Dawn of the Dreamsmith (The Raven's Tale Book 1)

by Alan Ratcliffe

  “A sorry fate for any man,” Bergen said sadly. “Even a diplomat.”

  Adelmar chuckled. Would that he had been there that day at court, when his father received the package containing the head of the envoy he had dispatched to the mysterious southern continent with an offer of alliance. Alas, he had been stationed far away, at War’s End, at that time. He had, though, received a letter from Jarrod, wherein his brother revealed that the grisly trophy had bounced three times down the throne-room steps before landing at the bottom with a gruesome squelch, causing three ladies of the court to faint. He felt a brief pang of regret at the thought of his brother, but hardened his heart to it.

  “They sent us a clear message,” he said aloud. “That their borders would remain closed to the Empire. They might have been our ally, but instead that day they became our enemy.” He touched the spot that marked one of the coastal settlements. “Have you ever seen one of their ports, Bergen?”

  “No, my lord.”

  Adelmar stared at the outline, searching for answers but finding none. “One in the east, one in the west,” he went on. “Small harbours, walled off. Any passage into the interior blocked and guarded. I’ve heard tell that when our traders land there, they find themselves labouring under the hostile gazes of olive-skinned soldiers, and make sure they conclude their business as quickly as possible. None have been taken or killed, to my knowledge, but none are willing to risk their necks and become the first.”

  The young soldier leaned close to the map. Along the outline of the coast, further marks had been made to show the known locations of the Tenebrian lens-towers. Their rays had already proven deadly, decimating the Legion’s fleet in a disastrous first attempt to reach their shores. “I’ve spoken to some of those who survived the first crossing. They say the Tenebrian defences are impenetrable.” Adelmar uttered a bark of laughter, and the younger man looked up questioningly. “My lord? Have you been able to devise a strategy?”

  Without answering, Adelmar stretched out a hand, and tapped at one section of the coast, a narrow peninsula. A mark denoting a lens-tower had been placed there. “I have,” he replied, smiling. The report he’d received from Slake had been as illuminating as he had hoped.

  As the afternoon passed, Adelmar outlined his strategy to his adjutant. The young soldier raised a number of points that left him scowling, but as ever he valued his input and made a few adjustments to his plan accordingly. It was bold, he knew, but he had faith that it would work.

  They were still poring over the map as the shadows began to lengthen. Looking up, Adelmar realised that evening was quickly setting in. “I should check on my family and see that they’ve settled in,” he said, signalling the end of their discussion.

  He found Ellara and their two daughters in a flurry of activity in their chambers on the next floor. An avalanche of clothes had been pulled from trunks, considered and discarded. Dresses of every hue were strewn around each bed, divan and the floor, so that it felt as though he had stepped into a rainbow. Merely crossing the threshold left him reeling from the bewilderment that strikes every man upon entering a bastion of such unbridled femininity.

  Ellara laughed when she saw the stunned expression on his face, before explaining that they were getting ready to join Sir Ghyle and his wife for supper in the smaller chambers they had temporarily relocated to. Adelmar sighed. The castellan’s invitation had slipped from his mind almost the instant it was proffered, but it seemed he would not escape it as easily as he’d hoped.

  While Ellara, Amelie and Rosalynd continued to fuss around one another, Adelmar retired to a small dressing room and dutifully removed his riding leathers and breastplate in favour of a crimson tunic. In truth, he enjoyed the sight of his daughters squabbling and playing. It felt as though their family life had returned to normality following the tribulations of their journey. Perhaps Amelie had been sickening for something, as Ellara had thought. It was possible that the timing of her illness so soon after the incident with the pendant inside the wheelhouse was coincidental. Days had passed since the last time she had mentioned the necklace, and in an unspoken agreement with his wife and youngest daughter, none of them had brought it up either. As far as he was concerned, the matter was resolved.

