I did not tell them about my murders, or my escape. Instead, I shared more about what the Gloaming was, and then about one of my earliest experiences there.
“I tried to organize the men in that dark city, soon after I first arrived,” I explained. “The needs of the place were obvious. Men are starving, and they kill each other for food. I tried to gather a few men who might help me establish some order, but everyone seemed to conspire against me. Hunger and fear and darkness made everyone down there distrustful of order. Still, I tried to set up a system for collecting the food and distributing it evenly. More of us would survive that way, I promised them.
“It worked for a short time, precariously, but then the droppings of food became all the more scarce. My followers had grown to ten men, but suddenly there was not enough food to sustain even us working together. Starvation set everyone on edge; a fight broke out between two of my men, and I broke in to pull them apart. There was no kinship, but only terror between us. More men jumped into the fight, and it was all I could do to escape with my life.
“Many men died then, simply because I had called them together. I later tried smaller gatherings, too, but those had the same result. The failures showed me the limits of the Gloaming. No order can last when there are not enough resources to survive. Starving men cannot be controlled, unless you suppress them with the constant threat of immediate death. That kind of forced order is not right for men. Down there, where everyone was struggling to survive, it was impossible to lead men towards the good. Eventually I pushed away the hope of joining with others. Staying alive became my all.”
Wren and Jon had leaned in close, with an eager but frightened look in their eyes. I worried about what my face had added to my story. I was not prepared to hide the despair I had faced in the Gloaming, or the pain I felt from the sins that it had led me to commit.
I decided that was enough talk for the night. “It has been a long day, and there will be more time for catching up. We need sleep now.”
The talk had exhausted me, especially after the day’s efforts. Jon took the assignment of watching the burrow, and I fell into a fitful sleep. I slipped in and out of dreams, none of them pleasant. Each time I awoke to the thought that tomorrow we would march to join a war, except that the war was a mere skirmish delaying my fight with Tryst. I was afraid to think of what I would do if I prevailed and stood over him with my sword at his neck.
Chapter 10
A WOMAN'S TOUCH
“Therefore let anyone
who thinks that he stands
take heed lest he fall.
No temptation has overtaken
you that is not common to man.”
It was pouring when we awoke, a good omen for leaving no tracks. As I crawled out of the damp burrow, before the sun had reached the horizon, it felt like the downpour would continue for hours. I savored watching the rain soak the ground. It was a natural rhythm that I had missed in the Gloaming.
Jon and Wren walked alongside me with such sluggishness that I felt spritely by comparison. Last night, they had finished off that bag of wine to celebrate the beginning of our adventure. Wren was never an expert at moderation, and Jon tended to follow his lead.
We made slow, wet progress to the bank of the Tyne, where the brothers said they had tied their horses. They were hidden well in a small gulley by the river. I did not see them until we were almost on top of them, but when I did, my eyes saw three where I expected two. I looked at Jon and Wren, their faces beaming with joy and pride.
“Well done, my friends!” The third horse was an impressive black steed. I greeted him calmly. He looked built for the battlefield, but there was a shadowed look to him, as if hollowed by some dark experience. “He has good form. Where in the world did you find him between the city and here?”
Wren pointed at Jon. “Ask him. Jon is the one who ripped one of the soldiers off his saddle and grabbed the reins of his horse. While you were wisely charging for the Glade, Jon turned back again and rode into the pursuing soldiers. I watched from outside the archers’ reach, but not Jon. He decided he would fight against a host of soldiers in the shade of arrows. I still do not know quite how he did it, but soon after he clashed with the men, he was riding away just ahead of them, with this horse at his side.”
“I figured we would need another horse.” Jon shrugged and an innocent grin began to spread across his face. “It was tempting, of course, to let this steed go free, just so we could watch Wren try to keep up with us on foot.”
“You never cease to impress me, Jon.” I gripped his shoulder in genuine thanks. “I would rather have you and Wren on my side than all of Tryst’s knights.”
I turned from the brothers and looked upriver. “We ride west and north today towards the town of Albemarle, where the army will make its first stop on the journey from Valemidas. With all of us riding, we should arrive in under two days, maybe before Tryst’s scouts.”
I mounted the black horse and moved to a trot along the right side of the river. The horse had been well trained, and he followed my lead naturally.
The river bank made for easy riding, flat silt dotted with willows. Beads of rain dripped from my hair to the water’s edge below me. I needed to appear as steady as this rolling river if I was to lead again.
The brothers rode behind me in silence for a long while. Eventually Jon sparked casual conversation, about light topics like the forest and the brothers’ burgeoning mushroom trade. The ride was a pleasure. The discussion, the horses, the forest, the river, the adventure, the freedom—it was all restorative.
The rain did not relent once during the day. At times, it became so heavy that it isolated each of us in a gray wall. We traveled steadily with a few brief stops to rest and feed the horses. That night we set up camp in a tight copse of trees out of sight from the river. I slept deeply after the long, wet day on horseback.
