The Never King

by James Abbott

  As with anywhere, a hierarchy existed. There were gangs here, as if somehow these hardened men could not get by without some form of structure to offer stability and security. His informants told him of the Hell’s King, the Bloodsports and the Chained Dead. The gangs divided the prison between themselves, looking out for their own men in different ways, ensuring a ready supply of illicit trade and backhanded favours. Landril figured that, if he wanted to discover anything at all about the man he’d come to find, joining one of these gangs might be the only way to do it.

  He assessed that the most powerful faction was that run by a figure known as Hell’s King: a brooding, serious man, apparently, who dealt both mercy and punishment equally, swiftly and, often, violently. His reputation was fearful, more so, Landril suspected, because he was rarely seen. None of Landril’s hastily constructed network of informants could give him a description of the man or point him out in the yard. It seemed the King of Hell was not a man to be found easily. Unfortunately, Landril was.

  Hell’s King

  For two days the tall prisoner had watched the shifty little newcomer with all the keenness of a hungry eagle at dawn. Initially he had thought him merely yet another assassin who had been issued his true name and taken it upon himself to end his days. Like those other failed attempts, this one would no doubt end sadly for the would-be assassin.

  But then he’d recognized him from days gone past. And he wondered how he’d ended up here. It was a far cry from the sumptuous lifestyle either of them had enjoyed previously and a long way from the city. A long way from anywhere. After all this time here, he could barely remember when he’d first arrived. Monotony had made the days blur together, and he no longer trusted his own memories. He did not even like the memories he could trust.

  When he had first arrived he had given no name and spoken to no one. He was uninterested in the power plays he saw being run between the gangs, had no wish to get involved with any aspect of it. But he wasn’t given a choice. Vallos had been a gang leader for years – an ex-soldier of some seniority, judging by his neck tattoos – and he had attempted to prove his dominance. Both he and the prisoner were of similar, muscular proportions underneath their loose grey tunics, bodies honed to perfection by years of campaigns, and both were scarred enough to show they knew their way around a fight. So when the bearded gang leader pulled a sharpened piece of flint and attempted to slam it into the newcomer’s shoulder, he saw the blow coming, saw the nod to the guards to allow it to happen and saw the others move to one side to give Vallos space in that narrow, stone corridor. In a movement that might have been missed with a blink, he seized Vallos’s wrist, smashed it against the stone so the flint clattered to the ground, headbutted the attacker, then shoved his face into the wall. Vallos slumped downwards and the newcomer gripped the man’s throat with one hand.

  He could have ended Vallos’s life there and then. Both of them, and the gathered, braying crowd, realized it. But he chose otherwise. He had seen too much blood in his life by that point. He had pushed Vallos away. Everyone was in awe, for no one had bested Vallos in a fight before. This newcomer had done it within seconds. From then on he gained a new name: Hell’s King. That was the beginning of his dominion in Hell’s Keep.

  *

  Eventually Hell’s King decided he’d better talk to the spy before someone else got hold of him. He ordered his men to cause a distraction on the far side of the open courtyard and while the guards’ attention was on them, he approached the spymaster.

  ‘Landril,’ muttered Hell’s King. ‘You’re a long way from home. And if you’re not careful your curiosity will end with a knife in a dark corner.’ He nodded towards where a group of the Bloodsports were watching them.

  Landril stared at him with surprise, then with unconcealed relief, which he quickly tried to hide. ‘Xavir Argentum. Thank the Goddess. You’re actually alive.’

  ‘You have a knack for stating the obvious, spy.’ Their voices were low. Xavir was conscious of being watched and overheard. Not even his own men knew of his past and he wanted to keep it that way. ‘In here my name here is Hell’s King,’ he continued. ‘You’d do well to use no other.’

  Landril smiled. ‘I came here to find you.’

  ‘Well, now you have,’ Xavir replied. ‘Why?’

  ‘I must speak with you about an urgent matter.’

  ‘I have no business with the outside world.’

  ‘Well, it bloody well has business with you.’

