Slow boy, slow boy, tell us what you know, boy ...
“Hey! Maybe he doesn’t understand us! We should be singing thlow boy, thlow boy ...”
“That’s enough!” Dirk yelled angrily.
The chanting dwindled to nothing as the boys turned to face him. The oldest boy in the group, and no doubt the ring-leader, was a heavyset lad of about nineteen, named Derwn. His father was Hauritz the Butcher, and even though he was only an apprentice, he knew he would one day inherit his father’s shop and fancied himself a cut above the rest of the young men in the town. His mother spoiled him mercilessly, too.
Derwn stepped forward, hands on his hips, and glared at them.
“Piss off, Dirk,” he warned. “And take your Senetian friend with you. This is none of your concern.”
“Eryk, come here!”
Although he couldn’t see him, there was no doubt in his mind that it was Eryk trapped against the wall at the end of the lane. After a tense moment of silence, the group of boys parted and Eryk finally emerged, pushing his way through his tormentors cautiously. His tear-streaked face was pathetic with relief.
“Go mind the horses, Eryk,” Dirk ordered, before the boy brought further ridicule down on himself by saying anything. Eryk nodded and ran from the alley, leaving Dirk and Kirsh to face the village boys.
“If I catch you tormenting Eryk again—” Dirk began.
“You’ll what?” Derwn scoffed. “You don’t scare me, Dirk Provin.”
“You should learn some respect for your betters,” Kirsh said, stepping up to stand beside Dirk. “How dare you speak to a member of your ruling family in such a manner!”
Dirk bit back a cry of despair. The last thing he needed was a Senetian coming to his defense.
Derwn glared at Kirsh, then spat on the ground in front of him. “I’ve got plenty of respect for my betters. I just don’t happen to see any of them around at the moment.”
A nervous titter of laughter came from a few of the boys behind Derwn, but most of them took an unconscious step backward. Dirk wasn’t sure if they realized who Kirsh was, but the mere fact that he was Senetian was enough for a few of the more sensible ones to be wary. Not that you could use the word sensible when describing a bunch of layabouts with nothing better to do than torment a slow-witted orphan for entertainment.
“Kirsh—”
The prince ignored him, his eyes locked on Derwn.
“Go on. Do it,” Kirsh dared the young man. “Take a swing at me.”
“Derwn, no ...” someone said from behind.
“You think I’m stupid?” Derwn accused. “I hit you once, and the next thing I know I’m being shipped off to Paislee on a slaver for breaking your pretty Senetian face.”
“That would be assuming you could hit me,” Kirsh replied with a calm smile.
“I’d break you in half, you arrogant piece of Senetian shit.”
“So do it. I’ll even promise not to report you. You hear that, Dirk? Assuming your prize Elcastran thug here can actually land one on me, he’s not to be harmed for it.”
“Kirsh, you don’t have to do this ...”
“I’ll even make a wager with you,” the prince offered Derwn. “You hit me, you get to walk away, no blame, no consequences. But if you don’t—”
“Yeah, like that’ll happen.”
“If you don’t,” Kirsh continued calmly, “then you will promise never to harm Eryk again. No, better than that, you will assume the role of his guardian, and it will be your mission to ensure he comes to no harm in the future. Agreed?”
Derwn stared at Kirsh, weighing up the odds, perhaps, then nodded. “Agreed.”
“So. Do it.” Kirsh stood there, waiting patiently for Derwn to attack. When the other boy hesitated, Kirsh held out his arms wide. “Are you waiting for something?”
Angry enough at Kirsh’s patronizing tone to overcome caution, Derwn charged forward. The prince nimbly sidestepped the boy’s lumbering attack and turned to face him.
“You missed,” he pointed out unnecessarily.
Derwn charged a second time, truly angry now, and again Kirsh simply stepped out of the way. Dirk glanced at the other boys and realized that not only was Kirsh infuriating Derwn, but he was humiliating him in front of his friends.
The third time Derwn charged, he was ready for Kirsh, but his fist connected with nothing but air as Kirsh ducked under the blow. Then the prince brought his fist up in a short sharp jab into Derwn’s face, and the boy howled with pain, clutching at his bloody nose.
