Firstborn

by Paul B. Thompson

  “I’ll do what I can, noble prince,” said Tamanier earnestly.

  “Good. As chamberlain, you’ll have access to every part of the palace. I want you to use your authority to root out the spy and reveal him to me.” Sithas paused and looked straight at Tamanier. “But be wise. I don’t want the wrong person accused. And I don’t want the culprit alerted.”

  “Do you have any suspects?” asked Tamanier.

  “Officially, no. Personally, yes,” Sithas said grimly. “I suspect my own wife, Lady Hermathya.”

  “Your wife!” Tamanier was so shocked he could hardly believe what he had heard. “Surely, noble prince, your wife loves you. She would not betray you to the humans!”

  Sithas rubbed his hands slowly together. “I only have suspicions. All I can say about Hermathya’s motives is that she so loves attention and the cheers of the people, that she spends huge amounts of money to keep their favor. I do not give her coins to scatter in the streets, yet she never seems to lack for money.”

  Shocked, yet pitying the prince at the same time, Tamanier asked, “Do you suspect anyone else?”

  “Yes, and perhaps he is the stronger candidate. His name is Vedvedsica. He is a sorcerer and a priest, he claims, of Gilean the Gray Voyager. My father sometimes uses his clairvoyant skills, but Vedvedsica is a greedy conniver who would do anything for gold or power.”

  “The emperor of Ergoth has plenty of gold,” Tamanier said sagely.

  They talked for several minutes more. Tamanier vowed to detect the traitor, and Sithas listened approvingly, nodded, then walked away. The newly created chamberlain was left in the east garden, surrounded by fallen petals and singing birds.

  *

  The farmers were apprehensive when they first saw the column of armed warriors ride by, but when they realized who the Wildrunners were, they came to greet these newcomers. Along the way, Kith-Kanan sent troopers to help one farmer to fell a tree, another to free an ox from a boggy ditch, and a third to mend a fence. Word of these kindnesses spread ahead of the Wildrunners’ march and increased the number of enthusiastic elves-Silvanesti and Kagonesti-who came out to greet Kith-Kanan and his troops.

  For the next few days, the way of the march was lined with grateful farmers and their families, bearing gifts of new nectar, smoked meat, and fruit. Wreaths of flowers were hung around the Wildrunners’ necks. Kith-Kanan’s mount Kijo was draped with a garland of white roses. At one point, the prince ordered his pipers to play a lively tune, and the Wildrunners passed through the countryside in a swirl of music, flowers, and smiling settlers. It was more like a festival than a military expedition. Some of the more veteran warriors were astonished.

  Now, ten days from Silvanost, sitting around the blazing campfire, warriors asked Kith-Kanan why he was making such a show of helping the farmers and herders they met.

  “Well,” he explained, stirring his soup with a wooden spoon, “if this militia idea is to succeed, the people must see us as their friends and not just their protectors. You see, our ranks will be filled by the same farmers, woodcutters, and herders we help along the way. They will be the troops, and all of you will be their leaders.”

  “Is it true we’re to take in humans and dwarves in the ranks?” asked a captain with some distaste.

  “It is,” said Kith-Kanan.

  “Can we rely on such fighters? I mean, we all know humans can fight, and the dwarves are stout fellows, but will they obey orders to attack and slay fellow humans or dwarves if those orders come from an elf?” asked one of the older sergeants.

  “They will, or they’ll be expelled from the militia, and lose its protection,” Kith-Kamm responded. “You ask if humans will serve us by fighting humans. Some will, some won’t. We’ll be fighting elves, too, I expect. I’ve heard tales of robber bands made up of humans, Kagonesti, and even mixed-bloods. If they rob, if they kill, then we will bring them to justice. We make no distinctions out here.”

  Sleep followed dinner, and guards were posted. The horses were corralled in the center of the camp, and one by one the lamps went out in the Wildrunners’ tents.

  Mackeli usually slept at Kith-Kanan’s side, and that night was no exception. Though the boy often slept soundly, the months he’d spent out of the old forest hadn’t completely dulled his senses; he was the first one to sense something amiss. He sat up in the dark tent and rubbed his eyes, unsure of what had roused him. He heard nothing, but he saw something very odd.

