiers, barely enough to keep the bandits and looters out of Hostigos Town. Certainly not enough to maintain peace within the borders of Hostigos, much less fight a war. Nor did he have the gold to raise any more soldiers, if there were soldiers to be had in Hostigos or, for that matter, anywhere else in the Five Kingdoms.
Furthermore, if Great King Lysandros was defeated and killed, his daughter would no longer be Great Queen. He was hoping for a loan from Lysandros to tide his Princedom over until next spring.
Then there was Great King Kalvan. It was rumored that he’d started a new Great Kingdom in the Upper Middle Kingdoms. Was that possible? If the claimant wars went on long enough, it was possible that King Kalvan might return to reclaim his former lands in the ensuing power vacuum. That will be very bad, especially for me. King Kalvan—if Rylla doesn’t have me drawn and quartered first—will have my head the moment he sets foot in Hostigos. No amount of conniving and fast-talking would save him from Kalvan’s headsman this time.
Great King Lysandros was his only hope, and what an insubstantial one he had turned out to be. Lysandros had wasted his men and his gold in a futile attempt at revenge upon the Usurper Kalvan; now, he was in a position to lose everything in the upcoming battle. With his army half-starved and most of their horses eaten, they were little more than an armed band of marauders. Prince Phidestros and his army would run through them like scythes in a barley field.
Although Sthentros would never have thought he’d live to see the day; it was his own insignificance in relation to the current political morass in Hos-Harphax, as well as the distance between Hostigos Town and Harphax City, that kept him out of the current fray. After the Investigation, Hostigos was so worthless and downtrodden that no one in the capital considered it a worthy prize. Of course, once the claimant wars were over things would change and what was once forgotten would once again be remembered.
Then his problems would really begin. Unless Phidestros decided to crown his own Prince of Hostigos before he returned to Besh Town. One more Ormaz-spawned damned thing to worry over!
“Is there any other news, Highpriest?”
“Yes,” Walthar replied. “Great King Lysandros’ army needs support against the Beshtan Army. A messenger just arrived from Balph saying that you are to order your men to attack Prince Phidestros.”
Sthentros rose up out of his chair. “Are you mad? I have less than five hundred men to protect my entire Kingdom. If I set them upon Phidestros’ army, which numbers in the tens of thousands, they will all die. How then will we protect our homes and farms from bandits and army deserters?”
“Styphon’s House will see that you are sent soldiers to replace those who are lost in the fight against the False Prince Phidestros.”
Who is the real ruler of Hostigos? he wondered, if this midget in a bedsheet can order me around like one of his minions. Unfortunately, the truth was: Styphon’s House was his only ally, if Lysandros went down to defeat.
“I will send out the orders today. I will also order them to remove the colors and badges of Hostigos. I don’t want Phidestros coming after me when the battle is over.”
“Don’t you have faith in your son-in-law?” the Highpriest asked.
He shook his head. “He boasts well, but he’s met his match in Captain-General Phidestros.”
The Highpriest Walthar shrugged, not even bothering to wipe the satisfied grin off his mouth. “It’s best to be prepared.”
Am I so insignificant, that even this hoptoad can insult me? It was a question he didn’t want to answer.
“What we really need are more Temple Guardsmen.”
“There are no troops to be spared. Not with an army at the gates of Besh City.”
Sthentros’ mouth dropped open. “The Temple is attacking Phidestros’ holdings! This is madness. Now, Phidestros will have good reason to attack Hostigos Town.”
Highpriest Walthar laughed. “He is not our problem. When he learns that Princess Arminta is a prisoner of Balph, he will light out of here like a scalded dog!”
Suddenly it all came clear, why Walthar wanted his soldiers and why he wasn’t worried about the Army of Greater Beshta.
Now, the question is: How can I turn this to my advantage? If I wait until the battle is over, I could sack the Styphon’s House temple and use that gold to buy more soldiers. I might be able to win Phidestros’ favor, if I sent a note, telling what Highpriest Walthar’s tongue let slip. If I could purchase his good will, there would be little to fear from Great King-Elect Selestros or Styphon’s House…
I will send my men to Prince Phidestros, but instead of sacrificing them in a futile and needless attack on Phidestros, I will give them a message warning the Prince about the Temple’s attack on Besh Town. If my men reach him first with the news, that will put him in my debt.
II
From his perch on a small rise just outside Besh Town, Knight Commander Orocles studied the siege that was laid out around him like a royal feast. A score of small guns, eight and twelve-pounders, on carts were concentrating their fire on the Besh Town Gates, while a storming party gathered behind them. There were two abandoned towers, one blackened and in ruins before one of the walls, where the Beshtans had poured molten lead and burning oil on it. The other tower was half-collapsed and only a third of it was above ground. It had foundered when an underground tunnel had been blown up just before it reached the walls. The hard-packed soil before the walls was littered with doll-like bodies from men who’d fallen during last night’s sortie.
Besh Town was set at the bottom of a valley.
Looming high over the town was Tarr-Beshta, high up on the ridge top and, if properly defended—which knowing Prince Phidestros it most certainly was—could prove to be as costly as Tarr-Hostigos to besiege. All Orocles knew for sure was that the butcher’s bill would be high if he hadn’t read the Princess correctly.
“What are we to do with the townsmen, sir?” asked the Commander in charge of securing the town, through the battle din.
Archpriest Grythos, who wore a full set of blackened armor with a black robe displaying Styphon’s device, a white sun-wheel on his back, said, “Let’s kill them all. All the less we will have to fight later.”
An artillery volley roared out and the last of the gate towers collapsed, throwing up smoke, stones and bricks.
“I’m still in command here, Archpriest,” Orocles answered. “Do not offer advice, unless asked.”
Grythos gave him a look under which a lesser man would have withered. Orocles had known Grythos when they were both Horse Masters in command of their own Blades. They had both served under Grand Master Soton, then himself a Knight Commander. While not a coward, Grythos had preferred to stay out of the thick of battle and save his efforts for afterwards. Those who knew him said that his best work was torturing prisoners and extorting ransom.
While former Knight Commander Grythos was good at getting answers out of reluctant prisoners, Orocles had never liked the man, nor trusted him. Once Soton had been elevated to Grand Master, he’d had no room for his ambition to grow. Therefore, no one who knew Grythos had been surprised when he had resigned from the Order and left to become a Highpriest at the Great Temple of Styphon in Balph.
Still, when compared to Archpriest Roxthar, Grythos was the epitome of reason and good temper.