“I win,” Kirsh announced, dusting his hands off as if he had done nothing more strenuous than swat a fly. “You may now consider yourself Eryk’s guardian.”
Derwn glared at Kirsh for a moment, then fled the alley. Dirk shook his head as he looked at the prince, wondering how much worse he’d made things.
“Dirk.”
He turned toward the boy behind him who had called his name. It was the cobbler’s son, Paron Shoebrook.
“We weren’t going to hurt him...”
“Go home, Paron,” Dirk ordered wearily.
“Derwn said he was a thief... he said they’d been robbed awhile back ... some silver and a gold coin ...”
“Eryk used to be too scared to steal food to survive, Paron. Why would you believe he’d steal anything from the butcher?”
The boy shrugged, his eyes full of guilt. “I don’t know...”
Dirk stared at the village boys for a long moment. Most of them avoided his eyes. “All of you, just ... go home.”
Eryk stayed close to Dirk for the rest of the day, pathetically grateful for his rescue. After dinner, he curled up in a ball on his pallet in the corner of Dirk’s room and listened silently as the boys sat talking of the incident. Kirsh was smug and Lanon was sorry both that he’d sent Eryk into town and that he’d missed what sounded like a good fight.
But the incident unsettled Dirk. There was enough trouble with the Senetians as it was, without Kirsh getting involved in a fistfight with one of the locals. He was concerned about his father’s reaction to the affair, too. Elcast was too small for news of the incident not to reach the duke’s ears eventually. Dirk just hoped he wouldn’t be blamed for it.
After a while the conversation drifted onto other things. By the time the evening sun flooded Dirk’s room with its crimson light their discussions had moved onto Kirsh and the great deeds he was planning to perform when he joined the Queen’s Guard.
By the sound of it, Kirsh was planning to single-handedly rid the Tresna Sea of pirates. It was a pity, Dirk thought, that the most notorious pirate in all of Senet and Dhevyn lay seriously injured only two stories below them. Kirsh was going to have to settle for less famous, more ordinary deeds to satisfy his lust for adventure.
He listened to the prince, thinking that there were many things about Kirshov Latanya that puzzled him, not the least of which was his eagerness to join the Queen’s Guard. Dirk couldn’t understand why a prince of Senet would be so enthusiastic about taking a commission in the almost purely ceremonial force.
The days when the Queen’s Guard had meant something had ended with the Age of Shadows. In those days, Master Helgin told him, it was called the King’s Guard.
And their king had been Johan Thorn.
PART TWO
TOUCH OF VENGEANCE
Chapter 16
Three days before the Landfall Feast, the High Priestess announced over dinner that everything was set for the Festival. At this point, Morna rose from her place at the High Table and strode off without a word.
An awkward silence followed her departure. Antonov was obviously displeased. Wallin looked distinctly uncomfortable, but the High Priestess seemed amused, rather than offended. She leaned across to whisper something to Antonov, which brought a smile to his face, and the meal carried on as if nothing had happened.
Prince Antonov learned about the fight in town, as Dirk knew he would. He was not angry, however. He emerged from the Library long eno
ugh to decree that Kirsh obviously had too much time on his hands if he had time to call out the local bullies, and ordered his son to undertake instruction each morning before breakfast with Lanon and the Elcast master-at-arms. Antonov’s reasoning, he joked at the dinner table that evening, was that if he tired him out, Kirsh might not find so much mischief to get into. He seemed more amused than concerned, a situation that Dirk had no doubt would have been radically different had Kirsh lost the fight.
The closer the Festival came, the more Rees grew short-tempered and edgy, and Dirk’s mother stormed about the Keep, blistering the ears off anyone who got in her way. Dirk saw little of Antonov and even less of the High Priestess. Apparently, discussions about the need for aid after the ruined harvest and the issue of rebuilding the temple took up most of their time. Johan Thorn wasn’t mentioned either, which Dirk thought very odd, considering the deposed king was the reason Antonov had come to Elcast in the first place. Alenor said nothing about her captive uncle either, wise enough to keep her opinion to herself. Kirsh seemed unaffected. He continued to rule his little coterie with the same careless, cheerful arrogance that he had when he arrived.
