by Mark Anthony
He saw the coach’s lantern as it hurtled around a corner. The driver pulled on the reins, and the horses clattered to a stop. Dust swirled around Travis. By the time it cleared, the driver had climbed down to open the door of the stagecoach.
“This is it, sir,” the driver said. “Castle City.”
“By the winged feet of Mercury, couldn’t you have hit fewer ruts along the way?” said a fussy, gentle, and familiar voice. Travis’s heart soared at the sound of it.
“Sorry, sir,” said the driver in a disinterested tone.
A figure climbed out of the coach and started down the steps. The satchel he carried got caught in the door, and he tugged at it to no avail. The driver helped him turn the bag sideways, and it came free so suddenly the man nearly tumbled down the steps. Only a fortuitously placed hitching post kept him from falling to the street. The driver shut the door, climbed back into the bench, and the coach rattled away.
“Blessed Isis, I thought I’d never make it here,” said the man, steadying himself and futilely trying to brush the wrinkles from his wool suit. He was an elderly gentleman, perhaps sixty years old in appearance, strikingly handsome, with vivid blue eyes. His white hair fluttered wildly about his head. “Zeus help me, what an utterly barbarous country this is!”
Gripping his lumpy satchel, he climbed up the steps to the boardwalk and promptly ran into Travis. The man stepped back, muttering more curses to long-forgotten gods. Joy filled Travis. It was Jack Graystone. His old friend, right there, looking just as Travis remembered him.
The white-haired gentleman frowned up at Travis. “Excuse me, my good fellow, but I’ve had a terribly long journey, and I—” He cocked his head, his blue eyes glittering. “Pardon me, but do I know you?”
Travis couldn’t help the grin that spread across his face. “No,” he said. “But you will.”
38.
The metallic odor of hot steel hung on the air, cauterizing Grace’s lungs. Atop its hill, the keep of Seawatch blazed like an alchemist’s cauldron full of naphtha. However, there was no time to think of Lord Elwarrd, who remained within the keep, or to wonder if the serving girl Mirdrid had escaped. In the bloody light of the fire, Grace could see her own desperate eyes reflected in the polished surfaces of ten onyx breastplates. Black swords naked in their hands, the knights urged their horses, closing the circle.
Grace started to reach down, to fumble with the knife tucked inside her boot. But that was ridiculous. What would she do with it? Cut through their armor as if it were cheese? She abandoned the knife and reached out with her thoughts, indiscriminately clutching the glowing life threads around her: those of men, horses, the wind-twisted plants that eked out an existence in the hard soil of the moors. She didn’t know what she would do with the strands, only that she had mere moments to weave them into a spell.
She was dimly aware of the others forming a triangle around her. Beltan gripped the sword Elwarrd had given him. Vani’s gold eyes shone in the darkness, and her hands were poised, ready to strike. Falken held only a slim dagger in his silver hand. He might as well have been holding his lute for all the good the blade would do him.
The enormous knight—the one with the three crowns of leadership emblazoned on his breastplate—was the nearest, and three others were close behind him. The remaining six knights were moving in as well, but the leader raised his free hand and they held back. No doubt the massive knight wanted to leave some room for him and the other three to swing their swords. Even with Vani and Beltan at her side, Grace knew four knights were more than enough. After all, it required only one to lop off her head. And that was what they wanted, wasn’t it? Not the others, but her—the heir to Malachor. They had been trying since she was an infant to kill her. And now they would.
“Get ready,” Beltan growled beside her.
Grace clutched the necklace at her throat and frantically wove the threads of the Weirding. A mist was starting to rise off the damp ground. Yes, she could weave a spell around the fog. She had done it once before, on the common green of the village of Falanor. She used the power of the Weirding to gather the mist in on itself, making it denser, pulling it toward her. Unseen by the knights, a gray wall rose up behind them. If she could get it closer, engulfing the knights, blinding them, it might give them the chance to get away.