  Xavir glared at Landril. ‘The man I was, he died out there. Years ago. My swords were taken. I have innocent blood on my hands. They sent me here because of it and they were right to. There is no forgiveness for what we did.’

  ‘You’re wrong.’ Landril’s words were fierce, but his tone was fearful. ‘You were in the Solar Cohort. And now you dwell with animals.’

  ‘They’re ordinary men, spy, just like you. Some were good men once.’

  ‘They’re prison dogs,’ Landril sneered. ‘Lowest of the low.’

  ‘You don’t believe that. Many in here come from good breeding. A man of your calibre would know that from their accents. And you’re in here as well, are you not?’

  ‘Ah, yes,’ Landril replied. ‘But I committed no crime.’

  Xavir smiled coldly, straightened his back. ‘Ask any of them in here and they would give you a similar answer.’

  ‘But it’s different.’

  ‘Of course. Look, spy, whatever you were out there –’ Xavir gestured with finger to the west – ‘does not apply in here.’

  ‘Technically it’s . . . spymaster. Anyway. You need to know what I have to say. It’s over five years since you came here, Xavir. Things have changed a lot in that time.’

  ‘That the world changes is its only constant. You came here to tell me poor man’s philosophy?’

  Landril had begun to wring his hands, cracking a knuckle. ‘Just let me finish, dammit. It’s been five years since he put you in here. Mardonius and his cronies.’

  Xavir gave no response to this bold claim.

  ‘He became king the year after, you know,’ Landril continued. ‘Once Cedius rotted away.’

  ‘So he is definitely dead, then,’ Xavir replied. ‘I heard, but I didn’t like to believe it.’

  ‘Sadly so,’ Landril said. ‘The old man was never the same without you and the Legion of Six. Then Mardonius began his warmongering. He’s expanded the clan territories and the duchies grow ever larger. People were happy. Metal merchants were happy. Those towns and villages on the borders were absorbed and Stravimon stands larger than even when you led the way.’

  ‘Nations expand and retract like lungs, spymaster. Nothing new here, especially where the clans are concerned. We’re people bred to fight. You didn’t come here to tell me that all was prosperous with the world.

  ‘No I did not,’ Landril said. ‘Mardonius has begun a campaign to clear our nation of those who worship the Goddess and other gods.’

  ‘I am not a religious man.’

  Landril shook his head. ‘You don’t understand. He is committing genocide – thousands of our own people have been killed. Good Stravir are no more.’

  ‘How so?’

  ‘As you’d expect. First he demanded higher taxes from the clans affiliated to her, and then gods like Balax, Jarinus, Kalladorium and the Great Eye. Suddenly local stations of the King’s Legion started to make life difficult for worshippers of all faiths. Those who worship the Goddess felt the brunt – they were treated like scum. A few families hid their faiths, but the majority – tens and tens of thousands – did not. When they refused to move from their homes, there was an increase in troops stationed nearby, and then many families just “disappeared”. The clans have been whittled down from thirty to half that – nearly all of them remain on his side.’

  Xavir considered the spymaster’s words. ‘How long ago was this?’

  ‘The most brutal of the cleansing started last summer, when there were harvest festivals an
d offerings for the Goddess, but the seeds had been planted long before.’

  ‘An ancient technique, that – to kill followers on their sacred holy days.’

  ‘This is only half my news, Xavir. Your family’s castles on the eastern border of the duchies have been ransacked. Only the fortress at Gol Parrak still stands, but no one stands with it.’

  ‘Why not?’ Xavir balled his fists.

  Landril took a slow step back. ‘Because the clans around Gol Parrak have been bribed over five years. The various families now fight for him.’

  ‘Do any of my family still survive at least?’ Xavir had not thought of his father and sister in years, assuming they felt shame for his being here.

  Landril’s face darkened. ‘Your father passed away defending Gol Parrak with several kin. Your sister escaped with her children.’

  Landril turned to three guards who marched by, none of them making eye contact with Xavir.

  ‘You came all the way here to tell me this,’ Xavir said softly. ‘You risked your own life. Did they brand you too?’

  A gentle nod. Landril lifted his sleeve to show the exposed ‘X’ upon his upper arm. The permanent mark of a prisoner.

