Blackmark (The Kingsmen Chronicles #1): An Epic Fantasy Adventure Sword and Highland Magic

by Jean Lowe Carlson

  * * *

  “It’s hard to say exactly what I saw,” Vargen murmured, cradling his tiny tea mug in his massive bear paws. They sat across from each other, fully dressed and sitting upon the high stools of his long wooden workbench, sipping a mellow tea. Mostly wintermint and elderbloom, it would calm and enliven the mind while they talked through what Olea expected to be the long hours of the night.

  “Why is that?”

  Vargen cradled his cup carefully in his big hands, as if its warmth could soothe him. “Because everything… moved. The walls, the furniture, the mirrors reflected walls that were impossible, even the chandeliers. The chandeliers!” He shook his head. “I've tried to recall it in detail, but specific memory still eludes me... the awful disorientation of that poison... those walls...”

  Olea reached out, settling her hand over his. “Steady. Start at the beginning.”

  He took a shuddering breath, and began again. “We arrived at the palace in full strength. Over two thousand Alrashemni came to the Summons, even elders who could no longer walk were carted through the city and carried up the steps of Roushenn. The King’s Summons had been explicit. All those past their Eighth Seal were to journey forth, or else there would be war against us. We were labeled traitors to the crown if we did not come, accused of High Treason, but without any specifics as to why the charge was being leveled. For what, I never did find out. But that was not my duty. I wasn’t Rakhan. My wife Elsiria and I marched at the front of the column. We were expecting conflict, but though King Uhlas den'Ildrian had amassed a presence of Palace Guard throughout the city, it seemed they were merely escort.”

  “As if he was not expecting trouble.”

  Vargen nodded, then sipped his tea. “And truly, I don’t think he did. Some were soothed, marching through quiet streets. Some, like myself and Elsiria, found ourselves suspicious. Why threaten us with High Treason, punishable by death? If the King had summoned us simply to renew our vows en masse, that’s all he needed to say. We would have come peaceably, without weapons.”

  “But he didn’t. The Summons was a threat.”

  Vargen nodded again. “And so we came armed, in our Greys. But the streets were quiet. And when the column arrived at the gate of the palace, a delegation came to greet us in the Great Courtyard. A few of the King’s Chancellors bowed and greeted us, but the King and his family were strangely absent. The Castellan invited us to overnight in the palace. Rooms had been made ready, for all of us. We were told we would see the King and renew our vows in the Throne Hall come the dawn, as all of us had done when we were newly made Eighth Seals. It was all very polite. We were invited into the palace, and a veritable army of servants escorted us in small groups to overnight quarters. I had not thought that Roushenn could hold such a mass of folk, but as we turned down this winding hallway or climbed that innumerable staircase, burrowing deep into the mountain, I realized that warren for what it truly was. A trap. You are Palace Guard, are you not?”

  Olea nodded. “I am Captain-General of the Palace Guard and Fourth Captain of the Realm, behind the captains of the Fleetrunners, High Brigade, and the Whitecaps, our naval regiment. I report directly to the King. Or at least, I did. Now I report to his daughter, the Dhenra.”

  Vargen’s brows rose, impressed. “You’ve done well, considering the charge of treason leveled against those who bear the Inkings.”

  “I was given a chance by the late Dhenir, Alden den’Ildrian.”

  “I suppose you were. In any case, you must know that palace was built to forestall a veritable army of invaders. I had not believed the tales, to look at it from the outside, but once we were within, I realized how far back into the mountain it truly goes. And how much of a labyrinth it was.”

  “There are whole wings that are entirely closed off,” Olea mused. “Places no one goes, because the tunnels are too labyrinthine, and even servants invariably get lost. I heard an estimate from Castellan Lhaurent once that the palace could hold an army of ten thousand in its bowels. It doesn’t just carve into the mountain. It’s beneath the foundations of this city. Beneath our very feet. All the sewers of Lintesh run through shafts that sink deep beneath the extensions of Roushenn. The Unterhaft is a maddening labyrinth, almost all of it closed off. But it means that Roushenn has rooms and kitchens and storerooms aplenty, when there is a host to house.”

  Vargen grunted, his dark eyebrows rising. “I had no idea it was so extensive.”

  “Most don’t.”

  “And did you know that the walls move? That there is a hidden palace behind the palace proper?”

  Surprise lanced through Olea in a vicious strike. She had always known there was something amiss about Roushenn. A cold fury suddenly bubbled up in her gut, but not at Vargen. “That I did not know.”