The leader of the knights brought his charger to a halt before her, looking more machine than man in his black armor. His three closest companions joined him, the other six maintaining the larger circle, from which there was no escape.
“You know what to do, brothers!” the enormous man shouted. “It’s time for death to come to those who deserve it. Now!”
Beltan raised his sword. Vani started to move, her dark form melding with the gloom. In unison, the four armored men raised their swords——and whirled their horses around to face their six brethren. The gigantic knight let out an earsplitting roar as he spurred his charger forward, sword raised before him. The three knights closest to him did the same.
Grace stared, the spell unraveling as her shocked mind tried to grasp what was happening. Clearly the six more distant knights hadn’t expected this turn of events any more than Grace. Before any of them could move, the gigantic knight swung his sword. There was a bright clang! A visored helm fell tumbling to the ground, a head still in it, and a lifeless body followed after, armor clattering like a heap of junk.
Now the five remaining knights reacted. Swearing and shouting, they turned their swords on their attackers. However, they could not move fast enough. Another toppled from his horse, crumpling to the ground where he lay motionless.
It was chaos. Riderless horses screamed. The mist Grace had gathered broke apart into swirling eddies, obscuring what was happening. The sound of steel on steel rang out again and again.
“What’s going on?” Falken shouted.
“I can’t see,” Beltan called back.
A patch of fog broke apart, and a horse came charging through, pounding straight for Grace. The rider pulled his sword back, then swung it around to strike her down. She could only watch as the blade sped toward her neck.
There was a chiming sound. Sparks flew as the sword contacted Falken’s silver hand, which he had thrust into the path of the blade. Falken tumbled to the ground, and the sword went wide—just barely. Grace watched as a lock of her hair drifted down into her outstretched hands. The knight recovered, pulling his sword back for another blow.
The darkness above him unfurled, like a black rose. Vani fell upon the knight, knocking him from the saddle. The knight spilled to the ground, landing on his back with a grunt. Before he could move, Beltan was there. He planted a boot on the man’s breastplate, then threaded the tip of his sword through the slit in the knight’s visor. Beltan clenched his jaw and leaned on the sword, driving it down. There was a crunching sound. The knight flopped once, like a fish on dry land, then lay still.
The night fell silent, save for the roar of flames from the keep. Beltan jerked his sword free; the tip was dark with blood. Vani peered into the fog. Falken had recovered his feet, and he moved close to Grace, taking her arm. Then they heard it: hooves against hard ground. A bank of mist broke apart, and four knights rode through.
One of them was the gigantic knight with the crowns on his breastplate. The others seemed to be the three that had followed him in the attack. Grace felt the others tense beside her. What did these four want? Did they have some terrible purpose the others would have opposed? As the fog dissipated, Grace saw six black forms on the ground scattered among the twisted bodies of the feydrim. Behind her, the keep consumed itself. Cinders fell gently all around like black snow.
The four knights came to a halt a few paces away. Falken stepped in front of Grace.
“What do you want from us?” the bard said.
The knights said nothing. Then, suddenly, the enormous one began to laugh. The sound echoed from inside his visor: booming and ferocious. When the big knight spoke, it was in a voice every bit a
s loud and deep as his laughter.
“By the foamy mane of Jorus, I never thought I’d see the day when I’d be saving the Grim Bard’s neck. I always thought I’d be wringing it instead.”
Beltan lowered his sword. Falken stared, mouth agape. Vani gave him a puzzled look.
“What, Falken Blackhand?” the enormous knight thundered. “Don’t you recognize your protector?”
With that, the man reached up and plucked the helm from his head. So much shaggy red hair spilled forth that Grace wondered how it could ever have been contained within. The man’s beard looked as if it could have housed several robins’ nests; only his nose and eyes were visible above it.
Falken took a staggering step back. “King Kel!”
The gigantic man grinned. “So you recognize me at last. I suppose that means I won’t have to kill you after all.”
He sounded slightly disappointed. The three men beside him had removed their helms as well, and while none was so prodigious or shaggy as the man Falken called King Kel, they were wild-looking all the same.