  ‘You have guts, spymaster, I’ll give you that.’

  ‘Admittedly, I took an elixir before they pressed the iron to my skin,’ Landril said, with half a smile. ‘I felt nothing, dammit, but I could smell my own flesh cooking.’

  Xavir shook his head. ‘Why did you do this? Why come here?’

  ‘Has what I said not been enough?’ Landril asked, a little exasperated.

  ‘Why did you, spy, come to find me? You only work on others’ behalf, so who sent you?’ Xavir demanded.

  A gust of wind howled by the side of the fortress, and Landril shivered.

  ‘Lupara. The wolf queen.’

  Forging Peace

  In the darkened cells, Davlor, an irritating man of twenty summers with straggling brown hair, rat-like features and small eyes, shuffled towards Xavir, who was lying on his bare stone slab of a bed. Despite today’s donation of blankets from the monastery, Xavir always ensured that he was the last to receive such comforts. The truth was that he had woken moments before, after experiencing a nightmare. A flashback. The harsher the stone under his back, the quicker he returned to reality from sleep. That was if he could sleep properly at all these days.

  Davlor stood beside him with a bloodied nose, and waited.

  ‘What happened?’ Xavir asked.

  ‘Someone claimed they had smuggled in a witchstone and I wanted to get it.’

  ‘And what good,’ Xavir said, ‘would a witchstone be among men?’

  Davlor shrugged. ‘Thought it might be useful, boss.’

  The statement felt even more petty and ridiculous given Landril’s earlier news about the crimes going on in the wider world.

  Xavir sighed. ‘And who’s responsible for the stone and for your nose?’

  ‘Gallus from the Chained Dead,’ Davlor replied sullenly.

  ‘Valderon’s men. As ever. I’ll meet with him about it.’

  ‘No revenge?’ Davlor said, surprised.

  ‘No, lad,’ Xavir grunted. ‘No revenge. They’re still bitter about Jedral gouging Fellir’s eyes ten days past.’

  ‘But . . . my nose—’ Davlor muttered.

  ‘Looks a lot better than it did,’ Xavir interrupted calmly. ‘Don’t be looking for battles over things as trivial as this.’

  ‘I still wanna see Gallus’s nose kicked in.’

  ‘Save your enthusiasm for the real fights, Davlor. You’ve only been here a few months and it’s not only your nose that will get disfigured, so get used to it or learn to keep your wits about you. Be vigilant at all times and keep your mouth shut unless it’s necessary. When in a cell with others you don’t trust, concentrate. Listen. Sense movements. But keep your damned mouth shut. Control your anger. Deploy it tactically. If you still have time to waste then listen to Tylos’s poems.’

  Someone nearby laughed. It might even have been Tylos.

  ‘You always talk like a warrior, not like a prisoner.’ Davlor eyed Xavir with an almost childlike enthusiasm for the supposed glory of military life.

  Xavir waved him away.

  There were five men in their shared cell, but it was still spacious. Xavir had come to an agreement with one of the guards in exchange for this particular place.

  He could hear Davlor still muttering curses about Gallus. As a relatively new inmate, Davlor could not know of the sheer effort to keep some form of peace among the gangs, otherwise there would be blood every day.

  Politicking.

  Ironic that even in here there were hierarchies, negotiations and understandings reached. Would things have been any different in the outside world? Xavir wondered. This was his kingdom now. But, once, he might have had another. It would have still been politicking, still the same, just in finer clothes.

  The conversation with Landril had stirred the burning embers within Xavir. This was a red heat he had suppressed, until suppression had become habit, and habit had become his character. He had never thought of leaving Hell’s Keep after the first year. He had found a way of coping and his satisfaction came from stopping other ruined men from being worse than they were. His gang had become a substitute for his clan, and that sat well with him.

  But . . . things were different now that Landril had given him a vision. The outside world – the duchies and Stravimon – was in crisis. People were dying. Lupara, of all people, was involved with Landril’s scheme. That suggested ill times indeed. In a way, being in Hell’s Keep was no longer a punishment, but a shelter from the storm.