When the morning broke, we veered north from the river. The rain gave way and the clouds began to break. Around midday we reached the edge of the forest and saw the empty Prince’s Road far to the north. While always crowded in Valemidas, where it was called the Path of Princes, the Road was often empty in the countryside. We rode parallel to it, along the edge of the forest, and saw only the occasional farmer in the distance.
The sun was low in the sky when we saw the first hints of Albemarle. It was a simple town that hung like a bead on the Prince’s Road, as the first settlement on the long path from Valemidas to the mountains. There was no wall around it, a sign of its dependence on the great city to its east.
As we rode out of the trees, with the day’s light fading, I delighted in the view before us. The rolling hills looked like they had been painted with the bright green hues of early spring, glistening after the heavy rain. To the east, there was an ominous chain of clouds that had been the source of all that rain. I hoped that it was drenching Tryst and his army now. We had seen no sign of the Lycurgus approaching from the east, but I suspected the scouts had already reached this far. They would have outpaced us, thanks to the road and our slowed progress in the rain, so I pulled on a wide-brimmed hat and kept my head low.
We rode into Albemarle like three typical merchants. On a normal day, three merchants might have been noticed. The town survived on the business of travelers. This evening, however, we could scarcely command a second glance.
The town was buzzing in preparation for the opportunity that tomorrow would bring. These people would have the honor of hosting the greatest knights in the land. Most importantly for them, they would see their famed new prince. That meant making everything look its best. Men were placing cobblestones on the muddy street. Children were running errands with bundles of goods in their arms. Others were washing windows and scrubbing walls, giving everything a luster of cleanliness that was probably rare to this place.
It was good to see the people’s industriousness. The pompous, easy life of Valemidas had not spread this far. Our nation could always count on the rural town
s to be a storehouse of lost values. That included respecting the prince, no matter what. It was the prince’s duty to return that respect, to enable and inspire the people to achieve their best. Tryst had never been willing to offer them respect. He was too caught up in the scrum of nobles and in his own image.
I thought of his last words as he had betrayed me. Tryst, Ramzi, and six of their men had shown up in my royal chambers in the middle of the night. I had awoken with Tryst, my own knight, holding my own sword Zarathus at my throat. His voice had been a sinister whisper. “You have great gifts, Andor, but not the will to power. Men like us must break the shackles of all these weak people around us. You will learn this where you are going. It is a tragedy to lose you, but the world’s progress depends on me. I might come for you after I conquer, and once you are ready to beg to me as your superior. Farewell, Andor.” His blue eyes had been ablaze as he slammed the hilt of the sword into my temple and knocked me out of consciousness.
I shuddered at the memory. My desire for revenge was nearly uncontrollable, but I had to control it. Father Yates’ guidance upon my return to Valemidas came to me. If I became like Tryst in order to depose him, then he would be the victor. I had to win on my terms, without losing myself in the process.
That was why people like these in Albemarle were so important. They lived full lives antithetical to what my life had been in the Gloaming. They also reminded me of the prince’s solemn duty to put the people before himself. I had to find a way to prevail over Tryst within the customs of Valemidas. Otherwise, I would be serving myself and undermining the generations of tradition, just like Tryst.
These thoughts settled into the back of my mind as we passed many others working in the cool night. We rode slowly and deliberately. I tried to keep my head down, to avoid anyone possibly recognizing me. My occasional glances up revealed the opening to the central square a few hundred feet ahead. That would be our destination for the night.
We passed a large blacksmiths’ yard on our right. Four men with huge arms and grim faces were hammering away at red-hot swords and horseshoes. The hissing and banging of their blows reminded me of war. This would be their chance to tout their arms to the prince’s knights. A giant of a man walked from one blacksmith to the other, checking on their work. His bare chest and shaved head were gleaming in the light of the fires. He was barking orders at man and steel alike, and it seemed that neither disobeyed.
He glanced at us as we plodded by. Before I could look away, his fiery eyes locked with mine. I would never forget those eyes. His name was Granville. He had been the head of the Prince’s Yard under my reign. We had almost reached the town square when I dared another look back. It was definitely him and, if he had recognized me, he was not showing any sign of it. No one else had noticed the fleeting exchange, and Granville’s commands continued to fill the air.
I had rightly expected that most of my sworn followers would not survive my fall. Father Yates had told me that the knights closest to me had found quick deaths or simply disappeared. Some outside my court had lived, but of those, only a few were certain to remain loyal to me. I could count them on my hands—including Jon and Wren, but not Granville. He had reason to support me, but this was not the time to take any risks, for his sake or mine. The reward from Tryst and Ramzi to anyone who reported on my return would be temptingly immense.
“We need to find an inn now,” I whispered under my breath.
“Just ahead,” Wren pointed to the northeast corner of the main square. “That is the Scarlett’s Embrace.” His eyes hinted at a smile. He pulled his hood tighter. “I know the tavern well and trust its owner. A few might recognize me there, but they are good people.”