Falken sank to his knees, and Grace had no idea if this was a sign of obeisance or if the bard was simply collapsing in shock. Regardless, she followed suit, and Beltan and Vani did the same, although the T’gol’s eyes remained suspicious.
This display seemed to please the gigantic man to no end, for he threw his head back and laughed again, and the sound rose above the crackling of flames, filling the night with his mirth.
39.
It was in the dead of the night when they finally reached King Kel’s camp.
For hours, Grace clung to the back of a charger that had belonged to one of the slain Onyx Knights. The horse was so huge she couldn’t sit astride it, but instead simply bounced atop the saddle, and its gait was rough and yawing, heaving up and down like the deck of the Fate Runner . After a time she slipped into a half dream in which she was running across an empty plain, trying to get to Travis. Only the land buckled and cracked beneath her feet, tossing her about like a pebble on a drum.
A lonely howl rose on the air, the call of a wolf, startling Grace awake.
“That’s one of my wildmen,” said a deep voice. “This will be the place where my people made camp.”
At first Grace thought she had fallen off the charger into dry grass, only then she realized her face was mashed down in the beast’s mane. She spat out horsehair and sat up, and for a moment she wondered if her dream hadn’t been true. The gibbous moon sailed low in the western sky, illuminating a jumbled rockscape marred by crevices and softened only slightly by wind-stunted bushes.
“You can come down now, lass.”
One of Kel’s warriors, still clad in black armor, reached a hand toward her. She started to swing herself down from the saddle. Only there was no way to control her descent from the massive horse. She started slipping, then falling. The warrior caught her in strong arms, and he bared crooked teeth in a grin as he repositioned his hands, moving them to new locations which were not, she suspected, chosen out of a simple desire to better support her weight.
“Let her go,” Beltan growled, sliding from his charger and marching toward them. Blood crusted his right shoulder. “I said let her go, man. You aren’t worthy to lay your hands upon a queen.”
The warrior started to curl his lip back, but King Kel made a sharp motion with his hand. At once the man released Grace, and she barely got her legs beneath her in time to keep from sprawling to the ground. The warrior stalked off, throwing down pieces of his armor as he went.
“Are you all right?” Beltan said, steadying her.
Grace lifted a hand to her throat. “I’m fine, really. I think he was just being...friendly.”
“A little too friendly I would say.”
“Well, they did just save our lives. How’s your shoulder?”
Beltan touched the wound Leweth had given him and winced. “I’ll live.”
Vani and Falken climbed down from their horses with more skill than Grace. Kel and the other men stripped off their black armor, throwing it clattering to the ground as if they found its touch distasteful. Beneath they wore rough tunics. Grace caught the flickering light of a fire not far off.
“This way,” Kel said, gesturing for them to follow. “My men will take care of the horses. Let’s go get warm. Some melindis berry spirits should help us in that regard.”
Vani frowned at the shaggy king. “You mean for us to drink hard liquor? But it is nearly dawn.”
“Very well, wench, we’ll hurry then,” Kel said, slapping Vani on the back with a gigantic hand.
The assassin stumbled, and her eyes bulged, although whether this was due to the king’s friendly bludgeoning of her bruised ribs or the fact that he had just called her wench, Grace couldn’t say. Beltan started to laugh, but Vani shot him a molten look, and he quickly clamped his mouth shut.
“Where are we?” Grace murmured, as they walked.
“Near the edges of the Barrens, I think,” Falken said. “I can see why King Kel told his people to hide here. In the entire history of Falengarth, no one has ever lived in this place.”
They reached the campfire, which was nestled in a hollow out of the worst of the wind. A dozen or so forms lay huddled in blankets around the fire, and they stirred groggily as the king stamped among them. He gave an affable kick to what looked like a bundle of rags. The bundle let out a yelp, then scurried on all fours at the king’s heels.
“It’s not right to kick a dog,” Grace said.
Falken let out a low chuckle. “Trust me, Kel would never kick one of his hounds. He loves them more than anything. Except maybe ale.”