  So it was that when he went down with his family to dine with Sir Ghyle, it was in a much-improved mood. A potentially volatile situation involving two of his most valued generals had been resolved, at least for the time being, and they had been able to draw a veil over one of the unpleasant events that occurred on the road. To his surprise, the castellan and his wife were decent company, and their table was well-stocked without being too extravagant for his tastes.

  To the chagrin of the ladies present, he and Sir Ghyle regaled the table with stories from the last campaign against the north, their laughter becoming more raucous as the wine flowed. A couple of times he caught Ellara’s eyes, but rather than being embarrassed by his conduct, as he had feared, she seemed to be pleased that he was enjoying himself. In truth, it seemed like a long time since he had laughed so. It felt liberating, as though cares that had weighed down his shoulders over the preceding weeks had been lifted at last.

  Without delving too deeply into the details, they talked about the days to come, when a large part of the Legion forces would board the warships that lined the quays, and set sail for the country that lay to the south. “I wish that I could be there with you,” Sir Ghyle said, with a wistful sigh.

  “You still could,” Adelmar said, smiling. “I’d be happy to accept your oath once more, if you think you could persuade your wife to part with you for a few years.”

  The castellan chuckled. “Those days are far behind me I fear,” he replied, patting a belly that had swelled alarmingly in the years since he left the Legion. “I’m not sure The Vigil’s armourer, skilled as he is, is up to the task of adjusting my old plate to fit.”

  The one blot on an otherwise fine evening came near the end. Sir Ghyle’s wife, a prim, steel-haired woman by the name of Lyria, leaned across the table to offer Ellara a platter of small cakes and spiced custard tarts. As she did so, the movement exposed her neck and the green crystal pendant she wore.

  Amelie’s eyes flew wide when she saw it, and what he read in them chilled Adelmar. It lasted only a moment, as their hostess concealed the necklace within her bodice once again, but that had been enough for him to see the hunger, the yearning, etched in his eldest daughter’s face as she gazed upon the stone. Whatever good-feeling the evening had stirred within him evaporated in that instant. Ellara had noticed it as well; though neither of them commented on it then, he knew her well enough to sense her disquiet.

  As the supper resumed, it was apparent that whatever spell that had enchanted the evening up to that point had been broken. Adelmar lapsed into a brooding silence, responding monosyllabically to any questions directed towards him. Amelie, too, appeared withdrawn, and her stolen glances towards the neck of their hostess only served to blacken Adelmar’s mood further. Ellara seemed determined to make up for their sullenness with forced levity, but it was to everyone’s great relief when the meal was finished and Adelmar and his family returned to their chambers.

  “I had hoped we were past this,” said Adelmar to his wife, after the children had been whisked away by a lady-in-waiting to their own bedchamber. “Did you see how quiet Amelie was after that? We are right back to where we were on the road. Confound that woman!”

  “She could not have known,” Ellara replied from the bed. It was a grand construction, a large hardwood four-poster frame with red velvet hangings. “If anything, I should take some of the blame. Sir Ghyle mentioned that Lady Lyria is very devout, but I was so concerned with making sure all our belongings were brought up I didn’t fully grasp his meaning.”

  “It’s not your fault.” Adelmar slipped between the silk sheets, which were pleasingly cool. He rubbed his eyes, feeling all the fatigue from their journey descend upon him at once. “It is not hers either, I realise th
at. If it had not happened tonight, it would have done at another time. It is a trial we must endure.”

  Ellara patted his arm soothingly. “I am sure that all she needs is time. I will keep a close watch on her while you are away, and ask that Lyria be a little more circumspect in her faith when around the girls.”

  Perhaps it was dredging up past memories that evening with Sir Ghyle, but as he slept that night, in his dreams Adelmar found himself once more upon the battlefield. He stood upon a tall hill, flanked by a thousand of his most trusted warriors. The anticipation in the air was almost palpable, and he took time to savour the moment, gazing down upon the massed ranks of an enemy still blissfully unaware of their presence.