  Pink shadows wavered inside the tent. Mackeli saw his own hand, washed pink by an unknown light. He slowly raised his head and saw that a red circle of light showed through the tent’s canvas roof. A glare of heat on his face, Mackeli had no idea what the red glow portended, but he was sure it wasn’t friendly. He shook Kith-Kanan awake.

  “Wha – What is it?” mumbled the prince.

  “Look!” hissed Mackeli.

  Kith-Kanan blinked at the red glow. He brushed the long hair from his eyes and threw back his blanket. In lieu of the sword he’d broken in the wildwood, he’d brought along a fine new weapon. Mackeli drew his own sword from its scabbard as, warily, Kith-Kanan lifted the flap on the tent with the tip of his blade.

  Hovering over the camp, about twenty feet in the air, was a ball of red fire the size of a cart wheel. The crackling red light covered the camp. Kith-Kanan immediately felt a prickling sensation on his skin when the red glow touched him.

  “What is it?” asked Mackeli wonderingly.

  “I don’t know...”

  The elf prince looked across the camp. The sentries were frozen, one foot raised in midstep, mouths open in the act of giving the alarm. Their eyes stared ahead, unblinking. Even the horses were rooted in place, some with hooves raised and necks arched in odd angles.

  “They’re all paralyzed somehow,” Kith-Kanan said in awe. “This is evil magic!”

  “Why aren’t we paralyzed?” Mackeli asked, but Kith-Kanan had no answer to that.

  Through the line of tents shadowy figures moved. Blood-colored light sparkled on naked sword blades. Kith-Kanan and Mackeli ducked down behind a tent. The shadow figures came on. There were five of them. By their clothing, features, and coloring, Kith-Kanan saw they were raffish Kagonesti. He held a finger to his lips, warning Mackeli to remain silent.

  The Kagonesti approached the tent Kith-Kanan and Mackeli had been sleeping in minutes before.

  “Is this the tent?” hissed one of them.

  “Yeah,” replied the leading elf. His face was heavily scarred, and instead of a left hand, he had a cruel-looking metal hook.

  “Let’s be done with it an’ get outta here,” said a third Kagonesti. Hook-Hand made a snarling sound in his throat.

  “Don’t be so hasty,” he advised. “There’s plenty of time for the kill and to fill our pockets besides.”

  With sign language, Kith-Kanan indicated to Mackeli that he should circle around behind the band of magic-wielding killers. The boy vanished like a ghost, barefoot and wearing only his trousers. Kith-Kanan rose to his feet.

  Hook-Hand had just ordered his men to surround the prince’s tent. The killers slashed the ropes holding the tent up. As the canvas cone collapsed, the five killers waded in, hacking and stabbing through the tent cloth.

  Suddenly, with a shout, Mackeli burst from concealment and bravely attacked the gang. He ran the first one through, even as that elf was turning to face him. Kith-Kanan gritted his teeth. Mackeli had attacked too rashly, so the prince had to rush his own attack. With a shout, Kith-Kanan entered the fray; he felled a mace-wielding killer with his first stroke. Hook-Hand kicked through the slashed canvas of the fallen tent to get clear. “That’s him, boys!” he shouted as he retreated. “Finish’em!”

  From five, the villains were now down to three. Two of the Kagonesti went for Mackeli, leaving Hook-Hand and Kith-Kanan to duel. The scar-faced elf cut and thrust with deadly efficiency

  Snatching up a cut length of rope with his hook, he lashed at Kith-Kanan. The knotted end stung hard
against the prince’s cheek.

  Mackeli was not doing well against the other two. Already they had cut him on his left knee and right arm. Sweat sheened his body in the weird crimson glow. When the killer on his left thrust straight at him, Mackeli beat his blade and counterthrust into his opponent’s chest. This moment of triumph was shortlived. The other attacker stabbed Mackeli before the boy could free his blade. Cold iron touched his heart, and he fell to the ground.

  “I got ‘im!” shouted the victorious killer.

  “Ya fool, that ain’t the prince-this is! Help me get ‘im!” Hook-Hand shouted back, out of breath.

  But Mackeli managed to heave himself up with great effort and stab his foe in the leg. With a scream, the Kagonesti went down. He fell against Hook-Hand’s back, throwing his chief off balance. That was all Kith-Kanan needed. Ignoring the flailing rope, he closed in and rammed his blade through the assassin. Hook-Hand let out a slow, rattling gasp and died as he fell.