  Xavir laughed to himself at the very notion.

  ‘What’s so funny, boss?’ Davlor called out from the darkness.

  ‘The world is caving in,’ Xavir muttered. ‘And we’re in the safest place we could be.’

  ‘You know, I think he’s finally lost it,’ Tylos said with a smile. The black man’s elegant ways made the statement seem charming rather than an insult. Tylos was in gaol for being a thief with expensive tastes. Xavir often enjoyed his company and his southern philosophy.

  ‘The fucker was always mad,’ said Jedral. ‘Happens to us all eventually.’ The wild-looking bald man often joked about having killed his own parents to claim an inheritance, but he was an inveterate liar and the reasons for his incarceration got wilder and wilder with each telling. But Jedral had watched Xavir’s back in here more than once and that was enough for Hell’s King.

  The others chuckled darkly, a sound that was replaced by the wind groaning through the old stone corridors.

  ‘Then you’ll definitely think I’m insane for what I’m about to suggest,’ Xavir announced.

  Jarratox

  Birds arced in a wide circle towards the sun, flocking tightly to form the shape of a hooded head in the orange-blue sky. The strange head, like that of an old crone, moved from left to right before scattering on the wind. From her bedroom window, with the breeze brushing against her face, Elysia watched the spectacle with a frown on her face, wondering if it signified anything meaningful.

  At times she felt as if she was questioning the purpose of everything.

  She peered out between the old stone spires towards the tip of the void that marked the limits of the island. Two hundred feet the other side of the drop was firm land, which could be accessed by one of three stone bridges – or levitation if one knew the right methods. She didn’t. The sisters did not teach those skills until near the end of a young witch’s education.

  Across the way she could see where the cliff face was alight with the glimmer of gemstones in the soft afternoon light. Witchstones, the source of the witches’ power, the various colours used for different spells and ready to be mined by the younger girls, who would abseil safely under the protection of numerous wards.

  Today the blue sky was broken up only by wisps of cloud. Green hills shimmered in the gentle heat, and here and there were copses
of oaks, and stone dwellings. To the west were forested mountains where, at night, she had noticed the occasional crackle of magic, but by daybreak there were no signs of what might have caused it.

  A floorboard creaked outside her room and a moment later there was a knock at her door.

  ‘It is time for your lesson,’ a voice called. It was the tutor, Yvindris.

  Elysia’s heart sank; she had hoped Birgitta might instruct her today. She at least enjoyed the lessons with her.

  Sighing, she pulled on her simple brown tunic, the colour worn by all novice sisters, and paused by the mirror to check her black hair was tied back neatly and to the right, in the official manner. She jumped down from the stone windowsill and tiptoed between the piles of books and parchments to, no doubt, endure yet another pointless lecture.

  *

  The young novice and the old, blue-robed teacher walked in silence along the passageway. Yvindris had a slight limp because of a persistent pain in her left leg which she waxed lyrical about to the bored Elysia. This was typical conversation among the older tutors, seemingly more concerned about news of their health than about magic – and even talking about magic could be dull enough at times. It made Elysia more determined than ever to spend time practising the more physical arts, lest she turn into someone like Yvindris.

  As their feet whispered along the ancient stone, there came the chatter of women’s voices from hidden alcoves, utterances of prayer or readings of arcane texts. Lore was being passed on from generation to generation of sisters. The book learning was what she liked the least – Elysia preferred to be out in the forests with Birgitta. That, inevitably, meant many of the other sisters accused her of being stupid.

  The two of them entered a wide courtyard, which contained a beautiful garden with a fountain in the centre. Privets no taller than her knee grew in intricate spirals, dividing up patches of different coloured flowers. Statues of former matriarchs lined the avenue ahead of her, and around the fringes of the courtyard were columns of stone half-strangled by ivy. A handful of crows loitered on the walls above. It was a bright day now and the faded stone glowed with the sun’s warmth. Three other young women sat on a stone seat in quiet contemplation, reading from scrolls; two looked up and gave her a disdainful glance. Elysia didn’t make friends easily – even among those brown-garbed novices of her own age.