  All was as he remembered it that day; the sting of the frigid air upon his cheeks, the stony soil beneath his feet. The way the sun glinted on the sharp blade of Duty, his sword, forged just weeks earlier at his father’s behest, to commemorate his son’s first command. At his back were the mountains, whose wind-swept passes they had spent days traversing. All had been leading to this moment.

  He saw faces below turn in their direction, and soon panic began to spread in their ranks. The northern forces had done what they believed to be prudent, keeping the women and children, the old and infirm behind them while their soldiers kept the Legion bottled up at the Granite Pass. They had thought them safe.

  They were wrong. As the people far below began to break, fleeing for their lives while their desperate wails reached his ears on the wind, Adelmar raised Duty high above his head and roared the command to charge. They swept down upon their enemy like a hurricane of divine wrath, a maelstrom of righteous fury. Adelmar was at their head, his shining blade singing through the air as they reached their prey. He cared not who stood in his way, cleaving necks and limbs with grim fervour. Distant shouts over the heads of the doomed civilians told him that his ploy had been successful. The northern forces were dividing, their lines descending into chaos as they struggled to decide which threat to face first.

  Soon enough, his sword began to meet steel instead of unprotected flesh as his vanguard fought their way through to the rear lines of Caderyn’s army, but they still met only token resistance. Here had been placed the most inexperienced soldiers, or the most venerable: auxiliaries only intended to fight as a last resort. Adelmar was merciless as he cut them down, the Legion soldiers around him bellowing his name as their battle-cry; the golden boy who was leading them back to glory after decades of ignoble stagnation.

  In his dream, Adelmar was aware of what he had not known at the time, that as he hacked his way through towards the northern general who had ignited this rebellion, the rest of his forces had already breached the Granite Pass and were even now doing the same from the opposite direction. Many northerners had already begun to throw down their weapons, seeing that their cause was lost; they had been caught hopelessly between the hammer and the anvil.

  Eventually, they reached him, Adelmar and his vanguard. The rebel lord sat upon a grey horse, looking down in dismay upon the decimation of his army. While his warriors engaged the general’s bodyguard, Adelmar shouted out a challenge. The general’s stag-horn helmet swung in his direction and he dismounted, just as he had in the past.

  Their fight was different in this dream, however. Then, Caderyn had been a beaten man by the time they locked swords in combat; Adelmar, twenty years his junior, had been strong and fought with a ferocity that stemmed from unshakeable belief in the righteousness of their cause. It had been an anti-climactic contest that ended with the northern lord on his knees in the muck, disarmed and defeated.

  In the dream, though, the enemy general fought like a wild beast. Their swords rang out above the sound of the battle taking place all around them. His strength was immense, forcing Adelmar back upon his heels. Through gritted teeth, Adelmar realised he would lose. Here, in the dream, he was old and riddled with doubts, just as Caderyn had been a quarter-century earlier, while the rebel general, his face hidden behind the visor of his helmet, fought with almost inhuman vigour. A gauntleted fist crunched into his chin, knocking him from his feet. A moment later his stomach exploded with white-hot pain as the enemy general’s blade pierced his armour.

  Adelmar felt his lifeblood drain from his body. He could only stare helplessly as the general raised a hand to lift his visor. In place of Caderyn’s sad blue eyes, the face that grinned down at him was his brother’s. As the last of his strength left his body, Duty dropped from Adelmar’s hand and fell to the ground. His eyes dancing with glee, Jarrod leaned closer to his face. “Just because you do not play the game,” he whispered, a ghastly leer twisting his features, “does not mean that you cannot lose.”

  A woman’s scream pierced the night. Together with thoughts of his brother so recently in his mind, for a moment after waking Adelmar almost thought he was back on the road, camping outside the inn.

  He was on his feet in an instant. Ellara sat upright, alarmed, as he raced from their bedchamber, his nightshirt billowing behind him. It took him but a moment to take in the two most pertinent details; that while Rosalynd was stirring in her bed, the one next to it stood empty, and that the door to their chambers hung open.