“But then—?” Grace’s question faltered as the ragged dog looked up at her, and she saw that it wasn’t a dog at all, but a man. His hair was caked with mud, and he smiled at her, baring teeth that had been filed into points. Beneath the grime, she could make out the swirling tattoos that covered his arms, his neck, even his face.
“That’s one of Kel’s wildmen,” Falken said in answer to her unfinished question. “They live in the remote highlands of the Fal Erenn. Mostly they avoid civilization and keep to themselves, but Kel has a way with them.”
The king pulled a gristled scrap of dried meat from a pocket. He tossed it down, and the wildman caught it in his jaws before scurrying off to gnaw at it.
“So I see,” Grace said dryly.
All the members of Kel’s motley band had awakened and were staggering to their feet. Most were rough-looking warriors like the ones who had helped defeat the Onyx Knights, but there was another wildman, as well as several buxom women with frowsy hair, saucy smiles, and rosy cheeks. Grace had a feeling none of them would object to being called wench. On the contrary, given the way not one of them had bothered to lace the bodice of her dirty gown, that seemed to be precisely the look they were going for.
The atmosphere around the fire was lively and boisterous, like that of a revel. Cheers and laughter went up as Kel ordered the aforementioned spirits to be brought out. Hands pulled at Grace, seating her near the fire, and someone pressed a wooden cup into her hand. She drank, then nearly coughed the liquid back up; it tasted a good deal like extraordinarily bad gin. However, someone gave her a hearty slap on the back, and she choked it down.
Instantly, warmth spread through her. Beltan and Falken accepted cups of the crude but effective liquor, and even Vani did not resist the offering of their host. After giving her cup a suspicious sniff, the T’gol downed the liquid in a single gulp without so much as batting an eyelash, eliciting whoops of approval from all around the fire.
Grace stared into the flames, watching as wood was turned to ash. Had everything in Seawatch been similarly consumed? She thought of the touch of Elwarrd’s lips on her own. Part of her wanted desperately to believe the earl was still alive; all the same, she knew he wasn’t. He had stayed behind so they could escape—the first and final noble deed in his life.
And what did it gain him, Grace? His mother was mad, but
in her way she was trying to help him, to protect him. Instead you killed him.
Except that wasn’t true. Grace didn’t know if she had loved Elwarrd—she wasn’t certain that was something she was even capable of. But he had brought to life feelings she had thought long ago dead and buried. And in return she had given him a way out of shadow where there had been none before. No matter what happened, she would not let herself regret meeting Lord Elwarrd of Seawatch.
Nestled between Falken and Beltan, Grace listened as Kel told his people—in a bold and bawdy fashion—what had happened in the time since he last saw them. In deference to the newcomers, he also spoke of how he had come to be in that part of the world, for the king and his people were far from their home.
Grace vaguely remembered Kel’s name from the Council of Kings a year earlier. As far as she knew, he didn’t rule a Dominion, which was why he hadn’t been invited to the council. The other rulers had referred to him as a petty king, which meant he wasn’t a true noble at all, but rather a self-styled monarch ruling over a small band of people. More like a chieftain, really. Except looking at the gigantic bear of a man now, it was hard for Grace to think of him as petty.
Kel had ruled over Kelcior, which Grace gathered was an old keep north of Eredane, on the western slopes of the Fal Erenn. It seemed that about two months before, a troop of men in black armor had ridden into Kelcior. They carried a standard no one had ever seen before—a black crown encircling a silver tower against a crimson field. Kel’s wildmen saw them coming, and at once the king knew there was no hope of fighting them. The knights were two hundred in number, clad in tempered armor, riding heavy warhorses. Kel’s warriors were only half that in number, with no armor and only stout ponies (better suited for the rocky terrain). Kel was bold, but he wasn’t stupid. Quickly, he gave the orders. His people gathered what things they could, then hurried into the mountains, following hidden trails the black knights and their horses would never be able to traverse.