  “When I saw it, I thought I had gone mad,” Vargen murmured, gazing down into his tea dregs. “There were four of us in my room, including myself and my wife, but the quarters were spacious. Mirrored chandeliers, furniture good enough for any lord, with two bedrooms, each with a four-post bed. Mirrors were everywhere, set into the walls between stone columns, even some of the furniture was set with an inlay of tiny mirrors, like dragonhide. It was opulent, far too much for hosting us. Myself and my wife, and Khennir and his wife Rhenna were on our guard. But as the night wore on everything seemed quite regular. We were provided food and wine, and a servant to taste everything. The fireplaces were lit. Our beds were turned down. Until finally, there was nothing to do but go to sleep. Khennir and I agreed to keep a vigil and leave our wives to sleep. But that’s when everything became madness.”

  “How?” Olea sat up on the edge of her stool, hands clasped tight around her mug, a twisting dread filling her.

  Vargen fiddled with his mug. “I smelled something. Sweet but putrid, like oranges or lemons gone to rot. My world began to tilt and reel. I tried to stand, draw my sword, but it was like the room tipped on its edge. A deafening ringing began in my ears, my stomach roiled. You’ve been through the trials of poison and so have I, but this was like nothing we’ve trained for. But I saw what I saw, Olea. The walls began to move, involuting towards each other, sliding out of the way, rotating. Mirrors shifted, reflecting everything in a mass confusion. Furniture moved, doorways moved, everything was sliding and reshaping! I tried to lurch to the bedroom to find Elsiria, but in my fugue I realized I didn’t even know where the bedroom was! I supported myself upon a drapery, but the wall started folding towards the one next to it. I tipped and got crushed between the two walls as they came nearly together.”

  Vargen lifted a hand to the scar that ran down the side of his face, down his neck and over his collarbones. “This was from getting crushed between the walls. Found out later that I had three broken ribs. But once the walls spat me out, I realized I was in a vast vaulted cavern, tinged with wan blue light, littered with free-standing walls and furniture. I turned back towards where I thought my wife’s room was, and realized I was looking through a mirror. Elsiria was on the other side, her room still changing, shifting. She had her blade out and was trying valiantly to stand, to fight, but she was as poisoned and disoriented as I. And then I saw a flash of … something. My mind thought it was a knife, but that wasn’t right. It was like five knives, like a hand of knives ripped across her throat. And I thought I saw…” Vargen shuddered and closed his eyes. Olea's heart keened for him, for them all, nightmares still potent even after so long.

  “Saw what?” She had to ask.

  Eyes still closed, he took a long draught of his tea, rolling it around his mouth, swallowed. “I thought I saw a demon.”

  “A demon?”

  Vargen’s eyes opened. “I can’t really say. I must have been hallucinating from the poison in the air. But I thought I saw… some massive creature. Lanky, it was tall as two men, and stood upright just like a man does, but hunched over. Leathery black skin, barely visible in the darkness. With knives for claws. An abomination. Fear engulfed me, to see it. But such a t
hing is fable. No worldly creature looks thusly. It must have been a man in costume, with knives. And in my fugue I hallucinated… something else.”

  “A demon.” Olea went very still, recalling a similar demonic creature she’d seen that same night, the giant scorpion ridden by the man in herringbone leathers. But this creature Vargen described sounded different. And Olea thought suddenly, that Vargen’s tale could be absolutely true. She had seen something, experienced something that night beyond her capacity to reason.

  And so had he.

  Vargen heaved a deep sigh. “I hope you never have to watch someone you love die,” he murmured. “I had seen my share of battle, and so had my wife. I had made peace with the fact that the sword might someday take her. But this was madness. I think my mind broke from it, seeing what I saw, from my terror. Everything ceased moving after she died. I hacked at that mirror with my sword and pummeled it with my bare fists until they bled, my ribs screaming agony. But nothing moved. Not for me.”

  “How did you get out?” Olea murmured.

  “I must have gone unconscious. I woke some time later, half-buried in a black curtain. I looked through the mirror, but her body was gone. There was nothing for me to do but find my way out. I can’t tell you how long I wandered in that fey blue darkness… like a staging area for a Traveler’s play. I passed mirror after mirror, rooms empty of people but full of furniture, jumbled like it had all been forgotten. It was like I was trapped in a dream world, behind the real one. At last, I passed halls where there were people beyond the mirrors, servants and Guardsmen, all going about their business. Palace folk, but no Alrashemni. They were oblivious to my presence behind the walls. No one could hear me, see me. Finally, I found myself heading down a plain tunnel cut into the byrunstone. It was utterly dark and I followed it by touch, until I waded through sewage, finally touching a ladder. I followed that up through a storm grate at the edge of the city. I had the presence of mind to shuck my jerkin and stow it, at least. Steal some clothes from a wash line. It wasn’t safe to be a Kingsman, not anymore. Somehow I knew the rest of us were dead. That what had happened in my quarters had happened to us all. Demon or man, we had been played false, right from the King's own hands. And it was all done very quietly, arousing not a single voice of protest in the night.”