  Mackeli lay face-down in the dirt. His right arm was outstretched, still clutching his sword. Kith-Kanan threw himself down by the boy. He gently turned him over and then felt his own heart constrict. Mackeli’s bare chest was covered with blood.

  “Say something, Keli!” he begged. “Don’t die!”

  Mackeli’s eyes were open. He looked at Kith-Kanan, and a frown tugged one corner of his mouth.

  “This time... I can’t obey, Kith,” he said weakly. The life left his body with a shuddering sigh. Sightlessly his green eyes continued to gaze up at his friend.

  An anguished sob wracked Kith-Kanan. He clutched Mackeli to him and wept. What curse was he under? How had he offended the gods? Now all of his family from the wildwood was gone. All gone. His tears mingled with Mackeli’s blood.

  A sound penetrated Kith-Kanan’s grief; the brute that Mackeli had stabbed in the leg groaned. Kith-Kanan lowered the boy’s body to the ground and gently closed his eyes. Then, with a growl, he grabbed the wounded mercenary by the tunic and dragged him to his feet.

  “Who sent you?” he snarled. “Who sent you to kill me?”

  “I don’t know,” gasped the elf. He trembled on his injured leg. “Mercy, great lord! I’m just a hireling!”

  Kith-Kanan shook him by the shirt front, his face twisted into a hideous mask of rage. “You want mercy? Here’s mercy: tell me who hired you, and I’ll cut your throat. Don’t tell me, and it will take far longer for you to die!”

  “I’ll tell, I’ll tell!” babbled the terrified elf. Kith-Kanan threw him to the ground. The light from the fireball suddenly grew more intense. The elf let out a scream and threw an arm over his face. Kith-Kanan turned in time to see the fiery globe come hurtling at them. As he leaped aside, the fireball hit the wounded elf. There was a thunderclap, and the globe exploded.

  Slowly, sight and hearing returned to Kith-Kanan, and darkness reclaimed the camp. The prince raised his head and found that his right arm and leg were scorched from the fireball’s impact. The wounded elf was gone, vaporized.

  *

  Mackeli was buried in a simple grave on the banks of the Khalkist River. The Wildrunners laid his sword across his chest, as was the custom with elven warriors. At the head of his grave, in lieu of a marker, Kith-Kanan planted the sprig of oak he’d snipped from Anaya’s tree. All this time it had remained green. The prince was certain the sprig would grow into a fine tree, and that Mackeli and Anaya would be united somehow in renewed life once more.

  As the camp was breaking up, Kith-Kanan fingered the small ring he now wore on his left little finger. This was the ring Silvanos had given to his great general Balif during the Dragon War. Sithel had passed the ring on to his son as a parting gift; it had been wrapped in the red silk handkerchief the speaker had passed to his son. Kith-Kanan had donned the ring with pride, but now he wondered if it was an unintentional portent of tragedy. After all, Balif had been murdered by his rivals, certain high-ranking elves who resented the kender’s influence with Silvanos. Now similar treachery had struck at Kith-Kanan and had taken his young friend.

  With somber diligence the Wildrunners struck their tents. When they were done, the senior captain, a Kagonesti named Piradon, came to Kith-Kanan.

  “Highness, all is ready,” he announced.

  Kith-Kanan studied the captain’s face. Like all the Kagonesti who served in the royal guard, Piradon did not wear skin paint. It made his face seem naked.

  “Very well,” he said flatly. “The usual columns of four, and I want outriders ahead, behind, and on both flanks. No one’s going to surprise us again.”

  Kith-Kanan put a foot in his stirrup and swung a leg over his horse. He slapped the reins against his horse’s rump and cantered down to the road. The golden ring of Balif felt tight on his finger, making his pulse throb in his fingertip. The prince decided then that the feeling would stand as a constant reminder of Mackeli’s death and of his own vulnerability.

  27

  HIGH SUMMER, YEAR OF THE RAM

  DEPRIVED OF ANAYA AND BEREFT OF MACKELI, KITH-KANAN THREW himself into his duty with a will that would have astonished those who had known him as a callow, self-centered youth. He drove his warriors as hard as he drove himself, and in weeks molded them into a quick-thinking, quick-acting force.