  When he reached the corridor beyond, he heard sobs coming from the floor below, and raced towards the sound. The door to the castellan’s chambers, where they had supped only hours before, was also open. One look at Sir Ghyle comforting his wife, her neck bare, told him everything. “Where?” he yelled, startling the couple with the ferocity of his tone. The castellan raised a shaking hand and pointed back up the stairs.

  Fear gripped Adelmar’s heart. Only two levels remained above his family’s own apartments, a small guardroom that housed the watchmen who maintained the beacon and the roof where the signal fire burned.

  There was a clatter of boots as guards hurried up the tower to investigate the disturbance, but Adelmar did not wait for them. He turned back the way he had come, and sprinted up the stone spiral staircase, taking the steps two at a time. The hatch that opened to the top floor of the tower stood open, and when he emerged through it saw a handful of guards hovering uncertainly nearby.

  Adelmar ignored them. All his attention was focused on the small figure that stood beyond the roaring signal fire. A strong breeze blew across the roof, tugging at the girl’s nightdress. Time seemed to slow as he edged closer. Amelie turned to face him. When their eyes met, she took a small step backwards, until her heels brushed the very edge of the parapet on which she stood. At her back was open space; a three hundred foot drop down to the ocean. Adelmar could hear the whisper of the waves far below. He stopped then, feeling his heart pounding in his chest. He said nothing, just held her gaze steadily, too afraid even to blink. A distant part of his mind was crying out a forlorn hope that this was just another part of his dream, but he knew it was not so.

  Amelie broke the silence first. She smiled beatifically and held her hands, clutching an unseen object, up to her chest. “I can hear it again, father,” she said, her eyes alight with joy. “I can hear the music again. Isn’t it wonderful?”

  “There is no music, Amelie,” Adelmar replied, keeping his voice calm. “Please, step away from the edge. Come back to me.” He held his hands out beseechingly towards her.

  Her clothes flapped in the wind. A small frown wrinkled her brow. “No, you’ll take it away from me again. I won’t let that happen.”

  Adelmar risked a small step forward. He was within perhaps six feet of his daughter, his arms outstretched. Close, agonisingly so, but still too far. They may as well have been standing on opposite sides of the world for all the difference it would make, if... “I promise, I won’t take it away this time, child,” he said, closing his mind to the ugly thought that had surfaced unbidden in his mind. “If you come back to us, this time you can keep it. All that matters to me is that you are safe.”

  The girl’s head tilted slightly to one side, as though listening to something he could not hear. “He says you’re lying,
” she said accusingly.

  “Who does, child?” He didn’t dare look around and break the eye-contact with his daughter. “There is nobody here but us.”

  “The green man,” she replied, matter-of-factly. “He says that you’ll take it away as soon as I go back. I won’t let that happen!” The final words came out in a scream.

  Adelmar had stood unflinching upon countless battlefields, but in that moment, for the first time, he knew what it was to feel fear. He understood then that his daughter had lost her mind, and nothing in his life had prepared him to deal with such a situation. “Please, come back,” he repeated, at a loss of what else to say. “There is no green man. Whatever you want will be yours, I promise.”

  “There is so, father.” Amelie clutched the crystal even tighter in her hands, until her knuckles were white. “I saw him in my dreams, and even now he whispers in my ears.” She smiled. In the moonlight, the expression was almost gruesome, more a grinning skull than the face of the daughter he loved. “He has a message for you.”

  “For me?” The girl’s eyes closed for a moment and Adelmar took another small step towards her. “What does he say?”

  “He says goodbye. Isn’t that silly, when you’ve never even met him?” She giggled, the sound of it grotesquely at odds with the situation. “Oh, I wish you could, father. My dreams are so beautiful now. I sometimes wish I would never have to wake up.”

  Adelmar could feel his world spinning away beneath his feet. His head swam. “Amelie, listen to me,” he managed to say, his voice becoming choked. “I want you to take a step towards me.”

  The girl held his gaze and smiled sweetly. “Do you think it is true?”

  “What is?”