We rode the final stretch with each of us pretending to look disinterested. Each side of the square was about two hundred feet long, comprised of a few wealthy homes and dozens of shops and taverns. In the center of the square was a raised stone platform, which had a forty-foot statue rising out of it.
The huge centerpiece loomed over Albemarle and told its history. It was an exquisite sculpture of a man, Prince Jonas. The stone was dark and smooth, almost black, and carved into a god-like body with the prince’s harsh visage. He had been prince almost two hundred years ago. He was renowned as a conqueror, both in physical ability and in spirit. History told that he had claimed all the free lands surrounding Valemidas under his domain. Statues never seemed to commemorate peaceful times.
Before Jonas, the continent had many independent city-states, which quarreled amongst themselves over the reach of their farmland and the marrying of their daughters. They were pillaged almost yearly by raiding tribes from the Targhee Mountains to the west. Rulers of Valemidas, itself the strongest city-state, had long been content to leave the other cities to that fate. It had little effect on what happened within the huge walls of Valemidas.
Jonas changed that. Unlike most princes, he was born outside Valemidas, in Albemarle. He traveled to Valemidas at age seventeen and rose by his own strength to prince by age twenty-seven. Men rallied to him because of his prowess and promises of glory, not because they loved him. His background and disposition had showed him two things: first, how much trade and influence Valemidas would gain by conquering towns like Albemarle, and second, how easy it would be for him to conquer them.
His method of attack was the same for every surrounding city-state. He led overwhelming numbers to each one, leaving little doubt that his force would win. Yet some of the independent cities had strong fighters who would not make it easy. So Jonas first offered surrender. He then offered a duel to settle the affair, between the greatest of the city and the greatest of his knights. That happened more than a few times. He always picked himself for the duel, and he always won. He fought with a great spear and the prince’s legendary sword Zarathus. He found no equal. To this day, boys in training pretend to be Jonas. I could not recall a single time that Tryst had pretended to be anyone else.
This statue was here in the square because Albemarle, the birthplace of Jonas, had been the first city, and the only city, that had rejected Jonas’s offers—both of surrender and of a duel. At that time it was one of the largest independent cities, with strong defenses, and it had elected to fight. The city’s council had voted on the decision, and had believed that the fortune of war was more impartial than a fortune depending on a single man. They voted for action, despite their weaker numbers, because they believed that submission would lead to despair, while action preserved for its people a hope that they might stand and achieve greatness. But they did not.
Jonas had obliterated Albemarle, burning it to the ground and sparing only the young women and children. If nothing else, he was a man of his word. He redesigned the city with his statue in the middle.
Before the city’s destruction, when the leader of the Albemarle council met with Prince Jonas to reject the offers, he begged to know why the prince would wage war against the city of his birth. Jonas’s message was simple, and it was repeated on the huge flag that flew from his spear in the statue: “The strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.” A cold wind now blew the flag and its message to the east, towards Tryst, Valemidas, and the foreign lands beyond the sea.
I pulled my thoughts away from Jonas and Tryst as stable boys took our horses. The brothers and I dismounted and walked through a broad oak door and into the tavern. The room was clean and subdued, under the spell of an attractive young woman playing the lute in the front left corner. The guests were all so intent on her that they paid little attention to us newcomers. Fires were blazing inside huge stone fireplaces in three corners of the room.
Of the ten round tables spread across the dark wooden floor, seven were being used. About forty people were in the room; mostly soft-looking men, dressed in fine silks. The room reached up two stories, and along the thick beams above there were dozens of hanging flags, probably from travelers who frequented the place. It looked like the most prominent merchants fancied themselves nobility here
. They even had their own symbols designed for them. Money and power were always jealous of one another.
I kept my hood up and headed to the back right corner of the room. It was the farthest table from the lute player, the other patrons, the windows, and the doors. Anyone who might have pulled his eyes away from the enchantress plucking the strings would have seen just another merchant looking for a roof and a drink. I sat with my back to the blazing fire and savored the warmth.
The brothers had followed me closely. Their hoods were pulled back and their focus was more on the people than the space. This was their domain, because every inn and town square was a catalyst for trade. Wren, in particular, always tried to bend these institutions to fit his will. I asked him about the flags once they sat at the table.
“You like the flags?” Wren answered casually as he leaned back. “I think they are an excellent addition here. It was my idea to have a pennant designed for our growing empire. You see,” he pointed up like a proud father, “it is the one with a sky blue background and a black dragon. We picked the dragon as our emblem long ago, because we attack life with intensity. Jon thought it looked best with black on the light blue. Our mother Selia wove the first pennant.”
A quick glance around the room revealed no one paying attention to us, so I pulled my hood back and glanced up. Sure enough, I saw the pennant hanging front and center over the room. The dragon shape on it was a simple, sinuous black, with flecks of silver at its eyes and along its back. It looked more restful and honorable than fearsome, which might have been their mother’s intention. Given the prominence of their flag’s position, it seemed the brothers were building quite the reputation and treasury.
Light in the Gloaming (The Gloaming Book One) Page 10