  Two months passed. High summer came to the plain, and the days grew very hot. Daily thunderstorms soaked the steaming plains and green forest, quenching the thirsty land so bursting with life. Grass grew on the plain as tall as a grown elf’s shoulder; so tall, in fact, that the herders had to cut swaths through it with scythes twice weekly. Vines and bracken choked the paths in the forest, making travel difficult, but the Wildrunners were too busy to complain. Tall mountains of clouds, like castles of white smoke, passed serenely overhead as the Wildrunners set up camp in order to construct a new armory; one Kith-Kanan had already dubbed Sithelbec.

  Militia outposts like the one under construction had been established all across the plain in the past eight weeks, and settlers of every race flocked to their standards. Humans, elves, kender, dwarves-they were all tired of being victims, subject to the whims of the roving robbers. The captains and sergeants of the Wildrunners drilled them with pikes and shields, and showed them how to stand up to the mounted brigands. Everywhere Kith-Kanan’s force stopped, an armory was founded. Stout stone houses were built by the Wildrunners, and there all the militia’s weapons were stored. At the sounding of a gong, all able-bodied people in the locale would rush to the arsenal and arm themselves. In an attack, the Wildrunner officers stationed close at hand would lead them out to repel the raiders.

  By a few weeks before midsummer, the south and central plains had been pacified. In most cases, the brigands hadn’t even stayed around to fight the new militia. They’d simply vanished. Parnigar, eldest of the sergeants, had pronounced himself dissatisfied with the results of the campaign, however.

  “What fault can you find?” Kith-Kanan had asked his trusted aide, the closest person to him since Mackeli’s death. “I’d say we were succeeding far better than we could have hoped.”

  “Aye, that’s the problem, sir. The brigands have given up too easily. They’ve scarcely tried to test us,” Parnigar countered.

  “Just shows that thieves have no stomach for honest combat.” The old soldier nodded politely, but it was plain he had not been convinced.

  The construction of Sithelbec began with a stockade of logs around the inner blockhouse of stone. Here, at the edge of the western forest, Kith-Kanan planned to extend law and order.

  Inside the forest, however, was a different proposition. There were many elves of the Kagonesti race living in the woods, but they were hardy and independent and did not take kindly to armed soldiers on their land. These woods elves got along much better with their human neighbors than they did with the Kagonesti under Kith-Kanan’s command. Worse, the western woods elves scorned the prince’s offers of protection.

  “Who do we need protection from?” they had asked scornfully when confronted.
“The only invaders we see are you.”

  The woods elves spat on Kith-Kanan’s representatives or threw stones at them, then melted into the trees.

  The Wildrunners were all for going into the forest and converting the stubborn woods elves at the point of a sword, but Kith-Kanan would not allow it. Their success was built upon the trust the common people had in them; if they turned tyrannical, everything they’d accomplished would be for naught. It would take time, but the prince believed that he could even win over the wild Kagonesti.

  As work on Sithelbec continued, Kith-Kanan received a dispatch from his father. The Speaker of the Stars had accepted the prince’s invitation to the outpost. Sithel was coming, accompanied by Sithas and a caravan of guards and courtiers.

  Kith-Kanan studied the dispatch, penned by his twin. The speaker’s retinue was large and slow-moving; it would be at least two weeks before they reached Sithelbec. Even with that grace period, the fortress would not be finished in time. Kith-Kanan exhorted his warriors to do their best, but to save their strength for fighting-even though bandits were becoming as rare as cool breezes in the hot and steamy summer nights.

  *

  The work was still unfinished when the banner of the speaker’s party appeared on the horizon. Kith-Kanan called in all his patrols and formed his warriors before the gates of Sithelbec.

  The Wildrunners looked on in awe as the speaker’s party came into view. First came forty guards on horseback, armed with long lances. Pennants fluttered from their lance tips. Behind them came an honor guard of nobles, sixty-two of them, bearing the banners of Silvanos’s clan, the city of Silvanost, the great temples, the major guilds, and the lesser towns of Silvanesti. The nobles formed a square behind the line of lancers. Next came Sithas and his entourage, all clad in scarlet and white. Finally, the Speaker of the Stars rode up, flanked by one hundred courtiers wearing the speaker’s colors. The tail of the procession consisted of the rest of the guards and all the baggage wagons.