  Olea sat silent a long time, both hands gripped around her cup, her heart cold like byrunstone. At last, she looked up, and her expression could have slaughtered an army. “Do you remember which storm grate you came up through?”

  Vargen gave a tired, rumbling sigh. “Yes. But you have to understand, I was severely drugged. I didn’t count my steps in the darkness. I don’t know which turns I chose in the twisting sewers. I got out by luck. I’ve tried to get back in a few times, but I end up just slogging through shit and piss all day.”

  Olea rolled her shoulders, trying to work out her tension. At last she sighed, her scowl bitter. “Lhaurent. I’m sure he knows about some of this.”

  “The Castellan?” Vargen murmured. “I've wondered so, too, in dark nights where sleep eluded me. His smile when he greeted us at the palace gates had the feel of eels that night. All the Chancellors seemed that way. Composed. Calm. Welcoming. Do you think they knew about the back passages of Roushenn?”

  Olea chewed her lower lip, considering it. “Those places you described aren’t on any map of the tunnels of Roushenn that I’ve seen. I’ve never seen a single wall move. But there are times… when I’m sure a different piece of furniture sat in a particular hallway the day before. Or when I walk a passage I’ve walked a hundred times, only to find that it takes a strange turn that I didn’t remember. I always come out where I’m supposed to be, but… sometimes the journey getting there is different. I mentioned it to Castellan Lhaurent once, and he sneered at me, said I had been drinking too much, believing tales of Roushenn being haunted with the Black Ghost and all. But after tonight…I have to find out. Maybe the Castellan and the Chancellate know about the walls and maybe they don't, but the Dhenra’s safety is in my hands. And if what you say is true, then Roushenn is far from safe.”

  Vargen drained the last of his tea. “Now that I’ve told you, what are you going to do?”

  Olea set her cup carefully aside. “I’ve been charged by Dhenra Elyasin, to find out what happened to the Kingsmen and why. And I intend to do just that. If you’ll help me.”

  “My life is yours. My sword is yours. I will do whatever needs doing. But this task… I want to do.”

  Olea nodded, then rose. “I need a few days to think. Give me three days and I will return at nightfall. Thank you for the tea, Vargen. And thank you... for the truth.”

  Olea didn’t mention their kiss, and neither did Vargen. It had been right at the time, two lost hearts finding out they were no longer alone. Olea stepped towards the door, her long stride purposeful. But a smattering of small metal pieces caught her eye upon a workbench, and she stopped suddenly. She changed course, walking over to a repair in progress, her long fingers trailing over a number of miniscule gears from a Praoughian wind-watch.

  “You repair Praoughian clockworks?”

  Vargen nodded, stoic. “I don’t get many, rare as they are, but yes. Why?”

  “Can you look at something for me?”

  His brows furrowed in confusion as Olea unbuckled a black leather pouch at her belt. Sliding out a small white silken bag, she dumped out from the silk a number of miniscule gears in brass and silver, gold and etched copper. Vargen motioned her over to a focus-lamp to get a better look at her treasures, training a series of lenses upon her palm.

  “What is it? Those gears look like nothing I’m familiar with.”

  Olea left her palm out for his inspection. “I don’t know. It’s a puzzle of some kind. My brother Elohl found it in the palace, the night before our kin died. He said it was all of one piece initially, but when he touched it, they fell apart. Can you put it back together? Can you tell me what it is?”

  Vargen's glance was deadly serious. “I can try. But what do you think they're for?”

  “It may be a key to why our kin were killed,” Olea murmured. Carefully, she returned the pieces to the bag and pressed it into Vargen’s palm.

  “I will do everything I can.” Vargen closed his fist protectively.

  It touched her heart. Stepping forward, Olea reached up, giving the Kingsman a quick kiss. But before he could say anything more, she opened the doors and fled out into the deep chill of the night. Olea took a single breath as she moved off through the dark-choked alley. One hand rested upon her sword as she picked up her pace to the silent street, the fingertips of the other playing across the topmost star of her Inkings, a seething rage burning in her gut.

  CHAPTER 16 – GHRENNA