Alenor hated rooming with their old nurse Varian, and Dirk often found her waiting outside their room early in the morning, impatient for the boys to wake. She was a deceptive little thing. She looked thin enough to break, and was quite reticent around Prince Antonov and the High Priestess. But she had a sharp mind, and seemed unafraid to say what she was thinking when alone with the boys.
It was rumored that Kirshov would be her consort when she was old enough to marry, which didn’t really surprise Dirk. Alenor adored Kirshov, even Dirk could see that. Kirsh treated Alenor no differently from the boys, which perhaps accounted for her less-than-royal manner when she was with them.
Having been raised a member of the ruling family in a predominantly male household on an island, Dirk had little social contact with girls of his own class. All the girls he knew were the daughters of servants or the merchants in town, and none of them were interesting enough to hold his attention for longer than a few minutes. He tended to lump all females in the same category as Rees’s betrothed, Faralan, who was pleasant, well trained to run a household and as boring as watching grass grow.
The strangest thing about the visiting Senetians was Kirshov Latanya, and much to his astonishment, Dirk found himself warming to the young prince.
Kirsh was the most open person Dirk had ever met. He said exactly what he was thinking, as soon as he thought of it, with no care for who heard him or the political ramifications of what he said. He seemed to suffer none of the prejudice of his elders. Kirshov Latanya judged everyone according to his own private code, and did not care if they were Senetian or Dhevynian, noble or servant. He was enthusiastic to the point of being obsessed about joining the Queen’s Guard, convinced it would be the most exciting life he could imagine. Dirk suspected the truth was somewhat less glittering, but one could not help being infected by Kirsh’s boundless enthusiasm.
But Dirk was seriously disturbed about what was planned for the Landfall Festival. After giving the matter a great deal of thought, he finally decided that Alenor, of all the members of Antonov’s entourage, would be the one to question about it. She, at least, was Dhevynian. To raise his concerns with anyone else might be judged heresy, and asking Kirshov was useless. He would either laugh at Dirk’s anxiety, or worse, inadvertently report it to his father.
So Dirk kept his own counsel and waited for his chance to get Alenor alone.
Following Antonov’s decree, for two hours at least, while Lanon and Kirsh practiced under the watchful eye of Master Kedron, Dirk was free to talk alone with Alenor. He found the princess sitting on the white-painted railing that circled the training yard. Dirk climbed up beside her as Kirsh and Lanon worked with slow, deliberate movements under the critical gaze of Master Kedron.
“He’s very good, isn’t he?”
Both boys were stripped down to their breeches and had worked up a sweat in the warm morning. Although he was only a year older than Lanon, at seventeen, Kirsh was taller and better muscled and moved with the kind of natural grace that no amount of training could instill. Master Kedron, whose reputation extended far beyond Elcast, had trained Lanon well since he’d been here on the island, but even to Dirk’s inexperienced eye, the better of the two was Kirshov. Lanon’s movements were the result of hours of practice. Kirsh moved like a cat, his wooden practice sword whistling through the air, one action flowing seamlessly into the next.
Lanon was not bad. He just looked inadequate next to the prince.
“Kirsh trains with the Palace Guard at home,” Alenor told him. “Prince Antonov said he might as well learn to fight the hard way.”
“Do you like living in Avacas?” he asked.
She shrugged and turned back to watch the training. “They don’t mistreat me, if that’s what you’re hinting at.”
“I never—”
“Don’t worry, Dirk. Prince Antonov treats me like his own child.”
“He makes his own child train with his guard,” Dirk pointed out with a frown.
Alenor smiled, but did not reply. They watched in silence for a while, then she turned and looked at him curiously. “Don’t you wish you were out there with them?”
“Not really. I’m going to be a physician. I don’t need to know how to fight.”
“Not even a little bit?”
“Well, I know the basics. Master Kedron and having a big brother saw to that, and Master Helgin makes me study tactics and history, but most of the time I’m in the infirmary.”
Alenor didn’t answer him, and for a time they simply sat in companionable silence, watching the boys train. But it took Dirk longer than he imagined it would, to work up the courage to ask what he had really come here to find out.
“Alenor, what’s going to happen tomorrow night?” he asked finally.
The princess looked at him. “You really don’t know?”
“I’ve heard the rumors about what happens in Senet. But—”
“Then you know what’s going to happen,” she shrugged, turning her attention back to the boys in the yard. They were trading blows now, carefully choreographed by Master Kedron. The moves were designed to train certain muscles as much as improve their technique. The sharp tack-tack-tack of their wooden blades echoed across the small arena as Kirsh slowly beat Lanon back, even though he was supposed to be simply blocking his opponent’s stroke. Kirsh had to feel like he was winning, Dirk thought. No matter what he did, Kirsh alwayshad to feel like he was winning.
“Prince Antonov can’t believe you don’t have a Landfall Festival,” Alenor added.
“We have a Festival.”
“But not a proper one,” Alenor corrected. “The High Priestess says it’s like a disease that’s spreading through Dhevyn. She says that a few good years with both suns shining and already people forget what it was like during the Age of Shadows. She says that if people keep turning from the Goddess, the Age of Shadows will come again.” Then the little princess glanced around and lowered her voice. “But even at court, there are people who don’t want the Landfall Festival to happen. That’s why I was sent to Senet. Prince Antonov told my mother I wasn’t getting a proper education.”
Dirk shook his head. “Personally, I’m not sure what the Goddess hopes to gain by making all the unmarried men and women on Elcast gather on the common and take a drug that turns them into animals just so they can rut like pigs for the rest of the night.”
If his crudeness appalled her, she didn’t let it show. “Belagren claims it means they’re blessed by the Goddess.”
“And what of the Landfall bastards that come from it?”
“According to the High Priestess, they’re blessed, too, because they were conceived under her protection.”
“Do you honestly believe that?”
She shrugged uncomfortably. “I do when I’m in Senet.”
He looked at h
er, puzzled by her statement.
“Around Prince Antonov and the High Priestess, I believe whatever they want me to believe, Dirk. It’s how I stay alive.” It was the first time he’d heard Alenor openly admit that she was not a fosterling, but a hostage.
“And when you’re not in Senet? What do you believe then?”
She studied him closely for a moment, as if debating how far she could trust him. “My mother told Prince Antonov that the bastards that come from the Landfall Festival are a blight on Dhevyn. They had a blazing row over it. Not long after, I found out I was being sent to Senet to live.”
That the Queen of Dhevyn would voice opposition to the rites of the Senetian Goddess, surprised Dirk. He’d often heard Morna complain that Rainan was nothing more than a Senetian puppet. Perhaps she wasn’t quite the ineffectual ruler his mother thought. On the other hand, if she had been any good as queen, surely she’d have driven the Senetians from Dhevyn by now.
“Why do you look so surprised? Your mother says much the same about it.”
“She calls it a self-indulgent orgy,” Dirk admitted. “She claims Belagren encourages it because it gives her a ready supply of acolytes.”
“She has a point. About the only place a child with a rope tattoo can acquire real status or power is in the Goddess’s service.”
“It’s like putting a brand on cattle,” he remarked with a frown.
“Branding them, slaughtering them? What’s the difference?”
“They’re really going to sacrifice someone, then?” Dirk asked in a low voice.
“Someone is always sacrificed at the ritual, Dirk, ever since the end of the Age of Shadows. It happens in towns and villages all across Senet and Dhevyn, and the Lion of Senet intends to make sure that Elcast falls into line with the rest of the world or there’ll be hell to pay. You don’t think it was coincidence that brought us here in time for Landfall, do you?”
Dirk stared at her. “I can’t believe that my father will countenance such a thing.”
Alenor looked at him with solemn brown eyes. “Then you don’t know the power of the Lion of Senet very well at all, do you, Dirk?”
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